She purses her lips.
“Kinda. She lives on the twelfth floor. I think her name is Amber or something.”
Amber. Perfect. I have a name now, and a floor to go with it.
I get back to my seat just as two guys in drag launch into a rendition of “Dude Looks Like a Lady.” Jordan leans over and whispers into my ear, “What was that all about?”
I just smile and shrug. There’s no point trying to scream above the sound system, and besides, Sarah is eyeing me critically from over her clipboard. I don’t think she appreciates me fraternizing with the contestants, since it might render me less than impartial in my judging.
So I sit helplessly in my chair while Christopher Allington is possibly—probably—schmoozing with his next victim. Amber—from what I can tell, given that I’m only able to catch brief glimpses of her, not wanting to look as if I’m staring—seems to be coming to life under Christopher’s attentions. She fiddles with her red-brown hair and squirms in her seat, grinning nonstop and generally acting like a girl who has never had a handsome boy pay attention to her in her life. I watch worriedly, chewing my lower lip, wondering if tomorrow morning, we’re going to find Amber at the bottom of the elevator shaft.
Except that I can’t really see Christopher as the murdering type. The deflowering type, yeah. But a murderer?
Then again, Evita Peron’s husband had been a notorious letch, and I read somewhere that he killed a bunch of people in Argentina, which is why Madonna didn’t want people to cry for her in that song.
Finally the lip-synch ends. Greg, the hall president, comes out and announces that the judges should begin deliberating. Everyone else gets up and heads for the Doritos (luckies). Rachel scoots her chair around so that she is facing me and Jordan and Sarah.
“Well,” she says, smiling at me. “What did you think?”
I think we’ve got a problem, I want to say. A really big problem. And not with the contest.
But instead I say, “I liked Marnie.”
Jordan interjects, “You would! No, those guys who did the ’N Sync song were much better. They really had the choreography down. I gave ’em tens.”
Sarah says, “Their ironic take on the boy band was deeply amusing.”
“Um,” I say. “I liked Marnie.”
“And she’s been through so much,” Rachel agrees, earnestly. “It’s the least we can do, don’t you think?”
Just wanting to get the whole thing over with as soon as possible so I can make up an excuse to go talk to Chris, I say, “Yeah, okay. So let’s give Marnie first place, ’N Sync second, and the Christina trio third.”
Jordan looks a little peeved by the fact that we’ve basically ignored his input, but he doesn’t argue.
Rachel goes off to tell Greg our decision, and I turn in my seat to spy on Christopher some more…
…just in time to see him leaving, one arm draped casually over Amber’s shoulders.
I’m out of my chair like a shot, without a word to Jordan or anybody. I hear him call after me, but I don’t have any time to waste with explanations. Christopher and Amber are already halfway through the TV lounge. If I don’t act fast, that girl might end up as a stain on the elevator motor room floor.
But then, to my astonishment, instead of turning toward the elevators, Amber and Christopher actually walk out the front doors of the building.
I follow, darting past the groups of kids congregated in the lobby. Nighttime is when the hall really comes alive. Residents I’ve never seen before are leaning against the reception desk, chatting with the student worker on duty. The guard—not Pete, who works days—is harassing a clique of kids who claim to know someone on the fifth floor whose name they couldn’t remember. Why can’t the guard just be a pal and let them in?
I bolt past all of them, throwing open the doors and stumbling out into the warm autumnal evening.
Washington Square Park is crawling with cops at night, cops and tourists and drug dealers and chess players, who sit at the benches in the chess circle until the park closes at midnight, playing by the light of the street lamps. High school kids from Westchester, in their parents’ Volvos, tool down the street, playing their radios too loudly and occasionally having their cars impounded for creating a public nuisance. It’s a wild scene, and one of the reasons why so many kids request rooms overlooking the Square…when there’s nothing on TV, there’s always the park to watch.
Which is precisely what Christopher and Amber are doing. They’re leaning against one of Fischer Hall’s outdoor planters, smoking cigarettes, and watching the NYPD make a bust across the street. Christopher has his arms folded across his chest, and is puffing away like Johnny Depp or someone, while Amber twitters like a little bird, holding her cigarette like someone who isn’t used to holding one at all.
There isn’t a moment to lose, I can see that. I approach them, trying to look casual. I imagine that’s how Cooper would have handled the situation, anyway.
“Hey,” I say amiably to Christopher. “Can I bum a smoke?”
“Sure,” says Christopher. He draws a pack of Camel Lights from his shirt pocket and hands me one.
“Thanks,” I say. I put the cigarette between my lips, then lean down so Christopher can light it with the Zippo he’s brandished.
I’ve never been a smoker. For one thing, if you’re a singer, it messes up your vocal cords. For another, I just don’t get how a cigarette could ever be better than a Butterfinger, so if you’re going to indulge, why not go the way of delicious peanut buttery crisp?