By Any Other Name(60)

What if I stayed? What if—

“All aboard,” a voice calls from the train.

“Good night, Lanie,” Noah says against my ear as the conductor blasts the horn. “Thanks again.”

Our arms fall away from each other. I turn from him reluctantly, and board the train.





Chapter Sixteen


When Meg comes into her office on the morning of May 15, she flips on the lights, then jumps at the sight of me, curled in the fetal position on her zebra-print love seat.

“Cool if I hide in here for the next six to eight hours?”

“Sure thing,” she says, tossing down her raincoat and purse. “Who are you hiding from? Are Aude’s sisters in town again?”

I shake my head.

“Oh, that’s right!” Meg’s eyes widen. “It’s motherfucking D-day for Noa Callaway!”

“Every time I hear footsteps,” I say, “I think it’s the Brinks messenger coming at me with that metal briefcase. The suspense may literally kill me.”

Meg powers up her computer, sipping a very large mocha from the café across the street. “Just think, by tonight at six o’clock, you’ll be curled up with Alice, reading the manuscript, swooning with delight, all your worries dissolved. But you’d better read fast, because Mama’s coming over after Goodnight Moon to drunk pack for Italy with you.”

I sit up on her love seat. “Meg, I have a confession.”

“You don’t want to drunk pack together?”

“It’s not that.”

She’s checking her email, not entirely focused on me. “Is it about Noa Callaway?”

I get up and close the door to her office. I come back to sit across from her, clasp my hands together on her desk. Now I have her attention.

“Uh-oh,” Meg says. “Is she . . . not delivering a manuscript for summer?”

“She is not delivering a manuscript for summer.”

Meg spits out her sip of mocha.

“He is delivering a manuscript for summer,” I say.

Meg wipes her mouth. “Wut?”

“Noa Callaway is a man. Like, anatomically. Facial hair, Adam’s apple, the works.” I make some gestures with my hands. “And you can’t tell anyone I told you.”

Meg bursts out laughing, waves me off—then freezes. “Oh sweet lord, you’re not kidding. How? What? When? Who!”

I stand up, pace the room. “His real name is Noah Ross. I only found out three months ago. Right after my promotion. Which Sue kept saying was provisional, so I couldn’t tell you until I got the manuscript. But now, well, here I am. Assuming he does deliver, assuming it’s good—I might want to explore what it would look like to tell his readers.”

“I understand,” she says, putting up a hand. “Complicity, the patriarchy, et cetera.”

I nod. I feel increasingly committed to telling the truth, to showing Noah’s readers what I’ve seen in him. “Can you help?”

I look at Meg, needing hardened, streetwise, Meg-like reassurance. But she is pressing her button in the hollow of her throat, trying to calm herself down.

“Should we take a cleansing breath together?” I ask.

“Let’s do that.”

We both inhale deeply. We let it out. We repeat. And soon, Meg gets a focused look in her eyes.

“Let’s start with the publicist’s first question,” she says. “What is he actually like? Is the guy playing GTA in his mother’s basement with a boa constrictor and a sack of Doritos? Is he a trench coat flasher? Does he torture dogs? Because my powers of spin are only so strong. . . .”

How to describe Noah Ross? How to sell him to Meg as an asset? Over the past three months, Noah has shown me so many surprising sides of himself, I don’t even know where to begin. Should I tell her about the motorcycle lesson? Our co-felony in D.C.? Calla Ross’s bookshelf in the assisted living home? Should I tell her about Javier Bardem eating sushi? Then I realize, Meg’s met him before.

“He’s Man of the Year.”

“No. Way.” Meg squeezes her eyes shut. “You are messing me up right now.”

“I couldn’t tell you. I still can’t tell you.”

She opens her eyes. “But everything is making much more sense. That’s why he was at the launch that night. That’s why you hid from him at Emergency Brunch. You don’t secretly want him—you secretly work with him!”

“Well, yes.”

It’s funny she put it that way, because it’s not that I actively don’t want Noah Ross. Especially this past month, when we’ve barely corresponded and haven’t seen each other . . . let’s just say I’ve had a couple of very stirring dreams. But I can’t tell Meg this—not right now. Her throat button can only handle so many pushes per hour.

“Lanie, does he want to go public?”

“We’re . . . in conversation about it,” I say. There have been a couple of emails from Noah, feeling out the particulars. Would we leak it to the press? Would he write an editorial? Would the two of us give interviews? Together? How close to publication should such a thing take place? And with what tone? What would be the rip cord if everything went to hell?

I’ve played it casual, optimistic, and slightly vague in my responses to him. The truth is, I need Meg to brainstorm a strategy with me. And then there’s Sue . . .