The Last Good Night Read Free

Manhattan, had seen a lifetime of people come here to conquer it anew. “Just like you,” he teased on our first date. “It’s a city of phoenixes, all that small-town ambition burning up whoever comes near it. Everyone here is the one who got out of wherever it is they can’t wait to forget. It’s a whole goddamned city of amnesiacs.”
    â€œWhat about you?” I asked.
    â€œMe?” He laughed. “When I went to college, they asked me the name of my hometown paper in case I did anything particularly notable. The only thing I could think to answer was the New York Times .” He smiled. “Actually, I’m jealous. No one who was born here has nearly as much energy as you infiltrators.”
    I wonder if he looks at the articles about himself behind the closed door of his study, or if he rereads the love letters on discouraging afternoons. I suspect that he does, though I’ve never caught him at it.
    I came to an empty page and pasted the People article onto it.
    Â 
    I WAS ON my third cup of coffee when David came up behind me and kissed the back of my neck, his lips still dry and caked with sleep. “Good morning.”
    â€œMorning.”
    â€œSo today’s the big day.”
    â€œYup.”
    â€œNervous?” he asked.
    â€œWhy should I be nervous? Just because every television critic in the nation will be watching and every women’s group has written to tell me I’m their next great hope?”
    â€œI’ll take that as a yes.” David poured himself a half-cup of coffee and filled the rest of the mug with milk. He took a sip and leaned back against the counter, the white T-shirt he had slept in falling in ripples against his solid frame. I knew if I touched it how soft it would be, how warm. “You’ll be fine. They wouldn’t have chosen you if they didn’t think you could do the job.” He smiled. “Of course, that’s what they said about Connie Chung, too.”
    â€œIt’s your optimism I find so irresistible.”
    â€œNot my piercing intellect?”
    â€œDon’t flatter yourself.”
    â€œSo, how did our little peanut do last night?” he asked.
    It was what we always came back to, Sophie. It was where we found each other.
    â€œAll right,” I answered. “Only one bout of projectile vomiting.”
    â€œDon’t you think we should talk to someone about this?” David asked nervously. He was a first-time father at forty-one, the baby melted all his usual wryness, it just dripped away.
    â€œI put in a call to the secretary of health, but she hasn’t gotten back to me yet.”
    â€œAnd I thought you finally had some clout.”
    â€œSeriously, David, she’s fine. We can’t call the doctor at every sputter.”
    â€œActually, we could.”
    â€œDoes the story of crying wolf ring any bells with you?”
    â€œNo. I don’t believe I’ve heard of that one.” He smiled, but he still looked worried.
    I smiled and ran my hand down his bare arm. When we first met, his parents had both recently died and, beneath his sheen of sophistication, there was a stunned, raw quality about him, as if nothing had quite scratched him before. The first night we slept together, he clutched me even in his sleep with such tenderness that I felt something deep within soften, shift. The largeness of his six-foot-three-inch body, the way it wrapped so thoroughly about mine, seemed to offer a refuge when I thought I had long ago given up the possibility of such a thing. It was so alien to me at first, and so welcome, this first real taste of security. It still is.
    â€œCome on,” I said now, prodding him gently. “Let’s go look at her.”
    We tiptoed into the baby’s room and stood together over the wicker bassinet. Sophie was snoring lightly, the fluffy white blanket up about her ears. “Our perfect little girl, our perfect little