“What?”
“He saw us.” My heart was jumping out of my chest. What would Gatsby do now that he knew I was sleeping in the same bed as his son?
I couldn’t trust a white man from a crocodile on the hunt. I imagined him returning with a golf club and swinging at my head, screaming, “Darky!” until I turned black and blue. Instead of defending myself, I’d say,I love your son, sir, I love your son,and let the damage be done.
“I don’t care what he saw,” Jay whispered, reaching out to me, his fingers like crane clamps.
I spun a circle about the room, feeling like a princess in a beam of twirling dust, the silk robe he draped me in falling off my shoulders. “Jay, it’s morning.”
I could smell tobacco. His father was in his room, puffing his pipe. Was he cooling off from his reaction? Would we have to fight?
I didn’t want to fight him. I’d be sad to hurt the man who helped create Jay.
Pinwheels rolled around in my stomach as I checked the room for my jewelry. I was wearing a filigree ring with a green gemstone, and it was so pretty but so tiny and easy to lose.
Jay leaned up in bed, wiped his eyes, and yawned. “He knows already.”
“Knows what?”
“That I like boys,” Jay said. “He’s asked me about it.”
“Oh.”Something about even that small reveal was satisfying.
Jay’s eyes opened wider, and I almost gave him a kiss, but I could feel Mr. Gatsby watching this too, as if he had a ghost eye in the room.The moment broke and part of me curled inward as I sat back on the bed. It was sickening to think that I’d found no way, in all eighteen years, to do away with the impulse to be with a man.
So I just left. Jay called, “Nick?” but I kept going into the hallway, into the splash of front-of-house window sunshine over the upstairs balcony. On the wall above the side table was a giant mosaic portrait of Alexander Hamilton made of glittering diamond.Why?
What will Mr. Gatsby do with the knowledge of us?
I wandered aimlessly through the morning, letting the city guide me, its streets offering a subdued entry into the day: shopkeepers sweeping, delivery trucks rolling in and out. I stopped by the park and watched children kick a ball while an older man played a mournful tune on his trumpet. His melody pressed on my heartbeat, which was skipping through an endless rhythm of survival and the hope for triumph ahead. But more so lately, survival.
Down the busier avenues, life bustled with urgency that made my turmoil seem invisible. The day stretched into afternoon, my feet carrying me deeper past the brownstones and businesses and toward the places I felt most at home, but I still felt Gatsby’s eyes following me.
I almost went down those streets darkened by alleyways, with the bootblacks and gamblers and gangsters, the drunks who emptied their pockets in the juice joints, to escape.
Instead, I chose to take another path.
Zihan’s family’s restaurant was still open, faint clinks of dishes and the simmer of steam drifting through the alley. And as the sun set, I climbed up their building’s fire escape slowly.
Jazz poured from open windows beneath me, couples laughing on the street, the glow of streetlamps casting warm halos on the sidewalk.
Zihan was sitting on the narrow ledge outside his window, legs dangling over the fire escape railing, his head tipped back as he stared up at the pinkening sky. His gaze was distant, almost lost, like he was dreaming. He noticed me when I was a few steps away.
“Nick?” he said, his voice low and playful. “Did you change your mind about working here?” He gave a small laugh.
I settled beside him, taking a breath. “I don’t know if I’ll ever work a normal job again. At least not here.”
He leaned forward, hands gripping the railing as he looked at me, dark eyes catching the sun. “All right? So what brings you here?”
“I never told you,” I began. “But Jay and I... we have a plan to flee New York.”
Zihan looked surprised. “To go where?”
“We don’t know yet. Anywhere but here. But first, my cousin and I think we’ll need more money to get this escape going. We think... we think it’s best to take it from Tom Buchanan. Tomake him pay for his crimes against migrants in the city. He’s been working with the guys who want to force families out. It would be like leaving justice behind us.”
“Okay.” Zihan nodded with interest, though his eyes widened with surprise. “How?”
“A party,” I went on, voice steady but quiet. “A huge one at Jay’s place—a fake engagement for him and Daisy. All of Gatsby’s connections will show up, including Buchanan. While everyone’s distracted... I’m going to slip into Buchanan’s place and take what’s stashed in his safes.”
