DC By the Book

Excerpt: The kids in her neighborhood all hated being west of the park: Woodley Park or Friendship Heights or Ellery’s favorite neighborhood (the site of her piano lessons, the site of today’s excitement), the Gold Coast. Ellery had no name for the collection of streets around her home where she skinned knees and hands. The houses on the Gold Coast weren’t just in rows, obedient toy soldiers. These houses were gathering up all the toys Ellery had ever owned, the Barbies, the stuffed animals, the building blocks. They had what her mother called turrets or Juliet balconies and front yards big enough for a good game of tag. Even the plain brick ones caused a tightness in Ellery’s belly. Some of them had ivy growing up the sides, angling for a way in.

Excerpt: In the dank of DC’s summer heat, cicadas scaled the heights of oak trees, vocal and untrained trapeze artists. But their shells, discarded and crumpled like candy wrappers, clogged drains and littered the sides of the road. The air was smeared with humidity, but as they drove through Rock Creek Park, a breeze lifted and Ellery, her face thrust out of the car window, waited for the wind to hopscotch across her cheeks.

Excerpt: My parents would take me down to the Lincoln Memorial sometimes, and there my dad would say, “Look! The emancipator of our people.” I would look and look some more at the large seated figure of one Abraham Lincoln. Right there, even as a small child, I was witness to the greatness of the past.

Excerpt: Shelby suggested Old Ebbitt Grill for lunch, right around the corner from the White House and often the site of high-powered Washington lunches. Janice eased into a green velvet booth across from Shelby when she arrived. Shelby leaned toward her, but didn’t even bother to fake a kiss.

Excerpt: If I’m not home, he says the drive from Northeast to Shaw is still worth it because he takes it slow and watches all the young people in the neighborhood clogging the narrow sidewalks of U Street.

Excerpt: He motions out at Fourteenth Street, packed with people out for some nighttime fun. Parts of Fourteenth Street used to be women and men out for a different kind of nighttime fun, but the sex workers have been spirited away to other blocks. The grit that used to be on these streets has been swept away by overpriced restaurants and residents who think more than two years of living in Shaw makes them the rightful bearers of its legacy.

Excerpt: He makes a left on Rhode Island Avenue. We veer right at Logan Circle. Friends in college who weren’t from DC said the street layout was confusing, the roundabouts, state names, alphabet, and numbers an unnecessary maze. When I was learning to drive, I would steer through a roundabout two and three times before I got the exit for the right street.

Excerpt: He turns into LeDroit Park, hidden behind the showiness of Georgia and Florida Avenues. Everything is new on those streets, but LeDroit is still old. Some of the houses are large, whole corner lots which balconies and porches. Others are smaller row houses crammed onto the block, yards just big enough for a parent and child to fall into a raked pile of leaves. The houses’ colorful paint jobs -- bright oranges, deep blues, pastel greens -- have to do all the elbowing for attention.

Excerpt: It’s the first day of April and earlier I could feel the warm air under the cold. The weather is taking its layers off. The cherry blossoms will bloom soon. Christian loves them. We’ve driven so far down Georgia, it’s turned into Seventh Street. We hit Pennsylvania. At night here, the floodlights planted in grass in front of all the government buildings reflect off the marble. The buildings are like ladies in wedding dresses, their skirts arranged.

Excerpt: He rides past the reservoir across from Howard, the moon filtering into the water this time of night. The clock tower on campus is lit.

Excerpt: He takes Columbia Road over, but doesn’t keep going toward Columbia Heights. He makes a left down Thirteenth Street back toward Shaw and my empty home. We ride and ride and then the car crests the hill at Clifton. All of Washington is laid out before us. The monument lit. The Capitol close enough to pick up and pocket.