Jay McInerney - Bright, Precious Days

“I’m sorry, I’m just a little upset. It’s nobody’s fucking business how I edit, but obviously I’d rather not have this in circulation.”

“Well, if you’re lucky, it will find a private buyer who just sits on it until Carson’s really famous.”

“Steve, let me think about this and ring you back. I’ve got to take this call.”

“Suit yourself,” he said.

CORRINE WAS MEETING Veronica and Nancy at Declan’s, the midtown cafeteria of the big publishing houses, literary agencies and TV networks — the kind of place where, if you read Vanity Fair and watched Charlie Rose, you’d recognize many of the faces in the room, and if you were yourself one of those bold-name faces, you’d know everyone at the surrounding tables. Clean and well lighted, with a bleached minimalist decor, the better to show off its complicated patrons, accented with a few mainly abstract canvases on loan from artists who were regulars. The venue was Nancy’s choice; having recently come out of seclusion in Sag Harbor, where she’d been working on a novel, she didn’t want to risk not seeing or being seen.

Walking to the table, Corrine passed a network anchor, a network owner, a movie star and three or four assorted journalists she’d run into with Russell.

As the maître d’ had informed her, Nancy and Veronica were already seated.

“Hello, hi, sorry I’m late.”

“No, that’s okay. We got here early.”

They both seemed nervous, as if they’d been caught talking about her.

“This is such a nice idea,” Corrine said. “We hardly ever do this.”

The other two exchanged a guilty look.

“At least I don’t,” she added.

“It’s true,” Veronica said, “we really should do this more often.”

“But actually, this isn’t necessarily just a casual girls’ lunch,” Nancy said, sounding a little stilted.

“No? What is it?”

The waiter chose this moment to ask what kind of water they would like — all three simultaneously calling for tap.

“Was it the nineties,” Veronica said, “when we discovered bottled water? And how it was so cool to order your name-brand water?”

“Whereas now it’s just pretentious and environmentally unsound,” Nancy noted.

“So what kind of lunch is this?” Corrine asked.

“It’s kind of an intervention,” Nancy said.

“ ‘An intervention’?”

The waiter returned. “May I get you ladies anything to drink?”

Corrine and Veronica ordered iced tea, Nancy a Bloody Mary.

“It can’t be my drinking,” Corrine said after the waiter left.

“It’s more of a relationship intervention.”

“Someone you love reached out to us,” Nancy said.

Corrine felt a tingle of fear at the back of her neck. Her first guilty thought was that this had something to do with Luke, about whom she’d dreamed last night.

“Who are we talking about?”

“Your sister.”

“My sister ?”

“We think she deserves a hearing. It’s been a year, Corrine.”

“She’s very hurt and very sorry for what she said that night. Isn’t it time to forgive?”

“I can’t believe she’s using you guys to get to me. And I can’t believe you’re falling for it.”

“She is your sister,” Nancy said.

Corrine could imagine her staging this, like a scene from one of her books. If she was really unlucky, it might become a scene in one of Nancy’s books.

“And she’s…” Veronica let the predicate hang, unspoken.

“Let me guess: the mother of my children. ”

“I wasn’t going to say it like that. But she did a wonderful thing for you twelve years ago, and surely that counts for something.”

“She wants to know the kids. She misses them. Shouldn’t she have that right?”

“I kind of like the status quo. Honestly, it’s been much less stressful not having her around.”

“Corrine, let’s be honest,” Nancy said. “You’re a little insecure about the whole biological mother thing.”

“I resent that.”

“I know you do. That’s because it’s true. I’m sorry, I love you, but I think you’re almost grateful to have an excuse to keep Hilary away from the kids.”

“I am. She’s a train wreck.”

“Yes, but that’s not what I mean. You’re afraid of what kind of relationship might develop.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it? Come on, Corrine, this is me you’re talking to. I know you.”

Veronica seemed content to sit on the sidelines for the moment.

“Even if you’re right about me, there’s Russell to consider. He’s told me many times he’ll be happy if he never lays eyes on her again.”

“Well, I’m sure you could change his mind.”

“I’m not so sure.”

Nancy’s phone, which was on the table in front of her, buzzed and vibrated.

“She’s here,” she said.

“You didn’t. ”

“Just hear her out.”

“I can’t believe you set me up like this,” she said, seeing Hilary coming toward them on the arm of the maître d’. When Corrine saw how sheepish and cowed she looked, she lost her steely resolve, and by the time Hilary got to the table, her face was quivering with the attempt to contain her emotion. Corrine stood and hugged her sister, irritated at her own soppy reaction.

“I knew if you just saw each other—” Nancy said.

“Oh, shut up,” Corrine said, sitting back down.

“Hey, sis,” Hilary said. “I like your jacket.”

“It’s an old hand-me-down from Casey and I’m sure you’ve seen it before.”

“Chanel is Chanel is Chanel,” Nancy said.

“Is that Shakespeare?” Veronica asked.

“I think it’s Gertrude Stein,” Nancy said. “Well, anyway, Hilary, you look good.”

“I’ve been on a juice fast the last three days, but the sad truth is, I still look at least a year older than I did when you last saw me.”

She did look older to Corrine. Although still annoyingly pretty and shapely, she seemed to have finally entered middle age — if just barely — having belatedly lost her teenaged aspect, although this perception might have been abetted by her outfit, a white blouse buttoned to the neck under a gray suit with a knee-length pencil skirt, the most sensible and sober ensemble Corrine had seen her sister wear since their Nana’s funeral. She was definitely playing the penitent.

“So,” Hilary said. “How’s Russell?”

“Nothing changes chez Calloway. You haven’t missed much.”

Hilary asked for a Bloody Mary and examined her menu. “What should I order?”

“The Cobb salad is the thing to get,” Nancy said. “They have this huge menu, but for some reason nobody ever orders anything else. If you want to feel like a regular, order the Cobb salad and ask them to hold the bacon, the blue cheese, the egg and the dressing.”

“What’s left besides lettuce?”

“Not much. Water and fiber and the sweet smell of self-denial.”

“Actually, that doesn’t sound bad,” said Corrine. It was just the sort of thing that drove Russell crazy; she could hear him saying, Cheese and bacon is what makes it a Cobb salad, goddamn it, but unlike most humans, she wasn’t all that crazy about either, and she hated heavy lunches. She didn’t like walking around feeling like a stuffed sausage in the afternoon. When the waiter returned, Corrine ordered the Cobb without the cheese and bacon. She retained the egg, though, and asked for the dressing on the side.

The waiter listened stoically as each of them subtracted ingredients from their salads. “Anything to start?” he asked wistfully.

“Let’s get a bottle of wine,” said Nancy.