One Fifth Avenue

When Mindy was safely in her office, Thayer muttered, “Can’t you read it on your computer? Like everyone else?” He got up and strolled through the maze of cubicles to the printer, where he retrieved Lola’s column. He read it briefly and shook his head. Lola was fucking James Gooch again. Could Mindy really be so dense that she didn’t know Lola was writing about her own husband? Ugh. It meant he and James Gooch now had one degree of separation. But James gave Lola money, and since Thayer enjoyed the same privileges as James for free, he couldn’t really object.

“Here you go,” Thayer said with a flourish, placing the printout on Mindy’s desk.

“Thank you,” she said, continuing to stare at her computer.

Thayer stood for a moment, watching her. “Can I have a raise?” he asked.

This got her attention. Putting on her reading glasses, she picked up the printout and glanced at it, and then him. “How long have you been here?” she asked.

“A month.”

“I’m already paying you a hundred thousand dollars a year.”

“It’s not enough.”

“Check back with me in five months, and I’ll see what I can do.”

Fucking old bag, Thayer thought, returning to his cubicle. But surprisingly, Mindy wasn’t that bad, not as bad as he’d thought she’d be. She had even taken him out for a beer and asked him all kinds of uncomfortable questions about where he lived and how he was surviving. When he told her he lived on Avenue C, she grimaced. “That’s not good enough for you,” she said. “I see you in a better place—like a walk-up in the West Village.” She’d given him advice about getting ahead, suggesting he attempt to appear “more corporate” by wearing a tie.

For some reason, he had taken her advice. The woman was right, he’d thought, upon returning to his disgusting apartment. It wasn’t good enough for him. He was twenty-five years old. There were men his age who were billionaires, but he was making a hundred thousand a year, an enormous sum compared to that of his friends. After scouring Craigslist, he’d found an apartment on Christopher Street, a walk-up with a bedroom that was barely large enough to contain a queen-size bed. It was twenty-eight hundred a month, which ate up three quarters of his monthly salary, but it was worth it. He was moving up in the world.

Seated behind her desk with her reading glasses perched on her nose, Mindy carefully read the latest installment of Lola’s sex column. Lola had quite a way with the description of the sex act and, not content to limit it to plumbing, also provided a detailed account of her partner’s physical characteristics. The first four columns had featured Philip Oakland as her lover, but this column and the previous one were most definitely about James. Although Lola called the man the Terminator, which made Mindy laugh out loud, the description of his penis, with its “constellation of tiny moles on the shaft, forming, perhaps, Osiris,” was James. Nor was it only the comments about his penis that gave him away. “I want to know every part of you. Including the dirty place,” the Terminator had said. It was exactly the same argument James had used on Mindy in the early years of their marriage when he’d wanted to try anal sex.

Putting the column aside, Mindy went back to her computer and, typing in the address of the Litchfield County real estate agency, scrolled down and found the photographs and description of a house. The past weekend, looking at real estate, the agent had explained that there was very little in their price range—there was hardly anything on the market for under a million three. She did have the perfect house for them, but it was a little more expensive. Did they want to look at it anyway? Yes, they did, Mindy said.

The house was a bit of a wreck, having only been recently vacated by an aged farmer. But these kinds of houses almost never came up. It still had twelve original acres, and the house, built in the late seventeen hundreds, had three fireplaces. There was an old apple orchard and a red barn (falling down, but barns were very inexpensive to restore), and it was located on what was considered one of the best streets in one of Litchfield County’s most exclusive towns—Roxbury, Connecticut. Population twenty-three hundred. But what a population. Arthur Miller and Alexander Calder had lived nearby, as well as Walter Matthau. Philip Roth was only miles away. And the house was a steal—only one point nine million.

“It’s too much,” James protested in the rental car on the way back to the city.

“It’s perfect,” Mindy said. “And you heard what the real estate agent said. Houses like this one never come up.”

“It makes me nervous, spending all that money. On a house. And it needs lots of restoration. Do you know how much that costs? Hundreds of thousands of dollars. Yes, we have the money today. But who knows what will happen in the future?”

Indeed, Mindy thought now, pressing the intercom button on her phone. Who knew? “Thayer,” she said, “could you come into my office, please?”

“What now?” Thayer asked.

Mindy smiled. She’d been pleasantly surprised by Mr. Thayer Core, having discovered that he was not only a crackerjack assistant but a fellow trafficker in evil, paranoia, and bad thoughts. He reminded her of her very own self at twenty-five, and found his candor refreshing.

“I need another hard copy,” she said. “In color.”

In a few minutes, Thayer returned with a printout of the brochure for the house. Mindy clipped the brochure to Lola’s two sex columns about James and placed a Post-it note on top on which she’d written, “FYI.” She handed the stapled pages to Thayer. “Could you messenger this to my husband, please?”

Thayer flipped through the pages and, nodding in admiration, said, “That ought to do it.”

“Thank you,” Mindy said, shooing him away.

Thayer called the messenger service to pick up the package. He slipped the papers into a manila envelope and, as he did so, emitted a little laugh. He’d ridiculed Mindy Gooch for months, and while he still found her slightly ridiculous, he had to give the woman credit. She had balls.

A couple of hours later, Mindy called James. “Did you get my package?” she asked.

James murmured a terrified assent. “Well, I’ve been thinking about it,” she continued. “And I want to buy that house. Immediately. I don’t want to wait another day. I’m going to call the real estate agent now and make an offer.”

“Great,” James said, too scared to sound enthusiastic.

Mindy leaned back in her chair, curling the phone cord around her finger. “I can’t wait to get started on the renovations. I’ve got all kinds of ideas. How’s the new book coming, by the way? Are you making progress?”

In the penthouse apartment in One Fifth, Annalisa Rice studied the seating chart for the King David event, writing the numbers of various tables next to each name on the twenty-page guest list. It was, as usual, a tedious process, but someone had to do it, and now that she had replaced Connie Brewer as the chairman of the event, the duty fell to her. She suspected Connie hadn’t wanted to give up her position, but with Sandy’s trial coming up, the other members of the committee didn’t think Connie’s involvement was a good idea. Connie’s presence would remind people of the scandal involving the Cross of Bloody Mary, and instead of covering the event, reporters would write about the Brewers instead.