Envy(65)

“Maybe. But I gotta tell you, Maris, fresh after you’ve climaxed, it’s a real bummer if the woman up and walks out on you.”

“I suppose.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said, nodding sagely. “Ask any guy.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

“In Roark’s mind she’s being a heartless bitch. He doesn’t need her charity, and who the hell does she think she is? He’s good and pissed.” Maris was about to protest when Parker raised a finger to halt her. “At least initially.” He picked up the remaining pages. “Shall I?”

“Please.”

“ ‘The day had started off lousy and then it had gone to pure shit.

“ ‘He thought about getting drunk, but could see no good purpose in it. Today’s disappointments would carry over into tomorrow, and then he would have to confront them with the handicap of a hangover.

“ ‘Besides, he hadn’t earned an excuse to get drunk. That right belonged to a man only if he had a circumstance to celebrate… or to mourn. One was allowed to lament a disaster visited on him by random selection, such as an act of God or a whim of Fate. But regret over his own culpability earned a man no such privilege. Responsibility for one’s sorry situation couldn’t be that easily removed.

“ ‘As much as he wanted to lay blame on Leslie, on Hadley, on Todd, for today’s miseries, Roark acknowledged that most of the blame, if not all of it, lay squarely with him.

“ ‘Leslie was wise beyond her years and experience. Moreover, she was honest to a painful degree. Their individual desires were too discordant, their dreams too disparate for them to have a future together. Their goals conflicted now. In the future they would clash resoundingly. When the inevitable separation came, they would be left scarred and embittered.

“ ‘The wisdom of her choice to return to her small-town aspirations and long-standing sweetheart didn’t make it any easier to lose her now, but ending the relationship before it actually started would spare them future heartache. At least they had parted while all the memories were still sweet.

“ ‘Professor Hadley had been well within his right to be perturbed. He didn’t want any stupid students under his tutelage. He had probably been as upset with Roark for being duped by his roommate as he had been by the tardiness. The professor’s time was too limited, his instruction too valuable to squander on fools. Taking Todd’s word for something as critical as that meeting had been nothing short of stupid.

“ ‘The challenge facing Roark now was to prove to Hadley that, all evidence pointing to the contrary, he was not an imbecile. He could learn from this experience. He must learn from it. If he didn’t, he would be as foolish, as much a waste of time and effort, as Hadley believed him to be.

“ ‘Today had been the first cold day of the season. It was also the first day of Roark Slade’s life as an adult. Without ceremony or sacrament, he had undergone a rite of passage. Whatever remnants of innocence he had awakened with this morning had been stripped from him. After today, trust was only a word, a remote ideal that would never have a practical application in his life. From today forward, any belief he entertained would be contaminated by skepticism.

“ ‘Roark wasn’t aware of this transition until years later, when he leafed back through the pages of his personal history, searching for the defining moment when his life had ceased being charmed and became cursed. His search always ended on this day.

“ ‘For months following that Tuesday before Thanksgiving, Roark would think about Professor Hadley and what he could learn from that embarrassing experience. He would reflect on all that he had learned from Leslie about himself as a man and a writer. He would think on that quite a lot.

“ ‘But what he had learned about his best friend Todd, he avoided thinking about altogether.’ ”

When Parker finished reading the final page, he stared at the last sentence for a time, then let the sheet slip from his fingers and drift down to join the others. By now the floor around the wheelchair was littered with pages of manuscript.

Quietly, and without looking at Maris, he said, “That’s it so far.”

She slowly unfolded her legs and lowered her feet to the floor. She slid her palms up and down the tops of her thighs, then clasped her hands loosely, raised her shoulders around a deep breath, and released it gradually.

“All right, Parker. It goes against the company’s policy as well as my own, but I’ll give you a ten-thousand-dollar advance just to finish the manuscript. When it’s completed, we’ll negotiate the terms of a contract. If you decline our terms and sell the book elsewhere, the ten thousand must be repaid from the first proceeds you receive from the other publisher. If you accept, that initial ten thousand will be applied to the advance we ultimately agree upon. In the meantime, I suggest you get an agent.”

“I suggest you get a grip on reality.”

“That’s a no?”

“Twenty-five thousand. Which barely covers my expenses. I’ve got to buy cartridges for my printer, paper.”

“Mighty expensive paper,” she said drolly. “Fifteen. That represents an act of good faith, considering that I don’t even have an outline.”

He mulled it over for several seconds. “Fifteen, no first-proceeds clause, and the fifteen is not applicable to the advance finally agreed upon. In other words, the fifteen’s mine no matter what. If Matherly Press can’t afford to gamble fifteen grand, you should padlock the doors tomorrow.”