Searching for Grace Kelly (2015) by Michael Callahan

Author:Michael Callahan [Callahan, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

THIRTEEN

September 1955

From the journal of Laura Dixon, Monday, September 5:

Labor Day. Has it really been weeks since I wrote in this thing? I started out strong, journaling almost daily. After that episode in Mrs. Blackwell’s office, I went right to the stationer and bought a journal and started writing. But then every day became every other, and then twice a week. Some journalist.

Just back from Greenwich. The trains run on a limited schedule due to the holiday, which gave me an excuse to leave the barbecue early. Though it was nice to be there, especially less than a month after the hurricane, which caused so much misery and damage everywhere. The town held up pretty well, thank God. And it was nice to spend so much time with David. Poor David, I worry about him, eleven and alone in that big house and Daddy working all the time and no buffer between him and Marmy. But he seems happy. He wanted to confirm our plans for the three of them to come for a weekend this term at Smith.

I can’t believe I didn’t tell them.

I am a coward. There’s no other word for it, so I’ll just use it. I am a coward. I would say I tried to tell them, but that would be a lie, because I didn’t. I’ll have to settle for “I had every intention of telling them.” But there was never the right moment. I knew if I did at the beginning of the weekend, it would ruin the whole thing, and then there was the barbecue, and at one point I thought that was actually perfect—I mean, there was no way Marmy would have exploded in front of the Chadwicks and the Thornes or the rest of them. But somehow, the moment never presented itself. And now I don’t know what to do, because as of tomorrow, I am living a lie.

Because I’m not going to go back to Smith. I’m staying here, in New York.

I think back on the summer and I can’t believe how much has happened. Moving into the Barbizon, meeting Box and Pete, working at Mademoiselle, and that funny run-in with Mrs. Blackwell in her office, and . . . Well, everything happens for a reason, right? Or perhaps that’s just what people say when they can’t explain everything that’s happened. You need to take it on faith that it will all work out.

I have officially deferred my senior year at Smith until January. Something that is going to become very evident very soon when the bursar’s office returns Daddy’s tuition check. It isn’t like I’m never going back. I’m just not going back yet.

Marmy is going to kill me.

But what’s that saying (why am I quoting all of these old sayings?): “When opportunity knocks.” How was I supposed to know that Cat Eyes would come up to my desk one day and, with clear bewilderment, pass on a message that Mrs. Blackwell wanted to extend my apprenticeship a month,

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