Summer of '69(21)

Jessie switches the TV off and hurries back to the kitchen, where Kate is unpacking her cooking implements and Exalta is sitting at the table with a gin and tonic in front of her and her checkbook out. Mr. Crimmins always hands Exalta a stack of bills from the local contractors on her arrival.

“There’s a TV in the den,” Jessie announces.

Exalta looks up. “What?”

“Mother,” Kate says.



Jessie realizes she should have known better: It took her grandmother years to agree to the Magnavox and she has resisted updating to a more modern hi-fi, despite Kirby and Tiger constantly imploring her to do so. There was no way Exalta would have sanctioned a television set. This is Jessie’s mother’s doing.

A tremendous quarrel ensues.

“Get it out,” Exalta says.

“I will do no such thing. David and I paid for it.”

“I should hope so!” Exalta says. “But nevertheless, this is my house. My house, Katharine, and I want it out.”

“I’m sorry, Mother. I realize I should have asked, but I thought you’d say no.”

“Of course I would say no. I am saying no. No!”

“I absolutely have to watch Walter Cronkite,” Kate says. “I’m sorry, Mother, but Tiger is my son. He’s so far away, and the only way I can know what’s going on over there is by watching the evening news.”

“Darling,” Exalta says. She pauses to throw back the rest of her drink, and when she speaks again, her tone of voice is a degree softer. “If there’s anything to know, they’ll tell you.”

“That’s cold, Mother.”

“But true. Unless we hear otherwise, we can rest assured he’s alive. I don’t see how watching Walter Cronkite is going to do anything but make you worry. And the names they come up with for these battles—my goodness. Hamburger Hill? It turns the stomach.”

“I need the television for my peace of mind.”

“I’m sorry, darling. I’m going to ask Bill to take it back to wherever he got it. You should never have gone behind my back.”

“I’m a grown woman, Mother. The television is staying.”

“If you’re interested in a test of wills,” Exalta says, “you’ve chosen the wrong opponent.”

“If the TV goes, I go,” Kate says.

“You can’t be serious.”

“Try me.”

Jessie wonders if she’s going to have her wish granted so easily. Will Kate leave Nantucket and take Jessie with her? She has never seen her mother and grandmother argue. Usually, Exalta states her wishes and everyone else bends over backward to accommodate her. Jessie knows they did have a battle when Kate announced she was marrying David Levin, but that was about true love versus religious bias. This is about…a television set. Kate must feel more passionately about the news broadcast than Jessie realized. She knows her parents watch Walter Cronkite every weeknight, but the same basic information can be found in the Boston Globe, and as far as television news goes, Jessie has to side with her grandmother. She finds it gruesome. She doesn’t want to hear the body count every night. Before Tiger left, it was just a number. Now, Jessie realizes, each body in that count was a person with a name and a family and talents and quirks and likes and dislikes. She also realizes that if Tiger dies, he will shrink to a number, one more body among tens of thousands.

Jessie can’t listen to Kate and Exalta another second. She slips out the back door to the cool fresh air of the yard. The yard is composed of a brick patio and a small plot of grass. Along the grass is a flagstone walk that leads to the property’s second dwelling, known as Little Fair, which fronts Plumb Lane. Little Fair is where Blair, Kirby, and Tiger stay. Upstairs, there are two bedrooms, one bathroom, and a small living space with a galley kitchen. Downstairs, there’s a third bedroom and a half bath. Around the side of Little Fair is an enclosed outdoor shower. According to Exalta, there is no reason to shower indoors during the summer, so although there are three full baths in the main house and a bathroom with a stall shower in this house, Exalta insists that everyone in residence at All’s Fair and Little Fair line up for the outdoor shower.

Jessie decides to check on things at Little Fair. She’s thirteen years old, and she knows that her siblings stayed by themselves in Little Fair as teenagers, but somehow she doubts she will ever be allowed to make the move to Little Fair. She might be able to use it as a clubhouse, however—a quiet place to read and escape the tensions across the yard.

As Jessie pulls open the screen door—the groan of the door is as familiar to her as her own voice—she wonders why Kate didn’t think to hide the TV in Little Fair. Exalta never comes over here.

The inside of Little Fair smells like bacon. Bacon? she thinks. Has someone been cooking in here? Jessie’s stomach growls. She peers in the downstairs bedroom that used to belong to Tiger. The bed is unmade and there’s a copy of The Godfather on the nightstand. Jessie’s eyes flick to the closet. There are clothes inside, a man’s clothes.

What?

Jessie suddenly feels like Goldilocks. She tiptoes up the stairs because now she hears a noise, a repetitive thwack, and then a softly uttered curse word: “Damn.”

“Hello?” Jessie calls out. She pokes her head between the spindles of the railing and sees a boy, probably two or three years older than she is, lounging on the couch with one of those paddles with a ball attached by a rubber string. The boy wears only a pair of mustard-yellow bathing trunks, a choker of what looks like wampum beads, and a white rope bracelet.