Maine - J. Courtney Sullivan [145]
It had never once seemed cruel. But now, suddenly, she could not bear the thought of it. She ordered the clams.
The dining room was crowded with young families and couples holding hands. They took a table by the window, one of the only free spots left. There was a crackling fire in the fireplace, and outside, fishing boats bobbed up and down in the harbor.
When Maggie went to the ladies’ room, Alice said, “Now, I know you’re mad at me. Please don’t be. I absolutely hate when you’re mad.”
“I’m not mad,” Ann Marie said.
“Yes, you are.”
She sighed. “Really, Mom, I’m not. It’s fine.”
“It was naughty of me not to tell you,” Alice said. “But you know Kathleen and her kids—when Maggie said she was staying on, I figured she’d probably change her mind any day.”
“But she didn’t.”
“No.”
Alice’s tone took on an edge. “Look. I told you not to come in the first place. If it’s such a burden for you, why don’t you go home?”
Ann Marie felt like a chastened child. She had changed all her plans to be here, yet Alice acted as if she were the ungrateful one.
“I want to stay,” she said to keep the peace. “I’m sorry.”
Alice smiled. “You’ll stay in the big house with me. We’ll put you in that front room with the best view of the water.”
“That sounds nice,” Ann Marie said.
Maggie came back to the table. Alice ordered two glasses of rum punch from the cocktail waitress.
“This one is becoming a killjoy like her mother,” Alice said accusatorily, pointing at Maggie. “Doesn’t drink anymore.”
Maggie had never been much of a drinker, which was hardly a surprise. In Irish families like theirs, there was always a person or two so terrified of becoming an alcoholic that they never gave themselves the chance. In Ann Marie’s case, it was her sister Susan, who hadn’t had anything stronger than an O’Doul’s since college.
“I’m just on a health kick lately,” Maggie said now. “Trying to lose some weight for summer.”
Ann Marie tightened up, waiting for the inevitable.
“That’s smart thinking,” Alice said. “Obviously you don’t look your best at the moment. But you’re young. The weight will fall right off you.” She paused. “Your hair looks nice, though.”
“Thanks,” Maggie said. She rolled her eyes at Ann Marie.
Alice switched gears. “Ann Marie, did you see that awful story on the news about the black boy in Dorchester who got killed by one of those scummy gangs? Two blocks away from the house I grew up in. What is wrong with these blacks? They’re mad for murdering each other. It’s their favorite hobby. They can’t help themselves.”
“Grandma!” Maggie hissed.
“What? It’s true.”
Maggie looked flummoxed. “There’s a lot of history there. A lot of inequality and suffering.”
“Oh, please,” Alice said. “Our ancestors had to suffer horrible racism when they got to this country—there were IRISH NEED NOT APPLY signs in every window in Boston. Our people were treated worse than dogs. But they never made excuses. They helped themselves up, just the way the blacks should have done.”
“It’s different. African Americans’ ancestors came here on slave ships and ours came here by choice.”
“Do you really call dying from famine or going off to some unknown land a choice?” Alice said. “And did you really just compare the Irish to the blacks?”
“You shouldn’t call them the blacks like that,” Maggie said.
Alice looked genuinely confused. “What should I call them? Afro-Americans? Or Negroes, as we said when I was young.”
The couple