The Mentor

by Sebastian Stuart

  “Listen, I’m feeling restless. Would you mind if I went out for a walk?” he asks.

  “Don’t be long.”

  After he’s gone, Anne turns out her bedside lamp and lies there in the dark.

  28

  Charles and Emma stand at the bow of the Staten Island Ferry as it returns to Manhattan. Charles has always loved this boat ride. He finds that the salt air and the panorama of water and sky, bridges and boats, has a way of clearing his head, loosening up his thinking, giving him a fresh perspective on the problem at hand.

  He’s hoping it will have a similar effect on Emma. They’re at a crucial point in her book: Zack is about to break down under his mother’s abuse. Charles is making aggressive changes, often rewriting whole paragraphs. He knows he’s driving her hard, but he also knows it’s good for her. Just as Portia guided him, he has to guide Emma.

  Charles knows what will happen if he tells Nina that Emma wrote the chapter, shows her more of the manuscript: she’ll want to start selling the book, get a buzz going, haul Emma off to lunches with editors. Emma is simply too fragile to handle that kind of exposure. No, it’s best if they remain closed in, working in secret, and then, when the book is truly as good as it can and will be, they’ll emerge triumphant to the world. Just as he dedicated Life and Liberty to Portia, Emma will dedicate The Sky Is Falling to him. He’ll be associated with her success, given credit for passing on the mantle to the next generation.

  It’s a chilly day and the sun keeps disappearing behind the clouds, darkening the waters around them. With the wind whipping her hair, Emma seems content. He leans his shoulder into hers and is pleased when she leans back.

  “How many people do you think are making love in this city right now?” Charles asks.

  “A small fraction of the number who wish they were,” Emma answers with a wry smile.

  They lean into each other a little more.

  “Charles…?”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “No, what is it?”

  “Well, I was just thinking about… this is hard for me. Your wife.”

  “What about her?”

  “Has she ever, you know, had an affair?”

  Charles laughs. “I highly doubt it.” Emma stares down at the churlish waters. “What makes you ask that question?”

  Emma shrugs.

  And then, from behind them, a woman’s voice: “Emma?”

  Charles and Emma turn to see a pregnant young woman walking across the deck with a young man, obviously her husband, in tow. Emma’s expression darkens.

  “Is that you, Emma?” the young woman asks. She has short dirty-blond hair and wears no makeup, has a kind face with large gray eyes.

  “Sue?” Emma says with a nervous laugh…

  Nick’s pizza parlor was where kids hung out after school in Munsonville. Emma didn’t have any close friends, but sometimes she’d sit around nursing a slice, because anything was better than going home. A lot of the other kids in Munsonville came from screwed-up families, but Emma’s mother was the undisputed town freak. Everybody who’s down needs someone lower, and Emma’s situation evoked condescending pity from her peers. Sue Jenkins-her dad sold plumbing and heating supplies, and her mom ran a store-front dancing school-was one of the few kids who tried to befriend Emma. Sue was sweet, and her family respected creativity. One Christmas they sent over a box of homemade goodies to Emma and her mother. Sue was popular, and one afternoon she invited Emma to tag along with her crowd when they went to Nick’s.

  They were all sitting around laughing and flirting-even Emma was starting to feel like part of the gang-when Emma’s mother walked in. It was an early spring day, mild and breezy, but Helen Bowles was pushing the season in her red short-shorts, high-heeled mules, loose Hawaiian shirt, floppy straw hat, and pink plastic heart-shaped shades that looked as if they belonged on a three-year-old; her mouth, thick with ruby lipstick, leaped from her powder-white face. Her wrists were heavy with the usual Bakelite bracelets. Everything got quiet and Emma slid down in her seat. Helen threw back her shoulders and with a lopsided pride sashayed up to the counter.

  “I’d like a 7UP, please,” she said in that weird voice she affected in public-Julie Andrews playing a film noir gun moll. Helen was major-league stoned.

  She took her soda and walked over to the jukebox. The place stayed quiet as she fed in her quarters. Madonna began to sing “Like a Virgin,” and Helen Bowles started to dance in the middle of the dingy pizza parlor. “Like a virgin / Touched for the very first time.”

  Helen’s dancing grew more and more exaggerated and suggestive. Nick was leering from behind the counter. One of the boys let out a whoop and started to snap his fingers. Others joined in, egging her on. Helen was in her glory. Sue gave Emma a look of pained sympathy. Helen slowly unbuttoned her Hawaiian shirt and then whipped it open, flashing her tits. That was when Emma ran out of the place.

  Sue studies Emma for a moment before asking, with a peculiar intensity and sincerity, “How are you?”

  “I’m fine,” Emma answers, a little too casually.

  “You look great,” Sue says.

  “So do you.”

  “I look like a whale. You remember Cliff.” Cliff, a stolid sort, puts a protective arm around his wife, and exchanges a nod with Emma.

  Sue and Cliff stand there waiting to be introduced to Charles. Emma tugs at her coat, bites her lower lip.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. This is Charles. Sue and I went to high school together.”

  “Hi. I just can’t get over how different you look,” Sue says.

  Emma smiles, still biting her lip. “We’re not kids anymore.” She quickly changes the subject. “What are you doing in New York?”

  “The tourist thing, while we still have a chance.” She pats her stomach and smiles. “What about you?”

  “I live here. I have a job. I’m-”

  Charles jumps in. “Emma works for me, she’s my very able assistant.”

  “You look familiar,” Sue says.

  “Charles Davis? The writer?” Emma says.

  “Wow. I saw the miniseries Kings and Clowns. Didn’t you write that?”

  “I wrote the book it was based on.”

  “Cool,” Cliff says.

  “God, Emma,” Sue says. “In Munsonville they’d-”

  “I know. Charles has been great. He’s helping me.”

  Charles takes Emma’s arm and firmly leads her off. “Enjoy New York,” he says.

  “Good-bye, Emma. Take care,” Sue calls after them.

  After the ferry docks, Charles and Emma walk along the Battery Park promenade. It’s late afternoon and the park is virtually empty. The clouds have crowded out the sun, turning the sky, the water, the world, gray-that singular Manhattan gray that seems to have tiny shards of reflective light scattered through it. They walk slowly, Emma absently nibbling on popcorn they bought at a little stand outside the ferry terminal.

  “Were you close friends with that Sue?”

  “No, not really.”

  “Family friend?”

  “No, we were in the same class, that’s all. She was nice, but we didn’t really have anything in common.”

  “Did you have a lot of friends growing up?”

  “What is this-Twenty Questions?”

  A tugboat chugs by close to shore; its horn blasts.

  “Emma?”

  “Hmmm?”

  “I don’t think we should discuss the book with anyone.”

  Emma tosses a handful of popcorn to a squirrel and out of nowhere a blizzard of pigeons descends.

  “Look, Charles, we have this whole park to ourselves, just us and the pigeons and squirrels.”

  “You see, Emma, there are a lot of pitfalls for a young artist.”

  “Are there, Charles?” Suddenly Emma runs ahead of him and jumps up on a bench. “I can’t believe Sue married that lug. Now she’s stuck in that town forever. And I got out! I got out!” Emma upends the
rest of the popcorn, and is quickly surrounded by a sea of fluttering wings and bobbing tails.

  As Charles approaches, Emma jumps down off the bench and puts her arm through his. “I really am a writer, aren’t I?” she says, trying on the identity like an expensive coat, one she lusts after but thought she could never afford.

  “I would say so. Listen, I really think it’s crucial that we keep our work to ourselves for the time being. Talking about it diffuses the energy.”

  “Who do I have to talk about it with? I don’t think my Chinese grocer has much of a literary bent, even if he could speak English. I suppose I could call the psychic hot line and ask them how the book is going to end.”

  “Emma, I’m serious. Will you promise me you won’t discuss it with anyone?”

  Emma smiles up at him. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”

  29

  Charles ducks into the damp dark of the midtown tavern. It’s eleven-thirty in the morning and the place is just gearing up for the lunch rush, waitresses getting their stations set up, the soft clink of glass and silverware, the comforting smell of simple food and decades of drinking. He orders a double Scotch and water. He needs a drink to steel himself for the job ahead. It’s really quite simple: Nina has to go. The paperback sale was a joke. And she hasn’t even sold the film rights. He needs a young agent, somebody hip, with a big L.A. presence. Someone who can make him a lot of money. Fast. And then there’s Nina’s gushing over Emma’s primitive prose. It’s damn good, sure- he’d been the first one to recognize that-but the way she goes on you’d think Emma was the second coming of Faulkner. The book is in much better shape now, thanks to him, but the last person he wants to give it to is some over-the-hill agent who would probably sell it for a fraction of its worth. Poor Nina.

  The portly bartender comes out of the kitchen carrying a big plate of french fries, which he secretes under his bar, shoving two or three into his face at a time. Charles remembers a crazy midsummer day about fifteen years ago when he and Nina had cabbed out to Coney Island to satisfy a mutual craving for hots dogs and fries. They’d stuffed themselves like pigs at Nathan’s, giggling, celebratory, madly in love with each other’s success. And then they rode the Cyclone, Charles with his arm protectively around Nina, wanting the world to think they were lovers. They’d walked along the Boardwalk for miles, for hours, as the long day gave way to dusk and dusk to night. They were partners, and it was forever.

  Well, forever is for fairy tales. This is a New York story.

  As the elevator soars silently to the thirty-ninth floor of Nina’s office building, Charles sucks on his breath mint. He’s even worn a suit, a dark gray suit, to signify the solemnity of the occasion. He steps off the elevator and into the offices of the Nina Bradley Literary Agency. Esther-efficient, unflappable Esther, who’s worked for Nina since the early days-sits at the reception desk.

  “Good morning, Mr. Davis.”

  “Esther. Is Nina in her office?”

  “She is. Shall I tell her you’re here?”

  “I’ll just head down.”

  Charles walks down the long, carpeted hallway, lined with publicity posters for books Nina represents, Charles’s prominent among them, past offices where well-dressed agents are working the phones. Jeffrey, Nina’s latest assistant, a stylish young man Charles assumes is gay, leaps up from his desk when he sees Charles approach.

  “Mr. Davis. Good morning. Is Nina expecting you?”

  “No.”

  Jeffrey picks up his phone. “Nina, Charles Davis is here… Of course.”

  Jeffrey hangs up and leads Charles across the hall.

  Nina’s pale gray office is dominated by her Pollock, bought when he was still affordable. Every line cool and uncluttered, the room epitomizes a certain post-World War II vision of modernism, a Midtown soul mate of Philip Johnson’s New Canaan glass house. Guess what, Nina, the world’s moved on.

  Nina rises from her desk and crosses to Charles, taking his hand in her own. He’s always loved the feel of Nina’s hands and in a rush of emotion he considers ditching his plan.

  “Charles, what a surprise. Can Jeffrey get you a cup of coffee? Something to drink?”

  Charles shakes his head and remains standing. Jeffrey disappears.

  “Charles, I am on such a high about this new book. When will I get more? I want to send a chapter to the New Yorker.”

  How can she do that? How can she think some unformed, uneducated kid from the outskirts of nowhere is a better writer than Charles Davis?

  “Nina, please. This isn’t a courtesy call… This is difficult.”

  Nina’s face grows grave. She sits behind her desk and waits for him to continue.

  “For the first two decades of my career, I couldn’t have asked for a better agent, but the last two books have been a disappointment. I feel that you mishandled them.”

  “You call the quarter-million advance I got you on Down for the Count mishandled?”

  “I’m not talking about money. I need a fresh start, a rebirth. A resurrection.”

  “You’re leaving me.”

  “I’m leaving you.”

  Nina looks down at her desk. Charles knows there won’t be any tears, any curses, a scene. Breaks like this are best accomplished quickly, cleanly. In the end, it’s all about the work. When she looks up at him all her polish and poise and sophistication are gone.

  “Just like that, after twenty-four years?” she asks.

  Charles meets her gaze; he owes her that.

  “I’m hoping we can remain friends,” he says.

  They look at each other for a long time, compatriots for whom things will never be the same. Nina runs her fingers lightly up the back of her neck and then, as if a switch has been flicked, her jaw tightens.

  “I’ll call you next time I need a golf partner.” She stands, walks to the door, and opens it. “Let Jeffrey know what you want from your files.”

  Charles knows how difficult she could have made this, could still make it, and he’s grateful.

  “Good-bye, Nina.”

  As he walks down the long hallway he feels guilty and exhilarated in equal measure. By the time he reaches the lobby the exhilaration has overwhelmed the guilt. Firing Nina is just the sort of bold move he needs to make a new beginning. Look at the work he’s been doing with Emma. Why, he’s practically writing her book, and doing it with a fervor and imagination that surprises even him.

  Charles grabs an apple off the kitchen counter and takes a bite. He strides into his office and stops cold: Portia is sitting across from Emma, wearing black and smoking a Pall Mall. She looks tired and tiny, but fierce nonetheless.

  “Jesus Christ, Charles, I know I’m a wrinkled old bag, but I don’t look that bad.”

  Charles struggles to regain his bearings; as far as he knows, Portia hasn’t been to Manhattan for years. How jarring to see her here, in this apartment, in this room-with Emma.

  “Portia…”

  “Another of the old Dartmouth dinosaurs bought the farm, so I crawled out from under my rock to see the old bastard off.”

  “Emma, why don’t you take a break, get some air.”

  Emma stands up and puts on her coat.

  “Don’t take any crap from this guy,” Portia says.

  Emma laughs. “I’ll try not to.”

  Charles watches as Emma walks down the hallway.

  “Why, I’d love a drink,” Portia says, reaching for her cane. She follows Charles into his office and sits down with a sigh. He pours two shots of Scotch, fighting to control the slight trembling of his hands.

  “Bright girl,” Portia says after taking a healthy swallow.

  Charles notes the twinkle in her eye. “Oh, you two had a chance to talk?”

  “No, I was too shy.”

  Charles fidgets with a tiny iron sailor he uses as a paperweight. Even after all these years, Portia has the ability to reduce him to a rattled kid. She’s too fucking honest, like a moral flashlight aimed into his
soul’s darkest corners. Charles is sure she can tell that he and Emma are sleeping together. What else can she tell?

  “What did you discuss?”

  “She was very tight-lipped. You have her well trained. She said how interesting it was to work for you, how much she was learning.”

  Charles looks down into his drink. A pigeon coos on the window ledge.

  “What’s her background?” Portia asks.

  “She’s from some kind of broken home. I can’t get much out of her. Tight-lipped, as you say.”

  Portia polishes off her drink and holds out her glass for a refill. “How are you, Charles?”

  Charles wonders if he should tell her about firing Nina. They never talk career, only the work itself. Why bother her? Why get into all that explaining?

  “I’m taking your advice, trying to stay in the game.”

  “Good. When can I read something?”

  “Why is everyone on me? You can all read it soon enough.” Charles immediately regrets his outburst. He stands up and walks over to the bookcase that’s filled with foreign language editions of his books. “This is the Japanese edition of Down for the Count. Some cover, huh?… Don’t look at me like that, Portia.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like I’m going crazy or something.”

  “Charles, you’ve never stooped to melodrama.”

  “I’m sorry. I’ve been working too hard. But it’s good. I think I’m on to something.”

  Portia knocks back her drink and stands. “Well, that’s what I came to hear. Now let me catch my plane out of this hellhole.”

  Charles holds Portia’s arm as they wait for the doorman to hail a cab. He has rarely touched her before and he feels self-conscious; he can feel her small bones and can tell she doesn’t like being held. They don’t look at each other.

  “Send me something soon, Charles. I need reasons to stick around.”

  “It’s always good to see you,” he says.

  “What’s left of me.”

  At that, Portia smiles up at Charles. No, she beams, her whole face lighting up, embracing the absurdity, the futility, of the human condition, and suddenly it’s nearly thirty years ago and Charles is a young man sitting in a New England classroom being inspired by a lonely woman who burns with a ferocious passion for the written word.