The other one scoffed. “Oh, whatever. Like it matters where they do it! They always get caught. Look at Tiger! Men are just that stupid.”
This caused the other one to laugh. “Julian Alter is no Tiger Woods, and trust me, his wife is no Swedish supermodel.”
She knew full well she wasn’t a Swedish supermodel, but she didn’t need to hear other people say it. She desperately wanted to leave but she dreaded going back to Julian and Leo every bit as much as she dreaded continuing her bathroom eavesdropping. The woman pulled out a cigarette.
“Do you think she’ll actually leave him?” the girl with the too-short trendy bangs asked her friend Screech Voice.
There was a snort. “I don’t think she’s going anywhere . . . unless he says so.”
“What is she, a teacher or something?”
“A nurse, I think.”
“Can you imagine? You’re just a regular civilian one day and then your husband is a superstar the next.”
Screech laughed particularly hard at this. “I don’t see Martin at risk of being super-anything. I guess that puts it all on me, huh?”
Bangs exhaled a final smoke ring and stamped her cigarette out in the sink. “They’re dead in the water,” she announced with the confidence of someone who’s seen everything, been everywhere, met everyone. “She’s sweet and mousy, and he’s a god. Gods and nurses don’t mix.”
Nutritionist! she wanted to scream. At least get it fucking right when you’re dissecting my marriage and assassinating my character!
They each gingerly deposited gum past their freshly glossed lips, closed their purses, and left without another word. Brooke’s relief was palpable, so much that when she finally left the stall, she didn’t even notice the woman who was leaning against the far end of the sink, her back to the mirror, typing something into her phone.
“Forgive me for intruding, but are you Brooke Alter?”
Brooke inhaled sharply at the sound of her name. At this point she would’ve chosen a firing squad over another conversation.
The woman turned to face her and extend her hand and Brooke recognized her immediately as a well-respected and hugely famous movie and television actress. Brooke tried to mask the fact that she knew everything on earth about this woman—from all the characters she played in romantic comedies over the years to the horrible fact that her husband left her when she was six months pregnant for a barely legal professional tennis player—but it was useless trying to pretend she didn’t recognize Carter Price. Did people ever not recognize Jennifer Aniston or Reese Witherspoon? Please.
“I’m Brooke,” she said so quietly and with such softness that she sounded sad even to herself.
“I’m Carter Price. Oh, my . . . I didn’t even realize . . . Oh, I’m so sorry. . . .”
Brooke’s hands immediately flew to her face. Carter was staring at her with a look of such intense sympathy, she was certain something was very wrong.
“You heard everything those cows said, didn’t you?”
“I, uh, I don’t really . . .”
“You can’t listen to them, to anyone even like them! They’re petty, silly, ridiculous people, and they think they understand, think they have the tiniest notion of what it’s like to have your marriage play out in public, but they don’t know a damn thing. About anything.”
Huh. Not what she was expecting, but very welcome.
“Thanks,” Brooke said, reaching out to accept a tissue from Carter. She told herself to remember to tell Nola that Carter Price had given her a tissue, and then she immediately felt stupid thinking it.
“Look, you don’t know me at all,” Carter said, her long, graceful fingers gesticulating through the air, “but I wish someone would’ve told me that it really does get better. Every story, no matter how juicy or horrible it is, eventually goes away. The vultures always need fresh misery to feed on, so if you just keep your cool and refuse to comment, it will get better.”
Brooke was so focused on the fact that Carter Price was standing next to her and confiding in her about her ex—conceivably the most gorgeous, talented, revered actor of their generation—that she forgot to speak.
She must have been quiet for longer than she realized, because Carter turned back to the mirror, concealer stick in hand, and said, “God, that was none of my business, was it?” while dabbing at an imaginary circle under her left eye.
“No! That was so, so helpful, and so appreciated,” Brooke said, quite aware that she sounded like an illiterate teenager.
“Here,” Carter said, handing over her still-full glass of champagne. “You need this more than I do.”
Under any other circumstances, Brooke would have politely refused, but tonight she agreed with Carter, movie star extraordinaire, and drained it in one easy swallow. She couldn’t say what she would’ve paid for another—it was within new-car territory.
Carter gave her an approving look and nodded. “It feels like the entire world has been invited into your home and every one of them has something to say about it.”
She was so nice! So normal! Brooke felt guilty for all the times she’d speculated with Nola about whether it was Carter’s shrewishness or her botched boob job that had driven her ex into the arms of that tennis player. Never again would she be such a judgmental bitch about someone she didn’t know.
“Yes, exactly,” Brooke said, smacking her palm against the sink to underscore her point. “And the worst part is, they think it’s all true. To just automatically assume that whatever gets printed in those things is accurate, well, it’s ridiculous.”
With this last sentence, Carter stopped nodding and cocked her head. A moment later, her face registered recognition. “Oh, I didn’t realize.”
“Didn’t realize what?”
“That you think he didn’t do it. Sweetheart, those photos . . .” She trailed off. “Look, I know it’s heartbreaking—trust me, I’ve been through all of it before—but it doesn’t help anything to live in denial.”
It felt like Carter Price had punched her in the gut. “Look, I haven’t even seen the pictures yet, but I know my husband, and I—”
The bathroom door swung open and a young woman materialized. She was wearing a sleek skirt suit, a Bluetooth earpiece, and a badge on a lanyard around her neck. “Carter? We need to get you seated right away.” She turned and looked at Brooke. “Are you Brooke Alter?”