Work Text:
It happens in Washington Square Park, by the broken fountain that has early spring flowers fighting through the concrete cracks. An assortment of college kids are your audience, their hazy smoke drifting in lazy spirals around where they sit in the basin. Somewhere nearby a child is crying frantically while a mother, or probably a nanny, issues a proclamation on the perils of jungle gyms.
It feels too cold for May, but it might just be the wind.
He tries to pull you elsewhere, points at an abandoned park bench out of the rush of the crowds. But you refuse to be convenient with your tears.
***
You were soaking in the terrors of Soho most of the day, the tourists and socialites clamoring together for their inch of space. Your attempt at a meandering stride had been denied by the crowds so you were drifting in the aimless rush, absorbing tidbits of conversations, confessions, anonymity. It wasn’t a surprise when the cameras didn’t come along. You always seem tertiary, superfluous to them too.
You wander purposefully into boutiques, leaving on your biggest pair of sunglasses and breaking out just enough attitude to counter the clerk’s. It's a favorite game of yours but it rarely works down here, where the hardened attitudes are mostly impenetrable, and even the lowliest salesperson seems to have years of practice in bitchery over you.
He calls when you are seconds away from cracking the female clerk at Burberry and you can see that the enthusiastic way you answer the phone sends you back to square one with her. Whatever, you like your H&M trench better anyway. But there is something in the way he says “I’m done,” that hurries you off to meet him, forgetting in your haste that you are still wearing their charm bracelet. They stop you by the door and you feel flustered and frantic and rushed, and then pissed off as a result.
You decide to walk the mile from Soho to where you are meeting him in Greenwich Village. Walking, you figure, will let you recover some ground. You have to force yourself to walk slowly now that the crowds are safely left to the south and before you know it, you're almost a little lost. You refuse to ask for directions and you think about what he meant when he said you fit New York.
***
In the end, he doesn’t really have to say anything more. He stands there by the empty fountain with an expectant look, that one “I’m done,” apparently code for a multitude of sins. He rolls his weight back and forth the way he always does when he’s in a hurry or uncomfortable and he doesn’t even have the decency to hold you as you try not to cry. Not that you would have let him, but the offer might have helped you feel dumped, rather than just let go.
He pats you awkwardly on the arm and tries to offer an “I’m sorry,” but instead he heeds your “just go,” and walks away slowly, looking back twice before crossing out of the park.
Some kid with the intent of facial hair asks if you're okay and you end up sitting down in the basin, passing a joint around in silence. You imitate them blowing smoke rings and it takes three tries to get one that lasts long enough to drift out of the safety of the fountain, into the open winds of May. They all smile at you encouragingly and you concentrate on gently dragging your knuckles around on the concrete, pressing a little harder with each swallowed tear, wishing the fountain worked.
***