Monday morning brought clear skies to the capital. The sun peeked over the Sierras and bathed the city in a serene golden glow. Jan drove through the busy, commuter-choked streets, past the intersection where Carter played his clarinet. She looked for him but he wasn’t in his usual place. For a moment she thought of going to his hotel, but dismissed the idea and drove on to her office.
When she pulled in to the underground garage and parked in her reserved space, she turned off the engine, picked up a large manila envelope, and glanced at the first page of her novel. Satisfied, she took a deep breath, closed the folder, and got out of the car.
On the top floor of the building, surrounded by huge solar-filmed windows, Peter Lipschitz sat on a leather sofa in the lobby outside Harry’s office. His legs, dressed in skin-tight designer jeans and brown leather cowboy boots, were stretched out on a coffee table in front of the sofa. His black silk shirt, pulled tight against his bulging health-club biceps, had been unbuttoned far enough to reveal a certain amount of chocolate-colored chest hair. The jet black hair on top of his head was slicked back, greased up, and ready to rock-and-roll, while the look-at-me face had the artificial bronzed good looks that come from too many hours at the local tanning parlor.
He was reading through part of his own novel when Jan came in to the lobby, dressed in an elegant pink suit and pumps. Her hair was neatly coiffed in a bun; her body was erect, her chin up, her eyes focused on the double-doors of Harry’s office.
“Well, if it isn’t the dragon lady,” he said as she walked past.
Jan stopped, turned slowly in a pirouette, and looked down at her x-husband. “Take your feet off that coffee table…this isn’t your office. And it damn sure isn’t your home.”
Peter frowned, removed his feet from the coffee table and sat up straight in the chair. “You have an appointment with Harry?”
“I don’t need an appointment,” she replied. “And what the hell are you doing here?”
“I have an appointment. Contract negotiations.”
“Your contract should be cancelled. And why isn’t your agent negotiating?”
He hesitated to reply. “After your little food fight the other day she decided it wasn’t safe to represent me.”
“Too bad,” Jan replied with mock sympathy.
Peter focused on the folder in Jan’s hand. “What’s in the folder?”
“Notes for a potential blockbuster, a bestseller.”
“Oh? What’s it about?”
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Jan smiled. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Peter slapped his novel down on the coffee table and stood up. “Look Jan, if you’re trying to outdo me, to get my contract torn up for some sort of revenge.”
“Your damn right I am! I gave you five years of my life. I made you a success, and what did you do? How did you thank me? By screwing around with half a dozen women who were as vain and shallow as you! I used to think it was my fault, that I did something wrong to make you unhappy at home. But no, it was you Peter. It was always you. You’re sick. You should be in one of those therapy sessions for sex addicts.”
“That’s a convenient excuse Jan. But for your information I was unhappy. I may be a regular guy, from a blue-collar family, but you and your stuck-up academic friends, your P.H.D. know-it-alls made me feel like a complete shmuck, because I didn’t have the pristine education, the good breeding, the middle-class parents. Like Kowalski said, ‘Common’? Yeah…I’m as common as dirt. But I made you feel good, damn good, when we were alone at night.”
“There’s twenty four hours in the day, Peter. The other twenty three and a half weren’t that good.”
“Ditto.”
“Ditto? That’s your clever reply? How many dittos did you put in your new novel; the first novel without me around to edit all your dittos?”
“Hey! What’s going on here?!” Harry came strolling into the lobby, minus his toupee, holding up a hand for them to stop arguing. “Jan, remember our conversation, our arrangement?”
“I was coming in for that, Harry, but I was interrupted.”
“Peter, can you wait another five minutes? I asked Jan to come in this morning.”
“I’ll wait.” Peter sat down on the sofa.
Harry gestured for Jan to go in to his office. She did, Harry followed, and closed the door.
Jan took a seat as Harry walked around and sat down behind his desk.
“You’re going natural today, Harry – no toupee. No special meetings?”
“Only this one, Jan.”
She leaned across the desk and handed Harry the manila folder. “The first three chapters, plus the synopsis, as per your request.”
Harry opened the folder. “No title?”
“No…no title yet.”
“What more do you know about the author, this Louise Carter?”
Jan hesitated. “She’s well educated, she’s new in town, she enjoys jazz, and she likes to write about characters who have their everyday lives turned upside down by extraordinary and unexpected circumstances. She’s a gifted writer Harry.”
Harry read the one-page synopsis. “The synopsis is incomplete,” he said. “There’s no ending, no resolution.”
“She hasn’t finished the manuscript. When she does she’ll complete the synopsis.”
Harry frowned, and started reading the manuscript. The room went silent as Jan anxiously watched Harry’s face for some clue as to weather he liked what he read. Harry remained stone-faced as he turned the first page and started reading the second. A few moments afterward he stopped.
“The writing is rather good, but can she sustain it for three hundred pages?”
“I’m confident that she can. She told me she’ll have three more chapters by Friday.”
“You can email those chapters to me. And I’ll finish reading these during lunch. Most of the staff is off this week, and I still want you to take a vacation. I’m not happy about what happened the other night. I don’t want to fire you Jan, but if something like that happens again I might have no choice.”
“Are you going to extend Peter’s contract?”
“That’s between Peter and me.”
“But this new novel that Peter’s writing; is it as good as the books I edited for him?”
Harry hesitated to answer. “No…it isn’t as good.”
Jan began to smile. “Thanks Harry. I’ll send him in.”
Peter was making notes in his manuscript as Jan walked past him. “You can go in now lover boy.”
Jan kept on walking through the lobby as Peter stood up, admired her figure, and walked into Harry’s office.