Paullina Simons - The Summer Garden

“Yes, calling for you. Looking for Alexander.”

“Oh.” Tatiana tried to keep her voice careless. “Did he say why?”

“He said something about the State Department needing to talk to Alexander. He was adamant that you call him. He’s been adamant every time he called.”

“How many times, um, has he called?”

“Oh, I don’t know, try … every day?”

“Every day ?” Tatiana was stunned and frightened.

“That’s right. Every day. Adamant every day. That’s too much adamant for me, Tania. I keep telling him, as soon as I hear from you, I’ll give him a call, but he doesn’t believe me. Do you want his number?”

“I have Sam’s number,” she said slowly. “I’ve called him so many times over the years, I have it committed to memory.”

When Alexander first returned home, they had gone to Washington to thank Sam for helping with Alexander’s return. Sam had mentioned something about a mandatory debriefing by the State Department, but he had said it calmly and without haste, and added that it was summer and vital people were away. When they had left Sam at the Mall near the Lincoln Memorial, he didn’t say another word about it. So why such urgency now? Did this have anything to do with the reversal of friendly relations between two recent war allies, the United States and the Soviet Union?

“Call Sam, please, so he stops calling me . Although …” Vikki’s voice lowered a notch into flirtation territory. “Perhaps we should let him continue calling me? He’s a cutie-pie.”

“He’s a 37-year-old widower with kids, Vikki,” said Tatiana. “You can’t have him without becoming a mother, too.”

“Well, I’ve always wanted a child.”

“He has two children.”

“Oh, just stop it. Promise you’re going to call him?”

“I will.”

“Will you give our boyzie-boy a kiss from me the size of Montana?”

“Yes.” When Tatiana went to Germany to search for Alexander, it was Vikki who took care of Anthony. She had grown very attached to him. “I can’t call Sam right away,” Tatiana said. “I have to talk to Alexander about it first when he comes home tonight, so do me a favor, if Sam calls again, just say you haven’t spoken to me yet, and you don’t know where I am. All right?”

“Why?”

“I just … I need to talk to Alexander, and then sometimes we can’t get the phone to work. I don’t want Sam to panic, so hang tight, okay? Please don’t say anything.”

“Tania, you’re not very trusting, that’s your problem. That’s always been your problem. You’ve always been suspicious of people.”

“I’m not. I’m just … suspicious of their intentions.”

“Well, Sam wouldn’t do anything to …”

“Sam’s not running the State Department, is he?” said Tatiana.

“So?”

“He can’t vouch for everyone. Haven’t you been reading the papers?”

“No!” Vikki said proudly.

“The State Department is afraid of espionage on all fronts. I must talk to Alexander about this, see what he thinks.”

“This is Sam ! He didn’t help you get Alexander back home just to accuse him of espionage.”

“I repeat, is Sam running the State Department?” Tatiana felt apprehension she could not explain to Vikki. In the 1920s Alexander’s mother and father belonged to the Communist Party of the United States. Harold Barrington got himself into quite a bit of trouble stateside. Suddenly Harold’s son was back in America just as tension between the two nations was escalating. What if the son had to pay for the sins of the father? As if he hadn’t paid enough—and by the looks of him indeed he had. “I have to run,” Tatiana said, glancing at Anthony and squeezing her hands around the phone. “I’ll talk to Alexander tonight. Promise you won’t say anything to Sam?”

“Only if you promise to come and visit me as soon as you leave Maine.”

“We’ll try, Gelsomina,” said Tatiana, hanging up. I will try someday to make that promise.

Shaking, she called Esther Barrington, Alexander’s aunt, his father’s sister, who lived in Massachusetts. She called ostensibly to say hello, but really to find out if anyone had contacted Esther about Alexander. They hadn’t. Small relief.

That evening over lobsters, Anthony said, “Dad, Mama called Vikki today.”

“She did?” Alexander looked up from his plate. His eyes probed her face. “Well, that’s great. How is Vikki?”

“Vikki is good. Mama cried though. Two times.”

“Anthony!” Tatiana lowered her head.

“What? You did cry.”

“Anthony, please, can you go and ask Mrs. Brewster if she wants some dinner now or if I should keep it in the oven for her?”

Anthony disappeared. Acutely feeling Alexander’s silence, Tatiana got up to go to the sink, but before she could utter a word of defense for her tears, Anthony reappeared.

“Mrs. Brewster is bleeding,” he said.

They rushed upstairs. Mrs. Brewster told them her son, newly returned from prison, beat her to get the rent money Alexander was paying. Tatiana tried to clean up the old lady with rags.

“He’s not staying with me. He’s staying down the road with friends.” Could Alexander help her with her son? Since he’d been in prison too, he should understand how things were. “I don’t see you beatin’ your wife, though.” Could Alexander ask her son not to beat her anymore? She wanted to keep her rent money. “He’s just going to spend it on filthy drink, like always, and then get hisself into trouble. I don’t know what you was in for, but he was in the pen for assault with a deadly weapon. Drunken assault.”

Alexander left to go next door to sit with Nick, but late that night he told Tatiana he was going to talk to Mrs. Brewster’s son.

“No.”

“Tania, I don’t like her either, but what kind of a fucked-up loser beats his own mother? I’m going to talk to him.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. You’re too tightly wound.”

“I’m not tightly wound,” Alexander said slowly, into her back. “I’m just going to talk to him, that’s all, man to man. I’ll tell him beating his mother is not acceptable.” They were whispering in the dark, the beds pushed together, Anthony lightly snoring by Tatiana’s side.

“And he says to you, screw you, mister. Stay out of my business. And then what?”

“Good question. But perhaps he’ll be reasonable.”

“You think so? He beats his mother to take her money!” Sighing, Tatiana twitched in the middle between her two men.

“Well, we can’t just do nothing .”

“Yes, we can. Let’s not ask for someone else’s trouble.” We’ve got plenty. She didn’t know how to bring up Sam Gulotta, cold terror gluing his name to her throat. She tried to keep thinking about someone else’s troubles. She didn’t want Alexander near that woman’s son. But what to do?

“You’re right,” Tatiana finally said with a throat clearing. “We can’t do nothing. You know what? I think I’ll go and speak to him. I’m a woman. I’m little. I’ll talk to him nicely, the way I talk to everybody. He’s not going to get rough with me.”

She felt Alexander stiffen behind her. “Are you joking?” he whispered. “He beats his mother ! Don’t even think of coming close to him.”

“Shh. It’ll be okay. Really.”

He turned her around to face him. “I’m serious,” he said, his eyes on her unblinking and intense. “Don’t take one step in his direction. Not one step . Because a syllable out of him against you, and he won’t be speaking to anyone ever again, and I’ll be in an American prison. Is that what you want?”