We spent the afternoon with cousin Jill sipping Belvedere cocktails and playing Nerf tennis in Moët’s spaceport headquarters. Her company sponsors the US Open so they built a miniature tennis court in front of the bar, just big enough that you don’t have to put your drink down to play.
Bannack was pretty good at swinging the racket like an ax and yanking at the net but preferred running the ball back to the server to return it so I out-scored him pretty early in the match.
Before heading back on the train to Brooklyn we all got wide slices of pie at a little hole in the wall in Chelsea. We were just a few doors down from The Leo House, the small nun-run hotel that our family used to stay in for our first few visits to New York with the Carroll College plays.
Seeing the front door triggered memories of eleven year old me eating cold porridge from the early morning breakfast buffet, talking with my mom in the drizzly shabby back garden and asking the elevator operator for a lift to the sixth floor please.
“Are you sure?” He asks me from his worn out stool.
Suddenly unsure, I nod, “Uh huh.”
He closed accordion elevator grate and pushed the brass handle forward starting our slow and silent climb to the top floor. I took one step out of the elevator and knew immediately that I didn’t belong. The nuns lived on the sixth floor. I met one in the hallway and without a word she returned me to the elevator. I can’t remember if the operator apologized to her or not but it was an awkward ride down to whatever floor I was supposed to be on.
