yelled down the phone. âItâs 2013 â âNew year, new youâ.â
âYeah, whatever. See you soon.â I hung up.
All in all, it wasnât looking good. I hadnât exactly chosen the best starting point. In addition to the joint pain that lingered from my early morning workout, there was one thought that splintered my mind: Adam. I had let him have me, I thought as I was brushing my teeth. Most likely, I had cured his obsession. Equally likely, he had transferred it to me.
âWell done Sophie⦠truly well done,â I grumbled aloud, staring at myself in the mirror.
Mirandaâs family joined us for New Yearâs lunch. Luckily the numbers were still small, being just her mother and her younger brother, who spent the afternoon on the couch, hung over from the previous night.
By 7 p.m., I was already back at the parking lot for my night shift. I spent the evening watching Adamâs car on CCTV. It was inert, like me, waiting for some sign of him. As I expected, he didnât call. In the days that followed, I saw him go to work, come home, and then leave again to retrieve one of his hookers. He ran like clockwork. He had evidently achieved his goal: seduce me in the New Year and lure me into his game. Perhaps that was all I had been: a challenge; an obsession to appease; a cure for the itch.
I thought of nothing else. Every night, when the doorbell rang, I prayed that it would be him. Of course, it was always Ben and Ester, to whom I had said nothing.
Two weeks later, on a Wednesday night around 9 p.m., I was sitting on the step outside the office door. I had been observing his habitual movements â Monday, Wednesday, Friday. He would have to walk past me to reach his car. I wasnât even planning to talk to him, I just wanted to know whether he had the nerve to say hello.
At nine forty-five, I saw him leave his building and head towards the lot.
My heart was racing and I could hardly breathe. Halfway across the stretch, he saw me and looked away. Without so much as a glance, he strolled by and opened the car door. I wished that I had the courage to stand my ground and wait for him to return with his prostitute, but it was humiliating. I decided to retreat to my bedroom. For the sake of my pride, I switched off the surveillance monitor. I did not want to see his re-entry, nor did I want to stay in that room any more. His presence still lingered there.
I grabbed my jacket and hurried outside to complete some aimless walking â headphones blaring.
I arrived at the corner and turned right onto Broadway, then onto Bond Street. I was thinking only of the movement, following the green lights of New York, shrouded in deafening rock music. On the final note of Thom Yorkeâs
Hearing Damage
, I stopped and found myself outside the bar where Stevenâs brother worked. I took this as a sign and spontaneously went inside. I settled on a bar stool and a cocktail soon followed.
âIâm really sorry Bob, I came out without my purse. I wasnât trying to scrounge, I just wanted to say hello,â I said.
âDonât worry about it, itâs my treat,â he said with a curious expression.
âI havenât seen your brother for a while,â I said.
âYou havenât heard? Heâs living with the guy that he met when you both came in last month.â
âYouâre kidding!â I gasped. âIâve left him a thousand messages but he never got back to me.â
âFigures⦠ever since he moved into this new place he hasnât been in touch with anyone, not even our mom.â
Just as I thought â a slave to love.
I sipped on the drink, without much to say. I had come outside to clear my mind and had not anticipated conversation.
âWhatâs new with you anyway?â he asked, spinning the cocktail shaker.
âNothing much,â I slurped the last of my drink through the straw. He laughed and
Douglas E. Schoen, Melik Kaylan