the fruits of fate

Louise stood in the quiet pale green of the half-lit hall in her apartment, the afternoon sunlight filtering weakly through the plate glass of the casement window. Zelda had remarked on her last visit that her windows are "flithy," but Louise didn't see the point of cleaning them. She quite liked to see the grunge, imperfect frames of the outside world.

At this time of day, if she stood very still... and if Marly, her Russian blue kitten wasn't wrestling with some string somewhere... she could hear the faint hum of the Prospect Expressway which divided her neighborhood from Park Slope. To say you lived "on the other side of the expressway" was like saying you lived "on the other side of the tracks." Brooklyn was dangerous, but her small neighborhood, hugged on two sides by the cemetery, was insular somehow, made up mostly of Polish and Italian immigrants, who took quiet strolls arm in arm after dark and let their children run free in the streets.

She felt safe here, standing in the narrow hall, staring at the photograph of her great grandmother - her mother's mother - which hung next to a small gilded-edge mirror. The only decoration on a long wall, they appeared awkward and alone, but keeping each other company. She remembered when she hung them just after she moved in two and a half years ago, the fresh paint smelling of new beginnings. The pained frustration at hanging them so they were straight, and the subsequent giving up, so that they hung on the wall slightly askew.

The mirror was a poor excuse for a mirror. She had picked it up from a cardboard box left outside a stately mansion on Garfield Place... some rich family's refuse. Most of the things in her apartment were acquired this way, on the street or in flea markets, an amalgam of the fruits of fate. The cast-iron skillet, the kitchen table, the Danish desk chair, were all like the mirror: half-functioning, half-pretty, their glory days a distant past. The chair was worn in the seat, and the table was wobbly, but they were dear to her and she liked the idea of giving them a second, third, or fourth chance at life, treating them as if new.

The mirror on the wall had lost some of its reflectivity. The coating had pulled away from the back like paint, having documented each passing year with another centimeter, so that now only the center surface remained. It was enough, though, that she could see her brown eyes eyes, strong nose, and small lips, barely lit by the waning sun. Standing, still, she glanced back at her great-grandmother's portrait. Suddenly, Louise saw the same brown eyes, strong nose, and small lips, and she realized she was probably now the same age as her great grandmother when the photo was taken: twenty-nine.

She had known this photo since her life's memory began, when it sat on her mothers dresser, until she went to college and asked to take it with her. As a child, she had always been captivated by the beautiful dress, old-fashioned hairdo, and the knowledge that, three years after the photo was taken, in 1922, she would be stricken with a fast-moving and vicious leukemia. Most captivating was her gaze: haunting, yet peaceful, as if she somehow knew what would befall her. It was the same look she saw reflected in her grandmother's eyes when she stood staring out at the bluegrass of her Kentucky lawn, and it was the look she saw in her own mother's eyes when she was lost in thought on a long car trip.

Louise turned her head to look in the mirror once more, staring, into nothing, and for that minute, in the half-light, the portraits of two distant generations of women hung on the wall, side by side, slightly askew, mirror images of each other.

blazing saddles

Everett sank into the cool velvet chaise in Chloe's living room. From where he sat, he could see the evening sun of Summer setting beyond the western edge of Tribeca, bathing the top halves of its buildings in a sherbet glow, calming the city as if it were singing it a lullaby. Car horns diminished in the distance, and work-a-day Chinese women scurried on the street below, picking up last minute ingredients from the vegetable vendors closing down their stalls.

He was tired, Chloe could see, no doubt from having spent the entire day on his bike riding all over the damn place. She figured he did this, regularly, mostly because he was broke, but also because he needed adventure and this was the only way to get it. Seemingly endless, drawn-out work weeks left Everett more morose and downtrodden than the average daily-grind worker. He just wasn't cut out for it, this sitting in an office chair, day after day. It killed him. These things he had explained to Chloe over and over, while strolling around Columbus Park or while taking tea at the Mah Jong Parlour on Pell Street. And now he was taking action... sort of.

"Man, it was such a fantastic day. I mean, 85 and sunny."

Everett had an admirable tolerance for extreme heat. Actually, it was beyond tolerance. He thoroughly enjoyed humid, hot, sunny days. While Chloe hated even the feeling of potential perspiration, Everett luxuriated in it.

Chloe retorted, "Ugh. The weather was horrendous. I could smell the fishmonger all the way from Canal Street today. Also, I attempted to ride my bike, but the saddle was so hot from the sun I promptly dismissed the idea entirely." (It goes without saying that Chloe complained about the weather rather excessively during the summer months.)

Wisely ignoring her, Everett continued. "Well, for some reason, today, people just seemed dazed by the sunshine. Pedestrians just kind of walked around like zombies everywhere I went, stepping into traffic, barely moving along sidewalks." (Ever since Everett started riding his bike, really riding his bike, he referred to people who were not on bikes as "pedestrians.")

"So, tell me what happened that's gotten you so riled up."

Everett had texted her an expletive-laden message earlier in the day, the content of which Chloe found impossible to decipher. In response, she invited him to "just come over whenever the hell he got back from wherever the hell he was. " And so, her bell rang about 6:30pm, just as she was putting some rose in the fridge to chill. Thank god he had showered before coming over.

Everett recounted:

So, this lethargy I was sensing wasn't limited to pedestrians. Even car drivers seemed to be a little... unconscious. To the point where just getting out of Manhattan over the bridge proved to be near-catastrophic, with cars just coasting through the red light at Canal Street. It's a good thing I'm a careful rider. But the worst was yet to come. As I was coming down off the bridge in DUMBO, I hit the light perfectly so as to be able to cross into that raised, center-median bike lane. And you know how that's just one huge downhill slope down to Sands Street? well, I was just blazing-saddles down that thing, made it through that one light at Gold Street. I must have been going like 40 miles per hour. And for some reason, I just did not notice this car that had driven up onto the bike lane median and whose driver had their door wide open, almost touching the concrete divider wall between bike lanes. So there was nowhere for me to go but into the traffic lane, which, most unfortunately, was taken at that very second by a car. So, I attempted to slam on my brakes, which, of course, didn't stop me in time. My front tire hit the inside of the driver's side door, sending me (with a helmet, thank, god,) straight into the window pane, shattering the glass. It's a good thing I wasn't going faster or I'd be a lot worse off.

"But where are your injuries? Your scratches?," Chloe interjected.

Everett pulled up him pant legs to reveal two equally-sized wounds on each of his knees.

Just these. But look, this isn't the worst of it. I'm getting up, trying to pull myself together, and this huge, fat woman is screaming at me. And I'm thinking, what the fuck, I should be screaming at her. She's still in her fucking car, saying 'Look what you just did to MAH CAR!! YouSONOFABITCH!!' And all the while her lazy, fat ass is still parked in that drivers seat.

I was incredulous. I couldn't believe this was happening. My gut reaction was to start getting myself together to keep riding, and as I picked up my bike, still shaking form the impact, she's saying to me 'That's right, KEEP MOVIN, KEEP MOVIN.' So I shot back, 'You're in the fucking bike lane, what did you expect you BITCH?!' Well, that finally got her moving out of her seat. I defensively scrambled up onto the concrete barrier and in front of her car, so that she was blocked by her open door. At that point, I don't remember what she said. Nothing of consequence, really. Apparently she had just parked her lazy ass there right on a bike lane, for no reason at all but to hinder cyclists.

While she was ranting, I determined that I wasn't seriously injured, and I decided that I would be proactive. As she kept yelling at me, I calmly mounted my bike and, once the traffic lane was clear, circled around her car. I took out my camera and snapped one photo of the scene. The back of her car and car door, clearly blocking a bike lane, with the window shattered and the most important piece, a clear shot of her license plate.

Once she saw me take the photo, she flipped her shit and went after me. I started to ride away but I wasn't fast enough. I guess I was too shaken from the fall. She knocked me off my bike and I was so angry that I promptly got up and hit her, and at that point it was just a full-on fight. Me and this huge, foul-mouthed woman. All I remember is that I just kept punching her, until she finally gave way and flew across the concrete barrier, rolling into the opposite bike lane, where she lay, motionless. Of course, before I had time to process what had just happened, a cop car rolls up with its lights on. He questioned me, I told him the story, and he sent me on my way, saying he'd take care of the situation. He didn't seem to care about the woman laying face down on the opposite bike lane. Once I started riding away, he finally strolled over to her, and as I looked over my shoulder, I saw her get up, yelling and pointing at me as I rode away. I figured, that's justice.

Chloe got up to retrieve the rose from the fridge. She hoped it was chilled.

ethics in mail delivery

Chloe had a questionable habit of borrowing her neighbor's magazines from the mailbox. Both girls shared a box with the other tenant on the floor, Mrs. Wong, who mostly only received type-written envelopes from obscure organizations such as The International Center for Psychic Research and The Knitters' Defense Fund. Bonnie Maloney, for her part, received a continuous subscription to all manner of fashion magazines, also, Newsweek. These were magazines which mildly interested Chloe, but not nearly enough to commit to a $19/year subscription. Besides, it was more exciting to borrow them.

Chloe was always the first to get to the mailbox in the late afternoons, right after Mr. Cho, the mailman, made his delivery. If there was a magazine in the box, she grabbed it along with her own mail. She was always sure to read the magazine that very evening, reading (or flipping) through its entirety, devouring its contents in an hour or two or three. The next afternoon, she carefully placed the magazine back into the mailbox, as if Mr. Cho had delivered it that afternoon. Each time, Chloe prided herself on the near-virginal appearance of the now-day-old magazine, betraying only the slightest hint of use. No harm done, Chloe figured, except maybe Bonnie's assessment of Mr. Cho, who she probably thought an unpunctual and careless mailman.

fresh snow

"Why are you wearing that? Didn't Ian give that to you?"

"Yeah, so?"

Eleanor gave her a look of death. They were sitting in a bar in the East Village, drinking red wine and watching the white snow slowly build up outside against the black of the night.

It wasn't as bad as she was making it out to be. Eleanor loved to be dramatic, and Chloe usually let slide most of any perceived antagonism associated with her overreactions.

"I don't mind it, you know..." Chloe went on. "It didn't end so terribly."

Eleanor sat up in her stool, her back straightening. Chloe could almost see her spine bristle. "What are you talking about?! It was awful!" Slumping down back into her position on the stool, with her arms folded, she added "Well, it was awful for me, at least."

This much was probably true, and she deserved to be overly dramatic about it. Chloe told Eleanor everything. It's possible she was so used to telling her things that she might tell her too much sometimes. When they spoke, it was as if her brain took control of her mouth, and any kind of filter that Chloe would use with any other person was rendered useless. It was the result of years of friendship, and there was nothing she could do about it.

"Really, I mean. Despite everything, I just really like this necklace," she explained to her friend.

The necklace in question was a golden, precious affair, with a fine chain and a small heart pendant with a hammered finish. Chloe didn't have any good reasons to back up why she liked it, like she could some other things she owned (i.e. "it was my grandmother's" or "it has a bird on it"). She didn't even like hearts, really. But there was something about it.

"Anyway" she went on, "I've purged it of all its negative meaning, in that way."

"Oh, and how have you managed to do that?," Eleanor shot back, dryly, skeptically.

God, Eleanor could really be a bitch sometimes.

"I created a kind of new life for it. Ever since Ian and I broke up, I've worn it every day. And every day I wear it, it acquires new meaning and becomes a part of new memories... such that its previous context, its old memory, gets farther and farther away."

"Have you been eating those street cart berries again?? I told you those things...."

Chloe had already zoned out, her attention stolen by some commotion between pedestrians. Eleanor was always getting on her for buying fruits from the street cart vendors in her neighborhood in Chinatown. There was nothing wrong with it, but Eleanor only bought her fruits from Whole Foods for twice as much, so what did she know?

She definitely didn't know that Chloe was rather fond of her new theory, which she called The Theory of Replaced Meaning. She could toss out the physical vestiges of past relationships which she didn't like, but the precious few ones she liked she found she could keep and make them her own. She applied this theory not only to objects but to places, too, reclaiming over the course of time the spaces they once shared. Over the past month since the breakup, Chloe had retraced all of the steps they took together. Up and down Elizabeth, Mott, and Mulberry Streets, and across Prince and Spring, Kenmare and Broome and Grand. She'd eaten at the same restaurants, drunk the same wine in the same bars, all in this new incarnation, with friends or without. It was a daunting undertaking, but once put in practice, it was downright enjoyable. She saw it all with fresh eyes, and it was even better than before. By now, she'd canvassed the whole of their relationship, from beginning to end, and this bar, unbeknownst to Eleanor, was the last stop. The place where it ended.

"Well, are you ready to go?" asked Eleanor, slurping down the last of her wine with clear impatience at Chloe's zone-out.

"Yes, let's go eat. Max's?," asked Chloe, putting on her coat and scarf.

"Isn't that where...?"

Chloe gave her a perplexed look. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

They stepped out together into the streets full of fresh snow, their boots leaving a double trail behind them.