You, Again(52)

“Jewish penicillin,” he says. “It cures anything.”

“Grief?” She slurps on the broth. “Self-loathing?”

“No.” He collects a thick stack of napkins. “You have to order the borscht for that.”





15


Sat, Dec 31, 9:13 p.m.

Josh: ETA?

It’s on 77th. The New-York Historical Society.

Ari: oh no

Josh: What?

Ari: bad news: i’m waiting at the entrance to the Staten Island Historical Society.

Good news: there’s an amazing wu-tang exhibit

I’m down the block—I had to stop at Gray’s Papaya

Josh: We’re about to attend a dinner.

Ari: ok but have you had the papaya drink?

Josh: No.

No one orders the papaya drink.

Can you hurry?

The sooner I show up to this event celebrating a family business I ruined, the sooner I can leave.

Ari: So glad you invited me to this!



Ten minutes later, Josh spots a long, gray puffy coat bobbing down Seventy-seventh Street. Ari is walking a bit unsteadily through the slush in high heels. Her hair is down in loose waves, longer than he remembers. Maybe. He can’t recall the last time he saw her without a messy bun or a ponytail. Or wearing lipstick. It’s not a huge transformation—except that the last time they were together, she had a serious case of raccoon eyes after running into her ex-wife. But she clearly put effort into this and there’s something…affecting about it. Even if she’s clutching an enormous Gray’s Papaya cup.

“Hey, Dust Daddy!” She moves a bit closer, into his personal space. Are they supposed to hug? Air-kiss? “I updated your contact name.”

“To ‘Dust Daddy’?”

“Hey, what’s my contact name in your phone? First and last?” Ari reaches for his device, which he quickly holds up out of her reach. They end up colliding and she blinks and steps back. “Oh my God. You shaved.” Ari takes her hand, still warm from the pocket of her coat, and presses it against his face, rubbing her thumb along his cold cheek.

“What do you think?” It’s been so long since someone touched him with any degree of tenderness, he’s tempted to tilt his head and lean into it.

“I’m still processing,” she says, withdrawing her hand. “I like seeing your face.”

He pulls himself together, swallows, and checks his phone. “You’re late. It’s almost nine-thirty—”

“There was no chance I was going to be on time, walking in heels this high.” She takes a step back. “And see? I ordered a coat. It’s like a sleeping bag with sleeves and it was on sale for the equivalent of five best-man toasts on NeverTired.” Ari spins around. “Are you happy now?”

Josh considers it for a second, trying to tease apart “happy” from a confused swirl of other emotions that have been bubbling up since that evening at the Strand and Veselka and the not-date that felt suspiciously more…something than any of the actual dates he’s been on in the last month. More like the best and worst parts of a brand-new relationship, after you’ve both broken the surface of polite conversation.

Ari looks at him with raised eyebrows, still waiting.

“Oh,” he replies. “Yeah. Good.”

It forces him to consider what she’s wearing underneath.

Why hadn’t they discussed their outfits? Did Ari even own a dress for a black-tie event?

“Let’s strategize. If you give me this signal”—she mimes a blow job with her fist and her tongue pressing against the inside of her cheek—“from across the table, we’ll make a run for it?”

He nods toward the museum entrance. “Come on.”

“Want the rest of this?” she asks, thrusting the papaya drink at him. There’s lipstick on the straw.

He wordlessly grabs it and throws it in the trash can on the corner.

In the lobby, a dour young woman holding an iPad—who is not amused when Ari gives their names as “Dust Daddy and Plus One”—directs them to the coat check.

Ari slips off the puffy coat, revealing a fluid silk dress with a slit that comes way up her thigh. She glances at him for a nanosecond, but his eyes lock on to her back first, because, well, it’s bare, except for two dangerously thin straps that cross once. He’s never actually seen this part of her: graceful curves and muscles that reveal themselves when she hands the coat across the counter. He’s still staring—had the coat-check person said something?—when she turns around and asks if her dress is okay.

“I stuffed a cardigan into my coat pocket if it’s too—”

“No!” Josh says too quickly. “It’s”—the straps are so precarious. One unplanned twist of the shoulder and—“nice.”

“I thought we could go all in on the goth-wedding-guest aesthetic,” she says. “I took a wild leap of faith that you’d also be wearing black.”

He allows himself to look again. The neckline plunges into a low V. This, too, provides new visual information. Her breasts are covered by two small triangles of fabric held up by those tiny straps—the kind of thing where it’s very apparent that there couldn’t be a bra underneath. “I like it.”