In the morning: August 31, 1982, a week and three days since we left Los Angeles. We are atop a hill, the city of San Francisco is below us. A trolley car passes to our left. We are listening to “Bridge Over Troubled Water” again. Arthur has always felt the violins held the last note too long.
We get out of the car to look at the breakers. The water is churning below us. I hold Jimmy in my arms. We go over the Golden Gate Bridge. Its suspension lines look as if it is made not of steel cable but of simple rods of steel, rising up to meet the tip of the slopes. “Look at how the ocean just breathes up and down,” Arthur says. The land here is surf and brush and rocks.
And then the trip is over. We have made a circle around the west. I have tried my hardest to show my boys that I am a regular father, they are regular boys, my friend is their friend and will be forever. I felt I needed to show them this sooner rather than later. Later, it might be too late.
Kathryn gets a road trip all her own, except of course for Artie and me. She is wearing a white dress. It’s her fifth birthday. She’s sitting in the back seat of the car as we drive through New York. She’s quiet and doesn’t want to say anything. It doesn’t matter. This present is for me, not her.
“Don’t you love to have a camera pointed at you?” Arthur asks her. “Whatever you do, it’s looking at you.”
She smiles. She’s eating candy the way a little girl eats candy—delicately, with the tips of her fingers. She puts her leg up on the headrest in front of her.
She’s wearing white knee-high socks.
Arthur sings, “There’s no business, like show business.” His arms are crossed. He leans down into her. She smiles. All this is being filmed for posterity. Arthur says, “I’m one of those few people who realize that the camera is by definition an intimidating thing. There’s no way to have a real connection with a camera lens. You try to look into it like it’s a friend, but sooner or later you realize it’s just a piece of machinery. How do you look at a piece of machinery and have any kind of real expression?”
Kathryn goes into a bag for another piece of candy. Arthur says she must be stuffed. She’s had one frozen yogurt, two hot dogs, one bag of M&Ms, an orange soda, some Diet Pepsi, a lollipop on the plane, an orange juice. She smiles at Arthur. She holds some bubble gum up to Arthur’s nose. He smells it. We discuss candy. Her lips are orange.
“Sometimes,” I tell him, “at night I look down into Kathryn’s tummy and I can see all that she has eaten.”
“Here is one of New York’s main hotels,” Arthur says. “The Plaza Hotel. It’s May 15, 1982. Saturday, 2:15. We are on earth.”
“We can all sit in the carriage,” Kathryn says. She explains, pointing to a horse-drawn carriage, how it’s going to work and where everyone is going to sit. Arthur says that’s how we all used to travel. By carriage. On the front bench of the carriage beside us is the driver, who is wearing a white tuxedo. Kathryn sits on my lap. I hold her shoulders. We plan our trip through Central Park.
“Here we are at the carousel,” Arthur says. “Is there a place to, as we say, park?” People bike by, hooting. It is a beautiful spring day. Arthur and I are wearing the same thing: blue shirts and khaki pants, our old standard undergraduate uniform. Kathryn walks ahead of us, on the grass. She’s not sure she wants to go on the carousel. Arthur wants a picture of the three of us, against a green fence. Kathryn doesn’t want to face the camera.
“Artie, c’mon,” she says.
While Arthur goes to get the tickets, Kathryn sits on the armrest of a bench. “Since you were born, I wanted to take you here,” I say. “Five years ago. Now it’s five years later.”
Kathryn gets on a white horse on the inside of the carousel. I get on one, too. They rise up and go back down. She watches me intently. I touch her shoulder. She holds onto the reins. She has two gold barrettes in her hair. A bell rings, signaling the ride is over. We dismount and switch horses.
Somewhere in the park, a band is playing “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Arthur and I sing along just as we did in college.
Arthur says to Kathryn, “I see you’re wearing your Docksides. I see the sides of your Docksides. But where are the docks of your Docksides?” He kisses her. He blames her for this affection. She’s the cute one. Irresistible. He can’t help it.
The horse leading our carriage towers above the cabs in front of us. Arthur points out the General Motors building, the FAO Schwarz building. Kathryn plays with her hair, as if she were just discovering it. People stare at us from the sidewalk.
Kathryn doesn’t want to go to the park zoo. I say we’ll go, but not for too long. She eats more candy. This time a Hershey’s bar. Her fingers are completely covered with chocolate. Then her face is. She licks her fingers clean. She takes a napkin, licks it, and then smears it on her face. She giggles as she does this.
Arthur talks to the people in the adjacent car. He asks them what language they’re speaking. They’re from Madagascar. They recognized him.
Because we’re going to the zoo, Arthur sings, “At the Zoo.” From across the street, some kid says, “There’s what’s-his-name.”
Kathryn wants another hot dog. And a grape soda. We go through the gates of the zoo. Kathryn asks that Artie hold the drink while I push her on the swings. But the swings are too crowded,
