DATING STACY

In Murray’s novella, a marketing consultant finds that post-pandemic New York City’s online dating scene is much more than he bargained for—and that it could cost him dearly.

As the story opens, it’s 2021, and 50-year-old Matthew is on his very first date after the start of the Covid-19 lockdown. His companion, Samantha, suddenly grabs his hands and squeezes tight: “What’s wrong?” she asks. “You don’t like me touching you?” Things are moving a little too quickly for the masked Matthew, and he immediately recoils from the contact. “Take off your mask and kiss me on the lips,” a thoroughly disgruntled Samantha presses further; before long, she tells him that she’s unvaccinated. Matthew begs off, and the date is effectively over. “Listen Matthew, you’re a handsome guy, but you’re not my type,” Samantha announces. “I’m sure of it.” Matthew lives a sedate and sober existence, and he hasn’t had a long-term relationship in years; he’s in a vulnerable spot when another date, Stacy, upends his life. She’s an unemployed 45-year-old woman with a trust fund, too much time on her hands, and a curiously unexplored fixation on her often-married father. Still, the very attractive Stacy easily insinuates herself into Matthew’s psyche, despite their obvious lack of chemistry from the start. She’s upfront about her struggles with depression, which Matthew appreciates, but he continually—and perplexingly—ignores a red flag: her avowed aversion to healthy relationships. Indeed, her litany of troubles with old boyfriends doesn’t seem to concern Matthew at all; he’s more than willing, for instance, to accompany Stacy on a late-night stroll around Riverside Park, immediately after her former beau, a troubled saxophone player named Hunter, accosts them in a bar.

None of this matters very much, though, because Murray manages to build effective tension and drama through the use of economical and direct dialogue. Each exchange between Stacy and Matthew ends with an anticipation of danger, consistently propelling the story forward. Like a savvy musician who knows the value of not playing too much, the author generates a palpable sense of impending calamity with the notes he elects to leave out, as when Matthew suggests to Stacy in Riverside Park that they should go back to her apartment: “Stacy kissed me again. ‘No. Not yet. Not yet. Let’s try to enjoy this moment fully.’” However, if there’s one area where Murray falters, it’s in his crafting of a decidedly less-than-bombastic climax. The trajectory of Matthew’s journey with Stacy is easy to predict, and its endpoint is ultimately unsurprising, when all is said and done. However, this may not be the best way to evaluate Murray’s adventure. After all, no piece of music can be rightly evaluated on its conclusion alone; rather, one must take into account the experience of listening to it and the feelings that it evokes. The author’s lean story structure hits enough intriguing notes to keep readers’ attention, even if they can probably predict how the final stanza will sound.

A somewhat predictable but strangely alluring tale of post-Covid love.