At first he was entirely convinced that the real issue, though Amanda had denied it, was money. He had scared Amanda by coming on too strong, too fast, he thought, and then when he had told her he was leaving Melissa for her, he was positive that Amanda no longer even saw him, Howard, but saw Christopher instead, coming back to live off her.
Live off her? (This thought, while standing on a traffic island in the middle of Broadway, near Lincoln Center, made him lean his head against a light pole, earning murmurs of consolation from the winos sitting on the bench.) Howard did not want to live off Amanda—God, no. Howard wanted to live with Amanda, he wanted to—
It was all so screwed up, he thought, striding south on Broadway. Everything. Absolutely everything. He felt sure if he had more money Amanda wouldn’t have said a word. But, with his salary, who was he to move in with her without appearing to be another Christopher? But he couldn’t make more money than he already was, Howard thought. When he had made the decision to become an editor he had also made the decision that making money would never be a priority—
With Melissa, it didn’t have to be a priority, he reminded himself. No, but that hadn’t been it. Really. It really hadn’t. He had wanted to be an editor in the worst way.
And now you hate it, so what’s the excuse?
He didn’t hate being an editor; he hated being at Gardiner & Grayson. But was that it, either? He didn’t know if he wanted to be an editor anymore. No, that wasn’t right. He did want to be an editor, but he wanted to be like Gertrude’s vision of an editor—to be out in the field, exploring and discovering and fostering new talent.
A lot of former book editors had become literary agents and Howard had thought about this a lot. These days, the literary agents—the good ones were out in the field doing all of the discovering. They found the writers and worked closely with them—encouraging them, guiding them, sometimes even preliminarily editing them—and then endeavored to place them with the editor and house that they believed would most likely nurture that writer’s career.
Harrison always said the analogy of good book publishing was childbirth. The writer is the expectant mother; the book is the unborn child; and the editor is the midwife. “And the agent?” the gang at G & G would ask. “If they’re good, the labor coach; if they’re not, a baby broker.” Howard liked the image of labor coach—it implied a deep sense of trust, of being “in it” with the writer for the long run.
And there was the money side of being an agent. An agent received anywhere from ten to fifteen percent of a client’s earnings. So if an agent did a good job on behalf of good writers, he or she stood a very good chance of making a very good living.
Howard had thought about becoming an agent but then had always dismissed it as a pipe dream. Where to find writers? Why would a good writer choose him as an agent when there were so many established, wonderful agents in town? And what about office space? Telephones? Accountants? Lawyers? Insurance...
Over and above the whole idea making him feel exhausted, there was the very real possibility that he could fail. His paycheck, inconsequential as everyone seemed to think it was, was still regular. As was his insurance, his pension plan—
Thirty-three and I’m scared to lose my pension plan?
No, he was scared of going completely bankrupt. Of giving up the identity that his business card gave him. (“Gardiner & Grayson?” people would say, looking up at him with a bright eye. It was extraordinary, the power of that name in America. Howard could go anywhere, call anywhere—the White House even—and people would be very careful to take notice of him.) What would it be like just to be Howard Stewart? Who the hell was that? Without the power of the Gardiner & Grayson name fronting for him, why would anyone give him the time of day?
To be Howard Stewart and only Howard Stewart and to fail and to go bankrupt?
Sigh. It went without saying how Melissa would react to that. And Amanda was even worse—here he was an editor at one of the most prestigious houses in the world, and she already thought he was a failure!
How could she reject him so quickly? Why hadn’t she just come out and said, “Please leave Melissa first and then come to me”? But she hadn’t and Howard had not known what her reaction would be.
He felt sick.
He had blown it. If he had only kept his mouth shut! If he had only approached the subject of living with Amanda gradually, had given her time to get used to the idea... But no, he had to go flying in there, announcing his decision on the assumption that she would be elated by it.
No, no, he later decided, drifting aimlessly in Times Square, ignoring the solicitations of numerous prostitutes—white, black, Asiatic, Hispanic, female, male. No, Howard decided, it was not money, it was not his tactlessness that had made Amanda reject him.
It was because she did not love him.
There. He had admitted it. His worst fear had been acknowledged. Amanda did not love him. If she had, she would have been ecstatic that he was leaving Melissa. Instead, she had panicked at the idea of being stuck with him.
Exhausted, his stomach aching, Howard started trudging uptown, trying to think where he would go from here. The loss of Amanda felt like the loss of his dreams. Without her, he did not much care what happened to him. Would life now be impossible with Melissa? It had always been impossible, so what would be new? He had always managed to live a fairly interesting life with her, and there was no reason to think it would stop. In fact, all that had changed was that Howard now knew he was capable of having an affair. So maybe things would be better after all. Would it be so terrible if he had someone for himself in bed once a week? To take the sexual energy that Melissa loathed and discreetly channel it elsewhere, thus taking at least that pressure off their marriage?
Patricia MacMannis instantly came to mind and he followed that thought. She and Tom were rocking and rolling in their affair and, according to Patricia, it was in the throes of ending. She did not love Tom, she said. And she was not in love with Howard anymore than he was in love with her. But Howard really cared for Patricia, they were great friends, they trusted one another, and Howard was almost positive that if he carefully broached the subject with her, outlined what he had in mind, Patricia would—
His thinking was insane and he knew it. Amanda was not even a memory yet and already he was bedding Patricia in his head. And yet, what else could he think about? About Amanda? About the woman he had fallen in love with, and who had not fallen in love with him, and who had, the moment he was free, rejected him out of hand?
Yes, he would hurt. For a long, long time. And he doubted he would ever get over her. But what was he supposed to do? Just crumble, give up everything, move to a desert isle? Without Amanda, what would be the point in walking out on Melissa without any attempt at working things out? The worst had already happened—his dreams had been destroyed. And now there were only the realities left. He was married to Melissa. They had been together eight years. They had built a life together, a home together. That’s what he had. Right now. In hand. That’s what he had to deal with.
Howard arrived home at a little before eight in the morning. By now he was reconciled to the idea that the best plan of action would be to sit down and talk things through with Melissa. Amanda, on that point, had been right. He did owe it to her to at least try to reassess their marriage, their mutual anger and frustrations.
(Good, he thought, looking at his face in the hall mirror, I look like hell. Melissa will be pleased.)
He went into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of orange juice. Boy, he was tired. He started to make coffee.
The best bet would be to talk to Melissa while driving out to the house. Even with Daddy out there, a swim in the ocean, seeing Melissa’s friends, playing some tennis—maybe even a golf game with Daddy—would do a good deal toward setting things right. As a matter of fact, the more he thought about it, the more real Melissa became—sleeping only a few rooms away—the more unreal Amanda became. How would they—he and Ama
nda—have spent the weekend? Would they have even ventured out from Amanda’s apartment? Probably not. Would they have ever played tennis? Amanda playing tennis? Would she have ever come to a publishing party with him? (“I know she looks like the Empress of imperial Russia, but she’s really my wife,” he imagined himself explaining to Harrison.)
Howard closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. He let it out slowly, trying to ease the tightness in his throat.
He was angry. And he was hurt. And he almost felt as though he hated Amanda, making him want to make fun of her, tear her apart, ridicule her until she became so ridiculous in his mind that he could cast her out of it.
God help me. I love her.
But she doesn’t love me.
He glanced at the clock. Eight-fifteen. He poured himself a cup of coffee and stood at the window, drinking it.
She does not love me.
As he often did when he felt as though he had had it with Melissa, Howard thought of her the night her mother died. How she had looked, on her knees, sobbing on the bed where Mrs. Collins had been only days before. And he thought about Mrs. Collins and her fears about what would become of her only child. And he thought about those times that Melissa had so freely offered financial assistance to his family.
Melissa. Was it really her fault, the way she was? Was it really irreversible, or had Howard been too scared to stand up to Daddy Collins? To try to break the hold he had over them both? Yes, he had been too scared. But now, now... What was there to lose by trying? He and Melissa could talk all they wanted, but their only chance would be if Howard took Daddy Collins on.
Today. Howard could start this very day.
He poured coffee into a fresh cup, stirred in skim milk and a Sweet ‘N Low, and carried it to the bedroom. To start with, he would be apologetic to Melissa this morning. Admit he had been wrong by walking out last night. To reassure her that he wanted to talk things out, reassess where they stood. But he would also say that the things that had upset him were very, very real issues—ones he could no longer ignore or put up with. And he would acknowledge the things about himself that upset Melissa, and say they absolutely had to seek outside help—
He froze in the doorway of the bedroom. The bed was made and there was no Melissa. Instead, there were Howard’s suitcases, packed, standing at the foot of the bed. There was also a note and he walked over to read it:
You better not be here when Daddy and I come back Monday night. He will probably kill you.
P.S. I should have known it was the rich one.
He had left a note for Melissa to say that she could reach him at the Cambridge House Hotel on 86th Street. It was two weeks and something over nineteen hundred dollars before Howard realized that Melissa was not going to appear, screaming at him and then pleading with him to come home. No, that did not happen. She did not even call.
Rosanne had called him, though, at the office, to tell him of her custody battle with the Rubinowitzes over Jason. After discussing the problems, after Howard declared his financial support to help in any way he could, after Rosanne told him that Amanda had secured a lawyer for her, they got around to the subject of why Howard was not living at home. (“There’s a machine,” Rosanne told him, “and on it she says, ‘Messages for Howard should be left at the Cambridge House Hotel.’ “)
Rosanne then found a studio apartment for him on 95th Street between Riverside and West End. That first Saturday of studio apartment living found Howard charging up a storm at Macy’s: a pullout couch; a chest of drawers; an easy chair; a color TV; a large butcher block table; a straightback chair; a brass standing lamp; a brass desk lamp; two window shades; a rug; bath towels; dish towels; bath mat; sheets; blanket; pots; a pan; coffee maker; trash can; dish rack; dishes; glasses; mug; silverware; toolbox; vacuum; clock radio; telephone; hangers—and a spice rack.
Next had come the long list of “essentials” from the grocery store that Rosanne had written out for him, everything from salt to light bulbs to Drano to Campbell’s Soup. And then had come the long list Rosanne had written out for the hardware store, everything from a shower curtain rod to light switch plates and extension cords.
All in all, within a week, Howard’s apartment had pretty much come together. But, admittedly, no matter how nice the things were that Howard had purchased, he was more than unsettled by his new residence. First of all, it was only after Macy’s delivered all of the furniture that it occurred to him that, if he got back with Melissa, all of this stuff would be useless. He blamed Rosanne in this regard; in his confusion and uncertainty, she had railroaded him into taking steps that indicated a permanent separation. And he was not at all certain of that.
And then there was the residence itself. It was a five-floor walk-up, one of ten studios in an old town house. There were two windows that faced north—directly into the back of another apartment house—and there was virtually no sunlight at any time of the day. The plumbing was ancient; the wiring was positively frightening at times (when Howard turned on the kitchen light, the actual event took some sixty seconds of crackling and hissing to take place); and his neighbors were sketchy at best: an old man who showed Howard his loaded shotgun; a woman who was working for an escort service until Hollywood discovered her; and a rather rotund man in a red beret who tried to sell Howard a subscription to the Communist Daily Worker.
All this was Howard’s for six hundred and fifty dollars a month. “A steal,” he was told.
Howard went to work as usual and in the evenings came home to putter. He stayed home one day to have the phone installed and to have cable TV hooked up. (Without it, the only thing Howard could bring in was police radio bands and a flurry of snow.) That night, when everything was in place, Howard fixed himself a steak, watched a movie on HBO, and did the Sunday Times crossword puzzle.
Surprising himself, Howard had felt strangely elated. In his apartment. Surrounded by his things. Doing what he wanted to do. And when he had unfolded the couch, had crawled in between his new sheets, his head on his new pillows, he had fallen sound asleep for the first time in months.
It was not long, however, before he started to hurt. He had sent Melissa a card, telling her where she could find him, he had given his new number out to almost everyone he knew and yet his phone had not rung once. (He knew it was working because he had the escort service girl call him.)
And Amanda. Every day he wanted to call her, and every day he decided that he had no right to. Besides, he did not want to be rejected again. No, he told himself, wait. Some days he felt convinced that his marriage was over, that he wanted out of it, and that after he had really learned to live by himself, was really committed to going through with a declaration of independence, then he could call Amanda. But then, other days, Howard missed Melissa terribly. Well, it wasn’t as clear as that. When he discovered three cockroaches inside his refrigerator one night, for example, it was clear that he missed their apartment, but since Melissa was inseparable in his mind from their apartment, he supposed he missed her too.
Amanda. What would she think of this place? Howard wondered. She would be horrified, no doubt. It made Howard’s financial status so blatantly, painfully obvious. He had come to this? Rather, had he always been this? Had not Melissa come into his life, would this not be the way he would have lived?
“Even your precious Harrison couldn’t afford to lallygag around as an editor,” Melissa had always thought to remind Howard. “He had a wife and children to support; he was an executive by thirty; he edits, Howard—so your excuses fail to impress me.”
Would he have done better in his career had he not married Melissa? If he had, say, married Debbie in Columbus?
We live like children do. That was what Amanda had said. Was it true? Had he been living like a child, secure in the knowledge that there were people to care for him?
No.
Yes.
Well, partly—maybe.
One night, around eleven o’clock, the girl from the escort service, Mary Ann,
knocked on his door. She had in her hand a bottle of wine, a recent gift, she said. Would Howard like to share it with her? As a kind of housewarming? Touched by her thoughtfulness, and deciding that she was—despite her dubious career—not a bad-looking girl, Howard had invited her in. They sat around and drank the wine, switched to scotch, and she told him all about her life since the day of her birth in Stanley’s Crossing, New Jersey. By two, Howard was feeling no pain and was thinking that Mary Ann was actually rather sensational-looking. By two-thirty, he was convinced she was going to be a great actress—an absolute superstar. By three, she was lying across his lap on the couch and Howard was busy exploring her breasts.
That was when Howard received his first telephone call. At twenty after three in the morning. It was a wrong number. No, there was no Lucille here, he told them.
Hanging up, turning back to Mary Ann, all Howard could see was how much makeup she had on, that the blouse he picked up from the floor was polyester, and that the brassiere pushed up over her breasts was red.
Howard gently explained to Mary Ann that he was a married man, confused, yes, but to get involved with her would not be fair to her. He was sorry he had behaved the way he did; he thought Mary Ann was very pretty, very nice, and deserved better than to be used by him.
Mary Ann said she thought it would be fun to be used by him.
They parted amicably, however, and Howard promised to cook dinner for her one night. After she left, Howard sat at the table, held his face in his hands, and cried.
The next day Howard received his first piece of mail. When he saw his home address—his former home address—on the envelope, his stomach turned over. Envisioning a long letter inside from Melissa (the envelope was quite thick), one beginning with a tirade and ending with a plea for reconciliation, Howard let it sit on the table for a while. He changed into jeans, poured himself a scotch (he kept forgetting to get ice trays), took the phone off the hook, turned on the floor lamp and then got the letter. He sat down in the easy chair, took a deep swallow of his scotch, and opened it.
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