It’s 3 o’clock in the afternoon and I’m hot and sweaty. I’m recovering from a bad bout of food poisoning. French onion soup with mushrooms from a cafe across the street. I’ve lost three precious days so now I need to go look for an adventure. I grab my purse, my computer and head down to the frozen yogurt shop two blocks away.
I order a peanut butter and chocolate frozen yoghurt with chocolate chips and peanut toppings. I sit at a table outside with my laptop to people watch. I’m frustrated with myself because I’ve got writer’s block and instead of working on my book, All My Bad Boyfriends in NYC, I’ve been plotting a new class I want to teach called “Overthrowing the Patriarchy” that incorporates the Handmaid’s Tale and the recent Barbie movie. I’m very excited. Maybe I should give up writing and go into academia full time. I don’t know.
As I’m thinking, a very well-dressed, very tall Black man in a three-piece suit, wearing a top hat and carrying a cane stops by my table. “Excuse me ,Miss, can I sit here at your table for a minute and finish my call.”
“Yes, certainly,” I say.
He sits down and continues a heated discussion on his phone. He pauses and looks up at me. “What are you working on?”
“I’m developing course material about the female revolt against the male patriarchy,” I say.
“Really?” he says. “Are you a writer?”
“Yes, I am,” I say.
“Then, it’s my lucky day,” he says.
The man gets off the phone and shakes my hand. “I’m Wayne. I’m an investment banker and a basketball coach in the NBA. I’m looking for a ghostwriter for one of our players, Rob Hart. Are you a ghostwriter?”
“I’ve done some ghostwriting,” I say.
I’m talking out of my ass. I’ve never ghostwritten anything. Plus, I have no idea who the hell Rob Hart is or anything about basketball. Wayne tells me he played for the NBA for nine years and made $20 to $40 million during his career. “Nothing like what these guys are making today,” he says.
He shows me pictures of him and Michael Jordan and other famous people, including—unfortunately-- Donald Trump. I tell him I’m thinking of moving to NYC from California, but I need a job first—either as a writer or a college English teacher.
“I can set you up. I know the dean of Columbia,” he says. He slides his phone over to me and shows me the dean’s name in his list of contacts.
“Really?” My eyes widen.
“Sure,” he says. “You’re a young woman. You could do anything you want. What are you, 35?”
I break out into a huge smile. “That’s the nicest thing anyone’s said to me all month,” I say.
“You married?” he asks me.
“Nope. Been there done that. Don’t need to do it again,” I say.
He laughs. “You shouldn’t be so cynical,” he says.
I smile. I don’t normally talk to strangers. But I’ve been holed up sick and alone, and it’s nice to talk to someone.
“Hey, I’m starving,” Wayne says. “Do you want to go grab some Thai food with me across the street. Best Thai food you’ve ever had.”
“I just had a frozen yoghurt. I’m kind of full,” I say.
As we talk, a scruffy man with wild hair and a bright orange safety vest, who looks a bit like an underground subway worker, kneels down beside us on the sidewalk and sketches out a gigantic hopscotch game.
“That’s beautiful. Do you work for the city?” Wayne asks.
“No, I just do this for the neighborhood kids,” the man says.
Wayne digs into his wallet and hands him a twenty.
“Thanks, man! You made my day!” the man says. Then he turns to me and asks, “Would you like me to write your name in chalk?”
“Yes,” I say.
He breaks off a piece of purple chalk and writes out my name L-i-s-a.
“Purple is my favorite color!” I say.
Then he draws a big red heart around it and writes inside it: “Lisa, fulfill your calling.”
I squeal in delight. Maybe this a sign from God! Who knows? Maybe I’m Julia Roberts from Pretty Woman and Wayne is Richard Gere about to swoop me on the streets of NYC and make my dreams come true. I tell Wayne that yes maybe I could eat a little Thai food.
Wayne stands up with his cane and is shaky on his feet. From an old operation, he says.
“Can I lean on you?” he asks.
“Sure,” I say, and we cross Broadway together with Wayne leaning on my left shoulder.
We sit in cool brown leather stools at the bar in the Thai restaurant and order drinks, Phad Thai dumplings and Thai sea bass. Wayne tells me how he worked with Whoopi Goldberg on a documentary about Jackie Robinson. “You wouldn’t believe it. We’re in the Time Warner building and Whoopi’s pulling out this big green bong from her bag smoking up the place. I say, ‘Whoopi, you can’t do that in here!’, and she says, ‘Look here motherfucker, it’s legal! Don’t tell me you didn’t used to get high in the hood?!” So, we walk into this meeting smelling like Cheech and Chong!”
I laugh and ask about the Donald Trump photo on his phone “We play golf sometimes,” Wayne says.
“What kind of golf player is he?” I ask.
“He’s great, but he’s a got a bad attitude. He’ll make a bad shot, throw his clubs in the lake and make his caddies go fish them out.”
Wayne’s phone keeps ringing, but he doesn’t pick up. He shows me his phone and says it’s the vice president of the New York Stock Exchange and the president of Bermuda calling him. It seems odd and unlikely that so many allegedly important people are calling Wayne who is choosing to blow them off for me. I mean, why in the world would the president of Bermuda be calling him repeatedly?
Wayne notices my unease and says, “You seem nervous. Are you all right?”
“I’m ok. My nerves are just part of my Jewish persona,” I joke.
“What do you have to be nervous about?” he asks.
“Thousands of years of persecution,” I say.
“What about me, being Black?” he asks.
“We’re brothers and sisters. Let’s face it. We’ve been through some shit,” I say.
Wayne gives me a fist bump. I smile at him. I know what this is really about. I’m 56, not 35, and this isn’t the first time a strange man has approached me. It is the first time I got up and walked away with one. My parents warned me about this. They said don’t talk to strangers or take candy or get into a car with one. They never said anything about not following strangers who dangle promises of professorships and juicy writing gigs
“I’m getting full. I can’t eat anymore,” I tell Wayne. “Thank you, though. It was lovely meeting you, but I’m going to go.”
Wayne doesn’t ask for my phone number, and I don’t offer it. Instead, he tells me he’ll be at the French café tonight—the same one where I got food poisoning. He’ll wait for me if I want to stop by. I nod and walk out the door.
I walk to Central Park where street musicians are performing and sidewalk poets are poetizing and young lovers are stretching out on their blankets on the cool green grass, gazing at the night sky, the stars hidden behind the NYC clouds. I take off my shoes and stick my hot feet in a cool fountain.
One of two things is true: Either Wayne is a skilled con artist, or maybe everything he says is true and I’m missing out. Still, these favors come at a price—one I’m not willing to pay. I decide not to meet Wayne at the restaurant and instead walk back to the frozen yoghurt shop where I kneel down on the pavement in front of my name written in purple inside a big red heart.
I take out my phone, point it at myself and smile big for the camera.