Jenn shook her head.
“It takes two,” Jenn said. “Not to tango.”
Jesse smiled.
“I never said you were perfect,” he said.
“The mess we’re in,” Jenn said, “is a collaborative effort. No one person could have created it alone.”
Jesse tried to nurse his second drink.
I’ll take a sip, he thought, and put the glass down. And savor the sip. And talk a little. Like Jenn does. And have another sip. No hurry.
“You’re sure there’s no story, then,” Jenn said.
“Not the one you came out here for,” Jesse said.
Jenn had started to pick up the menu. She stopped, her hand resting on it.
“But there is a story,” she said.
Jesse sipped some scotch and put the glass back down carefully on the table. He let the drink ease down his throat.
“The Crowne estate project might make an interesting feature piece,” Jesse said.
“Yes!” Jenn said. “My God, yes! The conflict between privilege and poverty. Between real-estate values and human values. It could become a…” She moved her hands in circles while she searched for a word. “It could become a replica…a…ah…a microcosm of the same kind of conflict between haves and have-nots worldwide.”
“Wow!” Jesse said.
“It’s great,” Jenn said. “I can sell this, I can sell this.”
“How ’bout the conflict between you and me,” Jesse said.
“I haven’t quit on that,” Jenn said.
“Me either,” Jesse said.
Jenn picked up his hand in both of hers and looked at his face.
“I have always loved you,” she said. “I love you now.”
Jesse smiled.
“But right now you have a story to sell,” he said.
“Yes, I do,” Jenn said. “And don’t dismiss it, Jesse, it might be my way back.”
“To what?” Jesse said.
“To you, for crissake, don’t you see that? To you.”
24.
The woman was on the couch with a half-drunk can of beer on the coffee table in front of her. Her head was tilted back against the top of the couch. Her mouth had fallen open. She was snoring gently. Crow sat across the room. If someone opened the door, Crow would be out of sight behind it. At 11:07 the daughter arrived.
“Ma,” she said, and saw her mother slumped on the couch. “Oh, swell,” she said. “Have another beer, Ma.”
