Let me buy you dinner. What are you in the mood for?’
‘There’s no need,’ Ruth began, but I had already started to say, ‘There’s a taco truck on the corner.’
‘Tacos coming right up. Let me grab some cash.’ She ran up the stairs.
‘Do you think we’ve done the right thing?’ I asked.
‘Yeah, I like her. And it’ll be nice for you to have company while I’m at work.’
‘It will,’ I said.
Ruth went back to the kitchen to pour herself more wine. Eden was still upstairs, and I went over to the front window.
There was a man standing across the street, holding an umbrella which obscured most of his face, but I could see that he had a grey beard. He appeared to be staring straight at the house. Straight at me. And as soon as our eyes met he put his head down, pulled the umbrella lower and hurried away.
Weird, I thought. But when Eden came running back down the stairs, clutching a fistful of cash, I didn’t say anything to her about it.
Chapter 3
I emerged on to Eighth Avenue wondering if there was a manhole I could jump into. Sam Mendoza, the producer I’d just met, hated my play. He hadn’t used those words, but it was obvious. He had said it had ‘some potential’. And then he’d turned the conversation to Ruth, asking me how rehearsals for Dare were going. If I knew what kind of role she was looking for next. That, I realised, was why he’d wanted to see me. Not because he was interested in me or my writing, but because my girlfriend was a hot up-and-coming actor.
I was used to rejection and lack of interest. It went with the territory. After all, writers are as commonplace as rats. The world needs another one like it needs an extra hole in the ozone layer. I hadn’t been expecting miracles from this meeting.
But it still stung.
I got out of the Theater District as quickly as I could and walked towards Central Park. The city was as hot as hell, and crowded with tourists. In desperate need of a break from the heat, I popped into a Starbucks and bought an iced latte.
As I came out, I saw a familiar figure going into a jewellery store.
‘Cara?’ I called.
She stopped, looked around, then spotted me. ‘Adam?’
I reached her and we exchanged a quick hug. ‘This is a coincidence,’ I said.
‘Small world,’ she replied with her customary smile. It was the first time I’d seen her since we’d been in New York.
Cara had been on the cruise, the only other actress in the company. Miranda is the only female part in The Tempest, and Cara, an Australian who had something of the young Nicole Kidman about her, with strawberry-blonde hair and a cute smattering of freckles across her nose, had been Ruth’s understudy.
‘Why aren’t you in rehearsals?’ I asked.
‘I’m not needed today. Sally keeps reworking the script and my part has shrunk from tiny to infinitesimal.’
‘Oh dear.’
She shrugged. ‘That’s showbiz.’
‘But you’re still Ruth’s understudy, right?’
‘Yeah. Again. But unless she gets struck down by a mystery virus . . .’ She sighed. ‘Anyway, I’ve gotta run. I need to buy a birthday present for my sister. She’s sent me a wish list full of words like Tiffany’s and Saks. But why don’t I give you my number? We could go for a drink or something.’
‘That would be . . .’ I wasn’t sure how Ruth would feel about me going for a drink with Cara. But I took the phone she offered me and tapped my number into it.
‘I’ll call you,’ she said, and she disappeared into the store, turning at the last moment to give me a little wave.
By the time I reached Central Park I was coated in sweat, but it was a little cooler and quieter beneath the trees, away from the sunbathers and children clutching helium balloons. I sat on a bench and flicked through my script. Sam hadn’t even made any notes on it. I doubted he’d looked at it.
I got up and put it in a bin, laughing at myself even as I did it. I mean, it wasn’t as if I didn’t have a copy saved on my laptop. As I sat back down I tried to ignore the whisper of panic, the voice that told me I was wasting my time, that I wasn’t good enough. I had been writing for years, since I was at college, and apart from a couple