Suzanne Davis gets a life by Paula Marantz Cohen

Author:Paula Marantz Cohen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Paul Dry Books

A FEW WEEKS AFTER book club, I happened to run into the not-so-wispy Stephen in the mailroom. I’d seen him fleet-ingly a few times since our encounter at the Doggie Meet and Greet, and he was always in a hurry. Once, I’d seen him leaving the building with an attractive blond, confirming Pauline’s suspicion that I had missed my chance. He looked like he was in a hurry today too, and yet he paused long enough to say hello. Now that he appeared to be taken, I could also note that he had a nice smile.

“I’m afraid I’ve been busy,” he said, referring to his absence from book club. This was precisely what I’d said when I believed, fleetingly, that I had found my Prince Charming in the person of Philip. In the lexicon of the New York singles scene, “being busy” obviously means “I’ve met someone, and going to book club is no longer at the top of my list of things to do.” But Stephen, to his credit, did not appear dismissive of me as I had been of him, which says something further for his character and gave me another reason (along with the fact that he had apparently been snapped up by someone else) to think more highly of him than I had before.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t make the discussion of Daisy Miller,” he continued, sounding sincere. “I would have liked to hear what you had to say. I didn’t love it, but I read some others in the Henry James collection I have that I liked better. The Beast in the Jungle, for example. That really scared me. Have you read it?”

There were a number of things to surprise me in this communication, which happened to be the longest speech I’d heard out of the mouth of the no-longer-wispy-appearing Stephen. First was the fact that he expressed interest in my point of view. No doubt he was just being polite, but since most men couldn’t care less about being polite, when you find one who is, you notice. Second was that he’d read beyond the assignment. It brought back the impressive way he had identified a relevant passage in The Great Gatsby several months back—clearly, he had a functioning brain, also a novelty. Finally, he was asking about The Beast in the Jungle, a story that made a strong impression on me when I read it in college, and which I still think about sometimes when I’m feeling especially bad about my life. (Please note that if you haven’t read The Beast in the Jungle and think you might ever have the urge to hunker down with a very dense piece of writing that is likely to depress you, you should skip the next paragraph.)

Here’s the gist of The Beast in the Jungle: There’s this guy who thinks he’s fated to have something very important happen to him. One day, he meets a woman, and he tells her about this feeling, and she agrees to wait with him to see what it is that will happen.

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