Where'd You Go, Bernadette

Email from the guy outside the library to his architecture professor at USC

From: Jacob Raymond

To: Paul Jellinek

Dear Mr. Jellinek,

Remember how I told you I was going to Seattle on a pilgrimage to see the public library, and I joked that I’d let you know if I had a Bernadette Fox sighting? Well, guess who I saw outside the public library?

Bernadette Fox! She was about fifty, her hair was brown and wild. The only reason I looked twice was because she was wearing a fishing vest, which is something you notice.

There’s the one picture of Bernadette Fox taken about twenty years ago when she won her award. And you hear all the speculation about her, how she moved to Seattle and became a recluse or went crazy. I had a really strong feeling it was her. Before I could say anything, she abruptly volunteered, “Bernadette Fox.”

I started gushing. I told her I was a graduate student at USC, and had visited Beeber Bifocal every time they opened it to the public, and that our winter project is a competition to reinterpret the Twenty Mile House.

I suddenly realized I had said too much. Her eyes were vacant. Something was seriously wrong with her. I wanted to get a picture of me with the elusive Bernadette Fox. (Talk about a profile pic!) But then I thought better of it. This woman has given me so much already. The relationship has been one-way, and still I want to take more? I bowed to her with my hands in prayer position and walked into the library, leaving her standing outside in the rain.

I feel bad because I think I might have messed her up. Anyway. In case you were wondering: Bernadette Fox is walking around Seattle in the middle of winter wearing a fishing vest.

See you in class,

Jacob

Mom and Dad went out to dinner that night without me, to some Mexican place in Ballard, which was fine because Friday is when a bunch of us go to Youth Group and they have fried shrimp, plus they let us watch a movie, which was Up.

Dad left at five in the morning to catch a plane because he had Samantha 2 business at Walter Reed.[1] Claire Anderssen was having a party on Bainbridge Island, and I wanted to go out to our house there, plus I wanted Kennedy to spend the night. Kennedy gets on Dad’s nerves, and there was no way we could have a sleepover if he was there, so I was happy he was gone.

Mom and I had a plan. We’d catch the 10:10 to Bainbridge, and Kennedy would take the passenger ferry after gymnastics, which she tried to get out of, but her mom wouldn’t let her.