Come As You Are(37)

Angel: Your wrist hurts? Okay, my fingers hurt!





Duke: My wrist hurts from racquetball. Did you think I meant something else?





Angel: You know what I think you meant.





Duke: Spell it out for me. What did you think I was doing that made my wrist sore?





Angel: Gee. I wonder.





Duke: You need to get your mind out of the gutter, Angel.





Angel: You led it there, Duke.





Duke: Somehow, I think you can find the gutter on your own.





Angel: Guilty as charged. But back to favorite places. Why do you want me to pick one?





Duke: Hello? Our next interview. You’re allergic to offices, and since I took you to one of my favorite spots, it’s your turn to choose one for our next chat. Name some.





Angel: My favorite place in all of New York City is New York City. :)





Duke: Clever.





Angel: But I’d also have to add Central Park, the hidden underground gin joint in Chelsea, the small Elevator Museum in Tribeca, the Starry Night locksmith in the West Village, one of the street artists in the East Village, the Met, and I think I would probably also love Gramercy Park.





Duke: Tomorrow, let’s do the Elevator Museum. I’ve never been.





Angel: I’ll be there.





Duke: Also, why did you say you think you’d like Gramercy Park?





Angel: It sounds lovely, but I’ve never been there.





Duke: You haven’t?





Angel: It’s a private park. You need a key.





Duke: I have one.





*

I stare in disbelief at the former freight elevator shaft that’s now a strange museum. “It’s actually an elevator. And it’s the size of a car.”

She nods, a hint of mischief in her eyes as she bounces on her pink-booted feet. Pink boots I want to see on my shoulders.

I blink away the filthy thought, even though it’ll surely return in seconds.

“It’s the smallest museum in all of New York. It’s five square meters,” she says as we step inside and ogle the odd displays lining all three walls.

“And it’s weird. Admit it. This is intensely weird.” I spin in a circle, gesturing to the tubes of toothpaste on the shelves, the crushed coffee cups and bags of potato chips. Each object has a letter and a number in front of it, like you could enter it on a vending machine keypad.

Only the tubes and bags and cups aren’t for sale. They’re crushed, stepped on, trampled. The exhibit placard reads “Found objects from the streets of Manhattan.”

I study the objects, searching for hidden meaning but find none. I shrug and glance at Sabrina. “I don’t want to be one of those ‘why is this art’ people, but . . . why is this art?”

“I don’t know that it’s art, so much as it’s odd,” she says, crossing her arms as she regards the display here in Tribeca on the tip of Chinatown.

I scrub a hand over my jaw, thinking. Trying to connect the dots. “So it’s odd. Is that why we’re supposed to like it?”

“I don’t even know if we have to like it.” She waves a hand at a shelf of discarded honey-roasted chip bags. “I like that it’s entertaining. That it’s strange. It makes me think about all sorts of things.”

“Okay, Rodin,” I say, naming the sculptor whose most famous work was dubbed The Thinker. “What do these trampled-on toothpaste tubes make you marinate on up there?”

Smiling, she studies a wrinkled bag. Fire-hot, it promises. “It makes me think about things we overlook. Things we ignore.”

“But shouldn’t an empty bag of chips be ignored?”

“No.” Her tone is strong, laced with unexpected emotion.

I step back, giving her some space. “No?”

“You should clean it up. Throw it out.”

“Fine, true,” I concede. “I wasn’t advocating being a slob. And I’m totally against litter. But why do old tubes of toothpaste and empty bags of chips affect you?”

As she stares at the display, sadness flickers across her eyes. Her lips form a straight line, then she breathes in deep. “I think people, places, and things get ignored. And this exhibit forces us to see what we’d rather ignore. Every day, we walk past uncomfortable sights, we weave around painful conversations. And other people ignore us. I guess I like this place because it reminds me not to do that.”

As I study a coffee cup with tire tracks on it, I suspect she might be onto something—a universal sort of truth about human nature. “How to be a better human,” I say.

“Yes.” Her lips curve into a grin. “That’s what I would call this exhibit.”

“So you’re saying that perhaps looking at trash—displaced objects—makes us think how we can treat each other better?”