MARTIN

Martin hated living in the rambling West Side apartment alone. Whenever he visited Charlotte in her cramped loft an idea entered his head, but he didn’t have the courage to voice it until the day he dropped by to find her unwrapping a pair of robotic arms and TV monitors. She’d had them custom built so she could photograph herself from any angle without having to be a contortionist.

“I don’t have much room left to maneuver here,” she told him.

“You should rent another place,” he said. “A real apartment, with rooms for rooms.”

“Very funny,” she said, as she set up a step ladder, climbed to the top rung, and started measuring the distance from the floor to different spots high on the wall.

“Or better yet, move in with me,” he said.

“Oh, sure,” she said, sarcastically, but stopped what she was doing to look down at him.

“I’m serious. The place is a barn, a well-appointed barn that’s too big for just me. The bathroom echoes when I sing in the shower.”

“You sing in the shower?”

“Only when I’m alone. You’d have your own room. Your own bathroom. We’ll probably never see each other.”

Charlotte climbed down from the ladder.

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“I am,” he said.

She walked over to one end of the parachute curtain that bisected the space. She motioned Martin to the other. Together they tore it down.

Luca was a different story. Luca came to him. He called, sounding desperate, swore that Haze had made promises, that he’d returned to San Francisco without thinking things through, that he’d left New York with nothing. Martin expected to have to pay him off eventually. The boy wanted more than money though. He wanted a first class ticket back to New York City.

The first night the three of them spent together, they ate dinner in the kitchen. Thai takeout. Luca ordered and paid for it. The pad thai was a bit sticky for Martin’s taste. Charlotte ate hers with chopsticks, strand by strand. Luca swallowed the last sip of his milky Thai tea before he left the room and came back carrying a cardboard box.

He set the box on the counter and asked Martin, “Where do you want these?”

He started pulling out bottles and tins of spice: panch phoran, annatto seeds, Tandoori masala, achiote. And oils: olive, walnut, peanut, sesame.

“I like to cook,” Luca said.

Martin looked to Charlotte.

“Don’t look at me,” she said. “I don’t.”

Luca smiled. It was the first time Martin had seen him smile since he arrived. His smile was compelling, more open than the few times Martin had seen him smile while Haze was dying. Martin felt a stab of jealousy, imagining Haze’s first sight of him.

“We should have a party,” Martin said. “A dinner party. Nothing big. Just a few close friends. Charlotte’s friend Zdenĕk and the Aronsons. And your art dealer,” he said to Charlotte. “What’s his name?”

“Javier. Javier Peralta,” Charlotte said.

It occurred to Martin that Charlotte was the only one who had friends. Luca hardly left the apartment during all the months that Haze was dying, not an ideal situation to make new acquaintances, and what friends Martin had were either sick or, like Haze, already dead.