The Matrimonial Flirtations of Emma Kaulfield

by Anna Fishbeyn

  “He doesn’t expect you to get along with anyone—he just wants you to be civil to them.” “Oh, I’m perfectly civil.”

  “He’s in love with her, Cynthia.”

  “Oh, he’s always in love with the Jews, our son.”

  “Oh, dear God, not that again,” he moaned.

  “Can you honestly tell me that you’ve forgiven Russell for stealing all our money? Have you forgotten his Jewish origins?”

  “He was half-Jewish, the half that didn’t matter to him. We met him in the Catholic Church, Cynthia, for Christ’s sake! You can’t think every Jew is like Russell—you can’t blame our situation on these folks—” he whispered rather loudly.

  “Honestly, Hal, I can’t stand the way these upstarts come to our country and get rich, while you and I can barely keep our heads above water.”

  “These are nice people,” he said. “They don’t know about our troubles. It’s not their fault.”

  “You don’t seem to understand me, Harold—I don’t want Jewish grandchildren!” Her whisper became a hiss. I wanted to rush in and staple her mouth shut—I didn’t want to know or hear anymore but I was mesmerized by her hatred. My blood curdled again, the way it did when I was a child, indignation jolting me awake in the morning and indignation lulling me to sleep. How invigorating it might be, I thought grimly, bitterly, to battle life’s grand injustices again with my own mother-in-law!

  “I don’t want to stare into the eyes of little babies,” she spat, “and think to myself, ‘now there go our little Jews!’ They may have blond hair and blue eyes and they may be beautiful but that’s how people will see us from now on. We’ll be the grandparents of Jews. Of course not all of them are the same, I’m not disputing the existence of outliers—but their people have been so marred by common greed and mendacity that it’s impossible to have an open mind. To think that other people will associate me—with them—what purgatory!”

  The word “purgatory” grew louder and louder in my head, and I pulled myself away from the door. That’s when I saw it: her eyes catching mine through the French doors. Was she staring back at me? Did she realize that I was hiding, listening to her—was she doing this for my benefit?

  “Cynthia, my love—you’ve got to let go of your parents’ antiquated views,” Hal said beseechingly. “Don’t you remember, your father hated me too?”

  “It has nothing to do with my father, dear,” she trilled, her gaze quickly returning to her husband. “Until now all the Jews I’ve dealt with were acquaintances, neighbors, accountants, nobodies, but we’re talking about family—”

  “Remember us when we were in love—”

  “Don’t confuse apples with potato chips, Harold, we were perfectly matched.” Cynthia’s whisper grew louder. “Besides, I think she’s loose—like Eddie’s other one. A common whore.”

  “Where do you get ‘whore’?”

  “Call it a woman’s intuition—”

  “At this rate he’ll be alone and buried in work for the rest of his life!”

  “What are you proposing—to siphon him off to these people?”

  “What are you plotting, Cynthia?” Hal spoke in an almost inaudible tone, leaning fearfully into his wife.

  “I don’t plot, my darling Hal—I await opportunities. Besides, these people are very smart—they don’t want us as much as we don’t want them.”

  “Lenochka, gde ty, my sadimsya,” My grandmother’s voice rang through the library.

  “They’re yelling again,” Mrs. Beltrafio noted.

  “It’s rude of us to stay away.” Hal rose from the purple couch, but Cynthia remained in her seat, still and defiant.

  “Mother, Hal”—Eddie ran into the living room—“dinner is served.”

  I opened the door slightly and saw Mrs. Beltrafio beaming at her son, her eyes evaluating his face, shoulders, jacket, shoes. “You look wonderful, Ignatius,” she said softly, brushing her fingers along his forearm.

  “Mother, get up, we shouldn’t be rude.”

  “Give your mother a hand, I barely see you anymore.”

  She moved one shoulder toward him, but her arms stayed at her sides. He grabbed her arm and pulled her from the couch, his face cringing from irritation.

  “Be gentle with your mother, Ignatius, haven’t I taught you to be a gentleman?”

  “Mother, please don’t.” But he bowed his head and his body slumped into a subjugated curve.

  He held her tenderly this time, his arm guiding her forward as though she were blind. With his other arm, he held his father’s elbow, and the three of them moved in one synchronized uniform motion into the entrance hall. I froze, unable to feel my legs, my mind crashing into the same nagging, repetitive thought: he was their seed.

  During the initial stages of dinner, the Beltrafios looked like parrots pacing in a cage. They smiled, nodded, prodded each other under the table, and sought in our faces branches to hold on to before they drowned in our loud, boisterous laughter and melodious tongue. For Russian reigned over the appetizers like a necessity, like vodka, before English came wobbling in. I did nothing to remedy the situation; in those first couple of minutes, the Beltrafios had become one, and as one, they were my enemy. I refused to translate, to look at Eddie, to smile politely at his mother, to nod at his father. I wanted to starve them of language, to make theirs fade away; I wanted the engagement off and my life rewound to the moment I had first laid eyes on Alex. I regretted everything. Everything until Eddie said: “Did you know, Mr. and Mrs. Kabelmacher, that Emma is an incredible painter?” Until he touched my thigh under the table with the feverish urgency that sometimes gripped his entire body in my presence. And I felt his urgency within me, pulling me out of the fury I felt only seconds before. I felt myself being torn between two forces, or was it two selves? Who was whispering in my ear: you cannot wish this away, cannot snap your fingers and undo the damage of her tirade; you are in the thick of it, in the swamp of it, tasting the acid on your tongue—if you are indeed an individual, then you will choose—and each choice will be a compromise of your constitution, your principles, your will.

  “Of course ve know.” My mother looked at him, as if she was seeing him for the first time. “Our Elena is talent at many, many vonderful hobbies.”

  “This is not a hobby,” Eddie said bitterly.

  “So what does everyone think of Russia’s new democracy?” Hal appealed to my mother.

  “Many people zere are not happy,” my father declared like an expert. “Zey want tings to go back to ze way it vas. Democracy is chaos. Still, I wish my mozer was alive to see it all.”

  “What happened to your mother?” Mrs. Beltrafio inquired with interest.

  “Tree years after we left her, she need gall stone operation but in hospital, she got infection and died.”

  “That’s terrible!” Mrs. Beltrafio exclaimed, leaning across the table toward my father.

  My father’s countenance lost its social ease and camaraderie, and was replaced by a debilitating gray frown that immersed us all in the guilt he carried so ostentatiously on his sleeve. As he succinctly put it for my mother during their fights, “My mother’s blood is on my hands—not Yakov’s—it is I who left her.”

  My mother gave my father the usual two minutes of silence to demonstrate her respect for his feelings and then announced: “Well, in Russian hospitals, only strong survive. And zis so-announced democracy will not last. I give it ten, fifteen years at most and watch—some tiran—excuse me, I mean tyrrrant vill take control and it vill be back to dictatorrrsheep. Maybe not Communism zhis time, not like it was, but ze same prison.”

  “My wife is verrry pessimistic,” my father countered, retrieving his jolly persona. “I believe tings will improve. Look at America: it vas chaos when America vas young democracy—mafias and vild cowboys, and look at America now. All anyone talks about is Monica and Clinton entertaining oral sex!” My father erupted in laughter, then added, “Soon Russia vill follow example but zere no one care
s about oral sex or any sex for zhat matter!”

  Hal merrily joined my father with his own nasal chortle, and Mrs. Beltrafio stiffly grinned.

  “Always kissing ass to Americans,” Grandmother snapped at my father in Russian.

  “I wasn’t kissing ass—” my father meagerly defended himself. “I was making intelligent prognostications about the future of Russia.”

  “The future of Russia! Hah!” Grandmother grumbled, cackling, “Going to the dogs, that’s where it’s going—like it always was! There’s no justice, no justice in the world, as there’s no justice in one’s life. What can Yeltsin, that red-nosed drunk, do for the people now—steal more of their money to build himself more mansions? The KGB are the new mafia and that’s what they always were!”

  “What’s your grandmother saying?” Mrs. Beltrafio addressed me without looking at Grandmother.

  “She’s saying that Russia is going to hell,” Igor suddenly joined us in English. “And that we should stop listening to Russian radio, stop reading Russian newspapers, stop enjoying Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and Pushkin, and to irrefutably seal our separation we might as well cut out our Russian tongues!”

  “I vill toast to zhat,” my mother declared as if to signal this new era. “Let’s stop being Russian togezher!”

  “Well, I remember Russia being glorious,” Mrs. Beltrafio intervened. “The Hermitage was perhaps the most astounding museum I had ever set my eyes upon, and the golden-domed churches took my breath away.”

  “Vhen were you in Russia?” my mother asked.

  “I was a student in the late 1960s—I was doing a year abroad and in those years everyone wanted to see how the other side lived—”

  “Yes, I was student then too,” my mother murmured, “zhat was when Semeyon and I met.”

  My father looked at me and said, “Your mozer was most beautiful woman I ever met!”

  “Still is!” my mother corrected him.

  “Still are!” my father in turn corrected her.

  “My parents met at Moscow State University,” I told Eddie, “at a Komsomol meeting held for the whole university. They were sitting next to each other and my mother had a copy of Chekhov’s short stories in her lap.”

  “Dama s sobachkoy” my mother said.

  “Lady with a Lapdog,” I translated.

  My father jumped in. “I said to your mozer, ‘If you marry me, I’ll buy you whole collection.’ And you know vhat she reply? ‘Get in line! I already chave three suitors buying me Chekhov and all ze others are sworn to Pushkin. Vhat makes you different?’ So wizout blinking one eye, I said: ‘I don’t drink, smoke, swear or chave big ears.’ Your mozer look at my ears and say, ‘Zhat’s rare trait for a man.’ ‘Perfect ears?’ I ask. ‘No,’ she says, ‘understanding zhat women always want perfection.’ And zhat was zhat, as zhey say in fairy tales.”

  “We had to sell that kollektsiya,” my mother said wistfully.

  “Yeah, but you still chave my perfect ears!” My father laughed so hard tears sprang from his eyes. Then he swung his head from side to side to present the bewildered Beltrafios with two perfectly proportioned, miniature ears that lay snugly against his head.

  “So, Emma, how come you changed your name? Elena sounds very beautiful,” Mrs. Beltrafio inquired with aplomb.

  “I—I didn’t want—” I could barely remember why it was that I had changed my name; all that drummed in my mind were her perfidious remarks about Jews.

  “It was the Cold War and Reagan called Russia the Evil Empire,” I droned on with my stock response, when Igor suddenly stepped in. “Don’t you know, Mrs. Beltrafio, that Russian Jews are the most beleaguered people in the world?” He addressed her with a look of jaunty disdain. “The American Orthodox Jews hate us because we’re not religious. The American secular Jews hate us because we’ve managed, despite our jarring accents, to make more money than them. The American gentiles see us as relics of the Cold War, whom they still fear, and to be sure view us as inferior to themselves because we are not only Jewish but immigrants polluting their evolved nativism. But in general I find that American individuality is an illusion Americans feed themselves to feel at ease with their own prejudices. They prefer conformity over individuality. And while they like to ‘feel’ multicultural, in reality their cultures don’t mix at all. Look at the current state of black and white relations, for starters!

  “Except of course our Lena—she’s that perfect amalgam of two cultures, the Yin and Yang of Russia and America. Unfortunately that’s an illusion too, you see, created by die-hard assimilationists who believe immigrants can be neatly brought into the fold—folded into identical squares, stripped of their languages and everything else. If we completely negate who we were, only then can we change who we are and be accepted.”

  “Oh, I think Emma is doing a wonderful job,” Mrs. Beltrafio swooped in. “Why, I would never have suspected her of being an immigrant had Ignatius not alerted us to the fact! Her accent is downright Midwestern—you have to be extraordinarily talented to be able to pick up local dialect.”

  “No one can be both,” Igor protested. “For an individual can no sooner cut himself in half than he can change the color of his skin.”

  “Surely, you can be both,” Mrs. Beltrafio insisted. “Look at me—I’m a Catholic and an American.”

  This announcement sent shivers across the spines of all my family members, and a quiet gurgle of Russian spilled from their lips, culminating in the word “Catolik,” which now hung over the dinner table like an ear-splitting military helicopter.

  “There is a price to pay for wanting everything, Lena,” Igor continued with even greater determination. “No one can have everything in life, or you might lose your head—”

  “That’s the Russian ideologue in you talking,” I said. “In America, wanting is the only way to exist.”

  “Here, here!” Mrs. Beltrafio cried supportively, downing her wine glass, “that’s what I always tell my other son, Augustine, you must fight for what you want, not let life pass you by.”

  “You have other son?” my mother inquired. Then in Russian, she berated me: “What’s going on—why didn’t you tell us this?”

  “Told us what?” Grandmother asked.

  “Eddik has a brother,” my father explained.

  “Where is he? That’s very suspicious,” Grandmother noted.

  But Mrs. Beltrafio, to my utter shock, seemed intent on saving me. “Oh, this is our fault, Sonya—we wanted to surprise you. Andy was going to come with his wife and twin boys, but then our manager fell ill and Andy felt he absolutely had to stay. He heads my husband’s business, you see—I’m not sure Emma told you but we’re in the transportation industry.”

  “They’re small-time merchants,” my mother told Grandmother in Russian, while smiling at Cynthia, “not intellectuals!”

  “I knew it,” Grandmother countered in Russian, “but she acts like she’s some sort of aristocrat!”

  “Did you know, Mr. and Mrs. Beltrafio”—Igor addressed Eddie’s parents in a glowingly acerbic tone—“we used to war in this house over who Lena should marry—an American or Russian. The case against Russian men is that—”

  “They are shovitin pigs,” Sirofima cried in delight.

  “Chauvinist—chauvinist pigs,” Bella corrected her daughter.

  “Yes,” Igor said, nodding, “I plead guilty to that pleasure myself.”

  “And the case against American men?” Eddie asked, facing Igor like an adversary.

  “Oh, don’t you know—hasn’t our American ambassador informed you—they are stupid.”

  The table quieted down, and my parents in a unified gasp fixed their eyes on Eddie.

  “Thank you, Igor”—Eddie came back with a splendid, genial laugh—“for brilliantly alerting me to a major national epidemic. But if we wipe out male stupidity, right up there with teenage pregnancy and drug abuse, the country will be overrun with pompous mudaks!”

  A quiet laugh percolated
from Bella to my parents to my grandmother until it met Igor’s grim countenance, where it died.

  “What’s a mudak?” Mrs. Beltrafio wanted to know, but none of us answered.

  Only my father offered a way out. “Let’s make toast—to ourrrrr new family! To new beginning!”

  “I’ll drink to that!” Hal Beltrafio lifted his arm in the air as if to break free from his wife, and shouted, “To my wonderful new family!” My father extended his wine glass so far across the table to reach him that we felt his unwavering spirit of harmony and camaraderie soothe our aggravated throats.

  Grandmother brought out the stew and placed it directly under Mrs. Beltrafio’s pointy chin. A big white bone containing the cow’s brain sat in the middle of the platter.

  “What’s that?” Mrs. Beltrafio inquired with a gracious smile.

  “Stew with a cow’s brain,” Sirofima declared.

  “Be quiet, Sirofima,” Grandmother commanded in Russian, “let them eat it first. Haven’t we taught you yet to keep your mouth shut?”

  “Grandmother doesn’t want me to tell you,” Sirofima explained to Cynthia, unaffected by Grandmother’s escalating wrath, “but you should eat it. Grandmother says it has more vitamins than all the Total cereals combined.” Sirofima had her father’s dark, brooding brown eyes that seemed already vexed at the ignorance in the world.

  “Is that kosher?” Mrs. Beltrafio asked to avert attention from her injured sense of propriety.

  “I told you already—they don’t keep kosher,” Eddie said.

  “Well, surely I can try new things,” Mrs. Beltrafio announced with enthusiasm, but neither of her hands moved to partake of the cow’s brain.