Too Jewish (22 page)

"It was no great breakthrough like you see in the movies," he said. "Your professor didn't probe deeply into my psyche and find the root of my most profound problems."

"You left this morning feeling all right," I said. "And you came home spoiling for a fight. With Darby, no less."

"I'm sorry about that," he said. "I'll apologize to her before she goes to bed."

"Forget about Darby," I said. "What's this about my mother?"

He rolled up the one section of the paper. The front of the afternoon paper was pale green, and it looked substantial. He pounded it onto his left forearm. He couldn't let it touch his hand. Rhythmically. "I want to know how she found out about the scholarship."

"I definitely didn't tell her," I said. "She'd have made my life a living hell."

"Well, she decided to do it to me instead."

How could I not know this? That was the question on my face.

"You're not in every room all the time," he said.

I tried to think. We were all somewhere together. Their house. Dinner. What happened?

"All you had to do was go to the bathroom," Bernie said. "She was just waiting." Falsetto. "How could you do this to your child?'" "I said, What?' For Chrissakes, Darby was on her front sidewalk with a box of chalk. I had no idea what she was talking about. And before you could get back, she let me know that putting a child on scholarship was, wait, let me see, what were her exact words? Degrading and humiliating. Oh, and a blight on the Adler name."

I never knew. I didn't remember coming back from the bathroom.

"What was I supposed to do?" Bernie said. "Say, Your mother is being mean to me' when you walked back into the room? We just smiled as if nothing at all had happened in your absence."

No wonder Bernie was burning himself away, starting at his extremities. His hands were on fire.

"I don't understand how she knows," I said.

"Doesn't matter."

This was why Bernie was sick, but I wasn't going to say so.

* * *

I considered calling my mother, but that's what she wanted. Instead I called my only suspect.

I was surprised that they put me straight through. "What can I do for you?" Mrs. Prescott said. I'd forgotten I was a beggar.

I told her I was sorry to bother her, but Darby's scholarship was confidential, and yet my mother found out.

She was silent for a moment, probably biting her tongue. Most grandmothers paid tuition. Most grandparents should have shown up on parents' lists of assets. Darby shouldn't have qualified, but these things happened in families.

"You understand that the board had to approve," she said.

"But that was confidential," I said.

"I don't think it was anyone on the board," she said. "They are souls of discretion. The only other place I can think of is the financial office. They're really only clerical staff."

"Really only clerical staff." She said so much in those four words. These were not Newman people. No pedigree. Vocationally trained. Good at their work, but not hired for their social skills, certainly not for their social connections. She transferred my call.

And that is where it had happened. My mother had called up, nice as you please. And why had she not been invoiced? So sweetly. A loving grandmother. She always got a bill that time of year. "Oh, let me check, Mrs. Adler. Cooper, did you say?" A minute later, "Why, I'm surprised you didn't know. Darby is on full scholarship. I guess you can spend your money on something else this year."

I phoned my mother. Bernie was out of the house, so I could yell if I wanted.

"What is this bull about Darby's scholarship?" I said.

"I suppose I could ask you the same question." Her voice was so level.

"You cut off paying her tuition," I said. "What were we supposed to do?"

"People with any pride would have found a way to afford it themselves. And if you couldn't afford it, then you should have put the child in public school," she said. "But that wasn't really my point. What I really wanted was just a simple thank-you. If you just once could have shown some gratitude, I'd have kept paying. All you had to do was say please.'"

"Is that what you told Bernie?"

"No, when I talked to Bernie, it was too late." Oh? "The damage is done. I told Bernie that he's basically ruined his child. Do you realize what a social outcast he's made of Darby? That is a school for children with money. She might as well have I am poor' written on her forehead."

"Scholarships are confidential," I said. "Unless unscrupulous grandmothers call up and tell lies to find out about them. Darby's no worse off getting money from the school than she was taking money from you."

"She has to get good grades now. I didn't care how she did."

"I know. She has the highest average in her whole class. A little praise would have been nice."

"See what pressure Bernie puts on her? We never put that kind of pressure on you."

I wanted to say,
No, not that kind,
but my mother wasn't one for that sort of conversation.

I was feeling a lot of pressure. Bernie, Darby, and I weren't an accumulating family. We didn't measure. I didn't want us to be measured. Doing well was acceptable for the right reason. We needed to be careful. We were clear that Darby excelled because she simply was good.

"You need to step back," I said.

"You take, but you don't want to give, Letty. That's the trouble with you," she said. "I still don't hear any recognition of what we've done for you."

"Thank you," I said and hung up before she could speak. I looked at my hands, halfway expecting them to break out in blisters.

Darby was fascinated by divorce. She had been for a while. I heard her and her friend Catherine talking about it, and she asked about it at the dinner table. She knew of two people at school whose parents were divorced, and she admired the hell out of them. Not because of having divorced parents, just because they happened to be different. And she wondered which came first. She wondered a lot; Catherine did, too.

Becca's parents were communist atheists, Darby told us. That didn't hold them together, I said. All the boys want to ask her out, she said. Catherine was there.

"She has huge boobs," Catherine said, then turned red. She realized where she was.

"I don't think parents' divorcing makes your chest get bigger," I said.

"But she walks right," Darby said. "Tulane boys ask her out."

"Now
that
might have to do with divorced parents," I said.

"Oh, she doesn't go out with them," Catherine said. "But it's her decision."

The other person with divorced parents was the captain of the junior varsity basketball team. The girls didn't know anything else about him, except that all the other girls worshipped him, which was too bad, because he was so nice. They would have liked to like him. "But you can't like a popular boy," Darby said. I didn't need to ask why. I knew popular boys were dull and boring: that was how they became popular.

Darby and Catherine were content on the sidelines. Catherine was Episcopalian, which of course meant she wasn't on scholarship. She lived in the Garden District, and her parents had so much money that they saw no need to impress anyone. Catherine's clothes weren't ironed because Catherine didn't put them in the hamper. Catherine's sweaters weren't laundered; even Catherine's housekeeper was hands-off. Catherine was free to be a spectator, and lately she'd been watching Becca, with Darby.

I took Darby aside after Catherine went home. "Talking about divorce is getting on my nerves," I said. That wasn't what I'd meant to say, but that's the way it came out.

Darby shrugged. She was thirteen, and shrugging was part of thirteen. "What do you and Daddy talk about?"

"What?"

"I mean, I can't picture you two having a conversation."

"What's that have to do with divorce?" I meant the question, until it came out.

"I just don't see why you're married, that's all. Really, what do you have in common. Besides hating Grammy."

I could not help smiling. My mother was the house glue. She held all four of us together. Rena, Darby, Bernie, me. A little army protecting ourselves. I just didn't think Darby knew it. She probably hadn't known it for a long time, or maybe she had.

"We're both Democrats," I said.

Darby idealized a communist. A Democrat wasn't good enough. Even two Democrats who agreed with each other.

"Big deal," Darby said. "Even the stupid girls think Kennedy's cute."

I didn't know what to say.

"Look, you're never going to get divorced," she said. "I just think about it, that's all."

She was right.

Bernie had gone to Dr. Schulhofer three times three years ago. Bernie had considered himself a quick study. He'd believed he was full of rage, that his mind was hurting his body. "So?" he'd said. "So?" Eventually his doctor discovered cortisone; eventually his hands cleared up. "My mind sees me getting better. My mind makes me get better because it sees me getting better," he said. "There's the connection I can live with."

That was the extent of Bernie's self-examination.

Which was one less topic between us. So we didn't look too cozy to Darby. We didn't look too cozy to me. I didn't know how we looked to Bernie. He wasn't going to leave, but I didn't think it was because he had nowhere to go. He wasn't going to go to New York. Not without Darby, and surely not without me.

"How are you and Bernie getting along?" my mother said. I was over there one afternoon. I tried to drop by once a week around two. That way I'd have to leave to pick up Darby. It was best to visit regularly. I came full of good facts about myself, and I came on my own time, so I defused her.

"It's wonderful," I said.

"Oh, it doesn't have to be," she said. "No marriage is good after the first two years." She was trying to sound like a mother.

"We're happy as can be," I said.

"Listen, I have to tell you about Alyce," she said. "Her middle girl—I forget her name—anyway, this girl has two kids, lives in Georgia somewhere, and she's married to an absolute bum. So finally she comes to her senses and decides she can't take it anymore. But of course you can't get blood from a turnip, you know? I mean, even though it's his fault that the marriage never should have taken place to begin with, she's never going to get enough—what do you call it?—alimony to take care of two kids. So Alyce brings them here. And they buy the girl a house. Not a great house, but a house sort of like the one you have, and right now the kids are in Country Day. She has a discreet little trust, too. No need to work. Pretty good, huh?"

My mother was out of breath. Her eyes were wide with love for Alyce. Usually she had nothing good to say about Alyce.

I got the hint, but I didn't say so. "Alyce is a wonderful mother," I said. I could almost felt sorry for mine. The scales weren't tipping for her.

I told Bernie about the visit at dinner. Darby was rapt. "You heard your mother," Bernie said. "We're happy as can be. Eat your dinner."

* * *

We had started paying Rena ourselves two years ago. "You're cutting off your noses to spite your face," my mother said. "That's money you could have used a lot more wisely. You practically could have paid Newman." I did the math in my head, and she was right. But I couldn't believe she'd gone to the trouble to figure it out. "Somehow we have both," I said back.

I pictured her calling the school. "Oh, they can't pay tuition, but they have a maid. What they pay the maid would cover tuition, you know. Maybe they could escrow a hundred dollars a month." The mother in my nightmare had a point. The nightmare mother made me question my friendship with Rena. I liked Rena. I cleaned more than Rena; I cooked more than Rena. But Rena listened more than I did. And she talked more than I did. Maybe she went home and talked about me behind my back, but I liked to believe she didn't.

"I tell you what," my mother said. "I'm going to spend that maid money I save on Darby."

I told her Darby got an allowance, a dollar a week plus streetcar fare. That was enough.

"Oh, she needs spoiling. That's what a grandmother is for." This from a woman who didn't even know Darby hated pink and loved ancient history.

I imagined Darby hearing that. Darby didn't have one cell that wanted spoiling: that's what she was learning at school. Spoiling meant that something smelled nauseous. Grammy had taken her to Canal Street when she was seven because a friend of my mother's had done the same with her grandson. It was early December, and all the stores were full of toys. Darby could have had whatever she wanted. Darby came home with a tin of peanut brittle. My mother had accused me of coaching her.

For two years my mother had tried to make a wormhole through Darby. Mostly she brought her clothes. She went on trips and brought back gifts. Chic French sweaters, linen suits from London. Darby wore them, and a girl laughed at them, and she couldn't decide if she cared. She decided she did.

Darby wanted the same shoes as the other girls. She decided she wanted to hide in sameness. My mother always let me get shoes at wholesale price. Her grandfather had owned Imperial, so it was a lifetime courtesy. Darby wanted Pappagallos, but Imperial only had Capezios. Here was the chance to spoil her. "Take what I offer," my mother said. My mother never shopped at Imperial for herself, even though it was the biggest shoe store in the city. Discounts offended her. Bargains were something else.

Darby wanted nothing to do with her grandmother, until my mother decided it was time to go to Europe. I told Darby nothing about it, because I would ask Bernie first after she went to bed. Bernie would make the right decision. Europe was very hard to turn down; it was like Newman: I couldn't prove my worth at Darby's expense.

Catherine was spending the night, and they went into her room early. I gave him a few particulars, the ones that appealed to me. Six weeks. No mother, no daughter for six weeks. A learning experience. I'd been to Europe several times at that age, and I remembered landmarks.

"You know very well this is a shopping spree," he said when I finished. "Darby will learn how to nickel-and-dime. Darby will get her hair done. Watch her come back with her nails fixed. And she's coming back with a wardrobe. You think your mother's going to go through the Louvre?" I had to admit we'd gone to the Louvre, and we'd right away asked directions to the Mona Lisa. I'd seen how small she was. That was enough of the Louvre. We never went past the gift shop at the Rodin Museum. Florence had been about jewelry. I never knew there was art in Florence.