12   16 March 90   Daniel did not come home for spring break, which is this week. Spring, in March! Well, what we call the winter semester the Americans call the spring semester. No, I don’t mean to say home, but back to Montréal. He told me that New York is now home for him. I told him that I understood, just as Rimouski was no longer home for me once I moved here for university. I told Tina about the exchange and she said “I guess home is where you had your first sex.” We had a good laugh. Daniel said that he had things to do in New York during the break, like going to the opera. (I am glad that he likes opera.) He told me that he has a girlfriend who is from Iowa and who is going back there for the break. I was right the last time I wrote about Betty. She now has a boyfriend. A French kid named Gérard Brunet. Does not go to her school, of course. How she met him is still a mystery. Not particularly good-looking but very sweet, and seems to worship her. A little bit like Etienne and me. I don’t believe that they have done it yet, with each other or with anyone else. That’s different from Etienne and me, or at least me. I wonder how it will be for them. But she is beginning to speak French again. With Gérard, of course; his English isn’t very good. But sometimes, especially after she has been speaking with him, even with me. Then she catches herself and goes back to English. George got tired of waiting for me and called me in the middle of February. The pretext was to invite me to a party that he was having for his 50th birthday, as he told me he would, on the last day of the month. But of course there were hints of getting together again. Once again I said maybe and afterwards I called Tina. She said that she was going and encouraged me to go too, without feeling any obligation to G. She even thought that I might meet someone else there. So I went to the party and guess what, my journal. I fell for George again. It was the hotel-room trick again, red carnations included, and it worked again. Last night I saw him again. It was nice. He apologized for his callousness back in December. He said that he too was in shock and reacted by blocking his emotions. I want to believe him. I am not one to hold grudges. Even with papa it was not really a grudge, but a need to assert myself against someone who tried to annihilate me, quelqu’un qui essayait de m’anéantir. Non, papa, ce n’était pas de la rancune contre toi, seulement le besoin de m’affirmer. So I will continue with George for as long as it feels good. How long will that be? I asked him that once, and he said, “As Yogi Berra said, it’s hard to predict, especially the future.” I have since heard that it was Niels Bohr who said it first. I believe it. I knew some Danish exchange students at McGill, and they were all very funny. One of these days I will tell George. When I think of it. Or if he says it to me again. He probably will. He does have a tendency to repeat himself. But we laugh about it. Comida criolla   Early in April there was another chance to see a German movie on the big screen: a double bill of Fassbinder’s last two films. They didn’t bother with his very last one, since it was in English, but they saw the one before, Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss. The progress he had made since seeing The Tin Drum amazed him: this time he could ignore the subtitles almost completely. He was also reading Der Fall Maurizius with very little recourse to the dictionary. He felt ready for Germany. He decided that he would go for somewhat over a month, leaving early in June and returning in mid-July, and spanning the World Cup that would be played in Italy and that he could watch in real time on television. He was relieved that Canada, which had played in 1986 without scoring a single goal, did not qualify this time and so he would feel free to root for any team he chose. He chose the Federal Republic of Germany. He had thought of flying Lufthansa, so that he could practice his German with the flight attendants, but Mrs. Taylor talked him into taking Singapore Airlines, which stopped in Frankfurt on its way to Singapore. Not only was the fare much better, she said, but so was the service. The booking made, he immediately wrote Brigitte a letter – in German – with the details. It then turned out that on the first of June he would be moving into his own apartment. He would have only a few days to set it up. The apartment was in a building that was being renovated with a view to co-op conversion, in an area around Columbus Avenue and the Eighties that was undergoing gentrification. But the financing had run out – temporarily, he was told – so that the newly renovated apartments were put back on the rental market, with preference given to potential co-op buyers. Since he already knew that New York was going to be his home for quite a few years to come, it seemed to him natural to want to own a piece of it. His bank statement duly impressed the broker, and he was told that, once the contract was signed, he could move in on the first of June; he would have a one-bedroom apartment that, eventually, would be his own. Since the semester would end in mid-May, he told his mother that he would be back in Montreal for the second half of May, to gather those of his belongings that he wanted to keep and have them shipped to New York for delivery at the beginning of June. At the end of his stay they would celebrate, a week or so early, Betty’s sixteenth birthday. He made sure to inform Megan of his plan.   In mid-April, as he was beginning to write his paper on Der Fall Maurizius, he received Brigitte’s reply, also in German. She informed him that at the time of his arrival she would be in Göttingen, doing the last few performances as Arkadina in The Seagull. If he wished, he could take a train from the Frankfurt airport station to Göttingen and be there in a little more than two hours. She could get him a room in the same hotel where she was staying, and gave him its number, along with that of her room, so that he could call her from Frankfurt when he knew his arrival time in Göttingen. She would meet him at the station if it was not too late. The theater company in which she was performing was one of the ones in which she had worked in the late fifties while his father was a doctoral student. While in Göttingen they could take a trip to Bad Harzburg, and stop in Hanover on the way back to Hamburg, where he would meet the lovely Rita. She would be busy in Hamburg for the rest of June, but in July she could spend some time with him in Berlin and then accompany him to Frankfurt when it was time for him to go back to New York. Unfortunately there would not be time to go to Norderney: there was no point in going there for less than a week, and therefore that would have to wait for his next trip.   The last day of April was the last day of classes. Dr. Klostermann had decided to forgo a final examination and gave grades on the basis of the tutorials. Karen and Daniel both got A’s and they celebrated by going out to dinner and then back to her place, where, to his surprise and even more so to hers, she had the first orgasm in her life. After that she couldn’t get enough and during the next few days – designated as reading/study days – they spent a good deal of their time in bed. Canadian bookworm that he was, he had prepared for the finals during the preceding weeks, and he did well, ending with a 3.6 average for the year. But Karen was the kind of student who depended on coffee-fueled last-minute cramming, and she did quite poorly, to the point dropping below a B average and therefore facing the loss of her scholarship. In that case she would have to leave Columbia. Karen seemed quite nonchalant about the prospect. At their farewell encounter they were no longer practicing their German, and in pure Midwestern English she told him that Columbia had been a disappointment for her. She had not made any friends in New York, and meeting him was the best thing that had happened to her. Going to IU – she explained that that was the University of Iowa in Iowa City, not Iowa State where Jason was going – for her senior year would be just fine. Her concern was altogether different. “Now that I’m having orgasms, I assume that I’ll be getting ‘em with Jason too, and I don’t know how that’s gonna play with him.” He was astounded. “Why would that be a problem? Wouldn’t that make him feel good?” “I guess for you it’s normal, being French and all. But Jason is an Iowa country boy, and back home sex is just something you do because the guys want it. A girl isn’t supposed to enjoy it.” “But that was in high school!” “It doesn’t change until you fall in love with someone. I’ve got an older sister, and cousins, and that’s what I’ve heard from them: once you’re in love it’s different. And I’m not in love with Jason. But I love it when I come!”   Before leaving for Montreal he bought some basic furniture and arranged to have it delivered on the first of June. He got a simple dinette set, a sofa and coffee table, and a double bed with bedding. As a young man living in New York in 1990 he knew that his single bed in their Montreal house would not serve the purpose. Once again he took the train to Montreal. It was on time, and Mireille met him at the station. They went out to dinner before going home. Betty seemed to have matured more than the five months since he had last seen here would explain. She looked like a woman, not only physically but in the absence of the carefree girlishness that he had always known in her. Shortly after they got to the house the phone rang. Mireille answered. She turned to Betty and said, “C’est pour toi.” Apparently the caller had asked for Betty in French, and Mireille simply stayed in French mode. Betty went to the telephone, which was in the hallway, with a feigned reluctance. She spoke very softly. “Is something the matter with her?” he asked his mother, also softly. “She’s under pressure.” She seemed reluctant to elaborate. “What kind of pressure? School?” “No, she’s doing fine at school. She’s getting pressured for sex. Not so much from the boys. She knows how to say no, and this kid Gérard that she’s talking to, he’s very nice and respectful. He’s a little nerdy, though he’s cute, and he can’t believe that a beautiful girl like Betty would give him the time of day, let alone go out with him. But it’s the other girls in her crowd that are pressuring her. To them it’s not cool to be a virgin when you turn sixteen.” “That’s ridiculous! She obviously isn’t ready!” “Don’t be so sure. I was not quite sixteen when I had my first.” “Really! In Rimouski?” “Actually it happened in Montreal, but it doesn’t matter. I was ready. And I’d rather your sister lost it with a boy like Gérard, who’s considerate, though he’s probably inexperienced himself, than with one of the junior Don Juans.” The last words were said in a whisper as Betty came back into the living room, trying to suppress a smile. Daniel wondered if his mother thought of him as one of the junior Don Juans, but he didn’t get a chance to ask her. “On va sortir demain soir avec quelques copains,” Betty said matter-of-factly. He had not heard her speak French in four years. “Avec Gérard?” Mireille asked. “Bien sûr… of course,” Betty said with an embarrassed smile, as though suddenly remembering that she was an anglophone. Betty and Mireille continued chatting, but Daniel’s mind was on his mother’s revelation about her sexual life, the first that he could remember. So she, too, was fifteen when it happened to her, just like his father (and Brigitte). Sexual precocity, then, was not hereditary, since his awakening did not happen till he was almost eighteen. As for Betty, it was well over a year since she had told him that she was not ready, and Gen had given him a little lecture – like the one she gave her students – about the rapid hormonal changes of adolescence.   Another girl who seemed different after five months was Megan. Megan was always mature for her age, and now, at eighteen and a half, she was very much a woman. But during their one encounter she seemed distant and uncommunicative, and her participation in sex was passive and perfunctory, reminding him of Karen before she found orgasms, though Megan had not lost hers. He knew that she was no longer with Keith, and he wondered if there was a new boyfriend – for Megan never seemed to be without one – that she had not told him about, and if she felt guilty over cheating on him. Or perhaps she was depressed, for whatever reason. When she said good-bye he heard a subtext of good riddance. His last words to her were “Write me!” He hoped that, after some reflection, she might tell him in a letter what was going on.   Once again he took the overnight bus to New York, and he was at the apartment house at eight o’clock. The super gave him the keys. He went up to his apartment, which was empty except for the kitchen appliances. He put his bags in the bedroom closet. The smell of fresh paint was strong, and he opened the windows. The day was pleasantly warm. His apartment was on the third floor, and he could hear voices from the street below; most of them were in Spanish. After relieving himself – there was very little toilet paper on the roll, and no spare – he realized that he was hungry. Looking out the window, he saw that across the street there was a little neighborhood restaurant that was open. He decided that he could have breakfast there while looking out for the arrival of the moving van from Montreal – which would bring him his desk and dresser, among other important objects – and the delivery truck from the furniture store. Neither one had come by the time he finished breakfast, and he went back to his apartment after buying the New York Times at a candy store. He was absorbed in a lengthy article speculating on the future of the Soviet Union, and in particular on the role of Boris Yeltsin as the newly elected Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, when the buzzer rang. It was the furniture truck. It took about an hour for the furniture to be carried upstairs and put into place. All that time he was hoping that the Montreal van would not come. He had no telephone yet, so that he could not contact the moving company. Fortunately the furniture people left – after hanging around with some needless chitchat, which he finally realized was intended to elicit a tip – with no sign of the van. He went back to the candy store, where there was a pay phone, and called NYNEX to order telephone service. He was told that if he went to the district office in the afternoon to fill out the paperwork, he would have a line by Monday. He was in a quandary: what if the moving van arrived while he was away? He went back to the apartment, looked at the moving contract – which clearly named June 1 as the delivery date – and noticed that the company had a toll-free number. Once again he went to the pay phone, for which he had to wait since a middle-aged man was talking to it in Spanish, and finally called the movers. After giving them the contract number he was told that he could expect the van between three and five. Everything else happened in routine fashion. By six-thirty his apartment was furnished, the bed was made up, and most of his pictures and other wall hangings had found their place, at least temporarily, with the help of pushpins. He showered and went out for dinner. He walked west and when he reached Broadway he saw a restaurant whose sign advertised Cuban and Chinese food – comida criolla y china – and decided to try it. While waiting for a waitress to take his order – the place was quite busy – he looked around him. The staff was Chinese, but they spoke Spanish with the customers. Most of the tables seemed to be occupied by family groups speaking a mixture of English and Spanish. One of them, made up of a middle-aged couple, a young man and two young women, was seated at a table near him and was striking in the range of skin color among its members. Of the two young women, one was quite dark and the other fairly light. Both were very pretty and wearing low-cut, sleeveless summer dresses. The lighter-skinned one, whom he saw in profile, looked quite familiar, but he couldn’t place her. At one point she turned his way and flashed a big smile of recognition. “Herr Daniel Vilner!” she called out to him. “Cynthia!” he said, with a hesitant tone that undoubtedly betrayed the suddenness of his recognition of her, perhaps delayed by the fact that in class she always wore slacks – never jeans – and, depending on the weather, a blouse or a sweater. “Die Portorikanerin,” he said to show that he remembered how she identified herself in the first class. Cynthia laughed. “What brings you here?” he asked. “Me? This is my neighborhood. I live here. I grew up here. What about you?” “I live here too. I just moved in today.” “Welcome to the neighborhood!” She turned back to her family and he heard her say, “Es un compañero de mi clase de alemán.” He understood her perfectly. “Gracias,” he said, and resolved at that moment to learn Spanish after he returned from Germany. I might as well fit into my neighborhood, he thought. He ordered his dinner, choosing a Chinese appetizer – an egg roll – and a Cuban main dish – bistec en salsa de tomate. Cynthia’s group was finishing, and as they got up, the young man – who was of medium complexion – and the darker young woman took each other’s hands. As the rest of her party made their way to the door, Cynthia walked over to his table. “This is my brother Hector,” she said, pointing at the young man with her chin. “He goes to Fordham Law School. And that’s his girlfriend Letty, and her parents. She’s also my best friend from high school. They just got engaged.” “Where are your parents?” he asked. “That’s a little complicated,” she said with a laugh. “Let’s just say that I’m representing them. I could tell you about it some time, since I’ll be seeing you in the neighborhood, right?” “For a few days. Then I’m going to Germany for five weeks. And then I’ll be back.” “Germany! That sounds great! Send me a postcard, okay?” “Sure,” he said, pulling a pen from his shirt pocket and handing it to her, together with a napkin. Below her initials – CC – she quickly wrote not only her address but her phone number as well. As she was writing she said, “Call me Ceecee – that’s what my friends call me. You can spell it C-C or C-I-C-I.” So it was Cici. “And have a great trip!” She handed him the inscribed napkin, which he folded into his pocket. Just then his egg roll – actually a plate with two large egg rolls – arrived. “Bye!” Cynthia said as she started for the door, where her party was waiting for her. “Bye!” he said as he put a blank napkin on his lap. The last word he heard from Cynthia’s party came from her future sister-in-law, and sounded like kewapo. He wondered what it could mean. While in physical reality a very pretty woman did not necessarily attract him more than a not-pretty one, his sexual fantasy world always discriminated strongly in favor of pretty women. The soprano in Die Entführung was a case in point, and now Cynthia Carmona, or Cici, came to inhabit that world. By Tuesday evening, when he took the shuttle to JFK for his flight to Frankfurt, his apartment was all set up, with a working telephone, and with the gas and electricity accounts in his name. He moved his bank account from the Columbia branch of Citibank to the one in his neighborhood. His pantry was stocked with canned goods and other nonperishables from the mini market in his block. He had discovered by observing his fellow tenants that the super, an Anglo man in his forties named Eddie, was ready to perform any service for a tip. He was ready to be a New Yorker.