Loonglow

by Helen Eisenbach

  Clay wondered how long this newfound freedom would have the power to delight him. On the other hand, he might not have it for long. At best, this appointment would mean the beginning of extended servitude to a publisher; more likely, it would be the first in an endless string of discouragements.

  As the hour of the interview approached, an unfamiliar feeling of anxiety overtook him. He’d never before been judged by a complete stranger, he realized; what if the man treated him with utter contempt, ripping him to shreds with scorn? Who did Clay think he was—why had he ever thought he could publish a book? The sight of his manuscript suddenly provoked a sensation of acute nausea. Had he wasted two years of his life on a delusion of his own talent, soon to be unveiled as the sham it was? Editors looked at hundreds of books and manuscripts a year, maybe even thousands. What made him think this one would care about what he had to say?

  By the time ten-thirty approached, Clay was nearly green with revulsion and fear. If he hadn’t been so out of practice drinking he would have taken some alcohol to steady his nerves, but the past two years had been so dry as to lower his once limitless tolerance to that of a baby. He tried to play the piano, with pitiful results. If only he smoked: anything to take his mind off what he was about to learn. He should have thought to go running; now it was too late, unless he wanted to try to postpone the interview. Now there was an idea—

  The phone rang. Clay picked it up on the first ring, exhaling shakily into the receiver. A relieved voice asked if he was Clayton Lee, and if so, could he possibly reschedule the appointment, as his potential editor had suddenly been called to court? Clay wrote the date and time upon his table, assuring the immensely apologetic voice on the line that it was not the slightest bit inconvenient for him to reschedule; quite the contrary. He suggested canceling the appointment altogether, but the young woman assured him that this was the last thought he should be entertaining.

  A moment later, Clay was left listening to a dial tone, once again alone. He hung up, feeling as if an enormous weight had been lifted from his shoulders. Then he went into the bathroom and threw up.

  “On the other hand,” said Todd (Clay’s twelfth or hundredth editor so far), “you might try Bjorn Torovil at Tendon & Leeds. His list is small, but this just might appeal.”

  Clay rose and shook the young man’s hand, his head still spinning. You wouldn’t mind, he thought, if I don’t follow your suggestion for a year or so? Some months of taking in the cream of publishing had left him slightly dazed; whenever he tried keeping straight which pieces of advice had come from whom, which editor came with which house, he had to stop and lie down. The past few months he’d gotten such conflicting (and equally assured) advice, he’d passed confusion and moved on to numb paralysis.

  “Make it better.”

  That had been the recommendation of the publisher his father had procured for him, though it had taken Clay over an hour to receive it. By the time Clay was ushered into the cavernous office where a tall, beady-eyed man sat (immersed in what seemed to be a terminal telephone conversation), Clay’s nerves had settled from anxiety to the beginnings of mild irritation. The man motioned him to sit, barely looking up, then spent the next forty minutes swiveling in his chair and arguing over the telephone. “Fire the asshole,” he said twice, glaring at Clay as if he were responsible for the asshole’s presence on the planet. “I hear this bullshit every day. Who bought that piece of shit?”

  Clay was beginning to wonder if he was up to the honor of being published by such a company when the man uttered an abrupt “Dump it!” and hung up, turning to Clay as if he were a delinquent employee about to be terminated. Clay met his gaze evenly.

  “This crap”—the publisher motioned to the pile of Clay’s manuscript, which his secretary had placed before him at one point in the conversation. “Make it better. Then we’ll talk.”

  Clay cleared his throat. “Is there anything in particular you’d like to see me do?”

  “Fix it, fix it, for Christ sake just do it, I don’t have time to tell you how to do your job!” The man fastened a burning eye on Clay. “You’re wasting my time.”

  By all means, Clay thought, unfolding his hands in his lap, let’s have none of that. “You have no particular suggestions?” he tried. “Recommendations or …” The man’s attention was now focused on a memo his secretary had placed in front of him, Clay noticed. He sighed, getting to his feet. “Well, sir,” he said, astonished by the brevity of the actual exchange. “Thanks for all your time.”

  The other man squinted up at Clay as if his tone had been sarcastic. “Shit,” he said. “You don’t look a thing like your father. Some milkman’s bastard, probably.”

  “That’s entirely possible,” Clay answered, his eyes widening. “By all means share that theory with my father the next time you have a free moment before sentencing.” Resisting additional suggestions that crossed his mind, he left the office in a daze.

  “Will you hold for Rick Miner?” Clay was surprised to find himself on the other end of a call from the editor two days later. Miner came on the line, barked someone’s name, then took his leave with an economy of grace that left Clay short of breath. He hung up the phone and scrambled to write down the editor’s name and number, his head suddenly light on his shoulders.

  In no time at all, Clay found himself thrown in the midst of a network of editors who represented every kind of publisher imaginable, each happy to augment the list of future possibilities. First on the list was Rowena Merle, a plain-faced, possibly anemic woman of indeterminate age. Rowena wandered out to greet Clay dreamily and in the hour that followed barely allowed Clay the chance to utter two sentences in succession. “Of course I have so many wonderful authors I don’t remotely have time to edit them, for heaven’s sake,” she murmured. “Fortunately, I’m able to give my assistant the opportunity to line edit—it’s all I can do to return my phone calls most days …” This did not come as much of a surprise to Clay, who was not fully convinced that she knew the workings of most of her office furniture, much less the name of any living soul beside herself (including his).

  After twenty minutes, Clay surrendered to the rolling waves of speech, waiting for the flow to abate before he tried voicing any thoughts accumulated in the interim. Another forty-five minutes confirmed that even utter silence on his part was not enough to effect such a pause.

  The editor Rowena recommended turned out to be a starry-eyed young gentleman with the well-rounded personality of a cartoon character (Brenda Starr, Clay decided). Judd Esterhaus was initially too dazzled by Clay’s appearance to keep himself from staring (though, to his credit, he did blush becomingly as if to acknowledge this fact). Yet once he had regained his composure, he began to grill Clay about the personal motivation behind writing the book with a thoroughness Clay imagined would have served him well in the SS. Much as Clay tried to steer him to practical questions, Judd seemed reluctant to discuss any of the particulars of the book itself—what he thought its thesis about love and greatness really meant, or how he saw its chance of publication—refusing to believe that Clay couldn’t provide more satisfying information as to how much of the book was based on personal experience, his or that of anyone he knew. “Don’t you have some dirt?” he said at one point, piteously.

  Judd’s choice for him was a less waif-like but equally alarming six-foot-four boy editor whose collection of white teeth and doughy, plump cheeks gave him the appearance of an eight-year-old who’d been subjected to one too many hormone treatments. Clay found the young man’s tone of voice so inexplicably intimate he was only able to concentrate on snippets of the editor’s dialogue. “Just entre nous,” the giant said (Clay lost track somewhere in the middle of a rococo discussion about which publishers were sleeping with the same bestselling author).

  The next few editors went by in somewhat of a blur. There was a woman named Missy whose appealingly snide assistant mentioned to Clay (just before showing him into the office) that she defined the phras
e “editor from the waist down.” Shaking Missy’s hand, he thought of asking her to spare his tender heart, but she seemed so ill at ease with the basics of human interaction he suspected she had difficulty removing her clothes in total privacy, much less in front of company. Next came a stiff-backed woman who ushered a tearful assistant from her office, patted the bun imprisoning her lusterless dark hair and then brought Clay inside. He seated himself in a chair across from her; yet when she fixed a smile on him, he found himself unable to concentrate on anything but the certainty that she was waiting for the perfect chance to sink her teeth into his flesh. After her came Genie, a tall, anorexic woman who extended a limp, bony hand, looked down to tuck in what appeared to be a boy’s undershirt, and then surveyed her spotless office as if attempting to detect an overlooked speck of dust or excess of literature. As Clay spoke about his central theory (“… we project our deepest fantasies on people we think we love, not realizing that the way they make us feel, that power to do anything, doesn’t come from them at all”), she seemed to be absorbed in something other than his words. Only when she stopped to ask him, “Who is J. D. Salinger?” did he know for certain she was listening.

  Afterwards, in quick succession, came a stream of haughty, indistinguishable young men with ponytails of varying lengths, who all seemed quite intent on proving they were not in publishing but rather on the cutting edge of the new wave, whatever that might be.

  As Todd, the last of them, showed him the door, Clay wondered if he might do better on his own. Todd slapped him on the back and slipped a copy of a former showgirl’s tips on bran into his hand, then slipped away. He certainly could not do worse.

  “Enough,” Louey pleaded. “I give. I can’t stand any more.”

  “Weakling,” said Mia. They lay on the floor in Mia’s living room, giggling until their stomachs ached. “Loonlight in Vermont.”

  “Loon River.”

  “Blue Loon. Loon over Miami.”

  “Loonglow.”

  “It must have been loonglow,” Mia warbled, “that brought me straight to you.” She sat up, poking Louey. “Look at you—pitiful young creature.”

  “While you’re so shockingly mature.” Louey was weak from laughing. “I feel like someone else’s lunch. How can you have brought me to this sorry state?”

  “What kind of host would I be if I didn’t?”

  Louey studied the patterns on Mia’s ceiling. “The kind of host you are, of course. Incomparable and tacky.”

  How had she ever found a friend like Mia? Louey wondered. When she and Mia were together, the rest of the world seemed to disappear; they spent so much time convulsed in laughter she forgot that other people, other worlds existed. Her friends scarcely approved, of course, but Louey didn’t care; they couldn’t bring her the elation Mia did, or the surprise. It struck her as amazing that she’d stumbled upon her, someone who liked her silliness and sarcasm (both of which her friends did their utmost to overlook). She’d never met anyone so unconcerned with commonplace morality, who got away with doing everything she wanted. Mia went haphazardly through life, through attitudes, philosophies: she was an animal, a force of nature, indulging every appetite with no concern for anyone’s approval. It seemed to Louey Mia lived on some much higher plane, the way artists lived, or Europeans, concentrating only on sensation, pleasure.

  She was an innocent herself where pleasure was concerned. Bandying racy or suggestive comments came like second nature, but the thought of actually doing something with someone terrified her. Once when a boy had asked if he could kiss her, she had blushed so fiercely she could barely meet his eye. Next to Mia, who no doubt took lovers as cavalierly as men were supposed to, she felt no more than a child, a total infant. Yet though she and Mia discussed nearly everything, she was embarrassed to reveal her inexperience.

  “Big day Sunday,” Mia said, giving her a nudge.

  “Yeah, I’m almost legal.” Louey bent her knees and swung them back and forth against each other, keeping her feet planted on the floor.

  “Old bag. Any major plans for the day?”

  “Well, I was going to build an atomic reactor, but if you have something you’d rather do, I can always put it off.”

  “No, no …” Mia shrugged. “Can’t top that.”

  “Family will probably tie me up and force-feed me cake. They usually throw a feeble party with people they think are my friends.”

  “Must be why they didn’t invite me.” Mia pretended to be hurt. Louey snorted. “How about spending the day with me?” Mia went on. “I’ll even put on clothes.”

  “The glitter scuba gear?”

  “You name it.”

  “What a lucky girl I am,” said Louey, sitting up.

  “Here she is!” Louey announced at Mia’s door that Sunday. “God, the applause is deafening.”

  “Your birthdayship.” Mia bowed her head and let Louey inside. “You seem in half-good spirits.”

  “And why is that, do you suppose?” She ignored the glee on Mia’s face, walking into the house. “How many mortals get a chance to rack up seven decades of pure hell?”

  Mia squinted. “You do seem more … wrinkled, somehow.”

  “Thank you,” Louey said. In the living room, a bottle of champagne waited. “For me? And here I didn’t get you anything.”

  “I don’t know how you made it until noon without a cocktail.”

  “What’s keeping you, then, girlie? Wing it here.” Louey plopped down on the couch.

  “Women today”—Mia shook her head—“so—ladylike.” She popped the cork and filled two glasses.

  Louey began to drink, but Mia stopped her, giving a stern look. “To a twisted piece of work,” she toasted. “Long may you wave.”

  “Ditto.” A little embarrassed by the attention, Louey took a sip. Mia deposited herself on the couch next to her, curling her bare feet under her. Champagne on an empty stomach made Louey light-headed, and she leaned back, surprised to find that Mia’s outstretched arm was resting on the couch behind her. She took another sip. The warmth of Mia’s arm behind her was oddly comforting.

  After a long pause, Mia rose to pour them more champagne.

  “Trying to get me drunk, wench?” Louey said, but Mia didn’t answer, sitting down. Louey drank, wondering why her words hung in the air. “So,” she said at last, “where are the parents?”

  “Ditched ’em. Sent ’em on a cruise around the world.”

  Louey laughed and Mia jumped up as if she’d just remembered something. “What?” prodded Louey.

  “Cake!” said Mia, going to the kitchen. A minute later she came back, a mass of birthday cake cupped in her hands. “There’s cake!”

  “I see that,” Louey noted. “Make that piece yourself?”

  “Of course I did,” said Mia, shoving the bulk of the confection into Louey’s mouth before she had a chance to protest.

  “Thanks so much,” she sputtered, laughing. Mia reached to push a piece she’d missed into her mouth and Louey raised her hands in protest, gulping, “Special birthday feeding?” Mia laughed. Louey wiped her face with the back of her hand.

  “Here, let me help you with that,” Mia interrupted. Before Louey knew what was happening, Mia had bent to lick the crumbs from her mouth. Louey’s skin went hot. “That better?”

  “Uh—thanks,” Louey said; she felt the touch of Mia’s tongue as if it were still lapping at her lips. Her mouth felt strange.

  Before she knew it, Mia had begun kissing her. Mia’s mouth was nibbling at hers, teasing her lips apart; she couldn’t seem to breathe. Her mouth fell open. Mia slipped her tongue inside, darting and retreating, branding every corner of her mouth. How could Mia be kissing her? “Is this some—?” she started.

  “Yes,” said Mia softly, looking down at Louey’s breasts. Louey’s heart was pounding as, without warning, Mia unbuttoned Louey’s shirt, pulling it away from her body and slipping her hands inside. Louey started, unable to stop shaking. Fingers stole across her bare s
kin, making her feel chilled and burning at the same time. Mia kept staring at her breasts, plucking, hardening the tips to points; then Mia pulled her own shirt off and moved in close to brush against her, tantalizing. Louey tried to breathe, to swallow; she was trembling so fiercely she thought Mia would stop and throttle her. She couldn’t seem to keep her eyes from closing. “There’s more in the kitchen, if you want,” Mia murmured in her ear.

  “More?” Louey tried to clear her throat.

  “More cake,” said Mia, skimming lips against her neck, making her shiver.

  “Uh, no, that’s—” But Mia had fastened her mouth to Louey’s, kissing her so deeply Louey was stunned flat against the couch. She tried to move away, to talk to Mia, but Mia’s mouth kept coming down on hers, silencing her. Mia’s hands stole over her as Mia kissed her almost lazily, breathlessly—and then she was kissing Mia back, her hands were sweeping over burning skin, she was unraveling, nearly faint—how could she be kissing Mia? The champagne must be getting to her. Mia shifted, swaying so the tips of both her breasts teased Louey’s again, dizzying, then Mia’s hands were at her, stroking lightly, everywhere. “Oh—” Louey exhaled as Mia reached between her legs.

  The next week Louey left for her first semester of college.

  Sitting in a plush reception area, Clay studied the voluptuous Hispanic woman who manned the phones, keeping out the unwelcome intruders Regent Books seemed to encounter hourly. He gathered from the other visitors that her name, fittingly, was Cookie. The receptionist caught him sneaking a look and shook her head, giving him a bewitching flash of teeth.