Pug Hill - Alison Pace [10]
I hit rewind. I watch it again. I watch it two more times. Whenever the sad egg sighs, I do, too.
chapter four
Single Jewish Male, 32, Likes: Squash; Hedge Funds; WASPs; Long Purposeful Walks in the Cold
As uplifting an activity as staying under the covers for the remainder of the evening, watching the Zoloft commercial again and again, would be, at a little after seven, I reluctantly accept the fact that my night holds other forms of fun in store for me.
Slowly, I emerge from under the covers. I sit on the edge of my bed, holding on to it, not quite ready to commit to getting out of it. Though commit, I know I must. I walk the one and a half steps to my dresser and pull a T-shirt from the middle drawer, the in-the-apartment / gym-T-shirt drawer as opposed to the nice T-shirt drawer. Pulling it over my head, I look down and contemplate my pile of clothing on the floor.
I wonder if I should pick out a different outfit to wear to dinner at The Union Club. I pick up my pants off the floor, smooth them, and lay them on the bed. I retrieve the sweater and fold it. Even though said sweater and pants are perfectly fine, more than acceptable, I figure I should pick out a different outfit. The thing about The Union Club is that it’s the type of place that always makes you wish you’d picked out a different outfit, no matter what it is you happen to be wearing. Well, there are lots of things about The Union Club, that’s just one of them. I look at the green numbers on my alarm clock: 7:14 glows back at me in a way that I would not describe as helpful. I turn toward my closet, focusing first on my shoes. “Clearly,” I say to myself in my best snooty voice, “one does not wear Ugg boots to The Union Club,” and that makes me hate everything a little bit more.
Just before eight, I turn off Sixty-ninth Street and into the dark wood and marble entrance of The Union Club. The same man who’s always there, a man with gray hair and sad-looking eyes, gets up from this stool he has to sit in, in this little marble nook right off the foyer, and walks a few steps toward me, slowly.
“May I take your coat, ma‘am?” he asks and, as I do whenever I’m here, I hate that he calls me ma’am. I hate it not in the way that women in their thirties usually hate to be called ma‘am, because it makes them feel old, but because I know it’s in this man’s job description to call people sir and ma’am.
Some Biffy guy coming up from the downstairs locker room passes by and says, “Hey, Clarence,” to the guy waiting to take my coat. He says back, “Hi, Mr. Ward.” And really, I think I so often miss the mark. I will waste all this time and energy feeling sorry that this man’s job is taking the coats of squash-playing Republicans (I don’t play squash nor am I a Republican, but I think you’d be safe in assuming that pretty much everyone else here does, and is). What I should really feel bad about, if I’m inclined to feel bad about something, is the fact that I’ve been here fifteen, twenty times and this man has always taken my coat, and I’ve never asked his name. That’s another thing about The Union Club: it always makes me feel bad.
I take off my coat and hand it to him, to Clarence. I say, “Thanks, Clarence,” as he takes it. Clarence is now looking at me strangely. I smile back at him and it takes me a minute to realize he’s waiting.
“Oh, right,” I say quickly, “I’m here to meet Evan Russell.” I say this not only because I want him to know that I myself do not belong here, that I myself am not a squash-playing Republican, but because Clarence won’t let me in unless I’m meeting a member.
“Mr. Russell is in the library,” he tells me and then, making it all so much worse, he kind of shuffles away with my coat. I thank him again and wonder if Evan is the type of club member