“I thought we were going on the tube.”
“He just called and he’s on his way. I want some time with him before the party to hear what he thought about the review.”
The review. It’s been up on our fridge for the past week.
Every time I go to get a nectarine or a piece of cheese I have to see the photo of Maria curled up in the throne.
“And they might use me for a feature—Edward stopped by my studio today. Your friend Maria was with him too.”
“Maria?” What was she doing dropping in on Henry?
“Yeah. Anyway, Wilson’s going to be here any minute, so...”
Wilson is the director of Henry’s residency program and he lives on the fringes of Notting Hill. That puts him about seven minutes away by car if he left right after Henry hung up the phone.
“All right, all right,” I say, dropping my shoulder bag and flinging my coat over the kitchen table.
“Don’t flip out,” says Henry. “Go in what you’re wearing, just throw on a sweater or something.”
I am wearing a navy pantsuit, which clearly is not suitable for a Friday-night party. Henry appreciates the finished product when I spend an hour dressing to go out, but can never understand that without said hour the results will not be the same. I kick off my shoes and wiggle out of my pants as I head towards the bathroom. I pull my hair out of the day’s ponytail and look in the mirror. My makeup is faded. I have dark circles under my eyes and there is a large, unflattering kink in my hair from the tight elastic.
“Hey, toots, about five minutes!”
“I
know
.”
No time to hide the kink with curls or plug in the straight iron. I grab another elastic to scrape my hair into messy pigtails and hope I can pass off any dishevelment as intentional boho-chic. Then I dig through the closet for one of my standby dresses: the baby blue faux-satin one, spaghetti straps, empire waist.
“I’m going out front to catch Wilson, but you’ve got to hurry.”
I hear the door click shut, and my first reaction is to take my time and make him wait. But I remember that I was the one who was late, that this means a lot to Henry and he might be a bit nervous, all of those things that reasonable people should remind themselves of in this sort of situation. And I want to ask him about Maria’s visit before Wilson shows up. So I throw on the dress and grab a string of gold plastic beads that’s sitting on top of the dresser instead of searching for my amber pendant. I shovel a handful of cosmetics into my purse and make it to the street just as Wilson’s black Yaris hatchback slides to a stop in front of us.
“Hey,” says Henry, opening the passenger door. Grime music pulses from the car stereo. “Thanks for the lift. You remember Dani?”
Wilson is about forty-five, with spiked, streaked hair and flashy gold hoop earrings. Henry said he was one of
the
up-and-coming London painters in the nineties. I wave hi and start to crawl into the back seat.
“You can have the front if you’d rather,” says Henry. Wilson echoes the comment.
“No, I’m fine back here,” I say, settling into the corner. “You guys have stuff to catch up on.” I start to examine what I swiped into my purse: concealer and a compact, which is promising, some pink and blue glittery eyeshadow, which is less so, and some lip-plumping gloss I got last week and haven’t even opened yet. I sit back, pop open the compact and listen for any mention of Maria.
Wilson starts the car from second gear, and we shoot into the street just ahead of a sedan. He builds speed until the engine is roaring, then pops it into third. “So, Henry,” he says, “quite a coup with the
Guardian
review last week. They really took a fancy to you.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty happy. Edward Grant, the reviewer, stopped by the studio today.”
“Reaallly,” says Wilson, drawing out the word. “Has his eye on you for a feature in
Time Out,
maybe?”
“Sounds like it, but you never know.”
“But it’s a good sign. The review spent a lot of time on you—I’m sure Andreas is right ticked that they only gave him a few lines.”
“Well, I don’t know,” says Henry. I can only partly see his face, but he’s smiling. He and Andreas have studios close to one another and have gone out for drinks several times, but Henry hasn’t said much about him this past week.
“And who was that bird they photographed in your throne?” says Wilson. “She’s quite a looker.”
I sit forward to hear better and lean my hand, which holds a long gold tube of undereye concealer, against the back of Wilson’s seat. We’re coming up to a roundabout, and Wilson stops short to avoid merging into the side of a black Mercedes. I’m pitched forward and almost poke myself in the eye with the tube.
“Bloody hell,” says Wilson, as he makes a second, smoother attempt to enter the roundabout. “Just to wake you up, that was,” he laughs.
I survey my reflection in the tiny disc of the compact. I have a blobby line of concealer under one eye, mid-cheekbone to temple. Anemic linebacker style.
“No worries,” I say, redirecting as much of the concealer as I can onto the dark circles under my eyes, patting it in gently with my right ring finger. He doesn’t look in the rear-view mirror for my reflection but instead turns back to Henry.
“What were we talking about? Andreas? He’s green as a pea over that review, I’ll wager.”
Wilson keeps prattling on about Andreas and several other people I’ve never met, but whose names I think Henry’s mentioned before, and by context I guess that they have spots in the residency as well. I learn that Wilson fancies Tabitha and Meredith, that Nicola barely scraped into the program and was originally tenth on a waiting list but the spot opened up so last-minute no one else would take it, and if he weren’t program director and hadn’t moral standards he’d be sleeping with her, because she’s a stunner. Wilson is the guy who will be encouraging everyone to down tequila shots by eleven, telling a story about some sort of tragic, tortured event in his life to two pretty girls by midnight, and by one in the morning, after a litre of red wine and a few vodka shots, will be wearing some sort of improvised headgear and proposing a game of strip something or other.
I make it sound like Wilson is annoying, middle-aged and smarmy. And he is, but really I enjoy going to Henry’s parties. Compared to some of the functions—
parties
would be misleading—that I’ve had to attend, Henry’s parties are giddy carnivals. I remember one painful evening last year in grad school, hosted by Shannon, my contest-entering-obsessed, depressive office mate. She gave out
written
invitations four weeks beforehand, sent emails to follow up and made reminder phone calls two days before the event. To keep peace in the office, I had to go. When Henry and I arrived at her house, she led us downstairs to a circle of folding chairs (probably set up since the one-week-prior mark) and a wobbly card table pushed against the far wall set with a bowl of Bits ‘n’ Bites, a plate of Rice Krispie squares, stacks of Styrofoam cups and two-litre bottles of Dr. Pepper and diet cola. Carl and her husband were the only other people so far, and they sat on the far side of the folding-chair circle, away from her barking puppy, which she had put in its kennel under the snack table. At Henry’s parties, people actually wanted to enjoy themselves. And people like Wilson made it hard not to.
I’m done with the makeup, my eyelids now dusted with pink glitter and my lips tingling and numb from the lip-plumper. I’m not sure how much longer it will take to drive to this place in Shoreditch but I want to know what happened with Maria and Edward at Henry’s studio today. I lean forward a little more, and when Wilson pauses to take a breath in the middle of a diatribe on the incestuousness of art reviewing in London, I dare to break in, going for an obvious question.
“So, Wilson,” I say, “is Henry’s review in the
Guardian
really significant, in terms of recognition from other artists?” Henry turns his head, slightly surprised that I’m asking a question he knows I know the answer to.
“Dear, as I said, it will turn them green.”
“I thought the photo they ran with the review was really, um, provocative,” I say. Another look from Henry.
“Yes, right, that woman in the throne.” He turns back to Henry. “She’s right fit. Do you know her, or did she just turn up randomly?”
“Actually, she’s a friend of Dani’s,” says Henry.
“Reaallly,” says Wilson, again drawing out the word. “Is she a colleague?”
“Um, well, she’s not a psychologist, but I guess I met her through work. At a conference. She does archival and curatorial work. From Budapest. She’s here doing some stuff for the London Museum.”
“Has she been in town long? What’s her name?”
“Uh, Maria,” I say. “I think she’s been here a little while. As long as us, anyway.”
“Does she go to openings much? If she’s in need of an escort to another opening or anything,” he starts digging around in the tray under the car stereo, “you should give her my card. Just let me find it.” He whips both hands back onto the wheel to switch lanes, then digs around again.
Henry laughs and claps a hand on Wilson’s shoulder. “Good thinking,” he says, “but I think she’s already seeing someone. Isn’t that right?”
“Yeah, she’s dating Edward Grant. They seem pretty tight.” I keep an eye on Wilson’s reflection in the rear-view mirror.
“
She’s
dating
Grant
!” Wilson’s eyebrows arch up, up, up. “I see, I see.” He glances at Henry. “That’s working out well for you. Hang on to this one,” Wilson jabs his thumb backwards. He shifts his eyes to me in the mirror. “Looks and connections—can’t ask for more.”
We arrive at a renovated brick warehouse in Shoreditch. Henry’s chatting with Wilson and leaves me to climb out of the back seat. We all head to a door in an alley that opens to a flight of stairs. Henry lingers a few steps behind Wilson. “What were all those questions in the car about?” he says in a low voice. The dim yellow light of the stairwell stains both of us a dark gold.
Before I can say anything, Wilson pushes the door open and a flood of music and conversation spills out from the party. “Come on, you two!” He leans into the open doorway and motions for us to step inside.
“Henry!” Two girls rush up to him as soon as we walk in. “We haven’t seen you since the review came out!” says one. “Brilliant, just brilliant,” says the other.
“He’s our new star,” says Wilson, slapping Henry’s shoulder.
“Drinks?” I nod and Wilson heads deeper into the party. The two girls prattle on about Henry’s show. He smiles and laughs with them. Finally, he turns to me. “This is Tabitha and Meredith. They’re in my program.”
“Hi, I’m Dani.”
“Here we go,” Wilson’s back, hands Henry and me a bottle of Newcastle each. “Are we still talking about our Henry’s review?”
“It’s just so exciting,” says Tabitha. “Makes the program look great, too.”
“That it does.” Wilson takes a long swig of his beer. “How did it go?
‘Le Paradis Rouge
embodies the frantic extreme of the carnivalesque.’ Genius.” He clinks his bottle against Henry’s.
“The frantic extreme,” repeats Meredith. “Gorgeous.”
“Genius
is
extreme, of course,” coos Tabitha.
Henry smiles, tilts the bottle to his lips.
Henry rolls out of bed and heads to the kitchen. He’s up early to make his Saturday morning class. I sit up, groggy from the late night. He flips on the coffee grinder.
“Want to check that?” Henry yells over the whirr and points at the flashing red light on our answering machine. I bury my head in the pillow until he’s finished grinding, then shuffle over and hit play.
Maria’s voice wafts out of the tinny speaker. “Danica, Henry. It is Maria. I am wondering if you are free on Sunday. The notice is short, I know, but Edward has tickets for the Bourgeois exhibit at the Tate. And, Danica, there is an email I sent for you tonight. Call me.
Viszlát
!”
Henry must have given Maria our home number.
“Hey, that sounds good,” says Henry. “I’ve been meaning to get to that show.” He goes into the bathroom, starts brushing his teeth. “Give her a call and tell her we’ll meet them,” he shouts over the running water.
“Really? You don’t think it’s too short notice?” The thought of Maria and Henry becoming friends seems like putting salt on ice cream.
“Why, what else have you got planned?” He comes out of the bathroom, pulls a navy blue T-shirt over his lean torso. “Sounds like a nice afternoon.”
“Because you want to hang out with Edward?”
“What? They seem like nice people. Why wouldn’t you want us to hang out with your friends? They’re way more interesting than the people I met at your staff thing.”
“That party was fine. They were fine.” He’s referring to the dinner party Jana invited us to our first week here. We ate casserole on TV tables and made awkward conversation with people from Jana’s horticulture club.
“Are you serious? We were home by ten thirty.” He pours coffee into his travel mug, grabs his keys. “Hey,” he says, pulling one of my stray red hairs off his T-shirt, “do you know you’ve left hairs all over the bathroom counter? There’s a bunch in the sink—they look like little red worms,” he says as he shrugs on his jacket.
“Uh, okay, what am I supposed to do about that? I have hair and I brush it and some comes out.”
“Relax, tiger lily. I’m just saying, living with you, I’m noticing you shed a lot.”
“Thanks for noticing. Really romantic.”
“So tell Maria we’re on for tomorrow.” He gives me a quick kiss goodbye and he’s out the door.
I try to fall back asleep, but I feel uneasy about Maria and Henry’s burgeoning friendship. Will she confide in him, tell him about her work, the diaries? In the bathroom, I grab a piece of toilet paper, dampen it and wipe the strands of my hair from the sink and counter. I drop the tissue into the garbage, pour a cup of coffee and play Maria’s message again. She sounds friendly. I play it one more time, listen to her intonation when she says our names, her tone when she mentions the short notice. Maybe she’s sincere.
And the email. Has she heard more Foster stories through Edward? I turn on my laptop.