II
“You late again, Manny!”
That was his mother. He didn’t answer her. He looked at the room, at the table with its red tablecloth, now set for the evening meal, at the crayon enlargements of his grandfather and grandmother on the wall. At the ice box in the corner of the dining room. At the long-handled pot in which the soup had been cooked and brought to the table. His father ... long beard ... almost asleep.... Reba—was she dirty or was that just the way she put the rouge on her face? So much rouge! That was his sister.
“Where were you?”
He brushed past his mother. He went into the bedroom. Over his shoulder he told her:
“In school.”
“So late? You get out at five, no?”
“Well....”
He didn’t care to wash up. To hell with hygiene. That was for doctors. He wouldn’t be a doctor.
“Ain’t coming to eat?” His mother again, in the doorway.
“I don’t want to eat. I’m tired.” But he went. He sat down at the table. “I’m tired....”
“Ha! You make me giggle.” Reba. “What should I say then? You tired? My Gawd, you don’t have to stand at the machine all day long, punching them buttons till you think your arm was gonna break off.”
“Now you let ’im alone.” The mother had come to his defence. Always she came to his defence. “Studying ain’t so easy.”
“It ain’t? Wisht to Gawd you would ’ave let me study. How I was begging you to let me go to business school. All the girls I know is stenogs, only I got to work in a factory, because....”
She didn’t say it. But she looked at Emmanuel. The accusation was there. He jumped up. He pushed away his plate and jumped up.
“What do you want of me? Did I stop you from school? Am I making you go to work?” Still, he couldn’t shake off her eyes. They were telling the truth. His mouth twitched, he lowered his voice: “I guess you’re right. If it wasn’t for me you’d.... I’m sorry, Reba!”
She softened, too. She rose and put a hand on his sleeve. She smiled; underneath the thick paint on her face there was something kindly.
“Oh, what’s the matter with you, Manny? I was only kiddin’. Can’t you take a joke?”
Yes, they were all working for him! His father, getting rheumatism in that basement shop of his, haggling, cheating customers out of an extra potato, cheating for the sake of an added cent.... That mother of his, over there. She worked, too. Embroidered with her always diseased eyes. Reba....
“No, I guess you’re right, Reba. I ... I’m just sucking the blood out of you, all of you....”
“Don’t be a fool. My work is all right. You’ll be a doctor soon.”
Ah, he’ll be a doctor soon! That’s why they were willing to work. He was a bank of flesh, into which they put their greasy pennies.... To be returned with interest! What if he told them that he didn’t intend to become a doctor? What if he told them to go to hell? How? How to say it to them? After all this?
He ate his fish. There was no talk in the room. His father drank the soup with gurgling noises. It was borscht soup. It trickled down over his beard, red soup, and he wiped it away with the back of his hand. His mother sighed every time she had to rise to bring something to the table. His family!
Suddenly Emmanuel rose. The room was choking him. The walls were coming nearer. The clatter of the dishes was low thunder now.
“I’m through.”
He knew where he was going. Upstairs, to the third floor, to Etta. Etta! Etta! She was real. She had black hair, and when you touched it you could shut your eyes and think you were touching nice warm water. It seemed to lick your fingers with a warm tongue, her hair. Her eyes, too, like the feel of a child-wind in summer....
“Manny!”
She had come to meet him at the door. Their hands touched. He was the first to draw his away. Again he felt warm all over, as he had in the street. When she brushed past him in the dim-lit hall to lead the way to the living room and her body was close to his, Emmanuel was conscious of a feeling of shame, his throat became dry. For no reason at all, as far as he could tell.
Their living room was like any other East Side living room. No—better. Here there was a cheap golden-oak piano, too, and an incongruous gilded music stand with stencilled flowers and angels and birds. Otherwise the usual crayon pictures of bearded ancestors of scheiteled ancestors, the seven-branched candlestick on the mantel, the rocking chair, a vase with artificial roses....
“Listen, Manny, you never heard me sing, did you? I’m gonna sing a new piece I just got. Wanna hear it?”
She seated herself at the piano. She spread the sheets of music. The song was a ballad, a jumble of molasses-coated words, smirking though they meant to whimper. And her hands struck the wrong notes, they slipped off, she had to shake her head and begin all over again. Her voice uncertain, trembling. Still.... Emmanuel, listening to the girl, knew that this was the street returned. His mouth opened in amazement. His arm shook. Then:
“Etta!” he cried, cutting into the cracked notes of the piano. “You can sing!”
She didn’t seem to pay any attention to that. Again she started, false, tremulous. Emmanuel grasped her arm.
“Ouch, you’re hurting me!”
But he would not let her go on.
“Listen, Etta! You can sing. Don’t you understand me? You’ve got it in you. You ... well, you can sing, Etta! Not yet. You know what I mean. Not yet. But it’s in you. You can sing.”
“Yeah?” She was pleased. She brought her face closer to his as he stood there, bending over her.
“You’re going to study....”
“How can I? I got to go to work. I ain’t got time. You feel awful tired after taking dictation all day.”
He waved that aside. Again his hand was cutting into her arm.
“You’ll have to study. You don’t know how good it is. If only I could have studied!”
“Well, you’re studying, ain’t you? You’re gonna be a doctor.”
“That’s not what I mean....” How to explain it? “Listen, Etta, I wanted to study things like history. Not the stuff they gave me at high school. Real history. There is colour in it. The books never speak of that, though. They give you only dates and names. But when you shut your eyes you can see helmets and campfires. Flames and singing people in forests, monks in black hoods, golden coins. That’s funny how those golden coins come to you when you shut your eyes. That.... That’s history.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I never cared much for it in school.”
“Because you never shut your eyes to see. Then, take drawing. The way I imagine it.... Well, I wasn’t good at it, of course. My lines took crazy turns. They moved about the paper and I couldn’t stop them. The teacher was angry. But what could I do? He put there a vase and a strawberry box and I could see only patches of colour and sometimes fountains and sometimes dancing flowers. You know.... The lines went their own way. Sometimes one side was larger than the other, sometimes you could see through it.... And my teacher was angry.”
“I don’t understand you. What you mean flowers was dancing?” She reached out for his hand and patted it. “You say such funny things, Manny. What you shouting for so?”
He felt her face very close to his. Her hair touched his eyes. He brushed that aside. He spoke in whispers now.
“Listen, Etta, I’ll teach you how to sing. I’ll teach you. I can do it. I can’t sing myself, but I can teach you. It’s here in me! Shall I?”
She didn’t seem to care about that. She was flushed, her eyes had grown wide, warm. Her red bit of a tongue moistened her quivering lips:
“Yeah!” Hers was also a whisper. Then her arms were about his neck.
Feeling the touch of her bare elbows, Emmanuel stopped talking. The arms were hot. Through her thin blouse he could see the girl’s shoulders. Suddenly he bent his face to hers, almost bit into her lips. He was happy. No, not the melody of the street ... that was gone just now.... This was something else. His legs trembled.
“Etta, I love you!”
She lay back in his arms. She knew. She kissed him with even more passion than before. He was going to be a doctor....
“We’re sweethearts, ain’t we, Manny?”
“Yes, yes!” Ah, it was good to kiss her.
“We’re gonna go steady, yeah?” He would be a doctor. They would go “steady.” Then there would be a “catered supper” in the pink reception room of an East Side hall after the wedding, with many candles in the hands of the guests, a band for dancing, a paper-flower decorated throne for the bridal pair. “Steady, yes, Manny?”
There was only another year of college....