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Nothing that would distract my clients—I want them to see my designs, not the designer. On my off hours, I go wild. Salsa colors. Bold prints. Stuff that makes me happy.
    Licking crumbs from my lips and telling myself I do not need another cookie, especially on top of the Häagen-Dazs bar, I slip into a pair of brand-new, fire-engine-red bikinis and matching lace bra that are more concept than substance, a short purple skirt, a silk turquoise tank top. I may have pitiful tits but my legs are good, if I do say so myself, especially in this pair of gold leather-and-acrylic mules that make me nearly six feet tall. On my Favorite Things list, shoes rank right behind food and sex. Although sometimes,on days like today, sex gets bumped to third. I turn, admiring my feet. God, these are so hot.
    A pair of combs to hold back my hair, a spritz of perfume, a slick of lip gloss—
    I look at my reflection and think, God, Greg. Look what you’re missing. Then the intercom buzzes.
    And I just think, God.

Three
    T he tile floor in the bathroom in my first apartment, a fifth-floor walkup way downtown off First Avenue, was so caked with crud that everyday cleaning agents were worthless. So one day I hauled my butt to the little hardware store around the corner and explained my plight to the stumpy old man on the other side of the counter who’d probably been there since LaGuardia’s heyday. From behind smudged bifocals, he seemed to carefully consider me for a moment, nodded, then vanished into the bowels of the incredibly crammed store. A moment later he returned bearing a jug of something that he reverently placed on the counter, still eyeing me cautiously, as if we were about to conduct our first drug deal together.
    â€œThis’ll cut through anythin’, guaranteed,” he said.
    Muriatic Acid the label proclaimed in ominous black letters. The skull and crossbones was a nice touch, too.
    â€œJust be sure to keep windows open,” Stumpy said, “wear two pairs of gloves, and try not to breathe in the fumes, cause’, y’know, it’s poison an’ all.”
    Undaunted, I trekked back to my hovel, suited up, pried open the bathroom window with a crowbar I bought atthe same time as the acid, and poured about a tablespoon’s worth of the acid on a really bad spot by the bathtub. The sizzling was so violent I fully expected to see a horde of tiny devils rise up from the mist. For a moment, I panicked, wondering if the acid would stop at devouring roughly a century’s worth of dirt and grime, but would also take out the tiles, subflooring, and plasterboard of my downstairs neighbor’s ceiling, as well. After a few mildly harrowing seconds, however, the fizzing and foaming stopped, and I was left with what had to be the cleanest three square inches of tile in all of lower Manhattan.
    And that, boys and girls, pretty much describes what happens when my mother and I get together.
    The instant Nedra enters my space, or I hers, I can feel whatever self-confidence and independence I’d managed to accrue over the past decade fizz away, leaving me feeling, temporarily at least, tender and raw and exposed. Which is why I avoid the woman. Hey, I’m not into bikini waxes, either.
    It’s not that she means to be critical, or at least not with malicious intent. It’s just that, unlike the vast majority of her peers, Nedra hasn’t yet lost her sixties idealistic fervor. If anything, age—and a few years as a poli-sci prof at Columbia—has only fine-honed it. I, on the other hand, am a definite product of the Me generation. I like making money, I like spending it, preferably on great-looking clothes, theater tickets and trendy restaurants. The way I figure it, I’m doing my part to keep the economy from collapsing. Not to mention supporting entrepreneurship and the arts. Nedra, however, cannot for the life of her understand how her womb spawned such a feckless