Iris Has Free Time Read Free Page A

earlier. We were at our favorite Red Lobster in Long Island, where I’m from. My parents looked at me quizzically. “It’s a novel by Thomas Wolfe,” I explained, as a means of broaching the subject.
    And so, with my parents’ permission, instead of returning home that June, I signed up for drawing classes at the School of Visual Arts. Since my classes only met once a week, however, I had little to do.
    I took a lot of walks in the beginning. I lingered in bookstores, read novels in the park, and went frequently to the movies. I’d walk to Lincoln Center, which wasn’t far from my apartment, or else, if it were a Saturday, I’d walk the fifty or so blocks down to Angelika on Houston. On the street again after, alone in the warm summer night, I’d stroll the whole way back up to my apartment in Hell’s Kitchen, past lively restaurants and bars with crowds of young people spilling out, hoping that by the time I got home I’d be tired enough to sleep.
    I looked forward to the free film every Monday in Bryant Park. I’d spend the whole afternoon flipping through magazines in the Mid-Manhattan Library and then at dusk, wander over. Though the park always filled up hours ahead of time—people would come early and spread blankets to reserve space for friends—I went just at the last minute. The great thing about going alone, I considered, watching Psycho between groups of screaming friends, was how easy it was to find a single seat.
    I worked on my drawing a lot, too. At the end of every session of animation class, the teacher would gather everyone around for a critique. When it was my turn, I showed a fifteen-second cartoon adapted from my comic strip, “The Naked Woman,” about the boozy misadventures of its title character, The Naked Woman: Against a flat expanse of white, a naked woman runs, trips, and falls every fifth step. Above her head, a thought bubble reads, “Open bar!” I looped it to go on forever. In silence, we watched her run, trip, fall, get up . . . run, trip, fall, get up. . . . The other students in the class, mostly middle-aged men interested in superhero comics, called it “odd.”
    I didn’t go out much. I didn’t have anyone to go out much with. There was Caroline, whom I’d met that winter when my party life was in full swing. We went out occasionally—to the karaoke night where we’d met and were both regulars, or the Tikki Room at Niagara where we’d put our cigarettes on the bar and I’d say, “Let’s smoke cigarettes and act cool,” before lighting up. But since she didn’t drink and had an actual job to go to in the morning, she often went home early.
    Mostly, I looked forward to Thursdays, to Lex’s ’80s party. I’d met Lex at the same karaoke party where I’d met Caroline. He was part of the celebrity set—musicians who covered their own songs, B-actors and indie-darlings who pretended they didn’t want to be recognized but bristled when they weren’t—that had made the party famous. “I liked your song,” I told him one night. “It reminded me of my youth,” I said earnestly. This made him laugh and he began inviting me to all his parties—“Soul Sucka!” a ’70s night at Twilo that served chicken wings and forties, “Soft Sundays,” an evening of easy listening upstairs at Moomba. I always dressed up with a nod to the era or style he was referencing. He liked that about me, he said.
    Thursday would arrive. I’d compose a fresh eighties outfit—acid washed jeans maybe and a T-shirt cut to fall off one shoulder—and suck down a few beers while I got ready. Then, with my courage duly fortified, I’d make my way downtown. Usually, I’d bring something with me—a funny article I’d cut out from the Weekly World News (“Oldest Man in the World’s Secret to a Long Life Is Drinking a Quart of Whiskey and Smoking Two Packs a Day!”), or a vintage Garbage Pail Kid I’d found at the Salvation Army (“Messy Tessy”)—and turning up beside the DJ