by Sophie Jaff
I wheeled around to face him. “You know they found another murdered girl, right? That’s the second girl with her throat slit in just two days. So in view of everything that’s been going on, I don’t think what you did was particularly cool.”
His face fell immediately. “Oh shit, I didn’t think of that.”
“Clearly.”
I wouldn’t acknowledge him as we made our way to the exit, though I could sense him stealing glances at me. Outside the evening had grown dark and slightly chilly despite it being mid-May.
“Katherine, please, I’m really sorry. Sometimes I have an infantile sense of humor.”
I shrugged. A cab went by; somewhere a woman laughed.
“Let me buy you a drink and make it up to you.”
“That’s okay, thanks.”
“Don’t be mad with me.”
“I’m not, it’s just late and—”
“Hey,” he said and took my hand.
I was surprised and felt awkward. I tried to pull my hand away, but he kept hold of it. His hand, large and warm, holding my own. I refused to meet his eye.
“I know you think I’m an asshole now and I admit it was a totally stupid thing to do given the circumstances. Please forgive me and let me take you to this amazing wine bar so I can grovel properly and you can yell at me in the comfort you deserve.”
I finally looked up at him. He didn’t look away, only stood holding my hand.
“Fine,” I said, embarrassed. “I guess I’d like to be drinking while you grovel properly.”
“I know just the place,” he said. I was annoyed to feel a twinge of loss when he let go of my hand.
It was, in fact, a Spanish tapas bar, with chic little stools and framed old photos of decked-out matadors. David was warm and relaxed. I began to unwind. While the fate of those women had been on my mind, it was the manuscript that had triggered me. Something about it had gotten under my skin. I began to feel embarrassed about overreacting. Poor guy! No wonder his harmless joke had shaken me more than I cared to admit. I wondered if I should bring it up and explain, but fortunately, it seemed less and less necessary. As if by unspoken agreement, we didn’t refer to it again.
The wine was wonderful, full and red. We sat at the bar and ate delicious, expensive things on small toasts. He talked and I talked and the hours melted into one another until we had talked the place empty and the waitstaff started stacking chairs loudly and looking at us with irritation. It was honestly getting late by then and David wanted to give me money for a cab but I said no so he walked me to the subway.
He texted me to make sure I got home and I texted him back. It was fun and stupid and lovely.
He phoned me the following Tuesday.
“Hey.”
He had a good phone voice.
“Hey.” I was nervous, happy.
We talked for a little about nothing at all and then he said, “So a friend is having a birthday at a bar Saturday night, nothing major but . . .”
“I can’t. I would have loved to but—”
“Crap! You already have plans, don’t you?”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“I know I shouldn’t have waited those seventy-two hours before asking you to something three days in advance, but I was playing it cool.”
“See what being cool gets you?” Flirting with him was fun.
“And now you’re going on several amazing hot dates at the same time?”
“Obviously.”
“I see.” He sounded so woeful that I laughed.
“I promised a friend I would go to this party and I haven’t seen him in ages so I really have to go. It’s a costume party,” I admitted.
“A costume party? Are you sure the friendship is worth it?”
“Not really, but sometimes you have to make the sacrifice.”
“Well, next time I’m not going to wait so long.”
So there’ll be a next time. At least that’s what I thought, but there weren’t any follow-up texts and there was nothing formal arranged, no definite meeting time. I wonder if maybe that was my chance and I blew it.
I check my phone. Nothing. There’s something tragic about the saggy bearded man decked in Tupperware dancing with the somber girl clad in glasses and stuffed animals. They’re smiling but their eyes aren’t smiling. They want to find love outside of this small circle in this darkened room. They want to belong to a club that won’t accept them.
Right now I could be with David at some great bar, getting to know his great friends, but I’m here, sitting next to some random guy on the couch, listening to the ghoulish speculation all around me.
Why only now?
That girl, Samantha something, had a jealous boyfriend. They thought he went nuts and stabbed her to death. They didn’t connect her to the first girl until they found this new one. Then they realized that there were three girls killed the same way.
Shit.
I know, scary, right?
I try to talk about something else. I have to work hard, have to work to be heard above the music, have to lean in. The guy makes no effort to meet my half lean halfway. He smiles but his eyes never leave the dancers. I wonder if he’s drunk. I wish I were drunk. It is one of those nights where I will not be able to become drunk. Fuck you, jerk, I think about the nonleaner as I stand up. You wish you could have taken me to see the woodcuts.
I pass a girl wearing a lampshade and another brave soul sporting a belt of potted plants. It’s definitely time to go. I find Colin in the corner. He is sitting close to the host. They are both beaming with the easy intimacy of something just beginning. I recognize the warmth of the smile. And I said no to David for this. Thanks again, everyone. I tell Colin I’m leaving. I say I have to wake up early the next day. He makes all the usual protestations but I know he won’t mind now that he’s found someone. I debate texting David to find out where the bar is but it’s late and I’m far out in Brooklyn.
I go into the host’s room to change. The bed is a sea of clothes. The walls are a light shade of gray, soft in the glow of the bedside lamp. I move quickly. I don’t want someone to walk in. I want to change and get out of here. Bra hooked, top pulled over and down, jean buttons done, shoes tied, and it is only when I look in the full-length mirror that I see the man sitting in the chair. He has been sitting there the whole time.
I wheel around with a little scream.
The guy sitting there has dark curly hair and a leonine face, hooded sleepy eyes and a wide mouth. He does not apologize. He doesn’t even rise from the chair.
“The best part of New York,” he drawls, “is the people-watching.”
“What are you doing there?” He was watching me change, and I’m wearing my shitty underwear. Did I scratch myself? Adjust my bra?
“I thought it was obvious.”
“I trust you enjoyed that?”
He pauses in thought. Insult added to injury. “Wasn’t terrible.” The sides of his lips turn up ever so slightly.
“Aren’t you going to apologize?”
“No.”
“You should apologize.”
“Why? I’m not sorry.”
“I don’t know how you were raised, but when people do something wrong, it’s customary that they apologize.”
“Actually, you’re wrong. Society pressures people to apologize to satisfy the need for an acknowledgment of wrongdoing. People rarely feel bad for what they have done, only bad that they have been caught.” His tone is bored, faintly patronizing.
What an asshole. I think of the most wounding thing I can say. I’m vulnerable. He has seen the backs of my thighs and my ass, and not at flattering angles.
“So, you’re a psychopath.” My mouth is dry and my cheeks feel hot.
“Meaning that I don’t feel guilt?” He thinks about this. “Maybe I’m just honest.”
His eyes are so pale green that they’re almost yellow. Now they gleam. It’s clear that he’s having fun. I need to wipe the smirk off his ar
rogant face.
“You’re right. You’re not a psychopath. You have no manners. You’re classless.”
His smirk fades. Bingo.
He looks at me coldly. “So, how many dinners?”
“What?”
“How many dinners would it normally take to see you naked?”
My lips grow numb. My cheeks tingle as though he has slapped me.
“It usually takes the women I date about two,” he continues, “sometimes one, depending on the restaurant. And the girl,” he adds as an afterthought.
The air solidifies into ice. We stare at each other.
“Get up.” My voice is dangerous, soft.
There must be something in my tone. He unfolds from the chair, languorously, like a cat.
“Come here.”
He moves toward me.
“Stop.”
He does. Now he stands, waiting.
I walk around him to the bedroom door. I turn the key in the lock. Then I walk back to the very chair from which he watched me. I sit down and stare at him. Our tables have turned. “Well?”
“Well?” he echoes. His smile is insolent.
I keep my voice expressionless. “Take off your clothes.”
He looks at me for a long time and I wonder if he’ll laugh or leave the room. Time thickens. I will never get away with this.
Then, deadpan, not dropping his gaze, his hands start at the buttons of his shirt.
“Slowly.” My mouth is dry. I keep my voice calm, as if I often utter instructions of this nature.
Each button is undone.
His shirt.
Eased off.
His shoulders are smooth.
His chest is cream with a dime-sized mole in stark contrast to the rest of him.
Shirtless, he looks at me; again the corners of his mouth twitch up.
He doesn’t think I have the balls for this.
I swallow. I force myself to meet his gaze. “Take off your jeans.”
He’s not smiling now.
I don’t know what I’ve started, but I have to continue.
He wouldn’t apologize.
He pushes down his jeans and steps out of them.
He stands looking at me, clad only in his boxer briefs, black with white elastic. He remains utterly poised while I look at him. I allow myself to stare. His body is wonderful. I feel a prickle of sweat start between my breasts, under my arms.
I will finish what I started.
“Those too,” I say.
This must be a dream. It is not a dream. It has the languid motion and the strange heaviness of a dream.
A man, broad-shouldered, muscled and lean, stands naked in front of me.
Somehow the gravity in this room has increased in strength. I don’t know if my legs will hold me, if they will support my weight. Part of me wonders, Was it this easy all along, all I had to do was ask? His face gives nothing away, but I can see. Men’s bodies give them away. He is aroused.
I force myself to get up, to walk toward him. As slowly as I told him to undress.
He merely looks at me. He waits to see what my next move is.
I place my hands lightly upon his shoulders.
I go up on my tiptoes.
Standing on tiptoe, I lean in and whisper one word into his ear: “Five.”
Then I walk past him toward the door. I turn the key. It clicks and the door opens, letting in the thudding beats of the music, the raucous laughter, the hoarse yelling that passes for banter at 1:35 on a Sunday morning.
I leave. I don’t look back.
3
The third girl loved this grocery store.
Here in the gourmet grocery store there is warm butter light. Not harsh fluorescence but a soft glow, and shelf upon shelf and row upon row of everything she did not need but wanted.
There’s a counter and behind the counter there are people who sometimes smile and sometimes don’t. The guy behind the counter who she liked is James. He knew she wouldn’t buy anything but he always gave her full samples in those little sample cups, teriyaki chicken salad or wild rice and cranberries, filling them up generously. Maybe he saw in her face that she would have if she could have.
In the gourmet grocery store the vegetables and fruits are bright and beautiful and shining with inner light. These vegetables and fruits are in the prime of their lives, much like the shoppers of the gourmet grocery store.
Here are the milks. There are rice milks and soy milks and coconut milks and almond milks, vanilla and low-fat vanilla, chocolate and low-fat chocolate, and strawberry and original and low-fat original, and whole milk and half-and-half milk, which says “half” but has twice the calories of other kinds of milk, and milk that has vitamin A, and milk that has vitamin D, and milk that has vitamin B12, and milk that has extra calcium, and milk that has vitamins A, D, B12, and extra calcium added to it. There’s organic nonhomogenized milk, ultra-pasteurized milk and enriched low-fat milk, 1% and 2% and nonorganic milk and fat-free milk and hemp milk and creamy nondairy lactose-free beverages that look like milk and taste like milk and are used in place of milk but are not milk.
The third girl wasn’t that into milk anyway.
The third girl loved kale chips. They were really expensive but worth it. The vegan cheese kind was her favorite. “Vegan cheese” meant that it wasn’t even cheese. She always thought this was funny because she wasn’t a vegan. She wasn’t even a vegetarian. “I’m not a vegetarian,” she used to say, “but sometimes I date them.” The vegan cheese kale chips were so good that she thought the vegans must have put something in the chips to convert her. She did once have a vegetarian boyfriend who had first introduced her to the love of kale, also seitan. “Are you Seitan?” she had asked him. It was only half a joke. He hadn’t been kind. This was one of the reasons she had fallen in love with him. She had told her friends afterward that although vegetarians might be thoughtful toward animals they are cruel to women. “Look at Hitler,” she had said. She had only said this once, though, because that was really a little too dark, and she had a ton of Jewish friends.
Unsalted mixed nuts, salted cashews, unsalted cashews, honey-roasted cashews, natural pine nuts, soy nuts, raisin-and-nut mix, sesame crunch mix, rocky mountain mix, natural berry mix, natural ultimate mix, yogurt deluxe mix, omega-3 mix, healthy chocolate mix, Cajun hot mix, fantastic fruit mix, Turkish apricot mix, yogurt cranberry mix, milk-chocolate-covered peanuts, dark-chocolate-covered peanuts, dark-chocolate-covered almonds, milk chocolate almonds, dried blueberry and strawberry mix, cranberry explosion mix.
On the rare occasions when the third girl actually shopped here she bought a container of dried strawberries. She liked strawberries but she really loved freeze-dried strawberries because they reminded her of the freeze-dried ice cream fad when she was at school. She remembered learning that astronauts ate it, and when she had a piece she imagined herself weightless, floating and gazing down at Earth. It had a forbidden and scientific taste, milky and chalky sweet. Her mother never bought it for her. She remembered her first piece, taken from a friend’s packet. Her friend’s mother bought more junky kind of snacks. Her friend’s parents were divorced. Now the third girl would place each freeze-dried strawberry on her tongue, letting it fizzle and soften and become itself again. She tried to go slow because the bag is never as full as it should be, but often she ended up eating it too quickly, her fingertips pink with powder.
You didn’t have a cart the day you met the third girl. You don’t have one now. Carts are unwieldy. You can’t follow anyone properly. One of the best things about following someone who doesn’t know she’s being followed is the exquisite feeling of control. It tastes smooth and cool, like sucking a mint during a play, like a secret.
The third girl didn’t know she was being watched. She thought she was the one watching you. She watched as you helped a sweet old lady pick a box of tea down from a great height. She watched how you then moved away. She watched you not being solicitous or smug, just ef
ficiently helpful. She watched the way you joked with James behind the counter as he served you a helping of pasta salad with sundried tomatoes, artichokes, and feta cheese.
Cranberry, Cranberry Cocktail, Cranberry Pomegranate, Cranberry Raspberry, Cranberry Blueberry, Cranberry Apple, Cranberry Cherry, Cranberry Strawberry, Cranberry Tangerine, Cranberry Pomegranate Cherry, White Cranberry, Cranberry Lemonade, Cranberry Grape, White Grape, Grape, Mango, Mango Passion, Mango Papaya, Mango Carrot, Mango Orange, Orange, Orange Carrot, Orange Tangerine, Orange Strawberry, Strawberry Kiwi, Strawberry Banana, Strawberry Banana Orange, White Peach, Lemonade, Passion Fruit, Passion of Christ, Fruit Punch, Guava, Pineapple Ginger, Pineapple Guava, Pineapple Coconut, Pomegranate, Tamarind, Pink Grapefruit, Sorrel Ginger, Pear, Blackberry, Raspberry, Cherry, Ruby Pink, Ruby Red, Ruby White, Blueberry Pomegranate, Amen.
Choice is a wonderful thing.
The day you met, the third girl had wanted to say something to you but she had been shy. She wanted to say something to you, but she didn’t. So you started talking to her, by the cheese counter. You picked up a piece of Brie and remarked on the price. The third girl could take or leave Brie but she was happy to start a conversation. She also liked the way that, although you raised an eyebrow at the price, you still put it into the red basket that you were carrying with you. You aren’t rotten, like the “outside” fruit from the greengrocer’s the third girl is sometimes forced to purchase; you have money but you are still aware of prices. She liked the fact that you gave a smile and said, “A necessary luxury?”
You phrased it as if it were a question, as if you wanted her permission, as if, although she was a stranger, her good opinion was somehow important to you. She paused and you started putting the cheese back with a look of dismay and this made her laugh at your expression and your slow-motion placement of the cheese.
“You took too long,” you had told the third girl, “so it’s an unnecessary luxury,” and she said, “Sorry,” but clearly she was not sorry; clearly she was happy. She was happy that you were talking and happy that it was a Thursday with no classes tomorrow and happy because there was an eighties song playing that she loves. The third girl gravitated toward songs in which the verse moves from the initial minor chord to an augmented fourth, then to a sixth, then a seventh, and back to one. She liked her choruses a little more predictable, though, with the chords moving from a first to a fourth, a fifth, and back to one.