The Lover from Fifth Avenue
What is the truth in love, and what is a woman in truth and in love?
Victor Nash, attorney at law, had his own, peculiar opinion on that matter. Being witty, warmhearted, benevolent and perceptive, but somewhat selfish and fame-seeking – he preferred the multilayered, ambiguous interpretation of truth in accordance with his legal education and moral principles: he believed that it contained and symbolized an equal measure of eternal love and undisputed happiness, immaculate beauty and sparkling charm; it needed a man falling apart on the outside and a woman crumbling on the inside, professional success and plenty of clients familiar with the prospects of their own bank accounts. For Nash, the truth was a shocking, inconvenient and painful, but occasionally an exciting, intoxicating and sexually scandalous category. He sometimes vividly compared the truth with his wife Donna, who was seven years his junior, while boastfully saying: “Just as the truth is authentic, nothing is fake about my wife.”
Victor – or Lord, as he was nicknamed because he often acted that way, while he mostly called his friends and acquaintances ‘Count’ or ‘Countess’ – was absolutely right. Donna Nash really resembled a sea goddess; she was a beautiful creature with the face of an angel and short, somewhat tousled raven-black hair.
Her face bore an inexplicit, but delicate smile, lips as red as fish gills, and a slightly rounded chin. Her slender, smooth neck resembled ivory. She always wore short, figure-hugging dresses that accentuated her beautiful breasts and waistline, as well as her legs: to have such long, lissome and provocative thighs, subtly rounded knees and perfectly elongated, graceful calves were an unfulfilled dream to many women. The countless nuances of her body, the endless transitions and a gorgeous unity of bones, muscle and skin – that was Donna when he had laid eyes on her for the first time! There was nothing artificial or borrowed about her: even her long, black eyelashes were a true gift of nature, deeply imbued with life. A true masterpiece! The perfection of female beauty!
Donna was one of those young women from Pennsylvania who came to New York University after graduating from Cumberland College full of great hopes and plans about the future. To her, New York was a brand new vision, a new life, something that nurtured her youthful dreams in a special way.
When meeting her for the first time, a lot of people would see her at least as undereducated, if not even stupid. However, she was neither stupid nor undereducated: she had simply been raised in a different, stricter way. A genuine tendency to be deeply modest and withdrawn resulted in life led exclusively on the inside. She learned how to keep her feelings perfectly disguised, how to suppress her own will and desires; this mental state was actually the result of her extremely proud temper – or even something unfathomable and profoundly mysterious that couldn’t be recognizable, let alone discoverable by mere mortals.
She was modest and withdrawn, turned to herself, a girl who found arrogance, intrusion and sexual provocation as strange as lightning in clear skies.
She wasn’t very experienced in matters of the heart, nor was she up to talking about it. She would always avoid places at which her exceptional beauty could be claimed by a boastful pack of irresponsible men that could desecrate her like a holy sanctuary. She was confused at times, maybe even dispirited, sometimes too withdrawn, but everyone would understand her behavior as having the only possible and comprehensible reason – that she couldn’t cope with her new surroundings. Her soul was considerably sensible and proud, and the urge for happiness and the desire to start a sincere relationship with a good man, so innate to females, constantly reminded her to ignore the cruel and rude actions of the people around her. Simply put, she wanted to become a woman, but not an easy, cheap, one-night-standish one. Despite certain lack of orientation, she always seemed cool-headed: she knew exactly what she wanted.
She was devoid of the recognizable arrogance of a blooming girl aware of her exceptional looks, the kind who mastered the skill of heart-breaking as soon as she reached the right age for marriage. Donna’s eyes, a perfect picture of her overall personality, reflected a kind of sweet, surreal innocence. Those eyes, like two blackberries, impressed many men, triggering their deep sighs. Victor Nash was one of them: he was among the young men who were trying to get close to her and ‘to warm up her shimmering belly’ – that’s how many youngsters his age would jovially call their pastime spent with young girls at student campuses.
Victor was an interesting member of an old, respected and rich New York family: equally moderate and difficult, levelheaded and pretentious, smooth and restrained, selfish and egotistical, but sometimes also ironic, uncontrollable and rude when dealing with others, especially those who came to the big city from – so to speak – some godforsaken place. Some people occasionally complained about Lord’s periodical awkwardness and arrogance in everyday communication but, all in all, those verbal outbursts of his mostly induced mild disapproval, sometimes even candid favor and support because they were always uttered in a humorous tone, never with an evil afterthought or any ulterior motives. They were simply the consequence of unfettered opinions and a more liberal upbringing: the fact is that Victor was an only child and as such, he had preferential treatment in the Nash family. Of course, the permissiveness of his relatives – and especially his parents – helped shape his behavior, but there was hardly anything intolerable or exclusive: his assessment criteria were just somewhat milder and more sparing, and his everyday behavior was sometimes on the verge of good taste. And maybe his life was a bit more disorderly and vagrant than the lives of others. He was simply developing a personality of his own.
He was studying law, but he wasn’t quite successful at it. Not because the power of his mind was questionable, or too inadequate and poor for such demanding courses. Quite the contrary! His reasons and motives were of entirely different nature and, some would say, utterly prosaic. When Donna started her freshman year at drama school – the acting department – Victor was still a senior, even though a lot of his peers had already graduated, and some of them were even starting their careers. However, it was obvious that Victor was in no rush: he was too easy-going, sometimes even lazy, which was a luxury he could afford, given the fact that he was well-off and financially situated for the rest of his life.
He would often go from one extreme to another: he would pass the more difficult exams, such as the one in international law, immediately and with ease, while he would sometimes linger the easier ones even for years. He would wear tailored suits for months, and then he would be spotted wandering around in tattered jeans and worn down tennis shoes. He would spend his entire monthly allowance in a day’s worth of partying, while on some other occasion, if he happened to walk into an unplanned, oddball party he didn’t like, he would show incredible, almost pathological stinginess.
He was obstinate, a know-it-all among his peers, a man who had his own way of behaving and living. A lot of people welcomed him gladly into their company because his witticisms were known to gladden and cheer up everyone around him. He wasn’t a nuisance or a meddler. He had a perfect sense of measure, even though – and this should be acknowledged – he didn’t stick to it all the time. He did a lot of talking, but never too much.
His sentences were concise, measured and filled with sparkling humor, sometimes even bombastic. But, nobody could ever say to him: “Lord, you loosen your tongue more often than not”.
He was simply a charmer with substance, sometimes toxic and ruthless, and sometimes merciful and deeply loyal. He would mostly hang out at the student campus behind the Pan Am Building in Vanderbilt Avenue; he spent a lot of
his free time over there, socializing with peers from different social backgrounds, with various preferences and different points of view. Hanging out with Lord bore a certain symbolic meaning in terms of status: everyone wanted to get close to him, everyone wanted to see him at their parties, and everyone had their own, special way of dragging him to their meager table. Especially girls: some of them even developed their own little plans of stealing Lord’s heart, some of which were downright military. And he, having an elusive and unrestrained soul, thought of the majority of his relationships as passing affairs; he never committed himself to any of those girls. He wasn’t remembered as a fool, a buffer or a hayseed, but rather as a man who had his own views on life. He once said: “Two blue-eyed broads are keeping an eye on me! Big deal! However, I was rational enough to fall for the dark-eyed Winona, a petite bombshell from Oregon. She’s pure sex! Nothing but sex! All sex!”
Exactly from that period came an interesting anecdote which conjured up Lord’s numerous misdeeds: while dating Winona, he would usually sleep at her place and the two of them would share humble meals. She didn’t know the truth about him because he would always lie and deceive her. First, he told her he was a med student. Then he told her he needed to get a job fast because his father couldn’t pay for his studies anymore. Then, he fibbed about his mother publicly denunciating him because he gambled away his sister’s college fund. Eventually, he made up a story of how his landlady hypnotized him and almost got him to marry her crazy aunt, but he escaped at the last moment…
In a nutshell, Victor told her so many absurdities and trifles that the poor girl finally felt sorry for him and let him move into her modest little room until he resolved the issue of accommodation. It lasted for five or six months: Victor would spend two nights at her place, then the next two in his parents’ house on Fifth Avenue, near Central Park, telling Winona he got a job as a night porter at the ice cream factory in Bronx.
When the relationship eventually died – and that happened because the girl fell in love so much that she started to think about marriage – a scandal was born. Winona started defaming him, calling him names, telling everyone in a scornful and cold sternness that he had eaten half of the canned meat her father had bought for her. Soon, this story reached Victor. He got really mad at her gibberish, so he went to the nearby store, bought a truck worth of cans and brought them to Winona. Not in the literal sense, though – he unloaded them in Winona’s room, filling it up almost to the ceiling. When Winona returned from her courses, she had plenty to see – a pile of cans in her own bed, decorated with a red bow, and an accompanying letter: “Dear Countess, here’s your canned meat. When you finish them, feel free to return the cans to me because, let’s be honest, I haven’t thrown away any of yours in these five or six months we’ve spent together. You can keep the red bow and this letter. You can also keep me in fond memory if you’re up for it. I cared about you, but I hate girls who always count and calculate something. I hope you know what I mean. We had a good time, but you lost your common sense, so I suggest that you keep on living in the ditch water you created by yourself. Lord.”
Victor first met Donna in October, right outside the student campus. He remembered well that it was the beginning of autumn because he was walking down a path yellow from fallen leaves and because his parents were chasing him around the house for days, asking one single question: “Son, when are you going to graduate?” He ran away from home, but not because his parents were nagging him – he heard that a beauty named Donna had moved into one of the campus pavilions just two months ago. Everyone was talking about her: horny old porters, young men at dances and birthday parties, girls in the tea room or at lunch at campus or at nearby restaurants, and both girls and guys during lectures or in the silent atmosphere of the numerous halls at the National Library in 45 street.
“She’s killing me”, his friend Stacey told him one day, in an almost desperate voice. “She’s been killing me slowly: day by day, I feel more anemic and lifeless.”
“Who’s been killing you?” Victor asked, feigning ignorance, although he knew exactly who he was talking about. He had already heard the rumor that Stacey was hitting on Donna, trying to get into her pants, but that she showed absolutely no interest towards him.
“Donna! The bird of paradise! She’s killing me. She’s killing me with her beauty.”
“So, you’re not afraid of striking women. I like that in men”
“That girl doesn’t even want to talk to me.”
“You should take her out for a walk.”
“You’ve lost your mind, Victor. The vultures would come right at us. I know I stand a chance with her; I’m not like the other loudmouths, roughnecks and hayseeds. You know me well, I’m a serious guy.”
“You should marry her then.”
Stacey became pale and confused, and then answered: “Don’t be insane. We haven’t even talked yet and you’re already putting the old ball and chain on my leg. Truth be told, I’m ready for it, but she’s literally ungraspable. She refuses to discuss weather, let alone marriage.”
Victor put one hand on Stacey’s shoulder and grasped him by the upper arm with the other. “Don’t lose hope, Count. Try doing it normally, gradually, softly and dominantly. Besides, you have your own way of doing it. You’ve been to Acapulco, Havana, San Francisco, the Bahamas… There’s no place you haven’t visited, and you’ve managed to score a hot chick in every one of them. Just think of Ruth, Calista, Lucia… Those were all great girls, really nice and exceptionally attractive. You’ve also got quite a reputation here, at campus. Of course, what worked for Ruth, Calista and Lucia doesn’t have to work for Donna. However, my friend, one should never give up hope. Think of something original: maybe the chick will buy it.”
“I hope that Donna and I are going to settle somewhere.”
“Just don’t promise her the moon. She simply isn’t the type that would buy such a story. She only cares about love and nothing else. Can you tell her you love her?”
“Maybe I can.”
“Great, then we’re halfway there. Loosen your pride a bit, throw yourself at her feet and admit it: after that, no one will ever think of Stacey as a nerd kneeling before a chick, but rather as a man that captured Donna’s heart.”
Although he was exhausted and his heart was filled with immense pain, Stacey was as alert as a child listening to a bedtime story.
“Maybe it would be a good idea if I moved away from my parents and rented a nice little condo for Donna and myself.”
“You should seek your own happiness. What’s wrong about that? Either you’ll have Donna, or you’ll lose yourself.”
“What do you mean?”
“If you’ve already decided to hook up with that chick, you shouldn’t give up half way through. All of us, other men who might have started chasing that skirt as of this moment, are in an unequal position compared to you: we have yet to meet her, while you’ve already smelled the perfume behind her ears. You, my friend, are in a huge advantage: don’t gamble away your chances.”
Stacey hugged and kissed Victor. The latter felt just cheap sentiment – bland, growing and cheap sentiment. While they were turning away from each other, Victor said to himself, not without his famous irony:
“Count, you’re a fool! Nothing but a stupid, naïve fool!
* * *
Victor Nash was thinking more and more about Donna. He felt strong excitement in his chest when he saw her for the second time. He remembered it well: on a sunny Saturday, she appeared on a subway stop near the Pan Am carrying a tattered book on the French Black Wave. She wore a light, peach-colored linen suit and flat, black shoes.
Victor stood behind her and he could almost smell her fragrance. She was truly beautiful: she walked with her head up, upright and proud, her heels beating on the pavement. The sound of her heels was intoxicating to Victor, as well as the melody of her voice: she had that famous southern accent that was full of breezing charm. She had something so soft,
so appealing and universal, that she literally annulled any depressing thoughts and unbearable anxiety around herself. Indeed, she was somewhat self conscious and restrained about everything, but there weren’t many men who paid attention to that: they were all enchanted by her beautiful appearance. And every one of them had their own secret plan, their special tactics, idea and formula how to get close to her and capture her lonely heart forever.
Victor was in a specific state of mind: he promised to himself that he would do his best to penetrate the darkest depths of Donna’s soul, that he would use all of his male abilities to find out the secrets that this tall, lean beauty carried in herself. He felt that this wasn’t going to be just a casual affair. Quite the contrary – he was completely sure, maybe even for the first time in his life, that this wouldn’t be an affair, but rather something totally serious. He came to that conclusion on the basis of a tiny, seemingly insignificant detail: he didn’t even think of calling Donna Countess when they first met, in his famous ironic style. So, his plan completely differed from everyone else’s; this plan explicitly confirmed Victor’s intuition, sober contemplation, creativity and male resourcefulness.
Everyone was doing their best to appease Donna with an appropriate gift, an invitation to the movies or a birthday party, to capture her attention with classical and trivial details such as putting a rose on the table during lunch or a walk by the East River.
However, Victor chose a different way: a longer, riskier one. He reckoned with female vanity. He didn’t choose to capture Donna’s heart, but rather of her roommate’s. He knew that was the only way to be constantly close to Donna, almost in her bed, without raising doubts, not even hers.
Donna shared a condo with Madeleine from Charleston, a senior in economics, who was more likely to be considered ugly than beautiful. She only had a pretty face with dimpled cheeks, but everything else – her body, breasts and legs – was far from attractive. When Victor started complimenting her at a campus party, she felt really happy, proud and flattered. Even the biggest of nerds know how to talk to women, so Lord, who was an expert in that, a notorious heartbreaker, soon captured Madeleine’s lonely heart. It all happened in less than two months.
The Lover from Fifth Avenue (The Greatest Love Stories) Page 1