Maggie Gee - Virginia Woolf in Manhattan

She came up through the trees, panting slightly, skinning her elbow on one of the tree-trunks as she turned around to free her case.

When she turned back, Dad wasn’t there.

he wasn’t there he had never been there

(her mother complaining ‘You have never been there!’ but it wasn’t true, was it, Dad took me to America.)

She saw them, then, waiting for her. They were there, a gang of them, camped in the sunlight on the summit of the shining rock. Instantly Gerda’s eyes were drawn to the tall strong girl with a mane of dark hair, wavy, tangly, staring straight at her, a strip of red tying back her curls. Muscled brown arms, grey shorts, tattoos. Round her were a crew of — who or what?

Words came to Gerda. Words from stories. Rapscallions. Ruffians. Shaved heads, stringy legs, hard and muscular as legs of horses, eyes like black pebbles you couldn’t see into. Some were mixed race. Maybe all of them? Or were they — what did you call them — Gypsies? Rom, was it, you were supposed to call them? Tanned Gypsies. Or just — New Yorkers? She didn’t know anything about New Yorkers.

Those shorts aren’t grey. Those shorts are dirty, she suddenly realised. This she knew.

‘Hey,’ said the girl. ‘Come here. I like you.’ The others were sneering and pushing each other, but the dark-haired girl looked radiant. Happy to see her. Waiting for her. She had a kind face. Didn’t she?

All round them, through the trees, the border of skyscrapers seemed to bend closer to hear what would happen. Gerda herself had no idea. But at least, now, someone was pleased to see her. The sun still felt hot up here near the rocks, and she realised it must be glinting on her bracelet, Mum’s gold bracelet with the animals. She pulled her cuff down to cover it, but the girl’s eyes followed every movement.

Had she insulted her? They stared at each other.

The dark girl pushed the boy crouched below her, quite gently. He didn’t move. He was — leering at Gerda. She saw that one of his teeth was gone. He had a ratty, straggly beard, like a Muslim beard too thin to grow — perhaps it was a Muslim beard, though the tats on his neck were not a bit Islamic — and his eyebrows frowned above his eyes.

‘What’s your name?’ The dark girl smiled.

Gerda wasn’t sure she was ready to tell her. ‘Are you American?’ Gerda asked. ‘What’s your name, in any case?’ She folded her arms to make herself bigger, and stood very straight, at the base of the rock, peering up at the sunlit troop of monkeys. She passionately wanted to be part of them, part of a gang, part of the park, but also dreaded them. They were united, she was alone, she was only thirteen.

‘Nosy,’ said the girl, quite pleasantly, ‘arncha? I’ll tell you though. I’m Lily Roberta. People call me Lil Robber, I don’t know why!’ There was a chorus of laughter and jeers from below her. ‘Call me Lil,’ she said, sweetly, then, and with sudden energy kicked out her foot, and caught the bearded boy hard on the shoulder, yelling ‘Fuck off, all of you! I want to talk to my friend here.’

After a frozen second, they started moving, but as they went, their eyes ran over Gerda, and she saw the bearded boy had a fleck of spittle at the corner of his mouth as he walked muttering past her, too close, and for a second she thought he would spit. But no, they all vanished like smoke through the trees. But were they really gone, or were they just waiting?

Gerda looked at her feet. Mum’s ridiculous case, pink and girly and luxurious, everything she hated and was not. It was like having an enormous pink spot. She tore her eyes away from it. The skyscrapers on their side of the park were just tipped with sunlight, needle-sharp, and on the other side they had gone dark.

The rock still looked warm and bright. The girl came down from its summit towards her, and stretched out her hand to pull Gerda up. Red round cheeks, river-brown eyes, smiling eyes with snow-blank whites. ‘It’s warmer up here,’ she said, and laughed. ‘Now why do I think you’ve got nowhere to go? I’m right, aren’t I?’

‘Maybe,’ said Gerda.

She made a decision. She stepped on to the rock, and took the hand that was offered her. As she reached out her arm, the cuff fell back and the gold chain bracelet caught the light. She saw the gold, and then the girl’s bare feet, brown as a nut, but with painted nails, wild-strawberry-bright, in the same, sharp, unforgettable shot.

I am entering another world , she thought.

VIRGINIA

What I noticed in the lobby was the number of men. Most of them seemed to smile at me. Another world, a populous world, a world that seemed to welcome strangers. Hotel workers, I gleaned, quite soon, by their synchronised smiles as more guests arrived, their mild jockeying over errands. The men were all identically smart, in crisp white shirts, black ties, black trousers, gleaming shoes despite the dusty pavements. This hotel was half the size of the Wordsmiths Hotel in New York, but there were three times as many men working there.

One of them, I thought, was looking at me strangely, a small, stocky man with golden skin and a poised, balletic way of walking, his shoulders back, like an acrobat. I had watched him lift a case as if it was a feather. The lobby phone rang, and he answered. Now he was definitely looking my way. I was sitting by an enormous cactus. Perhaps it was Angela on the phone.

‘Was that my colleague, ringing for me?’ I asked him, and he mimed incomprehension, then came and stood quite close to me.

‘Slowly, please. I have little English.’

‘Telephone call? For me?’ I pointed.

‘You want to make telephone call?’

‘No.’ He was smiling at me very warmly. His face was jolly, like a smiling bun, lightly gleaming, and he smelled of lemon. His teeth were slightly stained, I noticed. I felt sympathy: my teeth were bad. ‘Would you like Turkish tea?’ he asked, and before I could answer, he said ‘I invite you.’

‘Well — ’

‘It’s free.’

‘Thank you. I am just waiting for a friend.’

‘I am Ahmet,’ he said, with a small bow.

‘I am Mrs Woolf. Virginia,’ I said.

At that moment, Angela arrived. Without a word, she hurried me out into the night, though I half-raised my hand to wave goodbye to him.

‘I was having a conversation,’ I said.

She ignored me. ‘Look where you’re going,’ she said. ‘I am going to take you through the Hippodrome. I do not want you falling over.’

I saw no signs of a Hippodrome as we marched uphill past laundries and gift-shops, but her face did not encourage questions. I thought about Gerda. I hoped she was tough. I was starting to feel pity for Angela’s daughter.

Men sat outside their businesses on plastic chairs, drawing deep on red-tipped cigarettes. They talked to their friends; their eyes idled. Many held small, curved glasses of golden liquid.

‘What do they drink?’ I couldn’t stop myself asking. ‘Tea,’ said Angela. ‘Turkish tea. Everyone here drinks Turkish tea.’

‘That is just another generalisation.’

She looked annoyed. ‘Never mind, it’s true.’

Would I have got away with a riposte like that?

It didn’t matter, I was happy again. Such a cheerful thought, that everyone drank tea, that Turkish tea could please everybody. In New York, I had been paralysed by the number of choices in every café, the urgency with which each young American spelled out his particulars: ‘Large skinny decaf latte, three sugars.’ Then when it came: ‘No, I wanted it wet.’ They were mad with choice, so it seemed to me. The bony walls of the self were so thin that something essential might be crushed if a purchase did not reflect their whim.