The place is packed, as it always is for William. He comes in from the staff room laughing with the bookstore owner, a cute girl with tatts and purple hair. William has a goatee today, and I roll my eyes beneath my cap brim. This isn’t a good look for anyone except a frat boy with a Frisbee in one hand and red Solo cup in the other. The crowd doesn’t seem to mind, however. When William waves and smiles, they all go Ahhhhhh, as if they’re having a collective climax. And they fall silent the instant he starts to read, like he’s thrown some magic powder over them.
All except one woman who pushes her way in late.
She’s small and panting, and her mascara’s running likeA Clockwork Orange. Her white tank is plastered to her body. It wasn’t raining when I left Maine this morning, but it must be now. Otherwise this little chickie just walked through a car wash or something.
An alarm bell goes off in my head.
I look at William. His head has popped up like an animal scenting another at a watering hole. He’s beaming right at her. But I could be imagining it. Because he always does this thing, panning his smile across the crowd.
He recommences reading, and I tune out. I’ve heard him so many times now, I have practically memorized this new novel along with the others. I heard this passage in Portland, and every day since then, and for a week before his launch, when I watched him pace his living room performing for nobody, making notations in his reading edition with the No. 2 pencil he had stuck behind his ear, recording himself on his phone so he could watch the videos back.
But nobody here has heard him read before, at least not this book. They angle toward him, they hold their breath. They close their eyes to let the master’s words wash over them. It’s so quiet I can hear the franticclickity clicky clickof the knitter’s needles.
All except the little latecomer, who is watching William with a skeptical expression. She’s wearing her red-blond hair in a side braid like a Disneyprincess—who does this over age 12?—and whether she knows it or not, she’s twirling the end of it round and round one finger.
She has a pen in her braid. Looks like one of those disposable fountain numbers.
Another alarm bell goes off.
William finishes, everyone applauds, they ask the usual questions, how does he write women so well, what about the Darlings, blah de blah. Which is annoying, because I have to listen to William tell the story behind the story of the Darlingsagain. Not that I have anything against the Darlings. I get writer problems. They’re real. And that poor girl William was engaged to—thatisa tragic story. But the group, come on. I know why William really started it.
Finally the show is over and the signing line begins. I don’t see the little braid-twirler anywhere, which is a relief. Maybe she thought Meh and went home. And I want to get out of here myself, before the crowd thins out, not only because it would not do to have William spot me but because, unlike our author, I can’t afford a fancy hotel for the night, so I’ll be driving back to Maine, to my sh*thole studio. And to New Hampshire tomorrow. Another day, another William Corwyn event.
But then I hear him call to those of us remaining, “You’re in for a treat!” and more alarm bells go off, because I see him standing with his arm around the little braid-twirler, who’s looking proud and embarrassed at the same time, an expression that looks a bit like constipation. Still, and despite the fact that half her makeup is streaking down her face from the rain, I can see that her eyes make jellybean shapes when she smiles.
Sh*t.
And she’s a writer. Apparently.
F*ck.
Which I learn when William trumpets her name:
Sam Vetiver.
Who?
It sounds familiar, which irritates me all the more because I can’t place it. That does it. I’ll have to buy one of her books now. So much for the SassySocks. And there goes my evening, my drive back to Augusta and a burrito and a beer and checking William’s social before a decent night’s sleep. Because looking at William and Sam Vetiver together, all my alarm bells are going off at once, it’s like a f*cking five-alarm fire in there, she is exactly his type, and it’s going to be a long night after all.
Chapter 6
At the Café
After the event was over, after William had signed dozens ofLambent Soulsand Sam threeSodbusters and aSharecropper’s Daughterfor a woman who said, “My book club read this years ago!”; after William had inscribed stock and schmoozed the booksellers and hugged Laura again and Sam had done the same; after all this, they stood together on the sidewalk beneath the bookstore’s awning. Sam was aware of the graphite smell of wet pavement after rain, of the heat rising from William’s arm, next to but not quite touching hers. It was almost nine and nearly dark, but because it was August there was still a pink stripe in the western sky.
“Woof,” said William.
“Indeed,” said Sam.
They glanced at each other and smiled.
“I’m ravenous,” William said. “Is there a place we could grab a bite? Will you dine with me?”
“I will,” said Sam. “And there is.”
William shifted his battered brown briefcase to his other hand to offer Sam his arm, and she led him toward a French café she knew would be open late. Halfway there the heavens split and it started to pour again, so they ran the final block laughing, Sam shrieking, and arrived soaking wet.
“I’m a hot mess,” said Sam as they dripped in the doorway. Her whitetank was transparent, and she didn’t want to think what was happening with her face.
