Tomorrow There Will Be Apricots

by Jessica Soffer

  Just after Joseph and I gave up the child, he took me for a picnic by the Hudson River. We found the perfect spit of grass. We bought hot dogs and soda. We even bought a kite. We were very quiet, the two of us, spinning on separate planes with our thoughts. We hardly said a word for hours, just staring, eyes glazed over, trying to get used to ourselves again. Eventually, it got dark. Joseph held my hand, put a sweater beneath my head, and we lay down to watch the sky.

  “What?” I said, finally. “New York doesn’t have stars?”

  He laughed.

  “Come on,” he said and nudged me.

  But you could hardly see them. In Baghdad they felt so close, like snowflakes on your lashes. It occurred to me that I didn’t really miss Baghdad after all. What I missed was the person I’d been when I was with Joseph there—when I’d been happy and unafraid of losing him and unaware of what could happen to a person when she refused to admit to sadness, to a gaping hole—and my former self felt like a stranger insisting that she knew me, absolutely sure of it.

  “Look harder,” Joseph said. “They’re there. Look hard.”

  Now I began rewrapping the lamb in some wax paper but I didn’t have enough. I’d thrown out the butcher paper, not thinking. So I had to use tin foil too. It was a mess, in the end, as if half-ravaged by animals. I couldn’t imagine what I’d do with all the food. I might cook the dishes as planned and give them away. But I didn’t think I could carry all the vegetables, rice, sauce, and so on. I’d collapse before reaching the front door.

  I dumped the lamb into the garbage can. Joseph would have told me about the starving children. “I can’t right now,” I said aloud. “So cut it out. I just can’t.”

  I poured the water back into the sink. It splashed against the sides and got on Dottie’s dress, but what did I care? No one to see it. I told myself that I would never have to get dressed up again. If I felt like it, I could stay in fleece until the day I died.

  I went back to the bedroom. I leaned on the wall to take off my shoes. I had to sit down to get hold of the buckle. I untied the dress. The buzzer rang. One shoe on and one shoe off.

  I yelled, “One minute!,” as if my voice might carry out the window and down to the street. I yanked at the other buckle. I was getting heated. I was getting winded. I yanked so hard the buckle broke. The shoe flew across the room, smacked against the wall, and then stopped. I had to smile. I wasn’t dead yet.

  “Coming!” I said. I held the dress closed as I made my way through the house, leaving a trail of baby powder across the floor. Things bobbled. My skin had a life of its own. If Joseph could see me now, I thought, he’d jiggle his skin too, in soli- darity.

  “Coming!” I yelled again.

  Dottie heard me upstairs. She tapped with her foot. Not now, Dottie, I thought. Not now, please.

  “Hello,” I blurted into the buzzer, panting, letting my shoulders drop forward and my head rest on the wall. The dress was open. I could see my own underwear—and everything.

  The voice, when it came through, was garbled, static.

  “I can’t hear you,” I said.

  Dottie would have called me a lunatic. I know what she would have said. You’re going to let someone upstairs? You don’t even know who it is? And you not dressed? Where shall I begin?

  “Come up,” I said, and pressed the buzzer to unlock the downstairs door.

  I waited with my eye to the peephole, my heart pounding like an angry fist. Seconds later, a girl emerged from the stairwell, her feet barely tapping the floor. I stepped back, shocked. She wasn’t a fifty-year-old lady. She wasn’t my daughter. She wasn’t Robert either. She was fifteen, if that. Her cheeks were the color of brick. I opened the door. She was wearing a rain jacket, and her hands were hidden in her sleeves.

  “Sorry,” she said. “The subway was so slow. I got out at Ninety-Sixth Street and walked.”

  Her voice was deeper than I would have thought. She took off a hat that looked too big for her, all flaps and flannel. She was long-necked, reddish-haired, and freckled, but olive in the skin, as if she’d been shaded. Her eyes were light blue, like ancient sea glass. She took off her sneakers without using her hands and then leaned over and placed them neatly by the door. They were flat as pancakes, with shoelaces that didn’t match. She was wearing socks with white bugs on them. She curled her toes when she saw me looking.

  “You know they eat them in Thailand?” she said. “Oven-baked with green curry.”

  “Socks?” I asked.

  “No,” she said and the sides of her cheeks lifted into a smile. “Crickets on my socks.”

  I squeezed my hands to get a hold of myself. I had to. Otherwise I would have stood there, unmoving, until the sky fell.

  Her eyes plucked around the small, unlit foyer while she braided her hair, fast fast fast. She had a cut below her chin. It was nothing big, but what an odd spot, I thought. What might she have been doing? I wouldn’t ask. This was the new me: this polite kind of thinking.

  “Am I the only one here?” she asked. Before I could answer, she said something else.

  “It’s okay if I am,” she said.

  “You are,” I said.

  I was still fumbling with the dress, like a ninny. The knot had come entirely undone. Here’s my bra, folks. Twenty-five cents a peek. Twenty-five years old too.

  “Do you need help?” she asked. “My mom has a dress like this.”

  She unknotted the thing in an instant, careful not to look where she shouldn’t. She nearly hugged me as she wrapped it around my back and tied it on the side. She was as tall as me but with lighter bones. Her jacket smelled sweet, like tea with milk. She had long feet. I had long feet too, but I didn’t mention it, not wanting to embarrass her. I knew it wasn’t the greatest feminine quality.

  “There,” she said, cinching the bow. When she straightened up, she looked past me. Not at me, though she didn’t seem shy. She had a freckle below her eye. Me too. I pointed to it, realizing that I was speechless. I hadn’t said a word. She laughed.

  “I noticed that,” she said. “We match.”

  I could feel the cold come off her body. What was wrong with me? This was no way to treat a guest.

  We stood there for a moment. It was me that was supposed to do something now but I’d been thrown off totally—and then thrown off again. I remembered that the lamb was half wrapped in the trash. What was I thinking?

  “Smells like zucchini bread,” she said. “Smells really good.”

  “Date bread,” I said. “From my country.” Oldest trick in the book: bake something to make guests feel at home.

  I wasn’t sure what to do then so I began walking into the kitchen. She took off her coat.

  “Oh,” I said. “How stupid of me. Let me take that.”

  She crumpled it into a little ball and handed it to me. I unrolled it and hung it on the doorknob. We stopped at the kitchen. I looked at the mess.

  “Wow,” she said. “This is really nice. Our kitchen is like this divided by four.”

  She delineated the space with her arms.

  “We’re always getting in each other’s way,” she said.

  I thought about asking her who each other was, but didn’t. I wanted to. The truth was, I hadn’t had much experience with girls of this age. Any age really. That would have been fine for Joseph. He could have spoken garbage to a garbage can. But I was awkward, overthinking everything. I hadn’t taken this into account, a child. I could have known young girls like this. I could have watched one grow. We would have had birthdays for her in the park. We would have brought all the ingredients for falafel sandwiches. Her friends could have made them however they liked and wrapped them in wax paper cones. Pickles or no pickles. Tahini sauce or no tahini sauce. Her birthday parties would have been a hit, I thought. All the kids would have liked them best.

  “What’s your name?” I asked her.

  “Lorca,” she said. And I slumped inside just the tiniest bit. I’d never read Lorca. I should hav
e. He’d been on my list.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t call ahead,” she said. “I called a little while ago but I couldn’t hear anything. I wanted to ask if it was okay that I showed up.”

  “Of course it’s okay,” I said.

  I introduced myself, thank goodness, unsure of whether to shake her hand or kiss her on both cheeks, so instead I said my name as I took the meat out of the garbage can.

  “I’m Victoria, nice to meet you. This was wrapped,” I said.

  “Great,” she said and I believed her. She was biting her thumb.

  She slid onto one of our barstools, as gracefully as I’d ever seen it done. She untied a scarf from her neck and held it to her stomach, slouching in a way that came easily to her. I could imagine her sleeping in the tiniest coil.

  “There were supposed to be others,” I said, wiggling out my fingers from beneath the heavy meat and putting it onto the butcher block again. “They didn’t show.”

  For a moment, as she turned her head, I thought she was going to suggest that she leave. Then we caught each other’s eye. I hope. I hope. I hope. What a pretty face she had, the kind that was unnerving in a child but always would be too. The kind that you could swear you’d seen before, but only because you wanted to. She was a composite of startling things. Cheekbones like you read about. Eyelashes that tickled her brows. A disproportionately large upper lip. She slid off the stool. I thought she was going for her coat.

  “No,” I began.

  “How can I help?” she said and washed her hands in the sink. Child of my heart, she washed her hands. She used the soap and a paper towel, which she folded into a square and put into her pocket.

  “Well,” I said, “we were going to make bamia.”

  “That’s great,” she said. “Just tell me what to do.”

  “Really?” I said.

  She looked at me, confused.

  “Really?” I said again. “You don’t mind?”

  She picked up an orange and smelled the skin. I smiled. I couldn’t help it. In the supermarket, people stared. I once smelled all the different soups at Dean and Deluca, and a manager came over. He called me madam. He asked me to kindly tell him what I was up to. I said, “Kindly? I wasn’t blowing my nose into the chowder.” What was wrong with people? Smell is everything.

  “Have you ever had a bergamot orange?” she asked.

  And I thought, Here we go. I knew this was going to happen. She was going to think I was a fake.

  “I don’t really like them,” she said before I could answer. “My mother uses them . . .”

  She trailed off and blushed.

  “Well,” she said. “They’re okay, I guess. But I like these bet-ter.”

  “Did you grow up in New York?” I asked. It was a legitimate question.

  “No,” she said. “In New Hampshire. Nowheresville is what my mother calls it.”

  “Northville?” I said. “Oh, nowhere. I understand.”

  I needed to watch myself. I hadn’t been around sharp minds for a very long time.

  She put the orange back delicately, as if it were glass.

  “We went to New Hampshire,” I said, trying to be breezy. “Fifteen years ago now. Not to nowhere, though. To the lake?”

  I couldn’t remember its name. Joseph had planned our trips. I brought my book. I brought loads of bug spray. He did the rest. I remembered the loveliest bakery there, with peach scones. I didn’t say any of this out loud and at least there was that. At least I wasn’t a babbling duck.

  She said, “Winnipesaukee.” She’d read my mind.

  “That’s the one,” I said.

  “It has two hundred and fifty-three islands,” she said.

  “You don’t say,” I said. And then: “How did you get your name?”

  She told me like she’d told it before. I felt silly for asking then. It felt like asking her to repeat herself. But I couldn’t help it.

  “Your mother doesn’t like it?” I said. “What would she have named you?”

  She was quiet for a moment. Her hands stopped moving. I thought she was going to get mad. She didn’t seem like the kind of girl to anger easily, to be jealous and so on. But I thought, I’ve gone too far. I’ve asked too much. It must kill her to have to talk to me. Stupid me with the stupid accent and the stupid dress that she tied so very nicely.

  “It’s hard to say,” she said. “My mother is sort of complicated.”

  After that, I did stop asking questions. I wasn’t going to make a mess. I thought, Kitchen sounds only. From now on, we cook. I passed her the mint and she was so adept with it, chopping it into a neat little pile. Her fingers moved dexterously around the knife, her motions smooth and steady—and I was thinking: Don’t get your finger, you’ll never come back then; if you bleed all over, you’ll hate this place, and, like an imbecile, I’d thrown out all the Band-Aids.

  I pointed out the things I was doing. I tried not to sound formal. I was suddenly conscious of my English. She watched me, nodded, but kept chopping. It seemed adult to me, her focus. She didn’t flit around. She was calm. Was I calm like that? Was Joseph? It was as if she were at the ocean, her feet rooted deep in the sand.

  I opened the can of tomatoes. I regathered the spices: paprika, celery seeds, red pepper flakes, mint, curry powder, ground ginger, salt, and pepper. I asked her to measure out half a teaspoon of each as I cut onions beside her and she said, “Do you know the wooden match trick?” I did, but I said no. And she told me. I passed her the garlic. After a little while, she lifted the grater and the garlic close to her ear and leaned into it. She looked at me as if to say, Listen.

  “It’s so funny,” she said, the silence collapsing in on itself. “Doesn’t it sound like swishing with mouthwash?”

  I put my hand over my mouth. My breath. Was she making a point?

  “No,” she said, laughing a little. “You don’t need it. I just think that. I think it sounds like that.”

  I laughed too. I laughed at myself. I felt suddenly lighter. I laughed a little more.

  “There’s no one here,” I said, shrugging. “You never know. My breath could be awful.”

  We made three dishes that night. We talked about polite things. Lorca was on a break from school for the entire week. She didn’t have pets. She lived with her mother and her aunt. She told me that she loved to cook. We loved to cook! And that she’d never traveled except to Florida and went to the bookstore a lot because she didn’t have many friends. I don’t either, I wanted to tell her. Joseph did but I was never social that way. It’s not the worst thing. I didn’t say that, though I wanted to. I didn’t feel like a glowing example.

  The sky was dark, and Lorca looked out the window. It was as if she were looking through a keyhole, into a fantasy book. Her face was romantic like that. She said, after the bamia, hummus bi tahini, and cabbage salad, “What’s next?” I was tired but not. It was eleven o’clock. I hadn’t been up this late for ages.

  She said, “Are you tired?” And without thinking, I told her, “No.”

  My goodness, my word, my heart. No, I’m not. I could do this forever. Please stay. Please stay, little child.

  After Lorca left, I shuffled around in the kitchen, where life lingered. It felt like a much-needed rainstorm had passed through. I cleaned up and then stopped. I loved the nest of dishes we’d made. Just so.

  I was in a daze as I undressed and put on my pajamas. I felt exhausted, but overwhelmed too. All this was so new. And I couldn’t tell Joseph, so the emotion hung about me, like a ringing phone.

  I didn’t want to get ahead of myself but certain ideas had crept into my mind and were creating an odd sensation in my chest. There wasn’t much left ahead of me. It wasn’t just the freckle, or the big feet, or even the shadow of Middle Easternness in Lorca’s skin—though it was all those things too. Lorca felt so familiar to me somehow. Not like I’d once bumped into her on the street or sat next to her on an airplane, nothing as uninteresting as that. It was something smokier.
It was more reflexive too, like being hungry or being stared at or waking up a minute before the alarm clock goes ding.

  It was wild, what I thought, outlandish even, but I thought it. Saying it out loud would be like trying to explain a dream.

  Still, I let myself think that there was some meaning in all this. I wasn’t spiritual. I didn’t believe in fate. Once in a while, I’d toss salt over my left shoulder but then feel ridiculous. I just kept thinking, She’s supposed to be here. She might just be someone to me.

  “Joseph,” I whispered. “Can you hear me? Did you see Lorca? Did you see?”

  Silence. More silence. Maybe a creak somewhere. Maybe an ambulance somewhere. Nothing to speak of. I couldn’t be sure. I sat there with a sock half on and half off until a car alarm caused me to jump.

  “Joseph,” I whispered. “I was sad too.” And though nothing happened then, no bright light, no crash, I felt a vague sense of comfort that had everything to do with Lorca. Sadness, and then.

  Lorca

  WHEN I OPENED the door, I found Blot perched on the railing of Victoria’s stoop, swinging his legs and whistling. I didn’t move; I considered turning around, going back inside, and waiting it out, but it was too late. He twisted his head around, his eyes finding mine, his hair twirling like a straw skirt.

  “Good evening,” he said. Dimples.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, unprepared.

  “That was not the greeting I expected,” he said. “But I’ll take it.”

  “Good evening,” I said, trying for something lighter. Lecanard-capricieuxhowmayIassistyou went through my head but I didn’t dare say it out loud.

  Already I could feel myself soften. I smiled and curtsied, readjusting my sleeves to be sure. Of course, it wasn’t that I was disappointed to see him. In fact, if I had made a wish in Victoria’s elevator, it would have been for this very thing. But the truth was, I hadn’t wished. I’d been distracted all evening, happy. Being distracted was new. Always, real life had been disappointing. I was used to things being better in my head. When life surprised me, I didn’t know how to live it, live up to it.