The Belief in Angels (2 page)

Jules, 6 years | Late August, 1967

THE LITTLE CORPORAL

“I’M PLAYING THE winner!” I shout to my brothers over the song on the old jukebox.

It’s “Wild Thing,” and David has pitched ten nickels in the old jukebox to play it over and over. Every time it gets to the part where they sing “groovy,” he yells it out and wiggles his butt. They’re ignoring me. David’s got Moses doing it now, too.

While my father and Grandfather Samuel have an
important
talk in the office behind the bar, I sit on a barstool in the Little Corporal drinking a Shirley Temple I made. It’s mixed the same way I always do it, with ginger ale, orange juice, a bit of grenadine, and four maraschino cherries. I know tons of drinks by heart, and I can make any drink out of the
mixerology
book behind the bar. My father showed me. I mix Rob Roys for my brothers while they play pool.

It’s eight in the morning on a Saturday, and school starts in a week. It’s one of the last big weekends of the season. Early this morning, my father packed us in the car.

Last night my father gave us all horsey rides to bed and read us fairy tales, but afterwards he and my mother screamed at each other again.

“Crooks go to jail!” I heard my mother scream.

“Idiots go to jail!” my father shouted back, and my mother agreed. But he got even angrier when she did.

“Don’t you lay a hand on me, you fucking coward. You fucking bully.”

I got scared the police might come again. When they fight like that, my stomach hurts.

The wind came out, so I listened to the bell buoy noises until I fell asleep. They sound kind of like St. Joseph’s bells except it’s not the same song every time. I like that the song’s always different. When the wind’s not out, I count the seconds between the light beams that slide across my wall. They shine from the lighthouse in the ocean and come after ten seconds if I count slow.

“Your mother’s asleep and you kids make too much noise,” my father said to us this morning. “If you behave yourselves, you can come down to the bar and play pool all day.”

We all screeched like monkeys.

“Behave!” my father bellowed, and we calmed right down.

“You all need to be good today. Your grandfather is meeting me down at the bar for a talk. A really important talk.”

I figured it must be, because my grandfather never drives out to Withensea.

“Meshugeners
drive the Boston Freeway,” he always says.

That means crazy.

The bar doesn’t open for an hour, so me and my brothers have the place to ourselves. My brothers pretend to play a fair game of pool, but David’s on a run, socking the balls in with regular
pock-pocks
and saying weird things to himself. Pool games with David are never fair. He’s the only one tall enough to hold the pool stick level with the balls. Moses is almost four, but he can barely see over the edge of the table without standing on his toes.

“Winner. Winner!” David shouts every time he sinks another one.

We can all hear my father’s voice slam through the door; we can hear it over the music, angry like a fist.

“They’re gonna kill me if I don’t give them the money. Do you understand, old man?”

I stare up at the huge wooden woman with the naked breasts hanging above the bar.

I know you listen. If I don’t tell anyone, maybe you’ll tell me what to do? You’re the most beautiful lady in the world. I think your eyes are much prettier than the statue of the Virgin Mary at St. Joseph’s.

The Virgin Mary’s just a statue. Even Father Donald ignores her. He prays to the naked Jesus.

My grandfather’s talking, but he’s too quiet to hear. He doesn’t want us to hear what they’re talking about. He thinks we’re all still babies.

If I tell about the fights and the police he’ll take us with him to Boston for sure. But if they find out I told …

I know what my father wants. He wants more money. It’s always the same.
My grandfather is a tailor who owns a few shops in Boston. My father thinks my grandfather is made of money.

My grandfather smells like butterscotch and lemons. My grandmother smells like chicken. They live in an apartment in Boston, and we visit them once a month. My mother drives us, although she hates to go. She screams at us practically the entire way.

“Shut up and sit back in your seats. If I have to pull this car over you’re going to get a smack. For Christ’s sake, whatever you do, don’t throw up in the fucking car or I’ll kill you!”

My mother zigzags in and out of the traffic lanes on the freeway; she doesn’t use the silver signal stick, but she yells at my father when he doesn’t do it. We like to kneel on the back seats and stick out our tongues at the people who honk at us. We watch to see if anyone crashes when she cuts them off because once she made two cars crash in the same day. She kept driving both times.

When she isn’t screaming, my mother sings along to the radio songs, except she doesn’t get the words right. She makes up her own words, which never make sense.

My mother barely talks to my grandparents once we’re there. She’s always real mad at them, although once I asked and she wouldn’t tell me why. She goes because my grandfather gives her money after dinner. I like to go. I love my grandparents and they love us. I wish we could live with them.

It’s the same dinner every time. Chopped liver with lettuce and egg on rye bread, matzoh ball soup with chicken and rice. I get the
poopick.
Grandma says it’s the chicken’s belly button, but I know it’s something else because all the grown-ups laugh when they say it. We always have the same dessert, too. Fruit cocktail from a can.

The money to buy the bar, to pay for everything, comes from my grandfather. My father spends most of the money my grandfather gives him on things my mother gets mad about.

Scotch, horseraces, and poker games.

My grandfather doesn’t spend much money on himself, though. He never goes on airplanes like my parents. He sews all the clothing he and my grandmother wear. He lives in a Jewish neighborhood in Boston in an apartment. It has a scary monster made of cement on the roof. It watches us when we go in. He has a
doessowtoe
he parks on his street, but he doesn’t drive it much anymore except on Sunday.

My mother says he has lots of money. She says he’s a millionaire. I think she makes this part up, because my grandparents never buy new stuff for the apartment. They replace the plastic coverings on everything when they turn yellow. My grandfather says they never buy new stuff at all because almost everything can be used forever if it’s man-made, except the TV tubes in his old Zenith.

Our grandmother’s name is Yetta. She never says anything in English because English isn’t easy for her. She speaks Yiddish and Russian, and my mother translates for us kids. When Yetta doesn’t want any of us to understand what she’s saying, she speaks Polish to my grandfather.

After I finish my Shirley Temple I watch Moses and David play another game. Moses bites his lip and concentrates hard on David’s shots.

One of these days, when he can lift the stick high enough to practice, I bet he’s gonna wipe David’s butt. David hardly talks to anyone, and when he does it’s like he’s sure no one cares what he says because he repeats himself or speaks nonsense. He’s nine now, and he’s got
hyperaction.

I know he’s the one who broke the crystal plate the other day. Moses would of told when they said we were all gonna be in trouble if someone didn’t tell who did it. David let us all get the horsewhip. He didn’t even care. I wish he’d show he’s mad or do something when Dad hits Mom, but he pretends he can’t hear it.

I pull my glass to the edge of the bar and lower myself off the stool. I stretch up to lift the glass off the edge when one of the Little Corporal’s green doors flies open and bangs against the wall. The noise makes me drop the glass.

“Where the fuck’s the ginger-haired midget?” a huge man with a weather-puckered face yells at me. He stands in the door making fists.

“Ah … I-I think he’s outside t-t-talking with my grandfather.” I try not to wince at the angry roughness of his words.

Sometimes when you don’t act afraid of them they calm down.

He throws me a dirty look. I frown at the broken pieces of glass scattered on the waxed wooden floor. It’s all mixed up with the leftover ice cubes, and it sparkles in the light that floods in from the sidewalk.

You can blame it on the man.

I glance over to the other side of the bar. My brothers have stopped playing. Moses and David stand frozen, pool cues braced against their chests like fishing spears.

“Who’s tending bar?” The man growls and stomps over to me. He’s standing right in front of me now.

Turpentine and poop.

I decide not to tell him the bar is still closed.

Breathe. Say it like Mary Poppins. Breathe.

“I can make a hundred different drinks.”

The man smiles a nasty thin line of lip, and I can see he’s missing teeth between the brown, beany ones he’s got left.

“You wanna be a barmaid? You wanna job? I’m the one who owns this joint now.” He shouts this loud enough for the people passing by on the sidewalk to hear.

My father comes out of his office and shouts back at the man. “Shut up, Pratt. These’re my kids you’re screaming at. If you wanna have a civilized conversation, come back in the office. If you wanna act like an animal, go do it where there aren’t any youngsters around.”

“I don’t give a shit who’s listening. This is my bar now,” the man, Pratt, shouts back.

“You’re an asshole. I can pay you what I owe. I’m not giving you the bar.”

I step behind the bar and duck. Then I peek over the edge where the sink and the silver mixing glasses are.

“What? Who do you think you’re dealing with? I’m not some pansy you can two-bit hustle. I won last night. You owe me, you fucking bastard, and if you don’t pay up I’ll fucking …” He stops when the door to the office swings open.

Both men stop shouting and scowl over at my grandfather, who ignores them and marches over to where my brothers are. He drags them back into the office. He’s looking around, but can’t see me peeking over the edge of the bar, and I’m afraid to run out.

“You’ll fucking what? Don’t be an asshole, Pratt. I’ll pay you what I owe, but I’m keeping the bar.”

My grandfather closes the door to the office with my brothers inside. He doesn’t know I’m out here. He must think I’m outside playing. My hands start to shake so bad I make the glasses on the bar counter rattle. I duck down so they don’t see me, but I can’t help peeking my head over the edge again. I want to see what’s going to happen next.

“I don’t want your money. I want the bar. You shouldn’t have put it up if you didn’t have the 50K. You’re gonna give me the keys or I’m gonna blow your fucking head off.”

I watch as he reaches into his coat, pulls out a gun, and aims at my father.

“Put that fucking thing away.” My father takes a few steps away and puts his hands out in front of him. Like his hands could stop bullets.

Holding my breath, my body goes numb and my stomach goes hollow.

I don’t know why, but I start to sing: “Raindrops on roses and whiskers on …”

Two things happen.

One: both men stop shouting and turn to see me behind the bar. Two: the gun goes off.

I think it must’ve scared the man when I started to sing because he swung the gun away from my father’s head and toward me, then pulled the trigger.

The bullet hits the mirror behind the bar, followed by a thousand crashes of glass. The next second my neck is stinging like someone stabbed me. I put my hand up to touch it. Something warm and sticky is oozing on my skin and down across my chest. I glance down. My blouse, which is powder blue, turns a deep, magenta-purple.

My father stands in front of me. “Oh Christ! You shot my kid! You shot her! Somebody call an ambulance!”

The man, Pratt, is standing next to him.

“Oh Fuck No! Oh Sweet Jesus!” he repeats over and over.