Bundle of Joy? (13 page)

“It’s okay,” he said.

“Okay,” I said.

“Anyway, I am heading over to a buddy’s apartment. I don’t feel like walking home over the Brooklyn Bridge just now.”

“They won’t give you a ride? I mean, you couldn’t just commandeer a fire truck or something?”

“I guess if I really needed a ride I could get it, but it’s fine this way. Anyway, I wanted to check and make sure you were okay, and reschedule our date.”

Had I gotten the thumbs-up from the rest of the truck?

“You could hang out for a while if you want,” I said. Never in my life have I been that forward with a guy; it must have been the moderate to super-expensive wine I had been downing.

“I would really like to, but I’m so tired I can barely see straight. I need to have my A game when we hang out. I need to match you wit for wit.”

He had this funny New York (Brooklyn?) accent, but I really liked listening to him talk.

“How about next Thursday?” I asked.

“How about sooner?” he asked quickly. “Like Tuesday.”

I felt my eyes close again and this time I smiled and nodded.

“Okay, cool, I’ll call you and we’ll work it out. Have a good night. And be careful around the hibachi. Don’t give me another reason to come back.”

“I will—be careful, that is,” I said. “Take care.”

He seemed about to walk away and then turned back and looked at me. “Oh, I wanted to tell you, you look really pretty in that light.”

I started to thank him, but he bent down and kissed my cheek. It was a quick, soft kiss, but he kept his cheek against mine for a minute.

“See you next week,” he said against my ear.

“Yep, until then,” I said, and then, even though we hadn’t really shared a meal (though I think I decided to count the rice-cream bars), I turned my head and kissed him on the mouth. New York City was dark. I kissed a guy. I guess anything could happen.

This time he walked away from me, all the way down the block past Armando and Kelly who were at that point just a couple of open mouths illuminated by their candles.

I pulled out my FDNY flashlight, turned it on and illuminated myself so they could see the giant grin that spread across my face.

The power came on the next morning at six a.m. I woke up with a hangover as the light in my room flashed on. I must have
forgotten to turn it off when I left to meet Maureen the day before. I called my mother to make sure she was okay. She curtly told me that she was fine and managed to make me feel guilty about not being there.

If it’s not one thing, it’s your mother.

I went back to bed for a few hours and when I woke up I listened to the radio and discovered that parts of the city still didn’t have power and certain subways were still stuck. There was no service and no one was expected to go to work.

I walked into the kitchen, where I found Kelly drinking a Gatorade and eating a PowerBar. I could tell by her face that she was hungover too.

“Thank God it’s a snow day,” she said.

I plopped onto the couch and dialed Jamie’s number.

“Hey,” she said when she answered. “You made it.”

“Yeah, how about you and the bambino?”

“We’re fine. We spent a few hours at the emergency room, but we’re fine.”

“Emergency room?” I exclaimed. “What happened?”

She told me the whole saga. She had gone over to a colleague’s apartment and had hung out there, thinking the power would come back any minute. When she finally realized that it wasn’t going to, she started walking home. It was too hot for her and she puked in the middle of the street. Some guy asked her if she was all right and she told him that she was pregnant. The good Samaritan started to panic, as his wife had had a miscarriage years ago, and the next thing Jamie knew she was in the back of an ambulance, light flashing, the whole shebang. Somewhere along the ride, Jamie started fearing the worst, too. She found herself crying as she lay on the gurney, feeling like she had seen this on an episode of
ER
.

“They took me to the emergency room. Luckily it was just St. Vincent’s, right across the street from home, pretty much. I couldn’t get in touch with Raj, so I had to stay there. They checked me, told me I was okay, and then wouldn’t release me until someone came to get me.”

“Wow!”

“The only place where the air-conditioning was on was the chapel. So I was in there, with all the crazies. One of them found out I was pregnant—I guess she overheard one of the nurses—and started screaming, ‘Giant flabby pussy! Giant flabby pussy!’”

“What the hell does that mean? What was wrong with her?”

“Well, I don’t know what the problem was, but the nurse came over and tried to reason with the woman. She said that the—” Jamie switched her tone to one of a scientist proving a theory “—vagina does, indeed, lose elasticity in pregnancy.”

“Really?” I was genuinely intrigued. I would have to look that up in my book, even if it meant skipping ahead.

“Yeah.”

“Then what?”

“Raj finally came to get me and we went home and we ate bags of pretzels and chips.”

I wanted to tell Jamie some of the stuff that had been going on with me over the past few days and ask her why she had never called me back. I wasn’t really sure where to begin, but before I could, Jamie started crying.

“It’s okay, Jamie,” I said, thinking the whole emergency room experience had frayed her nerves and that I should be grateful that she and the baby were okay. “You just needed to find out if you were okay. Everything’s fine now. The lights are on.”

“But, Voula,” she cried. “What if I really do have a giant flabby vagina?”

I
decided to meet Helen at a Thai restaurant on Smith Street. It was close to her apartment, but
not
her apartment. I wanted to be on quasi-neutral turf.

The night before we met, I had talked to Paul on the phone to plan our date and had told him I was going to be in Brooklyn. It had been three weeks since the blackout and we still hadn’t been able to keep our date: he was working so much. But we talked almost every day. Every time we spoke we made plans to get together, but were always thwarted by his responsibilities. Luckily my piece about the restaurant had been postponed, so I could keep dangling that out as a potential date. I wondered if I was going to cross the line between being a potential girlfriend and being a girl he wanted to be friends with.

The thing was that we talked all the time. He called me at random when nothing was going on at the station. I liked talking to him. He had a unique perspective on things. He just sort of seemed to know things, about the city, about people— about everything. It was easy to talk to him. We talked for hours at a time.

Even though I was worried that we might be crossing a line
into friendship, I felt that the telephone was probably an ideal way for me to get to know someone. Over the phone, I could be myself and see if our senses of humor gelled without having to worry that my eyebrows were growing out or I had spinach in my teeth. I felt like we were really getting to know each other. It was like an old-fashioned courtship or something. The only way I think I could have communicated with someone better was via e-mail. After all, I’m a writer. Unfortunately, Paul didn’t have a computer. He said he had an e-mail account, but rarely got to use it, because some of the other firemen hogged the computer at the firehouse.

I had thought he was so blue collar, but he had this amazing vocabulary. I knew that he hadn’t gone to college and so I figured he read a lot. Every now and then he would mispronounce a word in a way that charmed me. He had obviously taught himself things. It was hard to reconcile this witty voice on the phone with the image of the buff fireman massaging his massive thigh.

When I told him the subway stop for my sibling rendezvous, he said that it was one stop away from his and that the restaurant I was going to was one of his favorites.

“I should scope it out tomorrow and catch you with the other guy.”

“It’s not another guy, it’s—” the word felt foreign in my mouth “—my sister.”

“Aha!” he exclaimed. “I’ve caught you. You said you only knew Park Slope in Brooklyn. I’m totally setting up a sting.”

“Listen, Columbo, it’s really my sister. I do only know Park Slope. I’ve never visited Smith Street before.”

“You would have been here if your sister lived here,” he said. “I’m no fool.”

“You certainly aren’t,” I agreed. “But I
have
only been to Park Slope.”

“She just moved?”

“No,” I said. I wanted to leave it at that. This conversation was only confirming my belief that letting other people into your life made things complicated.

“One of those funny family things,” he said, like he knew all too well.

“Yeah.”

“Well, listen, if it goes sour, you have my number. I’ll be home tomorrow night. I can meet you wherever.”

I wondered if he could hear me smiling. It was true that I barely knew him, but something about him seemed protective and safe. In spite of myself, I liked it.

“Thanks” was all I could think to say.

The woman at the table by the window looked like my aunt Effie looked when I was a kid. It took me a moment to get my bearings and realize that it was my sister. She got up and hugged me. I returned the embrace stiffly. I had wondered if I was going to feel the love all the talk show reunions seemed to celebrate. Instead, I felt like I was meeting a new editor to go over a story. The editor was going to be interviewing me in a sense and just happened to look like a member of my family. I sat down and we stared at each other for a few seconds before either of us said anything.

“Did you find it okay?”

“Yep.”

She looked past my shoulder, as if trying to find the next question written on the wall. “How is your job going?”

“Okay,” I said. I probably should have elaborated, but it seemed like it should be my turn to ask a question. Then I realized I couldn’t really remember what she did. I guessed. “So you teach, right?”

“Yes.”

She asked where I had been for the blackout, and I told her.

She told me a long rambling story of how she had to find her son during the blackout, and I had a feeling that she was trying desperately to dispel the weirdness and realizing as she went on that she was only making it worse.

When the waitress took our drink orders, we consulted our menus in great depth. I was certain I wanted the massaman curry with chicken as spicy as I could get it, with a side of jas
mine rice instead of regular, and I was definitely going to try the curry puffs. I stared at the menu for a while, though, pretending I wasn’t sure.

The waitress came back and Helen ordered first. She chose the exact same thing I did, right down to the really spicy curry.

“And for you?” the waitress said.

I hesitated, but then asked for the same thing. Helen smiled, looking pleased, as if she had to prove we were really related. I don’t know why I was so determined to put some distance between us.

“Look, this is really strange.”

“I know,” she said, sounding almost desperate.

“I know we have a lot in common, but I just don’t really know how to be. I’ve gotten used to not having a sister.”

“You had two.”

“I haven’t forgotten that, believe me. I just don’t like to think about it. I mean, you made a choice to leave.”

“What else could I have done?”

“I don’t know, listened to them, served out your time.”

“For how long?” Her voice rose.

I looked over at the people at the next table. They were close enough to hear us.

She lowered her voice. “I was dying there. It’s no way to live. They never would have let me go away to college. I mean, did they let you go away to college?”

“Well, I went to Columbia. That’s not too shabby. I lived at home to save money.”

She raised an eyebrow. She knew it was bullshit. “With your grades, you mean to tell me that you couldn’t have gotten a scholarship to a school that was just as good, but not in New York. Georgia told me you only moved out a few years ago. It’s time to cut the cord.”

“It’s easy for you to say.”

“It’s not easy, I just did it.”

“Well, what do you want me to do?”

“Nothing—”

Our food came and we pulled back from the table as the
exact same plates were set before us. When the waitress told us to enjoy our meals, Helen picked up her napkin and folded it into a perfect square on her lap.

“I just wanted us to be in contact again. You’re my sister. I love you. You saved my life,” she said.

I didn’t know what to say to that. I took a few bites of my curry puff. It was piping hot and I felt my mouth burning. I swallowed quickly and it burned all the way down. I knew what she was talking about—one of the many nights I had woken up in a cold sweat.

“I don’t know if I did. I don’t remember.”

“Papa would have killed me.”

“No.” I shook my head. “No.”

Helen reached across the table and took my hand. I glanced down at our identical skin tone, the exact same jagged fingernails. I let her hold my hand without squeezing back.

“We share so much,” she said. “We share Cristina.”

“Please don’t talk about Cristina,” I said in a voice I didn’t recognize. I imagined what Georgia must have told her about my methods of denial. Georgia was always encouraging me to talk about Cristina, but I still couldn’t. “It wasn’t all bad, you know, living there.”

“No, I know,” she said. “My husband always tells me that his family is mine now. He says he and the kids are my family, that we are different than they were with us and Cristina.”

I felt my nose fill and numb. I wanted to defend our family.

“He’s right in a way,” Helen continued. “Having kids changes things, but I wouldn’t change all of it. It wasn’t the normal happy American family, but it was mine. You know, it made me me. It wasn’t all bad. I remember watching the soccer games, late into the night. You remember that?”

“Of course,” I said. I remembered being allowed to stay up really late, while my uncle and father hooted over every play, plates of
keftedes
coming out of the oven, my father picking me up and twirling me in the air when our team got a goal.

She nodded as if she was proving something to me. Maybe she was.

“Can we just—” I shook my head and looked around the restaurant “—talk, you know, just about now.”

“Okay,” she said. And we did.

She told me about her kids and her job. She showed me pictures of her beautiful dark-eyed children that looked like they were old souls trapped in young bodies. I told her about my writing. She said she had read a few of my pieces. She even quoted things to me from my scathing review of
My Big Fat Greek Wedding.
I was flattered and kept laughing with her, realizing that she had my uncle’s sense of humor, my aunt’s face, and whether or not I wanted to accept it, a smile like Cristina’s. I had a wonderful time with her, but sometimes it sort of hurt to look at her.

At the end of the night, she walked me to the subway.

“Now, you’re sure you don’t want to come over for some Italian pastry? They make it really good around here.”

“Next time,” I said.

She nodded like she wasn’t really sure she believed that I meant it, but I think I did.

“Okay, next time. Safe home.”

We hugged.

“Thanks,” I said, and went down the steps to the subway that would take me back to Manhattan.

I was more excited the following night about meeting Paul at Esme’s Eatery. He was standing outside the West Village restaurant with a bouquet of sunflowers, not the small ones that you see outside delis, but four big flowers that probably needed their own seat in the place.

He smiled as I came up to him. I liked how he was looking at me. I was looking at him, too. And he looked good! His hair was cut short, so his face seemed more square. His brown eyes appeared hazel because he was wearing a short-sleeved button-down shirt that was green and brown plaid, and brown cotton pants. I wondered about his thigh. I had to force myself to stop thinking about it.

He surprised me with a bear hug. He was so much bigger
than me. He had to be about six foot two, but he was just there, you know, present, solid.

He bent to kiss me on the cheek. I flushed, remembering how I had kissed him in front of my apartment. He handed me the flowers, ceremoniously.

“Why, thank you,” I said.

“You look great,” he said. It was matter-of-fact.

He was much more at ease than I was. I didn’t know what to say. I had already thanked him for the flowers.

“Should we go in?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said. He held the door for me.

The restaurant was small and lit by candles in small brown paper bags. I find that most New York restaurants are too tiny; you’re trying to have a conversation, but you can’t help eavesdropping on the people next to you who might as well be sitting in your lap. This place, though, had only about a dozen or so tables. Most of them were for two people. There were a couple of four-seaters and one big round table for six. There was also a wood-burning stove that had been filled with candles. They had used the space really well and it seemed the joint was filled with people on third dates.

“What’s your name, please?” the hostess asked us, after chatting with a couple near the door.

“Pavlopoulos, I have an eight o’clock.” I couldn’t reveal that I was from
NY BY NIGHT.
I didn’t want any special treatment.

“Right this way.” She helped me with my chair and handed us menus. She gestured to the flowers. “They’re lovely. I’ll bring you a vase. Enjoy your evening.”

“Nice place,” Paul said, looking at me over the menu.

I realized right then that I wanted this to work. I wasn’t sure what
work
meant, but I wanted to leave tonight with this good feeling.

I put the sunflowers in the vase the hostess brought and we ordered a nice Australian bottle of wine. The food was wonderful. I had ratatouille-stuffed octopus with chickpea fries, and Paul had pea risotto. I got halibut and he ordered a steak. I told him about the assignment I had been working on about the
blackout. A magazine had hired me to write captions for some photographs from all over the city. He told me about all kinds of fire calls he had been on. Neither one of us mentioned September eleventh, which had just passed, or where he had been two years ago on that day.

We ate slowly and no one rushed us. The servers were attentive without being overbearing.

“They got a real nice thing going,” I said after we had been there for almost two hours.

“You think it’s them,” Paul asked, winking. “Or us?”

I smiled. He reached across the table and took my hand. I wasn’t used to so much physical contact and yet the past couple of days had been full of hand holding.

“You want some dessert? Maybe some coffee. I bet you like coffee. You Greek types. Excuse me, Cypriot.”

I liked that he had corrected himself.

“Was everything okay?” the woman who had seated us asked.

“Yes, perfect,” I said.

“The food was excellent,” Paul said. As he said it, a man wearing a chef’s coat and plaid pants came out of the kitchen and slipped his arm around the waist of the woman.

“Great job,” Paul said to the man.

“Thanks, we’re glad you liked it. We hope you come back,” the chef said. As he spoke, the woman looked at him smiling.

“My steak was so tender.”

“Thanks. Ben’s a great cook,” the woman said.

“That’s for sure,” I said. “Are you Esme?”

“No,” she said. She smiled a shy smile. “I’m Rebecca. We just named this place after someone who is very dear to us.”