Chapter I The Interview
Chapter I
The Interview
O nce upon a time, in a magical land far, far away called New York, New York—the city so good they named it twice—there lived a twenty-three-year-old boy... Clark Crane put his novel down for the umpteenth time. There, we find our noble hero on the most elusive, daring, and stupid of quests: a job hunt in the middle of August...
If only the interviewer would show . . . Clark thought to himself.
He rubbed his sleepless brown eyes with a yawn and another check of his watch. Clark had arrived over half an hour early after a sleepless night. The interviewer, he noted, was over half an hour late.
He had been waiting in the back of a dark, empty café, sheltered away in the shadow of a tall Sixth Avenue building a couple of blocks off Central Park. The café was so small and tucked away, in fact, that he had somehow walked past it two or three times before noticing it. Looking around, he found the café to be as sleek and as sterile as his cold linoleum chair and the table he had been seated at. In the time he had been there, and much to his curiosity, Clark had been the only patron.
Maybe I missed the lunch rush . . .
Whatever the reason, Clark was just happy to be somewhere with air-conditioning and so thought nothing more of it. To him, it was a welcome reprieve from the one-hundred-degree city day outside. He sat listening to Midtown Manhattan bustling beyond the café doors: tires on potholed asphalt, honking cabs and wailing sirens, jackhammers on concrete and their catcalling hardhats, the patter of passersby in conversation, the bumble of business calls on cell phones and the bass of air traffic above. New York City was a soundtrack he never tired of hearing.
Of course, being the sole customer did not stop the waiter from throwing him a few disapproving glances now and again for taking up his table. Clark’s smudged glass of water had been left unfilled for quite some time, collecting condensation and sweating on his tabletop, party of one.
If he was being stood up, Clark decided he could live with that. If he was being bamboozled , however, well, that just wouldn’t do. It was all happening suspiciously fast anyway. Just the day before, his mother’s friend had rung him up with the news:
“ Clarky !” Patricia had chirped in her sitcom-nasal Queens accent he so adored. “Are you still looking for a new job? You free tomorrow? Oh, good! Listen, I have a friend of a friend, someone very important looking for an intern of sorts, and quick. I thought of you right away! You would be great at it. It could open many doors. A million girls would kill for the job— literally ! I’m gonna set you up for an in-person with her personal assistant—they’re a little ‘old-fashioned’ like that. A year there would change your life, Clarky.”
But what kind of internship, and for whom exactly? Despite his curious pressing, Patricia would reveal nothing more.
“Don’t worry about all that! Just be your sweet self, do exactly as you’re told, and they’ll love you like I do. Promise! I see big things in your future, Clarky...By the way, have you talked to your mutha ?”
All Patricia forwarded him was a time and address, and that was that, so there he found himself, waiting for who he wasn’t so sure. Was it normal to be this late for an interview? Had something happened? Had they found someone else? What had Patricia told them about, he ruminated, and why did it have to be something bad about him?! Clark resisted the urge to bite his nails, to no avail.
“Trust me,” she said . . . “It’ll be great,” she said . . .
Despite all the résumé-sending that summer and not landing any leads, none whatsoever, Clark was grateful to have lucked out on his current job in the first place, truly he was, even if it was a meager one; dead-end even. When job listings were calling for a degree and two to four years’ experience minimum, how was he or anyone else to compete, let alone survive? In this job market...? In this economy...? Maybe a city internship is too good to be true after all, a fairy tale; shame on me for dreaming...
Just as he resolved himself to the fact that this was why he hated interviewing, right as he was beginning to pack up his things, a woman arrived, dressed in far too much black for summer in the city.
She breezed in through the heavy glass door, wearing a curtain of long, straight dark hair that spilled over a smart black blazer and a cleavage-baring little black dress. A black snakeskin purse hung off one arm, and those impossibly long legs on which she strode landed in heels that clacked with every step—until, that is, she saw that it was only Clark inside. She stopped dead in her tracks and her face fell as she looked around.
“Hello,” he said, standing up and extending his hand. “I’m Clark. It’s nice to meet you.”
Ignoring him, the woman removed her sunglasses from under a heavy fringe. For a moment, those piercing gray-blue eyes rimmed in cat-like kohl and thick mascaraed lashes narrowed in on his. He smiled back.
“You were the one...referred by Patricia Hartford?” she asked, her accent properly, undoubtedly English.
“Yes, that’s me!” he said.
“Strange,” she began, pulling up her phone. “I could have sworn I was looking for a—”
“I, um, prefer to go by my middle name, Clark, if you don’t mind.”
A terse half smile flashed across her face. She placed a manicured hand in his for a shake that was polite and prissy yet limp. “Pleasure. Monica Chase-Whiteley. I was going to say, I was looking for a woman. ”
“Oh haha...” Judging by the look on her face, he had the impression that he wasn’t the only one Patricia had failed to prepare. Clark smiled back at her anyway. He noticed how her smile didn’t quite reach those blue-gray eyes as they took their seats. “Well—thank you for meeting with me!”
Monica pursed her lips.
Here we go, s tarting off on the wrong foot . . . Clark “like Kent” Crane, saving the day already . . . Way to go, nerd . . . The waiter approached their table.
Slightly hunched over, his deep walnut skin lined with age, the waiter held his arms behind his back in feigned modesty. “Can I start you off with a drink?” he asked in a monotone, looking only at Monica, leaving no doubt it was a question he couldn’t care less to hear the answer to.
“Coffee—iced, black, no sugar—and sparkling water.”
Clark watched almost amusedly how she spoke without looking up from her phone.
“I’ll have the same, please,” Clark added. Both Monica and the waiter turned to look at him. “Thank you!” The waiter frowned, turned on his heel, and left.
Monica asked, “How did you become connected to Patricia?” She hardly hid the skepticism in her voice when she said, “You seem to come with the... highest of recommendations.”
Clark surmised Monica was in her mid-to-late thirties, maybe younger, judging by her smooth, blemish-less skin, and cheekbones high as a skyscraper. She was styled in clothes likely worth more than Clark’s entire rent twenty times over, and those peculiar, unblinking gray-blue eyes under arched brows...Monica was gorgeous, wealthy, and cool. Clark—gawky in his big-boy clothes of well-worn Oxfords, secondhand slacks, a white button-down, and mousy brown hair and eyes—was not. She surveyed him in return and let out a deep, reluctant sigh.
“Oh, Patricia, she’s a good family friend, almost like the aunt I never had,” Clark replied with fondness, then kicked himself for using the word friend . “I’m really grateful she thought of me.” Truthfully, he had seen more of Patricia in the last few years than he had his own flesh and blood.
Monica flatly replied, “How lovely.”
As the waiter returned, Clark scrounged up a toothless smile back again. The waiter set their glasses down and poured their coffee over ice. “I will give you a minute to look over the menu.”
Monica said, “That’s all.”
The waiter cut her a look and turned away. When he disappeared behind the kitchen doors and they were alone once more, she put down her phone and continued.
“So, Clark , who are you, and why the hell should I hire you? Clearly, I haven’t heard of you before.”
“Ah, well...” Clark began, “I was born and raised in the city. Actually, I was raised in Astoria, just over the bridge in Queens where I, uh, live now. Have you ever been?”
Monica smirked. “No, I can’t say I have...” Judging by her manner, her words almost seemed to imply, And I never will.
“Oh,” Clark said, plowing on. “Um, well, I moved from home right after my freshman year of high school, and I’ve been on my own ever since. I rent a studio for chips from the landlord’s wife, a kind old Greek lady I know. Um, what else...I was an English major; I’m an avid reader. I’ve always loved books and a good story,” he said, holding up his well-worn copy of The Great Gatsby.
“ Wow , that’s so cool,” Monica said. “You don’t sound like you’re from New York.”
“Haha, thanks, neither do you,” he replied. She stared blankly back at him. Clark took a sharp inhale. “The uh, the accent never took hold,” he quickly added, “but sometimes it likes to make an appearance.” Abort mission...! he thought. Monica ordered one girl-interview, hot and fresh, hold the sarcasm, and I am not delivering... He shifted in his chair. “How about you? Where are you from, Monica? The UK?”
She narrowed her eyes at Clark. “London,” she replied, lifting a manicured finger and giving a haughty toss of her hair with a roll of her eyes. “I mean, obviously. We have homes in Paris, Ibiza, in many cities the world over, really. Although, I am nothing if not a London girl at heart. I attended an all-girls boarding school, studied Business Fashion at uni, and after I graduated, traveled throughout much of my twenties with my husband and my kids.” She held up her hand and flashed a wedding ring the size of a rock.
“I devoted myself to my charity work until, of course,” she continued, “I began working for Charisma. She was the one to introduce me to my husband. She is all about empowering women, after all...” Monica paused to contemplate her ring. Was it wistfulness that registered on her face? If this was her with strangers, Clark was afraid to imagine what she was like in private.
With a small pop, the air pressure at the table changed. Clark wiggled his ear. He figured the waiter must have turned the easy-listening down but...He perked his head up: was there even music playing to begin with? Had the noisy street outside gone still and quiet? Monica didn’t seem to notice.
“Charisma is a long-time friend of the family. We are a long line of prominent and highly influential witches, and we are very well-connected, in this city and more. It’s been a few years now that I’ve been in New York. We live just over there, on the Upper East Side,” she said, pointing northeast.
Clark was beginning to feel all kinds of naive. Nice one, telling someone like Monica my big bad hobby is reading...
“Do you work? Actually,” she asked, sizing him up and down, “let me rephrase that: what do you do for work?”
Then again... Clark thought to himself, the two of us, we’re not really cut from the same cloth...Wait...did she say “witches”...? They regarded one another from across that cold table, him in his white hand-me-down shirt and her in her black designer wardrobe.
“Yeah, I, um, I work at a... café, kinda like this one,” he said, waving his hands and motioning around the modern, dim, customer-less space they were seated in, “but I’m looking to explore other opportunities.”
The honest answer was that by “café” he meant more an old-timey relic of a coffee shop in Astoria, the last of its kind. It was a brick-and-mortar situated between two new developments, a community institution. There he served bridge-and-tunnels their donuts and cawfee on their way to their office jobs in the city or out to Lawn Guyland, watching the sun rise and set out the front window.
Did he hate it? Not exactly. At least, he wouldn’t say that. Most days, he liked the regulars and the routine, the neon sign, the familiar homey atmosphere and the aroma of their roasting Mexican coffee. They were long, early shifts, but there was free caffeine at hand, he could go to school in the evenings, and sometimes, in his downtime, he could even sneak a page or two of his reading.
The pay wasn’t much, however, not much at all: after New York City bills, rent, and groceries, Clark had just enough left to treat himself to something here and there—a new book or two perhaps, or maybe a matinee at the movies, but little else. It was a means to an end until something bigger and better came along. Nevertheless, Clark was smart enough not to give away that he was desperate for change and better pay, and that this could be his one-way ticket out. Don’t fuck this up, nerd...
As he sat there, a thought crept up on him: What if this was it? What if he didn’t get this internship? What if bigger and better never came and there he remained, watching life go by all around him, stuck behind the counter of that tiny little Astoria coffee shop, until the day he died?
“I brought a copy of my résumé!” Clark produced a printout from his backpack and slid it along the cold table.
Clark Crane
718.640.5555
2640 30th St Apt 5E
Astoria, NY 11102
Native New Yorker useful for cawfee, books, and cavalier humor. Aspiring to honesty, empathy, and authenticity. Professional dork and storyteller.
At this, Monica looked up at him. Clark sheepishly smiled back.
EXPERIENCE
Barista at Astoria Coffee Shoppe (7 years to present), Astoria, NY —
- Day-to-day tasks include inventory, shopkeeping, and maintaining customer service and food-and-beverage excellence, in service of a community cornerstone.
- Long-standing record for perfect attendance.
Tutor at Grade Smart Tutoring (1 year to present), Astoria, NY —
- English Literature, and Lang and Composition Tutor for grades K-7.
- Highly rated across GST’s grading scale. Great with parents!
Boarder at Catsitty NYC (4 years to present), Astoria, NY —
- Private, in-home cat sitter through agency.
- Trustworthy. Lifelong pet lover. Strong predilection for playtime.
EDUCATION
Hunter College, New York, NY (4 years)
English Literature Major
References available upon request .
She checked the back of the printout before saying, “You tutor as well as”—Monica almost stifled a laugh at this—“cat sit?”
“Yes,” Clark said.
“Why?”
“Why? Um, I like reading and writing, and it’s something that doesn’t require I exchange my body for.” Quickly, he added, “Like physical labor! And I love animals.”
Jesus, Clark . . .
“No, why on earth do you work three jobs? This ‘café’ doesn’t pay you enough?”
“Oh!” Clark turned a bashful shade of pink. “Tutoring gets slow this time of year. I really want a cat of my own, but I figure it’s better to make money on them for now. Cat sitting doesn’t happen often enough though, and they chew at my plants. I couldn’t do contract work like my father, I just wouldn’t fit in. The coffee sh—the café, I mean — is my steadiest gig but, no, it doesn’t pay what I want to be making.” Come to think of it, Clark didn’t know one person his age who didn’t have a side hustle or two. He wondered, Why am I telling her all of this...?
Monica put down his résumé. “How old are you, exactly?”
“Twenty-three,” he answered automatically, immediately kicking himself for it. Is that even legal to ask...?
“I see,” Monica said. “And, it says here that you haven’t yet graduated?”
“I’m...currently on a break.” Hey, Clark...? he thought. Shaddup...! He wasn’t about to tell someone like Monica that he had dropped out to survive the city. What was he going to do with a boatload of debt and a BA in English anyway? A girlfriend of his was selling pictures of her feet for good money— and honestly... he thought, that’s looking more and more like a lucrative endeavor... At this, Monica shot him a look with those gray, hollow eyes, and for a moment Clark almost worried that she could read his mind.
“Right...” she said. “Well, I’m afraid the position is for someone who can commit to full-time— preferably female. The job is demanding, to say the least, with some physical labor. The ideal candidate would wear a lot of hats.”
“I can commit to full-time!” he said in a hurry. “Physical labor is A-okay with me.” Can I...? Is it...?! Clark’s palms were clammy, and as he wiped them on his pants, he pushed the worry down and away that he was not winning her over. Before he could continue, however, the waiter reappeared.
This time, Clark watched as the man inhaled a reluctant breath, summoned a smile, and asked, “Can I get you anything else?”
A commendable attempt at pleasantness . . . Clark thought. Will it work . . . ?
“No,” Monica said, without looking up or removing her eyes from Clark, who could read the disdain all over her face. She waved the man away.
With a roll of his eyes, the waiter disappeared once more through the kitchen door. Clark couldn’t be sure but he had a hunch Monica might have always been a woman of privilege: here she sat, clacking her manicured nails on the tabletop, a spoiled little girl sighing with boredom and contempt. Clark imagined she had been gorgeous and popular growing up, but maybe not well-liked on the playground.
He cleared his throat. “About the position,” Clark began. “Patricia mentioned you were looking to hire an intern. Something about an extra hand? She didn’t really explain much at all, to be honest.”
Monica narrowed her eyes yet again. She asked, “You don’t know who I am, nor what I do?”
Clark shook his head.
She sat back in her chair and crossed her legs. The city outside had gone completely silent, and the café was still and quiet too. To Clark, it was as if all the world seemed to turn to mute. Monica’s every word punctuated the air, like her upturned nose she spoke through as she slowly said, “I am Charisma Saintly’s fourth assistant. I am her Keyholder, manager of her estate, and a member of her coven.”
Is she serious . . . ? So she did say “witches” . . . He asked, “Her . . . fourth assistant?”
“Correct,” she smartly replied. “We are an intimate team of about five or six. Charisma doesn’t like too many personalities around, and she is a very private person. There are four assistants on her team and coven, myself included, and a booker—that is, her sister. With the exception of her financial advisor, all of her companies are female led and run. The rest are in and out: her personal chefs, her photographers, her designers and stylists, and her many brand supervisors, managers, and handlers. The other assistants and I are all too busy juggling the needs of Charisma and her clients, a roster of very important people, and we are indeed looking for help. Somehow, the responsibility of hiring and conducting interviews always seems to land on me, so...here we are. And the interns, well.” She sighed, sizing him up and down once more. “We’ve had a hard time finding the right fit for the job.”
Clark nervously haha ed. “Oh, right!”
Monica raised an eyebrow from under that heavy fringe. Clark gulped. He wondered what she meant by witches, who the last intern was, and how that all might apply to him.
“What happened to the previous intern?”
“It’s a fast-paced work environment. Some can’t seem to keep up, or for that matter, last.”
This sounds insane . . . Clark thought. “What would my responsibilities entail?”
“An intern’s work is an assistant’s work—the same as any other witch’s assistant,” she said in a snit of irritation, as if he should’ve already known. “A junior’s responsibility—junior assistants, we call the interns—is to make our lives easier. Delivering, clienteling, organizing, preparing Charisma’s kit, maintaining her home and accounts, making sure all is running smoothly, etcetera etcetera. We require someone bright, reliable, and trustworthy, who is task-oriented, efficient, and can anticipate our every need. Charisma Saintly runs the tightest of ships, as do I. Your discretion would be of top priority.”
Anticipating their every need . . . ? More like reading their minds . . . “I’m dependable!” Clark said. “I’m discreet!”
Ignoring him, Monica glanced at his résumé and asked, “And you? How far along are you in your practice? I don’t see anything about it here.”
“My ‘practice’?”
“Yes.”
“Of what?”
“Of the Craft?” Her eyebrows were so dubiously raised under her bangs they had all but disappeared.
Clark nervously haha ed again. “Oh, that!”
Monica rolled her eyes.
“Um, well, I guess you could say I’ve always been kinda ‘spiritual.’ Actually, I’ve always had dreams that somehow seem to come true; insight I can’t explain; things happening around me—to me. I guess I’ve always been a bit intuitive , maybe since I was li—”
“I highly doubt that,” she said flatly. “Your mother, she isn’t a witch?” Incredulous, she asked, “You were brought up as one, were you not?”
“My mother? A witch? Um...I’m not so sure about that. My grandmother, my mom’s mom, maybe? She was a fiery woman, a figurehead to her community in her time, but I only know her through stories, of her—”
“So you haven’t assisted before?” Monica asked, cutting him off again.
“Assisted? Oh yeah, lots!” Clark could feel himself beginning to flush pink.
“Whom have you assisted?”
“Um, well, Patricia.”
“Patricia?” She narrowed her eyes, and the air seemed to become charged around her. “Really?”
Clark gulped. “Yeah. A ton.”
Monica enunciated every syllable and held herself very still. “And what have you assisted Patricia with?”
“Um, uh, well...” Clark stammered. He trailed away. Without a sound, the waiter appeared through the kitchen doors. He hurried to the landline on the wall, and Clark froze in disbelief at what he was witnessing: the phone was raised to the waiter’s ear, except his lips were moving and there was no sound emanating, none whatsoever. Clark realized he couldn’t hear a thing outside their table, nothing at all. His throat having gone dry, Clark took a gulp of water and, almost inhaling it, coughed and sputtered. “Is it just me or—”
“So let me get this straight,” Monica said, cutting him the deadliest of looks. “You don’t have a client book.”
He thought, A client book . . . ? Am I supposed to . . . ?! “Um, well, not really but—”
“You are not a practicing witch . . .”
“I think that depends on your definition of—”
“—you were not raised in the witching community—”
“Well, not exactly, but—”
“—and before today, you had not heard of me, nor Charisma Saintly.”
Clark blinked back at her. Suddenly he wasn’t so sure about any of this, and judging by the look on her face, neither was she. Clark could feel his cheeks and ears burn, and a prickling itch in the middle of his forehead.
“ Seriously? What, do you live under some kind of rock under the 59th Street Bridge? You must’ve crawled out from one to come here and waste my time, no doubt!”
Clark’s stomach just about fell into his groin. He backpedaled: “I’m sorry! The name rings a bell. Is she...a designer? I honestly don’t pay much attention to fashion or celebrities!”
At this, Monica’s lips slowly broke from pursed disdain into a gleeful smirk, one that did not quite reach those icy eyes and high-arched brows. This time, it was as if the entire world had stopped to listen to her speak, and as if everything was leaning in, even the walls.
“ For your information , Charisma Saintly is not only a megastar with a billion-dollar empire, but also the High Queen of All Witches, the Number One Witch in the World, and the most powerful of us all. She—along with us , her coven,” Monica hissed, “is behind the most powerful names alive today. If wealth could be measured in influence, she is certainly the richest woman in the world. Literally, she is the richest woman in the world, bar none, a gazillionaire, a goddess on Earth. Women and men alike worship the very ground she walks on. The Coven is one of her many businesses, and her most treasured. Under her rule, we lead an empire of witches around the globe, and most importantly, her throne here in New York, where I was somehow led to you. How you have not heard of her, let alone me, is beyond!”
Clark’s eyes were wide, his mouth sand, and his shirt clung to the small of his back in a cold sweat.
“Right now, as Charisma and her family are away on holiday, we are preparing for her return. September is a busy month, and upon that return, we, her team, will be meeting to discuss the rest of the year ahead. This is the job that a million girls would kill for— literally —and, well...” She stared dead at Clark, who stared back, mouth slightly agape, hanging on to every word. “We need someone quick.”
She waved her hand and snapped her fingers at the waiter, who reproachfully put the phone down.
“Yes?” he hissed once at their side.
“One coffee, iced, to go,” she said, “and a splash of milk.” She shot a look directly at Clark and added, “This coffee’s left a bad taste in my mouth.”
The waiter’s top lip curled and he appeared to be most displeased. “Certainly, Mrs. Chase-Whiteley.” As he left for behind the counter, Clark glanced at the untouched iced coffee, sweating onto the table.
“It is not an easy job by any means,” she said. “But it is the opportunity of a lifetime, one that could open many doors and change one’s life. Charisma changed mine. She launches stars. She could turn a rube into a ruler. You would be giving yourself to something bigger, something greater than yourself. Charisma knows what she wants when she wants it, exactly how she wants it, and she accepts nothing less than perfection...If you were right for the job, of course, which you most certainly are not.”
Clark gulped. A rube into a ruler . . . He had so many questions. Quick . . . he thought. Sell it.
“I love witches!” he blurted out. This time Clark’s mouth moved quicker than his mind. “Uh, I mean, women! I mean, witches! I mean—you know what I mean. I know all about them! I was practically raised by Hermione and the Sandersons! I know witches in books and in movies. I grew up collecting candles and crystals, and girls—around girls, not collecting them.” Clark was pretty sure there was spit collecting in the corner of his mouth. Monica was certainly giving him the most contemptuous of looks, knowing that this time he wasn’t lying: he was deranged.
Clark took a deep breath. “I might not know who Charisma is, or who you are, or much about how this whole...business works, for that matter,” he said, waving his arms around. “But I’m a hard worker, I’m a quick learner, and I’m never, ever late.” If life was a bunch of negotiations, Clark was not about to go down without a fight. It was this or the coffee shop.
Monica, however, had had enough. Seeing all that she needed, she swiveled around and grabbed her purse.
“It seems like a great opportunity!” Clark fawned. Something feels off about this... Still, Clark said almost reflexively, “I’d love to be in the run!”
Monica held up his résumé. Speaking slowly and enunciating every word as if talking to a fool, she asked, “Is this your phone number? Can you receive text messages at this number?”
“Yes, but...” he replied, looking down at his hand-me-down cellular and then up at her.
Monica folded the sheet crisply down the middle and stuffed it away. She stood.
“When would I start?” Clark asked, standing up with her.
“I’m all out of time for your silly questions,” she said, giving a curt half smile and a tilt of her head. She clasped up, and with a haughty toss of her hair, shouldered her purse and made for the exit.
“Okay, well, thank you for meeting with...me,” he called out, but it was too late. Monica had already sauntered away, muttering something about how some people should “sharpen pencils for a living.” She snatched her coffee from the waiter on her way out of that glass-front door and disappeared into a black town car that Clark realized had been lurking outside, all along.
The overhead lights flickered and the ambient noise of the city came rushing back like a wave crashing all around him. It was as if they had been sitting in a soundless vacuum the entire time, and it had been carried out in her huff.
The waiter appeared once again, watching the car drive off. “The bill, sir ,” he said in a cold, mocking English accent. He dropped it on the table and walked away. Clark’s face fell as he looked down.
Monica had left him to cover the check.
Clark stepped into the city heat wave. The blinding 58th Street sun bounded off its beige buildings, and, lost in thought, he made his way homeward. In the sweltering underground of the Fifth Avenue–59th Street Station awaiting the Astoria-bound N train, Clark did a quick internet search of Charisma Saintly. Just an hour ago, he’d had no idea big business around witchcraft could exist, let alone a network of witches and their witch queen. Was this for real?
“Designer ‘darling’ Charisma Saintly celebrates her 42nd birthday on the French Riviera with her family,” a headline read from just the day before, August 13. It was one of many.
One article from a couple of years prior proclaimed, “Charisma Saintly to divorce from second husband, Edgar Dortier, billionaire media proprietor and investor.”
Another read: “Charisma Saintly acquires one-of-a-kind, mega-million ‘air mansion’ of New York City’s Billionaire’s Row in heated divorce settlement.” A photo displayed a multilevel penthouse atop a skyscraper, complete with a giant deck and a mirrored glass tower, and flanked by “gothic stone gargoyles imported from an abandoned cathedral on the outskirts of Bucharest.”
One major publication caught Clark’s eye: “Charisma Saintly and the Renaissance of New York City.” Charisma was the cover star for the magazine’s latest publication in the coming month. “The Brit has invaded, and she’s taking over the world” :
Thanks to her successful empire of New York City-based, critically acclaimed restaurants, bars, and nightclubs—even her own church—Charisma Saintly, touted “Queen of the City,” is championed for bringing the return of glamour to New York, New York.
But that’s not how she got her start.
Just a decade ago, the beloved mother, billionaire, and multi-media mogul launched her namesake fashion line with a collection of twelve LBDs (that’s Little Black Dress to the rest of us) designed after her signature style, to a record-breaking debut.
Today her brand portfolio also spans home goods, beauty, and the launch of her first-ever fragrance—all of which continue to break sales records for women across all categories. There is no glass ceiling she can’t shatter, and nothing this woman can’t achieve.
“I love empowering women,” the style star emphatically shared during a sit-down at her posh, five-level penthouse. “I want to help all women look and feel their best. I love what I do, I’ve worked bloody hard for what I have, and I’m not going to stop!” We love a girl’s girl—read: a woman’s woman—who is unafraid to be ambitious.
For years, Saintly has been the name on the tongue of the rich and the famous the globe over, helping to style, brand, and market some of the biggest names of our time. Now, the tastemaker hopes to bridge the us-them club of celebrity and the everyday woman.
As she tours me through her living room, I’m quick to point out the many photos of her and her clients, the who’s who of politics and entertainment, all of whom call Charisma their best kept secret.
“Friends, my darling,” the trusted confidant corrects me. “These are all my very good friends.”
The five-level mega-home coined “air mansion” is the first of its kind in the West. It sits atop the tallest residential building in the world, overlooking a panoramic of the Tri-State area: a throne fit for a queen perched high above her queendom.
The penthouse spans approximately 18,000 square feet, with a whopping twelve bedrooms, seven baths, six fireplaces, three elevators, and a primary suite that takes up the entire top floor—a space off-limits to guests and cameras, the only part of the celebrity’s life that is, in fact. Fans can only hope to catch glimpses of the extravagant private quarters on the enigma’s social media, an insider’s view Saintly almost teasingly seldom features. Some secrets a woman just has to keep to herself.
The apartment even comes complete with a private spa, an entertainment center, an indoor swimming pool, two chef’s kitchens, and a 1,450-square-foot terrace—“For my parties, darling! I love to entertain.”
Want to be invited? Invitations to this queen’s parties are extravagant, coveted, exclusive, and infamously sent by private couriers for personal delivery to lucky attendees.
One of many homes, planes, yachts, and businesses spanning the globe, the apartment was awarded to Saintly in a heated and very public divorce settlement with her former husband, media tycoon Edgar Dortier.
Her most prized possession, however? Her children, of course.
“What matters first and foremost is always the children, keeping them safe, and keeping them happy,” she says, sharing a photo of Noble, 6, and Grace, 14. “They are my everything. The rest, like the penthouse, is just a bonus.”
Charisma Saintly’s life has splashed the public eye for much of this decade and more, and yet there is (still) so much myth and legend surrounding the icon and her namesake brand. Luckily for us, the curtain is steadily rising with the birth of social media, and Saintly is at the forefront.
Sure enough, her accounts draw in a following by the mega millions of well-engaged and dedicated fans across the globe. They dole hearts to photos of her and her fashion, her restaurants, and her sensationally glamorous work and travels.
“Your name has become so synonymous with glamour and empowerment and womanhood,” I point out, “it’s like we’ve always known you!” It’s true: Saintly is in the mind and heart of the modern woman, all around the world.
“I’ve always been here, darling!” the social media darling replies with a playful smirk. Saintly was surely the first to capitalize on style-to-celebrity-to-commerce, a feat both unparalleled and somehow, dare we say, so American. From her unmistakable style and golden-copper hair, to her emphatic, infectious way of speaking, Saintly can only be described as, well...charismatic! Simply put, she is famous for being famous, and for being Charisma.
“Like I always say, ‘Give a woman a little Charisma, and she can conquer the world,’” she shares with an infectious laugh. “We all need a little Charisma in our lives!” The social media darling adds, “The fans have been so special, really. I only hope to give back all the love.”
I ask the star, “What can we come to expect next?”
“First, it’s New York and fragrance,” she teases, holding up her debut luxury perfume, Charisma the Eau de Parfum. “Next, the world.”
It’s Charisma’s world, and we are all lucky to be living in it.
Clark’s train charged into the station in a gust of wind and creaking metal. “This is an Astoria-Ditmars-bound N train. Next stop, 59th Street–Lexington Avenue,” the crackling intercom announced. At the unmistakable ding-dong of the closing doors, Clark bookmarked the interview to finish later.
The captions on Charisma’s photogram gave Clark pause: big, splashy photos, all with a smile. With my friend so-and-so celebrity, they read. Clark did not have to keep up with celebrity culture—which he, of course, did not—to know that these A-list “friends” were the choicest of the A-list. Even Felicity, the sellout pop star-turned-actress Southern American he grew up idolizing, tagged her in a happy birthday post. The photo’s caption of the two read, “Charisma changed my life. I owe this wonderful woman so much. Happy birthday, my friend!”
Clark scratched at the middle of his forehead, which wildly itched. There was such familiarity about Charisma, and it wasn’t just her conspicuously copper hair that made Clark wonder if he had seen her face somewhere before. If only he could place where...
The next thing he knew, Clark was receiving advertisements for her first celebrity fragrance and her eponymous cosmetic range. Clark’s head was abuzz, swimming with words like “coven” and “internships” and “always cruelty-free.”
Nowhere, not in one article or caption or website, could he find the word “witch.”
But are they actual witches . . . ?
The train dipped and Clark lost service, rushing into the sloping tunnel under the East River, the great divider of the haves and the have-nots. On the other side, the train climbed above ground to Queensboro Plaza.
Even before rush hour, the platforms were packed with commuters, and every year increasingly so. With its easy proximity to the city, its relative affordability, and its access to the diverse foods of the World’s Borough of Queens, his hometown of Astoria was going gone: another victim, Clark reflected, lost to gentrification, commercialization, and transience, and quickly becoming the newest yuppie hot spot. The secret was out; the jig was up; and if he were being honest, maybe things had always been headed this way. Maybe he just wanted to keep it all to himself.
Even the air was different on his side of the tracks. There was a palpable taste of desire that flavored the hustle and bustle of New York City’s atmosphere—a polluted appetite, a wanting, a yearning that was never satiated. Here, however, the desperation of Manhattan and its fast-paced lifestyle was almost absent. Astoria, with its old-school, European charm and its longtime residents, had a slowness about it, an easier way of being. Still, New York was not a city for the soft.
Some minutes later, as Clark hopped off the train and down the stairs, passing a freshly burglarized laundromat swarmed with police and dancing lights, he noted that not even Astoria was immune to the growing tension of the times. Pandemics and super-weather, food shortages and a heating globe, the rising cost of living plus the onset of civil unrest and war: one could feel it all.
Down Newtown Avenue, past the bodega and up his sloping, tree-lined street, Clark bounded up the stairs of his prewar five-floor walk-up, into the respite of his tiny studio apartment. The quiet stillness and shrill ringing in his ears were drowned out with the push of a button on his ancient window air-conditioning unit. His interview attire, spotted in sweat, found itself on the hardwood floors.
To Clark, the studio was less of a “studio” and more like a bedroom. Even so, it was home. Its tall ceilings hugged exposed brick and drywall, coated over so many times over the years in thick, dripping paint that he sometimes called it his “papier-maché home.” The plants that filled the available floor and ceiling thrived under all the natural northern sun. It bounced off the neighboring buildings and storybook rooftops and in through the studio’s large windows, exposing an almost uninterrupted Astoria blue sky. Inside, Clark barely had enough space to stretch his arms.
To the left was an outdated white-refrigerator kitchenette, stove, and sink. In the middle of the studio sat his full-size bed, and next to it a bedside table holding the lava lamp his mother never let him have, the light switch of which he reached down for. It illuminated the single picture frame next to it: a mature woman with graying hair and an earnest smile. She was reading “The Frog Prince” to a little boy tucked into bed, beaming up at her with his stuffed animal frog cradled in his arms.
On the wall above the bed were posters of his favorite three witch sisters and girl-group pop stars (that part of the interview he at least hadn’t faked, he mused). To the right was a hand-me-down wooden dresser, and in the corner lived his wall-less, exposed “bathroom” of a clawfoot tub framed in old white subway tile, a toilet, and a pedestal sink.
As he peered into the mirror above the toilet, Clark thought, What just happened...? The entire ordeal had been so odd. No talk of scheduling, nor pay, just a desperate downward spiral. Boy, did she like to hear herself talk... He felt like he’d let Monica drive the entire conversation. He felt like he’d failed to impress. He felt like he’d blown his chance at something big.
The way she just walked away... Why hadn’t he just told her the truth from the get-go instead of fawning over her and playing along? He would email her a follow-up the next day—“Thank you for your time,” he would write. “I look forward to hearing back from you.” But what good would come of it... he questioned. Way to go, Clark...
In that mirror, he saw himself staring back just as he was. His five o’clock shadow, he reflected, came in patchy; his chest hair was sparse and scant. Clark stood just an inch shy of six feet, on the cusp of many an “almost”: tall, but not broad; cute, but not sexy; thin, but without much definition—and if he were being honest with himself, soft, owing to his proximity to coffee-shop pastries. Clark’s sallow olive skin cried out for a day off, out in the sun. His dark brown eyes were, well, brown, unless the sun hit his golden irises at just the right angle, framed by eyebrows he always thought a little too thick for his face. His jawline could have been sharper, and his shoulders could have been broader—they were narrow from a lifetime of playing small, he figured. Beauty marks freckled his entire body like stars he would draw constellations of as a child in marker and in pen. He would do anything to feel special, much to the distress of the adults around him. Mostly, Clark thought himself ordinary, or dare he even say “average,” one of his least favorite words after “boring.” Staring back in the mirror was a boy, not a man.
Looking into his eyes, Clark thought, Could be better ...He just wasn’t sure what to do about any of it. He wanted to muster up a smile, but instead, he broke away. At the microwave, Clark fired up a lunch—frozen chicken taquitos from the dollar store—trying his best to drown out his ruminations in the hum. He was so damn tired of living on those dollar-store taquitos.
Exactly a week before Halloween, Clark would turn twenty-four on the 24th of October, his golden birthday, an age he thought he would never reach. By that age, all of his high-school classmates and college peers had graduated and moved on to their high-powered careers, or gap years traveling to foreign beaches and overseas countries, or to marriages and babies and first-time mortgages—and otherwise onto their August vacations he could never afford, leaving him on his own in the big city for yet another summer in a row. That feeling crept up on him again like tears that wouldn’t come: Clark couldn’t help but feel behind in life. He felt so stuck .
He approached his bookcase, the shelves crowded with spine-cracked novels, tattered comic books and memorized fairy tales, and the creative chaos of many a tchotchke. Everywhere he looked, in fact, there was a memento, like a stuffed animal frog donned in a wizard’s hat and cloak. Clark picked him up and gave him a kiss.
“Hey, Froggie,” he whispered as he set him back down. “I tried.” I’ll get ’em next time . . . Promise . . .
His plushie sat a hero among many, in the company of the many stories he had amassed, of escapist adventures in faraway places, of school-going witches and wizards and the magic they wielded, of battles against evil villains and savage monsters, of brave souls and superhero underdogs who would face all the odds and rise to victory. They were reminders of his lack, beyond a wish, as much as they were of his dreams. Clark pulled a diary from the shelf.
Go to work, pay your bills, his pen seemed to write on its own.
Poor in money, rich in spirit. Sometimes I wish it were the other way around.
Eat, sleep, rinse, repeat.
Nothing is different.
Nothing changes.
You pay your rent and then you die . . .
The microwave beeped, the din of the refrigerator buzzed down, and the AC switched off to energy saver. Clark stood there in the stillness, listening to the commotion of his neighbors in the hallway, and the aboveground subway blowing by some blocks away. As he looked upon the little that he owned and the little he had accomplished since leaving home, he contemplated his own life story written. What would become of him?
Clark scarfed his meal and, once finished, sprawled over his bed for a nap.
Nightfall came slowly at the end of those long, hot August days.
Still, after he awoke, Clark pulled back his curtains and opened his window to the surprise of a mourning dove roosting on his fire escape. On evenings like these, when the heat had died down, he liked to climb up the banister to the rooftop. As Clark sat on the building’s ledge, he would catch those delicate moments of the sun setting behind New York’s long cityscape, a glittering horizon of light and labor, iron and glass, for miles north, south, and all around. The yellow fluorescent windows, and the LaGuardia airplanes in the blue sky above, were the city’s only visible stars. Watching them come out was his own private ceremonial.
That Thursday evening, Astoria was alight with the proletariat returned from their nine-to-fives, settling into their evenings. Clark was a voyeur to the all-too-familiar back-buildings and alleyways he peered down into, watching alley cats darting between parked cars while stray old ladies tended to their gardens and balcony plants. Flitting birds and squirrels ran across the branches and powerlines that lined those alleys and numbered streets, filled with rows of Tudors and prewar brick and modern homes. Their contemporary inhabitants did what those before them had always done: perch on their stoops and hang from their windows, or otherwise gather in their kitchens and at their tables or on their string-lighted patios, cutlery clinking, music streaming, family gathering. Here, he imagined what it would be like to be them. They were too preoccupied with their own immediate worlds to notice anybody else’s, never mind Clark’s watchful presence from high above.
The moon was out early that night, Clark reflected. Waxing crescent... It sat just beyond the liminal white-and-blue Robert F. Kennedy Bridge, some few blocks west on the East River. Its double-red eyes stared back at him as if the bridge were aware of Clark’s presence too: the ever-impenetrable watchtowers of Manhattan.
All seemed to remind him that even in a place like New York City, one could be surrounded by people above and below and yet still be very much alone.
Poor and purposeless, living in the best city in the world with little to no money to enjoy it, no prospects for better, no real plan, no real direction, no real skill or talent, as a single, housebroke, college dropout: Clark asked himself what the point of any of this was. Will I ever amount to anything...? The light of day waned and dimmed.
Blue summer sky turned to orange, pink, and violet, giving way to the velvet cusp of twilight until the sun had descended behind the city and all was a melancholy “Astoria blue,” as he called it: periwinkle, indigo, and gray, like the bugleweed at Astoria Park some blocks away. He let the buzz of the world wash over him, its shadow swallowing him up in a daze of despondency. Some evenings, he would lie there, just staring up at the sky, letting the night fall onto him and the rooftop turn black as the Earth spun without him. Maybe in his dejectedness, he was the most alive. Nowhere to go but up, nowhere to be but now. A nobody. A nothing...
Clark looked up to those shimmering towers he was on the outskirts of, of the world he so longed to be a part of. He wiped his eyes, and a single dark eyelash came away, resting on his finger amongst the salty wet. Make a wish, dork...
On that moon above him, on that starless sky and the city’s lights that twinkled in their stead, on all those stories at home below, on all the joy and the pain he had lived through, with all his heart and soul, under the watchful eyes of the RFK Bridge, Clark made a wish that he was going to do whatever it took to make it, to change, to rise to the occasion, to his highest potential, no matter what the cost or the sacrifice, to make a life worth living. He knew he wanted more than to just survive, and more than the taste of freezer burn on his dollar-store taquitos. Clark wanted so desperately to be free of the trappings of his working-class life.
He inhaled, poised to blow, when a gust of wind lifted that eyelash clear off his finger. It vanished in an instant, gone to the night air.
Awesome . . . Clark thought to himself. Love that . . .
Curiously , one of those blinking city lights somehow buzzed up over the ledge and onto the roof. Slowly it began to meander toward him. The light landed on Clark’s outstretched palm, a solitary firefly, before flying into the air and disappearing up and over that ledge again. Clark wiped his cheeks and hoped that nobody could see.
Once the crickets were chirping and the roof had plunged to dark, when the cloak of night had been well lowered, Clark stood up and dusted himself off. Down the ladder of the fire escape and through his open window he climbed, into his papier-maché hideaway. A long hot shower washed away all the dismay the day had brought.
He didn’t pick up a book or write in his journal that night. Instead, he put on that show about that vampire slayer he had seen a million times and crawled into his cool sheets, where an early, deep, dreamless sleep came fast.
The next day was Friday, and Clark’s second day off from the coffee shop.
He lay awake in bed, staring up at the ceiling. His circadian rhythm was telling him he should already be on his millionth pour of coffee into those blue-and-white disposable cups that proclaimed, “We are happy to serve you.”
Instead of rolling over and falling back asleep, however, he checked his phone. It was a quarter past six. There, a text message made Clark’s stomach drop in shock. A text message that would forever change his life as he had come to know it:
(3:03 a.m. unknown number): 2 W 57th Street. 7:00 a.m. Be on time. —Monica.