by R.S. Grey
“It’s a wedding band.”
“From who?”
The question actually makes me laugh. “Well technically, I suppose it was from me to me, but if someone asks, I’ll say it’s from you.”
“It’s hardly a ring.”
I take no offense to his critique. The ring is a thin band of tarnished gold. Inside, the name Ellen is engraved. When I asked the attendant at the antique shop about it, she shrugged and said, “I don’t know the story on it, but Ellen is as good a name as any. If you buy it in cash, I’ll give you half off.”
It was a deal I couldn’t pass up.
Apparently, Walt doesn’t love the ring I’ve picked out for myself, because the next morning, there’s a black box sitting on the kitchen island and a note sitting beside it.
For Elizabeth
I laugh under my breath as I tip open the lid. With a shocked yelp, I drop the thing and back away like it’s going to jump out and bite me.
Holy cow.
That’s some ring.
He must have raided the Smithsonian and snatched the Hope Diamond.
Just to be sure my eyes haven’t deceived me, I tiptoe close again and peer into the black case. Sure enough, it’s still there, maybe even bigger than the last time I looked at it: a large pale blue diamond with an antique cut, weighing some ungodly number of carats.
Too scared to actually move it, I leave the ring sitting in its black box and go back to the library, where I work all day on my series. Later, as I sit alone at the island, eating pasta for dinner and staring at the black box, I come to one conclusion: I can’t accept the ring from him.
Once I’m done with my food, I take the note and the ring and drop them both on Walt’s desk in his office. With his pen, I write a new message underneath his original one.
Thank you, the ring is very beautiful, but I can’t accept it.
Feeling good about my decision, I head into my room and rinse off before changing into my pajamas. I’m sitting up in bed reading, half under my covers, when there’s a knock on my door.
“Elizabeth?”
Ugh. Walt and I have barely seen each other in a week and a half, and now suddenly he wants to have a word with me when I look like this? I glance down at my current state and decide I don’t have time to put on a bra, but chances are he won’t be able to tell I’m not wearing one. He’s part robot, after all. Just in case, I cross my arms over my chest before telling him to come in.
The door opens and Walt steps across the threshold, backlit by the warm light of the hallway. In contrast to me, he looks as sharp as ever. He’s still wearing his suit from work, every hair still in place, no hint of fatigue on his chiseled features. I’ve tried to guess at the amount of sleep he gets in a night. It can’t be much, but it doesn’t seem to affect him.
“You misinterpreted this,” he says, stepping into my room and walking with purpose toward my bed.
He drops the black ring box on my nightstand.
“It wasn’t a gift.”
I frown as he stands back to his full height. Even in normal circumstances, it doesn’t feel like we’re on an even playing field, but with me sitting in bed and him towering over me like a menace, that fact is further emphasized. “Then what was it?”
“Part of the arrangement and not up for debate.”
“I think my ring is fine,” I say, holding up my hand to prove my point. He looks down at it with pure disdain, and I can’t help but laugh. “Oh come on. It’s not that bad. And it only cost me $15.”
“I’m sorry to say, but you were ripped off.”
He extends his hand out to me, palm up, and it’s clear what he wants. I hold out my left hand for him and, without missing a beat, he takes it and slides off the gold band. I can’t help the tingles that spread up my arm from where he’s touching me. His hand is strong and steady, as confident and sure as any other part of him, I’m sure. Without letting go of me, he reaches for the jewelry box with his free hand and yanks out my new ring, sliding it onto my finger quickly, as if he’s scared I’ll continue to argue about it.
The giant ring fits perfectly.
I glare up at him with speculation after he drops my hand. “Why does it fit so well? You didn’t ask me my size, and though you seem competent enough, I don’t believe you can just look at someone’s hand and immediately know their ring size.”
“As convenient as that would be, no, I can’t. I asked one of my housekeepers to take a ring from your collection. You don’t have to look so appalled—she put it right back after my jeweler was done using it.”
“Right, well, you could have just asked me for my ring size, and for that matter, my opinion. This isn’t my style at all.”
He tilts his head, studying me. “Are you always this gracious when you receive gifts?”
“I thought you said it wasn’t a gift.”
He rubs the side of his temple like I’m giving him a headache.
“Wear the ring, Elizabeth,” he says, pivoting on his heels. “I’m having a dinner party this weekend, here at the apartment.”
“Do I get to attend?”
“Yes, I think it’d be odd if you weren’t there considering it’s being thrown in our honor. And I expect to see you wearing the ring.”
He’s already leaving, probably eager as ever to get away from me. I can’t help but call out to him though, before he disappears again. “How was work today?”
He turns back, obviously confused by my question.
I shrug to show him I mean no harm. “Just trying to make things as civil as possible. Normal husbands and wives probably ask each other about their day.”
“It was fine.”
It’s clear he has no plans to continue the conversation by asking me the same question, so I smile gently and reach for my book. “Well, good night.”
He pauses for one more moment, looking in on me in bed before nodding curtly. “Night.”
Ever since the article in The Times, wedding gifts have started to pour into the apartment. Any time I leave, I return home to find another dozen piled up in the entry gallery near the elevator. I leave them alone, not sure what to do with them for two reasons. One, it feels wrong to open them without Walt’s permission. Two, they were sent under false pretenses. We shouldn’t be receiving wedding presents because we aren’t newlyweds.
Then Thursday morning, I get a call from Mason as I’m out for a stroll around City Hall Park, trying to convince myself spring is starting to appear even though it’s still a frigid twenty degrees outside.
“Hi, Mason. How are you?” I ask, trying to turn what is surely going to be a phone call strictly about business into something slightly more personal.
Sad as it may seem, Mason is pretty much the closest thing I have to a friend in New York City outside of Walt. How pathetic is that?
“I’m good. Thank you. How are you?”
“Oh, great, actually. Getting some fresh air.”
“Glad to hear it. I’m calling because Walt would like you to start opening and organizing the gifts that have been delivered to the apartment. Stationery will be couriered over later this morning, so when you have a moment, please also start to write thank you notes. I’ve emailed templates you can use to make it easier.”
As silly as it might sound, I’m more than a little thrilled to have permission to open the gifts—not that any of them are mine. They’ll stay at Walt’s apartment after I move out, but still, it’s fun to pretend…
Sadly, I’m slightly let down by everyone’s lack of ingenuity.
Over half of the gifts are made of crystal or china. There are tea sets and napkin rings and fancy placemats that start to all blend together. There are serving bowls and coordinating platters, and dear God, how is Walt going to store all this stuff? He already has one of each of these items tucked away in his kitchen.
The sameness of the gifts makes my task of writing thank you notes rather tiresome. I end up using Mason’s templates instead of coming up with anyth
ing on my own because how many different ways can you say Thank you for the generic crystal vase?
There are a few gifts that stand out from the others, though. Someone took the time to have our wedding announcement from the paper encased in an ornate gold frame, and I immediately steal it for my room. There’s also a pair of his-and-hers matching cashmere robes complete with our monograms. The same couple also included an elegant box filled with Ladurée macarons. I tuck into the sweets immediately while slipping into my new robe. Rest assured, that couple gets an extra-long thank you note written from the heart and complete with a tiny smudge of raspberry filling I can’t get off. Oops.
I’m actually enjoying my morning of unboxing gifts until my mom calls.
I let her first call go unanswered because I don’t want to be bothered, but then she calls again, and I worry that it’s something actually important.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Hi, Elizabeth. How are you?”
“I’m fine. How are you?”
Not bothering to answer that question, she steamrolls right along. “Are you still in that hotel in New York? Please say you’ve moved somewhere more decent.”
I consider for a brief moment telling her the truth about where I’m living, but I think better of it. I don’t know what she’ll do with that information, and more likely than not, she’ll assume there’s more to the story than there really is.
So, I give her the barest details.
“I actually found an apartment.”
“Oh? Where? Please tell me you have a doorman at least. I worry about you being in that city all on your own.”
“Um, yes, there’s a doorman.”
“Good. Where is it located? Not north of 96th, I hope.”
“It’s in Tribeca, actually.”
“Tribeca? How can you afford an apartment with a doorman in Tribeca?”
“It’s…um…small.”
“Of course. It’d have to be.” I can practically see her grimace on the other end of the line. “I don’t see why you choose to live there when you could move home and do your art here. Or better yet, find a profession that’s a bit more suitable for you.”
Just the phrase “do your art” makes my blood boil. It’s derogatory and she knows it.
“Are we really going to do this again? Every time, Mom? I’m going to start ignoring your calls.”
“Oh all right, I’ll set that issue aside for now. I actually have an important reason for calling you today, and it’s not to give you a lecture. I need your assistance.”
“My assistance? What now? Have you talked to Charlotte yet, by the way? You do realize she never planned on running away with her driver, right? That was all a lie. You let her off the hook too easily.”
“Don’t you dare take that tone with me. Charlotte is none of your concern and I plan on dealing with her accordingly, but what you did for your father and me…well, I hardly think it was some huge sacrifice. Not after everything we’ve done for you.”
Immediately, my hackles go up. “Everything you’ve done?”
“Yes. We provided you with every resource you ever needed while you were growing up. Everything you ever dreamed of—riding lessons, dance classes, private tutors. You were enrolled at the most prestigious schools, and you were connected to all the right families.”
I bite my tongue rather than argue with her about what a child really needs. She’ll never see it from my perspective. I’d rather save my breath.
When I don’t argue, her tone eases up. “That being said, I’d like you to please speak with Walt on our behalf concerning our monthly disbursement from the trust. It hardly covers the credit card bills, let alone mortgage and insurance and living expenses.”
Of course. I knew this was coming. I knew that original amount would never be enough for the way they like to live.
“Can’t you talk to him yourself? I didn’t agree to be the family liaison.”
“I would plead our case if he’d take our calls. We’ve been trying to get in contact with him ever since we received our second wire transfer. It’s a pittance, Elizabeth,” she hisses angrily.
“I don’t know why you think I’ll be able to get him to increase your monthly payout. I don’t have any sort of sway with him. We’re not even friends.”
“Well then become friends, Elizabeth. I expect an update from you in a few days. Please do this for us.”
I don’t want to go to Walt with this. In fact, I’m trying hard to distance myself from my family in his eyes. It’s clear he harbors no love for them, and I don’t want those feelings to rub off on me, though they probably already have. On top of that, I’m already asking too much of him as it is. Living with him is embarrassing enough; I don’t think I can work up the courage to go to him and ask for even more.
I decide I’ll wait a few days, just to see if maybe he’ll return my parents’ phone calls himself and settle the matter without my involvement. It’s a good plan considering I have more pressing matters on my agenda, namely calling Hauser & Wirth incessantly to try to get in touch with their acquisitions director to confirm whether or not they’re taking on new artists. So far, I’ve only managed to speak with the receptionist at their New York office, and she’s starting to get annoyed with me.
“As I said yesterday, I’ve passed on your message to the team.”
I have a feeling “the team” is the trash can under her desk, so Friday morning, I decide to march down to their gallery on 22nd Street and try to speak to someone directly. I have a few of my sketches with me as well as small canvases and a typed overview of what I plan to do for the series. I assume it’s a good place to start.
I am wrong.
To my credit, I do make it up past the gallery and into their offices on the second floor of the building. There, I’m told to sit. I don’t have an appointment—something they find very annoying—and I try to explain that I tried to get an appointment, but my complaint falls on deaf ears.
I sit there for two hours and forty-three minutes as people pass in front of me without a second thought. Then finally, a young woman steps out of an office, glances back and forth down the hall, and rolls her eyes.
“Oh fine, I’ll deal with her,” she says, walking directly toward me with no embarrassment whatsoever about what she’s just said out loud for me to hear.
When she stops in front of me, I shoot to my feet and introduce myself.
She nods curtly, responding to my greeting with only her name: “Beth.” Then she waves for me to give her my large black portfolio. “Let me see.”
I hand it over hastily and she drops it onto the coffee table, right in the middle of the reception area, and starts to flip through my sketches. She makes soft sounds under her breath, hums of interest, grunts of disappointment. I don’t know how she could possibly be looking everything over that fast. Surely, she needs some time to really consider what I’m presenting to her.
“My goal for the series is to take popular modern-born techniques and—”
“Right. Okay,” she says, cutting me off. “I see what you’re going for, but it’s not the sort of thing we’re after at the moment.” She leafs back through the sketches and tilts her head as she assesses them again. “This one is okay.” She says it slowly, as if it pains her to say so. “I do think it would be better on a larger scale.”
“I could do that, and—”
“No. As I said, this work isn’t what we’re trying to acquire at the moment. Our current lineup is teeming with artists confined to canvas. Moving forward, we’re looking for a multiplicity of forms and materials, sculptures, modern installations—that sort of thing.”
“Oh.”
“This, these,” she says, tapping her pointer finger on my sketch. “It’s coffee shop art.”
Coffee shop art.
Three words that on their own are each pretty great—who doesn’t love coffee—but when smashed together mean something akin to soul-crushing rejection. Coffee shop art is equivalent
to doodles on a stained napkin. Might as well just toss it in the trash on your way out. Thanks.
I don’t feel like arguing with her about the merits of art on canvas. Not everyone can put some huge sculpture in the middle of their living room, Beth!
It’s not worth it. I take my bulky portfolio—which now seems to weigh three times more than it did when I arrived—thank her for her help, and leave the gallery.
What a huge waste of time.
It’s already late afternoon, dark and cold outside. The dinner party at Walt’s apartment is tonight and I was supposed to find something to wear while I was out and about, but now I don’t really feel like shopping.
I pass a boutique that has dresses hanging in the window, and with a resigned sigh, I push past the door.
I don’t even care to look up at the racks of clothing as a boisterous sales associate flutters toward me, all smiles and happy hands.
“Hello there, gorgeous. What can I help you find today?”
Meaning in life?
A path forward?
I settle on the easiest answer. “A dress for a dinner party.”
She bats her hand as if to say, Easy-peasy.
“Cocktail casual, or is this something a bit more formal?”
“I…have no idea.”
She winks and shimmies her shoulders, not the least bit daunted by the task ahead. “Let me pull some looks and I’ll meet you back near the dressing rooms.”
By the time I leave my room, dressed and ready for the dinner party, the apartment is already abuzz with activity. In the kitchen, caterers work in an assembly line around the two islands, plating appetizers and prepping what looks to be a multi-course dinner. Servers work on the perimeter, pouring wine into decanters, polishing silver, and ensuring every wine glass is sparkling.
I’ve witnessed scenes like this at my parents’ house growing up, but I’ve never been on this side of it. I’m not sure who’s coordinated everything—likely Mason or April—but the staff looks up at me expectantly when I stroll into the kitchen.
