“Oh, Mom, it’s nothing, okay? I just made a mess of my life.”
Studying her from across the table, Harriet can still see beyond the worried lines of her daughter’s drawn face, beyond the graying hair and the drooping flesh of middle age, past the two failed marriages, the drugs and alcohol, the numerous career changes, the countless disappointments and indignities, to the roly-poly toddler, the gap-toothed little girl, and the sullen teenager with whom she’d fought so bitterly. Though Caroline has achieved varying degrees of success, known fleeting triumphs and sporadic fulfillment, she has not lived a happy life. And somehow, Harriet suddenly sees herself responsible for all of it, every dashed hope, every shade of disillusionment.
“That settles it,” she says. “We’re turning around. We’re going directly to your house, and I’m staying the week. Longer, if necessary.”
“No, Mom, slow down, really. I’m fine.”
“Please, Caroline, dear, let me do something. Let me come stay for a week. I’m more useful than I look. I can cook and clean and run errands. I can—”
“Mom, really, no. I was just having a moment, okay?”
“It’s the change of life, isn’t it, dear?”
“No, it isn’t, Mom. I wish it were that simple. Sometimes I just start thinking about my life, you know, the parts I can’t have back. But it’s good, reflection is good. I’m fine.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m positive.”
With that, Caroline flags the waitress, and in spite of Harriet’s protestations, insists on picking up the tab — tipping nearly thirty percent!
“Dear, check your math,” says Harriet, dutifully. “Fifteen percent of twenty-seven is roughly four dollars.”
“Hello, Mom, get with the program. Fifteen percent was decades ago. These days, it’s eighteen percent minimum — and that’s just for cheapskates and large parties. These people don’t have benefits. They have no job security. It’s cruel to tip less than twenty-five percent.”
Harriet’s determined not to haggle, though fifteen percent has always seemed fair. Besides, she’s proud of Caroline. Generosity, after all, is one of the few virtues that trumps thrift.
“Whatever you say, dear.”
They leave their food half eaten and drive mostly in silence through Ferndale, toward the border crossing at Blaine. Caroline loosens her grip on the wheel and rolls her shoulders several times to ease the tension.
“I’m glad I broke down back there,” she says. “It was a relief. I needed to get it out.”
“I’m glad, dear.”
Harriet reaches over and rests a hand on Caroline’s thigh and gives it a few loving pats. A dense, almost unbearable grief wells in Harriet’s chest as she withdraws her hand. Harriet, too, is thinking of a life she can’t have back. Tentatively, she replaces her hand on Caroline’s lap.
“Dear?” she says. “I know where you stand on the church, but. . would it be okay if I. .”
“Sure,” she says, producing a sad smile. “You can pray for me. That would be fine.”
December 19, 1953 (HARRIET AT SEVENTEEN)
A flipper here, a bumper there, a kicker, a spinner, a rollover, and ding-dong-ding, we’re in the waning days of 1953.
Who is that striking young lady just left of the mistletoe, poised in the sapphire blue evening dress with the portrait collar, looking ladylike in her long white gloves — the one who looks like a slightly chubby Susan Hayward? Well, in the right light, anyway, at the right angle, after enough buttered rum. Why, it’s you, Harriet Nathan, at your father’s Christmas party. Teddy Ballgame is six months back from Korea (along with your future husband). They’ve got a chimp on television now. They say this H-bomb makes Little Boy look like a party favor. And it’s not just bombs — everything is getting bigger and louder.
Look at you, Harriet, hair expertly coiffed, hobnobbing with the partners like you were born to it. So composed, so effortlessly buoyant, as you play the part of a woman. At forty, you’ll wonder what became of all that finesse, all that poise. But for now, your father is grooming you. If he has his way, you’ll be a credit to your sex. Weekdays, you’ll trade evening dresses for a woman’s business attire. You’ll make a name for yourself. Or better yet, you’ll stick with the name you were given. The click of your heels down courthouse corridors will one day strike fear in the hearts of opposing counsel.
Your father’s ambition is contagious, and maybe not beyond your reach. Next year, you’ll graduate high school and pursue that law degree he’s picked out for you. From there, with enough elbow grease, a formidable network, and a little luck, it’s up up up, Ms. Nathan. The world is your oyster.
But let us not forget, you’re only a girl, Harriet. Only seven weeks removed from your seventeenth birthday. You still dream of horses, still slurp malted milks and play pinball down at Sully’s. You’ve only been past first base a few times, and God knows, they didn’t really count (how could they!). You’re still not sure what you want for yourself or to which pressures you might succumb. Yes, Harriet, behind that feminine mystique is a girl who just got her drivers’ license last summer.
Maybe Charlie Fitzsimmons didn’t get the memo. Maybe he ignored it. Wouldn’t be the first time. Charlie has a way of getting around rules. The man can smell a loophole ten miles away. Yes, the whiz kid is fast becoming Old Charlie. After twenty years at the firm, he’s practically family. Like a trusted uncle, or an uncle, anyway. It’s complicated. Charlie confides in you, always has, ever since you were a kid.
Tonight is no exception. In the half-darkened hallway, where you’ve just emerged from straightening your hair in the washroom, and you’ve barely replaced your white gloves, Charlie all but corners you. Desperate for somebody’s confidence, he tells you — you, of all people, Harriet Nathan — of his plans to leave the firm and start his own shop. They keep adding names to the marble slab, but Nathan will always be first. Charlie wants his own shingle. Yes, Charlie’s ambitious, too. He gets what he wants. And he never forgets a friend. He’ll have a job waiting for you, he promises, but you mustn’t tell your father of his plans. Deal?
Smell his cologne, smell the rum on his breath, as he crowds in so close you can’t tell where one smell ends and the other begins. All but pinning you to the wall, he whispers. What surprises you about his groping hands is their boyish clumsiness.
In six months, Charlie Fitzsimmons will make good on his plans and leave the firm, opening his own shop less than two blocks away. Though there’s a few hard feelings with the Nathans, Charlie will remain a presence in your life, dropping you a line now and then as you pursue your degree, and each time he’ll remind you of that job that’s waiting for you.
You’ll never breathe a word of it to your father.
August 19, 2015 (HARRIET AT SEVENTY-EIGHT)
When Caroline pulls into Departures, easing to a stop curbside behind a long line of yellow cabs, the reception area is swarming with humanity.
“They probably won’t let me go all the way, Mom. But let me at least park and help you as far as check-in.”
“No, dear. I’ll be perfectly fine.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, of course.”
As they say their good-byes, Caroline eases back into traffic. Harriet stands in place, watching as the Mazda rounds the corner. As usual, she feels as though she’s missed an opportunity.
A voice from behind startles her. Harriet turns to find herself facing an unfortunate young man with acne-scarred cheeks.