If We Lived Here (26 page)

“Not quite. Didn’t you notice how he only makes himself available to her when she’s fallen on her face? And then he can be the knight in shining armor who swoops in to rescue the damsel in distress. Selden doesn’t want to be the day-to-day guy; he wants to be the hero. The hero is a much sexier role. It’s classic macho dude stuff.”

Emma considered the point. “I suppose that’s true. Um, why exactly are we talking about this?”

“I’ve been thinking about why you’re so drawn to this Lily Bart character, the ambitious thirty-year-old New Yorker.”

“She’s twenty-nine,” Emma said; the distinction seemed important.

“Okay, twenty-nine, whatever. My point is, obviously Manhattan society has changed a lot in a hundred years, but maybe not as much as we’d like to think. It seems to me that the pressures on a Lily Bart are pretty similar to the pressures on an Emma Feit—to have a kick-ass social life and relationship and home and career (maybe the career part’s new), to have a certain amount of money in the bank, to look a certain way, et cetera, et cetera. And then there’s the struggle to figure out exactly what the world expects of you and also what you really want, and to understand the difference between the two. That’s a ton of pressure. Obviously things don’t work out in the end for Lily. But even without some grand tragic ending to your story, it still seems like a lot to deal with.”

“Okay . . .” It was interesting to hear Nick rant about the hardships faced by female New Yorkers of Emma’s age group, especially in connection to Edith Wharton’s masterpiece, but Emma still didn’t understand what he was getting at.

“The thing is,” Nick went on, “I kind of get Selden. It can be hard to see you so ambitious, wanting a certain kind of life—your fancy job and us moving forward in our relationship in this one specific way, looking for the perfect place to set up our couple-y little life. It’s honestly hard to not feel resentful sometimes.” Emma felt her cheeks burn. She remembered that Gen had also used the word “couple-y” to describe Emma and Nick, back when she was trying to explain her own recent distance.
Ha,
Emma thought bitterly, recalling how she’d sympathized with Gen’s words—all lies, she now realized.

Her voice was harsh: “Nick—”

“Hold on, please hear me out. My point is that I’m the jerk, not you. I’m saying it’s hard, sometimes, to remember the kinds of pressures you face—because this stuff still isn’t nearly as intense for a guy. It can be difficult to be compassionate and patient and understanding and all the other things a boyfriend is supposed to be.”

“But, Nick, you’re assuming that I’m just mindlessly giving in to stupid societal conventions. What if I really do want these things?”

“You’re right. That’s not fair. Which actually brings me back to Selden. He can’t be bothered to get mired up in Lily’s complications. She’s working so hard to figure out how to exist in that society without totally succumbing to its more ridiculous elements, to live genuinely without also becoming a social pariah.” Emma was thinking this was a quandary more or less everyone faced: how to be true to oneself while also getting along in the world. Nick continued: “Selden only wants to be the hero. And I get that, I do: It’s exciting to be the hero, and it can be fucking hard to be the day-today guy, the grown-up in the serious relationship. That’s shitty to say, but it’s true.” Even as she was trying to wrap her head around Nick’s literary analysis, Emma was starting to understand where he was going with this; she felt nervous. “I’m not at all making excuses, but on that particular day with Genevieve, I’d been feeling like a useless lump in our relationship, failing at all the practical day-to-day stuff and frustrated with my recovery. And there was Gen, looking at me like I was that hero. And I gave in to it. It was a crappy thing to do, no question—childish and selfish and hurtful to the person I love most—and I take full responsibility for the crappiness. But I guess I’m hoping this is making me seem less like a monster, and more like an idiot guy who sometimes finds being a grown-up kind of complicated and overwhelming. A guy who messed up big-time in one specific moment.”

Emma nodded, not quite in understanding, but in acknowledgment. She’d often suspected that Nick found all the trappings of adulthood more daunting than most; it was a relief to hear him admit as much, despite the consequences it had led to. But it was a lot to take in, too much. “Okay,” she said eventually.

“The other thing is, no matter how you end up taking my stupid lapse in judgment, you have to know that, unlike Lily Bart, you have tons of people in your life who love you like crazy. Me, duh, your family, and Annie. You can’t begrudge her the fact that she’s having a kid.” Emma interrupted to explain about the e-mail she’d found—how after confessing her supposed misery to Emma, Annie had gushed to her mom like the pregnancy was the best thing ever. “Em,” Nick said, “I’m sure she feels both those things, and a dozen other ones, too.” For some reason this hadn’t occurred to Emma.

“Look, it’s not fair to you that I acted like an asshole, or that your friendship is inevitably going to change—”

“And don’t forget that our home might be flooded and destroyed.”

“Right, that, too. But—”

“I forgive you.” Even if she didn’t totally mean it, Emma knew she would eventually, and she’d had enough of this conversation.

Nick nodded, looking unconvinced. “You know I love you, Em.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Emma batted away his kisses. “I’m ravenous, suddenly.” Her only sustenance in the last day and a half had been orange juice and wine.

“Great. Let’s locate our storm benefactors and track down some breakfast.”

Chapter
26

A
s it turned out, Annie was not the fun-loving party hostess she’d been for the previous two days. “My cell phone’s dead, all our good food is rotting, and I’m fucking freezing,” she complained to Eli, who comforted her as if these problems were unique to her. Emma knew Annie would’ve been melodramatic even if she weren’t pregnant, and she steered clear of her all day.

By Wednesday, day four of being stuck inside, even Annie and Eli’s six-room apartment was starting to feel cramped. Emma awoke early, hoping for some alone time, but Eli was already up and dressed, setting the table with a platter of peanut butter sandwiches and a bowl of apple slices. Emma knew this was the last of the fresh fruit. He’d also mixed up a pitcher of lemonade from the powder Annie had insisted they buy at Fairway for their picnic. The spread almost made up for the lack of coffee.

After everyone ate, Eli explained his plan: “I went down to the storage unit and found our old rain boots. Thank God for flashlights and intuition, right? Our newer ones are up here, so that’s enough pairs for all of us. Apparently there are makeshift charging stations above Fourteenth Street. So let’s venture out for a walk to the wonderful land of electricity. We can power up our phones and maybe find some decent food.”

“And hot coffee!” said Emma, thinking it was a great idea. She craved fresh air and space. Although she’d half decided she could move past Nick’s slip-up, she was feeling claustrophobic with all that had been revealed in the past few days.

But Annie snapped, “And then what? Ems and Nick can go crash with Gen uptown”—
Yeah, right,
Emma thought—“but what are we supposed to do? Come back to this dark, freezing place? They’re saying the power could be out for a week or more. I want to go to my mom’s.”

“And get there how, honey?” Eli asked. Emma was impressed by how patient he sounded; Annie really had found the right guy for her.

“We’ll figure something out, right?” Which, as they all knew, meant Eli should figure something out. And miraculously he did: Within an hour he’d worked his magic (or connections) and found a car service that, if they could get themselves up to Midtown, was willing to drive them to Westchester. God knows how much money Eli had offered.

“The car can take us another three blocks to my brother’s, right?” Emma asked. A couple of months ago she would’ve dreaded the thought of crashing indefinitely with Max and Alysse, and might have even opted instead to stay in a dark, cold apartment with a dwindling food supply. But now Emma was sort of looking forward to it (though Max didn’t yet know she was coming). They likely had heat and light, yes, but Max was also one of her few loved ones who hadn’t recently betrayed her.

 

As they marched north along the dark, ravaged streets of NoHo, then the Village, and then Chelsea, Nick felt like he was in a dystopian video game. The few other pedestrians were all headed in the same direction, everyone on the same journey, off to face some final enemy and reap the ultimate reward. Nick was handicapped by the too-small boots—Eli had seemed embarrassed admitting they were size 8.5—and the noises they made as he walked with pinched feet were like a soundtrack:
squish, suck, squish, suck
. Nick thought of their home in Red Hook as of another land and another time, left behind in the quest for—
what?—
light, power, dry earth, civilization, peace. His despair at imagining all their things still packed in boxes on the floor of their street-level apartment, maybe now ruined, was punctuated by waves of lightness; he had the clothes on his back and his girlfriend at his side and the strength in his legs to walk forty blocks north. He and Emma had persevered through some big battle, and although who knew what other villains lurked around the corner, at least they were moving forward, trudging together away from the worst of the wreckage. Nick felt equipped to crush this game.

Annie’s complaining interrupted Nick’s fantasy. Apparently she
didn’t
feel she had the strength to walk: “I’m getting blisters,” she whined. “Honey, will you carry me?” God, that girl could be grating. After three full days cooped up with her, Nick kept catching himself spinning violent scenarios targeting Annie, her generous hospitality notwithstanding. He didn’t know how Emma, or for that matter Eli, put up with her in large doses. He felt a new respect for the guy he’d previously pegged as just out for a trophy wife, a guy who was now lifting his full-grown pregnant wife into a piggyback.

“Let me know if I can relieve your burden,” Nick said, patting Eli on the back.

“Thanks, dude. I think I can stick it out. Luckily we’re less than ten blocks away.”

“Fewer than,” Emma whispered, elbowing Nick. He smiled, and didn’t mention that distance could be an exception to the less-versus-fewer grammar rule. “Wow, look.”

She was pointing to Macy’s, the flagship store that took up an entire avenue block. What was arguably the city’s epicenter of commerce and capitalism was now, at ten a.m. on a weekday, dark and deserted—an incredible sight. Emma had once dragged Nick inside Macy’s to shop for couches, but he’d felt so overwhelmed by the crush of shoppers and sheer quantity of merchandise that he’d fled down the street to Sbarro. Now, all across Herald Square people were trekking together toward safety and power, talking to one another and taking in this strange new iteration of their city. No one was checking a cell phone (they were probably all dead) or brushing past others in a race to get somewhere important. Everything had slowed. Nick gaped like a tourist, in awe.

It seemed as if the whole world order had shifted. After weeks of distress over whether or not to tell Emma about his lapse with Genevieve, and if so how exactly to broach it, she’d found out on her own. When she’d discovered the text messages, Nick couldn’t believe how stupid he’d been not to have deleted them; but now looking back on it, he wondered if perhaps he’d saved them on purpose, partly hoping Emma would stumble upon them and bring everything out into the open. Because when that had finally happened, it hadn’t spelled total disaster. He and Emma had talked it through like adults. Nick wasn’t exactly sure where he stood with her, but there she was by his side now. And in a way he’d never felt better about the two of them.

In the spirit of camaraderie, he approached Eli. “So the other day you mentioned how your company might be able to help fund my school’s new tutoring initiative.”

“Oh yeah, man. Though now is probably not the best time to ask.”

“Right, no, of course. I figured the chances were probably pretty slim.”

“Nah, I mean right now, as in today. When no one has power and the whole city’s flooded, I don’t think I can call the board together to discuss your after-school program.”

“Oh, right.” Nick laughed nervously. He knew this kind of conversation was called fund-raising, but to him it felt like begging. He inhaled sharply, trying to shore up his confidence: “Well, when business is back up and running, I’d love to talk. Ten thousand would be great. Twenty thousand would be even better.”

“Look at you, driving a hard bargain. I didn’t think you had it in you, buddy.”

“Whatever I can do for the kids. We could mention the sponsorship however you’d like. And maybe I’d lay off on teaching my class about the evils of Wall Street.”

“Really?”

“No, probably not.”

Eli laughed. “That’s cool. Well, I’d say it’s as good as done.” He shook Nick’s hand and then hoisted Annie higher on his back. “Fuck, you’re heavy, honey.”

“She starts gaining weight that early, huh?” As soon as he said it Nick realized his error.

Annie glared at him and then at Emma. “Ems, did you tell him?”

Eli craned his neck to face Annie. “So then you told Emma?”

Simultaneously they said, “But you promised.”

“Shit, sorry,” said Nick. “I fucked this up.”

“So did everyone else, apparently,” Eli said. “I guess I’m the only one around here who can keep a secret.”

“Sorry, hon. It’s just, Ems is my BFF. I told my parents, too.”

Eli rolled his eyes and patted his wife on the butt. “Of course you did, naughty girl. Oh, well, now that it’s out, we may as well tell the world. Hey, world,” he shouted. On any other day a guy screaming on a street corner in Midtown would be either ignored or scorned, but now in the midst of the biggest natural disaster ever to hit the city, several people actually turned to look. “My wife’s pregnant! We’re going to have a baby!”

A group of people clapped; someone whistled.

“Congrats, dude!”

“Woo-hoo!”

“Hey, a hurricane baby. Name it Sandy!”

“That’s as good a reason as any to drink!” one guy yelled, and then pulled a beer from his backpack. He popped it open. “To the baby!”

Among the cheers and huzzahs, someone barked, “Whoop-de-fuckin’-do. Shut your goddamn piehole!”

“So we’re still in New York City after all,” Eli said. He yelled out, “Whoop-de-fuckin’-do yourself, dude! Screw you!” and then set off in a run to escape any consequences of the retort, Annie still hitched on his back.

 

They’d been passing homemade charging stations all through Manhattan, Good Samaritans with electricity who’d strung power strips out their windows for passersby to juice up their electronics. On Christopher Street they’d witnessed an argument between one man charging a large pink dildo and another wanting to plug in his iPad; the fight over which device was more essential devolved into a battle of pseudo-ethics, iPad Guy citing Aristotle and Dildo Guy citing “my motherfucking libido.” Nick insisted they stay to watch the outcome: Unsurprisingly, Dildo Guy eventually won out.

A block before Times Square they found a free power strip and plugged in their phones. Nick checked his e-mail, which was mostly junk. He scanned a
Celebrate Halloween with Style!
newsletter from something called Big Apple Fun (oh, right, today was Halloween); it was full of party tricks, like how to give guests a fright: “Try strobe lights; or better yet, turn off all the lights and hand each person a candle when they arrive.” Jesus, Nick thought, the image of people huddled in the dark with candles no longer sounded like a fun Halloween party gimmick. He moved on to an e-mail from Carl, subject line,
Wish you were here!
The attached photo was of Carl in his Hoboken condo, donning flippers, a Speedo, and a sun hat, his baby wading in water that was already up to Carl’s ankles.
Jesus,
Nick thought again.

He heard Emma on the phone. “There’s no way
you
installed it last winter,” she said in the impatient tone she reserved for Max. “You hired someone to install it, right?”

“Psst,”
said Nick. “Don’t antagonize him. We’re asking for a favor, remember?”

She rolled her eyes. “Anyway, that’s awesome that you guys have a backup generator. Congrats on your foresight. Is it possible we could come crash at your place for a couple of nights? Nick and I could babysit and give you and Alysse a break.”

“There you go,” Nick whispered.

An hour later the car service showed up. When the driver opened his door, people all around pounced, spewing sob stories and begging for a ride. “Mr. Eli Silber?” the driver called out. Nick felt embarrassed as Eli pushed past the crowd and shook the man’s hand, acting as if he’d won some award. The four of them piled into the car, and with a slam of the door separated themselves from the community of people in the streets.

“Peace out, New York City,” Eli yelled. “I can’t wait to get out of this shit storm.”

It was possible Nick was imagining the hostile, jealous glares from the throngs outside, but he slid down in his seat nevertheless, his stomach swirling with equal parts shame and relief as the car peeled off, ferrying them out of the storm-ravaged city.