If a Tree Falls Read online

  Sophia and Juliet were heaped together in an overstuffed beanbag chair in my study. Juliet was slipping off, clutching a fold of blue denim. I wedged myself in, yanked Juliet up from the side, and pulled both girls close around me.

  My most persistent childhood memory was of waiting: waiting for my mother while she “worked on herself ” in front of her bathroom mirror. As if she might still bring her runaway father back? As if she might remake herself into someone worthy of his return? I’d never know all of the pieces, the shards she took up with a restorer’s attention, to fashion herself whole.

  Whenever I walked into the bathroom, my reflection bouncing into my mother’s, she’d work on me, too. We could straighten my overly curly hair, she’d say. Her hairdresser could blow-dry it until it was fine and straight like baby grass. We could hunt down pleated shirts to narrow and conceal my growing breasts. Fix all that was wrong with me—my hair, my face, my body. My thoughts. My dreams.

  Starving, I swallowed whatever she offered me. My mother was starving, too. Nothing could nourish her, fill her holes. As if literal food proved a mockery, she ate next to nothing. She reduced herself to a fragment, a figment. Less was more. But of course, less was less, as well.

  Singletons where pairs should be.

  My mother and I were the same, after all, in our wanting—she wanting him, me wanting her.

  Her father did return after driving away. A year later, he appeared in the doorway of the Mount Vernon apartment. Hair tousled. Head cocked. All flair and fanfare. My mother couldn’t hide her excitement, even as my grandmother’s voice lilted with anger. He was beautiful, with almond eyes that brimmed with a like degree of hurt overlaying hope, overlaying hurt. A rally. They all rallied. But he couldn’t stay.

  My mother searched for her father years later, when I was in college—hired a private detective who tracked him down in Florida. She wrote him a long letter; she was in her fifties by then, a practicing therapist, a wife, and mother of four children. She wanted to see him, to introduce him to her husband, her children. He wrote back a one-sentence note: he was ill and he did not want her upsetting him. She was to keep away.

  It was in my mother’s crumbling reaction to her father’s note that I realized what intricate structures she had been erecting so painstakingly in front of the mirror all those years. The foundations and powders to cover up and hide every perceptible flaw, in a room where she alone could not hear the feedback whistling from her damaged ears. Before this, I had perceived my mother’s attempts to cover my blemishes as criticism of me, and her obsession to fix her own, as self-absorption. But I saw then that her intentions for both of us—we were one and the same in her heart—were fiercely protective. Before this, I had viewed my mother’s withdrawals, her inattentions, as rejections of me. But I saw then that her retreat was just one more symptom of fatigue from her straining efforts to shore herself up, fill her holes, patch her half so that she might one day be made whole.

  Sitting on the beanbag chair with Sophia and Juliet, I could see snowflakes drifting past the streetlights outside our window. A slight raise of my head, and I could see myself in the glass, my reflection. Fatigued. Fractured. I, too, knew the longing to be whole, for myself, for my family. The lure of powder to smooth the blemishes out. And I, too, knew the need to escape, to tune out my children. House chores, computer searches, journal writing sessions—they became justifications for retreat. I was drained and I yearned at times to be separate. But I also knew the need to hug tight, to clasp onto mother, even as she half-turned, inward. Away.

  In the corner, high up on the bookshelf, I spotted a cluster of books by Martin Buber. I had read them in school. A baby gets its sense of self from its parent. I from Thou. A smile, a wide open “ah,” a nose-kiss. Before individuation, the pure infectiousness of love; it bounces in the air between a mother and child’s near-touching faces.

  How could my mother help but falter? How could I help it?

  Galicia, 1885

  OUTSIDE THE HOUSE, A LIGHT snow dusts the ground. Elish and Herschel chase each other, dodging the frantic chickens. Inside, the youngest children play on the floor together, tangled like a heap of puppies. Pearl totters over rag dolls, a baby’s shoe, tiny hands and feet. She surveys the mess, exhaustedly. Nellie is fourteen years old already, Bayla twelve. Like little mothers, they help feed, clean, and bounce the littler ones. When they go to the market now, Nellie and Bayla carry the small square chalkboard Rayzl gave them, and they carefully write out orders for meat and herbs. On the walk home, their hands move in Sign even when weighted down by baskets and children. All of the others hear, though Elish signs, too, and Herschel’s stubby fingers have just begun to babble.

  In the autumn, Nellie stands waiting for Herschel with a little cake from the bakery tucked in her basket. She peers through the window of his study class, the chilly air nipping at her ears. Herschel is the youngest in the room, just three years old. His hair is newly cropped, except for the earlocks.

  Herschel is the family’s bright hope for a scholar. So smart. Nellie watches how he talks, even recites daily blessings; how Pearl and Moshe beam with pride. Nellie can’t help but flash with jealousy, knowing that she will never be adored, that she will never be a source of her parents’ pride. She swallows her feelings like lumps, so that she can accept Herschel’s eager embraces. Lately, he has become more and more attached to her—wanting her, watching her, following her everywhere and imitating her signs.

  Early this morning, he tugged on her. He wanted only Nellie to walk him to school, no one else! Her parents couldn’t stop fussing over him, puffing like peacocks as he left for his first day of school.

  Back to collect him now, Nellie expects to see him still blushing with self-satisfaction. So why is he sitting quietly, withdrawn? Why is the teacher looking at him sternly, like he isn’t answering his question?

  Nellie can sense the din in the room, the heat; the opening and closing of books, the raising and lowering of hands—though not Herschel’s. Nellie’s eyes fix on his, and she follows their path: darting quickly from the other children’s mouths to their eyes, mouths to eyes. She can see that his classmates are waiting for Herschel to speak; yet he remains silent.

  As Nellie follows Herschel’s eyes—his outsider, unknowing eyes—a knot deep down in her stomach rises to her chest, a cresting wave. Is it possible that her brother cannot hear the children around him, cannot hear his teacher? Can it be, that he has been delighting his parents at home by reciting what he’d previously learned, all the while losing his handle on sound?

  Nellie stands outside the classroom, a certainty settling into her gut while thoughts spin in her head. She is unbearably cold, suddenly. The moment school lets out, Nellie grabs Herschel’s hand tightly as he meanders down the steps toward her. The more she rushes him in their walk home, the more distractible he becomes, until she is nearly dragging him by one arm, his feet scraping the ground beneath them. She is walking so fast now that she practically slams into the front door.

  Entering the house, Nellie is overcome by a surge of nausea, the air inside too hot, the lantern too bright after the brisk, darkening outside. She has rushed Herschel home as if to safety, but now home, she feels an urge to keep running.

  Nellie settles her brother at the table with some cake, and goes to find Pearl in her room. Pearl looks confused; she can’t follow Nellie’s fast-moving hands. Nellie breathes in. Then she starts again. Just as Pearl did when they stood together over Bayla in her newborn bassinet, she points to her own ears, then to Herschel, who now stands in the doorway, and she shakes her head, “no.”

  Later that night, Nellie finds her mother rocking back and forth in her chair, her face laced with worry.

  “Maybe Herschel can hide it, at least for now?” Nellie signs.

  “What? How?” Pearl stops rocking.

  “We can scrape the leather out from inside his shoe. He will feel the floor more with his feet. He’ll know when someone is coming. I
f he remembers the words he has learned to speak . . . He can still speak . . .”

  Pearl stares at her daughter’s hands, tucked for the moment in her lap. For her boy—her Herschel—things will be more difficult.

  “And I can show him how the floor shakes, Mama, how to figure out who is coming by how the floor shakes.”

  When Pearl tells Moshe that Herschel is losing his hearing, Moshe just starts walking. Across the room and back again, across the room and back. Then he says words Pearl never thought she would hear.

  “Pearl, I think we should leave Tasse.”

  “Leave Tasse?”

  “Herschel will be a cast-aside here.” Moshe waves his hand as if to push away a distant memory: his father’s horse crisscrossing around a deaf man, dead in the road. “The rabbi told me the details of those discussions he had all those years ago. Do you remember?”

  “Of course I remember. He said that Nellie would be accepted here. Look at what those peasant boys did to her and her sister.”

  “It will be far worse for Herschel. The boys in his class, they will taunt him, they will suppose he is stupid. It is one thing for the girls. But for Herschel—”

  Pearl stares at her husband. Then she darts to her bedroom and begins rummaging through her trunk.

  “Pearl, I don’t mean we should start packing this moment!”

  “I’m looking for a letter! That letter from Lill Baumann.” Pearl retrieves the rumpled envelope from her trunk. The address reads: 1742 Union Street. Kings County New York. “Lill and Sam—they live in a big apartment building. Samuel found good work in a printing press. Maybe they can help us, just to get settled.”

  They scrape together what they can. They scrimp and save, yet they haven’t enough, not nearly enough, for all of them to go. How could Moshe have been so wrong in his figuring? Pearl stands at the wash basin, scrubbing a black pot. Her eyes burn. She lets the pot drop back into the basin, wipes her hands, and starts putting food out on plates.

  Moshe is sounding out options. If only three can go, it should be Pearl and two children. Maybe Herschel and baby Sarah. The other children can stay put; the older ones can care for the littler ones, at least for a while. But no. Not Nellie or Bayla. They can’t stay here without Pearl. Maybe Nellie and Bayla can go to Budapest, to the school for the Deaf, just until he can afford boat tickets.

  Pearl puts a fist to her chest. Sends an imploring look Moshe’s way. Moshe’s eyes are cast downward. He is still considering. He can’t pay for Rayzl’s tutoring now, in any case.

  Neighbors and friends tell cautionary tales, tales of people turned away at New York harbor, returned, barely alive, to a European port. The lame ones. The sick. Inspections officers and doctors check for difficulties. In 1885, even the land of opportunity has its limits. Pearl’s mind circles, never to find a resting place.

  Pearl is wary of the deaf school. Nellie and Bayla would be better off in America, with Herschel. Herschel’s deafness will not be detectable to an inspector. Herschel knows how to read questions on lips, and he can speak out the answers. Nellie is at least cautious and watchful and she can control her voice. She can say her name; Rayzl has worked on this with her. Bayla is another story. Her vocalizations are loud and unintelligible. Bayla might be the tip-off that prevents their entry to America. Ach. It doesn’t matter—the three deaf ones cannot manage such a trip by themselves. No.

  Pearl and Moshe argue that night. And they argue each night until they are out of time. The morning that a carriage and three tickets are arranged, Moshe declares that Nellie, Herschel, and Elish will go together to America. Over Pearl’s wails and objections, Bayla will travel with them as far as Budapest. She will be taken to the Jewish Children’s Deaf Institute on Mexicoi Boulevard. The carriage will journey on to the train station, and from there they will travel to the port at Bremen. The others will stay behind until there is money enough to collect Bayla and travel to meet Nellie, Elish, and Herschel in America.

  The house is complete chaos. Pearl stuffs extra scarves into an already bulging suitcase. Family and friends weep and kiss and hug the confused travelers. Moshe stalls the carriage driver, as people run in and out of the house. As Nellie, Bayla, Elish, and Herschel take their seats in the carriage, Pearl steps up after them. She takes their faces in her quivering hands, kisses their foreheads, her lips making promises of a quick reunion. When the horses start to whinny and stomp their feet, Pearl steps down. Nellie links her arms with Bayla, and Pearl wonders, suddenly, if perhaps the girls do not understand that they will be parting in Budapest, that Bayla will be left at the deaf school, and Nellie will take a train to the port at Bremen with Elish and Herschel. Pearl yells out to Elish, “Please explain, Elish—Nellie and Bayla will have to part, but they will be together soon. We will send for Bayla, and we will join you in America.”

  But as the carriage lurches forward, then turns sharply out of sight, Pearl is overtaken with anguish. Moshe comes to stand beside Pearl. He takes up her hand. Pearl yanks it away.

  Inside the house, the four littlest children scuttle and run, they crawl and give chase; yet to Pearl, the house is vacant. Silent, amidst the din. How did they leave behind so much silence—they, who were largely silent themselves?

  Moshe tries to placate her, he promises it will turn out all right. “How?” she asks. “How will it turn out all right?” Pearl stares at her husband. She has no faith left in him. He lives with his head in the clouds.

  Elish sits in the carriage, staring at her sisters. Nellie is bouncing Herschel on her lap, one arm twined around Bayla. Elish stalls. She gives herself a marker: I’ll tell them when the carriage passes that tree. But the tree is well behind them now, and her eyes are scanning for a new marker. Finally, Elish takes a breath and taps her sisters on the knees to get their attention. As Nellie and Bayla comprehend her news, their heads shake violently. Tears drip dark spots onto their skirts. How could Mama have left it to her to tell them? Elish rages inside. As the carriage bumps along, Elish begins to cry; then Herschel, seeing the distraught faces of his three sisters, cries out too.

  In Budapest, the carriage stops in front of a large brick building, its rows of arched windows with black wrought iron grates rising up four flights. Moshe had instructed the driver and paid him to escort Bayla into the office of the Headmaster. He nearly has to pry Bayla out of Nellie’s grip and drag her, rumpled and shaking, into the school. The three in the carriage are still crying, as he hoists himself back up and takes hold of the reins.

  In a dank corner, below deck on the ship, Nellie sits huddled with Elish and Herschel. Day and night. Day and night. They hardly have room to stretch out their legs. All around them, passengers are gripped with seasickness. For Nellie, it is not the turbulent motions of the ship that nauseate her, but the foul smells all around—the body odors, the vomit, the urine clinging to the sides of open buckets. Nellie offers Elish and Herschel food from the satchel that Pearl carefully packed for them. She herself can scarcely eat. She winds a shawl—Bayla’s shawl—around her nose and mouth, and breathes in her missing sister.

  Nellie takes knitting in hand, but her stitches bunch and pull. She rips them out, stows the yarn in her bag. Her temples pound with grief, as Elish tutors her to speak out answers to questions she may be asked by an Inspections Officer.

  Weeks pass, and finally the boat docks in New York harbor. Filthy and ragged, they weave their way out of the ship’s steerage compartment, unsteadily up the stairs to the outer decks, and finally, by barge, onto a pier in New York Bay. In a long winding line, they step into Castle Gardens. Uniformed doctors are everywhere, inspecting the passengers’ scalps for lice, their nails for fungus. Nellie yelps at the sight of a doctor brandishing a gleaming buttonhook, a man’s face twisting in pain as his eyelid is turned up. She clutches tight to Elish and Herschel.

  As they approach the front of their line, numbers pinned to their coats, an inspection officer barks a soundless question at Nellie. Her name, she thinks. He mus
t have asked her to state her name. She practiced this day and night on the ship. Now she shapes her lips, her tongue flat against the bridge of her mouth for the “n”, then poking out a bit for the “l.” She manages the four syllables “Nel-lie Wert-heim,” her belly pressing down on her bowel as her breath recedes. Her sounds—were they all right, she wonders? Because the man’s eyes have widened and his eyebrows are up.

  Quickly, Elish steps forward, saying in Yiddish that she, her sister, and brother, have traveled together to meet Samuel Baumann. If Samuel Baumann isn’t waiting for them, they are to make their way to 1742 Union Street in Brooklyn. She picks up Herschel, as if to be on her way to Union Street that very moment. The inspector looks at the threesome uncertainly, a piece of chalk balancing between two dusty white fingers. Herschel blinks and smiles, his eyes puffy, his skin reddened from the sea air. The inspector asks to see Herschel walk. Elish sets Herschel down, steps several lengths back, then beckons him to come. As Herschel walks to Elish, the officer turns back to Nellie, hesitating. Then, with a brush of his arm, he waves them along into the interior rotunda. They gather their belongings, and Elish tells a registering clerk their names, their old residence, and their destination.

  Nellie, Elish, and Herschel squeeze onto a wooden bench next to three elderly women cloaked in scarves. Their eyes search the faces of each passerby as their feet dangle in America’s hope-suspended air. When Nellie raises her hands to sign something to Herschel, Elish presses them against Nellie’s lap, a pleading look on her face. As it is, a clerk has looked over at them more than once. Four hours pass. Then five. Herschel has fallen asleep, his head cocked against Nellie’s shoulder. A large man with a bushy grey beard and a wide black hat approaches the bench. In Yiddish, he asks Elish her name. When she tells him, he smiles in relief and points a finger to his chest. “I am Samuel Baumann. My wife, Lill, is an old friend of your mother’s. You children gather your things. You’re to stay with us!”