by Rozsa Gaston
“Great. I’ll check and send it in.” Inwardly groaning over his unfortunate use of the word check, he swept the smallest pile of junk mail into the wicker wastebasket next to the table.
“Look for it now. Otherwise, you might forget.” How had she known he had no intention of looking for it? Was she wise to the way the male brain worked? He sifted through the remaining envelopes on the table, turning them over until he found one with a fancy design on the back.
“Okay, I found it.”
“Super. Open it up, and you’ll find the R.S.V.P. card with an envelope. There should be a stamp on it already.”
“Yup.” There was also an obscenely high amount listed as a charitable donation next to the box for a single person over age thirty-five to attend. He sucked in his breath.
“Are you okay on the donation amount?” she asked, presciently.
“Actually, I—uh.” “Why was it that women always found a way to sniff out what income bracket a guy was in?
“I don’t know which age group applies to you. But just check off the lower age group box and send in that amount. I’m on the committee, so I’ll make sure it passes.”
“Thanks, Ginny. Obviously someone doing the planning equates advanced age with enhanced wealth.” Jude was in the higher age group, but not even in the ballpark of the higher income expectations of whoever the planning committee was. Probably Ginny Slade and a bunch of single girlfriends, trying to sniff out suitable husband material.
“It’s more like we equate a not-very-advanced age with not-a-lot-of-disposable income,” she coyly replied.
You can say that again. He stared forlornly at the envelope from the student loan company that had fallen on the floor.
“You’ve got a tux, right?” she asked, sounding less assured than a moment before. Had his significant pause at her income question thrown her off? He hoped so.
“I—of course. I’ll dust off the old monkey suit.”
“Super.”
Was that the only adjective she knew? Maybe she’d spent so much time playing field hockey in prep school she hadn’t had a chance to work on her vocabulary.
“Well, see you September 28,” he said heartily.
“Super. See you then,” she replied. He thought she sounded a trifle disappointed. Had she expected him to talk about something else? What could they possibly discuss? Weather? Horses? Had she been prompting him to ask her out?
He hung up quickly. He certainly wasn’t up to asking her out. He’d already tried asking someone out once that evening and had failed. Besides, he wasn’t particularly attracted to girls with silver spoons in their mouths. They already seemed to have everything they needed. The ones who went after him usually wanted someone who looked like him, but with money. Good luck with that.
He picked up the student loan company envelope and ripped it open. The massive amount of principal he still owed toward his college education stared up at him. He was still paying off the interest alone, eleven years after getting his degree. Why had he let Ginny goad him into going to a benefit at any donation level? He couldn’t afford it.
Kicking the kitchen table leg, Jude gritted his teeth and wrote out two checks. He’d mail the student loan one that day and hang onto Ginny Slade’s benefit one a few days longer while he figured out how he would pay for it. He was fed up with being taken for someone he wasn’t. Yet, he was the one who presented himself that way. He kicked the table leg again, sick of himself. Something had to give.
“I’D LIKE YOU to spearhead Dan’s next book project,” the gray-haired man at the head of the large conference table said, looking over his newsroom reading glasses at Jude.
“Thanks. What exactly is his next project?”
“We’ve got the title, we just need you to come up with the rest.”
“And the title is?”
“How to Marry Money.” His boss, Jim Witherspoon, pursed his lips as if holding back laughter.
“Huh.” Jude looked around the table at the rest of the editorial staff. Karen Cucinelli, on his right, was reviewing messages on her smart phone. George Collins and Tina Berenblum faced him, both with fixed smiles on their faces.
“Was this already offered to Mike or Deniece?” Jude asked, referring to his colleagues, with whom he’d collaborated on ghostwriting Dan Perlstein’s last two books, How to Get Rich, and How to Stay Rich.
“No, Jude. You’re the man we need for this job,” Jim said.
“Any special reason?” Jude asked, his ego flexing as he eye-balled his boss.
“Deniece’s baby is due next month, and Mike just landed a contract with big pharma to do some technical writing. So they’re both out. We need you to get 100,000 words to us no later than the end of the year.”
Great. He was getting this offer, because they didn’t have anyone else. Jude’s ego contracted even faster than it had expanded the moment before. “What are the terms?” he asked.
“Same deal as the other books. You will be paid a flat fee upon delivery of first draft, then the balance upon publication.”
“What about royalties?” With a steady stream of royalty checks, he might finally be able to get the student loan monkey off his back. In addition, he needed to start looking for another place. The Griswolds had e-mailed from Europe to say they’d be back in the spring and would need him to move out of the pool house by the first of March. It was time for him to move somewhere where he didn’t have caretaker duties. Although he’d gotten a terrific break on his rent, he wanted to write, not spend his time shoveling snow and shoring up insulation.
“Same setup as before.” Jim shook his head. “It’s Dan’s franchise.”
Jude paused. It was good money. But the other side had their backs up against the wall. No one else was available to write it, and a deadline loomed. Wasn’t this the moment to push for more than the usual terms?
“What about a research budget?” he asked, after a long slug of coffee from the take-out cup in front of him.
“Of course. Whatever it takes.”
“I’ll need to access some high-level characters.”
“We know you can do it. Start by attending some of those charity events you get invited to.”
“Dan pays?” Dan Perlstein, Jude guessed, was a wealthy man by now, in the third season of hosting his own half-hour weekly financial news show.
“Yup. We’ll call it the cost of doing research.”
That would pay for Ginny Slade’s benefit along with a host of other events, now that summer was sliding into the fall social season. If he took this assignment, one long party season loomed ahead of him. But when would he find time to write the actual book?
“What if I can’t get the manuscript to you by deadline?”
“Don’t be a moron,” Jim barked. “We’re giving you a budget to attend parties. You have nothing else to do in the daytime other than write the book. Get the draft in by December 31, and you’ll have plenty to celebrate on New Year’s Eve.”
“Maybe I don’t want to keep on being invisible.” For some reason, Jude sensed there might be a chink in the armored wall of Dan Perlstein’s celebrity empire. Perhaps he himself was up against a larger deadline—produce the next book or risk having the lucrative book franchise cancelled. Was his show at risk? He had no idea what Dan Perlstein’s Nielsen ratings might be.
“Look, Jude. If you want something, just spit it out,” Jim Witherspoon snuffed his nose. Belying his patrician family name, Jim’s boss was a down and dirty scrapper, schooled on the streets of New York City’s publishing industry. He got what he needed done—and on time.
“Okay, Jim. I want a piece of the action.” He’d been about to say he wanted co-authorship credit, but stopped himself when he thought about the reputation he’d get as co-author of How to Marry Money. Maybe not.
“Name it.”
“I want 50 percent of the royalties Dan receives for it.”
“Impossible. It’s already contractually determined.”
> “Fine. Get someone else.” Jude stood. Crumpling his coffee cup in one hand, he made a basket in the corner wastebasket before turning to leave. The race of the day before had given him confidence that could only be the result of endorphins flooding his brain. Certainly, it wasn’t based on anything resembling reality.
He walked out of the room, a stunned silence in his wake. Moving slowly and deliberately, he kept his back straight. The soreness in his calf muscles felt good, as if he’d just engaged in battle. He flexed them. At the elevator, he pressed the down button, willing himself not to turn around.
“Get back in here,” Jim Witherspoon’s voice roared behind him.
“Why?” Jude replied without turning his head. His body remained motionless, the pose of a resting athlete.
“I’ll talk to Dan. We’ll see what we can do.”
“I want 50 percent of his royalties from the book.”
“I heard you the first time. You’ll be lucky if you get 10 percent,” Jim barked, coming up behind Jude at the elevator bank.
A good sign. Something was up in Dan Perlstein’s kingdom. Jude wasn’t sure what, but he needed to play his advantage.
The elevator arrived. As the door opened, Jude stepped in, then turned.
“Call me when you get me 50,” he said, poker-faced, looking straight into his boss’s eyes.
Speechless, the older man glared back at Jude. Jim’s face was the color of a tomato, attached to a body at least fifty pounds overweight, the result of too much time at a computer keyboard and on the phone. Jude kept his eyes on him as the door slowly closed.
THREE
The old familiar feeling flooded Farrah as she glanced at the magazine rack in the airport newsstand while waiting to board her flight. First shock, then bitterness swept through her, as she took in a cover story on two celebrities tying the knot in a surprise marriage. Almost two years ago, she had stood at a similar newsstand, new at her job, still fresh in the game of business, if not of love.
Her boyfriend had dumped her eight months earlier. It had been as understandable to her as if he’d explained himself in Swahili. She’d tried to put the shock of it behind her by throwing herself into her new job as a pharmaceutical rep. But frequent business trips hadn’t kept her from playing their final conversations over and over in her head. No matter how many times she replayed those painful moments, none of them had made any sense to her.
Traveling to Boston, she’d picked up The New York Times on the way to her departure gate. She flipped through it until she came to Sunday Styles, her favorite section of the paper. After perusing the Modern Love essay about a woman whose former boyfriend had come over with his new girlfriend to pick up his belongings from her apartment, she felt better. Her own breakup hadn’t been quite that bad.
Then, she scanned the wedding announcements—Rachel Jacobs and Jason Pfefferman, Harpreet Janda and Vinay Singh, Maria Fornacci and Melvin Thomas, and Alexandra Dingle and William Young. The last couple, cheek to cheek, beamed happily into the camera’s eye, not unlike the others. The woman was attractive, in a blue-blooded sort of way, not a strand out of place of her blond, upswept hair. The man looked a lot like Will.
Good God. It was Will.
Dropping the paper, Farrah’s heart thumped wildly.
How could anyone get married only eight months after breaking up with a previous partner? Flames of shame and rejection shot up from a place deep in her gut. Picking up the page, she forced herself to read on.
Alexandra Prescott Dingle and William Woodruff Young were married yesterday in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. Mayor Jean-Charles de St. Lager officiated in the town hall. Later in the day, the Reverend Adolphus Garnier performed a Protestant service at the Chapelle Anglaise nearby.
Ms. Dingle, 34, who is keeping her name, is an account executive at Ruder, Finn in New York City. She is a graduate of Vanderbilt University, where she majored in art history. Her father, Chesterton Dingle, is senior partner at Griff, Dingle & Coogan, a law firm in Manhattan. Her mother, Sarah Prescott Dingle, is owner of an eponymously named interior design firm in New York and serves on the board of The Children’s Aid Society of New York City. The bride is the great-great granddaughter of Alexander Prescott, the governor of New York from 1875–1879.
Mr. Young, 38, is a composer for ballet theater. He was second runner-up in the 1994 Frederic Chopin International Piano Competition, and was the winner of the Sigmund Soros Award in 1997. He received his M.F.A. in composition and piano performance at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. His father, the late DeVane Young was a property developer in Saddle Brook, New Jersey. His mother, Helen Young Shaw, is retired director of the Suzuki violin program at the Spence Chapin School in Manhattan.
Farrah put down the paper, stunned. Will had married well. How had he managed to meet someone with a name like Alexandra Dingle, convince her to marry him, then pull off a wedding in France in the space of eight months? Had he known this woman before he’d dated Farrah? Was she a childhood friend?
He and Farrah had dated for over two years. Then, in their final months together, he’d begun saying strange things, culminating in the final mysterious explanation he’d given that had yanked the curtain down on their final act.
“I think there’s a disconnect sometimes when we talk,” he’d told her, after they’d been on the phone over forty-five minutes in one of their frequent content-packed, emotion-laden conversations.
“Oh,” had been all she could say. Ouch! had been what she’d meant.
“I don’t know how to explain it. But there’s a missing of aims at moments when we talk. I’ve experienced it before.”
“Do you mean with me?” Or with other women you’ve dated? Whatever his answer, it wasn’t going to make her happy.
“Uh—yes. Not just with you. It’s happened before.”
She should have taken this as her cue that Will’s emotional baggage was something she was better off without. But she’d been in love. Whatever his faults, she’d wanted him. But he was letting her know she wasn’t the one. For the first time in her life she fully comprehended the meaning of the term “devastated.”
“Huh. Maybe we should get off the phone now.” She’d heard from various sources that overlong phone conversations with a dating partner weren’t a good idea. She kicked herself for having thought Will and she were an exception to the rule. Thinking back to teen-years phone conversations with boys that her mother had limited with an egg-timer placed nearby, she realized for the first time that her mother had known best. Too much idle chatter led to disaster. But now, it was too late.
“Maybe we should cut down on seeing each other so much.” The words flowed into her ear from the other end of the line like hot lava destroying everything in its path.
“What?” Her voice came out in a squeak.
“I said maybe we shouldn’t see each other so much.”
“I’ve got to go now, Will. Bye.” She’d hung up fast, her heart in a sling.
And that had been it. Two years of non-stop tingling joy and supreme confidence in knowing she’d found The One skidded to a halt.
There had been a few more encounters with Will, but they’d all been beside the point. They’d returned books, notes they’d written each other, and photos they’d exchanged in two, subsequent encounters. On both occasions her heart had broken all over again. Will had offered no further physical warmth or emotional connection from that phone conversation on. It had been total, inexplicable emotional amputation from the man with whom she’d been madly in love. Eight months later, seeing the wedding announcement sent her heart straight back into intensive care.
Ever since that day, she still shuddered every time she passed an airport terminal newsstand. Considering the amount of time she spent in airports, it was ridiculous. She needed to get over it, once and for all. Thinking back to the race of the day before, she conjured up the steely resolve she’d mustered as she’d begun to overtake Jude Farnsworth.
But then, she’d tripped. Was it a metaphor for her life? Sighing, she moved past the newsstand.
“American Airlines flight number 384 to Baltimore will now begin boarding at Gate 37,” an overhead female voice droned. She checked her watch. Right on time. Hurrying toward the gate, Farrah told herself that was the last time she’d allow an airport newsstand get the best of her.
The broad shoulders of Jude Farnsworth popped into her mind’s eye. How could she have screwed up their conversation so badly the evening before?
After that fatal conversation with Will, she had never regained her confidence on the phone with a man with whom she felt emotionally vulnerable. The problem had been that she hadn’t seen it coming. Everything had been smooth sailing with Will—warm intellectual and not-so-intellectual banter back and forth, spiced with sexy undertones. Then, wham, “There’s a disconnect sometimes when we talk.” Followed by, “Maybe we shouldn’t see each other so much.” Never had love’s hang glider crashed to earth so quickly.
She would not subject herself to another sucker punch like that. Once in a lifetime was all her heart could take.
What could she do to let Jude Farnsworth know that she would be receptive to a dinner date, after all? Should she text him? Call? She could send him a quick text message while waiting to take off, before the announcement to shut off all electronic devices.
Doubtfully, she eyeballed her phone.
No way. She was wary of e-mailing and texting as a means to get to know a member of the opposite sex. Girlfriends had regaled her with tales of woe stemming from overuse of electronic messaging early on in a budding relationship. She knew how easily messages from a potential romantic partner got forwarded to giggling girlfriends, then dissected, until whatever dignity the contents contained ended up shredded to bits. She would take her time and wait until she was certain of her tone before responding to Jude. But while she boarded, she couldn’t help but think of his navy blue eyes flickering over her.
Leaning back against her headrest, she gripped the arm of her seat as the plane took off down the departure runway. It was time for more than just another business flight to take off in her life.