Don't Forget to Write: A Novel

Back at home, Marilyn’s parents confine her to her room. Her mother, Rose, brings her meals. Rabbi Schwartz, his wife, and Daniel arrive, and Marilyn comes downstairs so that the two families can talk. At his parents’ insistence, Daniel awkwardly proposes to Marilyn, but she refuses him because she does not really know him and is not interested in getting married yet. Both sets of parents are furious. Marilyn insists that there is no reason for them to marry: She cannot have become pregnant from kissing. Rose faints.

That evening, Marilyn’s parents provide her with an ultimatum. Either she can marry Daniel, or she can go to Philadelphia and spend the summer with her strict great-aunt Ada Heller, who works as a matchmaker for Jewish families. Ada’s companion, Lillian Miller, will be away for the summer, so Ada needs an assistant to help with her work. If Marilyn goes and behaves well all summer, her father might consider allowing her to return to college in the fall. Marilyn reluctantly agrees that a summer with Ada is better than marrying Daniel.

Marilyn takes the train to Philadelphia, where a young Black man named Thomas meets her at the station. He is a medical student who knows Ada well and does odd jobs for her. Thomas brings Marylin’s bags to the car, where she meets Ada, a fashionable 75-year-old woman who has “platinum blonde hair peeking out from under a baby blue Hermès scarf” (29). Ada immediately confiscates Marilyn’s red lipstick for herself.

Ada drives extremely fast back to her fancy duplex. She tells Marilyn some rules: She is not to date anyone or borrow Ada’s belongings. She reveals that Rose once spent a summer with her, which surprises Marilyn. Marilyn meets Ada’s little dog, Sally, who dislikes her. Upstairs, Ada forbids Marilyn from entering any room besides her own bedroom and the bathroom. Lillian’s room is next door to Ada’s. Lillian is away because her mother is dying. Marylin explores her austere room and finds a photograph of Rose kissing a younger Ada on the cheek. It was taken a year before Marilyn’s parents married. Marilyn writes a brief letter home, asking her mother to send her books, a radio, and a new tube of lipstick.

At dinner, Marilyn tells Ada about her kiss with Daniel, which Ada finds very funny. After dinner, the two go for a walk in the park. There are several young men playing tennis there, and Ada asks Marilyn to get their names, numbers, and consent to go on dates with young women who are looking for husbands. As Marilyn walks toward the court, she trips on a rock and falls into a bush. One of the young men, who introduces himself as Freddy Goldman, helps her to her feet. She finds him handsome, but she ignores her feelings and asks the young men for their information. To persuade them, she says that if they go on three dates with women of Ada’s choosing and do not find one that they like, they can go out with her instead. When Marilyn returns to Ada triumphantly, Ada admits that she threw the rock that tripped Marilyn up, hoping it would help her get the men’s attention.

Back at Ada’s house, Marilyn writes about her day in her notebook. She loves writing, and Rose has always supported her interest, but Walter disapproves. Marilyn wonders why Ada never married, especially since she is a matchmaker. The next morning, Ada wakes Marilyn early, as clients will arrive soon. Each meeting involves a mother and her daughter (or, less often, her son), seeking Ada’s help finding a marriage partner. Marilyn brings everyone coffee and takes notes to get a sense of what the young person is looking for in a match. Ada gets a good idea of what people are like with just a few careful questions. Marilyn has the afternoons off. She admires Ada for running her own business, which is something she has not seen women do in the past.

On her first afternoon after work, Marilyn goes for a walk around the neighborhood. Ada lives in a Jewish area next to an Italian part of the city. When Marilyn asks for directions to the Liberty Bell, she meets another young Jewish woman named Shirley, who immediately recognizes her as Ada’s great-niece. Shirley tells Marilyn that her family and Ada usually spend most of the summer at the Jersey Shore, so they will probably see each other there soon. Marilyn is happy to have made a friend and buys herself more lipstick, which Ada once again confiscates.

The next morning, Marilyn tells Ada about meeting Shirley. Ada disapproves of Shirley’s family because they are new money and social climbers. The first clients of the morning are a mother and her tall, gawky daughter. The mother is very rude about her daughter’s appearance and is desperate for her to get married. Ada sends Marilyn and the mother to the kitchen to make coffee, and when they return, she has given the daughter a quick but effective makeover using the lipstick she confiscated from Marilyn. The pair leave, and Marilyn and Ada agree that the mother treated her daughter terribly. Ada instructs Marilyn to go buy more lipstick, specifying that she should get a lighter color, not red.

Marilyn takes the trolley to a department store to buy lipstick. She tries to see the Liberty Bell, but it is closed for renovations. When she gets home, Ada is talking quietly on the phone to someone she calls “darling.” Marilyn thinks that her tone sounds like she is talking to a lover, but Ada tells her nothing.

Ada takes Marilyn to the department store again, this time to buy her a summer wardrobe for the Jersey Shore. Everyone in the store treats Ada like royalty. In addition to dresses, pants, and blouses, Ada buys Marilyn two bikinis. She then takes Marilyn to the Liberty Bell, determined to show it to her even if it is closed for renovations. Ada charms the guard and convinces him to let them see the bell and let Marilyn touch it. Marilyn is impressed.

Marilyn’s mother sends a letter saying that she has sent books and a radio to Ada’s house on the Jersey Shore. A few days later, Ada drives Marilyn and Sally down to Avalon, a small beach town just past Atlantic City. For most of the summer, women and children spend their time there, with men visiting on the weekends. On the drive down, Ada suggests that Rose is not happy in her marriage. Marilyn is surprised, but she realizes that she has never seen her parents being affectionate.