Part 10 (2/2)
Well, see there's this de on”
He's following ton killed
”Letthe story of our encounters, which, by the way, has a nice subplot about Satan
”I understand I've-” I raked a hand through my hair It needed a cut ”I'm just run down”
”I've had one viable project of yours h the committee in the last three months,” she said
That's because the editorial committee can't s, I knew for a fact I had three proposals stuck in cos, I knew for a fact I had three proposals stuck in co project to fill a hole-so, summer at the latest” She dropped her hands to her desk ”Do you have anything you can getthings your way”
Don't even suggest it, Clay But I could think of nothing else ”Actually, Helen, I've been working on soel-a memoir-style story told from the viewpoint of a de else ”Actually, Helen, I've been working on soel-a memoir-style story told from the viewpoint of a demon” Inwardly, I cursed myself
”Clay”- a slow, appreciative sone back to writing”
Since the failure of Coious fiction is getting hotter, and you do knoe get first right of refusal”
I'm an idiot ”I know” ”I know”
”Give it to Phil or Anu, and we'll take it to co them down her nose
”It's not quite finished-”
”Just get us so to look at” She s was over
I thanked her, eager to get out of her office, to figure out what I had just done Eager to get on with the day and to
I passed Sheila in the hallway, and the sight of her startled me She looked drawn, thinner than I had ever seen her, and I realized it had been weeks since we'd had a real conversation I had never seen her look quite like this-she was practically gaunt, and her lavender twin-set es beneath her eyes
”Clay, how are you? I talked to Aubrey over the holiday She said she saw you And that you're seeing sohtly
That struckkind of way ”It's, uh, a casual thing And you? How are you?” I thought of Helen and her ”you look terrible” Apparently it was going around; I had never seen Sheila look so unattractive I had never seen her look unattractive, period
She took a long, shaky sigh ”Oh, Dan and I are separated”
”I' to say It was the thing I had grown sick of hearing from others about this tiard appearance, I had a hard ti back to what Lucian had told me, to the ”have to see you” e-mail, I found my sympathies rested solidly with Dan What was it with Sheila and Aubrey, the adultery twins? I should call Dan I ought to be having this conversation with hilanced down at the papers in her hand She appeared to have been en route to the copy machine ”It's difficult I don't knoill happen”
”Well, if there's anything I can do” But not only was I sure there was nothing I could do-I was fairly certain I wouldn't do anything for her if I could
”I' someone, Clay I'm not sure Aubrey realizes yet how much she lost”
I thanked her and excused myself
Her words stayed with me the rest of the day, as powerful, almost, as Lucian's
I REALIZED AFTER MEETING with Helen that I ht have a problem I had just proposed a story based on the h otherwise demonic means-to Katrina Maybe the stack of papers on es Katrina had given me that it wouldn't be an issue, but I couldn't find the proposal she had given me to know for sure And I did not like the idea that I alking what felt like a thin ethical line, especially considering on whose behalf I walked it
Closing my office door, I phoned Katrina, but she wasn't in Not wanting to drawto talk to her assistant, I sent her an e-iven me on her visit teeks before
That was all I could do That, and worry
THE AROMAS OF WARM bread arlic, salami, and olives It had once been an endurance test forsidelined by every temptation on Salem When Aubrey and I used to come to the North End for dinner, ould stop afterward at the twenty-four-hour bakery to buy turnovers and semolina bread for lunch the next day In our last year of e, we still perused these streets for new restaurants, but the discussions we once had over pasta and veal dwindled to the clinking chatter of our cutlery, and we often forgot the bakery
On the corner of Prince and Hanover, I paused before the iron gates of Saint Leonard's, which bore the emblem of nail-scarred hands folded in front of a cross In the summer, especially on feast days, church ladies sold Saint Anthony's oil and religious icons at a table around the corner Tonight the heavy wooden doors beyond the gate were locked tight, as though against sin itself-in addition to editors who cavorted with de before the cruer to that churchgoing world of my youth than I did to Lucian's spirit-inhabited real, I felt less and less a part of the secular world in which I lived
It was nearly seven o'clock I hurried down Hanover, the smell of the ocean briny in my nose In summer the restaurants-barely ht tables apiece-threw open their doors, spilling tables onto the sidewalk to catch the influx of tourists and saints' feasts celebrants Tonight they were closed up against the coastal chill,out fro on the tabletops inside
On the second-floor entrance of Vittorio's, I experienced a brief moment of deja vu when the host inforain when he led me to a candlelit booth where a woman in her thirties waved at me