The Day the Flowers Died (11 page)

She placed food onto tables throughout the afternoon rush,
picking up tips and putting all the coins inside her small apron
pocket unraveling around the seams.  Toward the end of the
rush, she plodded over to one of the two tables left.  A
blonde older woman with wide blue eyes had her hair pinned up
tightly like a honeycomb.  Her companion, a thirty-something
man, also had structured blond hair, blue eyes and a square frame
from his shoulders to his feet.  She overheard their
conversation and leaned in to listen.

“This place is crawling with Jews.  I’ve seen German girls
walk hand in hand with them.  Disgusting.  This is what’s
wrong with our youth today.  They’re being corrupted,” the
blonde woman said as sure as day that she was right and sat
haughtily in her seat.

Her companion didn’t disagree and even encouraged her thinking,
a thinking he also shared.  His stiff movements and rigid
posture reminded Rebecca of the Nazi men.  Her ear had pulled
itself in their direction and, before they noticed, she yanked
herself back to her job, but not before overhearing his
comments.

“Soon, we won’t have to worry about them anymore.  We’ve
got plans.”

Rebecca slipped away, wondering about his statement and if it
had anything to do with the stormtroopers terrorizing the
cities.  In this moment, she felt fear for Eli and herself for
the first time.  She slid her hands into her apron pockets and
felt the coins she had earned for the day.  

“Everyone needs to be served, Rebecca, even those you don’t
like.”

He knew Rebecca was an open minded girl, a girl whose sentiments
swayed as freely in the wind as the flowers in spring, and he knew
she was a principled young lady brought up by strict parents. 
He’d never seen the young man she dated, but knew of her mother’s
disapproval.  But none of this mattered as he shoved Rebecca
forward.  It didn’t matter if the customers’ values vehemently
differed from her own or if she desperately didn’t want to do this,
because they were only customers and Rebecca only a waitress.

Rebecca bit her lip and almost curtsied out of habitual nervous
politeness at the customers at the table, the customers who
repulsed every bone in her body.  She took their order and
served their food without so much as forgetting her smile, an
outstretched smile which she learned from her mother and reserved
for them.

At home in her quiet room, the thoughts of the unpleasant,
overheard conversation weighed heavily on her and then her phone
rang.  She pranced over to it, happy for the interruption,
believing it to be Eli.

She answered the phone with an enthusiastic hello until the
speaker at the other end asked, “Is this my daughter, Rebecca?”

The roughness in the voice jolted her back to the earlier
unpleasant conversation.  “Yes, of course, Mutti.  This
is Rebecca.  Who else would it be?”

“You sound different.” Her mother paused and then continued, “I
was calling to see how you were doing.”

“I’m fine.  I’m doing well.  I just got back from
work.”

“Work.” Rebecca could feel her mother’s glinting eyes. 
“You know you wouldn’t have to work if you just stayed home to
study at University.”

“Mutti, we’ve been through this too many times.  I’m not
going to do this with you again.” Rebecca’s voice was worn with
arguments between them and then her voice soothed, “Besides, I’ve
almost completed my diploma so you won’t be able to complain about
it much longer.”

“Your diploma? That’s fabulous, dear.  Has it been four
years already? It feels like just yesterday you were packing up
your luggage and leaving your mutti in tears.”

“You are so dramatic, Mama.” Rebecca rolled her eyes.

“So when am I going to see you?”

“I was just up for Christmas.”

“Over a month ago and besides, you didn’t stay long.”

“Can you blame me?”

“Yes, I can.  We bought you a new car and you show us your
appreciation by leaving on Christmas day.”

“Dad bought me the car, and you kept pushing the issue with
Eli.  I told you I didn’t want to talk about it on Christmas
of all days.”

“But I am your mutti and I worry about you.  You see
everything that’s going on with the posters and pamphlets. 
Hindenburg can only do so much to keep this country under control,
and there are many supporters of the Nazi party.  I don’t want
you getting hurt.”

“Just admit this is about you.  This is about you not
wanting me to date Eli because of your own prejudices.” Rebecca’s
nostrils flared.

“This doesn’t have to do with me, Rebecca.  There is so
much you don’t understand because you’re so young.” She paused and
then continued, “He could change your life forever, your
reputation, your hopes for settling down with a fine German
gentleman.”

“These aren’t my hopes, Mutti; they’re yours.”

“And they should be yours, too.  I forbid you to see him.”
Deseire held her tongue after her strong statement and Rebecca
hesitated to answer at first, surprised her mother had actually
said, “forbid.”

“You can’t forbid me, Mama.  I’m not a little girl
anymore.  I make my own choices.”

“Just promise me you won’t do anything rash with him.” Deseire’s
voice softened, soothed and Rebecca knew what rash meant to her
mother: intimate, pregnant, married, anything that couldn’t be
undone.

Rebecca knew her mother was too late with the first forbiddance
and she was exhausted at what else to say to her.

“Goodbye, Mutti.” Rebecca clicked the phone down as the white
cord tangled.  She plopped onto her soft sofa with a weary
sigh from a long day and closed her eyes to sleep.

Saturday, March 19, 1932

Missing her the past few weekends because of a stressful office
atmosphere, Eli took it upon himself to invite Rebecca for tea at
his place Saturday morning,.  He’d tried to make up for the
loss in the office since Ekkehard’s betrayal concerning the dry
cleaning receipts.  It didn’t sting Eli personally for he
didn’t know Ekkehard very well, but it was a betrayal to an office
he had worked at for more than five years, a betrayal to his
father.

Ezekiel and Eli vowed to never allow something like that to ever
happen again.  Over the past few weeks, Eli had to do twice
the amount of his usual work, his own and the clerk’s duties, since
Ekkehard had been asked to leave and they didn’t trust hiring
another man.

Since Valentines was the last day Rebecca had seen Eli, it took
very little encouraging on Eli’s part to arouse her interest. 
Rebecca yearned to see Eli: touch his skin, hold him, lay her hands
in his, caress his soft lips with hers.  She found the more
she didn’t see him, the more she dreamt of him while she walked to
her classes at University and while she served food at the diner
and while she slept.

She had grown accustomed to his dark hair brushing up against
hers on the sofa or in the bed.  She had missed his tender
voice calling her name.  So, when Eli had phoned Saturday
morning to invite her to tea at his room, she skipped from her sofa
and dashed up the stairs.

When Eli opened the door at her soft knocking, their eyes met
and all the feelings emerged that they felt on the porch the day
they first made love, intensified from a lack of satisfying
it.  Rebecca’s body burned, longing for his touch and Eli’s
eyes glazed over her as his fingers played with her hair and
neck.  Before Rebecca could address her sensual desires, Eli
reached out for her hand and escorted her to his small table with
two teacups on top of it.

He had a lot on his mind, yet somehow from his eyes falling on
her, all the thoughts that preoccupied him disappeared. 
Social anxieties or political nuances no longer filled the space
between them.  This space filled with her smell, an expensive
perfume, and the air she breathed, the same air that filled his
lungs.  In this space with her, the betrayal of Ekkehard and
the loss of the case, the woes of a growing Nazi party and the
propaganda plastered on the walls vanished.  This space held
only him and her and their love, pulling them like magnets unable
to resist its dangerous polarity.

As Eli watched her sip her orange flavored tea, he reached
across the minuscule wood table which pressed against his chest and
pulled her free hand to his lips.  Rebecca put the teacup
down, wrapped her other hand around his and then touched his
lips.  He held her hand there for moments.  Fingers
interlocked, she tickled his leg from underneath with her lifted
toes like feathers brushing against bare skin.  Control
diminished and Eli leapt, tossing himself around the table and
sweeping her into his arms.

His hands glided up her arms covered in white lace and then held
her face.  Impassioned, her body fell into his and both of
them fell onto the hard wood, pushing and pulling the spaces
between them.  Clothes ripped, hair pulled, chests became
bare, sweat fell from their bodies.  With heavy breathing and
legs sturdy, he lifted her up over himself and she wrapped her legs
around his waist.  He carried her into his bedroom, into the
quiet space that held them.  All the insecurities which Eli
buried deep within a hardened confidence lifted and all the words
spoken from Rebecca’s mother fell from her ears unattended and onto
the wood floor.

Rebecca awoke with Eli next to her, lying on his large sized bed
and beige white sheets.  Pillows cushioned Eli’s face and his
body sprawled out with his arm over her.  She slipped out from
under him, tiptoeing into the next room and grabbed her lace blouse
and skirt on the small wood table to cover herself.  The sun
had not yet risen, leaving the sky still dark with heavy blues and
grays.  Rebecca poured water into his kettle and boiled
tea.  While the kettle warmed, she tiptoed back into his room
and washed in the bath.  While she relaxed in the orange
scented water, she closed her eyes and let the flavored water soak
and soften her skin.  The kettle sung toooot and Rebecca
opened her eyes.  Eli leapt up from the bed, alarmed.

“It’s just the kettle.  I’m boiling tea.” Rebecca meandered
out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around her, her wet feet
leaving prints on the wooden floors.  Pulling the kettle off
the stove, she poured them both a cup and dropped a piece of lemon
into Eli’s, knowing that was how he liked it.  Eli kissed her
shoulders, then lifted his tea from the counter and sipped it with
his navy blue robe hanging over his bare body.

Rebecca returned to her bath, leaving her tea to cool.  She
closed her eyes again as she soaked in the tub with the water
tingling her feet.  Eli sipped a few times from his cup before
going to the bath to join her.  He hung his robe on the door
and slid in softly, not wanting to disturb her serenity.  They
laid twine for several minutes until the knock at the door startled
Eli for a second time this morning and with a disgruntled groan, he
slid out of the tub and put on a crisp white button shirt with an
ironed collar, pulled up his black slacks with two black straps
over his shoulders, and hobbled to the door.  He swung it open
and saw Aaron on the other side with puffy, blue lips and his nose
scraped and bloody.

“What happened?” Eli's stunned reaction left him staring at
Aaron.

Aaron’s short build stammered in with a limp.

“I threw a punch at a bully in a Nazi uniform.  He was
pinning up posters over the walls of our building, declaring how
the Jews are our misfortune.” He wiped his nose with a checkered
napkin folded in his pocket.  “We got into a scuffle.”

“What were you doing at the office Sunday morning? I thought
your offices closed Sunday?” Eli walked to the kitchen, searching
for a towel and ice.

“They are.” He rubbed his lip.  “But then they decided I
should be doing more work for them.  They told me I wasn’t
pulling my own weight, all the clients preferred other lawyers.” He
waved his hands.  “They said if I wanted to stay on the
payroll, I would have to come in Sundays and make up for hours I
wasn’t working during the week.”

Eli ran the white towel under the sink’s water and then enclosed
ice inside of it.  “Here, put this on your lips and nose to
help with swelling.”

“As if I don’t do enough during the week; I have my hands filled
with files and papers other lawyers want me to handle.”

Rebecca heard bits of the irritable conversation from inside the
tub and slipped on her white lace blouse and beige skirt that
swayed just below the knees.  She towel dried her hair and
ambled into the living area.

“Aaron, what a surprise to see you so early.”

“Sorry for the intrusion.” Aaron’s eyes glanced at Rebecca and
then back at Eli, comprehending what exactly he has just intruded
upon.

“It’s good to see you,” Rebecca said, sympathetic to his puffy
lip and blood stained nose.  She placed her hand over the
towel filled with ice and helped Aaron tend to his wounds like a
mother.

“Are you heading back to work?” Eli asked, sitting down on the
wooden stool near the kitchen table.  Aaron plopped down on
the sofa across from Eli.  Rebecca returned to her tea, cold
now, sipping it in the kitchen area.

“I don’t know if I’m invited back to work, frankly,” Aaron said
and Eli’s brows wrinkled.

“What exactly happened?”

Aaron lowered the towel of ice to his leg.  “I was walking
to the office and saw the Nazi, no older than twenty, putting
derogatory posters on the walls of the office and so I told him he
would have to take them down.” Aaron scratched his head.  “He
glared up at me and said, “Don’t tell me what to do Jew boy,”
smirked and finished posting it.” Rebecca walked into the living
area and sat at the other wooden stool on the other side of the
table.

“And you hit him?” Eli interjected.

“No.  I took a deep breath and then ask him again to stop
or I would have to take them down myself.” Rebecca tightened her
hands around her teacup.  “He stood up, taller than me, mind
you I’m not that tall, and he pushed me backward with both
arms.”