"We just landed our dream apartment," Darcy announced, practically vibrating with joy, to Tristan and Juan—two strangers she and Cole had befriended ten minutes into their first wide-eyed stroll through Abingdon Square.
“One-bedroom. On Bank Street, no less.”
Cole, her Connecticut-bred husband, nodded, his face molded into a stiff rictus.
“Get out!” Juan, leashed to his Pekingese, cried. “A one-bedroom on a tree-lined street? That's like finding a unicorn that already knows how to use a litter box.”
“Oh, you’re funny, Juan!” Darcy bounced.
“On a good day. Most of the time, I’m just manic-y.”
“Who’s your agent?” Tristan demanded. “If you don’t mind.”
“His name is Omar,” Darcy said. “He’s a little eccentric, but OH MY GOD—he is just … THE BEST! I mean, he went to war for us. Risked everything to get us in.”
"Please tell me you have his card. I will pay in blood,” Tristan declared. “I have paid in blood before. Not for housing, but still.”
“We’re dying to move back to the West Village,” Juan added, nearly dropping the Pekingese’s leash. “Brooklyn is just...so Brooklyn now. Everyone there has a kombucha brewery in their bathtub. It’s exhausting.”
“Brooklyn is like a halfway house for people who aren't ready to admit they hate drinking oat milk from a jam jar. Okay?” Tristan quipped.
“We are so fucking over it!” deadpanned Juan
“Darcy, excuse my prying, but I must know what you do for a living?” Tristan asked.
“Helping people live their best selves—to be quite honest," Darcy said brightly, her voice two octaves too high, the trauma sublimating into some manic presentation energy. “I like to call myself a Positive Lifestyle Architect.”
"God, that is so inspiring," Tristan breathed, clutching his Hermes scarf. “You got it goin’ on, girl. You’re young, blonde, with a sexy husband, and here you are—the Village! You’re ready to set the world on fire, right?”
“I know, it’s just so amazing!”
“You know what they say— ’when the universe opens up for you.’”
Meanwhile, the furious Pekingese spun in furious little circles like a demonic wind-up toy.
“Shush, quiet, AOC! Pappy’s talking!” Juan scolded, clicking his tongue.
Cole blinked. “Wait. Your puppy’s name is AOC?”
Juan straightened, brushing imaginary lint from his shorts. “Fierce, independent, Puerto Rican,” he said, ticking the qualities off on his fingers. “She’s not a Pekingese; she’s a Puerto Ricanese. Look at her — tiny but insane enough to take down an empire.”
AOC bared her tiny teeth and yapped again to underline the point.
Darcy laughed, her earlier nervousness dissolving into a ripple of absurdity. Cole smiled too, a little wearily, still unsure whether he was in the middle of a meet-cute or a hostage situation.
“What do you do, Cole?” Tristan asked, a hint of performance in his smile.
Cole smiled weakly, hands shoved in the pockets of his fraying khakis.
“I’m... uh... not doing anything right now.”
“Oh, I've been there,” Tristan said sympathetically, with a world-weary sigh.
“I’m there right now!” Juan laughed, throwing up jazz hands.
Darcy seized the moment, switching into life coach mode.
“Cole’s a writer.”
“Not really a writer,” Cole mumbled, instantly undermining.
“Yeah, you are.”
“No, I’m not.”
“YEAH, YOU ARE!” Darcy hissed under her breath, her teeth flashing. “You’re a fucking writer. Don’t embarrass me!"
“I’ve told you a thousand times, I’m not a writer until I’ve written something worth reading.”
Darcy spun back toward Tristan and Juan with fierce brightness.
“Get this — Cole’s dad? On the New York Times Bestseller list. Twice.”
“Well, once,” Cole corrected weakly. “And even then, it was, you know... back when people still bought books.”
“Just trying to make you sound interesting,” Darcy injected after an awkward silence, filled only by the Pekingese snorting and clicking its nails against the sidewalk.
Tristan, ever the diplomat, broke it with a syrupy grin. “I don’t want to interrupt the fun, but—what was Omar’s contact info again?”
“Oh, you can Google him," Darcy said, casual now, her manic energy shifting like a stage light. "After Everything I’ve Done For You. That’s the name of the agency."
Juan scribbled furiously in his bedazzled notepad: “After Everything I’ve Done For You — Omar — Apartment magician — Risked life and limb.”
Then Darcy leaned forward, dropping her voice to a scandalous stage whisper. “Something you should know: He’s … Palestinian, so he’s been through it all.”
“Ohhh...!” Juan wheezed, fanning himself dramatically with his notepad. “So it’s like that kind of listing.”
“And our landlord is Israeli,” Cole slipped.
Tristan’s eyes widened, intrigued. “Oh, so it’s not just rent-controlled — it’s conflict-controlled.”
“It’s a complicated relationship,” Darcy said, flashing a tense grin. “But they respect each other.”
Juan laughed tightly. “New York’s just feudalism with square footage. You either learn to game it or you end up sleeping in your kombucha tub.”
A moment passed, and AOC, having grown bored of her circle patrol, flopped onto the pavement and began gnawing at a leaf with clinical precision.
“I mean, we shouldn’t even have landlords and realtors,” Juan said suddenly, voice unusually sharp. “It’s such a medieval concept.”
Tristan raised an eyebrow. “And yet, we’re still asking for Omar’s card.”
Juan shrugged. “Let’s just call him, just for the fuck of it. I said I was exhausted, not radicalized. ”
Cole’s mouth opened, then closed.
“Well,” Tristan said brightly, breaking the tension. “You’re both lovely, and your energy is divine. Manifesting great things for you.”
“Manifesting central air,” Juan added. “And fewer historical allegories in the lease agreement.”
“Yeah, get in touch if you ever want to have a ‘throuple,’” Cole joked.
Tristan and Juan pause — long enough to register discomfort. Then Tristan laughs too hard. Juan bites his lip.
Juan squinted at Cole like he’d grown a second head. “Did you just invite us to a threesome?”
Cole smiled — not smug, just calm, like someone who’d finally figured out how to speak in a foreign dialect.
“Cole,” Tristan says slowly, “that’s either the funniest thing you’ve said or the scariest,” before he and Juan busted out laughing.
“I’ll take either,” Cole shrugs.
Darcy watched him, surprised — not just by the joke but by the fact that, for once, he said something that stuck.
Juan wiped tears from his eyes. “We have to hang out. Seriously. Text us. We’ll set something up. Drinks, dinner, dungeon, whatever!”
They exchanged numbers, air-kissed their goodbyes with exaggerated flair, then strolled off, AOC tottering ahead like a tiny, four-legged prophet; Darcy turned to Cole, her voice low and brittle. “What the fuck was that?”
“What?”
“You joked about a throuple. With them. Cole! I’m like: you don’t joke about things like that with a Gay couple unless you mean it.”
Cole shrugged. “Exactly why it works. Technically, throuples are three—say, one straight man, two gay. And since you’re a woman …”
Darcy shifted her weight, suddenly hyper-aware of her limbs. “I—what are you even talking about?”
Cole stopped, turned to her. Calm. Steady.
“You have to read people, Darce. We walk around here with our cute little apartment story and my sad little khakis—what are we really saying about ourselves? We’re hicks from the sticks, nothing more than fresh meat on the street. No, here’s the signal we want to put out: we may look like virgins, but we’re way open.”
“Open?! Open for what?!”
“Whatever comes our way. You said it yourself — New York is a performance. That was mine.”
“Call us if you ever want to have a throuple!” Darcy mocked Cole.
She stared at him, still trying to catch up. “Thing is, you assume the role of the quiet writer type throughout the conversation—God only knows what you’re thinking! And then when you do speak, it’s like some character you invented putting words in your mouth!”
Darcy let out a startled laugh, then covered her mouth. “Jesus, Cole.”
Cole started walking again, slower now, thoughtful.
Darcy shook her head, still stunned. “You’re scaring me.”
“Good,” Cole said. “Maybe now we’ll survive.”
end of part one
© Michael Arturo, 2025
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Michael Arturo writes fiction, contemporary political/social commentary, parodies, parables, satire. Michael was born and raised in New York City and has a background in theater and film. His plays have been staged in New York, London, Boston, and Los Angeles.
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