The Rules of the Tunnel: My Brief Period of Madness By Ned Zedman

Thirty-five million Americans suffer from depression. Ned Zeman, senior editor at Vanity Fair is one of them. A profiler of people from all walks of life including the likes of Julia Roberts, Jennifer Lopez, Timothy Treadwell and others, Zeman succumbed to anxiety and depression, ultimately being diagnosed with manic depression.

In his memoir, The Rules of the Tunnel: My Brief Period of Madness, Zeman chronicles his journey through the tunnel of depression – through pills, therapy, psychiatric hospitals, and finally, twenty sessions of ECT – Electro-convulsive therapy.

This is the alternatively heartbreaking and hilarious story of that discovery, which arrived only after a calamitous series of events, including amnesia, pills, psych-wards, shock-therapy, and a love-triangle from hell. Along the way, thanks to the heroic efforts of those around him, Zeman learns who his real friends are.

On Monday, August 8th at 7 p.m., Ned Zeman will be reading and signing The Rules of the Tunnel: My Brief Period of Madness at Book Soup.

Book Soup
8818 W. Sunset Blvd.
West Hollywood.
7 p.m. Free.
(310) 659-3110
Get Directions

In the meantime, Ned Zeman and Gotham Books, an imprint of Penguin Group (USA), have generously shared the first chapter of The Rules of the Tunnel.

Learn more about Ned Zedman on Facebook facebook.com/ned.zeman

*Warning: Adult Language

C H A P T E R O N E

You arrived at the gates of Xanadu on a sharp blue morning in April 1997. You were thirty- two.

The kingdom stood at the center of the universe, at 350 Madison Avenue, in Midtown Manhattan. But it was visible only to a rare few, due in part to its relatively modest scale, turdish coloring, and lunky 1920s- era architecture; it would have been the crown jewel of Warsaw. But that was the beauty part. If everyone could see Xanadu, it wouldn’t

be Xanadu.

You had traveled far. Across a vast continent. Alone. Carrying only a suitcase and a dream. Just three weeks earlier, you had enjoyed a life of quiet domestication, in a sunny house in Los Angeles, replete with a girlfriend, two cats, and the mantle of unfulfilled potential. You wore it well. The romance was on life support, indefinitely; you held a mediocre editing job at a middling city magazine perpetually on the brink of collapse. Freelance contributors, tired of waiting for checks that would never come, would soon begin mailing bricks on the company’s FedEx account.

But acquiescence had its benefits, once you really committed to packing it in. It was a lifestyle: enjoy brunch, sleep well. There were, in the whole of Los Angeles, upwards of six magazine writers, half of whom would be out the instant Paramount optioned their spec scripts. Any chimp with a notepad could muddle through in the city where

journalism goes to die.

New York was the last place on your mind. Already you had done a six- year stretch there, subsisting in a series of god- awful studio apartments with clanging radiators and nocturnal neighbors heard but never seen. But back then, at least, you were a Promising Young Writer for two Important Magazines Of The Day. You had, if not wealth or comfort, promise. Zing. But in the years thereafter, and throughout the bloom of your mediocrity, you retreated further and further from New York. Because that’s where the talent lived, and because you were a cautionary tale.

Were.

The building at 350 Madison Avenue was home to Condé Nast Publications, which was home to the world’s shiniest, swankiest magazines, among them The New Yorker, Vogue, GQ, Wired, W, Details, Gourmet, House & Garden, Architectural Digest, Condé Nast Traveler—and, not least, Vanity Fair. The braying alpha dog. The perpetrator of “buzz.” The slick, fat monthly variously loved, hated, envied, resented, mocked, and/

or feared in all corners of The Media- Industrial Complex, but especially in the world of print journalism.

You had read all the best stuff about the worst people— the Menendez brothers, Greta Van Susteren— by way of Dominick Dunne, VF’s most celebrated and indefensible writer. VF, in one issue, had published definitive articles on Iraq and the LAPD scandal. But of course the thing that stuck with you, in the end, was the Annie Leibowitz photo of Demi Moore’s swollen, naked pregnant-ness. How was it that a single magazine could so deftly pander (“Tom Cruise On Fire”) and soar (William Styron on depression, Marie Brenner on Big Tobacco)? VF, having dared to blend highbrow and low, bite and blow, refi nement and excess, was everything that was right and wrong with journalism

at the time.

Unless or until it hired you. In which case, it was just everything that was right.

You had accepted the job without hesitation or negotiation. Which seemed wise at the time, since neither option was available; your leverage was compromised, from the start, by its absence. VF’s editor, Graydon Carter, had seized the upper hand eight years earlier, when he was at Spy magazine, the elegantly cruel satirical monthly he founded with Kurt Andersen, the magazine’s co-editor. They hired you straight out of grad school at Columbia, after you’d sent them an article written in Magazine 101; it was a profi le of a man named Hank Schmidt, who was, in addition to New York’s most decorated Ku Klux Klansman, its only one.

Graydon and Kurt published the article and hired you as a staff writer. But you weaseled out of the job, having accepted a similar position at Newsweek. You thought of yourself as a Serious Journalist, destined to thunder about, saying things like “truth wants to be free” and “I’m a reporter, dammit.” Ideally, you would be chased through wherever

the hell Mel Gibson was in The Year of Living Dangerously. Or tortured in Burma. Carl Bernstein and Sydney Schanberg were just two more Screaming Jew Reporters until they became Dustin Hoff man and Sam Waterston. And they were all your journalistic deities.

In later years, after Graydon’s enthronement at VF and your freefall into obscurity, the power dynamic trended unfavorably. He threw you occasional writing assignments but otherwise kept you at arm’s length. When he finally summoned you, by phone, the power dynamic was firmly established.

“I need you to start three weeks from today,” he said.

“Great,” you said.

“Great.”

“The only thing is, I need to quit my job, pack, move.”

“Agreed.”

“ Cross- country. Three weeks.”

“Yes. They have these things called airplanes.”

“Right.”

“Three weeks,” he said. “Enjoy the flight.”

The frantic cross- country rally left little time for dithering or doubt. This evoked a feeling of nakedness. There was also the matter of your crawly skin— but the ill effects were small potatoes, considering your baseline state of emotional impairment, and given the healing power of There. The farther you got from Here, the better it felt.

You faced one last obstacle. Your face. Those damned glass doors as you entered 350 Madison were, in the sharp morning light, basically giant mirrors. This seemed inconsiderate of a guest who had spent decades avoiding the perils of reflection; your list of Things To Be Avoided At All Costs, though infinite and ever changing, included only one bona fide phobia. Mirrors brought nothing but bad news, then embellished it.

You’d always viewed yourself (in your mind’s eye) as fl awed but halfway presentable in appearance. Sufficient. A lanky huncher, a shade under six feet tall; brown hair, eyes; fair skin; casual in looks and manner— more Midwestern than Jewish. Inevitably, after meeting a girlfriend’s mother, the latter would tell the former, “Well, he looked like a nice young man.”

Now, at the doorstep of history, sufficient felt like gangbusters. You were clean- cut, freshly shaven, and dressed as if you’d stepped out of a catalogue for The Journalist’s Wearhouse: dark blazer, white button- down, blue- patterned tie, and khakis. The ensemble was designed to address the unique challenges you faced; it would project an

air of authority, of gravitas, while preventing others from mistaking you for the intern from Oberlin. You’d gone the extra mile, in consultation with the fashion experts at Desert Hills Premium Outlets, located just minutes from The Banning Municipal Airport.

But then came the glass doors. A funhouse- mirror effect lent your worst features (sunken eyes, long face) into Spitting Image proportions; the blazer, now hopelessly ill fitting, suggested a teenage usher. Shutting your eyes only made things worse, because mental images projected better in the dark, and because you looked like a disabled person, and because that didn’t make for an ideal first impression.

Onward through a lobby the color of canned salmon. Into an elevator. Flanked by two nerd- chic waifs of the sort that frequently made kindling of you. Alighting on the fourth floor, you checked in with the receptionist, pushed through the glass door, and entered the inner sanctum. You experienced, initially, a twinge of disappointment; VF, in your imagination, was a pleasure dome for the literate and heartless. There would be skylights and koi ponds. There would be a spinning cube at the center of a stark white room.

The place, in reality, was a study in institutional gray, from the carpeting to the prefab cubicles and desks. The main corridor seemed too narrow; the fluorescent lighting, a shade dim. Thick walls and shuttered doors concealed the few people who seemed to be in attendance. The total effect was one of hushed intrigue. Office Max noir.

“Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.”

Doug was a slender, suspiciously fit character with wire- rim glasses and thick brown hair cut short. He was forty- four, with a mien somewhere between bookish and puckish.

“Relax,” he said. Then he cackled. “Just f*cking with you. It’s actually pretty cool here.”

Doug was one of the few staffers you’d met previously. He had edited the latest of three freelance articles you had written for the magazine (Ivy League football) and had proven surprisingly un-prickish. Condé Nast, a company that trafficked in entitlement and privilege, favored editors who exuded same, most notably Vogue’s current editor,

Anna Wintour, and VF’s previous one, Tina Brown. You’d once interviewed Brown for a story in Newsweek. She swanned into the room, flanked by a mirthless assistant dressed like James Mason, and sat at the far end of a vast table. Her gaze turned your palms into oysters. You begged off a handshake. Muttering something about a broken thumb.

“Guess I’m the welcoming party,” Doug said.

“Where is everyone?” you asked.

“They don’t get here till ten.”

“I was told eight thirty at the latest.”

He loosed another quick, high- pitched cackle.

“Even the assistants don’t get here before nine,” he said.

“So why are you here?”

“Because I’m an idiot.”

He sighed. “California,” he said. “Why would you ever leave California?”

“Because I’m an idiot.”

“Did your girlfriend move with you?”

“No.”

“That good or bad?”

“I don’t know—”

“Because you’re looking a little pale.”

“Really?”

He shrugged, then said he had to get some work done. He invited you to wait things out in his office.

“ Thanks,” you said. “But maybe I should get my bearings. Check in with Graydon.”

“He’s not here yet,” he said.

“How can you tell?” you asked.

“The whole place would be different.” He swirled his finger in the air. “But he’ll be here soon. So don’t wander too far. Trust me.”

A tilt of your head.

“Because that’s when he’ll call for you,” Doug said. “Or come looking for you. He just knows. Don’t ask how. It’s unexplainable.”

“What happens if I’m not here?”

He just laughed.

Over the next few minutes, as you shuffled about pointlessly, things changed. The hush became a hum. Lights brightened. Outside each office sat a crisp young assistant, midtwenties, strong of bone, breeding, and eye contact:

“Morning!”

“Good morning!”

“Good morning, sir!”

The assistants were better groomed and dressed than you would ever be. The males favored slim three- button suits of the sort worn by boutique hoteliers. The metrosexual ones— the especially metrosexual ones— wore foppish tweeds; seersucker and bow ties were also in evidence. The female assistants hewed to The Condé Nast Stylebook (“colors may range from black to black, except for the heels, which must be sparkly, spiky, strappy, and, to be frank, a little porny”) while maintaining a dewy, fresh- faced appeal, as if they’d spent the weekend show- jumping in Coventry.

“Morning!”

“Good morning to you!”

Figures materialized out of nowhere, forming a natural ecosystem.

At the center of the system were platoons of copy editors (“it’s composed, not comprised”) and fact checkers (“Camilla used brands other than Tampax”) in hot, futile pursuit of the top- shelf editors. The latter were too busy talking their writers off the ceiling (“I’m aware you drank with Hemingway, but this paragraph still needs to go”). The floor seems tilted toward the far corner office, where a flurry of activity

had commenced.

It was 9:30 a. m. And the boss was in.

Finally, one of the assistants led you to another assistant, who led you straight back down the hall, to the office next to Doug’s. “Welcome home,” she said.

At the door hovered two throbbing blue orbs. “This is your assistant,” the assistant said. “Evglemniana.”

Or some such. Your assistant’s name (whatever it was) was marginally less daunting than her presence. Never had someone so tiny possessed eyes so large. Her giant blue gaze, set off by her Russian cheek bones and porcelain skin, was to be admired and feared.

“Nice to meet you,” she said.

“Likewise, Evglemuh—”

“Evgenia.”

“Right. Of course.”

She smiled evenly, in that well- bred way— just polite enough to conceal what you deemed to be either indifference or contempt (or both). Evgenia was different than the others. Cooler. Formidable. But you reserved judgment, given that you were (1) new to the masterservant dynamic, (2) a superpowerful young professional, and (3) a paranoid person.

“Well,” she said, before returning to her desk. “Call if you need

anything.”

At which point another assistant led you away, while explaining that the editor you were replacing had yet to vacate the premises. In the meantime, she said, you would be working out of an office/ storage room located in a separate department, among the magazine’s stylists and party planners. Evian, everywhere. There you spent three hours, alone, waiting for further instructions. An effort at mingling went nowhere. The stylists and party planners were loud and tan people, endlessly barking about “Donatella” and

“Annie” and the perils of seating Lord Goatsquabble next to Duchess von Schnurz at something called “The Serpent,” or “Serpentine,” or whatever. It was safer to just sit quietly, sniffing samples of Revlon Age Defying Makeup and Almay Time- Off Revitalizer.

Finally, Evgenia materialized at the door. “George needs you,” she said.

“Okay,” you replied. “One question.”

“Yes?”

“Who’s George?”

One of the other editors, evidently.

“What’s this about?” you asked.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Okay. But I was told to sit tight for Graydon.”

“Oh.” She trailed off . She seemed anxious to return to her real boss. Which made you anxious. Also covetous and ashamed.

“I’m sure it’s fine,” she said. “I’ll tell Graydon’s office where to find

you.”

George, a high- strung sort in wonk- chic glasses, could be found yammering on his cell phone and awash in copy. “Graydon wants you to shadow me for a few weeks,” he said, between conversations. “I’m swamped right now. So I’m gonna transition a writer to you, okay?”

“Absolutely,” you said. “Who?”

His assistant appeared. “He’s here,” she said.

George rose to greet a silver bull of a man in a pinstripe suit. “Come meet the newest member of the team,” George told the writer, before introducing you.

“Carl Bernstein,” the man said.

“Guh,” you said.

He shed his suitcoat and settled in.

“It’s an honor,” you said. “Really.”

“Well, thank you,” he said, warmly.

“Just here to help.”

“Great.”

George raised the subject of Bernstein’s current story assignment, about a blowhard Washington lobbyist named Tommy Boggs. Themes and plot points were discussed. Then, midsentence, Bernstein turned to you.

“Here’s something,” he said. “Any chance I can get my hands on a Diet Coke?”

George cried out for his assistant, who was AWOL. Things got uncomfortable.

“No problem,” you said.

“Great,” Bernstein replied. “Thanks, Ted.”

Evgenia was on the phone. So you went for it, scrambling down the elevator, through the lobby, and into a newsstand. Your wallet, however, remained upstairs. Back up you went, only to discover that the wallet contained no cash. This precipitated a sprint out into the street, followed by an ATM withdrawal, then the purchase of two Diet Cokes, then a triumphant ascent to pay dirt. By then, however, both Bernstein and George had left the building, whereas Evgenia stood astride her desk, ramrod- straight, at mock-ten.

“There you are,” she said.

“Huh?”

“You didn’t get my voicemail?”

“What?”

“Graydon called for you.”

“When?”

“Ten minutes ago. I left you a voicemail.”

“ But—”

She hurried you to Graydon’s assistant, Patricia, whose parents owned Venezuela. She guided you into an airy corner office with an off -white sofa, a private bathroom, and a crescent- shaped desk of the blond retro- minimalist variety. The desk was custom- designed, in keeping with the man’s stature, now in full effect. He stood six feet two, with a longshoreman’s chest and forearms. He had a ruddy tan, perfect teeth, and his trademark hairstyle: wispy salt- and- pepper clouds, jutting to the east and west. He topped things off with bespoke black suit, a black tie, a crisp white dress shirt, and cufflinks fashioned out of old fishing lures; his wristwatch, also antique, was worth more than your Nissan Altima.

“No rush,” he said.

“Just getting acclimated.”

“Wait,” he said. “You thought I was serious?”

He paused a moment before offering a handshake and a thick,

jaunty laugh.

“Glad to be here,” you said.

“Sure? You look a little pale.”

“Totally sure.”

“Good thing. Los Angeles would have fried your brain. I love visiting the place. And I love leaving it.”

“Yep. It was time for me to go.”

“What’s your girlfriend think?”

“That it was time for me to go.”

“Any luck finding an apartment?”

“Found one.”

“Where?”

“Brooklyn Heights.”

There was a pause.

“Brooklyn,” he said. “You know there’s a big island here we call Manhattan?”

Another pause.

“So you’re clear about everything you’ll be doing,” he said.

“Um,” you said.

“Writers write. Editors edit them.”

“Right.”

“I did hire an editor, right?”

“Right.”

“As opposed to a writer.”

“Right.”

“Show ponies and workhorses,” he said. “You’ve heard that expression?”

“Um,” you said.

“Two kinds of editors. The ponies swan around being fabulous. The horses keep their heads down and do the work. Guess which kind I hired you to be?”

“I love horses.”

He explained the magazine’s basic editing structure, which was singular in its simplicity. VF shunned the “tiered” editing process favored by many magazines, largely because multiple editors tended to dilute a writer’s voice, but also because simplicity insured accountability. You would preside over a specific stable of writers. “And you’re the only one standing between them and me,” he said. “It’s your responsibility to keep them productive, happy, and in line. We treat writers the way they should be treated. When a writer hands in a story, he gets feedback within twenty- four hours. Calls gets returned that day. You’re also part manager, part nurse. Some writers you’ll find more challenging than others.” He smiled. “But it rarely gets physical.”

He was alluding, perhaps, to an incident involving a writer known for his Olympian alcohol consumption and expense- account abuses. He ended up biting his editor on the elbow.

Graydon handed you a typewritten list of names. These were your writers, among them nine “contributing editors”—writers officially affiliated with VF— and a half dozen freelancers currently on assignment.Among the latter, one named popped.

“Sydney Schanberg,” you said.

“Back to The Killing Fields,” he said. “Sam Waterston wasn’t available.”

“Wow. Add Mel Gibson to Schanberg and Bernstein, and it’s my supertrifecta.”

“The Year of Living Dangerously? You’ve got a little Mel Gibson in you.”

“Really?”

He just laughed and laughed.

Finally he displayed a hardcover book. A preview copy of the sort reserved for critics and swells.

“Heard of it?” he asked.

In no way.

“Rings a bell,” you said.

“It’s incredible,” he said.

“I’ll start reading tonight.”

“Then go get the writer. I want him on contract with us.”

“I’m on it.”

“There’s no maybe on this,” he said, poker- faced. “But, hey, no pressure.”

“I love pressure,” you said.

You lay awake all night, amid unpacked boxes and duffels, reading the boss’s copy of The Perfect Storm.

Home was a one-bedroom apartment in a two- story walk-up in Brooklyn Heights; its rooms, though large, had evidently housed the local chain- smoking society. The walls were Marlboro White; the wood floors, sticky; the ’70s- era fridge stocked with a spilled bottle of Strawberry Yoo- hoo and an ossified plate of kung pao something. The apartment in Los Angeles had been half as expensive and five times nicer.

But, hey. The road to glory and plunder would be paved with setbacks

and sacrifices, because they wouldn’t be glory and plunder if any

clown could find them, and because that’s how it worked in Viking

times. Nose, grindstone; eyes, prize.

The book, by Sebastian Junger, was certainly a page- turner— all the dropped r’s and Men Against The Sea stuff evoked Jaws. Which also happened to be among your favorite movies. You were, like all cowards of a certain age, a sucker for any story involving guys who went Up The River. Midnight Express, The Deer Hunter, Apocalypse Now— all had to be watched without interruption (and with a bong).

But a sleepless night was a bridge too far; even in college, even when faced with finals or the remote possibility of sex, you were the guy who crashed at midnight. Then would follow ten unbroken hours of motionless, soundless, ursine slumber. Roommates treasured your ability to sleep through their crimes against nature. Sleep was a way of

life. And it was a good life.

And now, suddenly and henceforward, sleep was the Andrea Gail. The early returns were surprising. With insomnia came a kind of energy distinct from your endless supply of nervous energy, in that it produced vitality rather than bile. An enduring rev saw you through the coming weeks— the make-or-break period, when a single lapse would have forever doomed you to the loser’s lunch table.

Ultimately, it seemed, your energies were best spent trying to make your assistant like you. Investigation revealed that this was her third year as an assistant; that she was ticketed for a promotion; and that she was ten times smarter than you— a Harvard gal. Crimson had been a pox on the magazine world since your earliest days as a writer, at Spy and Newsweek. They said, rather than “I’m writing a caption,” “I’m working on a piece about . . .” You’d started at the bottom, as an unpaid summer intern at The Oakland Press, a newspaper in Pontiac, Michigan. Harvard twerps just showed up wherever they wanted to work. They expected.

It was only a matter of time before Evgenia had your job. “Um, would you do me a favor and FedEx this?” you would stammer. “I mean, if you don’t mind—”

She’d pause briefly, as if surprised to learn that you were still employed there. She’d look at you, regard you, without turning her body— the way an owl does when sensing threats in the night.

“Sure,” she’d say.

The futility continued until the morning you “overheard” Evgenia breaking up with her stoner boyfriend, whom you didn’t know but resented on principle. The doomed fool was calling from the downstairs lobby, issuing threats just wild enough to rattle the unbreakable assistant. Sensing an opening, you waved her into the office. There, after

issuing a few empty offers to chase the guy away, and after recalling a few of your most regrettable Breakup Moments, you flipped her.

“I like you,” she said.

“Sound surprised,” you said.

“I always thought you were nice.”

“Oh, god.”

“No, I didn’t think you liked me.”

“You’re terrifying.”

“This can’t be serious.”

“And yet here we are.”

“I don’t think you’re supposed to be terrified of me.”

“So where’d I go wrong? Assist me.”

She proceeded carefully. Tried not to laugh.

“Well, the apologizing,” she said. “You’d go, ‘Um, please, if you don’t mind, can you do me a favor and FedEx this?’ ”

“So that’s bad?”

“You’re the boss. I’m the assistant. You tell me what you need.”

“I need your approval.”

Evgenia, it turned out, defied the mold in which you had cast her. She was a female version of you, only cooler. She shared your insanities, while somehow remaining insanely well-adjusted. She used gentle force to rein you in, starting with the khakis.

“Pleats,” she said. “No.”

As Evgenia went, it seemed, so went the office. The other editors seemed to find you agreeable, in a shaggy- dog sort of way. Doug always let you tag along at lunch; the fashion editor, Elizabeth, wrangled you a Prada suit, lest you arrive underdressed to a party. You had novelty value. You were the editor who could be found in Brooklyn, guzzling Budweiser and ironing his ties.

This added to the thrill. There was a sense of being, for once, at the center of something big. Magazines, at the time, were booming. The classics (Esquire, GQ) had been born again, after years of moldering; new ones popped up every ten minutes, because there was always another emerging niche market to exploit (Wired) or another mogul angling to raise his profile (Harvey Weinstein, Talk). And if you were pitching a new magazine to prospective investors or readers, the conversation always began with the words: “It’s the Vanity Fair of boating/city/ cat magazines.” Your most recent employer, in Los Angeles, was called Buzz.

VF was predicated on one thing above all else. Access. VF was at the center of the Media- Industrial Complex because it owned the complex. Everyone else was a tenant. If you wanted in on the real action—to be in “the room within the room,” as Graydon would say— you had to be in VF. If you weren’t on the cover, half naked, you weren’t a

real movie star. If you weren’t on The Power List, ideally somewhere between Al Gore and Steve Jobs, you were just another schmuck with a Gulfstream. In Washington, the only thing scarier than being profiled in VF was not being profiled.

And, oh, the perks. VF seemed to have fifty staffers dedicated solely to the acquisition of prime reservations at restaurants with silly one- word names: Babbo, Moomba. All restaurants were fair game; writers, when treated to a meal, expected to join the swells at Michael’s, Elaine’s, or the Four Seasons Restaurant; one writer, upon meeting you at the Palm, said the choice made him feel “disrespected.” Hotels were five-star or bust; concierges, noting VF on a reservation, automatically upgraded you to The Shameless Assh*le Suite.

It beat eating cereal for dinner.

It nurtured your feeble ego.

It was the life you deserved.

There was a sense of momentum. Velocity. You traversed the entire office several times a day, pretending to be in search of something. Just because it felt good. Sometimes, after work, you walked the five miles home from Midtown: down to SoHo, through Chinatown, over the Brooklyn Bridge.

Brooklyn Heights was hardly an outpost. Located just across the East River from Lower Manhattan, it was famed for its unrivaled views of the City, its historic brownstones, and its cross section of blue bloods, househusbands, and half- mad writers. The two books that had tricked you into pursuing journalism as a career—Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood and Norman Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song—were written

in Brooklyn Heights.

The apartment became, if not homey, homely. To your original furnishings— green bed frame, two wooden tables, an old TV— were added a few chairs and doodads, in consultation with the expert design specialists at Crate & Barrel. While finally unpacking the duffels, you discovered a handwritten note:

You will be missed. But I’m so proud.

Love, Lizz

Lizz. The girlfriend you’d lived with for the past four years. The one everyone, including yourself, had deemed your future spouse. The bright- eyed gal’s gal who had also served as best friend, confidante, consigliere, gatekeeper, nursemaid, and shrink. The girlfriend who was now your ex-girlfriend.

Or something. You’d left things vague, in part because that’s what you did with everything, in part because neither one of you fully accepted that the end was nigh. The relationship remained as warm as ever. No fights. No tension. No tortured silences. You were, compared to many couples in your greater circles, a model of enduring love. Less

evident was the fact that you and she had become like siblings.

Meantime, though, you determined to put the issue behind you by putting it behind you. Problems, when viewed from airplanes, always seemed so much smaller.

Junger proved amenable to a writing contract, and work proceeded apace with Schanberg, Bernstein, and a third decorated warhorse from the golden age of print journalism. But the latter proved less nervous- making, because there weren’t any major motion pictures about him.

For days you edited Schanberg’s story, a sprawling return to The Sh*t; his first draft, though polished, came in at something like ten thousand words long— lengthy even for VF. It occurred to you then that his was the first substantial piece of journalism you’d ever edited— back in Los Angeles, you’d seen nothing but glorified Crayola scribblings.

Questions arose. Were you supposed to just flail away, as if editing your own copy? Or was it really about moving commas around before going to lunch? Did you have to ask the writer’s permission before doing anything? How could you know what Graydon wanted before you knew what he wanted? And, most important, which strategy reduced the likelihood that someone would berate you in public?

You aimed for the middle, reasoning that it was better to risk disappointing everyone a little than one person a lot. Schanberg, having reviewed the edited version of his article, cut straight to the point.

“So,” he said, “did you really like it, or are you just being kind?”

Bernstein’s story moved along smoothly until space constraints demanded some last- minute cuts. Bernstein was traveling and couldn’t be reached. So you slashed away, and prayed for a merciful god.

“Carl’s on the phone,” Evgenia said, first thing the next morning. “He sounds anxious.”

“Carl,” you said, after picking up. “Thanks for calling.”

“Help me understand something,” he said.

“So I guess you had time to look over the cuts I sent you.”

“I did.”

“So, as you know, time was really tight—”

“I’m sure.”

“So, listen, if there’s anything—”

“Do contributing editors get gym discounts?”

“Sorry?”

“Corporate discounts? Condé Nast?”

“Um. I’d have to ask.”

“Okay.”

“But, um, the edit?”

“It’s fine.”

“Oh. Um, great.”

“So you’ll get back to me? About the gym?”

“Absolutely.”

You celebrated the twin triumphs with a woman you’d once dated, at a bar called the Brooklyn Inn. Your cell phone rang. The caller’s voice was audible well before you put the phone to your ear:

“WHO THE F*CK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE! I OUGHTA COME OVER THERE AND KICK YOUR BONEY ASS!”

The third warhorse. Didn’t care for the edit.

“YOU GUTTED IT LIKE A TROUT! DO YOU EDIT WITH MITTENS ON? I WON’T STAND FOR THIS SH*T!”

“Slow down,” you said.

He hung up.

Before you could form a sentence, the phone rang again. “THIS BETTER GET UN-F*CKED!” he said. “I OUGHTA RIP YOUR BALLS OFF!”

Click.

“What happened?” the woman said.

“It’s fine,” you said.

“Doesn’t look fine.”

“It’s fine.”

“Dude, you look really pale.”

All night you paced the apartment, half in the bag, churning out worst- case scenarios. You couldn’t go tattle to Graydon, because that would make you the pussy who couldn’t handle his writers. The Warhorse would take his case straight to Graydon, exposing you for the fraud you were, and by lunchtime you’d be the latest addition to Modern Bride. Or perhaps the Warhorse would take matters into his own hands— he’d been through Nam, for crissake. The latter scenario seemed the way to go. Better to die violently than to fail publicly.

The next morning, you returned to the office well before 10:00 a. m., in an effort to avoid (or at least minimize) the public- spectacle aspect of the train wreck to come. By now, though, your fingers had gone from tingly to numb; your voice, from crackly to cracked. Again and again, you dialed the Warhorse’s number, only to hang up midway. You started dialing Lizz’s number, before realizing it was the middle of the night in

California.

Bzzzing!

Long ago, during your lone visit to a child psychiatrist, the doctor had noted in you a “heightened sensitivity” to, among many other things, “external stimuli.” Bright light. Loud noise. In recent years, however, only one thing had proved consistently problematic.

Bzzzing!

The best defense, when ducking phone calls, was a good offense. Turn down the ringer. Or yank the plug out. Let the voicemail know who’s in charge.

“Hello!” came Evgenia’s voice, from beyond the door. “It’s you-know-

who.”

Or kill your assistant.

“Tell him I’m on another call,” you said.

“Are you ducking him?”

“No.”

“You’re ducking.”

“I’m very busy.”

“With what?”

“Things!”

The phone’s call light dimmed.

“Might as well get it over with,” Evgenia said. “It’s not like you can avoid him forever.”

She underestimated you. The cat and mouse continued for days. You left a voicemail on his home phone when he was on his cell, then vice versa. Finally he just gave up. You broke him in a way the VC never could.

But the celebration was restrained, because you were too busy dissolving. The Siege at Warhorse, though glorious in its way, proved a Pyrrhic victory— battles, wars, and whatnot. You could only avoid so much confrontation and ridicule before insomnia came a cropper. Same time every night. Only a matter of time before Warhorse calls again.

Three fifteen a. m., sharp. Did I double- check those captions? Every night. Everyone smells my failure. Clockwork. Graydon’s reading the captions right now, quaking with outrage. Hourly updates. Whatever you do, don’t look at the alarm clock. Till sunrise. Better to stay awake, get a jump on the day.

BLEET! BLEET! BLEET!

Because nobody sleeps as deeply as the guy who crashes ten minutes before the alarm goes off , response times varied. Sometimes ten minutes elapsed before the noise penetrated your woolen brain; other times, bam, you ejected. The bleeting continued, regardless.

Falling, falling. At the office, while pressing a hot cup of coffee against your swollen eyelids, you heard the dreaded words:

“Graydon wants to see you.”

The corridor leading to Graydon’s office had, in recent days, narrowed and engthened. Heads weasel- popped out of offices and cubicles, taking in the spectacle. Graydon’s assistant, Patricia, mustered the sort of smile reserved for retarded buskers. “Go right in,” she said.

Graydon sat staring at a series of photo captions you’d written a day earlier, to accompany an article about Matt Drudge, the internet drone. He handed you the first caption, which read as you’d written it: “Matt Drudge outside his office in Los Angeles last year.” Except for the thick black line he’d drawn through it.

He pointed to the photo, which had obviously been taken in

Washington. He pointed out the date provided by the photo department: last month, not last year.

“Two errors in a one- sentence caption,” he said. “Impressive work.

Some editors take years to get this far.”

“Oh,” you said. “ I—”

“It’s completely unacceptable.”

“I know. I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. Just don’t do it again.”

“Never again. I swear I’ll never—”

Already he was out the door and halfway to lunch with Bono or David Geffen or whomever. Doug tried his best. “He reads every little word,” Doug said.

Retreating into the office. Killing the lights. Head squarely on desktop.

“Everything okay in there?” Evgenia said, from afar.

“I’m fine,” you said.

“Anything I can do before I go?”

“I’m fine.”

“You can’t just sit sulking all night.”

“I’m fine.”

By the time you sat upright, it was nighttime. You lurched around in the dark— the prospect of light was offensive— and pressed an ear to the door. Coast was clear. Everything was quiet: the office, the street. Friday nights were like that in Midtown. Arriving home, you climbed into bed, still dressed. And there you stayed for eighteen hours. Wide awake in your pants. Beneath a five- foot- long plaque your brother Pete had acquired long ago, under mysterious circumstances:

Great Ape exhibit and Amphitheatre

A Gift to the People of Detroit

Alfred E. Cobo, Mayor—1955

Everything, at this point, was an anvil on top of a piano. Utility bills sat on the kitchen table for weeks, unpaid. Not because of money concerns. Because who had the strength to find postage stamps? Meals went uneaten; suits, baggy; calls, unreturned. Writers grew restive; parents left long voicemails, asking if you’d forgotten about them.

By month six, your hands were trembling round the clock. The subway was a potential powder keg— The Taking of Brooklyn One Two Three. You kept up appearances as best you could— you were gifted that way. You were homesick. You missed Lizz. You wanted out. Needed it. And that’s when it happened. You glimpsed a newspaper clipping

fl uttering atop your overstuffed inbox. The article, frayed at the edges and torn from The New York Times, featured two photographs. In the first photo were two penguins; in the second, a beaming man. The headline read:

BRUNO ZEHNDER, PHOTOGRAPHER, 52, IS DEAD

THE RULES OF THE TUNNEL: My Brief Period of Madness

Ned Zeman

Gotham Books | Hardcover | $26 | August 2011

Also available as an e-book

Also available as an audio book

Frank Mundo is the author of The Brubury Tales and Gary, the Four-Eyed Fairy