Breadcrumbs

ADAM SEIGHMAN

I had a champagne bar to get to. I showed up with more than a full mickey of Seagram’s 7 in an otherwise empty stomach. It took three passes through every car on the train to find a seat across from the bathroom. You can drink on the New Jersey Transit. I’ve looked it up. You can drink on the New Jersey Transit, but they probably mean a beer after work and I wasn’t about to chance a buzzed run-in with a conductor, so the bathroom was a safe bet. I had a champagne bar to get to. I mean a proper, fancy affair. We were meeting some virtual strangers tonight and this is how I do first impressions. It’s bound to work out one of these times.

“You can drink on the New Jersey Transit. I’ve looked it up.”

It was the full mickey in by Penn Station, the little bit more through the subway ride and walk to Washington Square Park. Those were the moments of precious solitude to say:

I never minded spending copious amounts of time by myself

AND

they won’t notice. chew a piece of gum and they won’t notice. chew a piece of gum, extra spritz or three of cologne and they won’t notice. chew a piece of gum, extra spritz or three of cologne, smoke a cigarette before walking in and they won’t notice.

I think they might have noticed. But it didn’t matter. I had a champagne bar to get to.

• • •

BRIANNE KERR

When I was young I used to sit at the foot of the wooden rocking chair in my living room, empty,
and reach underneath the seat for the horizontal wooden bar. I would push and pull that bar, up
and around, making the chair rock, but I would pretend I was kneading bread, a task I saw only
in fairy tales, but I was sure that it would be like this, a rhythmic slow wave, with just enough
resistance to feel something. My parents would see me and worry about pinched fingers. Now,
older, on some Sundays I bake bread that I have yet to perfect enough to share and I don’t even
own a rolling pin so instead I run my fingers through its viscous flour and water and I go again
and again, fold and flatten, up and over, a sloppy ballroom dance in a kitchen neither cottage
nor palace, just here, and when I see the clock it usually tells me I’ve gone for too long.

• • •