One Fifth Avenue

  She sent the file to her assistant. Then she began surfing through her regular rotation of blogs: The Huffington Post, Slate, The Green Thumb (an obscure site about gardening that Mindy found soothing), and finally, steeling herself against shock, horror, and degradation, Snarker.

  Each week, Snarker made fun of her blog in a feature called “Middle-aged Mommy Crisis.” It wasn’t healthy to read hateful comments about oneself (some of the comments said simply, “I hate her. I wish she would die”), but Mindy was hooked. The comments fed her demons of self-hatred and insecurity. It was, she thought, the emotional version of cutting yourself. You did it so you could feel. And feeling awful was better than feeling nothing.

  Today, however, there were no items about her. Mindy was relieved—and slightly disappointed. It would make her evening with James more dull, with nothing to rail about. As she was about to close the website, a new item popped up. Mindy read the first sentence and frowned. It was all about Annalisa Rice. And Paul Rice. And his aquarium.

  This, Mindy thought, was exactly what she didn’t want to happen. When it came to One Fifth, no publicity was good publicity.

  Early the next morning, Mindy Gooch stationed herself at the peephole, intending to confront Paul Rice when he passed through the lobby on his way to work. Skippy, the cocker spaniel, was by her side. Perhaps it was the atmosphere in his home and not his inherent personality, but Skippy had developed a vicious streak. He was perfectly pleasant for hours, and then, without warning, he would attack.

  At seven A.M. on the dot, Paul Rice came out of the elevator. Mindy opened her door. “Excuse me,” she said. Paul turned. “What?” he demanded. At that moment, Skippy slipped out the door. Baring his teeth, he closed in on Paul’s pant leg. Paul turned white. “Get your dog off me,” he shouted, hopping on one leg while he tried to shake Skippy free. Mindy waited for a moment, then came out, pulling Skippy away from Paul’s leg. “I could sue you for that,” Paul said. “Dogs are perfectly legal in this building,” Mindy said, baring her own teeth. “But I’m not sure about fish. Oh yes,” she said, noting the look of surprise on Paul’s face. “I know all about your aquarium. There are no secrets in this building.” She went back inside and kissed Skippy on the top of his head. “Good dog,” she cooed. And from then on, a routine was established.

  The Halloween party Lola insisted she and Philip attend wasn’t at the Bowery Hotel after all, but in an abandoned building on the next block. Lola was dressed as a showgirl, in a sequined bra and panties, fishnet stockings, and high heels. She looked sensational, like a girl on the cover of a men’s magazine. “Are you sure you want to go out like that?” Philip asked.

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “You’re practically naked.”

  “No more naked than I am at the beach.” She wrapped a feather boa around her neck. “Is that better?”

  Trying to get into the spirit of things, Philip was dressed as a pimp, in a striped suit, white sunglasses, and a fur hat. On Eighth Street, Lola had bought him an imitation diamond necklace, at the bottom of which dangled a diamond-encrusted skull.

  “Isn’t this fun?” Lola exclaimed, walking to the party. The streets were filled with revelers dressed in every kind of costume. Yes, Philip thought, taking her hand. This was fun. He hadn’t allowed himself to have this kind of silly fun for years. What had happened to him? When had he become so serious?

  “You’re going to love Thayer Core,” she said, tugging on his hand to hurry him along.

  “Who’s he?” And seeing Lola’s irritated expression, said, “I know, I know—the young impresario who wants to be a writer.”

  “Not wants, is,” Lola said. “He writes every day for Snarker.”

  Philip smiled. Lola seemed incapable of making distinctions between the artist and the hack, the real and the wannabe. In her mind, a blogger was the same as a novelist, a star on a reality show was equal to an actress. It was her generation, he reminded himself. They had grown up in a culture of insistent democracy in which everyone was the same and everyone was a winner.

  A large crowd was gathered in front of a decrepit building. Gripping Lola’s hand, Philip pushed through. At the entrance were two guys with pierced faces, a transvestite in a pink wig, and Thayer Core himself, smoking a cigarette. He shook Philip’s hand. “It’s a destructor party, man,” Thayer said. “Building’s going to be torn down tomorrow. We do our best to destroy the place until the police get here.”

  Philip and Lola went in the door and up a wooden staircase. The air was hot and thick with smoke, lit by a single bulb. There was the sound of retching, and upstairs, music thumped out of two speakers set in the windows. The room was packed. “What is the point of this?” Philip said into Lola’s ear.

  “There is no point. Isn’t it great?” Lola said.

  They pushed their way up to a makeshift bar, where they were handed a slosh of vodka and cranberry juice in a red plastic cup, no ice. “When can we get out of here?” Philip shouted over the music.

  “You want to leave already?” Lola said.

  Philip looked around. I don’t know one person here, he thought. And they were all so young, with their smooth faces and their attitudes, preening and shouting at each other. And the music. Loud, thumping, with no discernible melody. Yet they were all dancing, moving their hips while keeping their upper bodies still. I can’t do this, Philip thought.

  “Lola,” he shouted into her ear. “I’m going home.”

  “No,” she shrieked.

  “You stay. Have a good time. I’ll meet you back at the apartment in an hour.”

  Walking back to One Fifth, Philip was relieved and then perplexed. He couldn’t imagine anything worse than being stuck at that crowded, hot, filthy party. How was that possibly fun? But he had gone to parties like that when he was twenty-two, and they were fun. There were scavenger hunts in limousines, endless evenings in tiny, smoke-filled clubs or in enormous spaces with a different theme every night; there was a club in an old church where you danced on the altar, and another one containing an abandoned subway tunnel where people went to take drugs. Manhattan was a giant playground where there was always music, always a party. One hot August night, he and Schiffer had crashed a party of transvestites on a decaying pier on the Hudson River, where several people fell in and had to be rescued by the fire department. He and Schiffer had laughed and laughed, laughed until they were crying. “Hey, schoolboy,” she’d gasped, bent over in hilarity, “let’s do this forever. Let’s never work again and become twenty-four-hour party people. Wouldn’t that be glamorous? And when we’ve had enough, we’ll live in an old farmhouse in Vermont.”

  What happened to those days? he wondered. Coming into One Fifth and catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror next to the elevators, he realized he looked a fool, a middle-aged man trying to pretend he was young. When had he gotten so old?

  “Philip?” He heard a voice. “Philip Oakland, is that you?” Followed by the familiar peals of laughter.

  He turned. Schiffer Diamond had come in and was standing with a pile of scripts folded across her chest. It was obvious she’d just come from the set, in full hair and makeup, wearing jeans, fuzzy boots, and a bright orange parka. A white cashmere scarf was tied around her neck. She looked good—her mocking, amused expression was reminiscent of how she’d looked when he’d first met her. How was it that she seemed not to have aged at all, while he’d become such an obvious victim of time? “Schoolboy,” she said. “It is you. What the hell are you wearing?”

  “It’s Halloween,” he said.

  “I know that. But what are you supposed to be?”

  Philip felt embarrassed and irritated. “Nothing,” he said, pressing the button for the elevator.

  The doors opened and they got in. “Like the hat,” she said, looking him up and down. “But you were never good at disguises, Oakland.” The elevator stopped on her floor. She looked again at his getup, shook her head, and got out. And once again, he thought, sh
e was gone.

  Hanging out with Thayer at the party, Lola lost track of time. Thayer seemed to know everyone and kept introducing her to people. She sat on his lap. “Can you feel my hard-on?” he said.

  Francesca showed up. She and Lola went into the stairwell and smoked marijuana. Then they found someone with a bottle of vodka. One of the speakers fell out the window. The night went on and on.

  At three A. M. the room lit up with the red and white lights of several police cars. The cops came in with flashlights, and Lola ran as fast as she could down the stairs and up Third Avenue. At Fifth Street, she stopped, finding herself alone outside in the dead of night. It was cold and her feet hurt and her mouth was dry and she couldn’t think of what to do.

  She began walking, wrapping her arms around her chest to keep warm. The streets were still filled with people and taxis, and it struck her as funny that she was walking around outside in little more than a bra and panties. “I love your ass,” Thayer Core had kept telling her. If she weren’t with Philip Oakland, she just might go after Thayer. But that would make her desperate. She’d go crazy hanging out in Thayer’s terrible apartment, with that awful Josh there all the time. That’s how it was for most girls. They were lucky if they found a guy who was interested, and then he lived in a terrible place. She could never live in New York like that. As her mother would say, “That isn’t living, it’s surviving.”

  She finally made it to Fifth Avenue. The street was deserted, yellow and spooky under the streetlights. She’d never come into the building so late and found the door was locked. She banged on it in a panic, rousing the doorman, who’d been sleeping in a chair. He didn’t know her and gave her a hard time, insisting on ringing Philip on the house phone. When she finally got upstairs, Philip was standing in the hallway in his boxer shorts and a Rolling Stones T-shirt.

  “Jesus Christ, Lola. It’s three in the morning,” he said.

  “I was having fun.” She giggled.

  “I can see that.”

  “I tried to call you,” she protested innocently. “But you didn’t answer your phone.”

  “Uh-huh,” Philip said.

  “It’s not my fault,” she insisted. “This is what happens when you don’t answer your phone.”

  “Good night,” Philip said coldly. He turned and went into the bedroom.

  “Fine,” she said. She went into the kitchen. She was angry. This wasn’t the reception she’d been expecting. She marched into the bedroom to confront Philip about his attitude. “I had fun, okay?” she said. “Is that such a big deal?”

  “Go to sleep. Or go to your own apartment.”

  She decided to try a different tactic. She slipped her hand under the covers and put her fingers over his penis. “Don’t you want to have fun?”

  He pointedly removed her hand. “Go to bed. Please. If you can’t sleep, go to the couch.”

  Lola glared at him, slowly took off her clothes, and got into bed. Philip was lying there with his eyes shut tight. She lay down next to him. Then she rolled onto her side. Then she accidentally kicked him with her foot.

  He sat up. “I mean it,” he said. “If you can’t sleep, you should go to the couch.”

  “What is your problem?” she said.

  “Look,” he said. “I need to get some sleep. I have a big day tomorrow.”

  “Take it easy,” she said. “I’ll take a sleeping pill.”

  “That’s always the solution, isn’t it?” Philip muttered. “A pill.”

  “You’re the pill,” Lola said.

  She didn’t fall asleep right away. She lay in the dark, hating Philip. He was no fun, and she probably should break up with him and go out with Thayer. But then she thought about Thayer’s apartment again, and how he had no money and was basically an asshole. If she broke up with Philip, she’d be back where she was when she started in New York. Living in that tiny apartment on Eleventh Street and going to destructor parties every night. There would be no movie openings, no dinners at the Waverly Inn, no rubbing shoulders with glamour. She needed to stay with Philip for at least a little while. Either until he married her, or something happened and she became famous in her own right.

  The next morning, Philip greeted her with a chilly “Good morning.” Lola’s head felt like a bowling ball, but for once, she didn’t complain, knowing she needed to mollify him. She dragged herself out of bed and went into the bathroom, where he was shaving. She sat down on the toilet seat, put her arms between her legs, and looked up at him through her mess of dark hair. “Don’t be mad at me,” she said. “I didn’t know you’d be so upset.”

  Philip put down his razor and looked at her. Last night, after the embarrassment of running into Schiffer and then lying alone in his bed waiting for Lola to come home, he’d begun to wonder what he’d gotten himself into. Maybe Nini was right: He was too old to be dating a twenty-two-year-old. But what was he supposed to do? Schiffer Diamond was obsessed with her career and didn’t need him. He supposed he could find a nice, accomplished woman who was his age, like Sondra, but that might mean accepting the fact that the exciting part of his sex life was over. He couldn’t do it. It was the equivalent of giving up.

  And here was gorgeous Lola Fabrikant, in his bathroom, contrite and pliable. He sighed. “Okay, Lola,” he said. “Just don’t do it again.”

  “I won’t,” she said, jumping up. “I promise. Oh, Philip, I love you so much.” And she went back to bed.

  Philip smiled. Where did she pick up her crazy ideas about love? he wondered. “Hey, Lola,” he called. “Why don’t you make us some breakfast?”

  She laughed. “You know I don’t cook.”

  “Maybe you should learn.”

  “Why?” she asked. Philip finished shaving, examining his skin in the mirror. He’d had young girlfriends before, but none had been quite like Lola, he thought. Usually, the young women were much more accommodating. He took a step back and patted his face, shaking his head. Who was he kidding? Schiffer Diamond had been much wilder than Lola. But he’d been in love with Schiffer, so her antics had driven him crazy—once she’d even suggested they have sex with another man. She might have been joking, but he never knew for sure. On the other hand, he wasn’t in love with Lola, so, he told himself, he was safe—her actions couldn’t really affect him.

  He went into the bedroom. Lola was lying on her stomach, naked under the covers, as if she were waiting for him. “Oh, hello,” she said, turning her head to greet him. Pulling back the covers, he forgot all about Schiffer Diamond as he surveyed Lola’s body. She opened her legs invitingly. He dropped his towel and, kneeling behind her, lifted her hips and slipped his cock in from behind.

  He came quickly and felt the sleepy calm that followed the satiation of pleasure. He closed his eyes. Lola rolled over and began playing with his hair. “Philip?” she asked sweetly. “What are you doing for Thanksgiving? Do you want to come to Atlanta with me?”

  “Maybe,” he said before he fell asleep.

  11

  The drilling had begun again in the Rices’ apartment. Enid Merle got up from her desk in annoyance and went outside. On the terrace above was a pile of copper pipes. So the Rices still hadn’t finished the renovations on their bathrooms. Or maybe the pipes were for the aquarium Paul Rice was rumored to be installing in Mrs. Houghton’s ballroom. Enid hoped the renovation wouldn’t drive her into becoming one of those particular types of old people who, with little in their lives on which to focus, become obsessed with their neighbors. She turned on the History Channel to distract herself. The programs were a reminder of the true nature of human beings—while there were always a few who strived for greatness, most of humankind was engaged in the crude art of staying alive, reproduction, and indulgence in the baser instincts, including murder, paranoia, and war.

  Her bell rang. Expecting Philip, she opened the door and found Mindy Gooch standing in the hallway. Mindy’s arms were crossed, and she wore her usual grim expression. “I need to talk to you about som
ething,” she said.

  “Come in.” Enid held open the door so Mindy could pass. Mindy’s visit was curious, Enid thought, as they hadn’t spoken since Mrs. Houghton’s funeral.

  “I think we have a problem,” Mindy said.

  Enid smiled. “I’ve lived in this building my entire life, dear,” she said, thinking that Mindy was referring to their lack of communication. “I was here before you moved in. And I expect to be here after you move out. If we don’t speak for the next five years, it won’t be an issue for me.”

  “I’m not talking about you,” Mindy said. “I mean the Rices. Something has to be done about them.”

  “Is that so,” Enid said coldly.

  “Paul Rice came by my office last week.”

  “Trying to be friendly, I suppose.”

  “Trying to bribe me to approve his in-the-wall air conditioners.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “I told him no.”

  “Well, then,” Enid said. “What’s the problem?”

  “This,” Mindy said. She opened her hand and held up a tiny green plastic toy soldier thrusting a bayonet.

  “I don’t understand,” Enid said.

  “This morning, when I opened my door to get the newspaper, I found a whole troop of them arranged on the mat.”

  “And you think Paul Rice did it,” Enid said skeptically.

  “I don’t think he did it. I know he did it,” Mindy said. “He told me if I didn’t approve his air conditioners, it was war. If this isn’t a sign,” she continued, shaking the little green army man in Enid’s face, “I don’t know what is.”

  “You must confront him,” Enid said.

  “I can’t do it alone,” Mindy said. “I need your help.”

  “I don’t see how I can help you,” Enid said calmly. “Dealing with unpleasant residents is your job. After all, you are the president of the board.”

  “You were the president of the board for fifteen years,” Mindy said. “There must be something we can do. Some way to get them out.”