Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
Wes
After dodging Ulla’s calls for more than a week after her announcement, he agreed to have lunch with her in Cobble Hill at a place she’d “discovered” on Smith Street.
Only Ulla could get away with claiming to discover something with over a thousand Yelp reviews in hipster central.
He’d been talking about everything with Mo, who agreed that having a little time to himself was important for him to process, but she also encouraged him to text Ulla that needing space was his reason for radio silence.
After five days, his mother had suggested this place when he reached out again.
The place, when Wes got there, made him think about Mo all over again.
“Uptrend Midwest Cuisine” was the fare genre, and lo and behold, there were Tater Tots on the menu.
They were artisanal, hand-sculpted potato knurls, but all the same, it made him ache.
The wallpaper had the too-conscious kitschy feel of someone’s great-aunt’s kitchen—roosters and red-and-white checker wall borders.
The tablecloths, too, were red-and-white checked, and a small wicker basket on each table had folded cloth napkins and mismatched flatware inside.
The menu prices were the first thing to tip him off that if this was someone’s aunt’s kitchen, that aunt was paying Cobble Hill rent and not Cedar Rapids.
Ulla ordered the soup—an heirloom tomato bisque with a grilled cheese lid, and after a glance at the menu, Wes chose the Tater Tot casserole. He took a picture of it when it arrived, texting it to Mo when Ulla went to the ladies’ room.
I ordered this and still no one has proposed to me yet?
Did you wink when you ordered?
Ah, I must have done it wrong. What time does your plane leave again?
7 am tomorrow. Still okay if I come to the show tonight?
His heart beat faster at the thought that he’d get to see her at the gallery. Yes and bring a friend if you want. Then he texted her the address.
She hearted the message, but then sent back a thumbs-up emoji. He wondered if mixed emoji messages were the standard text protocol for rivals that fucked.
The casserole was good—corn and carrots and ground bison in a light gravy sauce, all buried underneath a pillow of tots and shredded cheese.
The dish came with a side of homemade ketchup (spelled catsup on the menu).
He dipped a fork into the sauce, then scooped up a spoonful of meat and potatoes.
Delicious, but not the tastiest thing from the Midwest that he’d had near his mouth lately.
Ulla reseated herself at the table and glanced at her soup, then the casserole. “I’m going to need a walk after this. Heavy food.”
“That’s fine,” he said, not mentioning that the place had been her suggestion. “So, Dad called me the other night and told me the whole story.”
“We’re hardly the first couple to, well, you know.” She didn’t look around, but somewhere, someone in this city would have paid their left arm to get this story.
Wes understood the delicacy of the situation in the same way he knew that secrecy was untenable. Someone, somewhere, would slip and this news would get out. He thought about how he’d told Mo, and maybe he shouldn’t have. “When are you making a public statement?”
“We’re thinking sometime after the summer. You know summer is always a slow news season, and we don’t need to be written about more than need be. I can handle whatever the tabloids spew, but your father—I’d like to keep him from the worst of it.”
“Is there someone else?” He’d been thinking the question for the past week but finally had the courage to ask.
“Not on my side.”
Wes, very conscientiously, did not raise his eyebrows. “And was that what did it? I mean, finally, was that what ended it?”
She sighed, then took a sip of her unsweetened iced tea.
She had this way of using her straw, trying to bypass her whitened teeth to avoid all stains.
“I could have made it work, but honestly, I think we had run our course. Don’t think badly of your father.
Truly, sometimes these things have expiration dates. ”
He thought about the rights for Proud and the Lost , how the expiration of the authorial rights had been extended and extended and how much work it had taken on Estelle’s part to do so.
That wasn’t even marriage, where the other party could fight with you, ignore you, or cheat on you.
Making anything last long meant fighting against the natural will of time to change things, and Wes didn’t like it. “I never pictured you two apart.”
“Well, you weren’t around as much from age ten on, darling, so let’s be honest. How much were you really watching?”
“Fair enough,” Wes said. His casserole was too cold to enjoy. He put down his fork. “My book might become a published book. The one that adapts Proud and the Lost .”
His mother smiled at him, then raised her glass to clink against his. “This year will be full of surprises, Wes. Not all of them bad.”
He thought about Mo’s fingers stretched on the couch next to him, the press of her lips against his.
How he’d had to stop midchapter, unable to talk about a couple kissing without kissing her himself.
He thought about the little heart in the text message and cleared his throat. “True,” he said. “Too true.”
Ulla looked out the window, and despite her careful presentation, he knew she was sad and lonely.
He recognized the expression because he had worn it himself.
He remembered Ajay’s offer and realized that a night out might help her feel better.
“Do you want to see Ajay’s gallery opening with me in Tribeca tonight? ”
She focused again on his face and smiled as if she could tell what he was doing. “How weird is it?”
On the way to the gallery, Wes considered the likelihood of his manuscript becoming a real book.
He daydreamed as he went past the bookstores he’d browsed as a kid.
He’d attended dozens of author events at the Strand and imagined his name in the marquee above its entrance.
Wes Spencer, Too Proud . The name would probably change in edits, if they got to edits.
It sounded like a Fast I hope it will last.”
That particular aphorism was fresh in his mind when he looked up to see Maureen coming down the street in the dress she had bought in Greenwich. The dress she had peeled off in the hot tub.
He didn’t know if he mouthed “oh shit” or said it, but the sight of her sent blood rushing to his cheeks and other parts of his body.
He had to stifle his reaction, though, because Ulla was walking in step with Mo.
They must have run into each other up the block, and they were talking animatedly.
As he got closer, he swore he heard the phrase “extensive, body-wide acne” pass his mother’s lips and noticed Mo’s glance trace him in an appraising way.
Why had he thought that this second Ulla/Mo crossover event was a good idea, when it was likely his worst idea ever?
When they stepped inside the gallery and ran directly into Yuri Eikura, this prophecy was proven true.