11.
THE WATER looks burnt again. The color of weak coffee, twice run through a filter. It’s not good for a bath. She should not be lying in it.
On some days, the water turns strange. Something about the rusted pipes and the clogged drain. When it first happened, Suzy called the super in panic. Wait a few hours, he told her, groggy from a nap. The clear water did come back, about seven hours later. Suzy waited, eyeing the pile of dishes in the sink and the empty pitcher of Brita on the table. It kept happening, though, every few months, only just as she’s stepping into the shower or about to rinse the toothpaste out of her mouth. She has never gotten used to the burnt water, which has become a source of mystery. Why should it happen? What’s going on inside the pipes? She asked Michael about it once. He had no idea. He’d never lived in an old tenement. Pipes? he asked. What do you mean by “burnt”? Suzy changed the subject. She didn’t want to get into it. She would have to invite him over if she wanted to explain better. But that seemed wrong, Michael in her apartment. He would look awkward. He wouldn’t fit.
She sinks lower. The tub is so small that she has to bend her knees to get her shoulders wet. Her body looks almost tanned under this water, like the bikini-clad blonde from this morning’s billboard. From the minute she got out of the bus at Port Authority and into the taxi downtown, she was desperate to reach her apartment. She ran up the stairs. She was trembling when she stepped inside. But the water that trickled out of the tap was hazy brown. She jumped into it anyway. She lay in it. It seemed necessary.
Already, Fort Lee feels distant. Not even noon yet. The whole day before her.
Grace.
Detective Lester.
Mr. Lee.
Kim Yong Su, the guy out in Queens, as if half the Koreans do not live in Queens. Where has she heard that name before?
The water is cushiony, almost velvet. She must be imagining it. Her headache is lurking. She recalls the girl who thought that English was a headache-inducer. Why would Grace tell her that? Where did Grace go? Did she stop in Montauk to see her parents one final time before the wedding? Did she sail out into the sea for their permission? Would Grace fill her wedding with white flowers, as she had the funeral? Would she stand tall and make a vow, not once breaking into tears?
Suzy has never imagined herself married. By the time Damian’s divorce was finalized, it was too late. They never brought up marriage. For Damian, it reminded him of Yuki Tamiko and the life he’d left. Suzy felt it was wrong. She kept hearing her father’s last words. Whore, hers was the life of a whore. Marriage was never an option, which might have been why she chose Damian.
Suzy saw Professor Tamiko just once more, at the Greenwich Village apartment that belonged to Damian’s friend who was out of town on sabbatical. It was Suzy’s first day there. She had not quite intended to move in, although she arrived with a suitcase. Now it occurs to her that he might have set it up. She had thought then that it must be chance. An awful, unfortunate chance. Yuki Tamiko had known, though. She had seen it coming. She might have wanted to warn Suzy, but she also knew that the younger woman would never listen. It was the end of January. It had all happened too fast.
They had slept together once. Back in November. Then, right afterward, he was gone. A research trip to Asia. She only found out from reading the Spectator, which ran a small article on the upcoming expansion of the East Asian Wing at the Metropolitan Museum, for which a few experts had been selected to form a research committee. That is where she saw his name. Damian Brisco—Former Chairman of the East Asian Department at Columbia University, Professor of East Asian Art, on leave for the past three years. He was gone, somewhere, some city in China, Japan, even Korea. She could not stand it. He had told her nothing. He had held her afterward. She had lain in his arms, thinking about the blood, thinking it might have stained Professor Tamiko’s sheets. Dusk was setting when they walked to Riverside Park. They didn’t speak much. She was no longer a virgin.
She had no idea when he would be back. No postcard, no phone call. Somehow she knew that he would not get in touch, but she still waited. With each day, she was becoming less certain whether he had indeed made love to her, whether any of it had actually happened. But then she would recall how he had kissed her, in such quiet steps, until he was sure she was ready. It was embarrassing, how clearly the picture came back to her. She could recall his every breath. Her body held him intact. It was all in her body. She threw herself into her thesis instead. She would stare at the computer screen without seeing a word. She would replay Ran without remembering a scene. “First-class asshole,” Jen said, wincing, when she finally told her. “But, Suzy, you’re not any better.”
Two months later, in January, Suzy ran into him on Broadway. She was on her way to buy books for the new semester. It was the first time she had left her dormitory room in days. She was wearing a sweatshirt and jeans. An oversized blue hooded sweatshirt with “Columbia Crew” on its front. It had belonged to Jen. Suzy had thrown it on because it was the first thing she saw hanging across the chair. She was turning the corner at 114th Street. He was leaning over a stall of books outside the shop. It was him. She knew even before she saw his face. She felt something slip inside her. Her breath caught in her throat. She thought of her silly sweatshirt.
“Hi,” she said first. His eyes looked pained, she thought, neither surprised nor overjoyed by this chance. “Looking for books?” She tried to smile, although her face felt stuck, every muscle suddenly locked. She was afraid that she looked obvious.
He continued to gaze at her. His eyes still cold. She wished she had worn something else. “You look thinner,” he said finally, his right hand moving up slightly, as though it was about to reach her face.
“The thesis…” she stammered, unable to think of anything else to say. There were silver sparkles in his dark-brown hair which she had not noticed before. Neither spoke, although neither looked away. She wanted him to say something. She wanted him to explain why he had gone away so abruptly, why he had not been in touch. But she also knew that he had promised her nothing. He owed her no explanation.
“Come,” he said then. He took out a piece of paper and wrote something on it and handed it to her. His hand barely touched hers. It was an address. A downtown address. He was already hailing a cab. “Come stay with me for a while,” she thought she heard him say, but the cab was already speeding away. He did not turn around once.
Three days later, when Suzy rang the buzzer of the three-story brownstone on Hudson Street, it was Professor Tamiko who answered. Neither had expected the other. It was Yuki Tamiko who broke the awkward silence. “May I help you?”
Suzy just stood there, not knowing how to respond. She wanted to turn back. She felt caught, guilty, humiliated, all at once. She had never expected this.
“Here to see Damian?” Professor Tamiko asked, with an edged smile, as if she finally understood. This girl. This young girl in front of her.
Suzy nodded, feeling stupid more than anything.