Family Ties

visualize as they climbed over the rubble the workmen had left after taking out several walls. Annie was showing them the proportions of the newly enlarged living room and dining room and where the grand staircase was going to go. She had a unique talent for combining ancient and contemporary designs and making it look both avant-garde and warm, although it was hard to imagine right now.

The husband was questioning her intensely about the costs, and his wife was looking anxious now that she saw the state of total chaos the house was in. Annie had promised them it would be complete in a year.

“Do you really think you can get us in by next fall?” Alicia Ebersohl said nervously.

“This contractor is very good. He’s never let me down yet,” Annie said, smiling pleasantly at them. She looked calm and unruffled, as she stepped over several beams. She was wearing gray slacks, stylish black leather boots, and a heavy coat with a fur-lined hood. She still looked considerably younger than she was.

“He’ll probably bring it in at twice the price. I had no idea we were going to destroy this much of the house,” Harry Ebersohl commented with a look of dismay.

“We’re just making room. You’re going to need these walls for your art.” She had been working closely with their interior designer, and everything was in control. “Three months from now you’ll start to see the beauty of the house emerge.”

“I hope so,” Alicia said softly, but she no longer looked so sure. They had loved their friends’ house that Annie had done, and had begged her to take this job, and once Annie saw the house she couldn’t resist, although she already had too much on her plate as it was. “I hope we didn’t make a mistake with this house,” Alicia said, as her husband shook his head in despair.

“It’s a little late to be saying that now,” he grumbled as they went back downstairs and headed toward the front door. When they opened it, they stepped out into an icy blast, and Annie pulled the fur hood up over her blond hair. Both Ebersohls had already commented to each other how pretty she was, and that she apparently was good at what she did too, from everything they’d heard.

“What are you doing for Thanksgiving?” Annie said easily, as she walked them to their car with the plans under her arm.

“Our kids are coming home tonight.” Alicia smiled. Annie knew that both of them were in college, one at Princeton, and the other one at Dartmouth, a girl and a boy.

“So are mine.” Annie smiled happily. She couldn’t wait. All three had promised to stay with her over Thanksgiving, as they always did. Her favorite times were when they came home.

“I didn’t know you had children.” Alicia looked surprised as Annie nodded. She never talked about her personal life, just the job. She was the consummate professional in every way, which was why they had hired her. The information that she had children startled both Ebersohls.

“I have three. Actually, they’re my nieces and nephew. My sister died in an accident sixteen years ago, and I inherited her kids. They’re grown up now. The oldest is an editor at Vogue, my nephew is in his second year at law school, and the youngest is in college. I miss them like crazy, so it’s a treat for me when they come home.” Annie was smiling as she said it, and the Ebersohls looked amazed.

“What a wonderful thing to do. Not everyone would have taken that on. You must have been very young.” She hardly looked thirty now, but they knew her age from her credentials on her website.

“I was very young.” Annie smiled at them. “We all grew up together, and it’s been a great blessing for me. I’m very proud of them.” They chatted for a few more minutes, and then the Ebersohls got in their car and drove away. Harry was still looking worried, but Annie had promised him the work would come in at the price she’d quoted them, and Alicia was talking excitedly about the grand staircase when they left.

Annie glanced at her watch as she hailed a cab. She had five minutes to get to Seventy-ninth and Fifth to meet with a new client. Jim Watson had just bought a co-op and didn’t know exactly what he wanted. All he knew was that he wanted it to be fabulous, and he wanted Annie to make magic with it. She was meeting with him to give him some ideas. Jim was recently divorced and wanted a fantastic bachelor pad. It was a shift of mental gears as she rode uptown, and just before she got there, her cell phone rang. It was Liz. She sounded nervous and rushed. She always was. She had recently become the jewelry editor at Vogue, and she had just gotten back from Milan. She had come home to be with Annie and her siblings for Thanksgiving. It was a sacred date for all four of them. Annie was going to cook the turkey as she did every year.

“How was Milan?” Annie asked her, happy to hear her voice. She worried about her. Liz worked so hard, and she was always so stressed. She never had time to eat and had been much too thin for the past three years. It was the look everyone aspired to at Vogue.

“It was crazy but fun. I ran around for four days. We spent the weekend in Venice, which is dismal in the winter. And I spent a day in Paris on the way back. I picked out some great pieces for the shoot I’m doing next week.” If possible, she worked even harder than Annie, or just as hard. “Can I bring Jean-Louis tomorrow?” she asked Annie, and knew she would say yes. The question was just a formality, out of respect. Annie had welcomed their friends and significant others for all the years they’d lived together and since. “I didn’t know he was coming. He just flew in today. He has a shoot here this weekend.” They had met while working together in Paris, and Jean- Louis kept a loft in New York for his frequent visits. He was a successful photographer and almost identical to all the men Lizzie had had in her life. They were either photographers or male models, always handsome, never too deep, and Liz never got too attached. Annie often wondered if losing her parents had made Liz gun-shy about getting too close to anyone. Her romances never lasted long. She was surprised that Jean-Louis had been around for a while. Lizzie had been going out with him for six months.

“Of course you can bring him.” Annie had only met him once. He seemed nice enough, but she hadn’t been too impressed.

“What time should we come?”

“Same as every year. Come at noon, lunch at one. Or you can come home tonight if you want. Ted and Katie are spending the weekend.”

“I promised Jean-Louis I’d stay with him,” Liz said, sounding apologetic. “I’m going to help him with his shoot, unofficially. I’m pulling some jewelry for him today.”

“He’s a lucky guy,” Annie said, and meant it, and not just because Liz was helping him with his work. Liz always gave better than she got. The men she got involved with were always selfish and spoiled, and Annie worried that she sold herself short. She was a beautiful, talented, intelligent young woman. It shocked Annie sometimes when she realized that at twenty-eight, Liz was two years older than she had been when she inherited all of them. And in some ways Liz seemed so young. And she never seemed to think about marriage or settling down. Annie realized that she hadn’t set them much of an example on that score, since all she did herself was work, and take care of them when they were young. They had rarely if ever seen her with a date. She had kept the few men in her life well away from them, and there hadn’t been many anyway, and none she had cared about seriously. The last man she had been crazy about had been Seth, sixteen years before. She had run into him once a few years ago-he was married, lived in Connecticut, and had four kids. He had tried to explain to her how bad he felt that he hadn’t stepped up to the plate for her when her sister died, and she had laughed and brushed it off and told him she was fine. But it had given her a little flutter to see him. He was as handsome as he’d been before, and she had told Whitney about it. It all seemed like ancient history now.

Liz was in the process of apologizing to Annie that Jean-Louis hadn’t brought decent clothes with him, since he’d be working, and Annie assured her it didn’t matter. None of the men in Liz’s life ever owned a suit. Whether successful photographers or famous models, they always showed up in ragged clothes, with long hair and beards. It was the look she seemed to like, or the one most prevalent in her milieu. Annie had grown used to it over the years, although she would have loved to see her with a decently dressed guy with a haircut, just once.

In contrast, Liz was always stylish beyond belief and gave Annie fashion tips and even occasionally brought her clothes. It was always fun to see what Liz would wear. Annie’s style was simpler and more practical than hers. She felt too old now for wild clothes, and she had to wear things she could get around her job sites in without freezing or falling on her face in stiletto heels. Liz was tall, like her late mother and her aunt, and never wore anything less than six-inch heels. They were considered running shoes at the magazines where she had worked.

“See you tomorrow,” Lizzie said, as Annie arrived at the address on Fifth Avenue and took the elevator up to the top floor where Jim Watson was waiting for her, looking slightly dazed. He was suddenly terrified that the place was too big for him, and he said he had no idea how to decorate it without his ex-wife’s help. Annie assured him she would take care of everything for him, and she took some sketches out of her briefcase, and as he looked at them, he smiled. Annie had imagined the perfect bachelor pad for him, even before he knew what he wanted