She held onto my arm to steady herself, and we followed Rae and Shelly back upstairs. The green room was now full of people, and they all clapped when we entered.
October seemed uncomfortable and overwhelmed by the applause, and she went straight into the bathroom. I walked to the bar cart and poured myself another whiskey. When I turned around, Rae was there. And she was smiling.
“Great job, Joe. Well done. Really.”
It was the first genuinely nice thing she’d ever said to me, and I appreciated it. I mumbled a sincere “thank you” and offered her some whiskey, but she shook her head and said, “I’m driving you guys home, yeah?”
Soon, Phil rushed into the room. “That was luminous!” He threw his arm around my back. “You two make a great team! I hope this is just the beginning of a lot more collaborations!”
Is that what October and I are doing? I wondered. Collaborating?
October came out of the bathroom in a black slip dress with a big, camel-colored cardigan over it. Her sleeves were pushed up above her elbows and I could see a bandage on her forearm from where she’d cut herself in the cage.
She slid into a pair of sexy snakeskin boots, looked my way, and sighed. “We have to go downstairs and mingle before the auction ends.”
She’d twisted her hair up into a messy bun and wiped the dark eye makeup off her cheeks as best she could, but Shelly came over and said, “Lordy, let me touch you up before you go meet and greet.”
Thomas sauntered in, brimming with excitement, and announced that the top bid on the birdcage was currently at fifty grand.
Everyone cheered again, and while Shelly was fixing October’s makeup, October’s phone rang and she answered it. She and Shelly had stepped into the kitchen so I couldn’t make out what she was saying, but she looked sweet and animated as she spoke, and when she walked back into the room, she came straight to me and said, “Chris says congrats and thanks for the pic.”
I maintained a neutral expression, but I didn’t feel neutral. I felt like I was suffering the loss of something monumental.
Let her go, I thought.
My head believed that, but the little muscle in my chest was tense and tight as we shuffled down the steps to the main gallery, where the crowd still lingered, everyone waiting for a chance to meet October.
People swarmed her, and she gripped my arm, whispering, “Please don’t leave my side.” Then she started introducing me to everyone as the artist who built the cage. Strangers lauded my work and treated me like I was important, and while I tried with all my might to appreciate that, I remained too caught up in my own confusion to relax.
Phil pushed his way through the crowd, holding two glasses of champagne above his head. When he reached October and me, he handed each of us one. I didn’t want it, but I took it and then set it down on the table behind me. Across the room, Thomas raised his glass, made a toast praising October and all the other participating artists, including me, and then he thanked the guests for their generosity.
Having so many people touching and talking at October wore her down quicker than the performance had. Before long she was snapping the elastic hair band on her wrist and staring at her shoes, and Rae went to get the car.
The three of us were quiet on the drive home. October rested her head against the window; I was behind her, so I couldn’t see her face, but as we turned onto Lombard Street, I heard her sniffling in a way that made me think she might be crying. Rae glanced at me but didn’t say anything, and when we were stopped at a red light, she picked up her phone and sent me a text that said:
Gets emotional after performances.
Don’t worry she’s fine.
I wanted to reach up and rest my hand on October’s shoulder, to comfort her and let her know I was there, but I refrained because I felt Rae and I had turned a corner that night, and I didn’t want to take any steps backward with her.
Instead I wrote Cal a long text. I told him about how great the night had gone and how amazing October had been and how much one of the guests paid for the cage.
I should have left it at that, but ever since the drive into the city that afternoon, I’d been wondering where things stood between October and Cal, and I typed:
How’s it going with you two anyway? Better?
We were just getting off the bridge when his response came through.
Hard to get her to talk.
Still feels off.
Not letting her go without a fight tho.
I sent him back the thumbs-up emoji and put away my phone.
As we passed the Sausalito exit that used to take me to Bob’s houseboat, I thought about my father and wondered what he would have thought if he’d been at the gallery that night.
He wouldn’t have understood the performance, that’s for sure. But there was a part of me that wished he could have seen it anyway, wished he could have heard all the people praising my work.
It didn’t escape me that this was work I only knew how to do because of him. And I like to think he would have been proud of me. But if I knew Bob Harper like I thought I did, it’s more likely he would have deemed the whole thing a complete waste of wood, nails, and ingenuity.
NINETEEN.
I’d been keeping a file of words. I’d started the list after October asked me what my favorite word was because I hadn’t had
