It had turned into an unusual afternoon.

I’d come to the adorable sandwich and smoothie shop to get work done, hoping to keep my morning sickness enough at bay to get through a meeting with a co-worker.

Just when it seemed the coast was clear, and I could continue my pregnancy in nobody-knows, non-jinxed oblivion, in walked The Celebrity, the star of an HBO series who had been coming to this teensy-tiny shop for roughly two months and, I liked to joke, stalking me. We’d made eye contact, even smiled, but had never really spoken.

After a month-long absence she’d returned, and marched straight over to my table to break the proverbial ice. Due in part to the fact that I had a morning-sickness-abating sucked-on lemon rind wedged between my teeth and lips, I’d responded to her salutation by blurting out the news of my pregnancy.

Before I could console myself by thinking, “Telling a celebrity doesn’t count,” she announced that she was pregnant, too.

So now here I was, sitting in the shop discussing something I’d been hiding from even my closest friends and family with the star of a hit HBO series. At least she wasn’t a total stranger.

“How far along are you?” she asked, sitting down.

“About nine weeks,” I told her

“Eleven,” she said, pointing at stomach.

“So I guess you’re not superstitious about telling people,” I said. If she were, she would have waited to tell people until at least week 12.

“Oh my lord,” she said. “I’m totally paranoid. You’re the only person I’ve told save my mom and sister. And my husband, of course.” I nodded. Husbands didn’t count. “You’re really brave, though. Telling people at nine weeks.”

“Oh, I haven’t told anyone,” I said, shaking my head. A second later, we realized we’d both just blurted out our biggest secret. We started laughing.

“Telling someone you don’t know doesn’t really count, does it?” she asked. “No, it doesn’t,” I said. “But I do know you. I watch your show.”

“And I do know you,” she said. “I come to your sandwich shop.”

So it was my sandwich shop, was it? I was really beginning to like this celebrity.

I nodded and said, “Touche.”

“Actually,” she said, “I sort-of have told other people. But CityBaby aren’t exactly like real people, are they? Or, I should say, they’re anonymous.”

My confused look was question enough. “Surely you’ve heard of CityBaby?” The continued confused look still worked as an answer. “The Web site?” I shook my head. “Oh my lord,” she said. “You simply must go to the New York message boards. They’re a total hoot – and can actually be helpful. I posted a query about prenatal massage and got a bunch of recommendations.”

“So, it’s like a chat room for pregnant New Yorkers?” I asked, hoping I’d played down my wariness of chat rooms.

“Well, technically, it’s a message board, not a chat room,” she said. “But it is a way to obsess about being pregnant without actually telling anyone.”

I had to admit that piqued my interest. “Where’d you hear about it?” I asked.

“A friend was talking about it at a party a year or so back,” she said with deliberate nonchalance. Then she gave a what-the-heck eye roll, leaned in and said, “Sarah Jessica Parker. Last year’s Emmys.”

A celebrity had just name-dropped another celebrity. I made a mental note to check this CityBaby out.

Before then, though, I had to get to the bottom of something else.

“So tell me,” I said, realizing there was really no other way of asking, “What are you doing in this neighborhood anyway?”

“Well, the show’s on break, so I’m living here actually.”

“That I figured,” I said, nodding. “But what I mean is – why Brooklyn?”

“You mean as opposed to the West Village or NoLiTa?” she asked, smiling. “This just seemed like more of an authentic neighborhood. And, besides, a friend was talking about how much she loved living in Brooklyn at a party about a year back …” Her voice trailed off, and she gave another what-the-heck eye roll, leaned in, and said, “Jennifer Connelly. The Oscars.”

I nodded, playing it cool.

“Besides,” she added. “I knew I’d be trying for a pregnancy, and I didn’t want to be eight months along and worrying about the paparazzi if I blew up like poor Debra Messing.”

Maybe celebrities are even more celebrity-obsessed than the rest of us. But that’s not what struck me then. Instead, I was thinking about how this conversation would never have been happening at, say, the Masala Dosa shop I frequented in SoHo. Even though that place was charming and cozy and unpretentious, the Celebrity and I would have ignored each other. In Manhattan, it’s all about how over-it you are. In Brooklyn, it’s all about how real you are keepin’ it.

We spoke for a few more minutes, the Celebrity and I. She asked the standard things about what I did, if I was married, where I was from, and I asked about her husband, who she said was a musician. It was getting late, and I told her I’d better get home to check e-mails, but there was still one question left in my mind: why had she been so keen to talk to me?

It turned out I didn’t need to ask her this directly. As we said our goodbyes and joked about knowing we’d see each other here soon, she said something that explained it.

“You seem to know everyone around here,” she said, somewhat in passing.

And that’s when I realized what it was: I was the local she was making friends with in the small Tuscan hill town of Brooklyn she’d just moved to. “I do now,” I replied. “Local” was a role I could handle.

The Brooklyn Chronicles appears each Friday. Previous installments are available at www.nysun.com/archive_chronicles.php. The author can be reached at kschwartz@nysun.com.