'Why?'
'Because it's totally private.' She looked at me, perhaps with pity, then lowered her voice further. 'You're supposed to, like, know somebody.'
I nodded. Of course. After all, I didn't know anyone. I had no business, I had no connections, I lacked even a decent operative liethe one we all need.
Was it inevitable that Allison Sparks and I would fall into conversation? No. Or yes, definitely. She felt me looking at her as she passed back and forth through the restaurant, I'm sure, just as I felt her awareness of my arrival each day, her sidelong contemplation of my books, my solitude. We didn't smile at each other; rather we nodded, as if in silent agreement that although the interest was mutual, the moment was not yet ripe. Of course, I tried to hide my attraction to her, for I had no reason to hope that she felt any toward me. Yet I noticed that she made sure I received very good service at Table 17, and I made a point of never sitting anywhere else. People have such ways of communicating, of course. It was simply a matter of who would speak first, and when.
In the meantime I quietly studied Allison Sparks, and, having encountered many people in my work, imagined that I knew something about her. New York has many avenues to success, but there's a particular kind of young woman who sails upward through businesses (ad agencies, weekly magazines, real estate offices, big restaurants) that are naturally frenzied and unstable. Because she is well organized, industrious, and initially modest, such a young woman reassures those around her; other women feel she is attractive because of her personality, and older men- older than fifty-five, say- see in her a respectful and attentive daughter. So she prospers- at first. And she dates, although often the men are too weak for her and she discards them. Within a year or two her title changes and she has more responsibility, only to find that the parameters of her job now include conflict and neurotic personalities. For a while she tries to deal with these challenges with kindness and tact, yet finds that these strategies often don't work. By now she has identified superiors whom she considers allies and those she does not. She becomes more interested in the end, as opposed to the sweet-voiced means. Is she ready to admit this to herself? Not quite. Meanwhile she becomes adept at all the forms of workplace intimacy, with older men, younger women, people on the phone, and so on. She learns to use her voice, to be playful, teasing, affectionate. She can manufacture energy or humor as necessary, as well as disinterest or rank fury. These qualities of manipulation begin to help her score important successes. She makes money for the operation, she solves problems. The younger women in the business look up to her, but the men of the same age have started to realize that they must compete with her. Her natural ability is intimidating, especially as it seems she is often one step ahead of them in anticipating some small, essential detail. About twenty-nine now, she is at a crucial developmental moment; she is about to plateau or become extremely successful. If she has been working very long hours, the years of toil and loneliness have started to harden her. Men have come and gone; there'll always be another, she thinks. Like a good movie- sooner or later. A year goes by. She senses that the younger women could fear her. Another year passes. She has learned to negotiate aggressively for her raises. She begins to change the stores where she shops and to spend money on luxuries and services that make her feel better, that soften her private suffering. She starts to travel alone, not minding that she will appear available- because she is. The spectrum of men with whom she spends time lengthens on one end. She will see older men, in part because they are more patient listeners, but even more so because they have secrets of survival, invisible techniques of power that she wants to master. Is she ready to admit this to herself? Of course not. But she is no longer ashamed to say she is interested in men for their position, their connection to the greater ganglia of wealth and influence and information. The available males now fall into three rough categories for her: handsome boys who are poor, often less intelligent, and surely self involved; barracuda-men in their early forties, usually divorced, who might already be lying about their ages by a year or two; and, lastly, the moguls, small and large, who are now rich enough to die. They are ever more grateful for basic things: untroubled digestion, hair in most of the expectable places. They know they have only ten or twelve good years left. Our woman, nearing thirty-five, sees that the few remaining husband-types are having a rather good time with women ten years her junior. She tells herself she doesn't hate them. She tells herself she needs no one.
This was Allison, so far as I yet understood. And then one day, after I was done with my lunch, she simply walked over to me with a cup of coffee, her footsteps brisk and without hesitation, and said, 'So, Mr. Wyeth, you would appear to have a lot of time on your hands.'
I checked her dark eyes. 'That's true.'
'You strike one as unencumbered.'
'Unencumbered, yes. Unburdened, no.'
'Well, you do seem to like it here,' she said after a moment's consideration. She bent close to me and poured sugar and milk into my coffee without being asked. 'Assuming you don't mind,' she added as she gave the coffee a stir with the spoon.
'Not at all. Perfect. Thanks.'
'Well-' She stopped stirring. 'I know how you like it.'
'You do?'
'Yes, Mr. Wyeth. I notice things.'
'You can call me Bill.'
'So, where were we?' She tilted her head. 'Oh, right, 'Unencumbered, yes. Unburdened, no.' '
'Yes,' I said. 'But that's no secret.'
She blinked, perhaps purposefully. 'And what is?'
That stopped me. 'You probably know better than I do.'
She shifted her weight, one hip to the next. 'I just wondered why you come here each day.' There it was- the point of insertion into the other's life. Once that happens, you can't go back. 'Of course, we're glad to see you,' she added.
'I hope I'm not your only conspicuous patron.'
'Oh, please,' Allison sighed. 'You should see how many different crazy people come in here.'
I made some small noise of concurrence, noting at the same time Allison's nervous red fingernail digging against the wool of her trousers.
'There's one kind of person we need more of, though.'
'What's that?'
'Flirters.'
'Flirters?'
She looked at me deadpan. 'Even though you would think.'
'What would I think?'
'You would just think that in New York City there would be more people who could actually flirt.' Allison cocked her head, mouth open, daring me for a response.
'Terrible,' I agreed.
'Worse. It's unbearable!' she answered. 'One feels so abandoned.'
I could only smile down into my plate.
'You still haven't answered my implicit question.'
I lifted my eyes. 'Which was?'
'We know you are unencumbered, but we don't know if you are a flirter.'
'True,' I said, 'but we do know the exact opposite of that.'
Allison appeared pleasantly confused. 'The opposite-?'
'We know,' I began, keeping her eye now, 'that you are a flirter, but we don't know if you are unencumbered.'
'Well, yes,' Allison said, catching up, shrugging away my cleverness, 'but that's as it should be.'
'Oh?'
'But thank you, anyway.'
'For-?'
She bent over the table close. 'It was very nice wordplay.'
'It was all right,' I agreed.
'Are you usually so good at- wordplay?'
I just stared into her eyes. 'All right, I give up,' I said.
'Oh, don't. Not yet, Mr. Wyeth.'
