We'll Always Have Paris (19 page)

Finally we reached a dimly lit room with a sign that promised we had arrived. Inside was nothing but a lazy Susan with a chain that was thick enough to shackle King Kong. I felt like we were scoring drugs, albeit from nuns.

There was the voice that had buzzed us in, asking a question in Spanish. “She wants to know what kind of cookies we want,” Katie informed me, noticing a menu of treats taped to the wall.

“I don’t know what any of this means,” I told Katie.

“I can order,” she told me before carefully requesting chocolate cookies.

The nun barked at us for nearly thirty seconds as Katie’s brow knit in confusion.

“I’m pretty sure that meant no,” Katie said.

“Ask her what they have available.”

The color drained from Katie’s face. “I’m not asking her anything else,” she replied.

“Just ask—” I began before Katie quickly interrupted.

“I am not talking to that lady.”

We heard another sigh, this one more exaggerated than the last.

Struggling with my Spanish, I asked the nun what Katie later told me translated to “What cookies are my most good?” The nun began strumming her fingers. “All cookies are good cookies,” I managed to say in Spanish.

Katie whispered, “Say
cualquier
dulces
. Tell her we’ll take anything and just put money in the hole.”

I placed eight euro on the lazy Susan and pulled the chain to rotate the table. Katie and I looked at each other and held back a laugh as the nun took the money and started muttering angrily in Spanish. We heard a thud of a box being dropped carelessly and the pull of the chain. This was quickly followed by the nun’s heavy footsteps and the slam of a door.

Katie opened the small door of the lazy Susan and found a box of orange-flavored shortbread cookies.

“They should call these nuns the Sisters of Perpetual Impatience,” I said, looking for the exit.

“Let’s sit in the plaza and eat them,” Katie suggested, clutching her prize.

A half hour later, Katie’s chin was dusty with crumbs. Crafty sparrows hopped about the stairs where we sat, picking up cookie crumbs that escaped from our mouths as we chatted. Two barrel-shaped older women in orthopedic shoes passed by. One looked at us and told the other, “
Turistas estupidas
.” We can never be certain, but the voice sounded awfully familiar.

That evening, our last of six nights in Madrid, Katie seemed distracted as she ate her dinner. “What are you thinking about?” I asked.

“Home,” she said.
Uh
oh
. “Cross-country practice started last week and I’m going to be really out of shape when we get back.”

“Do you want to try and find a place to run when we get to Seville?” I asked.

Katie shook her head. “I miss home.”

I nodded, trying not to panic. I told myself that trying to convince Katie she shouldn’t be homesick would have the opposite effect. On the other hand, I wondered if homesickness wasn’t like spilled milk—the longer you leave it unattended, the worse it got.

“I miss Windmill Farms,” Katie said.

Windmill
Farms?
“The grocery store?” I asked.

“And the Del Cerro Pool,” she said, her eyes filling with tears.

I was lost. One part of me wanted to remind her that our pool membership was the biggest waste of money in our family budget because Katie had to be begged, cajoled, and dragged there every summer. And whenever we visited Windmill Farms, she asked if she could sit in the car while I went inside and shopped.

“And Daddy, I miss Daddy,” she said, bursting into tears. “I want to go home and see Daddy.”

I hugged her as she sobbed into my shoulder and repeated that she wanted to go home and see her father. “It’s hard,” I told her. “I miss Daddy too. But you seem to be having such a good time.”

“I hate Spain.”

“You hate Spain?” Katie shook her head to confirm.

“It’s freezing,” Katie replied. “And I have a headache.”

“Freezing?” The temperature broke a hundred degrees every day. I felt her forehead. “Katie, you have a fever. Let’s get you back to the hotel.”

After Katie took a cool bath, I tucked her into bed, wondering what I would do if she still had a high temperature in the morning. I went downstairs to the lobby to ask if we could extend our stay an extra day if we needed. “Of course,
señora
,” the manager told me. I phoned William from downstairs and asked him to call our room to talk to Katie, explaining that I needed to run down the block to buy some Tylenol.

When I returned, she was sleepily agreeing with him about something. Then she laughed and asked if he could tell her a story. With droopy lids, she smiled and accepted the glass of water and Tylenol I offered. She listened contentedly while William regaled her until she dropped off.

“You’re a miracle worker,” I told him, picking up the receiver. “What did you tell her?”

“I told her that Windmill Farms and the pool will be waiting for her when she gets home, and I am always a phone call away,” he said. “I told her it sounded like she needs a good night’s sleep and Spain would probably look a whole lot better in the morning.” There was a long silence. “Jen, are you still there?”

Now it was me who was crying. “William, I’m out of my league here. I think maybe we should come home.”

“You’ve done this before, you know what you’re doing, you’ve just hit a wall. Are you sick too?”

“I don’t know,” I said, dolling out a few Tylenol for myself just in case. “Maybe. Will you come meet us in Seville? We miss you.”

“Meet you in Seville?” William said with a laugh.

“It’s not funny. I need you.”

“Get a good night’s rest and if you’re still feeling shaky, I’ll do some rescheduling and catch up with you in Barcelona.”

“You will?”

“Of course, but please only ask if you really need it. I’ve got a lot scheduled and I can’t afford the time or the money right now.”

“But you
would
?”

“I would,” he assured me.

With that promise, my heart untangled. “Okay, I think that’s all I needed to hear. I’ll call you tomorrow and let you know if we’re still in Madrid or went on to Seville as planned.”

In the morning, I woke without an alarm clock and felt better than I had all week. Katie remained sleeping, so I felt her forehead and found that her fever had broken. I quietly packed our suitcases and hoped Katie would wake up without any sentimentality about our grocery store or community pool. I had packed everything except Katie’s toothbrush and a change of clothes, so I decided to go downstairs and buy her coffee and a muffin from the bakery at the corner.

As the doors to the hotel opened, Madrid looked more alive and beautiful than I had ever seen. The colors were brighter; the noise of traffic sounded like music. I felt like a better version of myself, immediately filled with an overwhelming sense of joy.

When I returned to the hotel, I floated up the stairs. “Katie,” I whispered, setting her breakfast down beside her. “It’s time to wake up.” She opened her eyes, looking like a newly hatched baby bird.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“Almost eleven,” I said.

She sprang up. “I need to pack.”

“I packed for you,” I said, appraising her condition. “And here’s some breakfast. All you have to do is eat, brush your teeth, and change your clothes and we’ll go to Seville.”

Katie tilted her head and looked at me as though I had done something utterly amazing. “That was
so
nice of you,” she said. Then placing a hand on mine, “Thank you, Mommy.”

What
the
heck
was
in
those
cookies?

I smiled. “How are you feeling this morning, Katie?”

“I feel great,” she said, last night’s drama completely forgotten. “How do you feel?”

“Quite well,” I said. “I’m going to go drop Daddy a quick email and give the front desk our key.”

Eating her chocolate muffin, Katie waved. “Tell him I said hi.”

Downstairs, I sat at the computer terminal in the lobby and let William know that all was back to normal with us and that we were off to Seville. “Our daughter has inherited either your strength or my denial,” I typed. “The jury is still out, but my money is on her resilience.”

Handing in my keycard, the manager nodded. “You don’t need the extra night?” I confirmed. He tapped on his keyboard a few times and looked up. “You are checking out early?”

I gulped. Had it really been nearly thirty years since I’d heard that expression?

“No, not checking out early,” I said, slightly shaken. “Staying on schedule.”

***

“Would you forgive me if I check out early?” my father asked me a week before I left for my sophomore year in college. We were sitting on the outdoor patio of Spumoni Gardens in Bensonhurst, eating our multicolored ice cream while my friend Matt was in the restroom. Christmas bulbs were strung from the trees despite the fact that it was a scorching night in August.

“Do you want to go home?” I asked, realizing it had been unfair to drag him out in his current state.

“I don’t mean tonight,” my father said.

I placed my hand over his, noticing how the skin hung loosely over his bones and muttered a few words.

“So, if I need to OD on something, it won’t change how you feel about me?”

“No, Daddy, nothing would change.”

Matt returned to our table, his eyes nervously darting about the surroundings. My father smiled at Matt and switched gears. “This your first time in Brooklyn?”

He replied with an emphatic nod of the head.

Silence hung as people around us laughed uproariously, enjoying the final nights of summer. At the next table, men with names like Vinny and Paulie spoke loudly about their “sangwiches” and “busting chops” while my father had just asked for permission to kill himself.

I told him I could never hate him and there was nothing to forgive.

Matt was my best friend in high school, the chubby kid who never got in trouble despite his constant disruptions. In tenth grade, my mother enrolled me in a private school on the Upper East Side after I couldn’t hack the three-train commute to the performing arts school in Harlem I’d started just three days earlier. She finagled a partial scholarship and drained her saving account so I could attend the tiny prep school with well-heeled, sheltered kids like Matt.

A few feet away, two men started arguing. “Let’s take dis outside,” one said. The other quickly reminded his adversary that they were already outside. With that, the two started laughing and patting each other’s backs, affectionately calling each other stupid motherfuckers.

My father looked at Matt and asked, “Scared?”

“Terrified,” Matt replied.

My father laughed. “This is like a field trip for you, isn’t it?” he asked without bitterness.

“Sort of,” Matt replied.

A few hours earlier, Matt and I had been sitting on the balcony of his parents’ luxury high-rise with no plans and a full tank of gas in the family Mercedes. I suggested we drive out to Brooklyn to see my father. Matt shrugged in agreement, and before long, we were crossing the bridge. Thirty minutes later, we rang my father’s intercom. He buzzed without asking who was there. When Matt and I arrived at my father’s apartment, the door was ajar. We knocked and an unfamiliar male voice invited us in.

My father and his friend stared at us, dazed. Finally, one spoke. “You guys cops?” the young man asked, placing a bottle behind his back.

“That’s my daughter,” my father said, as though he’d just figured it out. “JJ, what are you doing here?”

“You remember Matt, right? We thought we’d come and visit. Is this a bad time?”

My father’s friend quickly got up and grabbed his hoodie, patting the pockets a few times to make sure the contents were secure. “I need to get going, Shelly, I’ll catch you later.”

“What were you guys doing?” I asked.

“I was sharing some of my cough medicine with Manny,” my father replied.

“Your cancer medicine?!” I asked. “Don’t you need that?”

“I can always get more.”

“Does that guy have cancer?” Matt asked.

My father laughed. “Manny’s a drunk; he ran out of booze so I hooked him up with some of my cough syrup. It is some potent shit, I’ll tell you that.” The buzzer from downstairs rang. My father slowly lifted himself from his rocking chair and made his way over to the intercom. He told a woman named Jag that she should come back another time. “Tonight’s no good,” he said. She persisted, saying she could make it quick. My father told her to come back tomorrow, that his kid was there.

As my father and Jag negotiated a new time to visit, Matt turned to me and whispered, “Is this normal?”

“Define normal.”

“I’m serious, Jennie, I think your dad’s dealing cancer medicine.”

“
Dealing?
” I said, appalled. “My father is sharing. Just because he’s not a Wall Street yuppie doesn’t make him a drug dealer, Matt. Don’t be so judgmental.”

Matt held up his hands in surrender. “If you say so.”

My father turned to us, unsteady on his feet. “Okay kids, we need to get out of here. Where should we go?”

“Let’s go to Spumoni Gardens and get some ice cream,” I suggested.

“Ever had spumoni, Matt?” my father asked.

“Can’t say I have,” my friend replied.

My father nodded; a decision had been made. His hands shook as he struggled to lock the door with his keys. “This place in Bensonhurst has the best in the world. You’re gonna love it.”

The descent of the elevator startled my father, who gripped the handrail for balance.

Matt looked at me nervously. “I’ll drive,” he said.

As we walked outside, my father gave a snort of a laugh. “Nice car,” he said to Matt.

“It’s my parents’.”

“I hope so,” my father said, linking arms with me as we walked across the street.

With a mix of kindness and cluelessness, Matt helped my father into the car and fumbled for something to say. “How are you feeling, Shelly? I mean, are you…” he drifted off.