The Laments (39 page)

The conversation drifted as slowly as the black water beyond the window. Julia tried to get her mother to explain her plans, but Rose was oblique and changed the subject.

“How are you going to get Howard back to work?”

“He’s depressed, Mummy, and he won’t see a doctor.”

Rose sniffed. “A doctor? Hardly a solution.”

“I mean a psychiatrist. Somebody who deals with depression. Americans are more comfortable with psychiatrists,” Julia explained.

“Clearly, then, Howard’s not as much of an American as
you’ve
become.”

Julia flinched. “What do you mean?”

“Real estate. Development. Turning perfectly nice countryside into commodities. It all seems frightfully American to me.”

This time it was Julia who changed the subject.

“Were any of your husbands ever depressed, Mummy?”

“Never,” snapped Rose. “All of them drank, of course, but that was nothing unusual. Oh, yes, one had an addiction to morphine, but that was entirely the doctor’s fault.”

“And Papa?” asked Julia.

Adam Clare hadn’t been mentioned in many years, and Rose looked slightly wounded on hearing his name. “I remember your father always being a sad man,” she replied. “But it wasn’t the sort of thing you saw a doctor about in those days.”

Julia gave her mother a searching glance.

“Perhaps seeing a doctor might have helped him. . . .”

“Well, it’s too late now,” said Rose. “We’d been divorced for years by the time he died.”

Julia looked at her mother. “Why wasn’t I told about the divorce, Mummy?”

Rose shifted in her seat. “I’m sure I was trying to protect you, darling.”

“Oh God, Mummy, how
could
you keep it from me? I was just a child. I didn’t know whom to trust after that, whom to believe. . . .”

Rose was relieved when the waitress appeared with a lemon tart and two spoons.

“Figured you’d want to share,” said the waitress with a smile.

On her first taste, Julia felt her eyes well up; she wasn’t sure if it was the sourness of the tart, or the residual sting of the conversation that had preceded it. But the subject was dropped. Rose insisted on paying the bill, but Julia noticed that she had shortchanged the waitress. Julia added several quarters once Rose reached the door.

On the drive back, Rose turned to the future.

“Isn’t Will going to university next year, Julia? I haven’t heard a word about his plans.”

“He may want a year off before applying,” said Julia. “He’s not quite ready to go off yet.”

“What’s wrong with him?” replied Rose. “Most young men his age want to be off in the world, exploring their prospects.”

Julia chose her words with brittle clarity. “There’s nothing wrong with him.”

“A boy so obsessed with keeping the family together that he can’t think about his own future?” said Rose. “I think that’s rather ironic, considering the facts of his birth.”

It struck Julia that her mother had been digging around for a vulnerable spot, and she had finally found one as sensitive as the suicide of Julia’s father. Ever since Rose’s mention of Mrs. Pritchard in her letter, Julia had feared this discussion.

“He doesn’t know,” said Julia.

“In other words,” Rose observed, “you are trying to
protect
him, just as I was trying to protect you. . . .”

“Mummy, the most stable thing in Will’s life is his place in this family,” replied Julia. “How can I tell him he’s not really my son?”

“I faced the same dilemma,” replied Rose. “I spared you the news of our divorce because I wanted you to have some stability, darling.”

“It’s not the same thing!”

“It’s a secret, Julia.”

“Your secret devastated me!” cried Julia.

For a long while, they drove past the huddled Capes, split-levels, and colonials without uttering a word.
Your secret devastated me
. Julia’s words echoed in her head. For the first time, she imagined having just such a conversation with Will in twenty years.

Finally, Rose spoke her mind. “I regret not telling you about the divorce. I was young, I wasn’t equipped to cope with my feelings, let alone yours. I should have told you, Julia. . . . And I know you’ll make the right decision about Will.”

Julia steered the car into the familiar gravel drive and took a moment to search the contents of her bag. While Rose walked to the house, Julia paused to wipe her cheeks dry with a tissue.

Miss Liberty

Howard hated driving into the city. He despised its traffic jams, the mobs of sightseers, and the expense of everything. So Julia had planned to take Rose to see the Statue of Liberty. But Brautigan fell ill the next weekend, and she had to cover for him in the office. As the boys piled into the car, Howard was still trying to talk everyone out of the trip.

“The car might not start,” he warned.

“Mum replaced the battery,” countered Will.

The Buick started in spite of Howard’s complaints about a flashing alternator light. As they coasted along the turnpike, the twins seized the opportunity to interest Rose in all the sights they had yearned to see since coming to America.

“You
must
see a baseball game, Granny!”

“At Yankee Stadium,” added Marcus. “It’s a landmark.”

“And the Cyclone at Coney Island!” said Julius.

The ferry to Liberty Island puttered through churning, metallic-toned water. Gulls sang overhead and dipped for dropped morsels as the twins took copious advantage of Rose’s generosity at the hot dog counter. At the granite entrance, Howard refused to take the winding stairs up through the statue’s interior.

“I don’t like confined spaces,” he told the boys as they pleaded with him.

So Marcus and Julius tore up the winding stair, leaving Will to escort Rose at a slower pace. By the time they reached the top, the twins were dashing back down.

Rose seemed to relax in Will’s company; she was excited, curious, and she absorbed the view from Miss Liberty’s head with barely contained awe.

“America is such a crass, ugly place,” said Rose as she peered through a window stuffed with gum wrappers and soda cups. “I suppose one must accept its marvels with its vulgarity. It’s all part of the human soup, you know.” She breathed in, as if this spirit were somehow lingering in the air over New York Harbor; then she glanced curiously at Will.

“Are you happy here in America, Will?”

Will shrugged. “I miss England. I miss all the places I can remember. . . . And some of the people I left behind.”

“Really?”

Will nodded. “I dream about them all the time.”

“I dream about people, too,” admitted Rose. “Even the happiest person has regrets. You can’t rejoice in a sunny day if all you’ve ever known are sunny days, any more than you can grieve the loss of someone you’ve never met. Happiness and sadness go together.”

“I think I know more about sadness than happiness,” said Will.

“I’m sure this will change,” Rose replied.

They were walking down now, around and around the circular stairs, their footsteps echoing through the statue’s green metal viscera. They could hear the twins, far below, taunting each other. Will stopped for a moment, and looked up at his grandmother.

“Do I look French, to you?”

“French?” Rose looked puzzled. “Why?”

Will shrugged. “Someone told me I looked French. I certainly don’t look like anyone in the family, do I?”

Rose frowned. “Why—why would that matter?”

“I’ll tell you a secret,” said Will. “Sometimes I imagine I’m an orphan. I imagine that there’s no one in the world like me, no parents, no brothers, no family, no one expecting anything of me, no one to worry about. And for a few minutes, I like the feeling.” He shrugged. “And then it suddenly seems the very worst thing to wish for. And I’m glad to be who I am.”

“Yes,” Rose said. “I can see that.”

From below, the twins began shouting for Will to hurry up. He offered his hand to Rose, and, together, they continued walking down the stairs.

“I have a secret, too,” admitted Rose after a few minutes.

“What’s that?” Will replied.

“I came to America to see my family, of course, but I also came because I have nowhere else to go. I’ve spent my money, Will. All of it.”

“Good,” he replied. “Then you’ll stay with us forever.”

“I don’t know how your parents would feel about that,” confessed Rose.

“Actually, Mum and Dad need someone to watch over them. I can’t do it forever,” he replied.

Concert Night

The sky darkened like an inkblot as Will and Roy crossed paths on the trestle bridge after school. They waved, but didn’t stop to talk. Roy was in a hurry to pick up Dawn’s corsage from the florist before he began his shift at Dutch Oil; he would then sprint to Dawn’s house at eight-thirty and walk her to the dance.

Will had made peace with all this. While everyone at school was talking about the dance that night, he and Minna acknowledged their plans in secret: her fingers trailed his palm as they passed in the hallway. As he turned along Oak Street, past the cemetery, falling snow began cresting the gravestones, gathering on the wrought-iron fence, and forming delicate spires on its filigree.

Where Pye Hollow Road continued past Oak Street, it dodged pasture and woodland for about three miles, crossed the railroad tracks and passed Dutch Oil, then, after another two miles, ran alongside the Pye Hollow Country Club. After a good snow, the golf course became the terrific sled run Howard had told the twins about just before Rose’s arrival.

When Howard heard reports of a blizzard on the radio, he remembered his promise to take the twins sledding, and brought the matter up with Marcus.

Will and Julia went over to Frieda’s apartment together; Will was picking up Minna for the concert, and Julia was attending her Thursday meeting, which was being held on this Friday—tonight—because Avé had had to take her sons to choir practice on Thursday. As they walked along the icy street, Julia broke her own vow not to talk about Minna. She was bursting with curiosity.

“You know, I always hoped you two would get along. You were such a romantic little boy. Do you remember Ruth and Sally?”

Will answered slyly. “You know I never remember any girl once the next one comes along.”

“You know that’s not true,” Julia said, buttoning his army coat at the neck. “Please do be careful tonight—the roads look awful.”

Will promised.

THERE WAS A FULL-SCALE BLIZZARD
by sunset. When Julius phoned Cleo Pappas to invite her over after dinner, she said, “I’ll never get through the snow!”

But Julius was insistent. “We could watch TV, or look at magazines.”

Cleo giggled; she knew what that meant. “Will your brother be there?”

“Of course,” said Julius. When he put the phone down, Marcus appeared, carrying the two rusty sleds from the cellar.

“Dad’s taking us sledding at Pye Hollow Country Club.”

“But Cleo’s coming over tonight!”

Marcus argued that they couldn’t let Howard down. They agreed to spend two hours sledding, which would give them time to meet Cleo back at the house at nine.

“Want to come sledding, Granny?” asked Julius as they bundled up.

“You’ll catch your death.” She shuddered, and went to make herself some tea.

AS HOWARD DROVE OUT
with the boys, Will and Minna were boarding a bus for the train station. All the while, the falling snow kept changing—from a sprinkle of powder, to an open sky, to a cascade of thick flakes. The roads were becoming slushy and treacherous. The train bound for North Jersey wailed over marshland and through suburbs, smothered by the advancing drifts.

Minna wore a black leather jacket, a burgundy velvet skirt, black tights, and low boots. Her cheeks were rouged, perhaps just a little too much, but she wanted Will’s eyes fixed on her for the evening. And they were.

“What is it?” she asked when he kept glancing over at her in the train.

“You’re somebody else.” He smiled. “Do I know you?”

She looked at him first with anxiety; then an appreciative smile played on her lips.

Will wore his olive army greatcoat over a faded sweatshirt and jeans that fell short of his battered red Converse sneakers by more than an inch. His blond hair hung to his shoulders. To a stranger, Will was a boy on the cusp of manhood. He towered awkwardly over Minna, long-limbed and gaunt; but his downturned eyes became full and expectant when Minna spoke to him, and his large hands meshed in hers. Though his nose was prominent and his jaw too long, these features struck Minna as poetic. His casual sorrow was arousing, and evocative of her own discomfort in the world.

The train took on more passengers at Princeton Junction, and Minna anxiously studied her printed schedule. She admitted to Will that she’d never been north of New Brunswick, because her mother disliked trains and was fearful of the city.

“Then what makes you want to travel?” he asked.

“I just want to go to Paris,” she replied. “I want to walk on streets a thousand years old, and see all the things I’ve read about. And find my father, of course.”

It occurred to Will that although he disliked travel, it might not be so bad with Minna for company.

They were surprised when they found themselves at their destination, a windy station on the North Jersey corridor. The snow had tapered off to a powdery flurry. On the horizon, a gas refinery twinkled with thousands of lights—the disingenuous beauty of the industrial rim.

Will and Minna hurried along the platform, following the other shadows that alighted from the train. About ten blocks away, the neon lights of the concert hall beckoned.

“
YOU’RE WORKING BUILDING A TONIGHT,
” ordered Eddie as Calvin brushed the snow from his shoulders in the foyer of Building B.

“How come?” said Calvin.

“People are out. I’m switching things around. You’ll do the toilets,
hmm
?”

Calvin bristled. “Hell no! Roy does the toilets!”

Eddie shook his head. “Roy’s promoted. He’s doing floors.
You’re
doing toilets.”

“Shit, Eddie, I’ve been working here two years. I got seniority!”