The photography business was something I had learned piecemeal from my years of living with him. In some ways I was perhaps more equipped to see Tobias’s career than he was. Most photographers build their portfolio while still assisting, that much I knew. They began to get jobs from under their bosses—the fallout, so to speak. The gigs that were too far to travel or paid too little or were for a publication that was under the radar. Those jobs lead to more independence, which lead to more opportunity—more contacts. And so it went. But it hadn’t for Tobias. Because he had left Wolfe and then worked for someone whose clientele he wasn’t interested in. And now, diving completely into his own work, without a system behind him, was risky, particularly for someone like Tobias, who was so susceptible to the ups and downs of his own internal landscape.
In the beginning of his freelance stint he threw himself in full force, and I admit, however naively, to feeling buoyed by his enthusiasm. I knew better, but that knowing felt like a betrayal of Tobias, of his talent and my love for him. I ignored it. I watched as he spent thousands he didn’t have—that we needed for rent, for the wedding (we had set a date for the spring at a little church in Park Slope we had passed on a walk and liked)—on new camera equipment. I rationalized that he needed to spend money to make money. I pored over his computer with him, looking at city shots he spent his day taking. They were beautiful. Old men and their grandchildren. Waiters at West Village cafés that made the city look like Paris. Graffiti art. He was going to look for work, he said. He was going to go on desk sides and submit to magazines. He knew all the players. It was just a matter of time before he got his first solo shoot. I believed him.
But as the weeks went on, the plan began to morph. It wasn’t about jobs anymore. He didn’t want to take another soul-sucking gig, he said. He couldn’t do it again. He started taking pictures. Constantly. He missed a dinner with Kendra and her boyfriend. He canceled on a drinks night David and the new guy, Mark, had planned. All he did, all day and night long, was shoot.
“When do you think the Web site will be ready?” I asked him weeks later. I had just come home from work. Penguin and Random House publishing houses had merged not too long before and people were getting laid off left and right. I thought my job was safe, for now—they hadn’t quite attacked editorial yet—but it was just a matter of time before they did. I didn’t have my own list, at least not an impressive one, and I knew I’d be a hard sell at a competing publisher at the next level. I’d have to start as an assistant editor all over again, and I was nearly ready for a promotion. I was coming to the end of my twenties, too. And I had saved nothing toward the future I wanted. Not money, not time, not even vacation days. I spent everything hoping one day, what? Something magical would happen? Tobias would hit it big? I wasn’t even sure what he was doing anymore.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I think I need more material.”
“Really?”
I regretted it as soon as I said it. I could feel the attitude in my voice. He gave me a withering look—like I didn’t understand, like I couldn’t. I took him in in his sweatpants, and I thought that maybe he was right—I didn’t get it. I was someone who supported artists as my profession, but I wasn’t one.
“I can help,” I added, trying to override, rectify. “I know artists. I help writers all the time. We could put an ad in The Village Voice, on Twitter—you could do some commercial shoots to supplement.” I snuck that last part in, but he wasn’t even listening.
“I think what I need is an exhibit,” he said. “I went up to Queens today and shot a bunch.” He pivoted his computer so I could see. There were hundreds of photos of the World’s Fair grounds. They were beautiful. I did my usual supportive swoon—“Wow,” “I love this one”—but as he clicked through I started to feel less and less generous. Why couldn’t he have spent the day photographing a wedding? A bar mitzvah? A dog’s birthday party, if it paid? The city was full of people willing to shell out dough for his skills—and I resented that he felt above all that. That I had been at work and he’d been here, thinking of galleries and pictures and not bills.
“What kind of exhibit?” I asked when he was finished.
“You know, a show,” he said. “Somewhere I can showcase my work and invite the bigwigs.”
“Where?” I asked. I had no idea what he meant by bigwigs. Who said if he had a show any of them would even come? Didn’t he already have those contacts anyway? Every next step felt like one to the left. I was beginning to think he didn’t even want clients unless they were Vanity Fair.
“NYU,” he said. “My friend Joseph works in the administrative department at Tisch and said he could put it together.” He sounded defiant.
“Tobias,” I said. “I can’t carry us for much longer.”
“I know,” he grunted. “That’s why I’m working day and night to get this business up and running.”
“Great!” I said. “Fine.” I took my own computer into my lap. I had an edit I needed to finish for my boss. And I wanted a glass of wine. And to take a bath. And to stop talking about this.
“Sound more like you believe in me,” he said under his breath.
I pretended like I hadn’t heard him, and he went in the kitchen to make pasta or a sandwich or something and then went into the bedroom and by the time I finished the edit, he was asleep.
I confessed at work the next day to Kendra that I was stressed about money. I’d covered our rent myself for two months, which was half of my life’s bond savings. I didn’t know if I could go a third.
“You need to lay it out for him,” she said over coffee and doughnuts behind closed doors in her office. Kendra had recently been promoted to full-fledged editor, a title I should have had based on how long I’d been there. But I also couldn’t deny that the situation with Tobias was affecting my productivity. It was ironic: I needed the job more than ever, but I was performing at half mast. It took me three hours to do something that should have taken one. I was distracted and afraid. Yes, fear was behind it all. I was scared all this would come to a head—and then what?
“It’s too much to manage alone,” Kendra continued.
I licked some caramel off my finger. “He’s so sensitive right now,” I said. “He thinks I don’t believe in him.”
Kendra shook her hair out. She had recently let her bangs grow, and she had this punk-rock look now that worked on her. She was still seeing Greg. “Do you?” she asked. “Believe in him?”
It was a question I should have answered automatically. Of course I believed in him. He was the most talented artist I knew. I had been convinced of his talent since the moment I saw his first snap at the UCLA student exhibit. But I also knew I was biased. I loved him. I was invested in a way that couldn’t allow me to be impartial. And I also knew that talent wasn’t enough. I had met and read many talented writers over the course of my nearly four years at Random House who never made it through the gates. Some submissions were spectacular, but we couldn’t publish everything, and more often than not the savvy writer, the celebrity, the one with the Twitter following and well-curated Instagram presence was the one we signed.
I wanted to believe, the way I had, the way I thought Tobias did, that talent would one day win out—that every great manuscript, photo, painting eventually saw the light. But it got harder and harder to hold on to that vision.
“He’s amazingly talented,” I told Kendra. That much I was sure of. “I just don’t know if it’s enough. He thinks the world will fold at his feet, and it just doesn’t work that way.”
She nodded. “If he were taking concrete steps to build a business it would be one thing,” she said. “But I get the feeling he’s just out there playing with his camera. It feels like he’s taking advantage of you.”
The words caused me to plunk down my doughnut. That wasn’t Tobias. He would never wittingly use me in a way that didn’t benefit us both. But she was right about the fact that I needed to talk to him, be real with him. I couldn’t continue on like this—I was hemorrhaging money I didn’t have, and I still had hopes of us getting married in the spring. I still wanted a wedding—as trite and unaware as that sounds. I had blinders on. But isn’t that part of love? Refusing to see the parts that are so dark, so grim, they would send you running? Or is it that you see them and love anyway?