"No matter how many times Phil killed himself, by making that scene in the movie after I told him not to, he was only killing himself then. All the other thirty years of Strayhorn were around and alive: the little boy Phil who ran away from the bogeyman Rock and Roll, the Phil who thought up Bloodstone, all of them. Who you are now controls all the people you were. If this now-you dies for the wrong reason, the other ones get to do what they want. And if they don't have any guide, they go crazy."
"They killed Penn?"
"Sure. Maybe it was the eight-year-old Phil with the bad temper who was angry at the man for impersonating him. Or the twenty-six-year-old Phil who was stoned all the time and did strange things. . . . I couldn't tell you which one. Maybe it was a combination. Maybe they ganged up on Penn.
"Did Sasha ever tell you why they really broke up? Ask her. Ask her about 'A Quarter Past You.' She still has it. Don't let her tell you she doesn't. That'll show you some of the different Phils you didn't know.
"You're the only one now who can do anything about it, Weber. If you don't film that scene, everything's over. Other things too, besides Sasha dying."
"Like what?"
She shook her head.
"If I film it . . . right, then Sasha lives, and her baby – you – die. Right?"
"Right. I go away. I don't have to be here anymore."
It began innocently enough, sort of. They loved each other. They wanted to grow old together, and that is the only real proof of great love. But recently there had been one thing, one large speck of dust on their otherwise clear lens: sex. It had always been fine with them, and there were times when they reveled in each other. But sleep with another person a thousand nights, and some of sex's phosphorescence rubs off under the touch of familiar fingers.
One time, as they worked to catch each other's rhythms, she'd uttered something inadvertently that made him smile and want to talk about later, during those fading soft moments before sleep.
"You shouldn't!" was what she'd suddenly said.
He hadn't been doing anything new or special, so he had to assume she was fantasizing a naughty scene with someone else. The thought excited him, particularly because he himself had often done the same thing.
Afterward, in the blue dark, he touched her hand and asked if he was right.
"I'm embarrassed." But then she giggled – her sign she was willing to talk.
"Come on, don't be embarrassed. I've done it too, I promise! It's just another way."
"You promise you won't misunderstand?"
"I promise."
"Okay, but I'm really embarrassed."
He squeezed her hand and knew not to say anything or else she would shut right up.
"Well, it's not anyone in particular, just this man. It's a fantasy. I see him on a subway and can't stop looking at him."
"How's he dressed?"
"The way I like – jacket and tie, maybe a nice suit. But he's also wearing fresh white tennis sneakers, which throws the whole thing off in a great way. It's a touch of humor that says he wears what he wants and doesn't give a damn what others think."
"Okay. So what happens then?"
She took a deep breath and let it all out slowly before continuing. "I see him and can't stop looking, as I said. He's sexy and that's part of it, sure, but there are other things that make him more special than just that.
"He has these great Frenchman's eyes and is carrying a book I've been meaning to read for a long time. Finally he looks at me and I'm hooked completely. The best part is, he doesn't check out my body or anything. Just looks at me and I know he's interested. I love that. He doesn't go over me like I'm a new car in the showroom."
Her story was much more detailed than he'd have thought. In his own fantasies, he'd make eyes at waitresses in high heels or shopgirls with thick lips. Things were arranged. They'd go back to her apartment. Once there, they'd leap to it with instant heat and curiosity.
Moments pass before he realizes she's begun speaking again.
". . . follows me when I get off the subway. Knowing he's there behind makes me incredibly excited. I know what's going to happen and I know I'll do it, no matter what."
She talked on, giving the most minute, loving details. She and Mr. White Sneakers never speak, not once. As things get more intense, they slow down until it's all movement under water.
The single sentence ever said aloud is the line "You shouldn't!" This is something she says each time, but only once it's actually happening and she feels a momentary pang of guilt. But that passes quickly because the experience is simply too rare and extreme for guilt to enter into it.
When she was finished, there was a silence thick as fur between them. Under her breath, she mumbled something about its not being a very original fantasy.
"Don't say that! Don't degrade it! What do you care, so long as it excites you? What difference does it make how original it is? I bet – quarters of most people's sexual fantasies are either about taking or being taken.
"What's his name?"
"Who, the man? I have no idea. We don't talk. He never tells me."
"What do you want his name to be?"
"I never thought about it. What a funny question."
He went into the kitchen for some wine. When he returned, the light on her side of the bed was on and she was sitting with her arms wrapped around her knees.
"Peter Copeland." She smiled at him and shrugged as if a little embarrassed.
"Peter Copeland? Sounds like a Yalie."
She shrugged. "I don't know. It's just the kind of name he would have."
"Okay. Is it always the same fantasy? Do you ever make up others about him?"
She took a sip of wine and thought about it. She no longer seemed uncomfortable talking about Peter Copeland now that the fact of him was out in the open and he had a name.
"Usually the same – the subway, what he wears, how he follows me. It's enough."
That last phrase hit him hard. He'd had so many different fantasies with so many different predictable faces and settings. "It's enough." He knew then he was jealous of her and her Peter Copeland, content with each other and their silent mutual fever.
The next day, walking to work, he stopped in the middle of the street and started to smirk. At a florist, he bought ten tulips, her favorite flower, and arranged to have them sent over to their apartment. On the enclosed card he wrote, I hope you like tulips. They're my favorite. Thanks for putting the comet over last night's sky. Peter.
And in bed that night, he changed everything. He became an entirely different person in the dark. She couldn't see him so he could have been anyone. He wanted to be Peter Copeland but didn't know how.
Usually they spoke, but in this half hour when they owned each other, he said nothing. From the beginning she understood and responded eagerly. Whenever they sailed toward something familiar, their own from their years together, he steered them away. Then she took over and was strong or passive when he least expected it.
It was all better than he had imagined, and once again he grew so jealous of Peter Copeland. No stranger, however wonderful, deserved what she offered now. The only things he had ever given his dream lovers were both anonymous and forgettable.
At the end, when she again said, "You shouldn't!" he was thrilled she was saying it both to him and to someone else. A moment later he wished it were only him.
The next day he bought the book he knew she had been wanting to read. Inside he wrote, I think you'll like this. Peter. She discovered it under her pillow. Sitting down on the bed, she held it on her lap, both hands on top of it and very still. What was he doing? Did she like it?