Mitzi is a social butterfly. A papillon. Kelley watches her from his wheelchair. He and Lara are stationed at one of the central tables, where he can feel like part of the action without having to do much. Mitzi gave up her fanciful notion of wearing the gold roller-disco jumpsuit—thank heavens, as it no longer exists—and instead chose a flowing purple gown with diaphanous sleeves that look like wings. Her wild, curly hair frames her face. Her cheeks are pink with excitement. She flits from group to group, grasping hands, leaning in to ask questions about this person’s new job, that person’s aging mother. How does she keep track of it all? Kelley wonders. One of the things that has come to him with age is a narrowing of the periscope; he cares, now, only about his family. But Mitzi, of course, is young and healthy, she thrives on interaction, and since they closed the inn, her world has shrunken considerably.
Kelley wonders if, perhaps, she is anxious for him to hurry up and depart already, so she can get on with her life.
What a maudlin thought! And unfounded! Whenever Mitzi moves from group to group, she seeks out Kelley’s eyes, waves, and blows a kiss.
Kelley tries to take inventory of the rest of his family. The band has started playing, and Kevin and Isabelle are the first ones out to dance. They’re good, too, fluid and elegant, like the dancers in one of those movies Kelley’s mother used to love. Frances Quinn was a sucker for Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, and for the large-scale productions of Show Boat and Silk Stockings. She loved a man in a white dinner jacket. When Kelley got married to Margaret, Kelley and his brother, Avery, and all the groomsmen wore white dinner jackets to the rehearsal dinner as a surprise for Frances. The photographer took a picture of all of them surrounding Frances. If Kelley is remembering correctly, that was the happiest Frances had ever looked.
Frances Quinn would have loved Isabelle, Kelley is certain. She is classing up the Quinn bloodline. Even at two years old, Genevieve babbles in French; she can count to ten and recite the days of the week. She calls Kelley Grand-père and Mitzi Grand-mère. Margaret is Mimi.
Where is Margaret? Kelley wonders. He doesn’t see her.
Ava is standing at the bar talking to Mrs. Gabler, Bart’s kindergarten teacher. Ava is a saint.
Paddy and Jennifer are sitting and eating, although Paddy is on his phone and Jennifer has a faraway, distracted look on her face. Are they okay? Kelley wonders. They have weathered a couple of big storms recently—Patrick’s incarceration, Jennifer’s addiction to pills—but Kelley thought the ship had righted itself. They don’t look miserable, just not as happy and carefree as Kevin and Isabelle.
Where is Bart, the guest of honor? Come to think of it, Kelley hasn’t seen Bart all night. But since Mitzi doesn’t seem to be worried, Kelley isn’t worried. Although it must be nearly time to cut the cake—ice cream cake from the Juice Bar, a tradition—so Bart had better turn up. Just as Kelley thinks this, the side door opens and Bart walks into the party, holding hands with a Japanese geisha girl.
Dear Lord, Kelley thinks. Is this girl a…? Did Mitzi arrange for a…? Did Kevin and Patrick, maybe, as a joke, hire a… stripper dressed as a geisha?
Mitzi sees Bart and the geisha, swoops them up in her purple wings, and ushers them toward Kelley. No, not toward Kelley, toward the round table that holds the ice cream cake festooned with twenty-two candles, plus eighteen extra candles, one for each of the soldiers in Bart’s platoon who perished. That was at Bart’s request, his insistence.
Lara turns Kelley in his chair so he has a good view of the cake. Jennifer and Patrick stand up, Ava breaks away from Mrs. Gabler, and the band finishes its song. Kevin leads Isabelle off the dance floor. Mitzi lights the candles, and Ava clinks a spoon against a glass. The crowd quiets and people gather around the table in a loose ring.
Bart is still holding hands with the geisha. Kelley is confused. Who is it?
“Who is that?” Kelley asks Lara, but his voice is drowned out when the band launches into “Happy Birthday,” and Lara wouldn’t know anyway, would she? Lara lays a hand on Kelley’s shoulder as everyone starts to sing.
“Happy birthday to you.”
It’s the worst song ever written, in Kelley’s opinion. Nobody sings it well. One person, maybe, in history. The woman in the white dress. What was her name?
“Happy birthday to you.”
Kelley will not live until his next birthday, which means he will not have to sit like a dumb mute while people sing to him terribly off-key. Another small point of gratitude. He cried when he was small and his assembled friends sang to him in Perrysburg, Ohio. Frances snapped a picture of little Kelley in tears with the white cake from Wixey Bakery; she relished showing this photo to the girls Kelley brought home. She showed it to Margaret.
Where is Margaret? Kelley wonders again. Then he remembers that she declined the invite. She is retiring from broadcasting next month, so there are no more vacation days. He will see her at Thanksgiving. Hopefully.
“Happy birthday, dear Bart.”
Bartholomew James Quinn, born at 4:30 a.m., October 31, 1995, weighing eight pounds eleven ounces, measuring twenty-three inches long. Mitzi had pushed for ninety minutes without drugs. Without any drugs! She wanted to be present for every instant of the experience, and Kelley remembers the expression on her face when Bart was out, whole and healthy, wailing on her chest. She was radiant, exhilarated.
“Happy birthday to you!”
Bart takes a deep breath, then he turns his gaze to the geisha and blows the candles—all forty of them—out in one breath. The crowd erupts in applause and whistles.
Kelley closes his eyes. Let the kid have his wish, he prays. Please, whatever it is, let that wish come true.
AVA
Potter offers to cancel his Tuesday-afternoon seminar on the nautical novel and come with Ava to Nantucket, but she tells him she thinks it will be best if she goes alone. Potter is hurt, she can tell, and every sentence she utters as an explanation—“My whole family will be there,” “My father is sick,” “It will be an emotionally fraught time”—serves to make things worse.
“Isn’t that why you have a partner?” Potter asks. “So there’s someone to share the emotionally fraught times? So you have support? I like your family, and if you’ll forgive my hubris, I think they like me, too.”
“They do like you,” Ava says. And it’s true: they do. They like Potter so much that Potter could go to the party and Ava could stay in New York and everyone would be just as happy, if not more so.
“So why don’t you tell me what’s really going on?” Potter says.