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“Who are you?” I’m being calm, calmer than any rational person should be given such chaos. “What are you doing here?”
“My name is Mary. You must be new to the neighborhood!”
Oh, dear Lord and Taylor, this is what I get for living west of East End Avenue.
How did I ever let that walking sweater vest I call a husband talk me into it?
“I’m not new here, Mary. Are you?”
“I like to go skiing!”
“I hope you don’t wear those pajamas to your chalet in the Poconos. At least not until you get inside.”
“My name is...bye!”
Goddamn it—what’s really going on? Is she okay?
“Mary, are you…”
She’s already skipping down the hallway at quite a clip. Daring to poke my head out the door for the first time, I look down the corridor see several other young women waiting for Mary by the elevator.
All of them wearing cheap, drab pajamas.
And all of them giggling as she skips over.
And there’s Thomas, wearing a light blue cardigan, walking through that whole mess like it’s a perfectly normal thing to see in this building.
“I still can’t believe they let you wear that to work,” I comment as the Pajama Club boards the elevator.
“What you really can’t believe is that I have the status to get away with it.” Thomas is still several doors down the hallway, but he’s speaking louder than he needs to.
“You don’t need to brag so loud the whole floor can hear.”
“You think I’m bragging?”
“You know what, dear? You need to be more observant.”
“Why would you say that?”
Thomas reaches our open doorway and squares up to me. He immediately starts searching my eyes, trying to figure out how serious I’m being.
“Did you even stop to think why I was leaning halfway out our door when you got off the elevator?”
“I’m observant enough to know you weren’t leaning nearly that far out. And besides, I’m sure it had something to do with that improvisational performance art troupe wandering the hallway.”
“Is that what that was?”
“Just a guess. Are you going to let me in?”
Our routine is all thrown off. I’m supposed to be halfway through my martini right now. Thomas’s own martini is sitting next to mine on the bar.
Usually, I make them at the same time, but it’s well accepted that I need at least half a glass of gin and dry vermouth before having to talk to him in the evening.
This evening, thanks to Pajama Peggy and the Slumber Party Gang, we’re both starting our cocktail hour at the same time.
“And I’m stuck dealing with this lunkhead stone-cold sober.”
“You do realize you said that out loud, Margarita.”
