Текст книги "Dash & Lily's Book of Dares"

Автор книги: Rachel Caine

Соавторы: David Levithan
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Текущая страница: 5 (всего у книги 13 страниц)

me. Not in a humbug sense—I stil hugged Boomer like I meant every last squeeze. But mostly I was ready to have the apartment to myself again.

“So I’l see you the day after Christmas for that party, right?” Boomer asked. “Is that the twenty-seventh?”

“The twenty-sixth.”

“I should write it down.”

He grabbed a pen o the table by our door and wrote THE 26TH on his arm.

“Don’t you have to write down what’s on the twenty-sixth?” I asked.

“Oh, no. I’l remember that. It’s your girlfriend’s party!”

I could have corrected him, but I knew I’d only have to do it again later.

Once Boomer was safely out of the building, I luxuriated in the silence. It was Christmas Eve, and I had nowhere to be. I kicked o my shoes.

Then I kicked o my pants. Amused by this, I took o my shirt. And my underwear. I walked from room to room, naked as the day I was born,

only without the blood and amniotic uid. It was strange—I’d been home alone plenty of times before, but I’d never walked around naked. It was

a lit le chil y, but it was also kind of fun. I waved to the neighbors. I had some yogurt. I put on my mom’s copy of the Mamma Mia soundtrack and

spun around a lit le. I did some light dusting.

Then I remembered the notebook. It didn’t feel right to open the Moleskine naked. So I put my underwear back on. And my shirt (unbut oned).

And my pants.

Lily deserved some respect, after al .

It pret y much blew me away, what she had writ en. Especial y the part about Franny. Because I’d always had a soft spot for Franny. Like most

of Salinger’s characters, she wouldn’t be such a fuckup, you felt, if these fucked-up things didn’t keep happening to her. I mean, you never wanted

her to end up with Lane, who was a douche bag, only without the vinegar. If she ended up going to Yale, you wanted her to burn the place down.

I knew I was starting to confuse Lily with Franny. Only, Lily wouldn’t fal for Lane. She’d fal for … Wel , I had no idea who she’d fal for, or if

he happened to resemble me.

We believe in the wrong things, I wrote, using the same pen Boomer had used on his arm. That’s what frustrates me the most. Not the lack of

belief, but the belief in the wrong things. You want meaning? Wel , the meanings are out there. We’re just so damn good at reading them wrong.

I wanted to stop there. But I went on.

It’s not going to be explained to you in a prayer. And I’m not going to be able to explain it to you. Not just because I’m as ignorant and hopeful

and selectively blind as the next guy, but because I don’t think meaning is something that can be explained. You have to understand it on your

own. It’s like when you’re starting to read. First, you learn the let ers. Then, once you know what sounds the let ers make, you use them to sound

out words. You know that c-a-t leads to cat and d-o-g leads to dog. But then you have to make that extra leap, to understand that the word, the

sound, the “cat” is connected to an actual cat, and that “dog” is connected to an actual dog. It’s that leap, that understanding, that leads to meaning.

And a lot of the time in life, we’re stil just sounding things out. We know the sentences and how to say them. We know the ideas and how to

present them. We know the prayers and which words to say in what order. But that’s only spel ing.

I don’t mean this to sound hopeless. Because in the same way that a kid can realize what “c-a-t” means, I think we can nd the truths that live

behind our words. I wish I could remember the moment when I was a kid and I discovered that the let ers linked into words, and that the words

behind our words. I wish I could remember the moment when I was a kid and I discovered that the let ers linked into words, and that the words

linked to real things. What a revelation that must have been. We don’t have the words for it, since we hadn’t yet learned the words. It must have

been astonishing, to be given the key to the kingdom and see it turn in our hands so easily.

My hands were starting to shake a lit le. Because I hadn’t known that I knew these things. Just having a notebook to write them in, and having

someone to write them to, made them al rise to the surface.

There was the other part of it, too—the I want to believe there is a somebody out there just for me. I want to believe that I exist to be there for

that somebody. That was, I had to admit, less a concern to me. Because the rest of it seemed so much bigger. But I stil had enough longing for that

concept that I didn’t want to dispel it completely. Meaning: I didn’t want to tel Lily that I felt we’d al been duped by Plato and the idea of a

soulmate. Just in case it turned out that she was mine.

Too much. Too soon. Too fast. I put down the notebook, paced around the apartment. The world was too ful of wastrels and waifs, sycophants

and spies—al of whom put words to the wrong use, who made everything that was said or writ en suspect. Perhaps this was what was so

unnerving about Lily at this moment—the trust that was required in what we were doing.

It is much harder to lie to someone’s face.

But.

It is also much harder to tel the truth to someone’s face.

Words failed me, insofar as I wasn’t sure I could nd the words that wouldn’t fail her. So I put the journal down and pondered the address she’d

given me (I had no idea where Dyker Heights was) and the ghastly Muppet that had accompanied it. Do bring Snarly Muppet, she’d writ en. I liked

the ring of the do bring. Like this was a comedy of manners.

“Can you tel me what she’s like?” I asked Snarly.

He just snarled back. Not helpful.

My cel phone rang—Mom, asking me how Christmas Eve at Dad’s place was. I told her it was ne and asked her if she and Giovanni were

having a traditional Christmas Eve dinner. She giggled and said no, there wasn’t a turkey in sight, and she was just ne with that. I liked the sound

of her giggle—kids don’t real y hear their parents giggle enough, if you ask me—and I let her get o the phone before she felt the urge to pass it

over to Giovanni for some perfunctory salutations. I knew my dad wouldn’t cal until actual Christmas Day—he only cal ed when the obligation

was so obvious even a goril a would get it.

I imagined what it would be like if my lie to my mom was actual y the truth—that is, if I was with Dad and Leeza right then, at some “yoga

retreat” in California. Personal y, I felt yoga was something to retreat from, not toward, so the mental image involved me sit ing cross-legged with

an open book in my lap while everyone else did the Spread-Eagle Ostrich. I’d vacationed with Dad and Leeza exactly once in the two or so years

they’d been together, and that had involved a redundantly named “spa resort” and me walking in on them while they were kissing with mud masks

on. That had been more than enough for this lifetime, and the three or four after.

Mom and I had decorated the tree before she and Giovanni had left. Even though I wasn’t into Christmas, I did get some satisfaction from the tree

–every year, Mom and I got to take out our childhoods and scat er them across the branches. I hadn’t said anything, but Mom had known that

Giovanni deserved no part in this—it was just her and me, taking out the palm-sized rocking chair that my great-grandmother had made for my

mother’s dol house and dangling it from a bow, then taking the worn-out washcloth from when I was a baby, its lion face stil peering through the

cartoon woods, and balancing it on the pine. Every year we added something, and this year I’d made my mother laugh when I’d brought out one of

my younger self’s most prized possessions—a mini Canadian Club bot le that she’d drained quickly on a ight to see my paternal grandparents, and

that I’d then proceeded to hold (in amazement) for the rest of the vacation.

It was a funny story, and I wanted to tel it to Lily, the girl I barely knew.

But I left the notebook where it was. I knew I could have but oned my shirt, put my shoes back on, and headed to the mysterious Dyker Heights.

But my gift to myself this Christmas Eve was a ful retreat from the world. I didn’t turn on the TV. I didn’t cal any friends. I didn’t check my email.

I didn’t even look out the windows. Instead, I reveled in solitude. If Lily wanted to believe there was a somebody out there just for her, I wanted to

believe that I could be somebody in here just for me. I made myself dinner. I ate slowly, trying to take the time to actual y taste the food. I picked

up Franny and Zooey and enjoyed their company again. Then I tangoed with my bookshelf, dipping in and out again, in and out again—a Marie

Howe poem, then a John Cheever story. An old E. B. White essay, then a passage from Trumpet of the Swans. I went into my mother’s room and

read some of the pages she’d dog-eared—she always did that when she read a sentence that she liked, and each time I opened the book, I had to

try to gure out which sentence was the one that had impressed itself upon her. Was it the Logan Pearsal Smith quote “The indefatigable pursuit

of an unat ainable perfection, even though it consist in nothing more than in the pounding of an old piano, is what alone gives a meaning to our

life on this unavailing star” from page 202 of J. R. Moehringer’s The Tender Bar or, a few lines down, the more simple “Being alone has nothing to

do with how many people are around”? From Richard Yates’s Revolutionary Road, was it “He had admired the ancient delicacy of the buildings

and the way the street lamps made soft explosions of light green in the trees at night” or “The place had l ed him with a sense of wisdom

hovering just out of reach, of unspeakable grace prepared and waiting just around the corner, but he’d walked himself weak down its endless blue

streets and al the people who knew how to live had kept their tantalizing secret to themselves”? On page 82 of Anne Enright’s The Gathering, was

it “But it is not just the sex, or remembered sex, that makes me think I love Michael Weiss from Brooklyn, now, seventeen years too late. It is the

way he refused to own me, no mat er how much I tried to be owned. It was the way he would not take me, he would only meet me, and that only

ever halfway.” Or was it “I think I am ready for that now. I think I am ready to be met”?

I spent hours doing this. I didn’t say a word, but I wasn’t conscious of my silence. The sound of my own life, my own internal life, was al that I

needed.

It felt like a holiday, but that had nothing to do with Jesus or the calendar or what anyone else in the world was doing.

Before I went to bed, I got back into my usual routine—opening up the (sadly, abridged) dictionary next to my bed and trying to nd a word I

could love.

li•ques•cent, adj. 1. becoming liquid; melting. 2. tending toward a liquid state.

Liquescent. I tried to say myself to sleep with it.

It was only as I was drifting o that I realized what I’d done:

In opening the book at random, I’d only landed a few pages long of Lily.

I hadn’t left any milk and cookies out for Santa. We didn’t have a chimney; there wasn’t even a replace. I had submit ed no list, and had not

received any certi cations of my niceness. And yet, when I woke up around noon the next day, there were stil presents from my mother waiting

for me.

I unwrapped them one by one underneath the tree, since I knew that was how she’d want me to do it. I felt pangs for her then—just for these ten

minutes, just so I could give her presents, too. There wasn’t anything surprising beneath the wrapping paper—a number of books I’d wanted, a

gadget or two to add some diversity, and a blue sweater that didn’t look half bad.

“Thanks, Mom,” I said to the air. Because it was stil too early to cal her time zone.

I lost myself immediately in one of the books, only emerging when the phone rang.

“Dashiel ?” my father intoned. As if someone else with my voice might be answering the phone at my mother’s apartment.

“Yes, Father?”

“Leeza and I would like to wish you a merry Christmas.”

“Thank you, Father. And to you, as wel .”

[awkward pause]

[even more awkward pause]

“I hope your mother isn’t giving you any trouble.”

Oh, Father, I love it when you play this game.

“She told me if I clean al the ashes out of the grate, then I’l be able to help my sisters get ready for the bal .”

“It’s Christmas, Dashiel . Can’t you give that at itude a rest?”

“Merry Christmas, Dad. And thanks for the presents.”

“What presents?”

“I’m sorry—those were al from Mom, weren’t they?”

“Dashiel …”

“I got a go. The gingerbread men are on re.”

“Wait—Leeza wants to wish you a merry Christmas.”

“The smoke’s get ing pret y thick. I real y have to go.”

“Wel , merry Christmas.”

“Yeah, Dad. Merry Christmas.”

It was, I gured, at least an eighth my fault for picking up the phone in the rst place. But I’d just wanted to get it over with, and now here it

was—very over. I gravitated toward the red notebook and almost started venting there—but then I felt like I didn’t want to burden Lily with what I

was feeling, not right now. That would just be passing the unfairness along, and Lily would be even more powerless to stop what had happened

than I had been.

It was only ve o’clock, but it was already dark outside. I decided the time had come for me to head to Dyker Heights.

This involved me taking the D train farther than I’d ever taken the D train before. After the frenzied crowds of the past week, the city was almost

blank on Christmas Day. The only things open were ATMs, churches, Chinese restaurants, and movie theaters. Everything else was dark, sleeping

the season o . Even the subway seemed like it had been hol owed out—only a few scat ered people on the platform, a thin row of passengers on

the seats. Yes, there were signs it was Christmas—lit le girls delighting in their frocks and lit le boys looking imprisoned by their lit le suits. Eye

contact was often met with friendliness instead of hostility. But for a place that had been overrun with tourists, there was nary a guidebook in sight,

and al the conversations were kept quiet. I read my book from Manhat an into Brooklyn. But then, when the D train emerged from the ground, I

shifted so I could stare out the window, stealing glimpses of family windows as we chugged past.

I stil didn’t know how I was going to nd the Nutcracker House. When I got to the subway stop, however, I had some idea. A disproportionate

number of passengers had got en o with me, and they al seemed to be heading in the same direction—clusters of families, couples holding

hands, old people making pilgrimage. I fol owed.

At rst, it seemed like there was something strange in the air, giving it a halo of electricity, like in Times Square. Only, we were nowhere near

Times Square, so it didn’t make much sense … until I started to see the houses, each one more electri ed than the next. These were not Christmas

light dilet antes here. This was a spectacular spectacular of lawn and house ornamentation. For as far as the eye could see, every house was ringed

with lights. Lights of every color, lights of every shape. Outlines of reindeer and Santa and his sleigh. Boxes with ribbon, toy teddy bears, larger-

than-life dol s—al strung together from Christmas lights. If Joseph and Mary had lit the manger like this, it would’ve been seen al the way in

Rome.

Observing it al , I felt such contradictory feelings. On the one hand, it was an astonishing misuse of energy, a testament to the ingenious

wastefulness that American Christmas inspires. On the other hand, it was amazing to see the whole community lit up like this, because it made it

feel very much like a community. You could imagine everyone taking out their lights on the same day and having a block party while they put

them al up. The children walked around trans xed by the sights, as if their neighbors had suddenly become purveyors of an exquisite magic.

There was as much conversation swirling around as there was light—none of it involved me, but I was glad to have it around.

The Nutcracker House was not hard to nd—the nutcracker soldiers held sentry at least fteen feet into the sky as the Rat King threatened the

festivities and Clara danced through the night. I looked for a scrol in her hand, or a card on the top of one of the light-strung presents. Then I saw

it on the ground—a light-dappled walnut the size of a basketbal that had been cracked open just far enough to reach into.

The note I found inside was brief and clear.

Tel me what you see.

So I sat on the curb and told her about the contradictions, about the waste and the joy. Then I told her that I preferred the quiet demonstrations

of a wel -stocked bookshelf to the voltage of this particular street. Not that one was wrong and the other was right—it was just a mat er of

preference. I told her that I was glad Christmas was over, and then I told her why. I looked around some more, tried to see everything, just so I

could tel it to her. The yawn of a three-year-old, tired despite his happiness. The elderly couple from the train who’d nal y completed the walk

to the block—I imagined they’d been doing this for years, and that they saw both the houses in front of them and al the houses from the past. I

imagined each of their sentences started with the phrase Remember the time.

Then I told her what I didn’t see. Namely, that I didn’t see her.

You could be standing a few feet away—Clara’s dance partner, or across the street taking a picture of Rudolph before he takes ight. I could have

sat next to you on the subway, or brushed beside you as we went through the turnstiles. But whether or not you are here, you are here—because

these words are for you, and they wouldn’t exist if you weren’t here in some way. This notebook is a strange instrument—the player doesn’t know

the music until it’s being played.

I know you want to know my name. But if I told you my name, even just the rst name, you’d be able to go online and nd al of these

inaccurate, incomplete depictions of me. (If my name were John or Michael, this would not be a problem.) And even if you swore up and down

that you wouldn’t check, the temptation would always be there. So I’d like to remain at that one delicate remove, so you can get to know me

without the distraction of other people’s noise. I hope that’s okay.

The next assignment on the do (or don’t) list is time sensitive—meaning, it would be best if you did it this very evening. Because at this club that

changes names every month or so (I gave her the address), there is an al -nighter that is about to start. The theme (seasonal y appropriate) is the

Seventh Night of Hanukkah. The opener is some “jew re” band (Ezekial? Ariel?), and at about two in the morning, this gay Jewish

dancepop/indie/punk band cal ed Sil y Rabbi, Tricks Are for Yids wil go on. Between the opener and the main act, look for the writing on the

stal .

An al -nighter at a club wasn’t exactly my scene, so I knew I had a phone cal or two to make before the plan would be complete. I quickly

slipped the Moleskine into the walnut and took Snarly Muppet out of my backpack.

“Watch over this, wil you?” I asked it.

And then I left it there, a smal sentry among the nutcrackers.

eight

(Lily)

December 25th

I decided to give myself a Christmas present this year. I decided to spend the day only speaking to animals (real and stu ed), select humans as

necessary so long as they weren’t my parents or Langston, and a Snarl in a red Moleskine notebook—if he returned it to me.

When I was old enough to read and write, my parents gave me an eraser board that I kept in my room at al times. The idea was that when

frustrated, I, Lily, should write down words on the board to express my feelings instead of let ing she-devil Shril y express them through shrieking.

It was supposed to be a therapeutic tool.

I brought the eraser board out of retirement on Christmas morning when my parents phoned in for a video chat. I almost didn’t recognize them

on the computer screen. The betrayers looked so healthy, tan, and relaxed. Completely not Christmasy.

“Merry Christmas, Lily darling!” Mom said. She was sit ing on the balcony of their cabana or whatever it was, and I could see the ocean lapping

behind her. She looked ten years younger than when she left Manhat an a week earlier.

Dad’s glowing face wormed onto the screen next to Mom’s, blocking my ocean view.

“Merry Christmas, Lily darling!” he said.

I scribbled onto the eraser board and held it up to the computer screen for them to see: Merry Christmas to you, too.

Mom and Dad both frowned at the sight of the eraser board.

“Uh-oh,” Mom said.

“Uh-oh,” Dad said. “Is Lily Bear feeling a bit unset led today? Even though we’ve been preparing you for our anniversary trip since last

Christmas, and you assured us you would feel okay having just this one Christmas without us?”

I erased my last statement and replaced it with: Langston told me about the boarding school job.

Their faces fel .

“Put Langston on!” Mom demanded.

I wrote, He’s sick in bed. Asleep right now.

Dad said, “What’s his temperature?”

101.

Mom’s peeved face turned concerned. “Poor baby. On Christmas Day, too. It’s just as wel we al agreed not to open presents until we get home

on New Year’s Day. It wouldn’t be any fun with him sick in bed, now would it?”

I shook my head. Are you moving to Fiji?

Dad said, “We haven’t decided anything. We’l talk about it as a family when we get home.”

Rapidly, my hands erased and re-scribbled.

It makes me UPSET that you didn’t tel me.

Mom said, “I’m sorry, Lily bear. We didn’t want to make you upset before there was anything to real y be upset about.”

SHOULD I BE UPSET?

My hand started to feel tired from the erasing and writing. I almost wished my voice wasn’t being so obstinate.

Dad said, “It’s Christmas. Of course you shouldn’t be upset. We’l make this decision as a family—”

Mom interrupted him. “There’s some chicken soup in the freezer! You can thaw it for Langston in the microwave.”

I started to write: Langston deserves to be sick. But I erased that and wrote, Okay. I’l make him some.

Mom said, “If his temperature goes up any more, I’m going to need you to take him to the doctor. Can you do that, Lily?”

My voice broke free. “Of course I can do that!” I snapped. Geez, how old did they think I was? Eleven?

The eraser board, and my conviction, were both mad at my voice’s betrayal.

Dad said, “I’m sorry this Christmas is turning out not so swel , sweetheart. I promise you we’l make it up to you on New Year’s Day. You take

good care of Langston today and then have a nice Christmas dinner at Great-aunt Ida’s tonight. That wil make you feel bet er, right?”

My silence returned in the form of my head nodding up and down.

Mom said, “What have you been doing with your time, dear?”

I had no desire to tel her about the notebook. Not because I was UPSET about Fiji. But because it, and he, seemed to be the best part of

Christmas so far. I wanted to keep them al for myself.

I heard a moan from my brother’s room. “Lil l l l l l l yyyy …”

For the sake of expediency, I typed a message to my parents rather than speak or write it on the eraser board.

Your sick son is calling to me from his sickbed. I must anon. Merry Christmas, parents. I love you. Please let’s not move to Fiji.

“We love you!” they squealed from their side of the world.

I signed o and walked toward my brother’s room. I stopped rst at the bathroom to extract a disposable mask and gloves from the emergency

preparedness kit to place over my mouth and hands. No way was I get ing sick, too. Not with a red notebook possibly coming back my way.

I went into Langston’s room and sat down next to his bed. Benny had decided to be sick at his own apartment, which I appreciated, since

tending to not one but two patients on Christmas Day might have tipped me over the edge. Langston hadn’t touched the orange juice or saltines I

left for him a few hours earlier, the last time he cal ed “Lil l l l l l l yyyy …” to me from his room, at about the approximate time when on a

normal Christmas morning we should have been ripping through our gifts.

normal Christmas morning we should have been ripping through our gifts.

“Read to me,” Langston said. “Please?”

I wasn’t speaking to Langston that day, but I would read to him. I picked up the book at the point where we’d left o the night before. I read

aloud from A Christmas Carol. “ ‘It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is

nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humour.’ ”

“That’s a nice quote,” Langston said. “Underline it and fold down the page for me, wil you?” I did as instructed. I can never decide what I think

about my brother and his book passage quotes. Sometimes it’s annoying that I can never open a book in our home and not nd some part of it that

Langston has annotated. I’d like to gure out what I think about the words myself without having to see Langston’s handwrit en comments, like

lovely or pretentious BS next to it; on the other hand, sometimes it’s interesting to nd his notes and to read them back and try to decipher why

that particular passage intrigued or inspired him. It’s a cool way of get ing inside my brother’s brain.

A text message came through on Langston’s phone. “Benny!” he said, grabbing for it. Langston’s thumbs went into hyper-motion in response. I

knew Mr. Dickens and I were nished for the time being.

I left his room.

Langston hadn’t even bothered to ask if we should exchange presents. We’d promised our parents we would wait for New Year’s Day to do our

gift exchanges, but I was wil ing to cheat, if asked.

I returned to my own room and saw I had ve voice mails on my phone: two from Grandpa, one from Cousin Mark, one from Uncle Sal, and

one from Great-aunt Ida. The great Christmas merry-go-round of phone cal s had begun.

I didn’t listen to any of the messages. I turned my phone o . I was on strike this Christmas, I decided.

When I told my parents last year I didn’t mind if we celebrated Christmas late this year, I obviously hadn’t meant it. How had they not gured

that out?

This should have been a real Christmas morning of tearing through presents and eating a huge breakfast and laughing and singing with my

family.

I was surprised to realize there was something I wanted more than that, though.

I wanted the red notebook back.

With nothing to do and no one to hang out with, I lay on my bed and wondered how Snarl’s Christmas was going. I imagined him living in some

swank artists’ loft in Chelsea, with a super-hip mom and her super-cool new boyfriend and they had, like, asymmetrical haircuts and maybe spoke

German. I imagined them sit ing around their Christmas hearth drinking hot cider and eating my lebkuchen spice cookies while the turkey roasted

in the oven. Snarl was playing the trumpet for them, wearing a beret, too, because suddenly I wanted him to be a musical prodigy who wore a hat.

And when he nished playing his piece, which he composed for them as a Christmas present, they cried and said, “Danke! Danke!” The piece was

so perfect and beautiful, his playing so exquisite, even Snarly Muppet seated by the hearth clapped its Muppet hands, a Pinocchio come to life

from the sound of such sweet trumpeting.

Since I couldn’t speak to Snarl myself and nd out how his Christmas was going, I decided to get dressed and take a walk in Tompkins Square

Park. I know al the dogs there. Because of the prior gerbil and cat incidents, my parents long ago mandated that it was bet er for me not to have

my own pets since I get too at ached. They compromised by al owing me to take on dog-walking jobs in the neighborhood, so long as they or

Grandpa knew the owners. This compromise has worked out nicely over the last couple years, as I have got en to spend quality dog time with

loads more dogs than I would have got en to know if I’d had my own, and I am also quite wealthy now.

The weather was weirdly warm and sunny for a Christmas Day. It felt more like June than December, yet another sign of the wrongness of this

particular Christmas Day. I sat down on a bench while people walked by with their dogs, and I cooed, “Hi, puppy!” to al the dogs I didn’t know,

and I cooed, “Hi, puppy!” to al the dogs I did know, but to those dogs, I pet them and fed them bone-shaped dog biscuits I’d baked the night

before, using red and green food coloring so the biscuits would appear festive. I didn’t talk except as necessary to the humans, but I listened to

them, and found out al the ways in which the Christmases of everyone else in the neighborhood were not sucking this year like mine was. I saw

their new sweaters and hats, their new watches and rings, heard about their new TVs and laptops.

But al I could think about was Snarl. I imagined him surrounded by doting parents and the exact presents he wanted today. I pictured him

opening up gifts of moody black turtle-necks, and angry novels by angry young men, and ski equipment just because I’d like to think there’s a

possibility we might one day go ski ng together even though I don’t know how to ski, and not one single English-Catalan dictionary.

Had Snarl gone to Dyker Heights yet? Since I’d turned my phone o and left it at home, the only way to nd out would be to go see Great-aunt

Ida, who was on my talk-to list for the day.

Great-aunt Ida lives in a town house on East Twenty-second Street near Gramercy Park. My family of four lives in a smal , cramped East Vil age

apartment (with no pets, grrr …) that my academic parents can a ord only because Grandpa owns the building; our whole apartment is about the

size of one oor of Great-aunt Ida’s house, which she occupies al by herself. She never married or had her own kids. She was a fabulously

successful art gal ery owner in her day; she did so wel for herself she could a ord to buy her own house in Manhat an. (Though Grandpa always

points out that she bought that house when the city was in economic turmoil, and the prior occupants practical y paid Great-aunt Ida to take it o

their hands. Lucky lady!) Her fancy house in her fancy neighborhood doesn’t mean Great-aunt Ida’s gone al snobby, though. She’s so not snobby, in