Alyce Miller
        

            Hooper's friend and colleague Myrna who believed in such things actually wrote and placed the ad.  Hooper tried to envision himself as an "attractive prof. SWM, 37,  brn hair and eyes, with lit. and mus. interests" in search of ("ISO") " a woman of any race, ages 20-60  with same."

            "With same what?" he asked.  Myrna shot him a look.

            "Wouldn't it help if I put in more of a physical description?" 

 "No," Myrna snapped, "number one big mistake.  My relationship intercessor says you stick to articulating your interests.  No one is ever what they say they are anyway, so the less you say, the less chance of a letdown for each other when you meet in the flesh."
            Shouldn't I specify tall women?"  

"Absolutely not!" said Myrna, who barely cleared five feet herself.  "You might be excluding someone you really like over a meaningless matter of a few inches.  Keep the applicant pool wide.  Don't eliminate prematurely, especially on superficial bases!"

Hooper gave up protesting.  "You really think these things work?" he wanted to know, as Myrna phoned in the ad.  He still wasn't sure about the 20-60 years old part, since both ends of the age spectrum filled him with a queasy dread.  He didn't want to date his daughter nor did he want to date his mother.

"These things work," Myrna assured him in the evenly-stressed spondee he'd come to associate with her impatience.  "Don't analyze everything."

Hooper had known Myrna since law school, when they both clerked for the same judge.  He'd seen Myrna through two marriages and a long live-in, one pregnancy, and one abortion.  She was generally an even-keeled, no-nonsense sort of person, who ran her life like a business.  After her second divorce, Myrna discovered the personals and became an over-night convert.

"I'm telling you, I keep a log now," she'd crow on Mondays, after what she claimed to be a weekend of revel and romance, "I am meeting so many single guys.  It's like being a kid in a candy store."

"I thought there was a shortage of single, straight men in the Bay Area."  Hooper had put his foot in it now.

"What baloney!" cried Myrna.  "Male myth.  There are single men all over the place, if you know how to look. I'm heading toward my mid-life with a blast.  Dinner Friday night with Hank the plumber, symphony Saturday night with David the dentist, and bowling Sunday with Leon the computer analyst. Next weekend I'm booked up too with a Canadian and a Nigerian."

"But isn't there anyone you like well enough to see more than once?" asked Hooper.

"Sure," said Myrna, "but I'm playing it footloose and fancy-free for a little while until the mantel of despair I've been wearing falls off.  I need some time and space to get over Allen, work out my issues.  So much stuff has come up for me since the divorce." She lowered her voice.  "I've had such low self-esteem."

Of late, Myrna had adopted a whole new lingo, which Hooper found impenetrable at worst and at best too non-specific to be of value.  Myrna's oblique references to the mysterious changes occurring in "this season of her life" made Hooper as uneasy as he'd felt when his old girlfriend Charlotte had tried to explain the benefits of transcendental meditation.

 Myrna now divided the male world into binary opposites.  She had categories for men: "commitaphobics" and "commitaphiles," men with "dependency issues," men with "a fear of intimacy."  She often drew on literary analogies, referring to men as Peter Pan or Captain Hook or Winnie-the-Pooh.  In each of Myrna's vivid date descriptions, which she served up with relish, Hooper began to see himself: a self-pitying Eeyore, an insecure Piglet, the Wolf from Red Riding Hood, the Beast that Beauty loved in spite of everything.  Myrna's discourses, which were patchworks of what she learned at all the relationship seminars she was attending, smacked of thinly-veiled accusations, which Hooper suspected were directed at him as well.   She seemed to be accusing him of something dreadful, though she claimed she was referring to men she met through the newspaper.  Through Myrna's lens, Hooper imagined himself alternately as a frightened man, then a lonely man, a man who loved too much, or worse yet, a man who couldn't love at all, a man with no community, or, conversely, a man with too much community. 

Self-questionnaires began to appear not so mysteriously on his desk.  To appease Myrna, he put himself through a Cosmopolitan relationship test, the Myers-Briggs type indicator test, and a transactional-analysis primer.

"You're so parent," Myrna assessed Hooper.  "So Type A.  I guess it goes along with our profession, the need to control and take charge.  Lighten up a little.  Learn to let the child out. Be vulnerable. Be real."

Hooper started feeling edgy when Myrna would catch him at lunch or in his office alone.  What did she mean by real?

"You really need to try the personals," she insisted. "You've been alone too long, Hooper, it's not healthy.  It's time you found a woman. That is . . . . if you're interested in women. . . . " She gave him a long once-over.

***

A week after the ad was placed, Hooper received his first batch of correspondence, twenty-some letters in all.  Some were short and to the point, some more detailed, hinting at pleasures untold.  Some included snapshots: women on horseback, women waving tennis rackets, women posing seductively under trees, women perched coyly on steps in shorts and halter tops, women with their arms around small, grinning children.  With Myrna's help, Hooper sorted out the "failed chronic daters" from the "brand-new bumper crop."

"No, you cannot date anyone who has white sectional furniture," she said throwing into the reject pile a photo of a leggy bottle blonde, lounging on her sofa.  Hooper lunged for the photo, but Myrna slapped his hand.

It was pointless to protest.

"Look, trust me, I know how to read the sub-texts. And now, another word to the wise: arrange to have coffee first, no dinners, no movies yet," said Myra.  "Set a time limit, half hour max, for the first meeting. Always pay for their coffee.  It's an easy way to look generous.  Stinginess is a major turn-off, even if the woman is making more than you.  You can work all that out later if you click." After Myrna's knowledgeable paring down, Hooper was left with four letters: Barbara,  a legal secretary ("don't assume she's a gold digger, she sounds smart and direct"); Nadia, a journalist and ex-classical violinist, originally from New York ("she's probably gorgeous, and if she writes, it means she can think"); Leslie, a professor of women's studies and Afro-American literature who enjoys world music ("we're talking brains and probably a good political consciousness"); and Maureen, a divorcee with a Master's degree in comparative literature, emphasis on French, and a love of jazz ("she's well-read, Hooper, you're not going to be bored").

Hooper guiltily set aside an hour that he should have devoted to his brief on the collapsing playpen suit in which a small child had been practically strangled by the playpen net, and composed a generic response on his PC.  He used the mail/merge feature to insert the four names in the same carefully worded text.  He had Myrna read over what he had written.  She made several minor changes ("don't say just a half hour, it sounds as if you're apologizing"; "don't say you're passionate about Bach, it sounds so stuffy–I thought you liked blues and jazz, too"; and "don't sign it with 'sincerely,' it's too stiff--just say 'yours,' or something friendly like 'looking forward to seeing you'").

With a combination of trepidation and excitement, Hooper enclosed his business card ("Michael J. Hooper, Personal Injury Attorney"), in each of the envelopes, and mailed the letters himself at a mailbox in Noe Valley. Then he went about his business without thinking too much about the letters.

The first response arrived by telephone three days later, followed by three more the following day.  Hooper followed Myrna's advice not to get involved on the phone. 

The four voices were all pleasant but generic, each of them articulate, polite, upbeat, definitely very female, maybe hopeful. He jotted them in on his calendar. Barbara on Thursday at 6, Leslie at 7:30 (to give a little leeway in case he really liked Barbara), Nadia for lunch on Friday, and Maureen Saturday afternoon at 3 for herb tea (she wasn't "doing caffeine or dairy"), after he'd finished at the gym. 

"So," said Myrna as Hooper packed up his briefcase at 5 on Thursday, "let me know how it goes."

And so it began.  Barbara was pretty and pleasant, but way too young and a little giddy, and Hooper figured quickly she was masking her own disappointment with him in overly-polite responses. She excused herself sweetly after twenty minutes or so, saying she'd forgotten she had an appointment, but thanks so much, it was a real pleasure talking.  That gave Hooper an edge in being on time to the cafe several blocks away to meet Leslie.

Leslie was about his own age, a brilliant brown-skinned black woman with soft eyes like a deer, and Hooper's hope rose immediately. But during the conversation she became overly- intense, which then turned into thinly-veiled depression the way cynical academics can be who spend a great deal of time thinking about how unfair the world is, and eventually she conceded of her own volition to a conflict about dating men of other races, because she'd just broken off from a long-term relationship with an Italian man from Santa Barbara because he "couldn't handle the social pressures."  A lot of her women friends had started dating white men, and things had worked out.  But she had to be honest, she said, it wouldn't be fair to Hooper if she put on a false front. They could never be anything but friends, she said, and then looked as if she might begin weeping. Nadia canceled at the last minute on Friday, without explanation, her tone frantic and abrupt.  And Maureen phoned shortly after to explain that she'd had a successful date with a personals the night before and it looked as if things might work out with someone named Jimmy, so if Hooper didn't mind, she would take a rain check, and if Jimmy  turned out to be a bust, she'd give Hooper a call soon.

On Monday, Hooper arrived at work with another briefcase full of letters.   Heidi, Monica, Ann, Maria, Nancy, Beverly, Veronica, Padma, Lisa, LaShawna, Marjorie, Patti Jean, two more Leslies, a Philippa, and a Louise.

"Treat it like a job," Myrna advised.  "Don't get personally involved. Me? Ditch the Heidi woman -- anyone named Heidi has got to be trouble."

***

About three weeks into the whole business, in which none of the women panned out, Hooper's sagging spirits were lifted by a cheerful message on his answering machine at home: the caller identified herself as Louise.  "Hi, Hooper?  I'm the divorced physical therapist with a strong interest in sports and holistic medicine you wrote to last week."

He rewound the message and listened to it several times, marking each nuance in Louise's tone, detecting a solidity in the flatness of her vowels.  Dark, he thought, she's dark-skinned, dark-haired, with curly hair and long limbs.  Louise left her number, asked him to call after five. 

Hooper took a client to Enrico's, got home around eight, and showered.  Then he gave Louise a try.  A small child answered on the other end and it was only with difficulty that Hooper made it clear he wanted to speak to Louise.  The child didn't seem to know what he meant until Hooper finally said, "May I please speak to Mommy?"

"MO-mmy!" the child roared in his ear.  Hooper held the phone at arm's length to give his eardrum a chance to recover.

A moment later, when he replaced the phone against his ear, he heard Louise's gentle purr.  "Hello?"

"Hi, Louise?  It's Hooper."

"Oh, hi!" She sounded ecstatic.  "Thank you for calling. Is your name really Hooper?  It sounds like that old Paul Newman private eye film, oh, no, that was Harper." Then she laughed.

Hooper didn't know if she was criticizing or not.  "Hooper's my middle name actually, but I use it as both surname and informal first name.  My real last name is unpronounceable."

"Oh, something incredibly ethnic, I suppose, with a lot of z's and w's smooshed together?"

"Something like that," said Hooper.

"Ethnic's in these days. Why not flaunt it?"

Hooper didn't know what to say.

 "Well, I have a confession. My first name is actually Myrtle, after my maternal grandmother, but thank God for Louise, it saved me from total ostracization! Close friends call me Lou."

The child could be heard in the background, sustaining one, long breathless scream.

"Well, I guess this is our introduction," said Hooper in what he hoped was a light, but enthusiastic voice.  Even after practicing, he still found these conversations awkward.

"So, you're an attorney.  Downtown?"

"Embarcadero.  And you?"

"My office is near Russian Hill.  I work along with a chiropractor and a masseuse--Jonah, please, don't pull on Mommy's phone cord like that, it's going to snap.  Take the bear and go up to bed.  No!  Put the scissors DOWN. The bear needs both ears.  (Exasperated sigh)  Jonah, am I going to have to give you time out? --  Sorry, Hooper, my son has had a long day.  Anyway, I'm going to be downtown tomorrow for a meeting and I thought if you were free ..."

"Lunch?" said Hooper, then wished he hadn't interrupted.  It might be misunderstood as desperation.

"Sure, okay," said Louise.  "But I thought it might make sense, you know, be practical, if we talked for a few minutes on the phone.  Before we waste too much time meeting in person."

"Oh?" said Hooper.  He was not fond of phones, and Jonah's second long scream began to soar into the range of glass-breaking decibels.

Louise's vowels flattened.  "Yes, I thought maybe I could ask you a few questions and you could ask me a few questions, you know, to see if we had compatibility potential."

Hooper felt his heart sink.  "You mean like an interview, over the telephone?"

"Just preliminaries," said Louise in a brisk, practiced voice.   Hooper heard Louise cover the mouthpiece, her voice rose in muffled annoyance.  He heard the words "one, two, three" and "no Pocahontas for you tonight if you keep this up."

"Sure," said Hooper.  "What would you like to ask?"

"Question number one," said Louise," do you like children?"

Hooper took a deep breath. In the background Jonah shrieked.  "Well, yes, sure, yes, I do.  I like children ... some children.  What I mean is, I have two nieces and a nephew I'm very fond of."

"Do you ever want children of your own?" asked Louise.  There was an odd scratching noise in the background and Hooper realized it was the sound of pen on paper. Louise was taking notes.

He cleared his throat.  "Well, I'm pretty much a product of my generation, I guess, prolonged adolescence, years in law school, working on my career.  But of course I've thought a lot about children, it's just that I suppose I've gone this long without them, I must not be rabid to have them."  He'd meant to be humorous, but feared his words had the opposite effect: a stuffed shirt, a prig, or worse yet, a child-hater.

"So you don't want children?" Louise clarified.

"I didn't say that exactly," said Hooper.  "I think it's hard to visualize something like children theoretically without someone in the flesh to attach the children to. I'd like to think I had a partner in mind first."

"Oh, so if you were in love with someone, you'd consider having children."

Hooper cleared his throat again.  "Something like that," he said.  "Look, Louise, don't you think we're heading into deep waters here?  How about if we meet first, you know, see if we like each other, get our toes wet, before we plunge in over our heads."  Hooper was pleased with the metaphor.

Louise's tone tightened severely. "I guess you don't see the point here.  I received twenty-three letters last week, and yours was just one of them.  I've narrowed it down to ten, but you're only the second person I've contacted.  That gives me eight more people to meet.  That's a lot of coffee and lunch and parking, and parking in San Francisco is not cheap. I think we can save ourselves a lot of wasted time and energy if we get some things straight right off the bat."

"Okay," said Hooper. "You have a point."

"Do you want to get married?" asked Louise.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Do you want to get married?"

"I don't even know you."

"That's true, but I believe it's important to know certain things about a person before you go out.  I've dated a lot of men in my time and I'm sick of bullshit!" Louise sounded very angry.

"We were just going to have lunch, Louise," Hooper reminded her uneasily.

"I'm still open," said Louise, "but you've got to be able to deal with all of me. I want you to know who I am."

"I don't know," said Hooper in a dull voice.  Louise was beginning to sound like a tall order. 

After a pause, Louise said, "So I take it you're not really looking for a serious relationship."

"That's not true," Hooper defended himself.  "I just think this interrogation is a little premature."

"Interrogation.  Hmmmm, I see," said Louise. "You perceive that I'm interrogating you?  Aren't you being just a little paranoid?"

"Look, Louise, I think we're after different things."

The child began to wail, a slow, lugubrious unwinding of despair.  "You know," said Louise, "I'm a single mother and I've got a very busy schedule.  My work and my kid come first.  I've survived without a man for some time now and I've done quite well.  I don't need to make any quick decisions until all the cards are on the table." 

"Yes, it would seem so," agreed Hooper.  "I'm sorry to have taken up your time.  Good luck with the other nine."

He hung up.

***  

In the morning Myrna insisted that Hooper was much too easily discouraged.

"These things take time," she said, "they have a life of their own.  So Louise was a jerk, get over it.  Probably bitter and hostile.  A lot of women like that nowadays given circumstances.  Well, we all need to let  go of the past. Sounds like she's still collecting her brown stamps, and you, my friend, don't  need a grudge-filled, resentful date. You're a great guy. If I didn't have my hands so full with men, I'd snatch you up myself."

"Maybe arranged marriages are the best way to go," mused Hooper. "No fuss, no muss.  Your family selects a bride, you go to the altar with your eyes closed, you make it work out."

Myrna raised her eyebrows.  "And burn your wife for the dowry, too? Hooper, you're treading on thin ice." 

"Jesus, I don't really believe in arranged marriages," Hooper defended himself.  "I'm just joking."

"Then why bring it up?" Myrna was looking at him with grave suspicion.  "I certainly hope you don't convey that kind of attitude to these women you're meeting. It is not attractive."     That afternoon, he threw himself into his work.  He was working on a case for a client who was suing a drugstore because one of their chaise lounge chairs, on special for $22.99, involuntarily unfolded and fell off the top shelf onto her head.  She now suffered from terrible migraine headaches, as well as an unreasonable fear of chaise lounges. "It's interfering with my life in ways you can't even imagine," she told Hooper.  "It's awful. I go to a friend's house and see a lounging chair and it's like this post-traumatic stress syndrome kicks in."

In the next batch of letters, there was one that stood out from the others.  It was a xeroxed invitation, on orange paper, folded and stapled, announcing a pre-Halloween gathering at seven thirty in the evening at the home of one Anita McGuire.  There was a hand-penned note under the cheerful pumpkin face, which said, "Dear Hooper, instead of stretching myself on the rack of blind-date anguish, I've decided to throw a pumpkin-carving party so we can meet in a social context, among friends, without pressure.  R.S.V.P.  Hope to see you!  BYOP!  (Bring your own pumpkin)."

Hooper was amused.  A woman with a balanced sense of humor.  He phoned the number on the invitation.  A friendly recorded voice said, "Hi, you've reached Anita. You know what to do at the beep."  He left his acceptance on the answering machine. 

The day before the party, Hooper picked out a pair of jeans and leather sneakers and a sporty shirt.  He tried the clothes on, studying himself in the mirror.  Methodically, he added his black leather jacket, then a red tie with blue and white ping-pong balls on it.  He viewed himself from all angles and was satisfied with what he saw: a middle-aged man who could easily pass for ten years younger, tall, well-built, no disfiguring marks, not handsome, but not plain, solid looking, pleasant smile, with all his hair.  This last fact was nothing to sneeze at. Hooper gave himself the thumbs up.

The next evening, en route to Anita McGuire's, Hooper stopped at a large lot near Irving Street where pumpkins were being sold, and paid an extravagant sum for a pumpkin four times the size of his head. 

Anita lived in a stucco duplex out in the avenues, an unremarkable and foggy section of the city just below Clement Street. Hooper parked in front and walked up to the front door.  He juggled the heavy pumpkin in one arm, and rang the bell with his free hand. 

A buzzer sounded, and Hooper let himself into a carpeted stairwell. A small table sat to one side; in a vase a single red rose stretched itself upwards.  A sign, Hooper thought, and bent over to sniff the red rose, which turned out to be made of silk.  But still, a beautiful rose!

"Come on up!" called a cheery voice.  A face appeared over the bannister at the top of the stairs. It was round, framed with brown curly hair, and punctuated by a wide white smile.

"I'm looking for Anita?" said Hooper, a mixture of excitement and shyness stirring inside him.

"Sure, I'm Anita. Come on up."

Hooper heard faint hummable jazz and the sound of voices above.  He mounted the carpeted stairs.  It was Dizzy Earl Fatha Hines on the CD player.  Good sign.

Anita greeted him at the top.  She extended her hand. 

"And you are ..."

"Hooper ... "

"Nice to meet you."  She pumped his hand.  Slim, tall, small chest.  Someone who would age well, maybe, if she wasn't anorexic. Casually dressed in loose gray cotton slacks and a gray tee shirt and rabbit ears. Her eyes rested appreciatively on the over-sized pumpkin.  "Wow," she said. "You've got a huge one."

Hooper followed Anita's rabbit ears down a carpeted hallway into the living room where several guests had already gathered.  They were each holding what appeared to be soft drinks in clear plastic glasses.

"Here, you can set your pumpkin here." Anita indicated the dining room table off to one side where five other uncarved pumpkins sat faceless and uncut.

Hooper's pumpkin immediately dwarfed the others.

"Holy shit!" a man close by him exclaimed.  "That's one hell of a mammoth vegetable."

Hooper turned to face the speaker, a man about his own height, unremarkable, balding, wearing a white open-necked shirt and a sports jacket. 

"Or are pumpkins fruit?  I never can remember.  I know tomatoes are actually considered fruit, it has to do with the seeds or something. I'm Bud Franklin."  The man grabbed Hooper's hand and pumped it hard. "That's some pumpkin."

The other guests had turned and were staring at the pumpkin.  If Hooper hadn't known better, he might have mistaken the looks for hostile.  Then he heard Myrna's voice in his ear, just remember, they're nervous too. 

"So," said Bud, his voice a tad too loud, "are you a friend of Anita's?"

"Uh, not exactly.  What I mean is, she and I are just meeting for the first time."

"Oh, is that so, well ..."

Anita interrupted to hand Hooper a clear plastic glass full of dark carbonated water. "Help yourself to chips, too," she said.  She took a quick head count of the room just as the bell sounded below.  In a moment two more guests arrived, two very good looking men, each of whom dutifully placed a pumpkin on the table.  They were quickly followed by a buffed out fellow in his late twenties, with a pony tail and skin tight biker's pants and gloves.  He announced to everyone that his pumpkin had survived a trip across town balanced on the handlebars.

Hooper tried moving away from Bud, but Bud followed. He'd pulled a red clown nose from his pocket and attached it to his face. 

"You know, " said Bud, "you've got to live life fully, make every moment count ... take me, for example, I was diagnosed with the Big C five years ago . . . . but I've beaten all the odds.  Some say I'm a walking miracle . . ."

"Wow," said Hooper.  "That's great." He looked around. "Excuse me a minute Bud."

"Sure, Hooper."  Bud turned agreeably to the biker and introduced himself.  "Say, guy, do you think of pumpkins as fruits or vegetables?"

Hooper went in search of Anita who was in the kitchen tearing open another bag of chips with her teeth.  The rabbit ears had fallen to one side of her head.

"Hi, can I help you put out any hors-d'oeuvres, or anything?" he offered.

"This is it.  I wanted to keep things simple.  You could take one of these bags of chips out to the table and empty it into a bowl."

Hooper glanced around the spacious, airy room. "So, do you live here by yourself?"

Anita hesitated.  "Why do you ask?" 

"I didn't mean anything by it, just making conversation, you know, small talk."

"I hate small talk," said Anita, uprighting her ears.  "But, yes, I live here alone right now, though I have my neighbors below me.  We're very aware of one another around here. We have a neighborhood alert, and the cops can get here in 3 minutes flat."  She thrust the chips at him.

Was she suspicious of him?  Hooper carried the sack of chips out to the living room.  Nowadays you had to be careful what you said apparently.  Anita came up behind him with more dark carbonated water in a plastic bottle.  Hooper tried again.

"This is a great idea--you know, a party and all, to kind of get everyone comfortable. Take the edge off a potentially humiliating experience."

Anita's eyes narrowed.  "Yes," she said, "that is the point." 

Bud was now telling jokes to the biker and an older man with white hair who reminded Hooper of his torts professor in law school.  Hooper looked around the room.  About a dozen or so guests had now collected.  It was only then that Hooper realized that everyone there, with the exception of Anita, was a man. 

Anita glanced down at her watch, then tapped the edge of the dining room table briskly with a spoon.

"Attention!" she called. "Attention, everyone! It's almost eight o'clock. I thought we should get right into the pumpkin carving.  There are knives and spoons and plenty of newspaper to spread out on the floor.  Try not to get the insides on the carpet please.  I just had it shampooed."

Like obedient children, the guests retrieved their pumpkins and newspapers, and spread themselves out on the floor.

"Wow, who brought that monster?" someone asked.

"Jesus Christ, are we talking steroids?"

Hooper's pumpkin was suddenly the center of attention.  Hooper hung back, not wanting to claim it.  But Bud took care of that.  "The big pumpkin belongs to this guy right here, old Hooper."

A dozen pairs of jealous eyes rested on Hooper, or at least that's what he imagined.

"A last-minute choice, the only one left on the lot," he explained apologetically and shrugged.

"Sure," said Bud.  "I bet you hunted around all week for that big one, trying to make a good impression."

Hooper considered leaving right then.  But he heard Myrna's voice in his ear: Don't give up too fast.  See the thing through.  Bud's an Eeyore. Keep your eye on the prize.  He entered into the spirit of cooperation and dutifully collected his utensils and the newspaper.  If he could just keep a hold on the irony of it all.

"Good luck," said Anita, as if this were a contest, and suddenly everyone was digging into pumpkins with great fury.  Hooper found himself a spot on Anita's living room carpet next to a striking dark-haired  man with Mediterranean features. Hooper's mother's ancestors had not come  far from the Mediterranean themselves. He felt a sense of familiarity.  This man could be his uncle Mustafa.

"Niccolo," said the man, shaking Hooper's extended hand.  "I run an air duct cleaning business.  Suck the dust right out. And you?"

"Personal injury attorney."

"Oh, boy," said Niccolo.  His voice was heavily accented.  "I could have used you about three months ago when I touched my kitchen sink and got a shock that threw me to the ground.  My landlord refused to take any responsibility, even though other tenants had told him it had happened to them too.  Hey, I bet you make a bundle, wheelbarrows of moola and all that."

Hooper never discussed his income with anyone.  "I do okay," he said, flipping his ping-pong tie over his shoulder to keep it safe from flying pumpkin innards.  "Boy, it's been years since I carved a pumpkin."

Niccolo went to work on his pumpkin with a vengeance.  A tablespoon of seeds and stringy orange guts found their way onto Hooper's pants leg.  "Sorry," said Niccolo.  "This is so messy." He leaned over and scraped them off, but now there was now an oily stain on Hooper's leg.  Niccolo continued to scoop with gusto.

Anita sauntered among the pumpkin carvers kneeling on the floor hunched over their pumpkins.  She wore that trademark look of keen interest, characteristic of grade school teachers encouraging small children in bad art projects.

"What a great smile!" she remarked to one man, whose pumpkin was developing an uneasy leer.  The man beamed and began to explain the idea for the smile, but Anita had moved on, adjusting her rabbit ears.

The room buzzed with voices.  Something ridiculous, Hooper thought suddenly thought, about a room full of lonely grown men in sports coats and ties carving pumpkins.

Anita's shoes appeared right under Hooper's nose. He looked up.

"So you two got stuck over here," she said amiably.  She squatted down to monitor the progress, resting on her heels.

"Your pumpkin's face is a little crooked," she commented amiably to Niccolo. "He could use a tooth right there."

She scraped her fingernail against the pumpkin's crooked grin. Niccolo looked up in a fever, strands of orange pumpkin clinging to his nose and cheeks.

"Here," said Anita, and handed him a napkin. "You've got goop on your face."

She turned to Hooper.  "Where on earth did you get that huge pumpkin?  I've never seen anything so big."

Someone nearby guffawed.  Bud began to whoop with laughter. Hooper pretended not to hear.

"So you work on personal injury cases?" asked Anita. She was speaking so loudly that Hooper imagined the whole room of ears were attuned to his reply.

"Yes, been at it about thirteen years now."

"That must be interesting work," said Anita.  "My sister recently tripped over a Mr. Potato Head in her girl-friend's driveway and broke her hip. She's suing."

"Here in California?"

"No, Idaho.  That's where my family's from.  I'm the only renegade."

"How long have you been here?"  Hooper imagined fields of potatoes (or Potato Heads), or was that Iowa?  Those "I" states always confused him.  Indiana, Iowa, Idaho.  They all ran together. Beside him, Niccolo was sweating profusely and stabbing at his pumpkin.

Anita rocked back on her heels, calculating. "Oh, about ten years.  I took a break for a year and lived in China."

"In China!" said Hooper. "That must have been interesting. What were you doing in China?"  He modulated his voice into sincerity so it wouldn't appear he was making small talk.  Anita was not all that pretty, he'd decided.  And certainly the rabbit ears weren't helping.

"Yes, I'm a registered nurse and I was working in a small village teaching people about nutrition and AIDS and general health care."

"That must have been fascinating," said Hooper.  "I've always wanted to go to China."

"Yes," sighed Anita, "that's what everyone says," and she stood up.  Hooper started to say he meant it, that he'd been in Asia several times himself for conferences and once for vacation in Thailand, but Anita's attention was now on Bud's pumpkin.  "Now that," she remarked to no one in particular, "is a weird pumpkin."

She walked to the other side of the room and joined the biker and a stuffy-looking dark-skinned black fellow with a too-small pullover sweater straining against his potbelly. He heard Anita ask, "And what do you do?" and the potbellied man said, "Me?  I'm a retired history professor."

Hooper asked Niccolo, "So, did you meet Anita through a personals ad too?"

Niccolo, flushed, nodded.  "I think it's how everyone here knows her."

"She didn't invite any women," said Hooper.  "Don't you think that's a little weird?"

"No," said Niccolo, "but why should she?  She is trying to meet a man."

Hooper scanned the room.  He was definitely at the top of the pile; maybe the biker had him beat, but that was always the advantage of youth.

"Come over here, Anita," called Bud. "I need an expert medical opinion on whether my pumpkin's anatomically correct."

Anita snapped back, "If you don't know about anatomy by now, Bud, it's a little late."

This got a laugh from everyone.  Someone said, "Your pumpkin's not the only one who could use a little Viagra, Bud!"  More nervous laughter.

Bud was reveling in the attention, his face a bright mask of triumph.  He reminded Hooper of prisoners kept in solitary for weeks at a time, who were so desperate for physical contact and attention, they'd bait the guards just to get them to rush in and tackle them.

Hooper wanted out.  He finished gutting his pumpkin and quickly sketched on the face with a pencil.  He would leave as soon as he'd turned the thing into a semblance of a jack-o'-lantern.  What was Anita going to do with so many pumpkins? Light them all and stick them in her window and laugh at everyone for their folly?

Niccolo seemed to have given up on his pumpkin and sat looking down with disappointment at the mess he'd made.

Anita seemed to have given up too.  She sat on the edge of the sofa now, legs crossed, eyes roaming the room carelessly, with disinterest.  She had put some easy listening music on the CD player. A dozen men, thought Hooper, and none of us made the grade.

"Hey, Anita," called Bud.  "You got any booze here?"

"This is a dry party," she said. "I think when you're first meeting people you shouldn't be under the influence."

Someone joked, "Where are all the girls?" and uncomfortable laughter followed.  No one came right out and said what everyone was thinking.

"Well, now!" said Anita.  "You've all done a great job on the pumpkins.  Let's line them all up here in a row and put the candles in them and see what we have."

She began to clear space along the window ledge behind the sofa.  Hooper straightened up.

"Nice work," she complimented him.  "Very artistic."

"Thanks."   Hooper stood up and brushed off his knees.  "Thanks for having me, but I've got to get going. I had this previous appointment...." He was a horrible liar, and it was obvious he was lying, but he was past caring.

"Oh?" She gave a shrug.  "Too bad you have to leave so fast before I've judged all the pumpkins.  Thank you for coming." 

He started awkwardly in the direction of the door.

"Hooper!" He turned. Anita pointed to his pumpkin.  "Be sure and take it with you.  Grab a candle off the table on your way out. Enjoy your Halloween."

Hooper said a general good-night, shook hands with Bud and Niccolo, and hoisted up his enormous pumpkin onto his shoulder.  On his way out, he snagged a candle and a couple of stick matches, for no good reason he could think of. 

As he started down the carpeted steps, he heard the sounds of other leave-takings.  Men making excuses.  Everyone finding a reason to go.

Anita was thanking them all, urging them all to take their pumpkins. Hooper quickened his pace.

"Hooper!"

He turned around.  It was Niccolo, right on his heels.  He carried his half-finished pumpkin in an awkward embrace.

 "That was not a good time, was it? You want to get a beer?"

Hooper didn't, but it was easier to feel sorry for Niccolo than for himself.  At least he, Hooper, didn't sweat under stress.

"Sure, how about down on Clement Street. You want to follow me in your car?"

"I took a cab," said Niccolo.  "Where do you live?"

"Mission," said Niccolo.  "I come with you for one beer, then I catch cab home.  No problem."

"What the hell," Hooper said and, juggling his pumpkin in his arms, he unlocked the passenger door and made room for Niccolo and his lopsided pumpkin.

After his second beer at the corner bar, Hooper lit the candle inside his pumpkin. To the woman bartender's expressed delight, the face glowed wickedly.  There were a lot of comments; people seemed to think it was funny.  Niccolo caught the mood and lit the candle in his pumpkin as well. 

"What's wrong with your pumpkin, man?" a man in a Daffy Duck costume shouted from several bar stools down.  "He's only got one eye."

Niccolo frowned and looked at Hooper.  "My pumpkin is deformed.  But I don't care."

"Look at that big pumpkin!" remarked a girl, passing by Hooper. Her face was pierced in a dozen places.  She was wearing a pirate's eye patch, and some kind of black crinoline and spiky heels. "It's awesome, man."

"I wonder," murmured Niccolo, downing his third beer, "which of those guys Anita chose."

"Who cares?" said Hooper.  "It was a complete waste of time. Pretty insulting, if you ask me.  Makes me just want to stay home from now on."

"It's like one of those dating shows on television, you know where they fix people up?"

Hooper chuckled.  "You're right.  She had her pick of the bunch, didn't she.  Bachelor Number One, Bachelor Number Two, Bachelor Number Three. I'm surprised we didn't have to fill out a questionnaire, take a health test."

"Not a very pretty girl." Niccolo shook his head. "Not my kind at all. I like Asian women."

"Sour grapes?" asked Hooper.

"Sour grapes?" repeated Niccolo, not comprehending.

"It's an expression, that's all.  Means when you can't have something, you point out its flaws."

"Oh, I see," said Niccolo, eyes focused on two gorgeous young women in 60's style mini-skirts and tall platform shoes cross to the rest room. 

"Never mind," Hooper told him.  He was feeling oddly hopeful.  He thought how he would look forward to getting a good night's sleep and starting off for the gym early in the morning.  Yes, his luck could change very soon. Just watching the two girls in the short skirts pause and pose, put their heads together and giggle, renewed his faith in the possibility of romance.  One of them spotted him looking, noticed the pumpkin burning behind him, pointed, and laughed appreciatively.  Hooper smiled back.  Could it be this easy?

"You have much luck with the personal ads?" asked Niccolo.  He ordered another beer.

Hooper shrugged.  He was hoping to catch the girl's eye again, to signal interest.

"Me, I meet lots of girls, but none of them are right," said Niccolo.

"I think first off, you want to call them women," Hooper corrected. "Anyone over 18 is a woman, unless you're  . . ." He let the thought trail off.

"You meet lots of girls  in the personals?" Niccolo asked.

"I'm beginning to have my doubts about the personals, but I promised my friend Myrna I'd give them a try."  The mini-skirted girl turned and offered her profile to Hooper.  Her body bent and swayed as she talked and gestured. She was too young, he knew it, but at this point he didn't care.  After all, Myrna had said he should stay open. He was about to get off his bar stool and approach her, when Niccolo leaned across, his eyes receding behind their lids. He was clearly drunk.  "Hooper," he said in a husky voice.

Hooper lost his train of thought. "Huh?"

"Hooper, I would like to go home with you."

"What?"  Hooper bumped against his pumpkin.  The candle flame flickered. "Don't you have a -----?  Oh, you mean like go home?"

Niccolo nodded meaningfully.

Hooper spread his hands. "Hey, you've got me all wrong. I'm flattered and all, but frankly you're not my type."  He swallowed the last drop of beer.

"I'm bi," said Niccolo.
            "Oh, no, I'll buy," said Hooper. "Beer's on me."

"No, I said I'm bi," said Niccolo. "Aren't you bi too?"

"No, not really," said Hooper with a sigh  and slapped a twenty on the counter.  "Put your wallet away. I've already got it.  And yours too."

"Hey, don't worry," said Niccolo.  "I just thought we could both use a little company . . .  you know, until we meet women . . . ."

"Thanks, but no thanks," said Hooper. "Not my style." He wanted to feel flattered, but Niccolo's desperation was not attractive.

Niccolo turned to the bartender and ordered another beer. "I'm staying then----see if my luck changes," he said to Hooper with a wink. The top of his pumpkin smoldered and smoked, and a sickly sweet scent of burning pumpkin shell issued forth.

Hooper wished Niccolo good luck, then glanced over to where the two girls were standing.  They had just been approached by two younger men, men with lots of hair, men with smooth faces and expectant eyes. 

Something about their freshness, their eagerness made Hooper smile in spite of himself.  They still believed, he thought.

He was almost to the door of the bar when he heard someone call over the low din, "Excuse me, sir!"

He half-turned.  The bartender, a girl with long dark hair and a pierced eyebrow, was traveling toward him in her black tights and ballerina skirt at a fast clip.  She wore an expectant look on her face.  For a moment Hooper thought his luck was changing.  But then he realized the girl was lugging his giant pumpkin. "Here, you left this," she said thrusting the pumpkin at him.  "He's really cute, but he's not my type."

She was making a joke . . . Hooper paused, accepting the pumpkin half-heartedly.

"Oh, thanks -- I'm supposed to take this to a party," Hooper lied. "Thanks very much."  The bartender winked and turned around, disappearing back inside through the crowd.  Hooper stood a moment with the grinning pumpkin in his arms, wondering if he should go back inside and boldly place his phone number in her hand, but he didn't.  Instead, he crossed over the sidewalk and set the pumpkin down on the curb.  Flickering there, it added an air of festivity to the street. Looking up, he saw the night sky now thickening with the promise of rain.  Two couples dressed like something out of Louis the Fourteenth's court strolled by and pointed.  One of the women made a joke and everyone laughed.

Three drag queens striding along in heels and ball gowns bent down and shook their fans in the pumpkin's face.  "Now there's a nice big boy," camped one, and beamed at Hooper as he passed.

 The night was still young. Hooper sauntered back to his car, but turned to observe the pumpkin briefly before inserting  the key in the lock.  From this distance he thought how the cheerful disembodied face was a funny version of himself, cast from a strange bar into a foggy San Francisco night.  Instead of getting into his car, he glanced at his watch and looked around to see where he might go next.  Another eight hours until sunrise.  No guarantees, but if Myrna had her way, the night, itself so young, was an invitation. 

Copyright 2002, Alyce Miller

nidus is an online publication supported by the Writing Program at the University of Pittsburgh's English Department.