"I can go there," the man said.

They shook hands and Haarte returned to his own car.

He called Zane on the radio once more. "We're on again. This time in our own backyard."

Rune got elected to pick up the videotape and her life was never the same after that.

She argued with her boss about picking up the tape-Tony, the manager of Washington Square

Video on Eighth Street in Greenwich Village, where she was a clerk. Oh, she argued with him.

Rewinding a tape, playing with the VCR, snapping the controls, she stared at the fat, bearded man.

"Forget it. No way." She reminded him how he'd agreed she didn't have to do pickups or deliveries and that was the deal when he'd hired her.

"So," she said. "There."

Tony peered at her from under flecked, bushy eyebrows and, for some reason, decided to be reasonable. He explained how Frankie Greek and Eddie were busy fixing monitors or something-though she guessed they were probably just figuring out how to get comped into the Palladium for a concert that night-and so she had to do the pickups.

"I don't see why I have to at all, Tony. I mean, I just don't see where the have-to part comes in."

And right about then he changed his mind about being reasonable. "Okay, here's where it comes in, Rune. It's the part where I'm fucking telling you to. You know, as your boss. Anyway, whatsa big deal? There's only one pickup."

"That's like a total waste of time."

"Your life is a waste of time, Rune."

"Look," she began, not too patiently, and went on with her argument until he said, "Thin ice, honey. Get your ass outa here. Now."

She tried, "Not in the job description." Only because it wasn't in her nature to give in too quickly and then she saw him go all still and before he exploded she stood up and said, "Oh, will you just chill, Tony?" In that exasperated, sly way of hers that would probably get her fired someday but so far hadn't.

Then he'd looked at an invoice and said, "Christ, it's only a few blocks from here. Avenue B. Guy's name is Robert Kelly."

Oh, Rune thought, Mr. Kelly? Well, that was different.

She took the receipt, snagging the retro, fake-leopard-skin bag she'd found in a used-clothing store on Broadway. She pushed out the door, into the cool spring air, saving, "All right, all right. I'll do it." Putting just the right tone in her voice to let Tony know he owed her one for this. In her two decades on earth Rune had learned that if she wanted to live life the way she did, it was probably a good idea to collect as many obligations from people as she could.

Rune was five two, one hundred pounds. Today she wore black stretch pants, a black T-shirt under an businessman's Arrow shirt she'd cut the sleeves out of, so it looked like a white pinstripe vest. Black ankle boots. There were twenty-seven silver bracelets, all different, on her left forearm.

Her lips varied in size, compressing, expanding. A barometer of her mood. She had a round face; her nose pleased her. Her friends sometimes said she looked like certain actresses who appeared in independent films. But there were few present-day actresses she cared about or tried to look like; if you took Audrey Hepburn and put her in a Downtown, New Wave version of Breakfast at Tiffany's-that's who Rune wanted to resemble and in many ways she did.

She paused, looked at herself in a mirror sitting in an antiques shop window, the words wholesale only larger than the name of the place. Several months ago she'd gotten tired of her spiky black-purple haircut, had rinsed out the frightening colors, and had stopped trimming the do herself. The strands were longer now and the natural chestnut was emerging. Staring at the mirror, she now teased the hair out with her fingers. Then patted it back down. It wasn't long, it wasn't short. The ambivalence of it made her feel more homeless than she normally did.

She started once more on her journey to the East Village.

Rune glanced down at the receipt again.

Robert Kelly.

If Tony'd told her right away who the customer was, she wouldn't have given him so much crap.

Kelly, Robert. Member since: May 2. Deposit: Cash.

Robert Kelly.

"My boyfriend."

That's what she'd told Frankie Greek and Eddie at the store. They'd blinked, trying to figure out what that meant. But then she'd laughed and made it sound like a joke-before they grinned and sneered and asked what was it like to be in bed with a seventy-year-old man?

Though she'd added, "Well, we have been out on a date." Which left enough doubt to make it fun.

Robert Kelly was her friend. More of a friend than most of the men she'd met in the store. And he was also the only one she'd ever gone out with-in her three months' working there. Tony had a rule against going out with customers-not that any rule of Tony's would slow her up for more than a half-second. But the only men she ever seemed to meet at the store were either long domesticated or about what you'd expect from somebody who picks up clerks in a Greenwich Village video store.

Hi, I'm John, Fred, Stan, Sam,, call me Sammie, I live up the street, this's an Armani, you like it, I'm a fashion photographer, I work for Morgan-Stanley, I got some blow, hey, you wanna go to my place and fuck?

Kelly, Robert, deposit: cash, wore a suit and tie every time she'd seen him. He was fifty years older than she was. And when she'd offered to do him a favor, a little thing, copy a tape for him, for free, he'd looked down, blushing, and he'd asked her out to lunch to thank her.

They'd gone to a highly turquoise 1950s revival soda shop, called the Soda Shop, on St. Marks, and, surrounded by NYU students who managed to be both morbidly serious and giddy at the same time, had eaten grilled cheese sandwiches with pickles. She'd ordered a martini. He'd laughed in surprise and said in a whisper he'd thought she was sixteen. The waitress had somehow accepted the fake ID, which showed her age to be 23. According to the authentic documentation-her Ohio driver's license-Rune was twenty.

At lunch he'd been a little awkward at first. But that didn't matter. Rune was an old hand at keeping the conversation going. Then he warmed up and they'd had a great time. Talking about New York City-he knew it real well even though he'd been born in the Midwest. How he used to go to clubs in Hell's Kitchen, west of Midtown. How he'd have picnics in Battery Park. How he used to go for hikes in Central Park with a "lady friend" of his- Rune loved that expression. When she was old she hoped she'd be somebody's lady friend. She'd-

Oh, damn…

Rune stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. Goddamn. She reached into her bag and found that she'd forgotten the tape she'd made for him. Which was too bad for Mr. Kelly because he'd be looking forward to it. But mostly it was too bad for her-because she'd left it at the store and if Tony found she'd made a bootleg of a store tape, Jesus, he'd kick her right out on her ass. No pleas for mercy accepted at Washington Square Video.

But she couldn't very well go back now and pull it out from underneath the counter where she'd hidden it. She'd bring it to Mr. Kelly in a day or two. Or slip it to him the next time he stopped in.

Would Tony find it? Would he fire her?

And if he did? Well, them's the breaks. Which is what she usually said, or at least thought, when she found herself back in line at the New York State Department of Labor, a place where she was a regular and where she'd made some of her best friends in the city.

Them's the Breaks. Her mantra of unemployment. Of fate in general too, she supposed.

Except that today, trying to be cavalier about it, she decided she didn't want to get fired. For her, this was a curious sensation-one that went beyond the usual pain-in-the-butt inconvenience of job searching that began to loom when a boss would motion her over and say, "Rune, let's you and me talk." Or "This isn't going to be easy…"