The October List

never rest, even Friday night. The streets were still busy with traffic if dwindling of pedestrians. Limos queued in front of the posher buildings.
    ‘Bizarre,’ he repeated quizzically. ‘The restaurant, you mean?’
    Well, that was part of it. They’d eaten in a dive of an Indian place, curry and tikka and Kingfisher beer. The air had been tropically humid and heavy with sandalwood, the canned sitar music corny and the food perhaps the best South Asian cuisine she’d ever had. The feature dominating the room was a massive saltwater aquarium, easily ten thousand gallons. Gabriela had been captivated by the colorful fish, which eased, or darted, throughout the tank. Shrimp was on the menu, she noted, but no other seafood was represented. (‘Good thing,’ she’d told him, nodding at the aquarium. ‘Just wouldn’t be right.’)
    ‘Mostly by “bizarre,”’ Gabriela said, ‘I was actually referring to what happened before dinner.’
    ‘Oh. That.’
    And thinking back to those hours, while there were many memories, most prominent was Daniel’s touch as he lifted a silk handkerchief and wiped the moisture from her brow. Once again she now felt the tumbling within her, low, as she had then.
    Silence for a time as they walked toward subways – her station first. Daniel finally asked, ‘When you called your ex, I wasn’t listening, but I noticed you didn’t talk to your daughter for very long. Is everything okay?’
    ‘Oh, she’s fine. Sometimes, when her dad has her and he’s nearby, she clams up. They get along fine. He’s good with her. But you know how it is: exes.’
    Daniel’s wryly twisted smile said that he knew all too well.
    A mid September breeze encircled them.
    ‘You cold?’
    ‘A little.’
    ‘Take my jacket.’
    ‘No.’ She pulled her own light tweed around her more tightly. ‘I’m fine.’
    He didn’t persist; he’d probably sensed that once she’d come to a decision it would remain made. Which was largely true of Gabriela.
    She gave a grimace, pointing to a plaza near Wall Street they were just passing. Bankers’ Square. ‘See that building there?’ She pointed to a squat structure situated next to the new stock exchange facility, still bustling with construction work, even at this hour. On the other side was a medical center – a branch of a major Uptown hospital.
    ‘I have that to thank for my ruined weekend.’
    ‘It doesn’t look that intimidating.’
    ‘If you only knew.’
    In a few minutes they were at the subway station where she’d catch the train to the Upper West Side, the Eighth Avenue line. Daniel would walk home.
    ‘Look,’ he said and fell silent.
    Gabriela turned to him. She stepped aside so that the beam from a streetlight was not in her eyes.
    ‘Look?’ she prompted.
    Daniel spoke like a patient saved by an emergency room surgeon: ‘I really owe you. For the Princeton Solution.’
    ‘It would’ve worked out,’ she said gravely.
    ‘Not the way you handled it.’
    ‘Did the best I could under … let’s say, difficult circumstances.’
    But the expression of gratitude was, of course, a prelude to the inevitable.
    He said, ‘Okay, I find you very attractive. But, that’s only part of it. I like you. You’re fun, you’re artsy, you know business. So here’s the thing: I’m not seeing anybody and I haven’t been seeing anybody for a while. Can I call you?’
    ‘Anybody can call anybody if they have the number,’ Gabriela said. ‘The question is, will I pick up?’
    Daniel looked pensive. ‘Remember the days before caller ID? That was life on the edge, wasn’t it? Do I pick up or not?’
    She filled in, ‘Would it be a telemarketer, date, ex-boyfriend? A job offer?’
    ‘Or a wrong number.’
    ‘Or, God forbid, your mother.’ Gabriela winced. ‘We’re soft nowadays.’
    ‘Cowards.’
    They stood three feet from each other. Businessmen scooted around them, cars shushed past.
    It was time to part ways. They both knew it.
    He leaned in for a cheek brush.
    She felt heat, she felt a faint stubble. The residue of moisture from earlier, recalling his wiping it from their brows and cheeks. ‘Night.’ His word was spoken softly.
    ‘Night.’
    She turned and started down the stairs, digging for her Metro pass. Then stopped. She called, ‘My shoes?’
    ‘What?’
    ‘That old Tiffany bag I had? With my grown-up shoes inside?’ Earlier that evening she’d swapped her high heels for the Aldo flats she now wore. ‘I left it at