I'm listening to the Superhero demo that Brady gave me, thinking about marketing ideas for them, when my phone rings.

"Hello?"

"Heaven," an unmistakable Albanian voice says. "I am on break. I must talk with you. If you have time right now?"

"Marco?"

"Who else do you know who sounds like this?" Marco says.

"What's going on, kiddo?"

"Can I speak with you? In person?"

"Sure," I say, and I agree to meet him at the little park across the street from Temple.

When I get to the park I spot Marco pacing, and I notice that he's wearing a blazer, which is very uncharacteristic. He looks almost dressed up.

"Hi, sunshine!" I say and give him a big hug. "How's the restaurant?"

"How do you think? It is awful. Same as always," he says. He lights a cigarette and takes a deep drag. "I have received bad news."

"What is it?"

"My visa is expiring in four days."

"Oh no!" I say, truly alarmed.

"I don't know why I don't have received this paper before now. If the idiots think I can resolve this in four days, I don't know how."

"Will you have to go back to Albania?"

"Eventually, yes," he says.

"In the next four days?"

"No, of course not in the next four days. I can't. And Jean Paul made me a fake social security number when I started, and now when I called for my visa they have two social security numbers-and I have no proof of working, and I can't work in the restaurant without my visa. It is some mess. Why Jean Paul gave me fake social security number I don't know."

"Well, why would he?"

Marco sighs. "Because when I was hired I didn't have one yet, and he just said that he made it up to be finished with paperwork."

"How thoughtful of him."

"Yes," Marco says. He lights another cigarette with the one that he's just about totaled.

"I'm so sorry, sweetie," I say. "Is there anything that I can do?" It's in that second that I really regret asking, because Marco gets down on both knees. I think he's about to propose to me, but he can't really be about to propose to me, can he? He is. This is awful.

"I am not sure of what is to be proper. Am I to be on both knees or one knee?" he says, and I want to cry. I adore this little dude, and I would really do whatever I could to help him out . . . but there is no way I am going to marry him.

"It's one knee, but get up, Marco." He picks up one leg and is now on one knee, looking at me with his one good eye.

"Heaven, I know that this is not very romantic because it seems like it is only because I need citizenship. And it is. But also, I have always thought you were the most beautiful girl in the world."

"Marco, stop . . . really-"

"It is true," he says, and he presses my hand.

"I can't marry you, Marco, so please don't ask me to marry you. I can't. I hate to say no, but I can't."

"When you were sad because you broke up with your boyfriend . . . when you first began to work with us . . . and you cried, and I told you that there were hundreds of mans that would love to be with you-I wanted to tell you that I would be your new boyfriend-"

"Marco, listen . . ." I say, but then he reaches into the pocket of his blazer and pulls out a box. The box is a little bigger than a ring box, but what else can it be? He got a ring? Oh, this is getting worse by the second.

"I can't afford the ring that girls want, but I have this to give you," he says. He opens the box and holds it out to me with the most heartbreakingly earnest expression on his face. And I look in the box.

It's a belt buckle. It's a belt buckle with a rooster on it. It's the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen.

"It's a rooster," I say.

"Yes, do you like it?"

"I . . . I love it! I think it's very beautiful . . . but I can't-"

"Heaven . . ." he says with a long pause that I'm sure seems entirely appropriate to him. "Will you please marry me?"

To say I am stunned by the question would be like saying Michael Jackson's face has been affected by plastic surgery. No one has ever asked me the question before, but much more unsettling is my realization that it was the one question I needed to hear to dispel my looming dead-by-twenty-seven curse. Instantly, a life with Marco flashes before my eyes: rides in tiny carriages drawn by goats, a diet consisting of potatoes and coarse grain alcohol (made from potatoes), a wardrobe consisting of broad flowered skirts topped off by an apron, smashing plates, milking cows, squeezing out little Marcos with overgrown bowl haircuts and little glass eyes that constantly need polishing.

I snap out of my day-mare to see him standing there looking sweet and hopeful, despite the aroma of stale cigarette smoke hanging about him. "No, Marco. I can't. I'm sorry." I hate this. I hate it. This is so unfair. I hate immigration, I hate Jean Paul, and I hate myself.

"I will love you forever, you know," he says. "Not just until I make citizen." I believe him. I'll bet he would. And given the fact that I still need to get married soon, this is almost like some sort of test. I don't know what I'm being tested for, because of course I'd never marry Marco, but it still feels like something. And I hope I passed. If I did, then why do I feel so shitty?

"I know," I say to Marco. "Please stand up." I reach my hands out to help him up.

"It is okay. I didn't think you really would, but I had to try."

"I'm sorry. Here . . ." I say as I hand him the box with the rooster belt buckle. "You should keep this."

"No, I want you to have it," he says. "I insist."

"Pardon my ignorance," I say, "but is there a special significance of the rooster in Albania?"

"No," he says.

"Oh. Okay then. Well, it's really . . . really . . . special."

"I am glad you like it. I hope you will wear it often and think of me."

"I will," I say. And now that I've said it, it means I have to wear it because I don't lie. I mean . . . I lie . . . but not when it matters. I never lie when it matters, and I never make a promise that I don't keep.

I give Marco a big hug, and I start walking back toward my apartment-with my new rooster belt buckle.

"Tell me everything," Sydney says as we settle into our uncomfortable wooden chairs at Starbucks.

"I wouldn't know where to begin," I say.

"Did you hook up with him?"

"Brady?" I say. "No."

"Hmm."

"Hmm what?" I say, smelling a notion baking in that oven.

"I just thought for sure you would have," she says. "I would have."

"Well, you're a little less discriminating than I am."

"True," she says. And then I lose her to a cute guy that walks in and orders an Americano. "I'm sorry," she says without breaking her gaze. "I'll be back with you in a moment." And she continues to fixate on Mr. Triple Shot until he walks out. "He was gay. Didn't even look over here once."

I cough. Then I let it drop. "In other news I got proposed to today . . ." Sydney abruptly stops drinking her coffee and stares at me with fish eyes. "Remember Marco?" I continue. "Did you ever meet him? The Albanian busboy?"

"The one with one eye?" she says. "Gross!"

"Be nice. He's in trouble with immigration. I felt awful saying no. Really awful."

"Well, of course you said no."

"But I didn't have anything to offer," I say. "Like, 'No, I won't marry you, but here's a free pass to stay in America.'"

"Ooh! While you're handing out good stuff . . . can I get a key to Gramercy Park?"

"Sure," I say.

"Too bad he's not loaded. I'd do it for the money," Sydney says as she sips her coffee. And then it hits me. Marco showed me pictures of his parents' home in Albania. They do have money. She wants new boobs, and he wants to be a citizen. Seems like a fair trade to me.

"Actually I think his family does have money . . ."

"What kind of money?"

"The boob-buying kind?" I offer.

This seems to touch her in a special place. She ponders. "Would I have to have sex with him?"

"That's your business," I say, laughing. "I'm a matchmaker, not a pimp." I was only half serious when I brought this up and I think Syd was only half serious when she asked about the money. And oddly, that seems to add up to one whole serious proposition. Then my cell phone rings, and I don't recognize the number on my caller ID.

"It's 213," I say to Syd, and then I answer. "Hello?"

"Hey, sexy . . . miss me?"

"Yeah . . . desperately," I say even though I have no idea who it is.

"It's Darren," he says. "I've been thinking about you."

"Hey, Darren," I say, and Sydney's eyes pop out of her head.

"Oh yeah . . . you need to fill me in on that one," she says, and I shush her.

"I'm in New York," he says. "I wanna see you."

"You're here? Wow. Okay . . . what's your schedule?"

"I'm free . . . right now."

"Well, I'm with Sydney right now."

"Tell her she's a ditz. Ask her if she's had a substantive thought since last time I saw her."

"Okay, I'll tell her you said that."

"How 'bout tomorrow night?" he says. "Aqua Grill? Like old times?"

"Sure . . ." I say slowly. "Sounds good."

"Great. I'll grab you around seven?"

"Uh . . . fine," I say. I give him my address and we hang up. "He said he misses you," I tell Syd.

"You're seeing him?" she asks.

"I guess so. He caught me off guard."

"Tonight?"

"Tomorrow."

"Oh boy . . ." she says.

Brady.

I wake up to a pounding on my door that can only be Heaven. So you can imagine my surprise when I open my door and find Phil standing there.

"Hug me," he says, thrusting himself into my arms. So I throw my arms around the fucker and hug him back.