Unexpected Gifts (19 page)

The long slog up to our apartment included couples fighting behind closed doors, babies crying, children yelling, garbage left in half-opened cans, peeling walls, and rickety banisters that wobbled every time I be putting me hand onto them. Tony led the way, chatting, happy as a clam, but I noticed the rest of us didn't utter a word. Not one word. And when Adriana be seeing the laundry cord tied up across the living room, her scowl be stretching as far as both Cork and Derry counties it did.

Being without family or friends brought with it boredom and frustration it did, but the Saturday afternoon Tony toted a slick, white Bakelite radio into our kitchen and turned it on, I had an instant companion. The music programs were me favorite.
Manhattan Merry-Go-Round
would spill out into our apartment, playing nonstop popular songs as I be doing me washing, ironing, and dancing, pretending I was on stage, not a housewife trapped in her den. There'd also be programs like
The American Album of Familiar Music, The Fred Waring Show
with the Lane Sisters, Stella and the Fellas, and the guitarist Les Paul who be making his guitar float.

While Tony was scaling the heights, I be also enjoying
The Ed Sullivan Show
and
The Eddie Cantor Show
, particularly when singers like Dinah Shore and Deanna Durbin were on, but what really made me laugh and brighten me day something considerable, was
The Baby Snooks Show
with Fanny Brice. That woman got me sides aching, she did!

Adriana would insist on us listening to the
Fireside Chats
, where President Roosevelt talked about what be happening in the U.S. and urging us not to lose faith. Tony would look bored, but I be thinking he was certainly better than
Father Coughlin
spouting his venom.

Tony often be listening to
Believe it or Not, Charlie Chan
, and
Fu Man Chu
, but his favorite was
Amos n’ Andy.
He'd be tossing his head back with a mighty snort and slapping his thighs then, but each time it was on, the show be sending me straight off to our bedroom. White actors making fun of colored men wasn't me idea of high comedy.

In time, the radio held fewer charms for him and I could tell when he was with other women by the shows he be missing, but that was all right by me it was. What really be breaking me heart was watching Rose get stranger by the day.

When Tony be off in the morning, she'd be going over to her Rosie's Land in a corner of our living room silent as a tomb. There she'd be arranging and rearranging her dolls and toys over and over again, lining up the dolls first, then setting out her little china tea set and books in front of them, turning the skin on the back of me neck into a crawling centipede.

I decided to take matters into me own hands I did, and while Adriana was away with her new, intellectual friends and Tony was off God knows where, I'd be clasping Rose's wee hand in mine and passing by the long breadlines of people, just so we could forget ourselves in a movie theater. There, we be watching
The Golddiggers
, both of us thrilled by the Busby Berkeley synchronized dancing, and
One Night of Love
with the beautiful voice of Grace Moore. We'd also see the Marx Brothers, Ritz Brothers, Rin Tin Tin, and of course, Shirley Temple. And whenever we returned home, she not be going into her corner so much. For at least a good two days.

Then there be Joe. Massive, handsome Joe, turning me insides into jelly and me knees wobbly. Broad shouldered, vein-popping large-handed Joe who leaned down to talk so gentle to me little girl and her face be shining like the fairy princess she deserved to be.
No man ever wore a tie as nice as his child's arm around his neck
came to mind as I ushered him in.

“Mrs. Balakov, thank you so much for having me here.” His black eyes bore through me skin they did as he shook me hand.

“Please call me Daria.” Cocooned I was in his intense gaze and warm grip.

The men swapped work-related stories together on the couch while Rose and I be fussing in the kitchen nonstop until Tony told our guest he should relax and take his jacket off. Before I knew what I be doing, I found meself leaning towards the men and catching how his linen shirt be stretched across his muscular arms and chest I did.

“Daria, I hear you're from Ireland,” Joe commented softly right off at super.

“Ach, that I am.”

Tony muttered, “Try to speak American, Daria. You've been here long enough!”

Me head dropped down like a marionette with its string busted loose.

Joe jumped in. “You know, I'm a Mohawk Indian and when I'm around my own people I talk very different than I would on the job. In fact, my Mohawk name is translated as Gentle Horse.”

Tony laughed, but I be defending our guest. “That's a wonderful name, Joe! Horse because you're big, and gentle because you be man enough not to be hurtful.” Tony be staring at me, but I never cared less in me life.

“Well, the point is,” Joe continued, looking straight at me, “talk anyway you want to, that's fine with me. I think it's important to keep some of our customs, even in America, and one of my customs is telling stories of ancient Gods and brave warriors that fought the White Man.”

I could feel me heart give a quick thump. “Yes, that's what me mam used to do with me and I try to do the same with Rose! The Irish believe in telling stories as well.”

“What about magic and spells? Do the Irish believe in that? We certainly do.”

“Yes, we do. Ach, sometimes I be missing me homeland something terrible,” I blurted out before I could think. Out the corner of me eye I could see Joe slowly nodding.

Tony scoffed. “The both of you are living in the past! After all, this is America. We should all be Americans, even if we came from other parts of the world.”

“But why?” Joe and I shouted as one.

Rose threw in her two bits. “Tell us a story, Joe, tell us a story.” I'd never seen her so excited, and it warmed me heart to see how much she be insisting on sitting next to our visitor.

His eyes softened. “Well, let's see. How about Hiawatha?”

Rose leaned in. “Hia-watta?”

He laughed. “Hiawatha. He was a man who was persuaded by the prophet Dekanawidah to try to get warring tribes to form the Iroquois Nation. He was such a good talker, he got everyone to listen to them, and from then on, there was no more fighting among the tribes, just with the White Man.”

“What's so great about that?” Tony snickered.

“Why, that be just like the British and the Catholics and how the Catholic church had to join forces and organize so they could stand up against their oppressors. I know exactly what you're talking about, Joe.”

“Can you both please move onto something else?” Tony snapped. We all sat still as the kitchen sink drips be taking over.

I sat thinking. “Do the Mohawks like music?” I asked, watching him carefully push Rose's milk glass back a good six inches from the edge of the table.

“Oh, come on, Daria. Who cares about that?”

I could see Joe leaning back, assessing Tony through narrowed eyes. “I think music is very important, Tony. And yes, to answer your question, Daria, the Mohawks love their music. They use drums and a rattler made out of a whole turtle skin.”

“How interesting! Can you bring one of those instruments sometime?” I gushed.

“Well, I don't really have any. I left the two I had up in Canada where I came from. Sorry,” he said, giving Rose's hand a wee pat. “But, maybe, if you and Tony would like to, the three of us could go up to Harlem and hear some wonderful jazz that the people there play.”

Me “Yes!” coincided with Tony's, “Oh, for God's sake!” clashing like our marriage.

The rest of the meal belonged to Rose, and when Joe questioned her about her school, her hopes and dreams, and her very best doll, I swear her chest be swelling out a good inch or two. What a grand day for her it was and after he left, with promises of return, the apartment felt as empty as an oyster shell that be scooped out for a fine dinner.

The following Sunday he showed up with a Shamrock, he did, wetting me eyes and doling out fond memories. An Indian doll was for Rose, who be proudly carrying it over to her Corner, and a fountain pen for Tony who smiled but I knew it'd be misplaced by nightfall.

This time the conversation stayed on safer ground it did, with Tony participating as much as the rest of us, but whenever I glanced over at Joe, he be watching me every gesture like a hawk. At one point, when Tony be mentioning that he thought I should dye me hair to look more like Jean Harlowe in
Hells Angels
, I was surprised at the Indian's sharp reaction.

“She's perfect the way she is!” he sputtered, his dark eyes flashing and his words leaving me with a smile that be lasting a good week.

After that, I be singing all the time—standing at the kitchen sink, making fresh bread and butter, tending to me shamrock in the kitchen window ledge where the sunlight showed up a mere hour a day. The pull towards Sunday be getting stronger by the minute and Saturday nights, lying next to Tony's back, his cologne mixed with whiskey, I be picturing Joe kissing me, touching me in all the right places, and it be all I could do to stop from letting out a moan or two.

“Why do I love Joe more than Papa?” Rose whispered to me one night after a bedtime story. Her eyes searched mine, knowing the answer, but I guess she be needing to hear it anyway.

I could have answered, “I be feeling the same way, love,” but I said nothing. Instead, I'd be thinking of something Mama used to say about Da after a bad night. “
You can't pluck a frog!”
she be repeating over and over again. Then she'd give a huge sigh, her body as heavy as the soft hills surrounding us, and slowly, she'd carry on with her chores, like the loyal wife she was supposed to be.

From the moment Tony, Joe, and I walked into the Apollo Theater up in Harlem, dressed to the Nine's, as Tony'd say, the music, dancing, laughter, applause all be awakening something dormant in me. Cab Calloway and his orchestra were brilliant, as he be performing his famous
Hi-di-ho
song, and the Nicholas Brothers, leap-frogging over each other down a staircase on stage, then throwing up their arms in unison and landing in splits on the steps each time, took me breath away they did.

“Why you two like this place is beyond me! Why, there's nothing but a bunch of jive-ass darkies here, jitter-bugging their way to hell!” Tony snapped, his hand almost knocking over his champagne flute.

I be sensing Joe stiffen as me stomach turned to bile, and it took all me strength and wifely loyalties, to be hanging onto Tony's arm, not Joe's when we exited the club.

Three weeks later Tony came home early, unsociable, wanting his peace. Rose asked after Joe, and the way he avoided us both I knew something was not right. We ate supper in silence for a good ten minutes before he be mentioning Joe had gotten fired that day. His tone was flat, matter-of-fact, but his hands moved faster than usual and he kept staring at the table.

Me head felt as clear as a bell. “I'll wager you not be standing up for him, am I right? Joe, who be arriving with presents and making our Sundays filled with laughter and fine table talk. Joe, who be treating our daughter, for the first time in her life, like she was important and not a piece of furniture. Our
friend
Joe, right?”

There was no answer and no more Joe. For me there'd be no more singing and Rose's organizing and reorganizing hit record heights they did. Then fate played its hand. A Saturday it was, starting out pleasant for once, with Tony's taking Rose and me to see
The Three Little Pigs
at the Loew's Sheraton. Who knows, maybe he be changing. But inside the theater, when I was truthful about the smell of whiskey about himself, he took off like a wild boar I saw once, that be fleeing Mam's broom when she caught it invading her precious garden.

Rose and I lumbered home, our feet made of lead, and by the time we reached our main hall, I had me mind made up that once inside the apartment I'd be making hot chocolate straight away for her, a wee penance for her da. Then I opened the door and heard the strangest sound. Click-scrape-click-scrape. There be Tony in our bedroom, scooping up me money!