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The way his plump hand clutched at her hip seemed somehow improper; not morally, aesthetically.
I assume she did not ring his bell again, for in the next days she started ringing mine,
But if Miss Golightly remained unconscious of my existence, except as a doorbell convenience, I became, through the summer, rather an authority on hers.
her regular reading consisted of tabloids and travel folders and astrological charts; that she smoked an esoteric cigarette called Picayunes; survived on cottage cheese and melba toast; that her vari-colored hair was somewhat self-induced.
“I’ve got the most terrifying man downstairs,” she said, stepping off the fire escape into the room. “I mean he’s sweet when he isn’t drunk,
If there’s one thing I loathe, it’s men who bite.”
Tell me, are you a real writer?”
“It depends on what you mean by real.”
She took a bite of apple, and said: “Tell me something you’ve written. The story part.”
they make the dearest effort to look nice and smell nice too, and I love them for it. I love the kids too, especially the colored ones. I mean the kids the wives bring. It should be sad, seeing the kids there, but it isn’t, they have ribbons in their hair and lots of shine on their shoes, you’d think there was going to be ice cream; and sometimes that’s what it’s like
all you have to do to kiss somebody is lean across. What I like most, they’re so happy to see each other, they’ve saved up so much to talk about, it isn’t possible to be dull, they keep laughing and holding hands. It’s different afterwards,” she said. “I see them on the train. They sit so quiet watching the river go by.” She stretched a strand of hair to the corner of her mouth and nibbled it thoughtfully.
At any rate she no longer rang my bell.
I missed that;
A creature answered the door. He smelled of cigars and Knize cologne. His shoes sported elevated heels; without these added inches, one might have taken him for a Little Person.
seemed as though it were being just moved into; you expected to smell wet paint. Suitcases and unpacked crates were the only furniture. The crates served as tables. One supported the mixings of a martini; another a lamp, a Libertyphone, Holly’s red cat and a bowl of yellow roses. Bookcases, covering one wall, boasted a half-shelf of literature. I warmed to the room at once, I liked its fly-by-night look.
He tapped ash on the floor. “This is a dump. This is unbelievable. But the kid don’t know how to live even when she’s got the dough.”
You’ve got to be sensitive to appreciate her: a streak of the poet. But I’ll tell you the truth. You can beat your brains out for her, and she’ll hand you horseshit on a platter.
He expected recognition, and I didn’t mind obliging him, it was all right by me, except I’d never heard of O.J. Berman. It developed that he was a Hollywood actor’s agent.
One could see that Holly had a laundry problem;
Where the hell—” She was on her knees poking under the bed. After she’d found what she was looking for, a pair of lizard shoes, she had to search for a blouse, a belt, and it was a subject to ponder, how, from such wreckage, she evolved the eventual effect: pampered, calmly immaculate, as though she’d been attended by Cleopatra’s maids.
I HAVE A MEMORY OF spending many hither and yonning days with Holly; and it’s true, we did at odd moments see a great deal of each other; but on the whole, the memory is false. Because toward the end of the month I found a job: what is there to add? The less the better, except to say it was necessary and lasted from nine to five. Which made our hours, Holly’s and mine, extremely different.
Unless it was Thursday, her Sing Sing day, or unless she’d gone horseback riding in the park, as she did occasionally, Holly was hardly up when I came home. Sometimes, stopping there, I shared her wake-up coffee while she dressed for the evening. She was forever on her way out,
