Killing Kennedy

below.
    But Lee Harvey Oswald is planning to do much more than catch a glimpse. In fact, he is quietly plotting to shoot the president. Just a month ago, mere days before the birth of their second child, Marina noted his fascination with the movies Suddenly and We Were Strangers , both of which deal with the shooting of a government official—in the case of Suddenly , the president of the United States. The couple watched the films together, and Oswald even told Marina that the films felt authentic. She thought that a strange remark.
    Oswald does not hate the president. He has no reason to want JFK dead. He is, however, bitter that a man such as John Kennedy has so many advantages in life. Oswald well understands that it’s easier for men born into privilege to distinguish themselves. But other than that small amount of envy, he does not speak unfavorably about the president. In fact, Oswald would very much like to emulate JFK.
    Above all, he wants to be a great man.
    *   *   *
    “Can I ride home with you this afternoon?” Oswald casually asks coworker Wesley Frazier. The nineteen-year-old’s home is a half block from where Marina Oswald lives with Ruth Paine. Oswald often catches a ride out to the suburb of Irving on Friday in Frazier’s nine-year-old black Chevy four-door and then makes the return trip back into Dallas with him on Monday.

    “Sure,” Wesley replies. They are standing on the first floor of the Texas School Book Depository, next to a large table. “You know, like I told you, you can go home with me anytime you want to, like I say, anytime you want to go see your wife that is all right with me.”
    But then Frazier realizes that today isn’t Friday. It’s Thursday—and Oswald never rides to Irving on Thursdays. “Why are you going home today?” Frazier asks him.
    “I am going home to get some curtain rods,” Oswald replies.
    Oswald then steals a length of brown wrapping paper from the depository’s shipping department. He spends the rest of his workday fashioning a bag in which to conceal his “curtain rods.”
    Through it all, as he folds the paper to form the best possible sheath in which to hide his rifle, Lee Harvey Oswald is unsure that he will actually kill President Kennedy. What he really wants is to be permanently reunited with Marina and the girls. Tonight, he will beg his wife to take him back.
    But if she doesn’t, Oswald will be left with no choice.
    That is how delusional Lee Harvey Oswald’s world has become. He now deals only in absolutes: either live happily ever after—or murder the president of the United States.

 
    23
    N OVEMBER 22, 1963
    I RVING, T EXAS
    6:30 A.M.
    The Oswalds have been fighting. Again. But this time is different. This time it’s over. Lee Harvey stands at the foot of the bed in their cramped room at Ruth Paine’s house, dressed for work in gray pants and an old shirt. He twists the wedding band off his left hand and drops it into a china cup on the dresser. It was once a symbol of his love for Marina, but now it is yet another confirmation of the failure that envelops his life.
    Today Oswald will do something to change all that. Today he will prove that he is not a failure, even if it means losing his own life in the process.
    He drops $187 in cash onto the dresser as a going-away present to his wife and daughters. After all, it’s not as if he has a future.
    Marina lies on the bed, half awake. Hers and her husband’s last night together was not romantic. Oswald tossed and turned while Marina was up with the baby twice. They did not make love, although Marina made a 3:00 A.M . attempt at tenderness. He responded by angrily kicking her away.
    Oswald’s trip home was primarily to get his rifle. But he was willing to set aside his dark plan if Marina agreed to live with him. All evening long he pleaded with his wife to reconcile. He told her how much he missed his girls, and even promised to buy Marina a washing machine because he knew how much she wanted one.
    But Marina was furious that he had come to see her on a Thursday, which was against Ruth Paine’s house rules. So Oswald’s pleas turned into yet another round of bickering. But still he didn’t give up.
    Marina, however, doesn’t seem to want him back. They spent the evening outside, playing with June and Audrey on the dying autumn grass of Ruth Paine’s lawn. Oswald pleaded with Marina to become his wife again. She wavered, because Lee Harvey Oswald had once been the