Twenty-Three
It was a work night. ZaZa sat at the glass table in the dining area of her loft, with a glass of cheap white wine that really wasn’t half bad, and waited for Tania. She was jumpy because she wanted to see her so very badly. For more than a year, every Saturday, Tania Hutchison would show up around midnight. They’d drink some wine, light a joint, and after they were relaxed, they’d get undressed and go at it.
She looked at her watch. Why was Tania late? ZaZa got up, put the bottle of wine back in the fridge and sat down at the table again.
She’d decided. She was going to tell her. Finally. She’d kept the secret way too long. Months earlier, this had stopped being just a way to pick up some extra cash, to supplement the pathetic salary she made as a waitress while trying to get work as an actress.
Like too many other women, ZaZa had come to New York with stars in her eyes, and three years later had only managed to get some work as an extra in a dozen commercials. Every few months, she would decide to pack it in, move away, get a normal job, and yet something made her stay. She hated waitressing. Hated the studio loft in the crappy building in Hell’s Kitchen. Even with all the painting and decorating, it still looked like shit. She hated the hope she felt every time she went on an audition, and then the greater hope she felt every time she got a callback, and then the torture of waiting for the phone call that she’d gotten the part. The phone call that never came.
At first she’d resisted when Barbara, a fellow actress, had told her about this job. But ZaZa needed some new clothes, a good haircut and decent highlights. If she didn’t look good, she definitely wouldn’t get any work. So she’d said she’d try it. After all, how bad could it be-it was acting, wasn’t it? And she and Barbara were both actresses. They’d done scenes together in class. They’d gotten friendly, gone out for coffee, talked about their boyfriends when they had them, and their lack thereof when they didn’t. They’d become friends, not just fellow thespians.
ZaZa jumped. Damn. The buzzer was too loud. She’d complained to the landlord about it a dozen times already. Every time he saw her in the halls, he wiped his hands on his already dirty jeans, leered at her-not enough to upset her but just enough to creep her out and make her wonder if he’d seen her on the Internet-and promised that as soon as he finished fixing the floor in 4-B or repainting 6-A, he’d fix the buzzer. But it never happened.
Tania brought a freezing cold whoosh of air with her. As she unwrapped her scarf and her hair fell back into place, ZaZa pretended she wasn’t watching her, but she was. Tania’s nose was a little longer than was considered beautiful, and her jaw was too strong, but that just made her more striking.
The two women did not kiss hello, but they seemed genuinely glad to see each other. While Tania took off her coat, ZaZa poured her a glass of wine.
When, after almost two years, Barbara had finally given up hunting for work as an actress and moved out of New York, ZaZa had recruited her new partner. She’d met Tania doing extra work and they’d gotten friendly, going to auditions together. After a few weeks, ZaZa felt that their friendship was good enough to withstand the suggestion, so she took on Barbara’s role and broached the subject of the gig. First, Tania laughed. Then she asked to see what ZaZa did online. They’d sat in front of ZaZa’s computer, with two glasses of wine, and when ZaZa hit the play button, Tania leaned in.
She didn’t say anything while the footage ran. She didn’t get up, or move back, or squirm. The longer she watched, the more hopeful ZaZa became. When the scene was over, Tania stood up and told ZaZa she needed to think about it. A week later she called and said yes, she would do it, because she needed the money. All the stress in the sentence was on the word money.
That had been more than a year ago.
This would be the fifty-third time they’d stripped down and played at being lovers for the sake of the thousands of men who were out there in the black nowhere watching. ZaZa didn’t like to think about them. No, she couldn’t think about them. Couldn’t picture them, couldn’t wonder at what they were doing-it would poison her performance. Instead, each time they got together, ZaZa and Tania spent the first hour or so drinking wine and improvising the story they would use that night. ZaZa played at the scenarios as if she were on Broadway.
It was a test of their acting skills, Tania had said.
ZaZa had agreed. “It’s great practice for us. As good as any class I’ve ever been in.”
“So who should we be tonight?” Tania asked once she’d had some wine and warmed up.
ZaZa had bought a used paperback of Sappho poems and read two of them aloud.
“I love those. Let’s use them,” Tania said.
“You don’t think it might go over our audience’s heads?”
“As long as we give them virtual head with the scene, they won’t care, now, will they?” Tania had laughed, stood up and started to unbutton the black cardigan she was wearing.
“Don’t,” ZaZa put out her hand to stop her friend. “Let me do it. They’ll like that.”
And then they turned on the camera.
Twenty-Four
For dinner, Noah took me to a small restaurant that wasn’t in any of the guidebooks but was packed. He introduced me to Bella, the owner, who was in her sixties and had big blond hair and earrings that dangled down to her shoulders. Despite the crowd waiting at the small bar, we’d gotten a table immediately, along with a basket of hot corn sticks, dripping with butter, and a plate of spicy pickled okra that I wasn’t sure I wanted to taste. Once I had, I couldn’t stop eating them.
I let Noah order for me-crab étouffé atop a plate of dirty rice-and then ate more than I should have. The wine was crisp and cold, a welcome respite from the food that was setting my mouth afire.
Afterward, we walked over to Blues Palace, an unassuming club. After the band had played a few songs, the sax player noticed Noah in the audience and called him up onto the stage, insisting he play with them. He looked at me and I nodded. Once on stage, he sat down at the piano and his fingers took off.
Until I met Noah, I’d never listened to music just for the music; it had always been in the background. But I’d discovered that if you give yourself up to it and really listen, your body begins to resonate with the notes, and you hear it inside of you as a sensation as much as a sound.
Noah improvised for more than an hour and we got back to the hotel a little after one in the morning. There was enough moonglow coming through the open window for us to see each other. Without speaking, he reached out, put his hands around my waist and pulled me toward him. I felt as if I were moving in slow motion. First there was his face, with his soft blue eyes looking at me, and then it was closer to mine. I could feel his breath on my cheeks while his fingers gripped me, digging through my sweater and into my skin, the pressure contrasting with the gentle expression on his face. And then there was nothing but the blackness inside my own eyes and the sensation of his lips compelling mine to open. Lips moving in a way that makes nerve endings burst. Lips moving in a way that sends shivers up the back of your neck. Lips that cover your mouth and tease you alive. Lips that do not stop even as one kiss moves into the next, and the next one after that.
The rest of my body felt the kiss as if every pore of my skin was experiencing the same sensation and reacting the same way. It doesn’t make sense now, but that was exactly how it felt. As if his fingers were suddenly kissing my waist, and our thighs were kissing each other, and my breasts, beneath my sweater, were kissing his chest, and my shoulder bones were kissing his arms.
His lips kept returning to mine even as he moved me toward the bed and laid me down and pinned my arms to my sides. For one moment, he raised himself up on his elbows and hovered over me, smiling, watching me, before swooping down and taking a kiss away from me, and then giving me one back.