“You: sundress and bike. Don’t go anywhere.”

I was up late walking last night.  It was sweaty and hot in midtown.  I couldn’t really think straight, but I was happy to be out of work, unemployed, sweating at my own pace, not worried about waking up, and zombie walking my way into an air conditioned coffin.  As I got to the corner of 36th and Lexington, this woman, older, in her late 40′s walked by me, pushing her bike.  I looked at her for a split second longer than I should have and she smiled at me.  I am easily 15 to 20 years younger than she is.  My mothers friends look like this woman.  She was wearing a flower petal patterned dress with a sweatshirt tied around her waist and sunglasses resting on her head.  Her skin looked tired, but I instantly wanted to spend the rest of the evening with her.

When I got back to my fourth floor walk up, I was drenched in sweat.  I knew better to wear pants in weather this hot, but the movie theatre is always freezing.  I sat on my bed and looked at my typewriter.  Hadn’t written anything in weeks.  I laid down and just kept replaying the moment where bicycle lady smiled at my in my head.  It was more than polite, that much I know, and yet not lewd or inappropriate.  Welcoming.  That was a good word for it.  Welcoming.  Like going home.

I went into the kitchenette, and poured myself a large glass of water.  There was no ice in the freezer but I opened it just the same and stuck my head inside.  What was her name?  Something like Brenda?  Debra?  Karen?  Maybe she was a Karen.

I’ve seen plenty of women in this city, and for the most part, a great majority of them are attractive.  But none I’d ever passed looked like this, this level of calm.  She had something I wanted, and I couldn’t place my finger on it.  I decided I’d go to bed, but sleep wasn’t coming.  And as crazy as this sounds, I knew why.  I had to find this woman.

I went to sleep immediately after I made up my mind: tomorrow I was going to find this woman.  I live in a city of millions, but I knew in my heart of hearts I would be successful.  And I slept so well that night.

In the morning, I got up and jumped in the shower.  I made myself a cup of coffee, which I then put in the freezer.  Two pieces of toast and one egg over easy.  I pulled a notebook out of my dresser drawer, which was empty.  Perfect.  In it, I wrote two words:

Find her.

I grabbed the coffee out of the fridge and gulped it down.  As I locked the door to my place, I knew my next step was simple enough.  I would go back to the corner we met at.  I stood there for 10 minutes boiling.  I couldn’t tell which direction she would have been walking from, because in that part of town, there really is nothing.  There was a hotel on the corner, but the bike was clearly hers, not a rental.  And by the looks of her clothes, she didn’t live around there.  So what to do next?

I waited.  I waited for an hour.  Then another.  I couldn’t tell what I hoped to accomplish, but I figured maybe if I stood still she’d find me.  Also, it gave me something to do.  After quitting, most of my days were aimless.  I knew I had a time limit for when I’d need to look for more work, but I wanted to treat this summer as a gift to myself.  I was going to buy two months of life.  And if that meant using it to stand on a hot corner for hours on end, so be it.  It was my money and my life and I was glad to do what I wanted with it.

At 2:00pm, I realized I’d been on that corner for almost 4 hours.  My neck was starting to burn, and I had to pee.  But I didn’t want to leave.  So I did the only thing I could think of: I drew a picture of her, which looked like shit, as I can’t draw.  And underneath it I wrote:

“You: sundress and bike.  Don’t go anywhere.  Be back in 10 minutes.”