Dollface

by Renée Rosen

  Curling myself into a ball, I grabbed a pillow to muffle my sobbing and my screams. I cried so hard I gave myself a headache and made myself sick, grabbing the waste bucket just in time. I flopped onto my back, the tears continuing to pour from my eyes, landing in my ears.

  AND BABY MAKES FOUR

  I sat in silence with my news for several days. I was in bad shape and nonstop nauseous. Everything smelled like fish to me, making me even queasier. All day long at the insurance offices of Schlemmer Weiss & Unger, I forced down soda crackers, praying they wouldn’t come back up and land on my Smith Corona.

  I didn’t tell anyone, not even Evelyn—who assumed I had the stomach flu and kept her distance, hoping not to catch it. I didn’t dare correct her. She didn’t know about Tony Liolli, but even if he hadn’t been in the picture, I didn’t want Evelyn discussing my condition over a round of pillow talk with Izzy. I couldn’t risk having Shep hear the news before I’d had a chance to tell him myself.

  With each day I grew more confused, acting as if there were choices to make—Tony, Shep, Shep, Tony—when really, the only choice was deciding when to tell Shep. I knew he loved me and he’d once said he wanted children. He’d be thrilled if he knew I was pregnant and we’d get married. End of story. End of my affair with Tony.

  But then I’d turn weak. What if Tony wanted to marry me? I knew that was an unlikely scenario. Tony loved me, but he wasn’t the marrying kind. But still, even if he would have me, I wasn’t ready to pick one man over the other. I questioned whether I knew either one well enough to marry them. I didn’t know Tony’s birthday or Shep’s favorite movie. I couldn’t have told you what size shirt they wore or if they still had their tonsils.

  And in turn, neither one of them knew that purple was my favorite color or that all my life I’d dreamed of falling in love with a handsome man who would get down on one knee, profess his love for me, place a diamond on my finger and whisk me away from my ugly past. Maybe I’d read too many novels, seen too many moving pictures, but that was how it was supposed to happen. Not like this.

  And, yes, I wanted to have a baby someday—three, to be exact—but how could I bring a child into a crime family? Was that fair? Especially when my own father had been murdered by men like that.

  There was one other option, though I told myself I could never go through with it. But I was scared and desperate and each time I pushed the idea aside, it boomeranged back with greater force.

  So I decided to call Tony.

  • • •

  When I arrived at his hotel room, Tony took one look at me and said, “What’s wrong? What’s the matter?”

  I tossed my pocketbook onto the bed and just came out with it. “I’m pregnant.”

  He pulled a matchstick from his pocket and slipped it between his lips. I went over and sat on the side of the bed and Tony joined me. Neither one of us said anything just then. I glanced over and I could see by the way his eyes went wide and then narrow that the news was sinking in. The elevator dinged out in the hallway and we heard a couple laughing until they keyed into their room.

  “So am I the father?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. . . .” God, I honestly don’t! How did I let this happen?

  Tony pitched the matchstick onto the nightstand. “Does he know?”

  “I haven’t told him yet.”

  He lowered his head to his hands and sighed. “So what do we do about this?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t want a baby. Not right now. I’m not ready.” After a week of wrestling with myself and weighing options, I had my answer. “Tony, you have to help me. Tell me you’ll help me!”

  “Help you? How?”

  “Don’t you know someone?” I reached over and clutched his lapels. “You must know someone who could . . .”

  “You mean like a doctor?” Prying my fingers off his suit, he stood up, padded over to the dresser, poured himself a whiskey and studied my face.

  “Please don’t look at me like that. What else am I supposed to do?” I dropped my head and cried into my hands.

  Tony threw back his drink, polishing it off with one gulp. He looked into the bottom of his empty glass and then gazed back at me. “Yeah, I probably know of someone.”

  “Will you help me?” I wiped my nose on my sleeve.

  Tony set his glass down, came over, and stood in front of me. “You’re sure this is what you wanna do?” He sat down beside me.

  Once I felt his arms around me, I dropped my head to his shoulder, the fabric of his jacket rubbing against my cheek. “I’m not sure about anything right now.”

  • • •

  Tony made the arrangements. All I had to do was meet him at his hotel room that Thursday and he’d take me to a doctor on Fullerton Parkway. Afterward, I’d tell Shep I wasn’t feeling well. Female problems. He wouldn’t ask questions. Not his department. I’d recover and life would go on.

  But it would be different now. It had to be.

  The time had come for me to make a choice. I couldn’t continue carrying on with both men. So I pictured my future with Shep and then with Tony, and then, in rare, fleeting moments, I saw myself walking away from them both. I felt more confused than ever.

  By the time I showed up at the Hotel Twenty-nine, I was light-headed and a little tipsy from draining my flask on the el ride over. Stepping off the elevator on the twelfth floor, I went to room 1201. As I knocked on the door, I opened my compact to check my lipstick one last time before I knocked again. And then a third time. Still no answer. I was about to knock once more, but heard the elevator car coming and left before anyone caught me hovering outside Tony’s door.

  I rode down to the lobby, staring into the iron pull gate, ignoring the elevator operator who’d been asking about the weather. I was dazed, wondering where Tony was. He said Thursday afternoon. It was Thursday, wasn’t it?

  The lobby was crowded with men seated in oversize chairs, reading newspapers, talking quietly among themselves. The faint smell of Clubman talc hung in the air. I knew it was Clubman because Tony used it and the back of his neck was always scented with it. I glanced about, certain he’d be standing nearby, but I didn’t see him anywhere. Maybe he was running late. Maybe something had come up.

  I went to the front desk to see if he’d left a message for me. After I pinged the little brass bell, I stepped out of one of my heels. I wore a new pair of pumps that day, and they were smarting. The marble floor felt cool and soothing beneath the ball of my foot.

  A stocky man with a pockmarked face stood off to the side at the front desk. “Hey, you—toots—looking for your boyfriend?” He stuffed the stub of his cigar into the corner of his mouth.

  I didn’t know who he was or if he knew who I was. Keeping my eyes straight ahead, I tried not to let anything register on my face.

  “You’re looking for Liolli, right?”

  My heart was pounding as I clutched my pocketbook and turned toward him.

  “I’ve seen you here before with him,” he said through a haze of smoke. “Yeah, I’ve seen you before.” He buttoned his double-breasted suit coat, his sapphire pinkie ring sparkling in the light. “I’ve seen you here with him.”

  I broke out in a clammy sweat and fidgeted with my bracelet and then an earring and then my bracelet again, wondering if he knew I was also Shep Green’s girl. It was for this very reason that I never lingered in the lobby. I told Tony we should meet someplace else. This hotel was too risky, too close to the Four Deuces, but he had said I was worrying for nothing. I should have trusted my gut. Not a doubt in my mind that this guy worked for Capone. He drew down on his cigar, and I busied myself with something in my pocketbook, but I could still feel his eyes on me.

  When the desk clerk turned up I asked if there was a message from Tony.

  He gave me a vacant look.

  “Tony? Tony Liolli. He’s a guest here.”

  “Oh! Mr. Liolli. I’m sorry,” he said, consulting the registry, “but Mr. Liolli has already checke
d out.”

  “He what?” The room turned upside down as I gripped the edge of the counter.

  “Just this morning. I’m afraid you missed him.”

  I felt the smile on my face stiffen in place. I couldn’t breathe. “Where’d he go? Do you know?”

  “Oh, miss, Mr. Liolli doesn’t tell me things like that,” the clerk said, leafing through the pages of the registry.

  “But I need to find him. This is important!” I was calling too much attention to myself. The floor turned wobbly beneath my feet. I was woozy as I worked my foot back into my shoe.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am, but I can’t give out any personal information about our guests. It’s the hotel’s policy.”

  A bellhop handed the clerk a room key and I slipped through the lobby, making it less than a block away from the hotel before I started to cry.

  Tony Liolli had run out on me. He saw his way out and he took it. It was over. He was gone and now there would be no doctor. I was pregnant and I was going to stay pregnant. My future flashed before my eyes: a crying swaddled child on my hip, dirty diapers piled on the bathroom floor, bibs and baby bottles everywhere I turned, me dressing in schmattas like my mother wore, my body stretched out beyond recognition. A new life inside of me was growing, but at the same time part of me was dying.

  I ducked into an alley, trembling as I doubled over, sobbing. People walked by, looked in, looked away. One young man stopped and asked if I was okay. Was I okay? No, I wasn’t okay. I was never going to be okay again.

  • • •

  I was in a fog and hardly remember how I made it back to the rooming house that day. What I do remember is a sensation that I had a sickness inside me that I had to get rid of. And I tried everything I could think of. I called in sick the next day, and while the others were all at work, I drank quinine and castor oil, remembering that had worked for one of the girls in the rooming house. Next I soaked in a scalding hot bath, gulping down gin. I didn’t even feel a cramp. Nothing. I didn’t know how long it was supposed to take, and I was so desperate I climbed out of the tub, reached for Evelyn’s tennis racket and swatted myself in the stomach until I cried out in pain and dropped to the ground.

  The next morning when I still hadn’t miscarried, I called in sick to work again.

  “You’re not warm,” said Evelyn, feeling my forehead. “You’re going to get fired if you keep this up.”

  “I don’t care!” I snapped. “I can’t go in there right now. I’m sick. I’m really sick!”

  “Okay.” She backed off, her hands raised in surrender. “I believe you.”

  I felt horrible not telling her the truth. I just couldn’t bring myself to tell her about Tony and the baby. I was terrified she’d say something to Izzy and it would all get back to Shep.

  When all the girls had left for the day, I went downstairs to the parlor. My hands were shaking and even before I picked up the telephone, I knew what I was about to do was a mistake.

  Someone answered on the third ring. “Four Deuces.”

  “Is Tony Liolli there by any chance?”

  There was a long pause and the knot in my stomach tightened. I could hear whoever was on the other end of the line taking a drag off his cigarette or cigar. I was sweating, my fingers gripping a porcelain vase that rested on top of the desk where the house phone was stationed.

  “Ah, sorry, Tony isn’t here. You, ah, you wanna leave a message?”

  I slammed down the telephone and batted the vase, watching it land on the floor, furious when it didn’t shatter into pieces. Not even a chip or a scratch. God, how I’d wanted the satisfaction of destroying something other than my own life.

  I looked at the telephone again, hating myself for still thinking about Tony. And what would I have said if he’d been there? I didn’t know if I still wanted Tony to take me to that doctor, or if I really just wanted to hear him say it—say that he didn’t love me anymore.

  After that I went upstairs and grabbed the bottle of bourbon I kept stashed in my bureau. I went to the closet and took out a knitting needle and headed for the bathroom at the end of the hall. Hanging my robe on the hook behind the door, I stood naked on the cool tiled floor, trembling. I didn’t know if I was more frightened of the pain or the consequences. I wasn’t proud of what I was about to do, but I couldn’t see another way out for myself—or for this child who deserved a better start in this world. I knew this would haunt me for the rest of my life. Wondered if I would ever be able to forgive myself. Worried that I might do permanent damage to myself and not be able to have children when the time was right. It all weighed on me. But the thought of being rid of it, of being free to get on with my life, canceled out every doubt, every fear, every worry.

  I sat on the edge of the bathtub, set my drink on the floor and reached for the wooden knitting needle. My thighs quivered as I spread my legs. Just do it! Just get it over with already. But I couldn’t. I grabbed my drink again and that time gulped down the last of the bourbon and took a deep breath. Now! Do it now! I clenched my jaw as I inserted the tip of the needle and paused. Collecting myself, I attempted another few inches. I’d gotten only three or four inches in when I heard someone coming down the hallway. I froze in place as my pulse raced and my heart hammered against my ribs.

  “Vera? Vera—you okay?” Evelyn pounded on the door. “I ducked out during lunch to check on you. I brought you some soup.”

  “I’m fine. Just, um . . . Just give me a minute. I’ll be right out.” I threw the knitting needle across the floor and buried my face in my hands. Tears streamed down between my fingers and mucus bubbled from my nostrils as my body shuddered in shame. If Evelyn had come home just five minutes later I would have gone through with it. I know I would have. She’d stopped me. It was a sign.

  I knew what I had to do. The decision had just been made.

  I DID AND NOW I DO

  Facing myself in the cheval mirror, I studied my long white satin gown and gauzy lace veil. It had been a rush job from the dressmaker, the same designer who made Dora’s wedding gown. It had mother-of-pearl buttons and hand-stitched embroidery. It cost a fortune but Shep didn’t mind. He just wanted me to have the dress of my dreams. It was perfect and yet I didn’t look anything like the bride I wanted to be. I turned to the side and flattened my hands across my stomach to see if I was showing. Not yet. It was the first week of May and according to the doctor I was only in my seventh week. I pursed my lips, studying myself in the mirror. There was no sparkle in my eye, no joy in my heart; I felt heavy and weighed down. I was not the sweet object of affection who had waited patiently for her man to propose. No, I had cheated my way into matrimony. I didn’t deserve to be a bride.

  “It’s starting to fill up in the synagogue,” said Evelyn, coming back into the dressing room.

  “God, I don’t want to be the center of attention right now,” I said, squeezing my eyes shut and rubbing my temples.

  “Oh c’mon now.” Dora stepped in and hugged me. “This is just typical prewedding jitters is all. Here,” she said, handing me her glass, “have some champagne.”

  I nodded and took a sip, but it wasn’t just the wedding; it was everything—it was the mess I’d made of my life. It hurt to breathe.

  I hated Tony Liolli, but goddammit, I also missed him. Everything reminded me of him. A crumpled package of Lucky Strikes resting on the vanity made me think of Tony—not because that was his brand, but just because he smoked. Earlier in the day a deck of cards got me thinking about his magic tricks. Anything Italian ,or just the mention of the South Side, made him flash through my mind. Everything led me back to Tony Liolli, including the baby I was carrying.

  “Oh c’mon now, honey,” Dora said. “You’re gonna be just fine. You should have seen me before I married Knuckles.” She smoothed out the crepe fabric of her dress and jangled her bracelets until they slid down her forearm, settling at her wrist.

  “I’ve never been so scared in all my life,” I said, taking another si
p of champagne. The girls all knew I was pregnant and not one of them judged me for it. “I’ve never changed a diaper, never fed a baby.” My voice began to crack. “I don’t know the first thing about raising a child.”

  “When the time comes, you’ll know what to do,” said Dora, stroking my arm.

  “Kids—I hate ’em. No good comes of them.” Basha reached for her flask tucked inside her garter. She took a long swig and dragged the back of her hand across her mouth.

  “What’s eating her?” I asked.

  “Squeak,” said Evelyn, adjusting her pearl necklace. “Squeak’s here with Mrs. Squeak.”

  “Oh, no, Basha, I’m sorry—”

  “Why the hell did you invite her, anyway?”

  “I didn’t. We invited Squeak—not her. You know I wouldn’t do that to you.”

  “It’s all because of his damn kids,” said Basha. She slurred her words, weaving in her high heels. It wasn’t even three o’clock yet.

  “Keep an eye on her, will you?” I pleaded with Dora and Evelyn. “I don’t want her to make a scene. And tell her to go easy on the sauce.”

  “Don’t you worry, honey,” Dora said with a smile. “We’ve got everything under control.”

  Just then my mother came into the room and the girls clammed up. “Can I have a moment alone with my daughter?”

  Without saying a word, my friends each kissed me on the cheek and excused themselves, sidestepping their way around my mother. She stood in the doorway studying my gown, twisting her mouth into a pucker that brought out every line around her lips. “This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be,” she said finally.