Pressure Drop (2 page)

Nina, looking in the mirror, wasn't dwelling on all that. She was searching for signs of being thirty-nine. There were plenty of those, but none that could be called lines, except by an unfriendly viewer. Still, she could see where the lines were going to be. Enough. She splashed her face with cold water, rubbed hard with a towel, dressed, stuffed
Living Without
in her briefcase, and rode the elevator down thirty-five floors to the streets of Manhattan.

“Morning, Ms. Kitchener,” said Jules, holding the door for her. He was dressed like a Swiss Guard, only a little more gaudy. “Lovely morning,” he added, almost as though he meant it, which wasn't like him at all, and Nina, walking out into eighteen degrees and driving snow, remembered that it was the Monday after Thanksgiving: the start of tipping season.

Nina walked to work, sharing the sidewalks with stiff-legged masses hunched miserably into the wind, everyone's vapor breath rising in the air like cartoonists' balloons empty of dialogue. She made eye contact with nobody except a motionless man in rags at the corner of Third and Forty-ninth who suddenly swayed toward her and whispered, “Merry fucking Christmas.” No one else took any note of him.

Thirty-nine. Three nine. As she walked, Nina imagined the digits tolling like village bells in a Frankenstein movie. In fact, she was still clinging to the last few hours of thirty-eight. She hadn't been born until noon. Then had come twenty happy years, a period closed by the death of her mother from breast cancer, made remote by the death of her father a few years later from colon cancer. That was Act One, The Nuclear Family. Then, with some overlap, came Act Two, The Boyfriends. This wasn't the right word to describe them—one of The Boyfriends had been fifty-two, at least he had said he was, although he had sometimes looked older, especially on the fatal day when he and Nina encountered his daughters on the nude beach at the Club Med in Tahiti—but there was no right word. “Lover” was too specific, “friend” too general, “paramour” too operatic, “mate” not operatic enough, “significant other” too much like something John Cleese might have sneered at on “Fawlty Towers.”

The Boyfriends: David, who left her for an ashram in Marin County; Richard, whom she left for Lenny; Lenny, who went back to his wife; Alvie, who took drugs; Marc, who took her money; Zane, who came too soon; another Richard, who never came; Ken, who talked about a ménage à trois whenever he had too much to drink, which turned out to be most of the time.

Those were the ones she had been serious about. The others were better forgotten. The Boyfriends themselves were probably better forgotten too, but that would mean forgetting large parts of her own history. David, Richard, Lenny, Alvie, Marc, Zane, Richard the Second, Ken. They defined her past in seemingly comprehensible periods, like a genealogy of the kings of some troubled state.

Now they were overthrown. Nina was out of the boyfriend game for good. The business had given her the strength to do that. Once in a while there was a setback—a Boyfriend might pop up, at a nearby restaurant table perhaps, or in a bad dream. But she could handle that. She was on her own. Living without men and children. She wanted to find out more about the “and loving it” part.

The office was a four-story brownstone with a little iron railing out front, a little brass plaque that said
KITCHENER AND BEST
by the door and a mortgage like the rock of Sisyphus. A furious-looking Pekingese was defecating at the base of the first stair. A woman in a mink coat and fluffy pink slippers held the dog's leash. “Hurry up, you little prick,” she said, snapping the animal into line behind her the moment it had finished.

“Jesus Christ,” Nina said, stepping over a turd that seemed grossly out of proportion to the size of its maker, and entering the building.

Jason Best was at the front desk, on the phone. Behind him, a computer was blinking a screenful of multicolored nonsense. “Please hold,” Jason said, punching a button. “Please hold.” Punch. “Please hold.” He glanced up at Nina, giving her the kind of bemused look Cary Grant used to deliver so well. Jason resembled Cary Grant in other ways too—a little taller, perhaps, a little darker, a little more handsome. “There's a fuck-up on the L.I.R.R.,” he said to Nina, covering the mouthpiece. “Amalia won't be in till noon.”

“There's dog shit by the door.”

“Ick,” Jason said, and punched another button. “Kitchener and Best. Please hold.”

The morning papers were on the desk. The
Post
said: “
SEX MANIAC WOUNDS 3
,
SHOOTS SELF
,
PIT BULL
.” Nina took it outside and cleaned up the mess. Then she went up to her office on the top floor.

Jason hadn't mentioned that it was already occupied. That wasn't the way he worked. Two women sat on the couch by the window. They might have been about her own age, perhaps slightly older. One had long salt-and-pepper hair; the other had blond hair, cut very short, and wore glasses with oversize frames.

“Hello,” the salt-and-pepper one said. “I think we're a little early.”

“The snow and all,” the other added. “We weren't sure how long it would take.”

“womynpress?” Nina asked, wondering how to vocalize the lowercase
w
used in their cover letter.

“That's us,” said salt-and-pepper. “I'm Brenda Singer-Atwell, publisher.”

“M. Eliot,” said the other. “Editor-in-chief. And you're Nina Kitchener, right?”

“Right.”

“We've heard good things about you, Nina,” said Brenda.

“From who?”

“Everybody,” replied M. “Gloria, for one.”

“Gloria Steinem?”

M. nodded.

“That's funny. I don't really know her.”

“Well, the word is out—you're the medium to the media,” said Brenda. “Did you have time to go over our manuscript?”

“Yes,” Nina said, sitting at her desk. “Like some coffee?”

“Great,” said Brenda. M. nodded.

Nina picked up the phone and buzzed downstairs. “Rosie called in sick,” Jason said. “The NBC guy wants to make it at four instead of five, and Amalia won't be in till two.” The pressure was on; Jason's voice was rising into a register Cary Grant never used, not even when helicopters were chasing him.

“Any coffee?” Nina said.

“Coffee?” asked Jason.

“In the machine.”

Brenda and M. were watching her closely; at least, Brenda was—M.'s enormous glasses were reflecting the light, masking her eyes.

“I'll check.”

“Thanks.” Nina put down the phone.

M. turned her head slightly, revealing her eyes. Sharp ones, and they were indeed looking closely at Nina. “New coffee boy?” she asked.

“That was Jason Best,” Nina said. “My partner.” The sharp eyes shifted away and Nina realized her voice had gotten hard.

A few seconds passed in silence before Brenda said: “So what did you think?”

Nina took the manuscript from her briefcase, placed a yellow legal pad beside it. “Before we start, I have to explain that this initial consultation costs one hundred dollars. After, if you decide to proceed with us, it's two-fifty an hour, plus expenses. Expenses vary, but we don't do anything big—like travel, entertainment—without checking with you first.”

Brenda and M. looked at each other.

“We were told,” M. said, “that you had a less … exacting fee structure for feminist organizations.”

“Who told you that?”

“Several people.”

“Gloria Steinem?”

M. opened her mouth to say yes, but Brenda said, “No,” before she could.

“Well, it's not true,” Nina said. “Our fee structure is set.” She tried to stop herself from adding, “Exacting or not,” and almost did. Maybe after a few more birthdays she'd be able to.

Brenda and M. were looking at each other again. Silently and quickly they came to a decision. Nina saw how they worked: like a good lion tamer act. M. made trouble and Brenda ran the show.

“It's a deal,” Brenda said.

“The clock is ticking,” M. added.

Nina turned to her. “One. The manuscript is badly written. It doesn't have to be art, but it has to be better than this. That's your territory. Two. There's not enough anecdotal material, especially in the first two chapters. They're too theoretical, too boring. That's where you need the personal stuff, up front. Three. You've got to have an introduction, written by somebody who's well known and as mainstream as possible. Preferably a man.”

“A man?” said M.

“Four. Tell the author to lose that Tolstoy parody or whatever the hell it is at the beginning. It's unnecessarily off-putting and it begs comparison with the big boys, comparison that reviewers won't find in her favor.”

Brenda glanced at M. Faint pink patches appeared on M.'s face.

“Having said that,” Nina went on, “there may be a market for this book. Demographically. There are lots of women in the boat she describes and they read books. You've got to sell them on the ‘and loving it' part. That aspect of the book has to be completely rethought. Then, supposing you can make these changes, it will come down to two things—the personality of the author, that's the main one, and the package, important but secondary.”

Brenda was writing rapidly in a notebook. M. was sitting very still, her jaw jutting out a little.

“Is Dr.”—Nina glanced down at the manuscript—“Dr. Filer married, by any chance?”

“Of course not,” M. said.

“Good. Any children?”

“No.”

“What's her Ph.D. in?”

M. looked at Brenda. Brenda looked at M. M. said: “I'm not sure. Sociology, maybe. Does it matter?”

“Of course it matters,” Nina said. “If it's in metallurgy you might as well bag it now.”

Silence. M. looked at Brenda. Brenda said: “I understand you know people on the Donahue show.”

“That's right. But they don't do me any favors, and I don't try to sell them anything that'll make Phil look like a jerk.”

“Do you know him?” Brenda asked.

“I've met him. I don't know him.”

M. stuck her jaw out a little farther. “But you called him Phil.”

“Jesus. It would be a bit silly to call him
Mister
Donahue, wouldn't it?”

Jason came in, balancing three cups on a tray. “Coffee, tea, or me?” he said. Brenda looked at him blankly; M. with a stone face; Nina laughed.

They drank coffee. It was excellent, with a slight taste of walnut. Jason wasn't capable of making coffee like that; Nina knew he had sent out for it. Brenda and M. seemed to relax a little on the couch.

“I'd like to meet the author,” Nina said.

Brenda smiled; a nice smile, not as dazzling as Jason's, but warm, and Nina sensed they could be friends. “We thought you might. She should be here any minute. I hope you don't mind.”

“Not at all.”

The phone buzzed. Nina picked it up. “Hello,” she said.

“Mummy?” said a little boy. He was crying.

“Mummy?” said Nina.

The little boy's voice broke. “The man said my mummy was there.”

“Just a minute.” Nina looked up. “There's a child on the phone. Do either of you—” But Brenda was already up. She took the phone.

“It's Mummy,” she said. “What's wrong, Fielding?” She listened. Nina heard more crying. M.'s foot tapped the carpet. “I'm sure she didn't mean that,” Brenda said. “She's really a nice person. Don't cry, angel. I'll see you soon.” Pause. “Not long. Right after work.” Pause. “No, that's on Wednesdays. Today is Monday. I work the full day on Monday. Bye-bye.”

She hung up. “Goddamned Gina,” she said to M. And to Nina, “We're having nanny problems. You don't know of a good one by any chance?”

“No,” Nina said. “How many children have you got?”

“Two, but the older one's in school.”

Nina turned to M. “What about you?”

“What about me what?”

“M. has a daughter,” Brenda said.

“Who lives with her father,” M. said, in a tone devoid of editorial comment. And is her name N.? Nina wanted to ask. But she didn't.

“And you?” Brenda said.

But before Nina could reply that she seemed to be the only one in the room who fit the target audience of the book they were pushing, Jason opened the door and said, “This way, please,” to someone in the hall. Then the author walked in.

The author had a pleasant face, if a little too much of it. And there was much too much of the rest of the author—Nina's companion in the target audience, and candidate for television, where no one had yet invented a gizmo that stopped the camera from adding the obligatory ten pounds.

Why the hell did she have to be fat? Nina thought as they were introduced. Dr. Filer squeezed herself on the couch between her publishers. For one moment, Nina was afraid that some sort of Three Stooges–style slapstick was about to erupt. Instead Dr. Filer surprised her by saying: “I'm so glad you're able to see us. I'm here to learn.” The surprise wasn't just in what she said, but in her voice, a soft Southern contralto that sent a clear message to Nina: radio.

“Fine,” Nina said. “Sell me on the ‘and loving it' part.”

Dr. Filer smiled. She needed dental work. That could be bought. “It's simple,” she said. “It's time women discovered what men have known for a long time—there's life beyond the home. Work, friends, self-fulfillment, even the life of the mind. If lots of women are going to end up alone in life, as seems certain to be the case, they might as well learn not to feel devastated about it. Women have taken some big steps in the last twenty years and the men haven't kept up. There aren't enough quality men out there, and that's not going to change very quickly.”