The Smart One (24 page)

“Were you able to help him?” Clare asked.

Joey dug her hands into the front pockets of her jeans. “I think so,” she said. “He knew God hadn’t abandoned him. He just needed to hear it.”

“I’m really proud of you,” Clare said, and gave Joey a hug. Then they both looked at me to see if I would join in the lovefest.

I rolled my eyes. “If you break into a rousing chorus of ‘Amazing Grace,’ I’ll push you into moving traffic.”

Joey put one arm around me, the other around Clare, and started to sing.

When your heart and your ego have been shattered by a man you thought might have loved you, there are worse things you can do than go out on a date with a guy who’s hung up on your beautiful older sister. For instance, you can agree to have the date at a romantic seaside restaurant, where you feel compelled to go through the motions and pretend you’re having a wonderful time. Or worse, after dinner you can accompany the guy to a club where his friend is playing the guitar for a band that covers seventies classics, and then endure an hour-long conversation with the friend, who’s more interested in finding out what it’s like to be Joey Bloom’s sister than in anything about you. Worst of all, you can end the date by inviting the guy inside and sleeping with him.

I’d like to say that being the smart one, I’d never do any of that. But alas, that’s exactly where I found myself. It wasn’t that the sex was bad, it’s just that I was having a hard time concentrating. Maybe it was the slice of chocolate cheesecake in the refrigerator. That can be mighty distracting. Leo seemed to be having a grand old time, but my mind kept going back to the cheesecake, thinking about padding downstairs in my bathrobe after we were done. If Leo fell sound
asleep afterward, which I suspected he might, I could have it all to myself.

“Feels so good,” he said.

“So good,” I echoed.

“God, I’m close!”

I closed my eyes and took a mental walk around the kitchen. Did I have any decaf in the house?

Jonathan, my ex, thought that decaf was the great Satan of hot beverages, and it pissed him off that it had become the default coffee at catered events. “It’s not
coffee
,” he would say. “They shouldn’t call it coffee.” And he would go off for an hour on how it was symptomatic of the great dumbing down of our society, how everything became blander and more diluted so as not to challenge the lowest rungs of taste and sensibilities.

I wondered if Jonathan was still sleeping with Savannah, and if they had any little schizophrenic artist babies crawling around the loft, making statements with their rice cereal. Jonathan and I didn’t talk much about having a baby. I just always assumed the day would come. Most of our city friends who had kids waited until they were pushing forty, so I never felt tremendously rushed. After the divorce, I spent a few weeks in near panic worrying about my biological clock. Then I came to the decision that I was not going to let it become an obsession like it did for so many of my friends. So I made a pact with myself that if I wasn’t married by age thirty-nine, I could have a baby on my own. It went a long way toward taking the pressure off.

Still, there was a part of me that measured every guy with the father yardstick. Leo loved kids and would probably make a splendid dad one day. The thought of it made me project the possibility onto the flat-screen TV in my mind. If I stayed in New York and took that art teacher job, would Leo and I keep
dating? Could I see marrying this guy? Would that be too weird for Clare? I imagined a life where I took up a hobby that I could do while having sex. Scrapbooking came to mind.

“Almost there!” he cried.

Thank God. I wasn’t getting any younger. And if I was going to stick to any sort of a plan about getting on with my life—starting with that chocolate cheesecake—we’d have to wrap this up. Fortunately, I could tell Leo was just about there and then…the phone rang.

Shit. The last thing this guy needed was a distraction. With his ADD it would derail him entirely. To my surprise, however, it had the opposite affect. His concentration increased. Leo grimaced and cried out, “The phooooone!”

He was done.

I felt like throwing a party. A chocolate cheesecake party.

“Are you going to get that?” he said, the very second he recovered. I thought he was kidding, but Leo rolled off me, picked up the phone, and handed it to me.

“Are you still mad at me?” said the voice on the other end. It was Kenny. I pulled the sheet over myself and sat up, looking at the clock.

“Why are you calling so late?”

“I’m at the airport—catching a late flight to New York.”

“You’re coming back?”

“I have news, Bev.
Letterman
called today. They’re making me an offer. I’m flying in for a meeting tomorrow.”

“I’m happy for you.” It wasn’t a lie. I wished him well. I just needed him out of my heart and out of my life.

“Listen, they’re taking me out to lunch and I’d like you to join us.”

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”

“They told me I could invite someone.”

“It’s not that. It’s…”

“C’mon, Bev. You’re going to have to forgive me sooner or later.”

Leo rolled over next to me and started snoring softly.

“I’m sorry. I can’t.”

“If you change your mind, we’ll be at Nonny’s on West Fifty-seventh Street at one o’clock.”

“I won’t change my mind.”

Leo coughed.

Kenny paused for a moment and I felt a chill. “Is someone there with you?” he asked.

I hesitated, thinking about whether I should tell him the truth. On the one hand, it would surely end things between us. On the other hand, it was the cruelest way to do it. I drew in a breath.

“Yes,” I said, “there’s someone here with me.”

I waited for him to respond. Nothing.

“Hello?” I said. “Are you there?”

All I heard was the sound of him breathing, and then a gentle click.

Leo was still there the next morning when Linda Klein, the realtor, called with some news. Apparently, the Goodwins were still interested enough in the Waxmans’ house to hire an engineer to evaluate it. It was, she said, a miracle that someone would be willing to buy a house that was the scene of a murder, and that we should “bend over backward” to accommodate them. The reason Linda called me was that she needed Renee’s permission to let the engineer make his inspection, but every time she called the number in Florida she got disconnected. Sam, I figured, must have been intercepting the call and hanging up on her. I told her I would get right on it.

Sure enough, when I called the Waxmans’ home Sam picked up on the first ring. I pictured him sitting on a floral sofa with the phone on his lap, not letting anyone near it.

“It’s Bev Bloomrosen,” I said. “I need to talk to my mother. It’s important.” I was being cagey. I thought if I asked to speak to my mother he might pass the phone, whereas if I asked for Renee he’d likely hang up.

“Who is this?” he said.

“Harold and Bernadette’s daughter.”

“The rock star?”

“
Uh…
yes.” I thought it might be best not to argue.

“I saw you in that video. You looked like a whore.”

“Can you just put my mom on the phone?”

“Are you calling about that damned key again?”

“My sister already found it,” I lied, guessing Joey had tried to get him to tell her where the key to the storage unit was. I figured I might as well play along. Perhaps he was ready to give something up.

“It’s fifteen, four, thirty-two,” he said.

“What? What does that mean?”

“The combination. You don’t need any damned key.”

“It’s a combination lock?” I said as I scrambled for a pencil and paper. “Fifteen, four, thirty-two? Is that right?”

“Who is this?”

“It’s Beverly, Mr. Waxman.”

“You’re not Harold’s daughter!”

“I am, don’t you remember? You gave me the Santa Claus ornament?”

“Clare,” he said.

“No, that’s my older sister. I’m Bev. I was just in Florida with you.”

“The car accident.”

“That’s right.”

“He should have let you burn. I told him to. I said ‘Let that bitch burn!’ But he wouldn’t listen.”

I shuddered, thinking about the police officer risking his life to save me while Sam screamed from behind that he should let me burn. In fact, I almost remembered it. I could almost hear Sam’s voice in the background.

“Is my mother there?” I asked. “I need to speak to my mother.”

After breakfast, Leo and I got in his van and headed over to the storage facility to see if the combination Sam had given me would work on the lock. Maybe it was just my own eagerness, but I had a strong feeling about it. I was close to holding an actual sample of Lydia’s handwriting that I could compare to the letter. The thought was at once terrifying and exciting. I wanted the truth, I
needed
the truth.

I told Leo to go straight at the light and he continued accelerating as if he didn’t notice that it was red. I forgot he had that terrible habit of stopping short, and I once again slammed my foot down against an imaginary brake. My heel felt sore as I did it, as if I had injured it recently. When the van halted with a jerk, I remembered, in a vague sense, that I had slammed my foot down like that recently, only I had done it hard enough to hurt myself. When was that? I closed my eyes for a moment and envisioned it. I had been in the backseat of a car. Of course—it was the accident. Kenny had been driving and I was behind him with Renee.

When the light turned green and Leo stomped on the gas, the whole thing played back for me, as if the memory had been there all the time. Sam had grabbed the steering wheel, sending us off the road. I remembered seeing trees slap the windows and feeling like we went airborne. That must have been when the car flipped completely over, landing back on its tires. I must have passed out then, and when I came to, someone was shouting to me.
Bev! Bev!
I tried to ignore him and drift back into the black sleep, but he wouldn’t let me.
The car’s on fire!
He pulled at me. I looked down and saw flames. Sam was standing off by the side of the road, shouting for him to leave me alone, to let me burn, but he wouldn’t. He reached in through the window and grabbed me. My leg was stuck and I couldn’t get out. I screamed.
Don’t worry
, he said. He put his arms under mine and tugged hard, but I was
jammed. The interior seemed to light up then, and I realized it was because high flames shot up from the hood. I was terrified. People started shouting that everyone needed to back away from the car before the gas tank exploded. I thought he was going to leave me, then. I remembered thinking,
This is not how I want to die
.

The man pulled even harder and I tried to wriggle free, but it was useless—the front seat had fallen to the floor and pinned my foot.
It won’t come out!
He told me not to worry, that he wouldn’t leave me, and pulled so hard I heard something on his body pop. I thought it was over then. I was ready to die.

“Just go!” I said, but he didn’t. And then, the floor under my foot burned away, freeing me. With his one good arm, he pulled me out. I was okay. The man in the blue shirt had saved me. But of course, it wasn’t a police officer. It was Kenny. That was how he dislocated his shoulder—saving my life.

I looked at my watch. “I have to go to the Gotham,” I said to Leo.

“What?”

“I mean the city. I have to go to Manhattan. I have to catch the next train.”

“Why? I thought we were going to the storage place.”

“Just drive me to the train station!” I yelled. “I have to be someplace. I have to get to Nonny’s by one o’clock.”

As I sat by the window on a Long Island Rail Road train heading toward Penn Station, watching homes and the back end of local industry fly by, I worried about getting to the city in time to meet Kenny and the
Letterman
people having lunch. I was cutting it awfully close.

But I was more worried about whether I could get him to forgive me. Kenny had risked his life to save me. And what did I give him in return? Distrust, condemnation, even vindictiveness.

Yes, Kenny’s temper was a bear, and sometimes it got the better of him. But he wrestled it relentlessly. In fact, when he hung up on me the night before, I could feel him caging the beast. Despite his hurt that I had slept with another man, he kept his rage to himself, protecting me.

I needed to blow my nose and looked in my handbag for a tissue. Finding none, I resorted to wiping my nose with the back of my hand. I didn’t want to cry. But the tears spilled. After a few minutes a woman across the aisle and a row back approached, holding out a travel pack of tissues.

I took one and thanked her. She tried to hand me the whole pack.

“That’s okay,” I said.

She held onto the back of the seat as the train swayed. “I have more,” she said.

I accepted it. “Thanks.”

She looked like she was ready to head back to her seat, but hesitated. I could tell she wanted to know why I was crying.

“A man?” she asked.

I nodded.

“He hurt you?”

I thought about that for a second. “I hurt
him
.”

“Then why are you the one crying?”

“I don’t know.”

She shrugged and went back to her seat. In fact, I did know. I was mad at myself and didn’t know what else to do with the anger. It was, I knew, typically female to turn fury into sadness. Just like it was typically male to turn sadness into fury.

The windows of the train went black as we passed through the tunnel beneath the East River. We’d reach Penn Station in a matter of minutes. I looked at my watch. It was later than I thought. I wished I could get the train to move faster.

Choosing to take a taxi from Penn Station instead of the subway was a mistake. I thought I was doing myself a favor by ascending to the fresh air of Seventh Avenue, but I’d forgotten that there were two kinds of summer days in Manhattan—the oppressive and the unbearable. Today was the latter.

There were about a hundred people waiting on the taxi line, so I decided to start walking uptown and hail a cab on the way. The air seemed almost completely devoid of oxygen, and the sky was dark enough to threaten rain. But there’d been nothing in the forecast about it, so I hoped I was safe.

At Thirty-ninth Street, I felt a few drops. I looked up hoping to determine that they were drips from an air conditioner. By
the time I crossed Fortieth Street, the sky opened in an angry torrent, and I dashed under an awning with a dozen other people. Water poured from the overhang in sheets, bouncing against the pavement and soaking our shoes. It seemed like the kind of downpour that might pass quickly, but even so, I didn’t have the time to spare. I peered down Seventh Avenue to see if there might be an available taxi. The street was thick with the yellow cars, but none were vacant. And then, a miracle as welcome and spectacular as the Red Sea parting happened right before my eyes. A taxi slowed and stopped about ten feet from me, discharging a passenger. I made a mad dash, pretending I didn’t see the old woman with a walker inching her way toward it. I forced myself not to feel bad about it. After all, I was in a hurry. She was probably on her way to a doctor for something malignant that was going to kill her regardless.

Okay, so Manhattan brings out the beast in me.

Traffic was a nightmare, and when we finally reached Nonny’s, I overtipped the driver and sprinted to the curb. Standing beneath the restaurant’s awning, I opened my purse and took out a compact mirror to survey the damage. I guessed I didn’t look too bad for someone with wet hair plastered to her head and mascara dripping down her cheeks. I cleaned up the best I could and applied fresh lipstick. I looked inside the restaurant and saw Kenny sitting at a large table with David Letterman and a group I assumed was the writing staff. My heart started to pound in something like a panic attack. I tended to get stupid and tongue-tied around celebrities. Once, when Joey’s career was at its peak, she dragged me to a barbecue in the Hamptons with her. She had neglected to mention that it was at Billy Joel’s house, and I got so flustered that I spent the first hour holding onto a glass of wine and trying not to let anybody see my hands shake. I was in the process of put
ting it down on a table when a man brushed by and said “Excuse me.” When I saw who it was, I dropped the glass and it crashed against the patio.

Billy Joel put his hand on my shoulder. I could smell his aftershave, the gin on his breath. “These parties never get started until someone breaks the first glass,” he said kindly, and then signaled for someone to come over and clean it up.

I opened my mouth to respond and nothing came out. I spent the rest of the party hiding in the bathroom.

But that was not going to happen today. I’d be charming and normal. I’d tell David Letterman it was nice to meet him. I’d smile at Kenny and, with any luck, he’d smile back and invite me to sit down. Or maybe not. One thing I knew for sure: I was going to think before I uttered a single word. I would not risk being embarrassed by an attack of dysphasia.

Showtime,
I thought, and pushed open the door. I walked toward the table, fixed on Kenny. God, he looked handsome. He felt me staring and glanced up. I guess the wet hair threw him for a second, because it took a moment for a flash of recognition to show in his face.

“Bev,” he said, getting up.

David Letterman rose too, and I took a long, slow breath, trying to oxygenate my extremities, which were going numb. Every head at the table turned to face me. I went all pins and needles at that point. Calming down was out of my reach.

“I’d like you meet the freshly watered Bev Bloomrosen,” Kenny announced.

The talk show host—looking thinner and tanner in person than he did on TV—flashed his iconic gap-toothed smile and extended his hand. “Lovely to see you,” he said, as if I were a guest on his panel.

I was so flummoxed at the idea of standing before him in the flesh, blood and three dimensions, I went white. Smile, I
told myself, and I think my face obeyed. I took his hand, and he kept shaking, expecting me to say something. I was aware of some quiet coughing as everyone waited for me to speak. I cleared my throat.
Say something quick and simple
, I coached myself.
Don’t overthink this.

“Same here,” I finally announced. My own voice sounded far away. “I’ve always wanted to meet Jay Leno.”

David Letterman dropped my hand and everyone froze in place as a postatomic silence seized the entire restaurant. Aware of my mistake the second the vibrations of my voice passed from my throat to atmosphere, I felt a panic rise up from the soles of my feet, bringing hot blood all the way to my scalp. I couldn’t breathe. My face burned with shame. I wished some Richter scale phenomenon would shake Manhattan’s skyscrapers and suck me down with the tumbling debris.
Please, God,
I thought, if the apocalypse is ever going to happen, let it be now.

I closed my eyes for a second, and when I opened them, everyone was still there, staring at me. I looked at Kenny, my salvation, but his face was covered by his hands. I counted two beats, waiting for him to look up and take me off the hook, but his embarrassment was so huge he stayed hidden. I turned and ran from the restaurant.

Now you’ve done it,
I thought, as I raced down Fifty-seventh Street. Without thinking, I jumped onto the first bus I saw. I couldn’t believe it. Any chance I had of getting Kenny to forgive me had just imploded. I had not only broken his heart, but had also humiliated him in front of his new boss. It didn’t get any worse than that. I had ruined everything.