The Complete Tales of Lucy Gold

Chapter Thirty-Two

99 chapter thirty-two Lucy was a gorgeous child who, when she spoke, sounded to be singing a made-up nursery song, so gently and persuasively did she express her magic, and for this reason people were drawn to her “like bees to honey.” She was possibly the most complete girl who ever had lived,Mrs and Mr Gold both privately thought. Her lithe limbs and sparkling eyes and blonde waves of hair: she was like a drawing of a girl or a painting of a girl or a paper doll into whom life had been breathed by an angel. Full, full, full of the wonder of being she was. And so easy from birth. Lucy was not only easy for others,however. Lucy knew herself well, and this brought the whole world gently to her. She knew the very depth of her nature, and how it was totally shallow, and that this was good. What was missing in others was not missing from her. What was it, I wonder. From an early age, Lucy enjoyed activities such as brushing her flaxen hair and painting her nails shellsparkling pink and smoothing the coverlets on the doll beds. She enjoyed pretending to iron on the little 100 pink ironing board made of metal; its pretend-iron even plugged in, always giving a wonderful touch of electricity to those littlest of hands. She adored kneeling at the bedroom window, hands clasped under chin, and watching the mailman deliver the mail, the milkman deliver the milk, the dry cleaner deliver the shirts. There was truly nothing Lucy didn’t enjoy—and her enjoyment was not only innocent-seeming, it was innocent. How exciting it was in the evenings, when Mr Gold would return Merry and Ketzia home from their lessons at the Academie Musicale. Her two older sisters,returned home to her again, the three graces reunited at last (every separation from her sisters and brother or mother or father pained Lucy—the only pain she truly knew was the pain of missing them). On one such evening in winter, here came Merry, trudging up the snowy path, wearing a white rabbit coat bought from a mail-order catalogue, carrying a folder of mysterious songs Lucy loved to hear her play, and to which she would sing along (“Paperback Writer,” “Cat’s in the Cradle”). Here came Ketzia, sniffling, dragging behind , in the poncho Grandma had made her. Her brown, mousy curls stuffed into a wool hat from Daddy’s office picnic last year: GOLD INC embroidered upon it. Lucy put her hands to her cheeks, barely able to contain her pleasure at this joyous reunion. She pressed a hot cheek to the window and watched her breath puff out and make a cloud there. And then she kissed it. O breath, o air, o childhood home, home of the heart and the soul and the being. Lucy had no words for this— 101 but she thought she was whole, and she thought that this was forever. ...