“You know, your grandfather wrote terrible poetry,” she interrupts. “He once wrote a series of haikus called Foreplay.”
I glance around. “I missed the segue in the conversation.”
“Believe me, he was good at many things. The man could read an X-ray like it was a nursery rhyme,” she says. “He made the lightest pierogi you ever ate. And when it came to a sensual massage, your grandfather had hands like a—”
“Okay, BD!” I say, laughing. “I get it, but what’s the point?”
“That no one person can fulfill every single one of another person’s needs. Which is why book clubs and grandmothers exist. I’m sure Irwin would have liked a more enthusiastic audience for his efforts in verse. Whereas I would have preferred the poetry of his fingers to the poetry of his . . . poetry. I would have liked him to pick up a novel once in a blue moon. There was this wonderful couples book club at the JCC we never got to join.” She takes my hand. “I do wish you could have known him.”
“Me, too,” I say, and give her hand a squeeze. Irwin died before I was born.
“My point is no marriage gets it all right, honey, but I hope that in choosing Ryan, you have found someone you can turn to when you have a problem, when you really need a steady heart.”
“Of course,” I say, too quickly. “And I will tell Ryan. At some point. When I have a better handle on what I’m going to do.”
“When’s that going to be?” she asks. “It won’t get easier to tell Ryan, especially if you have more interactions with Noah.”
“I’m screwed, okay?” I say, surrendering dramatically. “Did I mention Noah told me he’s used up New York, that there’s nothing fresh for him to write about? Why did he have to choose now to get writer’s block?”
“Very selfish of him.” BD nods as the waiter clears our plates. “This is supposed to be your moment to shine.”
“I don’t know what to do.” I reach for the bill in the middle of the table, because it’s one way to seize control, and because if I lose my job, I won’t be able to treat BD to lunch for long. “How would Mom have dealt with this?”
“Your mother believed in the hair of the dog. She’d look for a way to solve this problem according to its nature.” BD takes out her golden snakehead compact mirror and reapplies some bright magenta lipstick. She looks at herself in the mirror, seeming pleased. “What about Fifty Ways to Break Up Mom and Dad?” she asks after a moment.
“What about it?” I say.
I think about my favorite scene, where the characters go hang gliding. The moment just before they run off the cliff.
Life’s greatest mystery is whether we shall die bravely.
I read this scene aloud to Ryan once. I was just about to tell him how it made me think about my mother, when he’d teased me—“So suicide is sexy now? That’s the message?”
But that wasn’t the message at all, and everyone in Fifty Ways made it down the fictional cliff in one piece. The message, as I understood it, was that some people can look into the abyss without losing sight of themselves or what they love. Without being too scared about what lies on the other side.
Maybe my mom’s last words to me were an act of bravery. She wasn’t worried that I was too young to handle them. She trusted me enough to make a leap.
Did she also trust that when the time came for me to make my own leap, I’d be able to feel her with me? Is that moment now?
“Are you saying Noah Ross is my abyss?” I ask BD.
“Maybe,” she says. “I’m also saying the man needs a taste of his own medicine. No one ‘uses up’ this city, and if he thinks he’s the lone ranger who’s done it, he’s got another think coming. You might have to be his tour guide on this adventure. It just might take you fifty ways.”
“What do you mean? We go hang gliding over the Hudson? No, thanks.”
“I mean take him to the places you take me,” she says. “This charming hole-in-the-wall, for example.”
“It’s the best Ethiopian food in the city.”
“And maybe Noa Callaway has never sampled its delicacies or thought about writing of them. He writes about the big tourist attractions. Show him your New York.”
“I don’t know . . .”
“Remember when you took me to the Lithuanian consulate for Užgavns a couple years ago? That was fun!”
“I remember you went home with the consulate general’s phone number,” I say.
“Exactly. I’d even go so far as to call it inspiring.”
“I took you there because I love you. Because I wasn’t scared you’d mock it or think it was boring. I am not showing that man my New York.”
“You know it’s a good idea, though,” BD says, sipping the last of her coffee.
“He probably does need to get out from behind his desk more often,” I acknowledge. “At the park, he had the look of someone who hasn’t seen the sun in a month.”
“See?”
“I could ask Terry to take to him to some new places,” I say. “I wish I could get overtime approved for Aude to do it. She’d have him whipped into shape in a week. . . .”
“Lanie, you are Noa Callaway’s editor.” BD shoulders her Birkin and rises from the table. “If Noa doesn’t write this book, Terry and Aude will still have jobs. Will you?”
I worry a hole in the paper tablecloth, not liking where this conversation is headed. Not able to stop it, either.
“Fine,” I say, standing up. “I will consider proposing a visit to someplace in New York that Noah Ross has likely overlooked.”
BD links an arm through mine as we leave the restaurant. “I foresee success.”
We step back into the city for the pleasant stroll up to Lincoln Center, where she’ll meet her League of Widows.
“I’m glad you’re so confident,” I say as we wait for a crosstown bus to pass. “Should I remind you that in Fifty Ways, the plan backfired horribly? They were supposed to break up their parents. They ended up breaking up themselves, climactically—at their parents’ wedding.”
“Yes, but that was fictional kismet,” BD says and winks at me. “You are my real, live granddaughter, whom I’m proud of and believe in. You are going to rise to this occasion like a Tinder date with a pocket full of Viagra.”
“BD!” I groan. “I’m going to have to work so hard to erase that mental image.”
“I’m sorry, doll, but I couldn’t resist.”
Chapter Eight
On Tuesday, I work from home, ostensibly to edit the third draft of the paranormal ballet manuscript. But really, I am busting my ass to clean my apartment, from worn floorboards to art deco crown-molded ceiling. I may be a mess, but my apartment doesn’t have to be.
I’ve mopped and I’ve dusted. I’ve taken a toothbrush to my grout. I’ve fluffed every pillow and gone through two bottles of Windex. My toilet bowl is sparkling, and the inside of my refrigerator is now scrubbed of last week’s experiment in wilted arugula. I even bought one of those vacuum robots, which is presently chasing poor Alice around my living room and will probably give her tortoise nightmares.