“You don’t recognize them?”

“Why,” looking at the two young men as they gave a name to Sadie, the hostess, Shelly’s forehead furled in thought, “should I?”

“Think!”

“You know I’d never forget any guys that look that good!”

“Oh, yeah? Remember the Palladium?”

“The Palladium?” Shelly questioned. “In Union Pier?”

“Yes. About, uh,” thinking, “six years ago.”

“Yeah!” Dawning on her. “Sure! The dark guy’s the guy that thought you were too young for him… uh?”

“Mitchell.”

“Yeah, Mitchell. And the other guy’s… Norman!”

“You got it!” Glancing over her shoulder again, “You want me to see if they’d like to sit with us?”

“Marcie, you know I’ve always had a thing for blonde guys! And somehow I get the impression that you sure want ’em to sit with us… Sure, go on, see if they want to.”

Standing within the mob of people inside the open door, craning their necks to see if there was anyone there that they recognized, traversing the large room slowly, Marsha! His pulse quickening, Mitchell’s eyes stopped at the right side of the restaurant when he saw a tall, familiar-looking girl stand up, step out of the booth, and begin to weave her way between the scattered tables towards the front of the delicatessen.

“So, see anyone we know?”

“Yeah…” Approaching, fastening and holding, Marsha’s dark-brown eyes meeting Mitchell’s green eyes, “we do.”

Turning his head, watching the tall, slender girl as she made her way to them, “We do know her, don’t we?”

“Yeah, Normie, we sure do.”

“Mitchell.”

Looking at each other, neither smiling, the young man and woman stood a yard apart.

“Marsha,” swallowing, holding his hand forward, “hi.”

Looking down, realizing he wanted to shake her hand… wanted to, Yes! hold her hand, moving hers to his… Touching. “Hi.”

His hand closed about her hand, then, the handshake no longer a handshake, their fingers twining about each other’s… The threads of what they’d lost on that dark road on their walk from Union Pier to Lakeside six years earlier were picked up and began to tighten about their hearts as…

The sight of this young woman, the mere touch of her hand in his warming him, comforting him as the touch of no hand had since… in three years. At a loss for words, able only to say, again, “Marsha, hi.”

The sight of this young man, the touch of her hand in his warming her in a way such as the mere touch of a hand had never warmed her before.

“Uh,” breaking the intense eye contact, but unwilling to let go of her hand, turning to Norman, “Norm, you remember Marsha… uh?” Looking at the girl, embarrassed, he reluctantly released her hand.

“Goldman,” she said, smiling. “Marcie Goldman.”

“Yeah! Goldman! That’s it… Norm, this is Marsha Goldman.” Their eyes locked again, “Goldman! Goldman! I won’t forget it again!”

“Yeah,” Norman said, “we met about a year ago; at the J.”

“No… Well, yes, but think back. You and Marsha met each other long before that.”

“We did?”

“Yes, sure we did. And you even know my girlfriend.” Turning to the rear, Marsha motioned to Shelly.

Seeing them looking at her, lifting her arm, Shelly wiggled her hand from side to side.

Squinting, even from this distance Norman could see that she was cute and hadn’t the slightest qualm about meeting her. But, shaking his head, “No,” he said, “I don’t remember meeting either of you girls before.”

“Oh, you’ll remember all right!” Marsha said knowingly, adding, “How’d you guys like to sit with us?”

“Yeah,” Norman said, “we’d love to!”

Following Marsha to the booth, “Shelly,” she said, “you remember Norman and Mitchell.”

“Do I remember Norman and Mitchell? Yes,” Shelly replied, “of course I do!”

This confusing him all the more, making room for him, Norman sat alongside Shelly.

Marsha slid into the empty seat, Mitchell followed and, sitting closely together, each aware of the warmth, the outsides of their thighs touched.

Shaking his head, “No,” looking at her closely, “I’d never forget anyone as cute as you, Shelly, but I’m sorry, I just can’t remember where I’d met you before.”

“I am crushed!” Shelly said, feigning hurt feelings. “You really don’t remember walking me home in Union Pier?”

“Union Pier? No,” thinking. “No, sorry, I don’t.”

“Marcie and me were in the Palladium playing pinball, and you and Mitchell came over and we started to talk… Remember?” Still seeing a blank look on his face, “And then we went to the bowling alley, and then you guys…”

“Oh, yeah!” Remembering. “Lakeside! You two lived in Lakeside, and me’n’Mitch walked you home!” Smiling. “Yeah! Hi!” Leaning closer, kissing her on the cheek, “Now I remember, sure!” he said happily, “Shelly, my old pal, how the hell are you?”

“Fine, Norm! Just fine!” Punching him playfully on the shoulder, “How the hell are you?”

“Now that I’ve finally met you again, I’m fine, too!”

The waitress, standing alongside the booth holding a tray with sandwiches and an order of fries, “You boys wann’a order somethin’?” she asked as she put the pastrami on rye in front of Shelly and the hot brisket sandwich on the table before Marsha.

Even though he’d had dinner no more than two hours earlier, “Yeah,” Mitchell said. “A corned beef on an onion roll and a chocolate egg-cream.”

“We don’t have none’a them.”

“Corned beef? You don’t have corned beef? Onion rolls?”

“No… Yes, we got corned-beef’n’onion rolls!” Looking at Mitchell as though he were a bug. “We don’t have the other… the what’ch’a’ma’call’it.”

“Egg-cream? Oh, yeah,” remembering that egg-creams were indigenous to New York City. “Okay, then, I’ll have a corned beef on an onion roll and a chocolate phosphate, and I like it extra sweet, please.”

Speaking to Norman, “An’ what about you, sport?”

“Uh, I’ll have the same…” Looking at Marsha’s sandwich, “No, give me what she has, and a cherry Coke.”

Turning from the booth, beginning to walk away…

“Ma’am,” Mitchell called after her.

“Turning back, “Yes?”

“Put it all on one bill.” Pointing to the dishes in front of the girls, “theirs, too.”

“You don’t have to do that, Mitch.”

“Yeah, he do!”

“It’s okay, Marcie,” glancing at Norman, “I want to.”

Laughing, “Hell!” Norman said, looking at Marsha. “Ol’ Scrooge here,” nodding his head towards Mitchell, “must really be trying to impress you.”

“Yeah,” he said, looking at Marsha, too, “I guess I am… Go ahead, eat. You girls don’t have to wait for us.”

“No, we’ll wait for you guys.” Sipping her Coke, “How’s your brother, uh…?”

“I got two now. But the one you saw that night is Larry.”

“Larry, right!” Remembering. “What’s the other’s name?”

Not knowing the true story, “Poor kid. My mom named him…” beginning to laugh, “Morton Humphrey Lipensky. Ain’t that a mouthful? How’s your brother… What’s his name?”

Fighting the urge to curl her lip, “Roger.”

“Yeah. How’s Roger?”

“Fine. He got married, oh, about six months ago, and Brenda, that’s his wife, she’s three months pregnant now. He works for my dad.”

Reappearing with their sandwiches and drinks, conversation stopped as the waitress placed them in front of the boys.

“So tell me, where’d you guys disappear to last year?”

Swallowing what was in his mouth, “When are you talking about?” Norman asked.

“When I saw you two at the J.”

“Oh, yeah, ‘then’… This pal of ours, Ron Lurey, introduced us to…”

Remembering, “Irv Steinberg!” Norman began to laugh.

“Irv Steinberg! Yeah, what a…” Thinking of the whore fiasco, Mitchell, too, began to laugh.

Giggling, “What’s so funny?” Shelly asked.

Attempting to stop, “Oh, nothing.” But, looking at Norman, Mitchell began to laugh harder.

Catching the laughter’s contagious infection, “Come on, you guys,” Marsha, also, began to laugh and, barely able to get the words out, “tell us what’s so funny!”

Hearing the uncontrollable laughter, people at neighboring tables looked to the booth.

Taking his glasses off, rubbing his palms over his teary eyes, gasping the words, “We can’t tell you!”

“Come on, Norman!” Poking Mitchell in the ribs with her elbow. “Sure you can!” But only succeeded in making him laugh all the harder.

“Oh, no! Believe me, we can’t!”

“You guys…” Shelly stammered, “get all the fun.”

Out of breath now, the hysterical laughter stopping slowly, “Know what I think, Shell?” Marsha said. “I think they went to the whore.”

The boys looked at each other, then at Marsha.

“How the hell’d you know about the whore?” Norman asked.

“How? It was all over Roosevelt on Monday. There were about a hundred-forty guys there, and when the cops came, there was a kind’a riot and twenty-three of ’em got arrested.” Looking at Mitchell, “It was the whore, wasn’t it?”

“Uhh…” Looking at each other, the boys smiled.

“Yeah,” Norman said sheepishly, “we were there.”

“But it sure as hell wasn’t our idea!” Mitchell said defensively. “It was that putz, Lurey. He dragged us there, and we were never up there, uh, with the whore.” Adding, “Jesus, it was the funniest thing I ever saw! You think, Normie?”

“Yeah, it was!” Adding defensively, also, “And we never even got close.”

“The idiot that had the whore up there didn’t want his neighbors to know that he had a whore up there, so he had all the guys come ’round the back…”

“Yeah,” Norman’s laughter coming again. “and guys were all over the place. And just so’s everyone knew they were in the right place—I couldn’t believe it!—the stupid guy had a…”

“Red light!” Mitchell interrupted, breaking up again.

“A red light?” Shelly asked. “Really? A red light!”

“Yeah! Well, like we said, we didn’t think it was such a hot idea in the first place…”

“Actually,” Mitchell interjected, “I thought it was a real…” looking at the girls, speaking softly, “shitty idea!”

“Yeah, actually I did, too, and when we saw all those guys, whether Lurey wanted to or not, we figured the hell with it!”

“And when we heard the cops, we took off.”

“Fast,” Norman added.

Becoming serious, looking at Marsha, “Yeah, fast! And I rushed back to the J to see if you were still there, but you’d gone.”

“You could have tried calling! I did tell you my name!”

“I don’t have such a hot memory, and couldn’t remember if you said your name was Goodman, Goldstein, Goldman, or Golden. God, do you have any idea of how many Goodmans, Goldsteins, Goldmans, or Goldens there are in the Chicago telephone book?”

Attempting to hide her pleasure, “You tried calling me, huh, really?”

(A "Becoming" Excerpt)