Mobilis in Mobili

“Put that book down!” Mom is yelling from the kitchen, but the only sound I hear is a muffled shriek. “Steve! Stevie! Come on! It’s Sunday! Your grandfather will be here in a minute! You have been nagging me all week . . .  and now I can’t get you away from this book! Can you hear me?”

She plants herself in front of me, her summer dress with fading forget-me-nots and her stained linen apron still smelling of the chicken cutlets she was frying. Her wavy chestnut hair is pinned on both sides, with tiny stubborn curls around her forehead. Now she is laughing and trying to yank the book out of my hands in a mock tug. “Jules Verne, Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea. . . .  Come on, get up, you are going to the real sea now! Put on your new shorts. . . .  no not these, the blue ones . . .  and your cap please. It is hot outside!” And with the back of her palm, she wipes the droplets of sweat from her upper lip.

I do what she says but my movements are dreamlike and slow. I have just sailed from Brooklyn Navy Yard with Professor Aronnax and Ned Land on the Abraham Lincoln and discovered that a mysterious sea monster was Captain Nemo’s submarine, Nautilus. I am stranded there, with Captain Nemo, who reminds me of course of the Count of Monte Cristo (that I have just finished reading), both of them enigmatic noble men with a dramatic past, on a revenge mission. . . .

Pushing through my mental fog, I am trying to come back to Brooklyn, to the house, and to myself, crouched on our worn-out little couch, forming a niche between bookcase shelves, like a cave, perfect for a little person to curl up in with a book. Above my head, there is a small foggy mirror and on the top shelf I keep my books next to a framed photograph of young pretty Mom in a sundress with a bright smile on her tanned face, her hair flowing in the wind, standing on Coney Island boardwalk against the backdrop of Childs, which looks...