My sister is an Assistant District Attorney, and her office is a block from the courthouses in Lower Manhattan. I almost never venture that far downtown, as my usual southern boundary is Tribeca, but figure it’s the least I can do for Emily, given that she has a full-time job and I don’t have any commitments today. Aside from the commute, another reason I hate the courthouse area is that there are very few places to eat unless you venture into Chinatown, and I’m not a big fan of Chinese food. At least Emily has selected a diner where we can meet.
People have long commented that we look like sisters, but I truthfully don’t see it. I possess my father’s features, which gives my appearance a slightly masculine bent, or so I’ve been told by casting directors. Emily, on the other hand, is the spitting image of our mother—so much so that if it weren’t for the fact that photos of our mother are actually prints, and not in the cloud, I might mistake them for selfies of Emily.
I’m slightly taller than my older sister. Not by much, half an inch, at most, but as anyone who’s grown up as the baby in the family will tell you, it’s enough that it matters to me. I take every opportunity possible to point out that although I may be younger, she’s shorter. In this case, that amounts to me standing when Emily approaches, and going on my tiptoes to do my best to kiss her on the top of her head as we embrace.
“I only have forty-five minutes,” Emily announces when we’re both on our sides of the booth. She raises her hand to attract the waiter’s attention.
“Relax, Em. The city will be safe if you take an hour for lunch.”
The waiter asks if we’d like anything to drink, but Emily tells him that we’re ready to order. Then she lets me go first.
“I’ll have . . . I don’t know, grilled cheese, with Swiss and a tomato, on rye. With a . . . coffee, I guess. Oh, and a side of french fries.”
Emily orders a chef’s salad, balsamic vinegar on the side, and a Diet Coke.
I smile when the waiter walks away.
“What?” she says.
“I can’t remember the last time I was in a diner with you when you didn’t order a chef’s salad, balsamic vinegar on the side, and a Diet Coke.”
“I like it,” she says, defensively. “Besides, we’re all not in our midtwenties anymore, my dear. French fries are only for stealing off other people’s plates when you cross the big three-oh. But, enough about my figure. What’s going on with you?”
What’s going on with me? If ever there were a loaded question, that’s it.
I want to come clean. To tell Emily the truth about myself. But something inside me overrules my best intention.
“You know me. I’m rehearsing all the time.”
I sing a lyric from the show I’m rehearsing—Into the Woods. It’s appropriately titled “I Know Things Now.”
Emily smiles. She always likes to hear me sing and often complains that I don’t do it enough in front of her. There’s a reason I don’t: she’s the one with the talent in the family. My efforts, I fear, are a pale imitation. No matter how good I get or how far my career takes me, I’ll always feel like an imposter next to her.
She offers up the key lyric, about being prepared.
In our little duet, she’s hit the nail right on the head. I’m not prepared, and she knows it.
“I’m thinking of ending things with Marco,” I finally admit. “He’s . . . not going to change.”
She nods thoughtfully. If this is a surprise, she doesn’t betray it. Then again, she’s seen Marco and me together, so I’m sure she must have thought my seeming epiphany about him has been a long time coming.
“You approve?”
Emily nods emphatically. “You deserve to be with someone who appreciates how amazing you are, Clare. I’ve never thought that was Marco. I get that he thinks he’s amazing, but that’s hardly the same thing.”
“He’s not so bad,” I defend. A reflex that’s highly attuned in me.
“That’s not what I want you saying about the man you’re living with. I want you to say, “He makes me a better person.” And in your case, that’s a very tall order for any man. Way too tall for the likes of Marco.”
“What if I told you that there’s a man . . . who might fit that bill?”
“I’d ask you why you weren’t living with him.”
“And if the answer was that he’s married?”
“Oh,” my sister says.
“Are you disappointed in me?”
She shakes her head in protest, and I know I’m being too hard on my sister. I don’t need a shrink to tell me that I’m projecting. I’m disappointed in myself.
“I have no judgment when it comes to you,” says Emily. “But I do know that being involved with a married man normally leads to heartache for everyone . . . except for the man.”
18.
I arrive at Mas a few minutes before seven. The hostess tells me that Paul has already been seated, and then she leads me through the restaurant. I follow her between two rows of seating, tables for two against one wall and a communal table that runs the restaurant’s length along the other, and around the wall of wine encased in glass, until we enter the back room. A giant etching of a blue fish dominates the main wall.
Paul is sitting alone at one of the pair of tables for two directly under the fish. The other table in the space is empty.
He stands as I approach and kisses me on the cheek. “I hope this is quiet enough,” he says. “Galen was able to give us the entire back room.”
Galen is Galen Zamarra, one of New York City’s celebrity chefs. I wonder if Paul really knows him, or just paid for the other table too.
The waiter, a young man clad in all black, approaches with a bottle of wine. He uncorks it, and pours a taste for Paul.
Paul swirls the white wine in his glass and then takes a sip. “Yes, that’s excellent,” he says to the waiter. Then to me, “I took the liberty of ordering a bottle of chardonnay. This is a Chateau Génot-Boulanger 2009, and it’s truly excellent.”
The waiter fills my wineglass. I don’t swirl it, but take a small sip. It’s good, but tastes like any other white wine to my primitive palate.
Paul orders our appetizers, but allows me to order my own main course. As soon as the waiter leaves us alone, I tell Paul, “We need to talk a little business.”
“If we must,” he says with a sigh.
“As I told you over the phone, the police detective running the investigation told me that they found Jennifer’s diary. Obviously, I haven’t seen it, but he said it left no doubt that you and she were lovers.”
“Would that be a problem?”
He says this with a smile that I bet he thinks is sexy as hell. I’m in no mood to play his game, however.
“I’m your lawyer, Paul. No need to charm me. And what you tell me is privileged. So it’s now truth time. Yes or no. Were you?”
He doesn’t answer right away, which is always a bad sign.
“Let’s assume, for the sake of this discussion, that’s a yes. Where would that leave us?”
For Paul, the truth is obviously beside the point. He doesn’t want to commit to a story, even with me.
“Anybody else in her life, as far as you know?”
“No. Could be, though. It’s not like . . . well, assuming we were involved, you can also assume it was casual and didn’t go on for very long.”