I Remember You

by Elisabeth de Mariaffi

  Marek tilted his head back in understanding but didn’t say anything in German or English, and Heike wondered if she’d set him on edge. Or if Eric was wrong about him: his mind was gone. Daniel was calling to her, and she let him call, watching Marek’s face.

  — You live here? she said.

  — Ja, hier, hier.

  — Hier im Spital? In the hospital?

  Marek shook his head. He lifted a hand and looked at her almost affectionately, as though she also were a child, then pointed out into the field, away from the farm, out past the workshop building where Eric had first stopped the car.

  — Im Spital nicht, nicht. Nicht! Meine Wohnung. I’ hab’ meine eigene Wohnung g’baut, i’ selbst.

  He had his own house. Heike looked around, following his gaze.

  — Where is your house? Here?

  But Marek had stopped talking. He rocked back on his heels and put his hands in his pockets. Heike checked on Daniel over her shoulder. He was crouched low in the grass, playing with something there.

  — A little friend, ja? Noch ein Kamerad, das Kindlein da?

  Heike turned back to Marek. His meaning was a little lost to her. She wondered how often he got a chance to speak to another person, someone from outside.

  He gestured again with a hand, this time toward Daniel and then back to Heike, adding a slight bow of the head in her direction: A little friend.

  — Nein, nein, no friend. He’s my own, my son. She touched her belly. Mein Sohn, mein eigenes Baby.

  The old man’s eyes clouded for a moment, as though he were perplexed, but then he crossed his arms and his mouth opened to laugh. He tipped his head in Daniel’s direction:

  — Jawohl, haben Sie so ein Kamerad. Kamerad, Kamerad.

  Marek muttered the words over again—a friend, a friend—low enough that Heike had to step forward to hear. He seemed on the face of it no worse off than any other man his age, but his language had suffered, and perhaps he had never picked up enough English to compensate. Isolated, she thought. A bit lonely. She started to call to Daniel to come over and say hello, but Marek waved her off. He was tired, he said. An old man. He was going to bed.

  — Nach Hause! Ins Bett!

  Heike watched him walk off along the path, then up over the hill until he disappeared beyond it. At the last second she called out:

  — Schlafen Sie gut! Sleep well, Herr Marek! He didn’t reappear, and she couldn’t tell if he’d heard her.

  She felt something at her side and looked down. Daniel was there, his hand sliding cleanly into hers. He wanted something.

  — Now you hide! Mami, you!

  Heike shook her head a little. Daniel linked his fingers in hers and squeezed, insistent.

  — Okay, I hide. I hide. But you have to count—can you count to ten? She took his hands and moved them over his eyes. You have to close your eyes, see? His fingers were pink and clean and damp from touching the wet grass. He screwed his eyes up tight. Heike started counting out loud and let him follow. When he got to five, she backed away and tucked herself behind the closest bush, crouching down into the branches. She called out to him:

  — Seven, eight, nine, ten!

  — Nine, ten! Daniel’s high little voice: Here I come!

  Heike hugged her knees. She braced her heels back against the low, thicker branches of the lilac, where it was dry, and waited. Daniel ran up and down, swishing at the leaves.

  — Are you here? Are you here?

  Then he was quiet. Heike waited. She counted to ten in her own mind before straightening up and peering around the side of the bush. The sun was low now. Where the grounds opened up, flat along toward the farm, the sky was shadowed but still warm. The path had a violet cast to it. She squinted to find Daniel in the shade around each lilac bush.

  — Dani?

  Heike came around into the little clearing where she’d been talking to Marek. Daniel was maybe fifteen feet away, close to where he’d been playing in the grass. He stood next to a ridge of smaller flowering shrubs, batting his hands at the petals. He wasn’t looking for Heike. His mouth was moving, and she realized he was talking to someone. As she came closer, she could hear him, his voice a sing-song. She strained to see if there could be someone there, hidden by shade. The old man, come back around. Suddenly she recognized the song: her own rhyme again, truly this time, the song she’d thought she could hear at the pond. It made her feel cold now, something in it strange and ruined.

  Hoppe, hoppe Reiter

  Wenn er fällt, dann schreit er

  Fällt er in den Graben

  Fressen ihn die Raben . . .

  It was an old rhyme, gory the way folklore can be. An anxious rider falls in the ditch, cries out; the ravens pick at him. Heike listened. He wasn’t batting at the petals. He was playing a clapping game, his hands coming together and then smacking at the air. The fingers, so pink and clean a moment ago, suddenly dark. There was no one with him.

  Heike stopped moving and watched him, a stitch tightening across her chest. His little voice clear in the sunshine. She caught herself looking over her shoulder, then shook it off. She was ridiculous. Spooked by the hospital and tired from the long day. More than one long day. She was hungry and tired, and it made her jittery. Any little child sings to himself. She wiped her hands on her skirt and called to him:

  — Daniel! You forgot about me!

  She moved forward to take his hand, and he stopped the game and turned to meet her. His eyes were bright; there was no reason to worry about him. They would go and meet Eric and drive to town, and she would order him shrimp. Shrimp cocktail and an ice cream sundae. He reached for her hand, and she rubbed it in hers.

  — How did you get so dirty so fast! The muck streaked her own hands, and Heike suddenly took hold of his and opened out the palms.

  Not garden muck, but blood. Each little hand scratched open. She looked at him, and his face was placid. He stretched his fingers wider.

  She dropped his hands and wiped at her own, the blood making a blush, a thin stain, as she rubbed it in.

  — It was the game. The game hurt me.

  Heike looked down at the ground near them and then up to where he’d been playing. He’d knocked the flowers with his hands. Shrub roses. The branches all full of thorns.

  She took hold of him by the wrist only, her fingers shaking a little against him.

  — Come on, we wash you up. Before your father sees.

  There was a garden hose at the exterior of the workshop building for the groundskeepers to use. Heike led Daniel over to it and held on to him with one hand, working the tap with the other. It stuck, the handle rusty along its grooves, and then gave suddenly, and she let the water stream out over his fingers. Heike held each hand flat and wide to clean it out. The shock of the cold water surprised him, and Daniel’s face screwed up tight. Heike cranked the handle shut and let the hose drop and showed him how to shake off his hands.

  — Now let’s see what they look like. So. Much better! Just some scratches.

  She blew on his palms. Each hand was a mess of little lines. She crouched down, drawing the hem of her dress up so that it wouldn’t drag in the mud near the tap.

  — When I was a little girl, Heike said, I played hide-and-seek with my sister. We were on a picnic, and we went into the woods to play. I wanted to be very clever, so I crawled right underneath a raspberry bush. Wild raspberries. I was picking them when I was hiding there. But raspberry bushes also have thorns. My arms and legs looked just like this, just like your hands now. She lifted the edge of her skirt and patted his hands dry, holding them in hers. She gave the fingers a squeeze. But it hurt to crawl under that bush, Daniel. Tell me, didn’t it hurt to play in the thorns?

  He rubbed the hands together and then opened them wide again.

  — Do I need Band-Aids?

  She watched him a moment, then looked up to gauge the dying light.

  — I think you need ice cream, Heike said. She pushed up to standing.

>   — And shrimps, he said.

  — And shrimps.

  — With cold sauce, Daniel said.

  — Yes, shrimp cocktail. But listen now: Next time if you are playing and it hurts, you need to stop that game. Okay?

  She laid a hand between his shoulders, and they walked back along the path to the parking lot. Eric was leaning against the side of the car. He had his hat in one hand, and he tapped it lightly against his thigh. When he saw them, he fixed it back on his head.

  — What happened to you?

  — Dani got hurt. There are some rose bushes there, and—

  Daniel held up his hands like little fans on either side of his face.

  — I had to sing the song, he said. The thorns hurted me, but I had to do the game.

  Something caught in Heike’s throat.

  — I already cleaned up his hands.

  — What are you talking about? Eric said. He was looking at the ground, at her feet. The soles of her shoes coated with muck, and the peekaboo tip showing off her first three toes, the softly rounded nails painted a delicate pink, with a slick of mud rising between them.

  — Oh, Heike said.

  — You look like you’ve been running through a sprinkler.

  — It was the hose. I just grabbed the first thing I saw. Heike stepped forward to touch Eric’s shoulder, but he twisted away and walked around to the driver’s side.

  — I can’t take you to dinner looking like that.

  — Eric. It was only a little water. Here, I’ll wipe them off. Everything’s fine.

  Eric stopped at his own door, and she heard the click of the handle as it sprang open in his hand, but he didn’t get in. He looked at her across the roof of the car.

  — Everything’s not fine. You’re a mess. You look like you’ve been mucking out a farm stall in your dinner clothes. What did you think was going to happen?

  — You told me to go for a walk.

  — You could have chosen to wait in the car. Use some sense!

  — It’s only water! Eric, this is easy to fix.

  Heike opened the back door and held it for Daniel to climb in. She watched him crawl over the seat until he was square on the bump in the middle. Then she opened her own door and slid into the seat, leaving her legs outside the car and knocking her feet together, twice, three times, to clean them off. Eric flung himself in next to her and slammed the door.

  — We’re going home.

  — What about your package?

  — There was no package. The supplier didn’t come through. What makes you think it’s any business of yours, anyway?

  Heike pulled in her legs and shut the door. She’d left her hat and gloves on the bench between them, and now she picked them up and drew the gloves smoothly over her hands. Eric turned, one arm along the seatback behind her shoulders, and spun the car into reverse.

  She pulled a compact from her handbag and pinned the hat smartly above her brow, fixing it into her hair despite the jostling of the car as it turned off the gravel lot, back out onto the road. In the back seat, Daniel opened his mouth and began to howl.

  8

  Dolan had written a play for television in the spring, and from there things had gone terribly wrong.

  — The play about the old Jew, Paulsen said. Only maybe he wasn’t a Jew. I don’t know. You saw it, right? Sunday night teleplay?

  Heike made a noncommittal shake of the head. They were standing on the back lawn at Dolan’s house. She wanted to say both yes and no at once, or else neither, and let her eyes drift down toward the greenhouse, then to the water beyond the lawn. Two long tables were set up nearby, under the chestnut trees, outfitted with cornflower blue cloths. Heike rested her hand on the back of a chair. It was cool in the shade. She could feel the flesh on her shoulders prickling. Renny Paulsen was a man she’d just met in the gin lineup. She wondered, if they moved into the sun, would he pay less attention to her nipples, the line of her brassiere, visible under the cotton voile of her dress. She tried a sidestep in that direction.

  Paulsen stood with his chin tilted down. It was a Jew play, he told her. Only it wasn’t. Surely she’d seen it? No?

  — I’m afraid I’m not much for the television. She sidestepped again, her torso shifting at the hip like a tomato plant straining for the light, and Paulsen followed her.

  — He sat down to write a play about that kid, Paulsen said. (Here his voice dropped, and he leaned into Heike’s collarbone.) That was the thing of it. About the Negro kid that got lynched; you know the one I mean. He straightened up a bit and looked around. But of course that’s not going to fly on the television, he said, so he swapped things up, made it an old Jew who gets killed instead of a Negro. Made it Boston instead of Mississippi. You think even with all that cloak and dagger he could get it past the network?

  Think again, Paulsen told her. Quit thinking and forget about it.

  Paulsen was a writer, too. Only he wasn’t. He taught. He’d given up writing for the teaching life, he said, and look at old Dolan, tearing his heart out for the television producers when he could be hawking Ionesco with his feet on his desk and a bunch of lovely young coeds with more money than brains to follow him around.

  — Pardon the expression, he said to Heike.

  — I never had any money, Heike said.

  — Good. It wouldn’t suit you. But, like I was saying. He held his empty glass a little higher, and the top half of him swivelled around, looking for a tray of fresh drinks to appear. There was a cigarette girl moving from group to group, and Heike looked at her eye to see if she was the same girl as the other night, but this one had a wide-open look and a mouth that was too small for her face. There was nothing sharp or delicate about her. When she came over to them, Paulsen tapped the cigarettes to one side of her tray and set his empty glass down in their place.

  — Does he throw a lot of parties? Heike said. Normally.

  — He’s cracking out of a funk, Paulsen said. With the glass taken care of, he had nothing to do with his hands, and they danced around, in and out of his pockets, like sad fish hoping to escape a dip net. He’s better now than he was. Good to see him opening the place up, seeing people again. Last few months he’s been all fight, all tooth and hammer.

  — After his wife left, you mean?

  — His wife? Where’d you hear that? I mean with the network, kiddo. Paulsen settled one hand on his hip and leaned back against it. He’s been back and forth for a year, he said. Best work of his life since then. Now he’s really rolling, you know what I mean?

  — I thought you said he should quit, Heike said.

  — Well, sure he should quit, Paulsen said. But so long as he’s working, may as well keep knocking ’em out of the park.

  Another girl walked by slowly with a tray of martinis. The girls all wore the same striped dresses, with a blue sailor’s tie at the breast. She was walking slow so as not to lose control of the tray, her kitten heels sinking slightly into the lawn with each step. Paulsen spun around to follow behind her.

  — Say, where do you think you’re going with those?

  Heike took a few steps backward until she’d been swallowed up by the low, looming boughs of a willow tree, then turned and walked into the house. There was a little nook in the hall outside the bathroom with a mirror and a small table, and she set down her empty glass and leaned in to take a good look at herself, her eyes and skin. The phonograph was set up near the veranda doors, meant for outdoor listening, and the music reached her in a distant way: the Platters, or maybe the Ink Spots. She pinched her cheeks and watched the colour flood into them.

  The door swung open and shut behind her, and she heard the click of heels against the wood floor of the hall.

  — Occupied?

  There were two of them behind her in the mirror: older than Heike, other men’s wives. Old enough to wear jewellery well. The taller of the two with her hair wound back in a twist, the glint of a diamond at each ear.

  Heike leaned out and wagged
the door handle. It chicked in the lock.

  — Occupied or off-limits, she said. She tripped on the words, enough to make the shorter woman raise an eyebrow at her accent. The woman opened her mouth to comment, but seemed to think better of it and turned away instead.

  Heike shifted over a little to make room. Only the tall woman moved in close, unpinning and repinning the sweeping front curl of her hair. A silver bracelet slid up and down along her arm and caught on the edge of her glove, a single charm hanging off it and making the tiniest of noises as she worked. Her hair was almost black, and Heike glanced at the line of her part, checking for grey. Her friend flanked Heike on the other side but kept her distance, watching her closely and only pretending to fuss in the mirror. When she noticed Heike looking, she wound a strand of hair around her finger in a bored way and then let it go, the hair really too short to play with. All three of them with white gloves, rather than any colour.

  The tall woman shook her bracelet down to her wrist and picked at the edge of its round decoration with a fingertip. Heike peered at this in the mirror, expecting it to crack open and reveal a tiny photograph, a fat baby or grandmother, or both, like a locket. The little door swung back and the woman shook a couple of tablets into her hand. She stretched an arm across Heike to her friend on the other side and handed off one of the tablets.

  — I only have two with me, she said. That’s all that fits. The woman caught her eye in the mirror, and Heike realized this was meant for her.

  — Do you have a pain? She looked from one face to the other.

  — No, sweetheart, it’s just Miltown.

  Heike knew the name. A medicine for nervous ladies. To ease the mind and heart: there was a sign in the pharmacy window in Ithaca, advertising whether or not the druggist was sold out. The selling out was the important part, a hundred scientists just like Eric watching the success of the thing and turning up the burner under their own research.

  — I think it’s mostly for pregnancy, isn’t it? Heike took her handbag off her arm and picked through it with her fingers, looking for something indiscernible. Busy work. The short-haired woman made a face and tossed the pill to the back of her throat, then clapped her mouth shut. There was a cut-glass dish on the little table filled with cigarettes, and she ran her hand over them as though she were evaluating a bolt of fabric.