Summer in the Invisible City Read Free Page A

installations and got into photography. From photography, he moved to film, and by the nineties he was mainly making videos and doing performances in which he would circulate around a gallery, pretending to be a visitor.
    Ten years later, Allan was in the Whitney Biennial again. This time, he showed a film called
Love
. It was 135 minutes of scripted dialogue between two actors walking through a dreary office park in Denver.
    The night of that Whitney opening, my mom’s roommate, Karen, was supposed to go with her boyfriend. When Karen’s boyfriend canceled at the last minute, Karen dragged my mom. She and Allan met that night. I was born a year later.
    â€”
    Now, I sit at my computer and reread the last e-mail he sent. Ever since he gave me my camera two years ago, we’ve started e-mailing. I’ll send him articles I find that mention him, and he put me on his mailing list so I always receive notices about his lectures and upcoming shows. I love picturing Allan typing my name into the address bar of his e-mail. I wonder if he stares at my name and wonders about me, the way that I stare at his name and wonder about him.
    The announcement says his show opens in two weeks, but he still hasn’t reached out to see if I’m coming or if we can meet up while he’s here. He must be really busy getting ready. So, I remind myself to be brave and do what I have to do.
    From: Sadie Bell
    To: Allan Bell
    Subject: Visit to NY?
    Dear Allan,
    How are you? I see that you are having a show in the city that opens soon. I am here all summer so maybe we can see each other when you’re here?
    Yours, Sadie

Chapter 4
    The next morning, I wait for Izzy to pick me up on the stoop outside of our apartment. The red bricks of the old brownstone next door are crumbling, as if the spongy summer air is somehow softening them. An old woman crosses the street diagonally, shading herself with a small parasol. The city smells and even sounds different in the summer, with fragrances that have been frozen all winter coming loose. A taxi rolls down the street with its windows open and music bounces out of the stereo inside .
    When Izzy pulls up, I see that Phaedra Bishop is sitting in the passenger seat, sunglasses holding her blond hair off her face.
    â€œHey, you guys know each other, right?” Izzy asks as I climb into the back.
    People always assume that just because you go to school with someone, you know them. The reality is that Phaedra and I have never spoken to each other.
    â€œHi,” I say nervously.
    Phaedra glances over her shoulder at me and gives me a quick, polite smile. Then she turns back to the road.
    â€œWhere did you learn to drive?” I say.
    â€œMy dad taught me in the country last summer,” Izzy says. “He’s such a bad teacher, I literally can’t believe I learned at all. He was such a dork about it, too; he even made me watch a drivers’ ed video. ”
    â€œDo you drive?” I ask Phaedra.
    She turns and looks at me and her eyes are blank, like I’m a stranger on the subway. Phaedra is so pretty that just looking at her feels like staring, even though I’ve gone through her Facebook pictures a million times. After a minute, she gives me another small smile and says, “No. Do you?”
    â€œNope,” I say, feeling my face burn.
    Phaedra Bishop is basically famous. Her family owns everything. The Bishop
B
is stamped on the packaging of half of the foods you see at the supermarket. Phaedra dropped out of a fancy New England boarding school in the middle of ninth grade to come to our public arts magnet in the city, which already made her more intriguing than everybody else. And then, a few months later, the
New York Times
published a story about her family in the Style Section. Next to the article, there was a picture of Phaedra in front of their brownstone. I remember staring at that picture, overwhelmed by all the millions of things I could be