Miles Read Free Page A

Nicolasha walk slowly
towards the lake, and waved at him when he turned around to glance at
something.  A silver double-decked electric train rolled to a halt in
front of me.  I couldn't see if he waved back.
     
    * * *
     

I I
     

A surfeit of the
sweetest things
  The deepest loathing to the stomach brings.
     
    A Midsummer Night's Dream
     
    The
turkey was dry and tepid.  The cabbage was strained poorly, the mashed potatoes
weren't mashed very well, the stuffing had too much celery in it, and nobody
looked twice at the lima beans, not even my mother, who prepared the
meal.  A completely inconsequential football game between two teams who
were already out of the playoffs droned on in the background.  Every light
in the living room, kitchen, and family room was on, yet, the small dining room
in which we struggled through the Thanksgiving meal seemed ill-lit. 
Certainly, my spirits were.
    I
think my family was cursed.
    My
mom, Frederika, was a tall, well-proportioned woman with thick, dramatic brown
hair.  A real hard case, some cop might have said.  As passionate as
she was hard, the kind of passion that let the heart and the soul control a
life that would otherwise have been regimented and accomplished, passion that
remains an anomaly for a pure-bred German.  
    Her
parents gave up a small foundry and the rest of their family in Saxony after Hitler took over.  The rest of their relatives died during the
war.  They moved into a small apartment above a bakery in Roseland, the
largely Catholic, multi-ethnic neighborhood on the far south side of Chicago . 
Her father went to work at the nearby steel mills, and her mother worked in the
bakery downstairs.  Mom was born a year after that, right there in the
bakery.  She grew up to be a strong-willed, bright woman, raised by the
hard-working women of the bakery.  Grandfather died in an accident at the
mill when she was ten, but they were able to make it through on the last of
their savings and the kindness of the bakery women.
    OK. 
When Mom was downstairs one morning, she heard the women gossiping about one of
their neighbors, a Polish laborer with two young boys.  The laborer had
gotten blind drunk the night before, which had been his wedding
anniversary.  Mom was intrigued.  He was despondent over his wife's
death to tuberculosis earlier that year, and confided to the bartender that his
younger boy, Simon, wasn't really his, but rather the illegitimate son of his
sister from Cracow , who fell in love with a young German Jew
refugee.  They both died during the war, too.  He had been visiting Poland weeks before the invasion, and she gave him her baby to take back to America . 
My Mom went to school with Alex and Simon, and had a crush on both of
them.  They were inseparable, but polar opposites: Simon was gregarious
and visceral, tall for his age and wiry, with trim, curly brown hair and eyes,
while Alex was a shy, artistic, private child, somewhat short and
plain-looking.  Their bond was baseball, and they attended almost every
White Sox game together, first with their father, and then alone, as soon as
they were old enough to take the street car to the park.  
    Simon
and Alex came to the bakery one rainy afternoon.  The White Sox were playing
in Cleveland , and the ladies had the game on the radio. 
They came to buy some bread for dinner that night, but really wanted to hear
the game.  So, business being slow, the old ladies, Frederika, Simon, and
Alex huddled around and listened with glee as the Pale Hose crushed the Tribe, 10 to 2 . 
The whole time, Simon and Frederika's eyes were never far from each
other.  Before leaving, he asked my mom if she would like to come home and
have dinner with them.  My grandmother waved her off with a smile. 
    Mom
and Dad pretty much fell in love that night.  
    High
school went by quickly for both of them: they excelled in their studies, both
competed in sports, and went to a lot of White Sox games with Alex,