“You alone?” Sylvia asked.

Ron nodded. Out here in the better light, he could get a good look at her. She was beautiful! Long dark hair falling over her shoulders, gray eyes with a bit of an oriental look to them, and a figure that made his pulse start throbbing. She was wearing a microskirt and white boots and a kind of loose-fitting short-sleeved blouse that didn’t hide anything.

“Nice rest’rant a few blocks down th’ avenya,” she said.

“Thanks—I was thinking I’d eat at one of the hotels. I’ve still got to find myself a room for the weekend.”

“Cripes, you ain’t got a room yet?” Sylvia shouted over the noise of the crowd. “Ya’ll never get one in th’ regular hotels. City’s jammed.”

Ron felt like an idiot. “Oh . . . then, what—”

She grinned at him. “Don’t worry. I know a place where you can get a room. An’ it’ll be a lot cheaper’n dese big hotels they stick visitors in. Right? An’ there’s a good rest’rant on th’ way. Right?”

Grinning back at her, Ron said, “Right. Let’s go.”

They fought across the stream of people walking down the street, went around a corner, and started down a cross-street. The crowd here was a little thinner, and it was easier to walk.

“Lousy tourists,” Sylvia muttered. “Think they own the City.”

The restaurant she led Ron to was quiet and dimly lit. It was nearly full, but it wasn’t noisy and nervy like the restaurants Ron’s father had gone to. Like most places in New York City, the restaurant had real live waiters. No automatic selector dials with their rows of buttons. No robot carts rolling your food tray up to your table on silent rubber wheels. Real waiters, in funny suits. Men who spoke with far-away accents and bowed and stood waiting for you to make up your mind.

Ron let Sylvia order dinner, since she knew the place. When the waiter left, she smiled at Ron and asked, “Where ya from? I don’t know nothin’ aboutcha.”

So while they ate, Ron talked. Sylvia listened and hardly said a word. Ron jabbed on and on. It was the first time anyone had asked him to tell much about himself, and he found that he enjoyed telling the story of his life. Especially to such a fantastic-looking girl.

By the time they left the restaurant, Ron felt warm and full and happy. And also sleepy. It was dark outside now, the street lamps were on. Not all of them, Ron saw. Many of them were broken, the bulbs shattered and sharp edges of glass hanging uselessly from their sockets. There were only a few people walking on the street now, and they all seemed to be hurrying as if they were afraid that something was following them. Something terrible.

Ron shifted his package of clothes from one arm to the other. “I still don’t understand how you can live here all year long when—”

Sylvia laughed. “Forget it. Don’t worry about it. Hey, c’mon . . . we gotta getcha a room. Right?”