Joone

Joone

by Susan Saraf

* * *

He’s away for the weekend and she considers life without him. She puts their baby, the love of their lives and the reason why they could never regret their relationship, to bed.  It’s seven o’clock and so far business as usual, Jonny only comes home before seven if she doesn’t beg and usually after a long day, like a dog at the dinner table, she can’t resist.  It’s an element of his psyche he claims to be unaware of; a part of him that rebels against doing anything that could even mildly suggest being controlled. Even though not coming home before seven pisses her off almost daily, to the degree that she attributes the trench that has formed between her brows solely to his lack of punctuality or what his friends and family fondly refer to as Persian Time.

         She lay their baby boy, Jakey Wakey, short for Jake, in his crib. The love she thought she would never find again arrived at nine pounds, one ounce on a bright January morning, her once in a lifetime, soul affirming, all consuming, unstoppable obsession, her first born baby boy.  Savoring the smell of his powdered cheeks, tucking his pacifier into his pink bow lipped mouth and arranging his teddy bears up by his fair chub rolled neck, so he can cuddle with his friends, the friends of a thirteen month old. She brushes his forehead with the tips of her manicured fingers, whispering their nighttime ritual, in a soothing voice that works for both of them:  comforting him while making her feel creative, like what she’s heard it means to be a good mother, unconsciously (but almost everything she does these days is unconscious) improvising off of a popular children’s book, “Good night trees, good night leaves, good night grasshoppers, good night penguins, good night Nana, good night Papa, good night Sahroya Joone, Bubby Joone…”.

Slipping out of his room she closes the door behind her. She listens to the house. She listens to her body.  She’s listening to hear if she feels the least bit alone. She doesn’t.  She will continue to test herself like this throughout the long weekend, but is it really valid? Can you discover if you can live without someone when you know they are coming back? Of course she always wondered what her life would be like without this one or that one, but now there were other people to consider, other lives besides him and hers. One had to be certain it wasn’t a matter of whimsy, a reflection of mood, that there was no bending of the circumstances to fit either.

         The heats coming up through the radiators from the basement, they live in an old colonial farmhouse on Long Island bought from the children of the man who built it with his own hands nearly a century ago. It is a much smaller version of the one she grew up in ten miles away, before she lived in an apartment in New York City and after she moved back in with her parents, lonely and desperate for change.

The sound of steam and the clacking of the pipes feel as warm and comforting as a bowl of mashed potatoes, it smells as good too. Walking down the stairs she holds the metal railing with her left hand; it feels cool. She’s afraid she might snag her palm on a ragged piece of metal on the banister, even though the thought is irrational, the railing is original to the house, smoothed by use for over 90 years. Still, she pulls her hand away. When she reaches the landing and turns into the dining room she checks the thermostat out of habit. She’s always policing Jonny, making sure he doesn’t sneak it up a degree and waste money on heat when he could put on a sweater.  It feels good to check the thermostat; she turns it up one degree because she can, because Jonny won’t see her being a hypocrite. 

         The kitchen is in front of her, looming like an unpaid bill. What should she make for dinner, for herself? She thinks of Gloria, her friend, Gloria never succumbs to creating a meal around the depressive tune of an empty house, she has been showing Sarah what it is to celebrate the time that she has, no matter where in time she is. Opening the refrigerator door she is stricken by the waft of dill and kebab and how easily she forgot that her in-laws had brought it over just hours before. She is sickened by the smells, more from the idea of being dependent on her in-laws then the actual herbs and spices used to marinate the meats. Instead of seeing the free home cooked and delivered meal as a gift, the idea that as a grown adult, a mother and a wife, her mother in law is still asserting her food into their refrigerator, makes her sick. She decides on a glass of Chardonnay, a baguette slathered in butter, sprinkled with Sea salt and a Vicodin. She brings her party for one into the den and sets it on a nesting table; she sits on the couch resting her feet on another nesting table, the next size down. She can smell the cold air outside coming in from a drafty window like a secret, something she might want to know more about. She feels decadent and content and indulgent sitting in front of the flat screen TV, she turns to the home improvement channel, on it the image of an exceptionally good looking older couple talking about how often he pleases his gorgeous albeit menopausal wife, a commercial for Viagra. Sarah can’t remember the last time she was pleased, at least by another person.

She spies on the snow falling outside the French doors Jonny installed by himself last fall, she was so proud of him then, they were proud of each other. She herself bragged to anybody who’d listen, calling him by the pet name she created, “did you see our French doors? Shaz did it all by himself! Saved us a ton and it looks like a real guy did it.”  They laughed together whenever she said that, “a real guy”, it sounded backhanded but she didn’t mean it that way, the right word would have been professional, “it looks like it was done by a professional”. Other than that, she was weary of overselling her husband, showing off, a lot of women weren’t so fortunate, they have to pay out for that kind of work and she didn’t like to court jealousy- her mother warned her that jealousy was the worst form of hatred. She wonders if that’s why she hasn’t heard from Penelope, but doubts it. Once when she told Penelope that she thought her sister was jealous of her, Pen’s face came up legitimately confused as she asked, “of what?” 

Looking out onto the backyard, laid over in a smooth sweep of ice, she can see the tops of the houses reflected on it, pine tree tops cut out in shapes of Christmas trees like shadow puppets. She wants to run out there, slide across the glass and be a kid for a moment, the kid who can slide head first belly down on a sheet of ice and not care about getting cold or wet. She tries the doors, pushing them out against the foot or so of snow piled on the other side, but they’re frozen solid.

She thinks to herself, Jake is sound asleep and I am trapped inside with my wine, bread, butter, salt and TV, waiting for my Vikey Rikey to kick in. This is too good to be true. She checks in to see if she misses her husband yet. Nope. Not even a little bit. In fact she begins to think they should do this more often, plan two or three trips apart a year, weekends away to collect themselves, remember who they were before they merged (collided?) into one. She turns on the country music channel to stir something up. Someone named Conway Twitty is singing about Linda being on his mind while he’s sleeping next to his wife, whom she gathers is not named Linda. It’s a good song- the dog! She switches over to the Classic Rock channel, more her speed. Honky Tonk Woman plays, she can remember singing it in a bar in San Francisco ten years ago, (maybe Grant and Green was the name of the bar), in a boozy haze of misplaced dreams she stepped up to the microphone and joined the band in song, she thought maybe she’d be discovered, the nineties version of a female Jim Morrison, but it turns out all she could do was drink like him.  This makes her miss those days.  There is a deep feeling of missing, for a reason she can’t place her finger on, she feels like she is missing something very important. It started out a feeling akin to leaving the house knowing you forgot something and then getting into the car and realizing you forgot your car keys. But for her there is no discovery, just the feeling, day after day, month after month. And the months are turning into years and she can’t figure out what she forgot, what it is that she’s missing. It’s a dull wandering ache that sometimes wakes her up at night.

She tells herself again to enjoy the present- the decadent, contented, indulgent, feet up on the nesting table, butter spread on a French baguette sprinkled with sea salt washed down with a glass of chardonnay, baby quieted sleeping peacefully, man finally being away after three years, self-gratifying present. 

If only our minds did what we tell them to before our feelings have a vote.

Instead she has a second thought. Sipping her wine, the drug kicking in, she thinks, “This would be even better with a cigarette.” Before she runs the thought through to its inevitable dangerous conclusion, she finds herself with her coat on walking out the front door. She is walking into town to buy a pack of cigarettes. She is walking away from her sleeping son, high on alcohol, Vicodin and the idea of freedom.

                                                 ****

“Hi, you’ve reached Sarah Callahan at Conquest Realty, your call is important to me. I can’t wait to help you navigate the Big Shitty. Leave a message, I’ll call you back.” Sarah said. She was sitting on a torn swivel-backed chair in the boiler like room of the real estate office where she worked, recording her out-going message for the fifteenth time. She felt like she was going to have an anxiety attack. She couldn’t seem to get it right, so she kept doing it over and over again, huddling over the phones mouthpiece, hoping no one could hear.

“What. Was that?” Kurosh asked. He sat next to Sarah on a long slab of desks, a computer per person in front of each. He was relatively new, relentlessly young and she liked him.  Sarah felt most comfortable around the unusual. He called himself a Persian, a word Sarah couldn’t quite remember the meaning of. When Iranians held Americans hostage, Sarah remembered the Long Island Iranians called themselves Persians so that their children wouldn’t suffer the guilt by association. It didn’t fool anybody.  As far as the parents were concerned the word served as a testament to their sneakiness. Since the Trade Center she had heard it resurface, being Persian was a declaration of innocence.

Kurosh had thick dark wavy black hair and bright blue eyes edged in green; his nose was like something carved out of an Italian piece of marble, bumpy and noble. His voice, she once judged as high pitched and annoying, she now found funny and kind. Plus he dressed well and smelled good- more than she could say for anyone else in the cramped lazy excuse for an office. Even the water cooler, the way it sweated and seemed to want to block the entrance, was sleazy. 

Sarah began painting when she was in middle school. She took what talent she had seriously, but couldn’t make it pay the bills. Hence, Conquest Realty. She thought she would be able to work part time at a job with flexible hours, like real estate while still pursuing her art. The trouble was, in New York City, there was no such thing as part time. You either were or you weren’t. At this point Sarah was a real estate agent and she wasn’t an artist. Still, she tried to be creative at any opportunity.

“That.” Sarah blinked slowly, “Was a creative, warm and side-splitting voicemail message.” Sarah said, “Listen and learn.”

“’The Big Shitty?” he was smiling.

“Yeah” Sarah said. “The Big Shitty, New York- Shitty.”

“I never thought I could love a girl who called the most important metropolis in the world, The Big Shitty, and yet.” he laughed and swiveled in his chair to face her, she swiveled around to face him as well, “I love you.” 

“I love you too, Koo-Koo,” she said, exhaling a blast of warm wet breath on her barely pink finger nails then buffing them on her sweater.  “Life is full of surprises.”

Sarah hadn’t been the type to casually tell a male friend she loved him, she hadn’t been the type to casually tell anyone she loved them, but with Kurosh it was easy, he oozed love, he said it all the time, it was as natural to him as being insecure was to her, an insecurity that disappeared when she was with him. She liked the freedom of feeling good and going with it. She knew it didn’t mean anything, but it came with affection so strong every one of her pores felt happy in what wasn’t deep but profound.

“Wanna do Indian?” he asked, casually moving his platinum watch around his wrist. She thought he had too much hair on his hands for a young man.

“Curry in a Hurry?” She closed the windows down on her computer.

He stood up and re-tucked his checked blue button down shirt underneath his sweater into his perfectly pressed gray flat front pants, creating a smooth silhouette of young kept manhood. Sarah briefly questioned his sexuality. But she knew by now that he was straight.

She looked around her desk to make sure she didn’t forget anything.  She told herself that she would clean up, follow up on the messages written on yellow post-it notes stuck to every available surface on her computer and then chuck them in the garbage. She didn’t mind the clutter but the sight of her own handwriting embarrassed her.  She was always trying to make it look pretty and grown up but it just looked like immature scrawl.

They walked out, he behind her, down the stairs, passed all of the stares, (office word was that they were an “item”), down to 28th street and Third Avenue, to Curry in a Hurry, their favorite Indian restaurant in little India. It was cold and overcast out, a damp celibate October day.

“Things are so much more fun now that you’re here” She said.

“Would you like to go or to stay?” he asked.

She intended to quickly diffuse the sentimentality he so ignored.

“To stay.  I’m not eating in that shit box with Jabber Jaws Roy ogling my food. Disgusting.” Her words came up harsher than she meant, upon hearing herself she winced. He pulled his neck back and raised one eyebrow, then a smiled flexed on his face meaning he forgave her outburst. She amused him.

“Okay, you go up and get a table and I’ll bring it up.” He said.

She carried herself past the shelves of turmeric and jars of pickled everything. She walked straight to the two top overlooking third avenue, the vertically hung royal blue and sunburst yellow Curry In a Hurry sign once high above her head was now sitting at eye level. The street looked busy, but it sounded still. Sarah felt a distance from it; waiting for her food, for her new-ish friend who she liked so much but really didn’t know, in a job where she felt the same- she liked it so much but really didn’t know a thing about it or the people who worked there. She thought, I spend all of these days of my life with people I have no connection too and its wonderful. How odd.

Sarah had the same core group of girlfriends since Middle School, the product of being of above average intelligence in a small town, nicknamed the TAG girls of the Talented and Gifted program. They had been tight once but since college careened in and out of each other’s lives like drunk drivers on the night time highway, sometimes speeding by, sometimes slowly sliding into each other’s lanes, but you could always count on them being out there, a car full of drama you were pretty sure you didn’t want to get into. Of the six friends, Sarah had always been closest to Penelope. Penelope was stylish and funny. She adored in her friend her humor (often self deprecating like her own) and her ability to stay above the fray, a trait some of the girls considered superficial and aloof.  They had plans tonight. Sarah was going to head uptown to meet her for dinner and hang at her new apartment. Sarah sighed thinking about it; Penelope had started living in a fantasyland where she recreated her obnoxious alcoholic groom into a charming prince and their brief courtship into a lifetime love affair. It was a land her entire family and all of their friends seemed to have moved to with her. Penelope and Dave had met at summer camp over the course of two weeks at sleep away twenty years ago and been reacquainted unexpectedly two months prior to them getting engaged, now they were married. This undoubtedly was the stuff of justifiable romance and Sarah was willing to overlook a few personality flaws; she liked the idea as much as any Nicholas Sparks fan. But Dave was a disaster. His trump card and the hand most played was that he was “raised well”.  In his case being raised well meant he had no manners, but he went to private schools and came from a southern family that was brought over on the Mayflower. Though she never said it, Sarah suspected, at twenty-nine, knocking on the door of thirty, Penelope had given up thinking she deserved better. Sarah didn’t feel it was her place to defend reality and so vacationed there whenever around, finding like most of her vacations, she got back exhausted.

Sarah watched people bustling in and out of the neighborhood stores, like ants, the shoe repair store, the hardware store, the jewelry store, these fantastic old mom and pops, insistently standing despite the big chains that had taken over the city just ten blocks south.  Kurosh came up with the food.

“Wa. La.” He said, placing the plates down on the Formica table. “Peaceful up here.” He looked around at the four other empty tables.

“Mmm, three o’clock”

They sat looking at the steaming plates of food in front of them; both of their moods seemed to have taken a turn for the somber, in step with the atmosphere.

“One of the things I like best about New York,” Sarah said. “We can go anywhere at anytime and get an adjustment, like a chiropractor for the soul.”

“I like that, ‘chiropractor for the soul’ the spine of your soul…” he mused, a forkful of basmati up to his mouth.

“So?” he asked.

“So?”

“You haven’t mentioned Trader” he prodded.

Kurosh was referring to the guy Sarah had been dating for the past seven months. He was a trader on Wall Street, he seemed to know everything about equities and junk bonds and other economical specifics that made him feel powerful and Sarah yawn. But he was funny and Sarah was ready to settle down and for the most part she could see herself with him for the long haul- even though he was Irish. Sarah was drawn to the tall dark and handsome, not typically found amongst her Irish brethren. But she found herself attracted to his squeaky clean boyish face, his bright blue eyes and freckles, what Sarah would most describe as his lack of mystery. Sarah grew up with freckles-freckles weren’t mysterious.  Plus, he had no political bent and she could see them having children together, raising a happy family, while pursuing her art. The tricky part had been for her to make him want the same things, it was particularly tough since lately he insisted on not calling her back.

“You mean Traitor” She said.

“Ooh, what now?”

“No, he’s…nothing…he’s fine… I mean nothing…nothing’s fine, haven’t heard, its been two weeks.”  Sarah pushed a lump of yellow curried chicken around her plate.

“No CALL? No NOTHING? In two weeks?” He shrieked.  He was shocked, too shocked. His alarm validated every one of her fears and made her heart constrict. He sounded like a Jewish grandmother who discovered her grandchild wouldn’t be having a bris.

“I’m moving on for sure.” Sarah blinked back tears.

“How?” he looked devastated in a way that made Sarah wish she was talking to one of her reserved conservative friends who would quietly indicate by saying nearly nothing that this was all normal and not heartbreaking, just time to move on. The last thing they would do is get hysterical. Kurosh was shouting as if hair was growing out of his palms. Sarah looked around the room to make sure they were still its only occupants.

“So? What? What have you been doing with yourself, God, you must be a wreck.” He asked, his Persian Jewish accent whining each word, pronouncing every g and hard consonant as if it were his last.

“Well, I haven’t been talking about him? That’s a start? And I’m going to start going out?” Sarah asked. She felt like she needed his approval and then she reminded herself that he was six years her junior. 

Here Kurosh went totally still. He carefully put his fork down, wiped his face with the cloth napkin from his lap (he brought his own, monogrammed) and stared at her with eyes that dipped in the middle and rose up at the ends, sizing her up. He seemed to grab considerable strength from his assessment, he sat up in his chair, squared his shoulders, calmly posturing not unlike a judge about to read his verdict.

“Yes, going out is the right idea. Tonight. With me.”  He placed his napkin back in his lap.

“Where with you? As what?” She looked skeptical but felt hope in her heart, was he asking me out?

“As my friend at a party, I just got this invite, it’s an opening” Sarah felt the hope curl up in her chest and die of embarrassment. He was six years younger than her. And she felt every one of them.

“Oh, like an art opening?”

“Yeah, I have the invite on my desk,” Kurosh slouched back down into his plate of food, the moment of hysteria passed, the problem of Trader and Sarah’s heartbreak solved. His body dispossessed of the seventy-year-old yenta that had held it hostage in the last five minutes, returned to a twenty three year old, “it’s gonna be sick.” Sarah thought about Penelope and their plans and knew she would gladly encourage her to go.

“Can’t, have nothing to wear” Sarah shoved part of a samosa into her mouth. She felt nauseous over Trader, still, the spicy savory bite sent saliva into her cheeks.

“You look fine.” He rolled his eyes. Sarah was wearing a brown cashmere turtleneck with brown pinstriped trouser pants and brown mules with these swirly things on them, also in brown, a gift from her mother (“add some fun to your feet”), she was literally covered in brown from the bottom of her chin to the tip of her toes.

“I look like a lesbian postal worker.” She said. Kurosh spit his drink onto his plate in what appeared to be a sneeze of laughter.

“See? I knew it and I have camel toe,” She said, then she remembered the caption from a Forward she had received of an obese woman in tight jeans. “Maybe even Moose Knuckle.”

“Oh my god, please come. We need you.” He said, his napkin back up, once again taking care of the liquid business on his face.

“What if he’s there and I send the wrong signal?” She asked, “like that I’m a dyke?”

“What if who’s there?” he asked.

“My husband.”

“Its open bar- champagne.” He answered.

“What time?”

“6 o’clock.”

“Sold” she said.

“ Rented” he corrected, as they were real estate renters, not sellers, “to the UPS dyke and her Moose Knuckle.”  Kurosh said tapping his water glass to hers.

“…to me.” Sarah said. She tilted her glass for the lip to touch his.

They got back to the office a little after 4 o’clock, it was already dark out; Daylight Savings had been the week before. The fall time change had always had a pronounced effect on her mood, no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t seem to quite pull herself up into joy, something about the passing of time depressed her. She decided, as much as she would normally like to go to a party with lots of champagne and art, she just couldn’t make herself. All she wanted to do was take a hot bath and get into bed. Sarah thought Kurosh would just have to understand. She opened up her email and there was a note from Penelope. Sarah replied that she was sorry she was going to bail on tonight’s plans, but she just wanted to get home. Penelope replied she understood that news would definitely make her “take to the bed”.

“What news?” Sarah quickly responded.

“Trader --engaged.”  Penelope replied. “Dave’s friend on the floor told us!!?!”

Dave had more than one friend working on the floor of The New York Stock Exchange; Sarah would get the details later. For now she remained stunned.  Sarah stared at the screen; she couldn’t believe it, yet at the same time it made perfect sense. He never loved her. How could she be so dumb? She couldn’t quite comprehend an answer to that. 

Her face flushed remembering the email she sent two days ago when her body was telling her not to, she had included an innuendo.  She thought about the moment she should have known. When, with a rush of adrenaline that always accompanies a bad decision, she pressed send and pulled her hand back into her lap. When, she then forwarded it to a couple friends to see if it was a bad idea, too late, after she had already sent it, what could anyone really say?  When, after he hadn’t written back, his silence was the answer-it was a bad idea. While she was worrying herself into finding a way to win him over, he was practicing his engagement speech to another woman. If humiliation came in a blanket, she was wrapped in it.  It was just like Penelope, sending such news in an email, she was used to Penelope making light of even the tenderest moments. It bothered her,  at the same time she was slightly relieved, the last thing she wanted was details of the blow.

She wanted to escape her shame. She wanted to feel something far away from her pain. She wanted a drink.

Sarah had a recall of the feelings she had when Adrian broke up with her over the phone after nearly four years of mutual promises, he hadn’t looked back either. They had been each other’s first love, but only she remained faithful.  They had started dating in High School and on through college. It was a rickety start, Adrian’s family was Hispanic. In Chestnut Bay they were the stubborn white kinky hair on a head of shiny straight black, unwanted.  Living up to the cliché, her friends shunned him, her mother never liked him.  But Sarah loved him and what’s more she believed in him. After the break up, his best friend told her he had only been with her for the last couple of years because he was afraid she would commit suicide if he left her. Her stomach turned over and her cheeks flushed when he said that, she felt betrayed. Could he have really twisted their mutual devotion, “I’d die without you.” into “I’ll kill myself if you leave.” ?  She vowed she would never let him see how he hurt her. She would act like she didn’t care. She would cry in private. She was glad for this saving grace.  He went on his merry way, making out with the girl who stepped in not two weeks later, while she lost seven years to heartbreak. 

She avoided going home to the reoccurring stab.

She wasn’t going to let herself do that again, waste time over thinking, sacrificing her life on someone who didn’t give her even the simplest level of courtesy. Because wasn’t that what she was doing? What was her life if not her thoughts? She obviously could not trust her judgment when it came to matters of the heart.  Still, as much as her heart wanted her to believe love was a gruesome game, broken limbed and begging her to limp off the field for safety, her head did not buy into the idea. Sarah could distinguish between Adrian and Trader and love. Her true love was out there, waiting for her, he was taking a long time to find her but once he did, he would never let her go. She knew love existed because she herself had the capacity for it. The more she thought about who he was bound to be, she realized it was just like him to be late, he was surely carefree, not one to be anxiously scanning rooms for his bride. He was a guy who had the ability to enjoy the present; he got caught up in life, the little rascal. These men had broken her heart, but they weren’t up to her standards of character. Sarah couldn’t even fathom breaking up with Adrian over the phone, or bleeding out her dates with Trader fooling him into thinking she was caught up with work until he heard from someone else that she was engaged, the way he did to her.  Indeed, she had been deserted but she had also been the deserter. She remembered how hard it had been to do the breaking up, hideous business, but she did it.  She could understand their cowardice. Still, all it boiled down to was that she wasn’t intended to be the mother of their children and they didn’t know how to tell her. That, she could forgive, right after she locked herself into the army green dented steel bolted bathroom stall and cried.

She walked down the hallway back to her desk, based on the scene in Curry in a Hurry, when she had mentioned Trader merely hadn’t called, Sarah wasn’t about to tell Kurosh he was engaged.  She was going to employ her standard posture, do her best to look like she didn’t care, like Trader getting married was the last think on her mind, the same way she acted like Adrian didn’t bother her.  The same way she pushed down everything. She heard this was very Irish, to extend her jaw and hide her feelings, for Sarah it was natural. She cleared her throat.

“So where’s the party?”  She asked.

                                                   ******

It was a sea of Persians. In his bid to get Sarah to the art gallery opening, Kurosh had told her it was going to be a “mixed crowd, super casual”.  Sarah, who had delighted in having made the acquaintance of every class and creed of character, didn’t know what a Persian was, Kurosh being the first person she met who ever described himself as such. That night she found out there were a lot of them, they all seemed to know each other, they all seemed to be in this room and they were not dressed “super casually”; they were draped in long evening gowns! Evening gowns, 18k gold, diamond necklaces and bangles with gems, blown out hair, perfume- so much perfume- the air was damp with perfume. There was nothing casual about them.

“Are you kidding me?” She glared at him and spoke without moving her lips. “It’s black tie and no one speaks English.”

“No way! Relax.” He said.

“It’s all older adults, wearing black tie and not speaking English.” She repeated.

“It’s early.” Kurosh consulted his watch. “Plus, this could be good for business. See that man over there in the red and blue tie?”

Sarah nodded.

“You know all of our listings on the A&P pages?” Kurosh was referring to pages of faxes they received every morning, up to the minute lists of the greatest apartments Available and Priced (A&P) in Manhattan. “He owns all of those buildings, Mr. Madorian.” Sarah looked at him, he had silver hair smoothed back off of his face, a distinguished nose and emotionless eyes. “He’s talking to Morris Lalazadeh, he owns Stone Shop.” He said. Stone Shop was a huge conglomerate of commercial buildings. “He just bought the Sears Tower in Chicago for 235 million dollars. Paid Cash-apparently…”

“Stop drooling.” Sarah said.

“Oh my god- he hired them.” He said.

“Who hired what?” Sarah asked from under her eyebrows. Even though she was impressed by the wealthy men surrounding her, they were storied to be entirely self made and the most industrial people in the business, she couldn’t shake the weight of learning that Trader was engaged, a brick was sitting on her heart.

Kurosh went on to tell Sarah that his friend hired models to serve drinks and talk to the crowd.  He laughed like he was eating something scrumptious at the same time. They walked over to Stefan, the host.

Stefan was over six feet tall, towering over nearly every person in the large loft space, his body was lanky and his face was strikingly handsome. He was what Sarah’s mother would have called a tall drink of water. Sarah thought about what her mother would say about Trader, she couldn’t fathom her disappointment, she would tell her to do embarrassing things to get him back, imagining this conversation made her weary, she refocused on Stefan instead. His eyes were a bright royal blue rimmed in solid black and wide like a cats’, like everyone else’s in the room, Sarah would notice later. Big almond orbs comprised the top half of their faces, most dark brown, some green, a few blue, all feline steady and settled underneath a heavy brow. Americanized, they wore their eyebrows tweezed or waxed but still there was a weight about them, they were the keepers of important secrets.

         “Hey Stef,” he gave his hand up top and then they hugged.

         “Heyyyy” Stefan said, kissing Kurosh on both cheeks. “Hoobie?”

         “Hoobam, merci, Chetorie?” He said.

“Stefan, this is my friend Sarah, we work together, she has her MFA in fine art, so I brought her.”

         Sarah thought to herself, an MFA, is a Masters of Fine Art

“Hi, so nice to meet you, what a turnout?” Sarah held out her hand, Stefan took it in his and held it while he spoke.

“Yes, we’re very happy, it’s all about enjoying.” He seemed to be purring.

“I bet it is” Sarah said with a wink. They all laughed.

“Kurosh would your gorgeous, talented friend, Sarah, like some champagne? Some food? Go help yourselves, there’s plenty of everything.” Stefan gestured grandly to the long tables covered in red velvet lining the side of the room. 

         “Gorgeous and talented friend Sarah would love some champagne, thank you.” Sarah answered for herself. They laughed, Sarah felt herself pulling out of her sadness.

It took them about a half hour to get to the champagne; Kurosh knew the people there and stopped to introduce Sarah to every one. By the second introduction she had forgotten that she was underdressed and out of place, everyone she met was gracious and warm, it was impossible to feel anything else, someone very cruel would have had to remind her that she was covered from earlobes to ankles in brown wool, she felt like she had been crowned in jewels and was walking on velvet heels, her first experience of the Persians was truly transformative.

         “Jonny!” Kurosh called out.

         “Hey dude,” Jonny said, they hugged like brothers.

         “Good dude, good” he answered a question he hadn’t been asked, Sarah wondered if he was nervous, “this is my friend Sarah, Sarah, Jonny.”

         “Hi” Sarah tilted her champagne glass toward him; he had a big smile, green cat eyes. She loved hearing them say dude, like surfers, to her it sounded as unexpected and curiously thrilling as hearing a bird talk. Jonny told Sarah and Kurosh that he was going to go to the bar quickly and he would come back.

         “Dude, the line is crazy it took us forever, we just got these” Kurosh said, again the way he said dude struck Sarah as misplaced, she realized it was the way he was saying it. He was trying too hard to be familiar as if he were looking for Jonny’s approval. Sarah wondered why before it occurred to her that Kurosh wanted Jonny to know they were not together as anything more than friends. She put herself in his shoes, he was here at a party with close relations, people would wonder. She noticed again that, aside from the hired help, she was the only American

         “Really?” he hedged, and then looked around. With that a blonde model came over carrying a tray full of champagne, “well, well, well” he laughed as he pulled one off of her tray and then two more for Sarah and Kurosh. Sarah’s stomach flipped as she remembered what it felt like to have someone pull drinks off of her tray, she had been a cocktail waitress during graduate school. That was the worst part of the job, an overzealous man yanking drinks off of her carefully balanced tray, her small hands trying to reposition before sending glass, expensive booze and their rapport crashing to the floor. She instinctively put her hand underneath the tray for support; she and the girl exchanged a knowing look. Jonny turned to the model and asked her to stay close.  She looked confused until he gave her a $50 dollar bill.  Kurosh and Sarah looked at each other and then to Jonny, cheers. Just then someone else came over to Kurosh, a woman spoke closely into his ear and then walked away.

“Ama Marjan,” he said to Jonny “my aunt,” he explained to Sarah, “is here, I have to go see her, I’ll be back.”

         “Well, I guess that leaves you, me and the champagne” Jonny said.

         “Not a bad place to be?” Sarah said, looking around, feeling like she was exactly where she wanted to be, far away from anything that was remotely familiar, a welcome stranger in a strange welcome place.

         “It’s the best place to be.” He smiled.

So there they were. Jonny and Sarah. Parked by the waitress and her

Champagne, they talked for a while, they drank a lot. Sarah felt the buzz in the air of them being left alone, he a single man, she a single woman, all that champagne, a conventional introduction with breathtaking potential. She wondered if he could feel it too.

         They talked about how she got there, then her quest for art. They both believed they were not judgmental.  He asked Sarah if she was going home to Long Island, she looked around the room to decide how much longer she should stay. Sarah couldn’t believe it; almost everyone was gone- the room once teeming with people was being swept up.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“10 o’clock”

“No!”

“Yes.” Jonny looked at his watch; “I’m going to head to dinner with Sharokh and those guys…you can come?” he looked at Sarah.

“Um okay, maybe I will…”

“Really?” Jonny asked, surprised she accepted.

“Oh, no, no. I was just kidding, I’m going home, going to the Ladies first.” Sarah said. She plastered a smile on her face as she turned to leave, embarrassed that she didn’t understand the empty gesture. She forgot that Kurosh did that, he would invite her somewhere to be polite, but then when she accepted he would glare at her, he thought it was ruder not to invite. Sarah thought it was confusing and weird; it must be a Persian thing.

They said goodbye and afterwards, Sarah scrambled to the back of the loft to the bathroom. Then she got her belongings out of coat check she headed toward the stairs.  They were up on the second floor over looking 5th avenue, Sarah looked out of the nearly floor to ceiling windows, down to the street. She didn’t want to go back outside, she didn’t want to get one step closer to reality. She felt a hand on the small of her back. She turned and Kurosh was pressed up behind her, his cashmere coat felt nice against her back, the faint smell of his cologne comforted her.

“Jonny wants your number.”  Kurosh said.

“Who’s Jonny?” she asked.

“The guy you were just talking to for three hours, hello?” he said.

His whining voice and attitude shattered the illusion that they could be a pair. She hadn’t remembered Jonnys’ name after they were introduced and they hadn’t exchanged them a second time. Sarah felt like she’d been given a pop quiz after a class she had spent idly daydreaming.

“Oh, ha!” Sarah said. She took a breath mint from her clutch and popped it into her mouth. “Okay, where is he?” she asked.

“He’s on the stairs, waiting for me to get your number.”

“I’ll give it to him myself.” she winked over her shoulder, heading toward the stairway. Jonny was talking to someone.

“Hey, Ku said you wanted my number.” Sarah interrupted.

“Oh,” he looked surprised and laughed. “Okay, cool.”

“You know so many people are coupled up, it’s hard to find someone just to do cool things with in the city” he said, looking at the man he was talking to. There was the smallest hint of shame in his explanation. Sarah looked from him to his friend and smiled. She wondered what “cool things”?  Such as make out with a woman?

“Okay, I’m heading out, good talking to you.” she said. Sarah walked down the stairs out into the doorway littered with people smoking cigarettes, saying their goodbyes. She bummed a light off of someone and headed up fifth toward 13th thinking she’d grab the N/R at Union Square and then decided to take the cab she spotted instead. If spending the money on a cab was the only thing she would regret in the morning, it was a good night. She flagged him down and hopped in, slid across the leather seat, and spoke into the plastic screen that divided them.

“Penn station?”

The cab pulled out from the curb. Sarah loved watching the city pass by the window plus she was pretty tipsy, she felt good, no new boyfriend, but she made a friend and maybe he’d call and they’d go out as a group, maybe it’d lead to somebody else. Who knew what could happen.  Sarah was open. They would be friends.

Sarah made her way to the big black call board that had all the times and destinations on it, embraced by the warm air she realized  her train wasn’t leaving for another hour. She had just missed it. She looked over at Charlie O’s…she already had a buzz, what was she going to do? Waste it? She might as well go grab a beer and wait for her train, pass the time, talk to people. Still she felt a hot rush flush her cheeks as soon as she decided and found herself walking into the bar. There were other women in there but everyone seemed to be in a group. Sarah was alone. She was walking into a bar to drink alone. Before she could talk herself out of it, she ordered an Amstel Light and acted casual. She pulled out a book-a leaflet from the night’s art opening- and started studying it like it was a map to her final destination in life. Despite her fear that everyone in the bar would turn around and notice her, no one approached her. In what seemed like seconds her beer was empty and she was ordering another one, mindful of the time, but kind of hoping she could stay there, inside the dark crowded bar with all its strangers and musty booze and live there forever.

“What time’s your train?” the bartender asked.

“11:14pm”

“ Five minutes, you don’t want to miss that” he was looking down while he wiped away the bottle rings of sticky beer sludge.

“Oh, I wouldn’t!” Sarah looked shocked at the idea even though it rang true.

“You’d be surprised.” He wiped up the rest of the bar, picked up the soggy dollar bills. .

Sarah laughed it off, as if the thought was ridiculous, but she took the warning and quietly thanked him.  She was happy she looked out of place, as much as the sick part of her wanted to, Charlie O’s in Penn Station wasn’t where she wanted to fit in. Just then this girl blew in. She was very tall, maybe 5’10 and thin, she had long blonde hair and she was laughing. That was the way to enter a bar Sarah thought, she wasn’t hiding under any pamphlets, she knew the bartender, he called her sweetheart. She ordered a Heineken, she drank it in what looked like one big gulp, slammed the still cold sweating bottle down on the bar on top of her money, looked over at Sarah and said to the bartender, “see you tomorrow, baby!” as she left, Sarah assumed to catch her train. She watched her go, she felt like she was in slow motion compared to her, then she realized she was late too. She made her train by an arm’s length. She thought about the girl part of the way home. That’s how she wanted to be, tall and loud and in charge of herself, having a quick cold one at Charlie O’s before her train, looking glamorous-not hanging around pretending to read, making herself comfortable. But she had nowhere to go; she couldn’t keep up that energy for an hour? The way Blondie drank that beer Sarah would of had to guzzle twenty.  She guessed she’d have to time herself better. Then she thought maybe she should get a bigger dream and rolled her eyes. Next thing she knew they were calling, “last stop, Ronkonkoma.” She had fallen asleep on the train, took it all the way out on the island. She walked out into the cold air and looked for a cab, she found the station across the street. The cab driver, a big fat man that took up almost the entire front seat, took her back to her parents’ house, charging an astronomical price, fifty dollars. Sarah told him she’d get the money for him when she got home.  Thirty minutes later, they pulled into the driveway, again Sarah felt a man poking her in the shoulder, waking her up.

“Hold on, I’ll get you the money, don’t leave.” she said opening the door.

“You can pay me in a blow job.” He offered. In the overhead light she could see fat rolls on his neck underneath what looked like a wreath of gray straggly hair. Gross.

“What?” Sarah asked.

“Blow job, I’d take a blow job.” He was looking at her from the rear view mirror. Sarah thought she might get sick. She got out of the car and went inside, immediately feeling safe and warm inside her parents’ house, she exhaled seeing her mothers’ purse was in the library and then again when she found her wallet was filled with enough cash. Sarah went back outside to the cabbie, eerily pulled right up to the back door. He rolled his window down just enough for her to put the money in. His fat fist came out and snatched the crisp dollar bills. Sarah turned around, walked inside and locked the door. The next time she passed out she was in her own bed. The next person to wake her up was her mother.

“I don’t know whether I’m on foot or on horseback, I could have sworn I had over fifty dollars in my purse and now I have three.”

“Horseback.” Sarah answered, pulling down the blackout shade she neglected to shut the night before. That night she would put the money back in her mother’s wallet, making her poor mom think she’d lost her mind- a second time.

                                                 ****