Then he looks down and sees the knife in my hand. I flip it open.
Rose, he says, his eyes going wide.
I put a finger to my lips and I shake my head. And then, in a flash, I have gathered all my hair into one hand. The knife slices through it in a single clean cut, and I feel my unevenly bobbed hair tickling my cheek. Suddenly, there is a great commotion all about me. Two orderlies have caught on and have rushed into the room. The Lieutenant Detective staggers backward. The orderlies pounce on me and take the knife from my hand. They start to wrestle me to the ground, but when they feel no resistance from me they stop and seat me in the metal chair, where I sit with my body gone slack like an abandoned marionette. They shout down the hall for Dr. Benson.
On the ground there is a pile of mousy brown hair, already netted together like some sort of absurd bird’s nest, and somewhere underneath the pile lies a single cigarette. I bend down and, brushing the hair aside, pick up the cigarette. Would you mind terribly giving me a light, I say to the Lieutenant Detective. For a moment, I think he is going to turn and run out of the room. He is looking at me with a different expression now, one I have never before seen on his face, and I know this will be the last time he comes to visit me. Slowly, with a shaking hand, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a matchbook. He strikes a match, and the flame dances with his quivering hand.
As I lean down to the match and inhale, I think of Odalie on the infamous day she strode into the office with her freshly cut bob of hair. I remember it was a Tuesday. In my mind, Tuesdays have always seemed like the most ordinary and mundane of all weekdays. But there she was, making Tuesday into a day none of us would ever—could ever—forget. I hardly knew her then; at that point she was still just the new girl in the typing pool with pretty clothes and a careless way with her jewelry. We had yet to share the secrets that were still to come, the late nights over hot toddies, the drowsy chat sessions spent reclining together on the same bed. She walked in that morning and the entire precinct held its breath. It was as if someone had stopped the very ticking of the clock. Then, someone—I can’t for the life of me remember who—paid Odalie a compliment. She turned her head to acknowledge it, and as her voice rode those familiar musical scales in a mellifluous trill of laughter, the glossy black of her newly shorn hair swung in a jaunty embrace of her cheeks. With that short hair it was as though every angle of her was crying out, I am free! Oh, how free! And how much freer than you!
The match goes out, and the Lieutenant Detective slowly retracts his trembling hand. But no matter; my cigarette is lit. I take a nice long drag on it, tilt my head upward, and exhale. If I am still sorry for anyone, it is Teddy. But as I’ve already explained in great detail, there must always be sacrifices along the road to evolution. For the briefest of seconds, I see a flash of Teddy’s face, his eyes wide with terror as he falls downward toward the concrete below.
How about that, Odalie, I think, and take another drag of the cigarette. Two can play at this game.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank my agent, Emily Forland, for so many things: her intelligent feedback, her perpetual calm demeanor, and her outstanding professional social grace. Thanks also to Emma Patterson and Ann Torrago of the Wendy Weil Agency, who, together with Emily, I am confident will keep the legacy of the amazing Wendy Weil going strong. Wendy will be missed. My deepest gratitude to Amy Einhorn for her expert editorial guidance, deft insights, and refreshingly straight-shooting approach. I am still extremely thrilled to be working with someone I so admire! Thanks also to Liz Stein, who is one smart cookie and a hardworking wonder. I am also very appreciative of the editorial contributions made by Juliet Annan; the sharp insights she added were invaluable as I honed the manuscript. Thanks, too, to Sophie Missing. I would like to thank Emma Sweeney for giving me my first job in publishing, and for paving the road that led to this manuscript finding a home. A tremendous thank-you to Jayme Yeo, my dearest friend for over a decade now, who patiently read and reread many early versions despite having a doctoral dissertation of her own to finish. I am deeply indebted to Eva Talmadge for many things: her carefully considered insights, her constant professional encouragement, and her friendship over the last two years. Thanks also to Julie Fogh, a one-woman support network extraordinaire! Thank you to Rice University and all my colleagues there. Thank you to Susan Wood: poet, mentor, and dear friend. Thanks to Colleen Lamos for directing my graduate school interests in modernism and to Joe Campana for setting an admirable example of how to accomplish good work as both an artist and an academic. I am grateful to my publishing girl-group for their fellowship and support: Hana Landes, Julia Masnik, and Laura Van der Veer (“Reading Rainbows,” unite!). I would like to express my sincere appreciation for the following people who read early versions of the manuscript and gave helpful comments: Brendan Jones, Mark Lawley, Melissa Rindell, Susan Shin, Ning Zhou, and Olga Zilberbourg. I am grateful to the Weldon family, who rented me an affordable apartment in East Harlem during the time I wrote this book. Thanks also to my New York roommates, who were supportive of this endeavor: Clare Brower and Matt Bessette. A big fat thank-you to Brian Shin, who has provided unconditional love and support throughout the years; I don’t know what I ever did to deserve a best friend like you, but whatever it was, I’m sure glad as hell I did it. On a similar note, I am extremely grateful for my family: Sharon, Arthur, Laurie, and Melissa.
Lastly, I should mention there are one or two moments in this book wherein I humbly aspired—in my own small way—to pay deliberate homage to the first true love of my teenage years: Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. My admiration abides.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SUZANNE RINDELL is a doctoral student in American modernist literature at Rice University. The Other Typist is her first novel. She lives in New York City and is currently working on a second novel.
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