Homeland Elegies(40)

I explained to Riaz that Ashraf had a preshow routine of applying moisturizer—he wore boxers through much of the first scene and was always concerned that his umber legs not appear too ashen—which had delayed the opening curtain more than once.

“Well, his legs looked great,” Riaz said.

Emily looked at him, head cocked to one side, the thick jumble of her postshow hair like an auburn mop about her face. I thought I saw her clock the same curious midmost appeal that had no obvious source. “I interrupted you—what was your name again?”

“Riaz. Riaz Rind.”

“I’m Emily.”

“Nice to meet you, Emily. Again. Such wonderful work. Really.”

“You have to say that, but thanks.”

“How did you peg it as Skadden?” I asked.

“I’m sure it could have been a half dozen other law firms in the city,” he said. “But the partner bullying an associate about Israel…I was there. I’ve seen that scene. I left five years before 9/11, so it wasn’t as bad for me. But the writing was on the wall. I did the math and got out.”

“The math?” Emily asked.

He scanned the room quickly, as if gauging how we might react to what he was about to say: “Support for Israel was the unspoken rule. I mean, it’s what’s in your play. I’m guessing either you worked there yourself—or you know someone who did.”

“I have a friend,” I replied, “who’s Jewish, actually.”

He nodded. “It was clear. No one was getting ahead with anything resembling a nuanced view on Israel. And by ‘nuanced’ I mean critical in any way—if you weren’t Jewish, that is. And even if you were.”

“Tell me about it,” Emily said with a chortle, tilting her glass of whiskey toward him in a mock toast. No one laughed.

“But…I mean—we all have views that aren’t open to debate. Right? I know I do.”

“That I hate men?” Emily said, drinking.

Riaz smiled. “That’s hard.”

“Hmm. I wish I could say that more often.” Her gaze lingered on him, interested.

“All men? Really, Emily?” asked an irritated voice. It was lanky, long-suffering Andrew, one of the other male actors in the cast, British-born, with crooked teeth and thinning hair. He’d become infatuated with Emily in the early weeks of rehearsal, and, after a rumored hookup between them during a break in rehearsal one day, he’d proceeded to pen her a stream of increasingly unwelcome poems. (I’d seen them; they were awful.) She asked him to stop, but he wouldn’t. That’s when the director intervened and threatened to fire him. “Even your dad, hmm?”

“Especially my dad, Andrew. You should know that.”

“And why should I know that?”

“Because I told you; you’re a lot like him.” She looked away and drank.

Andrew glared at the side of her face, his cheeks flushed. Then he got up and walked out of the room.

I looked over at Riaz and saw an expression on his face I would see more than once as I would get to know him better in the coming few years: his chin ever so slightly lifted, lips shut, a blank scrutinizing stare that expressed satisfaction without contentment. I didn’t understand the look then but would later: he trusted discord; he thrived on it. Sowing conflict and observing the fallout was his modus vivendi. To him, everything was a negotiation—that was something else I would discover—and not only because he had spent so much of his time making deals. I believe he’d found his way to the work he did in part because of the bracing simplicity with which he saw life itself. It was all very basic: get what you want, by whatever means necessary. That was all well and good in the pursuit of objects, I once said to him over lunchtime burgers at Shake Shack. But what kind of path was it to good relations?

“Relations like what?” he asked.

“Like friendship,” I replied.

It took a moment for the smile on his face to reveal its full, flattered nature. That’s when I realized there was a tactic at work even then: he’d found a way to push me to say what he was hoping to hear, namely, that I valued his friendship. And yet his reply wasn’t in the least friendly: “Friendship’s great. But it never made anyone a billionaire.”





2.


My encounter at the theater with Riaz was brief. Ashraf emerged from his dressing room not long after Andrew’s outburst, and by then, it was already time for the stage manager to lock up. Emily suggested we all repair to a bar on the corner. I offered my apologies. For three weeks now, every morning at five thirty, I’d been waking up with dialogue running through my head, ready to write. I didn’t want a late evening of drinking to interfere with the flow.

Two days later, I would hear from Emily that the night had ended at Riaz’s place. I’d stopped in at the theater between shows that day and found her in her dressing-room doorway. Seeing me, she waved me inside with an impish grin. Her friend Julia—whom I’d met before, a raven-haired, lupine beauty—sat at the mirror, holding up a tumbler full of amber liquid to the light. “It even looks like it’s got gold in it,” Julia said as she brought the rim to her lips for a sip. Emily slipped back into her seat and watched as Julia savored the taste, her expressions shifting with unfolding wonder. She shook her head in disbelief as she handed the tumbler back to her friend. Emily took it now and sipped, licking her lips, tittering with delight and disbelief of her own. Then Emily handed the glass to me.