I straightened, surprised. “Hey, Jay. Everything okay?”
“Everything’s great. Still free today?”
I hesitated. “Uh... I guess. Why?”
“To spend the day together. Just you and me. Sorry I ditched you at the gala, just... needed some air.”
I frowned, feeling queasy about where this invitation was coming from, feeling like I was being set up.
“Did something happen?” I asked.
Jay laughed, like he found my suspicion amusing. “Nothing but your birthday. I’m not letting you sit around like it’s just any other day.”
I froze, the words catching me off guard. How did he know? I hadn’t told him, not that I could remember—or anyone, for that matter.
“You know my birthday?” I asked, my voice softer than I intended.
“Of course—they’re all in the West Egg directory,” he said, like it was obvious.
I laughed a bit through a pause.
When Jay spoke again, his voice was steady, serious. “Be ready in an hour? Wear something light—it’s going to be a warm one.”
Was I crazy to hold my chaotic thoughts in for one day? To allow my worries to fall away, for our last day of the weekend, for one drive to Coney Island?
Instead of talking, I hung my head out the window and let my hair catch the breeze.
Jay reached over and placed a hand on my thigh. I couldn’t see his eyes because of the sunglasses, so he had the upper hand, and he caught me off guard.
When we arrived, the wind from the beach had bite to it, with the clouds trying to outdo the sunshine. I carried the basket and blanket from the car and laid them on the sand. I crossed my ankles in my red shoes and admired how they looked, like a vibrant Christmas bow.
I was close enough to the water to feel a sense of danger but far enough to avoid getting wet. I felt so in my element with this much sun on my arms. It confirmed my want for a farm and a simple, quiet life, and for nobody but Jay to know where I was. I wanted to ignore the things that kept me wound so tight and enjoy my day without distraction.
But Jay did not stop to chat with me, so I couldn’t bring up what I’d found in Buchanan’s study, even if I wanted to. Jay had this American flag kite that he had to fly down the beach. He started running across the mostly empty beach with it, looking up and back down as he tried to get it to fly. Each time the kite fell, he ran faster to keep it flying, and he shrank away from me, his slip-ons slipping off.
The ocean lurched closer to my blanket, its tongue stretching out for my toes. The endless water made me want to board a ship, travel across the ocean to the Kingdom of Benin.
That’s where my great-grandpa Sumner was from—a place full of shining palaces and busy merchant squares. The people used to trade with Europeans, selling slaves for guns and other weapons. Slavers wanted to be rich, so they would kidnap kids from their homes while their parents were at work. My great-grandpa was eight when he was kidnapped and sold to an Englishslaver. The slaver threw him into a ship cargo with two hundred others before his parents noticed he was gone. They were headed for the United States. Some people knew what was in store, so they jumped overboard, but Great-Grandpa Sumner did not know where they were going.
Above me, birds soared upwind like flying ashes.
I thought of Great-Grandpa Sumner randomly sometimes and wondered what he did on that ship. If he had to use a chain for a pillow or eat wood to feel full. If he could manage to make it, pushing for years through his sadness to build a free life, I could too, right?
Jay was coming back now and laughing with joy because the kite was flying high. Would he turn out exactly like his father, wasting money on things that were unjust?
A lonely feeling banged my heart between its cymbals as I took stock of how long I’d been by myself on our beach date. I must’ve been a boring conversation partner.
He rejoined me finally at the blanket, picked an apple from our basket, and sank his teeth into it, so viciously the juice ran down his chin stubble. “This is really ripe,” Jay said. “What else do you want for your birthday?”
He looked so good with his loose shirt blowing against his frame, I wanted to devour him like the meat of a coconut. There was no easy way to say that, no easy way to say that despite my suspicions of him, one look at him made my thoughts fall away. This was one time I did not want him to hear my thoughts. But windblown and talking about a ripe apple was one of my favorite versions of him.
And there was the ocean, planning our eventual demise, surging with the blood of my people. I wanted a mind like the sea that went on and on and on, until it forgot about civilization. One day I’d be one with the sea. Before then, I’d have Jay in every way he’d have me back.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Just hanging out is fine.”
He reached out to run his fingers through my hair and then twitched as if he wanted to check for witnesses. But, in the next moment, he decided he didn’t care. He’d feel me regardless.
I always thought love was something I’d have to change myself to find. That I wasn’t enough for it. Love would find me fine! When I was with Jay, I was realized without changing a thing.
