I served her three helpings, even though I knew she had barely the appetite for a few forkfuls. “What do you mean, what will be, will be?”
“It means what it means. I’m done.”
“You’re done?”
“I’m done.”
I set the Pyrex casserole dish down with such force that the glass cracked.
Mama reached for my hand, but I refused and stormed out.
When I came home later that evening, Teddy was gone and Mama was at the kitchen table. I went into my bedroom without saying a word. I was so angry at her, at the world, at everything.
In hindsight, I wish more than anything that I’d taken her hand that night in the kitchen and told her I was sorry. I thought there’d be time. Time to make amends, time to let her know I supported whatever decision she made, time to tell her how much I loved her, time to embrace her as I hadn’t done since I was a little girl. But there wasn’t. There’s never enough time.
* * *
St. John the Baptist was filled with friends and acquaintances of Mama’s I never knew she had. One person after the next gave their condolences and told me things about my mother I wished I’d known while she was alive.
We unveil ourselves in the pieces we want others to know, even those closest to us. We all have our secrets. Mama’s was that she’d been generous to a fault. I discovered she’d clothed nearly our entire neighborhood for free: she’d tailored a secondhand suit for an out-of-work veteran with an interview to be a cashier at Peoples Drug, repaired the bridal gown of a woman who could only afford to buy one with a broken strap and a wine stain on the bodice from the Salvation Army, patched the coveralls of a bottling plant worker, and mended many socks for an elderly widower who just wanted some company.
And that yellow prom dress I’d helped Mama rebead a year earlier? It had been a gift, not a commission. Mrs. Halpern’s teenage daughter wore it to the funeral, and the sight of her twirling to show it off made me dizzy with appreciation for the person my mother was.
Mama herself wore a black dress with intricate flower beading running down the sheer sleeves. The dress had been another secret. How long she’d been working on it I didn’t know. But I did know she’d made it to wear at her own funeral, as I’d first seen it the morning she didn’t wake up—pressed and laid across the rocking chair in her bedroom for me to find.
* * *
—
Inside the church, the Orthodox priest circled Mama’s casket, swinging his incense, the scented smoke billowing out over his gold cassock and dissipating above his head.
I turned away for a moment and that’s when I saw her: Sally had come. She was standing toward the back, wearing a short black birdcage veil. I turned back toward the priest, who was still swinging his incense—my thoughts on Sally instead of my mother. I wished she would walk down the aisle and stand next to me, take Teddy’s place, then my hand. But she stayed in the back and Teddy by my side.
The funeral ended and I followed Mama’s casket out of the church. As I passed Sally, she touched my arm. Her veil was askew and she had tears in her eyes. I kept walking. The procession made its way to Oak Hill Cemetery, where Teddy had arranged for Mama to be buried in a nice plot overlooking Rock Creek Park. Standing next to Mama’s grave, I looked for Sally in the crowd, but she wasn’t there.
After, Teddy tried in vain to comfort me. Days passed, then weeks. One night, when I couldn’t sleep, I decided to call Sally. My hands shook as I dialed her number, but the line just rang and rang.
EAST
May 1958
CHAPTER 19
The Muse
The Emissary
THE MOTHER
I woke from a dreamless sleep to Mitya standing over me. “Someone is outside,” he whispered.
“Is it Borya? Did he lose his key again?”
“No.”
I swung my legs over the bed and toed the floor until I found my slippers. “Go back to your room.”
Mitya didn’t move as I fumbled for my robe.
“Mitya, I said go back to bed. And don’t wake your sister.”
“She heard it first.”
Before I could ask what they had heard, there was a crash. “It’s just a branch,” I said, my voice as low and steady as I could will it. “That poplar has been dead since last winter. I’ve told Borya we need to cut it…” Another sound outside stopped me. It was quieter, muted. It was no falling branch.
The sound of the front door opening sent us both running toward the entryway. Ira was there, standing in the doorway, barefoot, her white nightgown illuminated blue with moonlight. The sight of her startled me. She was a ghostly angel—a woman now. “Ira,” I said gently. “Close the door.”
Ignoring me, Ira stepped outside. “Come out!” she called out. Mitya pushed passed me to join his sister. I grabbed hold of his nightshirt, but he shrugged me off. “Show yourself!” he yelled, his voice cracking. Movement behind the woodpile at the side of the house sent both my children tripping over themselves to get back inside. I shut the door behind them and tested the knob to make sure it was locked.
“It’s them,” Ira said. “I know it.” As she hugged herself against the wall, she no longer looked like a beautiful apparition; she looked like my little girl again.
“Who?” I asked.
“A man followed me home from the train station yesterday.”
“Are you sure? What did he look like?”
“Like the rest of them. Like the men who took you away.”
“I’ve seen them too,” Mitya said. “They watch me from behind the fence at school. Two, sometimes three of them. They don’t scare me, though.”
“Don’t be silly,” I said, but I didn’t believe my words. Mitya was prone to exaggeration, and his very healthy imagination, as Borya had put it, resulted in stories. He’d found a piece of Sputnik in the woods. He’d saved a little girl in his class from a wolf that had wandered onto the playground. He’d eaten a magical plant that gave him the power to jump higher than a trolleybus.
But this story I did not doubt.
Zhivago had been published in Italy six months earlier, and with each new country that published the book—France, Sweden, Norway, Spain, West Germany—I could feel more eyes watching us. With each foreign publication, questions arose about why the book had not been published at home. For now, the State spoke no word publicly of the novel. Its hand was steady, but a tremor grew. I knew it was only a matter of time before they’d act.