Eponymous

For three years I lived in Manhattan. I am originally from New York state (an upstate hick), but my family had been steadily moving southward until we wound up in the southeasternmost corner of South Carolina. After a number of years of being a big fish in a little pond, I decided to go somewhere where nobody knew my name. I moved to New York City.
New York is a city full of stories, they just need someone with some flair to write them. I don't have that, I only have the stories. This is my favorite.
I was living in the worst apartment building on 82nd street on the Upper East Side, a mere block or two from actual luxury at either end. It was a studio apartment with a former boyfriend as the leaseholder. That's another story.
I was out late on a Saturday morning to pick up some things from the grocery store. I had one of those ubiquitous two-wheeled carts and, for a change, I had gone to the smaller grocery east of us instead of the Grand Union with the enormous pear out front on 86th. Living on a shoestring, I was always looking for a bargain somewhere. To get there, I had to pass a large apartment building with a lobby and doormen. I was on my way back, with a full cart when I was stopped by an attractive but snappish young man who was looking for a deli. "Not what they have in there," he indicated jerking his head at the grocery, "a real deli where I can get a sandwich." I knew just such a place. There was a great deli on Second Avenue. I directed him westward and gave him the particulars of the place. He was so grateful, but still snappish, that he asked if I would like to go.
It was still early for lunch, I had to take the groceries back to the apartment, and this was a stranger who accosted me on the street, so of course I said I'd go. We strolled back up 82nd Street to my drab apartment building and he started telling me about how he came to be looking for a deli (so unsuccessfully) at that hour.
"I'm here for my cousin's son's bar mitzvah," he told me. It was his job to give the opening blessing. Andrew (let's call him that because I promise I can never remember names) had taken the early train in from Boston. He was interning at the JFK School of Government at Harvard. That was nice. I had a friend at Harvard Law School. I went up there occasionally to see him. When he got to his cousin's apartment building, he couldn't get upstairs. The intercom system was down and the Nazi doormen were unable to reach his cousin. So there he was, hungry and nowhere to go.
We reached my building and he offered to carry the cart upstairs. I said he could help, but that it wasn't that heavy, but he insisted on carrying. On the way up the stairs he told me it was the first time he'd picked anything up since he'd had the casts removed from his arms. Hmm, I thought, he's starting the Guilt Thing early. "Casts?" I asked. Yeah, he did gymnastics and was working out on the rings when he snapped both his forearms. I looked him over. I'd seen male gymnasts before and none of them were that tall.
I unlocked the door, hoping my roommate, Fred, would be up. He had just gotten up (he worked on Broadway, keeping late hours), but the sofabed was still out and he hadn't dressed. Fred had an impressive physique from the waist up, but no ass. His chest was covered in mounds of hair of three different colors. He had a carefully trimmed beard. He was wearing tiny silken trunks and no makeup. I told him we had company. I explained to Andrew that as Fred and I had once dated, he felt it his duty to vet all my male companions. His excuse was that People Knew that we lived together and if they saw me out with someone else, they'd wonder why I wasn't with him. So, my male companions had to pass inspection. Fred looked him up and down as I put away the groceries and explained that we had met on the street and were going to the Second Avenue Deli for a sandwich. Fred then said Andrew looked "okay."
As we left the apartment building, Andrew decided that he would try his cousin one more time. We walked east to the fancy-shmancy building and when we got inside, the doorman explained that they had been able to reach his cousin by contacting someone else on that floor and he was to go right up. Andrew then explained he was going to leave me in the lobby. My recollection of the lobby was that it was pretty large and modern with lots of white marble. Andrew was leaving me there because if his cousin knew I was there, I'd be invited upstairs. If I went upstairs they would invite me to the bar mitzvah. If I went to the bar mitzvah, for the rest of his life Andrew would hear about the Time He Brought the Blonde Shikseh to his Cousin's Bar Mitzvah.
That was fine with me. The bar mitzvah was that afternoon and I had other plans. It was a shame, because I'd never been to a bar mitzvah and it would probably make a good story. Whatever I was doing was something I couldn't get out of because I remember being disappointed. Andrew left me in the lobby and I pulled off my mittens and undid my coat and scarf to wait. He was gone a very long time. When he finally reappeared, he explained that he was almost unable to get away at all. The only way he escaped was he had to admit that he had someone waiting downstairs for him. Now, of course, they had to meet me. There was no way out. He went all Dennis Leary on me, bent over, gesticulating, and running his hands through his hair.
We got on the elevator while he coached me.
"I'm really sorry, but if they invite you to the bar mitzvah, tell them you have something else to do this afternoon."
"I do have something else to do," I said.
"They're going to insist," he added, all stressed out.
"It's fine. I have some other commitment."
"And if they ask you, your last name is Schwartz!" he groaned.
Tch, such misery! Why all the tsimmis?
In the apartment, I was surrounded by the whole family. The women had their hair coiffed and protected by toilet paper swaths (as my mother used to do), but, like the men, they were in jeans and shirts. I was introduced all around as "Marf," something Andrew considered to be neutral. Their hungry eyes were on me and it occurred to me that, being in his late 20s, Andrew was being pressured to bring home possible marriage material.
They wanted us to stay and eat there, but Andrew squashed that one.
They invited me to the bar mitzvah and I told them truthfully that I would love to go, but I had a prior engagement.
Andrew extricated us as quickly as was politely possible and we walked silently to the elevator. Inside the elevator he sighed and relaxed and I, unable to contain myself any longer, burst out laughing.
"What's so damn funny?" he asked.
"Schwartz," I said.
"It was all I could think of. It's a good thing they didn't ask."
"You don't even know my last name!" I said.
"Well, what is it?"
"Shopmyer."
"Oh hell, " he said, somewhere half-past relief, "that would have passed."