Orphan #8

by Kim van Alkemade

  “Not here, Mr. Grossman.” Bernstein’s low voice barely carried back to Rachel’s row. “Not in front of the young ones.” He gestured toward the back of the synagogue. Mr. Grossman followed the counselor’s gaze to the six- and seven-year-olds in the farthest rows. Even from this distance, he could see the fear in their eyes.

  Mr. Grossman lowered his arm. “I’ll deal with you later,” he growled to Sam, then stepped back. “Take them, then.” Bernstein led Vic and Sam from the stage. All eyes followed the boys as they made their way down the long aisle. Mr. Grossman cleared his throat. “Let me speak now of brotherhood,” he began.

  Rachel would have jumped up and followed her brother out of the synagogue were it not for the look Naomi shot back at her. More trouble, that’s all she would cause. She closed her eyes and made her mind go blank, stuffing her ears against the words spilling from the stage. Every passing minute felt like an hour.

  Finally Rachel sensed the children around her rising from the pews. Led by their monitors, their shuffling feet the only sound, they filed out of the synagogue. Once in the hallway, their voices, unleashed, echoed up the marble stairs as they recounted what they had seen. A counselor called out, “All Still.” For the first time in the history of the Home the words were ignored, no monitor willing to enforce the order with a slap.

  Naomi caught up with Rachel. “Bernstein will have taken Sam up to Nurse Dreyer for sure. Come on.”

  They retraced their morning’s steps. They found Sam in the Infirmary balancing an ice pack on the bridge of his nose. Bernstein was still there, and Vic, too, in a chair beside the bed. Rachel sat at her brother’s feet and laid her head on his knees.

  “Oh, Sammy, you shouldn’t have gone after Marc, not on account of me.”

  Sam lifted the ice pack and glared down at her, dried blood crusted on his mouth. “Do you even know what a brother’s supposed to do for his sister?” Nurse Dreyer pushed him back against the pillow and settled the ice. With his eyes closed, Sam said, “I only stick around here for you, but what’s the point? I can’t protect you. Naomi does a better job of that than me. I might as well run away.”

  Rachel sat up. “No, Sam, you wouldn’t really leave me here alone, would you?”

  “Look around you, Rachel. You’re not alone. Besides, what difference does it make if I’m here or not? I don’t think I can take much more of this.”

  Rachel remembered the slap she’d seen all those years ago from the window in Reception. She wondered how many Sam had endured between that day and this.

  “Come on, all of you,” Gladys Dreyer said, her perfume wafting over their heads. “It’s too crowded up here. Bernstein, you stay. Mrs. Berger’s coming over to talk to you and Sam. Everyone else, go on now. Sam’ll be fine.”

  Vic dropped an encouraging hand on his friend’s shoulder. “You’ll be good as new, Sam. Don’t let them get you down. Tell my ma I’m all right, will ya?”

  Sam nodded, then looked at his sister. “Go on then. You heard Nurse Dreyer, I’ll be fine.” Rachel saw a distance in her brother’s eyes that made her shiver, like he was staring at her through a scrim of ice. She leaned in to hug him, but he held her off. “Don’t,” he said. Rachel started tearing up again. “Don’t worry, I mean. I’ll see you tomorrow, at Reception, when we visit Mrs. Berger. Okay?”

  Rachel nodded. “Okay, Sam.” She followed Naomi and Vic out of the Infirmary. Bernstein lagged behind, conspiring with Nurse Dreyer.

  If she hadn’t been so worried about her brother, Rachel might have minded the whispers and pointed fingers that followed her through that long Saturday. Just before Last Bell, Naomi took Rachel aside in the F5 dorm and told her she’d heard from Millie Stember that Marc Grossman was being sent away to a military school up in Albany. Rachel was glad to hear it, even though the only consequence of what happened in the dark corridor that mattered to her now was Sam. She could hardly sleep, her anxiety alternating from his threat to run away to what else Mr. Grossman might do to him.

  The next afternoon, when Rachel went to Reception, Mrs. Berger and Vic were there, but not her brother. Fannie Berger wrapped Rachel in her fleshy arms. “He’s gone, kitten. Even with Marc away at school, it wasn’t safe for him here anymore.” Rachel barely listened as Mrs. Berger explained how she and Bernstein had pooled their money to stuff Sam’s pockets with crumpled bills before he slipped through an unlocked door and scrambled over the wall.

  Rachel broke away from Mrs. Berger. “But what will happen to him? Where will he go? Won’t the police bring him back if they catch him?”

  “He’s practically a grown man, he can take care of himself,” Fannie said. “He’s left the city, that’s all I know, but wherever he’s gone, I’m sure he’s fine.” Vic looked at his mother, a question raising his eyebrows, but she shook her head.

  “He’ll be all right out on the road, a tough kid like Sam,” Vic said. “He wanted me to tell you how much he loves you.” He gave Rachel a kiss on the forehead. She turned away, ashamed of the blush that colored her cheeks.

  Rachel remembered when the agency lady took her away from Sam, how he promised to come for her. She knew it wasn’t his fault he broke that promise. He was as young as the M1 boys, some so small she could rest a bent elbow on top of their heads. Sam couldn’t help it then, but he was sixteen now, not six, and this time he had left her behind on purpose. She felt as abandoned as on that first day at the Infant Home. Of the thousand children in the Castle, the millions of people in the city, none now belonged to her.

  In the distance, a bell rang. Across the yard, doors were flung open and children flooded out. Rachel felt their shouts smack against the glass like unwitting birds. She said her good-byes and left Reception. Wading through the crowded yard, dust gathered in her eyes. She had no lashes to blink it away.

  Chapter Ten

  THE SLEEPING PILLS DID THEIR JOB. THE NEXT THING I knew, the alarm was kicking me out of bed. It took a pot of strong coffee (I had to drink it black, I was out of milk) to clear the fog from my head. I was so eager to confront Dr. Solomon that I got to the Old Hebrews Home even earlier than usual. I had it all figured out in my head—dose Mildred Solomon first, but lightly, at eight o’clock rounds, then get to her last at noon. By that time she would be coming out of her morphine haze. I needed her coherent. She had so much to answer for.

  I had changed and was about to clock in when I noticed the calendar. Damn it. Gloria had me scheduled for tomorrow. When had that happened? We always had one or two days off between our long shifts. Speak of the devil, as Flo would say. Or think of her, anyway.

  “Good morning, Rachel. Bright and early as usual.”

  “Gloria, I don’t understand the schedule. I should be off tomorrow.” The potential delay of my appointment with Dr. Feldman threw me into a panic. It was taking all I had to hold my fears in check; the false calm wouldn’t last another day.

  “We talked about that a week ago. The other head nurse asked if I could switch with her, and I asked if you’d change, too, so I’d have someone I could depend on with me that day. Don’t you remember?”

  It rang a bell. Last week, I had no reason not to agree to changing shifts; this summer, one day was as long and lonely as the next.

  Gloria’s eyebrows drew together over her cat’s-eye glasses. “I was waiting for her to confirm her plans, so I didn’t write it on the calendar until I was leaving the other day. I’m sorry, Rachel, but I can’t see how to change it now. I’ve already switched everyone else around. And look, you’ll have three days off in a row afterward. You could spend some time on the beach, soak up the sun.”

  “But I made an appointment for tomorrow. . . .” I turned away from Gloria, afraid I was about to cry. I felt her hand on my shoulder.

  “Is something wrong, Rachel? Do you want to tell me anything?”

  “I’m fine, Gloria. I’ll reschedule my appointment, is all.”

  “Glad to hear it. You know how I rely on you.” Her locker clanged as she
took out her cap and pinned it over her bun. “I’ll send Flo in as long as you’re here.”

  Flo. I’d ask her, plead if necessary. Instead of following Gloria out, I lingered in the nurses’ lounge until Flo came in.

  “They say the early bird catches the worm, but really, Rachel, you’re making the rest of us look bad.”

  “You could never look bad, Flo.” I trailed her to the window. “I’ll have one, if you’re offering.” She looked surprised but knocked a Chesterfield out of the pack and handed it over, even lit it for me. The smoke did feel good, the warmth in my throat balancing the hot summer air. After a few drags I felt more steady. “Flo, I hate to ask, but Gloria changed my shifts around after I made an appointment for tomorrow. I was wondering, is there any chance you could switch with me? Come in tomorrow morning, then I’ll cover you that night?” I tensed. How much sympathy would I have to garner for her to agree? Nothing could be more pitiable than the truth. I braced myself to reveal it.

  “Sure, I could do that. I’ll be dead on my feet, but I’ll take any excuse to be out of the house.” She blew a smoke ring—I didn’t know she could do that. “My mother-in-law is visiting. She thinks I’m lazy, sleeping all day, even though I work nights. Bangs pots around in the kitchen making my kids what she calls a ‘real dinner.’ I would’ve asked you, but who wants to trade day for night?” She ground out the butt, tossed it out the window. “What kind of appointment?”

  “Oh, it’s to do with my hair.” It was a stupid thing to say, but I hadn’t thought that far ahead. “Sounds silly, I know, but I had to wait ages to get in.”

  “Like I said, any excuse to be out of the house while she’s here. Be thankful you don’t have to put up with a mother-in-law.” She grabbed my hand. “Oh, Rachel, I’m sorry. I’m an idiot, don’t listen to me.”

  I supposed she was remembering I’d grown up with no mother at all. Or was it that she felt bad for rubbing it in, me not being married? Whatever it was, I shrugged it off. “Don’t worry about it, Flo. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

  I clocked her out and myself in, then went to tell Gloria about the change. “Flo? The night nurse?” She scowled. “There’s a reason I wanted you, Rachel. I won’t pretend I’m not disappointed.”

  I’d never let Gloria down before; it was surprising how much her disapproval stung. I scurried off to prepare the cart for morning rounds.

  “DO YOU THINK you could get Mildred Solomon to take some broth again?” Gloria was checking off lunch trays, portioning them out to me and the other shift nurse. “She hasn’t eaten since you last fed her. I left a note in her chart for the doctor, asking if her dose might be lessened so she’d be able to take some food. See what he wrote back.” Gloria showed me the chart. The attending had replied to Gloria’s meticulously penned request in a barely decipherable scrawl. Start her on a feeding tube if she can’t swallow. We snorted in unison, the universal sound of nurses who know better than the doctors whose orders we follow. “See what you can do.” Gloria handed me the tray with Mildred Solomon’s broth and her next syringe of morphine. She would have never directly suggested I ease off her dose, but the possibility was implied.

  If only Gloria had known. The vial I carried in my pocket already held over half of Dr. Solomon’s eight o’clock dose. It was a risk, holding back so much, but when I saw her in bed it broke over me like a wave, everything she’d done to me. I wanted to shake her, smother her, smack her sunken cheek. Withholding some morphine seemed a restrained alternative. She’d be in pain, I knew, but the righteous thought that it served her right took hold of me. When I left her room after morning rounds, I’d closed her door to muffle any moans that might escape her parched throat as the morphine began to wear off.

  Entering with the tray, I saw Mildred Solomon’s arms and legs twitching beneath the sheets, like a child playing at snow angels. Bone cancer brings pain to the deepest parts of the body; no position of her limbs would ease their pinch and burn. She looked up as I entered the room, eyes bleary but expression sharp. “You’re late with my medication! Give me my dose, quickly.” Her voice scratched at my memories, like nails on a chalkboard. She rested against the pillow, anticipating the relief to come. “Be a good girl and hurry up, would you?”

  “I want you to eat something first. Can you do that for me?”

  “What do I care about eating? Can’t you see I’m suffering?”

  I sat in the visitor’s chair, the tray on my knees. “The doctor has ordered a feeding tube if you won’t take any nourishment.” I knew that would rile her.

  “Arrogant bastard,” she said, trying to raise herself up in bed. I cranked the handle to lift the mattress—as her hips bent, she moaned. “Let’s get this over with then.” She opened her mouth, an echo of that photograph of the child in the scurvy study. I spooned the broth between her shriveled lips. She gagged with each labored swallow. Determined, though, to outwit the doctor, she consumed all the broth I offered until she dropped her head back, exhausted.

  “There, I ate it all. Tell that to the doctor. Feeding tube, indeed. Do you know how uncomfortable those things are? Inhumane.”

  “I do know.” It was she, wasn’t it, who had shoved that tube down my throat? Not some anonymous nurse but Dr. Solomon herself. I remembered now, her necktie swinging over my face as she held up the funnel.

  Her breath was coming in shallow gasps. She gestured at the syringe. “It’s time. Not too much, but some, I need some. I need some now.”

  Instead of reaching for the syringe, I said, “In a minute. I want you to do something first.”

  She squinted suspiciously. “What now?”

  I didn’t answer. My eyes locked on hers as I unbuttoned my uniform to the waist, shrugging my arms out of the stiff, white fabric. Reaching behind, I unclasped my bra and pulled it away from my body. I looked down at my breasts, pale and tipped in pink, the nipples still small as a girl’s. I lifted Dr. Solomon’s hand, the fingers like a bird’s claw, and placed the tips under my right breast, pushing up. “I want you to feel this.”

  She didn’t have the strength to pull away. “Then I’ll get my medication?”

  “Soon, soon you’ll get your dose.” I pressed her fingers deeper. “Now, feel.”

  At first, the fingers were stiff, remote. Then the hand that had been trained as a diagnostic tool began to move of its own volition. It searched my breast, as if looking for a coin lost deep in a pocket. I winced at the pressure, the tissue tender. In a pucker of flesh, her fingers found a shape, circled it, judged its size and weight. Her pain seemed to be forgotten as Dr. Solomon exercised her profession.

  “There it is!” Excited as a squirrel, she pinched the buried acorn. Then the pain asserted itself and her smile twisted into a grimace. As her elbow sank toward the mattress, I leaned farther over the bed. Finally, she dropped her hand.

  “I don’t understand. Why did you want me to find your tumor?”

  “Because,” I said, our faces close. “Because you put it there.” I expected her to balk at the accusation, wrack her mind for what she might have done to deserve it, recoil as she confronted the consequences of her actions.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. What do you mean, I put your tumor there?” Dr. Solomon’s voice was tight with pain. “You said I’d get my medication. You promised.”

  With shaking hands, I hooked my bra and buttoned the uniform, adjusted my collar and cap. She didn’t understand, not yet. I’d have to prod her memory, pose the questions her medical articles had left unanswered. When she put it together, I was sure she’d be ashamed of the way she’d treated us, repentant for how she’d used me. I wondered if she’d ask me to forgive her. Would I be able to?

  “Do you remember the experiment you did at the Hebrew Infant Home, aiming X-rays at children’s tonsils?”

  “Of course I do, I’m not senile. It’s just that damn morphine, I can’t think straight, he prescribes so much.” Dr. Solomon closed her eyes. She seemed to be looking for som
ething. Was she finally remembering me?

  “Put me on the map, that study. No one had used X-rays on tonsils before.” She looked at me eagerly. “I met Marie Curie because of it, when she toured New York. Did you know that? Shook her hand, that very hand whose burns gave her the idea radium could be used in medicine. She congratulated me. Me! Thanked me, too, for my small donation to her radium fund. It was infuriating that the woman who discovered radium couldn’t afford any for her own research.” She stared at the ceiling, her suffering pushed back by the pleasure of remembering.

  “I almost didn’t get that residency at the Infant Home. Sure, they were starting to let women into medical schools, just enough of us to close down places like the Female Physicians College, but we weren’t exactly wanted, I can tell you that. Made me live in the dean’s house, where his wife could keep an eye on me. It was that, or room with the nursing students.” She spoke fast now, as if the words were outrunning the pain. “The Hebrew Infant Home had one of the best X-ray rooms in the city, all the radiologists wanted that residency. Dr. Hess only ranked me second because the dean’s wife made her husband put pressure on him. She championed me in her own stupid way, thought second place would satisfy my vanity, but why would I want second place when I deserved first? Then the idiot who’d been ranked ahead of me dropped a vial of radium. Can you believe the incompetence? We were in the laboratory at the medical college, passing it around—tiny thing, a tenth of a gram, but still worth thousands—until he bobbled it and let it fall into the sink. I remember his stupid face as he watched it disappear down the drain. Had to get a plumber in to melt the lead joints in the pipes to recover it. Once Dr. Hess heard about that, he nixed the idiot’s application. Well, everyone else had already accepted their residencies. My only prospect was a position in an outdated X-ray clinic in the middle of nowhere—Nebraska, I think it was, or maybe Wyoming—which I was putting off as long as I could. I was the best in my class, I should have had my choice of residencies. That’s what it was like for me, killing myself to be first just so I’d be in a position to capitalize on the stupidity of others.”