Bright, Precious Days Read online

  “The chef has somehow convinced a lot of New York foodies that an ox-tongue sandwich is a desideratum, not to mention fried tripe,” he said, sounding—he couldn’t help it, apparently—somewhat professorial. “But I remain agnostic, not to say skeptical, about stuff like that. I’d recommend the burger, which they make from a special blend of different cuts of beef from this bespoke butcher in the Meatpacking District, who may, in fact, be the last butcher in the Meatpacking District. All the others got priced out by nightclubs and fashionable restaurants that’ll soon go out of business to make room for even more fashionable restaurants and clubs.”

  “Do you mind?” she asked, holding up a small digital recorder.

  “I’m not sure I have anything all that interesting to say.”

  “Can I get you something to drink?” asked the waitress, a brunette with red streaks in her hair and multiple nose rings. Astrid looked at him for guidance. Although he was known to have a cocktail or a glass of wine with lunch, Russell ordered an iced tea. At some point he had to figure out her age.

  “Can I get a Belvedere Bloody Mary?” she asked.

  “Our house specialty is actually a Bloody Bull with house-made beef stock that’s rendered here daily.”

  “Okay, I’ll try that. With Belvedere. Make it a double.”

  “I should tell you we have one special today.”

  They waited as the waitress looked around the restaurant before leaning in and resting her palm on the table. She seemed to be judging the advisability of sharing this information.

  “We’re all ears,” Russell said.

  “Chef calls them ‘crispy bollocks.’ ”

  “You’re shitting me,” Russell said.

  Astrid, clearly, was unfamiliar with the term, but she leaned forward, an eager student.

  “Testicles,” Russell said. “Deep-fried bull’s balls, I’m imagining.”

  “Well—”

  “Known here in America as prairie oysters.”

  Astrid had been game for the house-made beef stock, but this was clearly a step too far. She directed a look at the waitress that seemed to implore her to contradict Russell’s description.

  But the waitress, sticking to the party line, merely shrugged her shoulders.

  “Really?” She was not a girl who lacked self-confidence, or an adventurous spirit, or the will to appear more sophisticated than she knew herself to be, but neither had she left Middletown, Connecticut, this morning expecting that she’d be invited to eat the balls of a bull, fried or otherwise.

  “I think we’ll get two burgers,” Russell said. “Medium rare.”

  “Sorry,” Astrid said after the waitress had receded.

  “That’s okay. It seems a little surreal even to me, and I’ve lived here for twenty-five years. So you’re at Wesleyan?”

  “And you all went to Brown? You and Jeff and Corrine?”

  “Class of ’79.”

  “Well, I’ve never really done this before, so let’s just start at the beginning. How did you meet Jeff?”

  “People were always telling us how we’d love each other. We were both writers, English jocks. So of course I hated him. We didn’t officially meet until sophomore year.”

  “You got into a fistfight over a girl?”

  “Now you’re extrapolating from the novel.”

  “So that didn’t happen?”

  “Not exactly. It’s actually hard for me sometimes to separate the fact from the fiction. Jeff’s version can be very compelling. He was a good writer. A very good writer. So at this point it isn’t always easy to remember what really happened as opposed to his reinvention of it. There was a punch thrown, I know that much. We were at a party and he flicked a cigarette in my beer cup. And I jumped up and tried to hit him, but I think he ducked away. That night’s shrouded in an alcoholic haze. And the next thing I remember we were lending each other books and talking late into the night over Gauloises and Jack Daniel’s about the Frankfurt School and Exile on Main Street and narrative modalities in Ulysses.”

  “Like, what books were you lending?”

  He thought about it. “Céline, Nathanael West, Paul Bowles, Hunter Thompson, Raymond Carver. Carver’s first collection of stories was huge for both of us.”

  “And when did you meet Corrine?”

  “That I remember very clearly. I first saw her at a party my freshman year. She was standing at the top of a staircase in a frat house. That was my first glimpse, looking up at her, a beautiful blonde, smoking a cigarette. I don’t know if I would’ve worked up the courage to talk to her or not, but as I watched her boyfriend came up from behind and she turned to look at him as he reached out to touch her cheek. I had no idea at the time they were going out, but I knew who he was. On the basketball team—a big man on campus. They were up there on Mount Olympus and I was downstairs with the geeks and the drunks. The next semester she was in my Romantic poetry class. I showed off big-time in class. Jeff was in that class, too, but I never talked to him. Hated him. We were competing for dominance.”

  “For Corrine’s attention?”

  “For everybody’s attention, though I suppose I was especially trying to impress Corrine. And the professor, of course.”

  The waitress arrived with Astrid’s drink, sweating in a heavy glass, with a celery stick sprouting from the ice cubes.

  “You know what, get me one, too,” he said.

  “Belvedere bullshot?”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “Go for it,” Astrid said.

  “I am,” he said, “although I seriously doubt that either one of us can tell the difference between a supposedly top-shelf vodka and the pour from the well. In fact, I know we can’t. The well, just in case you should want to know, is the place underneath the bar where they keep the cheap generic shit; I know this because I was a bartender in Providence when I was making my way through Brown, and the idea that you could possibly taste the difference between Belvedere and the industrial stuff that alkies drink when it’s mixed with tomato juice and Tabasco and horseradish is ludicrous. In fact, I doubt you could taste the difference straight up. The whole point of vodka is that it has no taste. It’s alcohol and water. Period. End of story. The cult of these premium brands is ludicrous, a marketing scam that started when I came of age. We used to think we were so fucking cool specifying Absolut. Me and Jeff, back in 1981, at the Surf Club. Yeah, we were such connoisseurs. Now it’s Ketel One or Belvedere or Grey Goose, but it’s not what’s in the bottle; it’s pure marketing, and whether or not a fucking celebrity gets spotted ordering one or the other.”

  “So why’d you order the Belvedere?”

  “Because I didn’t want to look cheap.”

  “Have I said something to make you angry?”

  “No, of course not. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to go off on a rant.”

  “You seem to have some major issues with Jeff.”

  “Oh, please, don’t give me that shit. You probably weren’t even born when he died, and I’ve had decades to think about this. The only issue I have with Jeff is that he fucking died. That and his being a junkie.”

  “Well, those are big issues.”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to get all worked up.” At which point the waitress arrived like an angel of mercy with his drink. “God that’s good,” he said after swallowing a third of it. “So where were we?”

  “Complaining about vodka.”

  “I just realized where I got that riff.”

  “What riff?”

  “That whole vodka rant. That was actually Jeff’s thing. He used to mock me for specifying Absolut. He’d make a point of ordering Smirnoff or whatever was cheapest. After he died, I stopped drinking premium vodka for years in tribute to Jeff.”

  “Oh, wow. That’s kind of cool.”

  “You mean it’s cool now that you know Jeff said it.”

  “Well, I am writing about him.”

  “And I’m grateful, really. A few years ago it made me sad
to think that no one was reading him, that there were only a few of us who remembered him.”

  “Still, it must be a little weird, the fact that he was—I know not exactly, but still—writing about you. You and him and Corrine.”

  “Kind of strange, sure.”

  “So I guess what everyone wants to know is about how you edited Youth and Beauty.”

  “The same way I edit every book. Sentence by sentence, reading closely, asking questions.”

  “But Jeff wasn’t there to answer them.”

  “So I answered them the way I thought he would have.”

  “I mean, did you edit the book in a way that made you look…better? You and Corrine. I guess the question is—sorry, but you know, it’s out there on the Web and everything—did you leave out unflattering material?”

  “That’s a loaded question.”

  “Well, it must’ve been tempting. Didn’t you ever think about turning the manuscript over to someone else? How could you possibly be objective?”

  The waitress arrived with the burgers, giving Russell an interlude to refine and, eventually, mute his indignation.

  “Can I bring you anything else? Mustard, ketchup?”

  “Ketchup,” Russell said.

  “And I’ll have another bullshot.”

  Russell considered the options. “What the hell, bring me a glass of the Rafanelli Zinfandel.”

  “I’ll have one, too.”

  “You want the bullshot and the Zinfandel?” the waitress asked.

  “Why not? It’s almost the weekend.”

  Russell was sort of impressed. “One of the things I love about this place,” he said, “is that unlike almost every other New York restaurant that doesn’t call itself a diner, they’ll actually bring a bottle of ketchup to the table.”

  “Would it be correct to put ketchup on bull’s balls?” she asked, then giggled fetchingly.

  “I think it would be almost mandatory. It certainly couldn’t hurt.”

  After the waitress delivered the ketchup, they set about the business of preparing their burgers, Russell putting a careful dollop of ketchup on each side of the bun and, on the top of the patty, a smattering of sautéed onions. Astrid was equally absorbed in her own rituals.

  The waitress returned with the drinks, then left.

  “We’re about to achieve a new level of intimacy,” Russell said when he had reassembled the dish.

  “Really? Right here at the table?”

  “To consume a hamburger in front of another person is to shed several layers of formality and dignity.”

  “Especially if you lick the other person’s fingers.”

  “I can’t say I’ve ever even thought of that.”

  “You should try it,” she said, and raised her index finger, shiny with grease, to his lips.

  Simultaneously appalled and gratified that she was so blatantly flirting with him, Russell felt it would be unchivalrous to embarrass her and reject what was, after all, a relatively cute and harmless gesture. He leaned forward, opened his mouth and closed his lips around her digit.

  “How was it?”

  “Needs a little salt,” he said. Was she really coming on to him, or just teasing him?

  The conversation died for a time, both taking refuge in eating.

  “So, there’s a school of thought that says you censored Jeff’s book.”

  “ ‘A school of thought’? Jesus, what are we talking about here? Has Harold Bloom weighed in on this subject, or are we talking about some Red Bull–fueled trolls surfing the Web in the wee hours?”

  “It’s just been the subject of a lot of threads.”

  “Threads?”

  “You know, like online conversations about a particular subject on a site or a board. I’m not, like, saying you did anything wrong. I just want to set the record straight. Plus, I’m curious, what it felt like editing a book that’s partly based on you and your experience. Weren’t you at least tempted to rewrite a little? Clean it up?”

  “Of course I was. And sometimes I was angry with Jeff, and sometimes hurt. But he was my friend and he was a very good writer, potentially maybe even a great one, and my first and only duty was to him and his book.”

  He remembered wishing he could have changed the past as easily as he might have changed the nuances and even the facts in Jeff’s novel. He always told himself it was fiction, even when bitterly aware how heavily indebted it was to actual events. But he was proud of the fact that he’d improved the novel, though he wasn’t about to brag about that.

  “But you must’ve changed certain things.”

  “Far fewer than I would have if he’d been alive. I bent over backward not to do what you’re suggesting. It’s one of the lightest edits I’ve ever done, and nothing affected the tone or the story line. You’ve read it—obviously. It’s not as if the Russell-like character comes off as anything like a saint. He’s kind of comically full of himself at times, and clueless at others. And”—he paused, but what the hell—“he gets cuckolded.”

  “That’s exactly what I’ve been saying.”

  Somehow this didn’t quite track, given her line of inquiry, but he said, “Thank you.”

  “What happened to the manuscript?”

  “I have it somewhere.” Actually he knew precisely where it was, locked in a file cabinet at home.

  “Would you ever consider…I don’t know, showing it to somebody?”

  “Do you have anyone in mind?”

  “Well, obviously, I’d love to see it. I mean, someday.”

  Another interlude of silence set in as they concentrated again on their meals, a trance of caloric surfeit, warmed by the sunlight that bathed their table and spilled halfway across the floor of the room.

  “Would you object to my seeing it?”

  “I’d consider that a betrayal of trust,” he said. “The editor’s hand should be invisible.”

  “The wine is really good,” she said.

  “The perfect hamburger wine.”

  “Would you think I was really decadent if I asked for another?”

  “As a gentleman, I would probably have to join you so as not to make you feel self-conscious.”

  He asked her about school, about her classes and her reading. She asked him about New York, publishing and the eighties. He couldn’t help liking her, a beautiful young girl interested in him and the things he loved, full of wine and vodka and admiration for his accomplishments, his worldliness, to the point that she actually seemed to find him sexually attractive. Outside the restaurant, she took his arm and said, “Let’s get a room at the Chelsea Hotel.”

  He looked at her, stunned; her impish expression read to him like a challenge, a dare.

  He considered it for a moment. The temptation was almost overwhelming. “I can’t tell you how much it means to me that you suggested that,” Russell said. “Even though I know you didn’t really mean it.”

  “I did, actually,” she said, leaning over and kissing him on the lips.

  “I’ll live on that for the rest of the year.”

  “Let me know about the manuscript,” she said.

  —

  Later, walking back to the office after putting her in a cab, he felt amazed that he’d been so sensible, proud of himself but also a little sad to think that he might never again experience the incomparable thrill of exploring a foreign body.

  This sense of erotic possibility stayed with him throughout the day, and that night, when he got into bed after consuming most of a bottle of Pinot Noir over dinner, the feeling drew him closer to his wife. As she read beside him, he began to kiss her neck and fondle her breasts. At first she ignored him but gradually succumbed.

  He couldn’t even remember the last time they’d made love, but now, for the first time in months, he found himself aroused, and worked himself on top of her. “Wait,” she said, reaching into the drawer of the bedside table, fussing with some kind of lubricant that she applied even as he felt himself deflating, reaching
for him, guiding him inside. They found their rhythm and he found himself succumbing to this slow, mounting pleasure. As good as it felt, it kept getting better and more insistent. Apparently he’d had just the right amount of wine to loosen his inhibitions and his quotidian anxiety without quite physically disabling him. They had slipped into a mutually satisfactory rhythm that gradually accelerated.

  All at once he felt a shortness of breath that became more acute, until he was afraid that he might pass out at any moment, or worse. Even as he gasped for air he continued to thrust his hips; the term death throes came to mind. He was going to die in the saddle, like Nelson Rockefeller. He thought he was coming, but he was going. With a racing heart and a rising sense of despair, he struggled to fill his lungs. He was filled with the dread of his own eventual demise. This is how it would feel as he lost his grip on the world, this breathless dread. Even if he managed to pull back this time, it would come for him again. This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, cheated of the final glory at least of an orgasm…

  He tried to tell Corrine that he was in distress, but he was unable to speak, unable to bid farewell to the love of his life; and then, just when he was convinced he would die on top of her, he began to recover his breath and his panic gradually subsided. He faked an orgasm with several violent hip thrusts accompanied by a series of moans before rolling off of her, his anxiety subsiding to an almost manageable level, leaving him with a residue of dread, his relief tempered with a hopeless sense that he had just caught a glimpse of oblivion.

  2

  THE BEST MARRIAGES, like the best boats, are the ones that ride out the storms. They take on water; they shudder and list, very nearly capsize, then right themselves and sail onward toward the horizon. The whole premise, after all, was for better or for worse. Their marriage was seaworthy, if not exactly buoyant. Better off, surely, than the republic, bulging at the waist and spiritually enervated, fighting two wars and a midterm election, all of which seemed endless.

  Or maybe not.

  At least they’d had sex last night, the first time in God knows how long. She wished they didn’t have to go out tonight, but they had a gala benefit: the third this month. How had she let herself get talked into this one? Her friend Casey had insisted, and it had seemed harmlessly distant a month ago, plus she owed Casey for buying a table for the Nourish New York benefit. That was how the system worked. She couldn’t remember what tonight’s worthy cause was. Something to do with South Africa? Russell was leaving from the office, where he kept his tux, because these benefits were almost always uptown, in the traditionally patrician district, despite the fact that money continued to migrate down the island; happily this one was nearby, at the Puck Building in SoHo.