The English American

by Alison Larkin

  I know I’ll probably be all right once I get into the city, because it’s supposedly built on a grid and therefore quite straightforward—unlike, say, Canberra, in Australia, which is built in a circle and impossible to find your way around even if you’ve lived there for decades. I traveled around Australia when I was seventeen, in my year off between school and university. It’s where I fell in love for the first time. With my cousin. We didn’t have sex or anything, but I did learn about kissing lying down.

  That’s one advantage of being adopted. It’s absolutely fine to fall for your cousin, because you’re not blood relations. I’ve often thought it would have been nice if our love had lasted. Because then, if we’d got married and had babies, the babies would be blood relatives of mine and Mum’s. Which would make me really related to Mum, if you see what I mean.

  But the romance between Drew and me didn’t last. I went back to university in England, and he became a park ranger in the Australian bush. Poor Drew. He really loved me, I think. And I loved him. And then I didn’t. As I drive, I wonder if other people remember every detail about the people who stopped loving them first—and very little about the people they left brokenhearted.

  The sound of horns hooting brings my mind back to the present. I read somewhere that it’s illegal to hoot your horn in Manhattan. If that’s true, then there are a lot of people breaking the law when I hit midtown.

  I’m not a particularly good driver at the best of times. But when something makes me nervous—well, forget it. I try to do a three-point turn, just as my driving instructor taught me back in Kew. But this is not a peaceful, tree-lined street in West London.

  I stall in front of a huge metal dumpster next to a barbed-wire fence. I get out and apologize. The horns hoot louder. Finally a parking-lot attendant takes pity on me and guides my car, backward, into his lot. I am surprised to note that he is wearing a bow tie, particularly considering the fact that his parking lot is nothing more than a forty-foot-square piece of concrete, surrounded by graffiti-covered walls, under open sky.

  He tells me he wants forty-four dollars to park my car there. I check his face to see if he is joking. He isn’t. But I’m grateful to him for rescuing me and impatient to see the city, so rather than spending hours trying to find a meter, I pay him. Then I sling my handbag over my shoulder and take my first walk through the streets of Manhattan.

  I’d much rather walk through the streets below famous buildings than visit the buildings themselves. So, on my first trip into New York City, despite the fact that it’s January and bitterly cold, I start walking. I head up Eighth Avenue, past the porn shops and the theaters and the subway signs with the lettersA, C, andE . I stop for a few moments on the corner of Forty-fourth and Eighth. A subway train is passing beneath me, massaging my feet as it rumbles below.

  The wind is fierce, and I’m grateful for the thermal underwear Mum sneaked into my suitcase and the Australian Ugg boots I’ve brought with me from England. My ears, however, are freezing, and I wish I’d brought a hat.

  New York is alive with people selling things. Newspapers, umbrellas, coffee, gloves, watches, jewels. I stop at the Broadway Diner for a mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows floating on the top.

  An hour later, heading along the famous streets toward what has to be Times Square, I notice a number of signs on a wire fence with Post No Signs stamped on it. “Jesus Saves,” “Adali Snapple, the Best Flavors on Earth,” “Thee Nail Salon—Manicure, Pedicure, for the Best Nails on Earth.” I can hear Charlotte and Mum’s voices in my head: “Why does everything have to be the ‘best’ in America? Why can’t it just be good enough? Hmm?”

  I stop at a pretzel stand and buy an enormous salted pretzel, which I cover with mustard from the squeezy yellow mustard container. It feels exotic and very American in comparison with Grey Poupon.

  I’m fighting against the wind, passing a dark, narrow alley, finishing the last bite of my pretzel, when I’m startled by a tap on my shoulder. I turn around and see a tall, strong-looking man in a long black coat and black face mask staring down at me.

  I won’t mind giving him what little money I have, but I’d rather not be bundled into the back of a car and dumped dead somewhere north of 160th Street without my coat or my shoes, like the woman in24.

  The man is holding my arm. I tell myself to stay calm.

  “Hallo,” I say.

  The wind is blowing fierce and sharp, and I can’t hear what the man is saying above the traffic. My scarf is flapping in the wind and I’m trying not to panic. His other hand comes toward me. He’s holding something. A drug dealer. Stay calm, Pip.

  “No, thank you,” I say, “I don’t take drugs, except for a cold. Sorry.” I smile politely at him, pull my arm away, and start to walk in the opposite direction. Maybe he’ll like my accent and let me go? He catches up with me, puts his arm around my shoulders, and pulls me into the alley.

  I mean it when I say I won’t mind giving him my money. When I was about fifteen, I had my bicycle stolen. I knew the boys that took it—I saw them at the playground with it the following week. The white seat had been painted red, but it was definitely my bike. I went home and told Mum about it. She said, “Don’t make such a fuss about it, darling. If they went to all the trouble of stealing it, they probably need the bicycle much more than you do.”

  Ever since then—well, I’ve seen her point. The only thing I’d really mind being stolen would be something I was in the middle of writing. Or my really comfy slippers. Everything else can be replaced.

  We’re protected from the wind by the alley, and I can now hear what the man is saying. “Your wallet,” he says.

  My first thought is to wonder why Americans insist on calling a purse a wallet and a handbag a purse. In England, a purse has a little metal clip and is used, mostly, for change. A wallet is flat. You keep your credit cards in it. They’re completely different. Some Americans even go so far as to call a handbag a pocketbook, which is not part of the vocabulary in England. An educated guess might lead your average Brit to assume it refers to an A–Z, perhaps. Or one of those minibooks full of inspirational phrases that you can read on the loo.

  My second thought is to remember that a magazine article I once read said that if you’re approached by a mugger, just give him what he wants—don’t put up any kind of fight, it’s not worth risking your life. I reach into my coat pocket. Maybe if I give him the money, he’ll let me keep my driving license. It would take me weeks to get another one, and I don’t want to risk having to take a driving test in the U.S. It took me five tries before I passed my British test, and I’m sure the only reason I got through it is because I took Charlotte’s advice: I resisted all urges to speak to the instructor, put my hair up in a bun, and wore a conservative-looking skirt with heels.

  “Oh dear,” I say, reaching into my pocket to give my purse to the man standing over me. “It doesn’t seem to be—”

  “Your wallet,” he says.

  I look into his outstretched hand. He’s not holding drugs or a gun. He’s holding my purse. “You dropped your wallet two blocks back. You gotta be careful, this is New York City.”

  “Oh!” I say, waves of relief washing over me. “Oh! I thought you were a mugger! Oh! Thank you!”

  The man is taking off his face mask, which, upon closer inspection, isn’t a face mask at all, but appears to be a balaclava, hand-knitted out of thick fluffy wool.

  He has brown hair, beautiful soft brown eyes, and a kind, craggy, interesting face. He’s lean and tall—about thirty-five or so—and he’s laughing.

  “Sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to scare you. My mom gave me this. She thinks I’ll get frostbite if I don’t wear it. I forgot I had it on.” He smiles at me awkwardly.

  “Here,” he says, handing me his balaclava. “Take it. It’s the least I can do after scaring you like that. Anyway, you shouldn’t be walking around New York City in January without a hat.”

  His accent is gloriously, unmistaka
bly from New Jersey.

  “But I can’t take your hat!”

  “It’s okay,” he says. “I’ve got three more of these at home.” His grin is impish and infectious.

  I’m not sure which hole to put my head through. He takes off his gloves and helps me get it on. His hands are warm and big and steady. He stands back and looks at me. In my bright yellow coat and black balaclava, I look like an M&M.

  “You look mean!” he says, smiling. “No one’s gonna mess with you now.”

  My voice is muffled from inside the man’s hat, which feels surprisingly soft against my freezing-cold face and smells pleasantly of man and aftershave.

  He reaches out and tucks a strand of my hair into the hat. Then, he puts his gloves back on again and looks at his watch.

  “I gotta get to work,” he says.

  “Oh,” I say. “Well, thank you so much! My purse has everything in it. My driving license, my passport. British driving licenses don’t have photo ID, at least mine doesn’t. That’s why I carry my passport with me. For ID. I need it when I go to the bank.” I know I’m giving him too much information. I should let the poor man go.

  “You’re British, right?”

  “Yup,” I say. “Well, sort of.” I stop myself before I start in on the whole story. “My name’s Pippa,” I say instead.

  “Well, hi, Pippa,” he says, smiling. “I’m Jack.”

  The wind is blowing his hair off his face, which I note is alive with merriment.

  “I’ve got to get to work, but…well…look, don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to pick you up or anything…”

  “Oh, good.”

  “But Friday nights are British night this month. Down at The Gold Room. I work there. It’s between Third and Bleecker. Why don’t you come on down sometime?”

  “I’d like that,” I say. “The Gold Room. Right. Got it. And…well, thanks for the…uh…gear!”

  “You’re lucky,” he said. “I could have been wearing the hat with the little yellow duckies on it.”

  The wind has picked up again, and we part, waving heavy gloves at each other.

  When I get back to Adler, Carol is waiting for me at the door. Billie made it to Georgia in time to tear her father away from a strongly protesting Molly Alice and drive him up to his cabin on the mountain. Earl died later that afternoon, lying in his recliner, looking out over the creek. The daughter he loved most was holding his hand.

  My long-lost relatives have already started gathering. I am to get on an airplane and join them on Buck Mountain in the morning.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  I’M SITTING IN THE BACK OFBILLIE’S CAR,sandwiched between Ralphie and my obese, manic-depressive aunt Marcie, while Billie careers down Buck Mountain at top speed toward the church. My aunt Octavia is sitting in the front next to Billie, telling me all about her daughter.

  “Your cousin Augusta could be your double. She’s got the red hair and the dimples when she smiles. Only she’s got no arms and legs.”

  Rocks and dirt are spraying out from the side of the car.

  “She lost her limbs the day she tried to kill herself. She threw herself off a bridge, but failed.”

  “It’s the family mood disorder.” Marcie’s voice is as deep as a man’s and she speaks very slowly. “It affects different family members in different ways.”

  Ralphie is staring blankly out of the window.

  Octavia pulls out a gold-plated compact mirror and puts on some bright red lipstick, which is a challenge, because the road is bumpy and Billie’s pushing seventy.

  “I am just shocked at the way Molly Alice forced Daddy to have a traditional funeral and is justrefusing to allow me to read my poem!” she says. Octavia has written a poem in memory of Earl entitled “My Father, My Self.”

  “She knows Daddy wanted us to celebrate his life, not mourn it. Now she’s finally got him where she wants him, she can control him,” Billie says, taking a furious swig of coffee from her no-spill coffee cup. It misses her mouth and splashes, unnoticed, onto her coat. It smells of hazelnut. “Well, she can’t control what we wear.”

  I am wearing a dark green chiffon dress of Billie’s mother’s, itchy and tight at the waist, and a pair of Billie’s high-heeled velvet shoes. Billie and Marcie are both dressed in cherry red. Octavia is wearing a winter white cashmere suit. Poor Ralphie has been forced into a gold jacket and a red tie. We look like figurines on the top of a Christmas cake.

  Unused to high heels, I hobble into Mapleville Episcopal Church behind Billie and Octavia, who stride in front of the rest of us, with their heads held high, wearing the only colored clothes in the church.

  The right-hand side of the church is filled with about seventy of Molly Alice’s family members. In the dim church light it’s difficult to tell whether they’re hunching their shoulders or a family with very short necks. Their black eyes dart suspiciously around the room. They look like a gang of moles. There isn’t a blonde or a redhead among them. In the front right pew, Molly Alice is seated quietly next to her daughter, Lee, who is as tiny as her mother.

  On the left-hand side of the church is Earl’s family from his first marriage. Billie, Octavia, Ralph, Marcie, me, and, at the back of the church, a short, furry, red-haired man in his fifties who has to be my Uncle Irv, the convicted felon.

  Octavia is sitting ramrod straight, with her poem folded on top of her white velvet purse. She is trying to catch the attention of the Reverend, who is trying to ignore her.

  “Reverend!” Billie says. “Reverend!” Her words echo loudly through the church.

  The Reverend Carpenter turns his attention to Billie and scuttles toward us.

  Billie smiles at him. “You remember my big sister Octavia?”

  “Tommy, I have known you since you were in shorts,” Octavia says, “and you will listen to me with something resembling respect. I would like to read a poem I have written about my daddy.”

  Reverend Thomas Carpenter’s voice is strained, but calm.

  “Octavia, we have been over this already. Earl’s wife requested a traditional service, with no additional readings.”

  “Daddy would have hated that!” Billie is almost spitting. “You know that, Tommy!”

  “There will be no poem,” the Reverend says, all serenity gone. “Do you hear me? There will be no poem!”

  “But…”

  The Reverend Carpenter’s green eyes bulge. He is trying to keep his voice low while his blood pressure visibly rises.

  “Mrs. Parnell”—he is annunciating his words so carefully, he sounds almost British—“Molly Alice was married to your father for thirty years. She doesn’t want to hear Octavia Stanford at her husband’s funeral. She wants to hear Saint Luke.”

  Octavia draws herself up to her full height. “That’s no way to speak to Earl’s oldest living blood relative!”

  But the Reverend has already left for the other side of the church.

  Octavia is shaking. Billie’s gone red. The service has begun.

  “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound…”

  The accent doesn’t matter. Anglican or Episcopal, the church service is the same on both sides of the Atlantic. Long, slow, dull, but comforting because, and perhaps only because, it is familiar.

  But dull is not an adjective that can legitimately describe this particular service.

  “We’re not going to Molly Alice’s reception after the service,” Billie whispers loudly in my ear during the first reading. “Pass it on.”

  Next to me is Johnny Taft. Earl started him in business when he was eighteen and helped him buy a house on the mountain. He’s a gentle, still, bearlike man who loved Earl. He is crying quietly.

  I pretend I haven’t heard Billie and stare at my hands, which are clasped, tightly, in acute embarrassment, around the funeral program on my lap.

  When the third hymn has been sung, Billie stands up.

  “Reverend Carpenter, Molly Alice, friends, relatives, a word, please.”

&
nbsp; Oh no.

  There is a murmur in response to Billie. The Reverend stands. Then sits. Then stands. Then sits again.

  “I was the person holding Daddy’s hand when he passed, and I would like to say a few words if I may.”

  Billie bows graciously in Molly Alice’s direction. Molly Alice stares back at her, frozen. Billie’s voice fills the room. Her tone is soft, respectful, sincere.

  “I know you’re all going to go to Molly Alice’s gathering on Pine Drive after this funeral. And I can understand you would want to do that, out of respect and all.” She nods in Molly Alice’s direction again, smiling graciously. “But if, after that, you’d like to celebrate Daddy’s life in the way he wanted, with music, dancing, and poetry written by a family member, I’d love you all to come on up to my place on the mountain after the formalities are over.”

  She claps her hands like a child.

  “I even have Daddy’s favorite bluegrass band coming!”

  And then, as if it’s an afterthought, Billie turns toward Lee. She is staring at Billie, blank-faced and still as stone.

  “And, well, as we’re all in God’s house, I would like to take this opportunity to say something to my half-sister Lee.”

  Her voice drops low, but every word echoes through the church.

  “Lee, I love you! We may have very different mothers, but you will always be my sister! And I want you to know that Daddy forgave you. Yes, he felt a little sad that you waited until the winter of his final year, when his body was riddled with cancer, before telling him. But both Daddy and I were so proud of the fact that you finally found the courage to tell him the truth about your sexuality.”

  Despite themselves, the congregation turns to stare at Lee, whose expression is still blank.

  “Lee, Molly Alice, everyone, I’ll hope to see you all later. And Lee, I want you to know that, in my house, you will always be welcome to bring your lesbian lovers.”