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“Ryan doesn’t know the exact timeline, just that Sandra showed up for work, on time, the following day. I remember the day perfectly. She came into work wearing dark glasses, looking like she was coming down with a cold. Ryan’s been silent about it since the incident.”
“What’s going to happen now?” I asked.
“They might be seeing each other; I can’t be sure, and he isn’t saying anything more to me. I guess we’ll see how they act the next time they’re in the office together. It’s been nice with Ryan away taping. I don’t have to worry about his disrespect. He’s been seeing Sally Clark, by the way. I didn’t know if that was a problem for you.”
“Jennifer, I never even met the guy for coffee, okay? I have no desire to date someone I’m working with.”
“I apologize for being so bitchy to you when you first arrived,” she said. “I was so jealous, but after the Sandra story, I never want to see the guy again.”
The weeks working for my dad stretched into months. Occasionally, I regretted not having taken a brief break after graduation, but it was too late for that.
The job as cohost didn’t get any easier, but that turned out to be a plus. Each building we featured was a challenge, and I had to cram as much knowledge as I could about them. Probably the most interesting building I worked on was the Margaret Sanger Birth Control Center in Brownsville.
A building in the same neighborhood that was affiliated with it, but lesser known, was Saint Anne’s Hospital, a precursor to modern-day birthing centers. But there were darker stories attached to the birthing hospital; one of the nurses had supposedly taken babies and sold them to desperate adoptive parents. I talked to my father about possibly making the story into a documentary, and he was interested. We’d discuss it as soon as the first season of Saving New York was over.
Keeping busy kept me from succumbing to Ryan’s charms.
It wasn’t easy, though. That chemistry he’d claimed we had at our first meeting was undeniable. It took more effort than I thought I had to stay professional. We enjoyed the time in front of the camera, sharing stories about the property with each other and our audience. We both had a knack for acting, that was for sure.
Randy said that was the spark the viewers saw and were attracted to; I wasn’t just another pretty face. I was hungry to learn more, and it showed. The buildings we featured interested me, and as winter approached, I imagined what it must have been like to live in timber houses with little or no insulation, heated by a wood fireplace. I did a spot about it, getting a group of Revolutionary War re-enactors to do a piece about life in Manhattan during the war. The audience loved it.
One of the houses was a late 1700s farmhouse with an outhouse in back. Students from Columbia excavating the pit had uncovered fascinating treasures: a child’s marble, broken china dishes with gold-painted rims, the kind a wealthy family might use, and the wire frame of a doll buggy. I would have enjoyed spending time with them, sorting through decomposed poop and garbage, including bones of different animals, even wild boar.
At night, I couldn’t wait to escape to my beautiful apartment. Our dialogue rarely varied.
“Would you like to stop for a drink tonight?” he’d ask.
And my standard reply was always, “Not tonight, Ryan.”
My apartment was the only place I longed to be, as autumn wound down and winter was in the air. I spent many evenings sitting alone at the window, next to a crackling fireplace, watching snow fall.
Ryan was eventually arrested for rape in the incident at Sandra’s apartment. In the same time period, she accepted a buyout from my father and went off on her own, accepting the offer to do a similar historical renovation series for Public Broadcasting.
The case against Ryan was thrown out when Sandra admitted the sex was consensual. But the press was horrible, and for the next month, we were chased by paparazzi, who mistakenly linked us together. Ryan needed support, and against my better judgement, I tried to be that friend for him. Slowly, I let go of my animosity. My new role as confidante to Ryan seemed to temper his romantic feelings for me. It was a relief. We maintained the pleasant comradery when we were on camera, but off camera, we really weren’t anything. But I wasn’t uncomfortable around Ryan any longer.
Despite the drama, the job moved forward, one episode after another, just two weeks ahead of schedule. I loved going to the old buildings, meeting the current owners, and recreating the original owners’ stories.
Making money legitimately felt great. Sightseeing around Manhattan with Randy and dining with him when he had time was the high point of my current life. But there was a definite temporary feeling about it all that I couldn’t put my finger on, so I took every opportunity to spend time with him that was offered to me.
My life had settled into two components, my job and recovery from the job.
