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Authors: Rosecrans Baldwin
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a couple in their twenties, new employees from the lab. He added, “It’s your boomer self-regard. People last century were lucky to even make forty.”
This from he who was becoming better-looking with age. Who received daily affirmation of his brilliance, who went on ploddingly succeeding, whereas I could cry a house down. Me of the midlife crisis, sending away for BMW brochures.
The week before Broadway, I wasn’t sleeping. I was petrified into a permanent waking state. I couldn’t read the newspapers. I was convinced some other new show would exhaust the critics’ applause. Obviously Victor knew by then what I was up to (God, I write that as though I’m still guilty about it) and figured he’d been left out, but he didn’t say a word. He never would. He nursed his exclusion: the moping, the hunched shoulders, the earlier morning exits and later returns at night. In situations where normally he’d lead conversation, he went quiet. Where he’d call me on my shit or want in on whatever I was writing, he turned off, shut down, and went back to the lab.
But where I want to go here, where I foresaw myself going, sitting here staring at CVS checkout girls through the window, sitting here while Victor drives back to the lab, already forgetting we just fought, is to dinner.
Two nights before our final dress, a dinner out: me, Victor, and his best friend, Russell. An Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side. It was Russell’s idea, in fact, to celebrate my success. Because already he viewed it as a success, the fact that I’d reached Broadway.
Whereas some people saw only how it could flop.
It was a beautiful night, one of those soft May nights when Manhattan glitters.
“So where’s Victor?”
“Where do you think?”
We ordered wine and sat in the garden. Russell surprised me by asking how I was doing. Normally his self-interest rates its own ecosystem. But he pushed: “Sara, I mean it, how are you?”
And I can still feel him put his hand on top of mine, still remember thinking, God, I hate this movie. But suddenly I was tearing up. I was overwhelmingly sad, as if I’d been that way for a while but hadn’t realized it, and a cry came out as a shudder, a complete meltdown sitting on an imported Tuscan bench.
Victor was an hour and a half late. He apologized profusely, but by then I’d spilled my guts to Russell and I felt great and we were drunk and I don’t know that I noticed. Victor saw what was happening, of course, but he only said something like “Well, I see we’re drinking white” or “Don’t let me hold you guys back.” I don’t know that either of us paid much attention. Russell was openly flirting by that point: with the waitress, the hostess, and especially me. Every woman in the room recognized the situation. Certainly I encouraged him. I laughed louder at his jokes. I was forty years old, and damn if I didn’t want to feel sexy, if I didn’t like looking young in his eyes.
Then at some point Victor asked me pointedly, “So how was rehearsal?” And I remember sobering when he said it. Because all it took was the change in his voice. Between the appetizers and entrees, this quiet moment when his tone stood out for its openness, and so did his face, and I dived in, when with just that one little question he’d made us “us” again, the us I loved. Well, I took him up on it, made some dumb joke before getting to anything real, but just when I stopped joking, when Victor inquired again and pressed me and put his hand on the table near mine, this time asking something more specific, about a certain actress’s tendency to drop lines, Russell interrupted, wanting to know if Victor understood what a hot piece of ass he’d married.
Russell laughed at his own comment and started telling some story. A minute later, Victor excused himself to the restroom, and Russell took the opportunity to tell me what knockout proportions I had, like I was an apartment he wanted to
This from he who was becoming better-looking with age. Who received daily affirmation of his brilliance, who went on ploddingly succeeding, whereas I could cry a house down. Me of the midlife crisis, sending away for BMW brochures.
The week before Broadway, I wasn’t sleeping. I was petrified into a permanent waking state. I couldn’t read the newspapers. I was convinced some other new show would exhaust the critics’ applause. Obviously Victor knew by then what I was up to (God, I write that as though I’m still guilty about it) and figured he’d been left out, but he didn’t say a word. He never would. He nursed his exclusion: the moping, the hunched shoulders, the earlier morning exits and later returns at night. In situations where normally he’d lead conversation, he went quiet. Where he’d call me on my shit or want in on whatever I was writing, he turned off, shut down, and went back to the lab.
But where I want to go here, where I foresaw myself going, sitting here staring at CVS checkout girls through the window, sitting here while Victor drives back to the lab, already forgetting we just fought, is to dinner.
Two nights before our final dress, a dinner out: me, Victor, and his best friend, Russell. An Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side. It was Russell’s idea, in fact, to celebrate my success. Because already he viewed it as a success, the fact that I’d reached Broadway.
Whereas some people saw only how it could flop.
It was a beautiful night, one of those soft May nights when Manhattan glitters.
“So where’s Victor?”
“Where do you think?”
We ordered wine and sat in the garden. Russell surprised me by asking how I was doing. Normally his self-interest rates its own ecosystem. But he pushed: “Sara, I mean it, how are you?”
And I can still feel him put his hand on top of mine, still remember thinking, God, I hate this movie. But suddenly I was tearing up. I was overwhelmingly sad, as if I’d been that way for a while but hadn’t realized it, and a cry came out as a shudder, a complete meltdown sitting on an imported Tuscan bench.
Victor was an hour and a half late. He apologized profusely, but by then I’d spilled my guts to Russell and I felt great and we were drunk and I don’t know that I noticed. Victor saw what was happening, of course, but he only said something like “Well, I see we’re drinking white” or “Don’t let me hold you guys back.” I don’t know that either of us paid much attention. Russell was openly flirting by that point: with the waitress, the hostess, and especially me. Every woman in the room recognized the situation. Certainly I encouraged him. I laughed louder at his jokes. I was forty years old, and damn if I didn’t want to feel sexy, if I didn’t like looking young in his eyes.
Then at some point Victor asked me pointedly, “So how was rehearsal?” And I remember sobering when he said it. Because all it took was the change in his voice. Between the appetizers and entrees, this quiet moment when his tone stood out for its openness, and so did his face, and I dived in, when with just that one little question he’d made us “us” again, the us I loved. Well, I took him up on it, made some dumb joke before getting to anything real, but just when I stopped joking, when Victor inquired again and pressed me and put his hand on the table near mine, this time asking something more specific, about a certain actress’s tendency to drop lines, Russell interrupted, wanting to know if Victor understood what a hot piece of ass he’d married.
Russell laughed at his own comment and started telling some story. A minute later, Victor excused himself to the restroom, and Russell took the opportunity to tell me what knockout proportions I had, like I was an apartment he wanted to
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