Part 2 (2/2)

”You've gotten bossier in addition to being more patronizing,” she says rather cheerfully. She speeds up and begins pumping her elbows in a power-walk impersonation. ”C'mon,” she says. ”It burns more calories.” She stops for a Don't Walk signal at the corner of East 64th. ”What would be your idea of a Denisecompatible job?” she asks him. ”And don't say bank teller or nanny or dog walker or taxi driver.”

He says, ”I can just see you behind the wheel of a gypsy cab.”

She leads him across Madison, heading east. ”I pick up my lunch on Lex,” she explains.

”Have you acquired any hobbies?” he asks. ”Hopefully one that could convert into a paying job.”

”I wish docent paid. I'd spend a different afternoon in each museum. Another thought I had was decorator.”

”For which you'd need a license. And experience.” And not ten beige rooms utterly devoid of personality.

”I'm getting offended” she says. ”I don't hear one single note of confidence in your voice. Is this how you'd talk to a son or daughter who was shopping around for a new career? Wouldn't you say, 'What are your strengths? Let's look in the cla.s.sifieds. Let's give you one of those skills a.s.sessment tests'?”

Shouldn't the word daughter remind Denise of her own child? He doesn't bring Thalia up because the reunion is still too thrilling and too sacred to be uncorked. ”Now, now,” he says. ”I'm playing devil's advocate.”

”I'm sure all of these people heading for the nearest subway work in offices,” Denise says with a sweep of her arm. Do they know something I don't know? And did they start off with more credentials than I have?”

”Can you touch-type?” he asks.

Denise stops and lets her jaw drop theatrically. ”Can you see me as someone's secretary? Answering a phone? Taking shorthand? Emptying coffee grounds?”

”Then don't ask my advice! It's not an unreasonable idea. There are receptionist jobs that amount to being a greeter in an outer office. Always nicely dressed. Gracious. Keeping your shoes on under your desk.”

”I'm mildly intrigued,” she says.

”Then read the want ads. Make some phone calls. Charm some HR people.”

”Is this wishful thinking? That I can dress up and sit at a beautiful desk in an atrium with a gorgeous arrangement of flowers-you've seen those giant, hotel-lobby-sized ones with birds of paradise and hydrangeas-and greet clients when they get off the elevator? Or that jobs like this exist at all nowadays? Don't companies want armed guards?”

”We used a headhunter who specialized in law-firm hires. I can look her up. There's bound to be firms who'd welcome someone with social skills and maturity-”

”Maturity! That's what I'm up against: age discrimination! You know where I'll end up? Waitressing at one of these places where they brag about their elderly help, and their nametags say how long they've worked there. I saw that in a Beverly Hills delicatessen once: 'Dottie, forty-five years.' 'Pauline, thirty-three years.' No, thank you.”

”Would you consider sales?”

Denise recoils. She stomps right on Lexington and picks up speed.

”I was thinking of a place like Bergdorf's or Bendel's,” he offers.

”Well, I certainly know my way around those places-”

”But?”

She stops, strikes a pose, imaginary c.o.c.ktail in hand. ”'Oh, what do I do, attractive single man whom I've just struck up a conversation with at a dinner party? I work at Saks. No, no, not Goldman Sachs. The other one, the flags.h.i.+p store on Fifth. I sell pocketbooks and occasionally fill in at costume jewelry. I wrap your purchases in tissue and then I run your credit card. Fulfilling? No. But I do get an employee discount. And what did I do before that? Nothing, actually. I had a grant from the husband foundation. How about you?'”

Henry smiles. Had he ever noticed a talent for showmans.h.i.+p in the young Denise? He doesn't think so. Certainly there were good looks, a flattering gaze, and small talk that bordered on the charming. He asks, ”Were you this entertaining in the past?”

Denise grins. ”I must have been. Because you know who inherited my sense of humor?”

He does know but doesn't answer.

”Thalia. She's funny in the way I'm funny: not joke telling, but just-what would you call it?-putting a story across.”

This would be the time to ask if Thalia is putting that ability to good use, but he is saved by the sudden appearance of particularly big and beautiful artichoke hearts attached to their stems marinating in a cafe window. Denise gasps. ”I must have one of those,” she says. ”That'll be my dinner, with a cold gla.s.s of something crisp and white.”

”That's not enough for dinner,” says Henry.

”Then my lunch,” says Denise, ”which I'll eat the minute I get home.”

He follows her inside and overrides her when she tells the man behind the takeout counter, ”One of those artichokes in the window.”

”We'll take six,” says Henry. ”Four for her and two for me.” His billfold is already in his hand. Denise is protesting but not strenuously.

”He feels sorry for me,” she tells the man behind the counter. ”My husband died and took all the money with him.”

The man smiles uncertainly. After all, who would say such a thing if it weren't a joke?

”I'm the ex,” Henry volunteers, then wonders what's gotten into him.

4. Bygones.

BECAUSE HE'S BEEN seeing Sheri Abrams, PhD, for decades, the reference to Denise Krouch requires no biographical footnote. Henry's divorce was the very catapult that landed him in this black Eames chair twenty-four years before, opposite the then newly minted clinical psychologist, chosen purely on the basis of Upper West Side geography. Her leafy office is untended and book lined, radiator clanging, tribal kilims on two walls, a four-minute walk from West 75th Street. He brings lattes for himself and Sheri-first-name basis from the beginning-and a gourmet peanut b.u.t.ter biscuit for her standard poodle, the third identical dusty black dog in his tenure. Their sessions have evolved into conversational sparring between opinionated friends. Sheri-and this is why he'd never consider psychoa.n.a.lysis-talks back, advises, and editorializes. They discuss movies, plays, op-ed pieces, and the openings and closings of restaurants on the West Side. She discharges Henry every few seasons, p.r.o.nouncing him over the hump and better adjusted than he knows. Yes, she always replies wearily; yes, we could meet for coffee or lunch, but after that, naturally, I'd have to refer you to another therapist. Accordingly, he is careful not to chat when they find themselves waiting in the same lines at Zabar's. After a few months, with or without a setback, he feels that something is missing. Most recently, it was Celeste's diagnosis, and now, on the heels of that loss, this: His longtime nemesis is filling his voice mail with messages. And her lovely, bighearted daughter! Could he even explain to Sheri without embarra.s.sing himself what one lunch has meant to him?

”When did you and Denise start talking again?” Sheri asks, frowning.

”About six weeks ago. I sent her a note of condolence when her husband died.”

”Which husband? I've lost count.”

”Her third.”

”Magnanimous of you.”

”I wrote a note, nothing profound, the usual sorry for your loss. She wrote back sounding a little desperate. So I called.”

She says evenly, ”I see. You picked up the phone and called your ex-wife.”

”Yes, I did.” He pops the plastic lid off his latte and says quietly, ”I was curious.”

”Curiosity is good,” she says with so little conviction that he laughs.

She asks what is so amusing, and he mimics her ”curiosity is good” with a more p.r.o.nounced strangulation of the syllables.

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