A FUTURE, FATASY LUNCH: LOWER EAST SIDE— NYC

I have this fantasy, I know exactly how it goes. I watch it play out in my brain like I watched One Tree Hill in high school, A LOT. I’ll tell you how it goes, a play by play as if we are rewatching season 4, where Chad Michael Murray saves Payton from her Psycho-brother-lover? Re-igniting their love and passion for each other and setting the coursework for the rest of the show’s history.

OK.

I am sitting at a round table, a white paper covering for a tablecloth, which is of course our preference because we write all over that shit, sometimes that’s how book ideas are born. They grow like the stain as it dries and the pasta grease you splattered everywhere settles into a puddle of ink. NYC, lower east side—1 pm. Not just any round table but the one in the back, away from people who know us, where cute, young goth girls can’t come up and share how much they love our work. About how it helped them get through their existential crisis when they were 23 and how our novels were a manifesto-type document to them, to help them break up with their shitty boyfriends, write that damn story, leave their stupid hometown, all those hard to do things in life— don’t get me wrong, I like this sort of publicity— no LOVED. I rub my face in it, its like porn for me and of course why pretend I didn’t? My ego could not be broken down, no matter how much Alan Watts and Nietzsche I consumed in my early 20’s trying to relinquish it. Baby, it is here to stay. But we’re with Chris, she is used to this sort of thing and sometimes its too much for her, we get that, she is Chris fucking Kraus.

It’s a lunch ‘meeting.’ I am about to order white wine, the most expensive by-the-glass option, which also happens to be my favorite German varietal of all time, plus a kale caesar salad with a piece of grilled salmon, that I allot myself to enjoy every so often while still declaring I am a vegetarian the six other days of the week. I am wearing black, a linen jumpsuit and suede black ankle boots with a leather jacket and smelling like the weed I smoked in the car ride over, the Uber XL that I deemed necessary. I make myself more intimidating with a red lip stain and my hair is down, long and half-dry.

Kate is wearing this forest green puffed-sleeve silk shirt with a pair of cream high-waisted carpenter pants and a square toe shoe that seemed impossible to walk in but visually stunning, on her of course. Kate, the Kate Zambreno is mocking me for my goth-looking photo on the last page of the novel I just got published after 7 years of writing. We finally connected with each other after I attended her 3rd lecture on Drifts, the novel that changed my life. I was the fan girl that I was now turning away as I prepare to eat a garden of shit lettuces with an anchovy-filled dressing. My ego and I both feeling nauseous now.

“SKY really!? You picked the saddest photo of you, of course in black and white while crying in the bathtub? Classic!" Chris is too consumed with her electronic cigarette and Bloody Mary, tinkering with the olives and pushing the pimento peppers out of their holes, making some crude, yet hysterical joke about anal and capitalism.

The server is approaching us, three women at a table covered in paperwork, books and pens, red and black, Kate telling me I could have adjusted that second to last paragraph, "did I go deep enough" she carries the anal joke a step further? I revel in her suggestions.

“Hello, so glad you could join us this afternoon.” This tall, tattooed, ego-size is giant on a good day kind of guy is here, ready to take our order. “What can I get for you Sky? Is it okay if I call you that?” Chris laughs, “call her whatever you want, she likes that.” I don’t even have a moment to consume that he knew my name, the name I go by and I think FUCK - has this guy read my work? Because I am still shocked every time I get a check, every time I see my book on a shelf or when they ask me to sign some copies at McNally Jackson and I have to ask myself, did they confuse me with someone else? They could not possibly be asking me to sign this book that does indeed have my name on it, plus a sticker with a note that it has been shortlisted for some list of fiction this year. I was nauseous in the good way.

I can see Kate scanning the menu, deciding all the options she could get… everything she did was methodical and intelligent. Her phone started buzzing and it was voice messages from her daughter, she started to play one for us. These Voice Memos were in Spanish and Mandarin, “I love you” and “can we get a kitty?”— she was teaching her kid Mandarin!? Kate was the coolest mom and I wanted to be a mom like her, thinking this thought as I prepare to order my 26 dollar glass of Gruner.

This server is still hovering over us, but not in a scary way. He is a bit red, pink actually, like pep-to. “I will have a glass of the Gruner and a kale caesar with grilled salmon— well done.” Yes of course Sky, he sounds sexier now then he did a few minutes ago. Kate orders the daily soup like the weirdo she is with a side of extra bread. Chris goes for another bloody. I see him writing with a Muji ballpoint pen and I think, should I have sex with this server? He knows MY name and is writing with the world’s best writing pen. Did he know that I loved those pens? Kate kicks me under the table and I come back to life. Her physical reminder without the words saying, “no Sky, not everything is about you.” My ego percentage drops 5 notches and I smile at her, a covert thank you.

Chris is discussing this lecture happening next week, happening at Hunter. I think I hear her say something about Semiotext(e) hosting it, on the topic of disinformation in a post-Trump America through fictional story-telling, etc. etc. She is speaking on the panel, alongside Kate, Samantha (Irby), Jia (Tolentino) and I am wondering why she is telling me about all these prized and accomplished women speaking on a panel hosted by the coolest literary agency alive— without inviting me with a free ticket to attend and now I’m hungry, where is that fucking kale salad so I can chew instead of respond about how it sounds like everything I love. I don’t want to be desperate, I am only a newly-published novelist who is also shortlisted on some list, who cares which one. I had been in a bout of sadness last week but it was lifting now and then she keeps talking and fuck, fuck, fuck she is inviting me to speak. I realize, as she continues— she held back this until now because she knows I hate public speaking and I am reminded again these are real friends, not the girls who fuck your boyfriends. These women wanted to support me and I was forever grateful. These were my friends, fucking crazy and now we finish lunch, I share my croutons with Chris and we discuss our travel plans for next week’s event.