Анита Диамант - The Boston Girl

Walking up the stairs to our apartment, I felt like a criminal going to be hanged. But when I got to the door, I heard teaspoons clinking in glasses. That could only mean there was sugar on the table, which meant there was company, which almost never happened.

When I looked through the keyhole, all I could see was a man’s back and my father rubbing his chin, which meant he was either uncomfortable or mad. Mameh was pouring tea and smiling her company smile, but she must have noticed the door rattle or something, because before I knew it she was in the hall, pinching me by the ear and talking so fast I could hardly understand her.

“You listen to me. You’re going to say you were staying in Cambridge to help out a woman who had a baby. Your sister is getting married, thank God, and he doesn’t need to know about you.”

“Betty is getting married?” I said.

“Don’t you dare say that name to Mr. Levine. Celia is the one getting married.”

I couldn’t believe it. I never heard Celia say a word about her boss, good or bad. I said, “But Mr. Levine is too old.”

“Forty is not so old. His wife is dead a year and he has two little boys without a mother. He sees what a hard worker your sister is: so clean, so nice and quiet. He’s got a good business, so she won’t want for nothing. Today he brought over coffee and a bottle of whiskey for your father. So you say, ‘Mazel tov’ and not another word.”

When Celia saw me she jumped out of her chair and ran to give me a hug. She was wearing maybe the first new dress I’d ever seen her in—with flowers that brought out her blue eyes. She looked beautiful.

Mr. Levine stood up. “Nice to make your acquaintance, Miss Addie. Celia says such nice things about you.” He was a small man—maybe an inch taller than me—with a narrow face and a reddish-brown goatee that made him look like a fox.

He said, “Aren’t I lucky to marry into a family of such pretty girls? It will be nice for Myron and Jacob to have a sister, too.”

I said I would be their aunt, not their sister.

He laughed and said, “You must be the smart one.”

Celia took my hand and said I got all As in school.

So Mameh had to say that she was sure Mr. Levine’s sons were even smarter.

“You have to start calling me Herman,” he said.

“What is your real name?” Papa asked. “I need it for the ketubah—the marriage contract.”

Levine waved away the question like he was brushing away a fly. “Hirsch, I suppose.”

Papa made a sour face. This was the kind of man my father called a gantze ganef—a real thief.

Levine reached for the whiskey bottle and said, “Let’s make a toast to August twenty-second.”

“I still don’t know what’s the hurry,” Papa said.

“What should they wait for?” said Mameh. “They aren’t youngsters.”

My mother and Levine started talking about the wedding. The ceremony was going to be in Papa’s little shul around the corner. Levine said he’d pay for honey cake and wine.

“But I will buy the herring,” Papa said. “You can’t have a wedding without herring.”

Levine smiled in the snobbish way Miss Holbrooke did when one of the Italian girls had said her mother’s cooking was better than the food at the lodge.

Levine said he was thinking about joining Temple Israel and Papa gave him the same look back. “You mean the big German synagogue where they throw you out if you wear a yarmulke?”

“The rabbi there is very smart,” Levine said. “I can make good connections for business and my sons will meet a better class of people.” He winked at me. “And Addie will like it because the women sit with the men, like human beings.”

“If you want a church, go to a church,” Papa said, and the words hung in the air like a bad smell. My mother got nervous and said that maybe the bride and groom would like to go for a walk together.

Celia said, “And Addie can come with us.” See how she looked out for me?

I walked a few steps behind them and watched. Celia looked comfortable holding his arm, and he patted her hand a lot but they didn’t say much to each other and I couldn’t tell if there was any feeling between them.

We were on Hanover Street, which felt like a carnival after Rockport. There were a lot of people walking and talking at the top of their lungs—in three or four languages, mind you. We walked past a shop window where a group of girls were watching a man take the clothes off a dress dummy. One of girls said, “That’s what I call fresh,” which made me wonder if Celia knew anything about the birds and the bees. She was so shy about everything.

My mother never told me about sex. When I got my period, she slapped my face and showed me how to wash the towels we had to use. You don’t know how lucky you are in that department. I found out about what happened between men and women from a couple of girls in the schoolyard—and they had different versions.

—

On our cot that night Celia said, “At least you’ll have more room when I go.”

“But I’ll miss you,” I said.

She said we would see each other all the time. “Mr. Levine’s apartment is only a few blocks from here.”

“You don’t call him Herman?”

She said she wasn’t used to it yet. For three years she had known him as Mr. Levine.

I didn’t understand how it all happened so fast. I was only gone a week.

Turns out, it had started in May, when Mrs. Kampinsky, who lived downstairs, told my mother that Levine was looking for a wife and Mameh said why didn’t he look right in front of him?

“He asked if he could walk me home after work,” Celia said. “I met his sons a few times and Jacob, the little one, seems so sad. Levine asked if I would mind taking care of them and promised that I would have a good life with him.”

I asked if she was in love with him.

“Not yet. Mameh says you learn to love someone when you make a life together. She says a man who loves his children is a good man. Myron is six and Jacob is almost four, and they need a mother. And like Mameh says, I’m almost thirty years old and who knows if I’ll ever get another chance like this? He’ll take care of me and Mameh and Papa when they get old.”

I could hear my mother’s words coming out of her mouth, so I said, “Did she push you into this? You can still change your mind.”

She said no, that she had decided for herself. “He asked me a month ago and I told him I wanted to think. I didn’t even tell Mameh until you went away. When she found out where you were, she started screaming that the settlement ladies had sold you to be a white slave and wanted Papa to go to the police. But when I told her about me and Mr. Levine, she had more important things to think about.”

I had the horrible feeling that she’d said yes just to protect me. I even asked, “That’s not why you’re marrying him, is it?”

She said no. “Actually, I feel bad because once I’m gone, you’ll have to leave school and I know how much you want to keep going.”

She was right. My parents didn’t make enough money to pay the rent and everything else. Without Celia’s pay I was going to have to get a full-time job.

I felt like a rock had fallen on my chest.

Celia whispered, “I’m sorry, Addie.”

I said it wasn’t her fault, which was true. I also said it was okay, but that was not true.

Mazel tov.

When Levine found out about my sister Betty, he invited her to the wedding. Mameh started arguing, but he made that wave with his hand and said, “Don’t be so old-fashioned. I want to meet one of these New Women. Anyway, Celia wants her there.”

When Betty walked into the apartment a few nights later, my mother wouldn’t even look in her direction. Betty grinned at me. “Who knew little Addie would turn into such a spitfire? Going off on an adventure like that without telling anyone? Atta girl.”