Unexpected Gifts (34 page)

They undoubtedly wondered how a dullard could produce such a wunderkind and as they marched out, nodding at Eugenia, glowering at me, they made sure to pat Adriana on her head.

The second the door closed, I had to let her know. “You are nothing but a weak, unattractive girl, and you'll never amount to anything!”

Once wounded, now her eyes turned steely. “Now say that in English, Papa!”

My slap landed hard across her left cheek, leaving a red mark the size of a large
sarmi.

She fell backwards into my wife's arms and together they stared at me, Eugenia with horror, my tearless daughter, with loathing.

“Papa, I have decided to go to school to become a Typewriter,” Adriana announced several months later.

“A what?”

“A Typewriter. You know, someone who types. Or, maybe a Switchboard Operator. They're both good careers. Every day I see all the young girls going to and from offices. These jobs can bring in good money for the family.” Her feet were a good foot and a half apart, her hands on her hips.

“You know how I feel about women working. And even if you tried, you would probably not be any good at it.”

“Funny, Papa. I could say the same about you with your nonexistent English.” When I lunged at her she managed to escape. I was a king surrounded by mutinous subjects, and as often as not I would catch Eugenia openly siding with our daughter. Every day there was a disagreement of sorts, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. The next time Mr. Sussman asked me to go to the flickers, I might go but without them.

“Hello. Goot to see you all!” Mr. Sussman said one Sunday, all dressed up. “Andrei, are you ready to go to the Flickers vit me?”

I started to shrug until he mentioned the name of the film he was eager to see, “
Birth of a Nation.”
Gathering my coat and hat, I quickly followed him out.

What a treat it was to see that movie again. So much to discuss about slavery in this country and the American way. I began my speech as soon as we left the theater, halting, guttural, to be sure, but far more fluent than I had ever been. My English teacher would have been amazed. But Mr. Sussman stayed very quiet throughout, scrutinizing the ground as we trudged back to our building.

“What you think?” I finally asked.

He didn't say anything for a long time. People, hurrying home for supper, passed us by and vendors glanced our way as they closed up their shops for the night before he spoke. “Dis movie vas terrible, terrible! If you like dis movie, you are very prejudiced. You are no better dan de Klansmen. Ve are all Got's creatures, no?”

I was horrified. “No, no. I am better! I am!
”

“Better dan the Klansmen?”

“No! Better than coloreds!”

He wouldn't look me in the eye after that, and creating some sort of excuse about having to go to work much earlier than I did, how his wife needed him later with the children, he got special permission to change his schedule. Our daily trips to and from the factory, once the high point of my week as well as a chance to practice my English, became a journey all by myself and as much as I hated to admit it, I felt lonely.

One day, a couple of years later, my supervisor singled me out. “Balakov, we have a very important person coming today to pick up a Model K he bought special. This guy has a lot of money. A good customer, so all's I want cha ta do is ta test-drive the car he picked out, then deliver it ta him in front of the building. Got it?”

I wiped my oil-stained hands on my overalls, slicked back my graying hair, and made my way over to the backend ramp, lined with Model K's, Model A's, and Model T's, ready to go. The Model K this customer had chosen was truly beautiful. A six cylinder, two-toned red and black automobile, with black leather seats, black pin-striping on top of a red chassis and white walled tires circling red spokes. Just knowing how the autos with colored paint took much longer to dry than the simple black ones, I remember thinking how rich this customer must be as I began the required two square radius test drive.

The car performed magnificently, and after only three blocks, my sudden yearnings caught me by surprise. By the time I had rounded the last corner, a half block down from the factory front gates, I had made up my mind. I was going to buy myself some sort of car, no doubt about it. At least a Model T. Surely I could save up enough for that.

Visions of me driving down Detroit streets in my Sunday Best filled my head as I pulled up to the delivery curb, and with the motor still puttering softly, I hopped out of the cab to shake its new owner's hand. After all, courtesy would get me far, no matter my current position.

The customer, deep in conversation with the salesman, was exiting the building while I was busy wiping my hand one last time before extending it when our eyes met.

The customer's voice was unmistakable, even as a whisper. “Andrei? Andrei, is that you?”

I couldn't even look at Borislav Grubo, much less shake his outstretched manicured hand. Spinning around, I walked away without looking back. Gone was my pride, my fantasies, only a pain lodged somewhere around my heart that stayed with me the rest of the evening until Adriana made a retort and my slap released some of my pent-up angst.

I took to strolling through Belle Isle after that. It was there that I could actually think, and it was there that I had an epiphany. I would create my own destiny once more by purchasing a car. And if Adriana wanted to work so badly, let her work. Let her contribute to my automobile fund. Make her pay for all her arrogance.

As a Typewriter, Adriana bragged about her new found financial independence while I bided my time. I enjoyed watching her leave the first few weeks in her crisp white shirtwaist, long skirt, and flat hat, so eager to learn, so happy to be liberated, then, a short two months later, just seeing her return home tired and frazzled as she handed over her paycheck to me gave me a special satisfaction.

Standing in front of my Model T, the first thing I noticed was the automobile's sheen, so black, so luminescent. It caught my reflection as if I were looking in a mirror, and when I leaned in close and exhaled, I loved wiping the condensation off with my sleeve over and over again, to see my unblurred image.

“We're going to take a family ride this Sunday,” I pronounced later at the supper table.

“Oh, yes, Papa. That is so exciting,” Tony chimed in. Adriana said nothing.

“Well, what do you have to say, Adriana?”

Eugenia jumped in. “She likes the car very much, Andrei. Leave her alone.”

“I don't hear her saying that, Eugenia. Well, girl? What do you think?!”

She stood up, then rotated towards me, ice in her veins. “I think—I think it's the best car my money could ever buy!” and charged off.

On Sunday morning, we took our places in the auto, but for all its beauty, its status, no one at Ford had prepared me for all the mechanical issues and the fact that if the ignition advance was not set back far enough, the crank could kick back on you. The first time it happened to me, Adriana snickered. The next time, I was half-prepared and by the third time I turned the crank, I had the complete process down to a science.

The flivver coughed up tiny jets of smoke as we moved out of Detroit and onto neighboring country back roads. The sun was at last peeking around billowy mountains of clouds, the saturated ground from a recent downpour, readying itself for a welcomed dry spell. It was going to be a glorious day. Soon, the roads became quite muddy, but I was undeterred. I adjusted my speed and made sure to keep the tires in between the ridges of sludge that seemed to be growing higher by the minute.

“Be careful, Papa,” Adriana cautioned.

“Yes, Andrei, please be careful,” Eugenia echoed.

I came to an abrupt stop, pulled the emergency brake, and switched off the engine. The Blue Jays were swooping towards their targets on the ground, the leaves rustling on the trees as I sat waiting, drumming my fingers on the steering wheel.

“Are we ready to go on without a critique?” I snarled. Eugenia nodded nervously. Nothing from Adriana. I climbed out of the flivver, started up the crank again, hopped into the driver's seat, and returned to my maneuvering without a backward glance. We didn't get far. Before I knew what was happening, the tires slid over a fallen, embedded tree branch, spinning us down into a steep ditch.

“Everyone out. Everyone out!” I barked. Adriana, Eugenia, and Tony scrambled up to the road, where I could sense them gaping down at me as I stared at my pride and joy. No words could express what I was thinking.

A passing motorcar with a lone driver came to screech up on the road asking, “Hey, do you people need a lift?”

I managed to climb up with my family and say, “Yes, tanks.” A minute later I was in front with this stranger, my family all wedged in back. We passed the same trees, the same bushes we had driven by earlier, jiggling and clattering back to our home and civilization.

When Mr. Sussman knocked on our front door, I was so exhausted, I felt numb. What now? I remember thinking as my family gathered around him, commiserating about his problems with the U.S. government. But when they all turned towards me, I shocked them all.

“No, I not going help you! No!
No! NO!”
I yelled. All their faces flooded me with power, but the next morning, after Adriana had vanished, all hopes of a reconciliation with my wife fled with her. I kept trying to reassure Eugenia that anyone descended from Thracian stock would certainly survive in this harsh world, but after two hours of her endless sobbing, Tony clutched in her arms for comfort, I finally gave up.

“Tony, stopping hugging your mother! Be a little man, for God's sake!” I snapped, taking pleasure in his scared, wounded eyes.

She was back to pristine. Back to organized. Back to tapping on every conceivable surface at any time of the day. Or night. A tiny spot on her living room carpet would be reason to retrieve the rug cleaner, small brush, sponge, and paper towel from the kitchen, and go to town. Bending over the spot, she would get into the same cleansing rhythm as her grandmother. And for the first time, Petra stayed well-hidden, tired of the incessant all encompassing hugs, the kitty litter scoops before she had even finished her business, the nonstop calling, “Here, kitty, kitty, kitty, want some Love ‘Em Ups?”

“Relabel, Reattribute, Refocus, and Revalue,” Mark was saying one day just after Sonia walked in.

“What does that mean again?” she asked, sitting down and double tapping on the table.

“Well, according to a Dr. Jeffrey Schwartz, these are four behavioral steps in helping you retrain your OCD brain towards normal thinking.”

“I thought you were so into drugs for helping OCD!” she exclaimed.

His eyebrows uni-lined. “Yeah, well that was before I read some of this research. Apparently, this behavioral therapy approach is doing wonders.” He handed out several packets. “Since this might be on the next test, I thought we all should have copies. Now, why don't we go over the meaning of each of these ‘R’s'?”

Everyone stared down at the first page, second paragraph.

“
Relabel
means recognizing his or her obsessive thoughts or compulsive urges as part of this mental disorder, and labeling it as such. The OCD patient needs to recognize that these compulsions are false messages coming from the brain, messages that provide a false protection from facing reality.

Everyone was leaning in, their elbows on the table. “Step Two is
Reattribute
, that means…”

“Yes, Mark, we can read. It says that this helps you to understand why these thoughts are so powerful in your head, that it's not your fault but simply the nature of your disorder, right?” Pamela said.

Shrugging, Mark appeared totally absorbed in the next few pages.

Sonia nodded. “Right, Pamela. You got it!” The ladies snickered together.

“Okay, all you Smarty-Pants, what does
Refocus
mean?” Mark sneered.

Silence, accompanied by a couple of page turns filled the room for several minutes before Sonia took the wheel. “This area is where the real work is accomplished. When the compulsive/obsessive impulse pops into your head, at first you label it as an OCD issue, then reattribute it. In other words, own it as part of your problem, then refocus or redirect it towards another activity, to stop the malfunctioning brain messages.”

Pamela and Ana clapped. “Bravo for putting it into such laymen's terms,” Ana said.

Mark sat still, glowering, then raised his voice.
“Revalue
simply means that once you do these first three steps, you can sit back and think about revaluing this whole process. You can…”

“You can begin to rethink about why you had to act out these compulsions/obsessions in the first place, particularly since you know in the end, these thoughts don't really help you at all.” Amidst another round of applause, Sonia speculated on how proud of her Harry probably would have been.

After the session, Pamela met up with her. “Fun times with Mark, no? How ‘bout a little R and R, excuse the pun, tomorrow night, along with me and some friends at this new club called Swatchnut? Or do you have to be at that other club watching Mike and his band?”

“I'm not with Mike anymore.” Something about her tone kept Pamela quiet.

Entering the single room in Mt. Lawkin Hospital's Obstetrics and Pediatrics wing, Sonia saw the two of them cuddled together on the bed, their brand new baby girl sandwiched between them. Just watching Pete's gentle caresses alternating between his new child and a tired Shannon gave Sonia the tiniest of tugs deep in her chest. Seeing her, Pete got off the bed and came straight over.

“Sonia, you made it.” His hug was larger than life.

“Congratulations, you two! Wow! A new little musician in the world.” Everyone laughed.

“So where's Mike? I thought he'd be with you,” Shannon commented.

“I haven't seen him for weeks now,” Sonia answered, disregarding the look passed between them. “So, how did the whole Julius thing play out?”

Pete pulled up a chair for her, close to the bed. Returning to his family, he smiled. “Whatever was said to Julius seemed to work. As soon as he was talked to, I got word in jail that he was miraculously dropping the charges. Interesting, no?”

“Are they going to press charges against him for money laundering anyway?”

“Who knows? Frankly, I don't care. I quit the band two weeks ago.”

“He's got a couple of studio session gigs coming up,” Shannon grinned, kissing her baby on the top of her head.

All of a sudden, Sonia felt like an interloper. “I guess I should be going…”

Pete walked her out into the hall. “You have no idea how much I appreciate everything you did for Shannon. I'll never forget that, you know.” He gave her a grateful hug. “And Sonia?”

“Yes?”

“He wasn't for you, you know.”

“Harry?” She bit her lip.

“Harry! Who's Harry? Mike. I'm talkin' about Mike.”

Getting dressed for an upcoming club night with Pamela et al. turned into a procedure. What outfit looked pretty and sexy, what style should her hair be in, just touchable soft, or sexy touchable soft? Halfway through, she thought of Mike picking out his various gear before performing and sighed.

The club itself was loud, packed, and smoky. Catching sight of Pamela and her friends, she made her way over to them, by-passing couples gyrating on the dance floor.

A waitress approached. “By the way ladies, your next round of drinks have been paid for.”

“By whom?” Pamela asked.

The waitress smirked and pointed to a group of five men three tables down. After several seconds of checking them out, Pamela waved. That seemed to be their cue. Instantly, they gathered up their drinks and cocktail napkins and came over, each one wasting no time sliding in comfortably with a different woman.

As the men settled in, the conversation took a different turn. “So, ladies, where are you all from?” began Sonia's designated man concentrating on his pick of the litter. Barely listening to their various answers, he moved in closer. He reminded her of Mike, handsome, cool, a guy who didn't wear the office garb so prevalent in the rest of the room. Dressed in black jeans, a striped button down shirt, rolled up mid-arm, he was lean, tanned, and fairly tipsy.

He started in. “So, what's a good-lookin' girl like you doing at a club without a date?” He looked down at her empty glass and immediately signaled a waitress. “What's your name, Babe?” he pitched.

Wrong label! Her mind batted. “No names,” she grunted.

“Okay. Whatever you want.” Watching her finish her second and third drinks as quickly as the first, he couldn't help grinning. This was going to be a piece of cake.

“Where do you work?” Sonia finally asked, coming out of her slow stupor for a second.

“I don't work. I guess I'm just a trust fund baby,” he said proudly. He eyed her more carefully. “What do you do?”

“I'm a student.”

“What are you studying?”

“Psychology.” She signaled the waitress herself.

“Do you actually believe in that shit?”

Suddenly, she thought of her long talk with Harry in the middle of the night. When the waitress appeared, she ordered another two rounds and after swilling those down, attempted a trip to the bathroom. Pamela jumped up and followed her.

“Sonia, what are you doing? What's wrong with you?” she added.

“Nothing. Nothing. Just gotta pee, that's all.”

“Well, I'm coming with you,” she snapped, grabbing Sonia's elbow and commandeering her towards the restroom. By the time they returned, the group was ready to pack it in, the men eagerly putting coats on their new finds before escorting them towards the exit, the women giggling nonstop at the men's inane jokes. Sonia's guy was already on his feet.

“Well, Babe. Why don't I take you home?”

“I don't think so,” Pamela sputtered.

“Ish okay, Pam. Ish okay…” Sonia murmured as her date threw his arm around her.

“Yeah,” he chimed in “we're gonna be just fine.”

Trailing them out onto the street with her own partner, Pamela called out a final warning, “Remember, Sonia, Relabel, Reattribute, and Refocus! Relabel, Reattribute, and Refocus!”

Letting herself be poured into a cab, Sonia laughed.

Back in the apartment, Petra scattered the second she spied someone new. Switching on the light and shedding her coat, Sonia staggered over towards the kitchen to get a glass of water, but was pulled back by Mr. Horny. He wasted no time. Kissing her neck and yanking off her clothes, he pushed her down on the couch.

“Wait wait wait,” she muttered. “You didn't kish my fingers.”

“
Don't talk
,” he warned. “I don't like talkers.”

Full steam ahead, he concentrated on her breasts, her thighs, and her groin, and the fact that she was barely responding didn't seem to faze him in the least. Jerking his clothes off with a vengeance, he cursed at a cuff button that wouldn't budge while Petra arched in the southeast corner, hissing.

Waking up at seven forty-five with a start, Sonia looked over at the sleeping man piled up next to her and desperately tried to remember what happened. Her tap-tap-tapping certainly didn't help. Nor did it lessen her pounding head, churning stomach, and a mad dash to the bathroom to throw up. Gee, I'm just like my mom, regurgitating in the bathroom at Shangri-la, she thought after she had emptied out all remnants from the night before.

Back in the living room, she started picking up his strewn clothes, then prodded his torso on the couch with her foot.

“Wake up, wake up!” She gave him two more pokes.

“Hi, there. What's the rush?” Smug, he rubbed one eye.

“You've gotta get out of here. I've gotta go somewhere!”

He yawned. “No time for breakfast?”

“Are you kidding?”

“No, I'm not.” He was sitting up, fully awake and very annoyed. “What's your problem, huh?”

“I don't have a problem.” She resisted the urge to tap by putting her fingers behind her back. “We both got what we wanted and now it's time to go, that's all.”

“I got what I wanted. You were like a zombie you were so wasted,” he sneered.

“Whatever. Just go, okay?”

He grabbed his clothes and charged into the bathroom. Soon, shower sounds followed a toilet flush and she was about to barge in to ask him what the hell he thought he was doing, then stopped. Just get him the hell out of here, she was thinking. Her patience worked. All she ended up having to deal with was his loud, “Bitch!” as he slammed the front door.

After Lily's cheerful invitation-to-dinner call, she sat tapping. And tapping. She knew she should study, but for some reason, subwaying down to Coney Island and the fish aquarium popped into her mind. There would be mountains of excited school children on their class trips, besieging each tank with tiny, blurred fingerprints, but the thought of being surrounded by all that innocence seemed particularly appealing.