There was the Bow'ry ablaze with lights;
I had one of the Devil's own nights!
I'll never go there anymore!"
- 'The Bowery', P. Gaunt & C. Hoyt, 1891
Squeezed out of the club by inches and onto the sidewalk. There had to be more elegant ways of exiting the Bowery Electric.
My
ears pinged. A flat, metallic tang of vodka soured my tongue. I hadn’t eaten in
any adequate way. The drinks thudded in my stomach louder than they should have.
A
mean gloss lay over lights and faces and I felt my teeth rub drily against lips
thin from lack of water. I pulled my shirt back into place, it had twisted
around while I elbowed through the mob. I felt grateful to be outside. Still it’d
be hard to walk this off and come out crisp, no guarantees.
July
choked the avenue. Ten pm and the air was thick but mostly fresh. I filled my
lungs with it. I willed my head to clear. If possible, to brighten. There was a
night off to enjoy and my only obligation, a friend’s fundraiser at Bowery
Electric, had been met. After chatting in polite screams, she had teetered off
in designer stilts through a crevice between shoulders. I was glad to donate
but talking to her over the bass line was like flirting underwater.
On
the sidewalk the blue door of the club clanged behind me. The steel, brick and
mortar served like a ribcage and muffled the untiring pulse within.
It
was a getaway night.
A
night off and nowhere to be and no one to meet. Being somewhere new and slightly
off-limits. You got away with it. It’s tastier that way. When the unfolding
story leads you.
I
live for the getaway.
Stretching
off in either direction was the Bowery. I had never really roamed it. Around
and through, but never along.
I
rubbed my face and breathed the haze away. Hands in pockets, I started walking.
From
old pictures I'd seen, there used to be twin canopies of steel and thunder
above, as north and southbound El trains blocked the sun below and rattled the
windows up high. Those images showed a latticework of ugly beauty I wished I'd
known. So I stared up and imagined them. It sobered me a bit.
Eyelevel
to my left was a coffee shop patio with fenced-in seating. From there Apple
logos glowed on laptops, hovering in the dark like creamy grey fireflies. That struck
me.
I'd
seen the name ‘Bowery’ itself cause either a shudder or a wistful sigh from those
who’d known it. Sometimes a twist of both as the happy-bad years drifted
through their eyes, with stories of junkies and murders and stripped cars on
cinder blocks and absent police and phone booths that reeked of piss and above
all the fast and thrilling genesis of great music. To hear them tell it the
Bowery was so authentic, it'd kill you. And now that was gone, and wasn't that
a goddamn shame, they said.
If
there had always been badness in its bones, the Bowery had since purged the
marrow clean, and flushed the flavor away with it. Hell of a trade-off.
I
kept walking. Crowds were pressed into sticky clumps by the July fist. Weave around
the crowds. Push through the haze.
Two
or three blocks north, maybe less, and I stopped beneath a luminous clock face.
It
hung from the black iron and beveled glass awning of an old train station in
Europe. The awning cast wide shelter from off a russet brick front and twin
glass doors frosted with the letters ‘BH’. Alongside the entrance was a row of
red cruiser bicycles with white rim tires and wire baskets in front. They shined
and were all stationed in a row and at the same tilt. Flanking the glass doors
were a pair of cylindrical lanterns, ornate metal, Spanish Moroccan. There was
an ebb and tide of purposeful walks through the entrance of The Bowery Hotel.
I
stood there. Why was I resisting the strong pull inside? There was a story in
there. The scent of it wafted out the doors. Still I dug in my heels and
wondered why.
It
was plain. I couldn’t justify the expense. Numbers are stubborn things.
It
pained me to boil it down so crudely. No one filing in or out of the hotel
seemed weighted with that thought.
“Excuse
me?”
A
slight, singsong girl’s voice from behind me, clear and amused. Her tone seemed
to peer around to pull me face front.
She
was a short brunette with only a toehold in her early twenties. Her figure was
obscured somewhat by a strapless black summer dress, a sack dress with a
drawstring just above her breasts. It ended at mid-thigh and she wore simple
sandals. The legs were strong. I had a feeling she was proud of her legs, had
almost a boy’s stance, was a good runner and swimmer, but maybe worried they
were meaty if she crossed them. I brought my eyes back up with a speed that
made it too obvious and felt like a tool. I said hello through a grin.
“So
you might think I’m weird...” She half-rolled her eyes and throat-laughed and expected
me to defuse.
“I
doubt it. I have a high threshold,” I said, defusing.
Her
unpainted mouth crooked up. “Oh, really?”
“But
don’t let me stop you from trying,” I said.
“Ha.
So I’m sure you’ve got plans? Or friends…”
“A
few. You’d like them.”
She
laughed and rocked on her toes.
“As
in you’re meeting people and so you probably
can’t, but…”
“…But?”
“…BUT,”
she giggled, “We were wondering if you’d like to join us for a glass of wine?”
I
paused and kept the smile and let my eyes travel, fast.
Her
hands were clasped behind her back as good girls do on the fronts of cereal
boxes and it pulled the black cotton of the dress tighter. She wasn’t wearing a
bra and her breasts were full and young and heavy, the cleavage not rolling out
but down. Eyes up, boy.
“…We?,”
I asked.
“OH,”
she laughed again at herself. For the third time. Then she jerked a thumb over
her shoulder, a slim bracelet spinning up her forearm. “’We’ being my uncle and
myself. We’re sitting right over there. See?”
Over
her left shoulder she made fast eye contact with a man seated at a table, so I
resumed.
The
skin was pale enough to be burned at Thanksgiving. Her chocolate brown hair was
parted at the center, bobbed at the jaw line and needle-straight. A ladybug barrette
of colored glass was tucked neatly into the left side of her high forehead.
“Wait,”
I said, “You… you just said your uncle, right?”
She
mm-hmmed as her grey-green eyes fired with an odd light and her grin swelled
her cheeks. She was a little cherubic, if that angel had slipped off the cloud
and hit her head.
I
was suddenly certain she wore no underwear at all. I was unsure how I knew. The
timing of that thought was poor, but manageable.
She
smiled at my smiling.
“So.
How ‘bout it?” she dared.
She
was familiar though I’d never seen her before.
“I’ve
gotta say…” I started.
That
was it. She was one of those ambling college girls you see in the park when
everyone else is at work, and she’s on the cusp of discovery. There’s a shine
of health, a bravado and a fragility, and a madness. They are delicious and one
of the best bad ideas the city has to offer.
“Sounds
like fun,” I said. “Lead the way.”
“Really?,”
she sang.
“You
knew it was a safe bet.”
She
tilted her head. “Why’s that?”
“You
didn’t send your uncle over to invite me. By the way, I’m Eric.”
I
extended my hand and she met it and told me her name.
I’ll
call her Cali.
She
spun on me with a flare and the low, rapid jostle from under the dress told me
I was right. Cali turned to make sure I was following. She needn’t have
bothered.
She
said, “We’re sitting over here.”
Cali
led me over to the sidewalk terrace of the hotel’s restaurant, Gemma. The brick
ended and became slick, pea green tile. The awning was striped brown and cream.
On the fabric’s front, the name was stamped in gold block letters. Behind its
scalloped trim, amber bare bulbs glowed wanly. Down from the balcony wound long
arms of wisteria.
The
portals into Gemma were so large as to make almost the entire place open-air.
Waiters in starched white aprons over black pants glided in and out, and had
the appraising look of surgeons.
Cali
and I arrived at the scuffed wooden table. She wheeled around it and retook her
spot. She looked a little triumphant.
A
man in his late forties was seated sideways to the table, ankle propped on his
knee, with one arm resting on the surface and fingertips at the stem of a glass
of chilled white wine. In the other hand he thumbed an iPhone. He was fixed on
it. He also knew we were there without looking, a flick of the eyes and a tiny
curl at the corner of his mouth.
Everything
visible about him was polished and precise. What he permitted you to see was
enviable. He was handsome and fit and wore his age well, with the heft of
experience and none of the sag. His posture in the chair had just enough slouch
to be carefree, the bearing of a man who only skims the bill before signing.
The
haircut was summer short and classic, brushed aside with fingers, with metal
filings in the chestnut brown. His face was the graceful aging of an Ivy League
heartbreaker. Even-featured and naturally tanned, with light white lines at the
corners of the eyes, he was the sort of former track star that weary wives
murmur over at college reunions. Whoever tailored his dark, short-sleeved
button down knew his craft, as it managed to mold and hang in equal measure.
Khaki shorts, leather flip-flops and the too-busy face of an Omega watch
completed the catalog appeal.
I
sat down. He looked up from his phone and managed an easy grin with a little
vague surprise in it. I wasn’t buying.
We
shook hands across the table. A flash faster than a finger snap went between
them. She leaned back in her chair
with elbows resting on the wooden arms and fingers laced. The air purred.
Something older than my presence at this table was there, then gone.
Cali
introduced us.
I’ll
call him Uncle Gula.
“Happy
you could join us, Eric,” he said, laying his iPhone on the table.
“It’s
a little out of the blue, I’ll admit, but thanks for the invite.”
“Give
my lovely niece here credit for that,” he nodded at her, “She spotted you
standing there and just had to have you.”
Smiles
can be pointed. I was looking at one.
“I
can’t say I blame her, but you know how impulsive college girls can be,” he
added.
Uncle
Gula grinned. His energy revved quietly. From my left I felt her wattage dim a
fraction. I noted it without looking.
“’Have
you’ while we celebrate her graduation, that is. Don’t misunderstand,” he said.
I
congratulated Cali. She thanked me but stared at him and thought things she
didn’t share.
“We’ve
been so lazy here, after dinner,” Uncle Gula offered. “We didn’t want to give
up the table.” He looked to her and she nodded from a corner of her chair.
“Holding
court?,” I asked.
“You
pay for the privilege,” he smirked. Uncle Gula motioned for a waiter. “Ever
eaten at Gemma, Eric?”
“Afraid
not, no, though I can see the appeal.” I didn’t think he was really asking.
“Ah,
it’s incredible. I’ll order another bottle. Join us? White alright?”
“I
wouldn’t say no. And yes, white is great,” I said.
Cali
sat taller in her chair. “That was the deal,” she said pointedly.
She
looked at Uncle Gula. It was the look of a child who finds the rules switched
on her mid-game.
“I’d
have said yes anyway, drink or not,” I said to her directly.
I
felt him watchful and coiled in the slouch. So I defused again. It was my job.
“What’s
good on the menu?,” I went on, cringing at myself but being sure to open it to
both.
“Oh.
Were you hungry?”
“No,
no, I ate.” I lied. “But I’m often in the neighborhood.” I lied twice. It may
or may not have been obvious.
The
waiter promptly arrived. Uncle Gula murmured and pointed to something in the
wine list. The waiter sped away and he turned back to me.
“Loved
the dayboat scallops. Very fresh, light,” he said.
There
was a beat. It was the natural space where Cali should have leaped in. She
didn’t. I wondered why.
I
turned to her and asked what she had eaten.
“The
chicken,” she replied, and sounded embarrassed about it.
“I’m
sort of a picky eater,” Cali apologized with a shrug and her voice receded. She
was girlish, small, staring. Our talk under the clock face a few yards away
might as well have been miles away. But then, he hadn’t been there.
I
looked back to Uncle Gula, who blinked at her once, twice, in a tolerant way.
He then switched back to me and fired up the too-easy grin.
“Lucky
for us you were out on the town tonight, Eric. ”
“Lucky?
In what way?”
“It’s
my last night here in the hotel. Her ceremony’s tomorrow morning. Lucky we ran
into you so you can offer us the New York experience,” he said.
“You
may be disappointed. I don’t stand in the harbor holding a book and a torch.
That gig’s taken.”
Uncle
Gula chuckled. “We must’ve interrupted something this evening then?”
“Not
at all. I was roaming. My night off.”
He
looked impressed. “Nobody with you?”
“Oh
no. Defeats the purpose.”
“Which
purpose is that?,” he asked.
“Roaming.
Not hunting.”
He
tilted his head, was about to say something then went coy and thought better of
it.
Cali
piped up. “I love that. It’s sort of free.”
I
offered her my best smile. If I kept this up, we could’ve filmed a toothpaste
commercial.
“New
York seems to reward stepping out to see where it all leads,” I said.
Uncle
Gula’s smile broadened. “And where’s it leading so far?”
“A
cap and gown, evidently,” I told him. “I’d like to hear more about that.”
It
was more agreeable when she smiled. His smiles were pointed. Hers were
grateful.
The
waiter returned with a bottle wrapped in linen in an ice bucket and three fresh
glasses.
“Orvieto,”
Uncle Gula explained. “A little too young but it should still be worthwhile.”
No one argued.
The
cork popped. Three glasses were poured. We clinked and toasted her graduation.
I
asked her what she had studied.
“Art.
Design, really,” she replied. “I’m at Pratt. In Brooklyn. I majored in
Communications Design. It’s a pretty new field. Exciting.”
I
paused to think then said truthfully, “I’m sure. But what is it?”
One
of the boys had thrown the ball to the girl finally and it cheered her. An
insistence rose in her voice.
“Words.
Graphics. Moving images and certain sounds,” Cali recited. “Basically like how
to convey a brand or message across a variety of platforms. Relating a powerful
message maybe without saying it, but doing so in a slick and kind of effective
way.”
“You
of all people should appreciate that, Eric,” Uncle Gula intoned over the rim of
his wine glass. His eyelids sank a little.
Cali
leaned to her right, which brought her closer to me. “But I also took a bunch
of photography courses. That’s kind of a side thing. Love it though.”
“Beautiful
hobby,” I said.
“And
I’m really good at it,” she insisted a little more darkly. Her eyes were locked
with her Uncle’s. His glinted in reply above the wine glass.
Cali’s
cheek was close to mine over our armrests. “I don’t doubt it,” I told her
sideways. “Practical, as well. You never know when your hobby can become your
breadwinner.”
“Oh,
has that been your experience too?,” Uncle Gula drawled.
Funny
guy.
I
provided the stock lines about my work. Both uncle and niece were as politely intrigued
as most strangers. I wasn’t eager to linger on it.
I
looked to him and signaled it was his turn.
Uncle
Gula’s index finger jutted from his wine glass and pointed at Cali. “Much the
same. Design. Only slightly different.”
“How
so, what do you design?”
“People’s
lives,” he answered.
A
rough swallow of wine. I turned to the girl.
“And
to think that deadbeat Moses only parted the Red Sea,” I said and Cali giggled.
Uncle
Gula smiled and obliged my joke.
“People
who want to overhaul their living space, their working space. They hire me. I
create an environment tailored to that individual’s needs, their tastes, their
outlook on life. Architecture, interior design. Both, either. It can be as
simple as an organizational system to make them more productive, or an
aesthetic flow to make them more inspired.”
I
nodded and thought about it. “Sounds fascinating. And expensive. A guru with a
palette wheel.”
His
grin was humorless. “Fortunately there are people who can afford it but can’t
do it for themselves. Or prefer to have someone do it for them.”
“I
see what you mean.”
“Do
you?,” he asked, maybe sensing another dig.
“Believe
I do. If more people played the piano, there wouldn’t be much novelty in my
playing it for them.”
Uncle
Gula placed his glass back on the scuffed table and re-laced his fingers. “As
you say,” he admitted.
“You
immerse yourself in others’ lives for a living. Better than they’re willing or
able to themselves. When your work is done, their lives are changed as if by
magic,” I said, ballsier than I’d intended.
He
looked pleased. “Unlike Mary Poppins, I don’t soar up into the sky afterwards,”
he said.
Alright,
so that was funny.
“Maybe
not, but people will always pay for newness,” I insisted.
“Tell
that to my antique dealer.”
“I
took some amazing pictures during our helicopter flight today,” Cali
interjected, a little shrill at the edges. We turned to look at her. “Would you
like to see them?”
Her
hand shot into her purse and pulled out her phone. She flipped through several images
on the screen and leaned back towards me.
“I
treated her to a helicopter ride this afternoon,” Uncle Gula murmured as if
he’d bought her an ice cream. “A gift for myself too, I’d never done it.”
I
leaned further to my left to join Cali in the middle.
They
were the usual aerial cityscapes, but well framed and lit. She had a good eye.
Cali kept the slideshow brisk, the screen of her phone tilted up to face us
both. I could smell a light, sweet sweat on her. I tried not to show it. Across
the table and excluded, Uncle Gula busied himself with the last of his wine.
Then
her finger started wiping the screen faster, a motion hidden by the phone.
Cali’s expression never changed. The cityscapes blurred by one after the other
until she landed on the faceless picture of a stark naked girl.
She
was curves and swells and dimpled places, not solid and not heavy. The breasts
pointed slightly in opposite directions as if for maximum field of fire and
were roundly capped by very pink nipples. The shoulders were slim and the arms
hung artfully like in an old portrait. Her stomach was not at all hard, but
fleshy and a little shaded until it sloped into a fuller shadow below. The hips
were wide and cocked so that the glancing hint of one cheek was teasing the
camera. The legs were strong. And familiar.
The
lighting was afternoon golden. The picture was taken in the reflection of an
old full-length mirror on hinges. What little I could see of the room was well
appointed.
Before
I could stop, my eyes shot to her right breast pressing into my arm then back
to the picture on her phone. I never doubted I was looking at a nude photo of
Cali, but I like to be thorough.
The
beaded moisture on my wine glass smeared as I drained it and placed it empty
back on the table.
“Impressive,
right?,” Uncle Gula prompted.
I
looked at him over the top of the phone and then back to the screen.
“I’d
suspected your niece had gifts, but this confirms it.”
Cali
had been stoic. But now she giggled again and bunched her shoulders into her
neck in fake unease. Her bottom lip jutted and her silent ‘oops’ narrowed her
eyes. Cali looked at her uncle as if she’d knocked over his priceless Ming vase
while playing with the puppy. Then she unraveled into throaty laughter.
Uncle
Gula read her face, at first quizzical, his eyes darting. Then the cloud lifted
and he smiled at her and placed his forehead in his fingers.
“Oh
God. You showed him that picture, didn’t you?”
I
didn’t stare at her. I looked dead at him. Maybe I shouldn’t have been shocked.
Was
the picture’s background a hotel room, this hotel in particular? I’d no idea.
Both her hands were visible in the photo so even though a mirror reflection,
she hadn’t taken it herself. Unless she used a timer? Did someone else take it?
I
left the last, obvious question unasked, even to myself. Too late of course. Once
it crosses your mind you’ve already asked it and are halfway to an unwanted answer.
He
might not have taken the picture. But at the very least he had seen it prior.
Cali
switched off the screen and threw the phone back in her purse. Uncle Gula
lofted his hands up in defeat.
“Well,
girl, I can admit when I’m wrong,” he told her with some respect.
Now
I watched them both. I suddenly hoped they found me more of an idiot than I
felt. It would be expedient.
“Thanks
for the drink,” I said, rising from my chair. “Thanks for the photo. And good
luck with the circus, this act should be huge in the south.”
Uncle
Gula watched my branching off in mild interest. He didn’t’ rise. I didn’t
expect or want him to.
Cali
appeared by my side with her purse on her shoulder a few yards later and kept
pace.
“Walk
me to the subway?,” she asked with her earlier perk.
“Afraid
you’ll get lost?”
“I
don’t know this part of town or where my line is.”
I
turned and faced her. I didn’t sweat wondering if she was angling to invite me
back to Brooklyn, or walk her part of the way and then make out at the top of
the subway stairs. Truth be told I thought about pressing it, if only just to
see. No question it’d be memorable. But no.
“Let’s
look it up, to be safe” I said instead, and took out my phone to scroll through
maps.
“I
might get lost,” she said.
“Not
for long. You have an appealing way about you. I know, I’ve seen it.”
I
asked what line she took to get home and found it and showed her on the map how
easy it would be to find. I suggested her uncle walk her if she was anxious.
Cali looked put out by the idea. She asked why I couldn’t do it.
“Oh
I’m booked solid, sorry,” I told her.
“With
what?”
“With
whatever happens in there,” I said and pointed at the twin glass doors of the
hotel with the etched initials.
“That’s
the hotel. What happens in there?”
“The
rest of my night, whatever it is.”
I
wished Cali luck and meant it and shook her hand and felt like an ass for being
susceptible to her look of disappointment. She’d survive. Lunatics always do. I
doubted she’d remember it by the time she climbed out of the subway stairs near
her dorm. I was certain I’d remember far longer than she did but then I always
think that.
I
waved her off and the doors were swung open for me by a pair of attendants in
dusty crimson vests.
I
made my getaway.
