A New York Romance

by Winters, Abigail

  She squint her eyes and watched him watch them.

  “Why not?”

  “Oh, well for starters, they have never met me before, and I do not want to disturb them.”

  “They don’t even know you?” She became even more puzzled.

  “No, we have never met. How could they know me?” he answered still glaring at them as the waitress quickly took their order. Charlie just watched them as he sipped his pineapple juice like most people sip coffee. Then he poured a little juice in his mocha and sipped it too.

  Julie wasn’t sure what was stranger—pineapple juice in a café mocha or the bizarre relationship he had with this couple. She made her choice.

  “If you have never met them and they have never met you, then how does that make you friends?”

  “They need me. I know what they are about to discover. They’re so close,” he answered.

  “Wait, you’re confusing me. You’ve never met them before but you got on a bus from Brookville to New York City to meet them in this coffee shop on this day because they need you?” Julie was getting frustrated, too. “How do you know they need you? For what? What do you know that’s so special?”

  “I just know of them and the love they have for each other. I could feel it. All they need is a little help.” He seemed obsessed with the couple, still staring at them out of the corner of his eye, stretching out his lips until he found the rim of his cup.

  “Are you going to introduce yourself at all?” she asked, still wondering why he would travel all this way to simply watch them. How could he know they were even going to be here? she asked herself, knowing she would not get a straight answer from him right now, or even a sane one.

  “No, I am not going to introduce myself. That would be a big mistake. I don’t want to interrupt them. They’re in love,” he said mysteriously, “true love.”

  “You’re serious. You came all this way on a bus that blew up to meet your friends whom you never met before. Somehow you find them here and you’re not even going to say anything to them,” Julie recapped.

  “Nope, I mean yep. I’m serious about coming here to meet them, but I’m not going to introduce myself.”

  She started to doubt there was ever a couple he was going to meet. Perhaps he randomly picked a couple that walked through the door, and pretending to know of them was an elaborate prank to lure her in.

  “How exactly are they your friends again?”

  “They are in love, Juliet,” he whispered, as if he was busy staring into the face of God, or something so extraordinary he could not look away.

  “If you’re not going to say hi then what are we doing here? This is a little creepy just spying on them,” she thought out loud.

  “I just wanted to see them and help them if they need it. Or maybe I need them more than they need me,” he whispered, following the rising thoughts in his head. “I do not get to see these moments anymore like I used to, ever since…” he caught himself before he let his big secret slip out.

  “Ever since what? You escaped from the insane asylum? Oh I’m sorry Charlie, I didn’t really mean that.” She regretted her words immediately. Much of the smile vanished from his face when she uttered them. “I don’t really think you’re crazy. You’re just a little…well, a lot odd. But I like it. I just don’t understand it.”

  “Yes, Juliet. How can I expect you to accept me as not strange if I do not reveal myself to you?”

  “Exactly! So who are you?!” she demanded, having his full attention for the moment. “What do you keep avoiding to tell me? It’s not like you are an escaped murderer of young girls or anything. Are you?”

  The right side of his mouth curled up into a partial smiled. “No,” he said to Juliet’s relief, turning his attention back to the couple. “I just want to watch them a while, then I will serve them.”

  If he was just trying to avoid the real question of his identity he was doing a good job of it.

  “Serve them? Serve them what?” Julie asked.

  “The drinks they ordered.”

  “But they’re coming right now. The waitress is bringing them…” suddenly the waitress slipped. The mugs shattered on the edge of the empty table spilling the couple’s drinks all over the floor, “…now,” as Julie finished her sentence.

  Julie sat back in the chair wondering if Charlie had anything to do with the accident. She waited in silence staring back and forth at the couple and Charlie, who was still staring at the couple. After a few moments he stood up and took the second tray of drinks off the waitress with a whisper and a pleasant smile as she walked out from behind the counter. On his way to the couple’s table, Julie watched him as he pulled out a tube of purple liquid, opened it up, and poured a drop into the couple’s drinks before he served them. They did not even notice him. Then he placed the tray on the empty table behind them, returned to his table with Julie, and watched the couple sip their drinks as they stared into each other’s eyes.

  “What did you do to their drinks?” Julie asked, not really fearing that he was poisoning them or trying to kill them. “What was that purple stuff?”

  “Poison.”

  “Poison?!” she shouted!

  “Shhh,” he whispered with his finger vertically placed over his lips. “It is a special poison I made myself.”

  He said it so calmly, like a serial killer reminiscing about his very first kill, the one that started it all.

  Charlie continued to watch the couple and sipped his café mocha getting whipped cream on his nose and cheek.

  “You made it yourself? A poison?” she whispered. “Tell me you’re not serious. You can’t do that! Are you crazy?!”

  “Relax, Juliet.” He used a calm, kind voice as she helped him wipe the whipped cream off his face. “Yes, the potion is a poison. But the poison only disrupts the neurons in the brain that connect past memories with present feelings.” In his quick glance at her Charlie could see that Julie did not understand. He gave her his full attention for the moment and proceeded to explain in layman’s terms. “It will stun the illusions of what love is. It will block past memories of what they think love is so they can be completely in the moment. It is like starting with a clean slate. The poison only lasts a moment, but when the love they feel for each other is as strong as theirs, they only need a moment to see what true love is and then they will carry it with them for the rest of their lives and beyond. I know they will. People go centuries without finding what this couple has. This is a very unique and extraordinary moment in the universe.”

  He turned back to the couple not wanting to miss the extraordinary moment. Julie stayed seated, but still somewhat panicked with her restless palms on the table ready to jump up and save them.

  “So you’re not trying to kill them, right? I don’t have to rush over there and stop them from drinking it?”

  “No, Juliet,” he replied without looking away from the couple. “It is quite the opposite of trying to harm them. People often associate obsession with love, a need to possess the other person. Some people even feel angry when they feel love because love has hurt them in the past. What I gave them paralyzes all those memories and their emotions for the moment and lets them see the true love that is already there, without conditionings or the hindrance of fear or self-cherishing emotions.” Charlie paused and then said, “There it is. Look at them now. They’re just staring into each other’s eyes without saying a word, resting in complete relaxed comfort. They’re completely free, with nothing to hide from the other. Like open books, they love each other completely and fully, with every breath throughout time collapsing into this one moment. They feel what each other feels and it is good. There are no flaws in their love now. It is perfection.”

  Julie stared at the couple and she thought she saw what Charlie meant. A unique and extraordinary moment in the universe? Here is this homely café? She wasn’t sure. In some sense, this event that Charlie considered ‘very unique and extraordinary’ in the universe, seemed so ordina
ry. She watched as they stared into each other’s eyes without fear, embarrassment, or shyness, without the slightest nerve twitching to turn away. They were completely and utterly in each other’s presence, without the slightest sense of imperfection. Even their flaws seemed to be laid out like an open book for the other to observe without judgment. Something was different about them. Perhaps it was perfect love.

  “Who are you?” Julie asked this strange young man across the table from her, more determined to get an answer now that he was not so preoccupied by the couple. “How did you know they would be here? How do you know so much about love? Or care about the love between two strangers you’ve never met?”

  How would anyone who spends so much time alone know about love? she questioned. He’s probably never had a girlfriend, she calculated, as she looked at his brown corduroy jacket, as if it alone would keep the girls away.

  “I am not comfortable telling you the truth yet, but I don’t want to lie to you either.”

  It was an honest response.

  “I understand,” she nodded, noticing his ability to look into her eyes longer now. She also felt the twitching in her nerves, the need to look away or say something to end the awkward silence between them, “I think you should at least speak to them.”

  “No, no, just observe is what I do,” Charlie said.

  “You can’t live your life all alone, afraid to get close to people, Charlie. Come on,” she insisted. She stood up from the table pulling Charlie behind her and approached the couple’s table.

  “No, Juliet,” he insisted, to no avail.

  “Hi, my name is Julie. We’re from out of town and I wondered if you might mind telling us what’s around here,” she looked back at Charlie and said, “We’ll pay for your lunch.”

  The couple looked at them with a strange kindness, reminding Julie of the seemingly insane smile of the limousine driver last night.

  “Nice to meet you. We have to leave now.” Charlie gently grabbed Julie by the shoulders and guided her toward the door.

  “What’s wrong, Charlie? Why can’t we just talk to them?” she asked as they stepped outside the café and began to walk along the sidewalk.

  “I just never interacted with the ones I help. There is no need for it,” he answered.

  “Why does there have to be a need? Why can’t you just talk to them because they’re nice people?” Julie asked. “Maybe they would like you, Charlie.”

  “It just never worked that way before and I’m not going to change it now just because I’m in this bah…” Charlie vaguely explained then sought to change the subject, but Julie did it for him.

  “Well then, you’re going to have to go shopping with me until you’re ready to tell me your big secret. Let’s go in here and get some new clothes for you,” she said, tugging at the corduroy jacket. “The way you’re dressed they probably didn’t believe you’re a tourist anyway.”

  She laughed at her own joke.

  Charlie didn’t get it.

  Chapter 8

  Inside the stone-gray building, appearing as if it was built in antiquity, rested many department stores, lined along the edge of the busy open hall. There were jewelry shops, women’s clothing stores, a men’s clothing store, candy shops, chestnut stands, and even a cotton candy stand nestled between a jewelry cutter and a country western store specializing in dingo boots. Julie watched Charlie walk through as if he was oblivious to it all, as if he walked down an empty street in his mind without a care in the world. He was focused—she could tell that much, but on what?

  The Victorian carpet paved the way to the marbled courtyard. Like ancient colonnades in a modern indoor plaza, stone pillars reached up to a painted ceiling with images of angels looking down. Beautiful plants rested around the pool of water-covered pennies with a glorious fountain at the center. Children made their wishes as they flung their parents’ change over their shoulders into the water in front of a backdrop of Chinese food, pizza, pretzel, and snow cone eateries. Others twirled their fingers in the water, scattering the array of goldfish waiting for breadcrumbs. A mother gently rocked her stroller back and forth with one hand while she shared an ice cream cone with her oldest daughter in the other.

  Charlie remained with a strange gaze on his face then suddenly, he came to a stop in the middle of the court and said, “Listen!”

  “What’s going on, Charlie?” Julie asked.

  “Do you hear it? It sounds like the gods of Olympus singing to the mortals. Where is it coming from?” he asked.

  “I don’t hear anything but the crowd, the water falling, and the music overhead,” Julie replied, thinking he heard something extraordinary.

  “Yes, that’s it! The music overhead!” Charlie yelled with a schizophrenic excitement to the crowd, “It is them! It is them!”

  “You mean the Air Supply song on the radio?”

  The strangeness that he was never ceased to amaze her.

  “Yes, Air Supply! The greatest band to ever share their music and voice with the world,” he answered, as if lost in the tone of the melodies and entranced by the words.

  “You’re not serious, are you?” There was a bizarre look on his face that said it all. She whispered under her breath. “Oh my God, you are serious.”

  Charlie did not answer. He was awestruck by the beauty of the music and started singing out loud:

  “Now the night has gone.

  Now the night has gone away”

  As he started singing Julie felt a pain she had never experienced before. It was as if someone was using a jackhammer to break through the eardrum of her soul. The sound of his voice made her fingers and toes clench with tension. It was the most horrifying thing she had ever heard, but he only continued louder. As Charlie sang everyone in the court turned to locate the source of the appalling sound. They began to cover their ears, dropping their food and shopping bags where they stood. Julie watched him wide-eyed with her hands over her ears as he belted out his obvious love for Air Supply’s music. Eventually, she had enough.

  “Charlie, stop!” Julie yelled out over the cries of babies and children while their parents carried them away, racing with strollers in hand. But he kept singing. The store workers huddled in the corners and back rooms of their stores. The brave ones ran to the front of their stores and closed the gates with their iron rods. Everyone prepared themselves as Charlie was about to go into the chorus, and to their great fear, he did.

  “Charlie!” Julie screamed over his appalling voice.

  The lyrics slowly faded from his lips. He looked around, wondering where everyone went. One by one he saw the store workers slowly pop up from behind their desks and iron gates, the shoppers peering out from behind the plants and benches, and Julie standing with her hands over her ears.

  “What happened here? Did I miss something?” he asked, clueless, as the security guard rose up from the fetal position behind the garbage can with his gun in hand.

  “No, Charlie,” she said hesitantly. “Everyone just thought they heard…gunshots and they got scared. You probably didn’t hear them because you were singing.”

  “Oh! Well as long as everyone is alright.”

  He turned and calmly continued walking through the court.

  “I take it you’re a fan of Air Supply?” Julie asked.

  “Of course! Who wouldn’t be a fan? You enjoy them, don’t you?”

  “Well I’m sure everybody enjoys their songs, but I’m not a real big fan,” she admitted. “Are they gay? ‘Cause a lot of times it sounds like their singing to each other.”

  “I’m not sure if they’re gay, not that anyone where we come from cares about such things.” He hesitated as he considered his secret; who he was, where he was from, and who he was talking to. Then he said to change the subject: “One thing I do know is that Graham and Russell know what love is.”

  “Graham and Russell? Who’s that? The guys from Air Supply?”

  “Yes,” he nodded slowly, as if dumbfounded that she did
n’t know their names.

  “You even know their names?” she questioned to herself out loud then mumbled privately, “He really is a fan.”

  “Of course I know their names. Everyone knows their names: Graham Russell and Russell Hitchcock. They both wanted to be called Russell so they compromised and one took it as the first name and the other the last name,” he said suddenly feeling like he said too much.

  “Ah Charlie, not everybody knows their names and weren’t they just born with those names? What do you mean they wanted to be called Russell? Where do you come from anyway? Did you time travel here from the early eighties?” She was not expecting an answer. She could tell she hit the point where he would not reveal anymore, as if she knew that part of him by now, where Charlie ends and the mystery of Charlie begins.

  Then she asked, “If they, Russell and Russell, know so much about love, then why are some of their songs so sad?”

  “Because humans make love sad, don’t they?”

  His addition of don’t they hit her like a punch in the gut, pointing out the pain she felt because of love in her past relationships, especially with her mother.

  Julie thought to herself that love was a wonderful thing but yes, Charlie was right. Humans did make love a sad thing, attaching feelings of obsession, lust, and even anger to it. She saw the faces returning to the open hallway and stores and realized that some people could not even experience love without feeling loneliness. But Julie did not need to look in the faces of strangers to know this; she only needed to look within herself to feel love’s tangled chaos.

  Charlie, sensing the change in her emotion asked, “How does something so simple and beautiful as love become entangled with so many negative emotions, like a rose growing in the midst of a garbage dump? Lost in the chaos of emotions and mental judgments, love’s wonderful scent and simple beauty cannot fully be nourished, enjoyed, and expressed. The true love we witnessed at the café is indeed unique and rare in the universe.”

  Julie said nothing. In one single moment she felt the question resonate in her deeply, echoing through the memories of broken relationships. When she thought of her mother she felt the flower in her heart wilting from the smoke of negative emotions, struggling to breathe or find any sense of redemption and worth, among all the anger and resentment. When she thought of love from a boy, she felt the anticipation as well as the danger. She felt the need to guard her heart with a wall of impenetrable emotions and hide behind her sarcasm and witty smile. The memories of love were cluttered with lost lonely nights, and feelings of abandonment.