Free The Kissing List by Stephanie Reents Page A

say to each other at work, but he won’t hear it. They go to the High Bar at the Gramercy Park Hotel. “I’ll take my regular table,” Dom tells the waitress. He presses his hand into the small of Vita’s back and steers her through the gray suits crowding the bar. She would like to lengthen her stride to get to the table faster, but she is wearing a satin skirt with a purply abstract print (the basement sales rack, French Connection, $29) that is so straight, it restricts her movement. The back slit could be unbuttoned, but showing leg doesn’t seem professional.
    “What can I get you tonight?” the waitress asks.
    “The usual,” Dom says.
    “And for you?”
    “A gin and tonic?” Vita asks.
    “What kind of gin?”
    “Umm.” She knows nothing about liquor. Or wine. Or European politics. This is why she could never be a professional girlfriend. Mastering the basics would take her weeks.
    “Bombay Sapphire suit you?” Dom asks in his pleasingly low voice.
    “Perfect,” she fibs.
    The waitress reappears with a small bowl of pleasantly salty popcorn and a dish of warm cocktail nuts with a really good ratio of hazelnuts and Brazils to peanuts. Dom’s usual comes in a martini glass. They toast, and Vita does her best to look Dom in the eye and affect a sophisticated yet casual air, not that she knows how to pull this off. Dom, she learns, is a country western singer in his free time.
    “One of the few African Americans in the biz,” he says with a laugh. “The industry’s been dominated by rednecks, but we’re changing that.”
    “That’s cool,” Vita says. “Not the redneck part, but the way you’re challenging the conventions. Do you perform much?”
    “Here and there,” he says. “What about you, Vita? What’s life got in store for you?”
    “Well,” she says, “I’m from southern Illinois, but I went to school out here.” She doesn’t know why exactly, but she winds up telling him about her thesis on captivity narratives, the accounts that Europeans wrote after being captured by Native Americans. “They’re part of the conversion narrative tradition,” she says, aware of how earnest she sounds. “White people stray from God, and as punishment they’re captured by quote-unquote heathen Indians. Then out in the wilderness and among the savages, they rediscover God, and when they finally return to quote-unquote civilization, they write thesetracts about the renewal of their faith.” How does anyone indicate italics without becoming repetitive?
    Her drink is gone, but there’s another one waiting. She usually doesn’t drink much, but the popcorn has made her very thirsty.
    “That’s fascinating,” Dom says. “You should write a book.”
    “I don’t know. Covering significantly new ground would require a lot more research …”
    “Or you should work at a magazine. I have some contacts, some people I could put you in touch with.”
    “That’s really nice.” This isn’t the first time one of her temporary bosses has tried to help her. She’s gotten lots of leads, lots of interviews, both real and informational, from people’s desires to see her settled. Her un- or underemployment makes everyone nervous. “I’d appreciate that.”
    After draining his second usual, Dom sweeps his hand across the windows. “Look at this, will you.”
    The view is beautiful, especially as the lights of the buildings become visible in the darkening hours: all those offices, all those windows, all those people working late, all the industry and productivity and commitment to capitalism.
    “You’re from Illinois, and I’m from Oklahoma.” Dom leans in, and his hand slides up her thigh. “We’re both a long way from home, and we’re not sure where our final destinations will be.”
    She doesn’t understand what Dom is saying until his lips are doing something on hers, and she feels obliged to do somethingback. Damply excited, whether from the kiss or its public nature or the fact that