by Alan Shapiro
Tula seemed to blame them all for everything, the stroke, the slurred speech, the inability to walk; she blamed them all, it seemed, Miriam especially, for being there to see her in such need. It was as if she thought their health had caused her sickness, and so to punish them, to show them all who was boss, she would not cooperate. She wouldn’t deign to help them help her.
By the third day, she seemed calmer. When the doctor examined her, she responded to his questions: she touched her fingers, she blinked, she nodded. She also expanded her repertoire of sounds.
At one point she said to Miriam, “I wa . . . I wa . . . I wa . . .”
“What mother?” Miriam asked. “What do you want? Do you want something?”
“I wa . . . wa wa wa,” but she couldn’t sound it out. She grunted in frustration and turned her head to the tray table beside the bed, toward the pen and paper by the phone.
Miriam handed them to her. Slowly, in a trembling script, she wrote “smoke.”
“Smoke?” Miriam asked. “Do you smell smoke?”
She frowned. She wrote, “No, goyishe kop, cigarette!”
Miriam wouldn’t buy them for her. “They’ll kill you,” she said. “You want to die?”
Her mother nodded yes, yes I do, the sooner the better.
SHE HAD JUST gotten home and started dinner when the phone rang. Miriam’s heart sank when she heard Sigrid Rosenberg, her neighbor down the street, say, “Miriam, dear, I’m so sorry about your mother.”
Miss Gloom and Doom, appearing as always at the first scent of catastrophe. “How nice of you to call,” Miriam said. “I’d been meaning to call you, too, but, well, you know . . .”
“Of course, dear,” Sigrid said. “Such a terrible time. I know. I don’t want to bother you; I just wanted to know how your mother’s doing.”
“She’s coming along, but it’s not easy.”
“No,” Sigrid said, “easy it never is. But your attitude, staying positive, looking at the brighter side—that makes all the difference.”
“I’m sure it does.”
“So many in the camps,” Sigrid went on, “they just gave up, stopped trying, and next thing you know, caput, they’re gone. But the fighters . . .”
“Oh, my,” Miriam interrupted, “look at the time. I’m running late, and the kids will be home soon.”
“Like your mother,” Sigrid continued. “I can tell she’s a tough one, that one, you wait.”
“Yes,” Miriam said, “she’s a fighter. Always has been, but really Sigrid I have to . . .”
“Family is so, so important, darling. Without it, you’re nothing. Take it from me.”
“I certainly do,” Miriam said.
“Do what?”Sigrid asked.
“I, um, you know, take it from you,” Miriam stammered, “take to heart, I mean, what you’re saying, and I really appreciate you calling, but I have to get dinner going.”
“Such an ordeal,” the woman said, “sometimes you have to wonder.”
“Well,” Miriam said, “I’ll give my mother your regards. Thanks so much.”
“Don’t mention it,” Sigrid said, then added, “How’s that little one of yours, the blond?”
“Sam?”
“The one who walks around with his shoes untied.”
Miriam had no idea what she was talking about. “Why do you ask?” she said.
“Some day he’s going to trip and break his skull.”
“Okay, well, thanks for calling,” Miriam said and hung up before Sigrid had a chance to say another word.
MIRIAM GOT THE kids off to school each morning, then spent the remainder of the day at the hospital managing her mother’s care. She forced her to do the physical therapy; she encouraged her, she cajoled her, sometimes she scolded her as one would scold a stubborn child. It was worse than getting Ethan to his music lessons. It was as if their roles had suddenly been reversed, the neglected daughter now the mother, and the mother—always so brusque and independent—now a needy and helpless child. Miriam couldn’t see herself as rising heroically (and forgivingly) to the occasion, although she tried. God knows she tried. Day by day, singing to herself “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” she carried out the task as best she could. Within a month, her mother could speak again, though her words were slurred; she could also walk, though she shuffled unsteadily like a toddler. Her left shoulder never regained feeling, so when Miriam would lose her temper, as she sometimes did, when she’d catch her mother smoking, or complaining or refusing to do anything to help herself, Miriam would hit her not terribly hard, and only there in the shoulder where her mother had no feeling.
ONE AFTERNOON TOWARD the end of her mother’s rehab, Miriam saw a well-dressed man in the dayroom sitting by her mother’s chair. He leaned close, their heads nearly touching. As Miriam approached, she noticed they were holding hands. The man rose when he saw her.
“Senorita,” he said, smiling, taking her hand and kissing it. “You remember me, of course, your mother’s friend, Issa Perez. New York, so many years ago?”
Yes, Miriam remembered. Of course. So good to see him.
He was heavier now and his hair was graying, but he looked as elegant as ever, a middle-aged Ricky Ricardo. His left eye seemed to wince when he smiled, making his impeccable manners and his poise seem shaky, fragile.
“I see your mother wasn’t exaggerating,” he said. “You’ve become quite a beauty. No wonder she’s so proud of you.”
Proud of her?
“When Tula didn’t come to town last month, and didn’t call, I wondered. I telephoned the store and they told me what had happened. Your mother didn’t want me to come, but I had to see her.”
Tula said slowly, haltingly, as if reading from a poorly printed script. “Tell him, Miriam, tell him to go away. To go home to his wife.”
“But darling,” he said, reaching for her hand, which she pulled away.
“Go home,” she repeated. “This isn’t me. There’s no me here. This,” and now she waved her hand over her lap, “this is not me. Go away, all of you.”
“Darling,” he implored, “sweetheart, you don’t mean it.”
He turned to Miriam. “Can’t you reason with her? She can’t just turn her back on me, on all our years together.”
Years together? What years? How? Who was he, anyway, this married man? And where was the black-haired daughter, was she, too, part of “this” history they shared, their separate life, or was he as much a stranger to his daughter as Tula was to Miriam? Why should Miriam help him?
He looked stricken. His bottom lip was trembling. Miriam understood only too well what he was feeling, his helplessness, his pain. She remembered the lobby of the hotel and the chandelier she had to sit beneath for hours while he and her mother disappeared to do who knew what; she remembered the toy store on the avenue at night and all the strangers rushing past her, the terrifying loneliness; she felt in her very nerve ends everything he now would have to do without. She thought of sad Miss Julie, and she felt sorry for the man; she thought of the two-timing riverboat gambler and she hated him. She didn’t know whether to sock him or take him in her arms and sing his pain away. All she could do was stand there, dumbfounded.
“Senorita,” he said, taking her hand again and kissing it. “I should go now.” He handed her a card. “If she changes her mind, please let me know. Be good to her, please, for my sake.”
After he left, Miriam and Tula sat in silence for a while, until Tula said that she was tired and wanted to lie down. “Okay, Mother, whatever you want.” Mr. Perez’s card fell to the floor as Miriam rose. She left it there. She took her mother’s arm and helped her up and walked her carefully down the hall to bed.
Scene IX
What an odd child Sam was becoming. So pretty, with his blond curls and big green eyes, that people would stop Miriam on the street and say, Ooo such a beautiful boy, I could eat him up, I could just kill him! But what they didn’t know were his quirky needs and habits. With Ethan and Julie, s
he could go anywhere, do anything. At the beauty parlor, Ethan (for a little while anyway) would thumb through magazines, and Julie, of course, would read her book. But Sam, he couldn’t sit still; he’d follow her to the chair and ask what this or that was, what the different combs were for, the different clippers, could he use the electric razor? What’s so permanent about a permanent, if it doesn’t last? And why does it smell so bad? You couldn’t take him to a restaurant or to someone’s house for dinner because he wouldn’t cut his food—he said eating food cut with a knife gave him a sore throat. He’d jam his fork into a steak and gnaw at it like an animal, like he grew up in a barn. And then there was the fuss he made about his clothes. On school days, he wouldn’t leave the house until he’d gotten his shirt tucked in just so. He couldn’t bear the thought of the shirt coming loose. She could never tuck it in far enough. After she’d tighten his belt to the last notch, as far as it would go, he’d raise his arms and wail if the shirt pulled out even just a little. It was as if he thought the world would end, as if life itself depended on his shirt staying put. Finally, she or Curly would get so enraged they’d blow up: “For Christ’s sake, get out of the house, you crazy kid you, you’re gonna drive us nuts.” Now that Sam was eight, Miriam decided he should spend his Friday nights at her mother’s apartment, to keep her company. The old lady took an interest in the boy that she never seemed to have for either Julie or Ethan. She loved to show him off to all her friends in the building. What a doll, she’d say. Her mood brightened whenever Sam was there.
“Why do I have to go?” Sam would ask. “Why can’t Julie or Ethan go?” And Miriam would say, “Because you’re her favorite, that’s why. It’s just one night and she’s lonely, and you’re going, and that’s the end of it.”
Every Friday night followed the same routine. For dinner, Tula gave him a steak and baked potato, and a glass of ginger ale. At least she didn’t care if he ate his steak with a fork. Then they’d visit her neighbors in the next apartment, Fanny and Gerta, two sisters, identical twins, in their eighties. To Sam, they looked like carbon copies of the Wicked Witch of the West from The Wizard of Oz: long nose, spiky chin, and thin lips that, even closed, seemed to be smiling, or just about to. They even dressed in black. The apartment smelled musty, like a cedar closet full of mothballs; there were rugs everywhere, and thick drapes, dim lamps, and stone sculptures of little naked men and women. The three women would smoke and tell the same stories and repeat the same complaints. At some point in the evening, Fanny and Gerta would take turns repeating their favorite Burma-Shave poems from the safe-driving billboards along the highway. One sister would recite the poem, and the other would say, “Burma-Shave.”
Don’t lose
Your head
To gain a minute
You need your head
Your brains are in it
Burma-Shave
He tried
To cross
As fast train neared
Death didn’t draft him
He volunteered
Burma-Shave
Eventually Gerta would bring up the subject of her ex-husband and how selfish and cruel he was.
“No-good bastard,” Gerta would say, and Fanny, who had never married, would add, for Sam’s benefit, “Pardon her French.”
“Empty my bank account,” Gerta would continue, “and walk out on me like that, without a word, not even a note. Not even a telegram.”
“Not one bit of explanation,” Fanny would offer. “Imagine that!”
“And mine,” Sam’s grandmother would say, “mine, what a greenhorn, the way he dressed, the way he spoke, and a penny-pincher, you wouldn’t believe, and if I wanted to do something with a girlfriend, you know, see a picture or get a drink, he’d get all high-and-mighty. It isn’t right for a married woman to be out alone on the town, like a tramp, a regular floozy—and this from a butcher. I couldn’t stand it.”
“What are you gonna do,” one sister would say, and the other would add, “Not a goddamn thing.”
Turning to Sam, his grandmother would ruffle his hair and say, “But this little one, what a husband he’ll make, that’ll be some lucky broad!”
“What a catch,” the sisters would say together. “We could eat him up. We could positively kill him.”
Then Gerta or Fanny would sigh, and say, “What are you gonna do?”
And getting up to leave, his grandmother would sigh, too, and add, “Not a goddamn thing.”
BACK IN HER apartment, with Sam on the couch, and his grandmother in her recliner, a halo of cigarette smoke around her head, they’d watch Rawhide and Gunsmoke, Sam’s favorite TV shows, though halfway through Gunsmoke his grandmother would begin to cry. She’d sob, “Issa, Issa,” or “My goddamn body,” and when he’d ask what’s wrong? why’s she crying? who’s Issa? she’d just keep crying, as if he wasn’t there. And then there was what always happened next when the show would end and it was time for bed. He dreaded bedtime because there was only the one bed, so they had to sleep together, and every single night he’d wet the bed. He couldn’t help it. He tried not to fall asleep but he always did. And he would wake up to “Oy Gott, oy Gott,” as she lifted off the damp nightgown, and made him take off his pajamas, and together, naked, in the dark room they would change the sheets. He couldn’t look or not look at the horrible breasts, the enormous overhanging belly, and the flabby legs. When the bed was made, he’d lie down with his back to her, on the far edge of the mattress and wait for morning.
And when morning came, he’d dress and kneel beside the window and look down at the street below, watching for his mother’s car. His mother always promised that she’d be there by eleven, but it was often after three before she showed up. For hours he’d watch the cars pass, never breaking his vigil, not responding even when his grandmother would ask him if he wanted something to eat, or did he want to watch cartoons, or what was wrong—why won’t he talk, cat got his tongue? He wouldn’t talk, he wouldn’t turn around. He knew he hurt her feelings, but he didn’t know what else to do. By the time his mother appeared, he’d be too eager to get home, and too guilty about his own behavior, to show how furious he was. He’d sit beside Miriam in the car, in silence, while she told him how much good it did her mother to spend time with him. “You’re the only one she loves,” she’d say. “If it weren’t for you, she wouldn’t want to live.”
Scene X
Ethan’s teacher, Stuart, was in his early forties. He was not what Curly would call “a man’s man.” A little portly but not fat, and always dressed impeccably, in blue blazer and bow tie, he was witty, attentive, courtly. “And how are you today, my dearest,” he’d always ask when Miriam arrived. Then he’d take her hand and bow slightly. His voice, so articulate, so refined, reminded her of Mrs. Pinkerton’s voice, her high school teacher, though without the snootiness, without the poetry she hated. He knew everything about show business and Broadway, and had even worked with Buddy Greco a few years back, the Buddy Greco, one of Miriam’s favorite singers. He also played the piano like nobody’s business. She loved to watch his delicate and nimble fingers dance across the keys. And best of all, he had a way with Ethan, who would listen to him and never argue, never talk back. And he recognized Ethan’s great potential. He said he’d never had a student with talent like Ethan’s. Oh, the sky was certainly the limit.
Miriam looked forward to the Saturday and Wednesday lessons. She loved the bright lights of the studio, the musty smell of the place, the mirrors along one wall, and the floor-to-ceiling window that divided the office from the studio, the office where she’d sit and watch in rapture as Stuart taught the kids to “shuffle off to Buffalo” or step/kick/step, or sing a medley of numbers from Bye Bye Birdie, Carousel, or Oklahoma. Watching Stuart, she felt a new connection to the theater, to show business and Broadway. And the excitement she had felt on that first visit to New York, the grandeur of the stage, the oversized emotions of the songs, the way even the saddest words were changed to joy and pleasu
re by the perfect voices singing perfect melodies—she felt it all again, with an overpowering freshness. Sometimes, during a dance number, Stuart would ask Miriam to sing along with him, and while she belted out a number from Pal Joey, or Porgy and Bess, or Damn Yankees, a happiness would overtake her, a sense of being right where she belonged, where nothing bad could ever happen.
ETHAN’S FIRST PUBLIC performance was during the intermission of the New England Fashion Show at the Statler Hotel in downtown Boston. Everyone who was anyone, all the muckety-mucks, were there, even Joan Kennedy (Teddy’s adorable wife) wearing a smart blue suit dress with a short cropped jacket, accessorized with a pearl necklace and white gloves. Miriam was sitting right behind her, two rows from the stage where, cameras flashing, the stunning models paraded the latest styles, styles her mother would have carried had she not had to sell the business after getting sick. It was like the mannequins had come to life before her, in swing or poodle skirts, and pencil skirts; in dresses with bolero sleeves and Peter Pan collars “softening the neckline” and tapered waists to emphasize what the MC called the “hourglass figures of today’s American wife and mother,” figures not much smaller than Miriam’s, which could still turn a head or two on a good day.