The History of Great Things by Elizabeth Crane Read Free Book Online Page A

pair of boots instead of those, honey? It’s snowy out. Yeah, I can see out the window, Mom . You look at me like I have no idea what’s good. You could bring a pair of heels. Heels with jeans? Don’t act like people don’t wear that now. I’ve seen the pictures of Bianca Jagger. Wait, you know who Bianca Jagger is? Yes, Betsy. So that means you know who Mick Jagger is? He’s that hideous-looking rock singer, right? Do you want to bother picking this apart? The fact that your mother knows who Mick and Bianca Jagger are, or the fact that she finds him hideous? You guess not. Well, anyway, I’m not going to a disco, I’m going on a date. What’s Nina wearing? What difference does it make what Nina’s wearing? You just called Nina to find out what she was wearing. Yes,because Nina likes to dress the same as me, Mom. Oh. This isn’t the complete truth, though, because while dressing identically to Nina is unacceptable, neither do you want to wear something radically different. Okay, what about a scarf? Do you want to borrow a scarf? People don’t wear scarves, Mom. I wear scarves. Mom, it’s 1977! I know what year it is. Well you don’t seem to know how we dress now. What are the boys wearing? How should I know! I heard you ask Nina just now. Don’t listen to me in my room! I wasn’t trying to listen to you. It’s not a big apartment. Well, don’t tell me what to wear. I can dress myself. I know that, I’m just thinking you might want him to ask you out again. You look at me like I’ve stabbed a basket full of kittens. Way down in you there’s one tiny cell of your being that wants to challenge me on this statement, to look into it more deeply, to ask about a dozen questions about the idea behind this statement, but you aren’t there yet. It’s a cell that isn’t a fully realized idea that can be formed into words. I thought I looked cute in this! Well, you always look cute, you’d look cute in a paper sack, but I wouldn’t send you out in that either. Get out of my room! You better watch it, daughter.
    Ed, it turns out, is gaga for you. When he comes to pick you up at our house for your second date, I can tell he has spent hours picking out his clothes because he’s wearing a nice pair of pressed slacks, Gucci loafers, a checked button-down shirt, and a crewneck sweater. Ed comes to pick you up and he sits down with us and he’s all pink in the face, can’t stop smiling, like the girlfriend sweepstakes has come to his door with a bouquet of balloons and you wearing a prom dress, a tiara, and a sash. Ed is richer than Croesus and takes you to Windows on the World on your first official date, and you talk about school, where you might go to college. He’s applying to Ivy League schools, but you wouldn’t get into any of those, which is fine, you don’t careall that much, and he says it’s not that important even though he’s not so sure that’s true; all he cares about for the time being is making you happy. At any given moment he will say or do whatever he thinks might accomplish that goal. You don’t look at him much on this date; even though the conversation is good, you aren’t very good at eye contact, and also he has to compete with the view. Ed maybe didn’t fully think through his choice of restaurant, because you are given to dreaming, but he wouldn’t know that, and when you look out those windows, uptown, you may as well be floating right out of them and over the city, looking at water towers and rooftops and cornices; you could do an aerial tour just looking at cornices alone, wonder who made them, what went into cornice-making, was that a job, cornice-maker, when did beautiful cornices go out of fashion, what happened to all the cornice-makers when that happened; or you could take a turn west and tour your life here so far, you could go up and down streets and note