Barking at Butterflies and other stories

The Movie Star

She had just come out of Mr. Mergenthaler’s office, and was heading for Cost when Jerry Schneider stopped her and said, “Nora, would you mind very much if I told you something?”

“What is it you want to tell me?” she asked. She was really in a hurry because Mr. Mergenthaler had said to get those invoices to Cost immediately, but Jerry was a nice high school kid of about sixteen who was only working for Mergenthaler and Harris during the summer, and she didn’t want to seem abrupt with him.

“I guess people have told you this a hundred times,” Jerry said.

“Told me what?”

“That you look like Kim Novak.”

“Oh, sure, Kim Novak.”

“I mean it.”

“Kim Novak is a blond.”

“That don’t make any difference,” Jerry said. “I know your hair is brown, Nora, but that don’t make any difference. You look just like her, I mean it. It’s the look right in here...” He raised his hand before her face and made a vague defining gesture. “Right in here, the eyes and nose and mouth.”

“My eyes are blue,” she said. “Hers are...”

“I know, but...”

“Hers are supposed to be lavender or something.”

“I didn’t mean the color,” Jerry said, “though the color is pretty close, too. I meant the look in her eyes, you’ve got the same kind of distant look she gets in her eyes. And your nose is hers exactly, Nora, I mean it. Exactly.” He paused. “Your mouth, too.”

“Oh, come on, Jerry,” she said. “Kim Novak is a beautiful girl.”

“Well, so are you, Nora. You could be her twin sister, I mean it.”

“Sure.”

“I mean it.”

“You’d better have your eyes examined,” she said and shrugged. “I have to hurry. Thank you, anyway.”

She smiled, and then walked quickly down the corridor to Cost. She was still smiling when she entered the office. Marvin Krantz, who was the company’s cost accountant, looked up and said, “What’s the big grin for?”

“Oh, Jerry Schneider,” she said. “Here are some invoices Mr. Mergenthaler said I should get to you in a hurry.”

“What’d he do?”

“Who? Oh, Jerry, you mean?” She smiled again. “He’s a silly kid.”

“Yeah, but what’d he do?” Marvin asked.

“He said I look like Kim Novak.”

“Well, you do,” Marvin said immediately.

“What?”

“Sure. Didn’t you know it?”

“Oh, come on, Marvin. Stop kidding me.”

“Everyone in the office says so.”

“How come you never told me before?”

“Maybe I didn’t think it was very important,” Marvin said.

“Well, I mean, if a girl looks like Kim Novak...” She shrugged. “Oh, come on, you’re kidding me.”

“Nora, you’re a very pretty girl,” Marvin said solemnly.

“But Kim Novak is a movie star.”

“So? Does that make her not a person?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No. What do you mean?”

“She’s a movie star. She’s Kim Novak.”

“So? You’re Nora Feldman. I’ll tell you something, Nora. I think Kim Novak would be delighted to learn that she looks like you.”

“Oh, sure, I’ll just bet she would. Besides, we don’t look alike at all,” she said, and walked out of the office.

On her way to the subway that night, she bought three movie magazines. One of them had Kim Novak’s picture on the cover. She didn’t get a seat until the train reached 149th Street and the Grand Concourse, and then she studied the picture on the cover as well as several pictures inside all three magazines. Nora supposed she was as tall as Kim Novak, or at least as tall as she imagined her to be, since none of the magazines gave a height. Nora was five feet seven in her stockinged feet, and Kim Novak seemed to be at least that tall, if not taller. But that was exactly where the resemblance ended, she thought. Even so, she continued to look at the pictures all the way uptown to Mosholu Parkway.

The benches outside the park were crowded with the usual collection of fellows who would whistle and call every time Nora walked past. They always made her feel clumsy and exposed, she didn’t know why, as though they could somehow see through her clothes. She always wished she could walk past with her head high and her nose tilted, just ignoring them. That night, she suddenly wondered why she never wore high-heeled shoes to work. Because I’m too tall, she thought, and then immediately remembered that Kim Novak was at least as tall as she was. Yes, but she’s a movie star, Nora reminded herself, and walked quickly past the benches, looking down at the sidewalk.

Her grandmother was cooking borscht in the kitchen of their Knox Place apartment. Nora put the magazine on the enamel-topped kitchen table and said, “Grandma, do you think I look like this girl?”

Her grandmother turned from the pot, looked at the picture of Kim Novak on the cover of the magazine, and said, “Who’s this?”

“Kim Novak.”

“Who?”

“Kim Novak. She’s a movie star.”

“A what?”

“A movie star.”

“She looks to me like a shiksa,” her grandmother said.

“She is.”

“So this is what you want to look like? A shiksa?”

“Grandma, I didn’t say I wanted to look like her. I only asked if you thought I looked like her.”

“By me, that’s the same thing.”

“Oh, boy, you’re impossible,” Nora said. “Never mind, I’ll ask Daddy when he gets home.”

“Sure,” her grandmother said. “Go ask him if you look like a Hollywood shiksa. That’s a nice thing you should ask a man when he gets home from work, to give him a heart attack.”

When she asked her father that night, he kissed her on both cheeks and hugged her and said, “Sweetheart, you look like Kim Novak and Elizabeth Taylor and Ava Gardner all rolled into one.” His voice lowered. “You also look very much like your dear mother,” he said, “may she rest in peace.”

The next day was Friday which was always a very busy day at Mergenthaler and Harris, not because Mr. Harris always left very early on Friday to go to his beach club in New Ro-chelle, but only because Friday was the day new lots of dresses always were shipped out, though God knew why on a Friday, the last day of the week. This Friday was just like every other Friday at Mergenthaler and Harris, except that it rained which meant Mr. Harris didn’t go to his beach club in New Rochelle, but instead was underfoot and in everybody’s way, especially with a lot of sixteen hundred dresses coming off the factory floor at three o’clock in the afternoon, and everyone anxious to get them sorted and packed and out before quitting time. Mr. Harris was a great help with his foul-smelling cigar, snapping orders at floor boys and packers and even some cutters who had nothing at all to do with the packing and shipping operation. Also on this Friday which was raining and hectic, Marvin Krantz asked Nora if she would like to go to dinner and a movie with him after work. She accepted and then called her grandmother to tell her she wouldn’t be home for dinner.

“Do you know this is the Sabbath?” her grandmother asked.

“Yes, grandma.”

“So where are you going on the Sabbath?”

“To dinner and a movie.”

“To see a Hollywood shiksa?”

“Grandma, there are a lot of Jewish people in Hollywood,” Nora said.

“Yes, I see them,” her grandmother answered, “on all the covers of the magazines.”

“Grandma, as a matter of fact, one of the biggest stars in Hollywood is Jewish.”

“Yes, who?”

“Elizabeth Taylor.”

“Sure,” her grandmother said, and hung up.

All during dinner, Marvin kept saying that he was taking Nora to “a very special movie” tonight, being very mysterious about the whole thing, but not mystifying her at all. She knew pretty well what he had planned, and wasn’t at all surprised when they approached a marquee with the name KIM NOVAK across it in big black letters

“Here we are,” Marvin said. “Now I prove my point.”

“What point, Marvin?”

“That you’re beautiful.”

“But I’m not.”

“You admit that Kim Novak is beautiful, don’t you?”

“Oh, of course.”

“Okay. If I can prove you look like her, then maybe you’ll realize just how beautiful you really are.”

“You make me feel silly,” Nora said.

“Why?”

“Well, first because I don’t look like Kim Novak. And also... well, because you keep telling me I’m beautiful.”

“You are.”

“I wish you’d stop, Marvin.”

“Why?”

“Well, you sound so serious.”

“Suppose I am?”

“I’m only twenty-one years old,” Nora said.

“Old enough to have dozens of babies,” Marvin said.

“Well, thank you, but I don’t want dozens of babies.”

“What do you want, Nora?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Everything. I want everything, Marvin.”

“Well,” Martin said, very seriously, “I can’t give you everything, Nora.”

“Then why don’t we just go see the movie?” she said, and they went inside.

A strange thing began happening to her as she watched the picture. She knew what Kim Novak looked like, of course, but she had never really watched her before, or at least never studied her the way she was studying her now. What she was trying to do was to sort of superimpose a picture of herself up there on the screen beside the picture of Kim Novak, to see if they really did look at all alike. She finally decided that both Jerry Schneider and Marvin Krantz were out of their minds. Side by side, the images of Nora Feldman and Kim Novak bore no resemblance to each other whatever. To begin with, Nora was much shorter than Kim Novak. Nora’s hair was brown whereas hers was a pale blonde. Nora’s bust was nowhere as full. Nora’s legs were certainly not as good. Nor did her eyes, nose, or mouth look at all like the eyes, nose or mouth of Kim Novak. She didn’t even sound like her. She was about to tell Marvin how crazy she thought he was when the strange thing began happening.

As the picture got close to the end, Kim Novak was running along the cliff chasing an old lady in a wheelchair. It was pretty exciting and pretty funny at the same time, and Nora was laughing along with everyone else m the theater and of course was excited, but suddenly her heart began to pound so hard she thought it would push itself right out of her chest.

“Hey, easy,” Marvin said, and she realized she was squeezing his hand very tightly, so she dropped it and instead clasped both her hands together and discovered they were covered with sweat. It was then that Nora began to believe it. It was then that she felt it was she who was chasing that old lady in the wheelchair, and not Kim Novak. Why, it’s true, she thought. We do look alike.

She was suddenly very scared and also son of pleased. She kept looking at the screen with a strange smile on her face. She’d always thought of herself as only herself, but now, well... now she realized that she did look very much like Kim Novak, who was a movie star. Little Nora Feldman from Knox Place looked like a movie star.

She shrugged.

Boy, she thought.

“Well, what do you think now?” Marvin asked as the house lights went up.

“I don’t know,” Nora said.

That night, when Marvin took her home, she bleached her hair a pale blond.

If there was any remaining doubt in her own mind concerning her resemblance to Kim Novak, the bleaching of her hair settled it at once. On Saturday morning, when she went down to the candy store on Gun Hill Road to buy the Daily News, the owner of the store — whose name was Gregory but whom everyone called Gus — said to her, “You know something, Nora?”

“What, Gus?”

“With your hair this way, you look just like Kim Novak.”

“Thank you,” Nora said.

“It’s amazing,” Gus said. “You could be her twin sister.”

“Well, thank you,” she said, and walked home with her newspaper. At eleven o’clock, she went down for a walk in the park and was stopped five times by people she knew who told her that with her hair this way she looked just like Kim Novak. By Sunday, everyone in her neighborhood, which was bounded by Mosholu Parkway and Gun Hill Road, had grown used to the blond hair and the idea that she looked like Kim Novak, so no one else mentioned it to her. But on Monday morning, the man in the change booth of the Mosholu Parkway elevated station said to her, “Miss, you’re a dead ringer for Kim Novak,” and Nora thanked him and accepted her token, smiling. When she reached the office, Mr. Mergenthaler buzzed her and told her to come in at once with her pad, and she ran into his office and listened while he reeled off a list of things he wanted done in a hurry and then he looked up abruptly and said, “What the hell did you do to your hair?”

“I tinted it, Mr. Mergenthaler.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes, sir.”

“My daughter tints her hair,” Mr. Mergenthaler said. “Why do you women do that, anyway?”

“I don’t know. Does it look awful, Mr. Mergenthaler?”

“Awful? No, it’s very nice. In fact...” He pursed his lips and frowned at her, looking extremely puzzled. “Well, never mind,” he said. “We’ve got a lot to do this morning.”

It wasn’t until after lunch that he buzzed her again and said, “Now I know what it is.”

“What what is, Mr. Mergenthaler?”

“Who you look like with your hair this way.”

“Who, Mr. Mergenthaler?”

“That movie star,” he said. “Kim Novak. Did you ever hear of her?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, there’s a very strong resemblance between you two girls.”

“Thank you, Mr. Mergenthaler.”

“Don’t mention it. Did you give my message to the cutting room foreman?”

“Yes, sir, I did.”

“Good,” Mr. Mergenthaler said, and clicked off.

When Jerry Schneider saw her later that afternoon, he immediately slapped his forehead and said, “Wow! Now you’ve done it, Nora, I mean it. Now you look just like her!”

“Do you think so, Jerry?”

“Boy, do I!” Jerry said. “Listen, Nora, if I bring a camera to work tomorrow, will you take a picture with me in front of the building? On our lunch hour?”

“Why?”

“So when I get back to school, I can show it to the guys and they’ll think I know Kim Novak.”

Nora smiled and said, “All right,” and then shrugged.

She put off going into Marvin’s office until late in the afternoon. Marvin, busily adding a column of figures, barely glanced up at her as she put a batch of invoices on his desk.

“Hello, Nora,” he said. “Did you have a nice weekend?”

“Very nice, Marvin.”

She waited by his desk, hoping he would look up, but he kept working with his head bent.

“Marvin?” she said at last.

“Mmm?” he said, without looking up.

“Look at me.”

He raised his eyes.

“Do you like my hair this way?”

Marvin studied her for a moment and then said, “It’s blond. When did you do that?”

“Friday night. After you dropped me off.”

“Why?”

“I thought it would be fun.”

“You look very pretty, Nora,” Marvin said. “But then, you’ve always looked pretty.”

“Do you like it better?”

“I like it the same.”

“But don’t you think I...?” She hesitated and then shrugged.

“Don’t I think you what?”

“Nothing,” she said, and left his office. She began practicing her new voice when she got home that night. She’d been thinking about it all the way uptown on the subway, so that by the time she got home she could almost hear it inside her head. When her father went into the spare room after dinner, to watch television, Nora and her grandmother began doing the dishes, and that was when she tried the new voice for the first time.

“Speak up,” her grandmother said. “I can’t hear you.”

“Grandma, I’m purposely trying not to shout like a fishwife.”

“Yes, so instead you’re whispering like somebody in a hospital, God forbid.”

“I’m trying to cultivate my voice,” Nora said.

“For what?”

“Just to sound better.”

“Then speak up,” her grandmother said, “and you’ll sound better.”

She practiced the new voice all through the next morning, answering the telephone in a breathy whisper that was a little startling to some of the customers of Mergenthaler and Harris. Just before lunch, in fact, one of the customers said, “Excuse me, this is Mergenthaler and Harris?”

“Yes, sir,” Nora said in the same voice. “Whom did you wish to speak with?”

“I’ll tell you the truth, young lady, you almost make me forget,” the man said, and Nora laughed a funny sort of laugh that seemed to originate somewhere way back in her throat.

On her lunch hour, she posed for a whole roll of pictures with Jerry Schneider outside the building. After lunch, she surprised Mr. Schwartz, who ran an outlet store in a Pennsylvania farmer’s market, by using her new phone voice on him. And later, she caused poor Mr. Harris to puff very anxiously on his cigar when she gave him the funny laugh from the back of her throat. For the remainder of that week, she practiced the voice and the laugh almost constantly. She also went all the way down to Fourteenth Street to see Kim Novak in a revival of The Man With The Golden Arm, and she bought as many movie magazines as she could find, searching for photos of Kim Novak and remembering what Jerry had said about that distant look in her eyes. Nora studied the look, and tried imitating it in her bathroom mirror, but she only looked either stupid or sleepy until one night she just stumbled upon it accidentally and almost scared herself half to death.

Oh my God, Nora thought, look at that.

Fascinated, she stared at this person in the mirror. Then she shivered and went to bed.

On Tuesday of the second week after she’d bleached her hair, Nora wore high heels to work.

“Where are you going?” her grandmother asked as she was leaving the apartment. “To a party?”

“I’m going to work.”

“With shoes like that?”

“What’s the matter with these shoes?” Nora asked.

“Speak up, I can’t hear you,” her grandmother said.

“This is my normal speaking voice,” Nora whispered.

“It sounds to me like laryngitis.”

“I’m terribly sorry-,” Nora said.

“Such shoes to work,” her grandmother said, and shook her head.

The shoes were a bit high perhaps, and Nora felt a little self-conscious throughout part of the morning, but only until she got used to the extra two inches they added to her height. Some of the girls in the office told her they’d never realized how tall she was, and one of the salesmen said, “Nora, you are positively statuesque. Did anyone ever tell you you look like Kim Novak?”

“Yes, a few people,” she said.

“You even sound like her.”

“Do you think so?” Nora whispered, and then laughed her throaty laugh and gave him her look.

“I’ll be damned,” the salesman said.

That night, on her way home from the elevated station, she walked past the boys on the park bench with her head very high, her heels clicking on the pavement, the distant smoldering look on her face. The boys on the bench were dead silent. There were no whistles and no catcalls. They stared at her as she walked past, and didn’t even begin whispering about her until she was well past the bench. Her eyes heavy-lidded, her face inscrutable, she allowed a tiny half-smile of triumph to play about her lips.

The next day, it really began happening.

It began happening on her lunch hour. She had walked cross-town to Fifth Avenue and then decided to have lunch in Schrafft’s. She was wearing her favorite color, which was lavender, and her blond hair was combed loosely about her face. She walked with a confident sway in the high-heeled shoes, coming into the restaurant and pausing to look for the hostess, a distant expression on her face.

She was unaware of anything around her because she was frankly very hungry and was thinking of what she would order. The hostess led her to a table, and Nora smiled at her and then picked up the menu and looked at it. A waitress came over and stood grinning a little foolishly, her pencil poised over her order pad. Nora looked up and said, in her breathy quiet voice, “I’d like a grilled cheese sandwich and a cup of coffee.”

“Yes, Miss Novak,” the waitress said, and grinned again, and immediately left the table before Nora could correct her.

Almost as soon as the waitress was gone, a young girl in a dark blue skirt and white blouse came to the table carrying a pen and a sheet of paper.

“Excuse me,” she said. “Could I have your autograph, Miss Novak?”

Nora looked at her and smiled. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not Kim Novak.”

The little girl seemed puzzled. “You’re not?” she asked.

“No. I’m not.”

“Gee, you sure look like her,” the girl said.

“Yes, but I’m not.” Nora said. The girl continued to stare at her, and Nora realized all at once that the girl didn’t believe her. “Really,” she said, “I’d be happy to give you my autograph if I were Kim Novak. But I’m not.”

“Well,” the girl said, “thank you,” and she smiled weakly and went back to her table. At the table, Nora heard the girl say to her mother, “She wouldn’t give it to me.”

Nora frowned. When her grilled cheese sandwich came, she began eating it in silence.

“Will that be all, Miss Novak?” the waitress said.

“I’m not Kim Novak,” Nora said.

“You aren’t?” the waitress asked. Her voice managed to convey disbelief, disappointment, and scorn — all at the same time.

“I’m sorry,” Nora said. “I’m not.”

That afternoon, on the way to the subway, a boy pushing an empty dress rack stopped her and asked for her autograph. Nora told him she was sorry, she was not Kim Novak. On Thursday, in Penn Station, a girl with a valise chased her all the way to the street and then breathlessly told her she loved all of her pictures and could she please write To Louisa, With Warmest Wishes, and then sign it? Nora told the girl that she was sorry, she was not Kim Novak. On Friday, she ate lunch in a little Italian restaurant near Eighth Avenue, sitting alone at a table in the rear of the place. She was asked for her autograph five times during lunch. Each time she said she was sorry, she was not Kim Novak.

That night, when Marvin asked her where she wanted to go for dinner, she immediately said, “Sardi’s.”

“Why Sardi’s?”

“Why not? The food is very good there,” Nora answered.

“What?” he asked. “I’m sorry, Nora, I can’t hear you. You’re almost whispering.”

“I said the food is good there, isn’t it?”

“Well, yes.”

“Then let’s go.”

She was very much aware of the stir she caused as she entered the restaurant. She saw the heads turning at all the tables, and she put her hand lightly on Marvin’s arm and whispered something about the pictures of the celebrities on the walls, and then smiled and stared smolderingly into the distance. At the bar on her right, she heard a man saying, “Look, honey, there’s Kim Novak.”

“We don’t have a reservation,” Marvin said to the head waiter.

The head waiter smiled genially. “That’s all right, sir,” he said. “We’ll see what we can do.”

He snapped his fingers, and they found a table for Marvin and Nora at the front of the restaurant, not too far from the entrance door.

“It’s very hard to get seated downstairs without a reservation,” Marvin said.

“Is it?” Nora asked.

“Yeah. This is a very good table.”

“We didn’t seem to have any trouble getting it.”

“No, we didn’t. That’s unusual.”

“Yes,” Nora said.

“Would you like to have a drink?” Marvin asked.

“No, thank you. Not now.”

“Would you mind if I had one?”

“Not at all.”

“Because, to tell you the truth, Nora, by the time Friday’s over, I really need a drink, believe me.”

“Go right ahead.”

Marvin ordered a double scotch on the rocks. The waiter took the order and then turned to Nora and smiled. “Nothing for you, Miss Novak?” he asked.

“Not right now, thank you,” Nora said, and the waiter smiled and left the table.

“What did he call you?” Marvin asked.

“Who?”

“The waiter. Did he call you ‘Miss Novak’?”

“I didn’t hear him,” Nora said.

“Boy, I’m sure he...”

“I didn’t hear him.”

When the waiter came back with Marvin’s scotch, he put the glass down and turned again to Nora. “Miss Novak,” he said, “are you sure you won’t have something? A little dry sherry perhaps?”

“Thank you, no,” Nora said in her quiet, breathy voice. The waiter smiled and left the table.

“He called you ‘Miss Novak’,” Marvin said.

“Did he?”

“Didn’t you hear him? He said it plain as day.”

“No, I didn’t hear him.”

“Well, how could you miss hearing him? He said, ‘Miss Novak, are you sure you won’t have something?’ Didn’t you hear him say that?”

“No, I...”

“Excuse me, Miss Novak.”

They both turned at the same time. The man standing beside the table was holding a Sardi’s menu in one hand and an open fountain pen in the other. He was a rather stout man, sweating a bit, beaming happily out of his round face.

“I hate to intrude this way,” he said. “My name is Roger Forbes, I’m from Oregon.” He paused self-consciously. “Eugene, Oregon.”

Marvin looked at the man in puzzlement and then turned to Nora, who was smiling patiently and sympathetically.

“I wonder...” the man said. “My daughter is a big fan of yours, Miss Novak. I wonder if...”

“You’re making a mis...” Marvin started.

“... you’d sign this menu for her?” the man said.

“I’d be happy to,” Nora answered.

Marvin’s eyes opened wide. Nora smiled at him, and then took the menu from the man.

“What’s your daughter’s name?” she asked.

“Marie.”

On the menu, Nora wrote To Marie, With Warmest Wishes, and then signed it Kim Novak.

“Thank you, Miss Novak,” the man said.

“Not at all,” she said, and smiled at him graciously as he left the table.

“Why did you do that?” Marvin whispered.

“It’s easier than denying it all the time,” she said.

“That’s against the law,” Marvin said, leaning over the table, whispering.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“You are impersonating Kim Novak,” he whispered.

“I am not impersonating anyone. The man asked me for my autograph, and I gave it to him.”

“He asked for Kim Novak’s autograph, not yours.”

“It’s not my fault he made a mistake. I’m not going to go through the rest of my life saying I’m sorry I’m not Kim Novak.”

“But you’re not Kim Novak.”

“He thought I was.”

“How the hell does that change anything?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said. “Let’s get out of here.”

“We haven’t had our dinner yet.”

“I don’t care.” She rose suddenly and began walking toward the door. At the entrance, the head waiter asked, “Is everything all right, Miss Novak?” and she said, “Yes, everything is fine,” and walked out onto the sidewalk. Two teenage boys walking past turned and smiled at her.

“Hi, Kim!” one of them shouted.

“Hey, Kim,” the other one called, “you want to go out with my friend?” and then they both burst out laughing and ran toward Broadway.

The doorman was grinning. “Taxi, Miss Novak?” he asked.

“Yes. Please.”

“We’ll walk,” Marvin said, coming up behind her.

“I want to go home, Marvin,” she said.

“We’ll walk to the subway.”

“The subway?”

“Yes,” Marvin said, and he took her elbow and began walking her toward Times Square. They shuttled across to Grand Central and then boarded the Woodlawn Road Express. Marvin seemed not to notice the turning heads, the craning necks, the pleased smiles and excited whispers of the riders everywhere around them on the subway. When they got off at Mosholu Parkway, he walked Nora into the park, and they sat together on a bench some distance from the nearest light.

“Nora,” he said, “there’s something I’ve got to tell you.”

“What?” she said.

“Nora, do... do you know how I feel about you?”

“I think so.”

“I love you,” he said.

“Mmmm.”

“I love you,” he repeated.

“Mmmm.”

“Is that all you can say? I just told you I loved you. Twice.”

“What do you want me to say, Marvin?”

“I don’t know. Say you love me, too, or say you hate me, but don’t just say ‘Mmmm’ as if I told you it’s a nice day or something.”

“Marvin, you don’t love me” Nora said.

“I don’t, huh?”

“No.” Her voice lowered. “You only love Kim Novak.”

“Who?”

“You heard me.”

“Kim Novak? I don’t even know Kim Novak. How could I...?”

“Marvin, it’s because I look like her, and that’s all.”

“Nora, I don’t care if you look like Kim Novak or Phyllis Diller, believe me.”

“Then why did you take me to that movie with her in it?”

“Because I wanted to tell you I thought you were beautiful, that’s all. Nora, what do I care who you look like? To me, you look like Nora Feldman, that’s who.”

“No, Marvin...”

“Nora, I love you. I’ve loved you from the first day Mr. Mergenthaler brought you into my office and said he wanted me to meet his new secretary. I was pricing that shantung, do you remember?”

“I remember.”

“So how could I be in love with Kim Novak? Did Mr. Mergenthaler ever bring Kim Novak into my office?”

“No, but...”

“Nora, I’m in love with you. You.”

“Who am I?” Nora asked. “Tell me that, Marvin.”

“What?”

“Who is Kim Novak, for that matter? If we look the same, and walk the same, and talk the same, maybe we are the same.”

“No, Nora, because...”

“A man in a restaurant thinks I’m Kim Novak, and I sign Kim Novak’s name on his menu, so he goes home and tells his daughter he got Kim Novak’s signature for her, and who knows the difference? Does he know the difference? Does his daughter? Does even Kim Novak herself know the difference?”

“Nora,” Marvin said very gently, “do you know the difference?”

“Yes,” she said. “The difference is being somebody when I walk into a restaurant.”

“Nora, when you walk into a restaurant you are somebody. Nora, to me you are everybody in the room.”

“Oh, Marvin, don’t you see? It means somebody caring whether or not I would like a little dry sherry before my meal.”

“Nora, I care. Nora, if you would like a little dry sherry before your meal, I would swim to Spain for it.”

“Or yelling out ‘Hi, Kim!’ on the street.”

“Nora, I’ll yell ‘Hi, Nora’ from the rooftops. I’ll yell it twenty-four hours a day, if that’s what you want.”

“Marvin, don’t you see? Everybody loves Kim Novak.”

“Not me,” Marvin said, “I love Nora Feldman.”

They were silent for a long time. Outside the park, on the street comer, the boys were telling jokes, and Nora could hear their laughter. At last, Marvin cleared his throat.

“There... there’s something I want to ask you, Nora,” he said.

“Don’t,” she told him.

“Nora, will you be my...”

“No, don’t,” she said, and stood up. “I want to go home, Marvin. I want to go home now.”

Marvin stood up and looked at her, and then he sighed and said, “All right, Nora. I’ll take you home.”

They walked past the boys on the corner and then up the block and into Nora’s building. Outside her door, Marvin said goodnight and tried to kiss her, but she turned her face away and began looking for her key. She opened the door and heard his footfalls on the steps going down the street. The minute she turned on the lights, her grandmother said, “Who is it?”

“Me,” Nora answered.

Her father must have heard their voices because from his room he called, “Who is it?”

“It’s Kim Novak, who do you think?” her grandmother said, and Nora smiled and turned out the lights and found the way to her room. She undressed and then washed out her underwear and set her hair and sat up for a while reading some of the fan magazines. One of them said that Kim Novak was left-handed. She hadn’t known that. After a while, she felt drowsy, so she put out the light and got into bed and instead of falling asleep, she stared up at the ceiling and wondered why she’d stopped Marvin just when he was about to propose, wondered why she’d turned away when he tried to kiss her. He was really a very nice fellow, and he’d said he loved her. She lay there thinking about Marvin and about being married to him, and finally she got out of bed. She walked to the window and looked out. She could see the lights of the elevated platform on Jerome Avenue. She went to her desk and turned on the lamp, and then she opened the top drawer and took out a sheet of stationery. She picked up her pen. She was about to begin writing when she remembered what she’d read in the fan magazine. She shifted the pen to her left hand.

Then, over and over again, she wrote Kim Novak, Kim Novak, Kim Novak...