Don't Talk to Me About the War (5 page)

“It’s only a radio program,” I say. “Ma Perkins will talk to that boy. He’ll decide that crime doesn’t pay.”

Mom is sitting by the table. She doesn’t answer me.

“And don’t worry about Helen Trent. She’s always falling in love with the wrong man.”

“It’s not that,” Mom tells me.

“Is it your eyes? Are you real tired?”

Mom doesn’t answer me.

“Lots of people’s eyes hurt,” I say. “Lots of people get tired. And people fall and drop things all the time. That doesn’t mean they’re sick.”

That’s what I say, but I don’t believe it.

Mom tries to smile. She thanks me for helping and says I should do my homework. I go to my room, but I can’t work. I’m too worried about Mom.

Dad comes home about six and I hurry out of my room. He has a bunch of yellow flowers—daisies, I think. He asks Mom how she feels, but she doesn’t want to talk about it.

“Then how’s Helen?” Dad asks, and smiles.

“She’s fine.”

That can’t be true! Helen Trent is
never
fine. Is Mom lying like that woman in Buffalo? Well, not exactly. Mom didn’t say she was a silent movie star.

Dad puts the flowers on the kitchen counter. He opens the cabinet just above the sink and looks for the vase.

“It’s not there,” I tell him quietly. “It broke.”

“Oh,” Dad says. He doesn’t ask how it broke. I guess he knows.

Dad opens the icebox. There’s just a little milk left in the bottle. He pours it in a glass for me. He washes the bottle, puts in the flowers, adds some water, and sets it on the table.

“They’re nice,” Mom says.

At dinner, I think about Mom and Helen Trent. Mom must like the show because, like Helen, Mom is over thirty-five and doesn’t want romance to be over for her, and I don’t think it is. Sometimes, when
Symphonic Strings
is on the radio, she and Dad hold hands.

Mom doesn’t eat much. Dad asks why, and she tells him she isn’t hungry.

After dinner, Mom sits in the easy chair and rests while Dad and I do the dishes. We don’t talk. I think Dad feels like me—he doesn’t know what to say.

We put the dishes away, and Dad and I go to the parlor to listen to the radio. The war news is good. The British, French, and Belgians are fighting back in what the reporter calls the Battle of Flanders.

Next, there’s a report from London.

“Just ten days ago, in his first speech to the British House of Commons as prime minister, Winston Churchill told his nation, ‘I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.’ He said, ‘for without victory, there is no survival.’ This is a crucial time for Churchill and his people.”

I think again about what I heard yesterday, that there’s a special bond between President Roosevelt and Churchill and wonder how long we will stay out of the fighting.

Dad says, “Too many people here are out of work. We have to get people jobs before we can even think about another war.”

Mom agrees. She tells me, “You’re my only child. I don’t want you to be a soldier.”

I’m sure Beth is right, that we don’t want the Germans to take over all of Europe. I’m sure Dad is right, too, that we need jobs here more than we need war. I’m confused about all this. I don’t know what we should do. But I don’t need to decide. That’s up to President Roosevelt and all those people in Washington.

At nine, Dad turns the dial to 660, WEAF,
The Maxwell House Good News Program
with Fanny Brice as Baby Snooks. She’s such a brat, but she’s funny. Her teacher asks, “If you subtract twenty-five from thirty-seven, what’s the difference?” And Snooks answers, “That’s what I say. What’s the difference? ”

It’s funnier when you hear her say it on the radio in her squeaky baby voice. I’m sure tomorrow I’ll hear all the Snooks jokes again from Roger.

Mom smiles when she listens to Baby Snooks.

I change into pajamas, look again at the
Daily Mirror,
and wonder what part of the newspaper Beth’s dad worked on. Lying there, on my bed with the light off and my eyes closed, I picture the map and the dotted lines.

The next morning, Mom is sitting by the window. “I looked outside,” she tells me. “It’s cloudy and might rain, so you should take your jacket.”

Mom watches me eat breakfast, a buttered roll and a glass of milk. Then, just as I’m about to get up, she takes my hand. She holds on a bit too tight. I can feel her hand tremble.

“I feel fine today,” she says. “Don’t worry.”

But I do worry.

When I get to Goldman’s and Beth sees me, she closes the newspaper she’s reading. She doesn’t talk to me about the war at all. She asks about Mom.

“I think you’re wrong,” I say. “I didn’t find any bottles, and I smelled Mom’s breath. It didn’t smell of whiskey.”

Beth smiles. “That’s good,” she says. “I don’t mind being wrong.”

I help Beth fold the newspapers and tell her how I feel, that I am scared. I just wish Beth had a different family history, that she could say, “Yeah, my mother had the shakes. She was sick, too, but now she’s fine.”

Sarah is waiting for us at the corner. The light is red.

Sarah steps real close to Beth and says softly, “Yesterday we got a letter. It was from my aunt.”

I lean close. I want to hear what Sarah is saying.

“My aunt still does not know where Uncle is. She said it is good we left and that we took Yosef and Moshe.”

“Who are Yosef and Moshe?” I ask.

“They’re Sarah’s cousins,” Beth says. “They came here with Sarah and her family.”

“Yes,” Sarah says. “They are little.”

The light is green.

“Where is your uncle?” Beth asks. “What do you think happened to him?”

Sarah shakes her head. She doesn’t know.

Sarah starts to cross the street and we follow her. She keeps a step or two ahead of us, I think so we can’t see how upset she is. When we get in, Sarah hurries to class.

“What’s wrong with her?” I ask.

“Jewish people in Europe are taken away by the Nazis. They disappear.”

“Go on,” Dr. Johnson tells us. “Go to class.”

At our lockers I ask Beth, “What do you mean they disappear?”

“Some come back. Others don’t. They’re just gone.”

“I don’t understand.”

Beth turns to me. “What don’t you understand!”

She’s almost scolding me.

“They take people away. All kinds of people. It happens every day.”

That’s scary, I think, but I don’t say it.

We get into homeroom just as the bell rings. We hurry to our seats.

Mr. Weils is standing in the front of the room. He’s holding the attendance book.

“Sit straight,” he tells us. “Sit tall!”

I sit up as he checks the attendance.

My first two classes, math and science, go by quickly. And for once, history isn’t too bad. Mr. Baker talks about Benjamin Franklin, the oldest delegate at the Constitutional Convention. He tells us about Franklin’s experiments with electricity, and that Franklin believed fresh air was good for people’s health. At night, even in the coldest weather, Franklin left a window open by his bed, and in the morning, he often took what he called an “air bath.” He sat naked in his parlor, so his whole body could bathe in air.

I close my eyes and imagine Franklin, an old man with long hair, taking an air bath.

Yuck!

I think about another fat man, about Fat Freddy Fitzsimmons and the Dodgers. I hope this summer I can get to Ebbets Field and watch him pitch.

I know I should be a Yankees fan, because I live in the Bronx and they’re a Bronx team, but I’m not. Dad grew up in Brooklyn and has always been a Dodgers fan, and so have I. Roger is, too, but I think for him it’s just one more way he can be different from most everybody else. Charles roots for the Yankees.

Finally the bell rings.

Beth and I walk together to the cafeteria, and she asks me if I heard what Mr. Baker said about Franklin’s air baths. I surprise her and tell her I did.

At lunch, I wonder if Sarah will say anything else about her aunt and uncle. She doesn’t. Mostly she doesn’t talk, and when she does, it’s usually to Beth. Maybe she feels funny about her accent. Maybe that’s why she hardly talks.

I sit, unwrap my sandwich, pick out pieces of onion from my egg salad. Lately, Dad makes my lunch, and he makes it the way he likes it, with too many onions.

Roger stands in front of Beth and tells all the Baby Snooks jokes. He does it in Snooks’s pretend baby voice.

“‘It’s time for bed,’ Snooks’s father said. He was in a hurry. ‘First, tell me a story,’” Roger says in his baby voice. “So this was his story. ‘A man bought twelve apples. Ten were good. Too bad. The end.’”

Sarah doesn’t laugh.

“Don’t you get it?” Roger asks. “Two were bad. Too bad. T-W-O or T-O-O bad.”

“English is not her first language,” Beth says.

Sarah says, “At home we talk German.”

“German!” Roger says a bit too loud. He stands, sticks his right leg out real stiff and goose-steps around the table like the newsreels of German soldiers. “
Achtung!
” he says.
“Achtung! Achtung!”

Sarah turns away. She looks upset.

Roger sits and shrugs, implying he can’t imagine what he did wrong. And I wonder why anyone would get upset by something Roger says. He’s always joking.

Beth tells Sarah, “He didn’t mean anything by that.”

Roger opens his lunch bag, unwraps his sandwich—salami—and takes a bite.

Maybe that’s why Sarah doesn’t listen much to radio comedies: she doesn’t understand them. In her house, they probably listen to music. That’s the same in any language.

Beth surprises us. She tells us something, and it’s not about the war.

“My dad’s boss gave him two tickets to Sunday’s Giants game at the Polo Grounds. He’s taking me, and I need to know about baseball.”

“Wow!” I say. “That’s great.”

Roger stands and pretends to be holding a baseball bat.

“Pow!” he says and swings. “There it goes! Over the fence! You should see
me
play baseball.”

Charles smiles. He’s a real baseball fan. He tells Beth, “Going to a game is fun, but don’t keep asking your dad questions. That can ruin a game. And also, root for the home team.”

“What about the game? What do I need to know about baseball?”

We tell her what to expect at a stadium. She already knows about balls, strikes, outs and innings, and how teams get runs. We tell her about dugouts, umpires, and catcher’s signals.

“And there’s a scoreboard in the outfield,” Charles says, “so you don’t have to ask who’s winning and what inning it is.”

“Don’t worry,” Beth says, and smiles at him. “I get it. I won’t ask lots of questions.”

After school, Sarah and I wait under the oak tree for Beth.

“Do you have any idea where your uncle is?” I ask.

Sarah shakes her head. “It’s a long time since he was taken.”

“Maybe he’s a soldier, or he’s hiding somewhere.”

“Yes,” Sarah says. “Maybe.”

There’s Beth. I wave to her. She smiles when she joins us. “It’s Friday,” she says. “No school for two days.”

We’re about to leave when Roger calls to me.

“Stop, Tommy! We need you.”

Charles and three other boys—Johnny, Ken, and Bruce, eighth-graders—are with him.

“We’re playing stickball and we need you. You’re the sixth man.”

I turn to Beth and Sarah.

“Okay,” Beth says. “I’ll see you on Monday.”

“Why don’t you come?” Roger asks her. “You can watch me play. I’m as good as some of those players you’ll see at the Polo Grounds.”

“I can’t, but thanks.”

Roger shrugs and joins the other boys. Before I can follow them, Beth takes my hand and says, “I hope your mother is better. I’m sure she will be.”

I watch as Beth and Sarah walk away. I look at my hand. It felt good when Beth held it. Then I hurry and join Roger and the others.