too pleased with the cosmic salad that had become my sister's life. Over her last winter break, Charlotte had invited a really nice guy named Jason to dinner. We all loved him. He was polite, good-looking, smart—a pre-law major—and his name wasn't a verb. Poor Jason didn't last long. Charlotte went back for spring semester and we heard less and less from her: no more weekend trips home with tons of laundry and no more daily phone calls to Ma. She was, instead, attending poetry readings and animal rights rallies with her new friend Orbit. This past summer we'd seen even less of her. She spent most of her time at his apartment and working as a teacher's aide for a summer school program in the city.
My parents were unsure of how to proceed. Her grades weren't suffering, but there were differences. We noticed changes in her clothing and speech, but just the lack of time she spent at home was enough. Like I said, we were tight. You miss two Sunday dinners in a row and my mother will be at St. Joseph's lighting a candle for you because surely you are ill, pregnant, failing school or, better yet, you've gotten someone pregnant. Theresa Murphy was sure her youngest was a shaved head away from joining a cult.
At first my mother didn't like that I was moving further away. It was hard enough on her when I moved in with my best friends, Max and Paul, just ten minutes away from the house I grew up in. The city was a different story. There were rapists, murderers, and thieves in the city. I tried telling my mother there were rapists, murderers, and thieves on Long Island too, but I don't think she cared. She was somehow convinced that they were not as bad as the criminals in Manhattan. In fact, nothing was worse than living in Manhattan, except maybe living with a woman out of wedlock. Ma didn't like that too much either, but all that was a small price to pay to be able to look in on and live closer to Charlotte. She was willing to forgive me that sin if it meant I could keep Charlotte away from the man we'd started to refer to as "The Cosmic Freak.” So, not only was it practical and affordable for me to room with Chloe, it was my family's last-ditch attempt to get Charlotte back.
From a totally different perspective, it certainly didn't hurt that Chloe was a knockout.
When she answered the door that first day, phone balanced on her shoulder, pad and pen in her hands, I was surprised. She looked stressed and frustrated, but she also looked cool. It was scorching hot out and it had been a two-block walk from the subway station to the apartment. I could feel my shirt sticking to me and worried that I'd make a horrible first impression. Chloe managed to pull off confident and in control even in her rushed state. She had on those pants that ended just below the knees, the ones all women seemed to be wearing this past spring and summer, but not all women wore them as well as Chloe.
When she had turned her back, assuming I was the plumber, I noticed the rest of her. The white shirt she wore did nothing to hide those curves; if anything, it accentuated them. It went in at her waist and fell on two round hips. For some reason it made me think of ripe fruit. I was less surprised that she was black—I hadn’t given any thought to the race of the person placing the ad—and more surprised to discover she was so good looking. It was like when you go on a blind date you expect the worst, or when you're on the Internet and some girl tells you how hot she is when in real life she's overweight and bucktoothed. Only in movies with Katherine Heigl or Scarlett Johansson do men meet beautiful strangers over the Internet or through newspaper ads. In real life you don't expect a girl like Chloe to open the door and then offer you the chance to live with her, and Chloe on her worst day could give both those ladies a run for their money.
In taking her up on the offer, I found myself meeting with Chloe and the
My parents were unsure of how to proceed. Her grades weren't suffering, but there were differences. We noticed changes in her clothing and speech, but just the lack of time she spent at home was enough. Like I said, we were tight. You miss two Sunday dinners in a row and my mother will be at St. Joseph's lighting a candle for you because surely you are ill, pregnant, failing school or, better yet, you've gotten someone pregnant. Theresa Murphy was sure her youngest was a shaved head away from joining a cult.
At first my mother didn't like that I was moving further away. It was hard enough on her when I moved in with my best friends, Max and Paul, just ten minutes away from the house I grew up in. The city was a different story. There were rapists, murderers, and thieves in the city. I tried telling my mother there were rapists, murderers, and thieves on Long Island too, but I don't think she cared. She was somehow convinced that they were not as bad as the criminals in Manhattan. In fact, nothing was worse than living in Manhattan, except maybe living with a woman out of wedlock. Ma didn't like that too much either, but all that was a small price to pay to be able to look in on and live closer to Charlotte. She was willing to forgive me that sin if it meant I could keep Charlotte away from the man we'd started to refer to as "The Cosmic Freak.” So, not only was it practical and affordable for me to room with Chloe, it was my family's last-ditch attempt to get Charlotte back.
From a totally different perspective, it certainly didn't hurt that Chloe was a knockout.
When she answered the door that first day, phone balanced on her shoulder, pad and pen in her hands, I was surprised. She looked stressed and frustrated, but she also looked cool. It was scorching hot out and it had been a two-block walk from the subway station to the apartment. I could feel my shirt sticking to me and worried that I'd make a horrible first impression. Chloe managed to pull off confident and in control even in her rushed state. She had on those pants that ended just below the knees, the ones all women seemed to be wearing this past spring and summer, but not all women wore them as well as Chloe.
When she had turned her back, assuming I was the plumber, I noticed the rest of her. The white shirt she wore did nothing to hide those curves; if anything, it accentuated them. It went in at her waist and fell on two round hips. For some reason it made me think of ripe fruit. I was less surprised that she was black—I hadn’t given any thought to the race of the person placing the ad—and more surprised to discover she was so good looking. It was like when you go on a blind date you expect the worst, or when you're on the Internet and some girl tells you how hot she is when in real life she's overweight and bucktoothed. Only in movies with Katherine Heigl or Scarlett Johansson do men meet beautiful strangers over the Internet or through newspaper ads. In real life you don't expect a girl like Chloe to open the door and then offer you the chance to live with her, and Chloe on her worst day could give both those ladies a run for their money.
In taking her up on the offer, I found myself meeting with Chloe and the
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