CHAPTER 39

Tuckahoe

“Slow Uncle Archie’s here? On Saturday? Why didn’t you say so?”

“I’m saying so,” said Harry.

We ran holding onto our caps toward our uncle behind the fence, his suit pockets bulging with Walnettos.

“I came to tell you, your mama can’t visit tomorrow,” Uncle Archie said.

Oh, no, I thought. Here it comes. The beginning of the end. I’d heard the stories. Like a clock, my mother said. First, it’s every week, then every other week. Then they come once a month. Then it’s once in a while. We’d all seen the kids waiting for relatives who promised they’d be there on Visiting Day and never showed up. Always something getting in the way. Work, maybe, Sunday inventory, or no carfare, or any kind of excuse they can make up because who wants to schlep all the way up to Yonkers and back. Why did they put us away in the first place? To make their lives easier. I’d heard Miss Beaufort’s smug reproach when she left her office door open: “If it’s so hard to leave your boy here, Mrs. Levy, Mr. Chaim Pipik, Mrs. Rosenbaum, Mr. Shlongstein, then why don’t you just keep ‘em at home with you? Huh?” The supervisors hated Visiting Day. They discouraged visitors. They didn’t want us complaining to outsiders. They didn’t want us getting used to mollycoddling, coming back inside on Sunday nights all soft. Like a clock, my mother said. Every other Sunday. Rain or shine. What was her excuse now?

“She’s sitting shiva,” said Uncle Archie.

“What?” I said.

“The baby died.”

“What baby?”

“Your little sister.”

“Gertie’s not a baby anymore.” Archie was so dumb.

“Who died?” said Harry.

“A baby,” I said.

“What baby?” said Harry.

“Gertie,” said Uncle Archie.

“What are you talking about? Speak English! Gertie’s two and a half,” I said. “She walks, she talks. She comes here and we roll down the hill together. Right, Harry? This hill we’re standing on.”

Uncle Archie started bawling. Even a child knew more than he did. “Gertie,” Uncle Archie cried. “Poor little kid. She caught a cold at the nursery and died.”

I reached between the iron pickets and grabbed the lapels of his cheap suit and shook him. What are you talking about Archibald? Are you fucking crazy? Sitting shiva for who, you numskull? I let him go, and I darted away. He’d probably get us in trouble for coming up here on the Sabbath. His arms flailed between the fence posts trying to grab me. It was so easy to dodge him, I had to laugh. He looked ridiculous. His pants rode too high on his waist and a teardrop was caught on the mole on his cheek and wouldn’t fall off. Fall off, you stupid freaking teardrop! I sneered at Uncle Archie, but he didn’t change his story. I came close, taunting him. Why were his lips always wet? I came dangerously close, until he grabbed me and pulled me against the wrought iron with one arm, grabbing Harry with his other arm. With my face pressed against his jacket I could smell the lavender water Grandma Cohen sprinkled on the handkerchief she placed in the pocket over Slow Uncle Archie’s heart. “No,” I said. I sobbed and he held me tighter until the iron bars were digging into my ribs. “Poor little kid,” he said. “Caught a cold.”