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In one, an epidemic turns women invisible, and nobody cares.
In Machados telling, the husband is not a bad man.
Its a case of murder by microaggression a thoughtless gesture with devastating consequences.
The series, she predicted, will undoubtedly be a force in the conversation about gender.
The controversy began last month.
The author Monica Byrnefollowed, recounting a story of how Diaz had violently shouted rape in her face.
It wasnt just their interaction that upset her.
His books are regressive and sexist, she declared.
The thread concluded with an ominous prediction.
The #MeToo stories are just starting.
The next morning, Machado woke up to an inbox bursting with requests for comment.
She didnt respond to them.
A few weeks later, we met for dinner at a tapas place near Union Square.
My feet rest on snoozing bears.
I am so fat I can only leave the throne on a palanquin borne aloft by twenty men.
I am so fat it takes the air out of the room.
I am so fat no advisor tells me no.
Wed talked about intuition, trauma, and her next book a speculative memoir about her abusive ex-girlfriend.
Now, we had to talk about Diaz.
After a sip of the house red, she changed her mind.
I will say this, she began.
But does that mean the two things were completely unrelated, she asked?
What level of delusional do you have to be to think so?
True to form, the fabulist of weird Americana summoned a metaphor from Dudley Do-Right.
Its so sinister in that way.
Her mother, a midwestern farm girl, was a homemaker.
Her father, the child of Cuban and Austrian immigrants, worked as a chemical engineer.
Once, in high school, she marched out to the porch and demanded one.
Someone offered her a drag, and then the men stared on silently as she coughed.
It was condescending, she said.
It was always, Oh, theres Carmen doing that weird thing she does.
She would never dispute that she was weird.
She had a loud laugh and an imagination that wandered into strange, disturbing places.
Success comes at the steepest price.
The saga concludes with an image of the hero trussed and roasted on a Thanksgiving platter.
His last words: I wish I did not come here.
She was 5 when she wrote this.
Some of the most stringent gender boundaries Machado encountered as a teenager were self-imposed.
She blamed herself for the incident: This is what happens, I reasoned, when you flirt.
(Last summer, the family celebrated Machados marriage to her wife.)
In 2010, she started graduate school at the prestigious writers workshop at the University of Iowa.
(In 2012,Diaz told theAtlanticthat sometimes people usually women lambaste him at his readings and public appearances.
Theres plenty of people out there who are like, Fuck you.
You are endorsing this shit.
Your portrayal of women is fucked up, he told the interviewer.
It happens all the time.)
Machado was one of those readers.
At some point in their careers, many fiction writers face questions about the moral leanings of their characters.
What Im troubled by, he told Machado, is how readily you accept the primary narrative.
Machado found this response supremely condescending, but the experience sharpened something for her, she said.
It was a really crystallizing moment, she told me.
The interaction with Diaz also perversely inspired her most famous short story.
The piece is a virtuoso exploration of the ways in which womens experiences are never trusted or believed.
After some 30 rejections, her collection found a home at the independent press Graywolf.
Machados tweets about Diaz have found a more mixed reception.
(As of now, theyre unresolved.)
Diazs behavior toward Machado, she wrote, clearly didnt meet the legal standard of sexual misconduct.
Artists are not obligated to agree with their critics.
(Wheres the rage?
Wheres the misogynistic rant?
When will she apologize?)
She said she did.
Thats whats so fucking weird.
The level of condescension.
She took a sip of wine and a deep breath.
It still makes me mad to think about it.
She told me that the intent of the tweets was to offer a signal boost to Zinzi Clemmons.
It wasnt about me, she said.
Im not a victim of Junot Diaz.
Im a female writer who had a weird interaction with him.
This makes me feel crazy, she texted me.
She pulled into a parking lot and started to cry.
Then she listened to the audio for herself.
Her impression of the conversation had not changed over the years.
You are entitled to quibble about tone,she tweetedfrom the parking lot.
But to say that what I said happened didnt happen is straight-up not true.
If you think so, you probably arent the best at reading subtext.
Like Machado, the fictional girl had seen something shed found disturbing and wanted to talk about it.
As a girl, I consented to his account of the story.
Machados fiction is richest when it delves into those internal, haunting moments that mark a womans life.
What is #MeToo, really?
Machado thought aloud, over a duck egg balanced atop a tower of crisp potatoes.
What does it mean at its core?
Is it about power?
Is it about gender?
This relationship will be the subject of her untitled speculative memoir, forthcoming from Graywolf next year.
There is no council saying, This is the meaning of #MeToo, she continued.
Theres no magic council of women in really long robes.
So how did she define this moment that were in?
But what comes after?
God, what should we do with them?
she said with a laugh.
In terms of having their art utterly devalued at every turn.
In terms of not being taken seriously.
Obviously, she added dryly, I dont think that will happen.
We fell into a hungry silence as the waiter set down a hunk of bone glistening with marrow.
It was the perfect dish for a diva of darkness: slightly macabre but inviting, hidden and complex.
Machado delicately excavated the creamy interior with a long silver spoon.
She took a bite of toast and fluttered her eyes, savoring it.
Delicious, she said.
