I’ve gone four blocks without a word from Alan. “I hate the way New York smells. It smells like rotting death.”

He glances quickly at me. “That’s an interesting way of looking at it. I’m surprised you wanted to walk.”

I shrug. “I always want to walk here. Morning. Night. It doesn’t matter. Sometimes I spend hours just walking these stinky streets.”

He is watching me again in that way he has, as if I baffle him. Jeez, we’re just making chitchat about walking. Why is that so confusing?

Inside the elevator, I can feel him watching me, but he doesn’t say anything. I struggle to keep my face carefully averted and only look at him when he precedes me into the apartment.

Alan stays in the great room while I gather my things. The first thing I do is check those damn pills. Why do they package them in a way that they are so hard to keep track of? I study them. OK, I think I’ve taken the right number. I pop out today’s and go into the bathroom for water to take it with.

I catch a glance of myself in the mirror. I stare. I look different, more aware of myself, more like a woman, less like a girl. Everything changes. It changes quickly. This is what I look like when I am with Alan. Will I still look like this when I am back in Santa Barbara, same old Chrissie? Same old life?

I go back into the bedroom, pull on a fresh change of clothes, and shove my things into my duffel. I stare at my wallpaper with the horrid stripes and the floral border. I never feel comfortable in the New York apartment. I feel really out of place right now. I head toward the great room, lugging my duffel.

My heart stops. Alan is on the phone. I heard it ring. I ignored it. I heard it stop. I thought the service had grabbed it, but Alan answered it. He is reclined comfortably in a chair. His feet are bare, he has a bottle of Jack Daniels in hand and he’s talking into the speaker.

“No, Chrissie is fine,” Alan says, making me cringe.

“What are you doing at my place?” Jack asks and I tense. The question is so bizarre on its very surface and yet somehow Jack’s voice is perfectly normal.

“Just checking on Chrissie. She doesn’t know anyone in New York. I thought I should check in on her. ”

Silence.

“I would have thought that Brian was keeping you too busy for social calls. Everything going all right, then?”

“I’m good. Working. Almost done. A few problems here and there, but most things settled.”

I walk over and curl on the arm of Alan’s chair.

“I heard an interesting rumor the other day,” Jacks says casually. “I heard you got into a fight with Vince Carroll on the sidewalk in front of CBGBs and broke his arm.”

“Since it’s made press coast to coast, I think we can safely assume it’s not rumor, Jack.”

“Does Chrissie have anything to do with it?”

“No. That was between me and Vince. I just gave her a ride home when it was over.”

A long pause. “You’re not drinking again, are you?”

“Fuck, Jack. I’ve been clean six months. I don’t need the sponsor bullshit.”

“It’s a fine line between drinking and shoving a needle in your arm.”

“I’m not fucking up all over again, so you can save the lecture I’m sure you’re itching to give.”

Jack lets out a long, aggravated breath. Silence through the phone. “Put Chrissie on the line.”

I tense, lifting the phone from the rest and take a steadying breath. “Hi, Daddy.”

“Hi.” Long pause—the kind he makes when he’s not pleased with me, but won’t say it. “Why didn’t you tell me that Rene took off on you?”

“I didn’t want to worry you.”

“I want you to fly home. We can spend some time together.”

“I don’t want to leave Rene. She’s really out of it over all this. I want to stay in New York in case she needs me. How did you know she left?”

“George called with his news.”

“Oh.”

More silence.

I change the subject. “You staying busy?”

“You know me, baby girl.”

“Well, try not to work too hard.”

“Talk to you soon, Chrissie.”

I feel my stomach knot and grow cold. Tears well behind my lids. “Talk to you soon, Daddy.”

Click. I hang up the phone. Alan is staring at me and there is something in his eyes that nearly makes the tears give way.

* * *

The candle flames flicker and dance all on their own. I am quiet. Alan is quiet. The mood is quiet, a comfortable quiet. He’s wrapped all around me. Neither of us seem ready to sleep. It’s after midnight. He is awake and still and being quiet for me.

We’ve had a day of strange quiet that felt oddly comforting and necessary. We walked in the park and Alan took me to dinner in a small, tacky eatery. We barely talked, and since returning to the apartment we made love only once and then just hovered in the quiet of the bedroom.

The sex was long and it was slow and it was tender. I cried all through it and I really don’t know why. Alan seemed not to need to ask why.

Alan has spent the rest of the night just holding me. It is good. Very good. This comfortable quiet. I feel better inside of Alan’s quiet, much better than I do alone inside of my own quiet.

I turn onto my side and Alan turns with me. He doesn’t release me. He is warm against my back, still holding on. Why is he with me? I feel his face in my hair as he inhales deeply. Why does he hold onto me this way?

“Go to sleep, Chrissie,” he whispers. “I want you to sleep. You’ll feel better in the morning.”

Chapter Nine

Something moves behind me and there is a whispering voice in the darkness.

“You talk in your sleep. Do you know that?”

I ease away from Alan and gaze up at him, blinking. There is enough light in the room that I can see the perfect lines of his face, and I frantically search his eyes, desperately trying to read them. But they are hooded and probing.

How long has he been watching me? It’s the middle of the night, his posture in bed tells me he’s been sitting up for quite a while, and he’s been drinking.

I scoot away from him, dragging the sheets to cover me. “Why are you sitting in the dark getting loaded?”

He takes a long drag of his cigarette. “You’ve been crying and mumbling for hours. It was the crying that woke me up.”

I push the hair from my face. “I’m sorry.”

“Why do you have nightmares? You have them almost every time you sleep,” he says, and his eyes are suddenly scrutinizing mine.

“Alan…I…I just have nightmares. It’s no big deal. OK?”

“The things you mumble in your sleep. Is that why you burn yourself?” he breathes, his eyes widening.

How did we get to talking about this again? I struggle to collect the right words to get out of this.

“I don’t do it anymore. I told you that. I don’t want to talk about it.”

He ignores my words in that completely Alan way. “What’s up between you and your old man? There is definitely a strange vibe between the two of you.”

“There is nothing. What does it matter? It’s two a.m.”

“It’s so strange how you talk to each other.” He shakes his head. “I’ve been sitting here trying to figure that one out. It’s like you’re both afraid to speak, which is completely strange since I find it usually impossible to shut Jack up.”

“God, do you have any idea how irritating you can be? Why do you want to dig around in my shit? Don’t you have more than enough of your own shit to deal with?”

Alan shrugs. “Yours is more fun.”

I sigh. “Really. Is that why I’m here—so you can amuse yourself psychoanalyzing me?”

“You’re here because I have three weeks to kill before I go back on the road. I’m between girls. You didn’t seem to have anything better to do. And I thought you’d do what I tell you and not be too much of a pain in the ass.”

He says it succinctly, like he’s reading a grocery list. I hit him, but Alan only laughs and rakes the tumbling hair from his face. “I was wrong about the pain in the ass part,” he teases, his eyes dancing with humor.