After the Fog (29 page)

Rose released Henry’s arm and smoothed his shirt where she’d been gripping him. She nodded and as she got to the door she thought she heard Henry sigh. The kind of sigh a person let go when he realized he’d just gotten out of a mess by the skin of his teeth. So she drank too much the night before. She deserved a little drink now and then. She stopped there.

“I believe you Hen. I do.” She had to. If she couldn’t trust Henry, even after he kept a secret with Magdalena, whom could she trust? Rose glanced over her shoulder, catching the sight of Henry buckled over, head in hands. Was his posture that of a man who’d told a lie and another and at least a third in the hopes of making the first go away? No, it was man who needed to find a job and that would best be done without Rose coaching him all the way. She would trust Henry and focus on her responsibilities. Someone had to keep things right. And, that would have to be Rose.

* * *

Rose drummed her fingers on her forehead, giving herself a pep talk. A little headache never hurt anyone. She’d grown accustomed to Leo being with her. That day, she’d come to appreciate the mental diversion Leo afforded, his presence gently leading her from the life she could no longer control to nursing, where she seemed to be master of her universe.

She stalked into the yard then stopped, struck by the darkness, and checked her watch for the time. Was she earlier than she thought? The fog was heavy and she had to hold her wrist close to her face. She tilted it to catch a sliver of light and read the time. She was not late for work at all.

Now this
was
unusual fog. Rose coughed and snatched at the air, trying to capture a chunk of it, as though that were possible. And yet, in a way it was. She could taste the metals in her mouth, the grainy remnants of the mills. She coughed again, stuck her head inside the door, yelling to Unk and everyone who was listening that Unk should not go out that day. If she could feel the heaviness of the fog, if it could make her sputter, then it was no time for someone with health issues to gallivant around Donora.

“Ellooooooooo!” Mrs. Tucharoni’s Italy-infused voice carried through the fog to Rose.

The woman must have guessed Rose came out of the house when she opened the door and a bright enough light pushed into the yard through the fog. Rose stepped quietly, hoping to disappear into the blackness without having to talk to the woman who birthed the boy who’d impregnated Rose’s daughter.

But, as though Mrs. Tucharoni had headlights for eyes, she cut Rose off in the yard, waddling faster than Rose would have thought she could.

“Have to go, Mrs. Tucharoni. See you later,” Rose said, and heard a string of Italian words tossed at her back as she strode away.

Too much to do. First she had to stop at the Saltz home to work on Joey’s polio-stricken legs. Rose’s stomach clenched at the multi-layered nursing tasks required. Henry’s words came back to her—she was compassionate with her patients. She was, but she kept her distance. She had to if she wanted to continuously traipse through the guts of her neighbors’ broken down lives. She returned to where Mrs. Tucharoni was standing and pointed at a sheet hanging from the clothesline.

“You don’t mind if I borrow one of these, right?”

Mrs. Tucharoni raised her chin toward the sheet in agreement then grabbed Rose’s arm as she reached for the sheet. Rose turned; the scent of lemon wafted from the woman’s freshly washed hair.

“Sara Clara.” Mrs. Tucharoni said slowly. “She have shower? Shower for Magdalena. For baby. I want to say—”

“Later,” Rose knew how rude she was being, but hearing that yet another decision had been made for her, that another person was planning something for Rose’s daughter without her permission, that people were talking about this as though perfectly normal, was too much for her to take. Didn’t any of these people realize that each reference to this pregnancy was a knife in her spine? It was a blatant reminder that she had not been Magdalena’s confidante at any stage leading up to and past her discovery her daughter was pregnant. Control of her life was an illusion.

Rose stomped away. She didn’t have time for musing about things she could not change so she wrapped herself in a plan of action for her patient, Joey Saltz. It was where Rose wanted to live forever, where no one caused her trouble that she couldn’t handle.

Mrs. Tucharoni called again and Rose froze. The woman couldn’t see Rose, but her voice, what she had said, what was behind the words, suddenly hit Rose. She had not become the mother she thought she would. But she couldn’t help it. She had no choice in the matter. She would never be like Mrs. Tucharoni, the mother who could look at a pregnant teen and think it was a good thing. Rose looked back into the fog and though she couldn’t see through it, she could clearly see her life.

Work had saved her once and it would again. Rose realized she couldn’t depend on Henry, or his family, or her children. She straightened her shoulders, and headed for Joey Saltz’s; through fog so dark she couldn’t see the curb of the sidewalk, the street lamps illuminating only an arms-length of space below them. She hadn’t been the kind of mother she wanted to be. Obviously, her family thought she fell short, keeping secrets from her, and with that realization, she turned her feet, her mind, toward work.

* * *

Rose battered away on the Saltz’s door. They never could hear a damn thing in that house. Finally, Rose pushed open the door and stepped inside. Onions, body odor, and a jarring farm stench greeted her. What the hell? Rose wrinkled her nose and breathed through her mouth as she walked past the broom closet. She stopped, went back and pulled open the door.

Fifty yellow chicks tumbled out the door, peeping, waddling, crapping all over each other. Rose covered her mouth.

On cue Mrs. Saltz stepped out of her bedroom and into the hall. Her teary onslaught began, arms draped around Rose’s neck. Rose recoiled, holding her breath to avoid the dirty body smell.

Rose told Mrs. Saltz she couldn’t keep peeps in the house, that it wasn’t sanitary and her other children could still be at risk for polio even if it was almost November. Mrs. Saltz whimpered and said she thought it would help their family if they could furnish their own eggs.

Rose stepped over peeps, shoving them aside with her foot. Just because there was some data that pointed away from filth ushering polio into the body, Rose wasn’t taking chances with letting patients house animals as though they were battening down on Noah’s Arc. But, she needed to tend to the boy. If she stopped to get rid of the peeps, she’d never get anything done so she would have to trust Mrs. Saltz to do her part.

Rose lumbered past Mrs. Saltz, toward Joey’s room. “Tell me how Joey is, and then get those peeps outside or in the cellar. Anywhere but in here.”

“Joey. He’s in pain, in such pain. He can not breathe.”

Rose had mentioned Warm Springs, Georgia, where they could send Joey to ease his pain. It was much more effective to work his limbs in combination with the warm spring therapy, but it was expensive. Rose had enough of Mr. Saltz putting his own drinking ahead of his son. After seeing him last night at the Merry-Go-Round, Rose was sure what didn’t go to drink, went down the shitter at the card game. Right along with Buzzy. Two dumb-asses, both of them on the losing end of poker more often than not.

“Listen,” Rose said in a whisper. “I saw your husband last night, gambling. He must have money. If we’re one day away from payday and he has enough to enter a game, then he’s holding out on you. You could probably pay for—”

Mrs. Saltz grabbed Rose’s arm, pulled her closer and whispered, her German accent camouflaging her words even more when she spoke quietly. Rose held her breath and leaned down.

“I’ve managed,” Mrs. Saltz said, “to push away almost enough money to send Joey to warm spring. Before he go, I think we need iron lung. This air is thick, filled with garbage. The general manager mill man say he have nothing to say about air, but I know. I only
sound
stupid.” Mrs. Saltz interjected German words when she couldn’t find the right English ones.

Rose would have pulled away and dismissed her words as nonsense, but something made her listen. Had this broken, sorrowful, weepy woman actually managed such a feat as hiding money from her husband—enough to send her son to Warm Springs? Rose felt reprimanded. Not that the woman could have known that Rose’s brother-in-law drained their savings repeatedly. But still, Rose always dutifully handed over most of her money to Auntie Anna. Henry had said that was what family did, when they first moved in with them fifteen years ago. Eager to be part of the big Pavlesic family, Rose had obliged.

Rose patted the woman on the shoulder. “That’s something, saving that money. Really, that’s really…stunning.”

“Your Unk teach me how to save. Tell me where to hide in my house. Plain sight, he say.”

Could it be possible that Mrs. Saltz would know where the old man had hidden his rumored money? If there really was such a thing. “Where does Unk say you should hide it?”

A croupy cough and groaning came from behind the closed door of Mrs. Saltz’s bedroom. She put her finger to her lips ending the discussion and resumed her wails, disappearing into the kitchen.

Rose reached for Joey’s doorknob, but didn’t turn it. She wondered if Mrs. Saltz’s crying was some sort of mechanism to maintain the balance or imbalance in her life. Rose heard Mr. Saltz grumbling behind the other bedroom door and it made sense. If Mrs. Saltz went too long without wailing, he’d suspect perhaps she could function, after all. Rose had trouble believing Mrs. Saltz had managed to hide away enough money for Warm Springs—but if she had, then Rose was even more puzzled. Why would Mrs. Saltz live the way she did?

More grumbling and thrashing came from Mr. Saltz’s bedroom. Rose glanced over her shoulder to Mrs. Saltz by her husband’s door, her hand poised on the knob. She hobbled over to Rose and waved for Rose to bend forward to whisper in her ear.

“I sorry to be the one,” Mrs. Saltz said. “But a nice lady like you should know. I know women like you from Germany. Know a lot, yes. But, how you say it, not what happening right under nose?”

Rose drew back, her face contorted with confusion.

Mrs. Saltz waved Rose back.

“Mr. Pavlesic,” she said in a whisper. “He there last night. Merry-Go-Round with men and poker and women. People run at mouth, like the chicks in the closet.” She opened and closed her fingers to her thumb. “Chirp-chirp. Chirp. They say you know everything but what
your
husband is up to.”

Rose felt her jaw drop, but she couldn’t seem to close it.

“I say,
you
the nurse I want in my house. Not hoity-toity mill nurse.”

Rose bit the inside of her cheek as panic flew through her. “You mean Dottie? Dottie Shaginaw?”

A clamor came from Mr. Saltz’s bedroom followed by groaning. Mrs. Saltz scurried off like a rat from fire. Rose stared at the woman’s back as she disappeared into the bedroom. Rose heard Mrs. Saltz’s cries behind the door and her husband’s angry voice ordering her to get some water, and cursing. The door opened and a teary-eyed Mrs. Saltz came out.

“Wait, Mrs. Saltz. Did your husband say if Buzzy won or lost last night?”

“Lost. But
your
Mr. Pavlesic, he there, he take care of things for his brother. I feel bad for you, for having husband who—”

Glass broke behind the Saltz’s bedroom door and Mrs. Saltz cringed then re-entered the bedroom before she could finish her end of the conversation.

Rose wanted to burst into that room, tell him where he could shove his demands, and ask what the hell the missus had been talking about. Could Mrs. Saltz have been confused? Rose had been drunk the night before, but she knew Henry had been with
her
. He’d been home when she arrived, hadn’t he? She thought she heard him in the bathroom and then he appeared as she was praying.

She tried to remember the timeline of the night before, once she’d begun drinking, but she couldn’t. She would sit down and map it out if she had to, later, but right then she had a job to do. And if she found out Henry was up to any sort of bullshit, why she’d simply toss him in the Mon.

* * *

Rose entered Joey’s room and smiled in the direction of his bed. Normally he was looking right at her, happy, alert, ready with a knock-knock joke. The kind of person Rose thought everyone should emulate. The kid had suffered a lot. Rose would take his body, and push and pull it, feeling as though she was ripping him apart and he wouldn’t make a sound. Rose took a deep breath and hummed as she popped open her bag.

She crept over to his bed and sat beside him. He was sleeping, his breath choppy and more shallow than usual. She wiggled his shoulder.

“Hi,” she said.

He opened his eyes and pushed himself up, his tendons in his neck stretching. He grimaced from the pain, but his cracked lips gave way to a smile.

Rose allowed him to struggle, knowing how important it was that Joey control his life. He fell back on his pillow. She fussed with the stethoscope.
Hail Mary full of grace…Hail Mary, Hail Mary
…her lips repeated the well-worn prayer, but her mind prayed something else—thanks that her children had never, ever suffered like Joey. She reminded herself that she’d have to add this to her list of sins—thanking God that her children were healthy.

A loud meow startled Rose and she spun around, bouncing the bed, making Joey suck back air.