Garden of Lies (29 page)

clackety roar of the train. “And for every letter I’ll say a dozen rosaries. And I won’t kneel on the

carpet. I’ll do it on the bathroom floor, where it’s hard and cold. And I’ll start going to

Confession again ... and First Friday Mass. ...”

Thinking of Mass soothed her, and that reminded her of something else that would make her

feel good. The
Law Review
volume under her arm. It had already done good for her once this

evening. She savored the thought of digging into it later on, the crackling of its stiff buckram

spine, feeling the smooth freshness of its thick pages. She knew she wouldn’t understand

everything she read, but she loved the phrases, the rich cadence of Latin terms, and all those case

summaries, dry at first glance, but if you read between the lines, used your imagination, they

were like stories. Yes, it
was
a little like the feeling she got kneeling in church, reading her

missal, hearing the priest’s incantations.

Then she felt a pang of worry. What if he found out? Would Mr. Griffin mind her borrowing

this, and all the others before it? But she never took more than one at a time, and she always

brought it back the following morning. Probably Mr. Griffin wouldn’t have noticed even if she’d

kept a book for a week. But why borrow trouble? Working for him was the best of the three jobs

she’d had so far—[166] the first for an office supply wholesaler who went out of business, the

second for a lawyer who wanted overtime to include bedtime—and she meant to keep this one.

No, of course he wouldn’t mind. He was so nice, so unlike those other two, Walsh and then

Delaney. And so energetic! Why, sometimes he made her feel like Dorothy, caught up in a

tornado.

She pictured him now, pacing to and fro behind his desk, the phone receiver jammed against

his ear, every now and then waving his arms or even thumping the desktop for emphasis. A big

man in his forties, a bit heavy around the middle, but a good face. The face of a man you could

count on, she thought. He reminded her of Brian that way, though they looked nothing alike. Mr.

Griffin made her think of an ex-prizefighter, but one who punched with words instead of his fists.

His jacket would be tossed over the back of his chair, shirtsleeves rolled up over his forearms,

and he was forever plowing his fingers through his thick tweedy-brown hair, making it stand up

in spikes that made her feel oddly tender toward him, the way she did toward Brian’s little

brother Jason, who always had a cowlick. He smiled a lot, too—she liked that about him. And

that time she’d sent the wrong letter to the Cressler Corporation, the one intended for Damon

Chandler, about how old Mr. Cressler’s memory was getting a little foggy and he sometimes got

his facts mixed up—God, what a disaster! She’d felt so terrible. But Mr. Griffin had been nice

about it, even though she could see he was upset. He told her it could have happened to anyone,

that they’d straighten it out somehow.

Rose thought he could probably straighten out just about anything. She didn’t have to listen to

the coffee-kitchenette gossipers to know Max Griffin was a superb lawyer, the most admired in

the firm, probably one of the best in the City. God, if she were sitting on a jury, for sure he’d win

her over, and the rest of the people, too.

Monday she’d tell him about borrowing these books. Not that he’d mind, just ... well, she felt

so dumb and embarrassed. What if he laughed? What if he thought her notion of maybe someday

becoming a lawyer was silly, a big joke?

At Avenue J, ten stops later, Rose got off. As she clattered down the grimy steps leading from

the outdoor platform, then through the turnstile and now outside onto the street, her heart began

to pound. A few blocks’ walk, and she’d be home.

[167] Rose suddenly wanted to prolong the short walk. What if she got home, and there was no

letter from Brian? Today was Friday, and sometimes the postman came on Saturday, but more

likely there’d be the whole long weekend and all day Monday before any more mail. And she had

already waited so very long ...

She stopped at the fruit seller’s on East Fifteenth and bought six oranges, choosing each one

with far more care than necessary. Then at the kosher bakery across the street, seduced by the

mingled aromas of cinnamon and chocolate and rye, she bought a slice of apple strudel in

addition to her usual loaf of pumpernickel. Old Mr. Baumgarten, who always had a pencil

perched behind his enormous ear, threw in a macaroon the way he’d been doing since she was a

little girl, coming here with Nonnie.

“So, your grandmother, how is she feeling?”

“Fine,” Rose answered dutifully.

“And you, such a fine young lady now! Working all the way in the City. So stylish, and

wearing high heels!”

“I’m fine, too, Mr. Baumgarten.”

Rose felt herself growing warm. If she had taken off her coat, the baker might have noticed the

scorch mark on her blouse. She’d been in too much of a hurry ironing it this morning, and she had

no other clean one to wear in its stead. Three good blouses in her whole wardrobe! And two nice

wool skirts, which she alternated every other day. This gray one, and the navy pleated one from

her old school uniform. Some stylish lady, ha!

Well, someday,
she told herself,
I
will
be. When Brian comes home, when we’re married. I’ll

be a professor’s wife then, and then I won’t ever have to feel shabby or inferior.

But what if he doesn’t come home? ...

Suddenly, she felt dangerously close to tears. She thanked the baker and, snatching her white

paper bag from his hands, fled from the store.

Now she was running, running, charging across Avenue J, half an eye to the traffic and

ignoring the red light.

She had to get home, she had to see if today ... oh please, God ... today ... let there be a letter. ...

The sidewalk seemed to pull at her, slow her down, her high heels catching now and then on

the uneven pavement—
step on a crack, you break your mother’s back
—and when she came to

some girls [168] playing hopscotch, she had to swerve out onto the street, darting in between two

parked cars. The oranges in their plastic bag swung against her, bumping her hip as she hurried.

Then at last she was bounding up the three low steps into the vestibule of her building.

Breathless, she hardly paused before pelting up the four flights to her floor. Her heart was

smacking against her ribcage when she reached the landing.

Brian, oh Brian, I miss you so. Your letters, that’s all I have. They’re everything.

Today, please, let it be today.

Nonnie was sitting in front of the television. Mrs. Slatsky, who always left at six sharp, a good

half hour before Rose got home, had switched on Nonnie’s favorite, “Gilligan’s Island.” As Rose

walked in, Nonnie barely glanced up.

“Dinner’s in the oven,” she said offhandedly. “That woman, she brought over a meatloaf.”

That woman. Jesus, Mrs. Slatsky was still “that woman” after how many years?

“Swimmin’ in grease, I’ll bet. She don’t know how to cook, that woman, any more’n I could

play first base for the Dodgers.”

One of Nonnie’s good days, Rose observed. Her grandmother wasn’t slurring much, and she

was sitting up straight, eyes sharp and bright as cut glass. Mrs. Slatsky must have washed her

hair, and set it, too, though it wasn’t too great a job. Still, that spared Rose from having to do it,

and she felt grateful.

But never mind Mrs. Slatsky. Where was today’s mail? Rose looked on the oak hall stand

where Slatsky usually left it after bringing it up in the afternoon. Nothing. Rose darted her eyes

about the darkened living room. She didn’t want to be too obvious. Nonnie mustn’t catch on how

much this meant to her.

“On the kitchen table,” Nonnie said, as if she’d read Rose’s mind.

She looked up at her grandmother, surprised.

The frozen muscles in Nonnie’s face had never really gone back to normal after her stroke, and

now she was looking at Rose with that curious half-smirking expression that, even after all these

months, still unnerved Rose. She saw that her grandmother was wearing the quilted pink bathrobe

Clare had sent her for her birthday [169] last month. Her hands, lying limply in her sunken lap,

reminded Rose of those awful curled chicken feet the butcher gave away for soup.

Saying nothing, Rose went into the kitchen. There, on the table, next to the toaster, two letters

and a postcard.

Her heart hammering, she picked up the first envelope and turned it over. Her hand was

trembling, her mouth dry. But it was only from Clare. The other a flyer advertising a new

shopping mall that was opening in Canarsie.

The postcard was from Molly Quinn, now living in Vancouver. Molly’s boyfriend had decided

to leave the country rather than be drafted, and Molly had gone too.

Rose’s heart sank. No letter, nothing from Brian.
No, not now ... what if maybe not ever ...

Oh God, how would she keep getting up every morning, how would she live? How would she

push herself through another day? Another hour even?

She put her head down on the Formica, too crushed even for tears.

Then she tried to imagine that Brian was in the next room—her favorite way of tricking herself

into missing him less—that any second he would come strolling in and rumple her hair, and kid

her about the law book she’d lugged home. Brian ...

But now she couldn’t believe it, it wasn’t working, not even a little bit. The feel of his hand

against her skin, she couldn’t summon it, however hard she tried. And his smell. What did he

smell like?

Smell. She sniffed. Smoke hung in the air, something was burning. She jerked upright. Mrs.

Slatsky’s meatloaf.

Suddenly, it struck her as funny. Here she was, worrying over Brian, and all the while life just

steamrollered on, subway perverts, Nonnie, burned meatloaf, and all. Yes, it
was
funny. She

began to laugh. Helplessly, with tears rolling down her cheeks and a knot the size of a fist in her

gut.

Chapter 8

“Why don’t you have a seat, Miss ... ah,
Dr.
Rosenthal?”

Dr. Dolenz smiled, but Rachel could see it was only a reassuring smile, not a really welcoming

one. His manner made her think of her father, a bit formal, yet eager to please. And this Park

Avenue consulting room with its massive gleaming desk and oak filing cabinets fitted with brass,

it reminded her of Daddy’s office at the bank, how it had seemed to her when she was little,

perched in the big leather wing chair opposite Daddy’s desk, feeling swallowed up by the room’s

heavy dark authority, its leathery, smoky man smells. That’s how she felt now, swallowed up,

diminished, as she sank onto the massive sofa beneath a trio of English hunting prints.

She made herself sit very quietly, hands folded in her lap, but her heart was racing. What

would the results of her X ray show? Six weeks since the abortion, and she was still not free of

it ... and maybe never would be.

Silently, she pleaded with him:
Please, if it’s as bad as the plastic smile on your face, then I

don’t want to hear it, I don’t want to know. ...

She thought back to how sick she’d been those first days after the abortion ... burning up with

fever, even delirious at times. The flu, she’d thought at first, so much of it going around. Like an

arrogant fool, she had dismissed David’s offer to put her in a taxi. Six blocks she had wandered,

numbly, drunkenly, in the rain until finally she sobered up ... or wised up ... enough to hail a cab.

By the time she got home, she was drenched, shivering with cold, her teeth chattering.

Three days the fever had stayed high. She knew it couldn’t be just the flu. There was the pain

in her abdomen, like surgical clamps. Kay finally had convinced her to come here.

Dr. Morton Dolenz. She stared at him now, a dark man with hairy arms too long for his body,

and thick features. But despite his simian appearance, he’d been surprisingly gentle. He had

diagnosed [171] it as severe pelvic inflammatory disease. Bad, he’d said, but not bad enough to

require hospitalization. Oh yes, she knew about PID. How it wouldn’t kill you, but it could scar

you ... inside.

He had given her ampicillin, one gram four times a day. Almost immediately, she got better.

Then, a month later, he had suggested the hysterosalpingograph to see if there was scarring in her

Fallopian tubes, and if so, how extensive. He made an appointment for her with a radiologist,

then scribbled a prescription for morphine—they injected radioactive dye into your tubes, he told

her, and there would be some pain.

Now, a week later, here he was rising from his chair, undoing the clasp on a large manila

envelope, pulling out films.

“I don’t believe there’s any point in beating around the bush with you, Doctor,” he said. “Why

don’t you have a look at these with me, and I’ll show you what I mean.”

She watched him clip the films to a lightbox on the wall. Slowly she rose to join him, a pulse in