MEN ARE THE NEW WOMEN
“Robert Miller Gallery.”
“Hey, Suki, it’s Hope.”
“Hi. Hope, nice you call. Haven’t heard from you long time now. You must want something.”
Suki Takashimaya always gets straight to the point. She’s kooky but brilliant, and her mouth and brain are usually going a mile a minute. Because her family owns a chain of luxury department stores, she is rich enough not to need a master’s in fine arts and visual communication and a Ph.D. in art history. But Suki lives and breathes art and has an encyclopedic memory for artists and their work.
“I wanted to follow up on the pictures I sent of Derrick Reynolds’s pieces,” Hope says sheepishly.
“I’m ready to talk, but you have to come to gallery so you can bring me something nice from the vault. I’m no stupid girl, yes?”
“Yes, Suki.”
“Good, you come at two, I give you fifteen minutes, yes?”
“Yes, Suki . . . ,” Hope says, but Suki has already hung up.
At exactly two o’clock Hope opens the door of the gallery and steps into the soaring white space. Music from the current video-and-music installation by Paul Miller, aka DJ Spooky, plays in the background while huge black-and-white blowups from the exhibit hang from the ceiling.
Suki looks up from her office, and looks at her watch.
“You good girl, right on time.”
Suki is a petite Japanese woman with a taste for eccentric outfits. Today she’s wearing a man’s black cashmere cardigan as a dress; her tiny waist is cinched by a thick yellow lizard belt. She has a red silk Hermès scarf tied at her throat, red tights, and black oxford pumps. Perched under her overlong black bangs are her signature geeky tortoiseshell frames. She looks like a poodle but she has a pit bull’s bite.
Hope clicks across the concrete floors in her heels to Suki and gives her a hug.
“Love the outfit,” Hope says.
“Thanks. You know I don’t like disappoint.” Suki smiles then steps out of the hug and looks at Hope. “So you getting any yet?”
“Suki, please. After Terence I might never want to have sex again,” she jokes.
Suki waves it off. “Not all men like Terence—thank God.”
“I know, it’s just he seemed so perfect, accomplished, and older. At fifty I thought he’d have it more together,” she finishes.
“Hah! Older not always better.” Suki snorts, leading Hope over to her office. “More years more wisdom yes, but not always; sometimes they age backward into little boys. Right now I’m dating two fifty-somethings: one lives with mother, the other lives with girlfriend. Both emotional, needy, like women.” She shakes her head. “Men today too high maintenance, maybe they the new women.”
Hope laughs. “Men are the new women. Maybe I’ll do a piece on that at Shades,” Hope jokes. “I’m sorry I’ve been out of touch,” she finishes contritely.
“Yes, and now you come for favors. Where’s my gift?” Suki demands, hands on hips.
Hope opens her Birkin bag and pulls out a long silk chartreuse scarf like she’s a magician’s assistant.
Suki claps her hands. “You did good. My color, yes?”
“Every color is your color, Suki.” Hope smiles, glad she likes the scarf.
Replacing the scarf she’s wearing with the new one, Suki looks at herself in her compact, then shuts it and gets down to business.
“So I like your guy. His work has energy. Very good, the marker and chunky acrylic against watercolor—almost panoramic, like looking at landscape.”
Suki finishes and smiles, but Hope is frowning. “So he’s in. Why long face? You look like horse. I like his work. Put up a show. What’s trouble now?”
“Believe me, I’m thrilled. I’m just not sure I can convince him to be in a show so soon.”
“‘In a show,’” Suki repeats frowning. “He is the show,” she corrects Hope.
“His own show. Suki, his apartment just burned down!”
“He can stay with you—you got big house. You knocking boots soon, yes?” she interrupts.
“I can’t answer that, Suki. Anyway, he has two kids.”
“So what? You got big town house. You tell me you don’t think of that already.”
“Well, yes,” Hope admits.
“Then what the problem? Baby drama mama?”
“It’s baby-mama drama, Suki, and no, she’s not really in the picture.”
“Even better.” When Hope is silent, Suki shakes her head. “You smart black girls overthink everything. Don’t waste my time. He got three months. Make it happen. I need bio. Send him to meet me.”
Three months, Derrick’s not gonna like that, Hope thinks. “I’ll try to arrange it, Suki,” Hope says, trying to sound convincing.
“Suki looks over her glasses at Hope. “Try? Why you have to try? He an artist, yes?”
“Yes, Suki.”
“And I’m art dealer, yes?”
“Yes, Suki.” Hope wonders why Suki frames all her sentences as questions.
“Do or do not—no try.”
Hope looks at Suki. “When did you become Yoda?”
“You talk nonsense,” Suki says, waving Hope away. “Send him down. What he want—a car?” she snorts. “Artists; like little babies. I get him myself. Where? Harlem, right? Four hundred-something street?”
“No, no, it’s not that far,” Hope laughs. “You’re worse than I am.”
“Good. Trains run from Harlem to Chelsea. Yes?”
“Yes, Suki.”
“Give him cab fare . . . put him in town car, not my problem. Just get him here, tomorrow. Three o’clock. Yes?”
“Yes, Suki.”
Suki’s phone rings. “And he better be good-looker.” She looks at her cell. “Gotta take this.” She shoos Hope away, then stops her at the door with a finger pointed at her. “Tomorrow, yes.”
Since it’s more a statement than a question, Hope doesn’t answer, just slips on her shades and exits into the beautiful October afternoon. She’s about to hail a cab when her cell rings.
“Hello.”
“Hope,” says an incredibly sexy voice.
“Speaking.”
“It’s Derrick.”
“Derrick.” Hope is flustered and gets back on the sidewalk after she’s almost plowed down by a truck.
“Yeah, I don’t want to take up your time but I thought about what you said, and uhm, if the offer still stands, I’ll take you up on it.”
Hope can’t say anything; she’s lost her voice.
“Hope, if you changed your mind, I understand. Yo, no big deal.”
“Oh, no.” Hope finally finds her voice. “That’s perfect, Derrick. I’m so glad.”
“Okay, well just until our place is renovated, you know. It’s too cramped at my mom’s and I wouldn’t mind seeing if I still got that art touch, you know. Okay, Hope. I’ll call you later and we’ll figure out the key thing. Okay, Hope. Hope?”
“Whatever you say, Derrick,” Hope says, barely hearing him because she is so happy.