Memories of Hazey Jane – Part 1
Posted on November 14, 2008
Halfway through, I realized that I’m writing this down for myself just as much as I am for you. The troubling thing is by the time you read this, none of it may have happened.
Do you remember last year, when things weren’t so good between us? It seems an age ago that my old roommate Gene finally decided to get hitched – our Gene, the Lone Wolf! The one who we all joked was in a common-law marriage with his left hand. I showed you a picture of the girl – the dancer; you said you had seen children in Somalia who looked better nourished.
In any case, I really did go to their wedding in San Francisco. It wasn’t anything fancy – just the family, and a few of our old mates from NYU…between the cheap champagne, slinky dancing, and dorm stories I’d rather not repeat, you wouldn’t have liked it, anyway. One of the bridesmaids insisted on taking me out for a drink, even after I showed her my ring. That was pretty awkward.
Not that anything came of it, of course. I called up Neil and asked him for Monday off; He laughed at me, so I wasted nearly $800 finding a 6PM return flight into LaGuardia. The timing could have been better. Checkout was at noon; the taxi ride from Stockton Street to SFO took the better part of an hour. Check-in was easy, save for an agent who nearly soiled himself seeing a sand-colored guy with a backpack full of lighting gear and a couple of Nikons. Or maybe he was just doing his job – after all, the color of today’s fear was orange.
Maybe I should have called you. We used to stay on the phone for hours, talking about nothing in particular, if we said anything at all. Sometimes I’d simply listen to your asthmatic snore. I miss that sometimes. We must have been crazy about each other then. But that day, considering the way we left things – I don’t think you’d have liked that either. So, carrying a quarter of my weight in dirty underwear, film, and lenses, I entered the terminal, with plenty of time to kill.
I tried reading. But it takes a quiet mind to digest the printed word, and my head was practically a Greek chorus of discordant voices. I thought about Gene, and the way he looked at Isabel at the altar. I think he was half in disbelief; I don’t think I’ve ever seen that much concentration in a man’s face before. I think he was beginning to realize who she really was. Someone who could make him hold down a job, and actually finish his degree – now that was real magic! I thought about you, of course, and how much I hate flying, among other things. A few pages in, and it was clear The Deathly Hallows would have to wait.
I caught up on my sleep, and called old friends here and there, but with Gene’s wedding in the history books for a good day, most of them had been reclaimed by their private lives, leaving only confused spouses and impassive voicemail systems to convey awkward messages.
Just when I was starting to get bored, I found my salvation – a hole in the wall with a cookie-cutter Copacabana ambiance. The glasses and tables looked clean, and it was close enough to the men’s room to know it wasn’t too expensive. I know you wouldn’t approve, but I figured one or two before a six hour flight wouldn’t hurt. I was a bit lonesome, but not desperate enough to take a stool with the other lost souls. Instead, I found an empty table near the back.
And that’s when I caught someone staring in my direction. I looked above, below, and behind to make sure it wasn’t a poster, newspaper clipping, or a stealthy French mime. After a few moments, I was forced to concede that there must be something deeply, truly fascinating about me. The thought made me fidget in my chair.
She had a copy of the Chronicle next to her drink – an amberish-brown concoction I couldn’t name offhand. It seemed to be going the distance; the ice was melting, with almost half the drink left to welcome it. A few sips of my first Guinness later, I felt a bit cheeky: “If you’re going to check me out, you could at least pretend to be reading that paper.”
To be honest, I’m not sure what I was hoping for with that one. A quick glare, maybe; a flush of embarrassment, and a pivot of the head, probably, but I didn’t expect her to actually hold the eye contact. I didn’t want any trouble. I picked up my bottle, and wondered if I should leave.
She shook her head, and finally apologized. “I just kept thinking you were somebody I knew.”
“Well, I’m not. I hope that clears things up a bit.”
Things were silent for a beat. It was quiet enough for me to hear the Packers were a field goal over the Giants, and had possession of the ball in the middle of the fourth quarter. The bartender shook his head and reached for the remote; I wondered how much he’d be out.
The woman cleared her throat – she clearly hadn’t had enough of me yet. “I am sorry, you know. If there’s one thing I try to remember about the person, it’s the face.”
The lone waitress interrupted me, and asked if I wanted another pint. I nodded, and she returned the favor – a smile with too many teeth. She wore a tight-fitting orange blouse and dark slacks, and walked as if she were stepping on steak knives instead of heels. I left an extra dollar on the table.
When she moved away, I got a clear look at my unsolicited acquaintance – a full-figured freckled girl with violently red locks.
I wasn’t in the mood, to tell you the truth. But she had one of those faces you couldn’t glare at for long, even if she had pricked your space. And if you did – well, you were just being an ass.
“What’re you drinking?”
“Campari on the Rocks.” And when I winced: “It’s not as bad as you think, especially if you take it slowly. My mom used to have a thing for them.”
“Used to? She’s moved on, then?”
“In a manner of speaking.” She smiled wryly. “Some days were better than others…sometimes they got so crowded she couldn’t look out the window in the morning.”
She wasn’t looking at me anymore. And if there were any more distance in her eyes, she might have been in Heathrow, not at the adjacent table. I figured I’d better let it alone.
And that’s when my phone chose to ring – a more furious buzzing than a nest of agitated hornets. It was too obnoxious to ignore, so without looking, I drew from the hip and sent you straight to voicemail.
“Not even a hello? I hope that wasn’t your wife.”
That didn’t earn her much credit. I wiggled my ring finger; the tarnished brass band was not that hard to miss. “How did you guess?”
She smiled ironically. “I thought you had look of a grounded man.”
“Grounded? I haven’t heard that word since middle school.”
She rolled her eyes. “I mean you look like you have a few things to lose. You’ve reached a point where you can’t end up drifting from one thing to the next anymore; you might end up sinking.”
I glanced at my half-empty glass. “Who knows? Maybe that’ll happen anyway.”
“Talking like that doesn’t help.” She said, not sternly. “Something wrong?”
I shrugged.
“You didn’t do anything stupid, did you?”
“No! Nothing like that…I mean…We’re still learning, and there are a few surprises here and there, that’s all.”
“Would you do it again?”
“Do what?”
She pointed at my ring. I drew myself up, and stroked the stubble under my chin. It was a good question. And I don’t think many NYU graduates are the kind to shy away from a perfectly good hypothetical. The nice part was that she was a stranger, which meant I could afford a little bit of the truth. “I don’t know.”
She sat up, and looked at me intently. “Is that a no?”
“I mean that question doesn’t make any sense. How would I know what it’d be like unless I actually went through with it?”
“Well you’re no fun.” She said, bluntly.
“I met her at school. We’d been going out for a while, so it had to happen sometime. And even if I somehow went back to our wedding day, I doubt it’d make much difference.”
“So is that a yes?”
“They all tried to talk us out of it – well, her, anyway. She graduated from Yale; I once heard her uncle say that I wasn’t even a scented candle to her torch. But we- I figured as long as we had a chance -no, I probably wouldn’t change my mind.” I finally answered. “And if I did, then what was I supposed to do with myself. I don’t think I could see it happening any other way.”
“There are things that’re just going to happen, I guess.” She mused.
The rest of that conversation became a long blur soaked in imported spirits. You can’t expect me to remember half of it, considering how many times I’ve gone through that night. She looked about our age, and I couldn’t help but wonder what would be waiting for a girl like her back in New York. She looked like the type of woman who could afford to sit back and think about these kinds of things all the time. Those kinds are usually either loaded, complete airheads, or simply not all there – and she seemed to be neither of those three. I wouldn’t figure her out until much later. In the meantime, it was all the two lonely travelers could do but to bid each other farewell, with a vague promise to see each other “around”, which of course means at a time synchronicitous fate finds interesting enough, which of course means only marginally better than never again.
In any case, we kept each other company until a female voice of skillful effervescence announced that Delta 1337 was boarding for New York, and of course, the people in first class got a dedicated boarding lane to demonstrate their superiority.
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