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hurried along the limestone cavern of West 91st Street, headed south for a block down Central Park West, then cut into the park. He followed a path tracing the northern side of the Reservoir until he came to a slight rise. He slowed down to stretch out the moment before he’d see it through the trees— this perfect piece of poetry. It made his skin prickle. Calvert Vaux’s mastery had created a testament to the Gothic Revival movement 150 years ago. Adam had never seen another bridge that could touch it. Well, maybe in Venice. The cinquefoil design on the handrail resembled delicate lace, and the cast iron spandrels somersaulted into an oval vault for the lower level of bridal path to pass through. He wandered around searching for the perfect vantage point, one that put the bending tree that echoed the bridge’s arch in the foreground, then planted himself on the stool. It was chilly out here for early May. He zipped up his fleece to his chin.
    He retrieved his easel and screwed it into a flat position, hooking on his water cup and paint attachment tray. Next, he unrolled the tissue paper around his brushes, Kolinsky Sable all the way from Siberia, the best. Calvert Vaux had been a watercolorist as well as an architect, like him. But Adam could never hope to lay claim to creations like this bridge. Still, stacked up in boxes in his building’s basement storage cage were 214 watercolor paintings of this bridge in different seasons and light conditions. Today the tally would reach 215. He was the J.M.W. Turner of Central Park. That was a laugh. If he could only manage to capture a fraction of the deftness of this bridge he would hang up his brushes.
    “Maybe you should just paint and forget trying to be an architect.” Those words were lodged in his brain like a tormenting pebble in a shoe.
    ***
    Alyssa Lincoln listened idly to Adam’s voice cutting through the background jazz at New York City’s fabled Monkey Bar. He was always in such a bad mood after his painting sessions.
    “That Norman is such an asshole. He’s having this reunion dinner at his fancy new house just to rub our noses in the fact that he’s loaded and we’re not. And that bitch, Iris Reid— how did she get to be his architect? She was never a great designer. Norman didn’t even like her in school.” Adam glared at one of the life-sized jazz figures on the mural facing him.
    “Maybe she slept with him. Ugh. No, I can’t imagine her being that desperate for work. Besides, she inherited that fantastic house from her parents, so she probably doesn’t even have a mortgage.” She shrugged as she rooted around her plate for the last bits of lobster. New York Magazine is right. They do have the best seafood salad here. “Some people evidently get things handed to them in life.”
    “Remind me again why we have to go to this thing.”
    “What thing?”
    “The reuni on— we were just talking about it!”
    “I told you, Adam— I want G.B. to give me a teaching job at GSD next fall. I’m going to go postal if I have to spec one more fabric wall divider at Fansler Interiors. G.B. always liked me.”
    “He liked me more.”
    “Good . You get him to give me a job. I want to teach a design studio.” She twirled the ice in her drink with a monkey stirrer. “I can fly home on weekends, or when the twins are home from college. Or you could fly up. I’ll get a cute apartment near Harvard Square.”
    “Uh, ‘ Lyssa , I don’t think people start out teaching at Harvard. I thi nk you have to work your way up— unless you’re famous.”
    “Darling, when have I ever followed the conventional route to getting ahead?”
    ***
    “Now, tummies on the mat for swimming, ladies. Oh, and Gill too, sorry,” shouted the sadist-in- lycra .
    It’s Gilles, not Gill, you twit, thought G.B. He could not believe that th is was his life, here, in a gym— or spa, or whatever they called them now. His T.A., Steve, had insisted that Pilates would tighten G.B.’s