It was a perfect day the sun blazing, the sky deep blue and cloudless, and it felt like it would definitely hit eighty later on. I headed downtown along the promenade adjacent to the Hudson, going at a pretty good clip by the time I reached the West Fifties. I'd been planning to blade all the way to Battery Park, but I tired out near the Chelsea Piers and had to sit on a bench to rest.

A young woman with long, dark hair in a ponytail was sitting at the other end of the bench. She was wearing black yoga pants and a black sports bra and looked like she'd just finished a run.

I stared at her until she noticed me, and then I said, "Great day, huh?"

"Yeah," she said. She smiled politely and looked away again. She had a plain-looking face, but she was still very good-looking.

"So do you run here often?" I asked.

She turned back toward me suddenly, as if my lame pickup line had jolted her.

"Once in a while," she said.

"Me too." I squinted. "Have we met somewhere before?"

"I don't think so."

"You really look familiar. Have you been on TV?"

"No."

"Radio?"

"You recognize me from radio?"

I laughed, then said, "I know I've seen you somewhere. Do you live uptown?"

"No."

"Oh, well. We must've crossed paths somewhere. By the way, I'm David."

"Ellen," she said.

I held out my hand and we shook. I hadn't done anything to hide the fact that I was blatantly hitting on her, but she seemed amused anyway.

She acted like she wasn't used to guys trying to pick her up.

"So what do you do?" I asked. "Maybe that's how we know each other."

"I'm a speech therapist," she said.

"Really?" I said, trying to sound truly interested. "Where do you work?"

"St. Vincent's Hospital."

"Cool. I mean, that's a great hospital."

"What do you do?" she asked.

"I'm the associate editor of Manhattan Business magazine." It was strange, saying my new title aloud for the first time.

"I subscribe to Manhattan Business," she said, her voice brightening.

"Really?" I said. "I don't think I've ever met an actual subscriber.

Or at least not a subscriber who's a speech therapist."

She laughed at my attempt at a joke. We started talking about the magazine for a while, and then I asked her a few questions about her job. We were making a lot of eye contact and she seemed to have warmed up to me.

"Do you want to get something to eat?" I asked.

She hesitated, caught off guard.

"Come on, I know we're not dressed for anything fancy," I said. "We could just go to a diner or something and talk some more. What do you say?"

"I have to be home for something at noon," she said. "What time is it now?"

"Just after eleven," I said. "Come on, there must be something nearby."

"All right," she said.

She stood up and I was pleasantly surprised she had a much better body than I expected. She was thin and toned all over.

We exited the promenade, talking about Chelsea Piers. She said she used to be a member of the health club there, but had quit because it was too expensive. Then we started talking about restaurants in the area, recent movies we had seen, and how nice the weather had been so far this spring. The conversation was dull but pleasant.

We walked over a few blocks to Eighth Avenue and decided to go into a bagel store. I bought us bagels with low-fat lox spread and coffees and we sat at a table by the window and continued to get to know each other. She told me about how she'd grown up in Manhattan, in Stuyvesant Town, and gone to Hunter College. When it was my turn to give a personal history, I intentionally omitted that my girlfriend had committed suicide yesterday.

I noticed it was a few minutes past noon and I said, "Didn't you have to get back?"

"It's okay," she said. "I just had to do some laundry and shopping I can do it later."

We continued chatting until long after our food was gone. During our conversation, she mentioned that she sometimes went to the weekend antiques flea market on Sixth Avenue and Twenty-sixth Street. I suggested going there, and she said that was a great idea. At the flea market we strolled around, browsing the junk and furniture. She said she needed a lamp for her night table and I helped her pick out a green-and-red stained-glass one.

"You'll have to see how it looks with the rest of my stuff sometime," she said.

We left the flea market, holding hands. I told her that my ankles were sore from blading and that I was going to take the subway home. She walked me to the subway station at Twenty-third and Seventh. We chatted for a while longer by the entrance to the station, and then I said, "So we'll have to go out sometime."

"Definitely," she said.

At a nearby news kiosk, the worker lent us a pen and gave us a small piece of paper. She jotted down her number on the paper and gave it to me.

"I'll call you early next week," I said.

"Great," she said.

I could've kissed her good-bye, but I didn't. I went down the stairs to the subway. On the platform, I ripped up the paper into little pieces and dropped the shreds onto the tracks.

Back home, I showered. It was surprisingly easy, standing where Rebecca had died. I barely even thought about it.

Fully dressed in slacks and a button-down shirt, I went into the living room. The answering machine was flashing, indicating a new message. I hadn't noticed the message when I came home before, so the person must ve called while I was in the shower. I pressed play and listened to Angie's voice, asking me to call her back. She sounded normal, so I didn't think the police had talked to her. I deleted the message, figuring I'd call her back later or tomorrow, or just see her on Monday.

Deciding that I was in the mood for Japanese, I went to Haru on Amsterdam. As I settled into a chair at the end of the sushi bar, I noticed, three spots down from me, a woman reading an Anne Rice novel.

She had reddish-brown hair and appeared to be about twenty pounds overweight. Her face was average-looking, but she had light blue eyes and there was something sexy about her. We started talking. She was an aspiring stand-up comic, and going by her dry, biting sense of humor that had me cracking up several times, I told her I thought she was going to make it big someday. As I finished my sashimi, I | continued chatting with her, enjoying her company. I knew I could've gotten her number and gone out with her sometime, if I wanted to. After paying for the sushi by breaking one of the hundreds Aunt Helen had lent me, I told the woman, "I hope we run into each other again sometime," and I left.

At a deli on Amsterdam, I bought a six-pack of Heineken and went to the video store on Columbus and rented Pretty Woman on DVD. Back in my apartment, I was drinking beer and watching the movie when I sensed Barbara's presence on the couch next to me.

I paused the movie and tried to concentrate on Barbara, attempting to somehow communicate with her. After a few minutes, I realized I was being ridiculous. Naturally, I'd felt a connection to Barbara while watching Pretty Woman, because we'd watched the movie so many times together. The fact that I'd downed a couple of beers might've been a factor too.

"I must be losing it," I said out loud.

I watched a few more minutes of the movie, and then the phone rang. I pressed pause again and let the machine answer. When I heard Angie's voice I went to the phone and picked up.

"Hi," I said.

"Oh… David," she said, as though she'd been mentally prepared to leave a message.

"Sorry, I just walked in," I said.

"Oh, okay," she said. "Hey, I just got this really weird phone call from this police detective. He said your girlfriend died yesterday."

Romero must've gotten Angie's number from Information.