by Gage Grayson
We’re already entering the small AstroTurf park under the bar. There are a couple benches, a fenced-in dog run, and a patch of sand facing the river.
The park is abandoned, but I hear a Lorde song blasting from the bar, and some laughing voices.
“There it is.” I point to the outdoor, wooden stairwell leading up to the second-story bar. “Let’s go.”
“Okay, let’s…but, what’s in that first story?” Maddie points to the plain, brick ground floor of the small building, with its two unadorned steel doors.
“Just a restroom. Come on, let’s go get that drink.”
Maddie doesn’t need any more inspiration, she’s on her way up the stairs before I even finish the word drink.
Wright’s Place is a single room. It’s maybe a hundred square feet, always a little too small for the crowds it attracts. When we walk in, there’s only a minor throng of people clumped at end of the bar, waiting their turn for the sole bartender’s attention.
I never really understood this place or its weird décor. The wine-colored carpeting suits the dark wood-paneled walls, but the two black and yellow art deco-patterned rugs clash with the carpet. The fifties-style jukebox and random painting of a ship are also out of place.
Seeing it through Maddie’s eyes, watching her take in the room for the first time, I’m finally learning to appreciate it. The design decisions are all unintentional and there’s no theme, but there’s no other place like it.
“I like it.” Maddie’s taking in the glass chandelier, which is also out of fucking nowhere.
We’re at the back of the misshapen line, the entrance just behind our backs.
“I like it, too. They just need to install some touchscreen kiosks to cut down on the lines.”
Maddie’s eyes move down from the chandelier, and I get a small jolt when she faces me, lit up with the perfect grin.
“What? So, this place can be another fuckin’ Panera or something?” Maddie’s smile grows sassier, and that little jolt of power I felt is now growing, as well.
I look over at the jukebox to stop myself from getting too out of sorts.
There’s a woman standing by the jukebox. Her hair is dyed bright blue and tied back into two buns with turquoise scrunchies.
“Yes, what’s wrong with that?” I look back at Maddie—a much more pleasant sight.
“You know what? Nothing. They should also have soup, bread, cookies and Wi-Fi.”
“They might already,” I respond, but Maddie now has her eyes on the drink the bartender’s making currently. He’s pouring from two bottles into a plastic cup, somehow creating a fluorescent green-tinted cocktail.
“What am I supposed to order?” Maddie asks, still facing the bar.
“Try the Island Punch.”
Maddie does another quick scan of the room’s furnishings. “It’s really called that? There’s nothing island-y about this place.”
“Except that drink name...”
“And we are on an island.” Maddie’s contemplating the view through the window, and I start to crack up. “The fuck you laughing at, mister?”
“You look so serious. I love it.”
“Don’t be condescending, I’m trying to figure this shit out. Now, we’re on an island, there’s sand downstairs...”
The bartender now has the line moving, and we shuffle forward a couple feet.
“...and there are string lights outside the windows,” continues Maddie. “That’s kind of tropical, right?”
“I appreciate your positivity, but I don’t know if that’s connected to the drink name.”
“I’m not asking what you know, Mister Barrett. All I need is your opinion on the goddamn string lights.”
A Drake song begins playing. A guy in a three-piece suit starts flailing wildly to the music coming out of the retro-looking jukebox. The blue-haired lady looks on coolly.
“My opinion is it’s all connected. The lights, this island, this city made of islands, the sand outside, it’s all part of the experience of the Island Punch.”
Maddie studies my face with her jade-green eyes. To her, this discussion is of the utmost importance, and there will be no rest until it’s resolved.
“I concur. Still doesn’t explain why this is called fuckin’ Wright’s Place.”
“We could ask the bartender,” I offer.
“Nah, fuck that. We need to leave some mystery unsolved for next time.”
As much as I like the sound of those words—next time—this is a moment to bite my tongue and leave some mystery unsolved myself.
There may or not be a next time, but this time is happening right fucking now. And it’s almost our turn to get a drink.
The man in front of us, wearing a fucking pea-green leisure suit of all things, is asking slow, infuriating questions of the bartender.
“Do you have wine?” he inquires.
“Merlot.” The bartender, wearing a vest and tie, swings the green wine bottle up from under the bar for the leisure suit guy to see.
“Merlot,” the leisure suit guy repeats, “Merlot, totally. Can you pour that with some cola?”
“Sure thing.”
The bartender begins work on the bizarre order right away. Everything about him seems friendly and pleasant, and he’s dressed nicely enough to wait tables at L'atelier.
“Madeline, would you like to eat at L'atelier after this? Or Del Posto, maybe?” I want to get the suggestions out before I forget about them, and I also want to keep this evening going as long as I can.
Maddie turns her head around, her eyes now set on me, ravishingly.
“The first one, L'atelier. No hurry, though.”
“‘No hurry.’ The two most beautiful words in the English language,” I mumble, maybe loud enough for Maddie to hear, or maybe not.
“It’s our turn to order,” Maddie declares loudly, the vested bartender now looking at us. “Island Punch, right? Is that right for this place?”
“Yes, Island Punch. Two of them.” I direct my words to the bartender, and he wastes no time securing two cups and running what sounds like a blender under the bar.
“A blender,” Maddie remarks. “I wonder if they have pineapple here, too.”
I blink hard. Did she really just say that?
Is she referencing something that she’s been trying so hard to avoid?
“The pineapple’s really good here,” I state dryly.
“Oh, just like in Hawaii?”
Hearing Maddie say the name of the state is enough to shoot my pulse up into the triple digits. It’s like a mini cardio workout.
“Not quite that good,” I croak mechanically.
“No fresh fruit here, guys. Sorry.” The bartender hands us our two bright green drinks while breaking the news.
“No problem, I forgot what longitude we were in,” I mutter, passing the bartender a pair of twenties.
I notice the leisure suit guy taking his drink outside.
“Hey, can we drink outside?” I ask the bartender.
“Sure. Do you want change?”
Maddie is on her way out the door with her Island Punch, and I start trotting to catch up with her as usual.
“No, change is never good,” I exclaim as Maddie and I slip out the door.
We start walking down the stairs just in time to watch the guy in front of us walk out of the park and onto the street with his Merlot and cola.
“Hey, I don’t think Leisure Suit Larry is supposed to leave the property with that beverage,” Maddie observes.
“And I don’t think that’s under the jurisdiction of the SEC,” I counter.
“Hey, I’m not fucking going after him, am I?”
“I guess it’s his lucky day,” I say as we reach the AstroTurf at the bottom of the stairs.
“I guess it is. Come on, let’s go to the beach.”
The empty west side of Manhattan starts to feel increasingly enchanted the moment we step onto the little patch of sand.
After we
take our spot on the bench facing the Hudson, I know I must be dreaming.
“Could you pinch me, Madeline?”
Madeline obliges. She doesn’t even look at me, she simply grabs a bit of my forearm between her thumb and forefinger and starts squeezing tighter, then tighter, then even tighter without mercy.
“Damn, okay, Maddie, I just wanted to make sure that this is reality.”
“What makes you think it is?” asks Maddie, not letting go.
“Only reality could hurt this much.”
“Fair enough.”
Maddie releases her grip, and we stare at the twinkling lights just across the state line.
“I bet the view’s better looking from that side of the river,” posits Maddie.
“It is.”
“So, do you think Snooki’s just chilling across the water right now? Is she enjoying the view?”
“No, that’s Hoboken. No Snooki, just the Cake Boss.”
“Are you sure about that, Ethan? You don’t think Snooki’s hanging out in Hoboken with the Situation, Bon Jovi, Bruce Springsteen and the ghost of Tony Soprano? What the hell else would be going on in New Jersey?”
“You got me, Maddie. Maybe we should stop looking at it.”
“Agreed, L’atelier it is.”
The walk to L’atelier is much too short. It’s only few blocks down Tenth Avenue and after a few minutes of wonderful, nonsensical conversation, we’re already being seated.
While Maddie joyfully peruses her menu, I watch a very inappropriately dressed couple slow dance, even though there’s no music coming from anywhere.
“Hey, does that look like David Foster Wallace to you?” I point over Maddie’s shoulder, and she turns around to examine the dancing couple.
The man is wearing an olive-green hoodie and a red bandana on his head. His date, maybe his wife, is dressed in sort of a biker getup: distressed black jeans, a white top, and a black choker.
“You mean the author of Infinite Jest?” Maddie asks, turning back to me. “I don’t think he’s alive anymore.”
“He’s not, but that looks like him.”
“You’re not one of those Infinite Jest guys, are you?”
“What’s an Infinite Jest guy?”
“One of those guys who tries to read Infinite Jest, only makes it a couple hundred pages in, but then displays it on his bookcase like he’s fucking proud of it.”
“Maddie, I barely know what Infinite Jest even is.”
“That’s refreshing,” Maddie says, smiling, looking at back at her menu for just a moment before locking eyes with me suddenly. “We should dance, though.”
Maddie and I put down our menus, rise from our seats, and do our own slow dance, accompanied only by the sounds of the restaurant.
Ethan
Sometimes it’s weird riding an elevator to the top of a century-plus-old skyscraper.
They do a thorough job keeping this place clean, but some days I swear I can smell the history—some musky scent that’s been embedded in the oak since 1915 or some shit.
It always hits me on a random day like today—just an average Wednesday when I’ve been doing nothing but working all fucking week. Stepping out of the elevator and into the office hallway, I’m hit with an odor like I’ve never smelled before in this building.
It doesn’t smell bad, and it actually doesn’t smell like history either.
It smells like masala dosa, and palak paneer...and it’s coming from the boardroom.
I think this is the morning to break my habit of walking past the boardroom like it doesn’t exist. Before I even get to my office, I need to see what the hell is going on in there at 9:00 a.m.
I’m too baffled by this change in atmosphere to even bother knocking. I enter through the squeaky boardroom door to see a cheap, generic Welcome banner thumbtacked up above two windows.
There are three fresh-faced upstarts—two guys and one woman—looking like it’s their first time wearing sharp business suits.
Actually, there are four. The three suited kids are huddled in a circle, talking to each other over paper plates of Indian food.
Those three are in their early twenties, and they nervously look over at me for a second as I walk in.
They’re all new hires—interns, most likely.
There’s another lady, a couple years older, sitting by herself at the conference table. She’s eating a large, plain naan—and nothing else—and her hair is dyed bright blue.
Why does she look so familiar?
The group of suited kids look relieved when I ignore them, and they go back to whispering anxiously at each other.
I sit down in the seat next to the blue-haired lady. She’s wearing a frilly black dress with a leopard-print trim. It might be the most casual thing anyone’s ever worn in this office.
“Good morning,” I greet her.
She turns to me with a mouthful of naan, so I keep talking.
“Are you one of our new interns?”
“No, I’m a financial analyst,” she mumbles with her mouth still full.
“I can get you some water if you’d like, and we have coffee out in the hallway...”
“No, I’m fine,” she responds after swallowing. “I just didn’t want you to think I’m an intern.”
I glance over at the interns huddled away from the table.
“I see. I’m Ethan Barrett, if you didn’t know.”
“I did know. I’m Kallie…Kallie.”
Kallie picks up her naan and takes a big bite. I guess that’s all the introduction we need.
“I just wanted to say, Kallie, I admire your fashion choices.”
Kallie thankfully puts her naan down before responding.
“Really?”
“Yeah, the hair especially. That’s quite a color.”
“Well, thank you. I appreciate that. I put a lot of work into it.”
Where do I know her from? I don’t want to ask, because she might misinterpret that and see that as inappropriate.
The interns all leave abruptly, dropping their plates and plastic forks into the trash can set up by the door.
“Friends of yours?” I ask.
“What?” Kallie responds, picking up her naan and putting it back down. “Of course they’re not. Why would they be?”
“Why wouldn’t they be?” I’m trying not to sound too outraged, but seriously. What the fuck?
“I’m just pointing out the assumption you made, Mister Barrett. That’s all.”
Mister Barrett. That’s someone’s thing, but it’s not Kallie’s.
“You can call me Ethan. Please.”
“Okay, Ethan.” Kallie pushes her plate with the naan away from her, and I get a physical sense of relief. “I didn’t skip that part of my career. I’ve put in my time at several lesser firms. I’ve interned.”
“Lesser?”
“I’ve worked right on Wall Street. My first job was with RF Lafferty...”
“Then why didn’t you stay on Wall Street?” I hear the apprehension in my own interrupting voice.
“Because there’s only one Ethan Barrett in this neighborhood, and he’s not on Wall Street. I wanted to work with the best, so I walked down the block, and here I am.”
I’ve seen plenty of analysts come and go, but Kallie has a rare talent for making me feel uneasy.
Kallie stands up with a confident smirk. Her expression stays in place while she looks down at me.
“Who hired you, Kallie?”
“I’ve met all the senior partners, but the offer came from Mister Rosen last Friday.”
“Rosen,” I repeat quietly, looking at Kallie’s unfinished naan.
“You okay?” Kallie’s voice sounds like it’s coming from the ceiling, and it has an edge of derisive laughter.
I force myself to look back up at Kallie’s smirking face and meet her gaze.
“I’ll see you around the office, then,” I state in a monotone voice.
Kallie’s smirk drops, and she
nods. I feel a bit of remorse as Kallie leaves the room.
She’s still young and still at the start of her career. She’s probably trying to project confidence and use flattery, but she’s struggling with it.
Kallie’s leftover naan is sitting awkwardly on the table. The greasy, empty bag from the 24-hour Indian place on Chambers Street is settling on top of the wood a couple feet away.
Who set up this whole event anyway?
It could’ve been one new of the interns, walking up from the subway and stopping at the first restaurant they could find on their way here.
I doubt they brought their own welcome banner, though.
I don’t know what’s happening in this office.
I stand up and start cleaning the goddamn table. No matter how well things are working, no matter how smoothly things are going, shit just changes over time.
There’s no fucking way to avoid it. Even if I holed myself up in my apartment and worked from home for the next few decades through retirement, I couldn’t steer clear of the merciless winds of change.
I pull the welcome banner down with a tug. My first instinct is to crumple it and throw it in the trash, but I end up folding it neatly and placing it on the table.
Even if I retired now, I couldn’t get away from it.
I could get out of the game. I could sell my condo and put everything in a low-risk index fund.
I could buy a cottage in the Berkshires and live out the rest of my life there. I’d never even have to leave.
But shit would still change. I would change, whether I wanted to or not.
And I’d still have to adapt.
So, I may as well stay in this increasingly weird fucking office and let the chips fall wherever.
I drop the plate and all the empty packaging into the trash can before carrying the can out of the room with me.
The cleaning staff here is, naturally, overburdened and underpaid, so I don’t mind pitching in whenever I can.
The hallway is abuzz with weird energy the moment I step outside. Not that jittery, nervous ambiance that Maddie inspires; this is the feeling of new people coming into the fold.
Interns, analysts—they’re all throwing themselves into the craziness and bringing their own craziness along for the ride.
