“Be more careful.”
I finished the cooking, then cleaned up, left a note for Betsy about what to do for his dinner. When I checked on him again, he was sleeping. I hoped he’d stay asleep until Betsy came. I’d feel better if he’d have twenty-four-hour care, but he wouldn’t hear of it. I’m not an invalid. I can take care of myself. This was increasingly untrue. But it’s hard to argue with the people who used to give you piggyback rides.
? ? ?
IN ADDITION TO MY ILLUSTRIOUS waitressing career, I was also a serial cat sitter, plant waterer, house watcher. For the last month and for possibly the next six, I had stayed in a loft on Greenwich and Vestry. The kind of place where about 1 percent of the population, less, might ever be able to consider living. I headed there after leaving Paul’s East Village walk-up.
The doorman in the cool museum of a lobby acknowledged me with the slight nod reserved for the help—nannies, housekeepers, cooks, personal trainers, massage therapists, cat sitters. His dark, lidded eyes slid past me, not lingering, as I drifted over marble and past snow-white walls adorned with towering modern art oils in shining white frames. I knew his name, Bruno—tight black curls and a nasty scar on his neck. He had bulk, standing nearly six feet, and edge. In a fight, he’d get dirty. I bet he carried a knife, which is a highly effective weapon if you have nerve, aren’t afraid to get in close.
On a console table in the elevator lobby, a towering vase of white calla lilies offered a funereal odor, filling the space, tickling my sinuses. The elevator opened, and a willowy blonde dressed in a draping, expensive white fabric brushed past me without seeing, staring at the enormous smartphone in her hand.
“Have a good day, Miss Dykstra,” I heard the doorman say, his voice bright and obsequious. I bet his eyes lingered on her—the spun gold of her hair, the elegant sway of her body.
He rushed to open the door for her. From where I stood, I didn’t even see her acknowledge him with an upward glance from her phone. He was invisible to most people, as well. He just didn’t realize it. Maybe somewhere, to someone, he mattered. But not here.
Inside the elevator, it was quiet and mercifully dim, no mirrors. I hated elevator mirrors, standing in a box, staring at myself. I avoided mirrors as a general rule, turned away from my reflection. I stepped into the private hallway that the owner had kept spare and undecorated and walked down to the door at the end.
Tiger greeted me as I stepped inside. He was more like a dog-cat, curious, always getting into trouble by tipping plants and tearing up throw pillows, sloppily affectionate, a big eater. At night, he slept on the pillow beside me in the gigantic king bed in the gigantic white room—white walls, white dresser, white down comforter, white sheets, white Eames chair in the corner—with views of downtown.
As usual, Tiger had scattered food all over the floor in the kitchen.
“Bad kitty,” I said mildly, petting him as he wound himself in furry figure eights around my ankles.
I swept up the mess from the gray slate floor and refilled the bowl with the stupidly expensive cat food I had to pick up from the organic pet supply store in the West Village. Tiger purred madly, then set to eating as though he hadn’t eaten in days though I’d filled his bowl that morning and had only been gone a few hours. He was lonely. I felt bad for him.
I had never met the artist that owned the apartment. He contacted me via the website where I list my services, checked my references, and then hired me without ever meeting me. He paid me via PayPal. It was possible we’d never meet, as had been the case with many of my previous employers. I preferred that. No connections. No personal contact.
But something about Tiger’s loneliness niggled at me. After sitting with him awhile on the couch, petting him, thinking about Paul, about John Didion, I got up, grabbed my laptop, and wrote Nate Shelby an email:
Tiger’s lonely. Maybe you should consider another cat.
He wrote back promptly.
[email protected].
I’ll think about it. Thanks.
Okay, great. The encounter led me to look up his website. It was spare and beautiful like his apartment, all neutrals, the only bright colors in the large-format oils, some of which I recognized from around the apartment. Big bold strokes of color, spheres, spirals, angry splashes, thick black jags that looked like tears in the canvas. His bio had no picture: Nate Shelby, a graduate of The Cooper Union, is a renowned artist who works primarily in oil on canvas. His work has appeared in galleries and museums around the world. He divides his time between New York and Paris.
In a world where people were promoting themselves from every possible platform, Nate Shelby didn’t seem to feel the need. I searched around online for some pictures of him and only found a couple. One when he was still at The Cooper Union. He stood in a room of other artists surrounding a nude woman who reclined on a chaise. He was thin and pale with a thick mop of black hair, his face a mask of concentration. There was another one of him, grainy, black and white, walking on the Brooklyn Bridge, hands in his pockets, head down. There were no shots of him at glamorous art parties in SoHo or Paris, no publicity images, no profiles in art magazines.
It wasn’t my habit to search out my clients. Usually, I could tell almost everything about someone by his home—what photos were displayed, and weren’t, objects collected, cluttered or tidy, what was in their medicine cabinet (that was a big one), the pantry, the state of the master closet, the home office. I got a sense after living in someone’s space for a while, an energy that settled on me. I knew the person even if we never met. I remembered the apartment and how it felt and smelled, like a relationship that ended amicably but forever.
The maid had been here. I could tell because the whole space smelled of astringent lemon, a tingling clean smell that was still unpleasant. Tiger settled on the windowsill, finding a lovely patch of light close to me. And I abandoned my laptop and sat in front of Nate Shelby’s gigantic Mac and opened the browser and entered the name that had been hovering on the edge of my consciousness all day, a tickle, a tune I couldn’t get out of my head.
three