If Harry Met Sally Again

by Annie Robertson

  HARRY

  We should get the check.

  SALLY

  Yes, we should.

  ‘You know, this is pretty good,’ I say, sitting back to read what I’ve written. I stare out at the arch, remembering the scene when Harry and Sally part company after their drive from Chicago, and allow myself a moment of optimism, ‘Maybe there is enough quintessential Ephron about this script; maybe it does stand a chance of being made after all!’

  24

  ‘The scene you’ve written at Ground Zero is beautiful,’ says Ben, a few days later. We’ve a meeting with Mike to discuss the latest version of the script, which I somehow managed to pull together over the last couple of days, a feat that required more cans of Red Bull and triple espressos than my heart will thank me for. I didn’t alter Truman’s character so the Truman–Anna relationship still isn’t right, which is bothering me but, other than that – the political references, the little bits of me in there, some new locations that Ben suggested – I’m pretty happy with the changes.

  ‘I’m glad you like it,’ I say, distracted by our surroundings, and my huge pastrami sandwich. We’re in Katz’s Deli! Yes, the Katz’s Deli where Sally faked an orgasm. ‘This place is amazing.’

  ‘Home of that scene.’

  ‘Given we’ve heard Lena Dunham’s fanny fart, Meg’s orgasm doesn’t seem so extraordinary now, but at the time it was pretty revelatory.’

  ‘Have you ever…?’

  ‘What?’ I know exactly where Ben is going with this question but there’s fun in playing with him.

  ‘You know…’ I can’t be certain but there might be the merest hint of a blush rising up his cheeks.

  ‘Time and time again with Will.’

  He sits back, surprised. ‘Really?’

  ‘Uh-huh. He was too selfish to be good in bed.’

  ‘I’m a very selfless person,’ he says, deadpan.

  ‘I’m sure.’ I allow the tiniest chink of a playful smile to curl at the edge of my mouth.

  There’s a momentary pause; I feel as if Ben is weighing up how much further he can take this conversation without crossing the line between flirtatious and salacious.

  ‘Plus, I’m Jewish…’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Jewish guys are great in bed, it’s a fact.’

  ‘Oh really? Why so?’

  ‘Circumcision,’ he says, still straight-faced.

  I blush despite myself. ‘What’s that got to do with the price of eggs?’

  ‘Stamina.’

  ‘Alrighty!’ I say. My cheeks feel crimson hot. Clearly I’ve been out-meddled. ‘You know, I saw the orgasm scene for the first time as a teenager with my dad sitting next to me.’

  ‘Ooh, awkward!’

  ‘I seem to remember a lot of throat clearing, a newspaper being swiftly brought out for him to hide behind, and me hugging my knees, pretending not to know what was happening.’

  ‘Classic!’ He scrutinises my face for just a moment longer than can go unnoticed. ‘You know there’s probably a few lines we could lose,’ he says, returning to the script, when it becomes clear I’ve noticed his watching me. He nudges his specs nervously up his nose. His hair isn’t styled today, there’s no moustache or beard, and he’s even wearing socks. The hipster thing is barely noticeable. ‘Shall we try a read-through?’

  We begin reading the scene with Harry and Sally walking round the Ground Zero Memorial, looking at the thousands of names on the bronze panels.

  HARRY

  Who could forget this day?

  SALLY

  Everyone remembers where they were when they heard.

  HARRY

  I’d just finished a game of racquet-ball with Jess.

  SALLY

  I’d just got home from dropping Truman at school. I ran straight back to him. Then you ran straight to us.

  HARRY

  Truman was terrified.

  SALLY

  We all were. Nobody ever saw anything like it.

  HARRY

  Apocalyptic.

  SALLY

  We tucked Truman in that night feeling as if we’d had the luckiest escape of our lives.

  HARRY

  I couldn’t bring myself to leave you.

  SALLY

  You slept on the couch, remember? With the TV on. I forgot we were divorced. I went to bed wishing you were beside me.

  HARRY

  I felt the same.

  SALLY shakes off the feeling and suddenly remembers:

  SALLY

  Truman wanted to go to the Met the next day. Do you remember how disappointed he was when we told him it was closed?

  HARRY

  Truman would have slept in the Met if they’d let him.

  SALLY

  (suddenly realising where Truman will be)

  You don’t think…?

  HARRY

  Why didn’t we think of it before?

  HARRY hails a cab to take them to the Met.

  ‘It’s good, Nina.’ He takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes. He looks completely different with his specs off, almost handsome, I think.

  ‘You’re looking at me funny,’ he says, catching me staring, and replacing his glasses.

  ‘You look different without your specs on.’

  ‘Different good or different bad?’

  ‘Good! A little like a young Tom Hanks.’

  ‘I hear that a lot!’ he says, heavy with sarcasm. I’m surprised by the lack of confidence this cynicism suggests. ‘That green scarf really suits you. I think should you wear colour more. You look good in colour.’

  ‘Thanks.’ I rearrange the scarf unnecessarily, touched that he’s adapted a Harry line to flatter me.

  ‘It brings out the red of your lips.’

  He’s staring straight at them, as if he’s thinking of kissing me. I twist them self-consciously, wondering if I’m reading the situation correctly.

  ‘I remember thinking Jen had a beautiful smile,’ I say, trying to defuse the moment.

  ‘Good put-down. I won’t do it again.’

  ‘Probably best,’ I say, returning to the script, sort of wishing that he would do it again.

  ‘It also makes your eyes look like opals!’

  I smile a ha ha, very clever smile.

  ‘Oops, see what I did, I didn’t let it go!’

  ‘She is still your girlfriend, right?’

  ‘Yes.’ He sounds less than enthusiastic.

  ‘What’s the matter? High school getting in the way!’

  ‘Ha ha.’

  ‘So, what?’

  ‘I think we’re moving in different directions.’ He thinks about this. ‘I’m not sure we were ever moving in the same direction.’

  My phone buzzes. I glance at it to see a message from Astrid.

  Major domestic. Can I crash at your place? A x

  Of course. You have Will’s old key. Need to talk? N x

  Maybe later. A x

  ‘Everything okay?’

  ‘Sure, sure,’ I say, tucking my phone away. ‘Shouldn’t we be heading up to Harlem?’

  ‘Oh yeah, about that,’ he says, getting up and offering me his hand. ‘We’re not just meeting Mike.’ I look at him enquiringly. ‘We’re meeting Catherine Regan too.’

  ‘Catherine Regan,’ I blurt. ‘As in the Catherine Regan – one of the biggest executive producers in Hollywood?

  ‘The very same.’

  ‘Holy shit,’ I say, feeling my knees wobble and all colour drain from my face.

  ‘Catherine, Nina,’ says Mike, as way of introduction in his elegant, townhouse office. I realise now why Ben didn’t tell me I was meeting Catherine Regan; I’d have worried myself sick about what to say, how to act, what to wear – anything other than the skirt that keeps twisting round my waist, and the tights, a size too big, that are wrinkled round my ankles.

  ‘Nice to meet you, Ms Regan’ I say, barely audibly, sweating just enough to make me uncomfortable. As I shake her hand I wan
t to yell, You’re the biggest executive producer in Hollywood, and you’ve read my script! It’s a miracle that I manage not to have a verbal vomit all over the Persian rug.

  ‘It’s Catherine, always Catherine,’ she says in a voice that is professional, self-assured, yet also friendly. She has delicate features in an oddly masculine face, her make-up is reassuringly expensive and her hair perfectly blow-dried.

  We sit on opposite sofas with a coffee table between them, upon which is a large bowl of jelly beans, I wonder if anyone ever eats them and if I could get away with one now. I cross my legs at the ankles, princess-style, to hide my baggy tights.

  ‘The script is great,’ says Catherine, causing me to have to catch my breath in delight. ‘I particularly like the fact you’ve kept Sally’s trait of meticulous food ordering. Nora, Rob and I tossed a lot of ideas around over the years but nobody came up with anything like this. Right, Mike?’

  ‘Right,’ agrees Mike, repositioning a cufflink.

  ‘But I was thinking,’ she continues. ‘It might be fun to play around a bit more with Marie.’

  ‘How so?’ asks Ben, picking up on my apprehension.

  ‘Marie had the potential to be a bit of a loose cannon,’ says Catherine, twiddling with a gold chain. ‘That whole delusion she was under, about the married man she was dating, leaving his wife. You got the impression that under the wrong circumstances, say for example, her husband dying, she could really come off the rails. I can really see the potential in making her into a drinker, someone who likes to make a play for a younger guy, maybe George,’ says Catherine.

  Ben casts me a sympathetic look of, didn’t I tell you?

  Immediately my heart begins to race and my mouth turns dry as I prepare to disagree with Catherine Regan. I take a deep breath before saying, ‘Ben and I discussed this already.’ I look to him for support, which he offers with an encouraging glance. ‘I don’t like the idea. Marie was a class act, not a drunken man-eater, and besides George is completely preoccupied with Jules.’

  ‘You’re right, she was classy,’ says Catherine, who is probably unaware of how hard my heart is pumping and how I’ve clasped my hands to prevent them from shaking so much. ‘But she was also a bit…’ She gestures something extra with her hand, her huge diamond ring catching the light.

  ‘Mad as a box of frogs?’ says Mike.

  Catherine offers a hand towards him to say, exactly.

  I sigh, more heavily than I intended, and stare at the framed film posters on the walls, thinking about Nora and what she would have wanted.

  ‘It’s the twenty-first century, things have moved on from the 1980s,’ says Catherine. ‘Why shouldn’t Marie have had a few flings with younger guys?’

  ‘This could work,’ says Mike, nodding, writing notes with his Montblanc fountain pen and leather-bound notepad.

  ‘Although we may be at risk of making her into a caricature just for a few laughs,’ says Ben. It feels good to have him onside. I remind myself that it wasn’t so long ago that I feared we’d never be on the same page.

  ‘I think it could really work,’ says Mike, clearly seeing the potential in it all.

  Ben casts me a look of, Sorry, I tried…

  I shake my head, not blaming him but appalled by the idea. It feels as if the heart of my script is being thrown to the lions, and all the optimism I’d garnered is evaporating, like late summer rain.

  25

  ‘Cake?’ asks Ben, after the meeting, standing on the sidewalk outside Mike’s office.

  ‘After that meeting I could quite happily down a quart of gin.’

  Ben checks his watch. ‘Three o’clock.’

  ‘I don’t allow gin before three-thirty so…’ I’m amazed that I can still manage a shred of humour.

  ‘Cake it is! I know just the place.’

  We walk a couple of blocks to a neighbourhood coffee house.

  ‘Fidelity,’ he announces, when we arrive, looking up at the sign across a grey brick warehouse of a building.

  Entering the building we walk past huge windows on the right-hand side that look into a sort of coffee laboratory. Ben stops to stare as other men might gaze into luxury car showrooms. There’s something goofy and charming about it, which takes my mind off the meeting.

  ‘All the beans they use here are from hand-selected Colombian farms,’ he says, brimming with enthusiasm. ‘They ship it here via FedEx so it’s as fresh as you can get without actually being in Colombia.’

  We walk into a huge brick- and wood-clad space with a massive atrium and a wall of plants. It’s pretty spectacular and the aroma of coffee is capable of giving you a caffeine fix all on its own.

  ‘What would you like?’ he asks, leading me to the giant wooden counter. A good-looking male barista, who wouldn’t look out of place in a GAP advert, is waiting to take our order.

  I stare at the boards, the doughnuts, muffins and cookies on the side and draw a great big ordering mind-blank. Decisions about cake defeat me at the best of times let alone when I feel as if I’ve just been hung out to dry by two of the biggest names in the business.

  Ben places his order – it’s obvious he’s known what he’s wanted since we decided to come – and the barista waits expectantly for mine.

  ‘Um…’ I raise my eyebrows, my eyes wide and lips pursed, in an attempt to communicate, ‘Help! I haven’t a Scooby’.

  ‘Would you like me to choose for you?’ asks Ben.

  ‘I’d love that.’ My shoulders drop about a foot.

  While Ben orders I check my messages. Other than one from Astrid to say that my landlady, Mrs Tang, in a foul mood, had tried to get into the flat, there is nothing. Ben asks for something in Spanish that I’ve never heard of, and for a specific bean and a method of brewing that I didn’t know existed. We watch the barista expertly create the drinks in wide, yellow mugs, then dish up doughnuts the size of Frisbees.

  ‘Looks great,’ I say, tugging at the top of my tights, as Ben places the tray on a large coffee crate in front of the huge, brown chesterfield sofa we settle on.

  ‘Just wait until you taste it.’

  I laugh.

  ‘What?’ he asks.

  ‘I’ve never seen anyone so passionate about coffee!’

  ‘Ah,’ he sits back, waiting for his coffee to be just the right temperature. ‘What can I tell you; it’s my thing.’

  ‘I can see that.’

  ‘It’s second only to my own writing.’

  ‘Wait,’ I say. ‘You write your own scripts too. You’re not just a “studio hack”?’

  He lets out a small laugh, which doesn’t sound particularly happy. ‘Don’t get me wrong, it’s great working on scripts like yours, but it isn’t my dream.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘Having my own scripts optioned. That’s what I set out to do but it’s almost impossible, hence why I work in development.’

  ‘Huh,’ I say, trying my coffee, finding myself respecting Ben a little bit more. ‘Thanks for sticking up for me today over the Marie thing.’

  ‘I’m just sorry I couldn’t do more. Once Mike gets something in his head…’

  ‘Catherine was equally as adamant. I don’t think we stood a chance.’

  ‘Let’s sit on it for a while, see how it plays out.’

  I savour another mouthful of coffee. ‘Don’t you think it’s weird that Mike didn’t mention the problem with Truman and Anna’s relationship?’

  ‘I don’t think it’s the sticking point you believe it to be.’

  ‘I’ll have to take your word for it.’

  ‘Do that,’ he says, reaching for a sugar doughnut. ‘Now, tell me something that isn’t about work.’

  ‘Like what?’ I ask, feeling a little on the spot.

  ‘Like, something you’re passionate about, other than Ephron?’

  ‘Oh, that’s easy – cake!’

  ‘Coffee and cake,’ he says, slowly, approvingly. ‘We could be a winning combination.’ He offers me a bite of
his doughnut before he’s even taken one. Will would never have done that. Will would have scoffed the lot in one fell swoop and then asked if I wanted some.

  ‘Now that is heaven!’ I say, trying not to make crumbs as I speak.

  ‘Told you this place was good.’

  ‘It is pretty great.’ The remaining tension in my shoulders seems to ebb away as I take in the atrium above us, the steel girders and the polished concrete floor. ‘You know, this might work as a hang-out for Truman.’

  ‘You mean use this place instead of Shakespeare and Co?’

  ‘Exactly. Mike was saying he wanted something more current, cooler. This place fits with the feel of the Foundry and the Meatpacking District where Harry lives. It’s more urban, less obviously romantic.’

  ‘Aren’t you trying to keep some shred of romance?’

  I laugh despondently. ‘Trying.’

  Ben points to the corner of my mouth. ‘You have a glob of doughnut just here.’

  ‘Here?’ I ask, brushing the area with a finger.

  ‘No – there,’ he points a little closer.

  I try to clean it again.

  ‘Better?’

  He shakes his head, raises his hand to my face, and gently rubs the corner of my mouth with his thumb. Goosebumps suddenly pepper my arms and the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  I look into his hazel eyes. He holds my gaze and gently strokes my bottom lip. He leans in. I close my eyes and before I can stop myself we kiss, a warm, longing kiss. We kiss until an image of Jen pops into my head, and I pull away. Breathless.

  ‘This is your place?’ I ask, as we ascend the stoop of a huge brownstone on the Upper West Side. It’s pretty much my dream property, akin to Meg Ryan’s place in You’ve Got Mail.

  ‘It’s what an Academy Award nomination buys you, well, that, and a deceased rich grandmother,’ he says, turning the key.

  I’m expecting to enter a communal lobby with several mailboxes, bikes propped up against ageing radiators and a whiff of damp, so when he opens the door into the bright entrance hallway of his home, with polished parquet flooring, I’m astounded.

  ‘I’m really not sure I should be here.’ The image of Jen is still fresh in my mind, and the guilt is gnawing at me.