Charmed Thirds_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [95]
Henry, now all of seven years old, treasured this photo more than anything else, more than his trick yo-yo, his Lionel train set, his Babe Ruth baseball card. He pinned it to the wall above his bed. Every night, he knelt on the floor and spoke to her like he was supposed to be speaking to God. “I love you, Lulu” were, for a long time, the last words he whispered before falling asleep.
Years passed and both Henry and Lulu grew older. Lulu's Hollywood career was curtailed by the emergence of the talkies, as they cruelly exposed that she had a rather strident, nasally voice that was unpleasing to the ears. Her popularity quickly waned, and by the mid-1930s, she could no longer be found onscreen or in the pages of any magazines.
Henry wasn't so fickle. In fact, Lulu's absence only made his ardor grow stronger. Her picture stayed on his wall all throughout his childhood and adolescence. It became a sort of curio among his family and friends, a relic from a bygone era, a conversation piece. But to Henry, it meant so much more. It meant hope and wonder. And so, it was one of the few personal items he took with him when he was deployed to the South Pacific during World War II. Other guys could have their Betty Grables and Rita Hayworths—for Henry, it was all about Lulu Livingstone. And he took the photo with him to New York City when he enrolled at Columbia University, courtesy of the GI bill. And it was with him even when he met, married, and moved in with Barnard College student Edna Goldblatt. Edna, a sturdy, wide-hipped blonde who looked nothing like Lulu, made light of her husband's adoration, and even had the old 8 × 10 framed. Throughout their fifty-seven-year marriage, until her death from ovarian cancer at age seventy-nine, Edna cheekily referred to the woman in the photo as her husband's “girlfriend.”
After Edna's death, Henry had no desire to stay in their sprawling house on Long Island. So he moved into an assisted-living community in Morningside Heights near his oldest daughter, who happened to be a professor at his alma mater. There, as one of the healthier, more mobile men in the community, Henry kept his own room and a number of fawning old biddies at bay. In that apartment, among numerous photos of his adored wife, four children, eleven grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren, was that old 8 × 10 glossy of Lulu Livingstone. It was badly faded after all these years, the message only legible to those who already knew what it said. But Henry gave it a special place away from all the rest, on the kitchenette counter next to his heart pills.
One day, about a month into his new residence, Henry didn't make it to breakfast. Or lunch. Or dinner. Concerned, one of the on-call nurses, Dora, came by his room to see if he was okay, or more specifically, still alive. Henry was still indeed breathing, feeling fine, but had decided to make his meals for himself that day because he wasn't in the mood to fend off the advances of the lusty ladies in the dining room. On the way out of his apartment, Dora spotted the picture of Lulu on the counter and stopped in her tracks. She'd seen this photo before in one of the other residents' rooms. Had Henry, she asked, ever met a woman named Lucille Greene?
Her hair was brittle and white. Her skin was mottled with spots. Her bosom had shrunk, her neck hung loose. Her lips were concealed by an oxygen mask. But her eyes, oh, her eyes were unchanged, still radiant with hope and wonder, despite being confined to the bed.
Just one look and Henry knew that this