The Boston Girl (11 page)

I thought he was sweet and that I was sweet on him.

I ran into Ernie Goldman on the trolley but I wouldn’t have recognized him if he hadn’t introduced himself. He looked ten years older than the last time I’d seen him, which was only a few years earlier in the Shakespeare class. He was so pale and skinny, I thought he’d been sick, but then I saw the cane, which meant he’d probably been overseas in the war.

I asked what he was doing and he said he was working in his father’s scrap metal business. When I told him I was on my way to a class at Simmons, he said, “I figured you for a college girl. You always asked the best questions.”

When I said that was one of the nicest compliments I ever had, all the lines around his mouth relaxed and his whole face rearranged itself into a smile that reached up into his eyes. When a shy person smiles, it’s like the sun coming out.

We got to my stop and said goodbye and honestly I didn’t give him a second thought. But the next morning, there was a bouquet of roses on my desk. The note said
May I take you to dinner on Saturday? Ernie Goldman.

Five minutes later, the phone rang and Betty said, “Herman says you got roses from Ernie Goldman? Who is he? Do I know him?”

He asked me to pick the restaurant. Betty said the Marliave was nice but when we got there, I was mortified; the dining room was lit with candles and all the tables were full of couples holding hands and whispering. There was even a violin player walking around playing schmaltzy music. I was afraid Ernie would think I was being pushy, but he didn’t seem to take it that way. He held out my chair and said he liked how quiet the place was.

I knew Ernie was shy, so I’d thought up some questions to get him talking, but he managed to turn them all around and I wound up doing most of the talking while he leaned forward and watched my face as if he was afraid of missing something. It was very flattering, and when I got him to smile I felt like I’d won the lottery. By the end of the evening, I thought he was sweet and that I was sweet on him.

We saw each other once a week after that, and when he found out that I usually went to Saturday Club, he asked if I would prefer we go out on Sundays instead. He was thoughtful that way, nothing like the blowhards I’d been fixed up with, and the complete opposite of you-know-who.

Ernie was formal, even a little stiff, but I didn’t hold it against him. I was pretty sure it had something to do with his being wounded, but when I asked where he’d been in the war he shook his head. “The doctors said I should put it all behind me.” I didn’t ask again.

When I think back, I get mad at what they did to those poor men. Ernie must have had PTSD—they called it shell shock—and the doctors told him to keep it all bottled up inside. They didn’t know any better, but it was like treating syphilis with candy bars.

A few weeks after we started going out, I finally got up the nerve to get my hair cut. The barber said I was lucky; my hair was so thick and wavy, it looked like I’d had it marcelled. Of course, what I wanted was straight hair with big spit curls on each side, but that would have taken a pound of pomade. No girl is ever happy with her own hair, is she?

But I did look good, if I say so myself. On the way home, a stranger actually stopped me on the street and asked if I was single.

When Ernie didn’t notice my haircut at all, I was hurt. Betty just shrugged and told me not to worry about it. “Typical man.”

But I was starting to wonder about Ernie. It’s not like I wanted him to make a pass at me, but after three months he hadn’t even kissed me on the cheek. Once when we were at the movies and he had his hand on the armrest, I put my hand on top of his. He didn’t pull away, but he didn’t take it, either, and I felt like an idiot.

And then there was the day at the art museum. I’d gotten two postcards in one day from Filomena, so I told Ernie I’d rather go look at the paintings than go to a matinee. He said okay, like he did to everything I suggested, but when we got off the trolley I saw he was limping more than usual. I asked if he wanted to sit down and rest and he snapped, and I mean like one of those turtles that bite. “Don’t talk to me like that.”

I pointed out some of the paintings Filomena had shown me but Ernie didn’t seem interested in anything, so after a little while I said we should leave.

We were on our way out when he stopped and stared at a big painting of a young man floating in the sea. Right next to him was a huge shark with its mouth wide open, like he was getting ready to bite the man’s head off. Some men in a boat were trying to rescue him but it looked like they were too late. His skin was gray and his eyes were glassy. It was gruesome.

One look was enough for me but Ernie couldn’t take his eyes off it.

“It’s from a true story,” he said. “Do you see the blood in the water, there? Do you see that his foot is missing?”

“What an awful way to die,” I said.

“But he didn’t die.” Ernie limped across the gallery to a bench facing the painting and I sat down with him. He was still staring at the painting. “This was the first place my nurse took me when I got out of the wheelchair. She said if Watson could be the mayor of London without a foot, there was no reason I couldn’t get myself up and out of the house.”

“And you did,” I said.

Ernie put elbows on his knees and held his head in his hands and sat like that for a long time. He didn’t answer me when I said we should go, and eventually one of the guards came over to see if something was wrong. Ernie didn’t say another word all day.

That night, I decided to break it off. I felt guilty—like I was abandoning a puppy I had adopted. And there was even something unpatriotic about walking away from a veteran of the war. But Ernie had been getting moodier and quieter, and then there was the physical element, or the complete lack of it.

The next morning, Ernie called me at work and said how much he enjoyed our time at the museum, as if nothing had happened. He asked if I’d go to the movies with him on Sunday, but I said I couldn’t because I was going to Revere Beach with Betty and the family. He told me he didn’t like going to the shore so I thought I was off the hook.

But later that day I got a bunch of daisies and the note said, “Maybe you could teach me how to like the beach.” It was so sweet, I thought, Okay, one more chance. But by the weekend I was praying it would rain so I wouldn’t have to see him again.

No such luck. Sunday was sunny and hot and Ernie met me with a daisy in his hand. “You look pretty,” he said, and I could see how hard he was trying. “Your hair is pretty, too.”

There wasn’t room in Levine’s car for us to ride with them, but I wanted to take the trolley anyway. With everyone going to the beach, it was like a party. There were hampers in the aisles and children running around and strangers debating where to get the best ice cream. I thought it was fun, but Ernie pulled his hat low on his forehead to shut it all out.

I told him it would be better once we got off, but it wasn’t. The boardwalk was mobbed like downtown at Christmas, only with the roller coaster roaring overhead. The beach was even worse. It was like an obstacle course of blankets and people. It was hard for him to walk on sand and the cane didn’t help at all.

When we found Betty and Levine, Eddy shrieked and held out his arms for me to pick him up. Jake was jumping up and down. “Aunt Addie, tell Pop to let me go to the arcade. I’ll win a toy for Eddy. Tell him I’m big enough to go by myself.”

Betty said, “Take him to the arcade, Herman. I have company now so you don’t have to worry about me.” She was very pregnant and trying to cool off with a big straw fan. “The baby makes me even hotter than usual. At least I don’t have swollen ankles like when I was pregnant before. Herman thinks it means I’m having a girl, which is what he wants.” She patted her belly. “This one is moving around just as much as my other boys. But no matter what comes out, this is the last one.”

I could see that Ernie was mortified by the way she was talking about her body; he didn’t know where to look and was sweating through his jacket. I asked Betty if she’d be okay for a few minutes if we walked to the water to find a breeze.

It wasn’t any cooler there and we ended up near a bunch of boys who were setting off firecrackers left over from the Fourth of July. The popping made Ernie nervous so we started back and that’s when the first rocket exploded over our heads. Ernie jumped and tried to walk faster.

The next blast was so strong, I could feel it in my chest, and babies started crying. Ernie threw himself down on the sand face-first, his hands around the back of his head. I crouched over him and said it was just kids making noise, but then a whole string of loud explosions went off, echoing up and down the beach.

Ernie pulled himself up and ran, dragging his bad leg behind him. He was running blind, with his head down and his hands over his ears, so he had no idea that he’d knocked a little boy to the ground or that the boy’s father was chasing him. He was a short man with muscular legs and it took him no time to catch up to poor lame Ernie in his shoes full of sand. He tackled Ernie, who curled up in a ball and started making those terrible choking noises men make when they cry.

The man stood over him for a moment, but then he kneeled down and started patting Ernie on the back, saying things like “It’s all right now, soldier. I know. I was there, too, but it’s all right now. You’re home.”

When he noticed me holding Ernie’s hat and cane, he said, “Are you the wife?”

“Friend of the family,” I said, ashamed of how fast I’d answered so no one would think I was married to this poor lunatic. “What should I do?”

“Let’s get him out of here,” he said and hoisted Ernie up by the armpits and dragged him toward the boardwalk. A man with an empty sleeve met us and said, “There’s a police car down by the carousel.”

I said I’d go and ran down the street as fast as I could. When the cops heard that Ernie was a veteran, they turned on the siren. They were very kind to him as they got him into backseat—they must have been in the war, too.

I never saw Ernie again. His parents sent him to a sanitarium in Colorado. I heard that they sold everything and moved out there to be with him.

Betty said, “I hope you aren’t taking this too hard. I never thought he was right for you.”

“I should have ended it a long time ago,” I said. “I was going out with him for something to do. God, that sounds so awful.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. He wasn’t in love with you, either.”

That didn’t make me feel any better, and it was a long time before I even thought about going out again. First Harold, then Ernie? It was pretty clear I didn’t have any talent at picking men.

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1922–24
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If I wasn’t so busy, I would have felt sorry for myself.

Levine went into business with Morris Silverman, who was a much bigger fish in Boston real estate and also a very nice guy. Everybody liked Mo Silverman. The only problem was that he already had three girls in his office and there wasn’t enough work for four secretaries. Betty wanted him to fire one of his girls. “I’m sure you’re a better typist.”

But to me, it wasn’t a problem at all. I had wanted to change jobs for a long time. I hadn’t done anything about it because no one was going to pay me as much as Levine and also it would have made a big stink at home.

So this was a good thing. Gussie was always saying she could get me a job with a judge or one of her businesswomen. And Miss Chevalier was working for the Boston Public Library, so I could ask her to recommend me for a job there. When Silverman said he wanted to talk to me about “the situation,” I was ready to tell him there were no hard feelings.

But instead of letting me go, he asked if I could just wait a few months. One of his girls was getting married and leaving in September but he didn’t want to let her go sooner because she was paying for the wedding herself. “She’s an orphan,” he said, and he offered to pay me a little something on the side. It would be our little secret and I would start again in the fall. That was a mensch, even if he did ruin my escape plan.

Betty thought it was perfect timing. She said I could spend the summer at home with her and the boys. “It will be good practice for when you have your own children.” She needed the help with the twins, who were two years old at the time—I guess they would have been your second cousins—Richie and Carl. Eddy was still a little kid, too. Jake was ten by then. I think he was Betty’s favorite and I don’t think anybody in the neighborhood ever knew that he wasn’t her natural son.

But spending three months with them—and around my mother—would have given me a nervous breakdown. Mameh never let up: I read too many books, I had too many friends, I dressed like a floozy, it was selfish to waste money on movies, and I was an ingrate because I wouldn’t answer her in Yiddish like Betty. Mameh didn’t call her Betty-the-whore anymore, although behind her back it was “Betty-the-climber” and “Betty-who-thinks-she’s-better-than-you-and-me.”

Once, as a kind of peace offering, I asked her in Yiddish if she needed anything from the store, and all she did was make fun of my pronunciation. Betty let that kind of thing roll off her back, but it always got my heart racing like I was being chased, and if she started in at night, I couldn’t fall asleep.

There was nothing I could do to please my mother, never mind that I was paying most of the rent.

When I told Gussie what was going on and that I might get stuck babysitting for Betty until September, she said, “You could go to Rockport Lodge for the summer.”

I thought she was joking. I hadn’t been to Rockport since the summer Filomena fell in love with her sculptor. Gussie not only went every year, she knew half the women on the lodge’s board of directors, which is how she knew that the girl who had been hired to make the beds and sweep the halls had quit at the last minute. “It’s not a great job and the pay is lousy but it might be better than staying home and changing diapers. By the time you get back, I’ll have something better for you.”

It sounded too good to be true: room and board, living away from home for the summer in the most beautiful place I’d ever seen? Gussie made a phone call and I was hired.

I told my parents I had a job as the assistant to the director at Rockport Lodge, which was sort of true and sounded better than “cleaning lady.” My father had no opinion but of course my mother thought it was terrible. Why would I do such a thing when my sister needed me? Who would be watching me? She used two Yiddish words for “tramp” I’d never heard before.

Betty told me to go. “You’re only young once. Never mind what I said; you don’t need to practice on my kids; they already love you to pieces.” But because Betty was Betty she also said, “Of course, they’d like to have some cousins already.”

I started crossing off days on the calendar. I got a valise and repacked it a hundred times. Buying that train ticket made me feel like a world traveler.

—

The director of Rockport Lodge that summer was Miss Gloria Lettis—not a youngster, that one. She had tiny eyes and the biggest bosom I’d ever seen. She was also very full of herself. Before I could put down my suitcase she said, “Come along,” and showed me to a closet full of buckets and mops—some for the bathroom only, some for the stairs and hallways. I was still carrying my bag when we went to see the linen cabinet, which I had to keep in the same exact order at all times, and then outside to the garbage bins, where I would empty wastebaskets every morning. I had never seen the annex, which was a new one-story building behind the main house, like a long cabin with unpainted rooms for twenty or thirty more girls. That’s when I started to realize how much work I was in for.

In the kitchen, Miss Lettis handed me over to Mrs. Morse, who hadn’t changed at all. She took one look at me and sighed. “Not very strong, are you? I just hope you don’t run away after the first week like the last girl.”

I promised I’d be there all summer but I could tell she didn’t believe me. She showed me my “room,” which was the old pantry and only big enough for a cot, a stool, and a few pegs for my clothes. And it was right next to the stove, so when the oven was on I had to get out of there or I would bake, too.

After a week, I thought I might have been better off with four boys than sixty girls who never picked up their magazines and were always losing their socks and hankies. I didn’t understand how they could get the bathrooms so dirty or how they managed to track in pounds—and I’m not exaggerating—of sand. I never stopped sweeping. If I wasn’t so busy, I would have felt sorry for myself.

But it wasn’t until the first Saturday changeover that I understood why that other girl had run away. As soon as the group that was leaving brought their suitcases downstairs, I started stripping and making beds, dusting and mopping floors, and carrying out heaps of trash. I lugged baskets and baskets of dirty linen to the laundry shed, where a tall African-American lady with white hair was boiling a huge pot of water. I barely finished before the next group arrived. I was so pooped that I ended up sleeping straight through supper.

Mrs. Morse was offended that someone could be too tired to eat her food, so she told Miss Lettis that either she get me some help on Saturdays or she would not be back the next summer. “And I will tell the board that you were the reason why.”

Lucy Miller showed up the very next week. I couldn’t imagine how a bony thirteen-year-old kid with blond pigtails would be much help, but she’d been cleaning up after six brothers her whole life, so she could strip and make a bed in half the time it took me. Thanks to her I never missed a Saturday lunch out of tiredness again. And believe me, that was a meal I didn’t want to miss.

The food in the kitchen was better than what they got in the dining room—especially Saturday lunch. When we finished eating, Hannah, the washerwoman, tipped her chair back on two legs and said, “That was a real Sunday dinner we had, even if it is only Saturday.”

I had never sat down with a black person before and I was a little shy of her at first. I had read
Uncle Tom’s Cabin
, so what was I going to say to someone whose grandmother had probably been a slave? But Hannah was easy to be around and a great storyteller. She even got Mrs. Morse to laugh about the summer people in the big houses in town; they seemed to think that the locals were deaf, blind, and too stupid to see that Father was drunk every night or young Miss was doing more than just talking to the gardener.

After a few weeks, my arms and legs were stronger and I wasn’t dead tired at the end of the day, so one evening when the girls were playing charades, I changed clothes and went to join in. There were a lot of puzzled faces when I walked into the parlor, but once they figured out that I was the girl who washed the toilets, nobody would look me in the eye.

I don’t think they were being mean. If the cleaning girl had shown up for charades when I was a guest at Rockport Lodge, I probably would have done the same thing—more out of embarrassment than snobbery, I hope. There must have been someone doing the cleaning when I was there on vacation, but I can’t remember seeing her. To this day whenever I lay eyes on a chambermaid, I smile and say hello.

After that night, if there was music or a lecture I wanted to hear, I pulled up a chair on the porch and listened through the window. On quiet nights when it was really dark, Mrs. Morse gave me an oil lamp so I could sit out where it was cool and read a book.