Small Mercies

Mike Dowd leans into the mic. “And God made us white and black and brown and Oriental. And was that a mistake?”

Again, a bit of hesitation, as if the crowd’s confused because no one told them there’d be a quiz, but eventually, a roar of “No!” roils up into the sky.

Mike Dowd shouts, “Exactly! No. God did not make a mistake. He chose to make us white and black and brown and Oriental and even red Indian. Those were the colors he wanted. If He wanted us to mix, then He would have mixed us. Made us half yellow, half blue. Purple and white.” Chuckles of approval roll through the crowd. “He didn’t make us mixed. Because He doesn’t want us to mix.”

Well, isn’t it the truth? Mary Pat thinks. Isn’t that just the bottom line? We have our way of life, the coloreds have theirs. The Hispanics, theirs. The Orientals have Chinatown, for God’s sake, and you don’t see anyone trying to force them to disband and disperse across the city. No, they know their place. And as long as they keep knowing it, they will be left in peace to manage their own affairs. And that’s all we want.

But as the morning moves along and the speakers grow louder (and a lot more repetitive), Mary Pat has begun to feel her outrage thin when she catches sight of a woman with the same hair as Jules move through the crowd. The woman’s face is rounder and older than Jules’s, but the hair is near identical. And suddenly, it’s like she’s lost her again. Like she’s losing her over and over and over. Like she can see the baby Jules cupped, naked and squawking, in her hand, and then she’s rushing straight through her daughter’s life, observing it the way you observe a train blasting past you — teething, first step, first flu, scraped knees, missing front teeth, first-grade pigtails, second-grade ponytail, a permanent broken heart in fourth grade after Mary Pat tells her Daddy’s never coming home again, acne at twelve, breasts at thirteen along with apathy for everything,

eighth-grade graduation, high school dance nights, the end of the apathetic stage coinciding with Noel’s final decline, the return of her spunk, her humor, her loud, goofy laugh — and then she’s gone, her daughter’s gone, she’s left this life, she’s stepped off into a void. Chambers of Mary Pat’s heart she was certain she’d shut tight fly open, and a sea of loss rushes in. She suddenly can’t remember what she’s doing here or why she should give two flying fucks why blacks or Jews or Orientals cross the bridge into Southie.

Jules.

Jules.

Why’d you leave me?

Where’d you go?

Has the pain stopped, baby?

Is your world warm?

Will you wait for me to find you there?

Please wait.

For a moment she wants to drop, just fall to her knees and wail her daughter’s name. And she might have if, at that moment, the crowd hadn’t surged to the right as though it were a single organism, and Carol, beside her, hisses one word:

“Teddy.”

Mary Pat looks through the throng, and now she can see him, flanked by security personnel and two MDC cops, his black hair slicked back and matching his black suit. Edward M. Kennedy. Brother to the dead president who gave his name to the federal building fifty yards away. Senator Edward M. Kennedy on the national stage, but here, in Boston, he’s Teddy. Mostly it’s because he’s Irish and the Irish don’t put on airs, so President Kennedy was always Jack, and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy was always Bobby, but maybe he’s also Teddy because of the three, he’s the one they all take a little less seriously. So clearly the youngest, so clearly the needy one, desperate for approval. And, of course, they all know he was kicked out of Harvard for cheating and abandoned his mistress in a sinking car in a Martha’s Vineyard lagoon and still has an eye for other ladies who aren’t his wife, particularly when he goes on his benders in the pubs of Beacon Hill and Hyannis Port. And all of that would be fine for his constituents, the good people of Southie and Charlestown and half of Dorchester, he’s one of them, after all, a Hibernian, a mick, a Paddy — except that Teddy’s bona fides have been suspect of late. Particularly in matters of race and even more particularly on the matter of busing, which he came out in full support of during several recent interviews.