Absent Friends

“That's not really what you mean.” He didn't answer, just sipped at his gin, so she went on. “You mean, ‘What good will it do New York's suffering citizens?' You mean, ‘Does a shell-shocked city really need more pain?' You mean, ‘Does a grieving country, trying to heal, to reach closure, to find some answers in these troubled times—'” That was all there was of that; Harry was stuffing a pillow over her face.

“Finished?”

The pillow nodded. Harry removed it, and Laura charged on. “You mean, ‘It's time to get back to normal'—wait, normalcy—‘and move on. To take back our lives or the terrorists win! In this city so damaged by Recent Events—'”

“I thought you were finished,” Harry complained, settling his pillow weapon behind his head.

“You mean”—the anchorman tone dropped from Laura's voice, she was Laura again—“for everyone's good, some truths are better off buried. Come on, Harry. You're not serious.”

“I'm beyond serious, Stone. I'm maudlin.”

“This is a great piece. This is tremendous. This is dynamite, Harry.”

“There were firemen from forty-six states at his funeral.”

“So?”

“And the Mayor, the Fire Commissioner—”

“Since when does Harry Randall give a damn?”

“You have it backwards.” He inspected his gin as though for something missing. “Harry Randall used to give a damn, but he wised up.”

Laura looked at Harry as he had at his gin. The skin around his eyes was loose and lined, old and dry, but the pale gray eyes were clear.

“You've been working on this for two weeks,” she reminded him. “Night and day. You don't eat. You don't sleep. You don't screw.”

“Wait—what was that just now?” Harry said, with mild surprise.

“You're lucky I recognized it, it's been so long.” She squiggled around, settling with her cheek on his shoulder, the hand holding his copy draped across him. “If you weren't going to run it, then why write it?”

He shrugged. “I thought,” he said, stopping as though surprised to hear his own voice, then going on, “I thought it might be important to find the truth.”

“Of course it is.” Impatience crept into her tone, and she could have kicked herself for it.

She said nothing else, just moved closer, held Harry tighter. His glass was empty; as he groped for the bottle, he said, “Maybe people need their illusions.” He was talking to her, she thought, about the story; and to himself, about something else, too.

She was quiet for a moment, then said, “People need the truth.”

He had hold of the bottle by the neck. “Why?”

“‘Wherever you're lost, land or sea, you can navigate by the north star. It's real; the sounds in the night around you aren't.'”

His eyebrows lifted. He poured gin, chortled, drank. “You're quoting that old charlatan Harry Randall.”

“When Harry Randall said that at my graduation, it was—Jesus, Harry, it was inspiring.”

“Stop. You're about to tell me I've been your hero since you were a child.” He sighed. “On the other hand, that was only the day before yesterday.”

“This story,” Laura offered gently, “this is a real Harry Randall story. The kind you—the kind everyone expects from you.”

“Expected.” Harry nuzzled his chin into her tumbled hair.

“Expects. Harry? Tell me the truth: it was fun, wasn't it?”

“Fun?” Harry pulled back, putting on a tone of shocked disapproval. “It most certainly was not fun. Exposing the perfidy of trusted members of society, following the trail of duplicity and deception as it leads ever higher and deeper—”

“At the same time?”

“Of course! That's the thing about duplicity, it can do two things at once. Sshh. Where was I?”

“Following the trail.”

“Right. Following, et cetera. This is a sacred trust, to be shouldered only with the most grave respect for its importance, to be undertaken with only the most solemn purpose and dedication. It is—”

“More fun than sex.”

His eyebrows went up. She kissed him. “Go ahead, tell me it doesn't turn you on.”

“That—”

“Not that! This!” She bopped him on the head with his copy.

He smiled and said nothing, and that said everything.

“And this? The way you wrote it?” she went on. “It's Harry Randall. It'll make them move, it'll smoke them out. You can't wait, can you? To see what happens next?”

Harry sighed, as though forced to acknowledge an inarguable, though unpalatable, truth.

“Harry?” Laura's heart was singing. She tried to stay calm, to not let on that she'd seen him struggle to the top of the dry, rocky mountain, and now she knew he could see the ocean, could find his way again. But she had one more thing to offer, a welcome-home gift. “This story will put you back on top, Harry. It'll show the Unbelievers.” Unbelievers was their name for the powers at the paper, Leo and the inner circle.

“Hell with the Unbelievers.”

“People—”

“Hell with people.”

But there must have been someone Harry was not willing to dismiss, because he kissed her, slipped on his robe, and e-mailed his copy to Leo at home. Leo kept the fact-checkers working through the night, and the next morning, the story ran.

BOYS' OWN BOOK

Chapter 4