The Sweetheart (31 page)

“Okay,” you say. “Let's do it.”

Sam brakes hard. The car jerks to a halt. “Say that again.”

But you can't bring yourself to say those words one more time. Instead, you take his hands off the wheel and into your own. This is it: you have made the choice. It is a good choice—the only choice, really. It gives you both a place to go and a person to go with. That is more than a girl in your circumstances should ask for. Someday, you are quite certain, you will thank your lucky stars.

TWENTY-NINE

I
t is late morning in Memphis when you head out for a run. In a few short hours, you and Sam will start out for Cleveland so that he can begin his transformation from wrestler to promoter and you can begin your new lives together. You suit up and slip out as quietly as possible, careful not to wake Sam as you leave. You don't want to have to explain what you are doing.

After a few stretches under the awning, you set out, headed north on Second Street, past the one-story brick buildings of Film Row toward the downtown high-rises. It is a bad time for a run. The heat is stifling; the occasional breeze provides minimal relief and brings with it the unfortunate smells of the Wolf River. Still, it feels good to be out here—on the concrete, under the neon. The wide sidewalks are dotted with newsstands stocked with comic books and vendors with baskets full of vegetables. Above you, the lines for the trolley cars form an electric web.

It doesn't take long for you to find a rhythm, feel your muscles awaken. In the last year, this body of yours has developed many abilities, but running may be the one you have most fully mastered. You can run until your legs turn to rubber, your lungs burn. Just a little longer, you will tell yourself, but once that's done, you decide you can go a little longer still, and again and again.

A few blocks into your run, a pair of trench coat–wearing, briefcase-swinging businessmen rubberneck as you cruise past. You continue onward. Your body no longer creates a debilitating self-consciousness. It has been your rocket ship. With it, you have enraptured strangers, inspired young women, paid for your father's mortgage, bankrolled your own independent existence, and brought auditorium after auditorium to its knees. You have a new and wholly merited respect for its value. But Sam is right—you were already starting to see its limits. You have withheld too much of yourself, reduced yourself to too few colors: platinum blond and Fire and Ice red. It is high time you broadened your palate.

What you are less sure about, now that you've had some time to think, is whether it is better this way—your persona quickly and unceremoniously put to rest. Sam certainly thinks so. In your conversation last night, he maintained that this clean break is better than what might have happened otherwise, you growing further enmeshed in something you clearly had ambivalence about. You'll grant him this—it is certainly more efficient. But better? Had the story been allowed to unfold gradually rather than suffer this abrupt ending, you might have someday packed The Sweetheart away with other items you'd outgrown. Now, you wonder if you aren't forever doomed to see her as something precious that was lost, a gem that slipped out of its setting.

You turn left and pick up speed as you run past the loan offices and shoe stores on Beale Street, attempting to distance yourself from this idea. That is the last thing you need to take to Cleveland. Sam is not a consolation prize. The man deserves better. What a silly girl you've been, wasting so much time bemoaning his flaws when you should have been examining your own. Overly ambitious. Shallow. Self-centered. Hardly the kind of person to merit his loyalty. You should count yourself lucky. You
are
lucky. Because even if the two of you aren't perfectly suited, what couple is? The ones you've examined most closely—your father and Patricia, Cynthia and Wally, Mimi and Johnny—all seem built on compromise. It is a happy ending you are after, not a perfect one.

Another turn puts you onto Main Street, where scores of fashion-­forward ladies in heels and gloves stroll the sidewalks. You can't help but notice the looks you get from them: the snickers, the raised eyebrows. Not that you blame them. A big, sweaty, red-faced woman in shorts and tennis shoes does tend to stick out in such a venue. On another day, you might take the hint and turn around, but you suddenly can't breathe.
You're fine,
you tell yourself.
Just keep going
. But you can't move. You can't go another step.

The awnings over Goldsmith's department store offer some respite, so you press your forehead against the cool display window and stare ahead while you wait for the spell to pass. From the other side of the glass, a group of mannequins stare back. One is clad in a floral-print, tea-length dress with an oversize bow. Another models a lemony-yellow suit with a long pencil skirt and cropped jacket, still another a red dress with bolero sleeves and a belted waist. One even sports a pair of lightweight slacks. And then there are the swimsuits. There is a jet-black suit made of waffle nylon, a second with gold embellishments and two small hip pockets, and a final one that gives you pause: a one-piece suit with a modest neckline and the new higher-cut legs in an uncanny shade of green.

As you take in the picture, your attention shifts from the mannequins to your reflection in the glass. You are as shocked as ever by the dark-haired girl who stares back as you, but once this fades, you find it is not followed by the usual feeling of loss. For the first time, you see possibilities. You cannot imagine Gwen slipping into any of these frocks, preparing for a day at the office or a day at the beach or a first date or her debut as a heel, but this girl—well, why not her? So you can't be The Sweetheart again. There are so many other women you could be, more even than what you see in front of you—ways of being you can't imagine, that have yet to be invented. Just a year ago, you knew nothing about wrestling, and now look at you. You are young and in between.

There is nothing wrong with what Sam wants. He wants what many people want. He wants to put on a suit and tie and go to the office. He wants to sit in the stands and watch his favorite teams. He wants to take his children to those games the way his father took him. At the end of the workday, he wants to sit around the dinner table and eat the beef brisket his lovely wife has prepared for him. He wants Leonie. He is a good man who wants reasonable things, and by all means, he should have them. The problem is that he thinks this will make you happy, too. This is not selfishness on his part, just a fundamental misunderstanding. The truth is he simply doesn't know you well enough. And perhaps you've been too willing to adapt to suit his moods and needs. But now it is time for you to stop pretending.

You will not go to Cleveland. In that life, you drown, and you take him with you.

There is a tap on your shoulder—an older woman in white patent leather heels and a belted pink dress, two sullen adolescent girls by her side. “Are you all right, dear?” she asks.

“Yes,” you say. “It's just—I just realized that I have to break up with my boyfriend.”

“Well, I feel sorry for that poor boy.” She offers you a monogrammed handkerchief from her matching white purse, and you run it over your eyes before mopping your forehead. “You know what you should do? Go in there and buy yourself something pretty. That's what I always do when I feel bad.”

“I don't think I'd know what to buy.”

“Oh, I bet you could find something.” She gestures at the window display. “Go on in and take a look-see.” She gives you the once-over before adding, “On second thought, maybe you ought to go home and clean up first.”

“Maybe I should,” you say, using the handkerchief one more time before offering your thanks and handing it back. The woman pats your arms and says, “That's okay, honey. You keep it.”

You close your hand around the handkerchief and let the city settle in around you. You will not go to Philadelphia or Otherside or Cleveland. That means this is not just another blue star on a map. Until a better option comes along, You Are Here. And who knows how long it will take you to figure out your next move? Maybe days, maybe weeks—maybe years. Thankfully, Memphis seems as good a place as any. An electric streetcar rolls past, sending off sparks. You can smell roasting peanuts. And there is this kind stranger, who has sent her girls in to start shopping without her until she is certain you can be left alone.

“Go ahead,” you tell her. “I'll be okay.”

And you will be, but it will get worse before it gets better. Before you are ready, you will have to tuck that handkerchief into your waistband and head back to the hotel room to deliver the news. Sam will sit quietly on the bed while you talk, his face still damp from a recent shave, his keys in his pocket, his eyes shining. But when you are done, it will be clear that you cannot be swayed, so he will not waste his breath. He will merely nod, resigned to his fate: another round of forlorn bachelorhood. And when the last good-bye has been said, he will put his hand on the back of your neck in that familiar way of his that can feel simultaneously tender and burdensome. Any ambivalence you feel will be merited, but in this moment, you will put it aside. From now on, all of your decisions will be your own. For better or worse, they will not be complicated by his wishes and feelings, which will make you blessedly free to accept this gesture's simplest meaning, to press your face against his shoulder as he says, for the last time, “Leonie, Leonie, Leonie.”

After that, there will be doubt. You will wonder if you have been clear-eyed or fatalistic, optimistic or naive. You will hope you have done right by him, that he will go home to the city he loves, do work that he is meant for, and settle into a life that is mostly like the one he wants. I think that is the point, after all. Not to get everything—few people do—but to feel like you got the right things, that you didn't let them slip away. You want this for him as much as you want it for yourself.

“Okay, honey,” says the woman. “I'll take your word for it. But I'll be right inside if you need anything. My name's Mrs. Timothy H. Kellogg. And you are?”

What should you say? You're not exactly Gwen anymore, and you're hardly Leonie. While you consider how you might answer, you shift the handkerchief from one hand to the other, flipping it over to reveal its monogrammed corner. There, above the rolled hem and some pulled thread work, surrounded by tiny embroidered flowers, is the letter
K.
And then it comes to you—a name from your past, one that might carry you into the future. At first, you are hesitant to say it out loud. Once you do, there will be nothing ahead of you but open road. But what else can you say? You can't rewind time, and you can't stop it either. All you can do is go forward.

So what are you waiting for? Go on. Tell her my name.

EPILOGUE

T
hat was the first time I introduced myself as Leigh Kramer. I have been doing it for so long now, nearly sixty years, that I sometimes forget I was ever anyone else. This is how I think of you, whenever something like Mimi's invitation gives me cause: as someone distinct from me, someone who could—and did—disappear. I guess I thought it would be different here, in front of the home you left in search of the championship, but it's not. It is all so familiar—the red brick, the arched windows, the unassuming cornice—and yet it feels like it belonged to someone else. A girl I used to know, a girl from another place and time.

When I set out this morning, I didn't plan to walk all the way to the old neighborhood. But here I am, standing on a sidewalk spoiled by handprints and cracked by overgrown oaks, staring at the stoop where Franz, a Winston dangling from his lips, gave his reluctant consent, and the home just beyond it. The one to its right is cluttered with folding lawn chairs and stacks of old tires; the one to its left—the Rileys' home, and then Franz and Pat's place—is boarded up with plywood. But this one has benefited from some recent improvements. The iron handrail has been replaced, and the door and window sashes have a coat of white paint so new it still looks wet. Just below the house number is a local Realtor's sign. It's for sale.

I take a seat on those steps and a long pull on my water bottle before I work up the nerve to pull the invite out of my pocket. I am surprised to find myself so rocked by it. I haven't suffered from sentimentality—nothing, at least, that would send me out on a hunt like this. I have long been rid of the evidence of your existence: the boots and the stilettos, the pencil skirt and the two-piece suit, the magazine clippings and the photographs. And I have no reason to grieve. The fact that Mimi will now be rewarded for her life's work and take her place among the pantheon of professional wrestling legends only underscores the conclusion I came to long ago: this is how it was meant to be. You weren't supposed to be champion. You had a more important purpose: you made my life possible. And it is much better to be me than to be you. I get to be my whole self—face, heel, and everything in between.

On the other side of the street, a familiar car pulls along the curb. The door opens, and the driver steps out, hikes up his pants, and walks toward the house. Now here is just the person to orient me in time: the Turnip.

“How did you know I would be here?” I call out.

When I say this, he stops in the middle of the street and stares. It seems he is only now realizing who I am.

“I didn't. What are you doing here?” Two boys, biking in his direction, pass around him on either side, which he smartly takes as a warning. He makes his way up to the sidewalk and over to where I am sitting. “Did you walk this whole way?”

“Don't act so surprised. I'm not that old.”

“Yeah, well, you're not that young, either.”

No, I guess I'm not. Most of my years are behind me now. All the more reason to be satisfied with the life I have led—because it's too damn late to do anything else.

I look at the Realtor's sign, and then back toward Harold, suddenly putting two and two together. “
This
is the house you're thinking of buying?”

Harold smiles. “I take it you don't think it's such a good idea.”

“Why would I? You have a beautiful home. You've been working on it for years. It's practically perfect. Why would you give it up for this?”

I'm not sure why I bother to ask him this when I already know the answer. This was his home, too. He lived here with his mother, next door to his adoring grandparents, harboring poorly understood desires and nurturing private hopes, until, at eighteen, he was let loose into the world and started making the decisions that led him to this point in time, when his daughter is halfway around the world living a life he doesn't understand. His presence here says something about the security he felt then and the bewilderment he feels now. For the first time in a long time, I feel something resembling tenderness toward the Turnip.

I mean Harold. His name is Harold.

“Oh, I don't think I could really pull the trigger,” he says. “I just happened to see that it was on the market and couldn't help myself.” Harold points at the invitation in my hand. “Is this why you're here? This person you're looking for—she's from the neighborhood? Anybody I might know?”

At first, I think about all the clever ways I can answer this so that I might avoid a lie but still keep you a secret (
You met her once, but you wouldn't remember it. You were still an infant.
) but then I realize that is not possible. To omit is to lie. I do not want to lie to Harold. I want to love him as much as Sis does, as much as Franz did, and the only way to bring someone closer to you is to tell the truth. I don't know why I have to keep learning this lesson, but I guess I do.

“The invitation is for me,” I say. “I am Gwen Davies.”

As soon as I say it out loud, it seems true to me in a way that it didn't before. You are not a separate being, someone I could just abandon in front of that window at Goldsmith's. You are the small part of me that, despite everything, and beyond all rationality, still wishes that last match had gone differently, and for reasons that aren't altogether selfless. I don't really understand how we can coexist—me wanting the life that I have, you wanting the life you didn't get—but we do.

“You are Gwen Davies,” repeats Harold. “What the hell does that mean?”

“It's a long story,” I say. “I am going to need some sustenance to tell it. Take me home so I can eat my MoonPie, would you?”

“The Realtor's supposed to meet me here any minute.”

“I can't wait. I'm old. You said so yourself.”

“Just walk through the house with me first. You must be curious.”

“I'm not. And you shouldn't be, either.” I wave the invitation at him. “You should take me home and help me figure out what I'm going to do about this.”

“It will take ten minutes. Twenty, tops.”

“It is more important for you to hear what I have to say. It might teach you something about parenting independent young women.”

Harold studies me for a while, which is just fine. I don't have an angle. I just want to talk, for once.

“Okay,” he says, “you win. Let's go.”

When we are buckled in, Harold motions for me to hand him the invitation. He studies it for a while. “Mimi Hollander,” he says. “Should I know that name?”

“Everybody should know that name,” I say. “She was the show.”

“Then we should go.”

We.
I don't know why, but that gets to me. I have to swallow hard before I can talk. “You haven't heard the story yet.”

“I know it starts with you being someone called Gwen Davies and ends with you getting this,” he says. He hands the invitation back to me and starts the car. “I am pretty sure that whatever you say, I'm going to want to go.”

I nod and slip the invitation back in my pocket. Maybe we should go, maybe we shouldn't. That doesn't seem so important right now. At least, not as important as what I am about to do. I start fiddling with the radio. I have a lot to think about before we get back to the house, and I could use some tunes.

“What's that station I like?” I ask, but instead of waiting for an answer, I push all the buttons until I find it, where Bill Haley's “Crazy Man, Crazy” is just getting under way. “Did your mother ever tell you about the time she and I danced on
Bandstand
?”

“Only every time she hears this song. So, about a million times.”

“Alright, then. I won't make it a million and one.”

“How about you dedicate the song instead?”

Harold is referring to a tradition I began as a DJ for WHER-AM, Sam Phillips's All-Girl Radio Station, where I spun slow, square tunes for the old and unhip. This was the job that helped me find my footing after those first few years of purgatory, waiting tables (the only other skill set I had) and torturing myself with hindsight. At that stage of my life, radio was the perfect fit: the studio combined some of the pleasures of the arena—most notably, a ready, waiting audience—with the privacy and security of the hotel room. One evening, I ended my show with a Tony Bennett song and, in a fit of nostalgia, said, “This one's for you, Father.” After that, I finished every shift with a personal dedication to someone who figured in my life. I never offer any backstory, just the dedication and the name.

This song is as good as any to send out to someone I love. It is the one that started it all, and I could dedicate it to many people. To my sister, Cynthia, who led me on the dance floor and said, “Do it, Leonie!” To Joe, who told me to get to work. To Sal, for discovering me, or Monster, for seeing me, or Sam, for letting me go. To my father, as I could almost every song I hear. To Pat, for loving him. It could go to my friend Screaming Mimi Hollander, the meanest bitch that ever walked the face of the earth. And, of course, it could go to you, the girl I used to be and, in some modest way, still am. But it is time for me to get back to the work of being Leigh Kramer, and I can't think of a better way to start that work than to dedicate this song to the man who is sitting right beside me.

“This one's for you, Harold,” I say. “Now, please. Take me home.”