Girl in the Moonlight (15 page)

I needed little persuading. We spent what remained of the morning naked, and then, in the early afternoon, we went out. On Madison Avenue, I felt like a tourist even though I had been raised in this neighborhood. With Cesca by my side, everything became unreal, new, possessing depths of beauty and fascination I had never perceived before. The familiar buildings seemed different, the items in the shop windows particularly alluring. She was pulling me along, caught in her gravitational wake like an asteroid around a planet. The force of her will, the extraordinariness of her beauty, the way that strangers would stare at her in the street, all seemed somehow bigger, more significant; compared to her the rest of the world was dross.

New York in early winter. There was no snow on the ground yet. The trees were barren. Already women were wearing furs, marvelous scarves. It was cold. I had on only an old tweed jacket of my father’s, turned up at the collar. Cesca offered to buy me a coat. I refused, but she insisted. We walked into a store where I tried on several Italian cashmere overcoats. Blue, tan, black. All of them rich and warm. They cost hundreds of dollars, a thousand or more. It was an absurd amount of money. We left the store laughing, coatless. “We should have stolen one,” she said.

In the Frick. There were groups of schoolchildren. Senior citizens. We passed by Lippi’s
Annunciation,
Gainsborough’s pale beauties. “These are my favorites,” she said in the Fragonard Room. “You see?” she said, standing in front of a large canvas depicting a young woman in a long silk dress leaning against a column in the middle of a lush pleasure garden. “That’s me, dreaming of love.”

We walked through Central Park and later had a drink in the Carlyle’s bar. I had noticed with great pleasure that she had removed her engagement ring. We sat side by side at a banquette in the corner, our thighs touching, holding hands. “Do you like martinis?” she asked. The room was dark, and faintly magical in its late afternoon emptiness. We were the only ones there besides the bartender, who was busy polishing glasses, and our waiter. Tables stood waiting for evening. A grand piano sat unplayed. On the walls elephants skated and giraffes doffed their caps. The world outside had ceased to exist. It could have been four in the morning. Time no longer applied to us, we were superior to it.

I laughed with delight. Everything was new, sparkling. I would have done anything for her, tried anything. Upstairs was our bed. The rest was forgotten. “I don’t know. I’ve never had one.”

“Never? Well, then, it’s time to introduce you.”

“Two vodka martinis,” she ordered. “Up. With three olives.”

They made me quite drunk. I was still learning how to hold my liquor. Like most college students, I was more familiar with beer, my father’s Jack Daniel’s, and sweeter concoctions, such as rum and Coke. The martini’s taste was aseptic, strong, yet there was something about the directness of it. After the second, my head started to swim. The room went in and out of focus. I started kissing Cesca, who kissed me back and then said, “Enough. Let’s go upstairs.”

I tried to pay, but she laughed and said, “Don’t worry. It’s all on Gavin.”

Dinner was from room service that night. She ordered a magnum of champagne. Caviar. We made love many times. She was tireless. Crying out, not caring if anyone heard. We knocked over a table. Several lamps, the telephone. Later we lay in bed, casually naked, and talked—about Gavin, Aurelio, her parents. She unburdened herself, sometimes drifting into long moments of silence. I said nothing. Then she would stop, and we would make love again. This went on for hours until, exhausted and satiated, we finally slept.

In the morning I awoke late, realizing I had to get back to school. No one knew where I was. I had obligations, work to catch up on. Cesca tried to get me to stay. She had assumed I would. We hadn’t talked about it. Looking back on it, I wish I had stayed. But I had to leave.

“Gavin doesn’t come back until tomorrow,” she said. “We can have one more day. Please stay. It’ll be fun.”

“I wish I could, but I can’t.”

“Fine,” she replied, covering herself with the sheet and sitting up in bed to light a cigarette.

“I’m sorry. It’s Thursday today. I can be back tomorrow night.”

“That won’t work.”

“Why not?”

“I told you. Gavin is coming back. I have to see him.”

“What are you going to tell him? That you can’t marry him?”

She blew smoke out of her nose. “I haven’t decided yet what I am going to tell him. But I think I am going to go ahead with it.”

This surprised me. It shouldn’t have, but it did. After what had just happened between us, I thought that the marriage would definitely be off. How could it not be? Didn’t it mean as much to her as it did to me? “I just thought . . .”

“What did you think? That I’d break my engagement to Gavin because we slept together?”

That was exactly what I had thought. But I was clearly wrong. I didn’t know what to say.

She laughed. “You just don’t get it, do you?”

“I understand that I love you. What more do I need to understand?”

She shook her head. “Let’s not go there, okay? I’ve got my own problems to sort out. Please don’t make my life more complicated than it already is.” She sighed. “Excuse me,” she said, standing up and walking to the bathroom, letting the sheet slide to the floor. She closed the door behind her and locked it.

I sat there for a while, feeling foolish. My cheeks were burning. Slowly I pulled on my pants. I knocked on the bathroom door. “Do you want me to go?”

From inside: “No. Wait a minute. I’ll be out soon.” The sound of running water. Eventually she emerged, her head and body wrapped in towels. She went to the bureau and withdrew a black bra and panties. I couldn’t help but watch her. The perfect line of her leg. The curve of her breast. Trying to memorize them, suddenly aware that they were about to be taken away from me again.

“Turn around,” she giggled. “You’re embarrassing me.”

When I turned back, she was dressed in black jeans and a long black shirt. Her feet were bare, her hair still wet.

“Are you mad at me?” I asked.

“Don’t be silly,” she said, coming over and giving me a kiss on the cheek. “I shouldn’t have snapped before.”

“It’s all right.”

She put her hand soothingly along the side of my face. “Don’t think that this didn’t mean anything to me, Wylie. It always has. It’s always very special being with you. If I do wind up marrying Gavin, I’ll never forget.”

“Cesca, I . . .”

She placed her index finger across my lips. “Shhh. I know. You should go now.”

“May I call you?”

“We’ll see.”

Rising up on her toes, she kissed my cheek. “Thank you for everything. Good-bye, Tricky Wylie.”

Somehow the door closed, and I was in the hallway, carrying my jacket. Then I was in the elevator and out on the street, with the doorman tipping his hat, offering to get me a taxi. It was all a dream. No, it wasn’t. It had been real, but there was nothing to prove it had happened, no physical evidence. No souvenir, no keepsake. Not even a book of matches to remind me of it all. I went to the garage next door. Handing over my ticket, I braced to learn how much I owed, fearing the bills in my wallet would be hopelessly inadequate. My bank card only worked in Connecticut. I could have gone to my father’s office and asked him for the money, but it would have been awkward. Why wasn’t I at school?

“That’s okay, mister,” said the attendant. “It’s been taken care of. Mrs. Oppenheim already called down. It’s on Mr. Oppenheim’s tab.”

C
ESCA MARRIED GAVIN, AS I WAS AFRAID SHE WOULD. IN
the end, I wasn’t invited to the wedding. I wrote to her often. Long, passionate, youthful letters. Occasionally she wrote me back a short note. Once I got a postcard from Spain with a photograph of the sea on the other side. It began
Dear Tricky Wylie
. . . But eventually we lost touch.

I cherished her memory. I dated other women, but none of them touched me the way she had. I was just going through the motions. Fumbling in the dark, the creak of bedsprings, bad breath in the morning, forced gaiety to pretend that what I really wanted was for her to be gone. Cesca was the apogee. No one else came close.

After college I returned to New York, rented a small apartment downtown near Wall Street, where the streets in those days were empty of life at night, and tried to paint. I took classes several days a week at the Art Students League. My father gave me a year to succeed. After that, who knew? He mentioned law school, but I never gave him any reason to think I would really
do that. To his credit, he was surprisingly supportive of my wanting to paint. He seemed proud of my talent, one he lacked. I think that, not unlike Izzy Baum, he would have been pleased to be the father of a famous painter. He even steered a few of his friends and colleagues to me, and they obliged him by paying me to paint portraits of them, or their wives or children. Once even a favorite Pekingese dog.

At the same time, he constantly reminded me of how difficult a painter’s life would be. “There’s no money in it,” he would say over dinner. “How do you ever plan to support a family?” I had no proper response and always assumed there would be money from somewhere, whether I earned it myself or was given it. He had been raised without such assumptions, earning every penny. He warned me about the dangers of being a rich man’s son. That was why he wouldn’t give me more money. He pointed to Roger as an example of early privilege having ruined his life. I had no answer to that.

I worked as a bartender and a copy editor. I lived as cheaply as possible, eating primarily pasta and canned soup. I completed a cycle called “The Life of the Poet.” It was a series of ambitious canvases depicting different aspects of a poet’s life. The poet with his family. The poet at work. The poet in love. There were eight in all. Aurelio formed my mental image of the poet—tall, gaunt, handsome, slightly tortured, wholly dedicated to his art. The paintings were large. I labored over them with everything I had. I made slides and showed them to several galleries. The only one that evinced any interest was run by an old queen, who took me for dinner one night and, after several bottles of wine, he started to say how handsome I was and suggested that we go to bed. I left him at the table, calling after me to come back. That I’d be sorry. It was a time when galleries displayed works with broken china on them or cartoons of barking dogs. Those galleries meant nothing to me, and I meant nothing to them.

In the spring Aurelio called me. He was back in New York for several weeks, also talking to galleries. He was not having much more luck.

“The art world has gone insane,” he said. “Beauty is dead. All they want is ugliness.”

We went out to a little coffee shop near his mother’s house. He looked well. Older, of course, but still the same gentle soul he had always been. He said that coming back to New York was depressing. It wasn’t just the art world. It was the city, the crime, the drugs, the filth. He sat there drinking his coffee.

“If it wasn’t for my family, I wouldn’t come back at all,” he said. “By the way, have you heard about Cesca?”

“No. Why?” I answered. I had been careful not to ask after her, waiting to bring her up at the end.

“She left Gavin. Ran off with some French actor.”

“Where? When?”

“A few months ago. In Paris. Mare was furious, of course. Personally, I was amazed the marriage lasted as long as it did. Cesca’s not the kind of person to be tied down by one man.”

“How is she? Have you seen her?”

“She’s well, I think. We spoke the other day. She’s already left the actor.”

“Is she still in Paris?”

“No, she’s back here now. In Amagansett. I’ll be seeing her this weekend.”

I wasn’t sure if this was good news or not. Instead of asking more, all I said was “Give her my best.”

Two weeks later my intercom buzzed. It was late, and I had just gone to bed. “Who is it?” I said into the intercom. At first I only heard static. “Who?” I repeated.

“It’s Cesca. Come down.”

“What time is it?”

“Who cares? Come down. We’re going out.”

Quickly, I pulled on my jeans and a T-shirt, grabbed my wallet and keys, and locked the door behind me. She was in front of my building, sitting in her red BMW convertible, wearing a revealing black dress. She looked terrific.

“Hello, Tricky Wylie,” she said. “Get in.”

I slid into the passenger seat. “How are . . .” I began to say when she reached over and kissed me deeply.

“Oh, I’ve missed you so much,” she said.

I didn’t know what to say. Thoughts and emotions spilled through my brain. Had I missed Cesca? When had I not? Had I not thought of her every day? Had I not put her face in front of every girl I met and found them all wanting?

But I also remembered everything.

She had been married.

Her life had become unknown to me.

She had ruined me.

And now she was sitting here opposite me, smiling her brilliant smile, her short skirt revealing those miraculous knees.

“What are you doing here?” I managed to say.

Already she was pulling away from the curb, taking us into the night. She drove a stick, shifting fluidly.

“We’re going dancing,” she replied. “There’s a great club in Tribeca.”

There was a large crowd milling in front, some of the people wearing outlandish costumes, like contestants on a game show. We parked across the cobblestoned street. “Come on,” she said. Pushing past the crowd, she walked up to one of the bouncers at the door and said, “Hello, Tommy.”

He replied, “Hey, Cesca. How’s it going?”

“Great. He’s with me.”

I followed her through a long hallway decorated with surrealistic images. An insistent bass beat pulsated through the room. The dance floor was packed. Beautiful women, effeminate men.
Celebrities. Movie stars. Investment bankers in pinstripe suits, club kids. Grace Jones strode past me, tall as an Amazon. “Let’s get a drink,” Cesca shouted into my ear. There was a bar in the back. People made way for her as she approached. She greeted the bartender with a kiss on both cheeks. “Hello, darling, two vodka martinis, up with three olives.”

“You got it, Cesca.” She slipped him a twenty-dollar tip.

“So how are you?” she asked me, lighting a cigarette. It was only slightly less loud here.

“Fine, fine. Really good,” I shouted into her ear. I was still feeling disconcerted, as though I had woken up in the wrong bed and had no idea how I had gotten there. “Lio told me about you and Gavin.”

“Yeah, well.
‘Ai xí és la vida,’
as we say in Catalan. That’s life.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Do you know? I never even took his name. What do you think that says about me? What do you think that says about him? Maybe I should have taken you up on your offer after all.” She smiled. “You know, sometimes I think you’re the only person who really gets me. I think you’d put up with anything I did, wouldn’t you?”

It was true. But I wasn’t an idiot. I knew what damage she was capable of doing. It was like those stories of people who adopt lion cubs and raise them as pets. Then, one day the lion has grown and it mauls you. The lion’s not to blame. Such behavior is in its nature. But inside us there is the belief that we are different, the exception. The ones who don’t get into car accidents, or are never diagnosed with cancer or mauled by lions. Until we are, we think we are invulnerable.

I nodded, but she was no longer paying attention. She drank her martini in nearly one swallow and placed the glass back on the table. “Drink up, Wylie. Let’s dance.”

I was never much of a dancer, but it didn’t matter with Cesca. She was a marvelous dancer. Sensual, spirited, moving perfectly
to the music, knowing that everyone in the room was watching her, admiring her. It was impossible not to. She danced with the entire floor, moving from partner to partner. I was just a member of the audience. Occasionally, like a leading lady on the stage, she would catch my eye and wink at me before resuming her role. I kept dancing on the periphery, keeping time to the music, not comfortable enough to stop but not feeling comfortable where I was. I knew there was no point in saying anything. I was just supposed to be happy I was there. It was what she wanted.

At some point, Cesca grabbed my hand and said, “Come with me.” Her hands were slick with sweat. She led me to a large ladies’ room filled with people of both sexes, some smoking, others making out. Cesca found an unoccupied stall and pulled me in. Instantly, urgently, her arms were around me, her tongue down my throat, grinding her hips against me. Then she placed my hands on her breasts and began to fumble with my belt. “Fuck me, Tricky Wylie. Fuck me.”

I did. Against a wall. But I didn’t want to. I remember looking up at her face, her eyes closed. It was only later that I realized I could have been anyone. Then, all I wanted was to please her. I don’t know which of us was sadder or the more confused. Her, for treating life so cheaply, or me, for being so easily in her thrall.

Later she drove me home through the early morning streets. “I’m so happy to see you again, Wylie,” she said, running her fingers through my hair.
“Molt maco.”

“What are your plans?” I asked. “Will I see you again?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’m not sure where I’m going to be one week to the next. I’ve always wanted to go to Fiji. Maybe I’ll go there.”

“What would you do there?”

“I don’t know. What I do now, I suppose. Maybe I’ll learn to surf.”

“Would that make you happy?”

She threw her head back and laughed. “Shit, I don’t know.”

“What if I came with you? To Fiji, I mean.”

“That’s incredibly sweet but a terrible idea. I’d drive you crazy in a week. If you spent too much time around me, you’d get sick of me. I wouldn’t want that. I like the way you see me. It’s the way I’d like to see myself, I think.”

“How do you think I see you?”

“Beautiful. Interesting. Desirable. Did I leave anything out?”

“No.”

“That’s the problem, Wylie. I did. I’m also angry, frustrated, spoiled, stubborn, occasionally cruel and self-destructive. There are days when I hate myself so much I can barely get out of bed. And, when I do, all I want to do is try to obliterate everything in my path. That’s why I don’t want to see more of you. I don’t want to obliterate you too.”

“Shouldn’t I be allowed to decide that for myself?”

“No. I wouldn’t ask that.”

“What if it was what I wanted?”

She shook her head. “No, you wouldn’t. Believe me.”

“Aren’t you being too tough on yourself?”

She shrugged. “Am I? Who’s to say?”

“Me. Let me in, Cesca. I love you. I’ll love you no matter what.”

She drove in silence for several minutes. “I don’t know. Maybe. One day. Not now. Okay?”

“Okay.” That was enough for me. For the first time I felt like we had an understanding, an acknowledgment that there might be a one day.

She stopped in front of my building. The street was deserted. Trash littered the sidewalk. The windows in all the buildings were dark. Few people lived there. It was not a residential block.

“By the way,” I asked. “How did you find me?”

“Lio told me where you lived.” I had given him my address so he could write to me.

“Lio did?”

“Yes.”

“Did you say why?”

“I said I wanted to see you.”

“What did he say?”

“He said, ‘I think Wylie still has a crush on you.’”

“What did you say?”

“I said I still had a crush on you too.” She reached out and took my hand. “See, it’s not just you.” Then she kissed me delicately on the cheeks, the eyelids, and the lips. “Good-bye, Tricky Wylie.”

I stepped out of the car and leaned back in. “When will I see you again?”

“I don’t know. Probably not for a while.”

“Now that you’ve got my address, can you at least write to me and let me know how you are?”

“I’ll try. In case you don’t remember, I’m not very good at writing letters.” She smiled one last time and then started the ignition. “Take care of yourself.”

“You too.”

I watched her drive away. In the east the sun was already rising.