New York Vignette

I went to New York. "The City" as those assholes like to call it, like there's only one. I like to go down there because it wakes up this part of me that feels like it sleeps a lot of the time. I like the pigeon carcasses and the blistered feet and the yelling and the gray, predawn light as we are getting ready to go to sleep. Everybody's apartment is small and dirty; everyone has a fucked-up toilet or shower. I love to see what people are willing to sacrifice in order to live The Good Life of New York.

I sat next to this man at a bar on Bleecker Street. Handsome older guy, bald, thick New-York-Italian accent. It was five o'clock in the afternoon and he was shitfaced. Coral-pink shirt. In front of him, placed carefully in a row, was a gin and tonic, a cup of espresso, a glass of cognac, and his Blackberry. He welcomed me like an old friend, kept calling me baby. "Do you know who I am, baby? Do you know who I am? I have a lot of money, baby. Do you know who I am?" Faced me with a big smile. Passed his hand over his mouth. Smiled again, this time with his front tooth missing. Tooth in, tooth out. Showed me his Blackberry. "Do you know what this is?" I looked at him. "Yeah, it's a Blackberry." Asked me if I have one. I don't. He seemed disappointed in me, "Don't you know where we are right now? Do you know where we are? You need to get up on this high tech shit." My explanation that I don't need one was dissatisfying to him. He changed tactics: "How 'bout you give me a little kiss, baby? Huh? How 'bout a little kiss? No? Well, how 'bout just one on the cheek, then. Just one on the cheek, baby?" He rolled his eyes and muttered angrily under his breath when I refused. When I asked him, "If you were my husband, would you want me kissing strange men in bars?" he looked away, no longer hearing me. We sat side by side at the bar, not speaking or looking at each other. A few minutes later, I took a phone call. As I turned my head and began to speak, I felt a hand massage my thigh. "Inappropriate!" I scolded, turning my body away. The hand massaged my thigh again, creeping upward. Phone and drink in my hands, I slipped out of my seat and moved to a table, never looking at him again. About ten minutes later, he shouted angrily in Italian at my friend, Bill, and then left the bar.