Beautiful People

When she heard that the Bosnian model with the tangled hair and the blue eyes had died — heroin, Miami — Jane smiled. The model, Petra, had had a thigh gap through which you could see the whole world, Lago di Garda to Prokoško. One less beautiful girl, thought Jane. It was her day off. She'd walked over three miles north, from Orchard Street on the Lower East Side through the sixties. The sun was out and also the homeless, who made Jane feel lucky.

On Second Avenue she walked into a cheerless shoe store, and then she headed west, stopping at several small food shops. She bought things that weighed little and could survive her return trip downtown — anchovies wound around puckered capers; a package of white sesame candy. She drank a small bottle of Sanbitter, its color bright red, like fresh blood.

The good news came in a Le Pain Quotidien on Lexington. It was early fall, the temperature of ham sandwiches. She sat outside and ordered a pot of Brussels breakfast tea. On her phone she entered the HGTV Dream Home contest. It was the latest iPhone and she thought of all the things she didn't deserve and all the things she did.

She checked M. B.'s Twitter. My thoughts and prayers are with Petra's family and friends. Many hearts have been broken.

She checked her Craigslist listing. iPhone 6 Plus 128 GB, gold. $375. There was one hit.

How much if your willing to ship it overnight to Jamaica, NY 11434 She put the phone down. The tea came. Some had leaked out of the pot onto the saucer on its way to her table. The waitress didn't apologize.

Jane needed money, and thought about the Fischl. The painting had come to her the way those things occasionally do. From rich men with bathwater scrotums. It wasn't one of the wild Fischls, the great Fischls. Not the famous Fischl with its splayed lady on the bed and her clockwork of meat and the boy staring at her while he filches money from her purse. Pieces like that sold for close to a million. No, Jane's was called The Welcome. In the foreground, on a beach, propped on one elbow, is a middle-aged woman, sunbathing nude, her bare backside facing the viewer, her G-string tan lines bright against her sunburn, her brown hair in two loose, sensual, slightly age-inappropriate pigtails. She is greeting a mostly bald middle-aged man walking toward her along the water's edge. He is broad shouldered, with powerful arms; he has nice pecs but a slight gut; he wears stylish black shorts. Everyone in the background is also middle-aged, with medium-rare bellies. One man wears goggles; another has a towel draped around his neck, as if he's cold. The woman's back is flabby, but tan and inviting; there is something unabashed about her. The sand is hard. The ocean looks rich. Everybody in the picture drinks good wine in the early evenings, Jane thought. Good white wine.

She could easily sell it for forty grand, but had never given it serious thought. If she sold it, that would be the end.

She thumbed through the dead model's Instagram again.

Petra in a wet white dress on a Caribbean beach, holding a teddy bear holding a heart that says Shit bitch you is fine.

In Fryes and panties and a leather jacket, sitting on the hood of a Jeep Wrangler, smoking a cigarette. Tiny, tanned legs parted. Four hundred twenty-two comments.

In the desert, wearing a flannel shirt, scrunched-up face, matted hair, holding a Pabst and flipping the horizon the bird.

In cornrows, thumbs-upping a plate of Mexican food.

At Halloween, as Martha Kelly from Baskets. Jane marveled at the club of beautiful women who wore granny dresses or horrific makeup on Halloween as though to say, I am beautiful every day of the year, but tonight I will hide, so you may shine.

Next a selfie. In a hotel bed, smiling sideways. Hotel stationery...