When she opened her eyes she was curled up on a fur rug clinging to Keith. Her blouse and jeans were on the floor beside her. She sat up. Her head felt clear and she thought about the bizarre dream. Then she looked at her body. She was naked! Ricky was sprawled across the floor . . . also naked and asleep. She stood up and slid into her jeans. It hadn’t been a dream. She had been part of something insane . . . ritualistic. She carried her blouse and walked among the sleeping people. She had to find her shoes. A clock struck in the hall. . . she wandered out there . . . two girls were nude . . . locked in an embrace. They stopped when they saw her and smiled. She smiled and they came over to her and each one kissed her lightly on the cheek. She smiled at the gesture of friendship and love . . . a rush of wonderful lightness streaked before her eyes . . . she saw flashing colors . . . she felt warm all over . . . but she felt she should go home. There were sandals lying all over the place . . . she must find a pair that fit. She found her bag and slid it on her shoulder.
Keith came over to her. “Where are you going?”
She smiled as she put on her shirt. “Home . . .”
He handed her a cube of sugar. “Eat it . . . it’s great.” Then he shoved an envelope inside the bag she had slid on her shoulder.
She sucked the sugar cube. “What did you put in my bag?”
“A gift,” he said as he began to unbutton her shirt. She felt like she was floating again . . . there was a whirring noise inside her head. But she broke away with a smile. “No . . . you belong to Linda.”
As she walked back to the foyer, the two girls who were still embracing each other looked up. They each reached out and pulled her toward them. They kissed her. They opened her shirt. One slipped her lips on one of January’s breasts. Both began fondling her. It was beautiful . . . these two girls she had never seen before . . . wanting to make her happy . . . wanting to be friendly . . . she felt them unzip her jeans . . . she felt one of the soft hands touching her . . . no . . . that was wrong . . . only a penis should do that . . . or a man . . . She pulled away . . . she smiled and shook her head. The girls smiled. One buttoned her blouse. The other helped her with her zipper. Each waved and went back to making love to one another. She watched them . . . it was like a ballet . . .beautiful . . . she walked to the door.
She went outside. The summer night felt cool and clean. If possible, she felt more light-headed than before. She could see beyond time and space . . . through buildings . . . through that brownstone house she had just left, where people were making love—happy beautiful people.
It was a wonderful marvelous world, and tomorrow she’d tell Mike all about it. No, Mike was gone. Well, when she saw him again. . . . because she would see him again . . . everyone existed forever . . . and he would know she loved him. Because everyone should love everyone . . . everyone should love everything . . . even a tree—a tree could love back. She stopped at a tree and threw her arms around it. “You’re just a young skinny tree . . . but don’t be afraid . . . because one day you’ll be a big tree. And I love you!” She clung to the tree. “Such a weak little tree . . . this whole street has such young weak little trees . . . But know what, little trees? You’ll all be here long after we are gone. And maybe someone else will tell you how much they love you. Don’t you hope so? Tell me, tree—if that tree next to you told you it wanted to belong to you forever . . . intertwine its branches with yours . . . become one . . . wouldn’t you like that? Wouldn’t the two of you together make a real big strong happy tree?” She sighed. “But no, you’ve got to stand here all alone, skinny and lonely . . . and maybe some of your leaves will blow against his . . . and with the wind you both can whisper and speak . . . and be together . . . yet apart. Is that the way nature wants it to be? Then maybe that’s the way we’re supposed to be too. But oh, tree . . . it’s so nice to belong to someone . . .”
She left the tree and began to walk in a zigzag pattern. She was aware of the way she walked, just as a child is aware when it is consciously trying not to step on the cracks of the pavement. She looked up at the sky. The stars were separated too. Were they lonely? Then she saw one shoot across the heavens. She shut her eyes and made a wish. Maybe right now her father was watching the same star from the ocean. Or maybe he was on one of those stars, beginning a whole new life.
“Twinkle, twinkle, little star.” She laughed. That was silly, because a star wasn’t little. A star was a big sun. . . . “How I wonder what you are!” She knew what a star was. She fastened her attention on one that seemed to be blinking at her. It was so bright, but she was aware that the velvet sky was starting to fade . . . morning would begin soon . . . that very special Thursday in June was over. Never to be gotten back. Only now it was a very special Friday. She got up and began to walk . . . sometimes she zigzagged . . . sometimes she skipped. The red light on Madison Avenue looked so red . . . and the green light so green. And those lights told people and cars what to do . . . when to go . . . when to stop. It was a world of stop and go lights. But who needed them? People wouldn’t hurt anyone. What was everyone trying to protect her from? Why did people try to instill fear? People were taught to fear and obey. Fear strangers . . . fear cars . . . obey lights! Who needed lights! The world would be much better without stop lights. People would stop and go quite properly without those lights. Because people cared. She stood in the middle of the street and threw her head back and stared at the sky. There were no stop signals in the sky . . . and with that whole big sky . . . Mike’s plane had gone down . . . from that soft sky into the soft water . . . and now Mike was looking at the sky too . . . and nothing could ever hurt him again . . . just like right now . . . nothing could hurt her . . . no one would hit her . . . because at this moment she was part of infinity. Nothing bad could ever happen . . . even death wasn’t the end . . . it was just part of another existence. She was sure of that now. She stared at the sky and waited for an answer . . . she heard the screech of brakes . . . a cab pulled to a stop inches in front of her. The driver got out . . . “You dumb drunken broad!”
“Don’t say that.” She smiled. She slipped her arms around his neck. “Don’t be angry because I love you.”
He pulled away and stared at her. “You coulda been killed. Oh, Christ . . . you’re one of them. You’re stoned out of your mind.”
“I love you,” she said and put her head against his cheek. “Everyone should love everyone.”
He sighed. “I got two daughters your age. I work nights so they can study. One goes to teacher’s college . . . the other is studying to be a nurse. And you . . . flower child . . . what the hell are you studying?”
“To love . . . to know . . . to feel. . . .”
“Get into the cab. I’ll take you home.”
“No . . . I want to walk . . . to float . . . to feel.”
“Get in . . . no charge.”
She smiled. “See, you do love me.”
He dragged her by the arm and put her in the seat beside him. “I don’t trust you in the back. Now . . . where’s home?”
“Where the heart is.”
“Look, I finished work at four, but I had an airport call. It’s quarter to five in the morning. I live in the Bronx. Right now my wife is sitting, waiting with the coffee, picturing me being held up with a knife at my throat. So let’s get with it. Where do you want to go?”
“To the Plaza. My daddy lives there.”
He headed for the Plaza. After a few blocks she touched his arm. “No . . . not the Plaza . . . he’s not there now. The man I loved was at the Plaza . . . now’s he at the Beverly Hills Hotel.”
“Look . . . where do you want to go?”
“The Pierre.”
“What are you? Some kind of a hotel freak? C’mon . . . where shall I take you?”
She looked at his registration card. “Mr. Isadore Cohen, you are a beautiful man. Take me to the Pierre.”
He started down Fifth Avenue. “And what’s your name, flower child?”
“January.”
>
“Naturally,” he said.
It was beginning to rain when Isadore Cohen walked her to the entrance of the Pierre. She looked up at the heavy gray sky. “Where are the stars? Where did my beautiful night go?” she asked.
“It’s turned into morning,” Isadore Cohen grumbled. “An ugly wet morning. . . . Now go back to wherever you belong.”
She turned and waved as he walked back to his cab. He had refused to take any money, but she had left a twenty-dollar bill on the seat. She tiptoed into her bedroom and closed the drapes. Sadie was still asleep. The whole world was asleep except dear sweet Mr. Cohen who was on his way home to the Bronx. He was a wonderful man. Everyone was wonderful if you took time out to understand them. Like Keith, now that she knew him—he was wonderful too. She undressed slowly and tossed her bag on the chair. It slipped to the floor. She leaned over and picked it up gently. “You, Mr. Bag, are a Louis Vuitton, and I happen to think you are ugly. But they say you are very ‘in.’” She studied the bag. Vera had made her buy it at Saks. (“But I don’t wear much brown,” January had said. “A Louis Vuitton bag isn’t just brown,” Vera insisted. “It goes with everything.”)
Well, for one hundred and thirty dollars she damn well intended to wear it with everything. Then she laughed. What was a hundred and thirty dollars if she had ten million? But the idea of ten million dollars belonging to her was impossible to grasp. Any more than she could feel that this apartment belonged to her. It was still Dee’s. She wondered if Mike ever felt it belonged to him. But the Louis Vuitton bag that cost one hundred and thirty dollars belonged to her. That kind of money she could understand. She sat on the edge of the bed and stroked the bag. She put the bag on the pillow and crawled into bed.
She wasn’t sleepy. She thought about taking a sleeping pill. She reached for the bottle in the drawer of the night table . . . then put it away. Why should she? She felt too marvelous . . . And as Keith had said, “There will never be this Thursday again”—only now it was Friday and there’d never be this Friday again. She lay very quietly and savored the wonderful feeling of weightlessness that flowed through her body. She knew she wouldn’t fall asleep . . . she couldn’t . . . yet she realized she had because the dream came again. First the eyes . . . so clear and blue. The face was vague . . . it was always vague, but she knew it was beautiful. He was a stranger, and yet instinctively she felt he was someone she wanted to be with. He held out his arms . . . and she knew she had to go to him. She felt she was getting out of bed and going into his arms . . . yet she knew she had to be in her bed dreaming the whole scene. That was it . . . a scene . . . because she saw herself getting out of bed . . . she watched herself follow the outstretched arms. Yet each time she reached him it was as if she hadn’t come quite close enough. He kept waiting. She followed him into the living room . . . to the window. But now he was outside the window! She opened it . . . the sky was dark . . . filled with stars. Now she knew it was all a dream because it had been dawn just a few minutes ago when she fell asleep . . . a gray sticky dawn . . . so that meant she was still in bed and not standing at the window, staring out at the stars and this mystical man. But this time, she was determined to see his face. She leaned out the windowsill. “Do you want me?” she called out.
He held out his arms. “If I come to you, you have to really love me,” she told him. “I can’t bear to fall in love with you and have you disappear, even if you are only a dream.”
He didn’t speak. But the eyes told her he would never hurt her. And suddenly she knew that all she had to do was jump out of that window and float up into his arms. She put one leg over the sill. And then she felt someone dragging her back. Keeping her from him . . . She struggled . . . And then she woke because Sadie was pulling at her and screaming . . . pulling her inside. She looked at the street below . . . she had been halfway out of the window!
“Miss January! Oh, Miss January! Why? . . . Why!” Sadie was sobbing from fright.
She clung to Sadie for a moment. Then she managed a weak smile. “It’s all right, Sadie. It was just a dream.”
“A dream! You were going to jump out of that window. Thank God I was in the kitchen when I heard the window open.”
January stared out the window. It was dark and there were stars. “What time is it?”
“Ten o’clock. I was just fixing myself some tea and going to watch the news. I tried to wake you at noon and you mumbled something about having been up all night. Mr. Milford called at seven and I told him you were still asleep. He was very concerned. He’s been calling every hour.”
“Don’t worry, Sadie. I . . . I took some sleeping pills this morning. I couldn’t sleep last night. I guess I just slept round the clock.”
“Well . . . will you call Mr. Milford? He’s very concerned.”
She nodded and went to her room. “Can I bring you anything, Miss January?”
“No . . . I’m not hungry.”
She picked up the phone and started to dial David. Suddenly the room went dark. Then bright lights shot through her eyes and she saw him again . . . just for a flash . . . the blue eyes . . . almost mocking her . . . as if she had been a coward. “You would have killed me!” she shouted. “Killed me! Is that what you wanted?”
Sadie came rushing in. January stared down at the phone, which was now buzzing with the phone-off-the-hook-too-long signal. “Miss January, you were screaming!”
“No. I’m . . . I . . . I shouted at the operator because I got a wrong number twice. Don’t worry, Sadie . . . please. I’m going to call Mr. Milford. You go to sleep.”
Then she dialed the number. Sadie hovered by and waited until she heard January say, “Hi, David!” Then she discreetly left the room.
David sounded genuinely concerned. She tried to make her voice light. But the room was growing dark again and the splashing array of colors had returned. “I went to a party,” she said as she blinked hard to make the colors disappear.
“It must have been a late one,” he said. “You slept all day.”
She closed her eyes to block out the flashing lights. “It was late. Some . . . some friends of my father’s . . . actors . . . directors . . .” The colors were gone and she was all right now. Her voice was strong again. “It was a late party . . . it didn’t start until midnight. And then when I got home for some strange reason I wasn’t sleepy. So I read . . . until morning. And then I took two sleeping pills . . . and . . . well . . . you know the rest.”
“How are you going to be able to sleep now?”
“Easy. I’ll read a dull book and take some pills. By tomorrow my time schedule will be straightened out.”
“January, I don’t like this sleeping pill business. I’m against all pills. I never even take an aspirin.”
“Well, after tonight I won’t take any again.”
“It’s my fault. I left you alone. And you shouldn’t be alone now . . . ever. January, let’s not wait out the summer. Let’s do it now.”
“Do what now?”
“Get married.”
She was silent. He had never asked her to go to bed with him since that first time. But his whole attitude since the accident had been different. He was gentle . . . considerate . . . and always concerned.
“January, are you there?”
“Yes . . .”
“Well . . . will you marry me?”
“David . . . I—” She hesitated. But what was she hesitating about? What was she waiting for? Another Tom to come along to destroy her? A relationship with Keith . . . and his friends? The full impact of it was just beginning’ to hit her. And even the dream was dangerous. She had almost jumped out of a window. She was suddenly frightened. What was happening to her? Where was the girl she had once been . . . still was. But that girl had allowed a stranger to make love to her in the midst of a room filled with strangers. Yet it had all seemed perfectly proper at the time. She began to tremble . . . she felt unclean . . . violated.
“January, are you still on?”
&
nbsp; “Yes, David. I’m . . . I’m just thinking. . . .”
“Please, January. I love you . . . I want to take care of you.”
“David—” She clung to the phone. “I do need you. Yes . . . Yes. I do!”
“Oh, January! I promise you’ll never regret it. Look, we’ll celebrate tomorrow night at dinner. I’ll invite a few friends. Vera and Ted . . . Harriett and Paul . . . Muriel and Burt . . . Bonnie and—” He stopped. “Where shall we do it? The Lafayette? Sign of the Dove?”