Emma To Bruce
Dear Bruce,
I woke up this morning to find it was an improbably beautiful day with bright blue skies and those cute little white scudding clouds. “All right,” I thought. “There is no way I am spending this gorgeous day in wonderful London inside this falling-down house, scrubbing the floors and brooding about ghosts. The question: how to convince Julian that we should go out and have fun?”
I marched upstairs and found Julian drinking coffee in the kitchen. I said, “Jules. You know that thing you want me to do, that I’ve been refusing to do? If you come out and have a good time with me today in London, I’ll do it.”
A big grin spread over his face. He said, “OKAY!” In fact, he said it as he was already running out the door. I had to get him to come back for a jacket.
Bruce, we had an absolutely great time in London. We took a boat ride down the Thames. We went to a costume shop. We saw the Tower and went to Fortnum and Mason’s and had tea. Julian ate all my cucumber sandwiches because I hate them. We went on the London Eye, which is like a more spectacular version of the Ferris wheel on the Santa Monica Pier. Demons did not attack this time, and Julian booked a whole pod so that we could snuggle and cuddle.
In the middle of the snuggling and cuddling, Julian stopped and stared into my eyes with an intense look. I could tell he had something to ask me, and for a moment I thought—well, it doesn’t matter what I thought.
“Emma,” he said, “what would you think about moving to London with me?”
I said, “What do you mean? We’re already here.”
He explained that he was thinking, if we got Blackthorn Hall all fixed up, we could live in it until Dru or Ty or Tavvy (or all three of them) grow up and want to move there. He explained that Helen and Aline were doing a great job running the LA Institute and that they don’t really need us. Besides, they’re thinking of starting a family soon so maybe they don’t want so many people running around the Institute. I said, “But I thought you liked Los Angeles, and practically everyone we know is there.” He pointed out that that wasn’t totally true. In London, we’d be closer to Ty, and pretty much the same distance from the east coast, where Dru is, and of course Mark and Cristina are in New York half the time, too. I think he could tell that I wasn’t sure what to say, because he added, “It’s really about us having a home, one that we make together. Being grown up, and having a grown up kind of life.”
I joked around, saying we were still pretty young, and he said, “I know that most people who get together when they’re teenagers break up. They get older and they change. I just want us to go through the important things together, so we change together. Does that make sense?”
I told him it did though I was pretty freaked out he even mentioned BREAKING UP as a concept. So I kissed him, which distracted us both, and when our pod came to a stop on the ground everyone cheered and whistled. The English are more lustful than I had previously suspected.
I was exhausted by the time we got home and discovered that our ghost friend had been active in our absence. In the dust on the dining room floor were written the words
FIND THE DEVIL TAVERN
Now what on earth does that mean? Though honestly, we were both kind of pleased to see the message. At least it’s a clue so that we can begin to unravel the mystery of our ghost and his silver band.
PS Bruce, I know you’re dying to find out what it was that Julian wanted me to let him do that I have been refusing to do. Remember when I said we went to a costume shop? Well, apparently Dru made Julian watch The Hunger Games with her the last time we were home, and he really really wanted to paint me like this.
The things we do for love.
—Emma
THANK YOU DRU FOR MAKING JULIAN WATCH “THE HUNGER GAMES”! Emma dressed as Katniss is a spectacle in itself!!!
