Tales of the City 01 - Tales of the City

faced him, grinning coyly. “You are fresh, you know that?”
    “April fresh, I hope?”
    “You’re too much!”
    “That’s what they tell me.”
    “Well, you can just …”
    “You must not be from around here, huh?”
    “Why?”
    “I don’t know. You just have a kind of … no, forget it.”
    “What?”
    “It’ll sound like a line.”
    “Will you just let me be the judge of that?”
    “Well, there’s something kind of … cosmopolitan about you.”
    After blinking at him for a moment, she looked down at her T-shirt, then back at him.
    “Why did you do that?” he asked.
    “I couldn’t remember if I was wearing my Paris Match T-shirt.”
    He chuckled smoothly. “It’s not your clothes. There’s just … something … an air. Oh, forget it.”
    “Are you from around here?”
    “Sure. Third drier from the right.”
    “C’mon!”
    “I know it doesn’t look like much, but it’s really pretty inside. Crystal chandeliers, flocked wallpaper, Armstrong linoleum … Where do you live?”
    “The Marina.”
    “Near here, huh?”
    “Yeah.”
    “How quick could we walk it?”
    “I don’t think … five minutes.”
    “You don’t think what?”
    “Nothing.”
    “Good. Shall we?”
    “Look, I don’t even know your name.”
    “Of course. How stupid. Brian Hawkins.”
    She took his hand and shook it rather formally. “I’m Connie Bradshaw. From the Friendly Skies of United.”

… And Many Happy Returns
    T HE FLOOR AROUND CONNIE’S BED WAS LITTERED WITH the bodies of its daytime occupants: a five-foot plush Snoopy dog, a chartreuse beanbag frog, a terry-cloth python with eyes that rolled (Forgive her, Sigmund, thought Brian) and a maroon pillow that said: SCHOOL SPIRIT DAY, CENTRAL HIGH , 1967.
    Brian was propped against the headboard. “Do you mind if I smoke?”
    “Go ahead.”
    He chuckled. “That’s very New Wave, isn’t it?”
    “What?”
    “You know … the couple sacked out afterwards with … It doesn’t matter.”
    “All right.”
    “Would you like me to leave?”
    “Did I say that, Byron?”
    “Brian.”
    “You can go if you want.”
    “Are you pissed or something?”
    Silence.
    “Ah, methinks the lady is pissed.”
    “Oh … you’re such an intellectual, aren’t you?”
    “My brain offends you?”
    Silence.
    “Look, Bonnie …”
    “Connie.”
    “So we’re even. Look … I’ll be guilty if you want. I’m the quintessential liberal. Ring a bell, I’ll salivate, flog myself, feel guilty for weeks. Just tell me what I did, will you?”
    She rolled over and hunched into a fetal position. “If you don’t know, there’s no point in discussing it.”
    “Bonnie! Connie!”
    “Do you treat all your bed partners that way?”
    “What way?”
    “Wham, bam, thank you, ma’am!”
    “Well, that’s getting to the point.”
    “You asked me.”
    “So I did.”
    “I don’t think it’s abnormal to require a little tenderness.”
    “‘She may be weary, women do get weary …’”
    “Blow it out your …!”
    “‘Wearin’ the same shabby dress …’”
    “You’re really an asshole, you know that? You are truly a … pathetic human being! You’ve got about as much warmth as … I don’t know what!”
    “Nice simile.”
    “Go fuck yourself!”
    She was up now, sitting at her French Provincial vanity, brushing her hair with a vengeance.
    “I’m sorry,” he said. “O.K.?”
    “What’s to apologize for? We don’t even know each other.”
    “We shared a fabric softener. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”
    “Yeah. The end of a horrible day.”
    “Jesus. What else happened to you today?”
    “Nothing. Not a goddamn thing.”
    “So?”
    “So it’s my birthday, dink!’
    He held her until she had stopped crying, then dried her eyes with a corner of her Wamsutta floral.
    “I’m hungry,” he said. “How ‘bout you?”
    She didn’t answer. She sat on the edge of the bed like a broken Barbie Doll. Brian left for the kitchen.
    He was back several minutes later, holding a tin pie plate with mock solemnity. “Don’t those North Beach bakeries do a nice job?” he said.
    From the top of a triple-decker peanut butter and jelly sandwich four kitchen matches were blazing festively.
    “Make a wish,” he said, “and no wisecracks!”

Mrs. Day at Home
    D EDE WAS TICKED. IT WAS ALREADY MIDAFTERNOON Sunday and Beauchamp wasn’t home from his Guardsmen weekend on Mount Tam.
    She slammed around the penthouse in search of something to occupy