Ghosts of Manhattan: A Novel(30)

She knew this was coming. “I understand.” She turns to me. “Where are you from, Nick?”

“Westchester.”

“Have you lived in the city long?”

“Yeah, since college.”

“Where in the city?”

“We’re in the West Village. My wife and I.”

She looks down at my finger. “What a shame.”

I’m stunned. She’s flirting. Without thinking, I pinch my ring and twist it around a few times until I realize what I’m doing and I stop. I know I would have only something stupid to say, so I don’t say anything.

She smiles. “I hate the Village. So many strange and winding streets, I always get lost. It’s a shame. Otherwise I like the area.” Clever girl.

“It takes a while to get to know it all, but I still get lost sometimes too.”

She reaches into her purse and pulls out a business card and flicks the corner so it makes a popping noise. She leans across and brushes close to me and picks up my cup of coffee, then slides her card across the table and puts the cup back down on top of it. She has total control of her motion, as though this is the customary way for everyone to offer a business card. I love the confidence. “Nick.” I raise my eyebrows in response. “If you think of anything, you should call me at this number.”

She stands and I snap out of the spell. Freddie stands too. “It was good to see you, Freddie.”

“Good to see you.” He looks even more disheveled.

She walks out of the Starbucks.

“Freddie, I don’t know whether to thank you or punch you.”





10 | MATT NORTHWAY


December 6, 2005

MY APPROACH AT WORK HAS ALWAYS BEEN TO KEEP MY head down and sell bonds. I never get political, but now, getting involved with Freddie, I think I’ve just agreed to start a political game where people tell me they’ll just teach me the rules as we play the first round. I wouldn’t say I’m worried yet, but I feel uncomfortable and I want to be with someone away from work. I’d like that to be Julia, but she’s the source of another stress right now. I call my college roommate, Matt.

I always look forward to seeing my friend Matt because everything I associate with him has nothing to do with anything else. I’m reminded of a time when I had a more rounded profile and could move between different types of people. Matt knew me back when I was still a dependent for tax purposes and before I had let a job define more of me than it should.

Matt’s a coffee barista and sometimes actor, and between off-Broadway plays and bit parts on Law & Order and other television shows, he’s managed to keep on with his craft. And he’s happy. It feels good to be with someone who doesn’t have the same set of worries and who doesn’t think that my worries are life-threatening or even much of a worry at all when put in perspective, and that helps me forget. He sometimes helps me to get away for a moment the way vacationing to a different language and currency can feel exotic.

Matt’s already on a bar stool with a beer when I walk into Cedar Tavern. We’ve been friends since freshman year and our reunions are always familiar and comfortable. I pat him on the shoulder as I sit next to him and see there’s a beer already waiting for me.

“Good to see you.” He clinks my glass.

“Very good.” My load feels lighter already.

Since college we’ve had a window into each other’s lives like following a character in a novel we can only barely find relatable. While most people would be resentful of the life of a Wall Street trader, Matt is fascinated and amused and sometimes stupefied.

“You look like crap, Nick. You look exhausted.”

I feel exhausted and in a way that is worse than hungover or tired. I feel almost defeated. “I am. It’s been a rough few weeks.”

A girl at the end of the bar is looking over at us, probably considering whether or not we’re gay. Girls always liked Matt in college and they like him much more now. Like George Clooney, he started out handsome and a little goofy-looking and got a bit less goofy-looking with each year.

He’s about my height, which seems too tall for an actor, with a thick beard that can’t be completely shaved away and seems to stain his skin dark. His features are broad and friendly with strong bones but nothing too angular.

“I know you don’t work too hard, so you’ve either been drinking too hard or it’s something with Julia.”

“I’ve been drinking too hard and it’s something with Julia, both.”

“I guess that would follow.”

I make an uh-huh noise and the girl is still watching us.

“I thought by now you two would have settled into a routine that you’ve both accepted and made work.”

“I think she’s been accepting a routine for a while now and is reaching her limit.”

“How bad?”

“I don’t know, but we’re getting older, and the routine has to change somehow. It isn’t just her. I want it too.”

“What does she want?”

“For me to quit my job, maybe leave New York. Things I can’t really even put on the table.”

He nods. I notice the girl again but I don’t think Matt has. He’s a better listener than I am.

“Anyway, the trouble is once you make your mind up that a thing makes you unhappy, you can’t stop thinking about it. So now I sit at work obsessing about what a load of crap it is. I just try to get through it and take it day to day.” Day to day like a soldier deployed to war, I want to say, but I don’t want to sound like an ass.