Angela Organ – Claudia Azalde
August 6, 2025
Angela Organ was ready. A black lace bodysuit under a fitted wool jacket, feet tucked into black secretary pumps, a tablet of Choward’s Violet gum in her mouth, and a final touch of perfume that smelled like an incontinent but glamorous old woman’s pantyhose. She switched off her lamp, which had a base shaped like a white horse, and set out into the night.
The subway dropped her two blocks from Lotus, the Thai restaurant where her best friend Beverly Chicago worked. Lotus had a small river running through it, being funneled through stone troughs, with real lotus flowers floating in the lazy stream of water. Coupe glasses adorned with tropical flowers and lychees rested on top of the violet organza tablecloths. Beverly was in a black silk top and trousers, with her tight curls pulled up into a bun and a shimmery gloss on her lips. She walked around as if in a trance; her normal disorganized state suddenly transformed into a methodical one.
She brought Angela a lychee martini, telling her “The kitchen guys are happy you’re here, they spotted you from the back. Especially Brayan,” she said, with a wink.
Brayan was a Salvadoran line cook, who liked to send Angela special things from the kitchen, like Asian pears cut into the shape of a swan, fresh sugarcane juice, and spring rolls topped with flower shaped carrots. He had the sweetest smile and a fade with the shape of a lightning bolt shaved into it. He also had some interesting habits, such as drinking fifteen beers at a time, and getting handjobs from prostitutes.
Once they all went out together and ended up in a club that was in a converted basement on the bottom of a rowhouse deep in Queens. The speakers blasted a thumping cumbia and they all took mezcal shots from plastic cups. Brayan kept trying to dance with her and kissed the side of her face but she ran away from him. Eventually, her and Beverly escaped together in a shared car, giggling and stumbling out onto the street.
She got a text from Colin Cardinal asking what she was doing that night, but she wasn’t particularly enthused by the prospect of seeing him. She had met him at a party a couple months ago, and he was the preparator of a gallery in Tribeca. Since they worked fairly close to one another they sometimes met for drinks after work. His eyes had a sad puppy dog look in them, which she would have loved as a seventeen year old, but felt was unbecoming for a thirty two year old man, though he had a symmetrical and classically handsome face. He could drink one tequila soda after the other, and then stumble out to meet the cocaine dealer around the block. He was fun, but Angela could sense something hollow inside of him, that was hidden by his casual alcoholism and social dexterity.
It seemed to Angela that some people had the ability to float through life in a pleasant way, as if on an attractive boat off of the coast of southern Europe. But after a while you realized they had no ability to get to a destination, and would remain forever unmoored.
The last time they got together they went to a screening of Ms.45, the Abel Ferrara movie. He was Colin’s favorite director, of course. They went to a bar afterwards, and Colin drank one mezcal drink after the next. He started telling a story about the cops being called on him and his ex girlfriend and then he started running his fingers through Angela’s hair and telling her how beautiful she was.
“You know, you kind of look like Zoë Lund,” he said, looking at her with his puppy eyes.
Angela laughed, “I don’t know about that. Maybe with a bigger nose.”
They started making out, which was one thing that Colin Cardinal was definitely good at.
She awoke the next morning in his Ridgewood apartment. His sweaty body was splayed out on the gray sheets, and he reached for her in his sleep. She let him hold her for a while, but she started to feel increasingly parched. Thankfully he lived alone, so she could free herself from his clutches and tiptoe out into the kitchen while still in the nude.
His kitchen was fairly clean, but most of the glasses in his cabinet seemed to have the names of various drinking establishments emblazoned on them. She drank tap water from one that read “Paddy’s Irish Pub,” and decided she wanted to go home. When she walked back into his room, he was starting to wake.
“Hey,” he said, smiling sleepily.
“Hey, I think I have to head out. I just remembered that I’m supposed to meet Beverly.”
“Oh ok,” he said disappointedly. “You sure you don’t want a coffee or anything?”
“I’m ok, thank you though.”
“I had a nice time last night.”
“Yeah, me too,” she said, while pulling on her stockings.
She decided to ignore his text, and went to H₂O Lounge with Beverly once she got off work. Small silver fish flickered in a low lit tank behind the stainless steel bar, and a giant white orchid sat next to it. A chopped and screwed version of “Why” by Carly Simon echoed through the room. Beverly flirted with Ivan, the buzzcut sporting bartender, and drank margaritas. They slid into a white vinyl booth and gossiped for two hours, before heading home.
On Thursday evening, Angela met Beverly after work at an opening at a second floor gallery in Tribeca. It was David Xu’s solo show, who was one of the late twenties/early thirties minimalist sculptor guys that orbited around New York. The show consisted of various concrete shapes placed on stainless steel shelves jutting out into the room. How boring, Angela thought, the work lacked an aura. Beverly was a bit more complimentary, since she was sleeping with the guy after all. Apparently his bedroom consisted of a mattress on the floor, a white comforter, and a white lantern, with only one pile of books, one large rock, and a black vase.
Beverly went about making her rounds, weaving seamlessly through the crowded gallery. Angela talked to Iris for a while, a beautiful six foot two trans girl with wide blue eyes like a Midwestern beauty queen, who was wearing a sixties dress embroidered with strips of Indian silk. She was talking about how she only wore one pair of shoes at a time, until they were totally worn out. Her current pair were yellow python ballet flats.
“That feels very frugal, like in the olden days,” Angela said.
“Yeah, I like that feeling. I hate having too many shoes lying around my apartment. And I hate shoe racks. ”
Beverly circled back around to them, with David on her arm, who was in a plain white tee shirt and loose fitting black pants, holding a can of Modelo.
“Congrats on the show!” Angela said.
“Thanks for coming. We’re probably gonna head out to Lake House soon, for the afterparty.”
At Lake House she drank an old fashioned under one of the blue and yellow canvas canopies that enclosed the wooden booths. David and Beverly were making out across from her, while Raul Ramos, the son of a Mexican oil tycoon who was always hanging around, inched closer to her. He was fairly good looking, but had horrible breath and kept trying to talk about Rousseau. She told them all she had to get up early for work and walked toward the subway.
Somehow, she accidentally ended up on the uptown train. She almost got off to transfer, but decided to stay on for a couple stops, to have a drink at the bar of her favorite classic hotel. She walked with her headphones on and her eyes glued to the ground, avoiding all of the cracks in the sidewalk.
She sat on a stool covered by a red velveteen cushion, which was bordered by short gold tassels. A man sat at the end of the bar, sipping dark liquor on the rocks. He looked a little bit like Marcello Mastroianni and appeared to be in his early forties. He was wearing a dark suit and had tired eyes.
She ordered Cocchi Americano on ice and could feel him watching her. She looked back at him, and decided she liked the look of the crow’s feet around his eyes, the subtle indents in his forehead. His hands suggested he was a man with real purpose, and he had no wedding ring on his fingers.
He smiled, as if noticing her approval. “I like your dress,” he said, a bit loudly so she could hear a couple of bar stools away.
She looked down at her clothes; a black blouse with a high, almost Edwardian style neck, a black pencil skirt, tights, and black pumps.
“Oh thanks, it’s actually a skirt and top.”
“Sorry, I can never get it right. I’m Piero by the way, Piero Venturini. Do you mind if I join you?”
“Sure,” she said, moving her jacket over. “I’m Angela.”
His presence at such close proximity to her was unnerving, yet something about his manner made her feel perfectly at ease. He smelled elegant and strange, a bit like a church, or a freshly cut log inside of a Prada store.
“Are you staying here, Angela?” His English was lightly accented and lilting.
“You mean in the hotel? No, I live here but I just stopped in for a drink after work. Are you staying here?”
“Yes, I’m here for work. What do you do?”
“I’m a copywriter for a cosmetics company.”
“Very interesting.”
“No, it’s actually pretty dull. What do you do?”
“I work in sales. I’m here on business from Milan.”
“What do you sell?”
“Medical devices, for cancer research purposes.”
“Wow, a very noble cause.”
“Yes, indeed. Are you waiting for anyone here? A boyfriend perhaps?”
“No, I’m here alone. Are you waiting for a girlfriend?”
“No, I’ve been divorced for a long time, and I’m in New York alone. Are you from here?”
“No, but I’ve lived here for eight years. I’m originally from Miami. Are you from Milan?”
“Wow, that’s quite a while. No, I’m actually from Turin, but I’ve lived in Milan for a very long time.”
He bought them both another round of drinks and they talked about their respective childhoods. When Angela said she had better get going, he asked for her number, and said he would like to take her out sometime. She recited it to him, and he bid her farewell with a light kiss on the cheek.
The next day she met Beverly for matcha lattes, and told her about this sophisticated older man she had just met.
“Wow, he sounds so perfect,” she said dreamily. “I’ve realized that men under thirty five are basically still little boys.”
“Yeah, I wonder if he is too good to be true.”
For their first date he took her to an Italian restaurant housed in an old townhouse in Midtown. It had white tablecloths and wood paneled walls, with fresh cut flowers placed in bud vases on every table. He ordered an expensive bottle of red wine and picked out all of the food for them both; grilled octopus, spaghetti bottarga, scallops with garlic sauce, venison osso buco, and panna cotta for dessert.
She wore a mid length black dress, and her long dark hair fell around her shoulders.
“You look beautiful,” Piero said, as the suited waiters brushed the crumbs from their table into little silver pans.
On the second date, he took her to see Puccini’s Madame Butterfly. Silent tears fell down her face during the third act, and Piero grabbed her hand.
Afterwards, they ate lemon sorbet and drank espresso with Sambuca. He started explaining the plot of the Houellebecq novel he was reading. She hadn’t read that one, but had read two of his other books.
Sitting at her desk at work, she got a text from him saying “Mi Manchi Molto,” with a kissy face. She went to the bathroom to reapply her lip liner and giggled while she primped in the bathroom mirror.
On the third date, they went to a bar inside of Grand Central station. Angela drank one too many martinis, and she couldn’t stop laughing. Piero seemed amazingly funny. His gray cashmere sweater suited him so perfectly.
He started kissing her in the gold rimmed elevator, his kisses warm and insistent. By the time they got up to the hotel room she was very drunk. She lost her balance along the carpeted hallway and seemed to fall into the plush white king size bed. Her clothes seemed to fall off as well, as Piero grabbed her by the waist and pulled her closer to him.
She woke up curled into his arms. It seemed like she fit there perfectly, nestled up to his chest. He stirred and pulled her closer. As he woke up, he began to kiss her back and neck. They made love and their bodies seemed to make perfect sense together. Afterwards, he held her and kissed her, stroking her cheek with his palm, and pushing the hair out of her face.
“Do you want to get breakfast? I can order room service,” he proposed.
“Yes please.”
Piero called and made an order. He put his arm around her and turned on the TV, they watched a show about selling houses in the Caribbean. The host with perfectly set barrel roll auburn waves was showing an older looking white house on the west side of Puerto Rico. It seemed to melt into the curvy tropical trees and vegetation surrounding it, but it was three blocks from the beach.
Piero squeezed her arm, “What if I bought that house for us? We could grow mangoes and passion fruit and have babies running around everywhere. And you would look so good with a tan.”
Angela imagined herself with a round belly and a full bust in a white bikini and shell necklace, with a ripe mango dripping juice down her chin. Piero was next to her in this hazy dream sequence, playing with a little girl in the sand. He was tan and looked more handsome than ever.
“That sounds really nice,” she said.
They heard a knock on the door, and Angela went to put on a plush white hotel robe.
A young hotel employee came in, pushing a cart. On it were two trays, which held halved grapefruits with proper grapefruit spoons, long slices of cantaloupe, strawberries, Belgian waffles, bacon, fresh squeezed orange juice, and coffee.
“Just put it on the table,” Piero said. He thanked him and gave him a cash tip.
Angela suddenly felt like she was starving and she ate the spread voraciously. When she finished, she lay back in the chair with a hand on her stomach.
“I want to take a nap,” she said.
“I think I’ll take a shower, if you want to join me. But please nap if you want to!”
She yawned and said, “I think I’d like to lay down for a minute.”
As he went into the bathroom, she looked around the room and noticed it was devoid of any personal items, which was strange for a longer term stay. She opened the drawers of the dresser and the door of the armoire, and they were both empty of clothes. There was no suitcase tucked away either. From the bathroom she could hear the shower being turned on and the curtain pulled back along the metal rod.
His wallet was on the side table, brown Italian leather that was a little worn around the edges. She pulled out the hotel key for this hotel, his EU citizenship card (he looked serious and handsome in the photo), his credit card, and then tucked behind it was a paper sleeve, holding another hotel key card.
The plastic key card was marked with the Days Inn logo, and an ugly yellow and blue geometric pattern. On the paper sleeve, written in blue pen, was Room 206. She quickly looked it up, and found that the only Days Inn in the area was a couple stops downtown on the train. Breathless, she stuffed the key card into her purse and hurriedly threw on her clothes. She closed the heavy door very gently, so that it made no sound.
The facade of the Days Inn was set back a bit from the street, as if to make its garish blue and orange color slightly less offensive to the eyes of passing pedestrians. The building itself was extremely skinny, and it rose up awkwardly above the low rise pre-war apartment buildings around it.
She walked inside, passing by the pimply receptionist sitting behind the black granite desk. As she walked down the hallway to the stairwell, she thought that the floor tiles were the ugliest ones she had ever seen. She went up one flight of stairs and down a carpeted hallway until she reached room 206. Hands shaking, she took the key card out of her purse and as she did she felt her phone vibrating, it was Piero calling her. She ignored the call and pushed open the door.
The air in the room was stale, the floor was a horrible gray and black cubical pattern, and there was a stock photo of the New York City skyline printed on a canvas triptych which hung above the bed. On the desk was a pack of Marlboro golds, a small half finished handle of Plymouth gin, a small unopened bottle of Canada Dry tonic water, and a handwritten note on the hotel stationery. It was definitely Piero’s handwriting, and it read:
Per Alessia–
€10,345
-2300
= 8045
On the corner of the desk was a stack of folded papers. She opened the one on top, which seemed like a legal document. It was in Italian but she could make out what it was, unsigned divorce papers. Inside the folds of the document was a small photo, of a beautiful brunette woman with a little boy. They were sitting in the grass in a park on a sunny day, embracing each other and smiling at the camera.
The woman’s name on the divorce papers was Alessia Frangipani. Her signature was flowery and perfect, and a little bit slanted to the left. Underneath these papers was a check written out from Alessia to Piero for 10,000 euros, and under that was what looked like an identification card with Piero’s name on it. On the top of the card was printed L’unione principali di idraulici di Italia. She Google translated this, and found that it read: The Plumber’s Union of Italy.
Piero’s suits were neatly hung on wooden hangers which hung from a plywood baseboard. They seemed rather drab in the morning light, and now held the pathetic air of a teenage boy’s Sunday best.
She felt her phone vibrating again. She placed the key card in its paper slip on the desk, and then blocked the number that was calling her.
The sun was shining outside of the Days Inn. She put on her sunglasses and walked to the park to sit on a bench for a while. A light breeze brought up goosebumps on the back of her neck, and the air seemed to ring with the sound of children playing.
She stood up suddenly and all of the blood rushed to her head, spinning her vision around. She fell back down onto the bench, to avoid passing out.
An older woman approached her, asking if she was ok. She nodded and smiled, weakly.
“Yeah, I just stood up too fast.”
The next morning she walked to work taking a different route, and turned right onto a nearly empty street. The morning light passed through a chain link fence, illuminating gray pebbles on the ground. It was oddly misty, and steam rose from a manhole in the asphalt. Through the mist came a black Lincoln, inching slowly down the street. As it drove past her, the tinted window rolled down, revealing a dark haired man. She walked up to him, and he held out his hand, but as she got closer her vision began to blur.
The car sped off, tires screeching. She grabbed onto the chain link fence to regain her composure, her heart was beating a mile a minute.
Once she felt a bit better she continued, walking around a corner onto a wider street. A man in a tan suit was standing on the sidewalk, holding a white dove.
He winked at her, “Watch, watch this pretty lady!”
He flicked his other wrist and opened his palm, and suddenly there were two white doves in his hand, flapping their little wings. Angela clapped, and put a dollar into his hat. She couldn’t stop smiling.
That evening, she went to the gym after work. As she climbed onto the Stairmaster, she set the image on the screen to be one of a white sand beach, with clear turquoise water lapping at the shore. A wooden rowboat was tied up with a fraying rope, and skinny palm trees bent down toward the sea.