MATT McGEE

★ ★ ★ ★

FLASH FICTION

Image by Paul Basel

‘Another Season in New York’          

            Owen approached photography in seasons.

            The last three months of every year were spent in an Upstate New York portrait studio posing, shooting and embellishing holiday photos for the wooded valley’s financially gifted families.

            Then, signaled by the popping of New Year’s Eve corks and the sight of Christmas trees beside trash cans, Owen made his annual return to Manhattan.

            Within weeks he’d become someone’s live-in boyfriend. He’d buy a Metro card, scour the city and shoot roll after roll.

            As overhead televisions in Nate’s Bar showed the Jets’ post-season hopes fading and another Mets season coming into focus, he’d begin looking for a sign, expecting, ready to fly. 

* * *

            On a Tuesday evening in March his latest girlfriend appeared from the bathroom, twisting the empty ring finger on her left hand.

            “We should talk.”

            He set his newspaper down. No signs in there either.

            “Go for it.”

            “I’d like to see other people.”

            Well, there it is. He waited, wanting to be sure.

            “Why now?”

            “I met someone, OK?”

            Owen picked lint off a couch cushion. “Been a good winter.” He didn’t mention being migratory, a species native to the Upstate region.

            “I’ll go pack,” he said.

            “Just like that?”

            “It’s OK. I understand.”

            “You ‘understand?’”

            Owen stopped in the bedroom doorway. “It’s just a signal.”

            In the bedroom closet Owen found his duffle. She watched him fill it, sling his camera bag over his shoulder and move toward the bedroom door. He opened his wallet. He dropped $400 on the bed.

            “What’s that?”

            “You’ll need it for rent.”

            A half dozen sentences shot around her head. “Thanks.” She leaned against the door frame to let him pass. She twisted her finger again and bit her lip. “I’m sorry. I like you, Owen. It’s just….”

            I know what it is, he thought. Just another season in New York.

            “I like you too,” he said. “Maybe we’ll see each other around.”

            He held the strap to his shoulder and pecked her cheek. On the way out he eyed the day’s spent newspaper, splayed across the coffee table. The signal had snuck up on him.

            It usually did.

* * *

            On his way to Grand Central, Owen allowed himself a last drink in Nate’s Bar.

            “Come to find yourself a little Snow Bird, did ya?” Nate asked.

            “Leaving, actually.” Owen indicated the bags at his feet. Nate set a freshly poured Guinness onto the bar. Owen slid out a nearly-maxed Visa card. “You know me too well,” he said.

            Nate ran the card. “I know all you migratory birds.”

            Before Owen could get his hackles up, Nate’s gaze crossed the room.

            “Might wanna swing by table fourteen,” Nate led with his chin. Owen turned casually. She sat in one of the high-backed booths: mid-thirties, a fresh drink in front of her, no one keeping her company.

            Owen crossed the room quiet as a cat. Ten feet away, she said:

            “I was wondering if you’d ever fly back this way.”

            Owen stopped. She lifted her eyes from her phone.

            “Don’t remember me, do you Owen?”

            He slid onto the bench opposite her. “You were just about to remind me.”

            “Valentine’s Day, 2007.”

            “Oh c’mon. Who remembers where they were fourteen years ago?”

            She leaned over the table and whispered in his ear. His eyes slid side to side.

            “Oh, that night. What have you been doing?”

            “Writing. I live outside Cleveland. Not a literary hotbed. Nine months out of the year I write copy for an advertising firm.”

            “Boring.”

            “Yep. Then three months a year I’m here, knocking on publishers’ doors.”

            She paused. She’d noticed his gentle, growing smile.

            “What?”

            Owen shrugged. “Just… complimenting my own good taste.”

            She smiled, sipped her drink. “Birds of a feather,” she toasted.

            That night, moonlight washed over their bed. This little love nest, it was tempting, an opportunity to remain. The first yellow rays of sunrise cast through her window, no longer weak winter light.

            She watched him unwind his pants. Owen kissed her forehead.

             “Flying the coop?”

            He stood, his bags slung over his shoulder. “Yeah.”

            “Maybe see you next season.”

            “I hope you’re too famous to know me by then.”

            She smiled into her pillow. “You too.”

            Before he set the lock on the door, he looked into the light streaming through the high window. Then he mounted the sidewalk, turned toward Grand Central, following the sun toward its next cycle.

* * *

            With two hours remaining, Owen visited Paul. The agent thumbed through the prints Owen delivered.

            “Your work is…” Paul flipped a few prints, “I love it. But it’s missing something.”

            “Oh?”

            Sunlight glinted off his friend’s eyeglasses. “It’s seasonal. Singular.”

            “You mean simplistic?”

            “No. No, not that. The composition, light, they’re excellent. I’ve been buying your stuff for years now.”

            “Yes.”

            “I’ve finally noticed, they all happen during winter. The city really comes alive in the late spring. Where are those photos?”

            Owen thought. “Guess I’ve always had a thing for New York in winter.”

            “You come from Upstate, right?”

            “Every year.”

            “Like a snowbird,” Paul smiled.

            Owen looked out the window. A hardened snow bank was softening into slush.

            “Yeah,” he said. “Not a very ambitious one, I guess.”

* * *

            Owen’s bus droned through the countryside. Maples were budding at the call of the spring sun.

            Paul had bought three photos. It would carry Owen through the early months. He recalled the critique: singular in season.

            The bus was set to full retreat, like his childhood days, off to summer camp. He ached for a woman’s number to text. But he wasn’t a collector that way. He remembered Kipling: He who travels fastest.

            Nearing town, a break in the slate-colored sky promised spring’s permanence. And though still months away, he knew a blast of cold air would have him scoop up his camera, and once more he’d fly south just in time to greet a new season.