DEDICATION
For Bryan and the Rowlets
CONTENTS
Dedication
Sunday, November 24, 2013: Clio Eloise Marsh 12:03AM: “People will see us.”
12:35AM: “Don’t worry.”
12:52AM: “Come.”
1:03AM: “Where are we?”
8:27AM: “I lied.”
9:04AM: “It’s loo late.”
11:21AM: “I know all about this bench.”
5:07PM: “You barely know me.”
Monday, November 25, 2013: Smith Mae Anderson 7:31AM: “Shit. Shit. Fuck.”
7:41AM: “What’s gotten into you?”
8:30AM: “I told him something I never told you.”
9:55AM: “We did not send you to Yale to become a housekeeper.”
1:15PM: “Watch where you’re going.”
5:14PM: “What do you mean, you knew?”
6:32PM: “Thank you for being human.”
Tuesday, November 26, 2013: Tate Robert Pennington 1:12AM: “A bucket of booze & some pussy.”
9:53AM: “I’m a grown man, Mom.”
10:49AM: “You have every right to despise me.”
1:49PM: “Not today.”
3:57PM: “Do you believe in second chances?”
6:31PM: “They had an epic sex life.”
9:28PM: “Onward.”
Wednesday, November 27, 2013: Clio 8:14AM: “It’s over.”
1:02PM: “We never do know about anything, do we?”
3:47PM: “I’ve never wanted you more.”
6:11PM: “This is Henry, Dad.”
8:04PM: “You’ll figure it out as you go.”
Thursday, November 28, 2013: Tate 7:14AM: “Well, mercy me, that’s the first time you’ve used that word in a while.”
8:56AM: “Tell me more, Professor Pennington.”
5:37PM: “You’ve got some balls”
9:45PM: “I’m hard.”
Friday, November 29, 2013: Clio 8:15AM: “Why don’t we ever talk about her?”
9:31AM: “Me too.”
11:21AM: “I’ll be fine.”
3:08PM: “I’ve been trying to call you.”
5:37PM: “I have a surprise for you too.”
Saturday, November 30, 2013: Smith 8:41AM: “It’s you.”
9:45AM: “It could be a true disaster.”
10:35AM: “Aap khubsurat hain.”
11:25AM: “What in the heavens is transpiring in here?”
6:27PM: “You may kiss the bride.”
9:17PM: “Slow down, cowgirl.”
Midnight: “I like the sound of that.”
Sunday, December 1, 2013: Clio 8:24AM: “What will happen?”
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Aidan Donnelley Rowley
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
Sunday, November 24, 2013
CLIO ELOISE MARSH
If we expect to suffer, we are anxious.
—Charles Darwin,
The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals
There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.
—Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species
BEST OF NEW YORK 2013
Best Stress Reliever—Birdwatching with Clio Marsh
City stress getting to you? (Be honest: of course it is.) Wander over to Turtle Pond on Sundays at nine a.m. for an invigorating amble through the Ramble with bird enthusiast Clio Marsh. A curator in the Department of Ornithology at the American Museum of Natural History and an adjunct professor in evolutionary biology up at Columbia, Marsh has a knack for spotting theatrical avian displays—and for communing with nature-seeking New Yorkers. Nota bene: Forget the wilderness of online dating; turns out a Central Park sojourn can lead to love. Marsh herself met her current amour, hotelier and Northern Irish import Henry Kildare (who will open his fifth boutique hotel, the Here Inn, on the Upper West Side this fall) after one of her walks.
12:03AM
“People will see us.”
Clio sits alone at the hotel bar.
She traces her fingertip around the rim of her empty champagne flute and surveys the aftermath of the party. The lobby and bar are littered with wineglasses and crumpled cocktail napkins, evidence of exuberance and good cheer. Wooden skewers with clinging shreds of chicken satay are tucked here and there. A crimson scarf has been left behind on a velvet chair. Towers of plates wait to be whisked away.
Henry’s staffers dart about with a quiet efficiency, attacking the mess, transforming chaos back to order. All will be pristine in no time and the Here Inn will sparkle for the first guests, who will check into their new rooms in a matter of hours. Henry has done this four times before, and he swears this is the most fun part, when real people arrive toting their literal and metaphorical baggage.
In the beveled mirror above the bar, Clio catches a glimpse of herself and barely recognizes what she sees. The pin-straight hair; the dramatic eye makeup, now smudged; the twinkling silver dress. She crosses and uncrosses her legs on the leather bar stool, kicks off the brutal, borrowed heels, massages some feeling back into her toes.
For a sublime second, a sentence floats through her head unsolicited, an impossible thought.
I am happy.
Can this be? Is it too soon? It hasn’t even been a year.
She feels a smile take over her face. Not one of the artificial, fake-it-to-make-it smiles she’s perfected over the years as a matter of survival, the smile she flashed so many times tonight in an abiding effort to pass muster, but a real-deal smile.
Jett, the platinum-haired bartender, returns from hefting bags of empty bottles out back. A recent Juilliard grad, he harbors dreams of Broadway.
“I can’t believe how quickly this place came together in the last month,” Clio says, looking around and taking it all in. It’s all so perfectly Henry: the pressed-tin ceiling, dark wood moldings, vintage chandeliers and mosaic floor. There’s a real Christmas tree with tiny white lights by the wood-burning fireplace and the room smells of oak and pine. “When I left town, it was still a construction zone.”
“The crew worked around the clock. You should have seen Mr. Kildare—he was right in there, screwing in lightbulbs and drilling holes . . .”
“Well, that must have been a sight,” she says, smiling at the image. “It doesn’t surprise me. Henry lives for the details.”
“That he does,” Jett says, filling her glass reflexively. “Where were you anyway?”
“South America, for work,” she says, stretching her arms to stifle a yawn. Jett seems intrigued, so she continues. “My department has a grant to study Andean hummingbirds.” Jett’s eyes glaze over a bit. “I just flew in this morning so I could be here for the party, and I’m not really seeing straight. Can’t tell if the champagne is helping or hurting.”
“In my experience, champagne helps until it really doesn’t,” Jett says through a knowing smile. “So what’s better? Chasing down birds or rubbing elbows with fancy New Yorkers?”
“The former,” she says. “By a long shot.”
“Thanksgiving plans?” Jett asks as he wipes down the bar.
The mere mention of the holiday makes Clio stiffen and sip. She needs a few days to fortify herself before she thinks about Thanksgiving. “I’ll be in Connecticut, with my father,” she says quietly, her eyes clouding. She finishes her drink in one swift gulp, tips her glass out to Jett for more. “And what about you, Jett?�
� she asks. “Big plans?”
“Oh, I’ll be right here,” he says, slapping the bar. “Another VIP night at the hotel. But tonight was the big one. I think it went well. Seemed like a great party.”
She nods, takes a too-big sip of champagne. “It was a great party,” she says, her voice light and drifting. Jett disappears into the kitchen and she flips through the pages of a leftover book. Here Is New York by E. B. White, Henry’s literary hero and the inspiration for the hotel. It had been Henry’s idea to give each guest tonight a copy as a parting favor.
A blast of cold air hits her. Clio turns toward the front door and sees Henry stumbling in from the street, alone. He ducked out not long ago for a cigar with the last of his guests, two nattily turned-out New Yorker editors and the etiquette columnist from Town & Country. His cheeks are rosy and his fedora threatens to topple. He spots her and sidles over, flashing a dazzling smile. She slips back on her heels and slides off her stool to stand as he approaches.
“Warm me up, m’lady. It’s absolute winter out there,” he croons, loosening his bow tie. The booze has brought out the dregs of his accent, which is all but gone after two decades in America. His blue eyes are unusually bright. He lifts Clio to sit on the bar top and presses himself between her legs. The marble, white with gray veins, is cool on her bare thighs.
“There’s poetry in the wreckage, eh?” he says, looking around at the postparty disarray.
“Indeed there is.”
“God, I’ve missed you, my Bird Girl,” he says, tucking her hair behind her ears, kissing each lobe. “I’m so happy you’re back. That you’re here.”
“I’ve missed you too,” she says, running a hand through his hair. It’s grayer than it was even six months ago.
Jett reappears to check on his boss.
“Pour me a nip of Jameson, will you? Neat,” Henry slurs over her shoulder.
“Yes, sir,” Jett says.
“Oh, laddy, no. Lose the ‘sir’ stuff. I know I’m old as dirt, that I’ve got years on you young things, but let’s just pretend for the evening, shall we?”
Clio watches as Jett unscrews the bottle and pours, the brown liquid glistening in the crystal tumbler.
“Well, well,” Henry says, taking Clio’s face between his cold hands. “We bloody did it.”
“You did it,” she says, correcting him.
“We.”
“You. All you,” she says, pulling him to her. Tonight’s success was not a stroke of luck or the aligning of a mysterious assemblage of stars. In the six months Clio’s known Henry, she’s barely seen him sit still. It’s been an inspiring blur of long nights watching him squint into a glowing computer screen, a flurry of contracts and certificates and architectural floor plans, mad dashes around Manhattan to curry favor with investors and expeditors and media players, elaborate furniture and art sprees, all leading to this moment, the realization of a dream and a lot of hard work.
“You, me, tomato, tomahto, never mind. We did it and it’s time to move on,” Henry says, and kisses her again. It’s not a delicate peck appropriate for public, but real and almost rough, magnificently forceful. He knocks her glass over and the remaining champagne spills, pooling on the bar. He puts his mouth on her ear, his breath warm and laced with tobacco. “I thought they’d never leave. All that schmoozy-dooze kissy-kissy bullshite and all I could think about was you, getting you upstairs . . .”
“You’re drunk, Henry,” Clio whispers, stating the obvious. She contorts her arm behind her to blot puddles of champagne that soak through to her skin.
“Drunk? Is that the best you’ve got, Professor Marsh? I’m miles past drunk. I’m bollixed. Gee-eyed. Langered. Plastered. Rat-arsed. The list goes on.”
“I’ll make a note to work on my Drunk and White lexicon,” Clio says, and grins, proud of her timely levity. It’s never been her strong suit. “I found you a Christmas present, you know.”
“Did you now?” he says, and there’s a boyish excitement in his face. “Is it under the tree?”
“Calm down, Mr. Kildare. All good things in time.”
“How in the world did I get so lucky?”
“You and I both know I’m the lucky one.”
Henry shakes his head, finishes off his drink. He wipes his face with the back of his shirtsleeve, then kisses Clio’s bare shoulder.
“Oh, Clio, it’s crazy . . . it’s stupefying, really. Nearly fifty years on this good Earth and suddenly I’m a joyful bloke.”
“After tonight, you deserve nothing less,” Clio says.
“Yes, yes, because tonight was a massive hooley and this fine joint is up and running, but it’s beyond that, you know,” he says, grinning, tapping his finger to her nose. “I’m plain elated and my Lord, it’s you. You are to blame for this. You and your clever friend Jameson, I reckon. In cahoots, you two.”
A whiskey-soaked soliloquy. A tumble of feeling, of words. Clio flushes with embarrassment and puts her hands to his lips to quiet him. He laughs and slides a hand up her dress, high up her thigh, buries his face in the nape of her neck. His eyelashes tickle her skin as he blinks.
“I have no idea what happened to my suit jacket,” he confesses through laughter, his mumbled words wet on her neck. “Could’ve used it out there in the Arctic. Ach, it’s bound to turn up.”
“It will,” Clio says as he stands again. She places her hand on his chest. A button dangles from his vest. His shoes are untied. His hair is mussed from the wind. That mischievous, messy twinkle, camouflaged briefly by nerves and decorum tonight, is back. Clio traces the shape of his hand in hers, the edges of his badly bitten nails.
“What about you? How are you? You’ve been off sleeping in tents and chasing your birds and here you are, right before me, a bloody vision. How are you feeling, my darling? You must be exhausted.”
“I actually feel great,” she says, remembering her revelation from moments ago. She nearly whispers the word: “happy.”
The music that’s been playing in the background all night seems louder all of a sudden. Bono’s voice bellows around them. “And all I want is you . . .”
“Yes, I want you. Tell me you want me.” He lifts her chin with his forefinger, pulls her face to within inches of his. He kisses her again, then pulls away, awaits her answer.
“I want you,” she says putting her hand on his cheek. “Oh, do I want you.”
And she does. It’s unlike anything she’s felt before, this anticipatory burn. Time can’t move fast enough.
“You know what I think?” he says. “I’ve behaved myself all night long. I’ve been a good and rightful boy. I’ve jumped through my hoops and done my deeds, but now I’m free to let you in on my plan. You know very well how I fancy a good plan.”
She nods. He’s a planner, this Henry.
He places a hand on each of her knees, presses his body into her again, flicks off her shoes. His voice dips deep into his nighttime growl. “Close your eyes.”
She does.
“This is how it will go: We will make it only as far as the elevator. In we’ll waltz, all manners, and the doors will close and I will push you against that back wall because I know you like a bit of rough-and-tumble and back you’ll go, and I will lift this little frock that’s driving me bloody mad and I will drop to my knees . . .” His hand inches up her leg.
“Keep going—”
“The best part,” he whispers now, in her ear, “the clincher, my dear, is that tiny little camera tucked into the ceiling. People will see us. Tell me the thought doesn’t get you wet. I dare you, tell me.”
“Let’s go,” Clio says, looping a finger through his belt, yanking him closer. “Now.”
He lifts her, floats her down to the floor, and as he does, she feels him stiff against her.
She drops to the ground to collect her heels. When she stands, she locks eyes with a man she doesn’t know.
“Not so fast, you two,” he says.
12:35AM
“Don’t worry
.”
The man wears a dark suit. His eyes are a blazing electric blue. Has she seen him before? He’s strangely familiar and Clio can’t figure out why. Does he work at the museum? Is he a fellow professor at Columbia? He stands there, just staring at them with a look of sharp disapproval, until his face splits into a censorious grin. Then he tackles Henry in a hug.
“Well, Hanky. Sloshed again, I see. Fitting.”
“Bloody hell, Patrick,” Henry says, returning the exuberant embrace. “What on earth are you doing here?”
“You know exactly what I’m doing here,” he says, grinning, winking at Clio. “I finagled a last-minute client meeting in the city to surprise you. Then the bloody flight was three hours delayed, but what the hell, better late than never. And this fresh-faced vision must be Clio? You said she was younger, Henry, but good God, robbing the cradle, are we?”
“Settle down, Pat. She’s thirty-four. Your age,” Henry says, pulling Clio between them. “Meet Patrick Kildare, my baby brother. Pat, meet Clio.”
Ah, that’s it. She’s seen pictures of Patrick, the youngest of Henry’s three brothers. He’s the one who lives in Silicon Valley and works for Google. Married, two little boys whose toothless grins are all over Henry’s iPhone. With one hand, Clio straightens her dress and extends the other to shake Patrick’s. The resemblance, she appreciates now, is staggering. They have the same eyes, the same long lashes and unruly brows, the same inky black hair. The same straight nose and square jaw and cleft chin. But Patrick is conspicuously younger, hasn’t yet grayed at his temples. His skin is still smooth, free of lines. He’s slimmer, missing that slight paunch that’s come from years of working hard and living well. It’s startling, really: she’s looking at Henry fifteen years ago.
“How was the party?” Patrick says. “What all did I miss?”
“Oh, it was just brilliant,” Henry says. “Couldn’t have asked for a better turnout. Who’s who from Condé Nast Traveler and the New York Times. Graydon Carter from Vanity Fair. That funny young gal everyone’s always raving about. What’s her name again, Clio?”
The Ramblers Page 1