It’s been six weeks since I first walked into Doubleday. Allen did his part and negotiated a fair deal on my behalf. I’m not sure if Jackie has real sway, if the book is indeed good, or if they let her buy whatever she wants to keep her from taking her prestige elsewhere; when Allen told me the official offer came in I had to sit down. It wasn’t the money (the advance isn’t much to speak of), but the fact that Jackie came through. That this wasn’t a dream—it was really happening.
When the contracts arrived, Allen messengered a copy over to me and we spent a good hour or two dissecting it over the phone. He pointed out where he was able to do well for me, and also what were industry-standard terms. When I felt I understood the agreement as best I could, I made an appointment to sign.
“You ever met her?”
“Jackie?” he asks. “We spoke on the telephone.”
“In person, I mean.”
“Sit down, sit down.”
For once there’s an empty chair, but I have to push a few manuscripts on the floor aside so there’s room for my feet.
“Not one-on-one like you, hotshot. But back in the day when she was first at Viking. I knew Tommy Guinzburg, the publisher. We’d do business together and he’d invite me to the office when he knew she’d be there. She’s tall. Surprising, right?”
“She was mostly sitting down.”
Allen guffaws. “I wish I could have seen the look on your face.”
“Yeah, well. You were no help.”
“Listen. I didn’t want you to be in your head. Remember our first meeting? You’re very engaging, but you can get in your own way.” I shake my head in protest even though he’s got me pegged. The first time we met I was trying to make a joke about his credentials and mispronounced the word emeritus. After that, I was tripping over my tongue for the entire conversation.
“Bygones, right? I got the two of you in a room together.”
“You’re quite the yenta.”
You can tell Allen’s still pleased with himself; he chuckles, forming a slick grin. He leans back in his chair, then grimaces and bounces forward.
“Bruises?”
“Yeah. That’s going to smart for days. Anyhow, I don’t even know why he hired her. Tommy. She had no experience. Her Rolodex, I guess. Thought she could bring in some big books as an acquiring editor. I think he offered her something like two hundred bucks a week. I’m not sure the whole experience was even worth that.”
“Why not?” I’m fascinated.
“The relationship only lasted two years before it blew up in his face. She quit over some two-bit novel they did about the assassination of Ted Kennedy.”
“You mean Bobby?” I’m confused.
“No. Ted. It was some alternate-history sort of thing. She sent him a letter of resignation in the middle of the night. The middle of the night! The book was in poor taste, but still. Meanwhile, for those two years? Chaos.” Allen looks all over his desk and finally produces a pen. “You have to put it in context. She was enticingly available to the public for the very first time. She had an office, regular hours. Their poor receptionist had to field every whack-a-doo who stepped off the elevator wanting to see her. People would show up with a ream of blank paper and demand a meeting like they were the next Mario Puzo. Meanwhile, phones ringing off the hook. Mike Wallace on one! Barbara Walters on two! Some housewife called like clockwork for a daily report on what Jackie was wearing. One man showed up, and when he was refused an audience he said he was wrapped in dynamite! Tommy himself had to intervene and talk the man down. Ha!” He reads the shocked expression on my face. Clearly, I’m not finding this as funny as he does. “Ah, well. You’d have to know Tommy.”
“So, what happened?” I hesitantly ask.
“Bah.” Allen dismisses my concern with the wave of his hand. “There was no dynamite.”
I roll my eyes. “Is it still that crazy? Do I need a flak jacket?”
“Oh, no. She got down to work and disappeared. Novelty eventually wore off.” Allen hands me four copies of the publishing agreement and the pen.
“So I’m not nuts, then. To sign these?”
“You may be nuts, kid, but not for signing these.”
I flip the top contract open to the final page, which is tabbed “sign here.” I pause, wondering if I should do something special to mark this occasion but decide it’s best not to stand on ceremony. I put Allen’s pen to paper and . . . nothing. It’s out of ink. I shake the pen and try again. Nada. “I hope this isn’t a sign.”
“Oh, come on.” Allen rummages through a drawer. “DONNA!”
“I don’t think she’s here.”
“You celebrate yet?” He pats himself down to see if there’s a pen in his pockets.
“Nope. Waiting to sign these.”
“Family happy?”
“I’ve been keeping a low profile. Superstition.” I cross my fingers on both hands to emphasize the point before remembering that some consider that bad luck.
Allen looks up at me. “Your mother?”
I put my finger on my nose. “I don’t know what she thinks. She hasn’t read it.”
“What do you mean she hasn’t read it?”
“I asked her to read it, she gave me a tomato.”
“She threw it at you?”
“No, just offered it. To eat. I asked her a second time and she said she’d still rather not.”
“Rather not what?” Allen conjures another pen, removes the cap, and hands it to me. It’s a promotional giveaway from a paper supply company in New Jersey and the top of the pen has bite marks. It feels anticlimactic, to say the least. I imagine if Jackie were the one to countersign these agreements (and not some business-affairs person) she would do so with an elegant fountain pen. I guess we all work with what we have.
“Read it, I guess. But I suppose she’d rather it not exist at all.” I hover the pen above the contracts and my hand shakes. Allen notices my hesitation.
“It’s a loving portrait,” he says.
“It’s an honest portrait.”
He chuffs. “She’ll come around. If not, now you’ve got a spare.”
“What, who—Jackie?” My face turns as red as Allen’s back.
“Editors are mothers of sorts.”
I’m annoyed the shutters aren’t more open so that I can stare dramatically out the window onto Fifty-Ninth Street. This is my last chance to do the right thing by my mother. Yet would that be the right thing for me? Is the mark of adulthood putting others first? Or is it standing behind your own vision, your own work, your own view of the world? Beads of sweat form on my forehead and I have to wipe my brow.
My hand still trembles, but I manage to sign all four agreements. I stare at my signature, barely recognizing it as my own. My name looks foreign. Like it’s not mine but my father’s—someone else who let my mother down. I thought this would be fun, I thought I would want to remember this moment, but in truth I just want to move on. “When do we get paid?”
“First check upon execution!” Allen takes the contracts from me and I place the pen in an empty mug, which I’m hoping is a pencil jar and not the remnants of his morning caffeine. He flips through the agreements to make sure everything is in order.
I suddenly see the wisdom in paying someone to hit me. I even consider asking Allen for his guy’s number. If I’m indeed causing my mother pain, wouldn’t some in return be rightful penance? And even if not, I already feel like the wind’s been knocked out of me—perhaps a few swift punches could knock it back in. I lean forward and put my head between my knees.
“You okay, kid?”
“Thought I dropped something.” I don’t tell him I’m suddenly nauseated.
“One for you, one for me, two for them. I’ll have Donna send them over this afternoon. Whenever Donna returns from Donnaland.”
I
sit up as he stacks the contracts, fastens them together with a binder clip, and slides them into a large envelope. “We good?”
I nod, unable to say anything more.
“One more thing.” Allen thrusts a piece of paper with a phone number in my direction. “Your new mommy wants you to call her.”
◆ EIGHT ◆
It’s two minutes before five o’clock when Lila guides me back down the long hallway that leads to the conference room, her coworkers packing up to go home. I try to make eye contact with everyone, smile to diffuse their annoyance. I can read the stress on their faces. Who is this arriving just as we are leaving? Do I have to stay? Will I miss my train? Lila keeps her usual pace; had we not met before, I would feel she, too, was itching to leave. She probably is, but Lila has only one setting: rushed. This time when we hit the conference room we bear a sharp right, down another hall, toward, I assume, Jackie’s office.
“Do you want coffee?”
I can picture the coffee mugs washed and put away for the day and the kerfuffle it would cause if I said yes. “No, thank you.” And then, because I can’t help myself from babbling around Lila, “Caffeine makes me jittery this late in the day.” I don’t want to say what we both already know: I’m jittery enough already.
A young, fair-haired man, handsome, maybe twenty-five, approaches us while pulling on a blazer in a windmill-like fashion I imagine members of a varsity rowing team do. He locks eyes with me like we’re cruising for random sex in an out-of-the-way park, and while unnerved, I can’t look away. I’ve spent years wanting to belong in these halls; glancing down would send the wrong message.
“Oh, hey.” Lila stops us. “This is Mark. He’s Mrs. Onassis’s new assistant. Mark, this is James Smale.” Lila punctuates my name with an air of disinterest.
“James Smale,” Mark says, shaking my hand while trying to place my name.
Lila rolls her eyes, I hope at Mark and not at me. “Jackie’s new acquisition.”
“Right.” Mark clasps his other hand on mine, they are soft and warm.
“Acquisition?” Like I’m some antiquity she’s acquired on an exotic foreign trip? “I guess we’ll be working together.”
“I look forward to it.” Mark lets go of my hand, but not before he winks. Thankfully, Lila doesn’t see that, her eyes might roll fully back in disgust. He walks past me and we both turn back for one last look. I’m one who feels invisible more often than attractive, so I’m almost giddy when I see him smile at me. Not to say Daniel doesn’t do his best to prop up my self-esteem, but he’s obliged to; the return date on me has long since passed and he doesn’t have a receipt. But was this flirtation? Or just aggressive friendliness. I stumble forward to catch Lila. Whatever that was, I don’t have time to process it.
We stop in front of a door that’s only slightly ajar.
“Here we are.” Lila raps on the door three times. Loudly. I would have knocked gently, with decorum; I’m instantly horrified. I turn to protest, but she’s already gone.
“Found it!” The unmistakable voice rings out from inside the office.
I knock again, quietly this time, and open the door a few more inches. “Mrs. Onassis?” I peer around the open door into the office and see no one. I bite my lip just in time to keep from saying “Jackie.” I peek farther into the room and find her standing by a bookshelf in the space behind the door. “Oh, hello again,” I utter awkwardly. I realize I have no idea what’s going on and hope for my own sake that what she’s found isn’t a manuscript more intriguing than mine. “What did you find?”
“A book I brought from home. Come in, come in.” She ushers me inside her office and I push the door closed most of the way behind me. I have the good sense to leave the door cracked, enough, at least, so that I can’t be accused of doing something untoward; it feels inappropriate to be entirely behind closed doors with her.
The office is not what I would call small, although it’s decidedly not palatial. It’s quite nice—comfortable, even. There’s nothing that would have prevented us from meeting here when we were first introduced. I’m wondering now if she didn’t select the conference room as neutral territory to put me more at ease, and I feel empty-handed suddenly, a gentleman caller without flowers or wine or chocolates.
“So nice to see you again, James.”
I can feel myself blush. “You as well.”
Jackie steps over several boxes (books, I’m guessing), which, in her skirt, is no small feat of gymnastics. They seem out of place, these boxes, uncharacteristically messy, but upon closer inspection her shelves are at capacity with manuscripts and galleys. There’s a painting of a dancer on the wall that looks like it could be worth a good deal of money, but I don’t know enough about art to be sure. I half expect her desk to look like her husband’s from the Oval Office, but instead it’s a Formica-topped eyesore that looks more like it might belong to a junior-high science teacher. The desk itself is covered in more manuscripts, weighed down with decorative glass paperweights.
Jackie holds the book up with both hands before circling behind her desk to take a seat. “I thought this would be just what we need for our working together tonight. Have you read the poet Constantine Cavafy?”
I glance at the book—his collected works. “No, I haven’t.” I wait for her to sit behind her desk before taking a seat in one of her guest chairs. I want to appear well read (and if there was homework for this meeting, I want to have done it), but this particular poet might be a little too obscure to fake a passing knowledge of.
“He’s not widely read in the States. My second husband introduced me to his works and he fast became a favorite. He has a poem, ‘Ithaka.’”
“The location of my book,” I say, although these must be very different Ithacas. I’m doubting that any poet named Constantine wrote about central New York.
“I’m wondering if it might be a good title for your novel.”
“Ithaca?” I’m momentarily disheartened. Not that I’m overly invested in my own title, but that the time has arrived to get down to work. I already miss the part where we fawn over me and the book. Can’t we have several more meetings like that?
“Though we generally try to avoid publishing titles with negative onomatopoeic sounds . . .”
I chew on that for a second. Ithaca. “Ick?”
“It makes the marketing department frown.”
Is she pulling my leg? There’s an uncomfortable pause and then I laugh politely, but not too much, in case I’ve misread her. I look around the office for clues that will put me at ease. Something that I recognize could belong to anyone, to normalize our interaction. The truth of the matter—it’s all rather conventional. It’s an office, like any other.
“So why Ithaca?” Jackie resumes. “Why set the book there?”
“Oh,” I say, the question snapping me back. “I grew up there. Well, a microscopic town just outside. So when people ask me where I’m from, that’s what I say.” Daniel’s voice fills my head. “You don’t want to change it to Cape Cod, do you?”
“I beg your pardon?”
I shake my head slightly. “Someone told me that you would . . . never mind. Nothing. It’s small, Ithaca. Exotic-sounding, perhaps. I like the Greek name. I think it evokes the book’s underlying tragedy. But otherwise, there’s nothing special about it. Like the characters themselves, at first glance. They’re unremarkable. On the surface they could be any mother and son. But I find simple can be . . . quite complicated.”
“Oh, so do I. You only passingly refer to the name of the town in the manuscript. It got me thinking that you might mean it as more of a state of mind. Or a state of being. Does that make sense?” Of course she must know that it makes perfect sense, but phrasing it as a question sets me up to agree. Perhaps a skill she’s used in the past, asserting her own ideas by involving others.
“It certainly does.”
Jackie looks like she’s about to say something and then stops. She thinks again before picking up the book. “I’ve marked the page. I don’t have my glasses. Would you do the honors?” She opens the book and hands it to me. It takes a moment for it to sink in that she’s asking me to read.
“Happy to.”
“Just the last few lines.”
I fumble with the book, almost losing her place, until I manage to get a good grip. I scan down the text of the poem, looking for just the right place to jump in. “Ithaka has given you the beautiful journey.” Already I feel a lump forming in my throat so I read quietly until I get to the very end. “And if you find her threadbare, Ithaka has not deceived you. Wise as you have become, with so much experience, you must have always understood what Ithakas mean.” I glance up at Jackie and she’s looking just past me, as if considering the meaning again for the very first time. “That’s . . . wow,” I say. I left my apartment early to walk here, gathering courage along the way in the invigorating March air, desperately dreaming up intelligent phrases and casual topics of conversation to use as filler, should our dialogue sputter. And yet, all I can come up with is “wow.”
But it is remarkable, especially if Ithaca is not a town or a place or a state of being, but a person, a mother, a soul. Indeed, she has not deceived me; somehow, I must have always understood that.
Once again Jackie opens her mouth to speak, then stops. But this time she plows forward without any further hesitation. “I have a thought.”
“Oh?”
A grin spreads across her face, hinting at the woman one always suspected lay just beneath the decorum. She opens her desk drawer, pulls out an expensive-looking bottle of rum, and plunks it on her desk. The alcohol sloshes, creating a rippling meniscus.
“This was a recent gift from one of my authors after a trip he took to Barbados.”
I’m not sure I’m following. “Rum was your thought?”
“Close,” Jackie says. She stands, lifting the rum to inspect it. She pulls her shoulders back as if not to let the heavy bottle topple her forward. Allen was right—she is indeed tall. “Daiquiris.”
The Editor Page 6