Change can happen so suddenly.
I'm twenty-six years old, and I live alone in a one bedroom apartment in Manhattan. In all honesty, I'm a ladies man. A bit of a man whore. Kind of like Joey Tribbiani, only I have no acting ability. I used to go from bar to bar and cafe to cafe and bookstore to bookstore scoring numbers. I'd be having sex about six times a week, never speaking to the women I slept with again. Of course they were hurt, and of course I didn't really mind. It was no skin off my back.
The women I picked up varied in sexual ability. In general it ranged from terrible to okay. Honestly, I just needed something to fill up my nights. A few good investments had me living easy, so I had no workdays. I was at least smart enough not to waste my money on an apartment I didn't need with a lot of other useless shit. So if my math was correct, I'd be just fine for the next five years. So I decided to spend that time enjoying life before my prime was over.
My sex life was monogamous for respective nights. One girl, one orgasm for each of us, goodnight. They wanted more than one, because I could certainly give it to them, but it was up to me. Besides, after one, they could say they were satisfied. Very satisfied.
Over the period of one week, I would develop from having one girl to two to three. Not only that, but I would find myself enjoying life at its fullest like I never had before.
**********
I wake up at 8:00 in the morning. My bed is directly in the center of the room with about five feet between it and the wall on all sides. The walls are blank. There are two lamps in the back corners of the room on night tables. In the drawer of the back right table I keep my glasses. In the drawer of the back left table I keep a copy of a book that I haven't bothered to read yet. The front right corner has the door, and from the front left to the door is the closet. I have all my suits organized in intervals so that I don't wear the same suit twice in ten days. There's just enough space for a little dresser that I keep two pairs of jeans and three white t-shirts in. There's my underwear, my socks, and condoms. More condoms than anything else. On the wall close to the closet a window looks out to the New York street below.
I go through my little routine of showering, getting dressed, and watching the news. I'm out the door at nine o'clock and say good morning to the door man whose name I don't know, though he knows my name. "Good morning Mr. Cameron." He'll say. But I always tell him to call me Gary.
I turn left, left, right, go straight for three blocks, left again, and then I'm at Kallem Kafé. I walk in and order a coffee and a slice of banana bread. I receive these things silently on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays because Lexi, the counter girl, never got a call back from me. But the place is just where I go, so I got used to it. At least I try to be nice to her.
I eat the same bread and drink the same coffee every morning. Rainy days, snowy days, humid days, and days of perfect weather. Banana bread and a mocha brew with vanilla cream and one packet of sugar. I sit there and think of nothing, do nothing but stare at the table and consume. I worked at this slowly and left by 9:30.
This was when I got open range to go wherever for however long. The easy place to go was Central Park. There are different women everywhere with similar personalities. There was plenty of variety, though. The nature lovers, the yoga fanatics, the running athletes, the soccer athletes, the college seniors, the first-time visitors. But my favorite was always the tourist. She would be there with family or friends or whoever. That's what made it fun.
But again, Central Park is the easy place to go. The really easy place to go is the bar. What could be easier than the girls who drink with their friends and practically throw themselves at the men they deem attractive? And boy am I attractive - according to nearly every woman I've fucked. And my mother; I'm her "pumpkin angel".
Then there's the harder locations like the book stores. The women who go there tend to be shy or like to keep to themselves. They're very involved in their books, so there's not much time to get hit on by any kind of man. That book that's in my night table is for just this. I know nothing about it, but I know just enough about its author to score the girl's number.
It works best when she's browsing for books or reading one. I'll slyly place myself close to her and give it a moment, then I'll notice her in a side glance and put myself into her world. I'll ask her about what she's reading. I'm not really listening, and when she's done talking she normally asks who I like to read. I'll tell her about the author as a person, what inspired him to write, where he came from, and then I'll say some bullshit about how I interpret his writing style. She'll just keep listening to me ramble, and I'll eventually ask for her number. After that, I'll go home and throw the book onto my couch opened up to a random page. We'll go out to dinner at a cheap restaurant with nice atmosphere like a pizzeria or something, and when I invite her inside she sees the book. I don't know what it is, but she'll suddenly be naked as soon as she sees it.
That's how it used to be.
**********
DAY ONE: SUNDAY
I woke up at 8:00 in the morning. I slid out of bed and walked to the shower. Then I showered, big surprise. I went back to the bedroom and picked out my Sunday One suit. I went out to the couch and turned on the news. The recent storm hadn't done too much damage, which was certainly good news. Some crime had occurred during it, which surprised me. A few other stories about gas prices and good citizens passed by and I was out the door. I got my banana bread and coffee from the silent Lexi, and left Kallem Kafé. It was a Central Park day for me.
I hailed a cab and got out around Fifth Avenue. I bring a notepad with me and pretend to write so that I'm not some creepy guy watching people at the park. I walked for about twenty minutes before I found an interesting looking girl. She was doing yoga on a blanket by the water. The plan was to wait for her to finish and "accidentally" run into her and somehow bring up my writing.
After about ten minutes, she started gathering her things. I got ready to bump into her. I got off my bench and started walking. She was getting closer and closer, nobody in front of her. But as I passed by a fork in the road, I ran into someone else. She was a girl who was about to take a picture of a building visible from the park. I know because she dropped a camera. I bent down to pick it up for her, and so did she. "Gary?" she said. It was my cousin Marcia.
I was so surprised that what came out was a deadpan, "Yeah?"
"Don't 'yeah' me you big goof! This is crazy! Of all the people I could run into in the Big Apple!"
As I tell you this story, I can't remember what I was thinking when I said this: "No one who lives here calls it the Big Apple."
I hadn't seen Marcia for eight years, which is about the time I moved to the city. My parents threw me a farewell party which she was at, and that was the last time I had seen her. She called me about once a month for the first two years, but the past six have been in random intervals. Now I had bumped into this sandy-haired twenty-four year old woman I called my cousin. Why I was so rude to her I could never explain.
"Listen, Janie and Adrian are here with me. We were going to surprise you but I guess that was ruined." She laughed in her cutest way. "Are you busy? Do you want to come hang out with us, show us around?"
Again, something inside of me just didn't register what was going on. I certainly loved my family, but I didn't want to see them just yet. It may have been the anticipation of the hot yoga girl, but I still believe my words were inexcusable. "Can't you show yourselves around?"
She lost a little bit of her excitement. I was starting to offend her. "Well you live here, can't you show us what's good?"
"I could. But the best way is to find out for yourself."
"Gary is something the matter?"
