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if—”
    “It’s all right,” she said. “You can pay me back whenever you want to.”
    We left my apartment and went down to the street, holding hands. It was another freezing day, but not as windy as yesterday. We talked about the weather and about how she loved skiing. I told her how I once modeled for a ski catalog, but how I’d only gone skiing once in my life, about five years ago, and how I wasn’t very good. But I told her I’d love to go with her sometime.
    We went up First Avenue to the Citibank cash machine on the corner of Sixty-eighth Street. She punched in the code and I stood behind her, memorizing the digits—4-7-6-6-3-4.
    When she was about to type in the amount of money she wanted to withdraw I said, “You think you can make it a hundred instead of fifty? I mean if it’s a problem forget about it, but I needed to buy some cleaning supplies for the building. If I don’t clean today my landlord’ll get pissed off. He has this bad Greek temper and I really don’t feel like dealing with it.”
    “Sure,” she said. “A hundred’s no problem.”
    “Thanks,” I said. “This is really nice of you.”
    I walked her to her building on York Avenue near Seventy-first Street. It was a pretty nice elevator building. I felt like shit for taking her back to my dump two dates in a row.
    In front of the building we hugged and kissed.
    “I had an amazing time last night,” she said.
    “Me too.”
    “So will I hear from you this time?”
    She laughed, trying to make it into a joke, but I knew she was serious.
    “You kidding?” I said. “I’m dying to go out with you again. How’s tonight sound?”
    “Tonight?”
    “Yeah. How about you meet me at the bar around midnight? We can hang out awhile, then, if you’re up for it, we can go out for a little bite. Maybe this time we’ll make it to the restaurant.”
    We both laughed.
    “Unless it’s too soon,” I said.
    “No, it’s not too soon.”
    “Wait, I forgot—you have to work tomorrow so maybe we should wait till Friday or Saturday.”
    “It’s okay,” she said. “I can make it tonight.”
    “You sure?”
    “Positive. I’ll see you at midnight.”
    We kissed and hugged for a while longer, then I walked away, looking back every few steps and waving. At the corner, I turned and I waved again.
    I did some chores around the building—the guy in Apartment 2 had a leak in his radiator—then I cleaned the hallways and stairs, dumping out buckets of half water, half Clorox, and mopping up. My neighbors were mainly interns at New York Hospital and young college grads. They were nice enough people, but I kept to myself mostly, only talking to them if I had to do work in their apartments.
    Around ten o’clock, I finished cleaning and went to a deli on First Avenue and bought a couple of bacon-and-egg sandwiches. I started eating the sandwiches on my way home and finished them in my apartment. Then I started getting ready for the audition.
    When I got out of the shower I put on the outfit my manager had told me to wear—jeans and a white V-neck T-shirt. In the commercial, I was going to play an average Joe, a working-class guy who lives alone with his dog. My manager thought it would be a good idea if I looked scruffy and a little tired so I didn’t shave.
    When I was dressed and ready to go, I practiced my one line in front of the mirror. I had to kneel down next to a dog and say, “He eats great and looks great, too.” I practiced saying the line as many ways as I could think of, until I thought I had it down perfectly. They’d have to be crazy not to pick me.
    The audition was at a studio on Fifty-seventh Street near Seventh Avenue. I took the 6 train downtown, switching for the R at Fifty-ninth. I arrived at twelve-thirty, a half hour before I had to go on.
    As usual, there were dozens of guys in the waiting area who looked like they could be my twin brothers. They were all wearing white V-necks and hadn’t shaved.
    I was practicing