Love and Other Consolation Prizes(98)

The workers stared back, brows furrowed.

“Where are you all from?” he asked. “What prefecture?”

The Japanese girls looked at one another in confusion, then back at Ernest as they smiled and shrugged and tried not to laugh.

“Um, look, mister, I’m from Bothell,” one of the girls said in perfect English.

“Yeah, we just work here,” another said. “I’m a sophomore at Franklin High.”

“And I’m from Garfield,” the last girl said. “Go Bulldogs.”

American Zen, Ernest thought, as he paid to go inside.

He passed a few tourists who were leaving as he followed the girls, who clip-clopped in their geta footwear into the heart of the Japanese Pavilion, where a hidden garden was nestled beyond tatami mats and behind shoji screens. In that quiet, serene space, far from the whirl and bustle of crowds and carnival rides, he finally found Gracie, kneeling at a small table with a lacquered tea set, the box partially open in front of her. She looked at the cups, the teapot, and held the ladle as though trying to remember the proper order of the ceremony she had once been so proud of.

Ernest thanked the hostess and approached Gracie, who smiled slightly, seemingly confused.

“Hello, Gracious.”

She looked up, surprised to see him.

“Oh…didn’t you get my message?” she said. She touched her pockets as though she might have misplaced it somewhere. “It said that you’re supposed to go to the Space Needle—up there, where I’m…too afraid to go.”

“I went,” Ernest said. “And then I came all the way back down to find you.”

“Was Maisie there?”

“Maisie has always been there,” Ernest said. “But she’s not who I’m looking for.”

Gracie gazed back at him. “Are you mad at me?”

“Of course not.”

She straightened the collar on her blouse and checked her pearl buttons. Then she noticed her mismatched shoes, one blue, one brown. “I’m still a foolish old woman,” she said, shaking her head. “I just wanted you to be happy.”

“I am. You’ve always made me that way. From the day we first met.” Ernest removed his jacket and sat down across from her. “Can I help you with this?”

Gracie set down the ladle. “Please.”

Ernest regarded the elegant tea set, then looked around and spotted a stout earthenware bottle with a wide mouth on a nearby table. He reached over and retrieved the carafe, then gently moved the tea box aside. He sat upright and softly, reverently placed two wide cups in front of them.

“But that’s…not tea,” Gracie protested. “That’s…” She touched the bottle as she remembered. “That’s sake. Rice wine. That’s used for…”

“Weddings,” Ernest whispered as he offered her a teacup with both hands.

She took the cup in hers, fingers trembling. “You…still want to marry me?”

Ernest nodded and began to pour.





CLOSING CEREMONIES


(1962)



Two months later Ernest and Gracie went back to the world’s fair, on the night of the Century 21 Exposition’s grand finale. They weren’t among the thirteen thousand lucky men and women who squeezed into Memorial Stadium to hear the mayor give his closing ceremony speech, or watch the Police Department Drill Team, or listen to every high school band in the city perform. Instead, they arrived just before sunset, well after the record-breaking crowd had thinned—eager people who’d packed the fairgrounds on this last day, hoping for one more ride on the Space Wheel, one antipodal sermon of science, one final taste of a strawberry waffle cone, or one more last-minute bargain-priced, half-off, souvenir statue of the Space Needle.

“Maybe they’ll raffle you off all over again,” Gracie teased as they walked slowly, hand in hand, along a row of transplanted cherry trees. The blossoms, like her memories, had returned in fits and starts since the opening of the fair. Some fresh and lovely, others fallen, swept up, or blown away.

“Doubtful,” Ernest said. “They already had to shut down one of the concessionaires on the Gayway for giving away poodles. Too cruel, they said. Besides, who would want me? I’m just a consolation prize at best.”

She squeezed his hand.

“I remember you as much more than that.”

Gracie’s memory was like a jigsaw puzzle with parts that didn’t always fit, but she’d found the all-important edge pieces. She was beginning to reframe her life—their life. It was a work in progress, but the image was coming together.

“It’s too bad Juju didn’t write her story,” Gracie said.

Ernest laughed. He thought about the old typewriter in their apartment. Maybe he’d write their story. Then he thought about his other daughter.

“It’s too bad Hanny returned Rich’s ring,” Ernest said, though he was far more relieved than disappointed.

“True.” Gracie smiled. “She should have pawned it.”

As they walked near the monorail terminal, they examined each tree, searching for a loosely carved heart, etched with their initials fifty years ago. Pascual thought he’d seen it and had told them where the tree was. Ernest and Gracie finally found it as the streetlamps flickered to life. Their remembrance, etched in sakura bark so many years ago, was now just one of many, as dozens of other fairgoers had added their names, their initials, their professions of undying love.