Come Dancing

by Leslie Wells

  Then in my senior year, at the urging of my English advisor, I applied to grad school and got a full ride at NYU. The month before moving to Manhattan sight-unseen, in my anxiety I ran so many miles I got shin splints. I mused over out-of-date issues of the one NYC magazine our tiny library carried, absorbing the ads and articles. I didn’t understand half of it, but I couldn’t wait to start my brand new life.

  I took a Greyhound to the city in August, my belongings crammed into a used duffel from the Army-Navy store. Seeing the sooty skyline across the Hudson for the first time, I’d had a moment of panic. I didn’t know a soul in this intimidating place—what was I doing here?

  Wide-eyed, I got out at Port Authority and took the wrong express train, winding up at 125th Street. A sympathetic woman walked me over to the downtown side. After asking six strangers for directions, I finally found my dorm and collapsed on the single bed. Once I’d caught my breath, I waded into the moving-in chaos to meet my hall mates.

  I had thought I’d go for a Ph.D., but when I learned about publishing, my plans changed. I knew the entry level was low-paying, but working with novelists and Pulitzer winners seemed much more exciting than academia.

  My mother didn’t understand why I wanted to live in one of the most dangerous cities in the world. She’d thought I was going to teach English in our local high school after college. At times, when it hit me how slim my chances were for moving up at work, I worried about winding up back there. I was terrified of proving her right by flunking out of my budding career; New York could rip you open like a wind-blasted flower.

  But anything would be better than moving back to Pikesville. That seemed like being buried alive. The thought of returning with my tail between my legs sent ice water through my veins. Back home, I would have been teaching participles to bored high school seniors who’d rather be scoring touchdowns, or pot. Braving the cockroaches and graffitied subways won, hands-down.

  Chapter 4

  Stormy Monday

  Vicky called me Sunday afternoon. I was standing in front of my open fridge, trying to get some relief from the sweltering heat. “I still can’t believe you didn’t let Jack come home with you,” she said. “Just think, right now you could be licking whipped cream off every inch of his body.”

  I laughed. “Right now I could be wondering if I caught VD. And wishing he’d stayed in bed at least fifteen minutes before he dashed out to his next conquest.”

  “But Jules, you have to admit, he’s the coolest… I mean, what a sexy guy. And you’re so into their music … Anyway, you’re going to be a little mad at me.”

  “Why, did you give them my number? That’s fine with me.” I waved the fridge door back and forth, rattling an empty catsup container.

  “No, but I might have mentioned your address. And Sammy has my number.”

  “I imagine they’ve already forgotten about us. So I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for Sammy-boy to call.” I gave up and shut the door, unwilling to melt my one stick of butter.

  “Well guess what, he just did. He asked me out for a drink with him next week. He said you could come too, so maybe Jack will show up. Oh, and by the way, Sammy said you’re the first woman who’s ever—he emphasized ever—turned Jack down. So maybe you really did make an impression on him. All this is great timing; I’ve been in a slump lately.”

  For Vicky, a slump was six days without a date. “Don’t worry, I won’t barge in on your big night out. I do think it kind of intrigued them that we didn’t fall all over them.”

  “You could be right. Why don’t you come with me, though? Maybe Jack will be there.”

  “That’s okay.” It would be humiliating to tag along hoping Jack would show, and then sit around like a third wheel while Vicky and Sammy flirted.

  “All right. But let me know if you change your mind.”

  After we hung up, I thought of what Sammy said. It would be amazing if Jack got in touch—but what were the chances of that? I plopped down on the couch and peeled up my tank top to wipe my sweating face. Maybe I should have let him come home with me. But if he’d accompanied me to my lumpy futon, wouldn’t there be a horrible letdown when I never saw him again?

  With an effort, I forced myself to stop thinking about Jack Kipling and focus on the manuscript I’d brought home. This one was by Timothy Collins, a novelist Harvey had signed up. I hoped that if I worked on enough of my boss’s projects, he’d eventually let me acquire some books and I’d get what I dreamed of: being an editor instead of an assistant, and having my own stable of bestselling authors.

  Harvey’s mood fluctuated in an inverse relationship to how many calls he got from his wife. Monday morning she left four messages, and he was an ogre. I’d been told she worked at her rich father’s investment firm, but she seemed to spend most of her time monitoring Harvey. After he got back from his two-martini lunch, I gathered my notepad along with the project I hoped to bring up and went into the editorial meeting.

  I took a spot at the table next to my friend Meredith, our managing editor. She always supported my attempts to pursue a book, although in the past I’d gotten shot down every time. We were joined by Edgar, who handled arts and crafts. Kate and Charlie took the seats opposite. Harvey bustled in, scowling.

  “What’s on the bestseller list? What’s hot?” He fired his opening salvo.

  “Diet, sex, and woo-woo,” Charlie said, running a hand through his thinning hair. In his late twenties, he’d risen through the ranks by specializing in pop culture.

  “We need more of the first two categories and less New Age. At Esiness we usually had several blockbusters in the works.” Harvey always managed to bring up his glory days at the more commercial house, where he’d been fired for grabbing one too many young assistants. “Kate, what’s up?”

  “I have in a debut novel; it’s sex-and-shopping, but not badly written. Maybe Julia could give it a read,” Kate said. The stylish editor had been hired away from Hawtey Press, supposedly to bring in bestsellers.

  Harvey frowned. “What we need is another brand name. The only one in our lineup right now is Freeman Fyfe. You people have to work the phones more; come up with your own book ideas. Find out what the agents are hatching before they send it out to everyone else. At Esiness, I was always hounding people to give me a first look.”

  Meredith leaned toward me. “He was hounding them for a first look inside their knickers,” she muttered.

  “Was that something you wanted to share with the group?” Harvey asked.

  “Not at all,” Meredith replied blandly, polishing her half-rims.

  Anxiously I cleared my throat. “I have a project. It’s a proposal on how polluted the ocean is becoming.”

  “Who sent you that?” Harvey demanded.

  “I found it in the slush pile, but it’s really well-written. It’s shocking the way these factories are dumping their chemical wastes. The author has some credentials; he’s written for Science Times—“

  “But who’d buy a book about that?” Kate cut in.

  “And who reads Science Times anyway?” Harvey said.

  This was sinking faster than the Titanic. I decided to give it one more whirl. “I think people worry about the contaminants in fish.”

  “Some of these environmental books can do well if the writing is lively,” Meredith said.

  I scribbled THANKS!! on my notepad.

  Harvey shook his head. “Too much of a downer. Pass-ola!”

  Pollution project—ixnay.

  “Okay gang, I’m not hearing anything that’s rocking my world,” Harvey said. “You need to get some fire in your bellies if we’re going to put ourselves on the map. Oh, did anyone see that novel about the Italian monastery that went so high in auction last week? Something with ‘rose’ in the title.”

  The editors all shook their heads.

  “I can’t imagine it’ll sell in the provinces.” Harvey gathered his memos, the paper shivering in his stubby hands. “All right, class dismisse
d.”

  Sighing, I went back to my cubbyhole and resumed typing an endless pile of rejection letters.

  Chapter 5

  One Bourbon, One Scotch, and One Beer

  The following Friday night as I headed home from work, I noticed something sticking out of my doorway. At first I thought someone had left their boots there, but then I saw they were attached to a ripped-up pair of jeans. A squarish bottle sat between the toes. Sure enough, the black car was idling further down the block. As a rill of anticipation ran through me, I told myself not to blow my cover.

  “Been a while since I sat on a girl’s stoop,” Jack said, gazing up at me. He wasn’t as rumpled as he’d been at the club; he had shaved, and his thick, dark hair was clean. In fact, he looked incredibly good. I had to remind myself not to stare at him.

  “If Mr. Iaccone was around, he’d make you move on. He doesn’t put up with people hanging out.”

  “Who’s Mr. Iaccone?” His eyes were an extraordinarily deep brown.

  I smiled. “My eighty-year-old landlord. He likes to takes a broom to loiterers.”

  “I came by,” Jack said, rubbing his hand through his hair and making it stand on end, “to ask why you won’t come out with me. You aren’t even giving me a chance.” He pushed his lanky body up from the steps and smiled down at me, creating sexy creases on either side of his mouth. His maroon shirt was missing a few buttons; over it he wore a crinkled suede jacket that looked like a puppy had used it for a chew toy.

  Sammy had called Vicky to postpone their drink date, so I’d thought the whole thing was a non-starter. But I wasn’t about to let on that I was thrilled to my threadbare socks. “I have a manuscript in this bag that I’ve been trying to make headway on.”

  “Can I take a look? I’ve never seen a book manuscript.” His London inflexions would make a grocery list sound fascinating. When I hesitated, he said, “C’mon, enlighten me.”

  I unzipped my backpack and pulled out Timothy Collins’s doorstop, marked up in red ink.

  “Looks like you’ve done a lot of work on it already,” Jack said, taking it from my hands.

  “It needs it. I’ll be lucky to finish by July.”

  I watched as he rifled through the pages with his long fingers, still hardly believing that he was standing there. “What would be the most important part? This bit in the middle?” he asked.

  “All of it, really. I have to go through it and make suggestions. Half of which he’ll probably ignore.”

  “How about this?” He pulled the last forty pages out of the rubber band.

  “Yes, the ending’s pretty important. Leaving it out would be kind of like… when the radio cuts to a commercial before they play the last verse.”

  “Good. Then I’ll take this,” he said, folding the pages and stuffing them down his shirt.

  “Hey, I need that!” I reached out my hand. We only had one copy; Harvey would have my head if I lost a section.

  “You’ll get it back, don’t worry,” Jack said with a grin. He wrapped his arms around his chest. “I’ll give it to you tonight when you meet me for a drink. Where should we go, Fanelli’s?” He cocked a dark eyebrow mischievously.

  “You really aren’t going to give it to me?” I said, trying not to smile.

  “Sure I will, after we have our drink.”

  “Okay, Fanelli’s at eight. Does Vicky know?”

  “I’ll tell Sammy to make sure she comes. Do you always need an escort, or is it just me?”

  Taking the rest of my manuscript from his hands, I considered my answer as I unlocked the door.

  “It’s just you.”

  I called Vicky as soon as I got in. She didn’t know Jack was going to be waiting for me, but Sammy had mentioned they had a plan to get me to come out tonight. I told her I’d meet her at Fanelli’s, said goodbye, and tried to calm down. I kept picturing the way Jack’s eyes seemed to light up when he first saw me. To squelch my mounting excitement, I told myself that probably happened with any girl who caught his attention momentarily.

  I put on Billie Holiday and sang along to “Summertime” as I tried to figure out what to wear. I was so antsy, I mechanically tried on each of my four skirts while gulping a beer. What would I talk to Jack about—and why would he be interested in me? Was it that I presented a challenge, as Sammy said; a girl who didn’t bring him home right off the bat? Try to maintain your cool, I told myself. You’ll turn him off if he catches you drooling.

  Finally I gave up and put on jeans and a blue shirt with pearl buttons from Alice Underground, my favorite second-hand store. I fixed up my eyeliner and mascara, smeared on a little lip gloss, and then quit fiddling. Grabbing my backpack, I hiked up Mercer toward the familiar red neon “Café”.

  I opened the frosted glass door and waved at Hal. Squeezing past a raucous crowd, I continued to the end of the bar, where I spotted Vicky on a stool talking to Sammy. Someone in a large floppy hat was seated with his back to me. Vicky was so into the conversation, she didn’t notice me until I stood next to her.

  “I was starting to think I’d have to come get you,” she said.

  Beneath the big hat Jack wore a dark green jacket, not chewed-up like the one earlier. He pulled an open stool over to him. “She wouldn’t stand us up. I have something that belongs to her.”

  “Yes, you do. Is it still in your shirt?” I sat and hooked my ankles around the rungs in case I started feeling faint. Even in the droopy hat he was sexy, his thighs taut in tight faded jeans, obviously sans underwear.

  “Your papers are safe in the car, right outside. I didn’t want to spill anything on them.”

  Hal came down the bar and made eyes at me as if to say, You’re moving in fancy circles tonight. “Usual draft?” I nodded.

  “You look like you could use a shot.” Sammy indicated the line of glasses.

  “No, I’m okay.” If I had any Wild Turkey, I might really pass out.

  “We were just saying how packed it is in here tonight,” Vicky said in an Earth-to-Julia tone of voice. “They usually avoid public places on weekends.”

  Jack seemed intent on topping off their shot glasses with whiskey; after that, he drank right from the bottle. Vicky and Sammy murmured to each other as I cast about for something to say.

  “Did you get some editing done?” Jack asked, his face partially hidden by the hat.

  “I’ll get a lot done tomorrow. Mr. Collins likes to use three adjectives where one will do; every time I think I’ve weeded them out, several more crop up. They’re twined around his words like kudzu.”

  Jack laughed, then pushed back the brim and gazed at me. “I’m not used to beautiful girls being so smart.”

  To my horror, a slow burn started in my chest and spread to my cheeks. I took a gulp from my frosty mug.

  “Well, would you look at that,” Jack said. “It’s been fifteen years since I saw anyone blush like that. Like watching the sun rise in your face.”

  “It’s just this humidity.” I fanned myself with a bar napkin.

  He started to reply when two heavily made-up women barged over.

  “It is you,” the first one said breathlessly. “I told you so,” she added to her friend, who was staring at Jack as if afraid he’d disappear. “Can you sign something for us?” She batted her prickly eyelashes.

  “Sure.” He fumbled in his pockets as Sammy produced a pen. Jack plucked a cardboard coaster from the bar and scratched his name. “Oh thank you,” she gushed. “Wanna come party with us? We’re huuuge fans of yours.”

  “Ladies, we were just havin’ a conversation with our friends here,” Sammy said. “Maybe some other time.”

  “Can you sign too?” the woman asked, and Sammy obliged.

  “Here’s our numbers,” the second one said, thrusting a piece of paper at Jack. “Call us. We’ll show you a really good time.” Scowling at me and Vicky, the two flounced away.

  “Sorry ‘bout that,” Sammy said. “Sometimes the out-of-towners ain’t cool. Speaki
ng of which, another contingent’s headed our way … tattoos and really big hair. Wanna split?”

  “See you outside,” Jack said, and bolted for the back door.

  “Let’s boogie on out of here.” Sammy threw down some bills, took hold of our arms and hustled us along. We rushed into the warm night air toward the black car waiting at the curb. There was a commotion behind me as the bunch from the bar exploded out the door.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “Get in, we’ll discuss it on the way,” Sammy said, drawing Vicky with him. I jumped inside just as a meaty fist pounded on the window. I looked back when we pulled away, and one of the girls gave me the finger.

  “Come over to my place,” Jack said, leaning across the others to hand me the loose pages. “I kept my end of the deal, but we haven’t had our drink yet.”

  Vicky smiled. “Sure. We always keep our promises, don’t we, Julia?”

  We’re going to Jack Kipling’s apartment, was all I could think. I tried to quell my jitters as the men gave Rick a hard time about his getaway driving.

  Five minutes later we pulled up in front of a big gray building. Jack and Sammy spoke to the doormen as we crossed a slick-looking lobby. The elevator whooshed up to the penthouse and Jack pushed through the front door. When it opened onto a vast loft, I realized he must own the entire floor. Running along the wall was the biggest collection of albums I’d ever seen. Reels of tape spilled off the ends of shelves, and guitars were scattered throughout on stands, on chairs, and propped against furniture.