Who Do You Love(81)
Author: Jennifer Weiner

“You’ve been dating the same girl since high school?” Maisie’s expression was respectful and, Andy thought, a little amused, the same way some of his teammates looked when he told them that Rachel had been his high school sweetheart. Andy nodded. He couldn’t stop looking at Maisie. It was like she was the next step in female evolution, with her fine bones and tawny skin and long, straight black hair, with a beauty that could have been any kind of ethnic mixture, from Mediterranean to Israeli to Greek to part African American. Eventually, Andy learned that Maisie’s father, like his, was black, that her mother was French-Canadian, that her given name was Marie-Suzanne, and that she’d changed it when she’d shown up at Eileen Ford’s offices when she turned eighteen and found that they already had three Maries and two Marias on the books.

“When I showed up, I told them that I knew where I want to be in five years.”

“Where’s that?”

She gave him a sweet smile, a girlish giggle, and then said, “On the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.”

Andy wondered, briefly, if she thought that dating an athlete would somehow improve her chances. He was deciding that it was paranoid and ridiculous when she said, “I’ve already done a shoot with them. No cover yet, but I’m on their radar, so it’s not completely crazy.”

“What’s your ten-year plan?” he asked. She looked thoughtful, tapping one finger against her perfect lips.

“By then I probably won’t be modeling anymore.” She said this without audible disappointment. “Models have a sell-by date, and even if I get all the work done, thirty is thirty. That’s why I need to concentrate on building out my brand. Figuring out, ‘What does Maisie stand for?’ ”

Beware of people who talk about themselves in the third person, Rachel liked to say. But Andy was fascinated instead of repelled. Maybe referring to themselves that way was something only really, really attractive women could get away with.

“What does Maisie stand for?” As soon as he’d said it, he realized how flirty it sounded. Oh, well.

“That’s the question,” she said. “Is it swimwear? Soft goods? Lingerie? Cindy Crawford designs furniture. Kathy Ireland’s line for Kmart sells more than Martha Stewart’s.” Andy, who’d thought that models past their sell-by dates mostly hung on to fame and fortune by marrying rock stars or getting bit parts in movies, was impressed as he listened to Maisie parse her post-modeling future, touching on Christie Brinkley’s line of hair extensions, Iman’s cosmetics, and Tyra Banks’s and Heidi Klum’s respective efforts in television. Andy found that he was nodding, mouthing the words Yes and I know and I get it as she spoke, thinking he’d never met anyone so equipped to understand him, to understand that he had two lives to plan for, his current existence and his second life, the one you’d be stuck with after the life that you’d always wanted was over.

Andy learned that Maisie lived in New York, sharing an apartment with three other girls on the Upper East Side, but wasn’t romantic about the city, the way Rachel was. “The truth is, I could be anywhere. It’s embarrassing. Everyone from home wants to hear about the museums and the theater, but honestly I just don’t have time, and even if I did, I’d never spend two hundred dollars to watch a band or a show. I’d rather just download the music.” She tilted her head, smiling, like she was imagining music, or maybe the money she’d saved by not paying for concert tickets.

He nodded, agreeing completely, thinking about how it bugged him the way Rachel went on and on about the city, always comparing Oregon with New York, complaining about how there was no good Indian food and how you couldn’t even get a pizza delivered after ten o’clock. “I know it’s beautiful here,” she’d said, pointing out a particular shade of the sky or describing the way the air tasted, as if air had a taste. He knew she wasn’t happy, that she was always trying to convince herself that Oregon was fine, even though she still subscribed to New York magazine, and sometimes he’d catch her reading the listings, sighing over some gallery show or performance that she wouldn’t be there to see.

As diners came and went, they discussed their workouts, their diets, and which airport of all the ones they’d flown in and out of was the least terrible. When the food arrived, Maisie didn’t take a bite and then close her eyes and sigh in ecstasy, as Rachel sometimes did, or demand to know whether his own dinner was good, and glare when he failed to be sufficiently appreciative. Maisie simply cut her swordfish in half and pushed one portion, untouched, off to the side of her plate, then ate the rest in small, methodical bites.