WINTER, 1932
SOON THERE WOULD BE a simple marker placed here with the inscription that would read
HANNAH KOVITZ
1898–1932
Beloved Mother of Katie
the words that bore witness that once Hannah had walked upon the earth. Standing in the dense gray London fog that enveloped her slowly, Katie lifted her eyes toward the heavens. She listened, but there was no sound in the silence—no celestial chorus of angels singing, not even the song of the mournful dove. In time the grass would grow tall hiding the marker with no one to protect this sacred plot for posterity: the last time she would stand here was now. Who would know or care that beneath the freshly turned sod that had become home for Hannah was all that remained of a life born in poverty, lived in loneliness, ended in agony, whose passing went unnoticed as though she had never been?
Oh God, Katie whispered, is this all to mark the coming and the going of the genteel woman who had borne her life with dignity, who had buried two young sons and a beloved husband? Hannah, Katie remembered gratefully, had said it was she, the last surviving child, who had sustained her most of all. Hannah had prayed that she might live to see this child grow to womanhood, but even that was not fulfilled, for Katie was not quite a woman yet; tomorrow she would be seventeen. She called out softly, “Why, dear God, why? Please let there be meaning in my mother’s death, more than there was in her life, I beg you, dear God.” She picked up a handful of dirt, held the small, cold piece of earth close to her for a long moment, then threw it into the abyss. Giving in to blinding tears, she turned and walked away.
That evening she packed her belongings. The next day she took a train from Waterloo station, and at Southampton boarded a freighter that would take her to New York.
The crossing seemed like an eternity. For days on end the ship pitched violently, leaving Katie ill and confined to the cabin, windowless and foreboding. She would lie in her bunk with only the bleak, uncertain future to contemplate and suddenly living seemed more frightening than dying. Although during those last inevitable months, with Katie sitting at her bedside, Hannah had tried to prepare her for the eventuality that soon she would have to find a new life, hopefully better and happier than the one that she now had, Katie found little solace. But for Hannah, comforted with the thought that somehow out of all travail God did provide, there were compensations. In her absence there would be Malka Greenberg, her dearest and oldest friend, to whom she could vouchsafe her child and with whom Katie would find a haven.
However, when the time came Katie was not prepared. What would it be like, going to live as a stranger with Malka Greenberg and her family? She reached into her handbag and took out the faded photograph taken of Malka and Hannah so many years ago when they were small children in Poland, trying to read the face of her new benefactress. But nothing was revealed to indicate that she would really be wanted.
Malka Greenberg and Hannah Kovitz had developed a friendship that went back to a small village in Poland where both had been born. Their young lives were inseparable until Malka, at the age of fifteen, met and married Jacob Greenberg. Shortly after their marriage, Jacob decided to leave Poland, where life was unbearably hard, and go to America. Amidst promises of returning some day and a pledge of everlasting friendship, the two clung together, tears streaming down their cheeks, saying their goodbyes, each knowing secretly that they would never see each other again, as the Greenbergs departed, by cattle boat, for New York.
Ensuing years kept them in touch. They waited impatiently for a letter, a photograph. When Malka read that Hannah was dying, she wrote immediately that she was to put her mind at rest so far as Katie was concerned, that when the time came the child was to come to her as soon as possible. In spite of all her mother had told her about Malka, Katie realized that the two had not seen each other for many years, and that the years had a way of changing people. Katie thought perhaps Jacob Greenberg would object to her, even if Malka were willing. Maybe the two Greenberg children would not accept her. Maybe Birdie Greenberg, who was only a year older, would dislike having her around, and maybe Sammy, who was eleven years old, might resent having a stranger living in his house. Maybe she would be in the way. But the most important thing was that maybe Malka had merely made the promise as a gesture to a dying woman. And maybe she should have stayed in London; maybe she could have gotten a job and taken care of herself….
The ship reached New York harbor one day earlier than was scheduled and there was no one to meet her. Katie was desolate: she had no way of contacting Malka Greenberg because they had no phone. She had only their address, and Malka was expecting her the next day. After she had undergone customs, she sat on the shabby suitcase completely exhausted from the whole ordeal, unable to cry, and for a very long time watched the crowd disperse.
Finally, she realized what she must do. She picked up the suitcase, went out into the street, and experienced New York for the first time. And after she couldn’t say how many inquiries and struggles through the impersonal crowds, she found herself standing in front of Malka Greenberg’s door. Breathless by the time she reached the top of the five flights of stairs in the old tenement building, she leaned against the wall, felt the labored beating of her heart and waited for it to subside. All that she had anticipated was now here: the end of the journey had brought her to this moment.
She stood staring at the door and then timidly knocked, half hoping it would not be heard. When there was no answer she knocked again, this time with more vigor; still no answer. She took the letter out of her purse and looked again at the address; it had to be right, she had followed all the instructions for how to get here. This time, frantic, she pounded on the door. Suddenly it opened and there, framed in the doorway, was Malka, the front of her dress soaking from the washing she had just done. Awkwardly Katie said, “You’re Mrs. Greenberg?”
Malka stood looking at the girl. What happened that she was standing here? She was to have met her tomorrow. She could not find her voice. The resemblance between Hannah and Katie was so unmistakable it was as though she were looking at Hannah, and for one moment she was abruptly taken back to her own childhood. Slowly she held out her large arms, drew the young girl to her and kissed her with such tenderness that Katie easily placed her head on Malka’s bosom and the two held onto one another as though they would never let go. Katie knew that she had come home at last.
London seemed very far away now. Soon Katie became adjusted to the sights and the sounds of this strange land, and at times she had difficulty remembering she was the same confused and terrified girl who stood before Malka’s door only a few short months before. How wonderful it is, she thought, that one can shut out all the unhappy memories when there is love. At night she would lie awake and think of what might have become of her were it not for the Greenbergs and the love they had given her. It was they who had held her hand and led her beyond the dark of her bereavement. They had given her back her life, and now there was again reality in living, and contentment she’d never thought possible. The Greenberg family shared all they had with her, even the three-room flat where five of them now lived, without even making her feel she had intruded.
Birdie had gotten her a job in the same dress factory where she worked and each day brought with it new experience. And new enthusiasm, especially when she brought home the paycheck, which each week she gave to Malka, and each week Malka went through the ritual of refusing. She would say, “So tell me, Katie darling, how much do you eat? So Birdie’s got a bed, so how much room do you take up?”
“But Malka, dearest, let me share whatever I have with you, please.” Katie realized the Greenbergs were not really poor, they just didn’t have any money. She felt overwhelming gratitude for having a home to which she belonged, thinking what a beautiful word was belong. She now had a family, a job; she had reached the millennium.
Katie’s bliss was not felt completely by Malka. A girl going on eighteen should begin to think seriously of love and marriage, and quite frankly she was concerned about the absence of romance in Katie’s life. Wisely she reasoned that with Katie’s great need to feel safe and secure she might find things too comfortable in their family embrace. This and Katie’s shyness made Malka think that she might become an old maid. To Malka Greenberg this was unthinkable.
How wrong it was for Katie to be sitting around the kitchen table with Jacob and herself on a Saturday night, keeping Sammy amused while Birdie was at the movies with Solly Obromowitz seeing a Buddy Rogers picture. What was to become of Katie, wasting her entire girlhood, losing it in such a way? Youth disappeared fast enough. Something had to be done.
It was only ten o’clock when Birdie returned home. Malka looked up from her darning. “You’re home early. The movie wasn’t good?”
“It was good, I guess.”
“You guess?” Malka said. “So how come you didn’t stay?”
“Oh that lousy Solly,” Birdie said. “We had a fight.”
“This is how you talk about a nice boy like Solly? So what was the fight about?”
Birdie looked at her mother and smiled. How shocked her sweet mother would be if she told her that not only was it getting tougher all the time to keep Solly from going up to the roof, but to get him to keep his grubby paws off her was a whole battle. But damn it, she was going to fight him, and she didn’t know how long she was going to be able to hold out if she continued to see Solly, which she secretly hoped she would.
“Listen to me, Birdie,” Malka continued.
“So I’m listening.”
“Not only have I got a problem with Katie but I’ve got a problem with you.”
“So what’s the problem you got with me, mama?”
“I want you should be nice with Solly, that’s all.” She thought, oy vay, all she needed was two old maids in the house, one wasn’t enough.
“What’s nice?”
“I mean you shouldn’t always make out like you’re so stuck up. You see, Birdala, your problem is you go out with a boy a few times and right away you don’t like him.”
“So stop worrying, it’s not so serious. I’m going to see Solly tomorrow. Where’s Katie?”
“She went to bed early. You want a cup of tea?”
“You sit still, I’ll fix it.”
As Birdie put the kettle on the stove, she said to her father, “You want a cup, papa?” He mumbled something under his breath which meant no and kept on reading his paper.
“Take a piece of sponge cake, Birdie.”
Malka held the cup with both hands to her lips and peered over the rim, thinking how best to bring up the subject of Katie. “Birdie, why is it you never take Katie with you when you go out?”
“Because she doesn’t want to go.”
“Did you ever ask her?”
“Yes, mama, I did and I do. Tell me, what brought this up?”
“What brought it up is, I’m worried.”
“For you that’s nothing new. I don’t understand you, mama. What is she, an old maid?”
Malka was startled by the phrase. It was almost as if Birdie had read her thoughts. With pretended annoyance she said quietly, “Don’t get fresh, Birdie. Maybe in America they talk like that to a mother, but not to me.”
“O.K., mama, I’m not being fresh, but what’s to worry about?”
“I shouldn’t worry about a beautiful young girl who sits in a house every night and Sammy is her big companion?”
“Well what’s wrong if I am her companion?” Sammy asked. They’d forgotten him sitting round-eyed, listening to everything.
Birdie looked at him. “Big shot, you go to bed. This is not your business.”
“It’s as much my business as yours.”
“Don’t get fresh, Sammy.”
“That’s enough, children. Sammala, darling, go to bed,” Malka said. He objected but obeyed. On the way out he kissed first his mother, his father and then his sister, said good night, and went to bed in the hall between the kitchen and Birdie’s room, pulling closed the floral, cretonne drapery which separated them.
“Now listen to me, mama. I know how much you love Katie and all you want is what’s good for her, but you’ve got to realize she’s different from the boys on Hester Street. She doesn’t take to them and they don’t take to her. But she’ll meet hers, believe me.”
“Not unless you introduce her to someone,” Malka said adamantly. “I don’t want her whole young life to be wasted only working. She’s got to go out and have a little fun like other girls.”
Jacob, a man of few words, folded his glasses, put them in his shirt pocket, laid the paper down on the table, got up, and in a voice louder than usual said, “That’s enough already with the boys and the marriage and the marriage and the boys. When she’s thirty you’ll worry already. Come to bed; Malka.” He walked to the back bedroom off the kitchen and Malka followed.
Walking up and down in front of the Bijou Theater where he had been waiting for Birdie for the last thirty minutes, Solly wondered why he even bothered. Cold, never gave an inch. Who the hell did she think she was anyway? True, he was no Adonis, but he’d already stopped counting the girls he’d screwed since he was twelve, so anybody with a track record like that couldn’t be so bad. He should be furious with her for slapping his face—and hard—the night before, as they sat in the back row upstairs. In a gesture of pure love he’d thrust his right hand down inside her low-cut blouse, cupping her warm and round full breast in his sweating palm while, with his other hand under her dress, his fingers crept slowly up her thigh. But as he kissed her and tried forcing his tongue into her mouth, Birdie became so angry that she stood up and kicked him knowingly with her knee, slapped his face so hard he thought she’d broken his jaw, and through clenched teeth said, “You son-of-a-bitch Solly Obromowitz, don’t you ever do that to me again!”
Birdie had run out of the theater and into the street for several blocks with Solly calling out after her, “Wait a minute, wait a minute!” Tired, angry, and perspiring, she sat down on a door stoop when she heard Solly saying, “O.K., O.K., what the hell did I do that was so terrible? Tell me, what?”
Instead of answering, she sat clutching her purse and staring ahead of her. Solly simply could not stand the coldness, the being shut out. “Damn it, fight with me. Scream, holler, but don’t stop talking,” he said.
She finally looked at him, bit back the tears, but still there were tiny crystals of glistening moisture in the corners of her eyes. She said, “O.K., Solly, you want me to tell you why I’m so mad? So O.K., I’ll tell you. I’m no Hester Street tramp, the kind you can take to the movies for fifty cents and screw. I think I’m a little better than that. When I do get laid, it won’t be in the back of the Bijou Theater. Oh no, it’s going to be beautiful—you hear what I say—and with someone who loves me. So O.K., now you know.”
Solly was surprised at feeling unexpected guilt instead of his usual hostility and pain at her tirade of rejection. “You mean to tell me that you never necked?”
“That’s right, not the kind of necking you’re talking about. The trouble with you, Solly, is you think the same as every other Hester Street bum, that everybody’s alike, looking for a cheap, quick screw, button up your pants and go home. But you’re wrong. Life’s tough enough; it’s even tougher if you want to live it like a decent human being and for that you’ve got to work a lot harder in this place.” She started to cry.
Solly looked at her, then cautiously he put his arms around her, brushed away the tears with the back of his hand and kissed her softly on the mouth. He whispered in her ear. “I love you, Birdie. I’m sorry.”
They walked home in silence. When they reached Birdie’s house Solly said, “Can I take you to the Bijou tomorrow?” Birdie nodded yes and went up the stairs while Solly waited below until she disappeared, then he turned and walked home through the hot summer night.
Now, when he saw Birdie coming toward him as she crossed the street, he pretended he wasn’t hurt about the things that had happened the night before. “How come you’re late?” he said agreeably.
“I’m sorry, I had to help Mama. Solly, do you mind if we don’t go to the movies tonight, it’s so hot?” She added quickly, “It has nothing to do with last night, really. I just don’t feel like going, if you don’t mind.”
He grimaced slightly, thinking he really wanted to see the movie, but here he was saying, “O.K., we’ll do what you want.”
“Let’s go and have a soda, then we’ll see, O.K., Solly?”
They sat at a small round ice-cream table at Plotkin’s delicatessen and ordered a celery tonic. Solly was halfway through his when he noticed that Birdie had hardly tasted hers. “You don’t like it?” he asked. After all, it cost a nickel.
“It’s fine. Look, Solly, I have a problem I want to talk to you about.”
He felt flattered that she was seeking his advice. “Yeah, so what’s the problem?”
“You know Katie?”
He nodded his head. “So what’s the problem?” As she hesitated Solly popped a piece of ice in his mouth.
“Well, Solly,” she started out slowly, “I want you to do me a big favor.” She paused, then added quickly, “I want you to introduce Katie to David Rezinetsky.”
Solly nearly choked on the ice. “Say that again.”
“David Rezinetsky. I want you to introduce him to Katie.”
“You must be out of your mind—you think I’m going to ask him for anything.”
“Please, Solly, don’t get mad, this is important.”
“I will not. That guy never even talks to me. Like dirt under his feet he treats me.”
“Don’t be like that, Solly. You’ve known him all your life. You could overlook it if you wanted to do this for me.”
Solly scratched the back of his head. “I don’t know why it’s so important that she meets him. That’s number one, and number two is that that guy has lived in the same house two floors above me I forget for how many years, I went to school with him, I see him every day and never does he say hello Solly, drop dead Solly, go to hell, Solly, and you want me to go up to him and say, ‘Look Dave, have I got a girl for you’? He’d knock me on my can.” This was the advice she needed him for? The problem she wanted him to help her with? Like hell it was. She didn’t need his advice; she needed to use him, pure and simple, so her skinny girl friend could get a boyfriend she couldn’t get on her own. The hell he would humble himself, for what, why should he? What was in it for him? Not even the promise of feeling her tits in the dark movie.
Birdie’s eyes were cast down as she peeled off tiny bits of the cracked, dirty oil cloth that should have been replaced years ago. They both looked up when Mr. Plotkin called from behind the counter in Yiddish, “How long you going to sit there, till next shabbes? For a dime yet. I should charge you for sitting.”
Solly looked up, then around. There was no one in the store except Mr. Plotkin and themselves and the flies buzzing around the big slab of smoked salmon that lay on the counter. “You need the table for the big rush you’ve got coming in?” Up yours, he wanted to say to Mr. Plotkin, but he thought better of it because he knew his mother would give him one across the face even if he was going on twenty-one, because leave it to Mr. Plotkin to tell her how a son from the house of Obromowitz has profaned in his fine establishment. Aloud he said, “Come on, Birdie, let’s get out of here.”
They walked aimlessly for a while. There was really no place to go. Without looking at Solly, Birdie said, “Would you like to go up to the roof?” hoping that he would not misunderstand her motives, which were purely to divert his attention back to the mainstream of their conversation—her purpose. From the tone of his voice as he grumbled, “Oh what the hell,” she knew she could dismiss that problem.
They sat on the empty orange crates and felt the special heat of dusk. Birdie said, “I guess I hurt your feelings, Solly. I really didn’t mean to. I was just trying to do something nice for Katie.”
“Why that particular louse? I don’t understand, why him?”
“Because it’s a little bit complicated.”
“So uncomplicate it for me. I’ve got no place to go.”
“You know Katie lived in London with her mother when she was a little girl after she left Poland? Well, she’s had a really good education and the boys around here don’t appeal to her.”
“So that makes her some kind of a princess?”
“No, but what would she be able to talk to them about?”
“How would I know?”
Ignoring the sarcasm she went on, “I think my mother realized that she’d have a tough time getting a guy. Let’s face it, Solly, we’re slobs.”
That did it, Solly thought. “So I’m a slob? But David Rezinetsky the louse isn’t?”
“Now wait a minute, Solly. Don’t get mad—”
“Who the hell is he because he graduated from high school and I didn’t?”
“He’s a classy guy, that’s who he is.”
“Some classy guy, because he read a few more books than I did, so that makes him the Prince of Wales and me a slob?” He got up and paced back and forth, then angrily said, “Damn it, I had to go to work while he went to school because he had four older brothers. I got three younger ones. Him with his superior attitude, he runs around selling his fifty-cent insurance policies, big insurance man!” He turned to Birdie, looking her square in the eye, “Well I’m going to tell you, Birdie Greenberg, maybe you don’t think I’m good enough for you but someday the big insurance man will choke from envy because I got plans too, see?” Pointing to himself with both his thumbs he said, “I’m going to own my own theater someday, see?”
Birdie stood up and shook her finger at Solly as her voice crescendoed. “Damn you, Solly, that’s not what I meant and you know it. Skip it, forget it, if you couldn’t do this for me then you and I are through, understand? You and your crummy pride!” She ran down the stairs to her flat and slammed the door.
Solly remained on the roof for a long time, his head in his hands, shifting and kicking under his feet the small pebbles that stuck to the tar paper. Why was he debating with himself, he thought, when all the time he knew that he was going to eat crow for that frigid broad downstairs. He knocked on the door, and Birdie opened it.
Startled to see Solly but quickly composing herself and narrowing her eyes on him, she demanded, “Yea, what do you want?”
“Come out into the hall.”
She hesitated for a moment, then shut the door behind her.
He took a deep breath and said, “I don’t know how but I’m going to do it for you.”
She put her arms around Solly’s neck and kissed him hard. Maybe, he thought, this would have been an opportunity to make a deal with her in exchange for what he was going to do for her. But just as quickly he realized that Birdie would not be tricked into any barter. “Come on,” he said, resigned, “let’s go and get a knishe and cream soda at Erna Schimmel’s.”
Solly hung around the tenements, scarcely going anywhere for two nights trying to meet David coming or going. Finally, as Solly stood leaning against David’s crumbling banister, David came bouncing down the stairs two at a time. Before Solly could say a word he was away and down the street, with Solly running behind him up one street and down another until David reached the Christie Street gym, where he sat waiting his turn and watching intently the four other players as they ran and swatted the ball back and forth.
Solly quietly edged onto the seat next to David, being careful not to disturb him. Finally he spoke up, “Hi, Dave. They’re pretty good, huh?”
David looked quickly at Solly, thought momentarily what the hell was he doing here, then mentally shrugged, what did he care? and nodded.
Solly said, “You play a lot?”
David didn’t answer, he simply pretended not to hear. Solly tried again to engage him in conversation, and David again paid no attention.
The first four players left; it was David’s turn now. Taking the handball out of his pocket, he hit it hard against the wall and began the rally. Solly waited through forty-five minutes of torture, and boredom, for David to finish. He hated sports of any kind. There were really only two things he loved or even liked in this whole universe—Birdie Greenberg and the movies. The movies he loved, he ate, he slept. He would rather have worked as a part-time usher for no money, if necessary even getting up each morning at four to work at Lipkin’s Bakery so his evenings would be free to usher at the Bijou … he would rather do that than be, well, than be the mayor of New York.
Thank God, Solly thought, the game was over. He resented this arrogant creep. It was all too obvious David wanted nothing to do with him, but damn it he couldn’t turn back now; he wasn’t about to go back to Birdie and say he’d failed without even trying. He moved closer to David.
“You play great handball, Dave.”
David answered without looking at him, “Thanks.”
“You play often?”
Now David looked at him. This guy wants something. Maybe to make a touch, maybe he’s selling something. “O.K., Solly, what’s on your mind?”
Solly worried David could read his thoughts. “Nothing, I just happened by and saw you. Nothing wrong with being a little friendly, is there?”
David knew he didn’t just happen by. Gyms were not exactly Solly’s natural habitat. But David decided not to pursue it and got up and started to walk away, saying, “O.K., Solly, see you around.”
Solly jumped up and called out, “Hey wait a minute, Dave, I want to talk to you.”
Here it comes, David thought. He turned abruptly around, “What about?”
No use prolonging it. “Dave, I know we’ve never been friends, I mean real friends, but I’m going to ask you to do me a very, very big favor.”
“What kind of favor?”
It didn’t make it any easier for Solly that David impatiently volleyed the small ball between his hands as he stood there. Solly cleared his throat. He just couldn’t find the right words. It wasn’t easy standing in front of a guy you knew felt so damn superior to you—not at all the same as rehearsing the dialogue, taking both parts at three o’clock in the morning. The things he did for Birdie … so who asked him to be so crazy for her? Who forced him? “I’d like to ask you to double date with me and Birdie Greenberg and her best girl friend,” he finally blurted out.
David looked at him in amazement. “Solly, what do you want, what are you really after?”
“Nothing, Dave, honest, that’s it.”
“Oh, come on, Solly.”
“I know it sounds crazy. We were never out together before, and for me suddenly to ask you to blind date a girl sounds nuts, but please, Dave, would you do this for me? It means a lot, honest.”
“You’re right, it does sound crazy. But why me?”
“Well it’s kind of a mixed-up thing. Birdie gets an idea, nobody can talk her out of it.”
“What’s this got to do with me?”
“Nothing, really. Birdie thinks you’ve got class, she thinks you’re a regular Buddy Rogers, and she wants you to meet a girl friend she thinks you’d like.”
“And I suppose she looks Just like Jean Harlow.” He turned and began to walk out of the building. Solly hurried after him and stood in the doorway, but David pushed by him. He hated anyone who begged. Solly’s anger came out, his face grew red.
“David, can’t you even listen? I just asked you to do me a favor, that’s all. But no, your nose might fall off. Who the hell do you think you are, anyway? You always thought you were too good for me, for anyone around here. You were born in the same place as me. We went to school together. We’re cut from the same cloth. So what makes you think you’re so damn great?” Even though the anger had subsided, leaving him drained, Solly rambled on. “I’m in love with a meshuggena … she’s crazy but I’d go to hell for her if she wanted me to … I didn’t want to do this, I knew what you’d say …”
The consequences of failure came rushing at him as he thought of Birdie. Now more quietly he said, “I know she’ll hate me and think I’m stupid because I couldn’t get you to go. Knowing her she’ll never talk to me again and if that happens I’ll go kill myself somewhere. She doesn’t know you the way I do.” Then quietly he said, “All it would have meant to you was one lousy night. So she was pretty, or she wasn’t pretty, or you liked her or you didn’t like her, what the hell difference would it have made? Big deal. Only one night, Dave, that’s all for you, but for me it could mean the rest of my whole life.” Shoulders hunched, Solly looked very alone as he walked out to get lost in the crowd.
David watched Solly walking away, his teeth clenched, the muscles in his jaw taut. His first reaction when Solly had begun his attack on him was a desire to smash him one. That’s what he had wanted to do … but he didn’t, which was not a role that became David, He’d never taken any grief from anybody. When it came to defending himself, he was afraid of no one. He could never remember a time when he had deliberately started a fight, but if someone wanted to take him on that was O.K. with him. He was angry with himself because he let Solly get away with this, but even more angry because he didn’t know why, and that was what bothered him. He didn’t owe Solly anything. Besides, who had ever done anything for him, why should he do anything for Solly? Or for that matter for anybody, except his best and only friend, Abe Garfinckel, who had proved over and over again that he was a friend. Why should he? He asked for nothing from anybody, gave nothing in return. That was the way he wanted it, no obligations.
By his own design, David had been considered somewhat eccentric all his life by everyone in the community. A loner was a phenomenon in this closely knit society, and his aloofness was interpreted as conceit. David himself did nothing to dispel this impression and the effect snowballed. But conceit was the result rather than the cause of his isolation, and there were depths of intelligence and sensitivity within David that few would ever know existed.
To outward appearances David had all the physical attributes to attract people to him, but on the other hand he didn’t have the desire to attract the people who surrounded him. He had never been able to accept this network of humanity into which he had been born. They lived always with the fear of tomorrow, always with the threat of hunger, of illness, of old age, of dying. It was true that all of them had fled from the threat, or near threat, of annihilation, and understandably what they found here, if not utopian, was better than what they had before. Here was something they called freedom, but David constantly asked himself how much better was it, this kind of freedom? A ghetto without fences, a Diaspora without dignity?
What plagued David above everything else was the fear of poverty there seemed to be no escape from. He was driven to study in secrecy and to bear his doubts and dreams in loneliness. He would not capitulate to life, this he promised himself. If he had to remake himself he would; he would rise above the complacency of his family and his contemporaries, even if he had to forsake relationships that might have brought some companionship and comfort. To him, though, the risk of being like them was greater than the pain of being separate. He could bear that … he would be somebody, if only in his own eyes. It took discipline and loneliness, and David found his own private island, reading everything he could get his hands on, even from time to time going to a concert or a play with Abe. He held to his dream, and these things he did were less important for themselves than as part of his overriding plan of escape.
His aloofness did make him particularly attractive to the opposite sex. The more “hard to get,” the more desirable he became, and the girls pursued him. However, he didn’t avoid them just to play hard to get. They never bettered themselves, they never even tried, which was what he hated most of all.
So David Rezinetsky remained a loner, and let life swarm around him without being touched by it. Poverty and the ghetto bred mutual suffering, but David refused to share in any part of their lives. Still … that night, he had difficulty in getting to sleep. Solly stuck in his craw like a hard morsel he couldn’t spit up. He had to be honest with himself that Solly had touched a sore spot. The armor he had forged over the years had been chipped away just a little bit by some of the things Solly had said.
There was no denying, as Solly had said, that they were cut from the same piece of cloth, never mind how hard he tried to pretend otherwise, the truth was that—no matter how offensive the thought—chances were he would never escape from this sewer any more than Solly would. Face it, for every one who had, there were a hundred who couldn’t. The only lines of escape were either crime or education. The first was out of the question, so was the second. He had no diploma, no profession; he had no family to help him rise out of all this the way Abe’s family had done, and besides, what kind of a world waited outside for David Rezinetsky? He was a Jew living in a time when there were signs of blatant discrimination, signs that even literally read “No Jews Allowed.” At least here in this dismal ghetto, discrimination was one thing they didn’t have to contend with. Token compensation from a world that said “Leave this place and we’ll crush the dignity out of you, we’ll annihilate you.” Quotas at universities so subtle they hit you between the eyes, and you wanted to lash out and smash to pieces the world that didn’t want you. He asked himself where he did belong; and in a moment of honesty he had to say … here. Maybe he and Solly were not so different after all. They were Jews, a fact he could not be reconciled to, a fact that even in acknowledgment did not comfort him.
In his mind’s eye David again saw Solly standing there trying to reach him, his face sweating, his hair in his eyes, his glasses askew—and for some reason that David couldn’t sort out Solly now made him feel pity and admiration. It was as though he were looking at Solly for the first time in his life, Solly standing up to him. That had taken a hell of a lot of courage—David was also a head taller and thirty pounds heavier—fighting for a girl he loved so much he would take the chance of getting beaten up. David wondered what it would feel like to love someone with that much passion, and whether he ever would, or if in fact he were capable.
Anyway, it really wouldn’t hurt him if he did this for Solly … And now suddenly he wondered if Solly might actually have been serious about killing himself. At first he told himself it was a show of dramatics, but Solly was awfully convincing for once … what if Solly really meant to do what he had threatened … then David would be at least partly responsible … he had not even been willing to give Solly a chance, show him the courtesy of listening. Like it or not, he at least owed him that much. Everybody owed somebody something—even David Rezinetsky.