Sister Devota came running over, giving me the fisheye. “Irene, is this one of your pranks?”
“No, Sister, look, you can see her smiling face over there. Can’t you see her?” The stain was slowly spreading over the wall.
“Where? That stain?” The nun stepped up closer to get a better look.
“Yes, Sister, see that splotch over there? That’s her robe.”
The nun squinted her eyes. “Well, it does look a little like…” She sniffed around. “What’s that smell? Is that smoke?”
“Yes, Sister, I came in here to say a prayer when suddenly there was a great puff of smoke. I ran over to see what was happening, and when the smoke cleared, this miraculous vision of Mary appeared, and I fell on my knees before her.” My telling had been coached by years of watching Jennifer Jones in Song of Bernadette. It was Sister Devota’s favorite movie about the miracle at Lourdes, and she showed it every year.
“I wonder why she chose you,” the nun murmured. “When I’ve been waiting my whole life.”
“Sister, look, she’s holding something,” I said, pointing to a splotch on the right. I could tell I had her by the look on her face.
“Where, Irene?” The nun’s usual harsh features were softening, as if the weight of many years was dropping off.
“There, Sister, I think it’s a baby. Don’t you see him?” I asked, pointing.
“Why yes, I think I do,” said the nun, standing for a long time lost in her private thoughts, her face a blaze of ecstasy. Then, abruptly, she blessed herself. “Wait here while I get Father Mike.” With that, Sister Devota ran out of the church, her veil flying behind her.
Left alone, I cautiously got up to look around for the others. “Good old Connie, the escape artist, did it again. She must have a nose for trouble. And that stupid Al, this was his fault. Wait till I get a hold of him,” I was mumbling to myself when suddenly I heard someone coming. It was Father Mike and Sister Devota, and they brought the Good Samaritan Club, that bunch of do-gooders, with them. I was sure I was in for it now, but then I heard the hysterical nun yell, “Look, look, it’s the Blessed Virgin.” She fell on her knees, and some of the more impressionable girls knelt down next to her.
“I see her too, Sister.”
“Me too, me too!”
It didn’t take long for everyone to see her. Everyone but me. I couldn’t believe they had fallen for that one.
Word of the miraculous apparition spread quickly through the neighborhood. Soon lines formed around the block, as people battled their way into the church to see the miraculous apparition on the church wall. The amazing wart lady from the carnival was miraculously healed of the millions of warts that had covered her entire body for years, but afterward she cried about losing her job with the carnival. A few days later, Milda’s mother’s migraines disappeared soon after touching the stain. Mr. Vitkus recovered from his asthma. Soon other parishes came to see the miracle, as spontaneous healings were becoming a daily event.
Before long, miracles were becoming as contagious as measles all through the South Side. Soon girls in neighboring parishes began seeing all sorts of things. At St. George’s, the local Czech church, a girl named Sophie said she saw the statue of Mary crying or maybe sweating. True, upon investigation, it was found that condensation had formed on the statue, but it never dried out. Everyone rushed to see the new miracle and to touch the sweat. The local health department sealed the statue in a glass coffin in case there was a health hazard. A number of cases of gout were cured there.
St. Stanislaus, the Polish parish, had a miraculous spring burst forth at the foot of Mary’s statue. Everyone ran to get some of the holy water. Numerous cases of rheumatism and eczema were cured. Every home had a vial of the holy water until the Department of Water fixed a broken water main.
Random reports of miracles continued throughout the South Side for the rest of the year.
Meanwhile, I was getting a reputation of a different sort. Parents who had once warned their girls not to be like Irene now nagged their kids to be more like me. People began to look at me as if I were already canonized, wanting to touch me, ask my advice, and mostly just tell me their problems.
The Channel 9 news team came out to interview me, and the whole neighborhood watched TV that night. The next day, the local papers carried my story. Even the National Enquirer was talking about a cover story. Bishop Petraitis declared a holiday from school and everyone had a celebration. I was becoming a local celebrity. Little souvenir pictures of me standing by the miraculous apparition were being sold at the church kiosk.
The strange part was that I really did change, no longer doing crazy things to get attention. I even started praying, saying the rosary, and going to Mass. My mother thought that in itself was a miracle. Everyone encouraged me. Everyone but Connie.
“That was no miracle and you know it,” said Connie, sarcasm curling her lip. We were at our old hangout, Country Maids, drinking vanilla Cokes out of paper cones set into little metal holders. A morose song about a grisly car death called “Teen Angel” was playing on the jukebox.
“Well, maybe at first I thought it wasn’t, but now I’m not so sure,” I tried to explain.
“What! That’s just a stain on the wall.” Connie was outraged.
“How can you be so sure?”
“I don’t believe this,” said Connie, slapping her forehead. “I was there, remember?”
“I know that the water on the wall caused that stain, but people have been cured, Connie. Me, of all people, I caused a miracle, and it’s changed people’s lives.”
“Cut the crap, Irene. I know you, remember?”
“Oh sure, Connie, you liked me just fine when I was getting into trouble every second, but now that I’m not screwing up, now that people admire me for a change, you can’t stand it, can you? You know, I think you’re jealous.” I couldn’t admit to Connie that there was a small part of me that was secretly afraid she was right. No matter how hard I tried, sometimes my skin would start to prickle with the effort of being good, but I wouldn’t let anyone know how hard it was, especially not Connie.
Connie got up to leave. “Tell it to the Pope. I ain’t buyin’ it.” As she opened the door, I spun around on my stool. “Maybe I will,” I yelled.
It was true that Connie was jealous, and it was eating her up. And now that I wasn’t catching all the flak at school, somehow Connie kept finding herself in trouble. She had been to the principal’s office three times, and Sister Devota was threatening to call her mother.
“Why can’t you be more like your old friend Irene?” asked the nun, pointing to me one day.
Connie’s face was getting as red as her hair. That was it. Something inside her snapped. She decided to end this charade, not able to stomach one more remark about what a good girl I was. She told Sister Devota the whole truth about the miracle. The nun listened quietly until Connie was finished, while I gulped, thinking the jig was up.
“Liar,” screamed the nun, not about to lose her long-awaited miracle. “I saw that miracle with my own eyes,” she said, turning to me, “didn’t I, Irene?”
I nodded, my mouth twisting, trying to smile. It was all beginning to get to me.
Connie was suspended from school for the rest of the week.
When I went over to her house after school, I found her at home watching Queen for a Day, wondering how those women could scream so over winning a stupid washing machine. She said she had come up with a brilliant plan. She was going to cook up her own miracle since nothing had happened as yet at St. Patrick’s Church.
Somehow, she talked me into coming with her to the Irish church. It must have been the heavy armor of guilt we Catholics wear. We sat down in a pew, waiting for the church to empty, and then Connie went to unscrew the statue of Mary from its base. She figured if she moved the statue to the middle of the church and knelt befo
re it, waiting until somebody found her, she would swear the statue came down to her. But the screws were tight and no matter how hard she twisted and turned, those screws were not budging. She tried to use the screwdriver like a crowbar to force the statue off its base, but it slipped and jabbed her palm. Screaming with pain, she watched the blood trickle down her wrist. I ran to help her, but when I heard Father O’Reilly muttering in the yard, I panicked, not knowing whether to run or hide. Before I could decide, Connie had a blinding flash of inspiration and jabbed the screwdriver into her other hand and threw it under the altar. When Father O’Reilly found Connie, she was standing with outstretched arms, both hands bleeding. When he asked her what was going on, she answered with one word—“Stigmata.”
The Irish parish was overjoyed. Finally, they had their own miracle, and a fine one it was with the lovely O’Connor girl and their own statue of the Blessed Mother, and once Mrs. Shaughnessy’s rash was cured, that cinched it. Now the old parish had a reason to celebrate. A parade was planned with Connie O’Connor at the head and all the fine colleens following her. It was to wind up in the parish yard with Irish jigs, shamrocks, and all the usual shenanigans.
The morning of the parade, all went according to plan. Connie waved to the crowd with bandaged hands. When she spotted Al Vitkus and Joey Cicero, Connie waved like a beauty queen on a float. Al and Joey did not wave back. I came with them to witness her moment of triumph and smiled to see her so honored.
Al hooted. “Ah, go on, just ’cuz everyone else had a miracle, you guys had to cook one up too. Who are you trying to kid?”
When Connie saw that Al Vitkus and the handsome Joey Cicero were making fun of her miracle, she was devastated. She turned to me, frowning, as if I had talked them into it.
The Irish began to grumble. Thomas Kelly yelled back: “And what about your miracle? You don’t suppose any of us believed for a second that the stain on the wall was the Virgin Mother, do you?” The insult to my reputation stung. Soon insults were flying in all directions, and it didn’t take long for fists to fly.
Connie was mortified. No news teams or newspapers, just a huge brawl started by Al. She sat down on the curb getting ready to have a good cry, while I watched her from across the street. We eyed each other warily, not quite sure how we felt, but then a spurt of laughter bubbled up from deep inside me, which I attempted to hide with my hand. Seeing this, Connie tried to suppress her giggle. That was my cue to cross the street, biting my lip to keep from laughing, though a snort of repressed glee escaped. By the time we reached each other, hysterical fits of laughter overtook us. We cackled and squawked so that tears ran helplessly as we fell on each other, slapping our thighs, sides cramping, shrieking like banshees. Even Al stopped fighting and came over to see what was so hilarious, the laughter so infectious that soon he began to hoot with laughter. We all fell on the ground with cackles, doubled up and braying, slapping the sidewalk, trying to catch our breath. We laughed so damned hard that it was a downright miracle we didn’t just bust a gut.
Frozen Waves
Elena Kazlas, 1962
Some women have very short love lives. For them, love blows into their lives like a tropical virus, leaving them weak and trembling like a newborn lamb. And even after it’s over they shake their heads in wonder at the ferocity of what hit them. That’s how love was for Elena Kazlas.
Elena stood on the chocolate wafer line at Nabisco watching the one window in the factory, waiting for it to turn from black to gray, signaling that her shift was almost over. Down at the end of the line she heard Odell Givens singing “Good Morning, Heartache” again. Odell sang those sad Billie Holiday songs so often that even Elena knew them by heart—“My Man,” “Everything I Have is Yours,” and Odell’s favorite, “Gloomy Sunday.” Odell said all kinds of people committed suicide the year Billie Holiday sang it. Elena just shrugged. Imagine killing yourself over a love song, she thought. Sounded like nonsense to her. She had never understood those songs about men leaving women broken and alone like orphaned birds. Love was something foreign to her.
Elena shoveled cookies onto a corrugated paper tray, then bagged it and sent it on the upper conveyor belt. The chocolate on the cookies didn’t smell right, and it didn’t taste like it was supposed to. The line boss said this chocolate was too green, not ready for eating until it sat for some time. Elena didn’t eat the chocolate wafers anymore because she remembered Aldona, the new girl who had recently come from Lithuania, who tried to save lunch money by eating Mallomars all day long while on the line. Before her shift ended, she threw up right on the conveyor belt. Management had to stop production until it was cleaned up, and then they fired her. The next day they told the ladies on the lines not to eat green chocolate.
On the next line, Isabel stood watching a mountain of Lorna Doone cookies come down the wide belt from the floor above. All the while she cried about her husband, while using a long stick to straighten the rows so they wouldn’t pile up. These women on the lines were always wailing over men. It didn’t matter whether they were Lithuanian, Irish, Mexican, or even the Negro women who were moving into the neighborhood, their stories were all the same. Isabel’s husband was seeing someone on the Oreo line, Silvia’s husband was coming home late every night, Mary’s boyfriend had fallen in love with the bottle, and Odell’s husband had vanished years ago. Agota Janulis was the only woman on the line who was content with her husband, Pranas. Agota always told Elena that a good man meant a quiet life, and a bad man meant tears. You just needed to pick carefully, like fruit down at the market.
The other women always kidded Elena about her manless life.
“Who you saving it for?” Charlotta would ask her.
“Leave her alone, she’s waiting for the right man, that’s all,” said Agota.
“She’s waiting for a man with a gold-tipped one,” Odell would say with a wink. They cackled like hens at that one. Elena just watched the chocolate wafers marching by in straight rows, all those hands a blur of snatching them up in little trays, then sending them down to the next station, where Agota sealed them shut and sent them down to Odell, who put them in boxes.
Elena figured her father had been enough man for one lifetime. Always so particular about how his daughter looked, what she did, and whom she dated. He liked her to look plain, bland like his food. But now he and his diseased liver were buried and silenced, and Elena liked the quiet of her life. She felt like a modest jewel, muffled in gauzy cotton like her mother’s amber brooch, which she kept in a little box.
Having spent years being a dutiful daughter, she was now blessedly free, and it was intoxicating. For the first time in her life, she dared to join a group—the Baltic Chorale, a group of singers who met in a room behind the Amber Tavern every Saturday afternoon. And she started saving money for a vacation—not to Union Pier, Michigan, like the other Lithuanians, but a luxury vacation to Bermuda during some cold February. She had always hated Chicago in February, a month in which the whole city turned as gray as the slush on its dirty streets. Instead, she was going to take two weeks in February as though they were chocolate bonbons and fly to a resort hotel to sit on a palm-covered beach, drinking rum punches with little pink umbrellas, and toast those back home still wading through grimy slush in their galoshes. She cut out tropical pictures of white sand, coconut palms, and big hotels to put on her Frigidaire and began putting money into an empty Hills Bros. coffee can. There was no way she would be the same person once she came back from that trip. And there was no telling what could happen on such a vacation, whom she might meet, or how it could change her life. She would return with tropical memories and souvenirs that were unlike anything those Union Pier vacationers found on their drab beaches.
One Tuesday in June, not unlike any other in Elena’s life, a man named Johnny Charbonneau replaced Captain Eddie as the new box man. He came up like a feral cat that first day, grinning and introducing himself to the line. Odell was jus
t finishing her rendition of “Stormy Weather.”
“What do you pretty ladies got to sing the blues about?”
“All you slick men, that’s what,” said Odell, laughing loudly.
“Slick, I ain’t slick, I’m smooth, ain’t I, sugar?” Johnny put his arm around Elena, pulling her to him, a touch that was electric, coursing through her body like a flame, melting some long-frozen part of her. Elena blushed and giggled, startled by how good it felt. She had never seen anyone like Johnny. He looked like some tropical hothouse flower to her, something exotic that didn’t grow in Chicago. He had a Southern drawl and long blond hair combed back into a duck’s tail, with eyes so alive they took her breath away. This man was hungry for everything life could throw his way, nothing careful or measured about him. When she stared at Johnny’s smile, her soul, which had long ago shriveled to a raisin, now grew plumper. Johnny’s smile—his even Chiclets teeth were mesmerizing, casting spells on her.
The next day Elena found herself spending part of the week’s Bermuda money on a shampoo and set at Silvia’s House of Beauty. As Silvia piled curls high on Elena’s head, ratting each curl to make it stiffer, she kidded Elena about finding a man as good as her faithful Captain Eddie.
At work, when the line broke down as it sometimes did, Elena surprised Agota by asking if her lipstick was on straight. Agota bobbed her head up and down like those dog statues in the back windows of cars, as she watched Elena walk right over to Johnny, who was stacking boxes. He looked up and said, “Hey, sugar, what’s doin’?”
“Line broke down,” Elena answered, blushing.
“Oh, yeah, good, maybe I can cop a cigarette.” Johnny put down the box and walked out to the loading dock with Elena dogging his heels.
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