restaurant when I was with Amy, there was no telling what she might be willing to do the next time.
Seeming to sense my deliberations, Renee picked up the pace, widening the gap between us, willing me forward. If I couldn’t decide, she would help me choose. She couldn’t’ve known the decision to keep following her had already been made. I matched her speed and followed her past the entrance of Cooper Union’s Foundation Building and down East 7th Street. We kept at it across 2nd Avenue, across 1st, but between 1st Avenue and Avenue A, Renee slowed her pace considerably. I began making up the ground between us in big chunks. Finally, when she was just west of Avenue A and Tompkins Square Park, she stopped completely, turned, and waited for me to catch her.
I didn’t quite accept it was Renee until I was a foot away from her, her chest heaving, a panting cloud of white vapor in front of her face. Her cheeks were raw and red from the cold and her eyes watery, but, god, she was lovely. Screw me if, under the anger and confusion, I wasn’t excited to see her. Even this close, I couldn’t accept it was really her. Then her face turned from neutral to dead serious.
“Your wife is beautiful, Ken. She has the prettiest eyes.”
“What’s going on, Renee? What’s this all about?”
“I miss you all the time. It really hurts.”
“I miss you, too. I think about what I gave up to come here, but-”
“He’s watching us, so be careful.”
“He?”
“Jim.”
“Hug me.”
“Hug you?”
“Please, hug me. I need you to hug me.”
I did as she asked. Her body was so terribly familiar in my arms. Everything about her-from the feel of her hair on my face, the floral scent of it, to the heat of her breath on my neck-all seemed so natural, but something was wrong. She tensed in my embrace and put her lips close to my ear.
“Go along with him,” she whispered. “Do what he asks. Things aren’t what they seem and they never have been.”
“The package with the manuscript chapter, did you-”
“Forget that. It’s too late now. I hoped you would understand.”
“Understand what?”
She didn’t answer, but I felt her hand slide beneath my jacket, along my belt line, and down into my back pocket. She let her hand linger there in my pocket for a moment before removing it. It was an odd little moment of intimacy between us.
“What was I supposed to understand about the chapter, Renee?”
She untangled herself from my arms and stepped back. “Renee! Don’t you mean Zoe?” And before I could react, she slapped me across the face. “Which one of us were you fucking all those months, Ken, me or Zoe?”
I was stunned and cold again inside and sick to my stomach. I was being pulled in so many directions it rendered me immobile. But there must have been a question on my face, because Renee answered it.
“That’s right, Ken,
“Fuck!” I heard myself say.
“Jim’s in his truck on the corner by the park. I don’t know why I care, but I do, so don’t upset him. If he gets pissed, you’ll put Amy in danger.”
With that, she walked back in the direction we’d come. I was reeling, barely conscious of the passage of time and when I looked up, Renee was completely out of sight. I was so unsteady, I might not have moved at all, but her warning about Amy had gotten my attention. Somehow I put one foot before the other and made it to the corner.
Forty-Three
And there he was, Jim leaning on the front fender of his F-150, a broad and goofy smile painted across his face. Again, as with Renee and in spite of myself, part of me was joyful at the sight of him. Seeing him there-his quirky, rough-hewn looks, remembering our morning runs, shooting together in the woods above the falls-made me acutely aware of what I’d sacrificed and how lost I’d been since returning to New York. The St. Pauli Girl’s dire warnings notwithstanding, there was a measure of warmth and comfort in Jim’s being here. Although I knew it wouldn’t last, it freed up my limbs enough that I might approach him without completely freaking.
Yet even as I crossed the street, the warmth and comfort flowed out of me, down through my legs, out the soles of my old shoes, and onto the cold and pitted pavement of Avenue A. As I crossed the street, Jim Trimble’s goofy, boyish smile morphed into that knowing, superior smile of his. From the day Jim first walked into my classroom and tried to be the teacher’s pet, I’d had my niggling little doubts, doubts that I’d willingly, even eagerly, overlooked. But there was that smile again and my doubts were now full blown. I could feel my limbs seizing up on me. I was within a foot or two of him when panic fell like a shroud. Angry horns blared as I stopped dead still in my tracks. I was buffeted by the winds of passing cars and self-doubt. A cab was bearing down on me. I winced, bracing for the impact. A strong hand pulled me out of the way and I thumped into the side door of the old pickup.
“Are you crazy?” Jim was shouting at me. “Christ almighty, Kip, I didn’t go through all this shit for you to end up road kill.”
I wanted to speak. I really did, but the panic was choking me, making it impossible for me to string thoughts together. Jim had no such trouble.
“The way you wrote about this park in
I managed a syllable. “What?”
“You described Tompkins Square Park as a kind of a hellhole. I watched an interview you did once where you said you meant the park to be allegorical. That since Moses Gold’s most famous poem was called ‘Rumors of Purgatory,’ it was only fitting he winds up living here as a homeless junkie.”
“What?” It seemed to be the extent of my vocabulary.
“Get in the truck, Kip.” Jim’s voice was inhuman. I’d disappointed him already.
When he pulled away from the curb, I heard the familiar scrape and rattle of the exhaust. I once again lost track of time and place, my mind racing with myriad scenarios, one worse than the next. I wasn’t conscious of where Jim was driving to or what would come next. I remembered Renee’s warning not to piss him off, how it would be bad for Amy, and I rediscovered my voice.
“Our books live in our readers’ heads, Jim, not ours. Writers forget their books after they’ve written them.”
That explanation seemed to meet with his approval and the temperature inside the Ford’s cab rose a few degrees.
“What’s going on, Jim? What’s this about?”
“You,” he said. “It’s always been about you.”
“Me?”
“Sure, who else?”
“I’m a little confused,” I confessed.
He shook his head. “You know, when I set this all in motion, I thought you’d have figured it out by now. From everything I’d read about you, I knew you were a sharp guy.”
