by Dan Newman
The last TSB (although my thesis was long since complete and filed in the library) wasn’t as jovial as they usually were, and the Professor employed his usual directness to nail the problem on the head. “Roly,” he said, refilling my glass, “school’s over now, you know.”
“I know, I know,” I replied with a certain resignation.
“No, I mean we’re pushing you out. Out there,” he said, gesturing to the world. His lecture theater persona was long gone now, as were his bombastic and practiced lines. Across the table from me was a man who struck me as, well, almost sad.
“I get it, I get it. Time to go out into the world and all that.”
The Professor guffawed. He was the only person I’ve known who could actually do that—guffaw. “I don’t think you do,” he said. “You’d stay here forever if I let you.” He shoved my glass toward me, slopping beer on the table. “This is supposed to be the most exciting time of your life, and you just don’t get it.” He shook his ancient mane at me and then tapped his forehead with two gnarled fingers. “Think about it: You’ve spent God knows how much money getting this top-class education, and now someone out there is going to pay you for it. That’s a wonderful thing!” Then he pulled the PRESS card from his pocket and slid it across the table to me. “Here you go,” he said. “Time to go be a newsman.”
I smiled as I picked up the card, but somehow the moment seemed to falter, as if the little gag missed the mark and instead of being funny became something vaguely ominous.
The Professor sat back, took a long breath, and set his jaw. “Roly, can I be honest? I worry about you, son. You’re a train on the same tracks I was on. Nervous starts in life can lead to a pattern of safe decisions. And safe decisions are often…limiting.” Then he ran his hand across his hair in that way men do when they finally have to speak to something they’ve been avoiding. “When my wife died six years ago, I was pretty sure the world was over. I had no idea what to do. Everything had changed. But six years later, here I am. Still alive.”
My blank face appeared not to be the reaction he was after.
“Look,” he said. “The point I’m trying to make is that you need to go forward with…with more hope. More optimism. Just because you can’t see the way right now doesn’t mean it isn’t there. You’re a hell of a thing in the writer department, Roly, a hell of a thing,” he said, topping up our glasses from the pitcher, “and not half bad as a researcher. But you’ve gotta lighten up in the living-life category. I mean, expect more from life, Roly. Don’t fear it so much.”
I tried to make light of what I knew was a deadly accurate fact. “Etiquette dictates that you’re supposed to be giving me uplifting advice here, not blowing holes in my ego.” It came out decidedly flat.
“My job is to prepare you for professional life, so by all accounts I’ve only done half the job. You’ve got the professional bit down pat. But that life bit… Here’s what I’ll do,” he said. “I’ll write you a permission slip.”
And that’s just what he did. He plucked the PRESS card from my hand, took out his pen, and scribbled something on the back of it.
“Here,” he said, handing it back to me.
I read it and raised my eyebrows in mock surprise. “It says: Carpe EVERYTHING.”
“That’s right. Everything.”
“Carpe diem not enough for you?”
“Think bigger, Roly. Much bigger,” he said to me with a charismatic smile and one raised eyebrow. “Follow that instruction and you’ve got nothing to worry about.” And then he clinked his glass against mine and upended it.
“Now, take this as well,” he said, scribbling away again, this time on a napkin.
And so I did. “What is it?” I asked. On it was written a name and a number. It said: Dr. Cathy Coyle. “And who is Dr. Coyle?”
Across from me, I remember the mood in the Professor’s eyes shifting. “Cathy’s a very dear friend of mine. She works with people to help them find a way forward.”
“A shrink?”
“Cathy’s a superstar. She’s as laid-back as they come. She’s a real person, not some stiff couch pilot. And she’s a real friend.” He paused for a moment, and I remember telling myself to honor that pause, because there was more coming.
And there was. “When my wife died,” he went on, “Cathy put me back on track. She helped me see what I couldn’t. Helped me see that I’d shut down and closed myself off. It’s that simple. And for the record, Roly, no one necessarily has to die to make you lose your track. Some people just haven’t found theirs yet. Take it from one who knows: your circumstances, where you start from in life, Roly—that can’t be the definition of you. It’s what you do next that counts. So do me a favor, hang on to her number, and when you get a quiet moment, call her. It’s all covered, so don’t worry about the cost. She’ll be expecting your call.”
I remember trying to be a little indignant at that but what really bothered me was how he saw me, that I was someone who needed help. But I guess he was right.
“Trust me and do yourself a favor. Call her. It’ll just be an open chat.”
I thought about it for a moment. “So it’s just a chat with Cathy…with chatty Cathy.”
The solemn air evaporated and the Professor laughed his old-man laugh. “Just promise me you’ll call her, okay?”
I nodded, and he nodded back.
“It’s settled, then,” he said, raising a glass. “You’ve got nothing to worry about.” But later on, as I turned and waved goodnight, I saw the truth in the Professor’s momentarily unguarded eyes: I had plenty to worry about.
So now my mood has changed. The initial burst of confidence from images of the pub, the warmth of membership, the security of belonging, has faded. Now I feel decidedly alone. The old lady with the wrinkled stockings looks at me and I scowl at her. “What?” I hiss, and she shrinks into her coat and all but disappears into the seat. I feel worse now, and think about apologizing, but the train is slowing into my stop. It’s easier to just slink off than explain myself, so that’s what I do.
• • •
On the trip home, I sit slumped in the seat with my tie tugged open and my hair a mess from trying to pull it out with my hands. I try to analyze what happened, where it all fell apart. It’s all a little blurry, but I’m pretty sure it went south in that very first exchange.
I remember that she smiled. She wrapped it around her face right before that question. But on reflection the smile seemed too wide, too Cheshire Cat. “And have you applied to all the major daily papers, Mr. Keene?”
“Well, um, yes…”
“So is our paper just a natural target for a journalism graduate to lob his résumé toward? Or was there something different about us that made you want to work here—here specifically?”
I remember thinking: Is she pissed off at me? Shit. But I pressed on. “Well, as a rookie—as someone fresh out of school—I’m looking for a place to learn the business. A place where professionals… I mean, a place like this is filled with some of the best in the business, and I can’t think of a better place to grow.”
“Hmm,” she had said, jotting something on the pad resting on her crossed legs. “So really this is about what we can do for you, is that right?”
And like that Cheshire Cat, she began to disappear. Oh, she stayed there for the whole interview, sure, but it was just that disingenuous smile that lingered.
At my apartment, I check the answering machine, hoping for another message to focus on—I even allow for the wild thought that Miss Cheshire Cat might have called me back for a second interview—but there is none. I collapse into bed, feeling that I’ve finally reached the lowest point of my life, and will myself into a numbing sleep.
I awake to darkness, and for a millisecond, everything is okay as my memory and consciousness dance around in search of each other. But it all returns, first in my head, then in my gut. A low, hard, immovable object. The lingering element is simple dejection.
On the t
op of the magazine pile, Colin Dysart’s smiling face taunts me. I pull the worn copy off the stack, thumb through to the article and gaze at the family picture. My eye settles on a paragraph below the shot, and I read a single line at random. I started with nothing. What I have, I went out and got.
And the simple act of reading that line is all I need.
I know this old sensation well. I know its promise—its price, too—but I let it flood in. Sparks of confidence are growing inside me, welling up to something larger. I find myself cross-legged on the futon, a notepad in my hand, scribbling furiously.
The writing seems to bleed from the end of the pen, which is scribbling so furiously the resultant scrawl is akin to hieroglyphics. But still I scribble on, each note making a clear point to myself, mapping carefully what I need to do, how I should do it, and what the result will bring. It’s a simple plan—brilliant because of that simplicity and at the same time bursting with the courage and conviction of the Little Engine That Could.
At five thirty, the quality of the light through my window changes as the streetlights shut off and the day tentatively begins. I put down my five-hour labor and pad barefoot to the windowsill, eager to see the first day of my new life, of my new attitude, my new fortunes. There is no dazzling sunrise, thanks to the dilapidated buildings that tower above my little window, but if I lean out I can see the sky. It is dark and brooding. There will be a storm today, by the looks of it.
I smile as I watch the black clouds rake the building tops. It is a good sign, I tell myself, a genuine change in the weather.
5
The rain slaps at me as I hop off the streetcar and dash toward Dory’s. As I swing the front door open, I can see that Rhona is peeved, and a glance at my watch confirms that I am indeed ten minutes late.
“Sorry, Rhona,” I mutter as I slink in behind the till. “Storm killed the lights at my place. Alarm didn’t go off.” My ability to react convincingly to an evolving situation—some call it lying—is a capacity I am aware of, but somehow fibbing to Rhona, minor as it is, feels disproportionately wrong. And so I immediately chat it up with a customer, make him feel good about his Dory’s experience, and get him to chuckle at some inane bit of wit; I know it has the desired effect on Rhona. She rolls her eyes, swats me with a set of sculpted fingernails and says something like, “Oh, you,” and I know I am off the hook.
During a lull in the traffic, Rhona comes up behind me and places her hand on the small of my back. “So how’d the interview go?” I can tell by the way she asks that she’s hoping I didn’t get the job so I can still work for her. It’s a compliment of sorts, really, and I don’t take offense.
“It’s down to me and another candidate,” I lie again, this time to save a bit of face. “But I don’t think I’ll get it. They’re looking for someone strong in science writing, and that ain’t me.” Rhona’s hand creeps up my back from the position it has never left during our exchange and begins little circles around my shoulders. “Aw, shit, Roly, I’m sorry.”
I smile at her. “No, you’re not. You want to keep me here for life.”
Rhona ups the ante a little and smacks me on the ass. “Can you blame me?” she says, winking at me in the exaggerated way that she does with the best clients. It’s nothing new, but today it registers with me a little stronger. I feel it. In my crotch, I think. But it’s not all Rhona; part of it is the new knowledge I have secreted inside me—the knowledge that I have a plan. A real plan.
I spend lunch in the library, researching in an environment that is pure comfort to me. I find most of what I need easily. The things that are harder to track down excite me, and please me more once I have them jotted down in my small notebook. As I glance over my scribbling, I know that with every fact carefully cribbed away in my book I am closer to the goal I have set myself.
By two, I know there is no way I can go back to Dory’s. I would be useless, daydreaming about the execution of my plan, stapling and copying my way into Rhona’s bad books with every goof—and I just know there would be many. That’s how I manage to convince myself that calling Rhona and letting her know I won’t be back after lunch is a good idea. Of course, I can’t use this logic on Rhona, so I resort to the old standby: I’m sick. She takes it with minimal objection, which somehow worries me more than if she had put up a real fight. As I hang up the phone, another single note of regret hovers about me for just a moment; Rhona has been genuinely good to me since the day I started at Dory’s, and like every other time, this minor deception feels like a much larger betrayal.
But that’s something to worry about later. Maybe something for my next visit with Dr. Coyle, for those flat spots where I don’t know what to say. I shrug it off with a deep breath and, for the moment, bury it. Right now I have to head to the university campus and make the first tentative moves of my bold plan.
• • •
I have her face burned into my memory, as well as her father’s, her mother’s and both of her brothers’. She has a lovely face, no question, but below that she expands too rapidly for my liking, although in truth there isn’t that much to complain about. The other concession I must make is that, having never seen her in the flesh, so to speak, I must give some allowance to the contortions of the photographer’s lens. The only shot of her full body I have seen was in a newspaper, where she blurs somewhat into the background as she claps at her father cutting some ribbon or other. Even then, I can see a confident aura about her, as there is about all the family members, and I think that it must come from money.
At the registry office, I pull up a class schedule on the computer and spend the rest of the day crashing undergrad business lectures. They are first- and second-year affairs, so my intrusion goes unnoticed among the masses of keen backpack-toting undergrads. My exits, however, usually draw at least a pause from the lecturer, as learned eyes glance over bifocals to see who has the temerity to walk out halfway through a class. Only once am I challenged, and I simply ignore it and let the double doors swing closed behind me.
When I find her it is in the front row of an economics lecture, legs crossed and hair pulled into a single thick ponytail: Chloe Dysart. Given the size of the class—there must be 150 students in this enormous lecture hall—it’s possible I’m the only one here who knows who she is, who she really is. Do the people on either side of her have any idea she’s a Dysart? If they knew she was the daughter of one of the most successful media moguls in the world, that she was heir to untold millions, would they pay more attention? Would they look at her any differently—perhaps in the way I’m looking at her now?
She raises her hand and asks a tobacco-yellowed professor to please repeat the last point. Her voice is that of a woman, not the eighteen- or nineteen-year-old girl that she is, and it carries a casual authority. Immediately I conclude it is a confidence born of financial security.
I watch her for the full lecture, taking in her deliberate demeanor, her intensely furrowed brow and her strategically sloppy clothes that somehow stand out among the sea of sweatshirts and fleece. She has made deliberate efforts to blend, I see, but somehow the glint of money still shows through. She strikes me as a sharp individual, and her crisp, sudden moves betray the carefully selected college-uniform wardrobe. She is assimilating to the culture around her, but she doesn’t belong.
“Notes, young man, are the key to retention.”
Somehow I know the voice is directed at me, despite the fact that the steady monologue has not changed pitch since the lecture commenced. I look up from my scrutiny of Chloe and see a sea of faces swiveling toward me.
The lecturer is weed thin and beginning to succumb to the spine-bending pressure of old age. “Photographic memory?” he asks, and a ripple of laughter passes through the room. Not knowing what else to do, I raise my hands and eyebrows apologetically. He emits a low “hmm” and returns to his lecture. The heads swivel back and I try to drain the heat and color from my face.
Did Chloe turn and see me? She is now bur
ied in her notebook, just as she was before I was singled out. I wonder if it matters anyway, and whether she would remember a face as common as mine.
At the conclusion of the lecture I make a hasty retreat, carefully eluding any lingering questions from the ancient professor. How exactly I will introduce myself to Chloe is still a bit foggy, but the sarcastic lecturer has bought me an opening. I can ask her for the notes. Nothing suspicious in that.
I approach her with what I hope passes as a casual demeanor, and note that she is alone—not just by virtue of the lack of bodies around her, but alone in a greater sense, in her temporary status within these halls. Something about her just doesn’t fit in. But I accept that maybe it’s just me; maybe it’s just because I know that where she really belongs is with the super-rich, not down here with the trying-to-get-ahead crowd.
“Excuse me,” I ask, only partly feigning my embarrassment, “I left my bag on the bus and couldn’t take any notes. Any chance I could get a copy of yours?” I look into her hazel eyes and wonder what it’s like to never have to worry about money. For the Chloe Dysarts of the world rent is never due, grocery money never runs out, and bus fare is a concept that doesn’t even exist. The financial struggles of the plebeian masses like me have probably never entered her mind. For her, wealth is eternal.
Chloe looks at me blankly, then purses her lips in what I can only describe as disdain. Perhaps my thoughts are too close to the surface. “I don’t think so,” she says, and turns on her heel, almost flicking me with her ponytail.
