Sundays at Tiffany's - James Patterson [14]
Jane, be strong.
I looked at the cabinet doors, the ones beneath the farmhouse slab sink.
I reached my hand out.
Don’t go there, Jane. Don’t do this.
I opened the cabinet under the kitchen sink.
You are now officially staring into the abyss. Step away! It’s not too late!
I knelt. And since I was getting ready to worship, it was appropriate.
Behind the Brillo pads, behind the Windex, behind the Soft Scrub, I took out my secret box of Oreos. Written on the box was: “For Emergency Use Only! This Means You!”
I felt that tonight qualified. I ate four Oreos slowly, relishing every bite, every perfect combination of crunchy, chocolatey goodness mixed with sweet, creamy filling.
My ritual complete, I headed back to bed.
With two more Oreos in my hand.
The extra Oreos were gone before I hit the pillow.
Fifteen
MICHAEL’S APARTMENT was in SoHo, one of his favorite parts of New York City, or any city, for that matter. Like everybody else, he had a certain amount of free will, could make most of his own choices. He just had a job to do, a mission — to be an imaginary friend to children. It wasn’t a bad job, by any means. He sometimes said out loud, “I love my work.”
Still, he enjoyed these sabbaticals between assignments, between his kids. There was no telling how long they might last, so he’d learned to make the most of every day, to live in the moment, all that good stuff people liked to talk about, especially on TV, but often weren’t very good at putting into action.
That night he got back to his brownstone at about 11:00, totally shaken up about having seen Jane, the grown-up Jane. It had been a huge shock. Jane Margaux. Wow.
By the time Michael had hit the second landing, on the way to his fourth-floor walk-up, he could feel rock music drumming down from above, vibrating through the stairs. No doubt as to where it was coming from: Owen Pulaski’s apartment.
Owen Pulaski. Michael wasn’t sure what to make of that devil-may-care, happy-go-lucky lug of a man-child. He was certainly friendly enough, outgoing, always made an effort. In fact, as Michael got to the fourth floor, Owen was just greeting a couple of women at the door of his apartment. The women were tall, slender, inhumanly gorgeous, and they were laughing at whatever Owen had just said to them. Owen was about six foot three, burly, with a boyish grin that Michael assumed was hard to resist.
“Mikey, c’mon to my party. Don’t insult me now. Don’t you dare insult me,” Owen called across the hall.
“Thanks, thanks, I’m kind of beat tonight,” Michael said, but Owen was already crossing the space between them, and then he had his arm wrapped around Michael.
“This is Claire de Lune, and this is Cindy Two,” Owen said, nodding at both stunners. “They’re brilliant students at Columbia — I think it’s Columbia — who moonlight as beautiful models. Ladies, this is Michael. He’s great. He’s a surgeon at New York Hospital.”
“I’m not a surgeon anywhere,” said Michael as he was dragged into the packed, loud, overheated party at Owen’s place.
“Hey, hi,” said one of the women, a tall brunette whom Owen had called Claire de Lune. “I’m Claire . . . Parker. Owen is, well, Owen.”
Michael turned his wince into something resembling a smile. “Hi, how are you, Claire?”
“Not great, but let’s not get into that. We just met, right?”
Michael sensed trouble inside the girl, and he couldn’t resist; he’d never met a lonely, depressed soul he didn’t want to try to help somehow. Was it his fatal flaw? The way he was made? He had no idea, and he had stopped worrying about things he couldn’t control. Well, mostly he had stopped.
“No, it’s okay. I’m interested,” he said to Claire.
“Sure you are.” She laughed. Someone passing by pressed drinks into both of their hands, and she laughed again. “Guys love to