Danielle Steel - The Apartment

“That was quite a blaze,” he commented as they arrived, all four of them looking tired, and Sasha still teetering on Claire’s high heels. The others were all wearing T-shirts, shorts, and flats and looked as though they’d dressed in haste.

“Seven people died,” Sasha said sadly. “I think they were mostly old people, from smoke inhalation.” They didn’t know any of them personally, but all of the residents of the loft recognized some of their neighbors by sight and waved at them occasionally. It was tragic to think of how their lives had ended. It was one of the risks of very old buildings. One of the firemen had told Morgan it started as an electrical fire, in a building that hadn’t been renovated like theirs, and since it was rent-controlled, it had some of the original tenants in it.

They shared a bottle of wine at Max’s, and finally at three-thirty, they were allowed to go back to their apartment. The building reeked of smoke, and they opened all the windows when they got home, and turned on their air-conditioning units for ventilation, but they assumed correctly that it would take days or longer for the smell of smoke to dissipate. The buildings only two doors away were still smoldering, and firemen were hosing them down both inside and out. None of the possessions inside would remain.

“Boy, that was close,” Morgan said as she sat down on the couch with Max. “We could have lost everything.” In their haste, they had taken nothing with them, except Abby, who had grabbed her laptop with her novel on it. And Claire had stuck some photographs of her parents into her purse. The rest had seemed unimportant, but they would have hated losing their home. They had installed smoke detectors in the loft years before, and had never had a fire in the neighborhood come as close as that. It was an eerie, depressing feeling, especially knowing people had died.

It was five in the morning before they all went to bed, and just before they did, Claire turned to Sasha.

“By the way, how was your date?” Sasha had already forgotten all about it, in the excitement of the fire.

“Ridiculous,” she answered. “A total waste of time. I’d rather stay home with all of you, or work, or sleep,” Sasha said with a yawn. “He was pretty to look at, but there was nothing to say.”

“There are some good ones out there,” Morgan reminded her, as Sasha looked skeptical and Claire shook her head.

“I think you got the last good one left,” Claire commented, referring to Max with a smile, as he went to get ready for bed and let the girls discuss the date.

“What do you expect from an underwear model, for chrissake?” Morgan said to Sasha.

“He kept taking pictures of me to send to his Instagram followers,” Sasha said. “He probably told them he was out with Valentina.” Morgan and Claire suspected that was probably true. He wasn’t likely to be impressed by Sasha’s medical school credentials, and claiming he was out with Valentina would blow the minds of all his friends. Morgan groaned at the description of his sending Instagrams to his followers from their date.

“At least you tried,” Morgan commended her as Sasha turned to Claire.

“And how the hell do you walk in those shoes? I was afraid I’d fall and break a hip.”

“You can’t go on a date in clogs or Crocs,” Claire pointed out to her, and they laughed.

“Why not? I did with the last guy I went out with. He was a resident in orthopedics. We went out after work in scrubs, and we had a fairly decent time, until he admitted that he was engaged, but he wasn’t sure if he was going to go through with it, so he was checking other people out to see how he really felt about his fiancée.”

“Nice,” Morgan commented.

“I guess I didn’t do it for him. I hear he got married over the Fourth of July. She’s an ICU nurse, and he thought maybe he should be with a doctor. Maybe they’re all crazy. Thank God I don’t have time to date. I don’t know why I bothered tonight.” Except to keep her hand in, and she thought she should. Her sister always said she had no life. And Valentina wasn’t wrong, but Sasha didn’t mind.

“Two bad dates are not an excuse to live like a nun. And you have no excuse,” Morgan said to Claire. “You guys can’t stay alone forever. It takes some effort to find the right guy.”

“And then what? You get married and hate each other for the rest of your life?” Claire said in a negative tone. Her parents didn’t hate each other, but in her opinion, her father had ruined her mother’s life. And her mother had let him, which was even worse.

“It doesn’t always turn out that way,” Morgan insisted, although it had for her parents, who never should have gotten married in the first place. But her own generation was more careful, and a lot more cautious about who they married and why. Or they just lived together, which made more sense to her. Their parents’ reasons for getting married no longer applied. Giving up lives, careers, and cities for a man seemed like a bad idea to all of them, and led to miserable lives like those of Claire’s and Morgan’s parents.

“Well, I think I’ll give the dating thing a rest for a while,” Sasha said with relief.

“You haven’t exactly been knocking yourself out in that department,” Morgan chided her. “You can’t give up after one boring date. That’s ridiculous.”

“No, it’s ridiculous going out with guys you don’t have anything in common with.” But Sasha was too tired to think about it now. She said goodnight to her roommates, and headed for her bedroom to lie down. She had to be at work at six A.M. to deliver babies. Her life was much too real to be bothered with men like Ryan, and she didn’t need dinner that badly. As she lay down and closed her eyes for a minute, he slipped totally from her mind into oblivion, where he belonged. It had been a long night, and it had been frightening for those at risk of losing their homes, and tragic for those who had died, all of which made her date seem utterly inconsequential. She fell into a deep sleep, grateful for even half an hour, and particularly so that their home was safe.

Abby was painting scenery at the theater again, and Ivan was having lunch with a theatrical agent, when a pretty girl walked in, looking slightly lost and very young. She had enormous breasts that were nearly falling out of a man’s tank top and was wearing skin-tight jeans, and she had tousled, long blond hair that looked as though she had just climbed out of bed. Abby wondered if Ivan had scheduled auditions, but they had no part in their current play, or the next one, for a girl her age.

Abby stopped painting and looked at her. “Can I help you?”

“I…I have something I wanted to drop off for Ivan Jones. He told me I could leave it at the theater for him. Is he here?”

Abby shook her head, and noticed that the girl was holding a thick manila envelope against her chest.

“It’s…it’s a play I wrote, and he said he’d take a look at it. I’m at the Actors Studio. I’m an actress, but I’ve been working on the play for two years. I think I need some help with it, and he offered. My name is Daphne Blake.” Something about what she said struck a chord of memory. Abby had come to the theater with an envelope just like it three years ago, when Ivan first convinced her to try her hand at writing a play instead of her novel, and then promised to produce it. Abby heard an alarm bell go off in her head, and sensed danger. “Are you a set designer?” the girl asked with interest.

“No, I’m a playwright too. We all pitch in with odd jobs here, painting sets, working the box office before performances, cleaning up the theater. Do you want to leave the envelope with me? I’ll give it to him when he gets back,” Abby said quietly, trying not to seem nervous or suspicious. There was no reason for her to worry, and Ivan had every right to read other people’s plays. Although he only did his own very avant-garde plays, which never got good reviews, or even attracted the notice of the press. Ivan was particularly irate that every play he had produced and directed was ignored. Even the critics who covered Off Off Broadway said nothing about his work. It was the greatest insult of all. He had a small coterie of supporters who gave him just enough money to get by and believed in his work. But he had used none of the funds to produce one of Abby’s plays.

“Do you mind if I wait?” the girl asked Abby, continuing to clutch the envelope to her bosom, as though someone would try to steal it from her. Abby used to feel that way about her work too. More so about her unfinished novel than the very experimental work that Ivan wanted her to write. Some of it still felt forced and unnatural to her. But she trusted him.

“Not at all, but he might be a while, maybe a long while,” Abby said to the girl. “I think he was going to do some errands too.” It was a little bit annoying to have her standing there, waiting for the messiah to come, or the oracle to speak. Abby felt that way about him too. His particular style of writing was ethereal and strange. But he was so knowledgeable about everything involving experimental theater that Abby considered him one of the unsung heroes of his time. And apparently this girl thought so too. She sat down in the second row of the theater and prepared to wait while Abby continued painting scenery with a shaking hand. She was painting a large devil for them to use in the second act, and she had red paint splashed all over her, which looked like drops of blood in her hair.

The girl sat for two hours without making a sound, reading a book she’d brought with her, and Abby almost forgot she was there, but not quite. And then Ivan sauntered in, and smiled up at Abby onstage as he approached.

“How’s it coming?” he asked, referring to the devil she was painting. “Terrifying, I hope.” He beamed at her, as their eyes met, and she felt her knees turn to rubber as they always did when he looked at her. He mesmerized her, and she would have done anything for him. And they both jumped when the girl spoke in a soft voice from the second row in the dimly lit theater. Abby had turned the house lights down, and had kept only the spotlights bright on the stage so she could see her work, and had forgotten she was there. Ivan wheeled at the sound of the voice and was startled when he noticed her gazing adoringly at him, which Abby saw and didn’t like. The hint of something ominous was in the air.

“What are you doing here?” He was obviously surprised.

“You said I could drop my play off and you’d read it,” she reminded him.

“Yes, I did,” he said as though he’d forgotten and smiled at her. Morgan always compared him to Rasputin when he focused on women. Sasha thought he was just a creep. But Abby saw something in him that they didn’t, and the young girl talking to him did too. “I’ll read it on Sunday and Monday when the theater is dark, and let you know what I think.” And then he was struck by an idea. “Would you like to go for a cup of coffee and tell me about it for a few minutes?” he offered. “As long as you waited for me, you can explain what you tried to accomplish, so I don’t miss any of your intent.” Abby knew as well as he did that the play shouldn’t need an interpretation from the playwright, it should speak for itself. But she didn’t say anything as she continued painting the scenery, and pretended not to listen.

The girl instantly accepted his offer, and they left the theater a few minutes later, deep in conversation about her play, as she explained its message to him. And for a minute, Abby felt sick. She had heard it all before. He had said it all to her in the past three years. And she had seen him flirt with other young girls, actresses they auditioned, or young directors seeking work. She never took it seriously, or felt threatened by it, but this time, for some unknown reason, she did. The girl looked so innocent but determined, and he was so intense when he talked to her.

He came back an hour later, without the girl, and explained the meeting to Abby, so she wouldn’t worry. He didn’t want her to be upset.

“Her father has a shitload of money, and is willing to back any play someone will put on for her. I’m sure she can’t write to save her life, but we can use the money, and if her rich daddy is willing to help us out, I’ll read damn near anything, to keep our theater on its feet. It can’t hurt.” At least it explained why he was willing to talk to her, and appeared so interested in her play. “Sometimes you have to prostitute yourself a little, for the common good. Not like your parents, for the masses, which is selling out in its lowest form, but angels come into our lives sometimes, and her father may give us just the kind of backing we need.”