Red, White, Blue by Lea Carpenter

Author:Lea Carpenter
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2018-08-21T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

—

Noel told her that the night of the massacre one of the Israeli athletes had sent his thirteen-year-old son to stay with his mother. In doing so, he had saved his life. The men who carried out the attack were refugees. “They came from camps in Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan,” he told her. And then he would show her on a map where those places were. He would explain that fear, and a sense of injustice, often inspires bad actions. He would explain why the president of the United States had elected not to attend the athletes’ funerals.

As she got older Anna would increasingly wonder about her mother’s experience of that week. As those places took on new prominence in the world, she would think about the coincidence of her parents having been there when it all started.

“Who honeymoons in Tripoli,” she asked Lulu when she was older.

“Your father.”

“You liked different things,” Anna said, delivering her conclusion.

“Well, if commitment counts as a thing, yes,” Lulu said, delivering hers. After a certain age Anna didn’t ask about Tripoli anymore. She didn’t ask about the past.

Anna didn’t know how often Noel and Lulu spoke after Lulu left but she had the sense they stayed in touch. Sometimes she wondered whether Noel begged her mother to come home. Maybe the separation worked for them though it had broken their little girl’s heart. Until she was older, she couldn’t understand. We don’t think about our parents experiencing certain things until we experience them ourselves. Then we empathize, and forgive. Anna had developed a new interest in the details of her parents’ marriage as the day of her own wedding approached. Had Noel gotten down on one knee? Had Lulu been afraid before she said yes.

Children care about precision. Children believe in facts.

Even when you’re all grown up you’re still someone’s child.

What coincidence.

What luck.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.