She found a bookstore and the library and a street of charming shops. A village with a river running through it.
Jay was home by 12:45, and they sat down at a table of warm bagels, aged local cheddar, kosher dill pickles, sliced-up veggies, and freshly whipped mayonnaise.
“Listen,” said Jay, “I’m sorry about the Grinch act this morning. I was worried about the house.”
“It’s cool. Everything okay?”
“As far as I could tell. I took the padlock off the ladder and put it on the storm door. I hope that’ll do the trick.” He frowned. “Hope he doesn’t know the starter fluid trick.”
She nibbled at a piece of celery, trying to decide whether to tell him her latest news, figured she’d better. “There was this photograph of me and a friend,” she said. “Jamila, the one you thought was hot?”
He nodded, but from the expression on his face, he was already guessing the worst. “What about it?”
“I brought it with me,” she said. “I remember packing it. But it’s gone.”
He stared at his sandwich. “You’re saying this guy went through your stuff?”
She shrugged-didn’t want to admit that Mr. X had pawed through her clothes, her underwear. She shuddered.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s hardly your fault.”
Jay shrugged and looked forlorn as if somehow it was.
“Jay, I don’t know what’s going on up there, but it doesn’t change my mind. I mean I’ve come this far.” She took a deep breath. “I want to ask if we could share the house. For a while, anyway.”
He stared hard at her a moment. “Did you talk to Marc?”
She shook her head. “I’m too angry.” She broke off a piece of bagel, crumbled it in her fingers. “He’s such a jerk! I can’t believe he didn’t say anything about you.” She shook her head. “All these jerks! What am I, a jerk magnet?”
“Thanks.”
“Oh, stop with the hurt routine. You know what I mean.”
Jay blundered into a bagel sandwich that was too thick. She shook her head in disgust. He stopped. “Kidding!” she said. She made an open-face, took a bite. Swallowed.
“Actually, I’m not being entirely honest,” she said. “About Marc, I mean. I can believe him not telling me about you. He’s… Oh, I don’t know. It’s like he’s a sociopath or something.” She glanced at Jay, whose mouth was open, his sandwich raised halfway there but stopped in midair. “Not in the Anthony Perkins-slash-Norman Bates way, but in the seriously irresponsible conduct way.”
Jay was frowning now, and Mimi realized she was freaking him out. “Forget it,” she said. “I have taken precisely one psych course. All I meant was that Marc doesn’t seem to get it about caring, about family, about giving a shit.”
She took another bite of bagel. She glanced at Jay again and felt guilty at the bewildered look in his eyes. She reached across the table and was about to give his hand a squeeze but then thought better of it; she wasn’t sure why. “He’s not a murderer or anything. I don’t want you to think that. It just wouldn’t occur to him to bother saying anything. That having relatives somewhere would be a big deal-that, like, I might care. ” Jay summoned up a smile. “Believe me, Marc won’t see this as his problem,” she said. “You and I wanting the place. He won’t care what we do.”
Jay nodded. “Well, you’re right about that.”
He had a weird look on his face. “How do you mean?” she asked.
“My mother phoned him.”
“Get out of town.”
“Last night. If it makes you feel any better about him, he probably didn’t warn you because he thought I was still in school. So he didn’t expect you’d run into me.”
Mimi was almost pleased. It was sort of like an excuse. But when she thought about it, not much of one.
“He said pretty well what you said. It was up to us.”
Mimi drank a sip of water. Didn’t want to look at Jay. Didn’t want to see no written on his face.
“What is it you want to do up there?” he asked.
“I want to write.” She glanced up. Was he silently howling with scornful laughter? No. He looked impressed.
“Like a book? A novel?”
She shook her head. “A screenplay. I just finished my first year at NYU. Dramatic writing.”
“Very cool,” he said. “What’s it about?”
Ah. She dropped her eyes. Then glanced at him, a little furtively. “It’s about a girl who gets herself in a big mess in her first year at college and runs away to another country.”
There. It was out. She picked up her sandwich and took a bite. When she looked, Jay was regarding her with what… concern? Affection?
“Boy-type trouble?”
“Worse,” she said. “Professor-type trouble.”
Jay picked up his own sandwich and took a bite. It was as if they were building a little wall of sandwiches between them. The kitchen was filled with the sound of two people not talking. A motorboat went by out on the river. Jay swallowed, took a drink of water.
“The phone call you didn’t answer last night?” he said.
“Right. That was him.”
“Why don’t you block his number?”
“I did, so he’s started calling from pay phones. Different ones.”
Jay looked concerned, and it annoyed her because it only proved what she was worried about-that there was reason for concern. “So get a new cell phone from this area code,” he said. “It’ll be cheaper.”
“I just got here, remember?”
“Sorry,” he said. “It’s none of my business.”
You’re right, she thought. But she needed Jay on her side and bickering didn’t help.
“Hey,” he said. “I really am sorry. I’m just, you know, anxious.”
She nodded and thought that he was always low-grade anxious, as far as she could tell. “Thanks. It’s a sore point,” she said. Then she thought of something else and shook her head.
“What?”
“Oh, nothing. Just a random little memory that came to mind.” She pointed at her head. “Sometimes it’s like bumper cars up there!”
“Tell me,” he said. “I like bumper cars.” He grinned and she couldn’t help grinning back.
Then she had to look away. The intimacy quotient was climbing way too fast.
Still, he might as well know what kind of a crackpot he was dealing with. “Lazar Cosic-he’s the prof-he even accompanied me to one of Marc’s openings.”
Jay’s head jerked, as if he’d been sucker-punched. “An opening? So, like, Marc was there?”
“Of course. That was the point.”
He looked perplexed. “You wanted Marc to see you with-”
“A man almost his age? Yeah. Don’t ask why.”
“And?”
“And nothing.” She laughed, a sad little laugh. “If Marc noticed, he didn’t say a thing.” Then she shook her head. “And that is the end of the amusing part of this broadcast. Lazar confused going to the opening with taking him home to meet the folks, which is when he started talking about leaving his wife.”
“Yikes.”
“And I freaked.”
Jay chewed on his sandwich and looked to be chewing on what she had told him. “And so now you’re going to turn the whole thing into a movie,” he said.
“Well, you’ve got to admit there is some dramatic potential.”
“I guess.”
