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her father loudly that she was almost ready to go.
If he noticed she was wearing yesterday’s clothes, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he came closer and closer to the bed. Before I could maneuver,
he let his weight fal onto the mat ress, and I found myself cheek to cheek with the indentation of his sizable behind.
“¿Dónde está Mamá?” So a asked. When she bent down to pick up her shoes, she shot me a stern Stay put look. As if I had a choice. I was
basical y pi
“En el vestíbulo, esperando.”
“¿Por qué no vas a esperar con el a? Bajo en un segundo.”
I wasn’t real y fol owing this exchange, just praying it would be a quick one. Then the weight above me shifted, and So a’s father was once more
oor-based. Suddenly the space under the bed seemed the size of a downtown loft. I wanted to rol over, just because I could.
As soon as her father was gone, So a climbed under the bed with me.
“That was a fun wake-up cal , was it not?” she asked. Then she pushed back my hair to look at my forehead. “God, you’re hurt. How did that
happen?”
“Bumped my head,” I replied. “It’s an occupational hazard, if your occupation happens to be sleeping over with ex-girlfriends.”
“Does that occupation pay wel ?”
“Clearly.” I made a move to kiss her—and hit my head again.
“Come on,” So a said, starting to slide away from me. “Let’s get you somewhere safer.”
I stomach-crawled out after her, then went to the sink to clean myself up. Meanwhile, in the other room, she changed her clothes. I sneaked
peeks in the closet mirror.
“I can see you as wel as you can see me,” So a pointed out.
“Is that a problem?” I asked.
“Actual y,” she said, lifting her shirt over her head, “no.”
I had to remind myself that her father was no doubt waiting for her. Now was not the time for canoodling, no mat er how much the canoodling
impulse was striking.
A new shirt went on, and So a walked over to me, put ing her face next to mine in the bathroom mirror re ection.
“Hel o,” she said.
“Hel o,” I said.
“It was never this fun when we were actual y going out, was it?” she asked.
“I assure you,” I replied, “it was never this fun.”
I knew she was leaving. I knew we were never going to date long-distance. I knew that we wouldn’t have been able to be like this back when
we were dating, so there was no use in regret ing what hadn’t happened. I suspected that what happens in hotel rooms rarely lasts outside of them.
I suspected that when something was a begi
And stil . I wanted more than that.
“Let’s make plans,” I ventured.
And So a smiled and said, “No, let’s leave it to chance.”
It was snowing outside, anointing the air with a quiet wonder shared by al passersby. When I got back to my mother’s apartment, I was a mixture
It was snowing outside, anointing the air with a quiet wonder shared by al passersby. When I got back to my mother’s apartment, I was a mixture
of giddy thril -happiness and muddled gut-confusion—I didn’t want to leave anything regarding So a to chance, and at the same time I was
enjoying this step away from it. I hummed my way into the bathroom, checked on my shoe-in icted wound, then headed to the kitchen, where I
opened the refrigerator and found myself yogurtless. Quickly I bundled myself up in a striped hat and striped scarf and striped gloves—dressing for
snow can be the keenest, most al owable kindergarten throwback—and traipsed down University and through Washington Square Park to the
Morton Wil iams.
It was only on my way back that I encountered the ru ans. I have no knowledge of what I did to provoke them. In fact, I like to believe there
was no provocation whatsoever—their target was as arbitrary as their misbehavior was focused.
“The enemy!” one of them cried. I didn’t even have time to shield my bag of yogurts before I was being bombarded by snowbal s.
Like dogs and lions, smal children can sense fear. The slightest inch, the slightest disinclination, and they wil jump atop you and devour you.
Snow was pelting my torso, my legs, my groceries. None of the kids looked familiar—there were nine, maybe ten of them, and they were nine,
maybe ten years old. “At ack!” they cried. “There he is!” they shouted, even though I’d made no at empt to hide. “Get ’im!”
Fine, I thought, bending over to scoop up some snow, even though this left my backside ripe for an o ensive.
It is not easy to hurl snowbal s while holding on to a plastic bag of groceries, so my rst few e orts were subpar, missing their mark. The nine
maybe ten nine-maybe-ten-year-olds ridiculed me—if I turned to aim at one, four others out anked me and shot from the sides and the back. I was,
in the parlance of an ancient day, cruising for a bruising, and while a more disdainful teenager would have walked away, and a more aggressive
teenager would have dropped the bag and kicked some major preteen ass, I kept ghting snowbal with snowbal , laughing as if Boomer and I
were playing a school yard game, inging my orbs with winter abandon, wishing So a were here by my side.…
Until I hit the kid in the eye.
There was no aim involved. I just threw a snowbal at him and—pow!—he went down. The other kids unleashed the last of their snowbal s and
ran to him to see what had happened.
I walked over, too, asking if he was okay. He didn’t look concussed, and his eye was ne. But now vengeance was spreading across the faces of
the nine/tens, and it wasn’t a cute lit le vengeance. Some took out cel phones to take pictures and cal their mothers. Others began to reload on
snowbal s, making sure to create them from patches where the snow mixed with gravel.
I bolted. I ran down Fifth Avenue, skirted onto Eighth Street, hid in an Au Bon Pain until the elementary school mob had passed.
When I got back to my mom’s building, the doorman had a package for me. I thanked him, but decided to wait until I got to the apartment
before opening it, because this was the doorman who was notorious for “tithing” the residents by stealing one out of every ten of our magazines
and I didn’t want to share any potential goodies.
As I was let ing myself back into the apartment, the phone rang. Boomer.
“Hey,” he said after I answered. “Do we have plans for today?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Wel , we should!”
“Sure. What are you up to?”
“Tracking your celebrity! I’l send you a link!”
I took o my boots and mit ens, unwrapped my scarf, set my hat aside, and headed to my laptop. I opened up Boomer’s email.
“WashingtonSquareMommies?” I asked, picking the phone back up.
“Yeah—click it!”
The site was a mommy blog, and on the front page a headline screamed:
CRIMSON ALERT!
ATTACKER IN PARK
Posted 11:28 am, December 28
by elizabethbe
I am activating the crimson alert because a young man—late teens, early twenties— assaulted a child in the park ten minutes ago. Please study these photos, and if you see him, alert the police immediately. We know he shops at Morton Williams (see bag) and was last seen on Eighth Street. He will not hesitate to use force against your children, so be alert!!!
maclarenpusher adds: people like this should be shot.
zacephron adds: purvurt
christwearsarmani adds: remind me the di erence between a crimson alert and a fuchsia one? i can never keep them straight!
The photos at ached to the posting showed much more of my hat and scarf than anything else.
“How did you know it was me?” I asked Boomer.
“It was a mixture of your clothes, your brand of yogurt, and your piss-poor aim—wel , at least until you clobbered that kid.”