Let The Great World Spin: A Novel - By Colum McCann Page 0,42

you.

But he stood, buzz-haired and red-cheeked, in front of her, and she said nothing.

Say something to him. That shine to his cheeks. Say something. Tell him. Tell him. But she just smiled. Solomon pressed a Star of David into his hands and turned away and said: Be brave. She kissed his forehead good-bye. She noticed the way the back of his uniform creased and un-creased in perfect symmetry, and she knew, she just knew, the moment she saw him go, that she was seeing him go forever. Hello, Central, give me heaven, I think my Joshua is there.

Can’t indulge this heartsickness. No. Spoon the coffee out and line the tea bags up. Imagine endurance. There’s a logic to that. Imagine and hang on.

How is it being dead, son, and would I like it?

Oh. The buzzer. Oh. Oh. Spoon clang to the floor. Oh. Stepping quickly along the corridor. Return and pick up the spoon. Everything neat now, neat, yes. Give me back his living body, Mr. Nixon, and we will not quarrel. Take this corpse, all fifty-two years of it, swap it; I won’t regret it, I won’t complain. Just give him back to us all sewn up and handsome.

Control yourself, Claire.

I shall not fall apart.

No.

Quick now. Doorwise. At the buzzer. Her mind, she knows, needs a quick dip in water. A momentary cold swell, like those little buckets outside a Catholic church. Dip in and be healed.

—Yes?

—Your visitors, Mrs. Soderberg.

—Oh. Yes. Send them up.

Too harsh? Too quick? Should have said, Wonderful. Great. With a big swell to my voice. Instead of Send them up. Not even please. Like hired hands. Plumbers, decorators, soldiers. She engages the button to listen in. Curious thing, the old intercoms. Faint static and buzz and some laughter and door close.

—The elevator’s straight ahead, ladies.

Well, at least there’s that. At least he didn’t show them to the service elevator. At least they’re in the warm mahogany box. No, not that. The elevator.

The faint mumble of voices. All of them together. They must have met up beforehand. Prearranged. Hadn’t thought of that. Hadn’t let it cross my mind. Wish they hadn’t.

Talked about me, maybe. Needs a doctor. Awful gray streak in her hair. Husband’s a judge. Wears implausible sneakers. Struggles to smile. Lives in a penthouse but calls it upstairs. Is terribly nervous. Thinks she’s one of the gals, but she’s really a snob. Is likely to break down.

How to greet? Handshake? Air kiss? Smile? The first time around they had hugged good-bye, all of them, in Staten Island, at the doorstep, with the taxi beeping, her eyes streaked with tears, arms around one another, all of us happy, at Marcia’s house, when Janet pointed to a yellow balloon caught in the treetops: Oh, let’s meet again soon! And Gloria had squeezed her arm. They had touched cheeks. Our boys, you think they knew each other, Claire? You think they were friends?

War. The disgusting proximity of it. Its body odor. Its breath on her neck all this time, two years now since pullout, three, two a half, five million, does it matter? Nothing’s over. The cream becomes the milk. The first star at morning is the last one at night. Did she think they were friends? Well, they could have been, Gloria, they certainly could have been.

Vietnam was as good a place to start as any. Yes indeed. Dr. King had a dream and it would not be gassed on the shores of Saigon. When the good doctor was shot, she sent a thousand dollars in twenty-dollar bills to his church in Atlanta. Her father raved and roared. Called it guilt money. She didn’t care. There was plenty to be guilty for. She was modern, yes. She should have sent her whole inheritance. I like fathers; I just think everyone should disown one. Like it or not, Daddy, it goes to Dr. King, and what do you think of your niggers and kikes now?

Oh. The mezuzah on the door. Oh. Forgot about that. She touches it, stands in front of it. Just tall enough to obscure it. The top of her head. The clang of the elevator. Why the shame? But it’s not shame, not really, is it? What is there possibly to be ashamed of? Solomon insisted on it years ago. That’s all. For his own mother. To make her comfortable when she visited. To make her happy. And what’s wrong with that? It did make her happy. Isn’t that enough? I have nothing to