She blew me a kiss, closed the door, and locked it. I saw Frank in the window for a split second before the blinds snapped shut, too.
Now here I am at four a.m. in the Big, Rotten Apple, forcing myself to wake up on a weekday so I can be the first customer at the only place I’ll go all day, which happens to be across the freaking street.
Somehow, I don’t think this was what Mary meant by “living.” But until and unless New York stops being frightening and grotesque, I don’t see anything changing.
When I arrived home yesterday, there was a basket outside my apartment door. Inside was a barely legible, handwritten card: “Champers for my Champ! You’re money, baby!—Clifford.” The rest of the basket was empty. Someone stole my champagne.
That about sums up my view of Manhattan. Everything’s there for the taking, and it’s been taken by someone else.
I roll across my lumpy couch bed and land in “the kitchen,” aka the area where the hot plate and mini-fridge are. Another piece of advice from the neighbor I’ve only seen once: “Use your oven to store your winter coats.” (Without a closet or cooking skills, that made pretty good sense to me. Unfortunately, I’m sans oven. Instead, I hang my sweaters in the empty pantry.)
Out the window, the city is dark and unfriendly. The noise of a truck backing up—beep, beep, beep—fills the air. Is there a single quiet hour here? Ever? I make a deeply ironic cup of coffee so I can wake up enough to sit outside Café Crudité and insure I’m the first customer to arrive and purchase more coffee. Then I plop down cross-legged in front of the lopsided mirror hanging on the door and scrutinize my face. I looked like a human Xanax withdrawal yesterday, blinking into the light, but today that won’t do. It’s not enough to beat the Table Thief; I want to look good doing it (but not as though I’m trying to look good). I dab on tinted moisturizer, a swipe of eyeliner, and a muted lip. I’ll still wear my stomping boots and the arm warmers Mary knitted because I refuse to be miserable in an overly air-conditioned building, but other than that, I’m less Manic Pixie Nightmare and more “Oh, did I put on makeup?” I smile at my reflection, pleased with the results.
Outside on the darkened sidewalk, I’m flooded with adrena-line. There aren’t many people out, which is nice, but on the other hand, there aren’t many people out, so if something happens to me, or I need help in any way, there will be no one to hear my cries.
Boots, start walking. Fast.
I make it across the crosswalk on my second try. Progress. Then, at precisely 5:01, Evelynn strides toward the café entrance to unlock the door and jumps when she sees me.
“Hi! Sorry. Hi. I guess I’m the first one here today, ha ha ha. Am I the first one here?” I sputter.
“Yes,” she says. “Can you stand back while I …”
“I’m curious, is the biscotti already sitting there waiting for me? Or do you have to bring it out and display it?”
“We discontinued that policy after the events of yesterday.”
My mouth falls open. “Are you serious?”
“No.” She motions with her hand. “Can you give me a little space?”
Five minutes later, I’ve set up my mobile office at the glorious, big table, devoured all the free biscotti, thank you very much, and swallowed half my second cup of coffee. Ten minutes after that, the place is jumping with commuters, yet there’s no sign of the Table Thief. In between hostilities, he’d mentioned he “spreads out his visits,” so maybe he’s off to the next coffee shop on his rotation. I’ll be pissed if I got up early and went to all this trouble for nothing; is it so wrong that I want him to show up, witness his own defeat, and feel the loss of the good table before exiting my café and my life?
I’m downing my last dregs of coffee when who should walk in but Mr. Personality. He scans the room and his gaze rests on me.
“Not today, Satan,” I mutter triumphantly.
His brown eyes whip toward mine. “What’d you say?”
“Uh, I said, ‘Seat’s taken.’”
“I can see that. Given that you’re sitting in it.”
“Just wanted to make sure we’re clear. I’ll be here all day, by the way, so don’t get any ideas that you can, like, wait me out.”
“Well, Fifty Shades can’t watch itself,” he says disdainfully.
“Excuse me?”
“Six straight hours of mommy porn is admirably rigorous.”
“I have no idea what you’re—oh. The Weeknd.” Dammit, Clifford! “Uh, it was a parody video,” I stammer.
“Parody porn is underrated,” he says condescendingly.
“I didn’t come here to watch porn,” I hiss.
“Just do me a favor and keep the volume down, okay? Some of us are here to work.”
Asshole!
“Miles, your order’s up,” Evelynn chimes in.
Miles, eh? So, he’s got a name. But he doesn’t have a place to sit. Every table’s occupied, and more customers are piling in. He busies himself adding cream and sugar to his coffee while scanning the café for the next available place to sit. Unfortunately, the cream and sugar station is right next to me. I sense his gaze roving around and glance over in time to see him pour roughly half the café’s sugar supply into his mug. (And I thought he was tense before? He is going to Hulk Out when his blood sugar spikes.)
Out of nowhere, “Last Dance with Mary Jane” by Tom Petty pours out of my speakers. Not again!
A video chat box hijacks my screen.
I try to press Do Not Accept as fast as humanly possible, but in my haste I click Accept by accident.
“Should Frank get his own Instagram page, and if so, what should the sub-theme be?” Mary shouts.
I manage to hang up while dozens of eyes swing toward me in irritation.
“There’s a class for people who are new to computers coming up at the Y,” Miles says, lifting his mug (aka “sugar with a splash of coffee”) to his lips.
I don’t have time to counter this bit of snideness before he adds, “Wait. Was that—was that the real Mary Clarkson trying to FaceTime you?”
The image attached to her screen name is a faux-retro photograph from an old issue of Interview magazine. She’s got curlers in her hair, a bright red mouth, and a joint dangling from her lips. The song starts up again, with an added notification: Contrary, Quite would like to FaceTime. This time I mute the call and hang up simultaneously.
“Hmm?” I feign ignorance.
“Mary Clarkson. Undersea. Mary Clarkson!”
“Maybe.” Don’t you wish you’d been nicer to me before, so you could ask me about her?
“And you just … you just … you hung up on Mary Clarkson.”
“I’m texting her instead. Volume control, remember?”
I always forget that for dudes of a “certain age” (such as Clifford), Mary as the brave, feminist Duchess Quinnley of Undersea and her brief, forced mermaiding is everything golden and good from their childhoods. She was those guys’ first crush, and for some of them, their first, well … “self-love.” I wonder if that’s true of Miles. He looks younger than Clifford, though. He’s in way better shape, that’s for sure. Cutting remarks burn a lot of calories.