by Maya Rodale
“What’s a few flights of stairs?” I mused, thinking about the long walk down and back up to his penthouse apartment. I was used to a fourth floor walkup. At least we weren’t stranded on, say, the 50th floor.
“That’s my girl,” Duke said with a grin. “Let’s get dressed and go.”
My jeans had dried from my mad dash through the rain and fully clothed shower the other night. Under any other circumstances I would have thrown them away—after what happened I didn’t want to wear them again. But my desire to get out and see the city was stronger. I paired the jeans with my black patent ballet flats and one of Duke’s Project-TK T-Shirts and his Stanford sweatshirt that I had decided belonged to me now.
Then we ventured out, down numerous flights of stairs in utter darkness, with only the light of a candle to guide us. Once out on the street, we joined a crowd of people who had come out to see how the city had fared in the storm.
“It doesn’t look like the zombie apocalypse I was expecting,” Duke said as we strolled up the street. He sounded disappointed.
“Expecting, or hoping for?” I quipped. He just squeezed my hand.
The city was coming back to life. Wet green leaves had fallen from the trees and were plastered all over the sidewalk and streets. A few tree branches had fallen, but it seemed most of the trees in our neighborhood had been unscathed. It was so strange to see the streets devoid of traffic—and the cars that remained seemed to find it a challenge to negotiate intersections without working stoplights. Most of the stores and restaurants were still closed. The bodegas were doing a brisk business and one bar had actually opened, lit only by candle light, but packed with people.
“Let’s get a drink,” Duke suggested.
“It’s not even noon!” I protested.
“This is a special occasion,” Duke said. “And we’re not working today. Besides, I bet the bartender is full of information. Duke grabbed my hand and led me into the little dive.
A bunch of other people had the same idea—the bar was fairly crowded, considering that it was a weekday morning. But Duke was right—this was a special occasion. It’s not every day that the entire city had a day off, or that this town functioned without electricity. There was a lovely sense of camaraderie in the air—we had all weathered the storm together and we were all enjoying this strange moment before the city bounced back to normal.
We found two spots at the bar and squeezed in.
“What can I get you two?” The bartender was a big guy with tattooed arms and lots of piercings.
“I’ll have a beer,” Duke said. I winced, remembering the taste of beer from Sam. Then I shook my head, chasing the thoughts away. I would not let him take over my thoughts, all the time.
“A glass of white wine for me,” I said.
“That’ll be fifteen bucks,” the bartender said. “Cash only. And those drinks will be warm.”
Duke and I exchanged concerned glances, not about the temperature of the drinks, but the cash to pay for them. I dug into my handbag and with fives, ones, and assorted change, spent the last of our money on booze.
“I’m Duke,” he said, extending in his hand.
“Frank,” the bartender replied. The two guys shook hands and then started talking.
“So is power out all over the city?” Duke asked.
“I heard that everything is in working order above 39th Street. Below that, no power.”
“Electricity might be the one thing that gets me to go above 14th Street,” Duke said, referring to his aversion to Midtown.
“Be prepared to walk if you head up there,” Frank said. “The subways are fucked and probably will be for some time. Cabs are hard to come by. And cash only. Everything is cash only.”
We all glanced at the pile of coins and crumpled dollar bills on the bar in front of us. The last of our money. I took a sip of warm white wine and wondered if Frank and random cab drivers wanted stock in Project-TK. Probably not.
“We’re stranded,” I said glumly. “We’ll be stuck without power for days, possibly weeks. Maybe months.”
That meant no hot water. No flushing toilets. No properly cooked meals. No phones, no computers, no contact with the rest of the world. It would be like living in the Regency era, but without fireplaces or servants. Ugh.
“We can walk uptown,” Duke said. “It’s only forty blocks.”
I glanced down at my shoes. Yes, I wore ballet flats. But their soles were paper thin and would probably be worn through by the time we hit 39th Street.
“These are probably not walking 40 blocks uptown.”
“Girls and their ridiculous footwear.”
“Hey, when I put these on I thought I was meeting an old friend for a quick drink at a bar near my apartment.”
“They’re cute,” Duke said, grinning. “You too.”
“That’s more like it,” I murmured, sipping my chardonnay.
“Any word on when the power will be back on down here?” I asked Frank. How much longer until I can check on the first quarter of my book? How long until I can have a hot shower and a cooked meal? How much longer until life gets back to normal?
“There was an explosion at one of the power stations. Everything is really damaged. Definitely days. Maybe longer. We’re assured they’re working on it around the clock.”
“God bless those guys,” the guy to my left said. He was bald with thick black-rimmed glasses.
“Seriously. Them, and all the cops and firefighters,” a guy with a thick beard and flannel shirt chimed in. “They had a rough night and have more rough days ahead cleaning up after Geoffrey.”
“Any disasters?” Duke asked.
“The front of a building collapsed on Eighth Avenue,” the bald guy said. He pulled out his iPhone and showed me a picture he’d saved from Twitter before the power went out.
“Oh my God!” I gasped. “That’s right next to my building!”
“Good thing you were with me,” Duke said, leaning over and wrapping his arm around me as we looked at the picture of a building missing its front wall, leaving all the furniture within exposed as if in a doll house.
“Indeed,” I murmured, sipping my drink. I was so glad I didn’t have to weather the storm on my own. By storm I meant Geoffrey and Sam.
“How do you hear all this?” I asked.
“There are a few patches of cell reception along the river,” the bald guy said, and Frank agreed, adding, “that is, if you have any battery left.”
“Good to know,” Duke said. “God, I miss my iPhone. And the Internet.”
I imagined he missed them the way a smoker missed cigarettes. Or a junkie missed heroin. Or a teenage girl missed texting. I knew we would be walking over to the East River after these drinks to see if we could get service and check in with the rest of our friends. I had to let my mom know I was okay—she was probably freaking out. And I hoped Roxanna was safe as well.
Duke and the guys kept chatting but I tuned out their conversation and soaked up the atmosphere. This was, perhaps, what a tavern in the Regency era would have been like. This place had rough-hewn wood floors, tables, benches and a bar. But it was the light that made it seem like time gone by. No flickering fluorescents or bright bulbs. Just a mixture of daylight and candlelight. Everything seemed softer. I’d even say I felt like I was in an oil painting. I kept my eyes open and took in all in, taking advantage of this opportunity to experience life in a tavern without electricity, and planning to write about it later.
And then someone said something that caught my attention.
“I’m wondering when they’ll reopen the bridges and tunnels?”
“No one is going in. And no one is going out,” Frank answered.
Sam was still on this island. He was here, perhaps only blocks away. The thought of it made my skin crawl. But even worse was the thought that he might have gotten in his car to drive home in the storm when he’d been drunk beyond reason. Perhaps cops caught him trying to leave, gave him a sobriety test and
put him jail for the duration of the storm. I had no idea what had happened. I only knew that he was out there, and angry and I was afraid to see him.
I glanced at Duke as he chatted with Frank. He’d be pissed to know that I was actually worried about Sam after what he’d done to me—and what he tried to do. I was kind of pissed with myself for caring. But I was a nice person who cared about others, particularly people I had loved with my whole heart for twelve years. And I did not want to lose my ability to experience empathy because of one awful experience.
I still didn’t want to see him. I still hated the idea that he was somewhere on this island.
I tuned back into the conversation about all the ways in which the city was shut down or barely working but still carrying on.
“Wait—if the power isn’t on and there’s no way out of the city, what are we going to do about your IPO day and my reunion?”
“We’ll figure something out,” Duke said confidently—and too quickly. We hadn’t had that mature, logical conversation I was supposed to initiate. Now was as good a time as any, right?
“But we should come up with a plan,” I said. Because that’s what I did—planned. Outlined. Prepared.
“It’s too soon to plan,” Duke countered. “We don’t know if there will be power or if we can get out of the city. We might end up spending the night eating cereal and drinking warm beer in my apartment.”
I made an unladylike face. And then persisted in making Duke share my worries.
“But if the power comes back on,” I started, “your party is at the same time as mine.”
“We’ll go to both,” he replied with an easy shrug.
“How? Logistically, it’s practically impossible. Both events are from six to nine, with an hour and half drive in between them.”
“I don’t know, Jane,” Duke answered, completely at ease and unconcerned by an issue that was kind of consuming me at the moment. “I’ll figure something out. Let’s not worry if we don’t have to and don’t imagine the worst-case scenarios.”
“I’m writer. It’s my job to imagine worst-case scenarios,” I muttered. I also had a brain for imagining dramatic events, and hosting imaginary arguments and falling for the luscious fantasies I made up. What served me well in writing fiction could complicate things in real life.
I knew it was a bit ridiculous to worry about these two parties right now—or even at all. I mean really, what a fabulous problem to have! Do I go to the hottest party in Manhattan with my billionaire boyfriend? Or do I show up at my reunion, full of people who dumped me and fired me, with my billionaire boyfriend by my side? And let’s not forget my popular romance novels and the killer dress I would buy with my royalty money . . .
What worried me was old issues between me and Duke resurfacing. I knew he had feelings for me. I knew I wasn’t just any other girl to him. But I didn’t know that, if he had to choose, he would pick me over his work. I wasn’t crazy to worry about that—it had already happened before.
Somehow, we made it work. But sometimes I wondered if he thought his work and his stuff were more important than mine.
After we finished our drinks and gleaned every last bit of info from the bartender, Duke and I headed out, holding hands as we walked toward the river.
“Are you OK?” Duke asked. “You’ve been really quiet.”
“What’s going to happen when Project-TK IPOs?”
“I’ll be a billionaire in truth, so people can finally stop calling me the Bad Boy Billionaire with all that snark.”
For Duke, the success of Project-TK was intimately tangled up with his two previous and massive failures. He’d had a billion bucks and lost it. Built one company, only to have it fail spectacularly. Everyone had written him off. This was his chance at redemption.
But what about after redemption and triumph?
“Will you be crazy busy?” I asked.
“Probably,” he said, squeezing my hand.
“Too busy for me?” That was really the question on my mind. My heart.
“I’ll make time for my girl,” he said firmly. Then he smiled that infamous, roguish smile and his blue eyes sparkled and still . . . still . . . he took my breath away.
Then I tripped over the sidewalk and lurched forward.
“Careful,” he said, catching me.
“I’m a little tipsy. And I had just one glass of wine.”
Like the other night. Just one glass.
“Do you think it was my fault?” I asked suddenly, as the awful thought occurred to me. Had I somehow asked for what happened to me?
“What are you talking about?” Duke asked, confused.
“The bad thing that happened with Sam. I had been drinking. Just a glass of wine, but I hadn’t eaten so I was probably a bit tipsy. Was it my fault?”
Duke stopped. He turned to face me, placed his palms on my cheeks and made sure I was looking into his eyes when he replied.
“No, it was not your fault,” Duke said firmly. “No woman deserves what happened to you, and I don’t care how much she’s had to drink. He’s a pathetic ass and if I ever see him, I will beat the crap out of him. You did not deserve what happened.”
“It was just one glass,” I said in a small voice.
“Even if it had been ten,” Duke said, “it shouldn’t have happened. Either way, Sam is to blame.”
“Thank you,” I said. I knew it, logically. But those awful girl doubts crept in. Duke chased them away. I inhaled and exhaled and resolved to not to doubt myself so much.
“Are you sure you don’t want to involve the cops?” Duke asked, anguish in his voice.
I knew I should. I knew what Sam did was wrong. But the more I thought about it, the more I couldn’t see the point. Would the police even believe me? I had the bruises on my arms, but no one had seen the assault and I doubted we could track Sam down with the city in such a mess. The police were probably busy with other stuff right now.
Sam was going through a rough patch. A trip to jail wouldn’t help. I had loved him once and didn’t want to ruin his life over a stupid thing he did when drunk.
But then again . . . how many men went through rough patches and got drunk and didn’t assault women who cared for them? Plenty. But how could I have loved someone who had this capacity for violence lurking inside of him? It was hard to reconcile and I quickly gave up trying. I just wanted to forget.
We got to the East River after crossing over the FDR. Lots of people were out, competing for a patch of cell service. We wandered until our phones started vibrating with incoming messages.
Sam Chase: I’m sorry
Sam Chase: R U ok?
Mom: Just want to check in on you! Let me know you’re all snug as a bug and ok!
Sam Chase: Please let me know you’re ok.
Sam Chase: I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me.
Roxanna Lane: I’m with mystery man at his place. Are you ok?
Sam Chase: Jane . . .
Sam Chase: Please Jane. I’m sorry.
Mom: Janie! I’m so worried about you. Let me know that you’re ok.
I replied to my mom and Roxanna letting them know I was fine and with Duke. I deleted all the messages from Sam—it felt so good.
“Any news?” Duke asked.
I shook my head no. “You?”
As we walked home, he told me all about his team, where they were stranded and how everyone was making plans to meet up at apartments of those with power. So they could keep working. The world went on. Even without power.
LATER, DUSK WAS falling and we faced another cool evening lit by candlelight. I sat on the couch gazing shamelessly at Duke. He stood, hands in his pockets, staring out the window.
“Another romantic night in,” Duke said, turning to me.
“Is it wrong if I say that I’m tired of romantic nights in?” I replied, shutting my notebook and shaking out my hands. Seriously: how did people handwrite so much?
Duke took my hands in his and star
ted to massage them, rubbing out all of the tension. I sighed. Bliss.
“What do you want to do tonight?” he asked.
“Take a shower. A long, hot shower.” It was the truth. It was also impossible. There was no running water this high up without the electric pump working.
“And your second choice?” Duke asked with a wry smile.
“I want my own clothes. And a proper meal. And real light. And toilets that flush.”
“Not loving your taste of Regency living?”
“I love how flattering candlelight is,” I conceded. Everything little thing was so soft and lovely when lit by candles instead of overhead fluorescents. “But I confess: I want my modern conveniences back.”
“I could boil water on the stove and make you a bath.”
“We don’t have water,” I grumbled. Buildings this tall required electricity to pump water to the higher floors. Running water wasn’t an option. God, I missed it.
“We’re really screwed aren’t we?” Duke said, grinning, even though there was nothing amusing about his. Still, his amusement was kind of infectious and I couldn’t help but smile and sigh and lament my tragic fate of having my hands massaged by my hot, devoted boyfriend after a day of writing what felt like a truly great book.
“I told you. I had the worst luck lately.” But maybe I was kind of lucky. Because I had found a man I loved and work I loved.
“And I told you I’m lucky.”
He pressed a kiss on my lips. Just a quick little press of his lips against mine. I wanted more. I didn’t want to feel Sam on me anymore. I wanted new feelings to wash away the old ones.
“Since we’re living it up Regency style,” Duke began, “why don’t we play cards, drink brandy and make ridiculous wagers?”
“How do you know all that?”
“I read your books, Janine,” he said, calling me a wrong version of my name, as he did to be cute sometimes.
Not being a Regency gentleman, Duke did not have brandy stashed in his apartment. Unfortunately, he didn’t have cards, either. He did have a bottle of really good whiskey.
“Now what do we do,” I asked after we settled on barstools at the kitchen counter with our drinks. A mass of candles were scattered around, illuminating this little corner of the world.