The Long Way Home

Fredda Rosen

Word Count 1338

I wanted to live in New York City from the moment I knew it existed though fate had placed me in Akron, Ohio– Rubber Capital of the World.

My chance to live where I really belonged came when I finished a study abroad program in London in 1969. I was twenty years old and impatient.

“Let’s move to New York,” I said to my friend, Robin.

We were at Heathrow, waiting for the plane home. Robin, a Kansas City girl, was always up for an adventure. Plus, she had a boyfriend whose father, a comedian with a declining career but name recognition, had an apartment in New York. We’d have a glamorous place to stay until we found jobs. By the time we separated for our connecting flights at JFK, we’d agreed to meet in the city after visiting our families.

My mother sputtered time-worn objections to the plan: New York was dirty, dangerous, and expensive. My father said I should return to my summer job at the county welfare department until school started in the fall, which meant seven months in Akron, a death-of-the-soul sentence.

My reprieve came when my friend, Don, asked, “What are you going to do now?”

“I’m moving to New York,” I said.

“I’ll go with you,” he answered. “We can go in one of those cars you deliver to someone,” he said, referring to a service popular at the time.

He’d just graduated from college and had been granted conscientious objector status, the holy grail of the draft eligible in the Vietnam era. He showed me a sheaf of typewritten pages, a nascent novel he wanted to finish in New York.

Don found a car we could drive to Portland, Maine. That wasn’t too far from the city, we figured. He had a friend in Portland and would stay with him for a few days. I could take a bus from there to New York, and he’d join me later.

My parents were out when Don picked me up for the trip. “Tell Mom and Dad I moved to New York,” I said to my kid sister as I hauled the pink suitcase my grandmother gave me for high school graduation out the door.

In the car, Don handed me a pill. “Speed,” he said.

I’d smoked the occasional joint, but had never ventured beyond. Still, there was lots of driving ahead, so I swallowed the pill. By the time we reached the Pennsylvania Turnpike, it felt as if we were vibrating along the highway. I was thrilled when Don found a New York City DJ on the radio.

As the sun rose behind us, we reconsidered our plan to drive straight through to Maine.

“I’m a little jittery,” Don said. I concurred.

Robin and her boyfriend had set up temporary quarters at a Holiday Inn in New York, waiting for the right time to tell the comedian father about his houseguests. We parked in the hotel’s underground lot and headed to their room for a nap.

Rest proved impossible. All I could do was lie on my back, eyes wide open. My body felt stretched out, as if pulled on either end by a pair of overeager masseuses. We hung around for a while, drinking coffee, and then decided to push on to Portland.

Back in the parking lot, after the attendant brought the car, Don opened the trunk to toss in the things we’d brought upstairs.

“Hey,” he said, his voice nearly a shout.

I followed his gaze to the car’s interior. The trunk was empty. There was no pink suitcase. Don’s duffle was gone as well. We remained in place for a beat, looking into the maw of the car.

“Someone took our bags,” I told the attendant.

He shrugged. “It’s New York,” he said.

I mentioned something about the police.

“Call if you want, but get the car out of the way.”

We were on the highway whenI started a mental inventory. My clothes were gone: sweaters, jeans, the skirt I’d thrown in for job interviews. Ditto the gold charm bracelet from my parents, a sixteenth birthday gift; my photo album; and my prized possession from London, an orange Mary Quant mini skirt. I was left with what I had on, the dirty underwear I’d changed in Robin’s room, and the contents of my macrame shoulder bag.

Don was quiet, too, until he said, “My novel.”

The sheaf of papers he’d shown me in Ohio was stowed in his duffle. He had no copy. He hated carbon paper. It got all over your hands.

By the time we delivered the car in Portland and got to the bus station, I couldn’t decide if I was exhausted or wide awake. There was no direct bus to New York City. I’d have to change in Boston. That left hours of travel in front of me. Don left with this friend, and I found a pay phone to call Robin at the Holiday Inn.

She assured me we’d get into the comedian’s apartment soon, but in the meantime, she’d found a hotel with a better location. She would meet my bus at Port Authority Terminal in New York and take me there.

I tried to rest on the way to Boston, but kept reviewing my list of lost possessions. When I got off to change for the New York bus, I was hyper-aware of my shoulder bag, clutching it against me to fend off theft as I wound my way through the station. I couldn’t remember the last time I slept. Had it been 24 hours? 36? More?

At Port Authority, Robin wasn’t at the gate. I waited. I paced. Then I went upstairs to the main floor of the terminal to look, making my way through a thick, fast-moving crowd unlike any I’d ever seen. My hands were shaky. I had a headache. Unlike the people barrelling past me, I had no idea where I was going. Robin was nowhere in sight.

She’d moved to the Edison Hotel, but I hadn’t written down the address since she was supposed to meet my bus. How would I find the hotel? How would I find her? I wanted to sit down and close my eyes against the headache, but saw no waiting area, only the intimidating horde of travellers.

I walked outside to get some air and saw a line of cabs. Maybe a taxi driver would know the hotel? I climbed into one and asked the cabbie if he could find the Edison. In response, he pulled down the meter flag.

Relieved, I sat back in my seat, until my already-racing mind picked up speed. Would this guy drive me off to who-knows-where in Brooklyn? I saw his ID on the dashboard and tried to imprint the name on my brain. If need be, could I open the door and run for it?

It was a long trip. The fare gave me another fright, taking a sizable chunk of the money I’d brought with me. Months later, when I’d become a naturalized New Yorker, I understood I’d been taken for a greenhorn’s ride. The hotel was a mere five blocks from the terminal.

That day, though, I paid up and rushed into the hotel. I found the reception desk and asked for my friend.

“Sorry,” the clerk said.

The word left me stunned. Robin wasn’t registered. Her boyfriend wasn’t either.

Guests and uniformed hotel staff walked every which-way through the lobby. They belonged. I didn’t. I’d made it to New York, but I had nowhere to go and no one to turn to for help. I sank onto an empty sofa and started to cry.

The tears dribbled, then came full-force, staccato-style. Someone may have offered help, but I couldn’t speak. The sobs had taken over and could not be stopped.

Suddenly, Robin appeared beside me, her boyfriend hovering overhead. She had a room for us. We headed toward the elevator, and she handed me a key to my city.

Fredda is a non-fiction writer whose early work was published in the Washington Post, Cosmopolitan, and the Philadelphia Inquirer, among other publications. She took a thirty-year detour from the writing life to lead a nonprofit that helped people with developmental disabilities find jobs and live in their own homes. Thrilled to be retired and writing again, she lives in New York City with her husband and a large tabby named Monsieur.