Erasure (39 page)

“Pleased to meet you, Stagg,” Morgenstein said. “This is my girl Friday, Cynthia.”

“Oh, I can’t tell you what a privilege this is. To meet an author of your notable station.” She giggled a high-pitched giggle.

“Well, sit down, have a seat, have a seat.”

Stagg sat and tried to see the man in the dim light from behind his shades. Morgenstein was heavier than he had imagined, dressed casually in a tee-shirt beneath a blazer. And Cynthia was no more his assistant than Stagg was a real person. The young woman was nearly wearing a strained piece of fabric around what were, no doubt, enhanced breasts.

“Sorry about the table inside here and all, but, hell, I’m fat and I need air conditioning.” Morgenstein laughed.

Stagg did not.

“You’re not all that fat, Wiley,” Cynthia said.

Morgenstein ignored her comment. “Your editor was shocked that I was getting a meeting with you. Thanks for coming. Would you like something to drink?” He was already summoning the waiter. “Hey, I love that damn novel. I laughed my ass out. Oh, it’s sad too, don’t get me wrong. And real as hell. We can just lift the dialogue right out of the book.” The waiter arrived. “What’ll you have?” Morgenstein asked Stagg.

“A Gibson,” Stagg said.

Morgenstein struggled through a frown and continued. “You know I would have paid for the damn novel even if you refused to meet with me. I just decided to see what would happen. Three mil talks, don’t it?”

“Yes, indeed,” Stagg said.

Morgenstein offered a puzzled look to his young friend. “You know, you’re not at all like I pictured you.”

“No? How did you picture me?”

“I don’t know, tougher or something. You know, more street. More …”

“Black?”

“Yeah, that’s it. I’m glad you said it. I’ve seen the people you write about, the real people, the earthy, gutsy people. They can’t teach you to write about that in no college.” He turned his face to Cynthia. “Can they, sugar.”

Stagg nodded a cool nod.

“Hey, look at the menu and see what you want,” Morgenstein said. “This is all right, isn’t it. I had a hell of time picking a place. I was reading the book again on the plane and I thought about meeting at Popeye’s.” Morgenstein laughed. Cynthia wrapped her fingers around his arm and laughed, too. “See anything you like?”

“I think so.”

The waiter came back with the Gibson and waited for their orders.

“Me and the lady will have big steaks, medium and whatever else you bring with that. But no butter on the potatoes. Ranch dressing on the salads. Stagg?”

“I’ll start with the carrot and ginger soup. That’s served cold, isn’t it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I don’t see it on the menu, but I’d like just a plate of fettucini and a little olive oil and Parmesan.”

“Not a problem, sir.” The waiter looked to Morgenstein. “Wine?”

Morgenstein looked to Stagg.

“Anything you like,” Stagg said.

“Bring us a red wine,” Morgenstein said. As the waiter collected the menus and left, the fat man turned to his date with a troubled expression. To Stagg, “You know, you really ain’t at all what I expected.”

“We went over that. Why did you want to meet?” The tough act was working. Stagg saw a slight recoil of fear in Morgenstein.

“No reason in particular.”

They sat quietly for a while. Cynthia whispered something to Morgenstein, then giggled again. She played with a lock of her blonde hair and looked at him, her head tilted.

“So, you’ve done some time,” Morgenstein said. “I almost went to the joint, but my Uncle Mort got me off. It was a bum rap anyways, some kinda interstate commerce shit. What’d you do?”

Here Stagg was faced with a dilemma. So far, his only lie had been to answer to his name. Even owning up to having written the
damn novel
was honest enough. “They say I killed a man with the leather awl of a Swiss army knife.” The qualifier
they say
was a stroke and Stagg smiled to himself, a move that served to underscore the quality of his crime.

Morgenstein stiffened briefly, then seemed relieved. “Here I was about to think you weren’t the real thing.” He laughed with Cynthia, who was now eyeing Stagg quite differently. She seemed to crawl behind the fat man, but at the same time smiled coyly at Stagg, her gaze focused on, no doubt, her reflection in his dark lenses.

“I’m the real thing,” Stagg repeated. “Cynthia knows I’m the real thing. Don’t you, Cindy.”

Cynthia squirmed.

“Yeah,” Morgenstein laughed nervously.

The salads and Stagg’s soup came. Stagg took two tastes of the soup and pushed the bowl aside.

“Don’t you like it?” Morgenstein asked.

“Yes, it’s quite good. It’s exactly what I wanted.” Stagg smiled again at Cynthia, then to Morgenstein, “I’m afraid I have to run now. I have to pay a visit to a convalescence home.”

“Community service? I had to do that once. What a pain in the fucking ass. Little brats.”

“It was a pleasure.” Stagg reached across the table and shook the man’s fat paw, nodded to Cynthia.

“Hey, do you have a number here in town where I can reach you?” Morgenstein asked.

Stagg looked at the man for a couple of seconds, then laughed a cool laugh before walking away.

Behold the invisible!

Stagg found that the world changed for him during the elevator ride down to the lobby and in the lobby he was confronted with a huge poster, a colorful confusion of shapes which asked the question:

Did Julian Schnabel Really Exist?

He wandered to a next sign:

What does the Avante Garde?

To another:

One Man’s Graffiti is Another Man’s Writing on the Wall

Stagg was confused, angry. Outside, he scratched the dark glasses from his face and disappeared.

The afternoon turned cool and a gentle rain fell. I watched people make their way into the building while I sat by Mother’s bed. She was asleep. We listened to a Brahm’s symphony, number 2 or 3. She always liked it more than I.

I thanked my parents on more than one occasion for not raising me Catholic. I was thirteen the final time and they finally responded to me by saying, “We’re not Catholic, dear.” The
dear
was supplied by Mother.

“Oh, I know that,” I said. I stopped at the door and turned back. “That was a different thank you from my thank you for not raising me as a Christian.”

“Oh, we know that,” Father said.

“Why do you thank us for that?” Mother asked.

“Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît point,”
Father said.

“I know my reasons,” I said.

“Good boy,” Father said.

“Vive le roi,”
I said.

Father laughed. Mother had already turned back to her book.

I recalled the stupid fight that had ended my brief, and no doubt short-lived-anyway, relationship with Marilyn. It was not her lack of taste or possession of questionable taste that caused me to make a scene upon finding that awful novel by her bedside. I reacted because the book reminded me of what I had become, however covert. And that was an overly ironic, cynical, self-conscious and yet faithful copy of Juanita Mae Jenkins, author of the runaway-bestseller-soon-to-be-a-major-motion-picture
We’s Lives In Da Ghetto.

Not only my situation but my constitution seemed to make me an unsuitable candidate for the most basic of friendships, new or old, and romantic involvement seemed nearly ridiculous to me. Perhaps my outburst with Marilyn was as much a well-timed retreat as it was an expression of snobbish literary outrage.

My agent was not so much angry as he was amazed by my demand that the title of the novel be changed to
Fuck.
He asked me if I was crazy and I reminded him that he thought I was crazy when I first suggested he send
My Pafology
out.

“You’ve got a point,” he said. “Still, don’t you think you’re pushing it just a bit?”

“Not really. This thing is in fact a work of art for me. It has to do the work I want it to do.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“Maybe.”

“I don’t think they’re going to let you do it. Why not
Hell
or
Damn?
Why
Fuck?”
I could hear him shaking his head.

“That’s the title I want.”