Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney - The Nest

“True. Yes. For now. We’re going slowly, but it’s good so far.”

“I’m happy for you, mate. Don’t fuck it up this time.”

“I’m not planning to,” Leo said, bristling a little at the sanctimonious comment. Nathan had fucked up plenty of relationships in his day. “I’m ready to get back in the game, so to speak. That’s one of the reasons I wanted to see you.”

“I thought as much. I’ve heard you’ve been dropping my name around town. Telling people we’re working together.”

“That’s not true,” Leo said, stunned that his movements had already been reported to Nathan.

“I’ve heard it from more than one person.”

“Stephanie told me about your idea and I was curious. Really curious. I’m interested. I’ve been making calls and doing research and asking questions, but I never misrepresented myself. I never told anyone I was working with you or that we had any official affiliation. The conclusions people draw on their own when they hear my name and your name are not my doing.”

Nathan stared at Leo for a few minutes, assessing. “Okay. I see how that’s possible. I hope it’s true.”

“It is true.”

“Because I can’t hire you.”

“Can we back up a little?” Leo couldn’t believe he’d lost control of the conversation so quickly. “Can we start over? I know you’re busy and I came prepared.”

“I’m confused as to why you’d want to be involved with this fairly modest project I’m considering.”

“It doesn’t sound modest. It sounds ambitious and worthwhile.”

“Believe me, it’s modest.”

“It also sounds like something that was once my idea.” Leo stopped; he hadn’t intended to bring that up at all and certainly not so quickly. He couldn’t let Nathan rattle him.

Nathan looked up at the ceiling, as if seeking for patience from above. “You hardly invented the concept of an online literary magazine. Don’t go Al Gore on me, Leo.”

“I know. I’m sorry. That came out wrong. I — we — have the experience. We were a good team. You don’t even want to hear my thoughts? You know what I can do.”

Now Nathan let go his booming laugh. Leo was unnerved by how casual he seemed, how matter-of-fact. “Sadly, that is very, very true.”

“Let me just give you a quick overview, how I think you could expand Paper Fibres in some really interesting and fruitful ways.” Leo opened up his folder and took out the stack of printed pages.

“Jesus,” Nathan said. “Did you make a PowerPoint deck?”

Leo ignored him, paging through the sheets in front of him and pulled out one with a mocked-up logo. “Right down to an event-based app that would also push content.” Leo put the page in front of Nathan who stared at it, confused.

“An app?”

“You’ve got to have an app.”

“This is not news to me, Leo. Every sixteen-year-old in New York City is trying to build an app.”

Leo said, “That’s one tiny element. I have an entire—”

Nathan interrupted. “Leo, I appreciate that you put thought into this. And I’m genuinely thrilled to find out you’re with Stephanie. Really. When I heard that, I thought, Okay, whatever shit has gone down for the last few years, he’s got his head back on straight. And I hope you do. I hope you find a gig that makes you happy. But even if I wanted to work with you — and I don’t — I need someone young who will work for next to nothing. Someone who is already up to speed and isn’t”—Nathan gestured dismissively at the page in front of him—“breaking ground with an event app.”

“But what about experience? What about name recognition.”

“Name recognition?” Nathan was incredulous. “That, my friend, is part of the problem. What have you done since we sold SpeakEasy? Seriously, Leo. What have you done?”

What had he done? First, he and Victoria had lived in Paris for six months and then Florence, all without improving his French or Italian one iota. Those days and weeks were long blurs of visiting friends and meals and trips to “the country” that somehow he ended up paying for. Then Victoria declared New York “boring,” so they went west and leased an apartment in Santa Monica for a few years. He was supposed to be working on a screenplay, but he really went to the beach every day and tried to surf and then got stoned while Victoria spent a lot of time meditating and doing some kind of aromatherapy shit. They talked incessantly about opening up a small art gallery but never did. When her dermatologist found a precancerous mole on her otherwise unblemished décolletage, it was back to New York where she convinced him to fund a small theater group downtown so they could “nurture emerging talent,” which pretty much meant Victoria “producing”—and starring in — bad plays written by people she’d grown up with in the West Village. He’d gone for long walks and taught himself all about single-barrel whiskey. He read, quietly resenting anything he deemed good. He spent months designing a custom bike that he never rode.

“I wish I’d done a lot of things differently,” Leo said. “But I can’t go back in time.”

“I agree,” Nathan said. “You and me?” He wagged a finger between the two of them. “That’s trying to move back in time. We had a good run.” He slapped Leo on the arm, hard. Leo winced. “A bloody good run.” Leo knew the meeting was over when Nathan amped up the Briticisms. He watched Nathan gather his folders and slide his laptop into a briefcase. “I’ll have my assistant call you. We’ll have dinner. You, me, my wife, Stephanie. It will be fun. You can come uptown to take a look at the massive money pit and laugh at my folly.”

Leo hadn’t had a chance to say anything he’d planned. “Let’s reschedule. I realize now I should have sent you my ideas ahead of this meeting—”

“This isn’t a meeting.” Nathan tossed a credit card on the bar, started pulling on his coat.

Now Leo was annoyed. He deserved better. “Come on, Nathan. Don’t be like this.”

“Like what? In a hurry?”

Leo tried to think of what he could say to persuade Nathan to stay. The credit card on the bar was a black Amex. Leo couldn’t believe Nathan was doing that well.

“Do you need money?” Nathan asked, noticing Leo staring at the card.

“What? No.”

“Because if this is about money, I can float you a loan. I can do that.”

“It’s not about money. Christ. Why would you think I need money?” Leo was furious remembering that he had thought about borrowing money from Nathan. Hell would have to freeze over.

“I talk to Victoria now and then.”

“Fantastic. Fucking fantastic. Victoria, the most unreliable narrator of all time.”

“To her credit, I had to drag the information out of her.”

“It’s not to her credit; she signed an agreement. In fact, I find it very interesting that she’s trying to turn people against me—”

“Cut the bull, Leo. I asked about you as a friend. I was worried. Nobody’s against you.”

Leo took a deep breath. “So put me on your calendar. Let me give you my presentation. Just hear me out.”

“You say you’ve done your homework?” Nathan said.

“I have.”

“So you know who our CFO is?”

“I didn’t memorize the organization chart, no.”

“Peter Rothstein.” Nathan signed the bar copy and started ripping his receipt into tiny pieces, which he carefully placed back on the edge of the plastic bill tray. Leo frantically tried to remember why the name might be significant. Nothing.

“His brother was Ari Rothstein,” Nathan said.

Leo felt a vague familiar nagging, but still — nothing. “Do I know him?”