Cry For the Child If The Tears Will Come/A Christmas Carol/C. Dickens

7. Jackie Is Slipping Away and Laurel Tries To Hold On

When Monday arrived, the Monday after the President was killed, and Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald right in front of the cameras, everybody plodded around, trying to go back to whatever they were supposed to be doing. What were we? Numb, miserable, angry, hopeless. How could you memorize the capitals of each state and the dates they entered the union when you had this image planted before your eyes, the image of the President's head being half blown off on a nice sunny day in Texas?

Early that Monday morning Laurel had an argument with her parents, the loudest and most furious argument they'd ever had. Laurel wanted to cut a piece of pink fabric into a heart, put some red paint on it, and wear it to school, pinned on her sweater. Her parents were horrified. No, they said; that kind of posturing only makes thing worse. It brings up feelings that should be quieted and soothed by everday activities. Laurel was so angry; she slammed the door of the house so hard that everything shook. She pinned the pink heart to her bra, where it itched all day but she didn't remove the heart or scratch where it itched.

On the third day after the President was killed, Stuart went breezing by in the hall, surrounded by his loyal following of friends. "Hey, thunder thighs..." he called out and the boys laughed as usual. What wasn't usual was that Laurel blushed deeply at this and tried to hide. She was horrified; she was losing Jackie.

She tried to reason with herself. "Come on now," she thought. "JACKIE ISN'T DEAD. She can still save you."

But Laurel felt in that part of her heart--the part that knows--that Jackie wasn't First Lady anymore. Ladybird Johnson was. Lyndon Baines Johnson was President. Yes, they were Democrats but they were rooted in Texas. No more sophisticated Dior suits, no sparkling repartee at press conferences, no more Robert Frost and Pablo Cassals. Laurel saw a photo of the new President holding his dog up using the dog's ears; she saw another one of Johnson uncovering his flabby mid-section to show some stupid and pointless scar he had. Laurel closed her eyes in pain.

The first Look Magazine that was published after the assassination had a lot of photographs of the new First Family. The new President and the First Lady had two teenage daughters. Laurel put her face into her hands and sobbed. It was all so--so amateur, so paltry, after JFK and what was to be called "The Best and The Brightest"--Kennedy's choices of his cabinet members-- and classical music and Jackie's immaculate shoulders revealed when she wore a strapless evening gown with long gloves. Jackie never fidgeted. As Laurel sobbed, her mother came into the room and tried to comfort her daughter.

"Laurel, sweetheart," said her mother. "Don't do this to yourself. Look; the Johnsons have two teenage daughters just your age. Won't that be interesting, to see where they go to college and what they're interested in?"

Laurel grasped the new Look Magazine and threw it across the room. Her mother gasped.

"I hate those two daughters of his. They all have such stupid names. And did you know," said Laurel to her mother in a withering tone, "that the President said something, more than once, about himself and his cabinet being like King Arthur and his Round Table? Hmph. I'll bet those hayseeds don't even know who King Arthur and his Round Table were." And she stalked out of the room.

After dinner, three weeks into Lyndon Baines Johnson's term as President, Laurel lay in bed and waited until the members of her family were asleep. Her mouth watering, she crept down into the kitchen and ate a huge piece of freshly baked apple strudel. The fine pastry, the apple filling, and the white icing somehow made the pain go away.