Shadows of Berlin полностью

With a glance, Rachel spots a glimmer in Naomi’s lake-­deep eyes and the slight up-­curve at the corner of her mouth. “It’s a name” is all she says as she delivers Rachel’s goblet to her. But there’s definitely something she’s not saying. An agenda.

“Sounds Irish,” Aaron says after a hefty swallow of wine. “Is he an Irishman, this one? Should I brush up on my faith ’n begorrah?”

But Naomi is busy uncorking the white. “Aaron, can you just take a pill or something?”

“Oh, I can do many things,” Aaron answers with mildly menacing assurance. “Many things.”

Naomi snorts, and then the oven dings pertly. “Ah! That’s my cue!” She grins, delighted again, and returns to the stove with a pair of heat-­stained oven mitts.

Rachel drinks. The taste of the Chianti mixes with the taste of tobacco in her mouth. Actually, she misses the clutter and chaos of the place, and she’s happy to see that at least the bookcase retains it. A frantic old-­time mess. Books shoved this way and that, stacked atop each other, dust jackets ripped and tattered from the friction and overuse. She envies Naomi these shelves. She herself can never hold on to books. Books, letters, gloves, fountain pens, checkbooks, one earring out of the set, cigarette lighters, they simply slip through her fingers and are gone.

“Ten more minutes for the chicken!” Naomi sings out. Returning from the stove, she seats herself on the blanketed sofa beside Rachel with her wine goblet and lights up a cigarette, blowing smoke. “Hey, shtoomer. Can you quit your pacing, please?” she demands of her brother. “You’re wearing a hole in my rug.”

“Yeah, yeah, like I haven’t heard that before,” he says and falls into his impression of their mother. “‘Quit your pacing and sit. You’re wearin’ a hole in my rug, for heaven’s sake.’” He says this, dumping himself down on the sofa and puffing out a long breath. “So speaking of the crazy lady, does she know about your latest? Mister Faith ’n Begorrah?”

“Maybe.” Naomi shrugs.

“Which means no.”

“I don’t believe I need my mother’s approval,” she explains to Rachel. “Unlike some people.”

“Oh, yeah? Tell that to the woman who bore you, why don’t you?”

“I believe that we live in a world of individual freedoms, where people are responsible to themselves alone,” Naomi declares.

“Sure, well, that’s because Ma dropped you on your head when you were a baby.”

“Aaron.” Rachel scolds him with a slap on his leg.

“What? Ouch. It’s true. I get assaulted for the truth now.”

“It is true,” Naomi admits with a sigh. “She tripped over a throw rug in the bedroom and ker-­plop.”

“Yeah, and ever after, it was ‘I hate that rug. It’s a cursed rug,’” he says, mimicking their mother again.

“Cursed,” says Naomi, “but she never got rid of it.”

“Get rid of it?” Aaron’s mimic rises in pitch. “I should get rid of a rug while it’s still perfectly good?”

“So instead, for nearly thirty years, she walks around it.”

“Right,” Aaron agrees. “Like it’s a land mine or something.” He half laughs at the thought of this. The homey exchange with his sister at their mother’s expense has blunted his edge. The shared memory. The shared ridicule even. Then there’s a knock on the door. A confident knock. Not overly polite and not overly aggressive, but solid in its intention. The knock of a person who knocks on a door with self-­assurance, whether the door opens or not.

“That’s Tyrell,” Naomi announces, a swift excitement lighting her face. She sets down her wine and cigarette and eagerly crosses the floor.

Aaron stands in an obligatory manner. “Faith ’n begorrah,” he grumbles into the bowl of his goblet, taking a deeper swallow, but then quite literally, he begins to choke on his own words.

His sister must thrust herself up on her tiptoes to kiss the man now standing in the threshold of the apartment. “Hello, darling.” She smiles at him. The man smiles back at her and then smiles half blankly into the room. “This,” Naomi announces, looping her arm around his, “is Tyrell Williams.”

“How do you do,” the man says. His voice is deep, and he is over six feet tall. Must be over six feet tall. Dressed in a handsomely fitted gabardine suit. His features are striking. Powerful. Sculpted, one might call them. His hair is perfectly barbered. And he is Black.

Rachel jumps to her feet in the space opened by her husband’s gaping stare and sticks out her hand. “I’m Rachel,” she says.

“Very pleased to meet you,” Tyrell replies, shaking firmly.

“My sister-­in-­law,” Naomi informs him, as if this might be a surprise, and then turns to Aaron. “And this is my fuckhead brother, Aaron,” she says, but her voice is without rancor or sarcasm. Without mischief or satisfaction. It’s as if she calls him a fuckhead in a concerned, almost fretful manner.

Aaron snaps to quickly and juts out his hand as well. “Aaron Perlman,” he introduces himself in a soldierly fashion. “Pleasure.”