New York for Beginners (31 page)

Then Zoe turned to Tom. “I miss Brooklyn. Even though I only lived here for a few weeks,” she said. “Maybe we should move to Brooklyn someday.”

“But only if we talk about this prenup first, my dear,” Tom responded.

Zoe rolled her eyes. “All right. What do you want?”

“For you to sign the contract.”

“I won’t be bought.”

“Nobody’s trying to buy you, Zoe. It’s only for your own security,” Tom explained patiently yet again.

Then Zoe had a brilliant idea. “OK!” she said.

Tom eyed her in surprise. “You’re signing?”

“Yes,” Zoe answered triumphantly. “I’ll sign. And, if I ever end up having to take that money, I’ll donate all of it to the Bowery Mission for the homeless.”

“You’re crazy,” was all that Tom could say.

“And that’s exactly why you love me,” Zoe retorted and raised her glass for a toast.

After dessert, the guests started walking over to the south edge of the roof. Strange splashing noises, squeaks, and whoops had been coming from that direction for a while now. They peeked over the railing and saw that down below, in the inner courtyard, college kids in underwear were jumping off a ramshackle diving board made from wooden crates into a water-filled industrial garbage container. They had created their own little private swimming pool.

“That gives Dumpster diving
a whole new meaning!” Tom said in amusement. He put his arm around Zoe’s shoulders. Now that the matter concerning the prenup had been cleared up—if only in Zoe’s very unique way—he was obviously more relaxed.

Zoe laughed. “What does Cindy Adams always write in the
New York Post
? Only in New York, kids. Only in New York.”

31

AUGUST

It was August 4. The day of days. Lately, Zoe had been walking every morning from Wooster Street all the way up to her office in the Flatiron District. She didn’t have to wear heels anymore like she’d had to at
Vision
. At General Assembly, it was flip-flops, Crocs, or Chucks. When she reached the corner of Broadway and Houston, her eyes were drawn to a huge billboard that had been put up about a hundred yards away on Lafayette Street, above the strange gas station that seemed to be frequented solely by taxi cabs. Usually there was a Calvin Klein ad up there with some iconic New York scene. But today there was a slogan in pale-orange letters with gray-and-white pebbles and an ocean scene in the background: “www.yearning.com. Make yourself happy.”

For a few seconds, Zoe stopped, awestruck. She had never been this proud of herself before. Her project. On one of the most iconic billboards in the world. She skipped back up Broadway and murmured her new mantra: “Yearning. Make yourself happy.”

It was perfect!

When she got off the elevator on the fourth floor, Justus was already waiting by her office door with his arms crossed, like a teacher about to tell his student to go stand in the corner. “You’d better not read today’s paper,” he warned morosely. “It’ll put you in a bad mood.”

Zoe’s heart skipped a beat, and a terrible queasiness spread in her stomach. “It’s that bad?”

“Even worse,” Justus muttered.

On her desk, Zoe found the all-morning media review, which was created by Schoenhoff’s PR team every morning for the heads of office. It was comprised of all the important news that concerned the company. It began with an article by the German Media Service about Yearning’s launch.

A web portal that nobody needs, for people who already have everything.

Schoenhoff Publishing, the powerful media conglomerate that likes to mask itself as a grassroots company, is known for many things. For example, the phone book–sized Schoenhoff catalog that blocks up German mailboxes every spring and fall, for which entire forests are killed every time.

In short: It would be as credible for Schoenhoff to start a gigantic ad campaign for a goody-two-shoes website with the borderline-idiotic name Yearning as it would be for Rupert Murdoch to publish an ethics magazine.

Zoe could hardly believe her eyes. She was on the verge of finding a Kleenex to mop up the malice that was dripping from the article onto her desk. To be fair, the German Media Service was known for its cynically harsh tone. That was the reason everyone in media read it every morning with the utmost pleasure. But would it be wrong to want a little more impartiality?

The whimsical little team of Yearning, comprised of fashion minx Zoe Schuhmacher and the prodigal son, Justus von Schoenhoff, couldn’t be a better cast for a despicable and heavily masked consumption machine for people who already have everything, want even more, and can’t even admit it to themselves. Zoe Schuhmacher understands as much about sustainability as a vegetarian would understand about the subject of Kobe beef. And Justus von Schoenhoff, well, he’s back, and had to be presented with some no-brainer project by Mommie Dearest. Except he’s making a completely carbon dioxide–free and animal-testing-free mess of the few wee millions he has.

Whimsical? Fashion minx? Few wee millions? Zoe picked up the review with two fingers and threw it into the garbage in disgust, as if it was a piece of a newspaper she’d just used to clean dog poop off her shoes. “That’s so mean! And unfair!”

Justus only nodded. Then he said slowly: “If you don’t like the heat, get out of the kitchen. That’s how that saying goes, right?”

“Stupid saying!” Zoe cried impatiently and reached for the media review with imaginary dog poop on it. “What do the others say?”

A raw product made up of organic food, good tidings, and a bit of bohème for a target audience that probably doesn’t even exist. (Media Decoder, New York Times)

Wannabe-trendy zeitgeist, which seems completely cynical amid the climate of a worldwide economic crisis, growing unemployment rates, and fear of terrorism. (DasMedienBlog.de)

Baking, knitting, crafts—but organic, please. Housewifey flair from the fashion icons at
Vision.
Cute! (Berliner Neue Nachrichten)

Zoe lowered the media review. “Was that it?” she asked quietly in the direction of the other side of the desk.

Justus grinned at her. “That was it!” he called out in delight.

Zoe didn’t quite understand. “What is there to be so happy about? We were just torn apart by the critics, Justus.”

“Why should we care about the critics if the users love us?”

Zoe jumped up from her chair and ran to join Justus, who kept pointing at his screen in triumph.

“Is that Google Analytics?”

“Exactly,” Justus exclaimed and followed the steeper and steeper graph that showed www.yearning.com’s visitor stats. The site hadn’t even been up for 24 hours, and already it had 20,000 visitors.

“I think the users . . . like us,” Zoe stammered.

“Not like. Love. They
love
us,” Justus cried out and hugged Zoe so tightly that she hoped she wouldn’t crack a rib.

“Why didn’t you tell me right away, you jerk?” Zoe asked, poking him.

“It was worth it to see your face while you were reading the media review,” Justus said with a grin.

Zoe went into the office kitchen, where she’d been hiding a bottle of champagne. When she returned to their desks, she popped the cork.

When Tom and Zoe returned to their loft on Wooster Street that night, Tom went straight into the kitchen to open their very personal bottle of champagne.
Forrest Gump was right,
Zoe thought.
Life really is like a box of chocolates!
You never knew what you might get. But sometimes, when the Universe or the Big Boss—or whoever was in charge up there—meant well for you, or if you were just damn hardworking and a little lucky, too, you got two big, fat chocolate-toffee truffles with chopped pistachios on top.

Zoe set down her new Reed Krakoff briefcase in her study and looked out onto New York’s skyline. Over the rooftops on the other side of the street, she could see the Empire State Building on the horizon. It glowed in red floodlights like it usually would only for Valentine’s Day. Exactly a year ago, Zoe had come to New York with the best of resolutions. She thought back to Allegra’s favorite quote from the day of her very first walk in the city: “There really is one city for each of us, just as there is one true love.”

“And I got both things at once. I basically won the lottery,” she said to herself. “My city and my true love.”

Then she noticed that the little red light on the answering machine was flashing.

She pressed “Play.”

“Hello, Tom, daaaahling! How are you?”
a female voice with a nasal British accent said.
“This is Vicky. I think we should think this divorce thing over again . . . and by the way, I moved. I’m calling to give you my new number: 212-884-4999. Call me!”

Of course, 212 was New York’s area code.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks a million . . .

It’s been a few years now since I was standing by the fireplace near the bar in the middle of winter in the (previously) extremely exclusive restaurant the Waverly Inn (no phone number, no email address, no reservations for mere mortals) making small talk with a man in a suit whose golden buttons flashed in the firelight.

“Cozy warm in here,” I said.

“Like Bermuda in January,” the gold-buttoned man responded.

I’d never been to Bermuda in January. Or in February. Or in March. So what did I say? Nothing. I just stowed away the exchange somewhere in my brain, mixed up with other noteworthy encounters—and wrote a novel about it.

The characters in this book are all fictitious, but the situations in which they find themselves have mostly occurred that way, or could have. (My left turns in driving are still fantastic. Any previous passenger of mine will be able to confirm that!)

This book would never have been developed, expanded, reworded, proofread, corrected, and published if the following people hadn’t believed in me: I would like to thank my wonderful literary agent Georg Simader and his great team from the Copywrite agency for their enthusiastic support and the encouragement to walk new paths.

Also, thanks so much to the wonderful Amazon Publishing team; my brilliant translator Kate Northrop, who solved many tricky little cross-cultural issues; and to my US editor Hana Landes for her incredible eye for detail.

I received valuable input and some extra motivation from the people who endured my requests to read various versions or solve my technical questions (Would Zoe rather wear a wrap dress by Diane von Furstenberg or a little piece by Victoria Beckham?): Carolin, Matthias, Jan, Lino, Jobst, Pit, Nadine, Olga, Harry, Vanessa, Caterina—and Tanja, of course; my special thanks for getting tonsillitis at the exact right time.

And thanks a million to the two most important people in my life: M & N, who always believe in me. You guys are my rocks!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Photo © 2010 Christopher Lane

Susann Remke was born in Nuremberg, Germany, and studied English literature, American studies, sport science, and journalism in both the US and Germany. She has been living in New York for more than ten years with her husband, son, and two cats. She reports directly from the Big Apple for a major German news magazine.
New York for Beginners
is her first novel.

www.newyorkfueranfaengerinnen.de

www.susannremke.de

ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR

Photo © 2011 Alex Maechler

Kate Northrop grew up in Connecticut and studied music and English Literature in the United States and the United Kingdom, until she decided to try out life as a musician. Her travels took her to the German-speaking part of Switzerland, where she has lived since 1994 with her Swiss husband and their two bilingual children. She now works as both a professional translator and a lyricist. She has written lyrics for more than two hundred songs, and her credits include songs signed to major publishers, lyrics for a song in the soundtrack of an award-winning German film, and many more. She has translated several novels.