Summer of '69(18)

“Jessie!” Kate says, startling Jessie.

“What?”

“‘Yes, Mother,’” Kate prompts.

“Yes, Mother?” Jessie says, sitting up. Her mother is a stickler for manners when Exalta is around.

“The bridge,” Kate says.

The Sagamore Bridge is suddenly before them, distinctive and majestic, an arc of steel girders. Objectively, Jessie supposes, it’s quite hideous, but even so, Jessie feels a rush of fondness for it. Seeing the Sagamore means that summer is beginning, and Jessie’s twelve previous summers here have provided her enough joyful memories that she feels something like anticipation. The air smells like salt and pine, and as Kate drives over the crest of the bridge, Jessie sees boats slicing through the water of the Cape Cod Canal.

This optimism lasts all the way to the ferry dock. Driving the Wagoneer into the hold of the Nobska is a ritual for the family, and Jessie suddenly feels privileged to be doing it. Blair is stuck at home in Boston with heartburn and swollen ankles; Kirby is on Martha’s Vineyard among strangers. Tiger is in the jungle in Vietnam. Tiger would likely give anything to be here right now. Before Jessie complains again, even to herself, she’s going to remember that.

They park the car so its front bumper is right up against the back bumper of the ragtop VW bug in front of them, and Jessie is reminded of Miss Flowers’s juicy orange bug—but school seems very far away. It’s the family’s tradition to climb to the uppermost deck and “take in the sea air,” as Exalta says, so Jessie follows her mother and grandmother up the metal staircase, first to the main deck, where there are the men’s and women’s toilets, which are filled with a blue chemical instead of water, and a snack bar that sells hot dogs and chowder, and then to the upper deck, where the sun is the brightest and the breeze the strongest.

“Oh, look, there’s Bitsy Dunscombe,” Kate says. “I’m going to say hello. Want to come, Mother?”

“Heavens, no,” Exalta says. “That whole family is tiresome.”

Jessie happens to agree. Bitsy Dunscombe is the mother of twins, Helen and Heather, who are Jessie’s age. A “friendship” with the Dunscombe twins has been pressed on Jessie since early childhood. The twins are absolutely identical, each with white-blond hair in a pixie cut, freckles across her nose, a slight gap between her two front teeth, and, recently, pierced ears (which Jessie finds scandalous, since she has been taught that the proper age for a girl to get her ears pierced is sixteen). Heather Dunscombe is lovely and kind, while Helen Dunscombe is mean and stinky. (For example, Helen routinely asks Jessie when she’s getting a nose job.) Jessie would be okay hanging out with just Heather, but they come as a package, so Jessie keeps her distance whenever she’s given a choice.

Kate saunters off, leaving Exalta and Jessie standing at the railing, staring at the water. It looks blue in the distance but green when Jessie gazes down on it directly from above, and she knows that if she were to collect this water in a glass, it would be clear. Water has no color, she learned in science class. What people see is a reflection of light. Jessie thinks about sharing this knowledge with Exalta in order to break the silence, but Exalta is humming as though she’s in some kind of meditative state, which makes her seem unlike her normal self.

Finally, she turns to Jessie, tilts her head, and says, “Where did you get that necklace?’

Jessie’s hand flies up to touch the pendant. “My father gave it to me this morning. It’s the Tree of Life.”

Exalta lifts it from Jessie’s neck to better inspect it. “Tree of Life, you say? What does that mean?”

This feels like a thorny question. “It signals maturity and responsibility,” Jessie says. “In the Jewish tradition, thirteen is an important age.”

Exalta is wearing very large, round sunglasses in the style of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, so Jessie can’t judge her expression.

“Today is my birthday,” Jessie says. “My thirteenth birthday.”

Again, the glasses make it impossible to say whether this announcement comes as a surprise to her grandmother. It would not be unlike Exalta to forget Jessie’s birthday. The only grandchild’s birthday Exalta faithfully remembers is Kirby’s, September 30, because that also happens to be Exalta’s birthday. This is why Kirby is her favorite, or it’s one of the reasons.

Exalta rests her handbag on the railing, unsnaps the ball clasp, and pulls out a small velvet box.

“Happy birthday, Jessica,” she says.

Jessie is stunned. It takes her a moment to realize that Exalta has not only remembered her birthday but gotten her a present, and this present is most definitely not a savings bond, which is what Jessie usually receives. She accepts the box but waits for Exalta’s encouraging nod before she pries it open.

It’s a necklace. The gold chain is so fine, it looks like gold dust. Hanging from the chain is a gold filigree knot in which is embedded a diamond the size of the head of a pin.

“Your grandfather gave that to me on our first wedding anniversary, back in 1919,” Exalta says. “Try it on.”

Jessie can’t believe Exalta is giving her a piece of her jewelry. When Jessie was younger, she and Kirby used to tiptoe into Exalta’s room and paw through the jewels, trying to guess which would be left to whom in Exalta’s will. Exalta keeps an array of porcelain ring boxes on her dressing table, and Jessie adored the boxes nearly as much as the treasures they contained. Kirby’s favorite ring was a black pearl held in a clawlike platinum setting. Jessie’s favorite had been a trio of irregularly shaped opals set in gold. Opals had seemed magical to Jessie when she was younger; in the light, she could see they contained the entire rainbow. Blair, who had been too old to play the game but not too old to critique their choices, said that opals were garish, and Jessie had been secretly happy that Blair felt that way because if Exalta left the ring to Blair, Blair might give it to Jessie if she asked for it.