Bird in Hand - Christina Baker Kline [68]
Ursula frowned. Clearly, she expected more for her twenty-four dollars. “But what about your agent?”
“Oh. She says she’s not accepting any new clients at the moment,” Claire said, parroting the words her agent had said to her when she left on tour. (“Under no circumstances will you give any would-be writer who comes to your reading my e-mail address!”)
“Well, I know that’s not true,” Ursula said, adopting a mock-jovial air. “I have a subscription to Writer’s Digest. I know how it goes down. Agents are always looking for new clients. Just because I don’t live in New York City doesn’t mean I can’t string two sentences together, you know. I was listed in the Encyclopedia of American Writers last year, by the way. Not to brag. Just to make my point.”
Claire had seen ads for the Encyclopedia of American Writers; they charged seventy-nine dollars to list your name and bio, and then you had to pay ninety-nine dollars for the tome itself. She was suddenly bone weary; all she wanted to do was flee. It had been too long a day. She’d smiled and chitchatted with too many random people, and now she just wanted to get back to her hotel and meet Charlie at the bar and fuck him in her king-size bed.
She willed herself to smile at Ursula. “Wow, congratulations!” she said brightly. “I’m sure you’re very talented, and I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful. But feel free to contact me through my Web site if you have other questions.”
By this time Gary, the media escort, and Alan, a store clerk with a weedy goatee, had descended on the table, sensing a situation. “Can I assist you with anything else this evening?” Alan asked Ursula in a sugary singsong.
Stuffing Claire’s book in her bag with a frown, Ursula said, “No, thank you. And I just want to say one more thing to Claire Ellis. Irregardless of what that critic said, I don’t think your book is tedious navel-gazing masquerading as fiction. At least from what you read tonight. So good luck. I hope the reviews get better.”
“What is she talking about?” Claire asked Gary when Ursula was gone.
“Lord knows. She clearly has a screw loose. She probably made it up.” He flapped his hand dismissively.
Alan, stacking chairs against a bookcase, called over, “Actually, I saw that one. It’s the newest customer review on Amazon, right at the top. One star.”
“Oh, well, then,” Gary scoffed. “Customer review. Nobody pays any attention to those anyway.”
A tiny dark cloud was forming behind Claire’s eyes, meeting up with other clouds, gathering size and heft by the minute. She felt an achy exhaustion that had become familiar over the past week, the result of erratic surges and ebbs of adrenaline that occurred throughout the day as she moved from one appearance to another.
“Hey, you two want to go out for a drink?” Alan asked, rolling a heavy bookcase back to its customary place. “I can show you around ‘happening’ downtown Atlanta.”
“Fine by me,” Gary said. “We could have a few beers on the publisher.” He looked expectantly at Claire. “I’ll bet you could use a cosmo right about now.”
“I’d love to,” Claire said, “but I’m going to have to pass. I’m wiped. Thank you, though.”
“You don’t have to get up in the morning,” Gary said, leafing through Claire’s typed schedule. “Your flight to Richmond isn’t until two.”
“I need to take a bubble bath and go to bed,” she said, pulling on her coat. “I’m sorry. I’m a boring old lady.”
I’d love to. I’m sorry. I’m sure you’re very talented. I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful. Thank you, thank you, I’m sorry. Claire felt as if she were choking on her own white lies. She just wanted to go back to her hotel, damn it; was that too much to ask? She felt horribly guilty, but she hated this part of it—the endless expectation that one be grateful and polite. As he drove Claire around in his Prius all day, Gary had regaled her with stories of difficult writers: minor celebrities hawking kiss-and-tell memoirs, querulous old historians, bitchy