Riverside Park

At one time she had been a success in her family’s eyes. She had made the National Honor Society in high school and made the varsity soccer and tennis teams. She had always been a class officer, and as a senior had been voted most popular, most likely to succeed and best legs. She remembered being happy, feeling full of energy.

Now, even in her reformed state of living, Celia felt as though everyone she had grown up with had run ahead and she couldn’t catch up. It was as if she was stuck behind a wall of glass. She could see them but could not reach them. Rachel saw it because Rachel was the one who had to make up excuses for why Celia always ducked calls from old high school friends.

Celia pretty much ducked calls from everyone at this point.

After Celia encouraged Rachel to sign up for Match.com, the roommates’ relationship improved because Rachel had something exciting going on in her life to focus on and all Celia had to do was listen to her talk about her experiences.

Celia’s alarm went off at 2:15 p.m. She dragged herself out of bed, showered and put on her Captain Cook’s uniform, which consisted of tight-fitting black jeans, a long-sleeved blouse (with billowed sleeves and plunging neckline; aye, like a pirate), and tucked a clean black-and-white bandana in her back pocket, which she would put on at the bar. She knew she should call home to wish everyone “Happy Thanksgiving,” but if she did then she’d have to talk to all the relatives and deal with the questions her parents had not come up with satisfactory answers to: When was Celia going back to school? Was she seeing anyone special? Had she decided on her career?

She called her mother’s cell phone. She knew it would be turned off but she also knew her mother would check it later when she hadn’t heard from Celia. “Hi, everybody. I just wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving and tell you that I had a very nice day here but missed you guys and now I’m going to work. I hope dinner was good and Uncle Keith didn’t break any chair legs in the dining room or anything again. Love you!”

A cold wind blew at her back as Celia walked to Columbus Avenue. Sometimes the wind off the Hudson was so strong between West End Avenue and Riverside Drive people had to walk backward to reach their buildings. And this was only November. Just wait.

The restaurant was busy but the bar was slow. “Three Diet Pepsis, a Shirley Temple and a zombie,” one of the waiters said, putting in his order. “Identify the unhappy patron at that table.”

It was a nice group that worked here. Most of them had come to New York to be actors.

Celia flicked the channels of the two TVs over the bar. She turned the sound up on the NFL game and turned the sound off on the college game. The busboy brought in a couple racks of clean glasses and set them down on the bar. “Do you want me to put them away?”

“Not until you’re twenty-one,” she told him, smiling. Jason was terribly shy and young for his age, but he was a good worker.

Celia hefted the trays down into the bar and started putting the glasses away.

“Um,” Jason said.

She looked up. “You’ll be in the back?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Thanksgiving is the first day of Suicidal-Thoughts Season,” a regular sighed to Celia. He was divorced, this one, and had moved into the city after his wife in the suburbs threw him out of the house. Why, he was not saying, but Celia suspected it had something to do with the way he drank. Celia almost never expressed an opinion about anything that mattered to her customers—like the way they drank—because the tips were much better if she didn’t.

“I’m just thankful Thanksgiving’s only once a year,” another regular said from across the way, a heavily made-up woman with many miles on her. She’d been working at the Board of Ed for twenty-five years. She drank the house rosé over ice. She once told Celia she hung out at Captain Cook’s because it was a nice place, the people were nice and if she should happen to find a man in here sometime then she would feel a lot safer about getting to know him.

Another regular, the unpublished writer, came in and sat down at the bar. He had on a tie and jacket, which was unusual for him.

“Happy Thanksgiving,” Celia said. “What may I get you?”

“Arsenic or new in-laws,” he said, loosening the tie. “Irish Mist on the rocks.” He rested his elbows on the bar, watching her. “My agent’s going to fire me,” he said glumly, “I just know it. Asked me if I wanted to meet him for a beer. He lives around here.”

“You’re meeting him here?” Celia asked, pouring the whiskey. “On Thanksgiving?”

“I figure he wants to get it over with and tell me I’m going to be a fucking insurance salesman for the rest of my life.”

“And with that kind of language not a very successful one,” Celia observed, making everyone, including the writer, laugh. She wiped down the bar in front of him and slid a saucer of Chex Mix toward him. “He’s not going to have anything bad to say,” she said, “not on Thanksgiving Day. He wouldn’t have called you.”

“You think?” He was looking up at her with a kind of gratitude that translated into excellent tips. But that was not why Celia had said it; she meant it. She felt sorry for him. He’d been trying to sell something he’d written ever since she started working here.

“When’s he coming?”

“I haven’t called him back yet.”

“Call him,” Celia told him.

“You think?”

“It’s Thanksgiving, I’m telling you, he must be calling with good news.”

“I don’t know what it is you should be doing for a living, Celia,” the guy thrown out of the house in the suburbs said, “but it’s sure not this.”

Celia tossed the towel into the laundry bin and gave him a saucer of the peanuts she knew that he liked. “Why not this?”

“For starters, you sound like Martha Stewart and look like one of those women on Friends.”

“She does,” agreed the lonely Board of Ed lady.

“Thank you,” Celia said.

“Celia used to go to Columbia, you know,” the writer said. Celia imagined he was building her credentials up in his mind so he would do what she had advised and call his agent back.

“Ceil,” a waitress said breathlessly, careening into the bar. “I need two margaritas, a strawberry daiquiri and a mudslide as fast as you can make ’em.”

“Got it.”

A cold blast of air came in when the door opened. Celia glanced over and saw a man in overalls and a parka coming in. Keeping his coat on, the man slid onto a stool and briskly rubbed his hands. “Tenant blows uppa his stove and blamesa me. On a Thanksgivinaday, this I don’t need.”

Celia poured him a draft.

The second bartender for the night shift appeared. “Sorry I’m late, Celia.”

“You haven’t missed much,” she said, putting ingredients for the daiquiri, margaritas and mudslide in three of the bar’s six blenders and passing the order on to him because it was time for her break.

“Think it’ll get busier?”

“Not until nine, when people get back into the city,” she said, untying her apron and putting it under the bar. She went into the kitchen where, as usual, the crew was careening about swearing in different languages. (Their chef’s dyslexia was pretty bad.) Celia walked over to the dishwashing area. “Jason,” she called, and then she left the kitchen and headed for Mark’s office. She unlocked the door and went in.

She was standing examining the shift calendar on the wall when he knocked. “Come in and close the door,” she told him.

He did as he was told.

“And lock it,” she added, walking over. While he was turning the dead bolt Celia placed her hand on the small of his back and felt him freeze. “Yes, I want to,” she whispered into his ear. “Very much.” She let her hand slide down and smiled to herself. Amazing.

She led Jason over to the low filing cabinet that also served as a makeshift table in the office. She sat down and pulled him to stand between her legs. And looked up at him. And smiled.

The teenager’s eyes were half-closed and his breath ragged. It had been two weeks since the last time. While he just stood there Celia undid his belt, his pants, worked his zipper and then pulled his jeans down.

She took a sharp breath when she looked down. He tried to help her take his Jockey shorts down but his hands were trembling and Celia pretty much had to do it. As she sat back up it brushed the side of her face. She took hold of him and smiled, looking up. “You’re really something,” she whispered. Then she hastily stood up to take off her jeans and panties and moved back down onto the file cabinet. Jason grabbed at her thighs to pull her legs up and she scarcely had time to guide him into place before he shuddered and caved.

One of the hazards of an inexperienced teenage boy. The upside was Jason had been a virgin, free of disease, and now only knew the most acute desire to get into her. Which was fine with her.