Golden Age (54 page)

Richie said, “What do you post on your Facebook page?”

“Cartoons. Links to YouTube videos of punk bands.”

Jessica, who had a Facebook account, said that this was true. She showed Richie: Michael had 932 friends. Jessica had 267 friends. One of Michael’s friends was Loretta, but, according to Jessica, she never commented on or liked anything Michael posted.

Richie almost signed up for an account—even Ezra had an account—but in the end, he was too embarrassed.

One day, Michael said, “You know, that place is worth six million bucks now.”

“Up from a thousand or something like that,” said Richie.

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t you remember Dad telling us once that when he was a kid the land was worth eleven dollars an acre, if they were lucky? I don’t remember how many acres they had then, but it was probably something like three.”

Michael would not even smile. “I can’t believe he bought out everyone and gave it to Jesse. That still pisses me off.”

“Like we were going to farm.”

“I know lots of guys, especially in Chicago, who are in farmland. They say it’s a good investment. And if the crops burn up where they are standing, they get insurance payouts. Dad sent him money every year. He never gave me money.”

“You were always telling him you were worth more than he was.”

Michael scowled and went out on the deck. When he came back in, he talked about shoes—he had found a pair of Edward Greens in a used-clothing store, fit perfectly, perfectly broken in, seventy-five bucks.

It was so disorienting to think of Michael attending to weather conditions in Iowa that Richie was more than thrilled when, in September, he saw an article in the
Times
saying “Drought conditions appear to be easing, says National Weather Service.”

—

FOR EZRA
, who had been active in the Keystone XL protests the year before (how had Richie missed that? Well, he had made sure to avoid 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue while it was going on), the election posed a terrible dilemma. Next to the picture of John Burroughs, he now had a printout, in 24-point type, of a quote from
The New York Times:
“Mr. Romney envisions a nation in which coal-burning power plants are given new life, oil derricks sprout on public lands and waters, industry is given a greater say in the writing and enforcement of environmental rules and the Code of Federal Regulations shrinks rather than grows.” On his computer, Ezra had a file of everything Obama had ever said about climate change, including a speech he had made in the spring in Oklahoma, congratulating his administration on circling the world with oil and gas pipelines. Nothing Obama had said subsequently about stopping climate change redeemed his candidacy for Ezra. He thought voting for Romney might usher in the revolution, but, Ezra told Richie (realistically, Richie thought), he, Ezra, was the sort of person who might not survive the revolution. He
could
vote for Jill Stein, but to do so would not sufficiently express his anger at Obama. He was thinking about voting for Jill Stein
and
writing a letter to the White House explaining his vote.

Jessica was voting for Obama as an anti-racist gesture. The cascade of racist remarks about him and the made-up brouhaha about Benghazi offended her almost to the point of anger—a rare point for Jessica. When those soldiers were discovered in Georgia who plotted to assassinate him and had eighty thousand dollars’ worth of guns and explosives, she sent in a campaign contribution, resurrected her campaign buttons from 2008, wore them to work. Michael was voting for Obama because Loretta would never vote for Obama, and he was also telling Tia and Binky that they should vote for Obama, as a protest against the Republican Party for offering a roster of candidates that went from bad to worse to worst ever. He didn’t believe a word of the Republican yakkety yak about Benghazi, either. For about a week in October, even after Romney won the first debate, he could not stop laughing at an article he read about Romney’s body language. The “expert” found his “tilt and nod” gesture (“with eyes wide open”) positive and welcoming. Romney’s “tilt and nod” was a permanent tic, according to Michael, and had always reminded him of those dolls from the 1950s with dumbstruck round blue eyes, pursed lips, and bobbing heads.

Richie, with his government pension, would of course vote for Obama, but Ezra was getting him worked up. Ezra didn’t mind arguing, so he assigned Richie plenty of reading, both for and against the pipeline. When Richie pointed out that the Canadian oil was no
worse than oil from California, and that the Canadian oil would get to Texas, and into the atmosphere, no matter what, that the Chinese would not be deprived of the Canadian oil, and that much of the pipeline was already in place and operating, Ezra summoned a pleasant look, then leaned forward and said, “When do you stop? When do you say no? You don’t take mistakes from the past and use them as precedents for future mistakes. You say no, try something else—and something else emerges. You get investors to reject investments in oil companies. You use the Internet and crowdfunding. You bypass the Congress.”

“Good idea,” said Richie.

Michael continued to laugh at Romney—it was one of his greatest pleasures. One day, he said, “Look at me! I am in disgrace! Where’s the money? Where’s the expertise? But I can’t help feeling that I could run a better campaign than this guy.
You
could run a better campaign than this guy!” Michael seemed not to think Richie would be insulted by this remark. And he wasn’t. So many remarks over the years had stirred him up, and not anymore. It was strange. He didn’t mind it.

In D.C., Hurricane Sandy was like the flipside of the summer derecho—wet and windy, but cold and coming from the east, at the living room, rather than from the west, at the bedroom. Richie tacked a quilt over the windows and stocked up on a few things like Italian tuna packed in olive oil and cracked-wheat bread. He did not expect to be driven from the apartment, and he did expect to stay home—everyone in D.C. stayed home in a State of Emergency. When Jessica went out for her morning run, he stretched himself on the sofa and called Leo, who had an internship at the American Folk Art Museum in New York, thanks to Ivy. He said that he was staying with a friend way uptown, almost to Fort Tryon Park, which was higher ground than his apartment in Chelsea. He sounded calm and moderately receptive to his father’s attention. “How about your mom?” said Richie. “She’s in France,” said Leo. “But her place should be fine. I’m supposed to check it after the storm.” Richie said, “Call if there’s a problem.” Leo said, “ ’Kay. Love you.” From that Richie knew that Leo was somewhat more nervous than he let on. After Leo, he called Michael, who said he was at Henry’s. Richie said, “Are you dating Riley?”

Michael said, “Not yet. I have some tests to pass, and it doesn’t look good.”

“No surprise,” said Richie. After he hung up, he thought for a moment too long about whether this could possibly be true. He called his mom. It was an indication of how immortal he considered his mom that he hadn’t called her first. But she didn’t seem worried: the Hut was not in a flood zone, and Michael had given her a generator for her birthday and shown her how to use it. If it got really cold, she still had that mink coat from before he was born—she liked to climb into bed and curl up underneath it. Richie said, “What do you have to eat, though?”

Andy said, “Chocolate, dried cranberries, a nice Brie, some Honey Crisp apples, and a big Yellow Brandywine tomato.”

He said, “Mom! It could be days!”

She said, “Oh, I doubt that.” There was a long silence—she was finished talking. These days, she always finished talking fairly quickly. Richie, thinking of Leo, said, “ ’Kay. Love you.” They hung up. Richie realized that he had not meant to have any of these calls sound like fond farewells, but they did. That was how big Hurricane Sandy appeared to be.

When Jessica returned, she said that the Smithsonian was closed and groups of Chinese tourists were standing disconsolately at the door. Richie had Jessica’s favorite old Steve Martin movie,
Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid
, which she had seen seven times before she turned eighteen, in the DVD player and ready to go. He grabbed her, pulled her down on the couch, and held her as tightly as he could. If he had still been in Congress, he hoped he would have been thinking about the Grand Concourse and Prospect Park. But he wasn’t.

And so Sandy ushered in Obama’s second term. Michael was on the phone to Richie even as Karl Rove was yammering on in disbelief that, according to Michael, the fix wasn’t in after all. “Look at him! Now that blonde is walking through the studio to talk to the numbers guys. What a surprise, except not to everyone outside the bubble. I always thought Rove was a prick!” He started laughing and hung up. Jerry Nadler, of course, had been re-elected, and a Democrat had replaced Richie’s replacement. Earnest graduate of NYU, master’s in social work, career in nonprofits, idealist, not the type of
candidate Vito Lopez would have embraced, but, thanks to feeling up his office help, old Vito looked done for at this point. It was almost midnight. Jessica had fallen asleep on the couch with her feet in his lap. He took off one of her slippers and tickled her. When she opened her eyes, she said, “He won, didn’t he?”

“He did, sweetie. He did. The Super PACs don’t seem to have bought themselves a thing.”

Jessica yawned, and said, “Maybe it’s going to be all right, then.”

“I think that’s up to Ezra and Chance at this point.”

Jessica said, “Don’t leave out Leo. He’s got a lot on the ball.”

“That was complete do-it-yourself.”

“What isn’t?” said Jessica.

2013

E
MILY WAS STILL
in the ring, teaching a six-year-old boy who could sit on his pony but couldn’t get him to turn left or right. Fiona stood leaning against the gate, watching Emily do her best imitation of Mrs. Herman—talk a lot, be encouraging, demonstrate a few things, let the child find his way, but keep your eye out for pony misbehavior. Champ, who was a small pony, only twelve hands, was not as agreeable as Pesky had been, but he was good enough if the instructor carried a whip. The first thing Fiona said when the boy was finished was “What is your cousin Chance doing these days?”

“Ranch work, I guess.”

“Get him to come down here. I want to learn something new.”

Fiona never said “please” or “thank you”—too many years of giving lessons.

So Emily texted the last number anyone had for Chance, and two days later, he e-mailed her. The first time he came down, he rode four of Fiona’s young horses each day for three days; he rode six the second time. Fiona paid him a hundred dollars a horse, offered more, and said the safety factor was worth it. It was interesting to Emily just to watch. One horse, Dulcet, was talented but spooky. She rarely ran, but she often flinched. When Emily exercised her, the flinching was startling and distracting. Emily would worry that something worse might happen. It never did, but Dulcet was not progressing
quickly—she was seven now, had never been to a show. Fiona had decided that, at sixty-five, she was too old to fall off, but Dulcet was beautiful and talented. When Chance worked her, he did nothing wild or cowboylike—he just gently solicited her attention over and over, reminded her to trot a circle, or square a corner, or whatever the exercise was. Fiona got on and did the same, and within a day or two, Dulcet was much more relaxed. Just before Chance got into his truck to leave, Fiona hugged him and gave him a kiss on the cheek. She said, “I am going to pretend that you look like Tim”; then she hugged him again and said, “Charlie, too.”

The second time he came, Chance worked with one of Fiona’s very bad horses, one she’d gotten as payment for lots of missed board bills, who would buck hard and keep bucking. With Chance on his back, every buck led to the horse’s quietly spiraling, his back legs stepping over and over, until he sighed and gave it up. At dinner, where Emily talked about it to Chance, where he used words like “mindful” and “redirect,” Emily had to admit that she had sort of fallen in love with him, or maybe she was abandoning years of disdain. She could not help comparing him, just a little, with the lawyer she was idly dating, two years older than she was, who shopped only at Whole Foods, always took his shoes off when he entered his house, and chopped vegetables wearing latex gloves. His name was Corey, and Emily had really wanted to find him compelling for six or seven months, but when he rolled his socks together before they had sex, somehow the thrill was gone. She and Chance started idly e-mailing.

Fiona told her that, once upon a time, all the best riding horses came off the track—they were fit and mostly sound and ready to try something new. Those days were gone; Fiona’s stable was full of Holsteiners and Hanoverians, most of them bred in Europe, but all old horsemen had a lingering fondness for Thoroughbreds they had known, rangy with lots of bone, nice ones related to Hyperion, Prince John, and Eight Thirty, or tough ones related to Nearco. It was early April. Fiona sent them to the Santa Anita Derby, but she didn’t go with them.