Chapter One

      This city is not mine by birthright: I was born over three thousand miles away in a sleepy town in the heart of England. But ever since the day I set foot on its sidewalks, I have felt caught up in the biggest, most welcoming embrace by every street, store and tree-lined avenue. I don’t know if a city can make a heart decision, but if it’s possible then New York chose to make me belong. And even though some of my most difficult and painful days have taken place here, somehow this city has always softened the blows—just like a good friend who sits you down with a cup of tea and tells you to be patient because things will turn out OK in the end. And you know they will. Eventually.

      My friend Celia tells me that I’m a ‘Frustrating but Adorable Optimist in the Face of Overwhelming Evidence to the Contrary’. If you think this looks like a dramatic newspaper headline then you’d be on the right track: Celia writes a column for the New York Times and she’s lived here all her life. She was one of the first true friends I made in the city and she watches out for me like a slightly neurotic older sister. She won’t mind that description of her—come to think of it, that’s probably one of hers anyway.

      Celia’s apartment is on the second floor in an elegant Upper West Side brownstone residence just off Riverside Drive on West 91st Street, and every Saturday morning we meet there to put the world to rights over coffee. Sitting at her maple table by the large picture window, I can see out to the street below. ‘Sit for long enough in New York and you’ll see everyone in the city walk by,’ Mr Kowalski always used to say. He was the original owner of my florist’s shop, before he retired to his beloved Warsaw with his daughter Lenka, where he lived until his death, just over five years ago. Mr Kowalski was another of the first true friends I made