Book of Numbers: A Novel (74 page)
Read Book of Numbers: A Novel Online
Authors: Joshua Cohen
Tags: #Fiction, #Literary, #Retail, #Technological, #Thrillers
Pod caffeine, strudel in a sleeve. And while I was at it, why not, grabbing the giveaway notebooks and ballpoints.
Lisabeth helmed the booth in mourningdress chic, channeling both the orphan and widow (typesetting jargon: an orphan the opening line of a paragraph stranded alone at the bottom of a page, a widow the closing line stranded alone at the top). It was as if she’d traveled prepared for a loss, a charcoal dress quivering to the knees. Her face was swollen from the crying or bouquets. Aaron would’ve appreciated that—he’d always been attracted to women allergic to flowers, and latex.
The foldingtable was shrouded in blueblack linens, furled roses and closelipped tulips, bonbons, sekt. Bereavement cards in soft and hardback, boxed sets. I lined behind the wild sprigs of a deliverer who turned around and cringed. My jaw must’ve been trickling again. Lisabeth signed for him, took another babysbreathed bouquet, set it among the
aster strewings, doing her duty stalwart. Such rectitude, she wouldn’t even avail herself of a chair, but stayed standing as if all the books the agency had ever represented were balanced on her head.
I was about to pay a visit emptyhanded.
But then a woman cut in front of me—Cal’s editor, Lene Termin, Earth Mother. A batik peasant smock, a chunky butchness latebloomed with antidepressants.
Lene didn’t even meet my sneer, only said, “Pardon, Entschuldigung.”
She said to Lisabeth, “Pat Sagenhaft, my partner, just picked Seth up at Newark.”
“So helpful,” was all Lisabeth had.
“Pat’s going to sit in with him and the lawyer—Rich?”
“Spence Rich.”
“But just in an advisory capacity—make sure no one’s getting shafted.”
“Thanks.”
“That meeting’s for noon, NY noon. Meantime and with your OK I’ll go personally make the followup calls, to reassure the clients, offer like second opinion, outsider perspective. The immediate goal is fending off the poachers.”
“I understand. And thanks.”
“Again I can’t stress this enough, I’m here for you—Aaron meant a lot to me. If it makes sense to merge, you’ll merge—I’ve already got a few names in mind and even just casually a couple of feelers.”
“Already?”
“Too soon, but—interesting feelers.”
“Your partner Pat’s still with Riba Group, yes? Or Schwartzlist?”
“Then again it’s never too soon—especially with our girl to take care of, the princess of Princeton.”
“Achsa.”
“Exactly—we’ll be sure to involve her in all aspects of the process.”
“Achsa,” Lisabeth snuffed.
“I’m so proud of how you’re holding up, Lisabeth—that won’t go unnoticed. Now is there anything else I can do?”
There was nothing, and Lene lunged across the table to roll Lisabeth in her breast, then left, oblivious of me. Aar had loathed her—“Hel” he’d called her, “Helene, Queen of the Norse,” senior editor at Viking.
Lisabeth, poor wealthy Lisabeth who’d never understood how to take advantage, forsaken by her lanky associate with the quiff and clip, her underling, but in terms of power dynamics, overling, Seth—I could write it out already, it could write itself out clearly even black on black: Seth would coordinate publicity, the funeral, any lunches he’d take with other agents from other agencies he’d explain away as merely convivial, or acculturating, but then by the time Lisabeth’d get back to NY Seth would’ve installed himself either in Aar’s old corner niche, after having removed Miri’s sexless bed and finally fumigated the closets of her mothballs, or in newer officing toward the top of a Flatiron vivarium repping the bottom half of the list, which, the bottom half quarter, would mean repping me. Clever boy. With any brains he’d eventually move into media, but still keep a bit of lit to keep the cred up. If he or his next partners had any class they’d offer Lisabeth a job, or wouldn’t, that’s the only point on which I’m undecided—I’m sure Lene’ll be in touch.
To me, Lisabeth said, “The news just broke online.”
“Seth?”
“He wrote the statement, but I—why do you deserve an explanation? And what happened to your cheek?”
“I don’t. And Iceland happened.”
“Another tragedy another excuse to drink? You’re bleeding.”
“Take it from me: Bleeding means I have a heart.”
“Anyway,” Lisabeth shrilled, “before he flew back he left this envelope for you,” and she handed me a manila.
“Who? Seth did?” I gutted it for what, I’m not sure—a book already lost? already finished?
“It’s Cal’s, his manuscript. Seth said Cal was giving you a copy. For your thoughts. If you have any thoughts.”
“Appreciated.”
“You’re not acting appreciative. What did you expect?”
“Forget it.” The titlepage was inscribed: “With compliments and condolences—we have to be in touch—[email protected].”
“Care to tell me what you’re doing here, Josh?”
“What?”
“Here, in Frankfurt, why?”
“Aar never told you?”
“Told me what?”
“He never said anything about Switzerland? Our deal?”
“You have a deal or just a proposal, and didn’t you just say Iceland?”
“He mentioned nothing whatsoever?”
“All I have is what I get from your wife.”
“Exwife.”
“Not yet. Don’t worry, though—don’t tell me where you’re living and I can’t tell her where to have you served.”
“It’s complicated, Lis.”
“That’s what her companion’s always saying, the actor. Phoning twice a day about an Amex bill. He canceled the card. But he’s wondering for next time whether it pays to get the extra identity theft protection. I’m like customer care with him. Member services.”
“So you’re just the person to talk to.”
“What?”
“My money—can I have it?”
She stiffened, “Your money for what?”
“That’s why I was meeting Aar.”
“He was giving you a loan?”
“It was sort of like he owed me.”
“So send a record or invoice, I’ll have a check sent when I’m back.”
“Not happening.”
“If it’s an address thing I can wire you online.”
“Not that. Cash.”
Lisabeth—let her be stunned by the gall of it all and not the truth of it. She tonguewriggled her toothgap, “Cash?”
“I need it bad.”
“You need it badly.”
“That’s correct.”
“But Seth has the agency Visa.”
“You can’t just stake me yourself?”
One inflamed white bud at tonguetip, “I make $40K a year.”
“You make $60K.”
“OK, $60.”
“Just help me out, Lis. I promise I’m good for it.”
She held her purse, both hands. That’s it. Nothing else and no deeper
meaning. Lisabeth held onto her purse with both hands. She pallbore toward the rear of the hall—heels icepicking past the newest electroflex displays and penputing and fingerink platforms, then wading sullen through crumpled snowballs of epaper—to a temporary slidewall set with fussy ATMs. As we waited our turn she went on a pillage for the appropriate card—tampon, aloe handsanitizer, lipstick, gums, cherry suckers—verlag businesscards origamized or anxiously twisted, laundryoom passkey, Tetheld, lists, personal debit, platinum Visa, its frosty hologram unmistakable.
“Just use that one,” I said. “That has to be your parents’. ”
To be desperate is to live off what others let you have—I wonder if Aar ever met, and if so what his impressions were of, her parents.
She snorted and did the hairtuck behind the ears, what loyalty. Pathic girl, ticridden girl, who typed with nibbled nails and left voicemails with bruxism. She’d tolerated so much, so many clients reliant, and Aar, who’d insisted on salutations on email, phone honorifics, smoking indoors, rye in the drawer, regular drycleaning. He’d preferred the place 10 blocks south unless he’d needed the suit same day, in which case there was a place two blocks north, though he’d always leave it up to her to intuit which he’d needed. This was what I wanted to tell her, how grateful Aar’d been, how appreciative. How freeing but how guiltily freeing it was now that he wasn’t around to stop me from deceit.
With our turn I hung back, pointlessly because Lisabeth faced fully machineward, screening me from the screen and the keypad, her mouthbreathing fogging the prompts but not her compliance. To both sides other patrons swiped, tapped, scifi luminance and blare, sci-nonfi. The units were teleporters, timemachines. This wasn’t Frankfurt anymore, but Whitehall Street 2002. This was Miri’s bookstore, but in its afterlife as bank, and not even a fullservice bank, just machined, a Chase, which anytime I visited Aar’s office above it I took as command, chase the past forever. This was Achsa’s first time back since the space’s conversion. Aar, who had to work, and had no babysitter, and had to get cash anyway, had turned it into a lesson. Achsa knew what she stood in, tile, plateglass, she knew what’d happened to her mother’s books, the same thing that’d happened to her mother. They’d gone away and been turned into money. She’d asked how the cash got into the machine and Aar’d asked her back,
just guess. Achsa’d said maybe it was printed, like a printer was housed inside each unit. Try again. Maybe it was like a sewer, she’d said, or like with trees, the roots of trees, the money was always just flowing through tubes, which routed it to blossom at locations of customer request. Aar’d loved that explanation. On the way home they’d passed a produce stand, he’d said, and Achsa hadn’t known what to make of an apple whose stem still had its leaf. It was news to her and shared delicious.
Choose English. I snagged the first two digits of Lisabeth’s PIN. 8, 0. Choose the cash advance.
“How much?”
“How much’s the max?”
Her $500/withdrawal limit rounded to €360, apparently, which we went for four times, and I even went in for scolding her, made her wait around for the last receipt to spit, while her Tetheld quaked with calls, msgs, txts, Momcell, Daddygreenwichwork, and fraud alert premonitions, and she ignored them.
What mystified, though, and heartened, was her holding out the bills and saying, “How are you going to convince me to expense this?”
“I’m a client, aren’t I? Haven’t we been discussing me?”
She shelled shut her wallet and pursed it. “Just don’t lose it.”
“All spending is losing, but sure.”
She yelled, “I don’t mean the money. Get drunk again, get a prostitute. You dick. I mean Cal’s novel—we can’t have it floating around.”
The envelope, which I’d been carrying. “Confirmative.”
A sigh. “Josh, tell me—why aren’t writers invited to Frankfurt?”
“Why?”
“Because they can’t deal with the fact that this is a business.”
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a-bintel-b.tlog.tetrant.com/2011/01/07/thedumpydump2
expectancy. life comes first in semesters for school second in quarters for career and third in trimesters after which life ends and no one hangs with friends. but when i got pregs all my friends had become mothers already and they hadnt had time for me in semesters quarters my first trimester where they finally surfaced because i was finally becoming their peer. babyclothes and cribs and strollers and just about every other type of castoff handmedown bottle bootie were arriving by mail or being dropped off and explained over wheatgrass juice and muffintop brownies.
moom wanted to know how long i intended to nurse before she told me how long was recommended but her recommendation was shorter than anything in books or on
weaner.org
. its def a girl or boy i can tell moom was always telling me and “emi” said wed want to know before and that was the best decision and “tal” said we absolutely wouldnt want to know before and that was the best decision. hospital drugs and the nosocomical infections had to be weighed against the risk of homebirth and if homebirth a decision had to be made whether to purchase a tub or borrow a friends and disinfect it. like if you go to do what your parents did if you cursed as a kid you washed the kids mouth out but now that was considered abuse and if you did that you had to be concerned with whether what you washed with contained toxins.
but $@#! it was $@#!ing exhilarating. i was glowing healthy and even smelled nice like a bakery of pearls j said i wasnt showing just yet. the fertility docs each recommended their own gynobstetrician so we went browsing and still to doc meanley who was encouraging. he said we were doing better than ever until he pressed
j to share and j who never liked being pressed said that he considered a child like a book like hed get to write a child but doc meanley dispproved and asked what happens if you get blocked dont books end up writing you and though j was peeved doc meanley pressured more by claiming that j was being “aversive.” He asked why did you try for a baby if you dont actually want a baby to which j asked “why did i get married if i didnt actually want a marriage” and the doc said it was enough with the “aversives” but then j said “i got married and am having a baby with her so that no one else would [have to????] because i love her so much” what a schmuck if youre reading this having you in my life was already like having a child.
work was so great to me too that already just the moment i told my boss “ben itkowitz” (
reread my pseudo/anonymity policy
) he was jumping up and down with me saying bubele take all the leave you need. which in ben language meant you best square everything away before you pop one. which meant training my templacement just personable enough that s/he would get on as comfy as sportswear with the clients but also just shoddy and incompatent enough for dealing with coworkers officeside that s/hed get fired if they didnt consult me on every single detail throughout my maternity. that was the only move to make according to “emi” and “tal” for u&i to beg me back to acct mgmt and beyond that promote me. also i needed to prepare clientside transitions for all the open accts though i have to be careful what im typing “net bank of new england ii” “manic webisode” “hellacopter: da game” “pomegranate” “beverage” all while brainstorming a campaign for the alarm system thing and planning the probono.
the msgings always the difficultest but dealing with the city its doubled. the conceptual idea of it was about links between the local and nonlocal or between personal health and the environment. it was an initiative directed at minority communities that are come on in the majority if you ever get out of the cabs. now just lump general women and children in with the minorities and
you already have three quarters of the city and the rest are jewish males (the bulk of who are HANDICAPPED).
wed been working on the proposal copy/design for the promo material different versions for different schools and religious groups for community leaders and parents. it never made any sense that though the work was probono we still had to pitch but we did and so went downtown to the school like ps 188 that was interim headquarters until the office at the health dept got its hvac cleaned of mold.
a guard ushered us down the hall amid all the students leaving and told us to wait by the lockers and we obeyed like we ourselves were still in school and the guard became a teacher. i felt like that difficult to describe to anyone who hasnt felt it feeling of being elated but crap and feeling id rather be going with the students heading out from last class or extracurriculars to snuggle into carrot celery hummus and a nap. the students were so big in their bodies but their faces were small and they carried what i had high in front of me low on their backs huge enormous sagging backpacks. they were asian hispanic and every other race to justify my decision about bringing along “khan” who was pakistani and “rod” who was half brazilian half korean i think though this wasnt their acct. they were just relatively between accts at the agency and ive always known how to present. the rest of my team was “jim” and “jon” two guys (black) (and gay and jacked and impeccably tailored my bangers my banging creatives was our jk though they werent romantically involved with each other and me a preggers white girl rounding out her 20 lbs heavier filenes basement going out of business suit.
i wasnt sure what we were waiting for and then i was sure and getting queasy. i hadnt been told this was a cattle call the type in which prospective clients interview a number of agencies or i had been told and id forgotten but whichever i was flustered nauseated or nauseous j always corrected me. [501c3s and public agencies are worse than private corporations theyre the absolute worst to work with please forgive the digression. the money given to
them out of the goodness of hearts or from taxes doesnt go to the hungry children without healthcare but to midlevel professionals on disability and though i understand why a for profit has to try to get the best work for the best price the city likes to swing dick the same way and had already smacked u&i $20k in the hole on a campaign that ultimately lost its winner 4x that. well beyond any monies saved in the deductibles. still profile was enhanced.] i got that it was a cattle call and that i was the cow with the door letting out a team from an agency ill just call “the white agency.” they all were hauling out their mockups i didnt have a chance to eval because of a pet the bulge reunion with this totes bitch wasp girl who shrieked that she hadnt known i was preggers as if we were friends and id neglected to tell her and she wrapped herself around me to exaggerate how burst i was but i only said i thought shed been laidoff and had gone into media admin or alumni affairs for like marymount or williams.
we went in after into not anything administrative but just this classroom all set up like a classroom just chilling. it made me think no way im going to send my kid to this or any other publicschool im just going to follow “tali” and move back to wykagyl or the north shore of the island or do like “emi” and straight from the hospital fill out an application for the 92nd st y anything but abuse my own kid like this. It was just this spare ugly dropceiling sheet tile flooring streaked like the dryerase board dented globe dump. At a table the color and greasy texture of fries and a seeded bun stool the size of a burger i eased down onto slow like i was at maximum capacity already.
now im already on thin ice writing about a client so im just going to composite with the assurance that unlike with j everything is true but the job must be protected. its really difficult to do that because i just have this urge to go ahead and type because there arent any consequences here in front of me besides my smoothie. in the future there will have to be this immunity. this immunization booster or whatevs that lets me both vent and erase lets me both tetrant and delete because i can say from experience from having been on the other end the receiving end that a spouse cant
be just a recipient or sender. there really have to be better ways than this or crumbling cookies and sneaking a scoop of yellow cakebatter icecream into my smoothie to cope with the pressure. “verna smith” sat atop the teachers station across from us. she was the project mgr. an old but young mix of black mama poet laureate with dreadbraids twisted through cowry shells dangling peacock feathers and white dyke flannel over chinos. then maybe two maybe three other people inhouse. communications personnel at the health and education depts.
“verna” was talking forever about the project the expectations whatevs but always bringing it back around to her resume or core principles. it was difficult to pay attention especially by “in my socialwork days up in the Bronx” but also because of the cramping just severe excruciating cramping. though i dont mean to be so mean. its difficult because im making up “verna” from the combo of two people honestly the project comanagers and the one from health was tolerable enough because about to retire and haitian french but the other from education was middleaged an irish catholic phd cunt who said things like “advertising in schools can be justified only as a teachable moment for media literacy.”
i was so out of it i could only could barely poke my bangers to represent. “jim” and “jon.” big mistake. biiiig miiiistake. “jim” opened up with the tag “eat junk feel city” because he wrote it and was sure of its humor but the depts either didnt get it or did and just sat as he did the dumbest thing and tried to sell the sell or just neutralize by explaining that the agency didnt think the city was shitty or might be in any way associated with junkfood however we did think the msg would register with youth and i was feeling junky shitty myself. “jon” picked up with “get nutritionated” which was greeted similarly. neither of these were the tags to start with and i thought they knew that i mustve told them that with the city they had to start conservative and work up to the risquey or what the braindead would find risquey they had elected officials to please it was wet the stool. i got shaky up and ignoring the sense of having pissed myself had rod and khan hold the boards “eat and run—or walk—or bike” “eat the world
(in moderation)” my hand was trembling. but those only launched education “verna” into this on the rag rant about such “old played out dichotomies.” though health “verna” had no issue with “edgy” the hope was to “get the best msg to the worst affected” education said “this has to be a quality of life initiative with a secondary benefit educational component delivered about or even through the very medium of ad culture inculcating critical reading techniques and consumer scepsis? skepsis? vital to differencing between exploitative msging and healthy mealplanning public service announcements.” as comparables were being cited from like the american heart association and the presidents council on physical fitness i was dying literally physically dying. but just then “jon” and “jim” interrupted what was becoming another miracle of “verna” converting crackheads in tremont by recounting the modalities of the multiple intelligences. “the healthiest dinners have the shortest commutes” campaign featured an extension of the subway map extending the lines out of the boroughs into farm country to encourage consumers to relate to dutchess county and the mexicans who picked in jersey. “next bus: 2-10 minutes next local apple season: 1 year.” and the “vernas” said “wed be very pleased to further this discussion” i was doubling over. and the “vernas” said “well be in touch” i was bent over my hands on the table slipping ketchup mustard picklewater blood slurping down my stockings and through the mesh a gob on the tip of a heel.
now you and i mean you (but not you ladies. you. were supposed to be in dc. some archaeology conference. my memorys perfect. like a computers memory perfect. like a wrinkling going gray elephant computer. but let me check
they dont have elephants in mesoamerica
. it was supposed to have been some convention about mesoamerican archaeology four days three nights and this was just in the middle. youd been excited about it couldnt stop talking about it. i couldnt help but be excited for you. but then i was being squeezed toward the school lobby. “jim.” “jon.” hero friends. everything was a hero the hallways were heroes just for being halls and the lockers that stayed shut for me were heroes and the doors that were being opened for me were heroes and
everyone was a hero except the education people and even the health people who did nothing but wait around houston street for the 911 “verna” called while even the guard was out yelling and hailing cabs though no cab would take us and 911 took forever. “verna” cradled me with womens room papertowels and told me about her two children who were grown architects in new orleans and how her daughter used to work much before my time and more in acct services at an agency ive forgotten. “verna” hung over me asking questions not to keep me with it but to accuse what did i eat did i drink enough was i on any drugs who remembered. my memorys as perfect as something i cant think about just now like how you j youd be writing your hackwork online and wouldnt know what analogy to use youd take a break and read some poetry and then return to work and write that whatever it was the experience of being in a hotel or motel or b&b inn was like poetry that was your default analogy. in the ambulance up 1st ave i had my bangers scrolling my contacts for you and calling but your phone was off and they were leaving msgs delirious. yo um j man your wifes going to where we going where. bellevue er. it was strange when they said your full name. which i never did because you dont deserve the vowels. through admissions before turning the corner i had enough mind presence to tell them how my mother was listed as moom and the bangers got her on the line and before they hung up she was already driving the triboro. then they kept calling you through the day through the night staying all that time until “ben” came too and kept moom company until d&c became dilation and curettage and she was let into my room and coming to all i said was that the day before the night before everytime id called youd picked up. i had moom call “tal” and “emi” and i talked to them while moom on her own initiative called your mother but i wouldve told her that was pointless you tell your mother nothing you hide and keep secrets from everyone and this is the repulsivity j how you keep them from yourself so who knows if she even knew i was preggers the bitch didnt even offer to drive up. then because i told moom you were in dc because you were writing walltxt for the met she
called the met but they were closed and she got lost in the menus and transfers. she went to the apt and got the paper where you wrote down where you were staying but the numby and addy you gave were for two different dc hiltons and neither had a record of you as a guest and beyond that no record of archaeology either and moom came back to my room and immediately told me because j you have to respect and be open with the ones you love even if it slays them. because though what you dont know cant hurt you used to be legit now theres nothing that cant be known and so the greatest pain has become not the act itself but the thought of you trying to conceal it from me and how stupid that is and how pitiful the failure how petty. but at the time and it mightve been the anesthetic all my reaction was defending you to moom saying that you were always garbling logistics and that was accurate saying that you probably hadnt booked your own room and that was probably accurate too and reception clerks understand nothing about cuttingedge archaeology. also i was flipping because they gave me doxycycline a tetracycline or teratogen that causes birth defects as an antibiotic and not clindamycin with a shorter halflife so we wouldnt have to wait as long to try again. i wanted nothing i just wanted it out of my system now but though the nurses kept saying discharge and i kept saying discharge moom was just trying to get everyone talking about the same thing. also in the middle of that conversation j you called. you knew what was going on but pretended you didnt because you knew that if i found out youd checked your msgs before just calling me back the moment you turned your phone back on id be whacked youd be. i knew that you knew i was wasted because i didnt interrogate you on why youd turned your phone off or were pretending. we had levels between us deep with meaning to excavate. fuck you and fuck your mummy. you checked the amtrak schedule and said youd be back in four hours but that was a typical exaggeration because it took you all of six and moom who wouldnt leave the room to let me take the call alone had already gotten me back to the apt by then and wouldnt leave until you got
there or here and even after discharge the discharge continued and like with this its still sour fresh.