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“Never gets old.” Uncle Louie leaned against the railing and gazed at the skyline of Manhattan like it was a long-lost lover that hadn’t aged and still desired him. “She gets prettier and prettier over time. Every city is a woman. If New York City were a woman, in fall, she’d be Sophia Loren. In summer, Claudia Cardinale. Spring? Giulietta Masina. Winter, she’s Kaye Ballard in a babushka.”

“I’ll meet you after lunch.”

“Where you going?”

“I thought I’d walk around. Get some air,” I lied. It was the first lie I ever told Uncle Louie.

“I’m gonna grab a calzone at Rocco’s. You want one?”

“Yeah, that’ll be nice.”

“Good work on the installation. I’ll pick you up in an hour.”

Uncle Louie and I had done a final walk-through for our marble wall fountain installation in the courtyard of the Riverview apartment complex. I was sad when the work was complete because I couldn’t help but feel a personal connection to the neighborhood.

Hoboken was the first stop the immigrant Capodimonte men made in 1920 before moving down the shore to start our marble company. The women, my great-grandmother and grandmother (who was a little girl at the time), followed them to the United States in 1936, after my great-grandfather sent them the passage. They moved quickly to emigrate with the war brewing, leaving everything behind in Carrara. Maybe the idea of Hoboken as a refuge is in my bones. Hoboken carried our dreams while Manhattan was the glittering backdrop for them.

The doorman spun the revolving door like a lucky wheel of fortune.

“Miss Baratta?” The building Realtor, Margarita Cartegna, wore a black pantsuit and reading glasses around her neck on a gold chain. “I’ve got two studio units to show you. Do you prefer courtyard or riverside?”

“The Hudson River side, please.”

Mrs. Cartegna was surprised. “I thought you might like to overlook the fountain you installed.”

Once I have drawn the project; chosen the appropriate materials; worked with the stonemason, plumber, and electrician; and overseen the construction of a marble installation, I move on. The fountain in the courtyard is spectacular, but there was no need to look at it every day.

We got off the elevator on the seventeenth floor. Mrs. Cartegna opened the door of 17C and allowed me to enter the empty apartment first. There was nothing but windows and light in the L-shaped space. We were so high in the sky, I could reach out and touch the clouds as they floated by.

“I don’t have any one-bedrooms right now, but I personally believe that the studios feel more spacious. And truthfully, the wall closet is bigger in the studios than in the one-bedrooms…” She kept talking, but her voice faded away as I walked through the empty apartment, my heels clicking against the hardwood floor. Mrs. Cartegna did a hard sell on the new kitchenette and the bathroom, but I was not listening. I pushed the doors to the balcony open and stepped outside. Air! Light! Sky! The cold autumn air sent a chill through me. I was transfixed as a white cargo ship slowly sailed down the green river and out to sea.

Mrs. Cartegna joined me on the small balcony. “Wait until the leaves change. From here, they look like they’re made of gold velvet.” She leaned on the railing and looked down at the Hudson River and sighed. “Get the apartment of your dreamsnow, because when you have kids, a balcony is the first thing to go. Only singletons rent the balcony apartments.”

At least Mrs. Cartegna could see that I was asingleton. I liked that I didn’t have to explain myself to her. Maybe it was obvious because I had a gray pallor, a sign of cellar dwelling. I had been living in the dark for so long, she could actually see me blossom in the light. I wondered how I thought I could make a reasonable decision aboutanythingwhen it was so easy to hide myself in the basement like a broken machine that had lost its purpose. I reminded myself that I moved home out of necessity because Mom and Dad needed me. During my separation, when I was falling apart, my parents were too. Mom had a knee replaced, and Dad had his shoulder done. I had to hold them together. They even believed moving home and tending to their needs would take my mind off my “troubles.” If only that had been true.

I leaned against the railing next to the Realtor and looked out. “I made a dream board,” I told her. “I saw all of this. I made a collage of pictures fromWorld of Interiors,Traditional Home, andElle Decor. I saw myself high in the air, above the treetops. Like this. Only thing, there was an elegant bathtub on my board. And there’s no tub in this bathroom.”

“Ah-ha-ha.” She smiled and shook her finger. “There’s a hot tub and a pool on the roof.” She pointed. “I’ll show you. Full amenities. Parking. Do you have a car?”

“It’s a wreck.”

“You don’t need it. PATH is down the block. The train can take you anywhere.”

“Anywhere is exactly where I want to go.”

We went back inside the apartment. It was quiet inside, not a sound from the world below. I imagined sleeping without thewhoosh of the sump pump, the constant whirl of the dehumidifier, and the clunky sound of my parents’ footfalls over my head. I could fill this apartment with books, a sofa upholstered in a paisley of coral, peacock green, and midnight blue. The walls? Eggshell, with a few drops of cobalt blue stirred into the paint for that hint of Italian sky.

“The super can paint the place any color you like,” she said, reading my mind.

That would be a first. My sister, Connie, chose gumdrop lavender for our bedroom walls when we were girls. Dad painted the cellar apartment egg-yolk yellow, consulting no one. I think he had paint left over from a summer in the eighties when he painted the curb to prevent beach bums from parking in front of our house. I even relinquished my color rights when I was married. I acquiesced to Bobby’s favorite neutrals, silvers, and black. I pretended to like his masculine palette, but it was like living inside a box of razor blades.

“Anycolor?” I asked Mrs. Cartegna. “Do you mean it?”

“We should haveenough ravs,” Mom says from the kitchen doorway.

I jump.

“Sorry,” Mom says. “You were someplace else.”