Escape to Manhattan: One

It happened during the middle of a media ethics class. I started to crack.

The professor, who made a habit of handing out reading assignments and paper topics as if it was the only class we had, made us do group presentation on public relations disasters. After hours of mind-numbing discussions about Exxon Mobil oil spills and Tylenol poising scares and dozens of horrendous Power Point presentations, I started sweating. A lot. And I got dizzy. And a little faint.

I went home and my boyfriend asked if somebody had died. I wanted to cry. Menopause-style heat flashes seized my exhausted little body.

I had to get out. Immediately. Out of the city, out of the state—hell, maybe out of the country.

Eventually it became clear that I had two choices: either take a vacation and get out of town, or take a swan dive from the Washington Avenue Bridge on campus and plunge into the icy waters of the Mississippi where my body would float like Ophelia’s beneath the surface of the icy water (except I’d been doing a little overeating lately, so perhaps I’d just sink—who knows).

Okay, so perhaps that’s a bit dramatic, but the point is that I needed a vacation. Badly.

I called my friend, Christian, who is an actor in New York and has a great little apartment on the Upper East Side, one block off Central Park. “Christian,” I said, “I’m slowly going mad here in Minneapolis. I need to come visit and get some R&R.”

“Jordan, you know you’re welcome here anytime,” he said, laughing. “Really.”

I laughed, too, but my laugh was crazier, more like the laugh of a frazzled person coming undone. Without further deliberation I grabbed my Visa, called my travel agent, and booked a flight. A week later I was in New York.

* * *

My boyfriend, Braden, didn’t like the idea of me going to New York. At all.

In fact, he hated it.

“Jordan, why do you have to go all the way to Manhattan to get a break?” he asked, following me around my apartment as I packed for the trip.

“I have to go, Braden, because I need something—something different, something new.” I plucked my toothbrush from the medicine cabinet and zipped it into a sandwich baggie.

Braden rolled his eyes. “I feel like you’re trying to tell me that what we have here isn’t working.”

I guffawed and grabbed dental floss and my contact lenses. “Well, Braden, is this working? This whole thing we have going here?”

“I love you, Jordan,” he said. He looked at me, brows furrowed.

“I love you, too,” I said. “That’s not the issue.”

I walked passed Braden where he stood in the doorway of the bathroom and chucked the supplies I’d gathered into a side pocket of my suitcase. I’d already stuffed my suitcase with jeans and shirts, socks and underwear, and now finally my morning supplies. I zipped my suitcase up with an air of authority and then looked at Braden.

“Look, Braden, I’m not breaking up with you. I’m just going to New York to catch my breath before this semester ends and I start pulling my hair out in clumps.”

Braden grasped at the last straws he could find. “New York City is supposed to be relaxing? And what about the fact that Christian is your ex-boyfriend?”

I crossed my arms. “What about it?”

“What do you mean, ‘What about it?’” Braden said. “It’s a fair question.”

“Don’t you trust me?” I asked.

“I don’t trust him!” Braden said. “You’re going to spend four days with him in his apartment and you’re saying he’s not going to try anything? I mean, where are you sleeping? On the floor?”

I grabbed the handle of my suitcase and wheeled it past Braden and into the living room by the front door.

“Braden,” I said, “I’m going to New York. It’s really very flattering that you think my ex-boyfriend still wants to sleep with me, but I’m here to tell you that I’ll be sleeping on his futon and not in his bed.” I sighed. “You’re really going to have to get over the fact that I dated him years ago.”

Braden, looking defeated, slumped onto the couch. I sighed and walked slowly over to the couch. Braden reached for my hand and pulled me down next to him. He scooted me closer to him and guided my head to his shoulder. I felt the tension slowly begin to loosen.

“Okay,” he said. “If this is what you need, you should do it.”

Our fingers interlaced. “Thank you,” I said.

“But you know, you could always just come to my place for a few days instead and I could cook for you and we could get a nice bottle of wine and—”

I lifted my head and looked at Braden, an eyebrow raised.

“Not quite what you’d imagined in a vacation, huh?” Braden asked.

I smirked. “Not quite, buckaroo.”

“Well, I thought I’d try,” Braden said. I returned my head to his shoulder and we sat there quietly, side by side, for almost an hour.

* * *

Relief spread through my body as I curled into seat 22A. It was the window seat and I figured I’d have a great view of the descent into New York. The plane was crowded with thirty-something men and women in curt business suits and artist types in form-fitting jeans and angular eyeglasses. Elevator music played in the cabin of the airplane as people continued stuffing their baggage into overhead bins and filed into seats. A burst of air came from the little nozzle above me and I took a long, deep breath.

A vacation, I thought to myself. This is the beginning of a beautiful, beautiful vacation.

I pulled out my cell phone and decided to make one last phone call before take-off.

“Dylan? It’s Jordan,” I said.

Dylan, my best friend, answered the phone groggily. “Hey Jordan,” he said. “Oh my God, you’re on the plane, aren’t you?”

“I am. And in two hours I’ll be in New York City.”

Dylan sounded much more awake at the mention of New York. “Oh my God, Jordan, I’m so glad you decided to get the hell out of here and take a break. You needed it.”

“Yeah, I did,” I said. The last of the passengers filed into seats and the flight attendants began closing overhead storage at the front of the plane.

“You were starting to drive me a little batshit with all the talk about stress, stress, stress and classes, classes, classes,” Dylan said.

“Hey!”

Dylan laughed. “Call me when you get there, punk. Minneapolis misses you.”

The plane gently started rolling backward. A flight attendant rushed by and pointed at my cell phone.

“You need to turn that thing off now that we’re in motion, okay?” she said, smiling wide enough that I could see every last one of her capped teeth.

I said goodbye to Dylan and snapped the phone shut, burying it deep within my messenger bag. Our plane slowly navigated the maze of runways while the flight attendants did their in-flight show, complete with oxygen masks and seat belts. Just before take-off I pulled out my iPod and tuned into a slow John Mayer song. Our plane came to a complete stop and I heard the engines fire up with a billowing roar. As the plane started tearing down the runway I was so giddy that I almost started laughing.

A minute later the wheels of our plane left the ground and Minneapolis slowly fell away. I watched the familiar city I’d grown to love so much turn into rectangular patches of homes and skyscrapers and then, slowly, into a jumble of colors and lines before we slipped through the clouds and into the afternoon sky.

* * *

An hour into the flight the flight attendants served cheeseburgers and I sipped a Diet Coke. While I munched on my burger I voraciously read a battered copy of “Angels in America.” I also had a trashy novel in my bag on standby, but I figured that reading “Angels in America” was a lot more appropriate for going to New York, especially with all the smartly dressed, intellectual-looking people seated around me on the flight. Never ending fields of clouds, plush and white, stretched out across the horizon outside my window. The sun shone so bright that it looked white.

Later, as Pryor gave the speech at the end of the play about dying quiet deaths no longer, the captain announced that we were a few minutes from New York. I flopped the book down and looked out the window. The sun had set without me noticing and I could see the sparkling, shimmering lights of New York shining below me.

Once we landed there was a mass exodus for the doors. I’m telling you, New Yorkers have no qualms about cutting ahead and pushing all the way out the door. Once I was inside the terminal I looked around me and gulped.

It was huge.

Our airport in Minneapolis is pretty big. It’s an international hub and hundreds of flights come in and out every day through its two terminals.

JFK, on the other hand, has nine terminals.

My cell phone started ringing and I immediately felt a wave of relief. I dug it out of the depths of my bag and looked at the Caller ID. It was Christian.

“Are you here yet?” he asked.

“I am,” I said. “I’m in terminal seven, I think.”

“Okay. Head down to baggage area D4. I’m waiting here for you.”

“You’re here already? How the hell did you find my baggage claim?”

Christian laughed. “I’ve learned a few tricks in New York, baby. Meet me down here.”

I nervously followed the signs above me through hallway after hallway, going up and down escalators and careening around corners before the hallways finally spit me out in a giant baggage area. The crowds were massive, packed six deep around each of the baggage conveyors. But then, like an angel, Christian appeared out of the exhausted pack of travelers.

“Christian!” I yelled. He rushed up to me and he hugged me tightly. “My God, you look great!” I said.

New York had changed him. He seemed taller and slimmer. His jeans fit him perfectly and he had a beautiful messenger bag that made me instantly want to ask where he’d bought it. He looked so fresh, so clean.

“It’s good to see you,” Christian said, leaning back from the hug. “Come on. Let’s get your bag. We have a long ride home.”

“Really?” I asked, surprised.

“Oh yeah,” Christian said, taking me by my hand and tearing into the crowd of passengers. “We’re in Brooklyn, baby. We’re almost an hour away by subway from the Upper East Side.”

The Upper East Side. What beautiful words.

* * *

I had to admit that the confidence Christian had while getting my bags and then navigating the subway system was kind of sexy. I secretly enjoyed Christian leading me around and initiating me in the ways of New York.

The Bronx subway cars were lit in yellowish-gray light and the walls of the subway cars were painted a reddish-orange color. The cars rocked back and forth and screeched occasionally on the ride into Manhattan, but that didn’t stop Christian and I from leaning in and talking at the speed auctioneers. I told him about my hectic semester and about Braden and the frightening prospect of never finding a job after graduation and he told me about auditions he’d been on and celebrities he’d seen on the streets (“Believe me,” he said, “you’ll see celebrities while you’re here—they’re everywhere”).

We changed lines in Midtown and then, twenty minutes later, we were in the Upper East Side. I wheeled my suitcase behind me and lugged it up the steep steps leading out of the subway.

“Are you ready?” Christian asked, looking at me and smiling.

“I’m ready,” I said.

Suddenly we’d emerged from the stuffy, clogged air of the subway system, the corridors littered with garbage and graffiti and huge advertisements, and we emerged in the crisp autumn evening. I sucked air into my lungs and let it out slowly. Straight ahead of me was Central Park. In the evening light I could see the huge trees in the park, the leaves changing color in the fall weather, and the sturdy stone wall surrounding the park.

“Welcome to New York,” Christian said, still looking at me and smiling.

I did everything short of squealing while walking to his apartment, tracing the north side of Central Park on our way home.

* * *

Christian’s roommates, both actors, were gone when we got to the apartment. The building was gorgeous—an ornate, stone and brick structure—and we walked the three flights of stairs to his apartment. The ceilings were high, the floors were hardwood, and the windows had a sliver view of the park if you craned your head at just the right angle.

I set my bags down and looked around the apartment. “Christian, you have an amazing place!”

“Thanks,” he said, grinning. He picked up the phone. “We’re ordering in Chinese. What do you want?” He handed me a menu and dialed the number.

Fifteen minutes later a delivery guy who spoke no English delivered a huge carton of steaming chicken and broccoli and a heap of white rice. We sat in the living room, sprawled on the couch, and ate with the New York evening news playing at half-volume in the background.

“What do you want to do tomorrow?” Christian asked.

“God,” I said, “I don’t even know. I mean, where do you even start in a city like this?”

“Well, I have sort of bad news,” Christian said.

I put down my fork and stopped chewing.

“I can’t be with you until tomorrow afternoon. I’ve got an audition at ten and at one, so we’ll have to meet up around four o’clock.” He looked at me, searching my face. I picked up my fork and took another bite of my chicken and broccoli.

“Well then, I’ll just have to adventure around the city myself tomorrow,” I said. I chewed and thought about what I’d just said.

“Good,” Christian said. “I don’t want you laying around the apartment tomorrow all by yourself when you’ve got this whole city at your fingertips.”

My stomach leapt. I thought about heading out into the city with a map and exploring, taking on the city solo. I was so thrilled at the prospect that I forgot to finish my food.

I was so excited that I forgot to call Braden before I went to bed.

This is the first part of the "Escape to Manhattan" series. The story continues Saturday, March 5, 2005.

Josh, 22, is a Minneapolis-based writer. He has written one novel, "The Unhinged Life of Jacob Archer," and plans to embark on a follow-up novel later this year. Josh can be reached at joshcentral@hotmail.com with comments, queries, or kind words.

(c) 2005 Josh and Josh Stories