Fire looked up. Sylvia was standing on the other side of the table, her hands on her hips—which seemed wider now but also less erotic since being dusted with political fallout. Mix-up was not a good thing.

“Goodbye,” he said, extending his hand. “It was nice to have met you. Nice meeting you, Lewis.”

Lewis ignored him. Sylvia held his hand and squeezed it. It felt tight. He let go.

As Sylvia began to walk away, Claire pulled her to the side and they spoke quietly. Lewis said he would meet her in the car.

Ian began to laugh. “Fuck you,” he screamed, pounding his bottle on the table. “You fucking fake, you.”

“I am not a fake,” Sylvia shouted. Claire covered Sylvia’s mouth and tried to calm her.

“Who the fuck talking to you?” Ian replied. “I was talking to Lewis. Ah, throw me corn, me never call no fowl. Let her go, Claire. She think I fraid for her.”

Claire told him to shut up and walked Sylvia downstairs. She came back shortly, unsure of what to say or where to begin.

She turned to Fire. “How can I make a living if he behaves like a shit? He needs to know when to shut his damn mouth. Those candleholders were the only things that sold today. And because of this prick,” she pointed at Ian, “Lewis returned them. Luckily, Sylvia wants them.” She wiped her face with her palms. “So at least we can say we sold something.”

“Fuck Lewis,” Ian muttered. “Fuck Sylvia too.”

Claire sighed.

Ian began to mutter incoherently.

“Go to sleep,” Claire snapped. “Tomorrow we have a date.”

“I not going nowhere with nobody.”

“Yes, you will. Just get some sleep.”

“No way. I’m drunk. I’m sleepy. I’m pissed and … I’m beginning to piss.”

A wet spot spread on his pants.

“He’s not going to make this barbecue tomorrow. I can see that. Fire, why don’t you meet me there?”

Sylvia sat with her body against the car door as they crossed the George Washington Bridge, trying to distance herself as much as she could from Lewis. Her hands, tired from being rolled into fists, rested in her lap. In her mind, she was still in the gallery, the argument was still going on, and she kept hearing the question again. “So if Sylvia was an editorial assistant you wouldn’t deal with her?” What did it mean, she wondered, that he had basically said no? Would she be with Lewis if he were a transit worker or a manager at a McDonald’s? She wasn’t sure. She asked herself if he would be the same person, if he’d be able to hold the same conversations, if he’d be equipped with the same intelligence and have the same values and opinions.

How much of us is what we do?

And who was she?

Was she a writer with a day gig at a magazine or was she a magazine editor who wrote on the side? There was a part of her that said she was whatever paid her bills. At heart, she was a writer though. She knew that. But writers don’t have security … and she needed that. Security was important to her. Which is why she’d never managed to take the time off to finish her novel. Would a writer without money be like a word processor? She looked at Lewis, who thought this meant she wanted to speak.