This Will Be

by Jane Cooper Ford

  She twirled Jamie’s body around to face the camera.

  Jamie felt panic kick in. She attempted to inch her body away, but Patty was gripping her arm with a hand like a well-manicured bear trap.

  “Here we go…” she piped cheerfully. “BOBBY!”

  A cameraman dutifully swung the camera onto his shoulder.

  Patty shook out her mouth with a quick vocal warm up.

  “Awwwooooo Awwwahhhh….EEEE eeee… She sells sea shells… Peter piper picked a pecker penis… Oh Jesus, I’ll never get that one. OKAY, Bobby, let’s go! Camera on!”

  She looked up into Jamie’s face.

  Jamie’s heart started racing. She was going to be on the news at 11 talking about the Pear Slices Diet. God please no.

  “So!” Patty chimed. “What’s your name and how did you hear about the book?”

  The light from the camera flared to life.

  Jamie felt an arm around her shoulder. Guiding her into the depths of the lobby crowd and away from the news camera.

  “So sorry, Patty. I just need to steal her away.”

  When the light cleared Jamie’s eyes, she saw the arm around her shoulder belonged to Penny. Who was looking completely gorgeous in a black v-neck dress. She smelled like Shalamar perfume. It was all next level sexy.

  “Oh thank god,” Jamie laughed.

  Penny removed her arm from Jamie’s shoulder.

  “Apologies for that, Jamie,” Penny said. A smile forming and a little chuckle she couldn’t help.

  “You’re laughing but that was perilous.”

  “Yes to both.”

  They looked at each other.

  Suddenly every word Penny had planned to say flew right out of her head. Perhaps it was the social buzz of tonight’s event. The smoke. A glass of wine from earlier. The smell of pears. It was a lot.

  Or it was Jamie.

  “You look lovely, Jamie.”

  “Thanks, you as well.”

  Penny glanced up. She spotted Dave Simon from Penguin. She waved. Anything to keep from looking at Jamie. What could she say? Her words from the stupid deli moment with Jamie hung in the air and it needed clearing.

  “Look,” Penny said. “Please accept my apology for the last time we saw each other. I really wasn’t myself.”

  “It was a deli. Who’s at their best?”

  Jamie watched as people streamed by in the lobby and Penny made little, acknowledging hellos and head nods. It was like standing with a celebrity. She was polite and charming.

  “Nice to see you, Eileen…” “Ted, so glad you could be here…Philip will be so pleased.” “Rhoda, I’ll call you Monday about the Ellerman book.”

  Penny turned attention back to Jamie.

  “Right,” Penny said. “The Pear Slices Diet.” Penny’s lips edged up into a smile. “You know this isn’t one of mine, right?”

  “I had very much hoped.”

  “These kinds of books pay for my kind of books,” Penny said. “So I’m grateful.”

  There was another chunky silence between them.

  “Shall we go in, Jamie?” Penny said. “I can introduce you to Philip later.”

  “Uh, sure.”

  Penny held her gaze for a minute.

  I’m so fucking confused, Penny wanted to say. I can’t stop thinking about you.

  Just say it. Say it. Say something true and make this be over.

  Penny searched her mind for words that made this situation go away.

  “Jamie - Look. The truth is - I thought I found myself attracted to you. And, I felt ridiculous. So I acted like a complete pillock. I apologize.”

  “Oh,” Jamie said. But she was so shocked it came out like Hoh!

  And all she could think was, “I found myself attracted to you…”

  “Right. Okay.”

  “So, let’s move on. Shall we?”

  “Uh… Yeah, of course.”

  Penny smiled. “I think the esteemed author will be reading a chapter soon, ” she said, arching an eyebrow at Jamie. “We can’t miss that.”

  But all Jamie could think was, “I found myself attracted to you.”

  Penny flicked her head for Jamie to follow, and led the way as they weaved through the crowd of elegant New Yorkers and across the wooden threshold into the legendary Oak Room.

  Jamie stepped into the overly crowded very smoky Oak Room behind Penny. A jazz trio was playing Fly Me To The Moon. Penny turned and gave Jamie a smile.

  And with that, Jamie watched as Penny disappeared into the crowd.

  Suddenly it was just Jamie. Alone in a crowd. And more confused than ever. She stood there hearing the words echo in her head.

  I found myself attracted to you…

  “The bar,” Jamie whispered out loud.

  A woman with a fedora and a glittery top, who looked like Diana Ross in a windstorm, grinned and pointed to the side of the room. “Over there, sweetie.”

  “Booze will make sense of this,” Jamie said quietly.

  The Diana Ross woman overheard. She smiled, “Honey have you read this weird diet book? You’re gonna need a whole lot of booze to make this make sense.”

  44

  “When you exercise, such as jogging or tennis…”

  Author Dr. Annie Hartower was onstage reading from her tome, The Pear Slices Diet.

  “This so-called ‘exercise’ creates a muscular shape that adds unsightly bulk. A big no-no.”

  She wagged a finger at the crowd for emphasis. “So, light housework or a brisk walk around the block once every two weeks will do,” she chirped.

  “And this, combined with The Pear Slices Diet, is all you need to have the body of a celebrity like Farrah Fawcett.”

  Forty minutes into this reading, Jamie was hot and crabby and standing by the book signing table. Pressed in between a man with a purple velour tuxedo and a woman who kept rolling her eyes and muttering, “Fucking pears.”

  She glanced around the room for Penny. And spotted her over by the bar. Penny’s face was flushed from the heat. She was smiling, working her charm on various Manhattan luminaries. There was Philip McLaren, the head of Peckham Press. Gloria Lindsey, from the news. And someone who looked like, and probably was, Gore Vidal.

  Meanwhile, on the stage, Dr. Annie was still reading. Her shrill voice filling the room through the P.A. system.

  “So!” Dr. Annie chirped. "Just add a little bit of Red Food Dye Number Two - Don’t worry about the warnings - and one dash of saccharine to the pear slices on the baking sheet, then pop in the oven for twenty minutes at 350. Your Thanksgiving Dinner awaits!”

  She paused for effect. A few people diligently applauded and she triumphantly thumped the book closed.

  “Thank you so much!” Dr. Annie said, “Now I’m going to take your pear-related questions.” She checked her watch. “But I’ve only got an hour for questions, so…”

  Jamie glanced over to where Penny was standing by the bar. They made eye contact.

  Jamie mouthed, “Help.”

  Penny laughed. She mouthed, “Sorry.” Then she put her drink down on the bar and flicked her eyes towards the exit.

  Jamie nodded.

  Jamie spotted Penny standing by the lobby desk. She was casually chatting with someone who looked like Helen Gurley Brown from Cosmo.

  Penny excused herself and made her way over to Jamie. “Ms. Brennan, I believe I must take my leave of this place.”

  “You heading home?”

  “I am.”

  “Was it the pears for Thanksgiving dinner?”

  “That didn’t help.”

  “Why don’t I walk you to Grand Central? I’ll grab the bus from there.”

  Penny furrowed her brow and smiled at the same time.

  “Um, sure. Walk with me.”

  They strode fast down 44th Street towards Park. The night air thick and hot.

  Jamie picked up the pace to keep up with Penny. “Ah, we’re walking fast. I see.”

  Penny smiled. “Apolog
ies. It’s how I get through Manhattan.”

  “Was it growing up in London? Walking the moors?”

  “Something like that,” Penny smiled. “How’s the writing going?”

  Jamie chuckled. “I was afraid you’d ask.”

  They got to Park Avenue and turned right. Jamie could see the Pan Am building a few blocks ahead. Grand Central.

  “It’s going,” Jamie said. “The writing.”

  “Terrific.”

  Jamie sped up. “Oh my god, I feel like a Pekinese trying to keep up at a dog show.”

  Penny eyed her sideways again, a smile curled across her lips. It was sexy.

  “Look,” Penny said. “Can we forget what I said to you earlier?”

  “About…”

  “Attraction?”

  “Reluctantly.”

  Penny smiled. “Jamie…”

  “Sure. Of course we can.”

  “It’s this bloody heat. I don’t even know what I’m saying.”

  “Who does?”

  Jamie glanced down Park and watched the streetlights in the blocks ahead all switch from red to green at once. The poetry of Park Avenue at night.

  There was an awkward silence between them now.

  Jamie felt the silence between them like it was going to blurt out her feelings. So she stared straight ahead at the Pan Am building ahead.

  Because everything she felt for Penny Langston was just this side of ridiculous and bathed in impossible.

  45

  “Thank you for walking me, Jamie.”

  They were standing at the top of the marble staircase in Grand Central, at the main entrance from Vanderbilt Avenue.

  Jamie glanced down the stairs. Below was the great echoey expanse of Grand Central. And even at 9:30 p.m., people were making their way through the concourse and on their way home.

  “What time’s your train?”

  Penny glanced at her watch. “Ten minutes.”

  “Good thing you walk like a gazelle.”

  “Good thing.” Penny glanced into the concourse. “I should go.”

  “Penny - what you said before?”

  “About?”

  “You found yourself attracted to me.”

  “Jamie, look…” she waved her hand dismissively. “It’s really nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing.”

  A thirty-ish businessman walked by from the Oyster Bar and tried to catch Penny’s eye. She ignored him.

  “Jamie, truly, it’s nothing. I had just never - it was a new thing for me - being around a gay woman. And I think for a moment it just - unnerved me.”

  That wasn’t the word she meant to use. But Jamie Brennan was standing in front of her expecting something.

  “Un..nerved you…”

  “That’s not the right word.”

  “I see,” Jamie said. “You pretend to be all cool and worldly and it turns out you’re actually as small minded as anyone —”

  “That is not what I said - ”

  “It actually is what you said.”

  “Well, then it’s not what I meant.” Penny could feel her stomach clench. This would be a good time to go catch her train. “Don’t put words in my mouth, Jamie.”

  “I apparently didn’t need to.”

  “I meant...” Penny shook her head and sighed. She glanced off to the distant platform gates on the left-hand side of Grand Central then at her watch. Just past 9:30.

  “Look. I shouldn’t have to explain every little thing to you,” she said quietly. “Jamie, I have to go.”

  “Woah. Wow.”

  When she looked back at Jamie, she saw a woman she hadn’t seen before. Taller, defiant. Jamie crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows. All the visible clues that Penny had said something in her bad mood which Jamie was taking offense to.

  “Penny - you don’t have to,” Jamie began in a measured voice, “Explain every little thing to me, as you say.”

  Penny felt her own anger and irritation begin to take over. This was spiraling out of control.

  “But you do,” Jamie continued. “Need to speak to me in a nicer way than whatever the hell this is you’re doing right now.”

  “Look, please don’t want anything from me.”

  Jamie retracted her head. Penny saw the hurt.

  “Don’t what?” Jamie said.

  “Nevermind.”

  “Penny - you said you were attracted to me. I never said anything to you.”

  “Fine then. I understand. I need to go.”

  “I said nothing.”

  “I understand, Jamie.” Penny’s voice came out in a snap. She knew again from the hurt in Jamie’s eyes it was too much. She was just making things worse. “Look. I have to go.”

  “Then go.”

  Penny sighed. “Don’t make this something we can’t—”

  “I’m not making it anything.”

  “You are - you’re—”

  And at that moment - all of Grand Central was plunged into darkness.

  The entire seven-story train station. The illuminated 200 foot high colorful Kodak ad of a kite at the other end of the platform. The Oyster Bar. The platform lights. The little lights above the ticket wickets. The bright green neon O.T.B, sign by the Off Track Betting wickets. Off.

  The entire place was pitch black.

  “Oh my god,” Penny said.

  And with the pitch black darkness there arrived an uneasy silence.

  Finally, a drunk lady cackled in the Oyster Bar. It echoed distantly down to the main floor and ricocheted off the round clock tower in the middle.

  “What’s happening? Jamie said.

  Jamie’s heart was already thumping in her chest. She was angry and frustrated and hurt. Penny Langston was taking the opportunity to upbraid her for things that were of her own doing.

  And now they were plunged into darkness. She could make out the shape of Penny in front of her.

  “This isn’t good,” Jamie said.

  “Hopefully the power will come back on any minute.”

  “Yeah, hopefully.”

  “Maybe you should go, Jamie.”

  “I’m not sure I want to leave you here alone in the dark, Penny.”

  Twenty minutes later, mostly spent in silence with an occasional comment about the darkness, they were standing in the same spot at the top of the stairs in Grand Central.

  Jamie saw the silhouette of a burly police officer shining a flashlight. He had just stepped inside the doors from Vanderbilt.

  He passed them on his way down the stairs.

  “Officer,” Penny started, “Is there any word on when power will be back?”

  “Ma’am, if you gotta get home on a train you’re gonna be a while,” he said. “It’s the whole city.”

  He kept going. Jamie watched the light from the flashlight cut through the darkness down the steps into Grand Central. She could see another flashlight down on the concourse. And another coming from the ramp from the Vanderbilt room.

  This was not like anything she’d seen before.

  A businessman in silhouette, smelling like booze from the Oyster bar, made his way down the stairs.

  “It’s the whole city,” he said. “Another cop told me outside when I went to get a cab. I’m gonna find a spot here. I’m not going back out there.”

  Jamie put her hand on Penny’s arm. She felt Penny jump.

  “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “I need to find a phone,” Penny said.

  “Do you want to go back to the Algonquin?”

  “I suppose that’s a good idea.”

  “Let’s go.”

  They walked out the front doors at Grand Central where the cabs pull up at the end of 44th Street. And stepped into the street.

  The effect was the strangest thing Jamie had ever seen. And New York City had some pretty weird sights over the years. But this…

  Everything was pitch black. Headlights and cab lights against the spooky silhouette of a darkened city
.

  “Oh my god,” Penny said.

  A couple walked past. “There’s no subways - buses down Park,” the woman said. Then passed them.

  “Look, Penny. It might be crazy and yeah it’s far - but I live down at University Place and 10th. Come to my place until it passes.”

  “That’s very kind, Jamie, but I’ll try the Algonquin.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  For Jamie, it was as much to keep Penny safe as herself.

  They got to the Algonquin after an eerie five minute walk. Strangers with flashlights filling in for stoplights. The sidewalks were teeming with people because there was no subway. And others spilled out to the street because they just didn't know where to go.

  Jamie glanced at the front door of the Algonquin. This time no doorman. No welcome. The illuminated sign was dark. But so was every sign and every light in their view.

  “This is so bizarre,” Jamie said.

  “Couldn’t agree more.”

  Down in the distance at 7th Avenue, Jamie could no longer see the Broadway theater marquees.

  Inside the Algonquin was hot and dark and crowded. There were a few candles around on tables and at the lobby desk. The lobby bar was filled, and a few drunk people were laughing. But the floor was filled too. Every space. People standing, leaning. sitting.

  Penny made her way to the woman at the front counter.

  “Excuse me, is Philip McLaren still here?”

  “I’m sorry - they left about twenty minutes ago.”

  “Right. Are there any rooms available?”

  “Sorry, we are completely booked up - and as you can see that hasn’t stopped people from coming off the street to set up camp.”

  Penny turned around to Jamie. “I have to call my husband.” She turned back to the woman. “May I use your phone?”

  “There’s a pay phone through the lobby. Bit of a lineup though.”

  “Oh god, please?” Penny reached into her purse, she opened her wallet and pulled out a twenty-dollar bill. “I’ll pay you.”

  The girl slid the house phone over to her. And waved away the twenty. “I shouldn’t do this, but I recognize you from the party. Here you go.”

  “Thank you.”