I was standing on the corner of Dartmouth and Quincy Avenue, wondering where the hell I was.
I’d MapQuested directions from my school to the Starbucks on West Harmon. Downtown, MapQuest told me to take Shortz Street down to Brick Lane, then turn left and head down until I reached West Harmon, then turn right and I’d be at the Starbucks in a few blocks. But Shortz Street was blocked off for some reason or other, and so I’d wandered around until I’d gotten myself lost.
I looked around the way people do when they’re lost, and sighed and wished I was in a mall so I could find a directory. Why don’t they have directories on streets? Why do I get lost so easily?
It was almost four o’clock.
I called David Charles. He picked up on the first ring.
“Alice Cooper,” he said.
I swallowed a heavy sigh. “Hi,” I said. “I’m going to be late.”
“Late? Why?”
“I . . .” I briefly considered lying. “Well, I’m lost.”
“You’re lost?” He sounded incredulous. Disgusted, even.
“I get lost downtown,” I said defensively. And in malls, and on campus, and in department stores, and in places like Target.
“Alice Ayres,” he said, “you don’t get lost.”
“Well, I do.”
“No, you don’t,” he said.
I cast a confused look to a woman who passed me. Who was David Charles to say that I didn’t get lost?
“Where are you?” he continued.
“I’m on the corner of Dartmouth and Quincy,” I said.
“Well, you just stay right there. I’m heading over.”
“Really?”
“I said don’t move, Alice. I’m coming over.”
He hung up. I sighed and went over to sit on a nearby bench to wait.
“’Scuse me,” said a teenage boy, “do you know if The Hub is this way?” He gestured west down Dartmouth.
“Don’t ask me,” I said. “I’m lost, too.”
Labels: january brings few faces
