Donald Antrim - The Emerald Light in the Air

Jonathan said, “Let’s go,” and he and Deborah rounded the kitchen island. He opened the heavy steel door at the back, near the freezer.

“Aw, fuck,” he said.

The gray stairwell was empty. The door closed behind them and they stood face-to-face under the dim light. Peering at Deborah in the dark put him in mind of Rachel; suddenly he wanted to call her, a bad idea.

Deborah was holding his sleeve again. “Hey,” she said. “How are you doing?”

“All right.”

“I like you,” she said then.

“I like you, too,” he said, and she announced, “I want you to know that if we sleep together and get pregnant I’m keeping the baby.”

He frantically wrenched the door open.

“I don’t know what to say! It used to be that people always smoked in the fire exit!” he blurted.

Where was Sarah? He needed to put things right with her. He stormed out of the kitchen and through to the terrace. On his way, he noticed that a few people at the center of the room had begun subtly dancing to the music playing on the stereo. Sarah was no longer on the terrace. The moon was higher in the sky now. Instead of a dying sunset, he saw in the west a bright metropolis of oil tanks, freeways, and planes taking off or landing at Newark. He’d lost Deborah — abandoned her, really — along the way. Back into the party he went. Then, at a loss over how the evening was going, he made for the front door and the antique cage elevator, which he rode to the lobby with a couple who were leaving the party — but what was he doing? Was he also leaving?

He was. The heat on the street had made a soup of the air. He felt his hair sticking to his forehead. He looked at his phone. He was on the verge of being quite drunk. He put the phone back in his pocket. This was his way of not calling Rachel.

He began walking. There was nothing much to look at on the street: bagged trash and a few brightly lit entryways. He came to a broad artery. Church Street? He was sweating. A couple passed him.

He and Sarah made a couple, didn’t they? Was it too late to phone Rachel? He crossed Church. After another few blocks, he had a feeling that the street was sloping downward.

There was the river. He leaned heavily against a building and dialed, and Rachel answered. “Jonathan?”

“Hey. Is it all right that I called?”

“Not really.”

“Can you talk?”

“Maybe for a minute.”

“I’ve been missing you.”

Rachel said, “You shouldn’t be calling me, Jonathan.”

“I know.” The buildings around him were massive and dark.

“Have you been drinking?” she asked.

“Some.”

“Oh, Jonathan.”

“What?”

“Jonathan, we’ve been over everything. We don’t have anything to talk about anymore.”

“You’re right.”

“I was ready to marry you,” she said.

“Why are you bringing that up?”

“Because you were never going to ask.”

“You don’t know that,” he said. Then he said, angrily, “Hang on, a truck is going by; I can’t hear you.”

“Can you hear me now?”

“Yes,” he said, and she asked, “Where are you?”

He said, “Downtown, near the Hudson,” and she said, “Jonathan, I think I should tell you that Richard and I are moving.”

“Moving? You’re moving? Where?”

“Los Angeles. He has some friends who can hook him up with teaching work at one of the art colleges.”

“Oh.”

“I thought you might have heard from Irena or Paul.”

“What?”

“I said, I thought you might have heard from Irena or Paul.”

“I haven’t talked to either of them.”

“Let’s not fight,” she said.

“I’m not fighting!” he said with a raised voice, and she said, “I heard that you’ve been seeing someone.”

“Oh, God, Rachel,” he whimpered. He was suddenly near tears.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

Then he began to weep. He tried to keep the sound from her. She said, again, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Jonathan.”

Jonathan put his phone back in his pocket. He wiped his wet eyes with his jacket sleeve and thought of Sarah.

By the time he got back up the street to the building, he had pulled himself together. The loft was a mess. The author’s books had disappeared or been scattered. The music was loud; dancing was taking over. A woman in the crowd held her arms high, shaking them in time with the beat.

Rachel, dancing, had always put her head down and tucked herself over and whirled her arms like threshers.

“Sarah!” he called into the mass of people, because he thought he saw her, jumping up and down in the crowd. But it wasn’t her.

Then he glimpsed, in a far corner of the room, what looked like a green shirt. It was William, talking to Sarah and Fletcher. Jonathan saw her look his way; she gave him a weak smile and a little wave, and then Fletcher and William turned and saw him.

“Jonathan,” William called out.

“Jonathan,” Fletcher said.

“Hey, guys,” Jonathan said, and came forward to join them. “I was just looking for you all.”

“We’ve been wondering where you were,” William said.

Jonathan explained, “I went in search of cigarettes. Well, Deborah and I went in search of cigarettes.”

Sarah spoke in a harsh voice. “Did you have any luck?”

“Not a bit,” he said to her.

“I’m surprised,” she said.

“Apparently no one smokes anymore,” he said.

She said, “Lots of people smoke.”

“I guess I’ve been looking in the wrong places,” he told her, and she said, “That sounds right.”

William finally broke in. “We were just talking about how much we hate these kinds of parties.”

“Who’s ready to dance?” Sarah said.

“Let’s go,” William said, and she and he went off together toward the center of the room.

“Do you want a cigarette?” Fletcher asked, taking a pack from his jacket pocket.

“Good God, thank you,” Jonathan said.

It seemed they were going to be friends for the night.

Jonathan said, “Let’s go to the terrace.”

When they got outside, they found Deborah and Kathy.

“Forgive me for running off like that,” Jonathan said to Deborah.

She asked, “Did I scare you?”

“A little,” he said, and laughed, and she laughed, too.

It wasn’t long before Sarah and William appeared, sweaty from dancing. Jonathan took the joint from his shirt pocket and asked, “Does anyone want this?”

Fletcher held the lighter. Jonathan inhaled and then passed the joint to William, who took a puff and gave it to Kathy, who handed it to Sarah. She gave the joint to Deborah, and Deborah took a big hit before offering it to Fletcher, who had some and gave it back to Jonathan, who passed it around again.

“Are you stoned?” a voice asked. It was Sarah.

His body felt heavy, and he could clearly hear the traffic coming and going on the streets and avenues below.

“Kind of. Are you?”

“I’m on the way,” she said.

William said, “I’m ready to dance some more.”

“I’ll go with you,” Deborah said, and Kathy added, “Let’s all go.”

Inside, Deborah and Kathy cleared a space and began gyrating. William followed, and then Sarah, too, began to move.

Jonathan watched her sway to the left then to the right, her arms seeming to float in the air beside her; she looked as if she were in a pleasant trance, like a charmed cobra. Watching her, he felt — what? Appreciation? Affection? Love? He felt himself lucky to be with her, for she made him feel calm, and now he slid up next to her, got his arms partway around her, and lightly pulled her toward him, so that their faces came close to touching. She shut her eyes and let his hands around her waist balance her.