I’m standing outside the Bistro, enjoying the cool of the early evening breeze, when a beautiful woman clad only in a towel walks past me.

“Good evening,” I say nonchalantly, as if nearly naked women pass my restaurant everyday.

“Good evening,” the woman replies with a big smile.

The toweled woman lives near the Bistro. I’ve seen her everyday for six years. We’ve always exchanged friendly smiles and hellos. As she passes I resist the urge to turn around and gawk. I don’t want to look gauche. I stare at the sidewalk. Chastity of the eyes brother, I tell myself. Chastity of the eyes. My neck muscles reward my virtue by cramping up.

“Yo!” a voice yells from the street, “Is that chick wearing a towel?”

The voice belongs to a cabbie hanging out the window of his car. I can’t blame him.

“Yup,” I reply.

“Outfuckingstanding,” the cabbie crows, “That made my whole day

I turn around to look for the woman. She’s disappeared.

“Did you see where she went?” I ask the cabbie.

“She went into the building next to you brother.”

“Thanks man.”

I lean against the wall and wait. The lady has to walk past me to get home. Sure enough, after a minute, she emerges from the neighboring building, almost naked as the day she was born. Her wardrobe leaves little to the imagination.

“You know,” I say, “I didn’t recognize you with your clothes off.”

The woman smiles, blushing slightly, “I’m doing this on a dare,” she whispers.

“I think you won that dare,” I reply.

“I think I did,” she laughs, continuing down the street.

I toss the chastity of the eyes thing in the trash and watch the woman walk away. She’s very cute. Suddenly the woman tosses me a look over her shoulder. It’s full of spontaneity and innocence but somehow still loaded with sin.

I like that look.

The woman ducks back into her apartment building. The show’s over. I shake my head in disbelief. If I wait long enough, the entire world will pass in front of my restaurant.

There’s more to this story. What was the dare? Why did she do it? The blogger in me wants to know the scoop. But I decide not to dig any deeper. I like a little mystery. Besides, there are always a million stories in the naked city.

And sometimes they’re really naked.