Lesley Evans - Strange Are the Ways of Love

Summer.

July, she thought. Summer in New York, with no shade trees or swimming holes, and the sun would be unbearably hot. The taxi turned a corner with its wheels screeching and headed south on Seventh Avenue. She glanced momentarily at the back of the driver’s head, then turned to gaze out the window, running her fingers nervously through her hair.

A rubber band held her black hair in a long pony tail, and she decided that both the rubber band and the pony tail would have to go. Maybe she would just let her hair fall free, straight down her back with the wind blowing through it.

Was there ever a breeze in New York in the summer? There had to be. New York was the same, every place was the same, in July or September or January. And outside on Seventh Avenue the people were the same, and downtown in the Village they would be the same.

And she was just another silly little girl from the Midwest, another corn-fed bit of fluff from Indiana making the famous pilgrimage to the big city.

The cab stopped for a red light. She sat up suddenly to stare out the window at the crowds on the sidewalk and sat back just as suddenly, forcing herself to relax.

Everything would be all right. But she felt wrong, somehow. Even the brown leather suitcase on the seat beside her seemed too small and too large all at once, too small to hold all the clothes she would need and too heavy for her to carry up the steps and into the apartment.

What’s wrong with me? she wondered.

I’ll find out, she answered herself. I’ll find out here, if I do nothing else, and if nothing’s wrong I can go back to Indiana, and if something is wrong, then—

Then I’ll stay here.

The cab turned right at another corner and the driver said, “You say it’s 54 Barrow? Right down the block here?”

She nodded; then, realizing that the driver couldn’t see her, she said, “Yes, that’s right.” It seemed to her that she ought to be able to say something else, something sharp or clever. But she couldn’t think of anything, so she just ran her fingers through her hair again and in a few seconds the cab pulled to a stop at the curb.

She opened the door immediately and stepped out of the cab, pulling her suitcase after her and setting it down on the sidewalk. The meter read $1.45; she gave the driver two singles and waved him away, watching the taxi move slowly down Barrow Street. Then, with a strange feeling of reluctance, she turned to look at her home.

It was disappointing. Paradoxically, it was exactly as she had anticipated and a disappointment at the same time. Her building was one of three red-brick buildings four stories tall, with an iron railing running alongside the front stoop. The red-brick front looked cold, almost shabby.

Janet Marlowe lives here , she thought. In two minutes they would be able to put up a sign in front of the building, not on the lawn because there was no lawn, and the sign could say: Janet Marlowe Lives Here . And everyone who passed by could wonder just who Janet Marlowe was, and why in hell she rated a sign.

She lifted her suitcase and walked to the door, opening it and stepping up into the vestibule. There was a row of buzzers and mailboxes, each with a card, each card with a strange name. 1-D had no card, and she made a mental note to put one in as soon as she got a chance.

Setting down the suitcase, she reached into her purse and fumbled for the key to the inner door. After a moment of panic she found it beneath a handkerchief. She turned it in the lock; magically, the door opened. Once again she picked up the suitcase and carried it into the hallway, closing the door gently behind her.

She paused in the hallway. It was very long and very narrow and incredibly drab, not as she had expected it at all. She had pictured something altogether different, wide and colorful with abstract prints hanging on the walls and some sort of oriental rug on the floor. Instead the walls were painted a nondescript gray and the brown carpet was monotonous and threadbare.

At the same time there was something satisfying about the hallway. It seemed to possess a comfortable anonymity, so that she could pass people there without saying hello if she wished. She could remain as much alone as she wanted to.

I must be crazy, she thought. It’s just a hallway, for God’s sake. I don’t have to pitch a tent here and live in it.

She carried the heavy suitcase to a door with a large gold D on it, fished around in the purse for the other key, found it quickly this time and opened the door.

As she moved through the apartment she realized how perfect it was and how much she liked it and how easy it would be to live there. There was a small bedroom in the rear with a single window facing out upon another wall, so that with the light out it was almost as dark in the daytime as it was at night. “It’s ideal,” Ruthie had written. “You can sleep whenever you like and it doesn’t make any difference.”

There was a tiny kitchen in the middle of the apartment with a two-burner gas range and a small refrigerator, and there was a large room in front facing out on Barrow Street, with a giant window Ruthie had said was quite excellent for looking out of.

The apartment was a bit extreme, which was in keeping with Ruthie’s taste. There was no rug on the bare and polished hardwood floor. Furniture was kept to a minimum. There was a bright red sofa along one wall with two equally bright blue pillows nestling on it. By the side of the window there was an unpainted wooden bookshelf loaded with paperbacks. Jan glanced through the books for a moment, wondering if Ruthie had actually read any of them, or if she bought them for show, or if they came with the place.

There were several Klee and Miró prints taped at random spots along the walls, and there was a little table loaded with more books and magazines, and a chair that looked comfortable. Ruthie’s last-minute instructions were typed on a sheet of yellow copy paper on top of the little table; Jan picked up the paper and sat down in the comfortable-looking chair. She lit a cigarette and began to read.

Jan Honey:

By this time you must be in the apartment, and I hope you like it, but not so much that I can’t have it back by the end of September. The super is in 1-B; he’s a pain in the neck but you can twist him around your finger if you smile and look sexy.

The rent’s all paid, natch. I meant to leave you some food but I used it all just this morning, but there’s a couple good super markets and a delicatessen on the next block. The electricity’s included in the rent, but I have to pay for the gas, so if you decide to kill yourself or anything just stick your finger in the light socket instead of taking gas.

No neighbors worth knowing, so I can’t give you any help there...

There was more — two paragraphs of uneven typing and disjointed prose telling her where to eat and what shows not to see and how to get places on the subway and where to buy clothes and a welter of miscellany. Jan drew deeply on her cigarette and laughed as she finished the letter. Ruthie was nuts, she thought, but very practical in her own way and very sweet and helpful, and now Ruthie was off to Mexico with some Village idiot who painted.

“I’m going to find out what it’s all about,” Ruthie had written once. And now she was in Ruthie’s apartment in New York to do the same thing.

The cigarette burned down and she stubbed it out in a large copper ashtray on the little table. She yawned, suddenly feeling very tired from the long train ride and the cab from Grand Central and all the rush and excitement. Resolutely she stood up and returned to the kitchen, lifting the suitcase and carrying it back to the bedroom and setting it down on the bed. She opened it and began unpacking things, putting some clothes in the small closet and others in the dresser. She put everything away methodically, devoting only half her mind to the task and letting the other half wander.