At this hour, in the dark belly of night, the streetlights of Central Park glitter like lost jewels. Charles stands at the window in his study, tracing the path of a lone taxicab as it makes its way beneath the spindly web of trees. He hopes that whoever is in the cab is beautiful and young and that the night holds them gently.
Charles turns away from the window and reaches for the bottle of Chivas on his desk. He pours himself another drink and takes a long, slow sip. The only light comes from a small desk lamp with a green glass shade. Charles is comfortable in its shadows.
It isn’t really Emma’s book anymore. He’s changed virtually every sentence, suggested whole scenes, molded Zack, given the mother complexity and pathos. It’s written in his style; it has his voice. It’s his book now. Besides, he needs it so much more than she does. It’s his resurrection. If Emma publishes the book, it will destroy her. Her past will come out, the media will create a sideshow, and she’ll be turned into a freak: The Girl Who Murdered Her Mother. She’ll have a psychotic break. What had the psychiatrist said? Incipient schizophrenia. Charles has to protect her. She’s all alone in the world.
He walks into the outer office. She’s left a sweater, a simple gray cardigan, on the back of her chair. He picks it up and feels the wool, running it slowly between his fingers. Then he presses his face into the sweater, and smells Emma, his Emma, and thinks of their day together, their lovemaking. They gave each other so much of themselves-from the beginning, really. What he’ll do is set up some kind of fund for her, from the earnings. He’ll call his old Dartmouth classmate, Dan Leber, he’s one of the best psychiatrists in the city. When they finish their work, Emma will need a good long rest somewhere, somewhere in the country, somewhere peaceful.
Charles goes back to his desk and pours himself another two fingers of Chivas, which he downs in a swallow. He’ll have to be very careful from here on in. If he can just keep things on keel for another two weeks, that’s all the time he needs, he’s that close. Portia wrote him a letter, demanding to see the book. And so he’ll show her what he has. He gathers up the manuscript and slides it into a manila envelope. He switches on his computer, its screen bathing him in a ghostly glow, and types the title page: The Sky Is Falling
A novel by
Charles Davis
For the briefest time, between the reveler’s last hour and the laborer’s first, Manhattan feels like a ghost town. In the unearthly calm and quiet, Charles walks out of his building with the manila envelope under his arm. The mailbox is a block away, but it feels like a mile. Charles loves the stillness, the sense of having stepped into a world with its own rules. Of course he’s doing the right thing, the right thing for everyone. He reaches the mailbox and opens it. For a moment he hesitates, and then he drops in the envelope and the box clangs shut.