A Day in June

by Marisa Labozzetta

  “I was engaged.”

  “Forget that Jason!” Faye discounts the statement with a wave of glossy red-tipped fingers. “I got over Billy Filene, didn’t? I told your mother she should have raised you with some religion. Maybe if you had been more religious, Jason wouldn’t have gone looking to marry God.”

  “He doesn’t want to marry God. That’s what nuns do.”

  “Men probably do now too. Times are changing. Speaking of which, how’s your roommate, Tiffany? I like that girl. A little kooky, but I like her. Bring her around sometime.”

  “You like her because she caters to you. Sometimes I’m uncomfortable around her. She tries to be like us but she’s filthy rich, you know.”

  “Money doesn’t make a person, Ryan. You can be a lady at a bar and a tramp at the Astor.”

  “What’s the Astor?”

  “It was a grand hotel in New York built by the Astor family. You know the Astors—you saw Titanic. The husband went down with the boat. Like I said, money can’t buy everything.”

  Ryan nods.

  “You know, when your mother wanted to marry your father, I was opposed at first. Not just because he was Catholic, mind you. But he took her to New York. They got married barefoot in the sand—no priest, no rabbi—just some bearded guy with a white turban. Come to think of it, the dress was macramé not cotton. ‘At least they got married,’ your grandfather said.”

  “Now, what’s your point?”

  “If you know what you want, it’ll work out.”

  “My parents separated.”

  “It was a phase. Your father just lost his mind for a little while.”

  “When he left my mother, you said he should have been shot with shit and sent to hell for stinking.”

  “I said that’s what your grandfather would have said if he had been alive. Look, your mother forgives your father; even I forgive the bastard. They’re working things out. Everyone deserves a second chance.”

  “Is this coming from experience?”

  “I’m not talking.”

  “Since when?”

  “I’ll admit to this: Sometimes I thought marrying my Sidney was the best thing I’d ever done; sometimes I thought it was the worst. All marriages are like that. As my Sidney used to say, ‘Take two and hit to right.’”

  “Do you even know what that means?”

  “It’s baseball talk. Do you?”

  “I played softball, remember.”

  “Something like: You can’t keep stalling. Eventually you have to take a stab at it and hope for the best. All marriages have spells that are like a chronic illness: The symptoms subside and you feel good; they flare up from time to time and you feel bad; occasionally the illness is fatal. The question is: What do you want, Ryan?”

  “I thought I wanted Jason.”

  “You were confused. I don’t know why your parents ever sent you to a Catholic college.”

  “It offered me a scholarship. It needed diversity.”

  “Look, do yourself a favor. Go on the Internet. That’s what all the young girls who work here do. You have a computer. There’s this JDate for Jews. It can’t hurt. I used to tell your mother, ‘Would you just try it?’ about dating a Jewish boy, and she would turn her nose up as though I were offering her gefilte fish that had been sitting in the refrigerator from two Passovers ago. She was like you—always with the gentiles. Always contrary.”

  “Can’t imagine where she got that from.”

  “Why don’t you put on some makeup? You’re such a pretty girl, but everyone can use a little help. You never know when Mr. Right will show up. You could be throwing out the garbage. And wear a few pieces of jewelry, Ryan—to attract a rich guy: money goes to money. By the way, when I’m gone up here”—she points to her head—“make sure my nails are done and my hair is colored. Clairol Nice n’ Easy, 101, Ash Blonde. And pull out any black hairs you see on my chin. Do I have any now? I left my magnifying mirror at home.”

  “You’re good, Faye.”

  “When you were a baby, I never took you or your cousins Emma and Jake in a car when I babysat.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I was afraid,” she says, as though Ryan should have known the answer. “Now I won’t hold a baby unless I’m sitting down. I’m afraid I might drop her. You see what I mean?”

  “No.”

  “Come on, Ryan. You’re a bright girl. The longer you wait, the worse everything gets. Fear overtakes you. That’s why I got on the bike—I was tired of being afraid. Get on the Internet. I want to come to your wedding.”

  “You’ll be there. I promise.”

  “But I want to know I’m there. Your mother and your aunt say I should move into an independent living place with access to assisted living when I get out of here. What do you think?”

  “Do you want to?”

  “I like my house, my garden, though I can’t work in it anymore. I keep busy with the few friends I have left. We play cards once a week. Sometimes we go to the theater. Well, we used to.”

  “Then stay.”

  “But they’re dying.” She sighs. “And it’s getting harder for us remainders to maneuver. We’ve managed up until now, but something’s bound to bite you in the ass. And so this question nags me: At what point do you stop listening to yourself and start listening to your children because your own logic is flawed? And if your own logic is flawed, how do you know it is?”

  “I don’t think you’re there yet, Faye. I mean, you might have been bitten in the ass, but not the other thing.”

  “Why? Because of what I just said? It doesn’t work that way.” She waves her long red nails in Ryan’s face. “One day you’re on; one day you’re off. At first you know you’re missing something. Soon you don’t know you’re missing anything at all. I see the ones who live in the building next door—the independent living building. They leave their cars’ key rings dangling from their hands like a teenager who just got his license, daring anyone to take those jewels of freedom from them. But then they’ll blink, and the only thing they’ll be driving is an aluminum walker with a license to linger because it’s also an assisted living unit.”

  “You said it’s about knowing what you want.”

  “There comes a time when what you want might no longer be good for you.”

  “Do you have to decide today?”

  “Of course not. I’ll be here for a good while. But hopefully I’ll be out in time for your wedding. When’s the date? I need to put it in my calendar.” She points to a calendar book with the picture of a brass band on the cover.

  “June twenty-eighth.” Ryan goes over to the calendar. “This is pointless.”

  But Faye directs her with a pointed finger and Ryan makes the notation.

  “Plan to go home, Faye. I’ll tell you if I don’t think it’s a good idea when the time comes.”

  “Oh, I wish I could go with you.”

  “You’ll be out soon enough.”

  “No. I mean to Vermont.”

  “I am curious.”

  “Tough to fold a winning hand, isn’t it? Think of it as an adventure. See where it leads you. You can always tell them it didn’t work out between you and your fiancé. But I’m optimistic something positive will come of this. And if it doesn’t, it’s material, Ryan. You can always write about it.”

  There’s a knock at the door. When Faye responds, a young man with spiked blond hair and wearing blue scrubs pops his head in. “Can I get you settled for the evening, Faye?”

  “I suppose, Louis. Come meet my granddaughter, Ryan. Louis is here to put me to bed.” Faye winks at Ryan.

  “Would you like something to drink? Coffee? Coke?” he asks Ryan.

  “No, thank you. I was just about to leave.”

  “Take your time. I’ll come back in a few minutes.”

  “Adorable,” Faye says when he’s gone. “Don’t you think?”

  “Please. He looks like he’s ten.”

  “He’s twenty-four and a
great poker player, but he’s a little too short for you. Listen, before you go, take something from the bag. Maybe there’s a necklace you’d like. Consider it a party favor.”

  “Jeez, Faye. You haven’t even been here two weeks.”

  “I like to keep busy.”

  Ryan pulls out a small padded envelope and holds it up for Faye to see. “What’s in this?”

  “A headlamp for hiking in the dark.”

  “Ooh, this is nice.” Ryan examines a rectangular red faux-alligator purse with silver chain handles.

  “The outside comes off. It’s magnetic. There are two more covers—plaid and zebra. Three purses in one!”

  “There must be a magnifying mirror in here somewhere.”

  “Take the watch in the skinny gold box, darling. It comes with six different colored bands to coordinate with your outfits.”

  Ryan puts everything back and closes up the bag. She walks over to her grandmother empty-handed. “Don’t worry, Faye,” she says kissing her on the cheek. “I’ll be back.”

  “Whatever you do, bubeleh, make sure he dances,” Faye calls after her.

  “Faye—” Ryan turns around. “What’s for breakfast tomorrow?”

  “Buckwheat pancakes with bacon, stewed prunes, and a softboiled egg. I can’t wait.”

  Ryan smiles with relief. “By the way, your poker buddy Harold is hot.”

  “Who?”

  The worried look returns to Ryan’s face.

  “Relax. I was only kidding. Stop the testing. I know who you’re talking about. Nothing wrong with my frontal lobe. At least he’s not like the mishuggah on the third floor who goes up to every woman and says: ‘I’m looking for sex.’ Every day it’s: ‘I’m looking for sex.’”

  “I think he likes you. I mean Harold. Can he dance?”

  “I think he likes you. Didn’t you see the wheelchair? Actually, he had a stroke, but he’s improving off the charts. And you won’t believe this, but he was an Arthur Murray instructor on the side. You know: Put a little fun into your life. Try dancing.”

  “No way!” Ryan’s never heard of Arthur Murray but puts two and two together.

  “Specialized in the rumba. Arthur Murray. A great place to be somebody.” She attempts to shimmy her torso. After Ryan has left, she grimaces with pain.

  Chapter 6

  Tuesday, January 21

  JASON MCDERMOTT KNEELS in a small chapel in a southern Catholic college. It isn’t even really a chapel but a room at the college turned into a chapel for the novices like him. The walls are painted white; the flooring is oak; the altar is a rectangular oak table with a cloth draped over it; a life-sized image of Christ on the cross dominates the wall behind it. There are no longer enough men aspiring to become Jesuits in America to warrant the upkeep of the old seminaries, and so Jason and others like him have been relegated to one of a handful of Spirituality Centers carved out of universities. Here, through rigorous prayer, dialogue, and observation, he goes through the discernment process of discovering his Jesuit identity and of confirming that God is calling him and that his desire to serve is pure and not some misguided notion.

  Jason grew up next to a defunct Jesuit seminary in a small New York State hamlet. The large modern brick building, built in the nineteen fifties, had stood vacant for as long as he could remember; today it’s a yoga and meditation retreat center. As young boys, his friends found throwing rocks at the many twelve-over-twelve windows a favorite summer pastime. While Jason couldn’t deny the rush he got from shattering glass with his perfect lobs, he hated it when one of the boys suggested going over to the seminary. He didn’t mind peeking into the windows, though, trying to catch a glimpse of a ghostly sacred life through a broken wooden blind or the slit of a ripped green shade, but when it came to destroying property, he recoiled and often made excuses, like his arm was hurting, to avoid joining in.

  His mother used to talk of how young seminarians had strolled in groups of ten or more—the way college freshmen now go out on the town in packs—along the hilly winding road, through cow pastures, down to the river. Always so handsome, his mother said, shielded behind the armor of those black cassocks, aware of how their smiles and winks titillated even little girls like her.

  He remembers the dining hall at the seminary, lined with black-and-white class photos of those young seminarians, and the enormous chapel with the marble floor and stained-glass windows and the lifesized image of Christ with one foot extended off the Cross, looking as though he were about to step down and join the other young men in singing the Regina Caeli that Jason swore he could hear. He used to imagine every pew filled with these ardent worshippers, their heads squared off with the same crew cut, wearing the same long black cassock and white collar, and their eyes filled with the same wild desires, the same fears. They may as well have been marines or West Point cadets finding comfort in solidarity as they prepared to give up—no, trade—privileges, a terrifying yet at the same time exhilarating experience. In the heyday of the priesthood, several hundred seminarians would have sat in every chapel like this one across the country. Today, all the seminarians put together couldn’t fill a single chapel. There are eleven other novices here at the Spirituality Center with Jason.

  In one of his theology classes at Driscoll, Jason learned that the only thing separating man from other life on this earth was the God-given gift of free will. And while Jason entered the novitiate of his own free will, he cannot but help worry that in doing so, he surrendered that gift to its distributor. On the contrary, Father Curran, his spiritual father, tells him God has given Jason the grace to exercise his free will in an extraordinary way. Like the marine, Jason thinks. Like the cadet. Father Curran should know; he’s been exercising his free will in this same way since he became a novice seven decades ago. Supported by an African carved cane, his free will is pretty much useless now except for when it comes to choosing between cognac and dry sherry at bedtime.

  Jason could have done his first two years in Boston, but he requested a different part of the country, figuring that the farther away he was from Ryan, the farther out of his mind she would be. Tonight, however, sitting alone in the modest chapel, his thoughts wander—really wander, to Ryan. He remembers the day they met in The Writings of Teilhard de Chardin. Both were seniors, he with a double major in theology and philosophy, she fulfilling a philosophy requirement she had postponed for three years.

  She invited him to a chocolate seder she was preparing for her suitemates and friends: chocolate-covered matzo, semisweet chocolate soup, brisket with Mexican chocolate poblano sauce, chocolate macaroons. She had liked being the only Jew, or half Jew, in the group, and she played up that aspect of her heritage, he later learned, not because she had any more affiliation to Judaism than to Catholicism, but because it set her apart from the others. And because she liked to have what no one else could have. This he understood about her right away.

  The seder was a blast. They were all drunk before they even got to the permitted first sip of wine (the only non-chocolate item) in the Hagaddah. He fell asleep fully clothed in her warm bed, breathing the fruity scent of her long strawberry blond curls into which he had buried his nose to avoid the stench of vomit coming from the common room where several others had collapsed before making it to the bathroom.

  He’d dated one other girl in college, but she’d broken his heart, and so he was cautious now, had been for a year. He left in the morning before she awoke, having scribbled a thank-you note on a Post-it and sticking it on the Jewish calendar she said her grandmother had sent her for Jewish New Year that hung from a bulletin board over her desk—next to the cross of palm that her Catholic grandmother had sent her after Palm Sunday.

  “I like having them fight over me,” she told him. On the cover of the calendar was a long, white-linen-covered table around which men with thick bushy beards, top hats, and spectacles sat studying texts in a room lined with bookshelves. And they shall make a sanctuary, the caption read in English. Everything
else was in Hebrew. It reminded him of the seder table, and so he stuck the Post-it in the center of the table in the picture. Thanks for the sanctuary, Jason.

  He thought it was a stupid thing to say, but he really didn’t know what else to write. He was clumsy around women, and yet they were always around him, clinging to him like a piece of gum to the sole of a shoe on a hot summer day. He enjoyed them—especially witty and gutsy ones. He admired them. But he enjoyed being around men too. He just liked people. Two days later, he found the cross and the calendar in his box in the school mailroom. Then she showed up at Taizé Prayer, and he knew there would be no forgetting Ryan; she would see to that, and he was glad.

  That night, as they sat side by side in the old musty library, the familiar scent of the mass of ringlets that fell around her like a whimsical drape drifted over him, overpowering centuries of dankness. When he glanced over at her from his laptop and she back at him, he was mesmerized by her big green eyes, as iridescent and glistening as the shiny coated lips and the porcelain complexion she said she had inherited from her grandmother and that, in the months and years to come, he would observe redden in the cold of winter or from a burst of laughter or outrage.

  She would become like a kaleidoscope that was forever changing, becoming more and more interesting to him in every way. She, nevertheless, would continue to work hard to pursue him, from anointing her body with intoxicating oils to planning events that would bring them together, because what she hadn’t suspected that night in the library was that he was already a goner. And all that stood in her way of knowing this was precisely the problem with Jason: his elusiveness, the difference between the feelings that lived in his head and those he revealed.

  After they went for coffee, they took a walk by the reservoir. They talked about their plans for a career in law. All they both really wanted to do was touch: first hands, then arms wrapped tightly around each other, then lips. Standing outside in the chilled air that night was far better than being hung over in her bed. Kissing her, aware that he was growing hard against her, was enough. It was nirvana, paradise, the beginning of an odyssey. He was in the only place he wanted to be. He forgot about the dorm meeting he was supposed to run, and he didn’t care that he would have to stay up all night to finish his paper. He was in love.