discount bin.
With about ten copies of Allentown Blues, all bearing a huge Waldenbooks label that told the world that this book that PMC had published just a few short months earlier, with a retail price of $23, could now be theirs for only $2.95.
“No,” I gasped.
A middle-aged woman who’d been scanning a copy of the dust jacket, trying to decide if my novel was worth her $2.95, glanced at me. Then she glanced at my picture on the dust jacket, then back at my face, trying to tell if the pitiful failed author of this discounted book could possibly be the same pitifully moaning customer standing next to her in a mall in Jersey City.
“I’m sorry,” said Ted, who was suddenly behind me. Oblivious to the fact that we were in a Waldenbooks in Jersey City, he wrapped a muscular arm protectively and lovingly around my chest. “I didn’t want you to see this.”
“I’m a failure,” I said.
“Don’t say that. All those people who didn’t buy your book are the ones who lost out.”
“I love you. You say the nicest things.”
The middle-aged woman, for some reason unfazed by our affection, held the book open to my photograph on the dust jacket and asked, “Is this you?”
“No,” I said and walked away.
We had dinner at the food court.
“I’m a failure,” I said again.
“So, what are you gonna do about it?”
I drew little designs in ketchup with a french fry, trying to decide what I was going to do about it. “I guess I’ll just resign myself to the fact that I’m not a writer. I am and will always be a slave boy at PMC.”
“I’ve got a better idea. Why don’t you write another novel?”
“No way. It’s too much work to go through just for humiliation.”
And suddenly that middle-aged woman from Waldenbooks was there. “I knew it was you,” she said too loudly. A few other food court patrons turned to see what was going on. “You’re Andrew Westlake!”
“Yes,” I confessed.
“I’m sorry about bothering you at the bookstore,” she said, still too loudly and without bothering to apologize for bothering me at the food court. “It’s just that I never met a real author before.” She opened her Waldenbooks bag and produced her marked-down copy of Allentown Blues. “Would you autograph this for me?”
Three teenage girls sitting at a neighboring table with several plates of the food court version of Chinese took note.
“You write a book, mister?” one asked.
The middle-aged woman proudly held up her copy of Allentown Blues for the girls—and several other patrons—to see. “He wrote this.” Then she flipped to the dust jacket photograph and said, “See? That’s him. That’s Andrew Westlake.”
“Cool,” said one of the girls.
The woman set the book down again and told me her name, so I wrote, To Marlene Birrell…Suddenly, you’re my number-one fan! Enjoy the book! Best wishes, Andrew Westlake.
We took the train back to Manhattan, then another one back to the Upper West Side, but it wasn’t until we walked through the front door that Ted said, “So, when are you going to start your next novel?”
“Oh, please,” I said, dismissing him but at least smiling now.
As he unbuttoned my shirt, he said, “Hey, now you’ve got a real, live fan. If you don’t write another novel, Marlene Birrell will be very disappointed in you.” He stopped, then added, “So will I.”
A few months later, Ted and I were enjoying a Sunday afternoon in late May, lying on a blanket in Central Park.
“Look at them,” I said, watching a young couple squabbling from a distance. “Wouldn’t you like to know their story?”
“Not particularly.”
I rolled over and looked at him. “What’s the matter? You sound distracted.”
He glanced at me, then trained his eyes somewhere else. “I guess I’m just a little tired.”
I tossed a playful punch at his shoulder. “Come on. We’re in Central Park, the people-watching capital of the world. Let’s people-watch!”
“That’s what I’m doing,” he replied dully. “I’m watching people. What else is there to do?”
I scanned the park, found the squabbling couple again, then pointed them out to Ted. “Here, let me show you how to people-watch. It’s an art, and this will help unlock your creative side. Now, you see that man and woman over there, arguing?”
Ted grunted.
“Well, I think she’s just told him she’s pregnant. But he’s only twenty-two, and he doesn’t want to be tied down with a wife and a baby when he’s so young. So now he’s trying to convince her to have an abortion, but she…she…uh…she’s a devout Catholic, so she refuses to do it. And that’s why they’re arguing.”
I turned and looked at Ted. He wasn’t looking at me or the young couple.
“So, what do you think they’re arguing about?” I asked him. “What kind of story can you come up with?”
He turned and finally looked me in the eye. “I think they’re fighting because she’s trying to force him to make up stories about the people they’re watching in the park.”
Some of us, I suppose, are cursed by our delusions of creativity. But some people are cursed by their lack of creativity.
And Ted was one of those people.
My second book was The Brewster Mall, which had a few gay characters—well, it did involve a huge retail shopping complex, after all—but was mostly a humorous story about the intermingled lives and loves at a mall not unlike the one in Jersey City. It even had a Waldenbooks where the philistine manager loaded the discount bins with the works of Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald.
David Carlyle still thought a little more poignancy couldn’t hurt, but—especially since it was mostly about “those drab, colorless little heterosexual people”—it was acceptable and PMC would publish it. I got another $7500 advance.
The dedication read, “To Ted, who made me write this book, so blame him.”
David arranged for me to sign copies of The Brewster Mall at that mall in Jersey City. In the spirit of the book, the Waldenbooks manager set up a discount bin full of marked-down classics.
I sold an entire three copies of The Brewster Mall, including one to Marlene Birrell. Waldenbooks sold out of $1.95 copies of Faulkner and Salinger. And the guy who managed the Arby’s in the food court was pissed off because he thought I’d libeled him. It wasn’t one of my better nights.
It was a long ride back to Manhattan, made bearable only because I knew that when it came to an end, I’d see Ted. And after two years, seven months, and one day, our relationship felt as fresh as ever. I was still very much in love.
I unlocked the apartment door. It was dark inside.
“Ted?” I called out. There was no reply.
I shrugged it off. Outside of tax season, Ted didn’t work late very often. But there were occasional nights. If he had decided to stop somewhere for a beer, who was I to begrudge him?
I tapped the play-back button on the answering machine and listened as I poured myself a stiff drink.
Beep. “Hello, dear, it’s David. Please call me when you get back from New Jersey. I want to make sure you escaped alive and that you’re still wearing natural fibers. Oh, yes, I also want to know if you