Chapter Sixteen
A few days later . . .
The Man had just popped the cap off a beer and I was eating a forgotten turkey chunk off the kitchen floor when a knock came at the door.
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “rapping at my chamber door . . .”
Nah, I’m just funnin’ ya. I’m not going to go all Poe on you here. I’m saving it. For Halloween.
The Man opened the door to reveal his editor: mid-forties, tweed jacket with elbow patches, horn-rimmed glasses, stiff as a board. If The Woman represents a more forward-thinking era in publishing, The Editor was decidedly old-school. Although, to my mind, while he might’ve thought he was a reincarnation of Maxwell Perkins, I’d say he was more on a level with . . . Well, I don’t want to name any names. Let’s just say that the real Max Perkins edited F. Scott Fitzgerald, including his masterpiece The Great Gatsby, which we all know I was named for. So I think I can say with more authority than anyone else, unless ol’ Scott was still with us to say it himself: this guy was no Max Perkins.
I trotted over to stand beside The Man, in a show of solidarity, glaring up at The Editor. The Editor, in turn, glared back down at me. What can I say? I try to get on with people whenever I can, but even for me, it’s just not always possible.
The Man stepped aside, gesturing with a magnanimous sweep of his beer bottle for The Editor to come inside.
Wait. We were inviting this guy in? I’d seen enough vampire movies—left running on the TV after The Woman had fallen asleep on the couch and The Man had escaped to another room, not that he’d ever admit he’d been scared—to know that once you do that, invite the vampire in, anything that happens afterward is on you.
“You know,” The Editor said, with that ever-present condescending tone, which was one of the reasons I didn’t care for him—like, get over your tweedy self, dude!—“if you’d agree to come to my office like a normal author, I wouldn’t have to come down here.”
See what I mean? The Man already knew he wasn’t normal. There was no good reason to call attention to that fact.
“It could be worse,” The Man said. “Stephen King used to make his editor and agent meet him at Red Sox games. Regularly.”
“So you’ve said. Many times. I hate baseball.”
“So you’ve said.” The Man touched his backward Mets cap in acknowledgment. “Many times.”
As they moved further into the apartment, The Editor abruptly shifted to, “I didn’t want to do this over email, but—”
“Can I get you a drink?” The Man offered, cutting him off.
The Editor stared at the beer in The Man’s hand, pointedly. “Do you have anything else?”
As a rule, The Man favors a good domestic beer. Further, he says that Budweiser will get you where you want to go just as quickly as anything else. But I guess that’s not good enough for some people. Again, see what I mean? Accept the hospitality or don’t accept the hospitality, but either way, there’s no reason to be a tool about it. Do people still say “tool”? I don’t know, but I saw it on an old show once and I liked it.
But, unlike me, The Man wasn’t at all bothered by The Editor’s blatant rudeness. I guess that, after all their years working together, he was used to it by then.
“Water,” The Man replied with a shrug. “I got plenty of water.”
“Fine,” The Editor said with a sigh. “I’ll take a beer.”
Hey, don’t do us any favors.
The Man disappeared into the kitchen. In his brief absence, I kept a wary eye on The Editor, who scowled back at me.
“I can’t believe I’m going to drink a beer,” The Editor muttered, “when I could be home enjoying dry martinis with my husband instead.”
Wait. The Editor was gay? How did I not know this?
Reluctantly, I put a check in the positive column for The Editor, his first ever. I’m very pro-LGBTQ+.
Soon, The Man returned with fresh beers for each of them, and after delivering The Editor’s to him, he plopped down in a chair. The Editor reluctantly took the chair beside him, back ramrod straight.
I guess The Man had finally decided to bite the bullet, because immediately, he opened with, “What didn’t you want to do in an email?”
But before The Editor could answer, The Man continued with, “Let me guess: you didn’t like the new book.”
Still not waiting for an answer, The Man said, “And you didn’t think it had enough heart.”
“Wow,” The Editor said, at last being given the chance to speak, “I guess I didn’t have to come down here after all, since you knew exactly what I was going to say.”
“Well,” The Man said, “you could start by telling me what we do about it. What’s next?”
“Look,” The Editor said, “we all love you.”
The Man did a not-so-subtle eye roll.
“OK, maybe that’s too strong a word,” The Editor said. “We all like you.”
“You tolerate me.”
“Yes.” The Editor pointed his beer bottle at The Man in an uncharacteristically gauche gesture. “That.” He paused, before adding with a rare and genuine enthusiasm, “But we love your writing! And we know what you’re capable of. Because of that, we also know that this book is simply not the best you can do. And, I’m sorry to say, far from it.”
The Man tilted his beer bottle, seeming to look to the familiar red-and-white label for inspiration, before taking a long swig. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to write with a broken heart,” he finally said.
“One would think that would fuel your writing—from great pain comes great art.”
“One would think!” The Man barked a bitter laugh. “But no.”
Over the course of this conversation, The Man had appeared to shrink in on himself, and as a result, I sharpened my glare on The Editor. OK, I may also have let out a growl. Just a tiny one.
“I have to say,” The Editor said, uneasy, as well he should be, “your dog gives me the creeps.”
“You’re the only one who ever says that.”
“Oh? Really? And how many other people come here?”
Silence from The Man accompanied by a glare at The Editor that was worthy of, well, me.
“That’s what I thought,” The Editor said.
“Other people come here,” The Man said, now on the defensive, “sometimes!”
“Like who?”
“There was a delivery person here last week!”
Even I couldn’t help but shake my head at the pathetic weakness of this response. If we’re going to be loners, we should own it. Let’s not pretend we’re yukking it up with the Domino’s kid on the regular. Mmm, Domino’s.
“And her,” The Man added softly, breaking my heart. “When she comes to pick up Gatz for the weekend, I still get to see her.”
Wait. Was that an actual empathetic emotion I was seeing on The Editor’s face? Was he feeling some small scintilla of . . . sympathy? Empathy? Some words have such a fine distinction, I can tell why some people confuse them.
“Maybe what you need,” The Editor suggested, not unkindly for once, “is a change of scenery. Maybe”—and here his eyes lit up, like he was warming to his own idea—“you could get your creative mojo back if you took a vacation!”
The Man and I exchanged a look, then we both stared at The Editor.
Who did The Editor imagine he was talking to? A vacation? Had The Editor ever actually met The Man?
“Fine,” The Editor said, mildly exasperated with us, and yet still curiously unwilling to relinquish hope. You know, that thing with feathers. “Then at least get out for a bit! What about meaningless affairs? That’s what I always do when my heart is broken! Well, before I met the love of my life and got married.” Wait. The Editor had a heart? Kidding! (Sort of.)
But seriously, what he’d said made me blink in shock,
because it seemed to me that—against all odds—maybe, just maybe this guy was onto something here.
“I tried that already,” The Man said. “It made things worse with . . . you know who, when she found out on Valentine’s Day.”
“Stop thinking about her!” The Editor said.
“The meaningless affair didn’t go anywhere anyway,” The Man said. “I broke it off right after Valentine’s Day. She wasn’t that interesting. She wasn’t well-read. She hadn’t even read Othello. Who hasn’t read Othello?”
“I bet he hasn’t,” The Editor said with a rude chin nod at me.
Don’t be too sure of that.
“Don’t be too sure of that,” The Man said, providing yet another reason for why I loved him so much. “Anyway, I just can’t be with anyone who doesn’t—”
“Stop thinking like you need to jump into another serious relationship!” The Editor cut him off. “You think she’s doing that? No, she’s living her best life with hot, poorly read, shirtless men on yachts. I’m almost sure of it. So get out there. Forget about her.”
Meaningless affairs . . . Hmm . . .
“You know,” The Editor said, thoughtfully studying the label on his own beer bottle, “this could be worse.”
The Man waited, no doubt desperate to be happy again, practically on the edge of his seat, for The Editor’s next words of wisdom. And I must confess that, for once, I waited on the edge of my seat too. For the first time in our long acquaintance it had occurred to me that this guy might actually know a thing or two.
“This,” The Editor finally said, “could be a can.”
Chapter Seventeen
Later the same evening . . .
A man and a dog walk into a bar . . .
It’s good to have a place where everyone knows your name. I know this for a fact, because I saw it on the TV.
For us, that place had always been a local Irish pub, our neighborhood hangout, the only place outside of home and Nick’s Italian Restaurant which The Man was ever reasonably comfortable enough to go to with any regularity. You know the kind of place I’m talking about: dartboard and a pool table and a few pinball machines, jukebox with no songs later than 1979, carpeting that had seen better days where there was more actual carpet and less floor showing through the remaining threads, the chief thing of beauty being a long mahogany bar running the length, at one end of which you can find the regular drunk old guy, while at the other is located the regular blowsy overage hooker. The kind of place where tourists wouldn’t be caught dead but where, yes, really, everyone knows your name.
“Gatz!” The cry came at us from most of the assembly—because when I said “everyone,” it was a slight exaggeration; some were complete strangers—as we filled the doorway. The place was reasonably packed, but as The Man and I—he in his disheveled best; me in the resplendent glory that is always me—made our way toward the bar, it was as though two stools magically appeared for us, side by side. The Man took the one on the left as I hopped up on the stool to his right.
The Bartender—early thirties, easygoing enough, tats up the wazoo—came right over with a bottle of Bud for The Man. Then he turned to me.
“What’ll it be?” The Bartender asked.
I gave him my patented doggy equivalent of an eye roll.
The Bartender turned away. Returning a moment later with a large, hand-painted ceramic water bowl, he positioned it so I could see emblazoned across the front: GATZ.
I tell ya, it gets me every time.
“Let me know if you guys need anything else, all right?” The Bartender said, rapping his tatted knuckles on the bar twice before moving away to help another happy customer.
“Thanks, man,” The Man called after him.
Another thing I’ve always appreciated about The Man? Even when the chips are down, he’s always got manners.
The Man and I conferred with our beverages of choice, sipping and lapping respectively. Then, as one, we swiveled one hundred and eighty degrees on our stools to survey the room. The Man moved to nonchalantly rest both elbows on the bar behind us, looking awkward for just a brief moment as one elbow missed. I would’ve tried to mirror the double-elbow maneuver, but I like to think I know my limitations. And anyway, on me, I thought the move would look kind of douchey.
Keeping both eyes on the room, The Man leaned in my direction, coming in for a whispered conference.
“What do you think?” he said. “See any good meaningless-affair prospects?”
He may have seemed smooth to the point of oiliness, like this was no big deal to him and he was just some regular sleazeball, but his jangling nerves were highly palpable to me, and I could see his hand shaking as he death-gripped his beer.
Dude, no one’s going to be able to hold your beer if you hold it that tightly!
I scanned the room. There were plenty of women in sight, in all shapes, ages, and sizes. There was even quite an array of dispositions on display, from the fun-loving to the crying-in-your-Chardonnay type. I’m as empathetic as the next dog, but to me, the crier was a nonstarter; we were depressed enough in our household already. And the angry one? Don’t get me started. That woman was just frightening.
For the next half hour, I indicated prospect after prospect with juts of my chin. And, for the next half hour, I watched The Man strike out, time and time again.
Geez, he wasn’t very good at this.
“This isn’t as easy as it looks on TV,” The Man observed.
Nothing ever is, pal. Nothing ever is.
But then my eyes at last located the best-looking woman in the room. No real intelligent spark in her eyes, so I had the feeling we wouldn’t be talking Kafka, but she seemed neither depressed nor scary. I liked the shade of blue of the frilly scarf wrapped around her neck, and I nodded my snout in her direction.
Hey, I figured, just because the interaction was supposed to be meaningless, it didn’t mean she couldn’t be a looker! And if he was only going to strike out again, then why not do it with the best-looking woman there?
Following the lead of my snout, The Man took a deep breath and was half up from his stool when the good-looking woman caught sight of us. And then a curious thing happened. She eagerly made a beeline in our direction.
“Oh my god,” she exclaimed, “your dog is so cute!”
There was that word again. I wanted to growl my displeasure at her lack of originality, but, what the heck? I was cute, she was cute, in that moment we were all cute.
“That’s funny,” The Man said, taking a blind stab at being suave and almost hitting the mark, “Gatz was just telling me he thinks you’re cute too.”
“I’m flattered,” she said, hand to scarf accompanied by a modest smile. “To think that I caught the attention of the famous Gatz.”
Huh, it occurred to me for the first time. I guess I am famous. Pause. Well, in here.
“Apparently,” she went on, “everyone in here loves Gatz.”
“Well,” The Man said, without a trace of envy, “Gatz does have that effect on people.”
“And is Gatz available?” she asked, now scratching me behind the ears, which I accepted gratefully. “It’s so hard to meet an available man in the city.”
She may have been acting like she was talking about me, but somehow, I sensed that her attention had shifted.
“Well,” The Man said, “he might be available for some things.”
“So,” she said, “what do you do?”
“Well,” The Man started, and it occurred to me that he’d started three consecutive sentences with the word Well. Couldn’t he come up with something more original? Maybe add a little variety? Synonyms for “well” are hard to come by in this context, but he could at least try. He was supposed to be a writer, for gosh sake, a literary writer! “He’s a dog, he eats a lot of treats . . .”
Heh. OK, that
was a bit better. Pretty funny stuff.
Apparently, she thought so too, because she laughed before asking, “No, what do you do?”
“Oh, I’m a writer. The dog’s not a writer. That would be pretty ridiculous if I said that, wouldn’t it?”
Hey, now!
“Although I suspect,” The Man went on, “if Gatz were somehow to write a book, he’d be better at it than I am.”
That was better.
“But no,” The Man went on some more, “the dog isn’t the writer. The dog likes treats and I’m the writer.”
And now, having witnessed it for myself, there was absolutely no doubt in my mind why The Man kept striking out.
“You mean like a published writer?”
“As opposed to the unpublished kind?”
She nodded.
“That would have to be a yes then. I write novels.”
Her eyes lit up, not the first time I’d seen a relative stranger react this way. Almost everyone wants to be a writer. And when they meet someone who actually is, some of them go kind of gaga. Like: “Can you tell me how to get published?” or “I have this idea for a book—maybe you’d like to write it with me?” Stuff like that.
“How cool is that!” she said.
Inwardly, I had to agree. The Man and I were impressive in our accomplishments.
“I’d love to read a book someday,” she added enthusiastically, “if I ever have the time.”
Oh brother. See what I meant about the Kafka? There are three categories of humans: people who read books, people who write books, and then there’s everybody else. Still, when it comes to meaningless, it doesn’t get any better than that. We were in!
Chapter Eighteen
The following Friday evening . . .
I was lying on the couch, chewing on The Good-Looking Woman’s scarf, which she’d left behind. Hey, what can I say? Some people are always losing stuff. Or maybe she was looking for an excuse to come back. Suddenly, there was a knock at the door.
The Man came out of the kitchen to answer it. It was The Woman.
“Hi,” The Man said somberly.
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