Limitless

‘ … either way,’ Atwood was saying, ‘it’s the promised land.’

I took a sip from my glass.

‘What is?’

‘The future, Eddie, the future.’

I looked back, distracted. Ginny was stepping tentatively into the room now. When she was just inside the door, she reached up to kiss her father on the cheek. She was wearing a strappy satin top and corduroy trousers, and was holding a suede clutch bag in her left hand. As she pulled away from her father, she smiled over at me, raising her right hand and fluttering her fingers – a greeting which I think was meant to take in Hank Atwood as well. She moved a little further into the room. It was only then I noticed that Van Loon had his arm stretched out to greet someone else who was coming in behind her. A second or two later – and after what looked like a vigorous handshake – a young man of about twenty-five or twenty-six appeared through the door.

Ginny shook hands politely with Dan Bloom and the other two men, and then turned around. She stood at the table and put a hand on the back of an empty chair that was positioned directly opposite where I was sitting.

The young man and Van Loon were talking now, and laughing, and although I found it hard not to look at Ginny, I kept glancing over at them. The young man was wearing a hooded zip-front thing, a black crew-neck T-shirt and jeans. He had dark hair and a little goatee beard. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I recognized him. At any rate, there was something about him, something around him that I recognized. He and Van Loon seemed to know each other quite well.

I looked back at Ginny. She pulled out the chair and sat down. She placed her clutch bag on the table and joined her hands together, as though she were about to conduct an interview.

‘So, gentlemen, what are we talking about?’

‘The future,’ said Atwood.

‘The future? Well, you know what Einstein had to say about that?’

‘No, what?’

‘He said I never think of the future. It comes soon enough.’ She looked at me directly, and added, ‘I tend to agree with him.’

‘Hank.’

Suddenly, Van Loon was waving an arm in our direction, and indicating for Atwood to come over.

‘Excuse me, my dear,’ he said, and made a strained face as he got up. He walked around the table, and it occurred to me then who the young man was — Ray Tyner. As movie stars reportedly often do, he looked a little different in real life. I’d read about him in the previous day’s paper. He’d just come back from shooting a movie in Venice.

‘So,’ Ginny said, looking around, ‘this is where the cabal meets, the secret movers and shakers, the smoke-filled back-room.’

I smiled. ‘I thought we were in your dining-room.’

She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Yeah, but I ain’t never had dinner in here. I eat in the kitchen. This is the control centre.’

I nodded over at Ray Tyner. Atwood and Bloom and the others had all gathered around him now, and he seemed to be telling a story.

‘So, who’s running the control centre now?’

She turned around in her chair for a moment to look over at him. I stared intently at her profile, at the curve of her neck, at her bare shoulders.

‘Oh, Ray’s not like that,’ she said turning back, ‘he’s sweet.’

‘Are you two an item?’

She pulled her head back, a little surprised at my question. ‘What are you, moonlighting for Page Six now?’

‘No, I’m just curious. For future reference.’

‘Like I said, Mr Spinola, I don’t think of the future.’

‘Is he why you wouldn’t go for a drink with me?’

She paused. Then she said, ‘I don’t understand you.’

I was puzzled at this.

‘What don’t you understand?’ I said.

‘I don’t know …’ Her face changed, as she tried to think of the words. ‘I’m sorry – it must be an instinctive thing – but I get the feeling that when you look at me, you’re seeing someone else.’

I didn’t know what to say to that. I stared uncomfortably at my brandy glass. Was it that obvious? Ginny resembled Melissa, it was true, but until that moment I hadn’t realized what a deep impression the likeness they shared had made on me.

There was a sudden burst of laughter from the other side of the room, and the group started to break up.

I looked at her again.

‘I don’t think of the past,’ I said, trying to be clever.

‘And the present?’

‘I don’t think of that either.’

‘Yeah, I suppose,’ she said, and then laughed. ‘It goes soon enough.’

‘Something like that.’

Ray Tyner had come up behind her now. She turned slightly and twisted her arm up to reach him. He took her hand and she got out of the chair.

‘Ray, this is Eddie Spinola, a friend of mine. Eddie, Ray Tyner.’

I reached over and we shook hands.

I was inordinately pleased that she had described me as a friend of hers.

Up close, Ray Tyner was almost preternaturally good-looking. He had amazing eyes and the kind of smile that meant he could probably work a room without even bothering to open his mouth.

Maybe I’d ask him to be my running mate.