Asymmetry - Lisa Halliday Page 0,1
cabs churning a spray up Amsterdam seemed to be traveling much faster than they did when it was dry. While his doorman made room for her by pressing himself into a cruciform position, Alice entered purposefully: long strides, blowing out her cheeks, shaking out her umbrella. The elevator was plated top to bottom with warped brass. Either the floors it climbed were very tall or the elevator was moving very slowly, because she had plenty of time to frown at her infinite funhouse reflections and to worry more than a little about what was going to happen next.
When the elevator doors opened, there was a hallway containing six more gray doors. She was about to knock on the first door she came to when another door, on the other side of the elevator, opened a crack and a hand came through, holding a glass.
Alice accepted the glass, which was full of water.
The door closed.
Alice took a sip.
The next time the door opened, it seemed to swing wide on its own. Alice hesitated before carrying her water down a short hallway that ended in a bright white room containing, among other things, a draughtsman’s desk and an unusually wide bed.
“Show me your purse,” he said from behind her.
She did.
“Now open it please. For security reasons.”
Alice set her purse down on the little glass table between them and unlatched it. She took out her wallet: a brown leather men’s wallet that was badly worn and torn. A scratch card, purchased for a dollar and worth the same. A ChapStick. A comb. A key ring. A barrette. A mechanical pencil. A few loose coins and, finally, three portable tampons, which she held in her palm like bullets. Fuzz. Grit.
“No phone?”
“I left it at home.”
He picked up the wallet, fingering a bit of stitching that had come undone. “This is a disgrace, Alice.”
“I know.”
He opened the wallet and removed her debit card, her credit card, an expired Dunkin’ Donuts gift card, her driver’s license, her college ID, and twenty-three dollars in bills. Holding up one of the cards: “Mary-Alice.” Alice wrinkled her nose.
“You don’t like the Mary part.”
“Do you?”
For a moment, he alternated between looking at her and at the card, as though trying to decide which version of her he preferred. Then he nodded, tapped the cards into alignment, snapped a rubber band from his desk around them and the bills, and dropped the stack back into her purse. The wallet he lobbed into a mesh-wire wastepaper basket already lined with a white cone of discarded typescript. The sight of this seemed to irritate him briefly.
“So, Mary-Alice . . .” He sat down, gesturing for her to do the same. The seat of his reading chair was black leather and low to the ground, like a Porsche. “What else can I do for you?”
Alice looked around. On the draughtsman’s desk a fresh manuscript awaited his attention. Beyond it a pair of sliding glass doors gave onto a small balcony sheltered by the one above it from the rain. Behind her the enormous bed was made up so neatly as to look aloof.
“Do you want to go outside?”
“Okay.”
“No one throws the other one over. Deal?”
Alice smiled and, still sitting five feet from him, extended a hand. The writer lowered his eyes to look at it for a long, doubtful moment, as though listed there on her palm were the pros and cons of every handshake he’d ever made.
“On second thought,” he said then. “Come here.”
• • •
His skin was lined and cool.
His lips were soft—but then his teeth were behind them.
At her office, there were no fewer than three National Book Award certificates in his name framed on the lobby wall.
The second time, when she knocked, several seconds went by with no answer.
“It’s me,” Alice said to the door.
The door opened a crack and a hand came through, holding a box.
Alice took the box.
The door closed.
Lincoln Stationers, it said on the box, tooled smartly in gold. Inside, under a single sheet of white tissue paper, lay a burgundy wallet with a coin purse and a clutch clasp.
“Oh my goodness!” said Alice. “It’s so pretty. Thank you.”
“You’re velcome,” said the door.
Again, she was given a glass of water.
Again, they did what they did without disturbing the bed.
Over her sweater, he put a hand on each breast, as if to silence her.
“This one’s bigger.”
“Oh,” said Alice, looking down unhappily.
“No no; it’s not an imperfection. There’s no such thing as a matching pair.”
“Like snowflakes?” suggested Alice.
“Like snowflakes,”