Dreamland Social Club(26)

“You know, Harv, you’re right.”

Jane said, “Breaking into the house isn’t the problem. The problem is the horse is chained to the radiator and the radiator and horse combined probably weigh, I don’t know, a ton? So good luck to you.”

They backed away, snorting useless comebacks—“I could probably bench-press the freakin’ thing”; “F.U. and the horse you rode in on”—and Jane walked back to her locker, pulled the baby off it, and walked down the hall toward Principal Jackson’s office, fully prepared to register an official complaint. But when she found the office empty, she lost her nerve, tossed the doll into the trash can by the door, then hurried to Topics in Coney Island History, where Mr. Simmons was handing out postcards in see-through plastic sleeves.

“Americans bought seven hundred and seventy million, five hundred thousand postcards in 1906,” he said, giving Jane a solemn raise of the eyebrows since she was officially late. “And imagine this: on one day in 1906, over two hundred thousand postcards were sent from the post office right here on Coney Island. One day. Two hundred thousand postcards.”

Jane gingerly held the card Mr. Simmons handed her right then, but she also tried to bore her thoughts into the back of Leo’s head.

Seahorse, seahorse, seahorse.

Postcard, postcard, postcard.

“Ms. Dryden,” Mr. Simmons said. “If you will. . . .”

“Johnny,” she began, then took a breath. “I’m having the time of my life here on Coney. The bars are rowdy. The women are mad.”

People started laughing, and Jane felt herself start to blush. She read on: “Hope you’re holding down the fort. Cheers, Geoff.”

“Thank you, Ms. Dryden.” Mr. Simmons nodded. “Anyone think their postcard is particularly worth sharing?”

Leo raised his hand.

“Mr. LaRocca,” Mr. Simmons said. “Let’s have it.”

“Billy. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you half the things we’ve been up to,” Leo began, in an Irish accent.

Everyone laughed again and Jane smiled and had to resist the urge to doodle her name and Leo’s in a heart. She’d dearly loved Ireland, and was impressed with the accuracy of his accent.

“Was picked up last night for drunk and disorderly behavior. Turns out the copper has a taste for the Irish; we’ll have to send him a case when I return. ’Tis a mad place, this Coney. Who knew the States were so liberated? Best, Jimmy.”

“Excellent,” Mr. Simmons said. “Now can anyone point out something that these messages have in common?”

In the silence that followed, Jane heard the flutter of a bird and looked out the window. A pigeon had landed on the outside ledge, and for a moment she studied it because it seemed to be studying her. She looked hard into its round pigeon eyes, wondering if maybe it was Birdie reincarnated?

“The people are having fun,” Babette called out.

“Bingo,” Mr. Simmons said, and he turned and wrote the word FUN on the board. “Coney was known during this era as the ‘Playground of the World.’ So let’s talk for a minute about fun! What is it?”

Luckily he didn’t seem to actually expect a response. He just kept talking. “Is fun by definition bad? Sinful?”

Now he waited.

“Not necessarily,” Legs said. “If you think things like the human roulette wheel and the Shoot the Chutes are fun. Or riding wooden horses at Steeplechase Park.”

“Good,” Mr. Simmons said. “That’s what I believe we call good clean fun, right. But Coney Island has also been called ‘Sodom by the Sea.’ And not by some religious fanatics or anything but by a reputable source: The New York Times. Who can tell me what Sodom is?”

Jane waited for someone to answer, but everyone’s faces seemed blank. For the first time she wondered whether her education to date—while scattered about the globe—was actually better than she’d realized. She raised her hand, and Mr. Simmons called on her. She said, “It’s a city that was destroyed by God for being so full of sin.”

“Exactly,” Mr. Simmons said, and Jane thought, Thanks, Mrs. Chester, who had taught her religious studies class in Ireland. “And it was considered sinful back in the late eighteen hundreds and early nineteen hundreds for women to cavort in the surf with their skirts pulled up, or to wear swimsuits in public. There were, let’s face it, brothels here on Coney and bars—lots of bars—where people were free to overindulge.”

“Sounds awesome,” Leo said, and people laughed.

“How’s this for fun?” Mr. Simmons said. “When Fred Trump bought Steeplechase Park, he threw a demolition party where guests were handed bricks and encouraged to destroy windows, rides, whatever, at Steeplechase. Does that sound like a fun party?”

“It sounds like a party for *s,” Leo said, and everyone laughed again and Mr. Simmons did, too. “You do have a way with words, Mr. LaRocca.”

Back at the bulletin board, Mr. Simmons said, “What about executing an elephant? Or watching it? Fun?” He picked up the stack of Topsy essays and started handing them back with grades. “Some of you thought so. Others, not so much.”

Jane was a little bit disappointed that she’d only gotten a B+.

“Before we meet again, I want you all to turn that sentence you wrote last week”—he winked dramatically and said, “And I know you all did it”—“into a postcard. A postcard from the place and time here on Coney where you had the most fun of your life. And I want you to send it to me.”