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One way or another, she was going to make it on her own

Which hy she was here, playing at a bar the Board of Health or at least the Board of Good Taste should have condemned

Nine weeks ago, she hadn’t known the place existed anypiano Well, not a living, exactly, but you could et by

It had happened st

rictly by accident, the way a lot of things did in New York

Her rooh they shared an apartment, they were acquaintances more than friends Emily didn’t know a lot of people Nola knew everybody

“This party’ll be fun,” she’d said “Couy”

“Thanks,” Emily had said, “but I don’t know if I can make it”

Not true

She’d had nothing to keep her froiven up on New York er than a New York ht hookups or the weirdness of couy you’d met online in another

Why party if you didn’t want to connect with a o and at the last ht, why not? At the very least, you could always scrounge so a free meal at a party

So she went

The party had been in an old brownstone in her own East Village neighborhood The apartment was small, the rooms were jammed with people She didn’t see a familiar face, not even Nola’s There wasn’t any food aside from a bowl that held what appeared to be potato chip cruured had been dip

After twenty minutes, she’d headed for the door, but the route to it was crowded and instead of getting closer to it, she’d been pushed back and back and back until she’d alht in a distant corner To her surprise, a guy was playing it; the noise in the apartment had completely drowned him out

He’d flashed her a smile “Hi”