Page 63 of Endless Summer: Stories
“Hell yes,” George says. He removes his plastic bib and stands to pull out Genevieve’s chair. They both look around the table to see if they need to excuse themselves, but everyone is busy chatting—Jessie with Helen, Kate and Bitsy with the strawberry woman from Main Street (George can’t believe that woman was telling the truth, that she did know his grandmother and she used to be his mother’s babysitter), and Kirby with Tiger and Magee. Mouth is busy wrangling with his lobster—Genevieve showed him how to use his cracker and pick—and the boys are playing tag in the sand.
Genevieve and George walk toward the water, then head east.
“What’s up with Sallie?” Genevieve asks. All George said when he arrived solo was that Sallie didn’t feel up to coming. Everyone had seemed relieved, maybe even happy—except for Kirby, who announced that she adored Sallie and found nothing wrong with a May-December relationship. “Hollywood is built on them,” she said.
“She broke up with me,” George says. He tells his sister the whole story: the blind date with Cousin Dana where he bumped into Sallie, then his break-in at All’s Fair, cutting his hand, going to the ER, where he saw… Cousin Dana, the phone number on his hand, lunch at the pharmacy.
“Are you upset?” Genevieve asks.
“Not really,” he says. “There were times when Sallie acted… like my mother. She spoke to me like I was a child. It was, I don’t know, weird.”
“So will you call Cousin Dana?”
“Yeah,” George says. “I will. She works for Dukakis.”
“Ha!” Genevieve says. “Brilliant. A Democrat.”
“What about you?” George says. “Are things serious with Andrew? I heard him telling Kirby that you two are moving in together.”
Genevieve’s stomach lurches and she emits a lobster-y burp. Gross. “I’m breaking up with him,” she says. “But I’m waiting until tomorrow so it doesn’t happenonmy birthday.”
“You always were smarter than me,” George says. He sighs. “We should probably turn around.”
They should, Genevieve thinks. Though she doesn’t want to.
“Do you think there’s something wrong with us?” George asks. “I always thought we were special. Or maybe notspecial,but not regular either. I mean, even the story of our birth is unique. We’re the first grandchildren, we’re boy-girl twins, Mom went into labor on Main Street, and Grammy drove in reverse down Fair Street. Dad was in Houston, sending man to the moon.” He pauses. “Though I do think it’s screwed up that neither Mom nor Dad called us today.”
In the distance, Genevieve sees the candles glowing on the long table and the lights of their grandmother’s house across the road. The sand is cool beneath her feet, and water swirls around her ankles. “They’re the ones who are messed up,” she says, patting her twin brother on the back. “You and me? We’re fine.”
The impossible happens and Magee agrees to go back to All’s Fair with Tiger and the boys instead of staying to oversee cleanup.
“The caterers did most of it anyway,” Jessie says. “Just go.”
“We’re on the first ferry tomorrow,” Magee says, extending her arms for a hug. “So this is goodbye.”
Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye—everyone says,Goodbye, thank you, what a memorable evening, all that butter, my arteries.
Helen Dunscombe says to Jessie, “Call me when you get back to the city. We’ll go to Dorrian’s and get dinner.”
“I don’t know,” Jessie says, grinning. “That’s pretty far uptown.”
As Jessie is carrying a stack of dessert plates smeared with whipped cream to the kitchen, she’s confronted by her mother and Rain, who are standing shoulder to shoulder in Jessie’s path.
Kate says, “Rain and I have mended fences. And we both agree that you and Pick should get married.”
Jessie opens her mouth but no sound comes out. She has spent the evening in a state of suspended disbelief. Kate has forgiven Rain, and Rain forgiven Kate—just like that?
The “just like that” Jessie is referring to, she realizes, is a matter of thirty-five years, longer than she’s been alive.
“We’ll think about it,” Jessie says.
The ladies don’t budge and Jessie has to laugh. “I’ll talk to Pick when he gets home from Germany. We’ll discuss it. Now, if you don’t mind, these plates are getting heavy.”
Her mother and Rain step aside, and Jessie heads for the kitchen, thinking,How nice of you to give us permission to marry.If she and Pick wanted to get married, they would have eloped; they’d nearly done it half a dozen times. There was a Thursday afternoon this past spring when Pick called Jessie at the office and said, “Meet me at city hall in an hour. We’ll get hitched, then I’ll take you to Union Square Café for dinner.”
Jessie said, “I’m in the middle of discovery here, darling. How about a week from Sunday?”
“City hall is closed on Sunday,” Pick said.
