From The Memoirs Of A Non-Enemy Combatant Part 7

"You're a straight fas.h.i.+on designer? That is so ironic."

Soon we were off the train, and I was carrying Todd Wayne Mercer's backpack for her along Joralemon Street. I confessed that I had seen her before. I described what she had been wearing to a T that day at the museum, the green DVF wrap dress. Mich.e.l.le was not at all taken aback. She was flattered that someone had paid attention and found her to be something she'd never considered herself to be: memorable. Only much later would she admit that she remembered me also as the small Filipino guy in tight jeans with the cute backside.

We walked on. She showed me the Brooklyn promenade, the waterfront of a tree-lined Everytown, USA. She pointed out where Arthur Miller, her favorite American playwright, had lived. This was a neighborhood so picturesque, so literary, so quaint, so white, that on any other day, with anyone else, it would have made me uncomfortable. I felt far more at ease on the corner of McKibbin and Graham among the drug peddlers and Puerto Ricans and blacks and hipsters, right in the heart of Bushwick-all immigrants in some way, encroaching on each other's turf. But on this first foray into Brooklyn Heights with Mich.e.l.le, I wasn't thinking about any of this. Through the open collar of her frock, I could see her pale skin, the ridges in her chest, and where the plumpness of her small b.r.e.a.s.t.s began. Then there was her long freckled neck-a branch. How intoxicating. Her face a ripened piece of fruit! Take a bite, it said. I resisted this compulsion to s.e.xualize her, I swear. Oh, but how I l.u.s.ted for a body! Still, I knew I needed patience and self-control if I wanted to get together with a girl of Westchester stock. I wasn't going to kiss her yet, I decided, and so in my head I recited a bunch of American cliches: easy does it, early bird gets the worm. "I find you to be fascinating," I told her. At my compliment she smiled and seemed to fold over like a lily whose petals were too heavy. (Why do we go floral when it comes to love?) G.o.d, how I remember her at first, so easily swayed by flattery, regardless of how crude and domineering she would become. Mich.e.l.le was a sledgehammer but could melt in your arms like lead if you said the right things.

From the waterfront we walked back to Henry Street, and then parted at the corner. I found it strange that she didn't want me to walk with her all the way to Nana's door. I suppose she realized that I was still a man she had only just met. After all, it was a city where anything could happen. You could be blindsided by a stranger and wind up on the Brooklyn promenade. I watched Mich.e.l.le trail off along a row of oil street lanterns with Todd Wayne Mercer's knapsack slung over one shoulder. I watched his initials fade away.

Everything I did in my studio that fall I did with the intention of impressing Mich.e.l.le. I sketched her from memory, putting her in dresses I hadn't yet completed. She was both a muse and a curse. I was productive, but I wasn't working for myself. Sometimes there isn't a difference. I make clothes for women, so who cares if I was making clothes for one woman in particular.

A week after our chance meeting on the 4 train, we had our first date at a Polish diner in the East Village, an old-world place, narrow and heavy on the linoleum. We sat at the counter and ordered from a chalkboard of specials. Mich.e.l.le introduced me to borscht and challah bread. We split a grilled cheese cut from the lofty Jewish loaf that reminded me of the pandesal rolls back home. She dropped a teaspoon of sour cream in my borscht and stirred until it became a milky fuchsia, like a thick bowl of Pepto-Bismol, though still quite appetizing. She told me it was her favorite color.

"Your favorite color is borscht?" I teased. She laughed and punched me in the side. Mich.e.l.le was so strong, with big hands and slender, soft-tipped fingers covered in antique rings. Those hands could grip my whole being and hold me close. I felt safe whenever she put one on me, as she did at the counter while we slurped our borscht. I placed mine on top of hers and we interlaced our fingers. What warmth! That first breach: My hand touching hers, her hand touching mine, my thigh in her hand, her hand on my thigh. The first time two lovers touch intentionally is always more memorable than a first kiss or a first time, at least for me. It's that rare singular jolt that can never be replicated. When the time came to split the grilled cheese, we were forced to let our hands go, and yet we craved that touch like addicts. So we faced each other to eat the sandwich, interlocking our legs under the counter. My knee was gripped by her two thighs, close enough to feel her inner warmth. It was our first date, but in the mirror behind the counter we already looked like a couple who couldn't be separated. When I called for the check, she put her hand on my lower back, just under my s.h.i.+rt, and we waited.

On Division Street in Chinatown we shared a bubble tea and ate sweet rice out of a banana leaf. I confessed that I didn't want her to leave and asked her to spend the night with me in Bushwick. It was a Sunday, and to get to school the next day, she needed to take the train from Grand Central Station back to Bronxville. We hadn't even kissed yet.

"Of course," she said without hesitation. "I hadn't even thought of leaving." And then she gave me a kiss, partly on the mouth, partly on the cheek, but wholly wonderful. I kissed her again. A breeze came and went. I felt the moisture she'd left on my face evaporate. I was a marked man from then on.

Mich.e.l.le came home with me and we made love, but I'll spare you the details, except for this: Naked, we bare our souls to each other. There are no pretensions. It is the antifas.h.i.+on. Whenever I show skin in one of my dresses-an open chest in front of the heart, or a slither of exposed back-I feel I am providing a peek at the truth. Mich.e.l.le's body, naked, was like truth serum. I melted at the sight of her bare shoulders, lightly freckled from a summer spent on Nantucket Island; her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, two matured handfuls of pale white flesh, outlined with a bikini tan line. I'd get down on my knees and breathe her in just below the navel until her white stomach fuzz stood on end. American women are so wonderfully hairy. Oh, how I fell apart before everything down there! The scent of young womanhood, so unmistakable! Her a.s.s was tremendous-I still dream about its two halves. And what her b.u.t.tocks held within its dark shadow was the G.o.d's honest truth! It was His work, revealed. Go tell it on the mountain.

Lately I've been thinking about mistakes. That's all I have the chance to do these days. There were times during the course of our two years together when I would ask myself how could I have gotten involved with a girl like this. Looking back now, isn't it obvious? I did it for love.

1. a.s.s, Arabic.

2. Infidel, Arabic.

3. A "nonlethal strike" in the Guantanamo lexicon.

4. An a.s.semblage of photographs, sketches, fabric swatches, magazine clippings, anything incorporating the ideas of a designer's collection.

5. Reconnaissance, paintings from the 1960s and 1970s.

6. Editor-in-chief of Vogue, 19711988.

7. The Dutchman, LeRoi Jones, 1964. Most-if not all-of the details recounted here are wrong.

8. It was Al Freeman Jr. who starred in the 1966 film adaptation.

9. Spelled Wilhelmina Prufrock (19312003).

10. New People's Army, an armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), deemed a terrorist organization by the United States in 2002.

Bronxville Revisited.

By mid-November I was putting in serious time in the top bunks of Sarah Lawrence, with its communal kitchens, RAs, visitor slips, damp halls, pot smoke, cut gra.s.s, big oaks, track and fields. I would take the Metro-North to Bronxville to watch Mich.e.l.le endure the hards.h.i.+ps of college life in a pastoral setting with lots of ivy on brick.

On the commute from Grand Central Station each weekend I'd see faces from my neighborhood-poorly dressed hippies, musicians, privileged brats such as myself. I learned that many Sarah Lawrence alums had flocked to Bushwick after graduation to hold on to their American collegiate squalor. They went back on the weekends to see their girlfriends and boyfriends, youth holding on to youth, as if there existed some underground pipeline between the two places. Discovering this made me determined not to be mistaken for one of them, even though one of them was upending all my happiness and fulfillment.

What's that, you ask? How does a young man veer from love to resentment in a matter of weeks? Well, as I've said, I wanted no attachments. And within two months of starting my new life I had found just that: an attachment. But this is a young person's dilemma, not something to waste the precious pages of my confession on when there is so much dirt in the filthy air that needs clearing. The last I will say on the matter is that when one does fall in love, there is always a dose of resentment that comes along with it. They go hand in hand. Things get put on hold when two people fall for each other. I was spending all of my earnings on trips to Westchester and mediocre dinners for two, even though my presence was actually needed at parties and events in the city. Without my presence, the dream could easily slip away. The dream of Bryant Park. New York Fas.h.i.+on Week. You see, whenever I found myself on Forty-second Street I liked to walk over to the square plaza and take in the way the light came through the London plane trees and down upon the stone bal.u.s.trades and trim lawn. Oh, how this small green enclave would be transformed twice a year into the center of my world! I felt a connection to this s.p.a.ce. The bustle that surrounded the park-the offices and revolving doors-made no real impression on me. In the park I was in my zone. It's where I planned to make my splash. To be remembered in the tent during fas.h.i.+on week is to be made immortal.

Mich.e.l.le, just by being with me, was steering me away from all of this. She was keeping me down and out in Bushwick. Ahmed's three thousand was nearly gone. Between the puffy coat I had to buy for winter and the train fare back and forth each weekend, Williamsburg was being completely squeezed off my horizon. All the hip, artistic people-my people-were thriving in the industrial colony that was Williamsburg without me, foraging their bohemian urban dream out of the lost grounds of SoHo and Greenwich Village before it. Each time I rode past Graham and Lorimer and Bedford on the L train, the neighborhood called to me. Behind every garage door was a sculptor, a painter, a band practice, a recording-in-session, a designer, a fas.h.i.+on shoot, altogether united in the common pursuit of trying to one-up each other in their respective areas of focus.

Where was my label in all of this? Without the proper funding, there was no label. Just a man in a room making women's clothing. How sad. I had all the right friends ready to help-Vivienne Cho, Philip Tang-but what I didn't have were the investors. And so, while doing everything myself-designing, sewing, creating-I was my own headhunter too. My plan had been to finish a small collection, secure a proper studio in Williamsburg, have Vivienne and Philip fall in love with my line, and get them to introduce me to the right people willing to invest, all in the name of high fas.h.i.+on.

The Friday before Thanksgiving, as I was hurrying home to grab my weekender, I realized I was being followed. Outside the Kosciuszko warehouses, where many of the SLC graduates took up residence in packs, I turned to look into the glare of the headlights of an idling car behind me. When I slowed my pace, this car didn't pa.s.s, just coasted alongside of me. As anyone with good American street sense can tell you, this meant bad moons were rising.

"Boy!" someone shouted, and I immediately recognized the voice. It was Ahmed. He pulled over to the curb in a small hybrid vehicle, a Toyota Prius. "I thought that was you. I know that walk anywhere. I said to myself, that's the walk of a Filipinni. That ragtag bunch of opportunists! They're everywhere at once. How the h.e.l.l are you?"

I went over to the car door and shook his hand. He was dressed in one of his new suits. The double-breasted gray plaid. He wore the jacket b.u.t.toned without a s.h.i.+rt underneath. His open chest reminded me of the TV actor Philip Michael Thomas, whose style I'd grown up emulating from the show Miami Vice.

"Check out my wheels," said Ahmed. "It's a Zipcar."

"What do you mean?"

"It's kind of like a rental, only it's not. This one's a hybreed. You should see the mileage I get on this f.u.c.ker. Astounding. Get in. I'll take you around the block."

"No thanks. I'm in a hurry."

"All the more reason."

Just then I heard a bottle smash somewhere nearby, and so I scampered around the front of the car and got in.

We rode along Broadway under the overpa.s.s of the el. This was Brooklyn's Broadway, a series of replicated blocks on which each shop was named after its service-Hair Braided, Checks Cashed, Jewelry Bought and Sold-and where young men huddled outside of Chinese takeouts, congregating with their dinners in white Styrofoam platters.

"So what's the hurry?" Ahmed asked.

"I'm going to Bronxville tonight. But I need to run home first."

"Bronxville, eh? What the h.e.l.l is in Bronxville?"

"My girlfriend."

"Your gelfriend? That's a lot of trip for a little p.u.s.s.y. She must be worth it."

"She is," I said. "She's totally hot."

"What's her name? Your gel?"

"Mich.e.l.le."

"Ah, Mich.e.l.le. 'Mee-ch.e.l.le, my belle. Sont des mots qui vont tres bien ensemble'...It's French for 'these are words that go very well a.s.sembled,' or ensemble. The Beatles. Nineteen sixty-something. The year rock was born."

Ahmed had an enthusiasm about him, a live-for-the-moment kind of feeling, which made you overlook the incongruous details. And we were foreigners, remember, speaking a second tongue. In Ahmed's case it was his forth or fifth language. Together we spoke an outsider's English. A language that sometimes incorporated terms from our homelands, words in our hearts that couldn't be translated. Out of our mouths came the world ensemble.

"You know where I live, Boy. Why have you insulted me by not coming by? Unless, of course, you've been working. You genius." He tugged at his lapel. Then he reminded me of how we had established a bond of trust, likening it to a California redwood.

"You seem preoccupied. If something's on your mind, out with it. Don't let these things fester. It's no good for the heart, man."

"I'm late, that's all."

"You're late. I'll drive you."

"It's like an hour. Don't be silly."

"Nonsense. I'd be honored. Besides, I have the hybreed for the rest of the night. And I still have to show you the mileage this beby gets highway."

I ran upstairs to grab my weekender-giddy, I admit, over scoring a ride to Bronxville. What good fortune! A girl was waiting to see me. A little money was still in my pocket. Why couldn't I have just been happy?

When I returned, Ahmed was fiddling with a GPS gadget.

"So, Boy, I've been thinking about the dress on that blonde."

"You mean Olya?"

"Olya. How could I forget Olya. Your business is very high-end women's wear, yes? Boy, I have to say. Ever since I started wearing your suits I've felt like a beautiful blonde myself." Ahmed belched. "Excuse me. It's amazing what a primo piece of clothing can do for your confidence. I've been a success in whatever I've chosen to tackle, as you may or may not know. But wearing something like this makes me feel like a success. When you get to be my age your successes pile up and nothing seems to surprise you anymore. You need to take losses just to let yourself know you're alive. I don't expect you to understand. But know this: Lately, I've been rejuvenated. With this suit I've been garnering respect and attention wherever I go."

"You see," I said, "this is what fas.h.i.+on can do to you. This is its raison d'etre. To make you feel good about yourself. When I hear this I know I've done my job."

"A confession, Boy. I suppose your artistic endeavors have been making me envious. To be so young and talented. You're leading the life that I wanted to lead, once upon a time. The social constrictions of my upbringing prevented me from exploring my true fas.h.i.+onista. I was brought up a Muslim. Allah is great, Muhammad his prophet, haraam this, haraam that, praise Allah. Look at how the women still go around in hijab, covered up, unable to flaunt their tremendous beauty. What a shame. Possibly the greatest shame of Islam. To be a fas.h.i.+on designer would never have been an option for me where I come from. Especially as a man. I'm not the first to call out the elephant in the room when I say it isn't the most masculine of professions. And now, at my age, would you believe that I'm getting the sudden urge to dress myself up? To be shameless for once!"

We drove through Williamsburg, where I knew I belonged. A safe haven for the artistic mind, where youth and fas.h.i.+on seemed both effortless and destructive. It was precious to me in that way.

"Look at that b.i.t.c.h with the rainbow dreads," Ahmed said, pointing out a pale, white, quasi-Rasta girl in a parka. "She's tattooed her face!"

"But you see, Ahmed, these are the people who set the trends for a good part of the world-the hipsters, the young, the transients. And that's the edge my collection will exploit. It's not necessarily beautiful. If anything, one might call her a freak. But what att.i.tude! Am I right? She has so much att.i.tude that you felt absolutely compelled to call her out on the street."

"It takes cojones to tattoo your face, I'll give her that."

As we coasted down Metropolitan, an Englishwoman's voice instructed us to turn right and then merge onto the BQE after two hundred yards. I can't explain it, but everything on this night seemed to be happening with such absolute precision.

True to her guidance, we rose onto the BQE.

"I am beginning to see your vision, Boy. You're very persuasive. I like that. As I said, I've been envious lately. Allow me to expand. I've linked this envy to two desires. I am envious of your talent-some of us can only be so lucky. The second is related to the fine suits you have made for me. I was once satisfied, but now I want more. Don't get me wrong, the suits are perfect. But I crave a closet filled with suits of the finest quality. This is a very strange feeling for me. It's like your former first lady with the shoes."1 "Ahmed, it's nothing to be ashamed of. This is what keeps the industry going, don't you see? We're all hooked. It's insatiable. Nothing is satisfactory, certainly not for the customer."

"Enough, Boy. You don't have to sell anything to me. Our trust is like a beautiful flower. We both need to care for it. Oh, let it rain! Let our garden grow! You see my enthusiasm. It's unwavering. And from the perspective of an investor, I know of no other industry with a five hundred percent markup on product. Well, besides oil. And we all know the Saudis have that cornered."

I didn't know how to respond to this. "What do you mean?"

"Do I have to spell it out for you? A-B-C-D? I want to be in business, what else? I'm a fabric salesman, but there's no honor in that. There's no art."

Bronxville suddenly seemed as far away as Siberia.

"We have trust, no? Trust is one-on-one. Otherwise it's a cl.u.s.ter f.u.c.k." He slammed his fist down on the dash. "I want to invest in your clothing line."

"Ahmed, start-ups are too much for a sole investor to take on." I was thinking on my toes now, trying to stay one step ahead of this dubious benefactor. "First I need to move the operation into Williamsburg. Then I need to find cutters, people who can sew. I need a good publicist."

"Don't bulls.h.i.+t me. What's a start-up? Sixty? Seventy thousand? So there are overheads. I talk to my accountant, d.i.c.k Levine. He handles all my finances. And I know landlords in Williamsburg who owe me. Converted warehouses. There's one I already have in mind. A former toothpick factory."

I was beginning to think of Ahmed's lies as just another occupational hazard. Models dieted. Writers drank. Athletes enhanced. And businessmen lied. I lowered my window.

There is a distinct change in the atmosphere along the Major Deegan. A transition from stuffy Bronx air into the more temperate chill of lower Westchester. The wind numbed part of my face. For a flash I saw myself trailing along the Major Deegan, my essence removed from my body, soaring above the Zipcar. I was flying. I let the air fill my lungs.

Then Ahmed swerved the car. "My G.o.d, did you see that pothole? It was bigger than you."

Maybe securing my financing this way was truly as foolish as I felt deep down at the time. But look at my position. Monday through Thursday I was selling my label to anyone who would listen, and no one was biting. Here was a guy who seemed genuinely excited about fas.h.i.+on. I didn't see Ahmed as a sucker, someone I could dupe into financing my label. I saw him as someone who believed in what I was doing. All of the flattery aside, I thought he had recognized me for what I was, a talented designer. You might be shaking your heads, "Look, look at the nincomp.o.o.p! Just like a jihadi, swayed by all the virgins he's been promised in heaven." I ask of you once again to put yourself in my size 7 shoes. My life depends on it! The prospect of me being his patsy never even entered my mind. Why would it?

"We'd be in West Nyack if it weren't for this GPS b.i.t.c.h," Ahmed said. "She's one hundred percent accurate. Entering Dodge in two point seven minutes. And look at the fuel gauge. The f.u.c.king needle hasn't even moved! Did I tell you this gets great highway or what?"

Once we hit campus, driving slowly along Kimball Avenue, I took in the pleasant offerings of a night in Bronxville. The smell of a wood-burning fire, the pock of tennis b.a.l.l.s echoing off the courts even in November, the imposing Tudor buildings magnificently lit. Crisp fallen leaves, like cinnamon and dried flower petals, were being crushed under our tires.

I directed Ahmed to drop me off in a faculty parking lot.

"Fancy pantsy," he said as he pulled in. "All this education s.h.i.+t costs a fortune. Your gelfriend, she comes from a rich family?"

"I think so. To tell you the truth I don't know much about them."

He shrugged his shoulders. "Never went to college myself. I started working at thirteen and I never looked back. I'm not a great artist like you, but I could always make money. Maybe that's my talent."

Before I got out, we agreed to meet Monday morning, as soon as I was back in the city. We would further the details of our partners.h.i.+p.

"Boy, know that I'd like to be a silent partner in all this. To be included in your business alone would be enough. I am not after your spotlight. Our trust can be a thing of beauty. Now, let's get out and hug like two men who aren't afraid of how it looks."

The way things have turned out for me here in No Man's Land, it could be said that I used very poor judgment. In fact, maybe this whole confession so far makes me look like a complete dunce. But what is good judgment? Good is too often confused with morally sound. In business, morality is a hindrance. I'm just saying. It is at complete odds with the fas.h.i.+on industry. There's no morality to it. Good judgment, in business, equals profit. In fas.h.i.+on, profit translates into fame. For all his contradictions, Ahmed did manage to convince me that he could make a profit. And I wanted to be famous.

Yves Saint Laurent said it best: "I began uniquely for the fame."

Mich.e.l.le lived in her own handicap room in t.i.tsworth, a Tudor-style building bordering the commons. When I first broached the subject, she said that she'd been lucky: The college had a surplus of these rooms with not enough disabled students to fill them. One of the room's amenities was a private bath with a large tub. I always thought the blue handicap symbol plastered to the outside of her bathroom door was typically ironic, a flourish she embellished by referring to it as the loo or the toilet or the powder room. She called all bathrooms everything but the bathroom. It was her way of acting desirable.

She signed me in with the RA, and we retired to her room for a nap. She took off her knit sweater and I undid my s.h.i.+rt. We kissed for a while and then held each other in deep loving embraces on her single mattress.

Lying on my back I told her about what had just transpired between me and Ahmed. "I can't f.u.c.king believe it. I have the start-up money."

"You think he's for real?"

"We just hugged on it in the parking lot."

"Uh! You're so weird. I mean, are you sure he's going to come through? It seems like a lot of money."

"With Ahmed, we have a special bond. I made him two suits, remember. This guy flipped over my work. I think I roped him. We're meeting Monday."

"That's so great, baby." But there was hesitation in her voice. In the word "baby."

"What?" I said.