A Window Opens: A Novel (13 page)

I was a mom capsule expanding into an innovator.

•  •  •

There was a horse-drawn carriage in front of the Scroll building when I left, and I was in such an expansive mood, I almost hired the driver to whisk me away to Penn Station. What better way to celebrate my arrival at the intersection of literature and commerce?

I came back to earth when Genevieve emerged from the rotating doors behind me. Aside from the ridiculous expense and practical nightmare of navigating midtown rush hour by horse, I would have died of embarrassment if Genevieve had spotted me tucking myself in under the green velvet lap blanket. Friendly as she was, she didn’t seem like the fairy-tale type.

•  •  •

On the train home, I traded texts with my dad, who was eager to hear about my first day and to tell me about his first day of jury duty. Then I checked Facebook and noticed that he had commented on several photos I’d posted in 2007, spurring a round of speculation from friends, along the lines of “Wait, you guys are in Maine? I thought you were starting your new job.” And finally, I caught up on the texts that had been piling up during the day. Several were from my mom, who never mastered punctuation on her flip phone keyboard. She spells it all out instead.

Mom:
scan at sloan kettering on mon at 2 care to join question mark dying to hear about first day period zowie exclamation point

Me:
Sorry, I’ll be at work—not much flexibility in this gig. But it’s great so far! Xoxo

I felt a flash of annoyance that my mom still expected me to be able to drop everything when I suspected Will wouldn’t even know about my dad’s appointment until it was over.

Susanna:
I was thinking of you all day. Sincerely hoping you loved it.

Me:
Thanks, S. So far, so good. I may need to check your impeccably curated shelves for ideas . . .

Susanna:
Don’t push it, bitch.

Nicholas:
So? Should I break open the bubbly?

Me:
I have arrived, in every sense. See you in a few.

Finally, I tweeted this, the result of a search for “fresh start” on BrainyQuote.com:

@alicepearse . 1m

“Daring ideas are like chessman moved forward; they may be beaten but they may start a winning game.” —Goethe [1 retweet by Genevieve; 1 favorite by my dad]

By the time I looked up, forty minutes had passed and we were pulling into my station. As I made my way down the hill between the tracks and North Edison Avenue, I saw a little figure running toward me, dribbling a soccer ball and smiling broadly: Oliver. He was there to meet my train. He had never done this before, and I felt so proud—of him, of me.

We walked home together, holding hands.

When we arrived, Nicholas was waiting on the front porch. “I thought we should celebrate,” he said, nodding in the direction of a bottle of champagne—already open, already half-empty. I grabbed its icy neck and took a long swig before we went inside for dinner.

B
y my second week on the job, I started to feel like I was in the groove. I recognized some acronyms here and there and I’d completed a series of mandatory video tutorials on issues like confidentiality and sexual harassment in the workplace. Every afternoon at four, I joined my colleagues for a coffee break and pastry tasting in the simulated Scroll lounge, known as the Sim.

The young Brooklyn hipsters were an impressive bunch. They answered e-mails after midnight while tending their chickens and building lamps from spare parts salvaged at flea markets. They baked artisanal macarons and wove their own reusable coffee filters and trained for weekend mud runs upstate. “Mud . . . what?” I asked David, when he mentioned plans to participate in the Tough Mudder.

“Oh, Alice, you should try it! It’s hard but amazingly fun.”

“I’ll stick to spinning, thanks.”

We brainstormed and bounced ideas off each other and promised to “noodle that over” when we didn’t have answers. The whole vibe was
invigorating. I enjoyed working with this crew in the same way I loved babysitting when I was in college, when kids were a rare species in everyday life.

And I had to admit, it was thrilling to be surrounded by people who understood so little about my “real” life at home.

“I can’t believe you have three kids!” they’d say.

Or “You look so great for . . . I mean, you know. You don’t look like a mom.”

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

First day in the new digs; just wanted to give you a shout-out. It turns out my building is dog friendly, so it looks like I’ll be able to bring the big guy in every now and then. Guess I’m not in the Big Apple anymore. How is it over there? Know anyone who needs a lawyer?

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Sorry for radio silence—have been in a strategy meeting all day. Did you know there are more bookstores in the US today than there were in 1930? Who knew? Hey, listen, I might be late for dinner—a couple of us are grabbing early drinks—but save some lasagna for me!

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Things were really quiet so I came home early. Lasagna in the oven and I’m on the porch with a Sam Adams. #thissuburbanlife

Dear [INSERT NAME OF AGENT OR EDITOR],

I hope you won’t mind that I’m tracking you down out of the blue like this. I just left my post as books editor at
You
to start a new adventure as a Content Manager at Scroll, an innovative new addition to the MainStreet family. We will be setting up retail lounges across the country where bookworms can browse and purchase e-books in a relaxing, inspiring environment. Coffee will be served.

I’m on the prowl for news of your authors’ latest and greatest novels and memoirs so we can make sure to include them on our list. I’m a huge fan of [INSERT NAMES OF AGENT OR EDITOR’S TOP AUTHORS] so I thought I would connect with you directly about the possibility of partnering for our ScrollOriginals program, where authors and bookstores have a unique opportunity to meet on the same page.

When you have time, I’d love to take you out for lunch or coffee so I can tell you more about our exciting plans. I look forward to hearing from you soon!

Alice Pearse

This e-mail was an adaptation of a template passed along to me by David, who inherited it from Matthew, who received it from Genevieve. The message contained some language I found borderline cringeworthy–especially the use of the word
partner
as a verb—but I went with it.

I struggled with the sign-off. “Best” and “Yours” and “Looking forward” were all the rage at
You
, but they weren’t really my style—or Scroll’s, for that matter. Several of my new colleagues went with “Cheers,” which I felt should be reserved only for full-blooded Brits.

I sent out a slew of these e-mails and was surprised by how quickly people wrote back. Seconds after I hit send, an editor wrote back: “Alice, thank you for reaching out. Really eager to hear what you guys
have up your sleeves. Looking forward to hearing what the future has in store for booklovers! I’m tired of buying online; ready to go back to the old way.”

I responded, “Great! I can’t wait to meet you!” and then forwarded the whole exchange to Genevieve, feeling downright tickled by the fun of it all. She responded promptly: “Want to grab lunch later? Hale & Hearty has a delicious mulligatawny. And hey, in the future? Please avoid using exclamation marks in your e-mails. Grazie.”

•  •  •

Standard lunchtime was 12:30, and choices included sushi, nouveau American, Mediterranean, farm-to-table, or any place that had an overpriced chopped salad on the menu. I always paid; my expense reports were astronomical. The best meals were with agents and editors, who peppered me with so many questions about Scroll, I barely had time to eat.

“Will you bundle an author’s previous titles with new ones?”

“Are you open to selling children’s books?”

“Is the ScrollOriginals program limited to nonfiction?”

“Will the subscription program extend to all branches?”

“Do you have plans for an outpost in [Topeka/Milwaukee/Fort Lauderdale/wherever the agent or editor’s mother lived]?”

I covered basic logistics over sparkling water and Diet Coke; then, by the time main courses arrived, I moved in with the features that hadn’t been mentioned in
Publishers Weekly
: the first editions, the sumptuous furniture, the sustained silent reading—SSR—areas, the lending library that would allow members to read any e-book for free while they were on the premises.

I knew my companion’s jaw would go slack with shock, then awe. It turned out, many members of the New York publishing community were tired of buying books from the solitude of their own living room. “Scroll will bring the community experience back to book buying,” I said, spearing a piece of grilled chicken or shrimp, then popping it into my mouth with gusto.

When my dining companion raised the thorny subject of independent bookstores, I trotted out my friendship with Susanna. “You know who my best friend is? An independent bookstore owner.” I explained how the Blue Owl functions like a little community center, how I couldn’t imagine life without it. “But lots of towns all over the country don’t have a bookstore anymore, so Scroll will fill that void.”

“What about stores that have survived the rise of the website: how will they fare with a competitor selling e-books for less money right down the street?”

“I’m sorry, I can’t talk about pricing right now. But we believe that a rising tide will lift all boats.”

If the agent or editor was around my age, I reminded them how threatened the networks had been by the advent of cable. It was going to be the end of television! And now the networks and cable coexisted alongside each other, with different kinds of programming but definite overlap in their audiences.

“Scroll is like cable,” I said. “We’re not trying to put anybody out of business. We’re just trying a new approach to book sales.”

“That is so cool. How lucky are you to be part of such an amazing idea?”

“I know. It really is a dream job.”

With cappuccino on the table, while the agent or editor nibbled on complimentary biscotti or mini meringues, I changed the subject. Evangelizing about Scroll started to feel a little bit like telling the story of how Nicholas and I got engaged—in Labyrinth Books, where he planted the question on a postcard of the Manhattan skyline inside Pablo Neruda’s
100 Love Sonnets
. I loved telling the story, but I’d told it so many times, I worried it might start to sound stale.

•  •  •

My dad came into the city to meet me for lunch. When the elevator doors opened on our pale-peach lobby, he was paying for a roll of Mentos at the newsstand, wearing a navy blazer and a maroon paisley ascot over his
stoma. It had been a few weeks since I’d seen him and he looked a little thin.

“Dad! Weren’t we meeting by the LOVE statue?” I glanced around surreptitiously to see if anyone from Scroll was behind me. Proud as I was of my dad’s mastery of Buzz Lightyear—no easy feat—I didn’t want to introduce him to my colleagues. They would be kind and appropriate, of course, but I could already envision the polite queries when I went back upstairs: “So, your dad.Was he always . . . like that?”

I remembered the one laryngectomee I knew before my dad became one himself. He was a retired policeman, very tan, who played the harmonica all day at the deep end of the pool where I worked; he was highly regarded by the stoner lifeguards for his rendition of “Another Brick in the Wall.” And then, one summer, he showed up on opening day with a hole in his throat. He had a new hobby—cards—and he was always trying to recruit opponents for rummy, spades, spit. “Name your poison,” he’d croak, pressing a gunmetal gray device under his chin. Nobody wanted to play. The guys in the snack bar called him Robocop.

“My train got in early, so I thought I’d check out your new place,” my dad said, gesturing grandly at the high ceilings and the single file of bamboo stalks growing out of white gravel in the middle of the lobby. At the sound of his voice, a woman in a suit looked up sharply from her iPhone. Mind your own beeswax, said my inner third grader.

“Well, great. Welcome!” I reached up to give him a hug—an experience akin to embracing a lawn chair; we Pearses are not touchy-feely by nature. “What do you think?”

“Fancy. I like the vegetation.”

I smiled, moving swiftly in the direction of the revolving doors. “Shall we? I was thinking maybe Le Bonne Soupe? They have a quiet upstairs—”

My dad held up his hand, shook his head, then moved the other hand under his chin. “I made a reservation. It’s a surprise.”

I followed him out the revolving door on 55th Street and we headed east. I knew better than to try to keep the conversation afloat on such a
bustling stretch. Buzz required dexterity (hard to walk and talk at the same time); plus it couldn’t compete with the rumble of cars bouncing over potholes or bike messengers howling epithets as they narrowly missed colliding with taxi doors and each other. Even without the normal patter of conversation, I could tell my dad was pleased to be back in midtown, his old stomping grounds.

Halfway down the block, he stopped, opened a glass door and motioned for me to go inside ahead of him. We were dining at Michael’s, a beloved if slightly timeworn media hot spot. Back when I was an editorial assistant, I had their maître d’ on speed dial and I would request the best tables by number. If my boss had an early appointment after lunch, I even ordered her the Cobb salad ahead of time so it was ready when she arrived.

My dad and I were swiftly ushered to the worst table in the restaurant. Michael himself seemed to sense that there was something different about our party, although he probably couldn’t put his finger on what it was since I was the one who had announced our name at the front desk when we arrived. He led us to the back of the first dining room—there was Barbara Walters, Dr. Oz, Chris Harrison from
The Bachelor
(would it be rude to snap a picture?)—then to the back of the second dining room. Michael kept checking over his shoulder to make sure we were with him. He pulled out both our chairs, opened each of our menus, and said, with a small bow, “Thank you for dining with us.”