An American Tune: A Novel

29 “MacArthur Park”

283 “MacArthur Park” Nora remembered a summer evening, dusk, lightning bugs flickering all around her. She was nine, maybe ten years old, standing in a vacant lot at the edge of her neighborhood, watching cars go by on the interstate, her hand lifted in a wave, imagining that a nice car with a happy family in it would pull over, and someone inside would open the door and beckon for her to come with them. It didn’t matter where they were going. Just one step away from where was now and she knew, in time, she would be able find her way into the world she’d read about in books. She was sure of it. New York, Paris, London, Rome. The watery streets of Venice. Cathedrals, pyramids. Fields of heather, snow-capped mountains. Tulips as far as the eye could see. Later, when darkness fell, and her parents sent her to bed, she propped a library book against her bent legs, pulled the covers up into a tent and read with a flashlight. She did this almost every night of her childhood, traveling by words. She made lists of things she didn’t know or understand in a notebook and looked them up in the encyclopedia at school. What, exactly, was a moor? Were unicorns real?Wasahairshirtreallymadeofhair?Shepuzzledoverhowwhole civilizations could just get buried. How long did it take, she wondered ? Didn’t people living nearby notice? Now the answer to this 29 284 An American Tune question seemed perfectly clear. They were buried by life itself, as it proceeded relentlessly forward. IntheweekssinceClaireleftBloomington,Norahadspentwhole days, still in her nightgown and robe, just sitting in Tom’s leather chair in a kind of dream state, fascinated by the workings of her own mind. At any given moment, her brother might appear, grimy and annoying; her sisters, their blond heads bent, doing their homework at the dinette table. The four of them might be crowded together in the backseat of the family car, the kids in their pajamas, their hair still wet from their baths, on their way to the Dairy Queen where they went sometimes on summer evenings. Her father driving, her mother, happy in the moment, her bent arm resting in the open window to catch the breeze. She’d feel claustrophobic, if it were her turn in the middle; agitated, not knowing herself until the last moment whether she would ask, as she too often did, for a sundae or milkshake or just settle for the nickel cone she knew her parents could afford. The perfect curl of ice cream at the tip of those cones, she remembered that–and the pleasure of licking it off, at the same time thinking the curl on a ten-cent cone would have been bigger, thus an even greater pleasure. She would get away from this small, stupid life, she had promised herself again and again. She would not live as her parents did. Her father, his music on the radio all that was left of whatever dreams he might have had; her mother with no apparent dreams at all, except the happiness of her children. If she had only known then how hard it was, what it felt like to have a child upon whose happiness so much of your life hinged, Nora thought, she might have been kinder to her mother all those years ago. If she could have known how foolish she would turn out to be. How she’d just walk away from her dreams becauseshewasafraidtofaceuptowhatshe ’ddoneand,intheend,settle for a life every bit as small as–and so much less honest than–her parents’ had been. And worse, having made that life with its implicit commitments and promises, she’d be seriously considering walking away again, knowing it would wreak havoc in her daughter’s life. Somethingthat,forallherfailures,Noraknewherownmothernever would have done. It would have been inconceivable to her. Sometimes,lostinherthoughts,Noradidn’tevenhearTomcome home from work and he would find her in the darkening living room, 285 “MacArthur Park” a cup of coffee grown cold in her hands. He would kneel beside her, place his hand on her shoulder, as if to ground her. “Nora,” he’d say. Buthisvoicespeakinghernamesoundedstrangetoher;shecould tellhestillfeltstrangesayingit.HewouldalwaysthinkofherasJane. TheforebodingshefeltaswarinIraqgrewcloser,moreinevitable, deepened her confusion and despair. Massive peace demonstrations around the world, petitions against the war flooded the internet, claimsoffaultyintelligencemadebyimminentlytrustworthypeople didnothingtostoptheclocktickingtowardtheshowdownthatmost believed, for better or worse, had been planned for in...