Rachel's Roses

by Ferida Wolff

“Can’t you see, Beryl?” said Bubbie. “Our Racheleh has a secret.”

  Hannah climbed onto Mr. Berger’s lap.

  “What’s a secret, Papa?” she asked.

  “A secret, little Hannah, is something you know that no one else knows.”

  “I want a secret too, Papa,” Hannah said.

  “She wants everything I have,” grumbled Rachel.

  “Be a little understanding with your sister,” said Papa. “You should feel pleased that she wants to be like you.”

  Rachel didn’t feel one bit pleased.

  Papa turned to Hannah.

  “So you want a secret.”

  “Yes, please, Papa,” said Hannah.

  He bent down and whispered something in Hannah’s ear. Hannah was listening so hard that her eyes closed and her face was all scrunched up. It made everyone laugh.

  Rachel was glad Mama had stopped thinking about her. She would have the buttons for her mother in another day or two. When they saw those buttons, they would understand why she had to have them. She would look so grown-up that they’d never ask her to be twins with Hannah again.

  Mrs. Golden’s dress was almost finished too. The long skirt took up so much room they had to be careful not to step on it.

  “What do you think?” Mama asked Rachel.

  “It’s beautiful, Mama,” she said.

  Mrs. Berger studied the dress for a minute.

  “It still needs something, but I’m not sure what. Maybe a ribbon to trim the collar. It needs a little surprise, a little something unusual to finish it off.”

  As Rachel tucked Hannah in that night, her sister asked, “What’s your secret, Rachel?”

  “If I told you it wouldn’t be a secret,” Rachel said. “Then you would know it too, and you’d tell Mama and Papa.”

  “No, I wouldn’t tell.”

  “Yes you would.”

  “Are you collecting pennies for your secret?”

  “How do you know about my pennies?” said Rachel.

  “I saw you get a penny from Mrs. Miller and I hear you counting them when you think I’m asleep.”

  Rachel had forgotten that Hannah was with her for that first message at Mr. Bloom’s store.

  “I’ll tell you if you promise to keep it our secret and not tell anyone else.”

  “I promise,” Hannah said.

  “What do you promise?”

  “I promise not to tell anyone our secret. Not Mama or Papa. Not even Bubbie.”

  “The secret is…”

  “You have to whisper in my ear like Papa did.”

  Rachel bent down and said softly in Hannah’s ear, “I’m saving money to buy special buttons for our skirts.”

  “Oh, that’s a good secret!” said Hannah.

  “Now remember, you promised.”

  “Can I tell Bessie? She won’t say anything.”

  “No. You can’t tell Bessie either.”

  Rachel could just imagine Hannah talking to Bessie under the kitchen table when everyone was around. There would be no secret after that.

  “I won’t tell anyone, then, Rachel. Not anyone at all.”

  When Hannah finally fell asleep, Rachel wondered if she should have told. She was sort of glad she had, though. Having a secret was hard. She wondered if it could be called a secret now that Hannah and Sophie both knew. It seemed like a kind of puzzle she would enjoy figuring out someday, when she didn’t have to worry about keeping the secret itself.

  • nine •

  LOST BUTTON

  Bubbie’s feet were acting up when Rachel came home from school. She could hardly stand.

  “Why don’t you soak them, Bubbie?” said Rachel.

  “That’s a good idea, Racheleh. But we’re out of Epsom salts. Will you go to the drugstore and get some for me?”

  “Sure, Bubbie,” Rachel said. She was going there anyway. She had the cloth purse with eighteen cents inside. She didn’t want Hannah looking into her stuff. Besides, she needed seven more pennies. Maybe she would get lucky and have lots of telephone calls. Then she would go straight to see Mr. Solomon.

  “Tell Mr. Bloom to put it on my account.”

  “Okay.”

  “And take Hannah with you.”

  The pain on Bubbie’s face stopped any argument. Rachel took Hannah’s hand and quietly closed the door.

  “Are you getting the buttons, Rachel?” Hannah whispered on the way. Hannah loved whispering.

  “Not yet,” Rachel whispered back.

  “I can help,” Hannah whispered.

  “You’re too little to help,” whispered Rachel.

  “Mama let me help with her secret,” Hannah whispered.

  “What secret?” said Rachel, not whispering at all.

  “I can’t tell. When I went to get a drink last night I saw Mama working on something special. She made me promise just like you did.”

  Hannah skipped down the street. Rachel was so surprised she couldn’t move. Mama had a secret too? One she’d only told to Hannah?

  Rachel took a deep breath. She would have to find out about Mama’s secret later. There was too much to do right now. She chased after Hannah and they entered the drugstore together.

  Rachel asked for the Epsom salts. As she waited for the package, she looked at the silent telephone. Would it ring today? This was the last chance she had to get the buttons. The dress was finished. Her mother would need the buttons, but they were still in Mr. Solomon’s store. And Mr. Solomon had said he would only hold them until the holiday. Then they would go back into the bin, where someone else would probably buy them. Tomorrow night was the start of Rosh Hashanah.

  “Here you go, girls,” Mr. Bloom said. “Tell your grandmother I hope her feet are better.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Bloom,” they said.

  As they left the store, the phone rang. What should Rachel do? Walk Hannah home and miss the call or run back now? Maybe she could get her roses after all. The phone rang again. It was as if the jangling bell were calling to her. It needed her as much as she needed it.

  Rachel shoved the package into Hannah’s hands.

  “Here, Hannah. You take this to Bubbie. I’ll watch you go up the street.”

  “But Rachel…”

  “Go. Go on. Hurry.”

  Hannah raced up the block to their house. Before she even started up the stoop, Rachel rushed back into the drugstore.

  “Rachel, there’s a call for Mr. Carnovitz. Will you please get him? I saw him go down to the delicatessen.”

  Mr. Carnovitz was at the counter ordering some corned beef when a panting Rachel gave him the message.

  “A telephone call? For me? I never had a telephone call before,” said Mr. Carnovitz.

  He ran out of the delicatessen, leaving his food on the counter, and headed straight to the drugstore.

  It didn’t even matter that he hadn’t given Rachel a penny. One penny wouldn’t have been enough. She still needed seven cents. But he had to come back for his packages. Maybe he would give her a penny then. Rachel decided to wait.

  Simcha was behind the counter helping her mother.

  “Hi, Rachel,” she said. “Can you play? Mother said I can take a few minutes off.”

  “Sure.”

  They sat on two orange crates in front of the store. Simcha had a piece of string, so they played cat’s cradle. Rachel usually liked making the string forms with her fingers, but today her heart wasn’t in it. It was taking Mr. Carnovitz too long.

  “I’d better go,” Rachel said.

  There was no way she would be able to get the roses now. Even if Mr. Carnovitz gave her a penny she wouldn’t have time to get all the money she’d need. She would take some of her money and buy ordinary, everyday, nothing-special buttons for the skirts.

 
Just then Mr. Carnovitz came charging into the store.

  “What a telephone call!” he said. “I forget everything, even the groceries. That was my brother. He’s here! I have waited so long for him to come to this country!”

  Mr. Carnovitz was so excited he was dancing in circles right in front of everyone.

  “Thank you, thank you,” he said as he pressed something into Rachel’s hand. “Here. Take this for the wonderful message you have brought me!”

  Mr. Carnovitz wasn’t nearly as excited as Rachel. He’d given her a dime! Ten cents! She had twenty-eight cents, three more than she needed. She could hardly believe it. Now she could have her roses and help her mother even more! She ran to Sophie’s house first.

  “I did it, Sophie, I did it! Let’s get the buttons!”

  Sophie put aside her homework, called out to her mother, and flew with Rachel down the stairs.

  Rachel watched Mr. Solomon count the money she gave him. She was afraid that maybe she had counted wrong. Or maybe she had lost some on the way over.

  But Mr. Solomon smiled.

  “It’s all here,” he said.

  He reached under the counter and took out the envelope he had been saving for her. “The buttons are yours,” he said.

  Rachel’s hands shook as she took the envelope from Mr. Solomon.

  “Thank you,” she said as calmly as she could, but she wasn’t really feeling very calm inside. A bubbling pot of Mama’s stew was more like how she felt.

  As soon as they stepped out of the store, Rachel had her hand inside the envelope.

  “Let’s see, let’s see,” said Sophie.

  Three glass balls stared up at them from Rachel’s palm.

  “Look how they sparkle, Sophie,” said Rachel.

  She held one up so the light could shine through it. All of a sudden, they heard someone yell, “Grab him!”

  Before they could move, Izzy’s little brother, Jacob, came charging toward them with Izzy pointing and waving like a madman half a step behind.

  “Can’t catch me, Izzy!” Jacob dodged around the girls, but Izzy bumped into them. He, Sophie, and Rachel fell to the ground. The rose buttons flew out of Rachel’s hand.

  “Look what you made me do, Izzy!” she yelled.

  “Why didn’t you stop him?” Izzy yelled back. He scrambled to his feet. “I’ve got to get my brother!” he called over his shoulder as he sped off.

  “Help me find them, Sophie!” Rachel cried as she got up to look for the buttons.

  Sophie found one in front of Mr. Solomon’s store. Rachel found one in a dirty crack a few feet away. But the third button was nowhere to be seen. They looked in every crack and behind every pushcart wheel. The last button had disappeared.

  “Maybe Mr. Solomon has another one,” said Sophie.

  “He said these were the only three he had,” Rachel said. “Besides, my mother needs the buttons now.”

  Sophie picked up the envelope and took out the button card that was still inside.

  “The buttons on the card are pretty,” she said.

  “Yes, but they aren’t my roses!” cried Rachel. Tears poured down her face as she headed home.

  “I’ll never speak to that Izzy again as long as I live!”

  • ten •

  LOST HANNAH

  Rachel stomped up the tenement stairs. First her mother had quit her job. Now one of the buttons she had saved so hard to buy was lost, so she would have to wear the same skirt as Hannah. Everything was going wrong.

  “Ah, Racheleh,” Bubbie said as soon as she walked in. “I’ve been waiting. Give me the Epsom salts before my feet swell to the size of pickle barrels.”

  “Didn’t Hannah give you the package from the drugstore?” Rachel asked.

  That Hannah! She couldn’t be trusted to do anything right.

  “Hannah is with you. Why should she be carrying the package?”

  “But Hannah isn’t with me, Bubbie. I sent her home long ago.”

  Everything stopped in the room. Bubbie stopped talking. Mrs. Berger stopped sewing. Rachel stopped breathing.

  Where was Hannah?

  “Why isn’t she with you?” asked Mrs. Berger. “Where is she, Rachel?”

  “I don’t know, Mama. I watched while she went to the steps. I thought she would go right into the house.”

  Where would she go? Rachel thought.

  “You left her by herself?” yelled Mrs. Berger.

  Mrs. Berger pushed aside the hem she was working on. Mrs. Golden was due to pick up her dress in the morning and there were still a few last details to finish. With Hannah missing, Mrs. Golden’s dress would have to wait.

  “We have to find her. Now!” said Rachel’s mother. “The sun is setting. She won’t know her way home in the dark.”

  Mrs. Berger rushed off to knock on the neighbors’ doors. Maybe one of them had seen Hannah.

  Rachel ran to her school. Hannah was always saying she couldn’t wait to go there. But the yard was empty and the doors were shut tight.

  When Rachel returned home, her mother was just coming up the stairs. Hannah was not with her. Where could they look now? Mrs. Berger went to look in the stores down the street.

  “Phil, have you seen Hannah?” Rachel asked as Phil was packing up his pushcart. “She’s lost. No one knows where she is.”

  “I saw her this afternoon,” said Phil. “She was going toward Delancey Street. She had a package. I thought she was taking it somewhere.”

  She should have been taking it to Bubbie, thought Rachel. Why was she going to Delancey Street? Of all places to get lost, Hannah had picked the biggest, busiest, most crowded street. How would Rachel ever find her?

  As she ran, Rachel imagined terrible things. She imagined Hannah trampled by a horse. She imagined her sister wandering in a strange part of the city and crying out for her. She ran faster.

  Delancey Street was so big, Rachel didn’t know where to start looking. She dashed into the first store, where a man was fitting a customer for a hat.

  “Did you see a little girl all by herself?” she asked him.

  “No, no little girl,” he said.

  Rachel went to the next store and the next and the next. No one had seen Hannah. The long street was filled with stores. Surely someone had seen her sister. Rachel wouldn’t go home until she’d searched all the stores.

  It was getting late. Rachel was getting scared. What if Hannah tried to cross the street by herself? What if Rachel couldn’t find her? No, Rachel would keep looking, even if it took all night and the next day. She went into a candy store and asked about Hannah for what seemed the hundredth time. She was ready to walk out, even before the clerk answered, and go on to the next store.

  “A little girl? All alone? Do you mean the one sitting in the back by the telephone?”

  There, on the dusty floor, sat Hannah. She was twirling her tangled braid. Her little foot kept tapping against the wall as if she was impatient for something. For a second, Rachel remembered herself sitting by Mr. Bloom’s telephone in the very same way.

  “Hannah! What are you doing here?”

  “I’m helping, Rachel. I’m waiting for the telephone to ring so I can get a penny to give to you.” She stood up and whispered in Rachel’s ear. “Then you can get the buttons.”

  “Oh, Hannah. You had us all so worried. Everyone is out looking for you.”

  “No one called, Rachel. I went to all the stores until I found a telephone but it didn’t ring.”

  Rachel thought of the first wave Bubbie had told her about. Hannah had followed her like the waves follow each other to the shore. Being a first wave was really an important job, and a big responsibility too.

  “It doesn’t matter, Hannah,” said Rachel. She grabbed the bag of Epsom salts and said, “Come. Let’s go home.”

>   Izzy caught up with them on their way.

  “I didn’t mean to knock you down, Rachel,” he said. “I was supposed to watch my brother while my mother was in the pickle store but he ran away. I had to get him before she finished shopping.” Izzy took a deep breath and then said, “Sometimes being a big brother isn’t easy.”

  Rachel realized that Izzy was a first wave too. He had just been doing his job, getting his runaway brother back.

  Izzy looked down at his shoes.

  “Sophie told me about your button. I looked for it after I brought my brother back to the store.”

  “You did?” asked Rachel. “Did you find it?”

  “Not right away,” he said. “I looked under every tree, in the cement cracks, in the gutter and…here.”

  He reached into his pocket and handed something to Rachel.

  “My button!” Rachel shrieked.

  “It was stuck between the bricks by Mr. Solomon’s store. The red color blended in with the bricks.”

  Izzy raised his hand as if to tug Rachel’s braid but stopped.

  “Bye, Rachel,” he said, and ran home.

  Rachel looked at the button in her hand. Something felt different. She’d worked so hard to buy the buttons, but they didn’t seem so important anymore. She’d almost lost Hannah because she wanted them so much.

  She led Hannah upstairs.

  Papa was home now. He was getting ready to join the search. They all shouted when they saw Hannah. Everyone talked at once.

  “You’re home!”

  “Thank goodness.”

  “We were so worried.”

  “Where were you?”

  Hannah looked at Rachel. Then she said, “I took a walk.”

  “Don’t ever do that again, Hannah!” scolded Mama before she grabbed Hannah into a big hug.

  Rachel was glad that Mama didn’t seem mad anymore.

  Supper was hurried that night. There was so much work to do. Hannah wanted to stay up late but she was too tired. She fell asleep at the table. Papa carried her to bed. She stirred as Rachel tucked her in.

  “Rachel?”