I’m out in New York City with Cary Grant, who confides that he’s lonely.
I’ve come to the city with Tilly, though her parents have whisked her and her siblings away to a christening. Mr Grant, in town on movie-star business, has offered to take me out for dinner. We spend the afternoon strolling through Central Park.
“It’s all so hard, being who and what I am,” he admits, but he’s laughing.
I try to listen, telling him I’m here if he needs me. “All you have to do is call,” I say. He chuckles.
“It’s almost summer,” he observes.
He slips easily from Hollywood charm to Bristol nostalgia, telling me about his English boyhood, then, “Keep it under your hat.”
I nod gravely. “Of course.”
“I think of England sometimes too,” I confess.
“How did you find life there?”
“I loved it,” I say, flinging my arms wide to show him how much.
He looks surprised. “You did?”
“Yes. I long for those soggy green fields back home.”
I run ahead and spin along the path, half for his amusement, half because I can’t help myself. Yet beneath my perfect mood, I sense I’m only brightening the winter in his voice, playing my part for him, as he plays his for the world.
“Come here, child, you’re drawing attention to us,” he calls.
“I keep forgetting you’re Cary Grant,” I snort as I run back to walk by his side.
“Thank you,” he says, linking arms with me. “That’s the kindest thing anyone’s said to me in years.”
He shakes his head. “I’m bored with being Cary Grant.”
“Are you?” I ask, genuinely surprised.
I’d always thought being Cary Grant must be the grandest thing on earth.
I see a boy I know walking briskly toward us, one of Tilly’s old friends from the city. I think he’s at Choate with Buddy, but I’m not entirely sure. His name is Holden, and Cornelia has a mad, unrequited crush on him. She thinks he’s handsome, brooding, and super-clever.
He stops to greet us, explaining he’s on his way to pick up his little sister and is in a rush. We shake hands, and then he’s gone again.
Mr Grant asks me about him.
“I can’t work him out,” I tell him. “He probably thinks you’re a phony and that I’m unintelligent.” I laugh. “He always says he doesn’t like movie stars.”
Mr Grant chuckles. “I don’t blame him,” he adds merrily. “We’re an impossible breed.”
“Hungry?” he asks, changing the subject.
“Always,” I reply, leaning into his shoulder.
“Atta girl.” He ruffles my hair as if I were four.
“Delmonico’s, here we come!”
Putting his arm around my shoulder, he propels us forward as we skip out of the park and hail a cab.
Sometimes I marvel at my luck, Cary Grant, of all people, playing the role of honorary uncle in my American life. It’s a waking dream, as vivid as Technicolor, and somehow, impossibly real.
***
“Are you going down South for the summer, or coming to the Vineyard with us?” Tilly asks as we spill out of our last exam. Barring a few end-of-term formalities, we’re finished for the year.
I shake my head. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“How do you think you did in the finals?”
“I feel confident. You?”
“Same,” she says. “I’ll probably come out on top.”
“I’m sure you will,” I reply.
“As will you, little Birdie.” She smiles a rare, tender smile.
She grabs my arm and we run for our bicycles, heading towards Farmington. “Freedom!” we shout, weaving down Main Street.
Tilly’s family keeps a compound in Chilmark. Buddy and Topper will be summering that way too, along with a whole crowd of friends. It promises to be tremendous fun.
“You will join us, won’t you?” Tilly presses.
I shrug. I don’t know yet. I’ll need to talk to Miss Mary, Grandpa George, and to the boy.
“You still at it with Li’l Abner?” Tilly asks annoyedly, wanting my heart anchored in New York with her and the friends we share. Everything else brings her “too much stress.”
“I’ll let you know as soon as I know. All right?”
She pouts as she parks her bike outside the movie house. “Just don’t wait too long, or I’ll find someone else for your spot.”
I long to see the boy, but I know he has a life of his own back home. Sometimes I wonder if I should let go, but the mere thought unnerves me. I want to go home to see him all summer long, but I want to be with these new friends too, and go to all the places I’ve yet to see.
***
Cornelia and Tilly are smoking outside the cinema in West Hartford.
“You do know we could be sent down if you’re caught,” I tell them.
“Ah, eff you and your rule-following ways,” Cornelia says.
“Oh, leave her be,” Tilly says. “It’s good one of us stays a goody two-shoes.” She offers me her cigarette. I shake my head.
Cornelia laughs. “Here we are, three promising young virgins, going to the pictures before summer.”
“Speak for yourself,” Cornelia adds with a grin.
“You did not?” I ask.
“Erm, no,” she admits, “but I will if I get a chance. I’m bursting at the seams.”
She shouts it just as an elderly man walks by.
“Sorry, sir!” Tilly calls.
“My friends are deranged,” I apologise.
“What are we watching again?” Tilly asks as Cornelia returns with the tickets.
Dear Brat, Cornelia tells her.
“I meant the actual film.”
“That is the film, you banana.”
“All right. Shall we?”
“Why not,” I say, grinning.
I like these two. I’ve never had friends like Cornelia and Tilly before, fast, loose, a bit wild. They keep me on my toes, and I like who I get to be around them.
***
Word has it the boy has been seen with other girls in my absence. Mabel and her friends make sure I hear about it.
“I bet none of them are like me,” I test.
“No one is,” he tells me over the telephone. “There’s only one you, but you’re so far away, and a man has needs.”
The cheek of him. I can’t help laughing. “Your needs, my ass.” I chortle.
I tell him I’ll go with Tilly’s family to Massachusetts for the first part of the summer, then come down South to see him later.
“It’ll be hot as hell here, remember?” he says. “You ought to come right away, and stay put.”
I tell him I’ll write, and he tells me to go to hell. We both laugh.
I hold the phone a moment after the line goes dead, wondering which part I’m really playing, and what will happen to him if I ever step off the stage.
My novel GREAT ARE THE MYTHS will be serialised (one chapter each day) over the summer of 2026. If you would rather listen to the audiobook, the full story is available for free on all the usual platforms. Info and links HERE
My World of Interiors 