Chapter Two
I’m drawn to New England because that’s where my roots are,
and I miss it. I come from many generations of New Englanders, and so, in my writing, I’ve been drawn back there to the landscape and the light and the type of personality that’s revealed.
—Elizabeth Strout
Braintree, Massachusetts
The Old Man awoke in a spare bedroom of his cousin’s house, in something highly analogous to agony from an abused back, the result of his roughly thirteen hours driving his car coupled with two hours still sitting in not especially comfortable—and certainly not lumbar-supporting—seats.
“I’ve got to do something about my back,” he said with a groan. “Well, nothing to be done about it now. Time to the get the brats moving.”
Breakfast went pretty quickly, as breakfasts will tend to when they’re really good. The kids were ready to go within fifteen minutes of finishing that.
“You get to ride on the subway today,” the Old Man told them. After the “Weees!” and similar expressions of boundless joy had died down, and he had them strapped into the car, he said, “Okay, geography test. I hope you weasels took careful notes.
“Where, Cossima,” he began, “is Boston?”
“The center of the known universe,” answered the youngest girl, “at least according to Bostonians it is.”
“Correct. And this is why they call it . . . ?”
“The Hub!”
“Very good. Now, Patrick, where is the very center of The Hub?”
“Roxbury,” he answered, without hesitation.
“And what do we find north of Roxbury, Juliana?”
“The South End, of course, because everyone knows that the South End would have to be north of the actual center.”
“Precisely. Now, Cossima, what is north of the South End?”
“East Boston,” she replied.
“Very good. Now for extra points, where is the North End?”
“South of East Boston.”
“Which is, again, of course, exactly where one would expect, right?”
“Yes, Grandpa,” the girl replied.
“Okay, Patrick, what school is on School Street?”
“There isn’t any.”
“Very good; Juliana, what court is on Court Street?”
“No court, Grandpa.”
“Also good. Cossima, back to you; what dock is at Dock Square?”
“No dock, Grandpa.”
“And, Patrick, what body of water fronts Water Street?”
“Maybe a small puddle if it rains, otherwise none, Grandpa.”
“I can see that you brats have captured the very Platonic essence of Bostonian geography. Let’s work on accents. Repeat after me: Cah, Pahk, Bah, Beah . . .”
Braintree MBTA Station, Braintree, Massachusetts
“Yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death,” thought the Old Man, “I will fear no evil,” for a Sig P365, with modified magazine spring for twelve rounds, plus one in the chamber, sitteth in my right pocket and a spare mag of another twelve resideth in my left. Moreover, stuck in the small of my back is an even smaller Walther PPK, in .22, with an Itty-Bitty suppressor, just in case.
Behind the thought was the now-slowing red, white, and silver painted subway train pulling into Braintree Station. The Old Man just didn’t trust public conveyances, neither the crews, nor the passengers, nor the busses, street cars (“trolleys,” locally), and trains, themselves.
He’d paid for two CharlieCard passes, good for a week, for himself and Juliana. The two littler ones rode for free.
Funny, as a young man I never gave any thought to the risk of a mugging on the subway. Is it the paranoia of old age in action, here, or the paranoia of defending my brood of grand-brats? No, matter, the fact is that I am prepared to defend my brood of brats and look far too well to do and even distinguished for the police to even think about stopping me to see if I am packing. Besides, better to be tried by twelve than carried by six.
The train stopped with a hiss of brakes and a whoosh of opening doors. He hustled the kids in and directed them to seats.
One of the advantages, he thought, of picking up the train at Braintree is that you get to pick your defensive terrain while the train’s still empty. Jesus, I have become paranoid, haven’t I?
“We’ve got ten stops to go to get to Park Street,” he announced. “I’d get us off at Downtown Crossing, what used to be called ‘Washington Street,’ but since the closure or changing of the two department stores, Filene’s and Jordan Marsh, I’m not sure how that station works anymore.”
The doors whooshed shut again. Almost immediately the train began to move forward and to pick up speed.
“Is it okay to stand, Grandpa?” Patrick asked.
“Sure, but it’s a bit of a skill, not too different from riding a surfboard. Unlike a surfboard, though, you’ve got those metal poles to hang onto. So go ahead but keep a good grip. You’ll see more that way, anyway.”
All three of them, then, stood up, uncertainly and unsteadily, took death grips on the silver poles, and began to enjoy the ride.
Weeeeee! thought Cossima.
Boston Common, Boston, Massachusetts
Down in the underground parking garage, someone male walked that little bit too close, causing the Old Man to nonchalantly slip his right hand into his trouser pocket. Cossima was the only one to notice it.
“Why do you do that, Old Man?” she asked, as soon as there was no one close enough to hear.
“Do what?” he asked, innocently.
“Get ready to shoot anyone who gets within ten feet of us?”
“Because I’m not as quick as I used to be? Because I’m paranoid? Because better safe than sorry? Besides, these folk are so unused to people carrying concealed that it would never occur to them that I’m reaching for a pistol. Moreover, it’s not anyone. Were it a girl I’d flirt rather than grab my pistol.”
She just shook her head, repeating his, “Paranoid. And flirt.”
“Guilty on both counts,” he admitted. “Come on, let’s go topside. And stop worrying about my being paranoid.
“There’s a common myth,” the Old Man said, as they emerged from Park Street Station onto Boston Common, “pardon the pun, that they used to hang witches and Quakers here on the Common. Didn’t happen or, at least, not often. The executions used to be down by Boston Neck, on what were called ‘the common lands,’ hence the confusion, which was southwest of here. We’re not sure anymore exactly where the gallows was, but it was somewhere near where Holy Cross Cathedral stands now.
“The town was almost an island then, and the Neck was really narrow, about one hundred and twenty feet across. It had an earth and wood wall and fort, and a gate. The gallows was on the other side of the wall.”
“Pretty brutal people,” Juliana observed.
The Old Man nodded, slightly. “It was a brutal time, yes. But I would not judge them, were I you. People are entitled to be judged in accordance with their own place and time. Moreover, who knows; maybe there was a witch or two in amongst them.”
“Grandpa! You know you don’t believe in witches!”
“This is New England,” he replied, with a shrug. “Steven King doesn’t set his books mostly in New England for no reason.”
“You’re laughing at me!” Juliana exclaimed. “You’re laughing at me because I do believe in witches!”
“Yes,” he agreed with a smile. “Now let’s walk down to what used to be Washington Street. Ah, but first . . .”
He led them to a small stand which sold souvenirs and such. “One item each,” he said.
They each settled on sweatshirts, two of which, for the two girls, read, “Love that Dirty Water.”
“You know,” said Eisen, “the slogan is from the song, “Dirty Water,” that we sang in the car. The song comes from the Charles River, which is pretty clean now, though I’m not sure I’d care to drink it, but was an appalling flood of dangerous industrial chemicals, untreated human waste, gasoline and fuel oil, and just about any other pollutant you can think of. It still can get pretty brown after a hard rain but they’ve mostly cleaned it up. Hell, you’ve seen it from the car, and more than once.”
“I remember,” said Cossima. “Looked fine to me.”
“You should have seen it fifty or sixty years ago,” her grandfather said. “Okay, let’s head to the shopping district. For what it may be worth, these days.”
The four made a quick dash across Tremont Street, then passed onto Winter Street with the Capital One Café to the left and a small branch of Bank of America to the right. Winter Street was purely pedestrian now, with brick replacing the asphalt of the road, itself laid over cobblestones, and with stone strips marking where the sidewalks’ borders used to be.
He noticed that Frank’s Custom Tailoring was still in business. Though not especially old—it had been founded in 1974—it was one of the few places in the city one could have something like true bespoke clothing made.
They teed out on Downtown Crossing, formerly known as “Washington Street” or, as he liked to think of it, The corner of Jordan’s and Filene’s. It wasn’t until they reached that area that anyone realized how quiet it was there, compared to the cacophony of the traffic elsewhere in the city.
Sadly, Filene’s was merely a shell, gutted from the inside, the bottom four floors filled with an Irish, as in from the Republic, department store, Primark, then built up and up, above that. and stuffed to the rooftop with condos, while Macy’s had demolished most of Jordan’s and chopped several floors off the one building they let stand. On the other corner, opposite Macy’s, was what remained of Gilchrist’s, now a mall bearing the name, “The Corner.”
He directed the kids to the inside of Macy’s by the main entrance on the corner of Summer Street. The makeup department began right on the other side of the door. An escalator led from that floor on up.
Cossima noticed the old man straining to keep from slipping his hand into his right pocket.
“You want to hear a story about your grandmother?” he asked, careful to keep from choking at the mention. “It has to do with this makeup department.”
“Sure,” said Juliana. “Why not?” asked Patrick. “Yes,” said Cossima.
“Good enough. This was back when it was still Jordan-Marsh. One day your grandmother needed to be made up for a formal event we had to go to. My mother made her an appointment to come here for it. They used to do it, still may, for all I know, for free as a sort of advertising thing.
“I dropped her off at the door, then went to find a parking garage farther down Washington Street, which wasn’t pure pedestrian at the time. By the time I walked back to here, the girl doing the makeup was about a quarter done. There was a solid wall of people, literally hundreds of them, standing around your grandmother, just watching this incredibly beautiful girl get made more so.
“I’m pretty sure she found the attention appalling. She was even more shy than she was beautiful.”
“You still miss her badly, don’t you, Grandpa?” said Patrick.
It took Eisen a moment to answer, and even then his voice was the essence of sadness and pain. “More than words can convey, every day and almost every minute . . . nothing to be done.”
Changing tone, he then said, “Let’s go see what this establishment has for a toy store. I’m sure it’s crap. And then, lunch?”
“Where?” Juliana asked.
“I’d prefer Durgin Park but it’s been terminated with extreme prejudice. The Old Arch Inn is gone, too. I’d consider walking to the Parker House. It’s quite good, as I recall, but also quite pricey. Let’s not be greedy; we can walk to Number Nine Tyler Street and eat at the China Pearl.”
“This time, Grandpa,” said Patrick, “leave your jacket on.”
“Why?” the Old Man asked. “I keep my pistol in my pocket or in the small of my back now. They’ve gotten smaller, you know.”
Braintree, Massachusetts
He sniffed the air then, picking up the distinct aroma of yet another cousin-cooked expansive breakfast. “No, they’ll be up for that already. My job is to hustle them through breakfast, then get them in the car and we’re off to . . . well, let’s do the drive- and walk-around in Southie today. See the old church, the houses we lived in, Big and Little Broadway.
That last distinction referred, respectively, to West and East Broadway. The former was “Big” because the larger stores, the bulk of the banks, most of the restaurants, and the theater with the sticky floor from generations’ worth of spilled drinks had all been there. “Little” had also been heavily commercial, but with smaller establishments, formerly Quinn’s Fruit Stand, Slocum’s Toyland, the local branch of the Public Library, Victory Meats, The A&P, more formally The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company, a grocery chain and at one time the world’s largest retailer, the odd hair dresser and barbershop, more than a few local bars, Federico’s Bicycle Shop (though that was technically a little bit off Broadway), that kind of thing.
That was all in the past, though; hardly any of those businesses remained.
Indeed, in thinking about it, the Old Man had to admit, You know, the old library may be all that’s left. Hmmm . . . thinking about it, I’d best look into parking. Fewer people there now, but more adults, hence more cars, hence . . . nightmare fuel. Double hmmm; I’d better call.
The phone rang only once before he heard, “Gate of Heaven / Saint Brigid’s, Karen speaking.”
“Hi, Karen,” Eisen said, assuming an accent somewhere between Southie and Brahmin. “You don’t know me from Adam but I used to live across the street from the Gate of Heaven. I’ve got my grandchildren up here, to keep them in touch with their Southie roots, and I was wondering if it would be possible to park in the lot where the Poor Clares convent used to be, at the corner of I and Fifth Street. I had in mind parking and then covering the highlights of Southie on foot. I’d be more than happy to make some donation to the church . . .”
“Well, those spots are all rented,” she answered, “But if you just want it just for one day in the daytime, sure, no problem. Not that we’d turn down a donation, mind. The churches don’t maintain themselves, after all and, despite the millions poured into it, the Gatey still needs work.”
“Great! I’ll be pulling in about Nine-thirty. Mail the donation to the parish offices? Say, twenty dollars?”
“Sure, that would be fine.”
Boston, Southeast Expressway, Northbound Lane
The Old Man barely glanced right, then began easing the white Avalon off of the expressway and onto Morrisey Boulevard. He said, “Now if you’ll look to your right, you will see the latest rendition of one of the least credible lies ever told by a nun. That blue splotch on the gas tank is Ho Chi Minh, in profile, the leader of North Vietnam during the key parts of the French Indochina War and our war—well, campaign, really—in Vietnam. The original was another gas tank, with the same design. A Catholic nun, one Sister Corita, pretty obviously in sympathy with the communists, painted it. Personally, I consider it giving aid and comfort to the enemy and would have liked to have seen the bitch stood against a wall and shot.
“Note, here, that I admire Ho Chi Minh, communist or not. But the nun I loathe.”
South Boston, Massachusetts
“It used to be a lot easier,” the Old Man said, “driving through South Boston. There were more people but more of them were kids, and the rest mostly working class, so there were a lot fewer cars and almost none during the working or school day. Driving was almost never one way; the streets hadn’t been narrowed by parking on both sides.”
He steered the Avalon left, off of Day Boulevard, across the gap between the green strips fronting the beach, then right onto Columbia Road. Traffic was light, what with most of the Yuppies who had in recent years come to infest South Boston out working downtown or within striking distance of Route 128.
The Avalon went two more blocks to Hamlin, where he took a left, then another left on Eighth and a right on Winfield. Winfield was entirely row houses, uniformly well kept up, with narrow alleys between them.
“I couldn’t live here,” Cossima said. “Too crowded.”
“It’s not as bad as you may think,” the Old Man said. “There’s a little yard down at the end of each of those little alleyways, and even Southie, densely packed as it is, has a lot of open green space, plus about a mile of beach and Castle Island, which isn’t actually an island anymore, not in a long time. And people are, or at least were, emotionally close.”
He took a right on Seventh, then another one on Sanger.
“Patrick, remember that picture of me you thought was you?”
“The one with the old-style fatigues and toy submachine gun?”
“That one. It was taken at Number Twenty Sanger, where my Aunt Lucy and her husband Pasquale Farulla—we called him ‘Patrick O’Farrell’—lived when they were first married. He was from Southie, too; a part of Third Street used to be an Italian Enclave. May still be for all I know.”
“Oh, wow,” said the boy, looking left at Number Twenty, as they passed. “It hasn’t changed at all.”
“It was a nice little first floor apartment,” said the Old Man. “Made nicer still by the presence of my Aunt Lucy, who was, if a little high strung, still a total sweetheart and a fine cook.”
“We remember her, Grandpa,” all the kids said, as one.
“Please continue to, all of your lives.”
Gate of Heaven Church, I Street, South Boston, Massachusetts
They all piled out of the Avalon just south of the imposing, cathedral-like, Gate of Heaven Church.
“This parking lot,” the Old Man said, “used to be a convent. Poor Clares, they were. Before that it was a school my grandmother attended, over a hundred years ago. Now it’s just . . . this.” He shook his head. “It was history, physical, manifest history, for generations. It should have been preserved and repurposed.”
He found himself sighing again. I seem to be making a habit of this.
“Never mind; this is only one little loss among oh, so many. Let’s go look inside.”
Of the three kids, only the eldest, Juliana, had seen the inside of the church, and that had been for her great-grandmother’s funeral mass, several years before.
“Wow!” said Cossima as she entered via the rear entrance, facing Fourth Street. Before was spread a vista of gleaming white marble, old gold, carved wood, fine statuary, and an overall glimpse of what mortal man could imagine the other side of the doorway to Heaven might look like. “I never imagined . . .”
“Trust the Irish,” said the Old Man, “to give all they’ve got when The Faith is at issue. It’s actually not as old as you might think, given appearances. There was an older church at one time on this spot but this one only goes back to the 1930s.”
He led them in genuflecting, for him a painful matter, given the appalling state of his back, hips, and knees, then led them forward, from the narthex, up the nave, and toward the altar.
“This,” he said, gesturing, “was actually the last spot I saw the face of my grandmother, my mother, and my aunts Lucy and Grace. Someday, with luck, it will be the last spot you see me.”
“Don’t talk like that, Grandpa,” the boy said. “Everyone knows you’re too mean to die.”
“There is that theory,” he conceded. “Come on over here.”
He led them to the right, to a place on the western transept in between a smaller assembly of pews and a very lovely statue of the Virgin Mary.
“When I was very little, we’d sit over there,” he said, pointing to a central location just to one side of the nave. “But when it came time for formal religious instruction, you—all the little kids of about five—got moved here. Odds were poor you would be sitting with friends, too. So here you were, five years old, and for the first time maybe in your life you are involuntarily separated from your loved ones.
“Wasn’t just me, I think.” He pointed toward to the west, saying, “This statue of Mary was about the only comfort you had as a lonely and intimidated little kid in this huge and intimidating church, too.”
“That’s why you’ve always felt close to Mary?” Juliana asked. “Why you went to her statue in the church back home when our cousin Julia looked like she was dying?”
“Exactly. I’ve felt very close to Mary since I was five. Had enough, kids?” he asked.
They looked around before answering, gradually coming to understand why the building should have been so intimidating to their grandfather when he was a little boy.
“The whole thing,” Juliana said, “it’s just so . . . so . . . so much.”
“As I said before, you lived your life to the rhythm of the church back then,” he repeated, wistfully. “Let’s go.”
From the Gate of Heaven they walked back to I Street.
“That one, over there to the right of Minnie Court, Number 110, is where I was a young boy,” the Old Man said. “Number 106 was where my great-grandmother lived, but she died before I was born. To the right from 110 were a bunch of mostly Federicos—yes, as in the Bike Shop—and, when married, for some of them, their husbands and kids.
“You would have to see it to believe it, but, trust me here; Federico girls don’t start to age until several days after they’ve died. They both trend good-looking and they stay young. Mind, my mother was better looking but she aged and they never did.”
With that paean to the immortal Federico girls, the Old Man led them to the intersection of I and Broadway, stopping at the southeast corner. Pointing left, up toward what was known as “Pill Hill,” he said, “Over there was where my friend, Brian Moakley, was killed by a truck while riding his bike. He was seven, if I recall correctly. School, the Benjamin Dean—that’s another fine old building gone—gave us some time off to walk to his wake. He was a little coppertop, covered with freckles. I can still, even today, picture him clearly in his coffin, wearing his white first communion suit, the red hair just standing out from the white cloth—satin or silk, I suppose—of the coffin. I’ve looked for him online and found nothing. Someone really ought to remember. I suppose that someone would be me and, now, you.
“There’s a very old Marine Corps boot camp yearbook in my library. It came to me from Brian. I think it was his uncle’s. Make sure whoever inherits the books takes care of it.”
Turning to face just slightly more to the left, the Old Man said, “Over on the other corner, back then, was a pharmacy. We called it ‘Morrey’s.’ I don’t remember if it had an official name. Next to it or—no, I think it was two doors up; it’s hard to tell with all the facades having changed, and my memory getting vague—was Kostick’s Deli. That’s where I first got turned on to halvah, New York style cheesecake—food of the gods, that was—and the joys of an overloaded pepper loaf sandwich on a bulkie roll.”
“Grandpa,” asked Patrick, “what is a bulkie roll?”
“Hmmm . . . how to describe? Well, it’s a regional, as in New England, variety of sandwich roll, derived from Jewish baking. It’s got a satisfyingly durable crust, and is usually topped with poppy seeds, but is essentially just white bread inside. No, don’t ask me how they make them.”
“I wasn’t going to,” said the boy. “Can we . . . ?”
“If I find a Jewish deli that serves all those things, yes, of course, we’ll have some. Just try to stop me. Now look across the street. Just in from Broadway, along Emerson, were Tom English’s pub or tavern, I misremember—and, no, I never did know how an Irishman gets the name English; rape, maybe?—Federico’s Bike Shop, where I bought your grandmother her first bike, and the Krause and O’Toole Insurance Company somewhere in there. Farther up was ‘Pill Hill.’ They called it that because in the second place, it was a hill, but in the first place it was replete with doctors and dentists. I had two dentists on this side, Swibalus, who had a really attractive blonde wife who served as his assistant and receptionist, and with whom I flirted when I was seven and eight, and Walsh, who unquestionably saved my life when I was nine.”
“A dentist saved your life?” asked Cossima.
“Oh, yes,” Eisen answered, with a deep nod. “This guy was old time, so much so that, while he had a modern electric drill in his office, he also had a foot pedal-powered one. Oh, yeah; he really did.
“I had cellulitis as a result of an incompetent quack’s pulling an abscessed tooth. Picture my cheek swollen to about five times normal size, maybe bigger, and growing. Penicillin, for whatever reason, wouldn’t work. The modern dentists all told my mother to take me home, make me comfortable, and let me die.”
“Let you die?” Cossima asked, eyes wide as saucers.
Eisen nodded seriously, saying, “Oh, yes. There was nothing modern dentistry could do, apparently. But old Walsh was not modern. He told my mother he could save me, but it was going to really hurt, because Novocain also wouldn’t work.
“So every day, two or three times a day, for ten or twelve days, I had to go in, open my mouth, hang onto the dentist’s chair and scream like a damned soul while he slashed the inside of my cheek and my gums with a scalpel.”
“Oh, my God,” said Juliana, looking mildly ill.
“No matter,” he shrugged; “I survived it. And it definitely made me more or less immune to pain. But I can still hear my little cousin, Lulu, outside, screaming louder than I was, ‘What are they doing to my Sean?’ Let’s turn east.”
Thereupon, the Old Man stepped off to cross Emerson. Just before crossing, he said, “My Aunt Grace lived down there for many years. I had at least two decent fights there, though in one I was badly outnumbered and had to conduct a fighting retreat for me and my cousin, that same Lulu. In my less Christian moments, I would still like to find the two kids that jumped us and shoot them. Fortunately, so far I’ve been able to resist the urge.”
None of the kids thought for a moment that their grandfather was joking; he was just the type to hold a grudge that long and, without making an effort to control himself, also the type to act on that grudge.
Thumbing in the direction of the battery of shops on Broadway between the intersections of Emerson and I, the Old Man said, “Fact is, I don’t recall too much about these stores. I remember my mother telling me that, during the Second World War and rationing, that was where you picked up your lardy margarine masquerading as butter and the yellow pills you mashed and mixed into the stuff to make the masquerade a little less obvious. Also there was a package—that means liquor—store. I want to say “Johnson’s,” and . . . maybe . . . Maguire’s Jewelry.”
On the other side of Emerson, he continued with, “There was a heating oil company here, M&T. Hah; the sign is still there, so maybe they are, too. Also Kiley’s real estate. There was a travel agency here, too . . . maybe All Points, though I suspect that all points led to Shannon Airport, in Ireland. And Kearn’s Insurance was in there somewhere.”
“A travel agency?” Juliana queried. “Where did working class folks get the money for much in the way of travel?”
The old man shrugged. “Pretty prosperous working class. They went to Ireland and Ireland alone. Think of it as a kind of Hajj. I suppose someone had to arrange flights back to the auld sod, after all.”
“Hey, is that the same library?” asked Patrick.
“The one where the librarian tested me on The Battle of Midway and then gave me an adult library card at two and a half? Yes. We should—I should—go over and get a copy of the record, if they have it still.”
The Old Man pointed again, into the middle of the street. “There used to be a streetcar that ran up Broadway. The tracks are, I think, still down there under the asphalt. I saw a section of it dug up when I was a kid and there they were.”
They walked a few hundred more feet, the Old Man pointing to this and that, when they came to a pizza place, the Olympic.
“Wow, a pizza joint in deepest, greenest South Boston,” said Juliana.
“What’s weird about that?” the Old Man asked. “In the second place, it’s not very green anymore. But in the first place, we used to have the IA, the Italian-American Restaurant, down on Third Street, that had excellent pizza. I think I mentioned that Third Street was something of an Italian enclave. You brats hungry?”
Whether they had been hungry or not remained an open question; the smell of pizza made them ravenous, though. They went in.
The pizza had been first rate. This meant, in addition, that lunch had been long. That, in turn, meant that the Old Man’s back was a horror story when he stood up.
“It’s the calcification of the ligaments in my spine,” he told the kids. “May as well call it ‘fossilization,’ I suppose.” Getting his back straight enough again to stand upright, like a human being, took a while and was, in addition, accompanied by a lot of muttered swearing.
Once he was able to walk upright again, the Old Man said, “Let’s go look at the place where Slocum’s was and then head back to the car. I’m about backed out and walked out.”
“What’s there now, Grandpa?” Patrick asked.
“I think—think, not sure—that it’s some kind of gift shop or home decoration shop. At least that’s what it looked like to me the last time I drove by.”
“Well, so much for that theory,” the Old Man said, looking in the window of the former Slocum’s Toyland. It was not, as it turned out, either a gift shop or a home decoration shop. Instead it was a . . .
“Well, let’s look it up,” he said, pulling out his cell phone. “Aha . . . WHAT? They have a massage therapist? Be still my heart. Ah, but they want you to text for an appointment. Well, no problem with that.”
His fingers flew over the phone’s keyboard, asking for both the earliest appointment available and if they had a waiting room. “I have my grandchildren with me and they are very well behaved, especially when I threaten to drown them if they are not.”
The answer came back very quickly. “Yes, we have a waiting room in towards the back and Dijana, our massage therapist, can fit you in for an hour in forty-five minutes. Will that work?”
“You betcha,” the Old Man sent back.
“Okay, brats, let’s go see if the library has records going back sixty-three years.”
As it turned out, the library did have those records. The Old Man got a copy, nosed around a bit with the kids, commented that, “This building was something like eleven years old, very midcentury modern, when I first set foot in it. It’s held up and held on rather well.”
After consulting the time on his iPhone, he said, “Okay, let’s head back across the street.”
“Can I stay here for a bit, Grandpa?” Patrick asked. “You know how much I like to read.”
661b East Broadway, South Boston, Massachusetts
As it turned out, Dijana wasn’t quite ready when the Old Man and the two girls arrived. They went to the rear, to a small waiting room perhaps eight feet on a side, and sat.
Initially, the girls played on their own cell phones. This continued even after the Old Man was called to the massage room. Juliana considered telling Eisen, “and please don’t flirt with the masseuse,” but decided it was a hopeless cause.
Eventually first one and then the other of the girls lost interest in her phone and began staring at the rear wall.
“You see it, too, don’t you?” Cossima asked.
Juliana nodded, while commenting, “If you mean a shimmering oval spot on the wall, a little bigger than Grandpa, I see it, yes.”
Cossima, the fearless, stood up and walked to the spot, then reached out to touch the wall. Imagine, then, both her and her sister’s surprise and shock when her hand and half her arm disappeared into it.
“Holy crap,” said Juliana, “it’s true. What Grandpa thought of this when he was a kid? It’s true!”
“I’m going in,” Cossima said.
“Don’t,” Juliana, the eldest, ordered. “Wait for Grandpa.”
“Nah, he’ll never let me go. I’m going in.”
Shaking her head, Juliana said, “That whole gymnastics thing was a terrible mistake. You were bad enough before that but you’re so much worse since.”
“Keep watch,” Cossima said. “Don’t leave without me.”
With that, the little girl lifted a leg up and stepped over and through the bottom of the oval, and then into . . . she didn’t really know what, yet.
While, across the street, his elder sister was fretting and his younger one was exploring God knew what, Patrick wandered about the library, looking over the offerings and just trying to feel the connection.
So the Old Man really did have an adult library card when he wasn’t even three yet. I’m not exactly shocked, but it does feel a little weird, even so.
Walking to the desk, inside of the doorway and to the right of it, Patrick asked if they still had The Battle of Midway, in their holdings.
“No, young man,” the librarian had answered after checking on her computer. “That one was sold off, as near as I can tell, more than forty years ago. We do have an historical section . . .”
“No,” he’d replied, “thanks, anyway. It wasn’t history I was looking for so much as a book my grandfather had read when he was very young, too.”
He didn’t mention how much younger. While his grandfather had been able to get the record of his first library card, it had only had a date of issue in the record, not his age at the time. For that one had to know his birthyear.
“Sorry, then; why don’t you look over in the juvenile section for something that might interest you?”
“I’ll do that,” Patrick agreed.