Bailey's Cafe Read online

  —The towels and extra linens are my own contribution, Eve said.

  That’s when she saw the rosewood rocker and matching chest in the corner. She stepped off the back steps, just to touch it all, because it couldn’t be real. But the latch on the chest felt solid in her hand, the top opening up to reveal neat stacks of thick cotton towels and beige sheets. A small door led into a bathroom: a claw-foot tub with gleaming faucets shaped like swans, cool blue tiles underfoot, scented French soap in porcelain trays, crystal jars of bath salts sparkling on the windowsill.

  —I dreamed of a bathroom like this when I was a little girl.

  —I did too, Eve said.

  —None of this can be real. Where am I?

  —Hell.

  Jesse once tried to describe to me what it means to go cold turkey. Imagine, she said, that you’re speeding along at, say like, seventy miles an hour. No car, no nothing, just your body, seventy miles an hour. And suddenly your whole body slams right into this big brick wall. But you don’t go unconscious, so you can feel crushed pieces of your skull stabbing back into your brain, your lungs collapsing in, each bone snapping and crumbling, your insides busting open as your guts rip apart. That’s how much it hurts. Now, imagine, she said, that your body gets slammed into that same wall again and again. Red-hot bricks one time. Blocks of ice the next. Imagine it going on for four straight days. And imagine, when it was over, that bitch put me through it all again.

  The room looked like it had been hit by a hurricane. And Jesse looked like she had taken the front end of the storm. Eve had rode it out within the calmer region of the eye, but she was still drained and tired. Jesse had fought her and scratched her, she’d banged her own head against the wall, shattered the windowpane trying to throw herself through it. Eve had wrung out towels full of sweat, changed her soiled sheets, and shoved cardboard between her teeth to keep her from biting off her tongue. As Jesse fell into deep, fitful sleeps, Eve dozed in the rosewood rocker. She was napping that way when Jesse woke up, this time finally free.

  —I can’t believe I’m still alive.

  Her voice was weak, her tongue swollen.

  —It was touch and go for a while. Would you like a drink of water?

  After giving her a sponge bath, Eve powdered her down and combed her hair. She kept telling Jesse not to thank her. Jesse thought she was just being gracious. She should have known better.

  —I have a gift for you, Eve said.

  She laid the velvet case beside her on the bed. It was lined in sky blue silk. The eyedropper was made of crystal, the teaspoon and syringe pure silver, the book of matches embossed.

  —What’s this? Some kinda joke?

  But the woman sitting on the edge of the bed was definitely not laughing.

  —You think I’d touch this crap after what I’ve just gone through?

  —Yes, Eve said, I do. But the next time you shoot up, it’s going to be with style.

  She left Jesse and went into the bathroom to wash the dirty sheets and towels. Jesse picked up the case and shook her head. As soon as she was strong enough, she was getting out of here, wherever here was. She snapped open the case and looked at the neat compartments. She’d never seen works so fine. And to show you how square the broad was, she hadn’t even put in the stuff. She checked under the matchbook and the syringe just to be sure. No, not even half a cap.

  —It’s in the bottom drawer of your dresser, Eve called from the bathroom.

  —You can just go to hell, Jesse shouted as loud as she could. But her throat was sandpaper and the words hoarse. You can just go straight to hell.

  On shaky knees Jesse made it over to the dresser and yanked open the bottom drawer.

  —Straight to hell, she said as she rummaged through the sweaters and blouses.

  She just wanted to see if the bitch could be that cruel. If she could be that goddamned cruel. The smooth white packets were wedged into the corners. Dear God, they were all quarter-ounce bags and there must be at least a dozen. Yeah, a dozen bags of powdered sugar. She wasn’t gonna be fooled. She tore open one just to see. Flicked it with the tip of her tongue—just to be sure. The stuff was so pure, it split her head open. If she tried putting that in her veins, it would send her to Valhalla. No, you had to cut something like this. Out on the streets it woulda been easy. Any druggist could sell you milk sugar or a little quinine powder.

  —Look in the top drawer, Eve called over the sound of running water.

  —Didn’t you hear me before, you sadistic …? I said, Go to …

  Jesse pulled open the top drawer to find a brand new box of milk sugar. A setup, that’s what it was. Nothing but a setup. Eve didn’t want to help her. Had never wanted to help her. She sagged against the open drawer, resting her head on top of the dresser. She could still hear her mother moving about in the kitchen, the scraping of pots against the iron stove. But Mother wasn’t there anymore; if Mother were still alive she wouldn’t have to go through this. They’d taken her mother, taken everything. Didn’t that cold-blooded monster understand that? No, she didn’t. Well, fuck her. Fuck them all. She stumbled back to the bed and the velvet case.

  Jesse could see Eve standing in the doorway of the bathroom as she began that mellow climb, higher and higher. Eve’s face was blurred, but was it possible she was smiling?

  —You can just go to hell, Jesse mumbled through the sweet relief of it all.

  —I think you’ve forgotten that’s where we are.

  Eve let her shoot up with the silver needle for another four days. She agreed it was all her fault. She agreed that life was one big stinking sewer. She agreed that there was just no way for any woman to get a fair shake. And then the world turned blood red when the dope suddenly disappeared. Jesse begged Eve not to put her through it all again. It was much too soon. It would probably kill her. And Eve agreed it probably would.

  Jesse has never tried to describe for me what it was like that second time around. She says there are no words for the experience. I can only tell you this, Bailey, I sincerely prayed to die.

  And it was something only half-living that Eve sponged and powdered at the end of the next four days. Clumps of Jesse’s hair would fall out as Eve combed it. It took another four days for her to gain the strength to even sit up in bed. And there was yet another velvet case.

  Resting a bruised and swollen hand on the velvet case beside her, Jesse turned her head to look around at the room that had no doors.

  —The needle is gold this time, isn’t it?

  —It’s gold, said Eve.

  —And if I made it through, I suppose I’d get platinum. Would that be the end of the line?

  —Remember where we are; that’s only the beginning of what’s available here.

  MARY (TAKE TWO)

  You already know that my name is Nadine, and my husband’s told you that I don’t like to talk. I’ve only agreed to set this one up because there isn’t a man in here who’s willing to do it. Why am I being so generous to those cowards? The truth is that, right now, there ain’t a man in this place at all. They all cleared out when they knew we were coming around to the little Jew gal who just moved into Eve’s. All of a sudden that coffee grinder I’ve been trying to get fixed for months gets pushed right up to the top of the maestro’s list, and he’s out of here as fast as grease on ice, with everything else in pants following behind. Maybe I’m being too hard. This isn’t a story that any man can tell. And the girl can’t do it for herself; she’s a little off in the head.

  No man has ever touched me.

  She’s fourteen. She’s pregnant. And yes, I believe her. Because I finally saw Eve cry.

  No man has ever touched me.

  I was out in my garden clipping the final buds from the camellias. And I was thinking that it was a pity I had no boarder who wanted them. Camellias are easy to grow late into the fall. I looked up and she was standing there with Gabriel, of all people, who was pointing to me over the wall. She had a vacant look to her face; she di
dn’t seem retarded at first, just stunned. And her clothes were filthy. I was more surprised to see him than the girl; he rarely leaves that shop.

  No man has ever touched me.

  This cafe sits on a street between two other places. Eve has the boardinghouse and Gabe has the pawnshop. I bet you haven’t heard my husband talk about him, cause he’s always losing arguments with the old man. They’ve gone on for hours about politics, the war, and that bloodbath over in Europe. I tend to side with Gabe myself, since he had a front-row seat in that disaster. My husband didn’t serve in that part of the world—and he isn’t a Jew. But that doesn’t stop him from thinking his view on the whole thing is right. I guess you’ve learned by now he has a lot of opinions. Unsolicited opinions. But his biggest bone of contention is that Gabe won’t ever eat here, although on the weekends we can keep a kosher kitchen and have done it for those who ask. I’ve told him that man is nobody’s fool; offering to go kosher still wouldn’t improve his cooking. But Gabe says he’s really too old and alone to have Shabbat in the back of the cafe. A proper Sabbath meal means family, and that would mean calling up ghosts; and it’d be too tempting just to stay back there forever. Then who would be on his end of our relay for broken dreams?

  A lot of customers get directed here from his pawnshop if they’re smart enough to understand the sign. One side of the cardboard hanging on his front door has a painted clock with movable hands. It reads, Back at—, and each hour he keeps moving the hands one hour forward. And under the clock is a red-and-gold arrow pointing down the street to us. After two or three hours, if the person keeps coming back without getting the message, and he thinks they’re still worth it, he’ll flip the sign over to where it reads, Out of Business, with that same arrow pointing down the street to us. Gabe is never open—we never close.

  No man has ever touched me.

  I should have guessed there had to be something different about the girl, because Gabriel had broken the pattern. A certain kind of person he sends to the cafe; a certain kind of woman Bailey sends to me. It was clear she was a foreigner, but he told me she was also a Jew. One of us who keeps the old ways. And it was hard to imagine what he could mean by old. His birth is on his face. He carries every crevice and ridge of the Caucasus Mountains. A speck of a town hidden in the seam holding together two continents and two seas. His spine is bent from straddling so much of the world for so long and his eyes water constantly from the strain of all he’s seen. And you must take her in, he said. I told Gabriel that I was the one who decided who stayed in my place and who didn’t. He ran his business and I ran mine. And why had he gone against the system? If she couldn’t find me on her own, she shouldn’t be standing at my garden in the first place. Without a word he left the girl right there and turned away. Then she handed me the plum.

  No man has ever touched me.

  Eve walked in here with that plum and placed it in the middle of the counter. I have a new boarder, she said. The fruit looked tender and soft. The reddish black skin was so thin you could already smell that the flesh would be sweet. Nadine, please, bring me a knife. I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to be any part of what was about to go on. God knows, I didn’t. And there wasn’t a man in the place, not a man to be found. This was women’s business. Nadine, please, bring me a knife.

  No man has ever touched me.

  She wasn’t the first pregnant girl to show up at my doorstep. But she was the first to make such claims. There was no way for the girl to be lying, or the whole village would have heard her screams. Echoes carry well in the green hills of Ethiopia …

  Elell, elell … nine shouts of joy from the hut kept far away from the settlement. A female child is born. Yes, the sound carries crisp and full through the eucalyptus as all stop to count. Twelve shouts for a male child. Nine for a female. Even down at the foothills of the plateau the oxen are stilled in the barley fields. Elell, elell … a new daughter. New life for the Beta Israel.

  Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

  They’re outcasts in their own nation and only allowed to be tenants on the land. All prayers turn toward Jerusalem as they spin linen, shape iron, and bake pottery outside their broken hovels. Keepers of the Commandments. Commandments given to ex-slaves. To the dispossessed. It is a poor man’s faith, so it has thrived among them well. A faith built on what is always attainable for the poor: prayer, children, and memories. In a nation that time forgot, a nation ringed by mountains, they are hemmed in by huge stone churches but have clung to the God of Abraham and the Law of Moses. They believe they are the last Jews in the world. They are certainly the last to build sanctuaries and anoint a high priest.

  And these words which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down and when thou risest up.

  So each child is welcome. Each child means survival. But it is the girl child who will carry the special honor of keeping the home and bearing sons. Elell, elell … nine shouts of joy from the hut of blood.

  I stood rooted to the floor as Eve took the plum from the counter and cradled it gently in one hand. Fruit that tender will bruise easily. With the tip of her fingernail she traced the faint seam that ran from the little round dent in the center that looked like a belly button. It was perfect and whole, with the seam dividing the front of the plum into two plump mounds. Without warning, she squeezed it quickly and the seam opened. I had been right: this fruit was very sweet. It was only a slight opening, but clear juices were already beading up from deep within the middle. And down within its fleshy walls was just the glimpse of a hard little nub. Eve held the split fruit between her fingertips and, this time, demanded the knife.

  And God said unto Abraham, Thou shalt keep My covenant therefore, thou, and thy seed after thee in their generations. This is My covenant, which ye shall keep, between Me and you and thy seed after thee; Every man child among you shall be circumcised. And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt Me and you.

  It is hot and airless in the hut of blood. But the mother of the new girl child knows she must stay for fourteen days. From there she will move to the hut of woman-in-childbed, where she is still declared unclean until sunset of the sixty-sixth day. After bathing, washing her clothes, and shaving her head, finally she will be allowed to return to the village. There has been no need to enter this child into the Covenant of Abraham, or to redeem this firstborn from the duties of the priesthood. The jubilant gongs and drums of the sanctuary at the very heart of the village remain silent at the first sounding of her name. Quietly it comes to be known that she will be called Mariam.

  Eve’s eyes never left mine as she held the open plum and squeezed again. The fleshy walls were spreading wider apart and its juices began to drip onto the counter. Inside, it was deep amber and red; veins swollen with sugar ran through the soft flesh. A firm tip was pushing up through its center, moist and fragile.

  Her mother tells no one how hard she begged Adonai for the firstborn to be a girl. She knew she would remain unclean much longer than with a male child, and so there would be more time to heal before returning to her husband. Even in the hut of childbed there has been so much blood. And she secretly hopes that the second born will also be a girl. Two girl children before she bears the sons. She knows that the neighbors will not whisper about two as long as she remains fruitful and there are sons. But daughters will be there to take care of her husband while she is walled off in the hut of childbed. At five years old her girls will already know how to roast grain and bake the injerra. It gives her pleasure to think that they will go in her place to the sanctuary with the bread and beer for the Sabbath offerings. And unlike her, they will be allowed to cross the threshold. She will tell them, as her mother told
her: While you are still young and unmarried, stand as close as possible to hear every utterance of the Torah. Listen well to the prayers and remember. Let your cries be loud and bend down low, low so your breasts touch this holy ground as you face east toward our beloved Jerusalem. You will be an old woman before you are allowed such a privilege again.

  Yes, it gives her much pleasure to watch this girl child, her Mariam, grow. And she hopes to be forgiven for her lie as the greetings come: A fine daughter for the Beta Israel, but a son next time. Yes, she answers, a son next time. It worries her that the child seems to be slow. She must be kept from stumbling into the fire; after many warnings there is still no fear of the heat and she has burned her fingers often. When they journey into Tuesday Market to sell their pottery, she must attach a linen string to Mariam’s waist or she will wander off and touch unbelievers. Then, with all else there is to do after such a long day, she must be cleansed before entering the village. While Mariam is kept at her side, the unbelievers know that the child is one of them and they will not pat her head or take her into their arms. The Beta Israel have a special place to sit in the market, and there is safety in their numbers. Some unbelievers will walk by and spit, Buda. Demon. But those who want to buy know to place the taler in the dust. If the child remains so open, how will she teach her to pass the clay pot without ever touching their hands?

  But she gives her much pleasure, this daughter, her Mariam. She finds she must repeat often to the child—and speak very slowly. But with patience and many lessons she does learn to bake the injerra without burning her fingers, and to season the wat with the right amount of pepper. It is a cause for much laughter when Mariam’s father cocks his head at the bowl of stew Mariam places in front of him. Can I eat this without burning my throat, little one? Yes, the mother thinks with pride, now he can. But for a while she was very worried. The child was almost into her sixth year and there had been no purification. Her own ceremony had taken place at three years old. She had begged the midwives for Mariam’s ceremony but they said to wait. If there was some defect in the girl, no man would betroth his son to her anyway. She had rained curses on their heads. A defect in one so beautiful? Look at the brightness of her eyes. The strength in her legs. She will honor the home of any man fortunate enough to receive her. And when they come to her father for the agreement they will bring more than one lousy taler. A thousand talers could not seal the betrothal for one so precious. But she had railed against the old women in vain. For months she cried herself to sleep with the fear they would leave her firstborn, her joy, unfit to be a true daughter of Beta Israel. She remembers a girl from her own village, a girl who drooled and pulled at her own hair. And those ignorant midwives had doomed her. They had left her filthy and intact.