Rachel read it over and over again, searching for more meaning between the lines. Finally she had to acknowledge the truth. Sam didn’t want her, didn’t even want her to know where he was. He’d been corresponding with Vic before ever writing to her. A flash of anger shook her hands. She tore both letters into tiny squares and tossed them down the shaft of the clock tower. They twirled like snowflakes and settled onto the dusty floor. There was nothing left for Rachel to do but let the tears come. The shadow of the clock’s hands moved slowly across Rachel’s face until, inevitably, a distant bell rang.
Rachel was wiping her eyes when a thought flowered in her mind, a thought so bright and supple it pushed back the sadness and dried her tears. Sam was always doing what he thought was best for her, from paying for Naomi’s protection to beating up Marc Grossman. It was like the time he promised to come for her if she’d be good for the agency lady, just so she wouldn’t cry. Maybe his letter, too, was an effort to do what he thought was best—stop her from worrying, let her finish school, allow the Home to care for her.
But Sam was wrong. He’d been wrong about Marc Grossman; Sam’s running away hurt Rachel more than what Marc had done to her. He’d been wrong about Naomi, too; she’d have stood up for Rachel, been her friend, even without Sam’s bribes. And he was wrong now. The Home, the nursing course, what did any of that matter when she could be with her brother and, maybe, their father as well?
Sam didn’t know what was best for her. Only she did. All these years she’d been doing as she was told. Maybe that’s all she knew, but it wasn’t what she wanted, not anymore. Her lower lip jutted forward as something stirred in her, born of the same stubborn impulse that once sent her into tantrums.
She still had the envelope. Sliding a fingertip over the words Rabinowitz Dry Goods she made her decision. She would go to Leadville, join her brother, reunite with their father. Somehow she would make her own way, show Sam she could take care of herself, that he didn’t have to protect her anymore. It was far, and the train ticket would be expensive. She wasn’t sure how much money it would take, but with an awful clarity, she knew where she could get it.
THE SHADOW HAND made a full circle around the clock face before Rachel climbed down the wooden ladder and the metal stairs and closed the secret door behind her. The corridor was crowded with children streaming down to dinner. She made her way against the tide to deliver the rest of the mail to Nurse Dreyer. The clatter of the children’s voices disturbed her thoughts. For the first time since she’d been at the Home, Rachel filled her lungs and shouted, “All Still!”
Instantly the din ceased. With a long exhalation, she looked up over the heads of the frozen children. Naomi, their new counselor, was at the back of the F1 group, twice the height of her charges. She looked at Rachel, confused and concerned. Rachel lowered her head and hurried along to the Infirmary. After she passed, she heard Naomi call out, “Okay, girls, go ahead.” The children sprang to life, like a stalled heart shocked back to beating.
At the Infirmary, the doctor had been summoned to set a boy’s broken arm, so Rachel’s lateness was not noticed. When the boy was resting, wrist in a damp cast, Gladys Dreyer put away the gauze and plaster. “I wanted to go watch the movie,” she said, “but he’ll need some looking after. The Warner brothers sent over a new Rin Tin Tin.”
“Go ahead, Nurse Dreyer, I’ll stay with him until I go down to the dorm to sleep.”
“So you’ve decided to go back to the dorm tonight? That’s good, Rachel. Get back in the routine before school starts up. Thanks so much for staying.”
“What’s one more evening?” Rachel hesitated. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course, dear.”
“Do we all have accounts?” She knew that whenever a child won some prize—a dollar for best essay, fifty cents for an outstanding speech—they were never given the money but told it would be added to their account.
“Most of you do, yes.”
“Is there any way to know how much is in it? And, how do we get it?”
“Mr. Grossman’s secretary keeps the books. I think all the money is on deposit at the bank. They don’t keep it in cash, I can tell you that. Whenever you’re old enough to leave the Home, they’ll close your account and give you what’s in it. But you’d have to ask at the office to find out how much there is.” Gladys looked at Rachel, curious and skeptical. “Have you won many prizes?”
Disappointed, Rachel shook her head, wanting to change the subject. “No, I was just wondering, that’s all.” She hadn’t expected any other answer but felt she owed it to Naomi to at least ask.
After the nurse left, Rachel read to the broken-armed boy until he fell asleep. Closing the book, she quietly dragged her cardboard suitcase from under the bed she’d come to think of as her own. She packed up the few things that had gathered around her in the Infirmary since she’d taken up residence there: change of clothes, nightgown, toothbrush, her birthday card, a jacket. From the desk drawer she added a big pair of scissors, black handles tapering to shining points. She picked up and put down Essentials of Medicine when her eyes fell on Nurse Dreyer’s cloche hat on a hook near the door. Knowing that, by tomorrow, this small theft would be overshadowed, she took the hat and placed it in her case.
The movie was still running as Rachel made her way through the empty corridors. The flickering light played against the windows as she passed. She paused to watch as Rin Tin Tin, his projection huge on the outside wall of the Castle, ran across the crest of a distant hill. Waves of clapping erupted as the credits started to roll and children began stirring from their places on the fire escapes. Rachel hurried along to the F1 counselor’s room. She entered and turned on the light. She was worried Naomi might be wearing the pair of shoes she was looking for, but no, there they were, under the little dresser.
Rachel set down her case and knelt on the floor. Reaching for the shoe, she drew it out and peeled back the insole. Fifty dollars. Hopefully it would be enough. She told herself that Naomi could still manage her tuition from what she earned if the Scholarship Committee pitched in. And if it turned out to be more than Rachel needed, she could send back the rest. She pulled out the bills and stuffed them into her case. She was about to leave when the door handle turned. Rachel froze.
Naomi came into the tiny room. “Rachel, what are you doing here?”
Caught, Rachel should have panicked. Instead, she felt strangely calm. Maybe she was already beyond the reach of the Home. “I’m moving back to F5 tonight,” she lied. She studied Naomi to see if she would be believed, but all she noticed was how beautiful her friend was. The visit to Coney Island had brought out the freckles on Naomi’s nose and cheeks. She had always worn her hair cropped, but now that it was fashionable her bob made her look modern. Rachel regretted, for the thousandth time, the nakedness of her own scalp.
“I figured as much, but I mean, why are you here, in my room?”
Rachel found herself unable to spin the elaborate story she’d rehearsed in her head. Something about the way Naomi looked at her gave Rachel a new idea. On an impulse, she dropped her case and stepped forward, slyly kicking the shoe, its insole curled out like a snake’s tongue, back under the dresser. Reaching, she took Naomi’s face in both her hands and drew the girl’s mouth close until their lips pressed together.
The room was very quiet, the sound of hundreds of feet moving along the corridor muffled by the closed door. As the kiss extended, their lips softened, then opened. Tongues touched, again sending a shock through Rachel. Their knees beginning to bend, Naomi pulled Rachel toward her narrow bed.
Rachel had thought one kiss would be enough to distract Naomi from her theft, like the kiss in the changing booth. Now, another agenda imposed itself. Haste drained away as they stretched out side by side. Arms around each other, mouths together, there seemed no end to the ways two girls could kiss. Tiny kisses tiptoeing over nose and chin. A tongue-tip tracing open lips. Soft kisses skipping down a neck. Humid breath k
issed into an ear. Lips pressed together, mouths open, inhaling each other’s exhalation until they drained their lungs of oxygen.
It should have been enough, more than enough. Naomi pulled away, thinking of Rising Bell and the day to come. But Rachel was uninhibited by thoughts of morning, her secret knowledge making her bold. She asked, “What else is there?”
“There’s this,” Naomi whispered, undoing Rachel’s dress.
“Show me.”
“Are you sure?”
“Show me.”
Naomi exposed Rachel’s pink-tipped breast. Cupping the other, still clothed, in her hand, Naomi took the nipple in her mouth. Rachel felt something inside her come to life, like a hard seed ripening. She arched her back and wrapped her hand around Naomi’s neck. Naomi pushed Rachel’s dress off of her shoulders, licked the other breast. The seed started to split, roots shooting down. Rachel lifted her hips and Naomi shifted. Fabric stretched taught as she pressed her thigh between Rachel’s legs. The seed opened. A light began to glow inside Rachel’s closed eyes. If she looked at it, it slipped away, but if she let her eyes gaze past the light, it grew brighter, purple and gold. The seedling reached for the light, striving, growing. They were close, the bright new leaves of the seedling and the sparkling light. They were near.
They met. Rachel gasped and trembled. Naomi pressed against her, urgent, then buried her mouth in Rachel’s neck and muffled a moan. Together they were quiet, Naomi’s cheek resting on Rachel’s collarbone. Her hand still on Naomi’s neck, Rachel floated away with the receding light into a welcoming darkness.
Rachel couldn’t tell how long she lingered in that darkness before the glowing lamp on Naomi’s desk brought her back. “I have to get to the dorm.” She sat up, pushing Naomi aside, and fixed her dress.
Naomi whispered in Rachel’s ear, “I’ve always thought you were so beautiful, just like you are, so smooth and beautiful.”
Rachel almost let herself believe it. Then she thought of the money and the scissors in her case. She shrugged Naomi off and stood, more abruptly than she intended.
“I have to go.”
Naomi sat up in the bed. “It’s all right, Rachel. Everything’s all right.”
“I know,” Rachel said. On the desk she saw Naomi’s watch; it was after two. “It’s just so late. Maybe I better go back to the Infirmary after all.”
Naomi reached out, but Rachel, knowing she didn’t deserve it, turned away from the offered hand. She grabbed her case and stepped into the dark corridor, the slice of brightness across the floor narrowing as she shut the door behind her.
Rachel moved silently through the sleeping orphanage until she found the entrance to her old dormitory. Setting the cardboard case down and taking off her shoes, she drew out the scissors before slipping inside. The rows of beds stretched away, pale mounds in the blue moonlight. Rachel was suddenly uncertain. After all these months, she didn’t remember where everyone slept. She took a slow breath. She’d simply have to creep down every row until she spotted the girl she was after. Gripping the scissors, she padded through the dorm. In the summer warmth, girls slept openly with light blankets swept off their shoulders. They didn’t stir; years of sleeping together had inured them to the night noises of girls dreaming or snoring or shuffling to the toilet.
It was in the next row of beds that Rachel found Amelia sleeping on her side, braided hair snaking across the pillow. Amelia, who was always so beautiful. Amelia, who ruined everything. Rachel cringed at the memory of Marc Grossman’s hand. She clutched the scissors. Leaning over, she placed the red braid between the bright blades. It was amazing how this thing that grew from Amelia was so dead it could be cut an inch from her scalp without her waking. The braid dropped into Rachel’s hand. She closed her fingers around it, dragging it on the floor as she walked out of the dormitory.
In the corridor, Rachel put her shoes back on and opened the case. In it, she placed the scissors and Amelia’s braid. She’d planned to leave it on the floor to mock the girl, but for some reason her hand had been unwilling to let it go. From the case, she withdrew the cloche hat and put it on before descending to the basement. Past the dining hall, Rachel steeled herself to walk to the end of that dark corridor. She hid in the shadows near the door the baker would unlock when he came in to start the day’s loaves of rye. By Rising Bell, she’d be gone.
Chapter Twelve
AT FOUR O’CLOCK ROUNDS, WHEN I FOUND DR. SOLOMON in terrible pain, I enjoyed seeing her writhe and squirm. I resented the morphine for bringing her peace, then regretted there wasn’t enough in the syringe to snuff her out. The vengeful feelings terrified me. Who was I, what was I becoming? First that librarian, and now this. Already wobbly from spending the hot summer on my own, I’d been knocked off my axis by Mildred Solomon’s arrival. All day I’d been suppressing my anxiety over tomorrow’s appointment with Dr. Feldman. I kept telling myself to keep it together until I got out of work, that I could fall apart once I got her on the phone in Florida, knowing her words could put me back together.
I hurried home, desperate to get behind the closed door of our apartment, to hear her voice, to know I wasn’t alone. I let the phone ring and ring but still no answer. It was eight o’clock at night, where could she be? I began to panic, anxiety capitalizing on my old fears of being abandoned. It was as if she’d dropped off the end of the earth and left me behind, the same way Sam left me behind, again and again.
It seemed the refrain of my life: when had I last seen my brother? At least I had something to remember him by. I went into my room, grabbed the leather handle on the side of the steamer trunk at the foot of my bed, and tipped it up on end. Undoing the clasps, I opened it like a book on its spine. Behind the curtain where dresses once hung, I now stored folded quilts layered with mothballs. On the other side, each drawer that once held gloves or stockings was now dedicated to a different person’s correspondence. From Dr. and Mrs. Abrams there were letters of encouragement while I was in nursing school, annual holiday cards, his obituary clipped from the Denver Post. From Simon I’d saved the childish notes that matured over the years until, at last, his heartbroken mother had mailed me his military portrait along with the carvings I’d sent each year on his birthday, saying in her letter that he’d wanted me to have them. There was Mary’s drawer, which I preserved like a museum. In another, my collection of movie ticket stubs, torn reminders of nights out together over the years. Craving the memories, I sifted through the tickets, reading a few of the movie titles I’d scrawled on the back of the stubs—Adam’s Rib, Notorious, Jezebel, Stage Fright—but each flash of memory only made me lonelier. I shut that drawer.
Kneeling before the open trunk, I pulled out Sam’s drawer, spread its contents across the floor. I shuffled through the couple dozen postcards Sam had sent from out west, color-tinted pictures of canyons or mountains, a different postmark on every one. Counting them out, they averaged two a year. He’d never been much for writing. Then the last card, from that apple farm in Washington State. He hadn’t signed his name to it, just scrawled Arriving New York Penn Station Friday. That and the date: December 8, 1941. I dwelled for a while in the memory.
Whenever December seventh rolls around and people remember that infamous day, all I can think of is hearing my brother’s voice for the first time in a dozen years. I was just coming off shift at the hospital where I used to work. All day, radios had been tuned to breaking news about the attacks. Nurses understood that a declaration of war would affect us, too. They’d be needing us, and for a lot of girls I worked with, the Army Nurse Corps became the opportunity, and challenge, of a lifetime. During the war years, I kept in touch with some of them. I envied their adventures, their trials, their purpose—some even got commissions and benefits—and there were times I regretted not volunteering. It seemed selfish and petty to have let my worries about how I’d manage with a wig in a field hospital stop me, but they did, and not just that. I worried what I might do, who I might turn to, if I was away from h
er for too long.
A group of us were nearly out the hospital door when the switchboard operator shouted across the lobby. “Nurse Rabinowitz, there’s a long-distance call for you. From a man,” she added, prompting the nurses around me to squeal, their speculations finally answered. Telephone lines were hopelessly clogged that day, but somehow Sam had charmed a Bell operator into putting through his call. I hadn’t heard his voice, let alone seen him, since Leadville. And now Sam was calling to tell me he was coming to New York to enlist. “Lots of Home boys are already in the military,” he said, his voice delayed by the distance. “You can be damn sure the rest of them will be lining up to volunteer.” He was right about that; the war was well timed for orphans. The army was somewhere else for the boys to go where they’d be fed and clothed and told what to do. But Sam was too old for all that, wasn’t he? “I’m not thirty yet, and anyway, I figure I’ll have a better chance of seeing action if I join up with a unit from New York.” I could hear from the excitement in his voice that he was ready for a fight.
The other nurses had milled in the lobby, waiting to hear my news. Disappointed that it was only my brother, they strutted off, anxious to get ready for dates with young men who would soon be soldiers. I walked home quickly across Washington Square, so excited Sam was coming back I barely noticed the cold.
A few days later, I was in the train shed of Penn Station, flakes on the glass roof making me feel like I was inside a snow globe, watching the board for the arrival of Sam’s train. For a moment I panicked, wondering if I’d recognize him in the frantic crowd. I stood on a bench, not caring how desperate I looked to anyone else, scanning the sea of faces. When I spotted him, I wondered how I could have ever doubted I’d know him. Seventeen or twenty-nine, his face still fit the contours of my memory. He told me later he was confused, looking up, to see a pretty young woman with red hair calling to him in his sister’s voice. Then our eyes met, and what we saw in each other reached back to those mornings under the kitchen table, waking hand in hand.
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