Burning Down the House by Jane Mendelsohn Read Free Book Online

slim silhouette of Patrizia. Poppy rolled over onto her stomach.
    Patrizia entered the room and sat on the bed beside her.
    She reached down and with a long finger pushed Poppy’s bangs to the side.
    Hello there, said Patrizia.
    What do you want?
    To talk. We didn’t get to talk at the dinner. So many people.
    Poppy was rolling over and sitting up with the covers held to her collarbone. They drooped slightly from her light grasp and she sat there practically exposed.
    What the hell? It’s the middle of the night.
    I just wanted to chat. I didn’t mean to upset you.
    You are upsetting me. Because you are waking me up.
    Is it true that you told people last night that you are not going to apply to college? I won’t get angry, I’d just like to know.
    Why? Who cares about this?
    Steve. He wants to discuss your future.
    My future?
    Yes.
    What future?
    The future that comes after today. Tomorrow, et cetera.
    I can’t think about that.
    He says that you must. You know what that means?
    Now?
    Poppy groaned and pulled some clothes from various points on the bed and hauled them over her head and legs. She pulled on the low boots and put two pills wrapped in Kleenex in her right bootleg and stood up next to the bed pulling on a long cardigan sweater over her T-shirt.
    —
    Patrizia was still sitting on the side of the bed in her silk bathrobe. Her legs were crossed. She had a large ring on one of her fingers, which she examined while Poppy got dressed. When she saw what emerged once Poppy had scrambled into clothes she shook her head.
    Did you have too much to drink tonight? she said.
    I don’t drink, said Poppy. I only take prescription drugs.
    Patrizia ignored this.
    College is a big party. Why wouldn’t you go?
    I don’t want a big party. I want to begin my life.
    Please, Poppy. Don’t be so melodramatic. No one ever “begins” their life. And anyway, you’ll get so many perks if you go to school: an apartment, an allowance, new people.
    I’m sick of school. And people.
    Patrizia eyed her. She slid the big ring up and down her finger. What do you want to do? she said.
    Work.
    Work, said Patrizia. That would be a novel experience.
    —
    Poppy looked plaintively at Patrizia. She looked at her hair. Patrizia’s shoulder-length hair was brown, the color and sheen of high-quality leather or very expensive chocolate. Sometimes Poppy could make out tiny strands of gray mingling amid the rich gloss. Didn’t you work? asked Poppy.
    —
    I came from Italy when I was twenty-two, right after university. I worked as a business reporter. Working all hours, slaving in the system. It was fun and interesting for a while, but it couldn’t contain me. If I hadn’t met Steve I don’t know where I’d be today. I was unfulfilled. He set me on a path to salvation. I would be sitting in a small apartment by myself drinking rosé in front of costume dramas or worse if he hadn’t found me. He saw something in me worth investing in and he sees something in you.
    Now who’s being melodramatic?
    Just come with me and talk to him.
    —
    They walked down the dark hallway with Patrizia glamorous and ghostly in her pale silk rippling and Poppy sullen and slouching behind her like something being taken into captivity. They passed by many closed rooms where the draft wailed under the doors and by paintings on the walls that hung patient and speechless in the night.
    —
    Steve was occupying a suite of rooms at the farthest end of the house. Patrizia opened the door to a passageway that led into the central living area. The walls were covered in an oversize toile print that in the dim lighting made it seem as if tiny people frolicking in boats and swings all over the room were being thrown into larger shadows on the walls. Patrizia strode in her wafting robe to the opposite side of the room where Steve was wearing headphones and sitting at a desk.
    He was staring at a laptop, with his tablet out on the table and a book open on his lap and papers