Notes on [redacted] | Vol. 002

New York creates a particular kind of intoxication — the kind that burns memory. Not just a city but a secret part of you, a hidden beast of your discretion. Here, there are no halftones. You either adore it, or you leave. That’s the toll, and everyone pays it — whether you come from the sloping paths of Los Feliz, an oppressed country, the swing states, or the abysses of your soul. Here, at [redacted], if you are lucky enough to be in, you might find something close to refuge. Not to be mistaken for asylum.

I meant to text my girlfriend. The one who crossed the globe for a summer in New York just as winter settled in on her side of the world. I wish we could trade places, and I’d take the cold. Instead, here I am, wasting my unemployment on booze.

Speaking of heat, it does strange things. Pulls forgotten details into focus. Like the two girls at the table behind me, one of which can’t be older than twenty. They’re talking about a TikTok someone in their group posted, loud enough to drown out my attempt to finish Last Summer in the City sitting at the bar in the entry room — a book about a Roman alcoholic, fittingly.

But it wasn’t Sirens on the couch that called my name. It was their bags. One of them has some duty-free Tory Burch pouch if I had to guess. The older one holding a Louis Vuitton Liv Pochette. Gen Z would probably call that a recession indicator. But me? I call it the Louis Vuitton Index©. Here is how it works.

Statistically (or at least observationally), you can track women's corporate growth by their monogrammed leather goods. They start small: the Emilie wallet. Then Liv Pochette (technically not even a handbag, just an accessory). Then, as the salary ascends, the dream of the Alma BB comes into view — though most likely the Speedy 25, paid for with a tax return check. If working class women are ambitious and tireless enough, they will increase profitability to the level of the OnTheGo GM — an ugly yet recognizable upgrade in salary. The final frontier? The Capucines bag. An executive badge of an industry leader. A symbol of successful growth that speaks, I made it — and, with luck, a golden ticket to the VVIC list of Giovanni, who works the floor and lives off his commissions. Now, The PurseBlog won’t teach you that.

My only hope is that by the time they get there, women hire a real stylist. Not one from TikTok.

Anyway, I’m still drinking since I heard Edmund White passed. I don’t know why it hit so hard. Almost a decade ago, I could barely speak in English and didn’t even know who he was until a brilliant friend introduced me to his work. Full disclosure: I haven’t even read all his books yet.

Maybe it hurts because I prefer reading living authors. Knowing they’re still out there makes their words feel more alive on my shelves. Like they’re keeping me company in my one-bedroom on the Upper East Side. But when they die, something leaves the room. Their legacy stays, at least while I’m still here to notice.

I’m also noticing a happily engaged couple in the corner celebrating with a group of friends who look like the cast of & Juliet, but if the cast were all in their 40s. That’s what happens when New York’s pickiest doorman gets a piece of the action in Paris for a week.

You know what I love about this modern family? Their prenup must include a two-party consent clause allowing the husband the occasional indulgence on boys' night at The Eagles as long as the trust fund payments hit her account weekly to cover her hobbies and her slowly evolving sense of style. So progressive of them.

To quote White on society’s selective disbelief, a line that says more about the limits of other people’s imaginations than the man in question:

‘THE ONE THING THAT IS SORT OF SNEERED AT AND NOT REALLY BELIEVED IS BISEXUALITY. ANY BISEXUAL MAN IS JUST SEEN AS A CLOSETED GAY MAN.’

You know what I respect about her? She's not hawking healing stones on Etsy but studying landscape design. There are only two careers that truly pay well: dentistry (high risk) and landscape design (no risk).

Honestly, I’m kind of excited to see her future decorating every pine tree in the dunes of Amagansett, where the groom’s friends will pay six figures like it's an art installation. Who knows, maybe Mary-Kate and Ashley hire her to cut the bushes in front of their store one day? You never know.

It was a night of accidental conversations and overheard confessions, stacked on top of each other like designer bags on the long couch, the one that probably hosted more people in one night than any late-night show.

It was late. The room started to spin. I came for one Aperol Spritz on a hot day with a friend who never showed up and stopped counting somewhere after my fifth Boulevardier, which came after the Irish White, despite being lactose intolerant. I keep forgetting this place wasn’t founded by Americans. Or that it’s not the restaurant where it is flagged under my guest profile notes on OpenTable.

I was elegantly wasted, outside, trying to look up at the sky (or at least toward it) when this PR lady interrupted me asking for a ciggy. She introduced herself with the kind of expression people get when they’ve left their contact lenses at home and are still trying to make eye contact.

— What's your sign? she asked, right off the bat.

Can someone explain to me when exactly Pluto entered the 8th House and made everyone this obsessed with astrology?

— I'm a Scorpio, I said. My moon is always rising. Birthstone is crystal meth.

— What?! she asked, squinting, clearly trying to read my lips.

— Edmund White died, I said.

— In Gemini season? she gasped.

— No, babe. During Pride Month in Retrograde.

Yours, Kiki