note: ten-part series continued! | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8

Back when there was still the anticipation of children in his life, he dreamt that he would one day be a Biddy Basketball coach, teaching elementary school kids the value of teamwork, sportsmanship, and self-discipline. As he stood in front of the bathroom mirror looking at his tussled hair, marked by flecks of gray, his fuzzy chin, and the gut that spilled over the waistband of his dark green sweatpants, a wave of regret and self-pity washed over him as he realized how far he had fallen from such dreams. What he needed was a coach for himself.

He drew up a mental scorecard in his head, the game being his life in the past five years. Failed marriage, no friends, dead-end job, deteriorating hygiene, twenty pounds, and a zero motivation to do anything. But was it necessary to categorize his life as a losing one? Or a game at all?

We all die in the end, he told himself from time to time. Is it so important to convince ourselves that we are doing well or living happily? While he experienced bouts of loneliness and nostalgia, he could hardly call himself depressed. Perhaps his problem had less to do with a scorecard and more with trying. He was apathetic, and increasingly, this indifference had become comfortable.

Maybe it was all the hours spent watching Sportscenter and listening to mindless sports talk on the radio, but he never tired of sports analogies. When a coach could no longer motivate his team or post a winning record, it was time for him to leave – either by resignation or by dismissal. He had accomplished very little in New York in the past decade. This belief was at the core of his decision to relocate. He had tendered his resignation.

***

Walking down 9th Avenue on a chilly Sunday morning, he made his way to Amy’s Bread on 46th Street. He was close to signing a lease for a two-bedroom house in the suburbs of Phoenix, which was the city that his makeshift random generator in Microsoft Excel had selected from a list of seven locations he typed in after browsing some websites about cities in the West. It helped him to pass the time at work. The other cities on the list were Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Vancouver. His parents didn’t believe him when he tried to explain the serendipitous process. “Isn’t San Francisco prettier? Why do you want to live in a desert?” his mother asked him on the phone.

A line flowed out the door and across the front of the store as people waited patiently to pick up fresh bread and pastries. He hadn’t been back to Amy’s Bread in quite some time, perhaps even before Janet had come in and out of his life. It was one of those places he had kept to himself – a small shop he used to frequent on weekends when he wanted to read a newspaper without being distracted. He carried with him the New York Times Magazine from the Sunday Times. It was the holiday movie preview issue with articles about actors, directors, films, and movie trends. Flipping through the glamour shots of celebrities in the Style section, he wondered if he could find nude photos of Scarlett Johansson online, and decided to look into it later.

Casually reading the magazine, he looked up from time to time to see who else was waiting in line. It was mostly middle-aged white people, most of them thin and wearing blank New Yorker expressions. The line moved quickly and before long, it was his turn to order. A skinny, young Vietnamese man wearing an apron asked for the next order from behind the counter.

“Hi, could I get a honey glazed challah knot and a large coffee, cream and sugar?” he asked.

“Okay, and would you like that to stay or to go?” the Vietnamese guy asked.

“To stay, please.” Having noticed the effeminate movements and the nasal quality of his voice, he concluded that the Vietnamese guy was gay.

He looked around for available seats in the tiny seating area towards the back of the shop. He noticed an empty seat across from an Asian woman reading the latest issue of the New Yorker. After hesitating for nearly a minute, he asked her if he could take the seat.

“Sure,” she said, barely looking up from the magazine. She seemed in her early-thirties, slim, shoulder-length hair, and possessed pleasant facial features, but nothing striking. She wore a dark purple wool sweater and jeans. She had on fashionable thick black-framed glasses. Probably Chinese, he thought.

He took a bite out of his challah knot and sipped on his coffee. He was disappointed to find that he no longer relished the taste of the challah knot and wondered if his senses had somewhat been altered in the past few years. He opened up the magazine and continued to read but could not help looking up from time to time at the woman sitting across from him. She had no ring on her fingers.

Finally. “Any good articles in there? I haven’t taken a look at my copy at home yet,” he said, although he didn’t subscribe to The New Yorker. The Asian woman looked up and stared at him quizzically before fully realizing the man’s attempt to strike up a conversation.

“Oh, nothing special. Just the same old, I guess,” she said. She went back to reading her magazine.

“I’m Robert by the way,” he said, a last-ditch attempt to get her attention. He stuck out his hand while waiting for a response. Another confused look came over her face, and with hesitation, she shook hands. “I’m Bernice.”

“Oh, that’s a nice name. Haven’t met anyone with that name before,” he said. He felt a rush of nervous energy as he realized how embarrassing this scenario seemed from his bird’s eye perspective. But he would be in another place in less than two weeks and had nothing to lose.

“Yeah, I get that all the time,” she said. Her voice was low and almost husky, but it had a pleasant quality. He was pretty sure that she was a smoker.

And their small talk began. She worked for an ad agency as an account executive and lived alone in the Upper West Side. She had a cat and graduated from Stanford. She had also been married once before.

“Well, looks like we have something in common,” he said, wondering if he sounded cheesy. She had been divorced for four years now and did not have kids. He told her of his ordeal and did his bit to portray himself as the helpless victim.

“Oh, that’s terrible. Gone, just like that?” she asked. But somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered if there were any unbearable characteristics about him that probably justified his wife’s sudden departure. He could use a better haircut, she thought.

After the coffees had been finished and the exchange of background information exhausted, Bernice excused herself for an appointment at a beauty salon. He asked if he could maybe call her up sometime. A hesitant expression formed on her face and she stood frozen next to her chair.

“Oh, no big deal if you don’t want to. Sorry, didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable or anything,” he said, quickly trying to regain his dignity.

“Here, take my business card,” she said, reaching for her leather brown bag. “My cell phone is on it, so give me a call sometime.”

She put on her cashmere beige long coat and walked out the door. He was unimpressive and lacked style. But he seemed nice and had been bold enough to approach her. She wondered if she would pick up if he ever called. She didn’t have an appointment – she needed to go home and feed her cat.

He leaned back in his chair and sighed deeply. He toyed around with her business card – a flashy double-sided card, red on one side and white on the other with a fancy logo. It was of a thick texture and the raised lettering gave it an expensive feel. Bernice Lim. He had been wrong. She was Korean, and yet, during their conversation, they hadn’t felt the need to bring up their ethnic background. He wondered if this carried any significance. He walked out the door, waved bye to the gay Vietnamese guy, and zipped up his jacket.

note: ten-part series continued! | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

If the toilet was a time machine, he would already have flushed himself. Instead, he looked below and saw pieces of brown in a yellowed lake. The noise of water spinning into the abyss did not send him back in time, but it did clear the toilet of his refuse.

Last night was his father’s sixty-second birthday. He met his parents at Dae Dong on 32nd Street, the only place he felt his parents ever went to whenever they came to Koreatown. He bought for his father a leather-bound copy of Foucault’s Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason which he had found at Strand Books that morning.

“Oh, this is one of my favorites,” his father told him. “I’ll definitely put it in the collection and retire that worn out paperback .”

They ordered naeng myun and haemul pajeon. He remembered the days when they used to order endless amounts of kalbi and samgyupssal and see who could stuff the biggest ssam into their mouths.

“Let’s have an OB, Dad,” he said.

His father searched his mother’s face for approval. She was indifferent and picking away at the kong namul, one of the assortment of banchan on the table.

“Why not. It’s my birthday! Not too many more of these left!” his father said cheerfully. His father had always made references to his waning days ever since his son beat him in arm wrestling as a fifteen year-old. “Take care of your mother when I am gone,” he would say to his high school son from time to time. Now it was about time his son had his own son, or so he thought from time to time.

The naeng myun came and silence reigned as the family of three worked their way through the noodles, the boiled egg, and pieces of pear. He then looked up at his graying parents.

“I’m going to quit my job next week.”

“Really. What are you going to do?” his mother asked.

“Move out of the city. Somewhere quiet. Find another job maybe. Or even go back to school.”

“School? Aren’t you a bit too old for that?” his father asked.

“Well, I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet,” he said. His reply betrayed his easy annoyance with his parents’ skepticism. They knew better than to pick any further. He calmed down.

“I think I just need a change of scenery for a bit. I’ve saved up enough in the past few years so I can afford to explore different options,” he said.

“Oh. Will you move far?” his mother asked. “It’s okay if you want to. We won’t mind.” His mother had a way of inoculating against any expressions of sentiment with preemptive remarks.

“I don’t know. Maybe the West Coast.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re finally taking some action for yourself. I was beginning to wonder how much longer you’d stay with your job. An existential awakening perhaps? Learn to play golf!” his father said in a light-hearted manner.

“And meet a nice girl while you’re at it,” his mother added.

The waitress placed a small dish of sliced oranges along with the check on the table. He pulled his credit card out of his wallet.

“Happy birthday, Dad. Here’s to another healthy and happy year.”

note: ten-part series continued! | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

The last time. It was raining lightly and cold outside. It was one of the more dreadful February evenings in New York. He held an umbrella up for Janet as they walked out of the restaurant. It was their fourth visit to Otto, the upscale pizzeria and enoteca near Washington Square. During the course of their relationship, Janet had helped him to develop a fondness for wine and cheese. Otto offered a large selection of Italian wines and various types of cheeses, and the couple usually opted for eight or nine different cheeses with maybe two or three appetizers on the side. He always ordered the fresh calamari with basil although Janet seemed to disapprove of the raw texture.

He knew something was off-kilter when she only sipped half a glass of wine the entire night. They usually ordered a bottle of Lugana Riserva Zenato 2002 and then tried a random red. They never finished the Lugana, and she asked the waiter for more ice water.

“Are you seriously going to stick with that job of yours?” she asked.

“Hey, we’ve had this talk before. I still need to sort things out and think about what I want to do,” he said.

“You’ve been ‘sorting’ things for ten years now. You can’t keep settling for shitty dead end jobs and pitying yourself,” she said.

“Okay. Listen. We’re out to have a quiet night and to enjoy dinner. So let’s not talk about this now,” he said, but she had already stopped listening to him.

They made love that night. He had trouble sleeping afterwards. The soft feeling of inebriation absent this time, he grew anxious. She was often testy these days, and she exhibited a coldness that seemed to intensify noticeably with every petty argument. He was afraid that if he woke up the next morning, she would be gone.

She was still there when he woke up, her back turned towards him. He let out a sigh and got ready for work.

It was the next day that she left. He knew instantly the moment he got back from work. Her clothes and personal belongings were either gone or thrown into the trash can. He looked for a hand-written note or a message on his cell phone. Nothing. He wanted to call her, but didn’t know what to say. He took out a bottle of chianti, which they kept along with a few other wines on top of their refrigerator, and began to drink straight out of the bottle.

The next day, he found an email from her. Sorry, I had to leave. I’ll have the papers sent to you. Please sign them so we can end things peacefully. He furiously wrote up a reply, asking why she was doing this, and how she could simply throw away the marriage without even consulting him. Had she been in an affair? Couldn’t they work out their problems? Did he do something wrong? But he never sent it to her. He waited, and the papers came.

He lied to his parents. He said it was a mutual parting and that they had remained on friendly terms. They felt bad for him, but did what they usually thought was best for all parties – they left him alone.

The last time he heard her voice was when he called her a few weeks after their divorce had been finalized.

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

“How have you been?”

“Good. You?”

“I’m okay.”

“Hey, did you take the iron?”

“Yes.”

“Oh.”

“I have to go.”

“Okay.”

She hung up before he could tell her to wait. He went to Duane Reade that day and bought an iron. He didn’t even know where she stayed.

***

The last time. Greg called late at night and left a message on his voicemail the day before their planned dinner at Wolfgang’s.

“Hey, I hate to do this to you, but I’ve been offered a new job, and it looks like our business thing will have to be put on hold. I’ll call you up sometime. Take care.”

He never heard from Greg again. He went to Wolfgang’s that evening on his own and ordered a filet mignon, a side of creamed spinach and German potatoes, and a bottle of cabaret sauvignon, which he managed to finish by himself.