The Two-Family House: A Novel (31 page)

“What are you doing here? You didn’t say anything to him, did you?”

“Of course not. Mort asked me to come before I left. I’m going on a trip in a few days.”

“A trip?”

“My aunt Faye passed away. I’m going to Florida for a while to settle everything with her estate.”

“Faye? Oh no. She was a wonderful lady.”

“She was. Anyway, I’m leaving on Wednesday.”

“How long will you be gone?”

“A few weeks.” For as long as the two women had known each other, Helen could always tell when Rose was lying. There was something about the way Rose’s upper lip curved inward that gave it away. As much as Helen wanted to know the truth, she didn’t want to provoke an argument. The last time the two of them argued, Abe had almost died. Stop asking questions, she told herself.

“Have a nice trip.” Helen forced a noncommittal smile and made herself walk past Rose and down the hallway to Abe’s room. Her hand was already on the door handle when Rose called after her.

“Helen!”

Even from several feet away she could see that Rose was crying. It took all of her strength not to go to Rose to comfort her, all of her willpower to root her feet to the spot on the floor where she stood in front of Abe’s room. She tightened her grip on the door handle and waited for Rose to say something. Silently she counted to ten, promising herself that if Rose was still silent by the time she reached ten, she would open the door and go inside. When she reached eight, Rose spoke.

“I’m sorry. For all of it.”

Helen didn’t move an inch. She didn’t look at Rose. She couldn’t trust herself. She couldn’t even breathe. Rose spoke again.

“Goodbye, Helen.”

She watched Rose turn away from her then, watched her walk back toward the elevator that would carry her down to the first floor of the building. From there, Helen knew, Rose would walk out of the cold sterility of the hospital lobby into the warmth and brightness of the May sunshine. She would go back to her house and finish packing her things. In a few days Rose would board the airplane that would take her south, far away from Mort, from Natalie and from everyone else. Rose would leave every mistake and complication of her life behind, and when she disembarked in Florida, everything would be simple and new. Why, Helen wondered, would she ever want to come back?

Chapter 62

JUDITH

Rose was leaving the next day, and Judith was running out of time. She couldn’t speak with Aunt Helen, not with Uncle Abe in the hospital, and there was no one else to ask. She was the only one who suspected. Whether that made her particularly observant or particularly foolish, she would decide after she talked to her mother. Had she finally deciphered the truth, or was the whole idea ridiculous? She wouldn’t wait for her mother to return from Florida to find out. She would ask her today.

In the meantime, Judith decided to help Dinah finish packing for her trip to Florida. Judith couldn’t figure out why Rose was taking Dinah with her, but she was happy her sister was getting some attention. From a very young age, Judith had taken her place in the family as the most studious of the three sisters. Mimi, as everyone knew, was the beauty. Only Dinah remained undefined. For a few years she had occupied the role of the adorable baby of the family, but only until Teddy came along. After that, she had faded into the background, her personality hazy and her role in the family vague.

Judith found Dinah in her room, folding clothes into neat, square piles on her bed. Dinah had the smallest of the bedrooms, with faded yellow walls and white painted furniture. Other than a carefully arranged display of old dolls on the shelves in the corner, there was no clutter to be found.

Dinah was happy to have company. “You’ve never been on a plane, have you? I’m nervous.”

“No,” Judith shook her head, “but they’re completely safe.” She wanted to say something encouraging, something about how Dinah and their mother would have a wonderful time together, but she couldn’t make herself say those words, so she opted for simple truths. “It’s going to be so sunny in Florida!”

“Not too humid?”

“Not when you’re on the beach! And the food—I bet you’ll have stone crab claws.”

“Are they good?”

“Delicious. One of the girls on my hall is from Florida and all she talks about are the stone crab claws. Plus you get to stay in Faye’s house. I bet it’s fancy as anything. Remember her apartment in New York?”

“Of course!” Dinah was finally smiling, and Judith wished she hadn’t waited so long to make that kind of effort with her sister.

*   *   *

They were sitting at the kitchen table when Rose returned from the grocery store.

“Is it all right if I borrow the car for an hour?” Dinah wanted to know. “I need to pick up a few things at the drugstore. Want to come, Judith?”

“You go without me. I’ll see you when you get back.”

“Sure.” Dinah took the keys from Rose and headed out of the kitchen with her purse. A few minutes later Judith heard the click of the front door lock. She was alone with her mother.

Rose busied herself unpacking the groceries. She sprinkled a chicken with salt and garlic powder and put the roasting pan in the center of the oven. “There’s something I need to talk to you about,” Judith told her.

“It’ll have to wait. I have too much to do before I leave tomorrow. I have laundry and phone calls to take care of, and I’m just starting dinner.” Rose slammed the oven door shut.

“Then I’ll talk while you cook.” Judith’s tone was desperate, but Rose chose not to notice. She slid a pile of chopped broccoli into a casserole dish and poured a can of cream of mushroom soup over the top, all without looking up. “Fine.”

There was no easy way to introduce the topic, no smooth transition Judith could employ. “I have to ask you a question, but I don’t know how.…”

“You don’t know how to ask me a question?”

“I don’t have … the right words.”

“Isn’t that what you’ve been studying for all these years? Words?” Rose was exasperated. “I don’t have time for this nonsense. I have to start a load of laundry.”

Judith stopped her before she could leave the kitchen. “I heard you arguing with Aunt Helen,” she blurted out. “The night of the wedding.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Helen and I didn’t argue at the wedding.”

“It was before Uncle Abe’s heart attack. I was in the bathroom by the coatroom and I heard you yelling about a deal you made, thirteen years ago, you said. After that, I couldn’t hear anything else and I went back to the party.”

Judith waited for her mother to speak, but Rose didn’t say anything. She took a seat at the kitchen table and smoothed her skirt on her lap.

Judith kept talking. “I don’t expect you to explain everything to me. It was a long time ago, I know that. But I think you were talking about the night Teddy was born. The night Teddy and Natalie both were born.” Rose still didn’t speak, so Judith continued, “You were never the same after that night.”

“
I
was never the same?
Nothing
was ever the same!”

“Please don’t get angry with me,” Judith whispered. “I don’t want to argue with you.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I just want to ask a question. One question, that’s all. And I won’t bother you about it ever again.”

Rose crossed her arms over her chest and glared. “Go ahead.”

The air was thick with dinner smells and it was hard for Judith to breathe. There was nothing to do but to come out and say it. “I think you and Aunt Helen … that night. I think…”

“For heaven’s sake,
just say it
!”

“Is Natalie my sister?”

There was nothing exceptional about the moment that followed. Rose didn’t even seem surprised by the question. There were no tears, no shouts, no confessions. There was no hesitation before her mother spoke, and no excuses after. Judith knew the answer before the sound was fully formed. The only thing that surprised her was the flood of oxygen that filled her lungs the moment the word was spoken out loud. “Yes.”

Chapter 63

ABE

Abe was glad he was being discharged on a Sunday. After two weeks of hospital food, he couldn’t wait to get home and have one of Helen’s Sunday night pot roast dinners. She always made mushroom gravy to go with the roast, and those little homemade rolls he loved.

He had never been so happy to sit on the couch and watch the baseball game with his family. Helen didn’t follow baseball, but that first day home she wouldn’t let him out of her sight. She wasn’t watching the game as much as watching
him
, like she wanted to check his pulse. With all her staring Abe couldn’t concentrate on the game, so, sweet as could be, he told her maybe she should find something else to do. After that she made Natalie and George check on him and report back to her in the kitchen every fifteen minutes.

Sol, Arlene and Johnny were coming over to celebrate his first night home. Helen had invited Mort and Judith as well. Luckily, Rose was still in Florida.

“I told Mort to come over for dinner any night he likes while Rose is away,” Helen told him.

“I’m surprised you want to spend that much time with him.”

“I’m sure he won’t want to come every night. Judith is headed back to Boston soon and I don’t want him to eat alone. Plus, he can tell you what’s going on at work over dinner.”

“I won’t need updates from Mort. I’m going back to work tomorrow.”

“Abe!” She swatted his arm, not too hard. “The doctor said no work for at least a week!”

“Yeah, but he meant for people who don’t like their jobs.”

“He meant for people who had heart attacks! You’re not going!” The look on her face told him there would be no negotiating. He held up his hands in surrender.

A few hours later, when Abe looked around the table at Helen and the rest of his family, he felt an overwhelming surge of gratitude. He felt considerably less grateful when he saw what Helen was serving for dinner. “Where’s the pot roast?”

She pretended not to notice his disappointment. “The doctor said you have to cut back on red meat. I made a recipe from the cookbook the cardiologist’s nurse gave me.”

“It looks delicious,” George said, without enthusiasm.

“No, it doesn’t,” said Natalie. “It looks awful. But if Daddy has to eat it, then we do too.”

“Thanks, sweetheart.” Abe blew her a kiss from across the table. “Did you make the rolls, at least?” he asked Helen.

“Yes, but you can’t have butter.”

Abe sighed and shook his head. “When I was in the hospital I dreamt about this dinner. Pot roast, mushroom gravy, buttery rolls, pecan pie.”

“Well, tonight you can dream about broiled fish,” Helen said, “because that’s what we’re having tomorrow.”

Chapter 64

NATALIE

Natalie was excited to have her father home from the hospital, but she wasn’t looking forward to a house full of company. She would have liked one night alone with her father and brothers before everyone else was invited. Besides, she hadn’t seen Johnny since the night they kissed, and she was concerned things between them might be awkward. It turned out she was wrong: being with Johnny was the same as always. No, the person who surprised her that evening wasn’t Johnny. It was Judith.

When Teddy was alive, Natalie wasn’t particularly comfortable around any of his sisters, and after he died, she saw them only at large family gatherings. To Natalie, her cousins were “the Three Sisters,” like the title of a play George once told her about. She didn’t think of them as separate individuals with voices and ideas of their own. Rationally, of course, she knew they were different. But whenever she pictured them, it was always as a group.

Judith was the only one of the sisters to come to Abe’s homecoming dinner. Dinah was in Florida, and Mimi was still on her honeymoon. Aunt Rose’s absence, coupled with Abe’s long-awaited presence, created an unusually festive atmosphere at the table. Maybe it was because of the celebratory mood of the dinner, or maybe it was for some other reason Natalie couldn’t fathom, but Judith seemed intent on changing the old pattern between them. She chose a seat next to Natalie at dinner and asked several questions about Natalie’s summer plans and her friends. The unexpected attention was confusing but not unwelcome. If Natalie had been asked to choose one of the Three Sisters to spend time with, she would have chosen Judith for sure. Mimi was too self-absorbed and Dinah too wishy-washy. But Judith was more complex; she was smart and interesting. Natalie liked her.

Natalie told Judith about the mother’s helper job she had lined up for the summer, and after dinner, they talked about Judith’s summer plans in Boston. “I got a position as a research assistant for one of my professors,” Judith explained. They were sitting on the floor in Natalie’s room, looking at yearbooks from Judith’s old high school in Brooklyn. Natalie kept all of her brothers’ old yearbooks in her room. The boys didn’t want them anyhow, and Natalie liked to read the inscriptions.

Every few pages Judith would remember something about a classmate and stop to tell Natalie the story. Most of them involved Harry and one girl or another. It was cozy sitting together like that, handing yearbooks back and forth. Natalie hadn’t realized how much fun Judith could be.

“What are you researching?” Natalie asked.

“I’m looking for religious symbolism in the works of the early Romantic poets. It’s actually a lot more interesting than it sounds.”

“It’s funny,” Natalie admitted, “but most people don’t think the stuff I like is interesting either.”

“You mean math?”

Natalie hadn’t known that Judith knew so much about her. “How do you know I like math?”

“My father told me he studies with you. He told me he used to teach you and Teddy from his old math books.”

Natalie nodded. “Uncle Mort is
really
smart.”

Judith was smiling. “The two of you have a special relationship. I’ve been meaning to thank you, actually.”

The evening was full of surprises. “Thank me? For what?”