Astor Place Vintage: A Novel (24 page)

I looked up, startled to find Mr. Vogel, the vice president, standing in front of me. He might have been handsome in his day, but thinning, graying hair and a paunch were taking their toll. “Yes, sir.”

His lips curled into a smile under a thick mustache waxed to curl up at the tips. “I wanted to say hello. I hear you’re doing an excellent job.”

“Thank you, Mr. Vogel.”

“Miss Cohen speaks highly of you.”

“She’s taught me so much.”

“I had the impression that you’ve been teaching her. Your idea about the samples was first-rate. We’ll give it a go after the New Year. Keep up the good work,” he said, moving on.

Down in the locker room, I considered telling Angelina my good news, but then I decided not to, in case it should sound like boasting. “I can’t believe this year is finally over,” I said instead.

“How’d you like to go up to Times Square to ring in the New Year?” she asked.

“In this cold? With all the crowds?” It sounded like torture disguised as a good time.

“But it’s exciting, with all the throngs milling about. Then at midnight everyone goes mad, yelling out ‘Happy New Year!’ And since we’re closed tomorrow, you can stay out late for once. Won’t you come, please?” she said with a winsome pout.

I had to smile, flattered that she’d chosen to ask me out of everyone. “How can I say no?”

“It’ll be jolly fun,” she said. “I promise.”

She proceeded to ask a bunch of other girls, too. I felt like a fool and almost backed out, but sitting alone in my room now sounded dreary. At the very least, it would be an adventure.

Our group of seven squeezed onto a trolley with barely enough room to stand. When it was time to get off on Forty-second Street, we traded our cramped, claustrophobic captivity for the freedom to dodge hordes of moving bodies. Restaurants overflowed with revelers, and lines of people queued up for shows. Weaving through the crowds, I wondered what everyone was really celebrating. Making it to another year alive? What was so wonderful about living, anyway?

“Isn’t it silly,” Angelina said, hooking her arm in mine, “how we live in the grandest city in the world but hardly ever leave our own neighborhood? I’ll never forget the first time I walked north of Canal and didn’t stop. Must’ve been around ten years old. I found myself on Sixth Avenue and turned in to a department store; thought I’d died and gone to heaven—until the floorwalker kicked me out. I must’ve looked a sight in my hand-me-downs. That’s why I always take care to dress nice. If you look cheap, men’ll treat you cheap.”

As if to prove her point, we passed a woman standing by the stage door of a theater. There was no doubt about her profession. She wore a crimson dress trimmed with fur. She’d painted her lips as red as an American Beauty rose. Her peroxide-blond hair was swept up in a towering pompadour.

“I don’t understand . . .” I let my voice trail off.

“Understand what?”

“How she makes sure she doesn’t . . . get into trouble.”

“You’ve never heard of a rubber bag?”

“Rubber bag?”

“If the fellow wears it, you’re perfectly safe.”

I nodded, though I couldn’t imagine what it was or how it worked. “I wish it weren’t all so mysterious.”

“My mama never told me a thing, either. I guess she wanted me to have the same shock she had on her wedding night. You hungry? Let’s round up the others for a bite to eat.”

We turned in to the first cheap restaurant that had an empty table. As the other girls joked and flirted with some sailors sitting nearby, I wished I could ask Angelina exactly what had shocked her mother. Had Angelina already experienced that shock, too?

We prolonged our stay in the warm restaurant by ordering coffee and tea. New customers crowded the doorway, though, and before long our waiter gave us the evil eye, so we piled back out into the cold. Half a block down, the girls insisted on going into a brightly lit arcade. Though a sign said
UNESCORTED LADIES WELCOME,
I didn’t find the place particularly inviting—perhaps because of the sign in back that said
FOR MEN ONLY.
It hung over a long row of automatic picture machines. In front of every machine stood a man—except in one case, a boy was propped up on a box. They undoubtedly were watching some sort of vulgar peep show.

I tried to ignore them and let the girls entertain me with their skittish pleasure at feeding nickels into slots for the privilege of receiving an electric shock, or listening to a scratchy phonograph record, or stepping on a scale to find out their weight. The bright lights and seedy atmosphere began to wear on me, though; when midnight finally approached, I was more than ready to move on.

The girls insisted on pushing through the crowd to get as close to the square as possible. The year 1908 blazed in huge electric lights way up on the tower of the Times Building. The
newspaper had said it could be seen for miles. I wondered if my parents could see it from heaven. I wondered what they’d think of their daughter now.

At the stroke of midnight, everyone’s eyes turned up to the illuminated ball on the Times tower. Shouts of “Happy New Year” and joyous singing filled the street. Angelina yelled a hearty “Happy New Year” at me. When I countered with my own “Happy New Year,” she opened her arms and we hugged. Soon I was hollering along with everyone else. The hoopla continued for at least five minutes of what seemed like utter madness. Perhaps it wasn’t so very awful to be alive.

WHEN THE SHOP
door opened, I looked up from the journal, hoping it would be the delivery guy with my sandwich.

“I believe you’re expecting these?” said Mrs. Kelly’s grandson, lugging a couple of garbage bags.

“Oh yes, from Mrs. Kelly. You can set them on the floor back here, that’s great.”

“I’ll be right back.” He turned and dashed to a cab parked out front. I slid the journal into a drawer as he returned with two more bags.

“Thanks for bringing all that down,” I said, trying to remember his name—or maybe I’d never been told.

“I’m glad to get rid of it.” Seeming to remember this was a business transaction, he added, “She tells me some of it’s worth a lot.”

He wore khaki pants and a blue T-shirt with Nikes and a Yankee baseball cap. The look would be fine if he were in high school, but this guy was old enough to remember life without e-mail. No
ring. Commitment issues? “There are some nice pieces. She has good taste,” I said.

“Grandma used to work as a buyer in a department store.”

“That explains it.”

“Yeah.” He checked his watch and peered out the door.

“So . . . do you live there with her?”

“No, no, god forbid. Santa Monica.”

“Oh.” So why the Yankee cap? “You like it out there?”

“It’s pretty nice, other than the traffic. Those are interesting,” he said, peering at the shelf behind me.

“They’re head vases.” I took one down and showed him the opening on top. “They were big in the forties and fifties. Highly collectible now.” I needed to bring down my new one.

“I’ve never seen one before. They’re great.”

“Thanks. You know, I don’t think I ever got your name.”

“I’m sorry. Rob. Rob Kelly.”

“Amanda Rosenbloom.”

We nodded and smiled, but no one initiated a handshake. I got that feeling you get when you’re a single woman and you’re with a man who might also be single and you imagine he’s imagining that you’re desperate and would marry him tomorrow if he’d only say the word but why would he when he could have a twenty-year-old instead of a woman approaching forty.
Well,
I wanted to tell him,
I’m not desperate. I have a successful business—I think—and I like living alone and don’t need to be in a relationship to feel like I have a right to exist.

“You ever been out there?” he asked.

“Once. I don’t like L.A. much, but Santa Monica was nice, with the beach.”

“Yeah, the air quality is better.” He looked toward the door again, and I wondered why he didn’t just leave. Then I realized I needed to give him the check and he was probably trying not to be
crass. “I owe you money,” I said, my index finger in the air. “Hold on a sec.”

I wrote out the check for twelve hundred dollars and handed it to him with regret. I never would’ve made this deal if I’d known about my lease. As he put the check in his wallet, the delivery guy arrived with my lunch. I expected Rob to make his exit, but he wandered up and down the store, giving the men’s rack a cursory look. After I paid the delivery guy, Rob returned to my counter.

“I’m just here to help her get rid of things,” he said. “Take care of some loose ends.”

“That’s nice of you.” I took my turkey sandwich out of the bag.

“My older sister lives in New Jersey, and she helps out a lot more than I do, but she’s a lawyer and has two little kids, so I wanted to do my share. Grandma’s driving me a little crazy, actually. She’s an ornery old woman.”

I smiled but wasn’t sure how to respond, especially since it occurred to me to mention the journal, but then he might say I had no business reading it and should give it back.