Nightlife: A Novel

41

It was still raining in the morning when Greg called Judy Nathan. He spoke as though he had read some article that said women liked to be approached in surprising ways at surprising times, but she tolerated the call anyway. She accepted his offer to take her out to dinner, then said, “Wait a minute. You know, I have an idea. The weatherpeople say it’s going to be raining all day and all night, and maybe we don’t need to get all dressed up to tromp around in the rain. Why don’t we just have dinner at my place? It’ll be really simple, I promise. I have this tiny apartment and I don’t have the equipment here to cook anything elaborate anyway. Come on. It’ll be nice.”

He protested feebly, but she seemed not to have heard. She said, “Good. I can’t wait. Be here at seven, and don’t get dressed up.”

“Be where?”

She told him the address and was ready to hang up when he said, “There was one other thing I wanted to talk about.”

“What’s that?”

“Do you want a job?”

“What?”

“A job. Our company, Prolix Software Design, has an opening. It’s not a huge salary, but it’s okay, and it would put you in a better position to start your business.”

“It would?”

“Well, you can save money, or at least stop living off your capital, and you’ll learn more about the city and the business climate and all that.”

“Let me think about it later,” she said. “Right now I’m busy planning dinner.”

She heard a smile in his voice. “Okay. Just keep it in mind.”

“Sure. See you at seven.”

The clock above Judy Nathan’s stove said exactly seven when she heard the door intercom ring. She said, “I assume it’s you?” and heard Greg’s voice say, “I hope I’m not late.” She said, “Think I’d eat without you?” and buzzed him in. She opened the door and waited in the hallway for him to appear.

He came up the stairs carrying a bouquet of flowers that had the distinctive paper wrap of Fleuriste, and a paper shopping bag from a gourmet shop that held two bottles of wine, one red and the other white. She stood on tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “Somebody raised you right.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I’ll call my mom and tell her.” He was looking around him anxiously.

She took the flowers and the bottles. “These aren’t wet. Did the rain stop?”

“No. I kept them under my raincoat.”

He took off his raincoat and she saw that he had followed her orders to the extent of not wearing a coat and tie, but he had on tailored pants, a cashmere sweater, and a pair of shoes that were too good to wear out in the rain. “What beautiful shoes.”

“Huh? Oh, thanks. I got them on sale about a year ago.”

“You did not,” she said. “They’re new. Somebody told you that women are impressed by nice shoes. Take them off, and your wet socks. I’ll get you something to wear.”

He waited while she took his coat to her bedroom and hung it up, then snatched a pair of wool socks from a drawer. He held them in his hand and looked at them. They were just about his size. “Why do you have these?”

“One time I didn’t notice somebody had put some men’s socks on the women’s rack, and I bought a few pairs in a hurry.” She had bought the socks this morning while she was out preparing for the evening.

He put the dry socks on and followed her toward the kitchen area. The open kitchen was separated from the living room only by a high counter with two high stools. She had moved the dining table and chairs out of the kitchen, to the other side of the counter. She arranged the flowers in a vase she had bought this morning, and placed them on the dinner table.

“I have some scotch if you’d like that before dinner,” she said. “I noticed that was your drink.”

“Thank you,” he said.

She poured him a scotch and water that was a good facsimile of the drink he’d ordered last night. Then she brought canapés and caviar to the coffee table, and sat on the couch with him.

He said, “I thought this wasn’t going to be fancy.”

“I said it was going to be simple. You don’t cook caviar. You just open a jar. So how was your day?”

“It went kind of slow,” he said. “I spent most of it looking forward to coming here.”

She grinned. “Wow. Where are you getting this stuff? Is there some men’s magazine that tells you exactly what to say? I thought all they had were pictures of naked girls.”

“If there is a magazine like that, I’d like a subscription,” he said. “I’m always blurting out the wrong thing because I’m nervous. With you I just feel happy, so I don’t get as messed up, I guess.”

“Another good thing to say. Maybe I’ll start a men’s magazine and let you write for it.”

“Have you thought about the job I told you about?”

“Not yet. I will, though. What is it?”

“It’s support—a lot of filing and typing and answering phones. But in little companies you can make your own way quickly. You tear off as much work as you can do, and pretty soon that’s your job, and they hire somebody else to answer your phone.”

“How many people in the company?”

“Only thirty. Our section is ten. There are ten in sales, ten in administration. They’re all young, and get along okay.”

“Would I work for you?”

“No. You’d be in admin.”

“I don’t know. I’ll think about it some more.” She stood up. “Time to get dinner going. Just vault over the counter if you want to see me be domestic.”

He followed her into the cramped little kitchen, and she said, “I promised you cozy. This is cozy, isn’t it?”

“I like it, and I like what you’ve done with it.”

She smiled. She had spent most of the day buying the prints that hung on the walls, the dishes and flatware on the table, the cookware and the food, the sheets on the bed and the bedspread.

The dinner seemed to materialize rather than be prepared. The lobster tails and the filets mignons were broiled and the asparagus seared, the wines poured. Judy had never been interested in cooking, so while she had lived in the apartment high above the lake in Chicago she had developed a few very basic meals that she could make by simply applying heat and butter. She poured the wine liberally, and drank sparingly. When they had eaten the main courses, she produced a plate of tarts and napoleons she had bought at a downtown bakery.

Greg had experienced so few occasions when any woman had even tried to impress him that he could barely contain his delight at each part of the evening. After dinner she walked into the living room carrying cognac in small snifters, but Greg said, “If I have this, I’m not going to be able to drive home.”

She said, “Who said I wanted you to go home?” and sat on the couch to kiss him.

Later that night, she lay on her back in bed, listening to his breathing. Now and then a deep breath would end in a little snort, but she didn’t mind. She knew that when she wanted to sleep, she would. She decided that she was satisfied with her progress. She had only picked Greg out twenty-four hours ago, and she knew that by now he would do anything she wanted.

The difficult part had never been getting a man interested in her. All men seemed to be doomed to hunt for sexual partners all the time, like restless, lonely ghosts. The problem was in choosing the right man, but she was almost certain she had chosen well in Greg. He appeared to be convinced that he was in the romance of his life, the one that made all of the conventional rules and precautions seem ridiculous.

The next morning, while they were eating the breakfast she had bought yesterday with the knowledge that he was going to be here to share it, he said, “I hope you’ll take that job.”

“I’ve decided against it.”

“When?”

“Last night. At the same time when I decided you weren’t going home.”

“Why?”

“I hate complications.”

“What complications?”

“If you and I break up, I couldn’t stand to work there. If you and I don’t break up, other people couldn’t stand to work there.”

He let it drop. She had to wait a whole week before he brought up the topic she was waiting for. He was taking her home after a dinner in a dark, romantic restaurant when he said, “You never tell me about driving anywhere. Don’t you have a car?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I’d like one,” she said. “I know exactly the kind I want and everything. But I can’t.”

“Why not—money?”

“No,” she said. “Can you keep a secret?”

“Of course. Let me tell you all of the secrets I’ve kept.”

“Seriously. Do you promise?”

“All right.”

“Well, I have a lot of tickets from when I went to school in Boston. There was never any place that was legal to park, so I have parking tickets for all three years—about seven thousand dollars’ worth. If you couldn’t make it to class, you couldn’t pass, so it seemed to be the only choice.”

“So you’re an outlaw parker?”

“Yep. I left Boston, and figured that was the end of it. But I found out that some judge had issued a warrant for my arrest. I tried to register a car in Colorado once, and my name came up on the computer. They wouldn’t let me register a car unless I paid the fines. I didn’t have that kind of money at the time, and so I didn’t do it.”

“I’ve never heard of anything like this,” said Greg. “At least not for parking.”

“Neither had I until it happened to me. But here I am. I can buy a car. I just can’t register it or get insurance for it.”

“Not to be too obvious, but have you thought about solving the problem by paying the fine?”

“Of course. At first I didn’t take it seriously. It seemed like everyone was doing it. Then I got kind of mad, because it’s just a way for the city to make money off all these disenfranchised students from other places. Then I figured I’d better pay it. But by the time I was in Colorado it wasn’t seven thousand dollars. Those penalties had been growing for seven or eight years. It was up to about fifteen, and now that there’s a warrant, we’re talking about lawyers, and going back to court in Boston. They could put me in jail to make an example of me. Anyway, now you know why I don’t have a car.”

“It’s a bad situation,” he said. “Let me think about it.”

“I’m not asking you to solve it,” she said. “It’s my problem.”

Three days later, while they were on their way to a movie, he said, “Did I get it wrong, or did you tell me you have the money for a car?”

She shrugged. “Yes, I have the money. But big deal.”

“I’ve got an idea. You give me the money, and I’ll buy the car. I’ll add your car to my insurance, which will also make it cheaper. Second cars cost practically nothing to insure.”

“But then my car will be registered in your name. What happens if you get tired of having me around?”

“You’ll be driving a car that’s registered and insured in my name. What happens if you decide to drive it through the front wall of a nursery school?”

“I guess we have to trust each other.”

She forced tears to well in her eyes, put her hand on his knee so he turned to look at her, and then kissed him on the rough skin of his cheek. “I think this is the best thing anybody ever did for me.”

“So be nice to me forever. What kind of car do you want?”

“An Acura. Teal blue.”