STRONGER (16 page)

We hopped aboard a bus to get to our first destination. I told Nate how my mother and I would ride the buses all night when we were between places to live. They felt like a second home to me.

“Please excuse me,” Nate said, looking pained as he ripped his pad of paper from his pocket and began scribbling something down on the pages. “I must acknowledge the muses.”

“Doing so will put you in their favor,” I remarked loftily. I leaned my face against the window, remembering what it was like to have Mom’s arm around my shoulder, being the only passengers on a quiet, well-lit bus, a metal cocoon to the dark, unfair world outside.

We disembarked at Times Square. The sun darted in and out from behind the swiftly moving clouds above. It was springtime in the city, and it was wonderful. The crush of people in the area was incredible, vibrant, inspiring, and terrifying all at once. I heard four different languages as soon as I stepped off the bus. New York truly was a cultural center of the world.

“My lady, may I present Times Square,” Nate said grandly, bowing and sweeping his arm out to indicate the scene.

Marquees advertising everything from Broadway plays to footwear rose like monoliths into the sky. News headlines ticked by on the sides of buildings. Everyone wanted to be here, to see this spectacle, and I was a part of that.

“Oh, they made ‘The Lion King’ into a play?” I wondered aloud, squinting up at a billboard that featured a stylized feline face.

“Item number two on our schedule for today,” Nate announced. “See ‘The Lion King’ on Broadway. It’s a musical, of course.”

“I didn’t mean we had to see it,” I protested as he dragged me across the square by the hand. “I just didn’t know they’d made it. I begged my mom to buy a tape of the Disney movie at a thrift shop one day. We didn’t have the money, but she did it anyway. I’ve probably seen it a hundred times.”

“All the more reason,” Nate said over his shoulder. In no time, we were standing in front of a box office, purchasing tickets for the matinee.

The theater was cool and dark, forcing me to zip my jacket again. I soaked in the surroundings while Nate jotted some things in the notepad.

“Look at that,” I murmured. “You think you’re going to take a break from the muses and they just won’t let you go.”

“I think there’s one muse in particular that I can’t let go of,” he said softly, looking over at me. His gray eyes were warm, making me shiver and giving me butterflies. What was this feeling?

I didn’t have any time to analyze all the fluttering in my belly because the lights went down and the curtains went up. A parade of elaborate animal puppets moved across the stage amid the signature opening African chanting. It was beautifully done. The tears running down my face were halfway in appreciation of the artistry of the show and halfway in remembrance of Mom. We watched that “Lion King” videotape so many times we both knew it by heart and regularly sang along. It was her voice I heard when each performer sang.

When Mufasa died during the stampede, I wept just like I had as a child. I’d never been able to make it through that part with dry eyes. Nate noticed and put his arm around me.

The arm stayed for the remainder of the show. I liked it that way.

When the lights came up and we’d given no less than three standing ovations, he looked at me.

“Where to next?”

“What do you mean, next?” I asked. “This is all I could ever ask for.”

“It’s hardly past noon,” he said, checking his phone. “The day is ours.”

“I don’t even know what to do,” I said. “There’s so much I haven’t done.”

“Let’s make a list so we can check it off,” Nate said. We sat back down in our seats as the rest of the theater patrons filed out. “We’ll call it the ‘What Jasmine Needs to Do in New York City’ list.”

He opened his notepad and put pencil to paper, looking at me expectantly.

“Well, you can mark off Times Square and a Broadway show,” I said a little uncertainly.

“I’ll mark off Times Square in general, but not Times Square on New Year’s Eve,” Nate said, taking notes. “And I’ll mark off ‘The Lion King’ on Broadway but not Broadway shows in general. Next, we’re going to ‘Wicked.’ You should see as many Broadway shows as possible. And off-Broadway shows. And shows in general.”

“Okay, okay,” I laughed, feeling more than a little overwhelmed. “We don’t have to mark off Broadway.”

“Let’s think New York landmarks,” he said. “Empire State Building?”

“I’ve seen it from the outside.”

“Statue of Liberty?”

“I’ve seen it from the shore.”

“Ellis Island?”

“Um, no?”

“Central Park?”

“Passed by it.”

“MoMA?”

“What?”

“Walked the Brooklyn Bridge?”

“No.”

“Bergdorf?”

“Is that English?”

“Grand Central Terminal?”

“Are we going somewhere?”

“No, just to look.”

“Never been.”

“9/11 Memorial?”

“Too sad.”

“It’s a must see.”

Nate continued to jot things down even after he’d stopped asking questions. I thought that he must be aghast at the fact that I’d lived my whole life here but done nothing. Of course, I had intimate knowledge and experience with the underbelly of the city, but I had no desire to revisit those days or experiences.

“Here’s what we’re going to do for the rest of the day,” Nate announced. “Since it’s awesome weather, we’re going to take a ferry to the Statue of Liberty. We’ll get back in time for sunset, which we’ll take in from the top of the Empire State Building. After that, we’ll go to dinner at a little place I know. How does that sound?”

I shook my head, feeling like it was encased in cotton. How did that sound? It sounded incredible, amazing, like something I could only dream of. Were we really going to do all that?

“Let’s go, muse,” Nate said, grinning at me being overwhelmed with all the possibilities of the city.

We hooked elbows and left the theater, emerging out onto Times Square again. The crowd hadn’t diminished a bit.

The subway journey to the ferry brought back a bad memory of spending one night—and one night only—trying to ride it to stay warm and safe. That’s when my backpack had been stolen and my trust in people ruined.

The subway felt a lot friendlier, however, with Nate by my side. We sat together, standing when we felt charitable, and we kept up a running commentary of people riding with us. We would take turns whispering invented histories and motivations for each person we saw.

“He’s an expert cheese connoisseur,” Nate murmured in my ear, his voice barely audible above the racket of the subway car, swaying through the network of tunnels. His lips brushed the shell of my ear and I shivered pleasurably.

“His name is Monty Cheddar,” Nate continued, both of us staring as discreetly as possible at a portly man wearing a sweater vest and, improbably, a monocle. “He can name every type of cheese—and its country of origin—in a blindfold taste test. Last year, a bad batch of blue cheese threatened to end his career, but he recovered miraculously. The queen knighted him for his service to the cheese world.”

I had to look away from Mr. Cheddar, laughing so hard into my hand that my body shook.

“Who’s that over there?” I asked.

“What over where?”

“There,” I said, pointing as clandestinely as I could. “The woman with the dark glasses.”

She was dressed way too posh to be riding public transit—sunglasses in the subway car, black leggings, a black, low-cut blouse, and an over-sized matching black bag.

“That’s Missy Thing,” Nate whispered, “but she’s no model. Don’t let the fashion confuse you. She’s the first known case of pigment-phobia, meaning unreasonable fear of color. She shields herself from us with those glasses. She can’t bear for anything other than black or white to touch her body. An undiluted red makes her scream uncontrollably.”

The subway passed by in no time as I laughed myself from station to station.

The wind was a little too cool on the ferry. I wished for a scarf even though the sun was warm. Nate enveloped me in his arms as I held onto the railing, looking at the water below. It raced by, the boat pushing its way through the light waves.

“Check out that view,” Nate remarked.

I swiveled my head in the direction he pointed and smiled. New York City. We were far enough away now to really appreciate the buildings shooting up into the sky like steel and concrete flowers, glittering in the late April sunshine.

“It’s so beautiful, isn’t it?” I said. “From out here, nothing’s wrong with it. You don’t see the homeless on the street, you don’t see the poor, you don’t see the crime. Out here, it’s just the American dream, a city of possibility, and you’re pretty certain you’re going to make it in whatever you do.”

Nate released me abruptly and I turned, my brow furrowed in consternation. He was writing furiously in his notebook.

“Can you tell the muses to knock it off?” I asked, shaking my head. “I’m a little chilly, here.”

“Tell her yourself,” Nate said, looking up at me in amusement. His hair had grown out since we first met, and the wind played with it.

He finished writing and put his arms around me again, resting his chin on the top of my head. It was like a human-sized, heat-generating coat. I found him immensely comforting. I realized that I trusted this man, enjoyed being near him, considered him my best friend, would do anything for him. It scared me a little bit, made my insides shudder.

Could I truly have feelings for someone after everything that was wrong with me? I didn’t feel like I deserved to.

When we got off at Liberty Island, I was stunned by how big Lady Liberty was. She seemed almost like a toy from the shore, but here she towered. We didn’t get to go inside, as she was closed for renovations, but that just delighted Nate.

“Here’s the thing about the list we made,” he said. “Just because something’s checked off doesn’t mean you should never go back. You should make it a point to go back as often as possible. Things change. You change. Places change. Come back in a month and you might get to go inside the Statue of Liberty. Come back in a year and think about how happy you were the first day you met her and how happy you will be now to be with her again.”

I laughed, leaning against him. It struck me suddenly that perhaps he wasn’t talking about Lady Liberty.

“Here, stand right here,” Nate said, positioning me on a sidewalk. He reclined across the grass on the ground and pulled his phone out, snapping several pictures. “Okay, now hold your arm up like the statue.”

Giggling madly at all the amused looks we were earning, I complied, grinning and looking down at Nate.

We walked around for a long time, reading the plaques about the history of the statue. I knew I had to come back when she was open again, just like Nate had said.

The sunlight was starting to look richer, more golden as we got back to Manhattan.

“No time for public transit,” Nate shouted, seizing my hand and running to the street. “Taxi!” He put his fingers to his mouth and whistled in a piercing shriek. I didn’t know anyone could actually do that.

A cab pulled up and braked with a screech right next to us, almost exactly on cue with Nate’s whistle.