“So what’s money? Who cares? No slipping on the icy sidewalks for the pregnant lady, please,” he tells her, bending over to kiss her on the head. “I gotta go.”
“You don’t want breakfast? I’ll get up and make you breakfast.”
“Nah. No time. Don’t worry. I’ll grab a sack of cashews on the way in,” he tells her, sliding on his overcoat from the coat tree. “There’s a guy with a cart on the way to the train.”
As he adjusts the fit of the jacket’s shoulders, he bends forward. “Okay, so I’m going this time for real,” he says, coming back to dispense a final kiss, a big smack on the cheek. Then he pops on his hat and is heading out. “Chinese tonight,” he declares. “I promise, nothing too spicy. Some chicken and broccoli or something.”
“Sure,” she says, when she is pinched by a pulse of need and calls his name. “
“That’s me.”
He’s stopped. But now she’s not sure what to say. Suddenly, she feels embarrassed by the impulse, so what she says is, “I’ll have an egg roll.”
“Okey-dokey,” her husband says. “Egg rolls on the side. I’ll see you at the doctor’s at two. There—I made the decision,” he announces. “Take care of the heir.”
“I will,” Rachel says back. And then, “Aaron?”
He stops once more, eyebrows raised. “Yes, honey?”
“I’m not the star of the show,” she tells him and lays her hand on the swell of her belly. “The star is inside me.”
Aaron looks back at her for a second. “Okay,” he says. “I’ll remember that. See you at two.”
She nods. Then listens as the door closes behind him.
Turning back to the window, Rachel gazes at the icy galaxy of snowflakes clinging to the glass. Each unique. Each fragile, fleeting in the brightness of daylight.
The cat curls around her ankles, and she scoops him up, transports him to the sofa, where she deposits him on the couch. At twelve weeks, she is just starting to show. Her belly is a small, round bump that stops her pedal pushers from properly fitting.
On the wall, her painting hangs without a frame. Hangs from a pair of nails, a little crooked because she’s never been good at straight lines. Aaron does not complain. She has agreed to him moving the sofa to face the opposite direction, so that the painting does not give him the evil eye, though now and again, she spots him gazing at it as if he’s staring into the darkness of a cave. A cave that has opened up in their living room.
It becomes late in the afternoon, and she has dozed off on the sofa after her return from the appointment with the obstetrician. A woman no less! Dr. Eileen Kushner, a middle-aged practitioner with calm eyes and competent hands. She calls Rachel “Mami,” as in, Now breathe deeply for me, Mami.
Aaron remains uncomfortable around a female physician and keeps wondering whether they should go see Dr. Grauberger in Brooklyn, “Just to be on the safe side?” But Rachel likes Dr. Kushner, and who needs to schlep all the way out to Avenue P in Midwood?
The door buzzer rouses her from her nap. The copy of
Rachel’s eyes go wide. “What? What is this?”
“Just delivered for you, Mrs. Perlman. A man on a truck.” The stencil on the crate’s exterior reads: G. ALBERT GLASS GALLERY, FIFTH AVE, NEW YORK.
“Shall I open it up for you?” the German wants to know. “The crate?”
It takes some work with a hammer from his tool belt, prying out nails with the claw. Rachel keeps her distance, standing with her arms folded. But after a few minutes, the large rectangle emerges packed in straw and wrapped with kraft paper. Rachel glares heavily at the shape as the German collects the scraps of crate wood. “There you are, Missus Perlman,” he tells her, hovering, and she realizes he must be waiting for a tip.
“Oh. Um. Let me get my purse,” she says, avoiding eye contact, but the German is shaking his head no. Nothing is required, he tells her in German. The sound of his soft, slushy Bayerischer Sprechstil stops her in place. She is surprised by the painful expression on the man’s face.
“For all of it, I am sorry, Mrs. Perlman,” he tells her. “For all of what was done. It is so painful to carry the knowledge of such terrible happenings. But I was always only a medical soldier.” He wants her to know. “This I swear to. I had three wounds on the battlefield. A bullet is still with me. But I only ever treated wounded men. Never hurting other soldiers. Never hurting Jews. Never hurting anyone,” he says. His eyes are wet. Beseeching. And she can see it. The wounds he carries. She can see them reflected in his eyes.
Rachel breathes. Swallows. But then releases a tight nod.
A beat passes between them. The man frowns. The pain in his face closes over. “Let me know if there is more to be fixed for your apartment,” he says, avoiding eye contact, and makes for the door. But as he opens it to exit, Rachel speaks.