Authors: Sebastian Stuart
“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.
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.
Charles feels his mood curdle. He reaches for his wineglass and knocks it over, spilling its dregs on the white tablecloth. His stomach clenches and then burns.
Nina returns and sits down. “Charles, are you all right?”
“Fine. I spilled my wine.”
“That means five years of good luck. It’s an ancient African-American superstition I just made up.” She signals for the check. “Back to the salt mines. We should hear about the paperback sale of
Capitol Offense
within the week. Should be three or four bidders.”
“I should hope so,” Charles says.
The waiter appears and as Nina signs the check, he slides the envelope across the table.
“What’s this?” Nina asks, a glint of excitement in her eye.
“Just read it and give me your honest opinion.”
“Have I ever given you anything but? Listen, Charles, I know
Capitol Offense
has been a rough haul, but hang in there. You’ll prevail. You always have.”
Charles walks Nina out and sees her into a cab. He stands on the sidewalk and realizes to his surprise that there’s only one place in the world he wants to be at this moment: with Emma.
It’s a sparkly sort of New York evening, slightly breezy and cool, and Charles leaves the cab idling on Ninth Avenue while he and Emma dash first into a little market where he picks up an avocado, mushrooms, red pepper, onion, and garlic, and then to the deli next door where he grabs eggs, cheese, and a loaf of Italian bread. He looks casually handsome in his chinos and beat-up work shirt, and Emma loves watching him as he feels the avocado for ripeness, the pepper for firmness, asks how fresh the eggs are. He’s insisted on coming to Emma’s apartment to make the two of them his famous huevos rancheros for dinner. Anne is off giving a speech at a dinner celebrating women entrepreneurs.
The apartment is snug in the soft lamplight and warm neon underglow. Emma puts Brahms on her CD player and, his appointed sous-chef, she stands beside Charles as he peels the avocado.
“The avocado has to be so ripe it’s almost melting,” he says. “You can start chopping the onion and pepper.… I’d just
moved to New York and was living in one room in Hell’s Kitchen.
Life and Liberty
had been out for a month. I woke up one Sunday and it was number one on the
Times
best-seller list. Ten minutes later the phone rings. This five-pack-a-day voice says, ‘Davis, this is Lillian Hellman and you’re coming to my house for dinner tonight.’ … No, no, tiny pieces, do a horizontal cut and then a vertical one.”
Charles demonstrates his chopping technique, their shoulders just barely touching. Emma feels cocooned, enfolded in a sweet lulling buzz, by his voice, his presence. She takes the knife from him and chops slowly, lovingly.
“That’s it, Emma.… I get to her town house at eight o’clock. Hellman greets me. She’s got this face so wrinkled it looks like a dried apple, and cigarette smoke pouring out of every orifice. She leads me into the living room—Mailer, Capote, not to mention Jane Fonda, Dustin Hoffman, and half of New York society.… The garlic has to be paper thin.… Hellman announces me and all these women wearing ten grand on each finger rush toward me. I felt like a headlight at a moth convention.… Thinner.”
“Thinner?” Emma asks, her voice almost a whisper.
“The garlic has to be translucent; that’s the great secret.… So I get cornered by a bleeding heart in an evening gown who’s just read my book. She’s carrying this special guilt about Vietnam because her husband inherited half of some chemical company that makes Napalm. I sprint off to the bathroom before I make a nasty scene, and bump into Olga, the six-foot Swedish maid, spraying an entire can of bug bomb into the toilet, nuking this poor water bug who doesn’t know what hit him.… All right, I think everything’s ready to go.”
Charles turns the burner on high, puts on a skillet, and pours in olive oil. He’s so graceful, so deft, so at home in his skin, his
body
.
“Now every second counts. Dump in all the vegetables. Good. Sixty seconds and not one more.… After dinner, Mr. Napalm
stands up and toasts me and all the boys who risked it all for the good old U.S. of A. He takes out a cigar, and Hellman, who’s been chain-smoking through the whole meal, tells him cigars are verboten at the table. He sulks off somewhere, and some socialite starts rubbing my thigh.… Thirty seconds to go.… Mailer stands up to toast Hellman and everything is quiet when—
boom
!—there’s this explosion like I haven’t heard since the war. Olga comes running in, screaming ‘The bug! The bug!’ in her Swedish accent. Hellman slaps her across the face and everyone rushes into the hall.… The eggs.” Emma pours the bowl of beaten eggs over the vegetables. “Two minutes here and thirty seconds under the broiler.”
“Charles!”
“Turns out Mr. Napalm went into the bathroom to smoke his cigar, sat on the can, and tossed the match between his legs. The dinner party was shot … and so was his ass.”
Emma laughs.
“Dammit, the cheese!” Charles cries. They both turn to reach for it and bump into each other. Emma freezes. Then she breaks away and pours them both more wine as Charles sprinkles the cheese on the eggs.
“So that, Emma, was my first night as a member of New York’s literary elite. I hope yours is as much fun.”
He looks at her. She turns away. Then she’s in his arms and he’s kissing her.
He begins by unbuttoning her shirt, slowly, gently, and she stands there and lets him, unsure what to do with her hands. How much can he tell by looking at her? She starts to tremble, and looks down, unable to meet his eyes. He puts a hand under her chin and raises her face, looking at her with his hazel eyes, his kind hazel eyes. They are kind, aren’t they? Someone on the street below is honking his horn and shouting, “Come on, come on! Let’s go!”
Come on, she hears. Let go, let go.
And then her shirt is off and he’s touching her breasts, touching them lightly, kissing them. If only she could stop her body from trembling. If only that sign wasn’t so bright, if only it was dark, and she could hide in the darkness.
Let go.
He unhooks her skirt and it falls to the floor. Is he trembling too? He kisses her while his hands slide down her back, and now she is naked.
Let go, let go.
But, no, she can’t let go, she’s afraid, it’s too fast, she’s naked, naked in front of him, and cold. She feels faint, wishes she would faint. But his hands are touching her, the small of her back and then her waist, her thighs. A shudder runs through her body, something she can’t control. “Charles …” she begins.
But he puts his finger against her lips and leads her to the bed.
Charles stares down at Emma, at her naked body bathed in the crimson light. She’s so pale, her face is shining, her eyes wide, those lovely haunted eyes. She keeps so much hidden. He wants to know her secrets, to possess her secrets. She looks so beautiful—does she know how beautiful she is?—and so afraid, this lost child. Then he knows: This is her first time.
It feels better, being on the bed, in the shadows. If only she could stop shivering. He puts his hand on her cheek, cradles her face, kisses her eyes, her cheek, her chin, leading her, so gently, forward.
“It’s okay,” he whispers.
Then he runs his fingers over her body, his touch so light, floating, touching her so gently. He runs his hand up her thigh, his strong hand, up her thigh, over her scars, and her breath catches, and his hand goes higher.
Let go.
With each touch she feels warmer, and his fingers play on her flesh, and his mouth is warm on her skin, and her flesh is moist under his fingers, and his body is strong and he’s making love to her and, yes, she wants this, she wants him.
Charles knows it’s time, she’s ready, and he looks into her lost eyes, and he wants, needs, to be inside her. Poised between her legs, he wants her to look at him, at his body, to take pleasure from his body. And she does look, in wonder and confusion and want, and he enters her slowly, slowly, opening her up with his eyes. And then he stops.
Emma begins to cry. He kisses her and whispers, “Let go, Emma, let go.”
And Emma does let go, arching her body, encircling him with her arms, her legs, pulling him in, closer, closer, until she doesn’t know what she’s doing anymore, doesn’t care—feeling, for the first time in her life, a pleasure as deep as her pain.