Tales of the City 01 - Tales of the City

young,
for i am old enough to know better
and you are young enough not to care.
    Not bad, she concluded. And poetry was fabulous therapy, taking her back to simpler days at Central High when she cranked out anguished, e.e. cummings-style verses for the Plume and Palette.
    But this poem made her uncomfortable somehow, touching a little too close to the defensiveness she felt about her relationship with Norman.
    What relationship? So far, they had only kissed. A perfectly tame good-night kiss, at that. Norman was like … a big brother? No … and not exactly an uncle, either.
    She felt toward Norman what she felt toward Gregory Peck when she was twelve and saw To Kill a Mockingbird five times … just to experience that goose-bumpy, dry-throated, shivery feeling that came over her whenever Atticus Finch appeared on the screen.
    But Norman Neal Williams was no Gregory Peck. She tore up the poem.
    Mr. Halcyon was still in conference when Beauchamp sidled up to her cubicle.
    “Rough day?”
    “Not particularly,” she answered with deliberate blandness.
    “You look a little … bummed out.”
    “I guess it’s my biorhythms.” She wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but it kept things impersonal.
    “Can I buy you a drink tonight?”
    She stared at him icily. “I don’t believe you. I really don’t.”
    “Just trying to be nice.”
    “Thank you very much. I have a date tonight.”
    “Aha! Where’s the lucky man taking you?”
    She slipped a sheet of paper into her typewriter. “I don’t see why you should care about …”
    “Oh, c’mon! I’d like to know.”
    She began to type. “Some place called the Beach Chalet.”
    “Ah.”
    “You know it?”
    “Sure. You’ll love it. The VFW meets there.”
    She looked up to see a smirk curl across his face. He headed into the hallway again, where he saluted her crisply. “Don’t OD on Beer Nuts, toots!”

New York, New York
    R IVETED TO THE RECEIVER OF HER ANTIQUE FRENCH telephone, D’orothea wielded a gold-tipped Sherman like a conductor’s baton.
    She was talking to New York again.
    The fourth time in two days.
    Mona watched in cynical silence, curled up comfortably on their new buff suede Billy Gaylord banquette. She was sick of competing with New York.
    “Oh, Bobby,” shrieked D’orothea, “that’s the third time this month you’ve taken Lina to The Toilet…. Well, I know, honey, but … Well, look, Bobby. Once is slumming, three times is just plain sick. … It isn’t at all like The Anvil. The Anvil was fun in the old days. I mean. Rudi went there, for God’s sake! … I never saw that…. They weren’t, Bobby. I never saw any of that business with the fists…. Anyway, The Toilet is just plain flat-out scuzzy. I totaled a perfectly good pair of Bergdorf Goodman shoes….”
    It went on like that for ten minutes. When D’orothea hung up, she smiled apologetically at Mona. “Shit, I got out just in time. The Big Apple’s getting too wormy for words.”
    “Is that why you need a progress report every night?”
    “It isn’t every night.”
    “We have depravity here too, you know … and what the hell’s The Toilet?”
    “It’s a bar.”
    “Of course.”
    “It’s in Vogue this month.”
    “How gauche of me not to …”
    “Hey … what is it with you, Mona?”
    “I’m just sick of dealing with New York, that’s all. I mean, you’ve moved back here now, and it seems to me that you could …”
    “That isn’t it, Mona. You’ve been brooding about something.”
    “I’m not brooding. I’m always like this.”
    “I think you miss Michael.”
    “Don’t overanalyze things.”
    “Hon, if we don’t talk about it …”
    “It’s nothing. I’m in a bitchy mood. Forget it.”
    “I’m a little claustrophobic myself. C’mon … let’s take a walk.”
    Back at Barbary Lane, Brian Hawkins was boiling a bag of frozen chow mein. When it was ready, he gulped it down at the kitchen table while he leafed through his mail.
    Not much. An Occupant notice about a new pizzeria. A circular from the Chicago Urban League. A garish pink envelope listing the Treasure Island Frailer Court as the return address.
    The envelope contained a note card bearing the face of a Keane child, a sugary nymphet staring mawkishly from a tenement window.
Dear Brian,
They gave me your address at Perry’s. I hope you don’t mind. I just wanted to tell you what a fabulous time I had with you. You are a real sweet guy, and I hope you will call me