Yossi's Goal by Ellen Schwartz Read Free Book Online Page B

float away. Soon he began to eat a little more, sleep a little less. He started sitting up in bed, then sitting in a chair, then walking around the flat. At first, when he tried going up and down the stairs, he leaned on the banister and hacked. Mama said he wasn’t ready to go back to work.
    But soon he was able to climb the stairs with only a slight wheeze.
    â€œSee?” he said.
    â€œNot yet,” Mama said.
    He began following her around the flat, poking into her cooking, her cleaning, her sewing.
    â€œGo, already!” Mama said.
    So he went back to work.
    Daniel and Miriam continued their whispered conversations, their secret meetings. They tried to hide their activities from Papa, but Yossi was sure that Papa knew what was going on. Pretending to brush the snow from his boots, Papa lingered by the door when they were whispering on the other side. One time, when they were out, Yossi saw him take a handbill from under Miriam’s mattress. Yossi expected him to crumple it in disgust, but instead he looked at it thoughtfully.
    That was interesting, Yossi thought. He realized that ever since Papa had gotten over his pneumonia, he didn’t have such a disapproving look on his face anymore. He’d stopped arguing with Miriam andDaniel. And once, after they’d gone out yet again, Papa said to Mama, “Those two hotheads.” Yossi could have sworn there was a touch of pride in his voice.
    Maybe, Yossi thought, Papa was beginning to change his mind.
    It grew colder. At the street corners, snow was piled up to Yossi’s waist. In the mornings, when he stood on his corner selling
Die Zeit
, the wind seemed to blow right through his old coat. More than once, Yossi thought longingly of Max Steiner’s almost-new coat. It was still in the trunk at the foot of Mama and Papa’s bed; they hadn’t given it away. Still hoping he’d change his mind, no doubt. Standing on the corner, shivering, Yossi thought of the gloating look on Max’s face when he’d taunted him. Yossi pulled his old coat tighter. He’d never wear Steiner’s coat. Never!
    Yossi stopped by the ice rink every chance he got. On his way from selling his newspapers to Steiner’s. On his way fromSteiner’s to deliver the bundles. On his way home from lessons.
    He stood at the end of the ice and watched. He studied the boys’ moves. He learned the game. He saw how René passed the lump of coal, not to where Jean-Paul was right then, but to where Jean-Paul would be in three strides. He saw how Jacques pretended to shoot the lump, making Michel move his stick, and then, once Michel was out of the way, buried the lump in the snowbank.
    Yossi learned that the game of hockey was not really played with a lump of coal, but with a flat rubber disc called
une rondelle de hockey
. And that you didn’t really shoot the
rondelle
into a snowbank, but into an upright net called
un filet
. And that there were five players for each team on the ice at a time, plus a goaltender— Michel’s position—at either end.
    Yossi longed for the day when he had his skates and could play with René and the other boys. But now, after having given Mama and Papa his pennies, he wasstarting to save all over again—and his skates seemed further away than ever.
    Yossi learned a few French words. Then a few more. He taught the French boys some Yiddish words. They all began to speak a mixture of French and Yiddish, with grunts and facial expressions and pantomime thrown in when words failed.
    With this mixed language, Yossi learned that most of the boys’ fathers, and many of their older brothers too, worked all winter cutting down trees in the woods, far from home. It was dangerous work, the boys told him. Some of their fathers were missing fingers.
    â€œMy papa’s leg got crushed,” Jean-Paul said. He limped several steps to show Yossi. “That’s why he works at Steiner’s.” He