Because I have no ready response, I use my usual plan of attack. I flail and fumble incoherently, trying to regale Vladimir with some clever anecdote that may or may not be an answer to his question. Really, I’m just buying time. I tell him about Andy Edgar, a legacy of the underground film movement, who tried to develop a web vehicle to generate interest for his upcoming experimental feature film.
“Boy, was he something!” I say. “I mean, he was great. But out there, you know? He was charming and funny, and the idea was fantastic, but—wow! Guy couldn’t keep a train of thought to save his life. Trying to wrestle the project into some kind of shape, that was the problem. You get a surreal guy, and a surreal project. But no one to actually make it work, right? So, of course, the project gets dropped into my lap, and I’ve got to find a way to hammer it out. And in the end, and I mean after a lot of finessing, I guess I did kind of turn it into a decent, workable proposal …”
Vladimir’s expression remains blank. Either he doesn’t understand me, or he understands me perfectly. He just doesn’t like me.
“I guess what I’m trying to say is that I tend to rise to the occasion,” I mumble.
Vladimir nods. I watch him write on his legal pad, “rises to occasion.” He looks back up at me.
“You have weakness?”
I laugh. “Well, clearly, it takes me a long time to get to the point.”
Completely oblivious to my clever witticism, Vladmir jots on his notepad, “takes too long to get to point.”
After that, our interview is cut thankfully short. Vladimir is called into an impromptu business meeting, and I am asked to show myself out. Which would work if I could remember my way in. I have a bad sense of direction to begin with. And a windowless office makes it impossible for me to even use the sun as a guide to tell east from west.
I wander though the labyrinth of cubicles, skulking past the assistants who leer at my shameless display of naked flesh. A reception desk would be a welcomed sight. Instead, I stumble upon one office pantry after another. Or, most likely, I’ve made the same loop several times.
Instinct tells me to go left, so I go right. I finally see the double oak doors I’ve been looking for. I make a mad dash and hurl myself out of the stuffy office.
And into a conference room.
A sea of angry faces turn to glare at me. Vladimir, at the head of the conference table, rises stiffly. He points a militant finger at me.
“You turn around! You go to end of hall.”
I turn around. I go to end of hall.
Before I return home, I stop at the bank just for the sheer thrill of checking my account balance. For a moment I toy with the idea of taking out a whole forty dollars in cash. I laugh at such absurdity and take out twenty dollars instead. Good thing, too. The ATM spits out my receipt and informs me that my remaining balance is nineteen dollars.
The good news is today is Thursday and my unemployment check should arrive this afternoon. I check my watch. It is 12:30. I have plenty of time to catch the mailman on his route and run back here to cash my check.
I crumple up my receipt and toss it in the trash receptacle on my way out. The security guard, a smiling, heavyset black woman, holds the door open for me.
“Bye, bye, sugar,” she winks.
Okay, well, I suppose the bad news is I’m going to have to cash my check at a different branch of my bank. I can’t very well come back here if the security guard already recognizes me. It’s bad enough having to hunch over like a hoodlum in the far corners of the ATM vestibules, trying to endorse my checks with one elbow folded over the “New York State Department of Labor” logo on top of the slip. Would it be so hard for the government to adopt a direct deposit policy to make my life a little less humiliating?
I walk down a few blocks and stop on the corner to buy a cup of coffee from the street vendor. Because I don’t want to break my brand-new twenty, I fish in my pockets for change and eventually cough up seventy-five cents in nickels. The vendor gives me a look. He sighs and lowers his head.
“Five, ten, fifteen …” He thumbs the nickels on his counter accordingly.
At 12:45, I settle down on the bench outside of my apartment building to wait for the mailman. Just before I get comfortable, however, my cell phone rings. Of course.
“Sarah?”
“Hi, Gracie.”
“Hi, doll. Do me a favor. Remind me where you live again?”
“Um, Sixty-eighth Street?”
“Upper West, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Great. I thought I was in your neighborhood. Can you meet me outside my gym in about half an hour? I have a manuscript I want to give you.”
“Uh. Sure. Where’s your gym again?”
“You know where it is, doll. It’s the Equinox on Broadway. Broadway and … Ninety-second, I think?”
Ninety-second? How is that even remotely my neighborhood?
“Okay, Gracie. I’ll see you soon.”
“Bye, doll!”
Reluctantly, I hoist myself up and begin the trek twenty-four blocks north.
I find Princess standing outside, sipping from a two-dollar bottle of imported, natural spring water and shielding her eyes from the weak sunlight with her Armani glasses. She doesn’t look like she’s dressed for the gym. She looks like she’s dressed for a costume party with a “gym” theme. It isn’t enough that she’s wearing the twin set velour sweat suit—a zip-front hoodie with accompanying drawstring pants. She also has the matching headband. And spanking new sneakers the exact shade as the blue racing stripe running down the sides of her legs. If you think she’d have removed her diamond earrings—or her Cartier watch for that matter—you’d be sorely mistaken.
“Hey there, doll!” She waves at me.
“You already work out?”
“Uh-uh. Bikram in five minutes.” She takes a dainty sip of her water. “One hundred and five degrees and I still don’t break a sweat. Loved your last coverage, by the way.”
“Oh, thank—”
“Here ya go.” She dips into her Kate Spade tweed tote—currently doing double duty as a gym bag—and pulls out a Jiffy sealer.
“I was going to take it home and read it myself, but something came up last minute.”
I take it from her. It feels much heavier than the last one. That’s a good sign.
“No problem. I’m looking forward to it.”
“Great. No hurry getting the coverage back to me. Anytime next week is fine.” She removes her sunglasses and blows away the nonexistent dirt before carefully sliding them into a protective leather case. “So, in case you’re wondering, the reason I’m busy tonight is because I’m meeting Lenny for cocktails.”
I wasn’t wondering. But I raise my eyebrows and feign a curious, “Lenny …?”
“Oh, Sarah, don’t play coy. You remember Lenny Hawkins.” She waits for me to be impressed. So I give it my best shot.
“Really? The writer?”
“Uh-huh.” She winks at me. “The incredibly gorgeous writer, if you recall.”
Uh-uh. Don’t recall at all.
“Oh. Does he have a new novel he’s adapting or something?” I ask, already losing interest.
“Possibly.” She shrugs. “But I think we both know what this meeting is really about.”
“Right. Have a good a time tonight.”
“Oh, I will.” She starts backpedaling. “Take care!”
“Bye, Gracie.”
As I watch her hop up the steps to the gym, I am struck deeply with an emotion I never thought Gracie could provoke. I feel sorry for her.
I dash back to my apartment and catch the mailman just as he pulls up to my building.
“Hello, hello, 4B!” His pencil-thin black mustache curls upward in a cat-like grin. He hands me my unemployment check.
“How’d I know you’d be out here today?”
“Lucky guess?”
He chuckles and sorts through his stack of envelopes.
“Y
ou got another one, too.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“A big one.” He hands over a large manila envelope, surprisingly thick. “I didn’t know you were going to be a hot-shot lawyer.”
“What?” I flip over the envelope. Indeed, it is addressed to me. But in the top left corner, it bears the emblem of a curious sender: Columbia University School of Law.
“Mom!”
“Yes, sweetie-pie?”
“Did you send me a law school application?”
“Yup sure did. I told you I was going to.”
“Uh-uh. Never.”
“I could have sworn—No. You’re right. Must have slipped my mind. See, Dad and I just thought—”
“Oh, no you don’t!” I throttle the phone as if it were her neck. “Leave Dad out of this. This stupid idea has your name written all over it.”
“Sweetie-pie, just relax. Let me finish. Dad and I have a deal for you.”
“A deal? I don’t know if I’m ready to negotiate any deals. Seeing how I lack the legal expertise and all.”
“I don’t see what other choices you have. Your father and I can’t continue supporting you forever.”
“I’ve never asked you for money—”
“Maybe not yet. But how else are you going to pay for health insurance?”
“I … well, I … I’ll get a job soon.”
“Yeah? You sure?”
No, I’m not. I wring the phone harder.
“We’ll take care of the law school tuition. It’s certainly a worthwhile investment. For you and for us.”
“But I don’t want to be a lawyer—”
“How about an entertainment lawyer?”
I gulp back the bile rising in throat. Entertainment lawyer? Good God, if ever a worse combination were to exist it would probably have to include mayonnaise and pistachio ice cream.
Entertainment lawyers. These are the sort of people who keep Satan’s phone number on speed dial. Because, in the end, one soul for a three-picture deal with 20th Century Fox is more than a fair-enough trade.
“We’ll pay for the application fee,” my mother continues, undaunted by my silence.
“I can think of far better ways for you to spend the money.”
“We’ll pay for the LSATs, too. There’s a test next month.”
“Seems like a waste to me.”
“And maybe a little extra cash on the side?”
“You’re bribing me to apply to law school?”
“Dad and I were thinking somewhere around three hundred dollars.”
“I’ll consider it.”
Call waiting, thank goodness!, intercedes on my behalf. I don’t even have to lie about it.
“Sarah? Sarah! What was that? You still there?”
“I’ve got another coming in.” I don’t bother to look at the caller ID. “It’s important.”
“All right, sweetie-pie. I love you.”
“I love you too.” Click.
“Hello?”
“Sarah. Mark Shapiro, here.”
“Mark.” I groan. “Oh, hey, Mark. Sorry, I was just about to call you. I don’t think the interview today went well at all—”
“Really? Barb just called me. She said they loved you.”
“You’ve got to be joking.”
“No, no,” he assures me. “They thought you were very smart and friendly. But they want to see a writing sample.”
“What kind of a writing sample?”
“Nothing too demanding. Maybe a couple of paragraphs, a page at the most. Something about real estate.”
“Oh, all right,” I grumble.
URBAN REAL ESTATE
Nothing about who we are, what we do, or where we went to school matters much in today’s downturn, understimulated, recession-era market. The true mark of success, the only testament to good standing in modern society, is where we live.
The invitation to a person’s apartment is a one-way ticket into his soul. We are hence embarrassed to disclose our secret intimacies so openly. We are reluctant to admit that we are either downtown or uptown people, West Side or East Side inhabitants. The neighborhoods we live in are oversimplifications of ourselves—they pigeonhole us into limiting stereotypes, categories rife with misrepresentation. These neighborhoods, as such, are always dicey and never safe.
I should think it would better serve us to see the apartments themselves, and not their location, as the concrete, wooden, or brick versions of who we are.
We, as the citizens of Manhattan, are clusters of hermit crabs scavenging the coasts of the Hudson River for discarded shells. But we must constantly learn to compromise. The shells we choose for ourselves are often small, or chipped or colorless. In fact, the most telling feature of our apartments are not what they offer, but what they lack.
For some, the luxury of security in a doorman building is an option that simply cannot be afforded. For others, a view of a concrete courtyard overgrown with weeds, or a balcony overlooking a dimly lit alleyway, or a direct glimpse into a neighboring boudoir is considered an extravagance. Sunlight, the earth’s most valuable natural resource, is often an added feature we can do well without. And so long as the apartment building itself provides easy access to nearby subway lines, laundry services, and good restaurants, the room in which we actually decide to dwell need hold nothing more than our futons.
We tell ourselves all this is temporary. With fingers crossed we anxiously anticipate the passing of estranged relatives who live in finer Manhattan domains, hoping eventually to inherit their duplexes on Central Park West. We pray for a drop in the market, a winning lottery ticket, anything that allows us to believe that our apartments, like we ourselves, will someday realize their full potential.
chapter eight
I am putting the final touches on my essay when I notice the clock on my computer—which generally tends to run a few minutes behind—already reads 6:30 p.m. I save the document to send out the following morning, grab my bag, and dart out the door. I come back a few moments later to grab my MetroCard out of the pocket of yesterday’s jeans.
I manage to make good time and arrive at the Spring Street bar promptly at 7:15 p.m. As soon as I open the door, a bubbly brunette thrusts herself in front of me.
“You here for Six-Minute Match?” she chirps.
“Yup,” I reply, not nearly as cheerful.
“Super!” She takes a moment to outfit me with a personal name tag, a scorecard, and a list of sample questions.
“Now, have you been speed-dating before?” she asks.
“A couple of times.”
“Really? Are you interested in signing up for some of our Veteran Dating parties?”
I don’t answer her immediately, because for a moment the concept of Veteran Daters makes me shudder. I picture a slovenly clan, people with mangled limbs and bandaged hearts, trading war stories from the dating front. And in the background, a fat woman is singing a karaoke version of “I Will Survive.”
I take the pamphlet from the hostess anyway and offer her a mumbled thanks. Then I make haste to the bar, where I’ve already spotted Laurie gabbing on her work cell phone.
“Yup, no problemo. I can ask her right now.” She winks at me as I take the seat beside her. “Let me call you back in five.” She snaps the cell phone shut.
“You want a job?” she asks.
“Of course I want a job.”
“The art department is a little shorthanded this week. The director just saw the walls for the apartment set. He hates them. They need to be repainted before we start shooting on Monday. You think you could help out?”
“For how long?”
“Two days? Three days? It’s three hundred dollars.”
“But I—”
“Paid under the table, of course.”
“Then I’d love to.”
The bartender strides past us and gives me a questioning look. I shake my head.
“You sure you don’t want a drink?” Laurie asks. “I’ll
buy.”
“Nah, I wanna do this sober.”
She groans. “You’re not supposed to do it sober. It’s important to loosen up a bit before. That’s why they tell you to show up early.”
“Look, you know the rules. I let you drag me to these things ’cause you convinced me it was good interview practice. Now, until people start setting up an open bar in the reception area before meetings, I’m just—”
“Right, right, your rules. Sorry, I forgot. For a moment I thought you were doing this because it was fun.”
“Fun is an expense I can’t write off anymore.”
“Too bad. I’m expensing this as a ‘networking party.’ ”
“You’re serious?”
“How else do you think I convinced my boss to let me out early?”
“That’s so depressing.”
“Wanna know something even more depressing? I checked my calendar and I can’t schedule one of these events again until September. I’ve got to wait until September to book a six-minute date! God forbid a guy ever asks me out to dinner. What am I gonna say? ‘Sorry, I’m only free from midnight to 4 a.m.’?” She tosses back half her drink. “But let’s not talk about that.” She leans in and whispers confidentially. “By the way, I’ve already picked one out. Check out the sailor in the corner.”
I arch my head nonchalantly. He sits at a back table, hunching his laughably large biceps over a pint of beer. Who’s he fooling with the crew cut? Even with pale blond hair, it’s no secret his hairline is making a dangerous retreat.
“He’s perfect for you,” I say.
“Not for me, moron. For you!”
I roll my eyes.
Laurie snaps her fingers and straightens. “I remember what I wanted to tell you. That Ian Pascal book I gave you to read?”
“Loved it.”
Laurie waves her hand excitedly. “Paramount just bought it. And George Clooney is already attached.”
“Seriously? He’s the perfect choice.”
Pounding the Pavement Page 8
