Summers made even me feel as if I were becoming famous. That is, people took my picture constantly. That is, I kept accidentally stepping into the frame as a tourist took a picture of something else. These are the two truths of tourists: they walk slowly, and they must record their slow progress down the street. I appear in family albums, in slide carousels, sometimes a blur and sometimes a sulky stranger. When I ate my lunch on a bench outside the library, they thought me particularly picturesque, and photographed me on purpose.
They loved James, of course, and asked to take his picture, usually alongside a wife. He allowed it as long as they returned the favor. He really was becoming famous; usually they asked his name so they could write on the back of the snapshot. Mother, Niagara Falls, 1949. Minna, 1950. James Sweatt, Brewsterville, Cape Cod, 1954.
He never recorded the names of the tourists; what made one different from another? He read books on developing photographs. He became a Boy Scout, the world’s biggest. He wrote a prize-winning essay on community service. He played basketball, of course, and was always described as the star. By this they meant, tall. Any number of the words used to describe James just meant tall.
Certainly things could have continued thus, and I would have completed my life never knowing the lack. Or rather, I would have kept my relationship as it was with James, finding him books and recognizing a lack and counting myself lucky for that. Lacking things was what I did; I might as well lack something interesting. I felt in those days quite set apart from the rest of the human race, who regularly got what they wanted and complained anyhow.
On September 3, 1955 (James was sixteen and seven foot six; those are the vital statistics), I was just locking up the library doors after work, doing my usual ritual: check my pocket for the keys, close one of the big oak doors; check my pocket again, in case I was imagining things; close the other; check my pocket. Six steps led up to the library’s entrance. When I stood on the top stair, my head was roughly level with that of the statue of the town founder, which stood in the park across the street.
It was one of those days when the clouds ran past the sun as if they expected it to give chase: instead, Brewsterville’s main street dimmed, then brightened, then dimmed again. A small elderly woman stood at the base of the statue, trying to decide whether to sit down on the green park bench. A teenage boy in bad need of a haircut helped her—did she want to sit down? Was she sure? His hand touched the back of her elbow. I wondered if they were relatives or strangers.
Then the clouds moved along, and the street turned gold, and so did the woman’s hair. It was Mrs. Sweatt, that hair like stained glass; I could almost see the comb marks in it, like mullions. The teenage boy was Caroline Strickland, her own hair cut recently and too short.
Mrs. Sweatt was wearing some kind of strange athletic outfit: bloomers and a zip-up jacket. I considered fishing my keys out and going back into the library. Not that I wanted to avoid them in particular: I wanted to avoid everyone I knew, when I wasn’t in the library, out of that special brand of shyness that borders on arrogance.
But then they sat down and looked up. Mrs. Sweatt pointed at me. “The lady from the library!” Caroline said, so loudly I assumed it was a greeting. There was nothing to do but walk down the stairs and across the street.
“Hello,” I said. “My name’s Peggy.”
“Of course it is,” said Caroline. She didn’t bother to tell me her name again, though I remembered it. “We’ve been playing baseball.”
“Softball,” said Mrs. Sweatt.
“Right,” said Caroline. “Actually, I wasn’t playing, just Missus, James, and my husband. The nursing home—where Missus volunteers—against the Brewsterville Inn—which is where Oscar, my husband, works.”
“Who won?”
“The Inn murdered us,” Mrs. Sweatt said softly, as if reporting an actual, traumatic crime.
“But Missus has been practicing, and she was very good.”
Mrs. Sweatt laughed. She gave Caroline a pat, and then the park bench behind her. And at that moment, I knew why her husband fell in love with her, why any man would. The languid, fond hand, and that sudden giggle—it was like a magician pulling coins from your ear and then handing them over, as if the two of you were equally responsible for the sudden small miracle of wealth.
“What Caroline means is, I caught the ball once.”
“But that’s hard!” said Caroline. “It’s a big ball!”
“For all the good it did us. Jim hit our only home run.”
“We’re waiting for the menfolk right now,” Caroline said. “We’re going to Charley’s for ice cream. You want to come?”
You can’t imagine how this question astounded me. Did people really do this? See somebody on the street and take her away, as if communing with others of the human race were the simplest thing in the world?
I couldn’t think of the answer, and so I offered a simple statement of fact: “I don’t want to intrude.”
“No intrusion,” said Caroline. “Look, here they come.”
I turned around to see James walking toward us, a car driving slowly next to him, as if it were his pet. At a corner they both stopped, and James leaned over and stuck his head in the car. Then he turned down the side street, and the car continued toward us.
The Stricklands’ car was an enormous green Chevy, with a sun visor that made it look perturbed and dishonest, like a gambler. The man who stepped out somehow matched, big-faced and lantern-jawed, with hair so glossy black I wondered whether it was dyed. He was broad through the shoulders in an old-fashioned square-muscled way.
Mrs. Sweatt was standing up, looking upset. “Where did Jim go?” she asked the man.
“Some kids are having a barbecue, so he decided to stand up the old people.” He smiled at me. “I’m Oscar Strickland.”
“Peggy Cort,” I said.
“Nice to meet—”
“He should ask me for permission,” said Mrs. Sweatt.
Oscar shrugged. “Sorry. I didn’t think you’d mind.” But Mrs. Sweatt was looking wistfully at where James had disappeared.
“I invited Peggy to come with us,” said Caroline.
“Am I invited for the ride even if I don’t eat ice cream?” I asked.
Oscar looked shocked at such a sentiment. “No ice cream?”
I watched Caroline pinch him in the side.
“You’re welcome to come,” she said, “ice cream or no ice cream.”
I rode in the back with Mrs. Sweatt, who looked out the window with a great deal of purpose. Charley’s was in Provincetown, on the skinny main street that ran parallel to the bay. The sun had set by the time we got there, and the air was by-the-sea-in-autumn cool. Mrs. Sweatt announced that she didn’t want any ice cream either.
“This is Charley’s!” said Oscar.
Mrs. Sweatt pulled her socks up and tugged at the cuffs of the bloomers. “I’m just going to walk to the beach,” she said.
“Peggy, why don’t you go with her?” said Caroline.
Mrs. Sweatt sighed audibly.
“Good idea,” Oscar said. “We’ll have our ice cream and catch up with you.”
“I may be a while,” said Mrs. Sweatt. “I want to sit in a little silence.”
“You can sit in silence with Peggy. We’ll have our ice cream. We’ll give you time.”
“Okay,” Mrs. Sweatt said to me. “Come on.”
I didn’t want to go with her, of course, and yet was happy to: I’ve always found a certain sullenness comforting. So Mrs. Sweatt and I walked the block to the bay, to one of the stone walls that separated the backs of the shops from the start of the beach. Mrs. Sweatt climbed up to sit down, and I followed.
“So,” I said. “James hit a home run.”
Mrs. Sweatt was trying her best to sit in a little silence.
I hadn’t dressed for a sea breeze, and I rubbed my goose-bumpy arms. “I didn’t know he was an athlete.”
“You should see him play basketball,?
?? said Mrs. Sweatt. “He sure doesn’t get it from me.”
“But you played today, too, right?”
She smiled. “I caught one lonely pop fly. Thus begins and ends my career in sports.”
“What about James’s father?” I asked. “Was he an athlete?”
Mrs. Sweatt played with some sand caught in the cracks of the wall, then looked toward the bay. Her bloomers buckled up into silly pleats across her lap. Finally she said, “Who?”
“Ah. You’ve forgotten him.”
“No.” She sighed. “I can’t forget him. I don’t even try.”
It was like a line of a popular song—I can’t forget, I don’t even try—and she made it sound like the truest sentence there ever was.
“Shouldn’t you try?” I said dubiously.
“For what? Then I’d remember trying, too.” She started digging in her soft purse. “There’s two ways to get rid of something that big: effort and erosion. I’m trying for the second.” She brought out a dark brown medicine bottle and drank straight from it. Then she coughed.
“It’s not working,” I said.
“What?”
“The cough syrup. You coughed.”
She looked at the bottle. “Vodka.” She screwed the cap back on. “I’m on this medicine. To keep my weight down. It makes me nervous, so sometimes I take a little vodka to balance it out. You’re lucky, you don’t have to worry about your weight. Without my medicine, I’d start eating the ice cream and I—I just wouldn’t stop. So this medicine makes me stop.” She shook the bottle, then took another sip. “Disgusting.”
It was as much as I’d ever heard Mrs. Sweatt say. I understood, now, why I’d been sent along—to keep her, if not from actually drinking, then from drinking alone.
“I never was a vodka drinker,” I said.
“Me neither. But if I don’t—I get nervous. I can’t sleep.” She offered me the bottle.
“No, thanks.”
“I drink too much,” she said.
“Do you?”
“So they say.” She banged her heels against the seawall, thinking. She shook her bottle again, as if she were trying to conjure up more vodka, and examined its level. “I know people talk about me, I know what they say about me, I just try not to listen or behave too badly. I’d drink whiskey, but people can smell that.” She laughed her magician’s laugh, wistful and miraculous. “That’s all I need, to have people in this town talk truth instead of rumors. Nobody is invisible”—at this she elbowed me lightly—“but I aim to be at least confusing.”
“Whiskey,” I said. “Now you have me wanting some.”
She cut a look at me. “Really? You’d drink whiskey?”
“Sure,” I said. I half expected her to pull a second bottle from her bag, but instead she jumped up. “Come on,” she said. “They’re dawdling. We have time.” She slapped sand off the seat of her dark bloomers. “Come on,” she said again.
She led me to a door with a stained-glass window that showed two pilgrims, heels kicked up, mugs in their hands. The edge of the bar was two steps from the door. Mrs. Sweatt waved at the bartender, whispered something, and held up two fingers. He nodded and delivered two shots of whiskey.
“It’s cold out,” said Mrs. Sweatt to me, “and bourbon’s better than vodka, you’re right.” She took one dainty sip from her glass. “I used to be quite a drinker, when I was younger. Teenager. Sweet drinks.”
“This was where?” I held the glass beneath my nose. I was not a drinker at all. The smell was incredible. I knew from my college experiences that I’d have to down it all at once—the first sip would put me off.
“Davenport. Iowa. Bix Beiderbecke was from there, too. That’s about it.”
“Who?”
“Who? Bix! Really? You don’t know him? Something I know and you don’t. He was a cornet player. Famous one. Before my time, but his family still lived there. Everyone felt sorry for the Beiderbeckes. Drink your whiskey. We should get back.”
“I will. Why did they feel sorry?”
“Well, their son. A jazz musician. And he was a drug addict, too. I think that’s what killed him; he died young, anyhow. Everyone felt so sorry for the Beiderbeckes. Like they feel sorry for me in Brewsterville.”
“They don’t—”
“They do,” she said. She’d finished her whiskey in small furtive sips.
“Have another,” I said. “This is all I’m having.”
“Maybe I will.” She looked appealingly at the bartender, who brought her a second. “No,” she said. “They do. And it’s just like with the Beiderbeckes. Bix was the most important thing to ever happen to Davenport. And Jim will be the most important thing to happen to Brewsterville. I’m not just saying that because I’m his mother. He’ll be famous.”
“I think so,” I said. “A famous lawyer, maybe.”
She looked at me as if I were the stupidest person in the world. “Oh, I’m not talking about what he’ll do. I’m talking about him. He’ll be the tallest man ever, that’s why he’ll be famous.”
“He’s young,” I said. “He won’t grow forever.”
“You’ll see,” she said. “Drink.”
I didn’t want to. I investigated my glass, trying to seem thoughtful. “But your husband,” I said. “He wasn’t from Iowa.”
She wrinkled her nose, then scratched it. Mrs. Sweatt was always itchy when questioned. “No. He was a Cape Cod boy. Cape Cod.” She sighed. “Ruined me.”
“The Cape or the boy?”
“Oh, I guess I can’t pin it on the Cape,” she said. “Drink your whiskey.”
“Okay.” I lifted the glass, paused, poured it in my mouth, and swallowed. I concentrated on whacking the empty glass on the bar, so I wouldn’t shudder.
Mrs. Sweatt smiled completely for the first time in my presence; I saw that one of her lower teeth was entirely silver. “Wow,” she said. She’d forgotten that in whiskey, as in many things, it’s the amateurs who have to be showy.
It wasn’t as cool as I’d expected outside; it had been the wind off the ocean that chilled us, and now we were a block inland. Mrs. Sweatt was back to her usual silence. I still could taste the whiskey on the edges of my tongue. I felt a trifle unbuckled.
From behind us, a voice said, with a conspicuous lack of French accent, “It’s les girls!”
I turned. Oscar, of course.
“Les Brewsterville girls! Where you been, girls?”
Mrs. Sweatt wore a distracted, wistful look on her face, like the girl singer of a big band during a tragic ballad’s instrumental solo.
“Walking,” I told Oscar. “Only walking.”
Even now, I remember Mrs. Sweatt as the embodiment of every sad love song ever written; she believed every musical statement of what love did to you when it went wrong, how it was like a poison without an antidote, how you’d never breathe right again. Most people feel that way only when the music plays; all her days, Mrs. Sweatt’s heart was tuned to some radio frequency crammed with tragedy. Even that night in Provincetown (sitting on the sea wall, walking to the bar, drinking whiskey) she sounded like she was singing her own sad, particular lyrics: Can’t blame it on Cape Cod, guess I’ll blame it on the boy.
To others, perhaps, Mrs. Sweatt and I seemed similar: two youngish single women in a town of married couples. People in town probably pitied our singularity. We were old to be unmarried, and odd, surely matchless. But here’s the difference: she was ruined by love—that’s how she put it—while I was ruined by the lack of it. And the fact is when you’re flooded with something, you’re more likely to rot away, to disappear entirely, than if you dry up slowly. Ask the Egyptians, ask anyone.
The Adventures of Rocket Bride
A month after that night in Provincetown, James brought me a folded piece of ruled paper.
“It’s from my aunt,” he said.
The handwriting said Peggy Cort on the outside of the fold. It was improbably fancy handwriting for the unfancy paper—brown ink and
the practiced thick-then-thin cursive of someone who’d been brought up to write thank-you notes promptly.
Inside were the words dinner, friday, six pm, dessert if you’re willing.
All my life, dinner invitations moved me peculiarly. Dinner parties, like romance, always seemed to happen to someone else. I was a librarian approaching thirty, and people perhaps thought I was allergic.
I kept the catalog cards of withdrawn books for scrap at the desk. I picked one up to respond and glanced at the back. A home cyclopedia, encompassing health, nutrition, and child raising. That didn’t seem right. I sorted through the pile, hoping ridiculously I’d find one of the cards for that ruined copy of Tom Sawyer James had kept, but of course I’d pulled them years before. Some long-gone patron had already taken them, jotted down something less important on the back of the title card, the author card, the shelf list. I settled for A History of Rhode Island.
Dear Mrs. Strickland: Yes please, I wrote. And yes to dessert as well. P. Cort. I folded it in half. The printing on the front of the card left no room for me to write her name as she’d written mine, so I slipped my note in a library envelope.
Mrs. Sweatt met me at the door. Instead of saying hello, she plucked the bakery box from my hands by the length of string that held it shut, then turned from me, as if she were a servant taught not to interact with the guests. I hadn’t seen her at the library in the past few weeks, I realized, and in that short time she’d changed. Her face puffed out, as if she’d gained ten pounds only in her head; the rest of her looked bird-skinny.
“Hello,” I said. I tried to make it sound meaningful.
She sighed, and lifted that newly heavy head, and looked at me, and said, “I’ve been sick.”
Oscar Strickland was just behind Mrs. Sweatt; he shook my hand. “Hello, Miss Cort.” He, too, seemed strangely shy; I’d remembered him as a jocular man, even loud.
“Please call me Peggy,” I said.
Caroline came out of the kitchen, drying her hands on the back pockets of her jeans. “Why Peggy Cort,” she said. “How nice.”