Chapter 8
In the days that followed, Sawyer continued to wake up to the sounds of Charles getting up early to go to the gym.
“Do you ever work out with anybody?” she casually asked one evening, as they brushed their teeth for bed after he’d gotten home after another long day at the office.
Charles shrugged. “No one in particular,” he answered, his mouth ringed with frothy white toothpaste foam. He spat, rinsed, and wiped his mouth. “Why?”
“I don’t know,” Sawyer said. “The reason you picked that gym is because it’s so close to your office. I just thought you probably run into coworkers there.”
“Sure. I see coworkers there sometimes,” he replied. “And in line at Starbucks afterward. Inevitable. We basically all spend every waking moment within one city block of the office at this point.”
Sawyer noted: he sounded indifferent and tired. Not at all defensive. She reminded herself that just because Charles went to the gym and Kendra went to the gym, it didn’t mean they went together. Nick could be wrong, filling in a bunch of blanks without any real proof.
She felt reassured by this thought as she crawled into bed. Charles got in beside her. He put an arm around her and, along with it, a sense of warm comfort.
But the next morning, as Sawyer listened to the growl and whine of the blender, she caught herself frowning and chewing her lip, lost in thought again. She sighed, and for the rest of the week, threw herself back into her work, her writing.
Friday rolled around—another summer Friday. Another free afternoon. Sawyer wondered how she would fill it up.
At least her morning spent at work promised to be interesting; Johanna had sent out an early a.m. email letting the office know that one of her authors would be dropping in for a short, friendly meet and greet. When Sawyer read the name of who would be coming in, she gasped in excitement. It was Preeti Chaudhari, the author of the unsolicited manuscript she’d pulled from the slush pile. Sawyer had spent the last week rereading the manuscript and making editorial notes that she’d already handed over to Johanna.
It had been a pleasure to read the novel again. She’d put all her energy into the notes, and was excited for what would come next for the author. She couldn’t wait to meet her.
“Sawyer,” Johanna said as she emerged from her office. “We ought to have something to welcome Preeti. She’ll be here around ten thirty. See if you can run out and buy a box of pastries and some fresh-pressed juice from that boulangerie around the corner?”
She laid three twenty-dollar bills on Sawyer’s desk, then dusted her fingertips together, as though touching money with her bare hands was distasteful.
“Sure.”
Sawyer glanced at the clock—ten thirty was in twelve minutes. She hurried off and practically sprinted to the boulangerie.
When she got back, she spotted Johanna talking and laughing with a tall, angular woman with dramatic cheekbones and her dark hair swept back into a graceful chignon. Sawyer recognized that Johanna was making her usual circuit around the office, introducing Preeti to the various people involved in the publication of Preeti’s novel—whether it be art or sales or marketing. At present, they’d worked their way over to the art department and had stopped at the cubicle that belonged to Ellie, the graphic designer who had created the covers for Johanna’s last five books.
Excited to finally meet the author whose manuscript she had so admired, Sawyer set the pastries and juice down on her desk and bounded over, a wide smile on her face.
“Hi—Ms. Chaudhari?” she said, after waiting for Johanna to finish what she was saying with regard to her early thoughts about the tone of the cover.
The woman turned around, surprised, but with a pleasant smile.
“Please; Preeti is fine,” she said.
“Hi, I’m Sawyer. I’m so happy to finally meet you.”
Sawyer held out her hand. Preeti took it with a cool, elegant handshake that matched her composed, unhurried prose style. Preeti smiled…but it soon dawned on Sawyer that there was no glimmer of recognition in it. The name, “Sawyer,” did not ring any bells for this woman. She had never heard of Sawyer.
“Did you get the juice and pastries?” Johanna asked.
“Oh—yes. I did. They’re on my desk.”
“Wonderful. Can you bring them into the small conference room? And make a pot of tea? I think Preeti and I will sit and chat in there.” She turned to Preeti. “You said you prefer tea to coffee, right?”
Preeti nodded, and Johanna continued with the tour, clearly on a mission to introduce Preeti to as many of the imprint’s relevant personnel as possible before they all started leaving the office for summer Friday.
It’s so lovely that we were able to coordinate this last-minute drop-in visit,Sawyer dimly heard Johanna say as they walked away.
I’m glad, too, Preeti replied. I’m visiting my family—they still live in Queens, in the house I grew up in, much like the one described in my book, actually…
Their voices fell to a low din as they moved away from Sawyer, deeper into the sea of cubicles. Sawyer watched them go, a little stunned. One thing was abundantly clear: Johanna hadn’t bothered to mention that Sawyer was the one who had first pulled Preeti’s book from the slush.
Sawyer set the juice and pastries up in the small conference room, then made a pot of tea and set out a tea service in the room, too.
Was she crazy to have wished Johanna had mentioned her by name? Maybe what Sawyer had done wasn’t terribly monumental in the larger scheme of things—she’d recommended something she liked to her boss. It was Johanna who’d offered Preeti a book deal, and made it all happen. Johanna had that in her power. Sawyer was the lowest order of gatekeeper; Johanna was the one who had changed Preeti’s life.
Still, Sawyer felt a tickle of malcontent at her invisibility. She’d gotten it in her head that she was part of a team. That when it was time for her to move up from editorial assistant to assistant editor, one of the shining moments to recommend her for the promotion would be that she could say, I worked with Johanna Bailey’s author Preeti Chaudhari.
It was strange; having fallen in love with Preeti’s manuscript, Sawyer felt like she knew Preeti. Meanwhile, it was unlikely that Preeti would ever be able to pick Sawyer out of a lineup.
Johanna and Preeti emerged from the small conference room just before noon. Johanna walked Preeti to the elevator, bid her goodbye, then turned back to where Sawyer and Kaylee sat.
“Look at the time!” she exclaimed pleasantly. “You’re both free to go for the day, if you wish. Go enjoy your summer Friday.”
She hummed and returned to her office.
Irritated, Sawyer decided to pack up and leave before Johanna changed her mind and remembered to order one of them to clean up the conference room.
“I’m outta here. Have a good weekend, Kaye,” she called to Kaylee, who gave her a sympathetic look. They hadn’t discussed it, but Kaylee seemed to understand that Sawyer had harbored the hope that Johanna might include her more in Preeti’s book deal.
Sawyer was still mulling what had happened at work as she rode the subway home.
When she got to her apartment, she began to execute her regular routine out of habit, opening the windows, stripping off her work clothes, pouring herself an ice-cold glass of water from the pitcher she kept in the refrigerator, and automatically firing up the desktop computer that sat on the little desk in the kitchen.
She wasn’t really expecting any email messages, so she was surprised when she heard the suave male voice shout, “You’ve got mail!” and saw that there was not just one but two messages waiting for her in her inbox.
More surprising still was the sender: [email protected].
What more did the two of them possibly have to say to each other?
Sawyer’s eyes moved to the subject lines, and she found a second surprise. They were labeled “READ ME FIRST” and “READ ME SECOND.”
She stared cautiously for a few seconds, then gave in to curiosity and clicked on “READ ME FIRST.”
From: [email protected]
Hi Sawyer.
Today is Friday. I’m guessing (and by “guessing,” I mean making a highly intelligent conjecture, having gathered a reasonable amount of data) that you left your office, came home, and are now looking at your email, with no plans to do anything, other than stay in and probably read books for the rest of the afternoon.
I would like to suggest you meet me for a libation at The Watering Hole, which is not just a euphemism but the name of an actual establishment, perfect for city-bound folks like us on a summer Friday, as it is both dark and cool and free of judgment as to why one might be stuck in the city and drinking on a Friday afternoon.
Meet me. Hester and Essex on the Lower East Side.
—Nick
Sawyer sat blinking at the email, her face twisted in a skeptical expression, her lips puckered to one side, brow furrowed, one eyebrow raised.
She had no intention of trekking over to the Lower East Side to meet Nick for another drink.
Still leery, she clicked on the email titled “READ ME SECOND.”
From: [email protected]
Hi Sawyer, me again.
I’m making another highly intelligent conjecture that, having read my previous email, you are presently making that face that you make when you are skeptical and resistant to something someone is saying (the one where you twist your lips and raise one eyebrow and a little crinkle appears on the bridge of your nose).
I further conjecture that you are saying to yourself: “No way am I going down to the Lower East Side to meet Nick for a drink.”
But I think you should reconsider.
You said your best friend is out of town. So I’m betting you’re free.
Think about it. Your hot apartment. Or coming out for a drink. Not a lot to lose.
I’ll be here. The Watering Hole. Hester and Essex.
When you’re done rolling your eyes.
—N
Sawyer was indeed rolling her eyes.
And when she stopped, she realized she was angry. Angry and irritated. Angry and irritated and not in the mood to sit still. She’d been about to tell him off at the Yale Club when they’d been interrupted. If Nick wanted to pick up where they left off, fine—he would be sorry; she had no plans to hold back this time.
She went to her closet and dug out something to wear. Not something that looked like she’d made any effort, but rather, something comfortable. Something she could be herself in. The day was still scorching hot. She pulled out a pair of black denim shorts and a spaghetti-strap tank top, then looked in the mirror. It seemed like everyone bemoaned grunge fashion nowadays, but Sawyer still liked it; her dark hair and heavy bangs easily assimilated to the aesthetic. She grabbed a black-and-white-plaid flannel and tied it around her waist, then pulled on a pair of black Doc Martens.
Nick might be annoying, but he was right in one regard: Sawyer really only had two choices. Stay home in her stuffy apartment and be annoyed at him…or tell him to his face that she was annoyed with him. And it was simply too hot to sit around angry and all alone.
Just as their names might suggest, the Upper West Side and the Lower East Side were at opposite ends of Manhattan, and Sawyer’s route was not a straight shot. It required a bit of effort and an inconvenient train change.
When she arrived at the Watering Hole, she pushed through the door and stood in the entrance a moment, frozen, her eyes straining to adjust from the brilliant sunshine outside to the near-total darkness inside.
A man hovered behind the bar, presumably tending it. His leathery face signaled older age, yet there was something youthful and puckish about him. His hair was salt-and-pepper, but longer on top, and spiked up like a gentler version of a Mohawk. He wore a weathered army surplus T-shirt and was leaning over the counter on his elbows, reading a paperback novel. Two patrons sat at the bar, both grizzled older men gripping the drinks in front of them with both hands, vacant expressions on their faces. One appeared to be on the verge of nodding off.
Nick was nowhere to be found.
I’ll be here, he’d written. Maybe he was just playing a joke on her. Sawyer considered doing an about-face and leaving, when the bartender caught sight of her. He stood up at attention, and shoved the paperback into the back pocket of his jeans. Then he whistled and waved her in.
“Welcome! C’mon over! What can I get you?”
Sawyer approached the bar, uncertain whether she truly intended to stay.
“Um…”
“Don’t know how to make an ‘Um,’?” the bartender joked good-naturedly. “How about something else?” He waved his hand again, gesturing for Sawyer to sit down.
She gave in, and sat.
“Well, what do you recommend?” she asked, half-joking, half-serious.
The bartender looked her over. “A Sea Breeze,” he finally diagnosed. “A lady like you should have a nice tall Sea Breeze on a hot day like this.”
There was something kind about how welcoming he was, how happy to see her.
“All right,” she agreed.
“One Sea Breeze, coming right up!” He grinned and set about making the drink. He had a distinctly wiry energy about him that struck her as being both urban and feral at the same time. His left earlobe was missing a noticeable chunk, reminding her of an alley cat.
When the drink was ready, he set it before her and waited for Sawyer to try it, watching. She warily poked the maraschino cherry safely down under the tinkling ice (she was of the firm belief that maraschinos were freakishly unnatural) and took a taste of the drink. It was pleasant—grapefruit and cranberry, and what tasted like a stiff pour of vodka.
“Lovely,” she said. “You’re right—perfect for a day like today. Thank you.”
The bartender grinned again. He did a fanciful little bow.
Then the door opened, and a silhouette appeared, a flat black shape chiseled out of the blindingly bright light that blasted in from the street. When the door swung shut again, Nick materialized in the silhouette’s place.
His eyes went straight to Sawyer, and a crooked smile appeared on his lips.
“Nicky!” the bartender greeted him.
“Hey—Vic!” Nick called back.
The bartender came around from behind the bar and the two men hugged. Sawyer watched, intrigued.
Vic returned to his post and Nick sat down next to Sawyer, elbowing her in greeting.
“I see you took care of my guest,” Nick said to Vic.
“Your guest, eh?” Vic teased. “I didn’t see you come in with her. Besides, she’s too pretty to be your guest. Guest of the establishment, I say.”
“What did he fix you?” Nick said, addressing Sawyer this time, and pointing to the drink sitting in front of her.
“A Sea Breeze,” she replied.
Nick smirked. “Ah. Vic thinks you’re classy,” he said. “That’s his classy-lady drink.”
“Uh, I’m flattered—I guess?” Sawyer wanted to be annoyed—annoyed that Nick had heckled her into coming out to a hole-in-the-wall, and showed up late—but in spite of it all, a genuine laugh came out before she could stop it.
“You should be,” Nick insisted. “Vic’s been tending bar since he was a kid, barely tall enough to stand behind one. If there’s one thing he knows, it’s people.”
“When I got here and you were nowhere to be found, I would have left…if Vic hadn’t been so nice,” Sawyer said.
“I’m glad you like him, and I’m glad you stayed.”
He smiled, and Sawyer could feel him looking over her spaghetti-strap tank, shorts, the plaid flannel tied around her waist, her Docs. She looked him over in return—ripped jeans, a faded black T-shirt, his hair fashionably rumpled.
“Hey, Vic—can I get a cold one?” Nick called. He turned to Sawyer and dropped his voice. “The beers on tap are always piss-warm,” he confided. “Also, it doesn’t help that they taste like piss.”
Vic spied Nick mumbling in Sawyer’s ear and frowned.
“What kind of slander are you feeding my guest about this establishment?” Vic pretended to scold.
Sawyer suppressed an amused smile.
Behind the bar, Vic bent over and slid open the door to an ice chest. He rummaged around and pulled up a bottle, then pried off the cap and set the bottle of beer in front of Nick. Bits of ice chips slid down the sides of the bottle as Nick lifted it and took a sip.
“Let me show you around the place,” Nick said, and proceeded to set off on a tour to jokingly highlight various features of the bar, waving for Sawyer to follow.
“Here we have the Watering Hole’s Annual Pool Tournament Wall of Fame,” he said, pointing to a wall full of framed photographs of guys holding up trophies. “Note the number of times Vic himself here has won the championship…nothing fixed or fishy about that…nope!”
Nick winked.
“?‘Fixed’ would be me throwing a game!” Vic complained from behind the bar. “It’s not my fault I’ve been granted wicked pool skills by the powers that be.”
They exchanged a grin and Nick carried on. He pointed to a sagging leather couch pushed against one wall.
“And here we have the Lap of Luxury, aka, the sofa that one of the bar’s previous owners abandoned here a couple of decades ago and nobody ever got around to throwing out. Note how the rips in the fine leather have been expertly repaired with silver duct tape.” He turned and called over his shoulder. “How old would you say this sofa is, Vic?”
“Fuck if I know. Once it got old enough to order its own beer, I stopped checking ID,” Vic retorted.
“Rumor has it, Sid Vicious once sat on this sofa, shortly before his untimely death,” Nick said to Sawyer. “No direct cause-and-effect connection between the sofa and his death was found, of course. But if you wish to sit, be warned that you do so at your own risk to health and safety.”
Sawyer smiled at Nick. He caught her gaze.
“What?” he prompted.
Sawyer shrugged.
“Nothing,” she said.
He arched an eyebrow at her but continued the tour.
“And here we have the VIP in-house DJ,” he said, flourishing an arm at the boxy glass jukebox. “Otherwise known as ‘DJ Do It Yourself.’?”
He peered down into the glass case and worked the handle to flip a few pages of the selection list. Then he rummaged his pocket for a handful of quarters, dropped a couple in, and punched in his selection.
To Sawyer’s surprise, Van Morrison’s “Sweet Thing” from the Astral Weeks album began to play. She blinked.
“This is my favorite song,” she said.
Nick looked at her, his eyes searching her face in that way he had.
“Huh,” he said.
He set his beer on the table of a booth, and they proceeded to slide into the wooden seats opposite each other.
Sawyer sat and listened to “Sweet Thing” play over the bar’s scratchy speakers. She took a sip of her Sea Breeze and looked at Nick. Again, he caught her gaze.
“What?” he prompted a second time.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I came here ready to chew you out. But you seem more like…how you seem when we talk online. You’re funny online.”
“Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll say something rude and unfunny to put you off again soon,” he said. “We could get right to it and talk about religion or politics or something.”
Sawyer laughed. “No, please.”
Nick was quiet a moment. “Maybe it’s the setting,” he finally said. “It’s easier to be funny here. I definitely prefer it to the Yale Club.”
“You don’t like the Yale Club?”
“Not really. Sorry about those guys showing up—I should’ve guessed that could happen. They’re pretty obnoxious.”
“Your coworkers are?”
“Pretty much. I tried to limit your exposure as best I could.”
So, that’s why he’d hurried her out the front door.
Nick paused, then added, “I forget that I kinda hate that place sometimes.”
Sawyer frowned. “If you don’t like it, why are you a member?”
He shrugged. “Truthfully?”
“?‘Blunt and frank’—you said that was your thing,” Sawyer reminded him.
“It’s a kind of currency, I suppose.”
“What do you mean?” She frowned.
“To me, social clubs are just a bunch of horseshit. But they matter to other people. ‘Yale’ matters to other people. And if I’m going to sit down at the table of life and play poker, then I want a good hand of cards.”
“I see,” Sawyer said. “More of your ‘math.’?”
“Pretty much, yeah,” Nick replied.
He paused.
“Anyway, I misdiagnosed you,” he concluded.
“Beg pardon?” Sawyer asked, confused.
Nick shrugged. “I had you pegged for the kind of girl who would be most comfortable meeting at a fancy social club. But, I can see now, you’re…different.”
He gazed at her for a moment too long, and she grew uncomfortable.
“I guess when I picked the Yale Club, it was my version of making you a Sea Breeze,” he joked, easing the moment.
“But I like this Sea Breeze!” Sawyer protested, holding up her glass.
Nick laughed. “Well, that just goes to show: Vic has been doing this a long time, and he knows better than I do how to size a person up.”
“Still,” Sawyer said, laughing. “I’m pretty sure in some roundabout way, you just said you thought I was a classy girl who would like the Yale Club but you were wrong.”
She continued to laugh, but Nick turned serious. He put his hand over hers on the table. “Don’t do that,” he said.
Sawyer froze at his touch, mustering a confused smile.
“I didn’t say that. I said you were something different,” he said. “I happen to like what makes you different. I just didn’t expect it.”
They locked eyes again. Sawyer felt blood rushing to her ears.
Nick lifted his hand and withdrew it. “Sweet Thing” finished on the jukebox and “Brown Eyed Girl” started playing. Sawyer fidgeted. She took a heavy sip of her Sea Breeze, then cleared her throat.
“Do you and Kendra hang out here often?” she asked.
“She prefers the Yale Club,” Nick answered.
Sawyer raised her eyebrows. They exchanged a knowing look.
“She came with me here exactly one time,” Nick said.
“What drink did Vic make her?”
The smirk reappeared on Nick’s face. He laughed a little, to himself.
“A beer on tap,” he said.
It was an accidental punch line. They both laughed, a conspiratorial mixture of tickled and sheepish.
“Maybe it explains why she didn’t come back,” he admitted.
“Could be,” Sawyer said.
Nick turned serious again. “Actually, how about we don’t talk about them,” he said.
Sawyer blinked.
“I mean, we’ll tell each other if either of us finds some kind of…proof,” he qualified. “But other than that, how about we don’t talk about them.”
“All right,” Sawyer agreed.
It seemed respectful: she and Nick weren’t going to sit around and complain about their partners. Then it occurred to her that Charles and Kendra were pretty much all she and Nick had in common.
“But…” Sawyer said. “Why invite me down here, then?”
“It’s a beautiful Friday afternoon. What else were you going to do?”
“So this is…a pity invite? We’re back to that?”
“No!” Nick protested. “What if…what if I just like talking to you, and thought you might be free?”
Sawyer mulled this over, a look of deep consternation on her face.
“Is that OK?” Nick prodded.
“Yeah,” she said finally. “That might be OK. I’ll let you know.”
A long pause ensued. Then, Nick shrugged. “It’s supposed to thunderstorm this afternoon. Want to go for a walk before it rains?”
“Sure.”
Sawyer drained the rest of her Sea Breeze and groped in her purse for her wallet, but Nick waved her off.
“Hey, Vic—put it on my tab?”
“Don’t think I didn’t already, my friend,” Vic called back. To Sawyer, he said, “Nice to meet you, m’lady. Your next one’s on me, if you come back.”