The Fifth Avenue Story Society

by Rachel Hauck

  Dang it, tears. Brushing her hair used to be his job.

  “Mommy hurts my head.”

  Riley inherited his hair, thick and silky. As Chuck brushed it to a golden sheen, he told her the story of a magic book and how jumping into the pages took a girl on a fairy princess journey.

  “What about me, Daddy?” Jakey said.

  “The magic book turns you into a knight or a—”

  “Football player.”

  “Yeah, buddy, a football player.”

  Sometimes he told them how he met Mommy and fell in love.

  “Was she a princess?”

  “The most beautiful of them all.”

  Another shadow touched the glass pane and Chuck dropped to the ground, the sharp twigs of the bush scraping his cheek.

  Get out of here.

  Did he want to lose his kids forever? Provoke her to file for a Final Restraining Order? Go home, man.

  He waited for the coast to clear. One breath, two, three, four, five. As he turned to go, planning to shoot into the side yard and roll toward the neighbors, a dark Mercedes parked along the curb. Him. The hedgie boyfriend.

  He alarmed his car and moved up the walk toward the door, his Bruno Maglis scraping against the concrete.

  Yes, Chuck knew about Bruno Magli shoes. Trudy wanted to buy him a pair for his birthday one year. But what was he going to do with a five-hundred-dollar pair of shoes working at a trucking company? What would he tell the guys, who considered five bills a nice bonus?

  Hedgie, aka Will, entered the house, Chuck’s house, to the squeals of his kids.

  Chuck gripped the nearest twig and snapped it in half.

  What he wouldn’t give to knock on the door, grab the slick Wall Streeter by the collar, and throw him to the street.

  The exact move that got him into this mess.

  The voices, muffled against the windowpane, began to fade. Figuring the living room was clear, Chuck dashed toward freedom.

  At his car, he fired up the engine, set his Uber status to available, and dropped his forehead against the steering wheel, wishing for the millionth time Trudy would just talk to him.

  How could he make amends and win back the right to see his kids otherwise?

  He raised his head, catching the right part of his face in the rearview mirror. “Dude, you need a change. A life.”

  What kind of change? What kind of life? He had no idea.

  The Uber app tapped him for a ride and he responded. He tossed his phone to the passenger seat, and it landed on a cream-colored card.

  What was this?

  He read the gold block lettering in the glow of the dash.

  You are cordially invited to the Fifth Avenue Story Society.

  The Fifth Avenue Literary Society Library

  The Bower Room

  Monday, September 9 @ 8:00 p.m.

  * * *

  Jett

  He was restless. Moving from the kitchen banquette, where he dropped his backpack and bike helmet, he shed his jacket and dropped it over the back of the living room club chair.

  Down the short hall to his bedroom, he flipped on a light, his thoughts on dinner and his dissertation.

  Renée wanted to see something by mid-October. The university publishing arm was ready to fast-track a limited first-edition run, with a second printing in the new year.

  But he didn’t feel like working. He felt like, like . . . He reached for the cardstock invitation on his nightstand.

  The Fifth Avenue Story Society.

  He wasn’t sure why he brought it home. Or set it by his bed. But he’d been looking at it every night for almost a week.

  Cordially invited. By whom? As far as he knew, New York College didn’t have any sort of faculty initiation, where they’d catch him off guard and demand he quote a line from a classic novel or remember the publication date of a book pulled randomly from a shelf.

  Besides, he’d been on staff for almost four years. Not long enough for a promotion or tenure. But too long for an initiation.

  Taking his phone from his jeans pocket, he texted Renée.

  Did you send me this invitation to the Fifth Avenue Story Society?

  While he waited for her response, he collapsed back on the bed, eyes closed as if he never wanted to open them.

  The night in Central Booking symbolized the last two years. Trapped. Arrested. Helpless. Frustrated. Without justice. He didn’t even know what kind of justice to seek. For himself or for his ex-wife? For his brother?

  He sat up when his phone pinged.

  No. What’s going on at the Fifth Avenue library?

  Got me. I never heard of it until now.

  You should go, check it out. It’s a cute little place. Maybe they’re doing some sort of literacy push. How’d you get invited?

  Not sure. I found it with my things.

  No need to say which things. So far, the college seemed ignorant about his minor civil violation.

  Because he rode a bike to and from work and had once taken a spill in the street, no one questioned his scraped knuckles or his puffy, bruised eye.

  Go. Check out this library. You know with the Roth Foundation money (hint hint) we will be able to give back to the community.

  Seriously. Even in a text? I get it. Finalize the dissertation.

  How is it going?

  Jett started to type a reply, then hit the delete key. He didn’t want to lie. But he didn’t want to tell the truth.

  So you’ve been to this quaint little library?

  Yes, and you can’t get off that easy. Talk later.

  Jett studied the invitation. A night out at a library might do him good. He always felt at home with books. Stories had comforted him when his parents’ divorce ripped through his adolescence.

  Might as well check it out. He ducked into the shower for a quick rinse. The city was still warm at five o’clock when he rode home. Especially in the summer.

  In fresh jeans and shirt, he stowed the invitation in his hip pocket, made a ham and cheese on wheat, poured a glass of milk, and sat at the banquette, skimming his proofed and peer-reviewed dissertation.

  He was proud of this particular work. Proud to write about such an ingenious and timeless author. He’d researched Gordon Phipps Roth as a hobby since high school. The man was a natural choice when Jett had to select a dissertation topic for his PhD candidacy.

  Over time, he’d gathered more material on the scope and wisdom of GPR’s work than he would ever need, collected from biographies, experts in America and Europe, and conversations long into the night with fellow bibliophiles drinking craft beer.

  Then came the one haunting question.

  “What about the allegations of fraud? Did the great American author have a ghostwriter?”

  It was asked by one of his peers, Colin Hein, as they discussed Jett’s dissertation. From that moment on, his forward momentum all but ceased. The manuscript was ready for publication. But he couldn’t bring himself to answer the recent whisperings that his literary hero just might be a fraud. It seemed ludicrous. But to do his job, he must investigate.

  That was for another day.

  At 7:20, Jett removed his bike from the hook in the foyer, rode the elevator to the bottom floor, and started the journey to Fifth Avenue.

  To his left, the sunset threaded the remaining blue sky with a fireball of red-and-orange hues framed by royal purple and midnight blue. The evening breeze previewed cooler days ahead.

  As he pedaled, Jett pondered the invitation, what he might expect when he arrived. He half braced for it all to be some sort of prank, half prepared for a pleasant surprise.

  Maybe he’d find his own space-navy sci-fi, Rites of Mars, on the shelf.

  He had gone to a local bookstore in search of his novel when it came out six months ago. The salesgirl said she’d never heard of it. So his abysmal quarterly royalty reports were no surprise.

  He pedaled harder. All the nights devoted to writing and rewriting, again and again, i
gnoring the rest of the world, including his wife. For what? For a puny advance check and a chance to be his publisher’s persona non grata? Even his agent took weeks to return his calls.

  At Central Park, he took a right off Sixth onto Fifty-Ninth.

  This area of Manhattan had been Gordon Phipps Roth’s literary stomping grounds. He wrote more than ten books about the city’s Gilded Age before writing about York, England, with expertise and great detail.

  So why was Jett still weighing the man’s reputation? He could turn the dissertation in by Friday if he set his mind to completing a final read-through.

  But. Colin’s challenge chased him.

  When he arrived at the library, Jett locked his bike in the foyer and removed his helmet, running his fingers through his hair.

  He peered past the square entry into the small, quiet space. Bookshelves were anchored to high-ceilinged walls, and fat leather chairs faced the books rather than the room.

  At the reference desk, a woman with a sparkling, round face under a Brillo pad of wiry gray hair worked through a stack of returns.

  “Excuse me,” Jett said, leaning toward her, touching the serene air around her. “Where’s the Bower Room?”

  She smiled. Almost as if she knew him. Jett stepped back, his pulse a bit revved.

  “To your right. Go on in.” She pointed to the wall with a mahogany-stained door between two towering stacks.

  He started toward the door, then stopped and backtracked. “What exactly is the Bower Room? Why am I here?” He retrieved his invitation. “Have you seen one of these before?”

  She leaned to read the invitation without reaching for it. “The Bower Room, as you’ll see on the plaque by the entrance, was the private library of millionaire Joseph Winthrop. Most of his books still reside on his handcrafted shelves. The leather chairs and desk were also his. Beyond that door is another world. One captured in time. Where you stand now was the foyer, living room, and dining hall of the great mansion he built in 1888.”

  “Winthrop. The same Winthrop of Winthrop Industries on the Upper West Side?” The family were college donors. Renée mentioned them from time to time.

  “One and the same. Do go on in. Make yourself comfortable. There are many first editions, signed, on Joseph’s shelves.”

  “I don’t understand. Why did I get this?” Jett waved the card at her. “Just to view the books?”

  She smiled with an expression that calmed Jett in some deep interior place. “Go on in. Discover your story.”

  She gathered her books and disappeared behind a door marked Private.

  Discover your story? What was she talking about? More intrigued than bothered by this mystery, Jett headed for the door marked The Bower. Maybe he’d find some first editions. Or discover an author history had forgotten.

  Then he’d head home. Fall asleep on the sofa watching Monday-night football. Since the divorce, he rarely slept in their bed. At first it was too painful, then just a reminder of his stupidity.

  The Bower was as she said. Another world. Crossing the threshold, Jett entered the nineteenth century.

  The ambient glow of wall sconces flickered as if true gas flames. Breathing in, he caught a hint of pipe smoke and brandy. And the ever-pleasing fragrance of bound books.

  Stepping farther inside, he could almost hear the echoing voices of the men and women who must’ve graced this space.

  The room wasn’t large, more rectangular than square. The western-facing windows brought in the setting sunlight along with the sights and sounds passing along Sixth Avenue.

  As in the main library, the walls were constructed of book-laden shelves.

  A circle of chairs graced the center. Five in all. Jett dropped his backpack into the nearest armchair and moved to the plaque on the wall by the window.

  The library is all that remains of Joseph Winthrop’s Gilded Age mansion. Walls were removed between the formal living and dining room to create the main library. The restrooms are in the same location as the original water closets. You are standing in Joseph’s personal library, the Bower Room, where he shelved first editions and held literary, political, and religious discussions on a weekly basis.

  Teddy Roosevelt, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, and the prince of Wales were among his guests. But his favorites were the authors of his day. Mark Twain, Virginia Woolf, C. S. Lewis, and Gordon Phipps Roth.

  GPR? Jett swung around almost expecting to see the tall, lean, bearded man awaiting him in a shadowy corner. He imagined what kind of debate he’d start.

  “Who was greater, Twain or Tolstoy?”

  He moved toward the bookshelves and read the spines. Dickens, Whitman, Muir, Yeats, and Woolf. Gold-leaf first editions.

  “I’ve gone to heaven.”

  Behind him, on the front wall, was a writing desk next to a white stone fireplace, where a small wood fire burned. A bit warm for a fire tonight, but Jett liked the ambience it created.

  Opposite the desk stood an upright cabinet containing china and several old pictures.

  Easing down in his chair, Jett grinned. Heaven. At least his version of it. He just wanted to sit and take it all in as the weariness of the arrest, the pressures of his job, the failure of his novel faded away.

  The room enchanted and inspired him. Eyes closed, Jett listened again for the voices of the past. Perhaps Gordon would speak.

  “Absurd! I’d never use a ghostwriter. I am who I am.”

  Jett sat forward, eyes opened. Of course he never used a ghostwriter. Such a ruse would ruin his reputation, his name, his work.

  Gordon had lectured all over the world. His stories had inspired millions for more than a hundred years.

  Jett slapped his palm against the leather arm. This room could be his new haunt. He’d stop by on his way home from the college, rest among his “peers” before heading home. Maybe he’d work on his manuscript about Gordon in this very room. He had time Thursday afternoon.

  “Excuse me. Is this the story society?”

  Jett launched to his feet as an exquisite woman with bone-china features and blonde waves twisting over her shoulders stepped inside.

  “Um, yes.” Move, man. Don’t just stare. “I’m Jett Wilder.” He offered his hand.

  “Coral Winthrop.” Her velvety-smooth hand shook his. “What’s this all about?”

  She tossed her hair over her shoulders as she dropped her bag into one of the chairs. It was probably Jett’s imagination, but it seemed the flames in the fireplace kicked a bit higher for a better look of this beauty.

  This weird story society was looking more and more intriguing.

  “You tell me.” He pointed to the wall mount, gathering his wherewithal to act like a normal, decent man. He’d seen beautiful women before. Married one in fact. “Winthrop? Same as on the plaque? On buildings and billboards?”

  “Joseph was my great-great-grandfather. I assume you sent the invitation. I don’t really know why I’m here. I just, I don’t know . . .” She gave the bookshelves her attention.

  “Actually no. I received an invitation as well.” Now she looked at him.

  “I asked my father if he knew what was going on, but he didn’t have a clue. I haven’t been in here since I was a girl.” She smiled for the first time and tucked her hands into the pockets of her flowing slacks.

  “This is my first time. I may never leave. What do you know about your grandfather’s collection of—”

  “Story society? Sorry I’m late.” An older gentleman with deep-set blue eyes and a thick shock of salt-and-pepper hair entered, carrying a bulky black case and holding up a cream-colored invitation. “Got waylaid at work. I’m the superintendent for my co-op and—” He glanced at Coral, then Jett. “Guess you don’t care to hear about my job. Do I take any chair?” He cut through the ring and chose a seat opposite Jett.

  “Jett Wilder.” He extended his hand. “This is Coral Winthrop. Her ancestors built this place.”

  “Nice to meet you.” He
shook Jett’s hand and nodded at Coral before sitting with the box on his lap. “Ed Marshall. Who’s in charge?”

  “We have no idea.”

  The old man made a face. “Look, I got a story to write and when I got this here invitation I wondered if all the saints and angels were telling me to get moving. But if this is just a waste of time—”

  “What kind of story are you writing?” Jett said, feeling his way, using his expertise in the world of words and story to engage the man. He was sweet. Almost innocent.

  “Did you send the invitation?” Ed snapped open his case to reveal a circa 1920s Underwood typewriter.

  “No, I’m as flummoxed as you, Ed.” Jett leaned to see the ancient machine. “You know they make electronic typewriters now. Call them computers or laptops.”

  Coral snickered behind her hand. Ed scowled as he set the case on the floor next to his chair.

  “I see we have a class clown. I have a computer. I just prefer this ol’ girl for writing.”

  “What are you writing?”

  “My love story with my dear Esmerelda. Love of my life.” He kissed his fingers and sent his affection upward. “I miss her every day.”

  “Is that what we’re doing here?” Jett glanced back at Coral. “Are you a writer?”

  “Does ex-blogger count?”

  “What’d you blog about?”

  “Beauty products. I own CCW Cosmetics.”

  CCW. He knew the brand from his bathroom shelf. “My ex-wife used your products.”

  Her nod was courteous. “Most women twenty-five to sixty-five use our products.” Despite her air of confidence, Jett detected a hitch in her voice. “What do you do, Jett?”

  “I’m a professor of literature at New York College.”

  “Well then, professor, you’re in charge. Let’s get to work.” Ed rolled a piece of paper into his typewriter. “I’d like to know how to get started. Do I start in the beginning or somewhere in the middle? Or a favorite memory?”

  “Look, Ed, I’m glad to give some suggestions, but I’m not in charge here. I’m not the one who sent the invitations. I certainly don’t have time to run a writing clinic. However, there are writing groups all over the city. I’m sure—”