I live just a couple of blocks away from Manya now, in a two-bedroom apartment above the Riviera Cafe. Each bedroom is barely larger the bed in it, so there is no need to buy any other furnishings. At night, the rattle of the train underneath Seventh Avenue is muffled by the noise of the restaurant below, but I could still feel the train going by as I stepped around the narrow U-shaped path encircling my bed.
In the intervening years since we had met on that October morning, we had not lost contact. Manya had maintained her relationship with Kosta, although it hadn’t been easy: there were break-ups and reunions; she was faithful, he was not; jobs took them to different places, so they were often apart. Meanwhile, I would disappear for long stretches, and then return; various jobs, more degrees. But no one was really settled. Paradoxically, it actually seemed that Manya and Kosta were the most settled of all, a model couple with a true love relationship: they kept coming back to each other. Wasn’t that love?
I envied what they had, what I thought they had. My own relationships were brief; nothing that I took seriously. As a result, I too managed to commit one betrayal after another, without the courtesy of discussion or an argument when it was time for me to go, just a departure. I never knew that people could behave so badly. I led a loveless life, and had no idea what commitment was. A couple is a family, and a family is something you run from.
But, we consoled one another when we happened to cross paths. A dinner here, a drink there. We were like brother and sister, holding each other’s hands, respecting our familial triangle. After all, anything else would have been taboo, a kind of incest that neither of us would have dared commit. I never imagined anything else; neither did Manya.
And now we both lived downtown. She had finally left Kosta, and had a couple of brief encounters that she would tell me about when I would help her lug her laundry up five flights of stairs. I told her I didn’t want to hear about them, partly out of loyalty to Kosta, but also because I was jealous: I would never admit that I wanted her, but I still felt I could never have her. Or did I imagine all that?
Then, one evening, we were watching television in my living room, and about to go and pick up the laundry. My room-mate was out, and we were thinking about dinner. We sat together on the couch, straining to look at the image on the tiny TV that was set on the coffee table. Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire were dancing and singing a duet on a stage; our forearms, resting on our knees, were side by side and touching. Slowly, a hair-raising, prickly electricity flowed between us; I couldn’t breathe. I stood and moved away quickly. Manya too stood and came quickly around the low coffee table toward me. As she did so, she hit her shin full force on the table. A gash immediately opened up and started to bleed, a lot. There was no question but that we had to go to St. Vincent’s right away to get it treated. And so we did.
