Bright Lights, Big City Read Online Free PDF

cussed you out. Meanwhile, the magazine was going to press. The Druid called three times and encouraged you to keep trying. Finally, with the composing room screaming for the final pages, an accommodation of sorts was reached, unknown to the President and his staff. While Webster’s Second distinguished the meanings of the two words, the racier Third Edition listed them as synonyms. The Druid gave you a final call to explain this and to approve—not without trepidation—the original quote. The magazine went to press. Government continued apace.
    At one o’clock you go out for a sandwich. Megan asks you to bring her a Tab. Downstairs, you semi-revolve through the doors and think about how nice it would be not to have to return at all, ever. You also think about how nice it would be to hole up in the nearest bar. The glare from the sidewalk stuns you; you fumble in your jacket pocket for your shades. Sensitive eyes, you tell people.
    You shuffle off to the deli and pick up a pastrami-on-rye and an egg cream. The bald man behind the counter whistles cheerfully as he slices the meat. “Nice and lean today,” he says. “And now for a little mustard—just how your mom used to make it.”
    “What do you know about it,” you ask.
    “Just passing the time, pal,” he says, wrapping it all up. All of this, the dead meat on ice behind glass, everything, puts you off your meal.
    Outside, waiting for a light, you are accosted by a man leaning up against a bank.
    “My man, check it out here. Genuine Cartier watches. Forty dollars. Wear the watch that’ll make ’em watch you. The genuine article. Only forty bucks.”
    The man stands beside the torso of a mannequin, the arms of which are covered with watches. He holds one out to you. “Check it out.” If you take it, you’ll feel committed. But you don’t want to be rude. You take the watch and examine it.
    “How do I know it’s real?”
    “How do you know anything’s real? Says Cartier right there on the face, right? Looks real. Feels real. So what’s to know? Forty bucks. How can you lose?”
    It appears authentic. Slim, rectangular face, regal roman numerals, sapphire-tipped winding knob. The band feels like good leather. But if it’s real, it’s probably hot. And if it isn’t hot it can’t be real.
    “Thirty-five bucks to you. My cost.”
    “How come so cheap?”
    “Low overhead.”
    You haven’t owned a watch in years. Knowing the time at any given moment might be a good first step toward organizing the slippery flux of your life. You’ve never been able to see yourself as the digital kind of guy. But you could use a little Cartier in your act. It looks real, even if it isn’t, and it tells time. What the hell.
    “Thirty dollars,” the man says.
    “I’ll buy it.”
    “At that price you ain’t buying it. You’re stealing it.”
    You wind your new watch and admire it on your wrist. 1:25.
    Once you reach the office you realize you have forgotten Megan’s Tab. You apologize and tell her you’ll go back for it. She says not to bother. While you were gone she took two messages, one from Monsieur Somebody at the Department of Something, and one from your brother Michael. You don’t really want to talk to either of them.
    •  •  •
    By two o’clock it’s eight in Paris and everyone has gone home for the day. For the rest of the afternoon you will try to fill in the holes with reference books and calls to the consulate in New York. Your eyelids feel as if they are being held open by taxidermy needles. You push on blindly.
    Your new watch dies at three-fifteen. You shake it, then wind it. The winding knob falls off in your hand.
    The editor of the piece calls to ask how it’s going. You say it’s going. He apologizes for the scheduling change; he wanted to save it till next month at the earliest. For no clear reason, the Druid moved it up. “I just wanted to warn you,” he says. “Take nothing for granted.”
    “That’s my job,” you