Saturn's Return to New York Read online

  “I can’t believe it, I buy all my books from them You still writing?”

  “No, not for a while now How’s that crazy sister of yours?”

  “She passed away. She died of a drug overdose Two years ago.”

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

  “No. It’s okay. It wasn’t a shock.”

  I don’t know what that means. I don’t know how death in any form can not be a shock.

  Except for the fact that Marcus was probably more relieved than shocked when Suzie died I remember seeing the whole family together only once, after Suzie’s graduation from high school when all the faculty and students and families had spilled out onto the warm street Nineteen eighty-six Both parents were shrinks. Here was Mama psychiatrist, degrees from Vassar and Yale, bustling private practice, in a dirndl skirt and turtleneck and chunky turquoise beads. Here was Papa psychiatrist, professor at NYU, tweedy and also turtle-necked, and here we have Marcus with the awful ponytail and polo shirt And here we have Suzie: wired out of her mind, white dreadlocks to her waist, black kohl around her eyes, in a black minidress a half inch beyond being a shirt, red fishnet stockings, and stiletto-heeled boots with buckles up the side, Marlboro in hand. She was happy and upbeat and trying to make the best of it, their public appearance Marcus looked bored and the psychiatrists could not hide the embarrassment on their faces, try as they did with their tense smiles After graduation Suzie followed her rock star boyfriend to Los Angeles, and I never heard from her again.

  This seems like a good time to give a big fuck you to Marcus and leave My mother is laughing it up with Allison and Kerri and some other strangers She’s well and she doesn’t need me at all, in fact I’ve barely gotten a complete sentence directed toward me since I’ve been here. I look at Marcus’s smug white face and I’m about to tell him exactly what I think of him, how fucking heartless he is, how hypocritical, how it was probably his family’s lack of caring that had driven her to hard drugs in the first place. But then I see his big dopey smile and I think about what I say when people ask me about my father I say I don’t remember or it was peaceful or I wasn’t there, none of which is true. So I tell Marcus I’m sorry, and I wish him a good night, and I leave without making a scene.

  Chapter 3

  Friday I have off from work Christmas is on a Sunday this year but the office is closed on Friday just for the hell of it. We’re trained to expect a day off for Christmas, and a day off we will have. In the morning I call Veronica, the only friend I have left from high school, to tell her about Suzie Veronica is now a documentary filmmaker, and in my cruder moments I think she believes the catechism we were taught at St. Liz’s, the elite private school on Carmine Street where Veronica and Suzie and I met that we are special, that we are gifted, that the laws do not apply to us and that we will rise above the scum of public schools and the lesser private institutions to be the cream. She’s made two full-length films, the first on the history of Washington Square Park and the second on the head chef of Le Cirque. Neither film was picked up for distribution The one about the chef was actually pretty good

  “I’ve got some bad news,” I tell her over the telephone “Really bad news.”

  “Oh my God What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  “No, no, I’m fine You remember Suzie, from high school?”

  “Suzie who?”

  “Suzie. You know Susan Sparks. She was one of our best friends ”

  “Uh, blond?”

  “Yeah, blond Crazy Suzie. Suzie!”

  “Oh, yeah, yeah Crazy Suzie Oh no, did something happen to her?”

  “She died. I saw her brother last night at a GV party ”

  “Oh my God Poor Suzie. When are the services? Are you going?”

  “No, she already—I mean it was two years ago. She OD’d.”

  “On what?”

  “I don’t know. Dope, I guess. I know that guy she moved to L.A. with did a lot of dope.”

  “Yeah, but that was, what, thirteen years ago? She probably wasn’t with the same person.”

  “Yeah. I didn’t think of that ”

  “Who knows?” Veronica takes a deep breath and exhales slowly before she continues. Veronica never rushes, she takes her own sweet time and the rest of the world will wait. “It’s always so funny when you hear about these things later. It’s like you missed the whole time you were supposed to be sad Anyway, that’s Saturn ”

  “You too?” I say

  “What do you mean?”

  Veronica doesn’t like to be second at anything, so I let it go for the moment that Chloe, another friend of mine, told me about Saturn Return last week.

  “Nothing,” I tell her “Go on.”

  “At twenty-nine, the planet Saturn returns to the same spot it was in when you were born. So, when you’re twenty-nine is when you really become an adult. But it’s hard. You have to go through a lot of shit first”

  “Like what?”

  “Like with Suzie ”

  “But she’s the one who died And she was a year older than me And besides, she died two years ago.”

  Veronica sounds exasperated “Yes, but you’re hearing about it now In your Saturn Return.”

  The influence of Saturn Maybe. She takes herself a little too seriously sometimes, but I trust Veronica. The most important day of my life was probably the day when I was twelve and Veronica sat next to me in the St Elizabeth’s dining room—God forbid a cafeteria—and asked to copy my French homework I had never talked much to other kids before. Before my father died I hung around with Michael and Evelyn and the GV staff, and after he died I was stunned into silence I read my way from seven to twelve, starting with Ferdinand and Little Bear and Frog & Toad, moving through the Mummentrolls and the Chronicles of Narnia and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I was on to The Catcher in the Rye when Veronica stepped in and woke me up. No one else had known what to do The psychiatrists I had seen had been useless, with their finger puppets and surprise hugs. St Elizabeth’s was supposed to be specially equipped to deal with children like me, high I Q children who had failed to thrive in the public schools. At St Elizabeth’s we were given written reports instead of grades

  Mary has been something of a frustration to the English Department this year She has an obvious aptitude for the material; when she does turn in a book report, her writing and analytical skills are excellent She displays an ability to grasp the nuances of the material far beyond the obvious in the text But the reports she turns in are few and far between—only two of an assigned five this semester. Adding to the puzzle is that, despite a reluctance to approach the assigned texts, Mary constantly reads on her own, and clearly has an advanced understanding of literature for her age If she applied herself, Mary could easily excel in English and, I suspect, all her classes As it is, she lags behind the class

  This, from a seventh-grade English teacher. If Veronica hadn’t talked me into cutting French class that afternoon, and instead going to Washington Square Park to smoke cigarettes stolen from her nanny, I probably would have kept on reading I would have finished high school and then college and then gone to graduate school, and today I would be an English professor at some brisk New England college campus, like I was supposed to be. So when Veronica tells me I’m under the influence of Saturn, I’m inclined to believe her She’s been right before.

  At three o’clock that afternoon I meet Chloe, my closest friend other than Veronica, at a ritzy French restaurant in Chelsea so she can give me my Christmas present. When we were twenty-three I hired Chloe as a clerk in a bookstore I was managing. Two years later, she recommended me for a job at Trout Filagree, where she was an editorial assistant. Three months ago, when Trout merged with VLPS and Chloe was laid off, I got her a job at Intelligentsia, where for two years I’ve been an editorial associate. Intelligentsia bills itself as the world’s largest independent bookstore even though it’s not a store at all, but a website. My job is to write two “Spotlight” columns a week for the site. “Spotlight on
Nora Roberts.” “Spotlight on Harry Potter.” “Spotlight on New Wave Noir.” “Spotlight on This Season’s Great New Crop of Self-Help Books!'” Chloe’s new job title is category reviewer, poetry; she writes two-or three-line blurbs for each poetry title Intelligentsia will be peddling as it arrives. Even though we carry every new poetry title that comes out from a decent press, this is still not a full-time job. Chloe doesn’t care that poetry is our slowest-selling category, that most of its publishers are unsuccessful enough to claim nonprofit status, that poetry is the only category of literature so neglected we’ve had to install a sort of Disaster Relief Effort and make April National Poetry Month She loves it, she reads it, she believes in it, and she’s thrilled.

  I can not get over this restaurant Tho last time I was on this block I was in a cab on my way to Port Authority and it was lined with hookers Now I don’t see a single person who doesn’t look like they make at least twice what I do—although you probably could have said that about the hookers, too. Chloe looks good in a place like this. She comes from a wealthy Irish-American family in Boston and she still smells like money; her black hair is thick and silky from regular trims and touchups, her skin is creamy and flawless from an adolescence of dermatological visits She has a sly smile on her face today After we order escargots in butter, foie gras sandwiches, and two glasses of house white she asks. “Are you curious?”

  “Very,” I answer “I have no idea.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. No idea ”

  “Okay,” she says “Remember last week I was telling you about the Saturn thing, the astrology?”

  “I can’t believe it. This morning Veronica said the same thing”

  “Well. .” She reaches into her purse and pulls out a little brochure, a piece of thin pink Indian paper folded in three On the first side is printed, in Sanskrit-style script.

  KYRA DESAI

  ASTROLOGER

  I open the brochure and read.

  Kyra Desai moved to New York City in 1989 under the direction of her teacher, Vispanna, who knew she could better serve humanity in the States Ms. Desai began studying with Vispanna at the age of six, when he met her in the marketplace of the sacred city of Haberdash and recognized her extraordinary gifts through the presence of the polydactyl. Ms Desai moved to Vispanna’s estate, where she was privately tutored in the arts of astrology, meditation, puja, mantra, and Hindu ntual Her learning was rapid and she has been giving private readings since the age of twelve, when she was crowned as Master Astrologer Through the use of sacred mantras and a three-year period of silence, she has further refined her gifts and now holds the highest honors possible In addition to private readings, Ms Desai leads the Vedic Council, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the betterment of mankind through astrology

  Readings by appointment only Group rates available

  www.kyradesai com.

  “We’re going after lunch,” Chloe says with a big grin “You’re getting a complete reading. Birth chart, past, future, everything.”

  “Oh my God. How did you find her?”

  “A friend of my cousin’s went and said she’s amazing. She’s right up the block Are you excited?”

  “Oh, Chloe, I can’t believe it. I am so excited. This is so great”

  Really, I’m a little disappointed I was hoping for a Coach purse like she has or maybe something in cashmere I have a theory about fortunetellers, which is that the reason people find a session with a psychic or tarot card reader or astrologer so alluring is because everyone likes to talk about themselves This person you’re paying five or twenty or one hundred dollars could say anything as long it’s about you, and you’d leave with a smile on your face But I’m not immune, and it is sweet of Chloe, so I coo my happiness through lunch and up the short walk to this astrologer’s apartment. It’s cold out, and Chloe wraps her arm around mine like women do in movies. We stop at the corner in front of a stone house that goes around onto Tenth Avenue, taking up at least a third of the block Somehow I’ve never noticed this castle before It’s way too big for New York City, probably built before there was a city around it, and the areaway is overgrown with weed trees and bushes, dead and black for the winter. Naturally it’s been split up into apartments; Kyra Desai’s is on the third floor. We ring a doorbell and we’re buzzed in. A security camera films our entrance.

  The lobby is a sight, twenty-foot ceilings, a few pieces of gilt and velvet furniture scattered around Chloe and I have both been a little obsessed with interior design lately. Chloe’s got a great place in the East Twenties with her boyfriend, and I have a decent one-bedroom in Inwood, on the northernmost tip of Manhattan We spend a lot of time talking about loveseats and pillows, and I know that Chloe secretly watches the Martha Stewart Show on her mornings off, as do I This too, according to Chloe, is a symptom of the Saturn Return, it’s all about looking inward and finding your own space Maybe I had attributed it to that fact that at twenty-nine, we just don’t have the energy to get out of the house as much as we used to “Look down,” says Chloe. The floor of the lobby is pale pink marble with a compass inlaid in black and red granite. I’m always surprised in Manhattan to see that north is a bit to the west of where I expect it be In this city, we think our north is the world’s north.

  “Look at the elevators,” she says. There are three elevators and on each door is a brass relief panel of a man at work. One is moving a big chunk of stone, another holds a pickax, the third is busy up on a scaffold. After the third elevator a little plaque on the wall reads

  THE CARLTON BUILDING

  The Carlton was built in 1855 as a home for Jeremiah Carlton, who worked for the Dutch East India Company, and his family In the nineteen-thirties the Carlton served as the offices for the Department of Public Welfare and it was in this period that the elevators, designed by Warren Garfinkle, were installed Granted landmark status in 1972, the Carlton has served as a residential hotel since 1942 The films New York, New York and Looking Forward, among others, were filmed in the Carlton

  On the third floor a good-looking Indian man lets us into Kyra Desai’s apartment and silently directs us into a room off the foyer

  “Wait,” he says, and leaves Chloe and I look at each other, eyes wide. This is the perfect room. The walls are creamy off-white, with four long windows looking out onto Twenty-fifth Street Sunlight pours in Natural muslin curtains are held back with black velvet ribbons On one wall is a print of the Hindu goddess Kali, tongue stuck out, in a gilt frame, on the opposite wall in a matching frame is many-armed Shiva A Raj-style mahogany daybed, upholstered in pink-and-black Indian silk, sits opposite the windows. Against another wall is a mahogany secretary, the type with hidden compartments and secret drawers. In the middle of the room is a large round mahogany table, with a single leg curving into three lion’s paw feet. Around the table are three chairs with matching claw feet. And that’s it. It’s perfect. Chloe and I are wondering whether to sit on the loveseat or on the chairs or if we should sit at all when Kyra Desai enters

  She’s a vision Tiny, maybe five foot one, with glossy black hair to her waist, not a split end in sight She has a small gold stud in her right nostril and a chunk of thin gold bangles around her left wrist. She’s wearing a cropped Indian top in pale pink, a mid-calf tight black skirt, and high-heeled platform sandals I’m checking out her shoes when I notice—she’s got extra toes. Six on each foot. I look up; twelve fingers. It’s impossible to say which fingers are extra—the hand looks balanced and whole, nothing looks superfluous. Each of her twenty-four nails is painted a pale seashell pink. She catches me looking and smiles.

  “Hello, Chloe, Mary.” She gets our names right even though we’ve never met her before She says that Chloe will wait in the living room where Ahbney, the hunky Indian man, will attend to her every need, while I get my reading

  Chloe disappears and Kyra gestures for me to sit at the round table. In her impossibly high heels she walks to the secretary desk, pushes onto a small panel, a
nd a drawer pops open. Out of the drawer she pulls a small pink-and-gold paper booklet. When she gets back to the table I see that it has my name written across the cover, in the same Sanskrit-style lettering as the pamphlet Chloe gave me at lunch. Kyra sits down next to me and opens the booklet on the table between us. On the first page is a large circle with a smaller circle inside, divided into twelve slices like a pie, and strewn with cryptic little symbols in black ink—a crescent moon, a crown, an elephant.

  Kyra speaks in a beautiful upper-crust Calcutta accent. “Chloe told me your birth day and time, so I’ve already done your chart Now I will explain it to you You understand, she told me, a little of how our system works?”

  “I think so.”

  “So We start with the general. Your sun sign, which is ruled by fire, is in Scorpio, a water sign, and your moon, which is ruled by water, is in Sagittarius, a fire sign And your rising sign is back to Scorpio again How’s that for conflict?”

  She smiles. “Fire and water—no earth. You daydream a lot Your inside life is as big as your external world. Okay, now we’re going to look at your emotional life. Scorpios keep secrets, and they have a lot of secrets to keep, because their emotions are so strong. You have a bad temper, but you don’t let it show. You’re very impatient, you make impulsive decisions. Do you ever meditate?”

  I feel guilty as I confess no It’s common knowledge that everyone, everywhere, should meditate

  “You should,” she says. “Don’t let your emotions control you Mercury is in Aries Fire This means you make things hard on yourself. Venus in Taurus Earth, for once. You like luxury, maybe you’re a little spoiled. Mars is square Pluto This is like Scorpio, keeping everything inside. The fire and the water are always fighting with each other, so you have a lot of anger. Saturn is square Scorpio rising. You hate your father.”

  I do not, I emphatically explain to Kyra Desai, hate my father.

  “You do,” she says dismissively, “but you shouldn’t. You see this?” She points to an empty slice on the chart. “The Fourth House. This is your family life. Empty. Look at it like this, a planet in a house is like a light bulb in the house, it brightens it up So here, you need to light this house yourself This is a challenge; shine some light on your family. Moon in Sagittarius Your mother is a smart woman You’re not close to her either, are you?”