What I Loved

month after that conversation, I found myself alone with Lucille. We hadn't been in touch during her year in Houston, and after she'd returned to the city in the fall, my encounters with her had been limited to chance hellos or short talks in the hallway when she came by to pick up Mark. Violet's stories about "mixing" in the Giorgione painting, in the piano lesson, and in the Master Fremont game have a curious relevance to what happened between me and Lucille. I've come to think that even though she and I were the only people in the room that night, we weren't really alone.
    It began on a Saturday evening. Erica and I attended a large party on Wooster Street given for the supporters of a downtown theater group. When I first saw her, Lucille was in deep conversation with a very young man, probably in his early twenties. She had put her hair up, which showed off her slender neck, and she was wearing a gray dress, far prettier then anything I had ever seen her in before. I noticed that as she talked to the man, she occasionally grabbed his forearm in an emphatic and surprisingly forceful way. I tried to catch her eye, but she didn't see me. It was one of those crowded events, during which most conversation is scattershot at best and the lights are too low to see anyone properly. After a while we lost sight of her.
    We had been at the party for about a half an hour when Erica said to me, "See that kid over there?"
    I turned around. Across the room I saw a tall thin boy with thick black glasses and a shock of blond hair that stood straight up from the top of his head, a hairdo that looked very much like the straw end of a broom.
    * /
    The boy was hovering near the food table. I saw his hand dart out toward a plate of food. He snatched several bread sticks and stuffed them quickly into the pockets of his long raincoat — an inappropriate garment for a warm spring night with no rain. Within minutes, he had squirreled away rolls, grapes, two whole cheeses, and at least half a pound of ham in various pockets of the coat. Apparently satisfied with his hoard and looking very lumpy, the boy began to make his way toward the door.
    "I'm going to talk to him," Erica said.
    "No, don't, you'll embarrass him," I said.
    "I'm not going to tell him to put it back. I just want to find out who he is."
    Not long after that, Erica introduced me to Lazlo Finkelman. When I shook his hand, he gave a strangled nod. I noticed that the coat was buttoned directly under his chin, and he seemed to have stored more food in the vicinity of his collar. Lazlo didn't stay to chat. We watched him lumber toward the door and disappear.
    "The boy's starving, Leo. He's only twenty years old. He lives in Brooklyn — in Greenpoint. He's some kind of an artist. He feeds himself by raiding happy-hour tables and crashing parties like this one. I invited him to dinner next week. I want to help him."
    "He should last a month on the haul he made tonight," I said.
    "I got his number," Erica said. "I'm going to call and make sure he comes."
    On our way out the door, we saw Lucille again. She was standing alone and had slumped against the wall. Erica walked over to her.
    "Lucille? Are you okay?" she said.
    Lucille lifted her face and looked at Erica, then at me. "Leo," she said. Her eyes glittered and her face had a softness I'd never seen before. The joints of her normally stiff body had loosened like a marionette's, and as we stood in front of her, her knees buckled and she began to slide down the wall. Erica grabbed her.
    "Where's Scott?" she said.
    "I don't know Scott," Erica said gently. Then, turning to me, she said, "He must have ditched her. We can't leave her here. She's had way too much to drink."
    Erica walked back to Greene Street and relieved Grace from her baby-sitting duties. I escorted Lucille home in a cab to East Third Street between Avenues A and B. By the time she was fumbling for her keys on the steps to her building, Lucille had sobered up a little. Although her flabby gestures lagged behind her will, I could see a veil of self-consciousness returning as she struggled to fit the key into the lock The small railroad apartment on the second floor of the building was silent except for a faucet dripping somewhere in a hidden room. There were several pieces of clothing draped over the sofa, a large pile of papers on a desk, and toys scattered on the floor. Lucille dropped down on the sofa and looked up at me. Her hair had come undone and fell in long