Page 61 of After Hours at Dooryard Books
“Not if I get there first,” Patrick says, and that’s how Eleanor winds up with a swimsuit that will make her look like a strawberry, a matching red sun bonnet, and a hooded terrycloth bathrobe.
“She can’t even walk,” Susan says when they show her. “She can’t even crawl. She could’ve sat in a tide pool in her diaper like all the other babies.”
Before leaving the store, Patrick remembers to buy film for his camera and for Susan’s Super 8.
In the morning, it’s just as gloomy as the weatherman predicted, but they put on their swimsuits and various combinations of t-shirts and shorts, fill one of Mrs. Valdez’s enormous beach bags with snacks and towels, and get on the subway to Coney Island.
It takes an hour, which brings even Nathaniel to the limits of his enthusiasm for subway graffiti, although he spends the entire trip holding the baby while Susan falls asleep, her head on his shoulder. Somebody left a newspaper on the seat, so Patrickreads aloud the interesting parts of any articles that he thinks Nathaniel will like.
Patrick’s been to Coney Island—not the beach, but the boardwalk. It’s the kind of place that answers the question What Should We Do Today when the weather’s decent and you don’t want to go to the movies. People say it’s gone to seed, but there’s something inherently seedy about eating hot dogs while playing rigged games to win painted dolls. Is there a non-seedy place to pay a psychic a quarter to guess your name, weight, and occupation? Patrick isn’t sure he’d want there to be.
But it’s seedier than he remembers. The colors are faded and the paint is peeling. Maybe it’s the cloudy weather, but the crowds are thin. A bunch of stalls are shut down. It looks like the Parachute Jump closed since the last time Patrick was here, but it’s still standing, looming and quiet. Some property developer demolished the rest of Steeplechase Park a couple years ago. That same dickhead bought up a bunch of buildings and evicted everyone in order to put up some ugly high-rises. If there’s one thing that Patrick’s learned from ten years in this city, it’s that around every corner is a dickhead trying to stop you from having fun in public, especially if you aren’t middle class, white, and visibly straight.
The plan is to buy three ice cream cones, rent an umbrella, lay out their towels, and—Patrick isn’t sure about the rest. The water will be cold. Eleanor’s barely old enough to sit up, and probably won’t have much fun besides her usual amusements of being tickled and held.
Before they can do any of that, Nathaniel sees the roller coasters.
“It’s been twenty years since I’ve been on one of those,” he says, eying the Cyclone like he’s sizing up an opponent.
The Cyclone is an enormous wooden deathtrap that looks like it might fall over if you lean on it too hard. Patrick hasn’tbeen on a roller coaster of any kind since junior high. He isn’t even too crazy about it when taxi cabs take sharp turns.
But Nathaniel watches the cars fly along the tracks as if it doesn’t look like an obviously bad idea.
“You got nervous on the escalator at Macy’s,” Patrick says. “How can you think that looks like fun?” He gives Susan a pleading look but she shakes her head. She’s always hated roller coasters. She won’t even go on the Ferris wheel.
Nathaniel glances between them. “I want to see if I can,” he says, and Patrick isn’t going to argue with that. “Do we have time?”
“We don’t have a schedule,” Patrick says. “The ocean isn’t going anywhere.”
“I could go for a ride and meet you back here for ice cream. There isn’t a line.”
“I’ll go with you, if you want company,” Patrick says. Nathaniel still doesn’t like going anywhere farther than the grocery store by himself, but the truth is that Patrick will go wherever Nathaniel goes, unless he isn’t wanted. That’s just the state of affairs and he probably ought to get used to it.
“Really?” Nathaniel asks, one corner of this mouth twisting up. “Susan, will you take our picture?”
Susan does better than that. She takes the Super 8 out from under Eleanor’s carriage and makes a movie of them waiting in line, waving at the camera, paying for their tickets, getting into the back row of the horrible little train car.
The seats are plain wooden benches with a metal rail that lowers over their laps. At the front of the car are parents with two kids and a high school-aged couple. They all look like sensible people without any kind of death wish, but looks can be deceiving.
Patrick forgot how loud roller coasters are. At no point are you allowed to shut your eyes and forget exactly how rickety the entire contraption is. That doesn’t mean he won’t try.
“You can open your eyes,” Nathaniel says. “The ride hasn’t even started.”
Patrick doesn’t want to be a spoilsport, so he opens his eyes.
“You can keep them shut, it’s fine,” Nathaniel says. “You’re being very brave.”
Patrick attempts to sink in his seat, but the ride operator comes around and lowers the safety bar.
You’d think they’d start out slow, but the first drop is a dramatic plummet. Everyone on the ride screams, but Nathaniel gasps and starts laughing. Patrick clutches the lap bar. There’s nothing to stop them from sliding against one another when the ride makes one of its sharp turns. Nathaniel being next to him isn’t a novelty; Nathaniel touching him isn’t even a novelty at this point. It’s distracting, though, enough to take the edge off the certainty of disaster. Nathaniel’s hand closes over Patrick’s on the bar. “You’re doing so well.”
“Don’t patronize me,” Patrick complains, which only starts Nathaniel laughing again. The ride makes another drop. Nathaniel doesn’t let go of Patrick’s hand until the ride stops. There’s nobody who can see.
“So,” Nathaniel says when the car finally stops. “It turns out I hate roller coasters. Let’s go find somewhere nice to be sick.”
Susan reveals her true monstrous nature by filming them as they get off the ride, their hair windblown, their faces probably green. Patrick gives the camera a rude gesture. Nathaniel grabs Patrick’s hand and pulls it out of view. “Eleanor will watch that someday.”
Patrick doesn’t know how it’s never occurred to him that one day all of this will be told to Eleanor as a story, that one day she’ll hear something along the lines of “when you were a baby, wewent to live with Uncle Patrick.” Or maybe it’ll be Patrick telling the story: You came to live with me. We had a dog named Walt who stole your teething biscuits and let you pet his ears.
