Page 44 of Sunny Side Up

twenty-one

I walked into The Mark, a bright and sunny restaurant at the exquisite Mark Hotel, and seeing the SONNY banner hung across the entrance took my breath away.

Noor was friends with the executive chef; she’d really hooked it up.

The place was just gorgeous. Beachy, without being on the nose about it: White wood-paneled walls covered in hand-painted botanicals surrounded dusty pink-and-green chairs clustered into intimate seating arrangements.

Bright green amaranth hung from the exposed beams, in between enormous white fans, one after the other.

Pussy willows in glass vases reached up high in the airy room’s corners.

We’d scattered pink-and-green paper confetti all over the floor for an extra touch of SONNY whimsy.

Guests would be served, per the verbatim vernacular of the restaurant, “High vibrational plant-forward appetizers, tonics and cocktails.” Most importantly: We’d had every single swim style matted and framed in enormous sun-bleached wooden frames with the white paint half-stripped, as though they’d spent an entire summer drying out on the beach.

And yet, here we were, hours away from an event that had the power to define the future trajectory of my expanding career, and that would expose to the world—or, more intimidatingly: my friends, my family, the press, the two guys I was dating, and my ex—my true purpose in life.

I spotted a flash of Brooke rush by. In the opposite corner, Noor was nodding over a flower arrangement with a man in a headset.

It appeared Noor had somehow scored a headset, too.

Within minutes of their arrival, after shaking my shoulders in proud excitement then swarming me in a group hug, they’d transformed from the friends I knew into two masterful day-of-event planners.

Thanks to their respective careers—Noor in endless fast-paced, high-pitched kitchens, Brooke on photo shoots with Murphy’s Law in full effect and celebrity talent throwing tantrums—they both thrived in this kind of environment.

My family was there, too, causing their usual chaos. I wouldn’t have done this without them there, but their presence was more comforting than I’d expected. Even if they were all driving me insane.

“Are you okay, honey?” my mom said. “Your face looks a little funny.”

“Oh no, Sunny…” My dad turned my cheek to the side and began examining it, concerned, like a pediatrician looking at a rash. My eyes widened. Was I having some sort of allergic reaction to the makeup I’d had done earlier?

“You do look a little—” he smirked. I was already rolling my eyes. How had I not seen this one coming? “—a little Greene .”

“Jesus, Dad,” I groaned, laughing despite myself.

“Your face looks like it always does, Sun,” said Michael. “Ugly.”

“Michael!” That was Ellie. She jabbed an elbow into his side, and he pretended to fold over in pain.

“Security,” I called. “Security, please remove this man.”

“Sunny, you look perfect ,” said Ellie. “Your outfit is incredible; this place is incredible. I’m getting you a water and a glass of champagne.”

“I’m going to check out the food,” said Michael.

“This really is amazing,” my dad said, looking around, taking it all in.

If he’d been wearing suspenders, he would have thumbed them away from his shirt and whistled in awe at the space.

“And you do look perfect.” Then he spotted a giant potted fern that grabbed his interest and walked away to investigate.

“Ellie is right ,” said my mom. “Look at that outfit!”

I braced myself for the sting.

When I was growing up, she was never shy about critiquing a shirt that fell wrong or pants that fit too snugly, never missed an opportunity to tell me I was looking “a little pudgy” in something tight or that a skin-baring outfit was “trashy” (meanwhile my brother ran around our house and the neighborhood half-naked without any comments other than reminders to wear sunscreen or to come inside for a snack).

“I know it’s kind of a lot without a beach or pool nearby,” I said, suddenly self-conscious and defensive.

I wore my dream version of the shell-sprinkled prototype I’d worn that day on the beach: Instead of black, it was sparkly Kermit-green Lurex, just like I’d long envisioned.

The hips were cut even higher, the butt coverage even skimpier.

My ideal suit. Over it: an oversize white linen Veronica Beard blazer that did cover my butt, thank you very much—after all, this was technically a work event for me.

No pants, just hand-spray-tanned legs and strappy white Stuart Weitzman high-heeled sandals.

My toes were painted green to match the suit.

I’d had my hair blown out like Cindy Crawford’s in her classic Pepsi ad.

The angel who’d done my makeup on-site an hour earlier had given me that classic, no-makeup coral-lip, sun-kissed bronze, pink-cheeked look that Kate Bosworth had perfected on the red carpet all those years ago with Blue Crush .

“Who needs a pool?” my mom swatted the air. “You look beautiful.”

I couldn’t remember the last time she’d given that away so easily. “Really?!”

“Of course! You always do.” She dusted a crumb or something off the arm of my jacket. “You’re especially stunning today, though.”

Just accept the compliment, Sunny , I told myself, jaw clenched. Now is not the time to get into it.

She must have mistaken my bubbling anger for something else, because she pulled me into an unexpected hug. Even more unexpectedly, I sank right into it.

“It’s so…” She searched for her words. “… It’s so, I don’t know, impressive , and inspiring, how you’ve developed this fiery confidence in yourself. I wish I had that.”

I listened as she kept me close. Was this my mom, or a stranger wearing her skin?

“You used to be so hard on yourself as a kid,” she said.

“You’d get so mad at yourself for not looking like the models you saw in all those magazines you read, or the mannequins at Boston Store, or even the girls in your grade.

But none of that was your fault. It’s just how you’re built.

How our whole family is built, honestly.

” She laughed, pushing me back gently to gesture at herself: Everyone said I had her eyes and nose.

Her hair was highlighted into a permanent blond, like mine, and cut into a pixie, which she said made her feel “feisty.” She wore an A-line, boat-necked, pink-and-white floral dress with her grandmother’s pearls and those quilted flats with the black cap toe that look Chanel-ish but aren’t.

I knew there was a cardigan in her shoe-matching bag in case of over-air-conditioning.

She was typically about six inches shorter than I was without heels.

Today, there was a full foot of air between us.

Her weight had fluctuated my whole life, as she switched from fad diet to crash diet to fad diet.

She was currently about fifteen pounds lighter than she’d been the last time I’d seen her, I guessed.

Soft around the middle, heavier in her thighs, with a curve to her full waist, and impossibly small ankles.

She never showed her arms, always wore dark colors (making today’s pink and white a surprisingly generous gesture), refused to wear horizontal stripes or shorts above the knee.

We’d never had a conversation like this before—not about weight, or “diet culture,” or my body, in particular—where both of us were on the same page. Where she was listening to me and saying what I’d needed to hear.

“It was humiliating,” I said.

She nodded. “People can be so mean. Those kids who made fun of you. That brat, Kelly Feeney, who pretended to be your friend just to use you as her court jester. The magazines, the advertisements, the catalogs. All those TV shows and movies that used fat people as the punch line. It was just seen as normal. They set you up for failure,” she said, shaking her head. “But maybe I did, too.”

“No you didn’t, Mom. You were always there for me.” Out of the corner of my eye I saw Avery walk toward us, realize we were deep into something intense, and spin on her heels in the other direction.

“You brought home, like, fifteen different prom dresses for me just so I didn’t have to try them on in stores, then returned them all, then brought back fifteen more. I mean, that’s hero shit.”

“Sunny,” she said sharply. Thirty-five and I still couldn’t curse in front of my mom.

“Sorry!”

She continued. “I couldn’t stand to see you cry.

To hurt like that. I used to wish I could just wave a magic wand and make you skinny, like your friends, so that you’d have an easier time.

You were so beautiful. You still are. Not like that Kelly Feeney.

She got away with it when she was young and thin, but I’ve seen the pictures her mother posts on Facebook. Those giant ears—”

“Mom.”

“What?! I’m protective of you.”

“I know,” I said softly.

“I just wish I could have done better. I wish I didn’t have these feelings about my own body. I wish I didn’t pass them on to you.”

“You hardly invented diet culture, Mom,” I said.

“I know, but I certainly didn’t do anything to try and stop it from getting to you. Not really, anyway. I felt like I’d failed you because I couldn’t—I don’t know, lose the weight for you? I blame Jenny Craig,” she said, so matter-of-fact that it made me laugh.

“I just wanted to do what was best for you. All I want, all I’ve ever wanted, is for you to be happy.”

“I know, Mom.”

She took a deep breath, and her eyes began to well up with tears. “When you called and said Zack was leaving, that was the worst day of my life. Not because of him,” she said, shaking her head. “Screw Zack!”

“Mom!” Screw?! Those were harsh fighting words compared to her usual Midwestern cheer. I looked around just to make sure he hadn’t walked in yet.