When We Were Young

by Jaclyn Goldis

  “Radiant,” said Joey, beaming at her.

  Sarah beamed back. Oh, how she loved this girl.

  After they’d rinsed their feet, Sarah asked a few questions about the computer that she’d written on a Post-it. Then she stepped out onto the front porch to see her granddaughter off.

  As Sarah waved goodbye, a thing began to nag her. At first, she brushed it aside, waving, waving. This used to be Sam’s job—to see their girls safely off. After his death, Sarah had assumed his role.

  But as Joey disappeared around the bend, Sarah’s arm stopped its motion, and she wondered whether she’d been selfish to evade Joey’s questions before. Whether there was something plaguing her granddaughter. Whether Joey needed to understand something, or release something, and instead of helping, Sarah had withheld honest counsel.

  Sarah went to her computer, and in an act that was most familiar to her, she buried those uncomfortable questions.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Sarah

  Corfu

  1943

  After Sarah learned the Nazis had taken Corfu, she ran to Gira Beach, to find Milos on his return from fishing. He called it the best beach in the world, and they strolled often on the peninsula by the old windmills off the dunes, searching for funny-shaped seashells to add to their collection and watching the flamingos flock.

  But that evening, Sarah didn’t even notice the waves kiss the shore. The sun hovered over the lagoon, low and orange, by the time Milos stepped onto the sand, a net slung over his shoulder and a bucket in hand.

  She ran to tell him but saw it first on his face. How long had he known without telling her? She couldn’t bring herself to ask.

  “You never told anyone you were Jewish, did you, Sarah?” She squirmed from his attempted embrace but shook her head no. Then she retched onto the sand. Milos came down on his knees beside her. “We’ll get you new papers. There aren’t any Jews on Lefkada. Only my parents know. No one else will suspect.”

  “I don’t care about that!” She wiped her mouth, her knees aching from the pebbles they crouched atop. “What about my family? That’s what I care about! My family!” She shifted to a seat atop her hands to keep them from throttling him.

  “Your family will be okay,” he said in an infuriatingly soothing tone.

  “We don’t know that. They haven’t responded to a single one of my letters! I want to visit them right away.”

  Milos extended his hand. Reluctantly, she let him pull her up. They began to walk home. The sky was shredded in pink, the day erased. It was almost impossible to imagine the Nazis could mar this unblemished perfection of an evening.

  “Sure, my love. Let me ask around. We’ll figure out a way for you to visit them.”

  But a week later, after Milos’s parents had vowed not to tell anyone Sarah was Jewish, after they had papers in hand declaring her Sara Christakos, she said it to him again: “I need to go to Corfu.”

  Milos was on the floor, mending his nets with black twine. “Theodore just went to fish there. He’ll tell us how it is. Let us wait and see.”

  It became December with all Milos’s hedging. Again, Costas came into the shop.

  “We don’t have baklava,” she told him. “The Nazis have confiscated all sugar, flour, and oil. On pain of death, if we have it.”

  “I know.” He nodded. “What do you have?”

  “Bobota with raisins.” It was a loaf made with salt, yeast, cornmeal, and whatever other more exotic ingredient Sarah could scrounge. Today, raisins.

  “Bobota would be wonderful then.”

  As Sarah plated it, she garnered the courage to ask him, “So what is the state of Corfu? Have you heard?”

  He frowned and shut his newspaper. “Yes, I’ve heard a terrible thing. They closed the Jewish school.” That was the school Sarah once went to with Benjamin and Rachel. “Jews have to report in for counting each week too. But unfortunately, those aren’t the worst things. The rabbi of Corfu now reports to the German commandant. Each evening, the rabbi must go to the German officers’ quarters. He must stand in the room as the commandant bathes. When the commandant emerges from the water, the rabbi is made to hand him a towel.”

  “While he’s naked?” Sarah managed, unable to fathom such a horrid, shaming scene.

  “Yes. It pains me to say it, but yes. And on the Sabbath, they make him work and sweep their floors.”

  Sarah cried then in silence for kind Rabbi Nechama, he of the booming voice at the Romaniote synagogue who kindled something in her heart when he sang. She’d subsumed her Jewish pride to be with Milos. Now she wept for Rabbi Nechama and the Corfiot Jews. She was a Corfiot Jew. She’d forgotten it, and now she’d remembered.

  She went home that evening, and Milos listened to her weep. They sat on their bed, teeth chattering in the December chill. Milos was filthy from a day at the quarry, but Sarah said, “You will not bathe until we resolve this.” He tried to reassure her. Maybe she wanted to be reassured.

  “So they closed the school, Sarah. They will go to a different school. It’s humiliating, yes, for the rabbi, but it’s not the end of the world. We just need to wait it out. Soon, the Germans will lose the war, and all of it will return to normal.”

  “No. I cannot accept that. I am going to see my family. The ferry still runs. I cannot sit by while they are in danger.”

  What Milos did next was squeeze her wrist very tightly. For days after, she could still feel the place where he squeezed it. “I forbid it, Sarah. It’s too dangerous now.”

  And so Sarah unraveled. Like one of the textiles over which her father hunched, Milos pulled the string, and she went to shreds. But did she ram her fists against his chest in protest? Did she say You are not the boss of me! I will do what I want to do?

  No, she did not. She accepted it like Milos was her master, like she did not have two feet that could have hitchhiked a ride to Igoumenitsa and boarded the ferry to Corfu.

  It is far easier to do nothing than it is to do something. So Sarah was quiet. She pretended that reality was not reality. She said stupid, worthless prayers when her own two feet could have taken action.

  Days passed as Sarah attempted to shove from her mind what Costas had shared. She continued to write her family letters, with nary a reply. Maybe Milos was right. She could sometimes convince herself of that in the dead of night as she lay awake, counting the panels in their thatched roof. Everyone was saying the war was as good as over. Soon the Allies would beat back the Germans. Then Sarah would be reunited with her family.

  But for now, the Germans had infiltrated their lives. People stopped looking at each other as much, just hurrying along on daily tasks, giving off fumes of fear. And the Germans existed in physicality too—waltzing into Sarah’s shop with their brisk commands, commandeering free goods. She always trembled on those encounters and for hours after, terrified those severe, unsmiling men would sniff out her Jewish-ness.

  Christmas and New Year’s arrived, and with them strange traditions that had once lived on the periphery of Sarah’s life and now moved into its forefront. The last of the celebrations was the Epiphany, the anniversary of the baptism of Jesus Christ, whom everyone kept blathering on about.

  “Who is this Jesus Christ anyway?” Sarah whispered on their way to church.

  She’d never been to church before, only passed by the exterior of the grand Church of Agios Spyridon in Corfu Town’s center. It housed the mummified body of the island’s patron saint, whom the Christians believed to perform miracles for all inhabitants. Well, Sarah wasn’t a believer, but she certainly wouldn’t refuse miracles performed for her family.

  “Who is Jesus Christ?” Milos repeated. “You can’t be serious, Sarah.”

  What was so crazy about the question? She supposed she’d heard the name bandied about by Milos and his parents, but she’d always tuned out the discussion. “It’s okay. You can tell me later.”

  He laughed, a surprising, uproarious sound. “Who is Jesus Christ? s
he asks.” He squeezed her side and laughed again, and Sarah laughed then too, for no reason at all. “I won’t soon forget that.”

  After church, an entirely bizarre and disconcerting affair, the congregants spilled out toward the shore, ushered along by the island’s philharmonic choir and children waving oranges by strings tied to their stalks. The sky was blue overhead, almost eerily so—a winter sky with the powers to distract and delude.

  When they reached the sea, Milos and his father and other able-bodied men swept out in trawlers for the much-hyped cross throwing. The bishop read some religious-sounding words. He was soft-spoken, tall, and thin, so different from big, booming Rabbi Nechama with his particular notes of prayer and song, Sarah’s foundation of home. A lump clogged her throat, recalling those old Sabbath days. As the bishop droned on, he inflamed her soul instead of soothing it.

  Suddenly the crowd began to chant, and then, even though Milos had prepared her, Sarah watched in amazement as the bishop tossed out a cross, and in unison, about fifty men dove into the frigid January sea to fetch it. Sarah prayed fervently for it to be Milos who found it, Milos who won, because the one who did was considered blessed and fortunate. And just in case Sarah was wrong about her God and Milos’s God was the one in charge, then she wished Milos to win because he’d promised to bestow those blessings and fortune upon her family.

  But eventually a man surfaced with a shriek, brandishing the cross. He was a portly fellow whom Sarah would have bet to sink rather than rise. Milos swam furiously to the shore and darted to her, shivering. Sarah wrapped a blanket around his shoulders.

  “I’m sorry it wasn’t me. I’m so sorry it wasn’t me, Sarah.” She nodded because he did sound awfully sorry, but she couldn’t access the words to console him. “Let us find the man with the cross. If you kiss it, it will bring you blessings just the same.”

  “It’s okay.” Sarah felt physical revulsion at the idea of pressing her lips to that thing.

  “I’m so sorry,” said Milos again, and Sarah could see how he needed her reassurance, to know he hadn’t failed her.

  “It’s okay.” Lies heaped upon lies.

  In the night, the wind howled outside like pleas, and her family populated her nightmares. In her head in the dark, Sarah was convinced they should take over boats and save them. But save them from what?

  In the daylight, she was sure she was overreacting. The Allies were closing in. Nonetheless, Sarah and Milos crumbled beneath the weight of what lived in her head.

  He was no longer her beloved Milos, but rather the boulder obstructing her path to her family.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Joey

  Florida

  2019

  Joey pulled up to the pink terra-cotta clubhouse where she’d spent the bulk of her teenage years, lifeguarding and eating free frozen yogurt. She was zonked from a day at Edith’s, if one could be zonked from accomplishing absolutely nothing.

  All of yesterday, she’d sketched ideas, masses of evil eyes, because that had first piqued Edith’s interest and they were indeed Joey’s specialty. But when she’d gotten in the space today and stared at the wall, attempting to feel what it was asking her to paint, it had all seemed wrong. The foyer needed something major. Something large-scale. Not lots of evil eyes, but one thing to hold its own against the coffee lid tapestry and the giant Lucite chandelier.

  She’d closed her eyes and tried to activate an image. Instead, all that had happened was that the butler had nearly tripped over her legs. As he’d said, brushing imperceptible lint off his jacket, he hadn’t expected the artist to be taking a nap.

  Joey knew the sign of a creative well run dry.

  That morning, Grant had suggested takeout for dinner from the Boca Beach Club, and Joey had offered to pick it up after her day at Edith’s. They’d decided on kale salads and turkey burgers in lettuce wraps from the club’s new California-style decorated-in-all-white spot where, appropriately, the kale salad was called the Wedding Diet Salad.

  Joey hadn’t confided in Grant, or anyone, about her recent binge. She was putting it in her past. Never again. She just had to be vigilant going forward, especially if she wanted to fit into her wedding dress. She couldn’t wait to slip on her pajamas and eat Wedding Diet Salads with Grant. They’d watch Bachelor in Paradise, maybe, and talk about anything other than her family, Leo, and the wall she had to paint.

  Joey switched off the ignition and smoothed her oversize white linen button-down. Then she twisted slightly to examine the butt of her slashed painter jeans from her college days. Before heading inside, she wanted to be certain that the rip that had resulted when she’d contorted herself on Edith’s floor to examine the wall from a non-traditional vantage point wasn’t indecent. Having reassured herself that nothing was poking out that wasn’t supposed to be, Joey locked the Jeep and followed behind two immaculately dressed women strutting on stilettos into the club.

  Joey gazed down at her sad feet clad in navy Adidas shower slides. Other than a few hiking trips she’d taken, she wasn’t one iota of sporty. Why had she let Lily talk her into this ugly trend?

  Suddenly, Joey noticed a woman in a prim pink trouser suit execute an ineffective duck behind a waist-high stone garbage bin. Her teased red hair popped out atop like some exotic flower.

  Was that G?

  G. Definitely G. What was G doing—?

  Then Joey saw her mother. And Lily. And Siya. What the…?

  She saw Lily punch something into her phone, and a moment later Joey’s purse bleeped. It was a text from Grant.

  Enjoy your bachelorette party! I know you didn’t want one, but Lily insisted she had maid-of-honor duties.

  A bachelorette party. God. Surprise throttled her, and disappointment—no Wedding Diet Salads on the couch—but Joey managed to serve up a strong face. She crossed the lot, zombie-like in her enthusiasm.

  A bachelorette party with her mother in attendance? She wondered where exactly that fell on the spectrum of fun to torture. But then the image of G drinking out of a penis straw made Joey spurt with laughter. She hadn’t wanted one of those productions, the type that threw together twenty friends from all walks of the bride’s life, each of whom paid a sizable portion of their monthly salary to attend. But maybe it would be nice to celebrate with something low-key. Chill.

  And zero photos of her shower slides permitted to grace social media.

  As Joey made it past the fountain in the center drive, she had a thought that made her want to run very fast in the other direction. What could she say? She was sick? She’d inadvertently dressed like a homeless swimmer?

  Leo was staying at the club. Bea hadn’t seen him yet, and worse—Lily didn’t know he was in town.

  * * *

  Joey was tipsy in the way that the private room Lily had arranged in the restaurant filled with a rosy glow. But she wasn’t so tipsy that she couldn’t comprehend the irony. A hostess was leading Leo to a table not four feet away, in the midpoint between the bachelorette party and the restaurant’s terrace. He sat, his back to them, framed by the sign strung over the private room door that read, SAME BACK FOREVER. Apparently Lily had ordered it from an Etsy shop—a play on the “same penis forever” bachelorette trope, in homage to the back being Joey’s favorite male body part. It made Joey giggle each time the sign popped into her periphery.

  Joey needed to text Leo ASAP to tell him to leave the restaurant. She rummaged for her bag, but it wasn’t under her chair.

  “Lil, do you know where my bag went?”

  Her sister glanced up mid-conversation with Bea about constructing a guesthouse in the Abramses’ backyard to house Lily’s growing media company. “That big canvas one?”

  “Yeah.” Joey sipped her jalapeño margarita, her eyes not straying from Leo’s back.

  “I thought it was your overnight bag. I had the guy put it in your hotel room.”

  “How could it be my overnight bag when I didn’t even know it was my bachelorette party? It had my
paints and stuff in it. And my phone!”

  “Your sister got you a hotel room, did you hear?” Bea said.

  “Actually, I got you all hotel rooms,” Lily said. “Boca Beach Club is one of my advertisers. The guy did me a favor.”

  “But I need my phone!”

  “Why do you need your phone?” asked Siya from Joey’s side, adjusting the bodice of her fuchsia minidress. “You don’t need your phone to get woke.” She made a jokey W with her hands, thumbs together, like the sign for an angst-filled “whatever” they’d used in middle school.

  Joey laughed in spite of the burgeoning Leo fiasco. “You are so uncool it’s terrifying.”

  “Whatever,” Siya repeated, hands back in the W-position. But she was laughing too. “Isn’t woke what all the kids are saying these days?”

  “I think you used it wrong. You’re looking for turnt. Or lit.” Joey felt only half present in the conversation. How could she tell Leo to leave without risking him swiveling around and being seen? Maybe she could write a note and tell a waiter to slip it to Leo. She just needed—aha!—a napkin to write on.

  “Turnt,” Siya mused. “Let’s turnt this party up. Do you want a passion fruit margarita next round?”

  “Sure,” said Joey absently, her eyes darting from Bea to Leo, from Leo to Lily.

  “You seem so…distracted, Jo. I mean, I know it’s your wedding. It’s not real to me yet.”

  Joey’s eyes flickered at her best friend. She really needed to tell Siya about Leo. She would tonight, she decided. Once they were alone. “I’m distracted because of this art commission. The timing is insane. And it’s not real to me either.”

  Joey glanced around for a pen, but nothing. She gave up. This note thing was stupid. She’d go to the bathroom and wave Leo over from a place out of sight from the private room.

  “Wait, so did I tell you that Aadesh’s sister, Kyra, went shopping with me for wedding shoes? I splurged on four-inch Manolos. Me! Manolos! Do you know what they are?”