As I perch upon a curb and watch the waste of a city wash by bit by bit beneath my feet on its way to the sewer, I spot a name on a page—and put a sole out to stop it.

The name means nothing to me—and yet everything—at the same time.  I’ve never known an ‘Aubrey’ or a ‘Ference,’ though I wish I had.  Had I at one time been so fortunate, I might now not be crouching on a curb.

Seconds later, I catch the last notes of Respighi’s ‘The Pines of Rome’ from some boom-box behind me and, at the same time, a voice raving in the crowd.  “That tune grabs me by the throat,” is what I hear.

My own memory prevents it from grabbing me by any such thing.  I once danced to it on a cabaret stage while we—the girls and I—pretended to fuck.  It was a long time ago:  young girls; old Europe; my youth.

‘Aubrey Ference,’ meanwhile—to my now older, less lascivious ear—looks like something part chemistry, part poetry.

Had I once been more able—at least able enough to find and keep an ‘Aubrey Ference’—I might not now be crouching curbside.  I might instead have a job, a condominium, and kids.  Might have a job, wife, condo, kids and a career.  But I now have only a curb—from which I watch the evidence of ‘Aubrey Ference’ drift by, ready to disappear if I lift a heel.

I don’t.

Instead, I spread her piece out on the sidewalk, pat it down, allow it a final gasp of fresh air – fresher, certainly, than my own last gasp—and read.

Back in New York, and after having alighted from the Lexington Line at the 34^th Street stop on my brisk way to Monday morning work, I stop in at a newsstand and buy a copy each of The National Inquirer, Star and The Globe.  I figure if there’s a story—and if anyone’s going to cover it—one of these three mavericks will.  Grist for the tabloid mill originating anywhere west of the Hudson is not going to find its way into The Post or The Daily News—unless and until, that is, someone discovers that the grist belongs to one of our own.  Then, of course, she’s suddenly one of ours—so it’s big news.  But I know it’s my duty to Angie to make sure that never happens.  It would be a hell-of-a career boost, no doubt, but Angie can’t really use that kind of boost just now.  I suspect, even before opening any of the three papers I now carry folded under my arm, that her rather short-lived career is all played out.

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Three hours later, a fine dinner tumbling in my belly while a cognac and coffee wait within easy reach, I sit in perfect contentment on a loveseat in front of a blazing fire in a cavernous room of a fine hotel.  This loveseat—like its twin just opposite me—is set at a ninety-degree angle to the fire, and I turn my head to look across the room and out the floor-to-ceiling windows at curtain call upon curtain call of large, billowy snowflakes—and then re-focus on the pitch black emptiness just out of range of the hotel’s lights.  The flames of the fire in front of me, I note with some relish, reflect ghoulishly off the windowpanes—orange specters dancing for my perusal and with no other care in the world but that I should be entertained.

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I go immediately to our room in the expectation that a contrite Angie, finally reconciled to her ungratefulness, will be awaiting my arrival—hat in hand, as it were.  I have every intention of extracting whatever price she’s willing to pay, penitence being as much at the pleasure of the aggrieved as it is at the pain of the transgressor.  I have no idea who this young man might be; still less, any concern about his welfare; least of all, a thought about his retribution or damnation.  The only compensation I wish to gain for this whole sordid business is Angie’s complete submission—that she should beg me to deliver her from her misguided need to look anywhere but to me for guidance, inspiration, and yes—transcendence.  I and I alone will be her redeemer, I’m thinking as I open the door—.

There’s no one in the room.  “Angie,” I call, half-expecting to hear a tearful “Yes, Bruce?” from somewhere within, but I hear only the sound of my own voice.

The thing now is to remain calm, think clearly, act decisively, I think to myself as I get undressed and pull back the bed sheets—but not before setting up my alarm clock with its luminous numbers and hands facing my pillow.

I’m solidly asleep long before both hands on my alarm clock reach twelve, and I have no idea how much time has passed when I first hear sounds outside our room, catch a glimmer of light from the hallway as she slips in through the door, then listen to her labored breathing as she waits for her eyes to adjust to the darkness.  I half-open one of my own and note the hour:  3:00 a.m.

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I put on my hiking boots, get some advice and a map from Meredith at the front desk, and set out into the woods.  The path—an old carriage road—is quite clearly marked for most of the way.  Lack of observation or adequate light might get you easily lost—at which point there’s no telling where you’d end up—but the trail is a well-trodden one, and a bit of attention to others’ boot-prints leaves you in little doubt about your destination.  Well over an hour later, I see a sign telling me I’m still .7 mile away from the lake, and I realize this hike represents something more than a comfy Sunday stroll.  I may have to embellish a tad with Angie—not exactly a sportswoman from what I’ve seen—but the end will most assuredly justify the means.

My first view of water is no less stupefying than my first sight of the Redwoods and Sequoias as we entered the park.  And yet, my sighting of what I believe to be the lake is in error; the spot I want is still a quarter of a mile off.  I move on—and in the meanwhile, gaze occasionally up at what my map tells me are Mt. Watkins, Ahwiyah Point and Half Dome.  The names have all the poetry of lentil soup, but the view can’t be denied.  I wonder only how it is that Christian missionaries didn’t immediately throw down their crosses and go native when they first stood where I’m now standing.

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Not even two weeks later, I’m sitting next to Angie as we begin our decent into San Francisco’s international airport.  She snores like a marmot, her head wedged in between the headrest and the window and about as far away from mine as she could possibly have put it.  I might, of course, take advantage—but I’m no dentist; which is to say, I like mine alive, alert, fully conscious.  Still, I can appreciate skylines as much as the next guy, and San Francisco’s got a good one.  I lean over Angie to look out the window, but get bogged down in the scenery most immediately below.  My-oh-my… buttons have been popped in the eagerness, I suppose, of firm young lungs to breathe some California air.  The view is breath-taking—yet not so overwhelming that I fail to notice once again her honeyed scent.  The smell—dare I say?—is divine.

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