Columbus Day comes up as cold as Christmas. I listen to the weatherforecast the night before, to see how it'll be for the beach. "High winds,unseasonably low temperatures," the guy says. He would.
I get up at eight-thirty the next morning, though, figuring he'd be wrongand it would be a nice sunny day. I slip on my pants and shirt and godownstairs with Cat to have a look out. Cat slides out and is halfway downthe stoop when a blast of cold wind hits him. His tail goes up and hespooks back in between my legs. I push the door shut against the icy wind.
Mom is sitting in the kitchen drinking her tea and she says, "My goodness,why are you up so early on a holiday? Do you feel sick?"
"Nah, I'm all right." I pour out a cup of coffee to warm my hands on anddump in three or four spoons of sugar.
"Davey, have you got a chill? You don't look to me as if you felt quiteright."
"Mom, for Pete's sake, it's COLD out! I feel fine."
"Well, you don't have to go out. Why don't you just go back to bed andsnooze and read a bit, and I'll bring you some breakfast."
I see it's got to be faced, so while I'm getting down the cereal and abowl, I say, "Well, as a matter of fact, I'm going over to Coney Islandtoday."
"Coney ISLAND!" Mom sounds like it was Siberia. "What in the world are yougoing to do there in the middle of winter?"
"Mom, it's only Columbus Day. We figured we'd go to the aquarium andthen--uh--well, fool around. Some of the pitches are still open, and we'llget hot dogs and stuff."
"Who's going? Nick?"
"Nick wasn't sure--I'll stop by his house and see." I'd just as soon steerclear of this "who's going" business, so I start into a long spiel abouthow we're studying marine life in biology, and we have to take some notesat the aquarium. Mom is swallowing this pretty well, but Pop comes intothe kitchen just then and gives me the fishy eye.
"First time I ever heard of you spending a holiday on homework. I bet theygot a new twist palace going out there."
I slam down my coffee cup. "Holy cats! Can't I walk out of here on aholiday without going through the third degree? What am I, some kind of anut or a convict?"
"Just a growing boy," says Pop. "And don't talk so sassy to your mother."
"I'm talking to you!"
Pop draws in a breath to start bellowing, but Mom beats him to it bystarting to wheeze, which she can do without drawing breath.
Pop pats her on the shoulder and gives me a dirty look. "Now, Agnes,that's all right. I'm not sore. I was just trying to kid him a little bit,and he flies off the handle."
_I_ fly off the handle! How do you like that?
I give Mom a kiss. "Cheer up, Mom. I won't ride on the roller coaster.It's not even running."
I grab a sweater and gloves and money and get out before they can startanymore questions. On the subway I start wondering if Mary will show up.It's almost two months since we made this sort of crazy date, and theweather sure isn't helping any.
Coney Island is made to be crowded and noisy. All the billboards scream atyou, as if they had to get your attention. So when the place is empty, itlooks like the whole thing was a freak or an accident.
It's sure empty today. There's practically no one on the street in thefive or six blocks from the subway station to the aquarium. But it's notquiet. There are a few places open--merry-go-rounds and hot-dog shops--andtinny little trickles of music come out of them, but the big noise is thewind. All the signs are swinging and screeching. Rubbish cans blow overand their tops clang and bang rolling down the street. The wind makes awhistling noise all by itself.
I lean into the wind and walk up the empty street. My sweater is about aswarm as a sieve. I wonder if I'm crazy to have come. No girl would get outon a boardwalk on a day like this. It must be practically a hurricane.
She's there, though. As soon as I turn the corner to the beach, I can seeone figure, with its back to the ocean, scarf and hair blowing inlandtoward me. I can't see her face, but it's Mary, all right. There isn'tanother soul in sight. I wave and she hunches her shoulders up and down tosemaphore, not wishing to take her hands out of her pockets.
I come up beside her on the boardwalk and turn my back to the ocean, too.I'd like to go on looking at it--it's all black and white and thundery--butthe wind blows your breath right back down into your stomach. I freeze.
"I was afraid you wouldn't come on a day like this," I say.
"Me too. I mean I was afraid _you_ wouldn't."
"Mom and Pop thought I was crazy. I spent about an hour arguing with them.What'd your mother say?"
"Nothing. She thinks I'm walking alone with the wind in my hair, thinkingpoetic thoughts."
"Huh? What for?"
Mary shrugs. "Mom's like that. You'll see. Come on, let's go home and makecocoa or something to warm up, and then we'll think up something to do. Wecan't just stand here."
She's right about that, so I don't argue. Her house is a few blocks away,a two-family type with a sloped driveway going down into a cellar garage.Neat. My pop is always going nuts hunting for a place to park.
Mary goes in and shouts, "Hi, Nina! I brought a friend home. We're goingto make some cocoa. We're freezing."
I wonder who Nina is. I don't hear her mother come into the kitchen. ThenI turn around and there she is. Holy crow! We got some pretty beat-lookingtypes at school, but this is the first time I've ever seen a beatnikmother.
She's got on a black T-shirt and blue jeans and old sneakers, and her hairis in a long braid, with uneven bangs in front.
Mary waves a saucepan vaguely at us both and says, "Nina--Davey--this is mymother."
So Nina is her mother. I stick out my hand. "Uh--how do you do?"
"Hel-looo." Her voice is low and musical. "I think there is coffee on thestove."
"I thought I'd make cocoa for a change," says Mary.
"All right." Nina puts a cigarette in her mouth and offers one to me.
I say, "No, thank you."
"Tell me...." She talks in this low, intense kind of voice. "Are you inschool with Mary?"
So I tell her I live in Manhattan, and how I ran into Mary when I had Caton the beach, because that makes it sound sort of respectable, not like apickup. But she doesn't seem to be interested in Cat and the beach.
"What do you _read_? In your school?" she asks, launching each questionlike a torpedo.
I remember Mary saying something about her mother and poetry, so I say,"Well, uh--last week we read 'The Highwayman' and 'The Wreck of theHesperus.' They're about--I mean, we were studying metaphors and similes.Looking at the ocean today, I sure can see what Longfellow meant about theicy...."
I thought I was doing pretty well, but she cut me off again.
"Don't you read any _real_ poetry? Donne? Auden? Baudelaire?"
Three more torpedoes. "We didn't get to them yet."
Nina blows out a great angry cloud of smoke and explodes, "Schools!" Thenshe sails out of the kitchen.
I guess I look a little shook up. Mary laughs and shoves a mug of cocoaand a plate of cinnamon toast in front of me. "Don't mind Mother. She justcan't get used to New York schools. Or Coney Island. Or hardly anythingaround here.
"She grew up on the Left Bank in Paris. Her father was an artist and hermother was a writer, and they taught her to read at home, starting withChaucer, probably. She never read a kids' book in her life.
"Anything I ever tell her about school pretty much sounds either childishor stupid to her. What I really love is science--experiments and stuff--andshe can't see that for beans."
"Our science teacher is a dope," I say, because she is, "so I really nevergot very interested in science. But I told Mom and Dad I was coming to theaquarium to take notes today, so they wouldn't kick up such a fuss."
Mary shakes her head. "We ought to get our mothers together. Mine thinksI'm wasting time if I even _go_ to the aquarium. I do, though, all thetime. I love the walrus."
"What does your pop do?"
"Father? He teaches philosophy at Brooklyn College
. So I get it from bothsides. Just think, think, think. Father and Nina aren't hardly eveninterested in _food_. Once in a while Nina spends all day cooking somegreat fish soup or a chicken in wine, but the rest of the time I'm theonly one who takes time off from thinking to cook a hamburger. They liveon rolls and coffee and sardines."
Mary puts our cups in the sink and then opens a low cupboard. Instead ofpots and pans it has stacks of records in it. She pulls out _West SideStory_ and then I see there's a record player on a side table. What d'youknow? A record player in the kitchen! This Left Bank style of living hasits advantages.
"I sit down here and eat and play records while I do my homework," saysMary, which sounds pretty nice.
I ask her if she has any Belafonte, and she says, "Yes, a couple," but sheputs on something else. It's slow, but sort of powerful, and it makes youfeel kind of powerful yourself, as if you could do anything.
"What's that?" I ask.
"It's called 'The Moldau'--that's a river in Europe. It's by a Czech namedSmetana."
I wander around the kitchen and look out the window. The wind's stillhowling, but not so hard. I remember the ocean, all gray and powerful,spotted with whitecaps. I'd like to be out on it.
"You know what'd be fun?" I say out loud. "To be out in a boat on theharbor today. If you didn't sink."
"We could take the Staten Island ferry," Mary says.
"Huh?" I hadn't even thought there was really any boat we could get on."Really? Where do you get it?"
"Down at Sixty-ninth Street and Fourth Avenue. It's quite a ways. I'vealways gone there in a car. But maybe we could do it on bikes, if we don'tfreeze."
"We won't freeze. But what about bikes?"
"You can use my brother's. He's away at college. Maybe I can find awindbreaker of his, too."
She finds the things and we get ready and go into the living room, whereNina is sitting reading and sipping a glass of wine.
"We're going on our bikes to the ferry and over to Staten Island," Marysays. She doesn't even ask.
"Oh-h-h." It's a long, low note, faintly questioning.
"We thought with the wind blowing and all, it'd be exciting," Maryexplains, and I think, Uh-o, that's going to cook it. _My_ mother wouldhave kittens if I said I was going out on a ferry in a storm.
But Nina just says, "I see," and goes back to reading her book. I saygood-bye and she looks up again and smiles, and that's all.
It's another funny thing--Nina doesn't seem to pay any attention to whoMary brings home, like most mothers are always snooping if their daughterbrings home a guy. Without stopping to think, I say, "Do you bring home alot of guys?"
Mary laughs. "Not a lot. Sometimes one of the boys at school comes homewhen we're studying for a science test."
I laugh, too, but what I'm thinking of is how Pop would look if I broughta girl home and said we were studying for a test!
14
Dave and Mary on ferry with other people.]
EXPEDITION BY FERRY