A Ticket To The Boneyard

I looked at my watch. I usually go toSt. Paul 's on Fridays for the eight-thirty step meeting, but it was too late now, they'd already started.

And I had caught a noon meeting downtown already that day. I told her I didn't have anything planned.

'Well, how about a movie? How does that sound?'

It sounded fine. We walked over to Sixtieth and Third to a first-run house. It was the weekend so there was a line, but there was a pretty decent film at the end of it, a slick caper movie with Kevin Costner and Michelle Pfeiffer. 'She's not really pretty,' Elaine said afterward, 'but there's something about her, isn't there? If I were a man, I'd want to fuck her.'

'Repeatedly,' I said.

'Oh, she does it for you, huh?'

'She's all right.'

' 'Repeatedly,' ' she said, and chuckled. Around us,Third Avenue was thronged with young people who looked as though the country were every bit as prosperous as the Republicans kept telling us it was. 'I'm hungry,' Elaine announced. 'You want to get a bite? My treat.'

'Sure, but why is it your treat?'

'You paid for the movie. Can you think of a place? Friday night in this neighborhood, wherever we go we're going to be up to our tits in yuppies.'

'There's a place in my neighborhood. Great hamburgers and cottage fries. Oh, wait a minute. You don't eat hamburgers, do you? The fish is good there, but I forget if you said you eat fish.'

'Not anymore. How's their salad?'

'They serve a good salad, but is that enough for you?'

She said it would be plenty, especially if she stole a few of my cottage fries. There were no empty cabs and the streets were full of people trying to hail one. We started to walk, then caught a bus onFifty-seventh Street and got off atNinth Avenue . The place I had in mind, Paris Green, was five blocks downtown. The bartender, a lanky fellow with a brown beard that hung down like an oriole's nest, gave a wave as we cleared the threshold. His name wasGary , and he'd helped me out a few months ago when I'd been hired to find a girl who'd done some of her drinking there. The manager, whose name was Bryce, had been a little less helpful then, but he was helpful enough now, greeting us with a smile and showing us to a good table. A waitress with a short skirt and long legs came over to take our drink order, went away, and came back with Perrier for me and a Virgin Mary for Elaine. I must have been watching the girl's departure, because Elaine tapped my glass with hers and advised me to stick to Michelle Pfeiffer.

'I was just thinking,' I said.

'I'm sure you were.'

When the girl returned Elaine ordered the large garden salad. I had what I generally have there, a Jarlsberg cheeseburger and well-done fries. When the food came I had what felt like deja vu until I realized I was getting echoes of Tuesday night, when I'd had a late bite at Armstrong's with Toni. The two restaurants weren't that much alike, and neither were the women. Maybe it was the cheeseburgers.

Halfway through mine I thought to ask her if it bothered her that I was eating a cheeseburger. She looked at me as though I were crazy and asked why it should bother her.

'I don't know,' I said. 'You don't eat meat, and I just wondered.'

'You must be kidding. Not eating meat is just a choice I make, that's all. My doctor didn't order me to quit, and it wasn't an addiction I had to struggle with.'

'And you don't have to go to the meetings?'

'What meetings?'

'Carnivores Anonymous.'

'What a thought,' she said, and laughed. Then her eyes narrowed and she looked appraisingly at me. 'Is that what you did? AA?'

'Uh-huh.'

'I thought that was probably how you did it. Matt, would it have bothered you if I'd ordered a drink?'

'You did.'

'Right, a Virgin Mary. Would it have—'

'You know what the British call it? Instead of a Virgin Mary?'

'A Bloody Shame.'

'Right. No, it wouldn't have bothered me if you'd ordered a real drink. You can order one now if you want.'

'I don't.'

'Is that why you ordered a Virgin Mary? Because you thought it might bother me otherwise?'

'It didn't even occur to me, as a matter of fact. I hardly ever drink alcohol these days. I hardly ever did.

The only reason I asked was because you asked about the cheeseburger, and while we've been discussing meat and drink I've been sneaking your cottage fries.'

'While my attention was diverted elsewhere. We could probably arrange to get you some of your own.'

She shook her head. 'Stolen sweets are best,' she said. 'Didn't your mother ever tell you that?'