“They’re animals.”
“Not all of them.”
“Just the ones who write on my page?”
“I told you not to read the comments. They can be really toxic. I’m sorry.”
*
I thought about closing both accounts, switching them to private settings, blocking every hateful Augie. But in the end, I just put down my phone and walked away. They could not reach me if I did not let them.
*
On Tuesday I arrived at work shortly before ten. The others had already arrived, but the gallery was strangely quiet. I was going through my emails in the office when Lulit slipped in and shut the door.
“Hey. How are you feeling?” It was an awkward greeting.
I looked up from my computer, aware that something was amiss.
“I’m fine, thanks. Why?”
She braced herself, crossing her arms, leaning up against her desk. I knew her well enough to know that this was her confrontational pose. “Our voicemail was full when Josephine got in this morning,” she started. “Our voicemail is never full. About a third of them were hang-ups, a third of them were press wanting to know if you could confirm whether or not you were dating Hayes Campbell, and a third were very rude girls leaving explicit comments. And that’s just on our main line.”
“Oh,” I said.
“Oh?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Solène—”
“I know. I know what you’re going to say, Lulit … I’m sorry. I’m sorry they’re calling. I’m sorry it’s bleeding over into my work. I’m sorry.”
She was quiet for a moment, staring off to the side. Who knew what was going through her pretty head?
“What are you going to do?” she spoke eventually. She’d asked it as if it only pertained to the phone calls, but I knew she meant about everything.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. Tell Josephine to tell them ‘No comment.’”
*
In the end, it did not matter whether or not Hayes and I commented because the tabloids picked up the story, what little of it they actually knew, and ran with it. And although I did not once search for material online, I’d heard the news from Amara. There was a series of shots of us exiting the Edison Ballroom that ran in Us Weekly, and People, and Star.
“You look exquisite,” Amara said Wednesday morning on the phone. “He’s leading you by the hand. His suit jacket is over your shoulders. He’s turning to look back at you. You’re smiling at each other and you both look ridiculously in love.”
“Shut up. Don’t say that.”
“Sorry. It’s true. It’s a great shot. You should see it.”
“I don’t want to see it,” I said. I was in traffic on the 10. Running late after my SoulCycle class. My in-box overflowing with old friends and acquaintances from out of the blue: “Hey, I see you have a new boyfriend.” The day already weighing on me. And Hayes, a million miles away.
“You look like the Kennedys.”
“You mean if John-John had dated his mom?”
“Yes, exactly,” she laughed. “Shit, I’ve gotta go, it’s Larry. Hang in there. Beware the wrath of teenage girls.”
*
That evening, I got caught up on a phone call with Hayes, who was in Paris and flying to Rome the next morning, and I was late picking up Isabelle from fencing. Again. He’d made arrangements for us to spend a week in Anguilla over the holidays. He’d wanted to surprise me, but quickly discovered that negotiating Christmas trysts with a woman who had a teenage daughter and an ex-husband in the picture was not for the faint of heart.
“Well, if this was easy, then it wouldn’t be worth it, would it?” he’d said, which made me laugh.
“You like me complicated, don’t you?”
“I like you complex. I don’t like you complicated.”
“I like you every way possible,” I said, and I could hear him smiling.
“Woman, I have to go to sleep. It’s bad enough I’m in Paris and you’re not here. Don’t tease me.”
*
I was still thinking about him and the lure of a week in the Caribbean later that night when Isabelle called me from her room, a distinct panic in her voice.
“Mom! Mom!!”
I found her seated at her desk, her laptop opened, an amateur handheld video playing on YouTube.
“What is that? What are you watching?”
“Us. You.”
It took me a moment to register what I was seeing. A group of people in conversation from a distance. A vast well-lit space. And then it came together. The lobby of the Mandarin Oriental. The morning Simon took the girls to the Apple Store. Hayes and I had our backs to the camera. The others were facing us, their features coming in and out of focus. I couldn’t make out any of our conversation, but it did not matter. The girls doing the recording had included a precise play-by-play.
“Is his hand on her ass? Holy shit, his hand is on her ass. Are you getting this? Shhh, I’m getting it. His hand is totally on her ass. Shhh. Did she just say ‘Mom’? Did she call her ‘Mom’? Oh my God, is that her daughter? No way! Holy fuck, that’s her daughter. Duuuude, your mom is fucking Hayes Campbell. Whoa. Sucks to be her. Um, she just got into an elevator with Simon, I don’t think she’s hurting right now. But still, imagine your mom is fucking Hayes Campbell. That’s like the fanfic that writes itself. She probably gets to call him ‘Daddy.’ ‘Hey, Daddy.’ ‘Hiiiiii, Daddy.’ ‘I have an itch that needs scratching, Daddy.’ ‘Daddy, why don’t you—’”
“Turn it off. Turn it off turn it off turn it off!” I slammed the laptop shut so forcefully, Isabelle’s canister of markers flew off the desk. “Ignore it, Izz. Ignore it. No one’s looking at that.”
“Really?” She looked up at me, her eyes welling. “Because apparently it already has thirty-four thousand views.”
I was shaking. “Please don’t watch that. Promise me you will not watch that.”
“It’s out there, Mom.”
“It’s out there, but we don’t have to let it in here. You have to promise me, Izz.” I stooped to her level, taking her hands in mine. “You have to promise me that you will not search for those things. You will not go looking for those things. You will not Google. Because it’s only going to hurt you. It’s only going to hurt us. Those people don’t know us. They don’t know you. They don’t know me. They don’t know Hayes. They’re going to say some really hurtful things and we just have to ignore it. Okay?”
She was crying now. The tears rushing. Her pain, palpable.
“Promise me, Izz. Please. Promise me.”
“Okay.” She nodded. “Okay.”
But I knew it in my heart: there was no ignoring this.
*