by Julia Dahl
“Will you write about this?” he asks.
“I’d like to,” I say. “I have to talk to my editor.”
“I know a lot of people think that your stories about what happened to Rivka Mendelssohn were bad for the community, but I disagree. I believe in justice. If a Jew commits a crime he must pay for it, like anyone else.”
“Do you think a Jew did this?” I ask.
“I have no idea. I hope not. But that is not a concern for me. Pessie’s family and the rest of the community in Roseville are afraid of any negative publicity. They believe the goyim will use it to destroy us. I am more concerned with what causes this publicity. If we are the cause because our actions are unjust, we have brought that pain onto ourselves.”
I look at Saul and see that he is nodding. I know that he agrees; he’s said as much to me before. It’s why he joined the police department, and it’s part of why he had to leave. But Saul no longer wears the black hat. I wonder, looking at Levi’s thick beard, what else about the world he lives in does he disagree with? How much does he have to believe to remain in the fold? Is the costume just a habit? What will he teach his son?
“Thank you for reaching out,” I say. “I’m going to call the Roseville police as soon as I get to the office.”
“I will be interested to hear what they have to say.”
“One last thing,” I say. “Do you happen to have a photograph of Pessie?”
“A photograph?”
“Yes, just a snapshot. You could e-mail or text it to me.”
“Yes,” he says, to my enormous relief. I’ve been at the Trib long enough to know that they won’t even consider running a story about Pessie’s death unless we have a photo of her. But no one teaches you how to ask people for photographs of their dead loved ones. It’s so outrageously invasive, especially when you have to ask just days, or even hours, after a death. The only way to do it is to step out of your human ideas about decency and become a reporter-bot.
Before Levi leaves, I double-check the spelling of his name and his age, and the same for Pessie. I ask for their wedding date, and Chaim’s birthday. The first six months I worked for the Trib I made a lot of mistakes. I trusted people I shouldn’t have and avoided asking questions I should have. Because my job was basically to run from place to place gathering information, and then call it back to someone in the office who wrote it into an article, I felt little ownership over the stories I worked on. If I didn’t catch a last name, I figured someone else would be able to find it. If I forgot to ask an age, or an exact date, oh well. But that carelessness, I think now, is corrosive. And as I have lain in bed, night after night, trying to find the courage to call my mother back, one of the things I have asked myself is, what will she think of me? Which meant I had to ask, what do I think of me? I’ve always considered myself ballsy, an essential ingredient for a reporter. But no one has ever accused me of being careful, and I know now that I can’t be a good reporter—I can’t really be good at anything—if I don’t get serious. In college, journalism was my major, but now it’s my life. It’s the only thing I’m certain of: I am a reporter. One day, perhaps, I will be a journalist.
After Levi leaves, the waiter brings the check and I pull it toward me; it’s barely six dollars. Saul is looking out the window.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes,” he says. “Why do you ask?”
“Well, that thing Levi said about suicide…” I trail off.
“Being shameful?”
I nod.
“I think about my son every day,” he says. “In some ways, suicide is a perfectly rational response to great pain. If you do not believe in God and you feel that the people in your life will be more hurt by your continued presence…” He looks back toward the river. “I think a person can come to a place in his mind where he thinks he is doing something positive. Something almost kind.”
“I wonder if that’s what Pessie did?”
“Anything is possible,” he says. “And of course her husband would probably feel a great deal of guilt.”
“He could be in denial.”
“Yes.”
I wait for Saul to say more, but he is finished with this topic. “I think it’s worth asking about at least,” I say.
“I agree.”
I slip a ten-dollar bill into the black pouch and motion for the waiter.
“I called Aviva yesterday,” I say while we wait for change.
“That’s wonderful” says Saul, unable to suppress a slight smile. “What made you decide to call?”
I shrug. “I guess I was thinking about Pessie. I don’t know. Now that I know she’s alive I don’t want her to, like, die in a bathtub before I get to meet her.”
“What did she have to say?”
“It went straight to voice mail.”
“Oh,” he says. “I’m sure she’ll call you back.”
“I didn’t leave a message,” I say. “I might try her again tonight.”
When I get in to the newsroom, I ask the library to do a backgrounder on Pessie Goldin, and then I look up the Roseville Police Department. The Web site is a single page located inside the larger Town of Roseville site. There is a portrait of Chief John Gregory—a white man with a ruddy red face and graying hair who looks fifty-ish—and a short statement about the department’s commitment to preserving public safety. I call the phone number and ask for the chief.
“May I say who’s calling?” asks the woman who answers the phone.
“My name is Rebekah Roberts,” I say. “I’m a reporter for the New York Tribune.”
She puts me on hold, and after about a minute of soprano sax, Chief Gregory comes on the line.
“Chief Gregory,” he says.
“Hi, Chief Gregory,” I say. “My name is Rebekah Roberts and I’m a reporter for the New York Tribune.”
“What can I do for you, Rebekah?”
“I’m working on an article about a woman who was found dead in Roseville last month. Pessie Goldin?” I wait. He says nothing. “Are you familiar with this case?”
“What can I help you with?”
“Well,” I say, “I’m wondering if there has been any investigation into her death. Her husband believes she may have been murdered.”
“Does he, now?”
“He does,” I say. “He told me that he found her in her bathtub, and that her son was left alone in his car seat. I know she was buried without an autopsy but…”
“Did he tell you she had been taking antidepressants?”
I shouldn’t be surprised that he asks this, but it pisses me off nonetheless. I remember that right after I started taking pills for my anxiety, Iris and I happened to be up late watching Law & Order: SVU—as college girls will do—and the episode centered around a woman who was raped, and who had been undergoing treatment for depression. The defense attorney was like, she takes antidepressants, clearly, she’s unstable. The jury didn’t convict. I was like, shit, if I’m ever the victim of a crime they could use the fact that I take pills to completely undermine my credibility. We both agreed this was total bullshit.
“He did,” I say.
“Well, then.”
“Are you saying that you didn’t investigate her death because she was taking a kind of medication about thirty million Americans take?”
“Now you’re putting words in my mouth.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “Are you looking into her death?”
“I’m not going to comment on that.”
Well, then.
“Okay,” I say. “Thank you for your time.”
I slap down the phone and let out a groan. I suppose I should be happy that I at least got a “no comment” for the story; getting anyone on the record at the New York City Police Department is practically impossible. At least in a small town like Roseville the chief picks up the phone when you call. Even if he is a douche bag.
I put Pessie’s story aside for the time it takes to pound out the articles the city
desk wants for tomorrow: a rewrite of a British tabloid story about Jude Law; a fire at a pizzeria on the Coney Island boardwalk; baby gorillas at the Bronx Zoo. At three thirty, I get a text from Levi with a photograph of him and Pessie, presumably on their wedding day. The text that follows says: pessie and levi, 2/3/10. Levi is standing and Pessie is sitting. He wears a double-breasted black coat and an enormous fur hat shaped like a cake box. Pessie is in white, lace collar to her chin, puffy shoulders. Neither is smiling, although they don’t look unhappy, exactly. Pessie has light hair, not blond, but not quite brown, either. Her eyes are gray-blue and she appears very young. A few months ago, I would have laughed at this portrait. I would have joked that it looked like it was taken in 1910—even 1810—not 2010. I would have made fun of Levi’s “ringlets,” as I derisively called sidecurls. Ringlets like Shirley Temple had. Ha! Did he sleep in curlers? Did he hold them steady with hairspray? I would have rolled my eyes and felt a mix of pity and scorn for Pessie and Levi in their stupid costumes. Now I still feel pity—for the dead woman, her grieving husband, her motherless child—but the scorn is gone. Inside those outfits, I know now, are human beings, just like me.
An hour later, the library e-mails Pessie’s backgrounder, with possible addresses for her kin in Roseville, Brooklyn, and Lakewood, New Jersey. Levi said that Pessie’s mother was named Fraidy, and there is a listing for Shmuli and Fraidy Rosen. I call the number and a woman answers.
“Hi,” I say, “my name is Rebekah Roberts. I’m a reporter for the New York Tribune.”
Silence.
“I’m trying to reach Pessie Goldin’s family.”
“What do you want?”
“I, um, I’m very sorry to hear about Pessie. I met her husband, Levi, earlier today and I am working on a story about her death…”
“I have nothing to say,” says the woman, and hangs up the phone.
Perhaps someday I will get used to being hung up on, or having a door slammed in my face, or being run off a front lawn, or shouted out of a business. But I’m not there yet. Shame creeps like fog up my cheeks and squeezes my heart. If my daughter died in a bathtub, would I want to talk to a stranger about it? Probably not. But what if that stranger wanted to help? And is that what I’m doing, helping? It’s hard to feel like it sometimes. Sometimes I just feel like a predator.
Just before the 5:00 P.M. deadline I e-mail a draft of Pessie’s story to Larry Dunn, the Trib’s lead police reporter and, since the Rivka Mendelssohn story, a kind of mentor for me at the paper. After I press send, I call him at the Shack.
“Rebekah!” he says when he picks up. “How are you?”
“Good, thanks,” I say. “How are you?”
“Oh, the same. Working on the NYU jumper.” The night before last, a sophomore fell, jumped, or was pushed off the ledge of her fourteenth-floor dorm balcony and landed on the sidewalk along Sixth Avenue. The cops found a lot of weed in her room, and a little coke, so the paper is calling it “The Dorm Drug Den Death,” though it is unclear whether she was a heavy user, a dealer, or if the stuff had been planted.
“Do you have a minute? I just e-mailed you a story.”
“Hold on. Let me check.”
“It came from a source in the ultra … Haredi world.”
“Oh God,” says Larry, “you’re not done with those people?”
It’s not a terrible question. “Not yet,” I say. “There’s a man in Roseville, up north of here. His wife is originally from Brooklyn and she died sort of mysteriously. He found her in the bathtub with the baby screaming in the other room.”
“When was this?”
“She was buried March fifth.”
“That’s almost a month ago.”
“I know,” I say.
“What do the police say?”
“The chief was a douche. He was like, did you know she was taking antidepressants?”
“One of those,” he says.
“Yeah…”
“Gimme a second,” he says. “I’m reading.”
I wait.
“Do you think this is another pressure-from-the-community thing?” he asks.
“I don’t know. The husband said her parents are worried she killed herself and are, like, ignoring it. But he definitely wants an investigation.”
“Bathtubs are tough,” says Larry.
“What do you mean?”
“Even with an autopsy it’s hard to prove how someone died if they’re found in water.”
“Oh,” I say.
“I’m not saying you shouldn’t look into it, I’m just thinking out loud.”
“Okay.”
“Do you have a photo?”
“Yes,” I say. “A wedding portrait.”
“Good, gotta have a photo. Have you talked to the parents?”
“I think the mom hung up on me.”
“Ah. Okay, well I guess this works for me. I’ll send it to Mike for tomorrow.” Mike is the city desk editor. He hired me and used to tell me where to run when I was on the streets. Now that we’re in the office together, we rarely talk. I think he’s better with people over the phone than in person.
“Cool,” I say. “If I get anything from the parents, I should e-mail him?”
“Yup,” he says. “You ready to make more enemies in the black hat world?”
Ready as I’ll ever be.
CHAPTER FIVE
AVIVA
I left your grandparents’ house late one night while everyone was sleeping. I kissed your face and held you, your tiny body zipped up in pajamas with sheep on them, a bit sweaty, and deep in sleep. Your eyelids fluttered and you blew a little bubble of spit as I said good-bye. I felt my heart contract, as if someone were squeezing the blood out, when I set you back into your crib. I wore a backpack and soft shoes and I walked out the sliding glass door in the kitchen. I took a bus from Orlando to Jacksonville and north to Ocean City, Maryland. My cousin Gitty was there—or at least I hoped she was. Gitty left Brooklyn a few years before I did. When I was fifteen, I asked her mother, my tante Leah, if she ever wrote to Gitty, and she said no. I asked why not, and she said that she had four other daughters who were good Jewish girls and would make good Jewish wives, and she had no time to waste on a girl like Gitty. That was how she said it, “A girl like Gitty.” I didn’t need to ask what that meant.
“She sends letters to her sisters, trying to poison their minds,” she said. “I throw them away.”
When I asked where the letters came from, she shooed me out of the room. Tante Leah and Feter Izzy lived on the second floor of a house halfway up the block from ours. The mail came late in the day on our street. Sometimes I saw the lady from the post office pushing her bag as I walked home from school. I had a key to their apartment, so one day I let myself into the first floor where the mailboxes were. I went back every day, and after about a week, I found a letter from Gitty. I took it home and that night I wrote to her telling her what I’d done. I told her I missed her and that I hoped I could visit her. I sent the letter to the return address in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Gitty wrote me back and told me that she was very happy and that she was living with some nice people in a house near the ocean and working selling sunglasses and t-shirts in a little store along the boardwalk. She said she went to the movies sometimes and was saving her money for driving lessons. We wrote to each other every week for almost three years. And then, right after I met your father, she stopped writing. I sent four letters that went unanswered. A fifth came back marked return to sender. I asked Tante Leah if she’d heard from Gitty, and she said no. About two weeks before I left for Florida, Gitty sent me a letter from Ocean City. I’m still alive, she wrote. New job, new city. Come visit! I sent a letter telling her my plans. I wrote again after you were born. I asked her to send me her phone number. I said I really needed to talk. But I never heard back.
I had saved almost five hundred dollars from money your grandparents gave me for cleaning. The bus ticket cost one hundred. It was the middle of the
night when I arrived at the bus station in Ocean City. I had barely slept. Every time I shut my eyes I saw you. Your swirl of fine red hair. Your upturned nose. The tiny, sharp fingernails I had to file down every day. I saw your chubby legs, kicking, always kicking. I saw your smile as I changed your diaper. And your blue eyes, wide open, astounded by everything you saw. You were so beautiful. I looked for Gitty’s name in the phone book attached to a booth outside the station, but she wasn’t listed. I had the address from the year-old letter and I asked the man behind the thick glass if he knew how I could get there. He said it wasn’t far and that I could walk. I waited at the station until dawn and then I started walking. I could smell the ocean but I couldn’t see it. Seagulls circled overhead like vultures, squawking. The streets were quiet. Little houses with little squares of grass in the front. I could feel I’d caught a cold on the bus. I sneezed and sneezed and I didn’t have any Kleenex so I wiped my nose on my sleeve. The address on Gitty’s last letter was a house separated into apartments. There were metal lawn chairs and green Astroturf on the front porch. It was barely eight o’clock, but I felt feverish and desperately wanted someplace to curl up, so I rang the bottom bell. No one answered. I rang the other two. Nothing. I tried the doorknob and it was open. Hello? I said. It smelled like cigarette smoke and urine inside. I stepped into a room covered in thin carpet, with old food and beer cans strewn about. A girl was asleep on one of two sofas. There was a dog in the corner, which frightened me. It wasn’t big, but I had never spent the night in a home with a dog. No Chassidish family has a pet. They are not kosher. But I felt so weak I would have slept in a room with a tiger. I sat down on the sofa opposite the girl, pulled my feet up beneath me, wrapped my arms around my backpack, and fell asleep.
It must have been hours later when I woke up. The girl on the sofa across from me was still there, but she’d changed positions. I heard voices and dishes, and a shirtless man sat down next to me and turned on the television. He bent forward, revealing a white back spotted with moles. More moles than I had ever seen. Moles with hair poking out of them. I stood up.
