BESTSELLERS & BEST FRIENDS
My book publishing blog, with murder mysteries woven through it.
If this is your first visit, be sure to start with “1. Let’s do it!”
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I went there today.
Bob Niegowski was now on board.
We met with Holly. Her eyes, I swear, were still red from crying.
The two of them would wind down the business. I’d keep Holly on for another three months. She’d have her full year of paid internship. And I gotta say, shutting down something isn’t a bad experience to have. It happens a lot over one’s career. Technologies and the staffs and obligations that go with them, expire. Same with warehouses, and ill-conceived acquisitions. Shit happens.
My announcement regarding Randy’s death will run in tomorrow’s New York Times and the various book publishing journals.
I touched base with a real estate agent to sell the loft. And I had a long conversation with Columbia University regarding how to set up a needs-based scholarship.
It was a busy morning. Bob and Holly went out to lunch. I had no appetite.
It was quiet and my being at Randy’s made me all the sadder. I looked at the floor. When the light’s right, I can see the damage done to the floor when the “Big” crew had a trampoline in here.
The loft’s walls were simply shelves. Lined with thousands of books bound-on-the-right-for-left-handed readers. Floor to ceiling. Under the windows, over the windows, in between the windows, in the office area, the living room area, in the bedroom, even above the kitchen cupboards and bathroom toilet.
My god, those windows. The views they offered and the light they allowed. The six on one side, and the five on the other.
I paused. The five on the other. My head spun a bit as if my memory was asking for help.
The five on the other?
I took the elevator down to the basement, walked by the building’s laundry room, and out the back door into the courtyard. I stood where I had several days ago and looked up at the eighth floor. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6! The fifth window was now closed. The last window was still open.
What the hell?
I went back inside to the loft. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 windows, all closed, then a bookshelf. I was scratching my head and counting on my fingers when Bob and Holly came back from lunch.
Enough! These last few days, my god, I don’t know if I’m coming or going.
I went home to find Sally looking at an old video, a box of tissues next to her.
She was watching something that she and Randy had enjoyed together.
I gotta share.
Tomorrow: Charlie Watts, Regis, Kathie Lee, and me