The Bestseller

by Stephen Leather

  “The man opened his wallet and pulled out a handful of bills. He held them out to Debbie, his trembling hand bathed in sweat. ”On the dresser,” she said. “Don’t you know that you never hand over the money. And put it in an envelope. The man frowned. She could see that he was nervous. Nervous and stupid. He’d been wearing a wedding ring but he’d taken it off and she could see the pale skin at the base of the finger. Why did he think that she’d care about whether or not he was married?

  “The man swallowed nervously. “I don’t have an envelope,” he said. She pointed at the desk by the door. “Use the hotel stationery.” The man waddled over to the desk and picked up the envelope. “Two hundred and fifty, right?” Debbie glared at the man with cold eyes. “If you mention money again I’m out of here,” she said. “We don’t discuss money. You don’t hand me the money. Those are the rules.” The man apologized like the wimp he was, put the bills in the envelope and put the envelope on the dresser. “Now what?” he said.

  “Debbie pointed at the bathroom. “You shower. Everywhere. And clean your teeth.” The man nodded enthusiastically, like a little boy about to enter a sweet shop. “Will you kiss me?” he asked. “On the mouth?” Debbie sighed. “Of course not.” She pointed at the bathroom door. “The clock’s ticking.” The man waddled into the bathroom and after a few seconds Debbie heard the shower kick into life. She took off her coat. She wasn’t wearing a dress, just a matching red bra and panties, black stockings and suspenders. She lay down on the bed and looked at her watch. Ten minutes gone, fifty to go. Then she had to get to Rite-Aid to pick up her Zivorax and then get home in time to meet her daughter off the school bus. The babysitter was coming at seven and she had her third appointment of the day at the Marriott Hotel at eight. Three hours. He was a regular, flying in from Chicago, and he was a good payer. The agreed fee was a thousand but he always gave her a tip on top. He was one of her best-looking clients, tall and well-groomed and he knew not to take liberties, like trying to kiss her on the lips or trying to get her to screw without a condom. Debbie never kissed. Ever. And she never let the client go bareback, even a guy like the Chicago client who was married and had never had an STD in his entire life. The shower stopped running and Debbie took a deep breath, preparing herself for what was to come.”

  Callas looked up from her laptop. “That’s as far as I’ve got,” she said.

  “Well done, Vicki,” said Grose. “It’s really coming along well.” He looked around the lecture hall, deliberately avoiding eye contact with Jenny. “What does everyone else think?”

  Half a dozen of the students raised their hands and Grose went to them from left to right. All six were complimentary and none expressed any reservations about the subject matter. Grose knew that they were scared of retaliation down the line, that if they criticized Callas she’d be gunning for them with both barrels when it was their turn to read. The longer the course went on the more Grose realized that what he was doing was basically pointless. He wasn’t allowed to make the course competitive and there was no real attempt made to criticize bad and mediocre work. How was anyone expected to improve their craft if all they ever heard was how wonderful their work was?

  Grose was a big fan of the ten thousand hours theory, that no matter what the skill or the craft that was how long it took to acquire it. It went for mastering a musical instrument, learning a foreign language, painting, even learning a trade like plumbing or carpentry. To master the skill you had to put in the hours, you had to pay your dues. And that went for writing, too. You could pretty much throw away everything you wrote during those first ten thousand hours, it was a rite of passage that every writer had to go through, in the way that artists made dozens of sketches before finally picking up a paintbrush and starting work on their masterpiece. Grose had certainly put in the hours while he was in his twenties. He’d written six novels all of which had been rejected by every agent in the country. It was only when he’d written the fifth that he had won a publishing deal and it was his seventh book that had been the big one, that one had almost won the Pulitzer. It had been a long hard road, hours and hours of work followed by brutal rejection, but Grose had never given up, never stopped trying. But the students on his course had no sense that writing was craft that had to be honed. All they cared about was getting published and making millions. They wanted to be the next Patterson or Grisham or King or Rowling, they wanted their names on the bestseller lists and their faces on the cover of US magazine and they wanted it right now. The last thing they wanted was to be told that their work was lacking, that they needed to master the basics of storytelling before they could even think about a publishing deal. And because they were themselves too sensitive to criticism they were reluctant to criticize others, so everyone just sat around nodding and smiling and saying how wonderful they all were.

  The door to the lecture hall opened and Adrian Slater strode in, his long black coat flapping behind him. He was wearing his impenetrable shades and holding his backpack in his right hand and his motorcycle helmet in his left. “Sorry I’m late, the traffic was a nightmare,” he said as headed to the back of the class.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” asked Grose.

  Slater stopped and turned to look at him. “I’m taking my place in class,” he said. “I’m sorry to have disturbed your flow.”

  “Flow? This isn’t about flow. You’re off this course.”

  Slater tilted his head to the side. “I don’t think so,” he said.

  “I can assure you that after your performance yesterday I won’t be teaching you again.”

  Slater tilted his chin up. “I don’t think you’re in a position to make that call,” he said. “With respect.”

  “With respect?” repeated Grose, getting to his feet. “You’ve shown me not one iota of respect, nor have you shown any respect to the members of this class.” He pointed at the door. “I want you to leave, now.”

  Slater stared at Grose for several seconds and then turned his back on him and walked up to his seat. He sat down, placed his motorcycle helmet and backpack on the floor and folded his arms.

  “Mr Slater, I am ordering you to leave the premises. You are off this course.”

  Slater said nothing.

  Grose felt his heart pounding in his chest. Part of him wanted to march up to Slater, grab him by the scruff of the neck and throw him out of the lecture hall, but he knew that in any physical confrontation he’d come off worst. Slater was younger and fitter, and if he refused to go there was nothing that Grose could do about it. “You are in big trouble, Slater,” Grose shouted, but even as the words had left his mouth he knew how weak he sounded. He grabbed his briefcase and stormed out, cursing under his breath.

  CHAPTER 18

  Jenny walked out of the college building with two of her friends but stopped when she saw Slater sitting on a bench on the far side of the road. She had arranged to go shopping with the two girls but changed her mind when she saw that Slater was reading a manuscript. She knew immediately that it was her work in progress that he was reading and she wanted to know what he thought. “I’ll catch you later,” she said.

  “You’re not going to talk to him, are you?” asked Rhonda, a tall black girl with dreadlocks that hung half-way down her back. She was from the Bronx and was working on a gritty detective novel with a black lesbian protagonist that Jenny felt was too clichéd to be publishable. Not that she’d ever said that to Rhonda, of course. Most writers pretended to appreciate constructive criticism but deep down all they wanted was to be told how wonderful their work was.

  “He’s psycho, you know that,” said the other girl. Her name was Sally-Anne and she was from a small town in Florida. She was writing about a small girl who was abused by her father and Jenny was fairly sure it was based on Sally-Anne’s own experiences. She was stick-thin and had dark patches under her eyes as if she didn’t sleep well and while she was often smiling the smile always looked slightly off.

  “He’s not psych
o,” said Jenny dismissively.

  “He is so psycho,” said Rhonda. “He’s talking about killing someone on the course, you heard him.”

  “Doesn’t matter anymore anyway,” said Sally-Anne. “You heard Grose. He’s kicked him off the course. Good riddance, I say. Whether or not he’s serious, he shouldn’t be screwing with us the way he is. It’s not funny.”

  “He is fit though,” said Jenny. “He’s got that Robert Pattinson Edward thing going. Mean and moody and soft white skin.”

  Rhonda faked a shudder. “You are one sick bunny,” she said. She nodded at Sally-Anne. “Come on, I hear the Gap calling my name.” She reached out and touched Jenny gently on the arm. “Promise me one thing, baby?”

  “What?” said Jenny.

  “If he does kill you, can I have your laptop? I am so sick of mine freezing on me.” She laughed and hurried over the road. He didn’t notice her until she sat down on the bench next to him. “Hey,” she said.

  Slater grinned at her. “How are you doing?”

  “I’m fine, but you’re still winning friends and influencing people.”

  “He’s an idiot. He can’t throw me off the course.”

  “You just need to handle him the right way.”

  “Yeah? You know he set the cops on me?” He took out a cigarette and lit it.

  “Are you serious?”

  Slater nodded and blew smoke. “Two of New York’s finest tried to give me the third degree last night.”

  “What happened?”

  “They tried to get heavy with me and they failed miserably,” he said. “I sent them packing.”

  “And you think Dudley sent them?”

  “I’m sure of it.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “I’m guessing he tried to get me thrown off the course and when that didn’t work he thought the cops would scare me off.” He blew smoke up at the sky. “He thought wrong.”

  “You shouldn't give Dudley such a hard time. He’s a good teacher. Really, he is.”

  “Maybe. But he's not a writer. Not any more. He’s not written anything worth reading since The Snow Birds. His sales have dwindled to pretty much nothing. Some of his books aren’t even in print any more. That's why he teaches. Because he can't write. And that doctorate took him six years to get. He's no more a doctor of philosophy than he is a writer.”

  Jenny looked down at the sidewalk. “He's jealous of you,” she said quietly.

  “He said that?”

  “No. But I know that's why he doesn't like you. You've got something he hasn't.” She looked up at him. “Talent.”

  Slater studied her with amused eyes. Then he slowly grinned. “Do you want to go sailing?”

  “Sailing?”

  “How can we go sailing? This is New York.”

  “Which is surrounded by water.”

  “But where do we get a boat from?”

  “I live on a boat.”

  “You do not.”

  Slater laughed, took a final drag on his cigarette, and flicked it away in a shower of sparks. “I live on a yacht. For real. Now do you want to come sailing or not?”

  CHAPTER 19

  Slater drove through the gates to the marina and parked close to a low flat-roofed building with a store at one end and a repair shop at the other. A mechanic in oil-stained overalls waved at Slater as he took off his helmet and Slater waved back. Jenny took off the white motorcycle helmet that Slater had given her and shook her hair. “That was interesting,” she said.

  “Have you been on a bike before?” asked Slater.

  “First time,” she said.

  Slater grinned mischievously. “That would be why you were hugging me so hard.”

  “Only when you went fast,” she said.

  There was a black carrier box on the back and Slater opened it. He took out Jenny’s laptop bag and gave it to her, then took the helmet from her and put it in the box and locked it.

  “Do you always carry a spare?” she asked.

  “Not always.”

  “But today you happened to have one?”

  Slater laughed. “Busted,” he said “I was planning on asking you to visit.”

  “Do people always follow your plans?”

  “If I’m lucky,” he said. He nodded towards the water. “Come on, I’ll show you my pride and joy.”

  He took her to a wire fence and pulled open a gate and stepped aside to allow her through first. There were more than a hundred boats, most of them motor launches, moored to wooden pontoons, bobbing gently in the grey water.

  “I never knew there were marinas in New York,” she said as they walked down a narrow pier.

  “There’s a few,” said Slater. “But they cost an arm and a leg.”

  “And you live on board?”

  “Sure.” He stopped alongside a single-masted yacht and waved his hand at it. “Home sweet home,” he said. Across the stern was the yacht’s name. WRITE OF WAY. “Why did you call it that?” asked Jenny.

  “Boats are feminine,” said Slater. “Never call her ‘it’. She’s a she.”

  “Well pardon my lack of knowledge,” laughed Jenny. “So why is she called Write Of Way?”

  Slater shrugged. “Just a joke, I guess. Plus she’s under sail which means powered boats have to give way to her. In theory, anyway.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, the rules of the sea say that a powered boat has to give way to a boat that’s under sail. But if a yacht as small as this comes up against a huge freighter or a tanker in the middle of the ocean, the yacht is the one that needs to watch out.” He slapped his hands together. “They’d slam right through it and not even notice it.”

  “Have you been out in the ocean?”

  “Sure. Sailed her all the way down to the Panama canal last year and up through the Bahamas and up to New York.”

  “On your own?”

  “Sure.”

  “That’s so cool. I wish I could do something like that.”

  “You can. You can do anything, Jenny, so long as you set your mind to it.” He held out his hand so that he could help her climb onto the deck. Once she was safely on board he joined her and unlocked the padlock that secured the hatch.

  “How long have you had her?” asked Jenny.

  Slater pulled open the hatch. “A few years,” he said. “The great thing is that if you get bored with a place, you just up anchor and go.”

  “Could you sail across the ocean in her?”

  “Sure,” said Slater. “You’d want to be careful weather-wise but you could sail around the world if you wanted.”

  “Are you going to do that one day?”

  “Maybe,” said Slater. “Would you come?”

  Jenny laughed. “I don’t think so,” she said.

  Slater waved at the hatch. “Do you want to have a look below decks?” he asked. “I’ll give you the tour. Then we’ll take her out.”

  An hour later they were standing by the wheel, carving through the gently heaving waves of the Hudson River. The nearest vessel was a good quarter of a mile away, a twin-masted yacht heading towards the sea. “Can you take the wheel?” he asked.

  “What? Sail her you mean?”

  “You’ll be fine,” said Slater. “The wind’s only a couple of knots, we’re hardly moving.” He put his hands on her hips and guided her to the best position to stand, and showed her the compass. “Keep us on that heading, but don’t worry if we move off course. We’re sailing so everyone has to give way to you. That’s the rule of the sea.” He pointed at the GPS monitor. “That’s your position there. With this, you can never get lost.”

  “I thought sailors navigated by the stars and that sextant thing.”

  “Those days are long gone,” said Slater. “I mean, I can use the stars and I do know how to use a sextant but there’s no point. You switch on that thing and it tells you where you are to within a few feet.”

  He patted her on the shoulder and went downstairs in
to the cabin. He came back up a few minutes later with a bottle of champagne and two glasses. “You’re joking,” she said.

  “What?”

  “You can’t drink and sail, surely?”

  “It’s not like driving a car,” he said, placing the glasses on the bench seat. “There are no cops with breathalyzers out here.” He popped the cork and poured champagne into the glasses. She picked up one of the glasses. He took the other one and clinked it against hers. “To having fun,” he said. “To having fun and writing great books.”

  “And to drinking champagne under sail,” she said. She touched her glass against his. “And to good friends.”

  “Amen to that,” he said. They both drank and Slater refilled their glasses.

  “I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she said.

  “You can do anything you want, Jenny. You just have to put your mind to it.”

  She waved her glass around. “I mean, this, sailing around Manhattan. Drinking champagne. It’s so, I don’t know, decadent.”

  “Decadent?” He waved at the skyscrapers to their right. “That’s decadent. Apartments costing tens of millions of dollars, some of the richest people on Earth many of whom haven’t worked a day in their lives, churning through the world’s resources like there’s no tomorrow, while others work all the hours that God sends for minimum wage. This isn’t decadent. This is just you and me sharing a bottle of wine on a boat that happens to be my home. This is real.”

  “It feels real,” said Jenny. She sipped her champagne. A seagull swooped over, circled the mast, and then flew off.

  “I’m glad you came,” said Slater.