Amy Falls Down (38 page)
“A real diagnosis of what?”
“A fatal pulmonary whatsit, not cancer. My lungs are turning into glass, okay? They stopped, though. They’re half-glassed.”
“You don’t cough anymore.”
“I quit smoking. Thanks for reminding me.”
Amy decided to believe her. She needed an undying Maxine. “Listen,” she said. “I don’t want to be a TV personality. I mean it. I hate the whole damn thing. I really do.”
“Good,” said Maxine. “You’re a nine-day wonder and you’ve had maybe seven days. This is smart. Leave them wanting more. I was worried I’d have to talk you down.”
“I thought you knew me.”
“I do know you, but I’ve known a few others who got blinded by the headlights and lost their way. Remember Hetty Mant? She had another four-five bestsellers in her, but she flamed out on
The Match Game.
Hey, are you crying?
”
“Not anymore,” said Amy. She explained about Tiffany’s mashup and how depressing it had all been. “I had a goddamn epiphany,” she said. “I hate when that happens. It was grisly, Maxine, but I feel much better now.” She did. Yes, her life was a poor stunted mess of missed chances, and yes, she had played to lose, and yes, there was nothing to be done about it now. She felt sad, but not numb. Hollow, but not empty.
Maxine talked books. Amy was going to make enough on the
Malignant Creativity
advance to support herself modestly for the next three years. They discussed what Amy was working on now, the new stuff, the possible novel, and she agreed in principle to another non-televised tour sometime in the distant future. “You keep writing, you won’t have to do anything else unless you want to. You can quit the online gig if you like. Up to you. Gotta go.”
“Maxine? Was all this worth it? For you, I mean. All the work, all the machinations, the reservations and the bookings and the plots and the Byzantine mind games and, well, putting up with me, let’s face it—”
“You’re kidding, right?” She sounded miffed. “That was the most fun I’ve had in thirty years. We’re a goddamn team, babe!”
* * *
She went to fix herself a drink, then realized she was wide awake and not ready to wind down. She put on the coffee and joined Alphonse in the raised garden. For December the night was balmy. She sat down on the wall beside him and listened to him crunch on something. His brow was shiny in the moonlight and mostly white now. He had just about lost one of his three colors, the chestnut washed out with age. Basset hounds were not noted for longevity. The thought that he would die sooner rather than later was unbearable, except that it wasn’t, because everything was bearable. We are built for suffering, she knew; we do it well. But to do it right now, when everything was excellent, would be silly. When Max got sick she had suffered strenuously, tormenting herself through sleepless nights as though grief could be prepaid in installments. But what if you could? she wondered. What if you could bank pain in some repository, like a Christmas Club, parceling it out in tidy packets while you’re young and strong. This was a vapid idea for a story, but it stuck anyway. There was something usable in it, some tiny thing.
There was something too, much larger, in the shabby spectacle of her televised image, which had indeed been
she
but not
self.
There was a difference between the two, and it bore exploration. As did a lifetime spent not waiting in the wings but living there, refusing the light, finessing the drama. All about her, in the night sky, in the garden shadows, hid the children she had never had, the people she had never touched, mapping out a vast flickering network of missed connections. There was something in a life lived barely.
“We are willful creatures,” she told her dog, surprising him into an upward glance. She could see the moon in both his eyes. “We have work to do,” she told him. Together they rose and made their way through the dark to the back door of her bright little house.
ALSO BY JINCY WILLETT
Jenny and the Jaws of Life
Winner of the National Book Award
The Writing Class
About the Author
JINCY WILLETT is the author of
Jenny and the Jaws of Life, Winner of the National Book Award,
and
The Writing Class,
which have been translated and sold internationally. Her stories have been published in
Cosmopolitan, McSweeney’s Quarterly,
and other magazines. She frequently reviews for
The New York Times Book Review.
Willett spends her days parsing the sentences of total strangers and her nights teaching and writing—sometimes, late at night, in the dark, she laughs inappropriately.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.
AMY FALLS DOWN.
Copyright © 2013 by Jincy Willett. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
Cover design by Steve Snider
Cover illustration by Goran Rusinovic
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Willett, Jincy.
Amy falls down / Jincy Willett. — First edition.
pages cm
ISBN 978-1-250-02827-3 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-02828-0 (e-book)
1. Women authors—Fiction. 2. Life change events—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3573.I4455A81 2013
813'.54—dc23
2013004051
e-ISBN 9781250028280
First Edition: July 2013