The Billionaire's Command
Page 57

“I’ve never been,” she said. “Isn’t that sad? I’ve lived in New York for three years and I’ve never been to the Statue of Liberty.”
“That is sad,” I said. “And a known side effect of workaholism. Of course we’ll go, if that’s what you’d like to do.”
She smiled at me and gave me a kiss on the cheek. “You’d better be careful. If you keep indulging me like this, I’m going to get spoiled.”
“And what a terrible state of affairs that would be,” I said. I rolled onto my back and pulled her on top of me, and those were the last words we exchanged for quite a while.
She spent the night at my apartment, and in the morning we got out of bed at an unreasonably early hour for Saturday and walked to the subway station in Union Square. We stopped for bagels on the way, and I was treated to the surprisingly delightful sight of Sasha eagerly stuffing her face with a dab of cream cheese on her nose.
“I’m hungry,” she said, when I smiled at her vigor.
“A healthy appetite in a woman is a sign of gluttony,” I said. “Surely you know that. Also, you have cream cheese on your nose.”
She shrugged. “I’ll lick it off later.”
“You’re disgusting,” I said in admiration.
We took the train to Bowling Green, and walked from there to the ferry terminal in Battery Park. We had timed it so that we were in line for the first ferry of the day: less crowded, and fewer tourists. I knew that, as a lifelong New Yorker, I was supposed to be tolerant of and helpful to the tourists, who were, after all, the lifeblood of the city; but I mainly found them irritating, with their sparkling white athletic shoes and propensity to stop in the middle of the sidewalk and unfold their maps, oblivious to everyone around them. The thought of sharing Liberty Island with dozens of squawking teenagers and red-faced men in “I Heart NY” t-shirts was more than I could handle.
It was a hot morning, and even with the sun still rising over Brooklyn, the humidity had me sweating through my t-shirt as we waited in line for the ferry. A breeze blew off the water to the south. Sasha turned her face into it, her hair blowing, and said, “Thanks for indulging me.”
“I don’t indulge,” I said.
“Yeah, you say that, but you do,” she said. “I bet you’ve been to the Statue of Liberty so many times you’re sick of it.”
That was true, but I wouldn’t admit it to her. “I haven’t been here in years,” I said. “Not since middle school, I think. They tried to make us go in high school, but my father sent a note to school that I was sick, and we spent the day at the Central Park Zoo instead.”
She smiled up at me. “You’re close with your dad, huh?”
I shrugged. “He raised me. My mother was always at work, always busy. I love her, of course, but my father’s the one who changed the sheets in the middle of the night when I wet the bed.”
“I can’t imagine little Alex ever peeing the bed,” she said. “I bet you were a really serious little kid. Like, reading boring Russian novels by the time you were eight. I bet you didn’t even go outside to play.”
“You have very strange ideas about me,” I said. “Do I seem serious now?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Sometimes. But sometimes you’re really playful. I can’t figure you out.”
“Good,” I said. “When the mystery’s gone, the relationship’s over.”
“Oh, is that what this is?” she asked. “Are we in a relationship?”
Her tone was light, teasing, but I looked at her very seriously—as serious as she accused me of being—and said, “I wouldn’t hesitate to give it that label.”
“Well,” she said. She glanced away, and slipped her hand into mine, small and warm. “I guess that’s okay.”
We crossed the water at the front of the ferry, standing at the railing while seagulls swooped overhead. The ferry was almost empty at that time of day, and our only company at the bow was a man and his son, probably about eight years old, tossing bits of bread at the birds and shrieking with laughter as they stooped to catch the pieces midair.
Sasha smiled at the man and said, “He looks like he’s having fun.”
The man chuckled. “We do this every weekend, and he never gets tired of it. Kids, huh?”
“Yeah,” she said, and looked away.
I wrapped my arm around her shoulders and squeezed. “Troubled thoughts?”
“I’m just thinking about my brothers,” she said. “I kind of raised them, you know? We would walk into town because there was this duck pond near the church, and Tristan always got his fingers bit because he was too dumb to toss the bread on the ground.”
“When was the last time you saw them?” I asked.
“My dad’s funeral,” she said, and there was nothing to say after that.
The ferry landed at Liberty Island, and we disembarked and walked around the perimeter of the island to the front of the statue. Tickets to go inside had been sold out months before, so we just stood and gazed up at the golden flame in silence.
“My ancestors probably saw this,” Sasha said, after a few minutes of quiet contemplation. “They came over from Scotland in the late 1800s. The land of promise, you know. All that bullshit. And then they ended up digging coal out of the earth.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I took her hand and threaded my fingers through hers.
“This is really nice,” she said. “I’m glad we came. I’m glad—Christ.” She turned to the right and looked toward the Manhattan skyline: the skyscrapers of the Financial District, the Brooklyn Bridge, and the Empire State Building small in the distance. “I really love New York.”
Her voice was thick, choked with emotion, and I watched with concern as she blinked back tears. “Sasha,” I said, “what’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” she said, and shook her head. “I don’t know. It’s just—I’ve lived here for three years, and I’ve never appreciated it. I’ve never done anything. I just work and go home and then go to work again. And now, being with you, seeing the city through your eyes, I just—I wish I had taken advantage of it, you know? Like, done stuff. Gotten out of the apartment more.”