Bertrand Court by Michelle Brafman Read Free Book Online Page B

grandchildren — whom she practically pretended were hers sometimes — to take their first bites from the spoon that had touched the mouths of generations of their family’s babies? Goldie couldn’t even think to peel a potato she was so hot. This one she couldn’t blame on Irving.
    Hannah examined her bubbe, in that way that made Goldie uneasy, as though her granddaughter were twenty years old already, as though she could see right into Goldie’s heart. “Let’s go watch for Aunt Sylvia, Bubbe,” she suggested in her sweetest voice.
    Goldie always felt better when her hands were busy. She led the little girl to her newly reupholstered chair, forest green with gold stripes. “Go get me your hairbrush,” she ordered. Hannah returned with the brush and a glass of ice water. “That’s a new coffee table. Use a coaster, dear.” Hannah placed the glass on a coaster and sat on her knees in front of Goldie, who brushed the tangles out of her hair just as she and Sylvia had done for each other when they shared a bedroom back in Mama’s four-room apartment on Burleigh Street.
    â€œThere she is, Bubbe!” Hannah pointed out the window to her aunt, still slender and a looker. Hannah had inherited Sylvia’s figure, thank God, and not her mother’s schmaltz or her father’s pear shape that hours of schvitzing in the gym couldn’t change. “She’s here, she’s here! Do you think she brought raspberries?” As Hannah turned around to face her grandmother, Goldie knew what she would read in the little girl’s expression. Hannah had never once looked as excited to see her own bubbe as she was to see this woman whom Goldie had thought she knew better than anyone, including Hyman.
    Chic in her pantsuit from Gimbel’s and her fresh set from Minsky’s, Sylvia waved up at Hannah. Goldie’s neighbor, Zelda, recovering from her corn surgery, limped to her mailbox and nodded at Sylvia, who kissed her cheek and made a beeline for Goldie’s steps.
    Goldie hauled herself out of the chair and rushed to her bedroom, where she listened to Hannah’s breathless chatter, something about a Barbie doll that talked or some such mishegas. “I’ll be out in a second, Sylvia,” she called, trying to make her voice sound normal.
    Business had been good for Hyman that year. Goldie took her knippel, a fat brown envelope filled with bills she’d been socking away, into the bathroom and sat on the toilet to give herself another minute, but she couldn’t stop herself from thinking bad things about her sister. She’d been too generous, and not only with the money. “Simon, have you called your aunt this week?” “Simon, go shovel your aunt’s front step.” “Simon, take the kids to see Sylvia; they need to know their aunt.” “Sylvia, you play with the kids. I’ll fiddle around in the kitchen.”
    Goldie was sobbing now, and the tears were going to give her away. Once she started, though, she just couldn’tstop. She would frighten Hannah, who, like Sylvia, missed nothing. She buried her face in a bath towel until her shoulders stopped shaking. Cold water helped, but she would need a miracle to hide her puffy face.
    Sylvia knocked on the door. “Goldie, you okay in there?”
    â€œJust a little indigestion. Take Hannah to the park.”
    â€œYou sure? You don’t sound so good.”
    â€œGo.”
    When Goldie heard the door close, she came out of the bathroom and began chopping potatoes again. Halfway through the second potato, Sylvia and Hannah returned for Hannah’s doll. Goldie just wanted to keep chopping, but for the sake of her Hannah, she had to force a smile. Sylvia looked worried, and Hannah looked scared. Goldie’s eyes were so swollen that they felt like buttonholes in her head.
    â€œCome on, my little monkey. Come and show me your trick on the