Almost a Woman : A Memoir (9780306821110) (32 page)

It was easy to tell the house where the party was, because many cars were parked in front of it and the window shades were up. We came up a walk lit by strings of Christmas lights on the ground. Inside, the house was warm, smelled of cinnamon, cloves, and burning wood in a fireplace. A blonde, big-boned woman met us at the door, and Otto kissed her on both cheeks. She was Minna, his older sister. They looked alike, but Minna spoke much better English.

“I'm so happy you're here,” she said, pressing my hand, “Otto has told me so much about you.” Regina and I exchanged a look, wondering what he could have said, as we barely knew each other.

Minna treated us like honored guests, introduced us to everyone there, offered us drinks and miniature sausages from a tray.
Her husband, Jim, was American, but as blond, blue-eyed, and (German-looking as everyone else in the room. He wore
lederhosen,
and I wasn't sure if it was really a national costume or a joke. His principal job was to keep everyone's glass full, which he did with gusto. From time to time he broke into song, and the company joined in what I took to be German Christmas carols.

We'd arrived as dinner was being served. The dining room table was heaped with food arranged by type. A turkey, a ham, a platter of meatballs, and cold cuts were set next to a variety of cheeses, whipped cream, butter. Beside them were colorful bowls of vegetables: chunks of yellow squash, milky mashed potatoes, green string beans dotted with tiny white onions, blood-red beets. Several trays held crusty breads, rolls, seeded buns. A sideboard was devoted to cakes, puddings, cookies, chocolate-covered nuts, and fruits. It was the most bountiful spread I'd ever seen, each food group set off from the other with ribbons and pine boughs.

Otto and Gilbert led us through the buffet, encouraged us to taste everything. They laughed at how diligently I kept the different flavors from contaminating one another, and at Regina's face when she tasted the whipped cream and it turned out to be not sweet, but spiced with horseradish.

After dinner, we went down to a finished basement with chairs along the walls, a bar, a Hi-fi with a stack of records that dropped one by one onto a lazy turntable. Nancy Sinatra insisted that her boots were made for walking, the Monkees were daydream believers, and the Young Rascals promised good lovin'. Otto and Gilbert flailed their arms and legs in a style I'd come to associate with American dancing, which now appeared to be an international technique. Used to the graceful, seductive movements of
salsa, merengue,
and
chachacha,
I was frustrated by the distance between our bodies, the sense that we weren't dancing together, but near each other. That changed when Percy Sledge wailed about when a man loves a woman. Someone turned the lights down. Otto took off his jacket, pulled me close, and I was finally in his arms, my head resting on his broad chest. Each time
Percy Sledge's voice rose, Otto drew me closer, and I didn't resist. As the song ended, Otto took me by the hand and led me up the stairs. Regina watched us, smiled, buried her head in Gilbert's shoulder.

“Where are we going?” I asked, but Otto didn't answer. We went down a hall. He opened a door into a dark room, but I refused to go inside. “Let's go back,” I suggested. He pressed me against the wall and kissed me.

It was wonderful, his kiss. Soft, warm lips. The heat between our bodies. The slow insinuation of his tongue into my mouth. Irresistible. Each time we came up for air, he guided me closer to the door. A couple went past us into another room, and I caught a whiff of Regina's perfume. Otto mumbled some words into my ear, which I didn't get. “Please,” he begged and I understood that I'd better get out from between him and the wall. His kisses were insistent, his hands strayed. I was overwhelmed, certain that if I waited a moment longer, I wouldn't be able to resist his curious fingers, his hot tongue, the desire to rip my clothes off and present myself naked before him. He was a big man, but I was a muscled dancer. With effort, I pushed him away and ran back to the crowded basement, where the Troggs sang about their wild thing.

I sat on one of the chairs against the wall, tried to calm my breathing. Otto had not followed. I was grateful not to have to face him just then.

Minna came over and sat next to me. “Are you having a good time?” she asked.

“Very nice,” I responded, my voice tight. She didn't notice.

“My brother really likes you,” she confided. “He's never brought a girl for us to meet before.”

“I like him too,” I admitted, hoping that if she conveyed that message, he might forgive me for what I'd just done.

Two small windows high on the wall faced out to the walkway in front of the house. Huge snowflakes twinkled among the Christmas lights. Minna followed my gaze. “How lovely!” she exclaimed. “Look, everyone,” she called, “it's snowing.”

Several couples stopped dancing to ooh at the sight. Otto came down the steps. I expected him to be angry, but he wore a sheepish expression, smiled sweetly, sat on my other side, squeezed my hand. He turned to the window where everyone was staring, and I turned in its direction. To my horror, there were my mother and Don Carlos marching toward the front door, fat snowflakes pelting their resolute faces.

“Oh my God,” I stood up so fast, I slipped and fell to my knees. Otto helped me up, and I ran up the stairs. I opened the door before they could knock. “What are you doing here?” I shrieked. Mami's lips were pressed together. She looked behind me at the festive house, the leftovers of the meal still on the holiday table, the curious faces that followed us to the door.

“You didn't call,” Don Carlos responded. “We were worried about you.”

A giant hot wave of humiliation, relief, and shame, rolled over me. Ten minutes earlier I'd almost given myself to Otto. What if Mami had found me naked in bed with him?

Minna appeared at my side, put her arm around my shoulder, invited them in, offered them a drink. But Mami declined with a strained smile, pointed to the taxi at the bottom of the walkway.

“And your friend?” she asked.

“She's in the bathroom,” Minna said, too quickly.

“Where's my coat?” I croaked. Jim retrieved it from a closet by the front door. Mami stared at him—a grown man in green leather shorts with suspenders, red knee socks with dangly felt balls on the side. Otto helped me into my coat, tipped his head sympathetically when I pulled it closed and crushed what was left of the corsage he'd given me. “Thank you,” I said to no one in particular.

I wanted to die, wished that on the way home, the taxi would crash and kill us, so that I never had to face Otto again. But the
driver was careful, drove slowly, which gave me plenty of time to scream at Mami and Don Carlos.

“How could you do this? I'm old enough to take care of myself!”

“Lower your voice or I'll shut your mouth for you.”

The source of Mami's anger was an enigma. I argued that I'd asked her permission, had brought Otto home for her to meet, had found a chaperone. She knew where I'd be, who I'd be with, when I'd be back. Don Carlos repeated that I'd forgotten to call when I got there, but I reminded him they had Otto's sister's number. Why hadn't they called to see if I'd arrived safely? They'd gone to great trouble and expense to come get me, to humiliate me in front of my friends, to teach me a lesson I didn't need. I was hysterical all the way back to Brooklyn. As soon as we got home, I tore the pink dress with the fake pearls off me and ripped it to shreds. The tiny pearls dislodged from the fabric, plinked onto the linoleum floor, rolled into the crevices along the baseboard where roaches lurked.

Regina didn't come to work on Monday, but Otto was there. Ilsa and I were scrambling to open and sort piles of mail by ourselves when he approached the long table that divided our department from Purchasing. He was the same person as two days before, but now I saw him through Mami's eyes. Unlike Neftalí and Sidney, Otto was a man, not a boy. That didn't make him less attractive. As he stood in front of me, I couldn't stop blushing. Shame and desire alternated, fused until they were the same.

“We can have coffee, yes?” he asked. Ilsa frowned from her desk.

“My break is at 10:30.” I was happy that he'd talk to me after Saturday night's fiasco. Ilsa coughed discreetly to let me know I should go back to work. Before he left, Otto bowed in her direction, which I found gallant but she found infuriating. She muttered a few words in her language that sounded hostile.

“Why don't you go out with Sidney anymore?” she asked later.

“I'm a
shiksa
.” The defensive tone in my voice surprised me as much as it did Ilsa, whose eyes flickered wildly for a few seconds, then looked away.

Everyone in the cafeteria stared at Otto and me sitting by ourselves in a far table. He held my hand through the fifteen minutes I was allowed for coffee. In his halting English, he apologized for getting “fresh,” which astounded me, since I had had as much to do with it as he had.

“Your mother and father is very good,” he assured me, “they take good care.”

“They treat me like a child.”

“It is good,” he consoled me. “You are not American girl. They are very free.”

“I want to be free,” I hinted, but he didn't get it.

“You are perfect,” he smiled. “My girlfriend,” he murmured, and, had I been standing, my knees would have buckled under me.

Later, we had lunch in the coffee shop where he had once nursed the wound I caused him. He had to go to Switzerland next, he informed me.

“We write each other,” he offered.

I was late getting back, and Ilsa put on a face. She glared at the piles on the tables. My apology didn't affect her mood. Later, as we filed a stack of documents in side-by-side cabinets, I apologized again.

“It wasn't right,” she relented, “for me to be so cross. It's not you I'm mad at, it's him.” She tipped her head in the direction of the International Department. “And it's not him,” she amended. “It's them.” I had no idea what she was talking about. She fixed me with her blue eyes. “I had a very bad experience with Germans,” she explained. Then I understood.

“But Ilsa,” I argued, “they can't all be bad.”

“To me they're all the same.”

“But it's not fair.”

“Fair? Was the murder of six million Jews fair?” Her voice rose, but not so loud that anyone else heard. I stammered that no, it wasn't, but that it was equally wrong to judge a whole nation by the actions of a few.

“A few!” She was appalled. “The whole country stood by as Jews were murdered. My mother, my father, my sisters and brother.” The passion in her voice was hypnotic, and I remained silent, hoping she'd continue, but she bit her lips and said no more.

“I'm so sorry, Ilsa.” I touched her arm, and she pressed my fingers and smiled sadly.

“I hope you never have to hate,” she murmured.