"Charlie, I think you need something else in your life."

Charlie looked up from his desk, where he'd been staring at the Thursday New York Times crossword puzzle. Monday and Tuesday were easy, Wednesday took him a while, and Thursday stumped him about half the time. Friday and Saturday were completely out of the question. If he could get complete a Thursday, it meant a good weekend was on the way. He had been working on this particular Thursday since the morning, when he'd snaked the crossword page from the paper pile in the Starbucks down the street from his office.

"Rose, I'm busy," he said. "Don't you have some work to do?"

She strode around to his side of the desk and slammed her hand down on the crossword.

"17 across is dormouse," she said. "36 down is ruminate. 53 across is joi de vivre. That should get you most of the way done. Now pay attention."

Charlie double-checked her answers. They were correct.

"I know something about you," she said. "I know that you live alone, and I know that you work alone, and all of your customers come in at weird hours, and I have the sneaking suspicion that they're all men. But you're not gay. You're moody, petulant, short with me, but you still look at me all the time, and frankly, I know I'm not what you're looking for. I take care of myself, but I was born before Woodstock. You were probably still in high school at the second one."

"Just out of college," mumbled Charlie.

"Whatever. Not important. You need to go out more. You're lonely, Charlie."

Rose scared him a little bit, and when she was seated on his desk, leaning over him, lecturing and wagging her finger, she was Exorcist-class scary.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked.

She grinned at him. "I'm going to write you a personal ad, and I'm going to put it on Craigslist. Then you and I are going to sit down and read the personal ads, and you're gong to respond, and you're going to go out with some people."

"Why?" asked Charlie.

She got up and straightened her skirt, making her permed hair fall over her eyes. "Because you're bringing me down with your by-yourself-all-the-time moping," she said. "And I'm tired of that. Write something about yourself down, bring it over to my desk, and we'll get started."

SWM, 28. I live in the Lower East Side, and I work midtown in an import/export office. I like to listen to music, walk around the city, and relax with a good beer or two when things get a little hectic. If that sounds like your cup of tea, get in touch.

"This is it?" said Rose. She was chewing madly on a pen, which made her a little bit hard to understand. "This is how you're going to meet the woman of your dreams? This is so boring that George Lucas would think it's snappy. Who taught you...never mind."

She turned to her computer and fired up a word processor. "You need to have an air of mystery, but project competence and confidence." She typed away for a few minutes. "Here, look."

Are you tired of the usual New York City date crap? I am. I've gone out to shows, seen the bands, attended the underground theaters in Williamsburg, and done everything you can possibly do while trying to figure out how to meet someone in this great city. Frankly, I'd rather just have a drink and figure out if I like someone.

Me: 28, SWM, brown hair, greenish blue eyes, in shape. I work midtown at an import/export company, and I really like my job. I'm not one of those guys who gets out of work and starts tearing it down because I sold out and am working in banking. Nope. I work and I like it, and I hope you do, too. I try to leave the city on the weekends that I can-go hiking in the Gunks, take the Chinese bus up to Boston, even hit some of the swamps in Jersey (which I find surprisingly beautiful). If you're single, cute, and up to hang out, drop me a line. If you're married and just looking to have some fun-sorry, no dice. I hate to have to put that in there, but you just never know.

"That's ridiculous," said Charlie. "I've never been to the Gunks in my life. I don't go to Boston. I never leave the city. New Jersey isn't beautiful. This is so ridiculous."

"Are you tired of being by yourself all the time?" said Rose.

He paused. "I guess."

"Then shut up and start reading through the w4m ads. We'll find twenty that you like, we'll personalize this a bit for each one, and we'll get you out there. Are you ready?"

Charlie nodded. Dating had never really been his bag; he could count the number of blind dates he'd been on his life and not use up his available supply of thumbs. Not to mention that his freelance-assassin job didn't really lend himself to good introductory conversation. Throwing in that women tended to make him nervous-he'd much rather try to finish off a contract on a ninja with an anger problem than introduce himself to a girl at a bar-and he was probably going to miss all of the awards for Player of the Year.

On the other hand, he was lonely. Why not give it a shot?

New York is a playground for everyone, so why can't it be ours? I'm a SWF, 26, work downtown but live in Ft. Greene (I love Ft. Greene!) and am totally not into all of the midtown/UWS stuff. I'm as happy at the Bowery Ballroom as I am at the Strand or in the middle of Central Park with a decent bottle of wine, some bread and cheese. I was a crunchy hippie for a while, now I just play soccer. I'm vegetarian but don't care if you are, and most people think I'm pretty cute. I'm short, so you don't have to be too tall. Your pic gets mine if I like yours. And oh yeah, I'm from Nevada. But we're not all gambling addicts or hicks, so if that is one of your hangups, please don't bother.

They had exchanged pictures, then a couple of emails, furtively written from Rose's computer, and agreed to meet up for a quick drink at Manny's, a bar near Union Square. The bar was Tuesday-night uncrowded; he'd found two stools with no trouble, and had laid his coat on the one next to him so that nobody would steal it.

She was almost exactly like her picture. Five foot three, very long brown hair pulled back into a ponytail, petite, wearing a business-casual skirt and blouse underneath a long coat.

"Hi," she said.

"The seat's for you," he said. His heart was beating as quickly as it did when he was closing in on a hit.

"Thanks," she said, taking off her coat and hanging it from one of the hooks underneath the bar.

"So," she said as she sat down. "What do we talk about?"

He blanked. Surely there had been a current event, a war, a crash, a crime...something had happened in the world or the city today. He'd seen a headline in the Post that another guy had been reading on the subway on the way over: Man found in Queens Apartment with 78 Cats!

"Um...uh...what do you do?" he mumbled.

"Well, I work at a very specialized banking firm," she said. He noticed a small divot on the side of her nose; at one point she'd had a ring there. She was looking right at him as she spoke, her blue eyes were huge, and her eyelashes were proportionally long. Even in the dim light of the bar, they were the longest eyelashes he'd ever seen.

"Where?" Charlie's brain was going a mile a minute. He knew nothing at all about soccer.

"And on a club in college," she said, stirring the gin and tonic that the bartender put down in front of her. "I play once a week in a league, and then there's pickup in the park..."

She talked on, and Charlie found himself interested; he'd never played soccer in his life-the closest he'd come recently was when he'd recently kicked a head that he'd accidentally taken off into an alley to get it out of the way of a two-blocks-away cop. It hadn't been his fault-how was he supposed to know that the "special" rope he'd bought from Soldier of Fortune had been implanted with razor wire? But it was interesting, mostly because as she talked he could still look at her eyes.

"So what do you do?" she said. "You said import/export, but..."

"Well, it's kind of like that," he said. He'd decided to just continue with his standard cover job. "I deal exclusively in rugs from Uzbekistan..."

He'd never been to Uzbekistan, would never go to Uzbekistan, and had only chosen it as a cover job because it seemed unlikely that anyone he would meet in the course of a normal day would have spent time in a country where they habitually boiled dissidents.

"Uzbekistan?" she said.

"Uh...yeah," he said, looking at her with a small smile. Uzbekistan was mysterious, distant. The kind of guy who would do business there was tough, sympathetic, everything that a girl with big eyes and long eyelashes would love.

"No way! I did a one-year program there after college. Such a cool country..."

As she talked he felt little squibs of sweat starting to come out on his palms, under his arms, on his forehead.

"And I was living with these nuns," she continued. "Somehow the nuns had managed to put together this church sanctuary in Uzbekistan, and they ran a little hospital and school, and my job was to teach English to the local kids. Of course, the nuns only spoke Italian and a bit of Uzbek, and I didn't know either language before I got there, so I spent about three months not talking to anybody at all..."

She uttered a string of nonsense syllables.

"Excuse me?" said Charlie.

"Uzbek!" she said. "I figured you'd probably know some of the language."

"Not so much," he said. "See, most of the dealers want to speak English to practice. So...uh...are you looking for a different job, or do you like what you do, or..."

"Not really," she said. "But really...the thing about the Uzbeks is that they're so intense." She reached for her water, missed, and touched his fingers instead. "The men with their beards and the women with their chadors and veils; it's so amazing. It really must be hard to deal with them."

"They're pretty out there," said Charlie. The damp spots under his arms had definitely grown bigger, and he desperately wanted to wipe his forehead."

She smiled at him. "And then there's that little game they play..."

"Game?"

"You know, the bargaining one, where they..."

"Right. Yeah," interrupted Charlie. "That one. I hate that game."

She looked at him quizzically. "I like it."

Charlie gripped his drink hard. "I was wondering, about soccer..."

"Oh, forget soccer for now," she said, reaching over and grabbing his wrist. "I'm so excited to have someone to talk to about Uzbekistan! It' s so hard to have all of these thoughts bottled up inside about the place, and I don't know anybody here who's actually been there."

"Uh...yeah," he said. "Can you excuse me for a second?"

"Sure," she said.

He got up and walked to the back of the bar. It was one of those places with two unisex restrooms. Both were in use, so he stood.

"Uzbekistan," he said. "Uzbekistan? Who the hell has been to Uzbekistan?"

The door to one of the bathrooms opened, and he walked in after the rail-thin Euro-model woman who'd been in there cleared out. The door locked with a sliding bolt, and Charlie looked around for a way out. No dice: the window in this bathroom was blocked with iron bars. He went through his pockets-wallet, keys, switchblade, fishing line, three .45 cartridges, four receipts from Rite-Aid, and a small vial of clear liquid that was supposed to cause cardiac arrest, indistinguishable from a natural heart attack. He looked at the vial for a few seconds, then put it away. Nothing that could cut through iron bars, and suicide wasn't really a brilliant way out. He sighed and left the bathroom.

"Everything ok?" she said as he sat down.

"Um...no," he said. "Look, I kind of have to go...there's a problem. I have...um...Krohn's Disease, and I forgot to take my medication."

She furrowed her brow. "Oh...well, that's ok. Do you have to go?"

"Yeah," he said. "Otherwise I'd be going to the bathroom every fifteen minutes."

"No problem," she said. "We should get together again, don't you think? I just love talking about..."

"Uzbekistan," he said.

"Exactly!" she said. "Maybe I could come by and check out some of your rugs sometime?"

"Sure," he said, smiling and vowing to never use his real email address for online dating again.

Slim, seductive SWF looking for a partner in crime. And when I say that, I don't mean that I want you to sit in the getaway car while I'm inside robbing a bank. If we were actually robbing banks, ideal guy is right in there with me, the Val Kilmer to my De Niro (without the gambling problem) (and without the tattoos) (and the lame ponytail).

I'm looking for a SWM, 25-35, over 5'7". You should be able to appreciate the Supreme Beings of Leisure and the Magnetic Fields, have good taste in scotch and maybe indie-boy hair, but that's not necessary. I spend my days working on my acting (I take classes and such), my evenings waiting tables, and my in-between time reading and sewing. You should have no problem with the fact that I change my hair color when I get bored and like to wear fabulous shoes. Sound interesting? Drop a line!

Instead of a soft, pleasing pop, there was a minor explosion as the blowback overfeed, which had not had its 100-shot servicing, overfed, knocking Charlie backwards and causing the bullet to go off course. Instead of tapping right through the head and killing instantly, the shot merely knocked off the dealer's right ear.

Charlie was a mess. He was looking in the mirror at a man who looked like he'd been the victim of the bombing of a chimney factory. His face and hands were blackened and dusty, and his collar was shredded to near-nonexistence. He looked down at his hands, which were red and swollen underneath the sheen of black dust.

As usual, it wasn't really his fault. He'd set up shop on the third floor of an unfinished Queens warehouse/loft development, targeting a recent-immigrant yarn dealer who'd fallen behind on the payments to his local bodega loan-shark. The shark himself had been relatively new to the business (which explained why he'd hired Charlie), and had insisted that the hit take place during the day. So Charlie had broken into the loft space in the morning, set up his H&K sniper rifle on a tripod in the open window, and waited for his quarry.

It had been going like a Bruckheimer scene-the appearance of the yarn dealer in the store, the front window glass that distorted Charlie's view just enough to make a shot iffy, the tension as the dealer puttered around the shop without standing in front of the door or going outside, then the release as the dealer started stacking samples on the sidewalk and Charlie pulled the trigger.

Charlie had run down the stairs and across the street, where nobody had yet noticed the yarn dealer lying down on the stoop, his bloody hand clamped firmly on the side of his head where his ear had been. Charlie stood and looked at the man for a few seconds, shrugged, and dragged him into the shop, where he finished the job manually.

The upshot of all of this was that Charlie was late, very late, to meet the partner-in-crime girl for tapas and sangria at a small-plate restaurant in Greenwich Village. He stripped, jumped into the shower, and started to scrub like a madman. The crusted bloodstains and dirt was coming off fine, but the black, sooty leftover from the blowback overfeed explosion stayed on. He switched to Lava mechanic's soap, which he kept around for this kind of problem, and ten minutes of scrubbing cleaned his face and hands nicely.

Rather than take his chances on the F line subway, which had been iffy lately due to construction, Charlie hailed a cab on Delancey street. With luck, he'd only be about twenty minutes late. He would have called ahead to let Christina know about his lateness, but he had forgotten to take down her number from Rose's computer when he'd left his office for the job in the morning.

"Bleeker Street and Seventh Avenue," he said to the cabbie, a smack-addict looking old guy with a smattering of stubble, the kind you get when you shave with an electric and don't care enough to do it right.

"You got it," said the cabbie.

Charlie settled back into his seat and tried to relax; Joe Torre's recorded voice welcomed him to a New York City cab ride, reminded him to put on his seat belt, told him that he had the right to not listen to music if he didn't want to, and oh my God. Charlie lurched forward to get a better look in the driver's rear view mirror, causing the seatbelt to tighten and throwing him backwards.

"You ok?" asked the cabbie.

"Yeah," said Charlie. "Um...am I hallucinating, or do I have no eyebrows?"

The cabbie craned his neck, looking at the mirror. "Nope," he said. "That some kind of punk thing?"

"Uh...yeah," said Charlie.

The cabbie shook his head. "Whatever happened to just piercing your ears? When I was a kid, that was enough to get y'ass kicked all the way up Flatbush Avenue. Now..."

Charlie tuned him out and panicked. Here he was, clean, well-dressed, only twenty minutes late, and completely lacking in the eyebrow department. There was no way he was going to ditch out on the girl, so he started to rack his brain for an excuse. Nothing came to mind.

She was waiting at a small table in the middle of the restaurant, tapping a straw on the side of a glass of ice water, resting her head in her left hand, wearing a light blouse and a darker brown skirt that ended just below her knees, revealing bare, pale legs.

"Hi," he said as he sat down.

"Hi," she said.

"Sorry I'm late," he said. "My alarm clock is broken, and I completely lost track of the time."

"It's no problem," she said. "Actually, I was a little bit late, too."

Charlie exhaled slowly. So far, so good. All he had to do was think up another little white lie...

"Hey," she said. "I'm sure you get this all the time, but...what's up with your eyebrows?"

"Chemotherapy," said Charlie.

She blanched. "You have cancer?"

"Did," he said. "I did have cancer. Mild cancer. Such a mild case that the chemo only made my eyebrows fall off."

She stirred her drink a couple of times. "Oh...kay."

I'm looking for a special man. One who has a handsome face for me to wake up to in the morning, but doesn't get worked up about my bed head. A guy who doesn't abuse any substances, but can tell the difference between Tanqueray and Sapphire.

I won't say that I'm a closet romantic, because I'm way out of the closet on that. I'll be honest and say that yes, in fact, I am looking for a life partner, someone to share everything in life with. It's cheesy to say that you like walks on the beach, but...well, I do like a walk on the beach every now and then.

I suppose I could share more, but I'm pretty sure that just this little bit will get me enough responses to get a few dates out of this whole mess. Do yourself a favor and be over 20 and under 35.

Charlie was more than ready for this one; it had taken nearly two weeks of emailing back and forth from Rose's computer before Laura finally agreed to meet up with him, on that very Tuesday night, at a small coffeehouse in the west 70s. She sounded exacting, special.

"Got another one?" asked Rose.

"I think so," said Charlie.

"What do you think your chances are?"

Charlie shrugged. "I have no idea. Unlike most of the people who post on Craigslist, she actually knows how to spell, so I figure she can't be as crazy as some of the people out there."

"What do you care?"

"I've started email conversations with at least ten women. Six of them couldn't spell or screwed up their punctuation. One I decided I didn't like. I've been on two dates, and those didn't go well."

"Why not?"

Charlie hesitated.

"It just wasn't working," he said. "Not my fault, not her fault, it just was."

She cocked her head to one side. "In both cases?"

"Yes, in both cases."

"What's this one's name?"

"Laura."

"So you think this is going to work?"

"I hope so," said Charlie. "She likes to read, and neither of us owns a television." Charlie didn't own a television because he'd accidentally shot out the cathode-ray tube on his last set, and he had never quite mustered the energy or the funds to buy a new one. He hadn't mentioned that part to Laura-she seemed to think that not having a TV was an intellectual decision.

"That's it?"

Charlie turned towards Rose. "No, not really-she seems kind of like me, I guess."

He turned back and read her last email.

Great! I'm a huge fan of just having a conversation about what we like, and not letting some event get in the way. If we've got something to talk about, great. If not, that's ok. I think we'll probably have something to talk about, though; you seem like a really interesting guy. Let's meet up at McSweeney's on West 72nd Street tonight at around eight. It's a quiet place, good for conversation, and the food isn't bad if you're up for a quick bite. Just email be back and let me know if you'll be there.

"Yeah," he said. "She seems really nice and normal."

Rose laughed. "It's always those that turn out to be the real psycho killers."

McSweeney's was a literary bar; the walls were covered with pictures of E.B. White, Arthur Miller, E.L. Doctorow, and their ilk. It was a dark place, with wood-paneled walls and a middle-aged bartender with a droopy mustache. Charlie was nearly forty-five minutes early, so he ordered a Murphy's Stout at the bar and scoped for the best table.

The best table was near the front, in a corner, next to a window; away from the hubbub of the central bar area, but with a view of the street traffic. Nobody interesting was going to walk by on the Upper West Side, but there was always a chance.

Charlie waited and sipped his stout, rehearsing his talking points in his mind. He was a rug dealer, yes, but no longer specializing in Uzbekistan-he merely took delivery from a variety of vendors from all over the world, and redistributed them to specialty distributors domestically. Not retailers, because then she'd ask him what store. After four or five dates, perhaps he'd let slip that the rug thing was just a cover and hint at his darker, more mysterious side.

He took out a piece of notepaper and went down his list of current events:

• A revolution had broken out in a small African nation.
• Paris Hilton had leaked another tape, this time of her working topless in a shelter for homeless veterans.
• The Mayor was agitating for yet another subway fare increase.
• A new Andrew Lloyd Webber musical based on the life of Donald Trump was opening on Broadway. Laura had mentioned that she hated musicals, and figured that having something to readily make fun of would be a good something-in-common.
• In England, a member of Parliament was in a deep scandal, having called all of the children in his district "ignorant little arachnoids."

He took sips of his stout and watched the bar start to fill up. A waitress who couldn't have been two days beyond her 21st birthday came by to ask him if he wanted to order an appetizer; he thought for a second and declined. It was already seven-thirty, and he didn't want to appear rude by having food or the remnants of it on his table when Laura showed up.

"If you change your mind, just give me a wave," said the waitress, smiling.

Seven forty-five. Charlie chanced it and went to the bathroom, where he washed his face and hands and double-checked his hair in the mirror. His eyebrows had grown back to the point where they looked sparse, but not too odd. He hoped that the darkness of the bar would help with that.

At eight o'clock, nearly every table was filled. Charlie looked hard at every woman who entered, comparing each one with the digital photo that Laura had sent. No matches. Charlie started to shred the coaster that had come with his beer; first tearing it in half, then in half again, then again, until his table was covered with confetti. He swept the pieces up and piled them on an empty chair, then realized that that looked odd and put the pieces in his pocket. Hopefully, he wouldn't have to explain them later in the evening.

Eight-ten. The waitress came by, and Charlie ordered another Murphy's, to make it look like he'd just arrived, sat down, and ordered. The waitress came back with a full pint glass at eight-fourteen. Charlie sipped the head, and started tapping his fingers on the edge of the table.

By eight-twenty, he was a third of the way done. He looked at the back of his hand, then slapped it lightly; mustn't drink too fast and look like he'd been here a while. Unconsciously, he started to shred the coaster.

At eight-thirty, the coaster was completely gone, as was most of the beer.

"Another one?" the waitress was smiling down at him, her nose ring glinting off the light cast by the small table lamp.

"Sure," said Charlie. He craned his neck just a touch to make sure that the woman who was walking into the bar wasn't Laura-no dice. She was short with a blonde butch hairdo.

"Everything ok?" said the waitress.

"Fine, yeah," mumbled Charlie.

The next Murphy's showed up at quarter to nine. Charlie pulled the coaster out from under the glass and started to shred it. Laura must have really hit some traffic, or busted a heel. He'd seen the aftermath of a broken high heel before, and it wasn't pretty; could definitely delay you for an hour, at least.

By nine-thirty, the bar was standing room only, as the young and attractive Upper West Side investment banker set gathered to lubricate and size each other up. The table next to Charlie was packed with five guys in suits. One of them, a slicked-back brown-haired guy whose name was most likely Chet, turned around and put his hand on the empty chair at Charlie's table.

"Using this, sport?" he said. "Thanks."

"Y..." Charlie's word was cut off as the guy pulled the chair over to his side and gestured to the butch-haired blonde, who sat down and put her hand on Chet's shoulder.

"Yeah," whispered Charlie. "It was taken."

At ten-thirty, Charlie stood up to go, steadying himself with the chair; the three beers seemed to affect him more than he thought they would.

"You leaving?" Charlie turned around to see who was asking the question, and he was surprised to see that he knew the guy. Fast Frankie Jamison was a notorious gun-for-hire. known for his clean, efficient kills. He was the kind of guy who the big mob bosses hired when they wanted a job done silently, with no mention in the papers. Nobody knew how Frankie stashed his bodies so that they were never found, but several men had died while trying to figure it out.

"Charlie!" said Frankie. They'd met several times at the Assassin's Guild meetings. "No idea you hung out here!"

"Frankie," said Charlie. "Actually, I was just taking off."

"Well, Gloria and I thank you for the table. Don't we, honey?" Frankie put his arm around the girl next to him, a slender girl in a businesslike miniskirt who had at least three inches on the five-six Frankie.

"Yes, thanks," she said, leaning over and nibbling on Frankie's ear.

"You're welcome," said Charlie.

"Seeya around," said Frankie, planting a hard kiss on Gloria's lips as he sat down.

Charlie headed for the door, then turned around to look at the table. Frankie and Gloria were sitting next to each other, whispering in each others' ears. Frankie's hands were working their way up Gloria's legs. Charlie reached inside his jacket and pulled his snub-nosed, two-shot silenced .32 pistol, aimed at Frankie's head, and pulled the trigger.

He missed. The bullet smashed into Charlie's empty stout glass right as the waitress was picking it up, sending shards of glass everywhere. Frankie and Gloria didn't notice, the waitress jumped a bit, and none of the yuppies in the bar even heard the shot over the din of pick-me-up conversation. Charlie sighed, holstered the gun, and left.

Charlie took the subway home. The A-line was deserted aside from a few off-shift restaurant worker types and the occasional crackhead wandering down the aisle selling batteries or bootleg DVDs. He switched over to the F line at West 4th street, and sat near the door.

An advertisement, scarred with graffiti, caught his eye. Lavalife singles, it said. Find your dream right now; thousands of professional, successful singles are members. Don't just date, live!

The train pulled up at the Essex/Delancey stop. Charlie looked at the ad one more time, reached over, and pulled it out of the tin frame. He crumpled it up in his left hand, squeezed once, and dropped it in the only garbage can in the station that wasn't overflowing with trash.

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