River

by Shira Nayman

  “We bought the tickets,” Papa said.

  “But I don’t want to go! I want to stay here with Mama!”

  “We need you to be strong,” he said. “It’s going to be a hard time.”

  I looked at my uneaten ice, a slush puddle in the soft paper cup. My brother’s ice was dripping down his chin and onto his shirt in pink-and-blue rivulets. What was Papa trying to tell me? That we would be in the way? Or maybe that Mama didn’t want us to witness what she was going to have to go through?

  “We won’t be in the way, I promise!” I said, trying to dampen down the desperation rising into my chest.

  “We’ve given this a lot of thought, sweetie. This will be best all around, really. You’ll be helping by taking care of Billy on the plane, and helping Grandma take care of him when you get to Australia. Plus, this way, you can have another big adventure this summer.”

  “I don’t want another big adventure,” I said, staring at the melted slush with despair. “I’ve had enough adventures this summer. Don’t want any more.”

  There was no point arguing. My parents had made up their minds. The tickets had been bought. I threw my dripping paper cup of melted ice into the trash can on the street. I opened my mouth to speak but the big lump in my throat squeezed my voice to nothing.

  “I’ll be taking you to the airport tomorrow afternoon,” Papa said.

  Tomorrow. I tried to wrap my mind around it all.

  “There’s a quick, easy change in Los Angeles—you’ll have no trouble with that—and Uncle Michael will collect you at the other end.”

  I nodded, grabbed hold of my brother’s sticky little hand, suddenly feeling very small and alone.

  “How ‘bout that, little guy,” my father said to Billy. His face was deadly serious. “An adventure with sister, just the two of you.”

  Billy turned his bright face upward toward me and grinned a rainbow-ice grin. “How ‘bout that, Sis! You and me!”

  Back home, I told Papa I’d be up in a minute and sat on the second top stair of the stoop, one of my favorite places to think. The late-June weather was glorious, the sunlight buttercup-yellow, and the air warm and still breezy, before the humid heat turned the city into a grimy, muggy hothouse. But for me, the dryness felt mournful, as if my beloved Brooklyn had been reduced to a parched gulch; in my head was a whistling wind that only I could hear. An elderly neighbor passed by, leaning on her cane, her tread heavy and uneven. She froze as a little kid whizzed by on a scooter. Our street was lined with towering trees, each holding a hundred years or more in their branches; I looked up through the needles of the giant pine in our neighbor’s front yard that spread over our stoop, listening to the riotous birdsong. I had always loved sitting here, watching the world go by. But now, everything looked different. I didn’t know the old woman leaning on her cane, or the little kid whizzing by—they weren’t neighbors from my block—and the birds seemed raucous, as if our sweet little sparrows and thrushes had been replaced by scrappy, caterwauling seabirds. Even the squirrels had a feral look. I’d never thought of them as related to the sinister rats we’d seen scuttling along the trash-strewn subway tracks; now, their rodent nature seemed starkly revealed.

  I could not have known what an extraordinary adventure I was about to embark upon. Though perhaps part of me knew, the part of a person that pulls little puzzle pieces from a day and turns them into dreams.

  After dinner, I went to my room to pack. My limbs felt heavy and my mind felt like sludge. I had to keep reminding myself that in Melbourne, it would be winter. I couldn’t for the life of me remember where I’d put my winter gear. My gaze wandered to the wall above my bed where I’d displayed the art museum postcards Papa always brought back from his work travels, where he gave lectures and attended academic conferences.

  My eyes settled on the oversized postcard depicting Rembrandt’s painting of Jeremiah, elegant in his despair as he lamented the destruction of Jerusalem. Papa had told me about the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam where dozens of Rembrandt paintings and drawings hung, this one included. The deep pain in the prophet’s face broke my heart anew; in the distance, the city of Jerusalem burned, the flames’ thick ochre smudges lapped at the giant dome of the temple, dissolving upward into heavens that were dark with destruction. The prophet rested his head on his hand, eyes cast downward, a few gleaming treasures beside him, likely rescued from the burning temple—religious objects of silver and gold. He had prophesied the destruction, but no one listened. His sense of helplessness flowed into the room, joining my own.

  Mama appeared in the doorway.

  “Can I help?” she asked.

  “I can’t find any of my stuff!” I said.

  Mama pointed to under the bed.

  “Remember? Last year we bought those plastic bins …”

  I crawled under the bed and dragged out the bins, which were heavy, filled as they were with winter boots, coats, sweaters.

  Mama sat on my bed as I packed. Her smile seemed effortful, as if she were posing for a photographer who was taking too long to snap the picture. She suddenly looked thin and frail, lost in the large black cardigan she’d pulled around her; it was warm, but she seemed to be feeling chilly. She looked like a teenager wearing her mother’s clothing. I stopped what I was doing—the half-folded T-shirt dangling from my hands—and searched her face. Still that gray tinge to her skin and her eyes ringed with black circles. She tightened her smile, as if that might be more convincing.

  I thought of the other mother I knew much better than this one: sparkly and zany, with a rippling laugh. The one who once pretended to chide Billy and me for splashing wildly in our oversized tub, then climbed in, clothes and all, and splashed along with us. Who took me, when I was five or six, to the Plaza Hotel for tea, and when I said “Yuk!” at the smoked salmon sandwiches on their silver plate, responded in a false, uppity voice, “Now, dear, the correct thing to say is: That’s disgusting and it makes me puke!”

  I looked at the stiff woman-child on my bed and wondered where my mother had gone, wondered if she were ever going to come back. That strange stretched smile was still on her face, but I saw that her eyes were welling; I watched as a tear rolled down her cheek. I dropped the T-shirt and climbed onto the bed, then put my head in her lap.

  “You don’t have to try to smile, Mama,” I said. When I looked up, I saw that the unfamiliar, taut smile was gone: sadness—and some relief, I think—had taken its place.

  “I’m going to do my very, very best,” Mama said. “I’ll be the best patient, ever. Promise.”

  “I know you will,” I said. I did not have words to say what was in my heart, so I said nothing more.

  The next morning, Mama rose early with all of us and shuffled around the kitchen, making pancakes. Little beads of perspiration gathered on her forehead as she whisked the batter. I wanted to tell her not to worry about breakfast, that we would grab a bagel at the airport, but seeing her effortful movements, the grim determination of her jaw, I stopped myself. She was making the pancakes because she wanted to, because she needed to. She was making them to tell us she loved us, to tell us she was sorry she was not coming with us, to tell us she was sorry she was ill.

  At the door, our bags already packed into the car, Billy gave Mama a big hug.

  “I love you, Mama,” he said.

  “I love you too, silly goose,” Mama said, with a trace of her old buoyancy.

  Then, it was my turn. I took my newly thin mama in my arms and gave her the best hug I could. When we drew apart, she looked at me deeply and long.

  “Take care of Billy,” she said. Then, she pointed to my heart, and whispered: “I’ll always be here. Remember that.”

  Our flight to Australia was agonizingly long. Twenty-three hours, to be exact. Billy was a dream, perky and funny and joyous, as he has been since he emerged from that sleepy newborn twilight, six weeks into life. I remember when he was an infant—four months old, on his first trip to Australia—how when Mama put him
up on Grandma’s kitchen counter in his bouncy chair, he beamed warmly at the tiles. I guess he just loved life.

  Being responsible for him felt terrifying. What if something went wrong? What if he got ill or scared? Every now and then, throughout the long flight, Billy asked, “Where’s Mama?” or “Where’s Papa?” My heart would lurch and I’d have to stop myself from thinking about the fact that we were thousands of feet in the air, two children away from their parents, alone above the wide, dark, impossibly deep ocean. Even glimpsing this thought sent terror shuddering right to the seat of my soul and I’d grip little Billy’s hand and mete out one of my small store of answers—“Papa’s taking care of Mama so that she’ll get well,” or “We’ll be there soon,” or “We’re going to see Grandma!” Billy seemed content with my responses, which I backed up each time with a few purple Skittles, his favorite, that we’d bought at Dylan’s Candy Bar, where you could buy the colors separately.

  After what seemed like forever, the plane finally began its approach for landing. I held Billy’s hand—“The plane is going fast! We landing, Sis?”—and then there it was, that Australian light: intensely white-yellow and somehow ringing with sound.

  “Where we going?” Billy asked.

  “To see Grandma,” I said, discreetly wiping my eyes. For a moment, looking out at the tarmac, I felt the world swoon, as if everything around me were doing a slow, eerie slide.

  “Oh boy, Grandma!” Billy said. He looked out the window. “Will Mama be coming soon?” he asked.

  “We’re going to see where Mama grew up,” I said, shaking my head gently in the hope of setting the sliding world to rights.

  “Where Mama grew up,” he repeated. Billy probably didn’t remember the last time we were in Australia, when he was only two.

  “Where Mama was a little girl,” I said, aware of a dryness in my throat.

  “Oh, where Mama was a little girl,” he whispered back.

  Uncle Michael was at the gate.

  “Hey, kids. Welcome to Oz!” he said in his broad Australian accent. Uncle Michael was tall and athletic and loved kids and dogs. In past visits, he’d taught me to play backgammon, gin rummy, and spit.

  “Got the games out for you lot,” he said as he swung Billy up onto his shoulders and then took charge of our bags. “Took them to Grandma’s. She made you a giant chocolate cake.”

  “Wow! A giant!” Billy said. I imagined what he was picturing—a massive cake formed in the shape of the ferocious creature depicted in his Jack and the Beanstalk storybook.

  “It’s a big cake, Billy. That’s what Uncle Michael means.”

  “Oh, a big cake,” Billy said, adjusting his expectations with a shade of disappointment.

  “But hey, Auntie Liora’s there too; I shouldn’t tell you this, but she got you guys a whole lot of prezzies!” Auntie Liora had the kindest smile and always seemed to be doing everything for everyone. She had a knack for knowing exactly what would delight us and gave us the loveliest things. How exciting that I would see her soon!

  On the drive from the airport, I silently greeted the towering eucalyptus trees that flanked the highway, with their slender, willowy branches and droopy dusty-olive leaves. As we got closer to the city, I watched out for the view of the city skyline—sleek towers and regal, angular colonial buildings, interspersed with swatches of leafy parks. Turning off the highway onto the wide city streets, we passed by rows of beautifully restored Victorian houses. The footpaths, as they called the sidewalks here, were filled with people heading to work, as well as some families—parents dressed in business suits wheeling strollers, likely taking their children to day care. It was a mild, wintry day—the opposite season here, being on the other side of the equator—but the light was as splashy as ever, as if pouring from the heavens in golden bucketfuls.

  Grandma and Auntie Liora were standing in front of the house when we pulled into the cul-de-sac. Grandma’s face had a funny look about it. I could see she was happy to see us, but she was also upset. I suppose she was thinking about Mama, back home in New York, who was probably this moment crumpled up on her bed enduring the terrible waves of nausea brought on by her cancer treatment. Auntie Liora put her arm around me at once and drew me close.

  “My darlings!” Grandma said, opening her arms. Billy shyly submitted to her embrace. “How was your flight?”

  “We were on a very big plane, Grandma!” Billy said. “Oh—and lots of clouds. A million!”

  “And did you count every one?” she asked, her smile filling the whole of her face.

  “Emily, did you sleep on the plane?” Auntie Liora asked.

  “Not much,” I said.

  “You look a bit pale. You’re probably just tired. Let’s all have a cup of tea. And Grandma’s chocolate cake. I know Uncle Michael is dying for a piece.”

  Though Grandma was almost seventy years old, her eyes shone with childhood. I loved the way she got excited about everything. Like the time we stopped for half an hour to watch a tiny army of ants making their way across the sidewalk toward their anthill on the nature strip, many bearing loads that looked a hundred times their size. I loved that she carried small gardening shears in the pocket of a big cardigan she wore when she went out for her daily walks, so she might clip a bloom when its beauty called to her. Once, she told me mischievously, she’d climbed over a tall fence to get to an extravagant camellia bush.

  I had never known my other three grandparents; two of them died long before I was born, and Papa’s father died when I was a baby. I don’t think Grandma quite realized how significant it was to be a child’s only living grandparent.

  We all sat around the kitchen table. Billy gripped onto my hand, stealing shy glances at Grandma and bolder ones at Uncle Michael and Auntie Liora. He happily tucked into his cake and soon had a chocolate mustache and beard.

  After Billy washed his hands and face, Grandma showed us around, to refresh our memories of the house. My mother had told us many stories of her own childhood in this house; we called it “The U House,” as it was shaped like the letter U around the back yard, which contained the swimming pool we’d always envisioned with such awe, being New York City kids. We loved our tiny cement patch in back of our Brooklyn house, a luxury among city dwellers, and could hardly imagine a yard sizable enough to contain a swimming pool.

  Daredevil Uncle Michael told us how when he was twelve, he’d climbed onto the roof and jumped from there into the pool.

  Auntie Liora shook her head. “Don’t be like Uncle Michael,” she said. “He was such a naughty boy.”

  One length of the U was a long hallway with floor-to-ceiling windows on one side and doors to the bedrooms on the other. Sunlight slanted in and marked the varnished cork flooring in bright parallelograms that Billy jumped into and out of. Looking into the back yard, I could see the pool cover sag in the middle, where rainwater flecked with leaves had gathered. A lone silver birch towered above the gray brick patio, holding the sky with its bare arms, its papery white bark hanging in places on the trunk in enormous vertical curls.

  Outside Grandma’s room was an unusual bench I’d always liked, made of a wooden frame and thin leather thongs woven crisscross to form a seat. Grandma had brought it with her when she and Grandpa Jack emigrated from South Africa, when Mama was a baby. She told us it was made of a now-extinct South African tree named stinkwood. Billy leapt onto it with glee, as I had done, the first time I’d visited Australia when I was exactly Billy’s age.

  “Stinky stink, stinky stink!” He bounced up and down on the leather thongs.

  “He’s discovered the bankie,” Grandma said, using the Afrikaans word for this kind of bench, one of the few relics she had from her South African childhood.

  She leaned down and whispered in my ear: “I have something special earmarked for each of you to take home with you when you’re grown-up. You always liked the bankie; it has your name on it.”

  What a happy thought! That Grandma wanted, one day, to give the banki
e to me.

  “I loved this bench myself as a child,” she said. “My happiest moments were spent sitting on it—dreaming of my future. Or playing with the dolls I used to make out of mango pits. I’d scrape all the fiber off the pit except at the top. That was the doll’s hair. Then I’d paint on eyes, nose, and mouth. I used to play with them for hours.”

  Auntie Liora and Uncle Michael left, and Grandma showed us to our room, which she’d set up for our arrival. The shelves had been cleared of her books and were now filled with toys and games and children’s books she’d rummaged up from when my mother and aunt and uncle were young. There were bright posters on the walls: Winnie the Pooh and his Hundred Acre friends over Billy’s bed, and a Monet print over mine—a garden with a little bridge.

  Back in the living room, my eyes fell on the large samovar, sitting in its special place on the sideboard. Last time we were here, I’d asked Mama what it was; she’d explained that it was the pride of my great-grandmother’s household when she was a child in Lithuania, a symbol of warmth and hospitality, the communal tea drinking at the heart of family life. The name had evoked something formal, imperial, and military, like a hussar in full regalia, with epaulets and brass buttons, a sword swinging from his hilt.

  “Grandma, have you ever used the samovar?” I asked.

  Grandma turned to look at the cylindrical samovar, about a foot and a half tall, made of brass, with elaborately carved feet and an ornamental crown. It was polished to a bright sheen. I recalled seeing Grandma rubbing at it with a chamois cloth.

  “Yes. Well, no. Not for a very long time. We used it on special occasions in South Africa, when I was a child. It must be decades …”