Blue Beauty

Blue Beauty is Jessica Mastriani’s baby-blue 1968 Harley, given to her by her father for high-school graduation. More than a striking possession, the motorcycle recurs as a means of movement through Jessica’s changing circumstances: she takes it out after Rob Wilkins appears unexpectedly, rides it toward a lead on Hannah Snyder, and later uses it to leave a tense exchange with her mother. Its history ultimately connects the gift to Rob, who had selected it for Jessica well before her father asked him what kind of bike she would like.

Gift and Appearance

Jessica finds the Harley in the garage of her family’s converted farmhouse, behind her mother’s paint cans. The house is nearly a century old, and the garage doors are barnlike; in that setting, the motorcycle has been tucked away rather than displayed. Her father had promised to buy her a bike for graduation. Jessica had not specified a year or color, so the fact that he found a 1968 model in such carefully coordinated condition exceeds what she had requested.

The bike is baby blue, a shade Jessica likens to the sky on Easter Sunday, neither quite turquoise nor teal. Cream-colored leather covers its seat, and shiny chrome trims it. Her father has also provided a matching cream-colored helmet, which Jessica puts on before taking the motorcycle out. She regards the Harley with an affection she herself recognizes as unusually intense for an inanimate object. That attachment is grounded in its particular look and condition: to Jessica, the bike is not interchangeable with any other motorcycle, even though she says that any bike would have suited her.

Long Underuse and First Ride

Despite loving it, Jessica has ridden Blue Beauty only a couple of times. The war and then her acceptance to the Juilliard School have kept her from using it more. She did not take it to New York City, where she feared it would quickly be stolen. By the time she returns to ride it, four months of disuse have not dulled its appearance or performance: the engine rumbles, and Jessica describes the motorcycle as finely tuned.

Her first ride in the described sequence follows an encounter that has left tension in her neck: she had opened her apartment door to find Rob there. Once she is on the street, that tension begins to ease. The relief is presented through the concrete act of riding, not through a change to the bike itself. Its engine and readiness make it available as an immediate way for Jessica to move away from the strain of the encounter and regain some composure.

Movement Through Jessica’s Story

The direction Jessica takes gives the ride a practical purpose. Instead of turning downtown toward Douglas Mastriani’s comic-book store, she heads for the newer part of town, near the hospital and the apartments built to house its workers. She has learned through a dream that Hannah Snyder is staying in Apartment 2T at the Fountain Bleu apartment complex, behind the Kroger Sav-On and beside the hospital. Blue Beauty carries Jessica toward that location; the fountain in front of the complex confirms the aptness, if not the grandeur, of its name. The motorcycle therefore links a private impulse to ride with Jessica’s effort to reach a missing person’s reported location.

It also returns when Jessica needs to leave a family confrontation. After her mother asks whether her psychic powers have returned, Jessica gets up with a sudden desire to take the bike for a spin. Later, while her mother continues pressing her about the subject, Jessica slips Rob’s grandmother’s ring on and off her finger, then decides to leave it on so she will not lose it. She says her mother cannot have both a conventional daughter and one with psychic powers, and heads down the porch steps toward Blue Beauty. When asked where she is going, Jessica says she is going to get away from her mother. The motorcycle provides the immediate route out of the exchange; the scene’s conflict remains between mother and daughter, rather than being resolved by the ride.

Rob’s Part in Its History

The gift has a connection to Rob that Jessica does not learn until later. When she asks whether her father bought Blue Beauty from him, Rob confirms that her father asked what kind of bike she would like. He adds that he had picked the motorcycle out for her long before the request came. Jessica responds with delight, saying she knew it, and leaves the conversation with her heart seeming ready to bubble over.

That disclosure changes the Harley’s personal history without changing its physical form. It had been her father’s promised graduation present and remains the bike Jessica rides; the revelation is that Rob’s choice preceded the father’s question. The motorcycle thus brings together two relationships in a single object: a gift from her father and a deliberate, earlier choice by Rob. Jessica’s joy at discovering that connection makes the bike’s appeal more than aesthetic, while the evidence leaves the precise circumstances of Rob’s original selection unstated.

Recurrence and Significance

Blue Beauty recurs near the end of the story as Jessica resumes riding after another phone conversation. Having spoken with Ruth, she goes to the garage, takes out the Harley, and cruises toward Wilkins Auto and Motorcycle Repair. At the light at First and Main, she sees Karen Sue Hankey in a white convertible in the neighboring lane, raises her helmet’s face shield, and calls out to her. Karen Sue looks over, startled; Jessica begins by apologizing for having brushed her off the day before, explaining that she had a lot on her mind. The motorcycle places Jessica in motion when this brief attempted reconnection occurs, but it does not replace the conversation: Jessica has to call across the lanes herself.

Across these scenes, the bike is both a carefully particular object and a practical vehicle. Its color, cream seat, chrome, matching helmet, and tuned engine distinguish it from the unspecified bike Jessica once would have accepted. Its repeated appearances mark transitions between confinement and movement: from the garage to the street, from family pressure toward distance, and from a ride toward a person she wants to address. The story does not make the Harley act independently; its significance comes from Jessica’s choices to ride it, the routes she takes, and the relationships its history brings into view.