Jane Mendelsohn - Burning Down the House

His legs appear first, running down the stairs. Of course he wouldn’t take the elevator when he was alone, he’s too big for it. His torso shows up next and then he comes forward, disjointed by all the panes of thick glass in the double doors of the building. He arrives in pieces, fragments of a classical sculpture, only this one wearing a hoodie and sneakers, jeans, a wool hat. His eyes wary, narrow, stoned, angry.

Hey. What are you doing here?

The heavy glass door swings shut slowly behind him. He doesn’t invite her in. They talk on the low stone steps of the building.

Why haven’t you been in school?

He pushes his hands into his pockets, looks to the side.

I got kicked out.

What? It’s almost the end of the year. I thought that was basically impossible.

Well, I managed to pull it off. It helps if you’re on financial aid.

She pushes her hair behind her ear and shivers a little in the dusky shadows of the unexpectedly pretty trees that line the street.

Okay, whatever, I don’t even care why they kicked you out. But why haven’t you answered my texts?

I’ve been busy.

Busy? Are you kidding?

No, I’m not kidding. What do you want from me?

You know exactly what I want from you.

He steps down to the sidewalk and leads her to the side of the building. They walk to a darker spot, in the dimmest shadows, near a dripping air conditioner that sticks out of a first-floor window, held in by duct tape and rusted metal bars.

I’m out. I don’t have any more.

She closes her eyes and lifts her eyebrows in mock astonishment and real displeasure.

Nice. You get me into those and now you don’t have any more. Thank you.

He does a more contemptuous version of rolling his eyes.

You know I could tell someone what you did, she says.

It’s too late. You blew that one. And anyway, I’ve already been expelled for something else. What are you going to do?

I should send you to jail, you asshole. Tears in her eyes now.

He digs his hands farther into his pockets. He blows air out slowly, very slowly, she can’t believe how long it goes on.

He turns his head to the side again and says, I can take you to the guys who have it. I don’t have any money to get it myself but I’ll take you to them. He looks at her, his forehead creasing like a matinee idol’s over his unreadable eyes, and says: If you want. Then he looks away.

That sounds creepy, she says. Where are they?

He shrugs.

It’s a subway ride.

How long a subway ride?

Does it matter?

—

She gathers along the way that it is indeed a long ride. When the subway lifts up, elevating on its thin outdoor track, high above the streets, levitating, it feels like to her, and she looks out over the city vast and leviathan, the tangled, cluttered, seamless stretch of buildings and streets like the oceanic debris scattered across a whale’s back, the blinking lights arriving like stars drowning in the sea, the whale beneath it all sloping and drifting, the city an animal afloat on the water, half submerged, a dark living rock, she thinks she should exit, get away, turn back. Why didn’t she just give him some money and tell him to go by himself? Because she thought he wouldn’t return with the stuff? Because she was afraid he would rip her off? How crazy is that? He is more than a thief, more than a liar, she has put herself in peril and thrown her lot in with a bad guy, worse than a lunatic, an exploiter, a user, an amoral force. But the necessary strength to escape does not emerge. She finds herself fixed to the plastic seat, face pointed toward the view, the lights that looked like drowning stars now glinting like fires burning on a plain, the last pale haze of day having settled into early night. No, this is insanity, she tells herself. I am not watching myself on a stage. There is no moonlight. There is no magic that will save me; I am going to have to save myself. I do not want to ferry myself toward some false shore of safety, some story that I once believed in but now know better. She thinks of Felix, of Ian, of Steve. Steve, she once thought he would make her whole. Ian, she once loved him, can’t find that emotion anymore, only ache. Felix, sweet Felix, she hopes he never feels anything like this. All of the people she has thrown her dreams onto speed past in the darkening window, reflections of the stories in her head. Then she remembers Neva, and the strong presence — an emanation, a beam of light in her brain — gives her a rush of hope. The next stop she manages to haul her body upward and clutches her bag as she stands to move toward the doors. But his hand is on her skin. It encircles her arm above her wrist. A dread coagulates around her heart. The sallow lights come on inside the subway car, which is practically empty. He tightens his grip.

I don’t think so, he says.

IN THE AFTERNOON Ian received a text from Jonathan about getting together that night at a club on the Lower East Side. Late. Ian felt a queasy relief reading the message backstage, glad that the rift between them was healing, and at the same time wary of what Jonathan’s motive might be, what ingenious aggression and subtle torture he might have in store. Standing amid half-clad dancers and warming-up singers, actors scanning lines, flirting, exchanging their daily gossip of past triumphs and indignities, Ian instantly responded that he would meet Jonathan and was ready for whatever debauchery ensued. The club was an after-hours nightspot called the Purse. Salacious acts were performed for an audience of mega-celebrities, minor celebrities, international billionaires, and locals with nine-figure balance sheets accompanied by models and sports figures and the occasional artist. The club opened at 11:00 p.m.; the show started at 1:00 a.m. Guests were advised to arrive by midnight.

Ian entered Essex Street with a light rain falling. Dark storefronts stood locked with corrugated metal blocking their entry. Lamplight skittered from newly formed puddles to the side mirrors of parked cars. Long-legged women crossed the sidewalk in front of him teetering from shadow to shadow. At the end of a block he turned right into an alley and walked down an aisle of wet pavement, lightly strewn garbage, random windows pouring vague, sooty light down from above. He glanced back behind him at the street and the pale neon in the distance marking more-ordinary pastimes. Then he walked up some low wooden stairs and pushed open a door and entered.

A seething crowd had gathered within. As if the vast structure had been erected around them to contain the hunger and yearning of this motley assemblage, like a meeting place of worshippers on an isolated prairie, waiting for their designated minister to appear. A zinc bar behind which bottles glowed with elixirs and from which drinks ushered forth in antique glasses frothing, bubbles gyrating, pale melon-colored concoctions tilting in front of dark-green-painted walls, lifted by ringed fingers attached to bodies seated on tattered velvet banquettes.

He made his way past the bar through the first crowds to an area of tables set for dining in front of a low stage, curtained and lit with footlights. Handsome men in rippling silk shirts fetched bottles and racks of glasses steaming from the kitchen, platters of hot utensils. Waitresses slid in between the tables placing candles and programs of the night’s festivities. They wore stained pink silk bustiers and garish blue-and-yellow stockings, red-and-gold leather high-heeled shoes, and they drifted through the dusty haze like strings of colored holiday lights come to life, fairy-tale apparitions, both charming and decadent, lewd. He had given his name to the maître d’ and was being seated at a table near the stage.