by Nicole Kelby
“It’s historical—and they have sea monsters,” the priest said. “You could take Little Mike. I bet he would love to ride a Wild West stagecoach with his beloved auntie and uncle, or take a Chinese junk across San Francisco Bay. What child would not like that?”
Patrick, a Yeats man, was clearly not impressed. “It’s not real, John.”
“It’s America; it doesn’t need to be.”
Patrick put the tickets back down on Father John’s desk. “Thanks for the kind thought, but—”
“Little Mike will love it,” Kate said, and picked them up again and put them in her purse.
In August, the First Lady went into early labor. The baby, a boy, died two days later. That night, Patrick and Kate were lying in bed, sleepless. Patrick was on his back, looking up at the ceiling fan, listening to the tick, tick, tick of it.
“I can’t even imagine it,” he said.
For Kate, the scenes on the television news were more eloquent than words could ever be. The President and the Wife were getting into their car to leave the hospital. The stunned look on their beautiful faces, and the way he shyly reached out to take her hand and then held it as if he would never let it go—it all said so much more than words could. The wise heart is mute, she thought.
Kate and Patrick lay in dark for a long time. When it seemed as if they had both finally drifted off to sleep, he said, “Did you know what the baby’s name was?”
She did. It was Patrick.
“We should get some sleep,” she said.
The next morning at breakfast, Kate announced that there’d been “enough sorrow.” Patrick looked up from the newspaper. His reading glasses sat low on the tip of his nose. “We’re going to Freedomland on Sunday,” she said. “I’ll do up my hair with the pillbox hat and wear the pink suit. I’ll smile a good deal. It will remind everyone of happier times.”
Patrick blew on his tea to cool it. Thinking. Then said, “It’s a fine idea, Mrs. Harris. We’ll give it a go.”
They took Rose; they put the top down. Little Mike, in the backseat, was laughing. Patrick said the boy was basking in Rose’s Oldsmobility. Although Kate was still not exactly sure what that meant, she laughed when Patrick said it.
As they drove, people they passed on Broadway waved at them. Kate waved back, as she’d seen the Wife do. It was the royal wave that the Queen herself did at her own coronation. It was just a slight twist at the wrist—a restrained move that oozed regality and did not suggest excitement. Kate mimicked it easily.
“It’s probably the gloves,” Patrick said. “White gloves lend themselves to poshness.”
It was a dry, warm morning. Patrick took a very long way to the amusement park. In fact, he drove up and down Broadway a few times before they actually left the neighborhood. So many from the parish smiled and waved at them that it was difficult not to want to drive forever.
“Maybe we should wait until Thanksgiving to go back home,” Patrick said. “Just in case business turns around.”
“Once more around the neighborhood?” she said.
“Of course.”
They both knew that the business would not turn around. At least, not as much as they needed. In three months, they would be gone. Rose would be sold. But on that day in August, they were still Americans. They had the suit.
Freedomland U.S.A. was just three years old. It was owned and built by the same man who’d designed Disneyland, but it was bigger and better and had cost a staggering twenty-one million dollars to create. Kate couldn’t remember the man’s name, but she’d read in the Post that he was in trouble because he’d built the park without Mr. Walt’s approval, using Disney’s staff and designs and, perhaps, some of his money.
Freedomland was bigger than Disneyland even dreamed of being. There were eight miles of rivers, lakes, and streams. Its Great Lakes held 9.6 million gallons of water. There were also five hundred thousand yards of streets, six miles of railroad track, and fifty thousand trees. Nearly ten thousand cars could be parked in their lots. Over ninety thousand people could pass through the gates in one day. In an effort to help people grasp the sheer enormity of the undertaking, the official guide was eighteen pages long. It had a two-page color-coded map that alerted visitors to the restrooms, a fact that Kate greatly appreciated, and explained in great detail the seven regions of the four-hundred-acre park.
“Massive,” was all Kate could say.
Even the traffic jam leading to the park was monumental, and they were soon stuck in it. After an hour of moving an inch at a time, Patrick Harris pulled the car off to the shoulder of the road just to take it all in for a moment.
“This is bigger than Ireland.”
“That’s because it’s America,” she said.
Parking was fifty cents, but the attendant waved them through. “No charge. Nice to see you, Mrs. K!”
Kate was surprised that the man was so kind and made sure that she waved that white-gloved wave directly at him. “Thank you so very much,” she said, whispering, just as the Wife would have done. The man blushed.
“Well, wasn’t that fun, Mrs. Harris?” Patrick said sweetly, and kissed her hand, but that was just the beginning of it.
On the streets of Old New York, in front of the miniature of Macy’s department store, on the tugboats in the harbor, and at the suffragette rally that was interrupted by a gangland robbery of the Little Old New York Bank—even on the horse-drawn streetcars—there were so many people who wanted their picture taken with Kate that she started to smile, pose, and talk like the Wife.
“They must think I work here.”
“Or they just like beautiful women.”
When the parade marched down Main Street, the band nodded as they passed her. Kate waved. One of the policemen helped her onto a float of the White House, and she waved while Patrick and Little Mike ran behind, laughing.
Kate, in her pink suit and pillbox hat, waved her way through the Great Chicago Fire, where, miraculously, the flames did not frighten Little Mike at all. Nor did the tornado ride, where houses spun like ballroom dancers. Kate continued to wave for hours.
By the time they’d reached the Santa Fe Railroad, where they rode the Monson No. 3 all the way to 1906 San Francisco, Kate had become so tired of waving that she wanted to stop, but everyone still waved at her, and so Kate continued on.
In Chinatown, they ate shrimp chow mein with chopped celery, fried noodles, and the tiniest pink shrimps that Kate had ever seen. She waved between mouthfuls. On the Earthquake ride, where San Francisco shook apart and then came back together, she was still waving.
When they took the half-hour tour of the New England countryside in an old Model T, past vineyards and rippling streams, and then cruised the Great Lakes on the Canadian, a gigantic paddle-wheel boat, Kate posed for pictures at every possible juncture. Somewhere along the way, she began to sign autographs, too. She wrote in the same handwriting that she had seen on Her Elegance’s drawings.
After nearly eight hours of being the Wife, Kate wanted to stop, but it was difficult. There were so many people who wanted the simplest of things—a photo, a word, and, sometimes, a hug. She could not deny them. At the seal pool, Patrick and Little Mike were hungry again and announced that they were in desperate need of root beer floats. Patrick remembered that they’d passed an A&W on their way somewhere but couldn’t remember where it was, exactly.
“I’m not even sure I can find the car again,” he said. Kate hoped he was joking.
The plan was to try to get to Satellite City just before the fireworks. The futuristic city featured the Blast-Off Bunker, an authentic reproduction of Cape Canaveral’s control room. Little Mike wanted to watch a rocket launch. They all did, actually.
After the fireworks, Count Basie and his orchestra were scheduled to play at Satellite City’s Moon Bowl, the outdoor amphitheater and dance floor. Kate had hoped they could listen for just a moment or two on their way out. Maybe have a quick dance under the stars. But they had to be careful
not to run out of time. Freedomland was so large, and the day was nearly over.
“Let’s map this out,” Patrick said.
He and Little Mike sat down on the bench by the harbor, with the official guide on their laps. While they plotted their course, Kate took off her shoes and put her feet in the San Francisco Bay—at least that’s what the sign said. It was just a big pond, really. It’s a knockoff, she thought. And wondered what the Ladies would think of Freedomland—the greatest knockoff of them all.
Her nylons were ruined, but the water was soothing. The pillbox hat made her head itch, but she didn’t want to take it off. Not yet, at least. Kate closed her eyes for just a minute; she couldn’t remember the last time she was this tired. They’d seen less than half the park. Next time, she thought, and then caught herself. There would be no next time. It was now or never.
Kate yawned, and a man snapped one picture of her and then another. Her mouth was open. Yawning was not attractive. The Wife knew better than to be caught doing that, but Kate no longer cared. It was late. She was tired. She yawned again and hoped the annoying man would just go away, but he didn’t. The man was moving around Kate as if to capture that particular quality that the Wife had. Kate was trying not to pay attention to him. He was like a spot on the edge of her vision.
Patrick and Little Mike were still looking over the map, trying to figure out the shortest point from here to there, when Kate noticed that there was a tear in her nylons. She wanted to slip them off—the garters would pop easily—but that man was still there, taking pictures. Kate refused to look at him.
She closed her eyes again and focused on everything else except the flash of the camera. There was the smell of popcorn, burnt sugar from cotton candy, and clouds of cigarette smoke. There was so much noise from the chugging railroad, the long drawl of the horn from the paddle wheeler, and a brass band in the distance—it was a lot like being in the city: the hum of it, life under the clouds. It was tiring, though. Everyone wanted something. Everyone thought you could be someone you weren’t.
“Look this way,” the man finally shouted. “You’re making me waste film.”
Kate looked at him. He was about her age, with sandpaper skin, wearing rolled-up blue jeans and scuffed boots. He was a roughneck. Behind him there was a thin young woman in a housedress; it was not the kind of thing meant to be worn outdoors, and certainly not to an amusement park. They were obviously together.
“Do you know how much film costs?”
“Sorry,” Kate said, but she wasn’t. She had a ticket, like everybody else.
The man pushed the young woman forward, next to Kate. “Go on, now,” he said. “Stand next to her. Hurry up.”
He must have been her boyfriend. Kate looked back to see that Patrick and Little Mike were still talking logistics on the bench. They didn’t even notice the commotion.
“Would you like a photo with me?” Kate asked her.
The young woman nodded.
One more can’t hurt, Kate thought, and hoped that the shot was from the waist up. When she stood and brushed herself off, the run in her nylons spread across her knee.
The young woman seemed apprehensive.
“It’s fine,” Kate said.
“Why are you dressed like that?”
That was the first time anyone had asked Kate that all day. It surprised her.
The man with the camera was growing impatient. “Just stand next to her. It’s as close as you’ll ever get to the real thing.”
The young woman didn’t move. “You don’t really look like her,” she said. “A little, but not much. The hair’s totally wrong. From far away it’s better.”
“Viola, shut up and pose.”
The thin woman in her threadbare dress tentatively stood next to Kate, as if she might run away at any minute. The vibrant pinks of the bouclé suit reflected off the woman’s face and gave her a rosy glow. The man took the photo. Another flashbulb sizzled. She leaned in and whispered, “I lost my baby, too. Like the First Lady.”
What was I thinking, wearing this suit? Kate thought. The young woman suddenly looked so pained. She seemed to be hoping for some words of advice, or comfort, but Kate had none. “I’m sorry” was the best she could do.
Viola shrugged, and then touched Kate’s sleeve, the bouclé. She rubbed it between her fingers. “It’s stronger than it looks.”
“A lot of things are stronger than they look.”
The young woman looked at Kate closely—not at the suit, but at Kate.
“Could be,” she said.
This is how the story changes, Kate thought. The story of the pink suit was no longer about beauty or forgiveness. It was about strength.
Little Mike fell asleep in the car. It was amazing to Kate how big he’d grown in just a couple of years. He was nearly six years old now, and not a trace was left of the Gerber Baby smile he’d once had. The tour was a farewell to Little Mike, too. Kate hoped he would always remember it, and her. And Patrick. But she suspected that when they left, the next time she’d see Mike, he’d be all grown up. Maybe even married. His aunt Kate would be just a dim memory.
Kate kissed his salty forehead and wondered if the kiss would push its way through to his dreams.
Patrick carried the boy into Maggie’s apartment and then drove home in silence. The night had turned humid. The pubs all along Broadway were closed for mourning. Some of the doors had black wreaths over them. Many of the signs were covered in black shrouds. After all, the President’s baby was Inwood’s own son.
The parking garage now held only Rose. The explosion had compromised its foundation. Rose and her Oldsmobility, her poetry of steel and thunder—Patrick and Kate would miss her so. They sat in the car holding hands until well past midnight. They didn’t care that the garage was stifling hot and precariously tilting to the left. Like the bats, Kate thought, always to the left, always toward home.
“Our farewell tour,” Patrick finally said, as if it were a summation of the day. The words were filled with wonder and regret. They made Kate feel a bit closer to heaven, but a bit closer to death, too.
That night their part of Broadway was quiet, as usual. The last bus came by, dotted with passengers. When Patrick went downstairs to take his shower in the shop, as he always did, Kate finally took off the pink suit. She was going to fold it, wrap it in tissue paper, and put it away—but didn’t. She hung it in the shop window. It would be her gift to the neighborhood.
“It’s like waving a flag,” she told Patrick. “Patriotic.” Then told him what the girl had said.
“Strength?” he said.
“Absolutely.”
In November, the Wife wore the suit for the last time.
There’d been no orders for Thanksgiving at all. Kate and Patrick had taken the proceeds from the sale of Rose and bought two one-way airplane tickets—her Oldsmobility was apparently worth a good deal. The apartment was now filled with boxes. Some were to go to Maggie. Some were for Father John to distribute to the poor in the parish. Patrick would take only his butchering knives and a few clothes. “That’s all I need,” he said.
Tomorrow they would be gone.
Mrs. Brown had asked them to drop by for lunch before they left. “I’ll miss you both like the devil,” she said. Kate held her until they both stopped crying.
“Yes,” was all Patrick could say. He’d recently discovered that he wasn’t very good at good-byes.
Mrs. Brown had her rituals. Monday through Friday, between the hours of one o’clock and three p.m., she cleaned the pub. It was never open for lunch, and that was a perfect arrangement, because her “stories” were on television then. She was particularly fond of As the World Turns, although she kept the volume low unless it looked important—like an indecent proposal, or a marriage proposal, or both. She usually plugged the jukebox with change from the register. The music was loud and Irish.
“I like to have a good weep while I clean,” she always said.
When Patrick a
nd Kate opened the door to the pub, fiddles were whirling like dervishes; the accordion was breathless. A small black-and-white television was sitting on the bar, blaring. The place reeked of ammonia and Murphy’s soap. Mrs. Brown was dressed for lunch but still had on her yellow rubber gloves. She was in a panic. On the television, the Wife was standing on a tarmac, holding a spray of roses. It didn’t matter at all that the TV was black and white.
“That’s your suit,” Mrs. Brown said.
Patrick pushed the jukebox away from the wall. The needle scratched the record hard. He pulled the plug, but the music was still ringing in Kate’s ears.
“After the shot hit,” the reporter said, “his head fell into her lap.”
Kate was speechless.
Into her lap—and the suit. The suit that Kate knew every stitch of, had lived every tuck and pleat of, had worried over, and cried over, and fell in love with Patrick over—this pink suit was the last thing the President ever saw. It was a particularly reckless pink, wild and vibrant, improbable in its beauty. And it had been made by so many hands, so many hearts. Those who were well known and those who were never known, and those whose names would be forgotten, not just Kate: it was part of them all.
After the shot hit, the President died with that vision of pink.
He died in all of their arms.
After, Kate thought. That word again. It was too much to bear.
That night, their very last in America, Kate and Patrick stood in the butcher shop, looking out through the window, into the deserted street. It was snowing, quietly. The snow was like an afterthought, like a task that had been forgotten in the chaos of the moment.
The pink suit was still hanging in the shopwindow.