Shadows of Berlin полностью

His voice turns clipped and efficient. Tech Sergeant Perlman managing the logistics. “We’ll bring a bottle of something,” he says. “I don’t know. We’ll bring a bottle of both, so that way we’re covered.” And then, “Yeah, I gotta go,” he repeats. “Your sister-­in-­law just walked in and is wondering what the hell I’m doing home on a matinee shift.” Then, with a quick “G’bye,” he clamps the phone’s receiver firmly into the cradle. “That was Naomi,” he announces.

“Yes,” says Rachel.

“She wants us at her place Saturday at seven thirty. I told her we’d bring the wine.”

“And did you suss out her agenda?” Rachel inquires.

It is Aaron’s belief that Naomi always has an agenda. Especially when dealing with him. He sniffs and rakes a bit of phlegm from his throat. “As I anticipated,” he declares in a voice that is both grudgingly resigned and self-­congratulatory. “A new goy in the boyfriend department.”

Rachel nods. “Ah” is all she says in response. This is an ongoing family controversy for the Perlman clan. Naomi’s obsession with gentile beaus. But Rachel has no wish to engage with it. “So what in hell are you doing home on a matinee shift?” she asks instead.

“Water main busted on West Fiftieth,” he reports happily. “Con Ed’s got the whole block shut down. So I get the rest of the night off,” he says and claps his hands together. “Zo!” he begins, adopting the alter kocker’s accent that he finds so amusing. “What’s fur supper, bubba doll? You want maybe I should put on some pants and go down to the Chinese for takeout?”

Rachel strikes another match to life and inhales the puff of sulfur before lighting a burner on the stove. “I thought I might cook something,” she answers.

“Really?” says Aaron skeptically but at least dropping the irritating accent. “Well, that ought to be interesting.”

Spaghetti. She’s learned how long to boil it so it doesn’t stick together by adding a few drops of Wesson oil. And she can heat up the sauce from a can she bought at the market. The label on the can assures her that Every meal’s a masterpiece, when Chef Boy-­ar-­dee makes the sauce! The choice was sauce with meat with a red label or simple marinara with a yellow label, but she always picks the meat sauce and then douses the steaming spaghetti with it as soon as she drains it from the boiling water, serving it with a slice of buttered white bread. Aaron eats without much complaint and seems to take some satisfaction in demonstrating the best way to twist the spaghetti onto the fork by pressing it against a spoon. The things a Jew from Flatbush learns, he observes.

“So I ran into Daniela Weinstock in the hallway today,” she mentions. “With her twins.”

Without interest. “Yeah, ya did?”

“They were going to the zoo.”

He sniffs. Clears his throat. Stabs a small orange meatball with his fork. “Okay.”

“I told her I was on my way to my shrink.”

Silence. Then Aaron sucks in air and sets the fork down.

“You told Ezra Weinstock’s wife that you’re seeing a shrink,” he says. Then he drops his head back and shakes it with disbelief. “Oy fucking gevalt,” he declares with utter desolation, as if he’s echoing the last words God spoke to Abraham. “My wife.”

“It just came out.”

“It just came out? Honey! Do you know… Can you conceive, for just a moment, with what lightning speed that bit of news is now going to flash across Brooklyn to my mother? Like the speed of a rocket. Like breaking the sound barrier, with the big boom at the end included.”

“I think,” she says, “you’re overreacting.”

“Oh, do you?”

“Plenty of people have see-­chiatrists these days. It’s not a stigma.”

“Trust me, in Flatbush, it’s plenty stigma enough. And by the way—­it’s not see-­ky-­a-­trist, it’s sigh-­ky-­a-­trist.” He says this with such force that the impact is too much for Rachel. She does what she hates doing in front of him during an argument. She bursts into tears.

Aaron drops his utensils and releases a plummeting sigh. “Okay, I’m sorry,” he says. Pushing back his chair, he’s on his feet, wrapping his arms around her shoulders for comfort. “You’re right. Everybody needs a shrink these days,” he tells her and kisses her on the neck. “I’m making too big a thing. Ma likes you anyway. If she hears?” he decides. “She hears.”

The next day, as Rachel comes into the house, the telephone is ringing. She yanks off a clip-­on earring to answer. “Perlman residence, hello?”

“Hello, honey, it’s Miriam Perlman. How you doin’?”

“Hello, Miriam,” Rachel replies, eternally uncomfortable calling her mother-­in-­law by her given name. “I’m fine, thank you.”

“Good!” Does she sound surprised at this? “Glad to hear it.”

“I’m sorry, but Aaron isn’t home. He went in early today.”

“Of course.” The woman sighs. “Just like his father. But that’s okay, sweetheart. It’s really you I want to talk to.”

“Me?”

“How’re you feeling? Good, you say?”

“I’m fine, yes. Fine.”