see his mouth turn down and his face go slack, the drugged, determined look he gets when he’s turned on. I climb atop him, my back to him, facing the windshield. I’m pressed against the steering wheel, and as we move together, the horn emits tiny bleats that mimic me, and my hand makes a smearing noise as I press it against the windshield. Nick and I can come anywhere; neither of us gets stage fright, it’s something we’re both rather proud of. Then we drive right back home. I eat beef jerky and ride with bare feet on the dashboard.
We love our house. The house that
Amazing Amy
built. A Brooklyn brownstone my parents bought for us, right on the Promenade, with the big wide-screen view of Manhattan. It’s extravagant, it makes me feel guilty, but it’s perfect. I battle the spoiled-rich-girl vibe where I can. Lots of DIY. We painted the walls ourselves over two weekends: spring green and pale yellow and velvety blue. In theory. None of the colors turned out like we thought they would, but we pretend to like them anyway. We fill our home with knickknacks from flea markets; we buy records for Nick’s record player. Last night we sat on the old Persian rug, drinking wine and listening to the vinyl scratches as the sky went dark and Manhattan switched on, and Nick said, “This is how I always pictured it. This is exactly how I pictured it.”
On weekends, we talk to each other under four layers of bedding, our faces warm under a sunlit yellow comforter. Even the floorboardsare cheerful: There are two old creaky slats that call out to us as we walk in the door. I love it, I love that it is ours, that we have a great story behind the ancient floor lamp, or the misshapen clay mug that sits near our coffeepot, never holding anything but a single paper clip. I spend my days thinking of sweet things to do for him—go buy a peppermint soap that will sit in his palm like a warm stone, or maybe a slim slice of trout that I could cook and serve to him, an ode to his riverboat days. I know, I am ridiculous. I love it, though—I never knew I was capable of being ridiculous over a man. It’s a relief. I even swoon over his socks, which he manages to shed in adorably tangled poses, as if a puppy carried them in from another room.
It is our one-year anniversary and I am fat with love, even though people kept telling and telling us the first year was going to be so hard, as if we were naive children marching off to war. It wasn’t hard. We are meant to be married. It is our one-year anniversary, and Nick is leaving work at lunchtime; my treasure hunt awaits him. The clues are all about us, about the past year together:
Whenever my sweet hubby gets a cold
It is this dish that will soon be sold
.
Answer: the tom yum soup from Thai Town on President Street. The manager will be there this afternoon with a taster bowl and the next clue.
Also McMann’s in Chinatown and the Alice statue at Central Park. A grand tour of New York. We’ll end at the Fulton Street fish market, where we’ll buy a pair of beautiful lobsters, and I will hold the container in my lap as Nick jitters nervously in the cab beside me. We’ll rush home, and I will drop them in a new pot on our old stove with all the finesse of a girl who has lived many Cape summers while Nick giggles and pretends to hide in fear outside the kitchen door.
I had suggested we get burgers. Nick wanted us to go out—five-star, fancy—somewhere with a clockwork of courses and namedropping waiters. So the lobsters are a perfect in-between, the lobsters are what everyone tells us (and tells us and tells us) that marriage is about: compromise!
We’ll eat lobster with butter and have sex on the floor while a woman on one of our old jazz records sings to us in her far-side-of-the-tunnel voice. We’ll get slowly lazy-drunk on good Scotch, Nick’s favorite. I’llgive him his present—the monogrammed stationery he’s been wanting from Crane & Co. with the clean
We love our house. The house that
Amazing Amy
built. A Brooklyn brownstone my parents bought for us, right on the Promenade, with the big wide-screen view of Manhattan. It’s extravagant, it makes me feel guilty, but it’s perfect. I battle the spoiled-rich-girl vibe where I can. Lots of DIY. We painted the walls ourselves over two weekends: spring green and pale yellow and velvety blue. In theory. None of the colors turned out like we thought they would, but we pretend to like them anyway. We fill our home with knickknacks from flea markets; we buy records for Nick’s record player. Last night we sat on the old Persian rug, drinking wine and listening to the vinyl scratches as the sky went dark and Manhattan switched on, and Nick said, “This is how I always pictured it. This is exactly how I pictured it.”
On weekends, we talk to each other under four layers of bedding, our faces warm under a sunlit yellow comforter. Even the floorboardsare cheerful: There are two old creaky slats that call out to us as we walk in the door. I love it, I love that it is ours, that we have a great story behind the ancient floor lamp, or the misshapen clay mug that sits near our coffeepot, never holding anything but a single paper clip. I spend my days thinking of sweet things to do for him—go buy a peppermint soap that will sit in his palm like a warm stone, or maybe a slim slice of trout that I could cook and serve to him, an ode to his riverboat days. I know, I am ridiculous. I love it, though—I never knew I was capable of being ridiculous over a man. It’s a relief. I even swoon over his socks, which he manages to shed in adorably tangled poses, as if a puppy carried them in from another room.
It is our one-year anniversary and I am fat with love, even though people kept telling and telling us the first year was going to be so hard, as if we were naive children marching off to war. It wasn’t hard. We are meant to be married. It is our one-year anniversary, and Nick is leaving work at lunchtime; my treasure hunt awaits him. The clues are all about us, about the past year together:
Whenever my sweet hubby gets a cold
It is this dish that will soon be sold
.
Answer: the tom yum soup from Thai Town on President Street. The manager will be there this afternoon with a taster bowl and the next clue.
Also McMann’s in Chinatown and the Alice statue at Central Park. A grand tour of New York. We’ll end at the Fulton Street fish market, where we’ll buy a pair of beautiful lobsters, and I will hold the container in my lap as Nick jitters nervously in the cab beside me. We’ll rush home, and I will drop them in a new pot on our old stove with all the finesse of a girl who has lived many Cape summers while Nick giggles and pretends to hide in fear outside the kitchen door.
I had suggested we get burgers. Nick wanted us to go out—five-star, fancy—somewhere with a clockwork of courses and namedropping waiters. So the lobsters are a perfect in-between, the lobsters are what everyone tells us (and tells us and tells us) that marriage is about: compromise!
We’ll eat lobster with butter and have sex on the floor while a woman on one of our old jazz records sings to us in her far-side-of-the-tunnel voice. We’ll get slowly lazy-drunk on good Scotch, Nick’s favorite. I’llgive him his present—the monogrammed stationery he’s been wanting from Crane & Co. with the clean
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