Forgotten Yiddish—opened it, saw she’d written on the paper being used as a bookmark, he supposed, and read it. “The Bronx, Knox Place, where I lived in it: Ruxton, where we live now; Aix-en-Provence, where I did so much of my doctoral research; my ex, Rex, and lots of sexy sex with you.” He said, “Was ‘Rex’ Richard’s nickname?” and she said “No, Ricky was. But it’s what I called him when he was acting imperiously to me, which he did a lot of the last year of our marriage.” She said, if this was their first date, she thinks she better be getting her bus, as she has a good deal of class work to do at home. They were outside for more than an hour. Walked very slowly as they talked. Got to 86th Street or somewhere around there, sat on a bench facing the river and park for about fifteen minutes. The bench was his idea and he probably asked her if it was too cold for her to sit and she might have said something like “Is it too cold for you? It isn’t for me.” He seems to remember a huge tanker making its way up the river. If he’s right, then they probably talked about it because it was so unusual and the ship was so big. He knows it happened once during one of their walks along the park side of the Drive. The car traffic going north — it was past five o’clock by now — was probably heavy as it always was on weekdays around that time and for the next hour or more — drivers trying to avoid the even heavier traffic going north on the West Side Highway — and they might have talked about that too. How, when they started their walk, there was hardly any traffic going either way, the Drive was relatively quiet and the air fresher, with so little car fumes, and it was still light out. Shortly before they got up from the bench, he thinks they stared in front of themselves awhile and then looked at each other and smiled. That’s what he pictures. He thinks it was around then when she said she better be getting her bus. He waited with her at the bus stop. She said he didn’t have to, she’d be all right, and he said “Are you kidding? I’m not leaving you alone here; I don’t care how long it takes the bus to come.” She said “The schedule”—there was one on the bus stop pole—“says…let’s see…they’re supposed to come every seven minutes at this hour, but you know New York.” He said “We should do this again — meet, one of these next few nights. But maybe for a glass of beer or wine this time, and early around five or six, if you like,” and she said “That’d be fine with me. Why don’t you call me and I’ll see what my calendar’s like. I know this weekend I’m busy. My parents, one night; a friend, the other. And Sunday I prepare for my class on Monday…a lot of reading, which I like to do the previous night.” “Not even for just a wee small drink for half an hour on Sunday? I’ll come up to your neighborhood, make it as convenient as possible for you,” and she said “It wouldn’t be worth the bother to you for just a half-hour, and besides, I have to stay focused.” “How about if I call later tonight to see what you’re doing next week,” and she said “Best, once I get home, I don’t think of anything but my work — there’s that much. Being relatively new at teaching my own course, you can say I like coming to class overprepared.” “But you do want to meet again, though, right? I mean if you don’t, that’s okay too,” and she said “I thought I said so; yes. It was fun, this afternoon,” and he said “I’d like to say ‘likewise,’ but that’d sound corny and it’s not something I’d ever say. Tell me, what am I saying? God, this is going badly, isn’t it? I must seem like a complete schlemiel to you,” and she said “Why do you say that? There’s my bus,” he thinks she said around then, and he thought it had ended badly and now he doesn’t know if she will agree to see him when he calls. He better give it a few days before he does call. Monday, to show he was in no rush. Oh, damn; strategies, he thought. He was feeling so good, so why couldn’t he have shut up at the end when he should have? But maybe it’s not that bad. What’s so wrong in showing you’re interested, so long as you don’t show you’re too interested too early on and maybe scare her off? More strategy, and what he thought after her bus left. He thinks it was the number five. No, he knows. They kept her apartment on Riverside Drive, till three years ago. When they were evicted because New York wasn’t their permanent address and they lived in the apartment for less than six months a year. Some regulation for rent-stabilized apartments, which lots of landlords don’t know about or take advantage of, but theirs did. With them out, he could fix the place up: new kitchen appliances and cabinets and toilet and paint job and sanding the floors and maybe new energy-saving windows — and get four times the rent they were paying and, under the table, because the apartment had such a great view, ten to twenty thousand in key money too. That’s what they’d heard. Gwen was very upset over it. She loved New York and her father still lived there at the time, while his own mother had died six years before and he didn’t much care for the City anymore. Too hectic and noisy and smelly and other things. He doesn’t know when he’ll next get there, even for just a day or two. They could have fought the eviction. She wanted to. The rent was affordable on their two salaries and she’d had the apartment since a few months before they met, and for about five years before that had lived in a smaller apartment in the back of the building with her first husband and then alone. But they were told by people who knew about things like this that they’d lose — the Real Estate Board or Commission or whatever it is almost always sides with the landlord — and they’d have to pay all court costs and about two thousand dollars in lawyer fees, theirs and the landlord’s, if not more. He’s repeating himself; he knows. The bus stopped. When he turned around he saw there was also now an elderly couple waiting for it, the man with a walker — he doesn’t know how he hadn’t heard the walker clanking on the sidewalk as the couple approached the bus stop — and the right front of the bus had to be lowered. He pictures putting out his hand and saying “So I’ll see ya; this was fun,” and she smiling and shaking his hand and saying goodbye and getting on the bus after the couple and standing in the aisle near the front — the bus was packed; he wonders if anyone gave up his seat to the elderly man; he knows he would have, or to the woman if someone had already given up his seat to the man — and taking a book out of her bag and waving it at him while with her other hand holding the pole above her head, as the bus pulled away. He waving back. After that, just about whenever he walked her to the subway or a bus stop, he’d kiss her goodbye and then blow a kiss to her as she went through the turnstile — he usually walked downstairs with her, didn’t just leave her at the top — or her bus pulled away, and she’d always smile at him, as she didn’t that first time on the bus, and often wave. “Unlike you, I’m not naturally demonstrative that way,” she said once when he asked her “How come you never blow a kiss back to me? Not important, so long as you kiss me just before we go our separate ways,” but she told him. And then said “If you really want me to do it every time we separate, I will,” and he said “It’s up to you. I like it but wouldn’t want you to do anything that’s unnatural for you,” and she continued not doing it. This was after they first slept together and maybe a few days after that said they loved each other. No, it took more time. He remembers it as being morning, around seven or eight, her bedroom was very cold, he got another blanket out of the linen closet and spread it out over the bed, got back in bed with her and she opened her eyes, must have just got awake, and said “What’s all the fuss about so early?” and he said “Keeping you warm, my dovey. You know I love you,” and she said “And I love you,” and they kissed. At least he thinks that was the first time they said it. He really now doesn’t know. He’s never been able to get that straight and when he asked her he thinks she said she didn’t know. And he now thinks she must have thought that blowing kisses was silly but she didn’t want to hurt his feelings by saying so. So what did he do after her bus left? Might have watched it disappear up Riverside Drive and, after a while, just its interior lights, and thought something like “She’s on it,” and pictured her standing and reading and grabbing the pole above her or the handle on the seat next to her when the bus was coming to a stop. Or thought again how lovely and smart and perfect for him she is, and what luck he’s getting to know her. Luck that he’d gone to Yaddo when he did and his room and Pati’s were next to each other and they became friends. And again, that business about don’t screw it up. And that things hadn’t gone as badly as he first thought they had. He can be clumsy in what he says sometimes, but she didn’t seem like someone who’d make something of it. She must see by now he’s a little awkward around her but having a good time. The conversation was good and that’s what’d seem important to her, he’d think. Have they started seeing each other? he thinks he thought. Anyway, he could have. In a way, yes, but so small a way that it’s too early to be certain of even that yet. There is going to be another date, that he’s almost sure of. And if there’s one or two after that, he thinks he’s in. Next one could be for dinner or lunch or just drinks somewhere, but not for another coffee and tea unless she says that’s what she’d prefer it to be. Actually, doesn’t matter to him what it is, he might have thought, so long as they meet. He probably walked down Broadway, could have stopped in at Fairway for a few things, maybe also the liquor store on Columbus near his block for a bottle of vodka or the fancy wine shop on 72nd for a bottle of wine, and went home. It’s possible he wrote some more and read for a while and then made himself a cheese sandwich, which he used to do around seven or eight just about every other night: rye toast or toasted rye bagel, tomato slices, lettuce, Dijon mustard, preferably an imported Swiss or French-like Swiss cheese and, if he wasn’t going to meet anybody that evening, thin slice of what used to be called Bermuda onion. Called his friend Manny later on and said something like “Want to meet for a beer? I want to tell you about this woman I met at a party last week and saw for coffee today and whom I’ll probably see again and I think I could really get to like.” Knows he called Manny that night because Manny reminded him of it several times, even at his wedding. “Who’s the first person you had to speak to about the future bride? Me. I take great pride in that and knew from the start you were lost.” They met at Ruppert’s. Doesn’t know what it’s called today. Something, he thinks, with “American” and “Café” in it, but that name could also have been changed since he last saw it. Or maybe it was still “O’Neal Bros.” when Manny and he met there that night. Knows it still wasn’t Kelly’s Bar & Grill, which it had been for about fifty years when they first started going to it in ’68. They sat or stood at the bar. The television above the bar was on, as it always seemed to be — usually, around this time and month, to a hockey or basketball game. Manny said “So who’s this chickie you’re so knocked over by that you had to drag me out into the cold to talk about her?” and he said “I didn’t say I was knocked over. And come on, it’s not that cold out and your place is the same three blocks from here as mine. Anyway, I’m just beginning to know her — it’s only been a week and one phone call and coffee date — but I think there’s potential there.” “Potential to bed her?” and he said “Potential to have a good relationship.” “What are her looks like?” and he said “She’s good-looking. Very good-looking, I’d say, though you might not think so.” “I don’t know. We agree on some things. But specifics,” which is what Manny liked to say. “Give me specifics,” and he said “Long blond hair, but a real blond, and beautiful smile and skin and, I think, green eyes.” “How can you tell her hair’s not bleached?” and he said “It’s just that when it isn’t, it looks like it isn’t. I’ve lived with a couple of real blonds. And she has a wonderful disposition, which is not looks, but helps. Soft, calm, as is her voice.” “How old is she?” and he told him and Manny said “Lots of years between you two, but that’s all right. She’ll take care of you in your old age.” “She’s also very bright. I know this means a lot to you. Has a Ph.D. from Columbia in French literature — her dissertation was on Camus. You like Camus. You’ve said