Dear Reader by Mary O'Connell

Author:Mary O'Connell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Flatiron Books

Six

A light rain started again, so Flannery closed Wuthering Heights and tucked it close to her body, protecting the love story of Miss Sweeney and Brandon Marzetti-Corcoran inside Heath’s borrowed leather jacket.

“And so the parky weather returns.” Heath stood and offered Flannery his hand.

She took it as if she were a geriatric who needed assistance rising from a park bench, and oh, the briefest touch of their lifelines, of all those random events that had to occur for this moment to take place …

“How’s she doing coming down off the Nardil?”

“Not great. She’s close, though. She’s in the lobby of the Broadway Hotel and Hostel.” Flannery took out the book to check the address, feeling like a plucky girl detective from a ’40s film noir. She pined for stacked heels, brick-red lipstick, and a slim pencil skirt to complete the picture: Whatever angel was orchestrating the day had committed a serious sin of omission in the wardrobe department.

“The Broadway Hotel and Hostel is at 101st and Broadway!” She tucked the book close to her again, glad to be topping her stupid uniform with Heath’s dreamy leather jacket, which made her feel like an ’80s punk rock girl with her favorite Dead Kennedys cassette in her Walkman, or a ’50s motorcycle chick with a switchblade and pack of Lucky Strikes in her pocket, a syrupy song playing in her heart. Each night I ask the stars up above/Why must I be a teenager in love?

“Poor woman. That place is a bit heavy on the hostel and light on the hotel, if you know what I’m saying, Flannery. I stayed there when I first arrived in New York. It looks loads better on the Internet. Though I suppose anyplace with shared bathrooms cannot be mistaken for the Waldorf.” He visored one hand over his face as looked down at Flannery. “I’m sorry I didn’t bring an umbrella.”

“Me too!” She hoped it didn’t sound like she was faulting him for not bringing an umbrella. She only meant that she, too, was sorry she hadn’t thought to bring an umbrella. Conversation: It was hard.

He stuck the newspaper beneath the rock on the park bench, leaving it for the next reader. “Flannery, if the powers that be went to the trouble to make this bit of park in upper Manhattan, they should have gone all the way and built a shelter of glass walls, a lucent way station in the middle of Broadway, where you could observe the world while also being protected from it.” He looked at Flannery. “What’s the word for it?”

“Um. Like, a glass house? An atrium?”

“Hmmm.” He tapped is finger on his bottom lip. “No, not that.”

She thought of Wuthering Heights, of Heathcliff looking through the window of the Lintons’ plush drawing room: “A shower of glass-drops hanging in silver chains from the centre, and shimmering with little soft tapers.” His description for chandelier was more luminous than the word itself.

But what could top Heath Smith’s description of the word he

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