The Fifth Avenue Artists Society

To my daughter, Alevia

There are moments when a man's imagination, so easily subdued to what it lives in, suddenly rises above its daily level and surveys the long windings of destiny.

—
EDITH WHARTON
,
The Age of Innocence

The Society attracted all sorts of artists to the grand drawing room on Fifth Avenue. It wasn't the want for fame that drew them there—though some certainly became known—or even the anticipation of improvement. Instead, it was the realization that for some, true art, great art, is not won in solitude. It must first be lived.

—
JAMES LAUGHLIN,
The Society

S
omeone's coming.” My best friend Charlie's lead-smudged fingers grabbed mine, stopping my pencil. A floorboard creaked beyond the door to his family's home library. I curled my shoulders, tucking my chin into the red soutache collar trimming of my cotton dress and folding my legs further into the cabinet. The paper in my lap crinkled and Charlie's hand clamped around my palm.

“Ginny, Charlie, I know you're in there. I've checked everywhere else.” The brass doorknob began to jiggle.

“It's Frank,” I hissed, as if Charlie didn't already know we'd appointed my twin brother the designated seeker. Charlie glared at me, willing my silence. He and I had always played hide-and-seek reluctantly—until we'd discovered the vacant cabinet below one of the walls of bookshelves in his library a month ago. Since then, we'd encouraged the game. We always emerged the victors—much to the chagrin of Charlie's younger brother, George, and my siblings—and it gave us time to work on our contribution to the Mott Haven Centennial Time Capsule without interruption. Just
today, we'd played five games, buying us three hours to finish our illustrated story on Bronx history before the time capsule was interred at six.

“Come on,” George's five-year-old voice whined. “The rules state that you have to hide where we can find you. A locked door doesn't count.” Our brothers had joined together to find us. One of them swiveled the door handle again. Charlie shook his head.

“It's not locked,” he whispered. “Sometimes the jamb sticks. And don't they know they're breaking the rules, too? There can't be more than one seeker.” The smack of a bony hip pounded into the wood, followed by another. The hinge rattled, threatening to give way. Pressing my story to my chest, I flattened against the corner of the cabinet. I breathed through my mouth. Mrs. Aldridge just had the bookshelves French polished and the pungent scent of shellac stung my nostrils.

“I give up,” George said. “I'm hungry and thirsty and my parents have already taken the sandwiches next door.”

“I
will
get in,” Frank growled, unfazed by George's surrender. His fist pounded into the door, followed by another series of bodily blows. We couldn't let Frank find us. Our hiding place would be lost forever.

“Come on, Frank.” George tried to dissuade him once again. “Your mother probably has your lawn all set for the picnic and I'm sure your father and sisters are starved. It isn't polite to keep them waiting.” Frank was silent. George exhaled and I could hear him withdraw into the foyer.

“Charlie,” I whispered. Frank slammed himself into the door and it finally gave, sputtering open in a series of resigned groans. Charlie slowly lowered his drawing pad from his lap, setting his pencil across the finished depiction of George Washington's stay at the nearby Van Cortlandt Mansion. He pulled the cabinet doors shut, blotting out the summer sunlight and the back of Mr. Aldridge's leather sofa.

Frank's footsteps came closer. Neither of us moved. I barely breathed. Finally, I heard him stop and yawn.

“Honestly, if you're in here, wherever you are, I give up. Everybody's out on the lawn eating and George has likely already drunk all of Mother's lemonade like he did on Memorial Day.” Charlie didn't budge, though my mother's lemonade was his favorite. We both knew Frank's cunning. My brother sighed, waited for a moment, and retreated from the room, his boots clopping toward the foyer. The minute the front door slapped into place, Charlie flung the cabinet open.

“Is your story finished?” he asked hurriedly. I nodded, glancing over my slanted cursive, hoping it was perfect. Charlie snatched the paper from my grasp, pressed it atop his drawing, and started to climb out of our hiding spot. “If my brother's consumed the last of the lemonade, I'll throttle him.”

“Wait,” I said, catching the tail of his suit. “You haven't read my story and we haven't signed our names to it.” Charlie huffed and flattened the pages on a shelf below a row of
Encyclopaedia Britannica
s and my favorite book, Washington Irving's
A History of New York
.

“I'm sure it's magnificent,” he said hurriedly.
By Charles and Virginia
, he scribbled at the conclusion of my story. Then, recalling he hadn't written our surnames, he leaned down and scrawled
Aldridge
. I waited for him to realize his mistake, to add my last name, but he didn't. Instead, he gathered our story in his hand and glanced at me. When our eyes met, his cheeks flushed, and I felt my own face burn. Had he meant to leave it off?

“Are you coming?” His gaze broke from mine and he walked toward the door, toward our families and Mother's lemonade.

I allowed myself to whisper it only once before I followed him.

Virginia Aldridge.