“Hey, c’mon,” someone admonishes.
“All right, all right,” Charles grumbles.
Emma sinks down in her seat, charmed by Charles’s enthusiasm, embarrassed by his outburst, and stunned by his statement. Nina Bradley is going to read her work! In the darkness, Emma smiles to herself.
After the movie, they ride uptown in a cab. It’s Emma’s first taxi ride, and it feels luxurious, almost decadent. Outside the window the city passes by as if it too is a movie, unfolding for her personal pleasure. Charles has turned to face her and has an arm on the seat back. He keeps touching her lightly, on her knee, her shoulder.
And then, in a quiet, serious voice, he says, “Emma, the story you’re telling-that young boy, his abusive mother-where did it come from?”
Emma doesn’t turn to him, but keeps looking out the window as she speaks. She’s been expecting this question. “There was this woman who lived with her son above the stationery store downtown. She was clearly disturbed. They were always dressed in dirty clothes, he was skinny and sad. Everyone in town talked about them, made fun of them behind their backs. One day I saw the two of them sitting at the lunch counter in Woolworth’s. She was talking to herself while he sat there eating his grilled cheese sandwich, trying to pretend everything was normal. But there were tears in his eyes.”
“Most writers put a lot of themselves into their first books,” Charles says gently.
“I’m probably no exception. After my father left, my mother started drinking and taking pills. I’m sure I saw myself in that little boy.”
They ride in silence for a few blocks. Emma can feel Charles studying her as she looks out the window.
“Is your mother better now?”
“Yes, she is.”
“You’ve gotten inside the boy’s head. But don’t back away from the horror of the situation. The mother may be sad, but ultimately she’s a monster.”
“But I want her to be a human being first.”
“She is a human being, a human being who is destroying her own progeny. You can’t pull back on that.”
Emma turns to him abruptly. “I have no intention of pulling back.”
They’re both surprised by the power in her voice.
Emma laughs uneasily. “I just mean-”
“You don’t have to tell me what you mean… Emma, I’ve enjoyed our day together.”
Emma looks down at her hands and for a moment she’s afraid she’ll cry. Or throw up. She takes several deep breaths. “Thank you for everything, Charles.”
“Look at me.”
Emma slowly looks up.
“You’re crying.”
“No, I’m not. I am not crying. I’m not.”
And then they’re both laughing and the taxi feels like a boat on a starry-night sea and Emma, as she discovers a part of herself she didn’t know existed, an elation as pure as light, almost stops watching herself, but can’t quite, and so stores the moment for future remembrance.
23
Ignoring the dash to each season’s trendy new restaurant, Nina Bradley can be found-winter, summer, spring, and fall-at her prime table at the Four Seasons. She understands the value of being seen and of seeing, and she enjoys the homage that she’s paid by the steady stream of media, publishing, and entertainment people who come through the restaurant. A brief stop at Nina Bradley’s table is a well-known New York ritual.
Nina, whose marriage to a much-too-dull businessman was, in her words, “a six-year cruise to nowhere,” is far too set-and content-in her ways to waste time looking for another man. She spends most weekends at her farm up in Columbia County. She loves the place, which she has willed to the Nature Conservancy. She maintains it impeccably and is proud of the cattle her farm manager raises organically. Nina has an occasional affair, but at her age eligible men are hard to find, and frankly, she sometimes thinks they just aren’t worth the trouble.
As Charles finishes up his steak, the waiter sets down Nina’s black coffee and removes her half-eaten grilled vegetable terrine. It’s been a good lunch. Something is definitely happening with Charles. She hasn’t seen him quite this animated in years; his recent bitterness seems to have evaporated. If she didn’t know better, she’d suspect he was in love. But it isn’t that. He’s being very cagey about his work, which is a good sign-he likes to surprise Nina.
“Thank God for our lunches. Anne never serves steak anymore,” Charles says, savoring his last bite. Nina loves the unabashed pleasure he takes in food. She can appreciate good cooking, but as for swooning and swaying over the latest Moroccan cheese or Ecuadorian roast-goat recipe, well, count her out. At least Anne has a sense of humor about all the culinary chatter.
“I hadn’t eaten a steak in two years when I bought my farm. Then I got to know a few cows and realized that any animal that dumb had to have been put on earth for man to eat,” Nina says.
Charles looks at Nina with unabashed affection. The man is feeling good about something. “Any industry gossip?” he asks.
“Vera Knee just got four hundred grand for the paperback rights to Honey on the Moon.” As soon as the words are out, Nina curses herself. Cows aren’t the only dumb creatures, she thinks ruefully, and quickly tries to recover. “Of course, her book is completely unreadable. And I don’t care if she got a cool million, I’m not interested in representing any of this recent crop of so-called writers with more personality than talent. I’ve got a stack of manuscripts this high in my office. I’m sending them all back unread.”
“But what if there’s one at the bottom of that stack that’s the real thing?”
“Then I hope it lands on the desk of someone who cares,” she says. “Will you excuse me, Charles.” Nina gets up and heads toward the ladies’ room to reapply her signature scarlet lipstick. She’ll be good goddamned if she’s going to switch to purple, no matter how hard MAC and Essence push it for black women. She thinks it looks like a bruise. Charles watches as Nina walks across the restaurant, watches as heads turn ever so slightly. In a black silk blouse and tailored black slacks, she is unarguably the most striking woman in the restaurant. Charles wishes he could tell her about Emma. But Charles and Nina’s relationship ends at a certain place, a place they both recognize and tacitly acknowledge, but never discuss. Friends to the death? Absolutely. Intimate? Never. Sometimes Charles wonders if she ever aches for someone to see her through the long night. But Nina knows what she’s doing, knows all about trade-offs, knows that no one-least of all a black woman of her generation-reaches her level of success without paying a price. And it’s a price Nina Bradley pays without a whimper or a whine.
Charles reaches into his briefcase and takes out a manila envelope. He opens it and lifts out a sheaf of manuscript pages. He reads the title page: Chapter One from
The Sky Is Falling
A novel by
Emma Bowles
Charles thinks of Emma, imagines her up in his office at this very moment, bent over her desk, writing. He removes the title page and tucks it into the inside pocket of his jacket. Then he puts the pages back in the manila envelope. He wants to make sure Nina gives the chapter an unbiased reading. There’s no way she’ll miss Emma’s talent and promise.
A ruddy-faced man in an expensive suit approaches the table. “Charles, how are you?”
Charles blanks. What is his name?… Arvin? Publicity director for a rival publishing company. A notorious boor.
“Hello, Arvin,” Charles says, hoping Arvin has the class to heed his indifferent tone.
No such luck. “I thought you were treated very unfairly on Capitol Offense. It’s a helluva book.”
“Thanks.”
“You know, I heard Vera Knee-”
“Fuck Vera Knee.”
“Good luck. She’s gay.” Arvin walks off, but not before favoring Charles with an oily smile.
