Garden of Lies (3 page)

She cranked the window down, letting in a blast of hot air, a soup of exhaust fumes and baking

sidewalks. Still, she couldn’t stop shivering.

The elderly cabbie began humming “While We’re Young.” [7] Sylvie wanted him to stop, but

felt too wretched to speak, and too guilty.

“Wadda ya say, now that we got those Nazi bastards pushed outta Egypt, ya think Ike’ll invade

Italy?”

Plainly, he was the talkative type. She stared at the little roll of fat bulging over the back of his

collar. It was an angry boiled-red color, scribbled with wiry black hairs.

Sylvie wanted to be polite and answer, but just then she felt nausea rolling up her middle in a

slow greasy wave.

As the taxi lurched up Park Avenue, she got that tight feeling again, starting in her lower back

and spreading around her abdomen like pincers. Tighter and tighter, until it became a red-hot

shaft driving straight through her.
God!
Sylvie stiffened, arching her back, feeling the springs of

the caved-in seat digging into her buttocks. To keep from screaming, she bit the inside of her

mouth.

Sylvie longed for her mother so intensely that for a minute she could feel Mama’s firm plump

arms about her, smell the sharp eucalyptus scent of the Vick’s VapoRub she always massaged

into Sylvie’s chest when her asthma was bad.
Don’t cry, shainenke,
Mama’s voice soothed inside

her head.
I’m here. I won’t leave you.

She could see her mama’s sleep-puffy face, the frayed gray rope of her braid twisting down

one shoulder of her worn flannel wrapper. And in her watery blue eyes, the ghost of the little girl

who had played croquet on the lawn of her papa’s great house in Leipzig before she’d had to flee

to America.

Mama, abandoned by her weak husband, selling postcards and catalogues in the Frick Museum

for twenty-eight dollars a week, foolishly dreaming of that better life she had left behind.

It had embarrassed Sylvie to hear how she spoke of the museum, as if she owned it, as if every

painting were theirs.

Tomorrow after school you’ll visit me at the museum, and I’ll show you the new Rembrandt.

Think of it, Sylvie. Such beauty, to own such beauty!

We owned nothing!
Sylvie cried out to herself, struggling against the claws of pain that drove

into her now. Only a few sticks of furniture. And the hand-me-downs that Mama’s sister, Aunt

Willie, whose husband had built up a big business in fox collars and stoles, sent over in the gold-

colored boxes meant for his merchandise.

[8]
Mama always said we had something better than Aunt Willie’s big house on Ditmas

Avenue. We had each other.

But that wasn’t true, Sylvie thought with a pang.
Mama left me, didn’t she?

The pain in Sylvie’s belly seemed to snake up into her throat.
Mama ... oh Mama, why did you

have to die?

She closed her eyes, felt tears burning behind her lids slip out the corners, slide down her

cheeks. She thought of that day, prissy Mr. Harmon calling her from her teller’s cage into his

office.
Your mother ... I’m sorry
... a
stroke.
Everything had gone fuzzy and gray, then black. And

then, waking up, she was riding in a limousine. Leather seats smooth as melted butter, deep

cushions and carpeting under her feet, a window separating the back seat from the front, with a

gray-capped driver. How strange, a whole other world!

Beside her, an arm around her shoulders giving her support, was a man.
Why, it was Mr.

Rosenthal himself, the boss of the whole bank!
She felt alternately hot and cold, alarmed and

thrilled. She thought she’d seen him looking at her, though he’d never actually spoken to her. The

other girls gossiped about him over coffee and sandwiches at the luncheonette—his wife had died

more than twenty years ago, leaving no children, and they all wondered why he hadn’t married

again. She’d thought perhaps other women were too much in awe of him to get close. Sylvie

recalled how intimidating he always looked, striding through to his office, his suits always

perfectly pressed, gold cuff links winking at monogrammed cuffs, issuing orders in a quiet but

commanding tone.

But here he didn’t seem at all frightening. She saw kind blue eyes caught in a fine net of

wrinkles, older than she would have guessed, at least fifty, silver-blond hair so fine the white

ridge of his scalp gleamed through it. He was taking her to the hospital, he’d told her. To her

mother. Hearing him, Sylvie could feel the calm strength radiating from him, flowing into her.

Then, afterwards, taking care of Mama’s hospital bill, making all the funeral arrangements,

then looking after her when she was so sick she couldn’t get out of bed. Never once, not
once,

being forward, trying to take advantage, until he’d asked her to marry him. Him wanting to marry

her, oh the miracle of it! She’d done nothing to deserve it.

And, oh God, look how she had repaid him.

[9] The memory of Nikos chafed like a pebble in a shoe. For a whole year, each morning when

she woke up, it was there, sometimes more irritating and sometimes less, but always there. It

lodged in her throat when she tried to eat. It tormented her sleep. It mocked her fierce yearning

that the baby growing inside her would look like Gerald.

Sylvie laced her fingers over the hard mound of her belly. The tightness was beginning to

subside, and the pain.
If only,
she cried to herself,
I
could have gotten pregnant before Nikos, then

I would be sure.

It wasn’t for lack of trying, God knew. Taking her temperature every morning and marking it

on the chart Gerald kept by the bed—three years of that! And those visits to the doctor! Lying

there spread out like a chicken to be gutted. Cold steel probing inside her until she’d wanted to

scream. And then being told there was nothing wrong. Give it time. What did doctors know?

She’d wept seeing the disappointment in Gerald’s face each month when her period came.

Why couldn’t she give him just this one thing? Look at the glorious new life he’d given her.

Not her fault, three different Park Avenue specialists had told her; but Sylvie knew better.

She felt sure she could get pregnant if only she could find a way not to hate having sex with

him.

How could she feel this way? Why? What husband in the whole world was ever more kind and

generous?

Yet the memory of their wedding night, seeing him naked for the first time, still made her

cringe. In his crisp, hand-tailored suits he’d looked large, prosperous. Naked, his belly a sagging

pouch, he looked old, grotesque almost. And he had breasts,
breasts
like a girl’s! To this day,

Sylvie felt revulsion when he lowered himself on her, no matter how many million times she told

herself she loved him and he loved her. His doughy belly pressing against her, making her gasp

for breath, his
thing
inching its way into her. Then such grunting and heaving, as if he were in

pain.
It’ll get better,
she’d told herself over and over,
it
has
to. It’s only because we’re not used to

each other.

But when he announced his desire by taking off his pajamas and folding them at the foot of the

bed, after eight years her flesh still shrank.

And then Nikos …

[10] A flare of pain in her abdomen jerked Sylvie from her reverie. She twisted in the back seat

of the cab, as if that somehow would let her escape its hot punishing grip.

As the taxi jerked right and left, weaving its way through the clotted traffic, she leaned forward

against the front seat, gasping, cradling her huge belly as gingerly as if it were a bomb about to

explode.

“I’ve changed my mind,” she told the driver. “Please take me to St. Pius instead.” She gave

him the address and in the rearview mirror saw him roll his eyes. He’d never get a fare back

downtown from that part of the Bronx, but up there in her old neighborhood she would feel, well,

safer somehow.

Just in case Gerald called, she’d leave word with Bridget that she was visiting her old friend

Betty Kronsky. Later she could say that the pains had become so bad there hadn’t been time to

get back downtown or to call that stuffy Doctor Handler, who was Gerald’s college roommate.

She knew this was crazy, hopeless really. Eventually Gerald would have to find out. But for

now at least it felt easier. Back in the old neighborhood, she would feel closer to Mama, almost as

if Mama were soothing her, protecting her. And maybe, well, she’d have a miracle—a baby that

looked just like Gerald, or her.

Out of midtown now, the taxi picked up speed, gliding past the stately apartment houses that

lined Park Avenue. Sylvie glanced at the diamond-studded Patek Philippe watch Gerald had

given her last Chanukah. Past two. God, would they get there in time?

Abruptly, it seemed, the elegance of Park Avenue became the sordidness of Harlem, and they

were rattling over cracked pavement, potholes, debris littering the streets. And worse. Old drunks

crumpled on the sidewalks. She shut her eyes. But she couldn’t shut out the stink. The smells

from mounds of uncollected, rotting garbage.

Then the humming vibration of the taxi’s wheels crossing the Third Avenue Bridge into the

Bronx. Sylvie opened her eyes. Turning off Bruckner Boulevard, she saw the streets were filled

with children—children of all sizes and colors, splashing in the gush flowing from uncapped fire

hydrants, darting in and out, oblivious to the traffic, so heedless of danger. She saw a nappy-

haired boy with smooth chocolate skin chasing a little girl, her long black braids [11] whipsawing

wildly at her back. Sylvie shuddered, imagining
her
child here, a wild brown thing playing hide-

and-seek behind garbage cans.

The cab lurched to a halt. Sylvie paid and maneuvered her bulk out the door, her legs

threatening to buckle as she stood.

She stared up at St. Pius Hospital. Its brick and granite facade was so blackened with grime it

made her think of an oven, one that hadn’t been cleaned in years. She felt her stomach knot in

dismay. It would be like an oven inside, no air-conditioning, probably no fans either.

The street noises assaulted her, children shrieking, radios blaring, voices yelling in Spanish

from open windows. Fighting back waves of dizziness, she trudged up the hospital’s front steps.

A deafening crack caused her to reel, her heart smashing against her rib cage. She was so

startled she stumbled against the top step, and only barely kept from falling by catching the iron

rail. Then she saw. Kids. They were setting off firecrackers on the sidewalk. Of course, tomorrow

was the Fourth of July. She’d forgotten.

Glancing up past the kids to the tenement window above, Sylvie saw a pregnant woman in a

faded print duster, her enormous stomach sagging over the sill, following Sylvie’s progress with

an impassive stare while a plump brown baby squirmed at her breast. Sylvie turned back and

pushed her way inside, feeling unsteady. Gray spots skated across her field of vision.

She could feel the contraction beginning to tighten. Sylvie was suddenly so dizzy she didn’t

trust herself to let go of the doorknob. The floor tilted sharply.

Please ... someone ... help me
...
,
she opened her mouth to say as a hood of gray gauze slipped

over her eyes, but no words came.

The black and white floor tiles swam toward her. Something cool and hard smacked her

cheekbone. Pain rolled through her like distant thunder.

Then darkness.

Opening her eyes, Sylvie found herself in an iron bed with rails on either side. A green curtain

surrounded it. Through the slit where the two ends didn’t quite meet, she could see the opposite

wall. A [12] framed picture of Jesus hung between two tall windows, His eyes raised

heavenward, palms extended to show puncture wounds dripping blood.

Sylvie hoisted herself onto her elbows. The effort sent hammers of pain smashing into her

temples, causing her to cry out. Her face felt stiff. She touched her nose, her fingers meeting

coarse adhesive.

With a clattering of metal rings, the curtain was yanked back. A woman, in a white uniform,

with a short white wimple covering her head, stood over her. The overhead fluorescent light

reflected off her eyeglasses, giving her an odd expressionless look. Her face was as white and

rubbery-smooth as a boiled egg.

“You’re lucky,” she said. “It’s not broken.”

Sylvie groaned. “I think I’m going to throw up.”

“No, you’re not.”

The stern reply so startled her Sylvie forgot how sick she felt.

“It only
feels
that way,” she kindly assured Sylvie. “You’ll be fine.”

Then the nun-nurse began rolling a tight rubber glove over her hand. From the tray she’d

carried in with her, she selected a tube and smeared something white and creamy over her gloved

fingers.

“I’m going to examine you to see how far you’re dilated,” she said. “My name is Sister

Ignatious, by the way,” she added as she pulled back the sheet and roughly inserted two greased