A Walk in The Snow (standard:Creative non-fiction, 10118 words)
Author: Anonymous	Added: Nov 25 2006	Views/Reads: 3742/2631	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
This is a Chistmas story. but not the usual Christmas story. This one is set in the Bronx of the 40s on a Christmas eve, and seen through the eyes of an abused little boy.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

world and was the only place that existed. Every store was dressed with 
Christmas lights blinking into the outside air. The colored lights and 
their vivid brilliance bounced off the snowflakes flickering down onto 
the streets. They sparkled on the snow drifts like shadows of color. 
Flakes landed on the tip of my nose and melted away. The air smelled 
fresh and bright. The streets were alive and breathing. Everything 
tickled my heart. 

It was dark by the time I reached the train station and my reserve heat
was dissipating. I was beginning to feel the cold. I stood leaning 
against a steel post at the bottom of the El, with my gloved hands 
buried deep into my mackinaw pockets, waiting to surprise my Mom. After 
awhile I wandered over to the Brighton Cafeteria, right next to the 
station. 

The Cafeteria had two entrances that we kids used from time to time as a
short cut from Southern Boulevard to the Westchester Avenue side. The 
busboys in the Cafeteria didn't care much for us cutting through, and 
chased us when we tried. I had a sneaking suspicion they enjoyed the 
chase. Eventually, it became a game between them and us. But what an 
exhilarating game. 

Standing outside the Cafeteria windows, I lost myself in the reflections
of people and automobiles passing by. When the image of a car reached 
the wide curve at the corner of the window, it bunched up into a 
squashed little stubby car that abruptly slowed down to a crawl. 
Reaching the other side of the curve, it pulled away onto the flat 
window. It gave the illusion of being larger than it was, and took off 
like being shot from a rubber band. 

Inside the Cafeteria there were old men with gray beards who spent hours
sitting at tables over a glass of tea. I swore I could remember seeing 
one of those men at the same table for days at a time, sitting and 
reading his yiddish newspaper. Why would any of them want to stay in a 
lonely place like this and never go home? Were they being held captive 
by the busboys? 

The Cafeteria doors opened, releasing one of the prisoners. Also
escaping was the overwhelming odor of a soup kitchen. In those few 
seconds before the doors closed, I could hear the hollow echoes of 
shuffling trays, clanking spoons, forks and glasses - an operetta of 
sounds vibrating off the tile floors and high ceilings. 

Pressing my head against the window gave me a better view of the
Cafeteria. The walls were painted with touches of pastel-like reds and 
yellows, but it was mostly dark green and blue that controlled the 
mood, muting all the other colors. The long walls were broken into 
large, rectangular panels outlined in thin molding. Within each panel 
there was a painted mural. One of the murals was a huge, floating, 
naked man with round, bulging lumps for muscles and black hair 
screaming out into space. His body was wrapped around a twisted horn 
that hid his genitals. His wide open eyes stared wildly down at the 
opening of the horn, watching fruit flying out from its center. 

The painting drew me in. Around the edges of the naked man, a halo of
light began to glow and throb, as if he was about to pull away from the 
wall. He knew I was watching him and his wild eyes turned in my 
direction, staring back into mine. I tried to turn away, but I could 
feel him looking at me, forcing me to watch him climb down off the 
wall. He was coming for me. I jumped away from the window. The cold 
heat of blood rushed back into my forehead and I ran back to the 
station, distancing myself from the painting's control. 

At the bottom of the station stairs, I heard the growing rumble of an
approaching train. Its massive armored cars screeched to a stop and 
pulled at the wood and steel, causing the platform to lurch forward. 
The entire station moved under my feet. It was alive, moving on its 
own. It was as if the train was an insect that had crawled on the 
station's back, awakening the giant out of its sleep. 

The wooden platform above filled with a herd of shuffling feet, rushing
to the exits. A flood of people overflowed onto the metal steps. All 
the men wore hats, but not just hats - they wore fedoras. My eyes 
squinted and strained, searching between all the bobbing hats that 
swayed from side to side, bouncing down the steps. 

The trains were coming faster now. As soon as one pulled out, another
was right behind it. After about the eighth train and still no Mom in 
sight, I began to worry that I missed her. Maybe somehow she had passed 
me in the crowd and at this very moment was on her way home without me. 
What if I left now and she was on the next train? I stood there frozen 
in my indecision, waiting for just one more train, then another and 
another. They came and went and not a sign of her anywhere. 

Not knowing what to do, I became desperate and thought I had lost her
forever. Again, people emptied onto the stairs, but this time I caught 
a glimpse of her face peeking in and out of the crowd. My Mom's bangs 
were sticking out from under her red, paisley kerchief and sweeping 
across her forehead. My whole world lit up. 

"Solinue, vhat are you doing here?" My Mom hugged me with joy and when
she held my hand with her firm grip, I became permanently attached to 
her -- she owned me. "Come, I've got to pick up a few tings." 

What we called the Triangle, was a group of food stores and outdoor
produce stands that were positioned around the streets that formed a 
triangle around the Simpson Street station. Hunt's Point was my 
neighborhood. It was the focal point of food from the East Coast to the 
West Coast, and imported from nations around the world - from the 
everyday to the exotic. Each store was an adventure in shopping. People 
came from all over the Bronx just to buy their food there. Shopping was 
a social contact sport, a daily ritual hunt for fresh food. 

There was an Italian store that specialized in noodles. Everywhere,
nothing but noodles. Any shape or any size you could think of, each in 
its own open, wooden bin. There were fish stores that had huge, 
strange-looking fish. Real live fish, swimming right before my eyes in 
a large, white tub of water. 

It was a different kind of life in the 40's, when business was done on a
personal basis, not with strangers who could care less if you shopped 
there or not. It was a time when your credit was always good and 
uncomplicated - they'd just put it on your tab. And if you were late in 
paying, you weren't penalized with interest charges. It was a time when 
shopkeepers catered to your individual needs, like being able to buy 
only one stick of butter or one egg at a time. Everything then wasn't 
bigger than you, or beyond you. The stores were human size, with human 
contact, with people we knew. 

No matter how often I had seen these stores, when I was with my Mother,
they were all new again. Each time she brought her fullness of life 
with her and renewed their vitality. It was like being in the market 
place for the first time. 

My Mom and I stepped into the midst of bickering voices and pressing
bodies. Everyone was cueing up to the vegetable stand, afraid to be 
left with second best. My Mother leaned against the produce stand, 
searching through the tomatoes. 

"Uh-uh, don't touch the tomados." "Vhat ya talking about, I'm not
touching." I pressed close to my Mother's rough, cloth coat, my cheek 
snuggled against her firm thigh. I could feel her concentrated energy 
of warmth radiate and overflow, spilling over me. The Vegetable Man 
wore a long, white apron that flared out from under his short, 
tightly-buttoned wool jacket. On his head was a stocking cap, flimsily 
cocked to one side. His words puffed out in little white clouds of 
smoke that slowly rose and, for a few seconds, like delicate ghosts, 
twisted and turned above his head, then dissipated into the night air. 

"How many tomados do you want?" "A pound, and no rotten ones." "Hey, I
don't sell rotten tomados." He plopped the tomatoes on a squeaking 
metal scale. My Mom shouted... "You be careful vit dat! I'm paying good 
money for dat!" The Vegetable Man shuffled his feet from one foot to 
the other and banged his hands together, trying to keep warm. He 
crossed his arms and put his hands under his armpits. "Dat,'s nineteen 
cents." My Mom was a little surprised and half-jokingly she teased him, 
"So much? Veigh it again. Dis time, do me a favor, take your thumb off 
da scale." "What thumb? Come on, Molly, I've got other customers." 
"But, nineteen cents. Please, Dahlink, I can't afford dat much dis 
veek. Be a sveetheart and do me a favor." The vegetable man sighed, 
"Ok, ok, Molly. What did I charge you last week?" "Ten cents for a 
pound." 

We crossed to the other side of Westchester Avenue, to the Jewish
Butcher. The store had Hebrew letters crawling around its window, more 
like abstract designs than letters. I stayed as close as I could to my 
Mom, trying to hide myself from a chance meeting with my friends. I 
didn't want them to see me going into the Jewish Butcher. My friends 
were Black, Spanish and Irish Catholics who saw these people as freaks 
-- as I did. They were strange people, with curly ringlets that hung 
from both sides of their temples, sticking out from under their black 
fedoras. They wore those hats so often that I thought of them as being 
a part of their heads. 

We walked out of the freezing cold and into the stifling heat of the
butcher shop, causing me to percolate under my many layers of clothes. 
While my Mom was giving her order to the butcher, my attention wandered 
to an open door leading to a back room. The floor was covered with 
sawdust and a man in a long, white smock sat on a chair in the middle 
of the room, holding a dead chicken. The limp chicken would jerk and 
jump up from his lap as the man yanked, tugged and twisted at the 
bird's feathers. The feathers flew into the air in all directions and 
slowly floated down, resting in a soft pile covering his feet. The few 
remaining hollow shafts were put under a steady stream of fire that 
shot out from a narrow, vertical pipe. A column of smoke spiraled 
around and through itself, spilling out into the room where I was 
standing and filled it with the distinct odor of burning hair. 

The butcher threw a slab of Roumanian Steak onto the butcher's block
and, with his knife hovering over the steak, moved it from one end to 
the other, measuring an imaginary line. 

"How much? Here? Here?" "There! Dat's a good piece." 

The butcher's long, finely-honed knife, worn thin from thousands of
sharpenings, lightly touched the steak and effortlessly slid through. 
He then ripped off a thin layer of the meat's tissue and, with his 
knife, made quick criss-cross slices, cutting through the sinews of the 
steak. 

Across the way at another table, a third man rolled square pieces of
brown wax paper into cone shapes. With a small, wooden spoon he scooped 
dark, golden mustard out of an open, wood barrel, filled the paper 
cones and pinched the tops closed. The whole process was done in a 
continuous motion, filling one cone exactly like the one before. 
Firmly, but gently, he felt the roundness of each plump cone as he 
lined them up neatly into a cardboard box. If only I could have one of 
those cones, so I, too, could touch its roundness the way he did. 

My Mother opened her pocketbook to pay the butcher and it exhaled the
aroma of Juicy Fruit gum. Then she fumbled through her paper money, 
which always smelled of perfume. For the longest time, I thought that 
was the way money was supposed to smell. The heat of the store became 
unbearable; my pulse throbbed and pounded against my skin. It seemed 
like we were going to be there all night. I felt my brain would burst 
if we didn't get out of this place and back into the cold air again. 

On our way home, we passed by Loft's candy store and stood on the corner
of Southern Boulevard and Westchester Avenue, right by the wooden 
clubhouse where newspapers were sold and where we waited for the 
traffic light. I felt safe and warm standing by my Mom, she held my 
hand in her cold and intense grip. 

That night, the Boulevard was more crowded than usual because of the
last minute Christmas shoppers and the mad rush for the last Christmas 
trees. Christmas started later then than now, which made it more 
spontaneous, immediate and exciting. The Spooner, The Boulevard and 
Star movie theatres proudly strutted their marquees out towards the 
street. Flashing lights ran around the movie titles, announcing they 
knew they were the main reason for the existence of the busy Boulevard. 
All the stores along the Boulevard were only window dressing for the 
movie theatres. 

My eyes made a full circle around the street and back to my Mom. She was
carrying two heavy shopping bags with twine handles that pressed deep 
into the flesh of her fingers. The creases in her hand turned purple, 
with white streaks squeezing out from her strained grasp. Looking up to 
her face, I saw no signs of pain and there were no groans or sighs, not 
a word of complaint. I remember thinking how strong my Mom must be. Her 
kerchief framed her flushed, red cheeks, and I followed the lines of 
her high cheekbones to her nose. It was shaped like a sharp arrow that 
gracefully pointed to her deep red, thin lips. My God, she was a 
handsome woman! She was drenched with a natural sexuality that drew men 
to her like lust-crazed dogs after a bitch in heat. My Mom was also a 
tough woman, yet she had a child-like innocence reflecting through her 
luminous, soft blue eyes. And there in her eyes, I saw a sadness that 
pulled me in and melted my heart. 

About halfway to our block, at the shoe repair shop, we met my sister
walking towards us. "Millinue? Vhat is dis?! Everybody's meeting me?" 

Millie looked up into my Mom's face and wrapped her arms around her
waist. Mom put the packages down and caressed Millie's hair, 
straightened her hat, and we were on our way home again. On the Hoe 
Avenue corner of our block, in front of the Chester Drug Store, was a 
man standing by a pushcart. The cart itself was a metal stove with two 
doors at its front, one on top of the other. Four spoked wooden wheels 
were connected to the side of the metal stove and on top, at the far 
end, was a smoking chimney. 

Millie asked... "Mom, can I have a sweet potato...Please?" "You'll be
too full for supper." "I promise I'll eat all of my supper. Please?" 
"Ok...Vhy not, it's oily yet. You too, Solinue? You vant? My eyes 
widened and I nodded, "U-huh!" 

We approached the cart and watched the Sweet Potato Man taking a handful
of broken crate pieces out of the box attached to the side of his cart. 
He snapped a piece of wood over his knee and used it to open the lever 
on the bottom door. The door swung open and a few lazy sparks trickled 
out. The Sweet Potato Man gingerly placed the wood pieces on the red 
hot embers in the oven. As he fed the fire, the hungry flames reached 
out for his hands. He pulled back and waited for the flames to subside. 
Again, he placed splinters of wood on the fire and, once more, the 
flames ignited. 

We watched as this game unfolded between the Sweet Potato Man and the
fire in which both players win, the fire gets fed and the Sweet Potato 
Man gets his sweet potatoes cooked. 

My Mom asked for..."Two sweet potatoes, please." 

The man wore cotton gloves with the finger tips cut off and his bare
fingers sticking out of the holes. From his pocket he whipped out two 
pieces of thin glassene paper. With his other hand, he grabbed the 
handle of the top compartment, which was tightly wrapped in rags, and 
opened the oven. This time the sparks escaped in a fury, shooting out 
like excited fire flies that danced above our heads. The snow sucked at 
the flecks of burning stars that fluttered around us, putting out their 
firey glow as they disappeared up into the overwhelming numbers of 
snowflakes. 

The Sweet Potato Man took two hot sweet potatoes from the oven and put
them each into a glassene paper. "Here, I picked out the best ones just 
for you." The sweet potatoes warmed our hands and the cold air carried 
their sweet smell, teasing our taste buds. Millie and I bit into the 
steaming sweetness and its crispy, burnt skin crumpled in and around 
our mouths. 

"It's still oily yet, I vant yous to go upstairs and vait for me dere. I
von't be long. I'm going to Abie's for a few more tings." (Abe and 
Moe's was a small grocery store on the corner of Faille Street and our 
block.) 

My Mother handed one of the packages to Millie, "Sveetheart, you tink
you and Solly can carry dis for me?" 

Millie, wanting to please her, "Sure, Mommy." We struggled up three
flights of stairs, one step at a time, to our apartment. 

Our dog, Spotty, a medium-sized mutt with long, white and red-brown fur,
greeted us at the door. She acted as if we had left her alone forever 
and she would never see us again. Her built up anxieties exploded with 
joy to see that we hadn't deserted her after all. 

In a wild spurt, Spotty jumped into the air and fell to the ground,
groveling and slithering on her stomach, peeing little puddles. 
Springing up from the floor, she dashed away from us to the other end 
of the long hall, paused briefly and turned her head in our direction. 
We could see a knowing look and the building of energy in her eyes as 
she accelerated for another attack of love. 

Just as Millie and I started to wonder what had happened to Mom, the
front door opened. It was my Mom, bringing the cold air in with her. 
She touched me with the fresh, crisp perfume of her cold skin. The 
brown paper bags crackled on the kitchen table as  she emptied their 
contents. The bags and the food became an extension of her talking 
hands, unconsciously molding the air around them into deliciously 
thick, rounded shapes that I loved touching with my eyes. 

Millie asks..."Where were you? You were gone for such a long time" Mom's
hand swatted at the air in disgust, trivializing her tardiness. "Ehhh, 
I met Gertie and ve got talkin' for a few minutes." 

She glanced up to the square green electric clock on the kitchen
wall..."Oy guttinue! Look at the time. Harold's going to be home any 
minute." (Harold was a man who lived with us) "I vant youse to go to 
your rooms and be very quiet. I don't vant any trouble." 

Way at the other end of the hall was Millie's room, which faced the
front street. The fire escape outside her window was a Balcony Seat to 
the brimming life which filled her room. At night the street lights 
were the projector of a child's imagination and Millie's room became 
the magic room of shadows chasing shadows, up the walls and across the 
ceiling. 

All the other rooms in our apartment were off to one side of a long
hall, except for Harold and Mom's room, which hooked to the left end of 
the living room, parallel to Millie's room and also facing the front 
street. Their room didn't seem to belong to the apartment, more like an 
afterthought of the architect. 

After Millie's room came the living room, then the kitchen, and the
bathroom. The last room facing the back ally, what my sister referred 
to as the dungeon, was my room. In my dungeon I would hear cats sound 
like human baby ghosts, shrieking in hollow, mournful cries during the 
night. Even with these eerie sounds of the night, my dark dungeon was 
my sanctuary. There I was alone and didn't have to pretend or work 
hard, so incredibly hard to protect myself from the wolves with sharp 
teeth. 

As I walked to my room I saw something looming in the dark shadows of
the hall, blocking my way. The closer I got to my room, the clearer the 
shadowy form became. I recognized the little red squares on the back of 
a monster, a monster named Harold. He was swaying in slow motion, like 
treading under water, making a great effort to think and decide where 
he was. I stopped about five feet away and could see him clearly now in 
his red checkered, mackinaw jacket that he wore like a second skin. 

Struggling to keep his balance, Harold grabbed me with his large, beefy
hands to steady himself. The longer he leaned on me, the more I could 
feel his crushing weight. My legs began to shake and buckle and just as 
I was about to cave-in, Harold shoved me against the wall. I hit the 
wall like a limp wet rag. 

Harold's alcohol spit sprayed across my face..."Get the fuck out of my
way you little, stupid, Jew bastard!" His hand felt like a hammer, one 
blow would have crushed my thin bones. And whether by accident or 
intentionally, Harold could have killed me so easily. That was the 
first time in my life I truly believed I could die. Everything in me 
wanted my Mom, but I was too afraid to scream for help. An outburst 
from my scrawny, insignificant self, might be taken by Harold as a 
personal attack. So I swallowed the lump of fear that was stuck in my 
throat. It gathered into a hard ball of desperation that pressed 
against my chest and drew tears from my heart. I didn't make a sound or 
move a muscle - like you'd react to a mad dog. 

Some people, like my Mom, thought Harold a good-looking man, but Millie
and I didn't think so. Harold had a square-shaped head with short, 
tight wavy hair. He was tall, large-boned, thick and muscular. He 
carried his strength quietly like an unexploded bomb and at any time 
that bomb could activate and violently explode. We never knew if a 
word, a gesture, or us just being there, would turn him into the 
monster he was. 

Harold bent forward to lift a couple of paper bags from the floor and
tripped over his own drunkeness. His arms thrust out against the hall 
wall for balance. Taking a deep breath, he lifted one of the packages 
and grabbed me with his other hand. Looking at the other bag that was 
still on the floor, he said..."Bring that bag into the kitchen. You 
hear me!? Yes?...No?...What!?" Afraid to hear my own voice, I inaudibly 
whispered, "Uh-huh." Harold banged and probed the top of my head with 
his steel-like finger tips "Hellooo? Is anybody there?" In pain, 
desperate and confused, I answer with a nod. "Don't you shake your head 
at me." His yellow-stained hands forced my head around. "Look at me 
when I'm talking to you!" 

The tears were swelling in my eyes. I tried to answer but nothing came
out. I was choking on my fear. 

"What's the use, why am I even talking to this fucking idiot?" Harold
stumbles into the kitchen. 

I picked up the bag from the floor and my touch made it come alive. The
whole bag began to pulsate in my arms, then popped and snapped against 
my chest. A hand with teeth broke through the bag. I screamed and 
dropped the bag on the kitchen floor and watched as another toothed 
hand broke through, and another, until the entire bag ripped open. 
Creatures with hard oval bodies sounding like ivory dice clanking 
together, spilled out all over the floor, scattering in all directions. 


"You fuckin stupid, stupid, stupid!...Look at what you did! Can't you do
anything right?! You'll always be a stupid, asshole Jew!" 

Harold rushed to his crabs. Their snapping claws clamped onto one of his
fingers, but he was too numb to feel it. Spotty barked and surrounded 
the crabs. One of them stood its ground, ready to defend itself from 
this undignified harassment. Spotty walked up to the bold crab and 
cautiously sniffed around it. The crab snapped at her nose and Spotty 
jumped back to a safe distance, bravely barking from where she stood. 

Harold corralled all the crabs onto the kitchen table and, one by one,
dropped them into a pot of boiling water. The remaining crabs on the 
table started to panic, as if they had heard the tortured cries of the 
others being boiled alive. The pot was full of squirming crabs tearing 
at each other, ripping off their claws. When they turned a bright red, 
nothing moved, except for the bubbling water that found its way to the 
surface, filtering through, around and between the crabs. 

Harold switched his attention to the other bag and pulled out two
towering bottles of Rheingold beer. They stood there above my head, a 
threat of what to expect for the rest of the night. Harold turned and 
saw me looking at him. From behind his thin, gold-rimmed glasses, he 
gave me a loathing stare and started toward me. "Who the Hell are you 
looking at?!" 

Before he reached me, my Mother walked into the kitchen and
asked..."Harold, vhy don't you trim da tree? Go on, I'll take care of 
the crabs. Sollinue, go in the living room and help." 

I didn't understand, I thought she came into the kitchen to save me and
now she was sending me into the living room to be alone with him. 

For Millie and me the living room was a no man's land, a buffer zone
between their room and ours. It was very large and sparingly furnished. 
The largest piece of furniture was a dark maroon, paisley velvet couch. 
Across the room was a matching chair. Their heavy, dead weight pressed 
hard against the floral linoleum floor. The room had two windows facing 
the backyard. And almost lost on the walls were two very small, cheap 
prints of windjammer ships on a calm sea. That's all there was. 

Oh yes, how could I forget the tall floor lamp standing erect like a
sentry, peeking over the maroon chair, looking like a place used for 
reading. But it was only a prop, because no one ever read in our house. 


My sister, Millie, and I watched as Harold set up the Nativity scene
under the Christmas tree. Each piece was individually wrapped in 
colored tissue paper, packed neatly in little square cardboard 
compartments. He handled them very delicately, as if they were so 
fragile that by just touching them, he would break them. 

My Mom came into the room as Harold started to trim the tree. "Harold,
vhy don't you let da kids help trim da tree?" 

He sharply turned to my Mother, "I'm not going to let a couple of
cocksucking Jew brats go near my tree!" 

"Harold, shush. Don't have such a mouth." 

This is my tree, its my Christmas, and I'm not going to have a couple of
filthy, Jew              Bastards soil my tree by touching it." 

Millie and I knew Mom was pushing Harold a little too far and that at
any moment he was going to ignite. If she wanted peace in the house, 
why didn't she leave him alone and let us go to our rooms? 

But she continued, "Harold, you're right. It is your Christmas and the
children have no presents. Vhy don't you get them presents?" 

Millie and I were relieved when Harold said nothing and continued to
decorate his Christmas tree. 

"Da kids never get presents." 

Why on this particular night did she care about presents when she never
did before? "Come, Harold, it's Christmas. Christmas is for kids. Get 
dem something." 

To my surprise, Harold reluctantly agreed. And then, from out of
nowhere, Mom said..."Millie, Solly, go with him and pick someting." 

Without hesitating, Millie refused and no matter how insistent my Mother
was, Millie couldn't be budged. I had great respect for my sister's 
courage and, even if I was two and a half years younger than her, I 
tried to imitate her by refusing, too. But it didn't do me any good, 
because I couldn't bear my Mom not loving me for any reason. I couldn't 
refuse her. She still had that power over me. It was her love and joy 
of life that kept me alive. 

The situation was hopeless. There was nothing I could say or do to
change my Mother's mind. All she had to do was insist and I was lost, 
forced to go with Harold. What had I done to make her punish me like 
this? 

It was after rush hour and there was no one in the street. No movement,
nothing. The neighborhood was at a standstill. The wind glanced off my 
ears, whistling a warning. Each snowflake thundered down, landing like 
a soft cat's paw. It fell so heavily it dissolved all traces of the 
manmade streets into undulating waves. The glowing circus of lights was 
now trapped in between the thick mountains of snow. 

From time to time, I saw a few stragglers with last minute presents held
tightly under their arms, walking home in the opposite direction. When 
they passed us by, they puzzled at the sight of a little boy and a 
drunken man fighting their way out into the blizzard and back towards 
the Boulevard. I couldn't accept the idea that I was alone with Harold. 
All I could think of was how much I wanted to be home. But this 
nightmare had to be played out. 

My eyelashes were heavy with frozen flakes of snow and I could hardly
see as I fought back my tears. Harold stared down at the snow in front 
of his feet, never saying a word to me, never looking back to see if I 
was still with him. All the way to the toy store, the wind carried 
Harold's resentment into my face. 

The clatter of dangling bells over the door made my skin jump as it
announced our entry into the toy store. "I'm sorry but I'm closing up." 
"Sir, this won't take long just a couple of minutes of your time," 
Harold said in his best polite manner. "Ok, but make it fast. I'd like 
to get home before it gets any worse out there." "Don't worry, Sir, I 
assure you we'll be gone in a few moments." 

Harold was always the perfect gentleman with strangers and especially
with the police. They never suspected he was a cruel bastard. 

Realizing we were standing too close together, Harold stepped away in
disgust, distancing himself from me. He didn't want anyone thinking I 
belonged to him in any way. "Well Stupid, don't just stand there, hurry 
up and get something." 

It was almost impossible to imagine that I...Me, Solly, was in a toy
store able to pick any toy I wanted. Toys I'd always seen in store 
windows, but could never own. And here was my once in a lifetime 
chance, a child's lifetime, in this child's lifetime. But because of 
Harold's all encompassing hatred of me and my deep fear of him, I'd 
have given up all these toys in exchange for being home alone in my 
warm room. I took two small steps into the store and my mind froze. All 
the toys blended together in a blur. 

"Don't you understand English! I said get something! We don't have all
day, move it!" 

I grabbed what was closest to me, a basketball -- a game I didn't like
and never played, or ever wanted to play. The games I loved were street 
games like slug, handball, box baseball, stick ball, triangle baseball. 
These were some of the games my friends and I played. All we needed was 
a cheap, pink Spaldeen rubber ball; no backboards, hoops, or other 
things we couldn't afford. 

But there I was, trekking back home in the storm, carrying a bulging
sphere a third my size, and with a drunken mass of hate. By this time 
of night all the stores were closed, leaving a desert of snow in 
ominous blue shadows. I was lost in this dark and strange place where 
there wasn't a single person to be seen - alone with a monster, never 
to find my way home. 

While we were in the store, it had gotten very cold and the freezing
cold was another insult to my soul. A hat whipped around the corner of 
Hoe Avenue, invading the empty street, followed by the silhouette of a 
man dressed in an overcoat. The stranger's arms and overcoat were 
flapping in all directions. His twists and turns were dictated by the 
deep snow. Desperately he screamed out..."Stop my hat! PLEASE HELP ME! 

"Vhats dis?," said my Mother, looking at the basketball. "Is dat vhat
you pick? My Sollinue, vhat are you going to do vit dat? Its snowing. 
Look. Look out da window, it's the middle of Winter. Vhere are you 
going to use it? Vhere's your brains? Vhat am I going to do vit you?" 
Mom shook her head, sighed, and with her lips puckered, made quick 
rhythmical sounds with her tongue, like dripping water from a leaking 
faucet. "Well, anyvay, vait in the living room, I'll finish mit 
supper." 

Mom had spent most of our lives with Harold keeping us kids away from
him and now, once again she was sending us into the living room to be 
with him. Why was she doing this? 

My sister and I sat quietly on the couch, cringing, hoping and praying
that Christmas Eve would end. Harold walked by, ignoring us, and 
disappeared behind the French doors leading to his bedroom. He was 
gone. Millie and I were alone. We looked at each other, sighed, and 
began to breath again. 

Then from Harold's room, we heard him rummaging through dresser drawers,
heard doors opening and closing. It all stopped abruptly, followed by a 
thick silence, as if someone breathed in and forgot to breathe out. 

Suddenly and with a lively gait, Harold proudly burst into the living
room holding a long, black leather case with a big bump at one end. He 
opened the case and a golden light glistened out into the room. It was 
a trombone, with engraved curlicues spiraling up and down and around 
the instrument. A real trombone, not just a picture of one, or 
something I saw in the movies. It was real and right in front of me. 
Looking closer, I noticed that it was in pieces. Each piece was 
snuggled in its own dark, purple-blue velvet bed. All the pieces 
smoothly slid together, gently clicking in place. 

Harold caressed the slide with soft hands, pushing the paper clip-like
shape back and forth in long and quick short strokes. This controlled 
the deep, bellowing, fart-like sounds vibrating out of the bell shape 
at its end. After he tuned up, Harold began to play excerpts of music 
he knew. And in between these abbreviated tunes, he stopped to 
reminisce about his illustrious career as a musician. 

"I played with the big ones. I played with the best of them, the best of
the bands. I never had to have an audition, they all heard of me. His 
eyes glazed over and almost mumbling to himself, Harold's mind walked 
through swollen thoughts. 

"I had a distinguished reputation. Yeah...a brilliant future....I was
respected then." Harold throbs out of his numb stupor. "Vaudeville! 
Yes! I played for the big names, like Jack Benny. That's right, Jack 
Benny, and others just as great. 

My best friend was a songwriter and I was there when he thought of the
song... a classic, 'Yes we Have No Bananas.' He was my best friend." 

Like his trombone, Harold slid into a different tune. "I'm an educated
man, a college graduate. Brilliant. Yes, brilliant. I could have been 
anything I wanted to be. Do you understand, they respected me. They all 
respected me. I could have been anything, anything, anything. "Harold 
stared off to the side, almost crying. 

He switched gears again and played another tune. Looking straight at me,
he said..."Books, wonderful books of great men, Ralph Waldo Emerson, 
Thoreau, "Walden Pond" - "If a man does not keep pace with his 
companions, it is because he hears a different drummer!" 

Harold asked me, "Do you know what I mean?" 

The quote and the strange names meant nothing to me. I was only
listening to my fear. All I knew was that they were just sound, coming 
from a face with sticky, white gook at the corners of its eyes and spit 
that bubbled and pulled from its lips, leaving a thick rim of white 
coating around the edges of its mouth. 

Then, Harold asked me the question he always asked me, over and over
again..."How old are you?" It was his subtle way of telling me I was 
very dumb for my age. By this time I knew it was a rhetorical question, 
so I didn't answer and turned away. Wrong move. 

"You little Prick, look at me when I'm talking to you. Look at me!" His
arm shot out like a steam shovel and shoved me deep into the couch, 
leaving a lingering hurt in my chest. I tried but I couldn't bear to 
look into Harold's hating eyes. Instead, I concentrated on his 
forehead. "That's better." Harold put his angry face inches away from 
mine. "Do you know what I do with my life now? I break my balls in a 
freezing cold shipyard, lifting as much as two to three hundred pounds 
everyday. Everyday! For what? A Jew Whore and her little Bastards. You 
don't understand a word I'm saying, do you? Do you?!" 

I was in a desperate dilemma, if I kept silent it would anger him and if
I gave the wrong answer he'd kill me. 

"Answer me! You stupid little Cocksucker!" My decision was made for me
because I had nothing to say. So I said nothing. This infuriated him 
and he came at me like an angry bull. 

Harold grabbed me and his knuckles pressed against my bony chest,
pulling at both sides of my shirt and scrunching my shoulders together. 
"You brainless Shit." 

In the middle of Harold's tirade, my attention focused on the cigarette
that never left his lips. It had burned down almost to his mouth, with 
a long trail of ash still attached, replacing the cigarette that was 
once there. Throughout his violent attacks, the ash never fell off. 
What kept it there? Why didn't it fall off? 

Harold didn't know what to do with me. My silence frustrated him into a
rage, and he threw me to the floor. My situation was hopeless. There 
was no fight left in me. 

Harold grabbed an open bottle of beer next to him and poured it over my
head. It flowed down my face and into my eyes. I couldn't blink fast 
enough to stop the burning pain. Rubbing my eyes just made it worse. 
Who could ever have known that a simple thing like beer could hurt so 
much. 

Harold stood Millie and I up against a blank wall in the living room.
(Millie smartly realized that this was not the time to rebel) "Hitler. 
I love that man. A wonderful, brilliant man. He  knows the truth. He 
knows what you really are. You're not human. You little Jews are filthy 
animals -- slimy, crawling little roaches. America just doesn't 
understand; he doesn't want our country. All he wants is to help the 
world to once and for all rid us of you fucking maggots. He's 
brilliant! But I don't think its being done fast enough. I'm afraid the 
war might end before he finishes the job." 

I couldn't understand what he meant about the Jews. I didn't know what
Jewish was. All I knew was that I was Jewish. It wasn't my fault. I had 
nothing to do with it. It was just a word to me. It could have been 
just another part of my anatomy, like the arm, the liver, the lung, the 
jaw, the Jew. But Harold was an educated man and he seemed to know what 
a Jew was. And what I was. So, it must be so. 

"Vhats going on in dere?" Mom rushed in from the kitchen. "Supper is
finished and if you vant to eat you leave the children alone. 

After having worked up a good appetite, Harold walked calmly into the
kitchen. Millie and I started for our rooms, what we had done every 
night since Harold came to live with us, was to eat alone in our rooms. 


"Vhere are you two going? Come, ve're all going to eat together." She
said it like she was doing us a favor. I sank down into the chair, lost 
behind the rectangle of the enamel kitchen table. The silence was heavy 
and full of tension. Millie and I could practically touch each others' 
thoughts; we could hear them screaming out for someone to save us. 
Harold began to pontificate again about his great intelligence, 
spouting excerpts of books he had read, and once more repeated the 
quote from "Walden Pond." 

"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because
he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music..." 

While Harold droned on, I thought to myself, 'Here is a man who talks
about books and I've never seen him read one. In fact, there wasn't a 
single book in the apartment. Not one. And here is a man who tells us 
that he is a great musician, but never listens to music.' 

"Sit up! Don't slouch. And get your elbows off the table." "Harold, let
the Boy eat." "Eat?! He'll eat the way I tell him to eat. This is my 
house and it's my money that's paying for that food." My Mother 
retorted..."I also work hard to pay for dat food." 

Harold conveniently ignored what she said and changed the subject back
to me. "The little retard eats like a pig. You don't just eat one thing 
at a time. You go around your plate like this, (Harold demonstrates.) 
and you eat a little of everything," 

Harold might have been right, but his seething hate turned my stomach. I
didn't even want to look at the food. But food meant everything to my 
Mom. She begged me..."Please Solly, eat." 

The phone rang from their bedroom. My Mom went to answer, leaving us
alone again with Harold. He looked at me with contempt, his lips 
pressed tightly together into two thin lines holding back his hatred. 
In a low voice that sucked back his anger, "Eat... your...supper." 

:I can't. I don't feel good." 

"You think I'm a fool? I know what you're trying to do. When I say you
eat, you eat!" 

Harold got up and stood over me. He scooped up a handful of large boiled
potato pieces from my plate and ground them into my face, trying to 
force them down my throat. His yellowed fingers smelled of tobacco and 
alcohol, mingled with his sweaty hands. He grabbed another handful and 
mashed them up into my nose and mouth. The potatoes overflowed from my 
mouth and squeezed through his fingers, crumbling down to the kitchen 
floor. 

Whatever he could not get into me, he continued to smash on my face
until I couldn't catch my breath. I was suffocating and he wouldn't 
stop. 

My Mother ran into the room. "Harold, vhat are you doing? You Son of a
Bitch, he's choking!" 

I coughed up most of the potatoes except for a small lump that lodged
between my nose and throat. Tears ran down my face, My Mother held a 
handkerchief to my nose..."Blow hard! Quick, blow!" I blew hard and it 
cleared my passageway. I clung to my Mom like a vise, while I took in 
trembling gulps of air. 

"You could of killed the Boy! He's only eight - a baby. Vhat's wrong vit
you? How could you do such tings to a small child? Vhat kind of man are 
you? Your hands should only fall off!" 

"Your little prick is not so innocent. He knows what he did. He's just
trying to get away with it." 

"Vhat are you talking? Get away vit vhat?" "Listen Bitch, this is my
house and he's going to live by my rules." "Noooo! You're just drunk 
and you're going to leave him alone. Solly, Millie, go to your rooms." 

Thank God, at last! Harold pushed my Mom aside and put his face into
mine... "Listen, and listen good. If I hear so much as a peep from your 
room, I'll kill you. That you understand, don't you? Now you little 
Moron, get to your room like y our Mother said." 

Who was this man? Why did he despise me so? Maybe it was true. Maybe I
was mentally retarded. Maybe I was horrible, contemptible and ugly. 
After all, Harold should know...he was an intelligent man. 

Behind my closed door, I could hear Harold's deep, guttural
whiskey-phlegm, wrenching up his evil self. At that very moment, I felt 
an irritation in my throat. Breathing in created a tickle that 
triggered a cough. I tried to smother it with my blanket, but it was no 
use. A muffled cough escaped from my room. Harold's reaction was swift. 
He must have been waiting and listening for any excuse to punish me for 
whatever he thought I had done to him. He ran down the hall. Each of 
his steps were like hard blows to my head. The Great Beast broke into 
my room..."You mother-fuckin' Jew Bastard! Make fun of me will you!" 

My Mom was right behind him and stepped between us..."Leave him alone!
Don't you touch him!" 

Harold warned her..."Get out of my way." 

She didn't move. "Christmas, Chrustmas! It's all bullshit isn't it? You
Phony! All this love and peace means nothing to you...Harold, if you 
love me don't do this." 

"You Jewess Whore! Get out of my way." 

"Harold!" 

Harold's eyes narrowed and leered at my Mom..."Last night I kissed and
licked your Jewish cunt. Love you? Isn't that enough love for you? Next 
time you can suck my Christian dick." 

"Harold! Harold, please, the children." 

Since Harold moved in with us, I developed a system to escape listening
to all the garbage that spewed from his educated, Christian mouth. I 
learned to create a distorted clogging sound in my ears, like the 
middle of a yawn. I became very proficient at it and in time was able 
to prolong the pulsating effect that vibrated over and over into my 
brain. Not only could I dull my hearing, I could also lose all 
connection to anything outside myself. I couldn't hear or think of 
anything else but the erratic vibrations in my head. 

But it didn't work this time. There was no escaping Harold. He broke
through my defenses when he tore my Mother's dress into shreds. 

"You're nothing to me...You and your little fuckin' retard...Nothing!"
He hit me on the head with his concrete knuckles. "The very sight of 
you makes me sick." 

Harold, enough already. I beg of you." 

Harold was out of control and my Mom tried to run. He grabbed her hair,
turned her around and, with his bulging fist, punched her in the 
stomach, sending her crumbling to the floor. 

Mom's voice was weak and low,..."Please Harold, you're going to kill me.
Please." 

Harold looked down at her and answered with a grunt, turned and walked
away exhausted. It felt so natural to hate this man. 

A dead, meaty thud shook the apartment. It was Harold, passing out onto
the living room floor, next to his Nativity scene. This was the time of 
the Weekly Collection, our family's religious ritual. Every Friday and 
on holidays, Harold would pass out and my Mom would take up the 
Collection duties by searching Harold's pants pockets for his pay 
envelope. If she didn't, she'd never see that money again. 

Harold lay unconscious on the floor, outlined by a puddle of urine and
wallowing in his own shit. I closed my door to separate me from the 
smell of his filth that seeped into my room. 

I wore my room like the clothes on my back. The dresser, chair, bed,
walls and ceiling were saturated with my energy. Everything in that 
room carried my scent. It was my room and now was my time. The rest of 
this night belonged to me. When the lights were on, my room was a safe 
place. 

But later, when the lights were out, I was transported into an
impenetrable blackness. This blackness oozed down over my face, 
engulfing me in its endless nothing. Opening my eyes as wide as I 
could, I would strain and stare into the thick darkness, but see only 
the black night flooding back through my eyes and into every corner of 
my thoughts. 

There was an uneasy truce between me and the ominous silence of the
pitch black room. After awhile I could sense a presence. There was 
someone or something in my room with me. I could hear it stirring -- it 
was watching me. Slowly, it materialized into barely perceptible, 
fuzzy, agitated dots that connected and formed into distorted 
threatening phantoms. 

The dark shadows would begin to bend and waver in and out of the black
ink. Their evolving contours swelled to enormous proportions that 
hovered above me. Every night they made an appearance and every night 
they got closer, devouring anything in their path. I would feel their 
groping hunger pulling me towards them. And every night there was a 
moment when they were about to reveal themselves to me. and if they 
did, I knew I would be lost and in their power. 

I had only one way to escape and that was under my blanket, my magic
shield. With my blanket over my head, I didn't exist. I became 
invisible to their world. In the crisp smell of clean ironed sheets, my 
dark brown, bakelite radio and I cuddled together under my blanket 
tent, creating my own world, safe from their invading eyes. 

Turning on the radio was an exciting ritual. Watching the pin-pointed
lights of the tubes grow brighter and brighter until their warm golden 
glow and the odor of the hot tubes heating against the plastic shell, 
filled my tent. I peeped out from a tiny crack of the corner of my 
blanket and the radio's light streamed out into the room, sending the 
monsters back to their world of conditions -- back to a fragile sleep 
waiting to awake again, always waiting. I closed the breach in my 
blanket, and I was back in my fortification against evil. 

Inside my safe place, I wondered if those beings in the night were
really out there, or did they need me to live. Did my energy give them 
life? I had this sinking feeling I belonged to them. And they were out 
there in limbo waiting for me to breathe life into them. 

Crackle... squeak... crackle... Sensitive to my touch, the radio
complained when I turned its dial ever so gently between the static, 
until I found the show I was searching for. 

Looking through the transparent plastic bubble of the radio's
rectangular face, I fell into a trance and stared inside the bubble at 
the musical Emerson trade mark, the illuminated dial and the gold 
parallel lines that ran like tracks around the edges of the rectangle, 
holding the station numbers together. To the left of the dial was a 
woven fabric that spoke to me in sounds that fired my imagination. 

This is how I spent the rest of Christmas Eve, with my surrogate family,
Jack Benny, Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy. I sometimes didn't even 
understand their jokes. But just hearing their voices every week, grown 
people laughing and doing fun things together, endeared me to them as 
intimate friends. I had other favorites like The Shadow, The Lone 
Ranger, The Green Hornet, Superman, Tom Mix -- a list that went on and 
on. Each show had its own theme music. I didn't know at the time they 
were mostly excerpts from classical music, but it meant more to me than 
the show itself. It thrilled me with great expectations of things to 
come. 

That music became an integral part of me - as if a nail had been
hammered into a young tree and when the tree grew, it grew around the 
nail and over the years the nail became part of the tree, fused 
together forever. And that's what the theme music did -- became a part 
of me, fused together forever. By chance, when I hear that music today, 
I become that child again, thrilled with the same expectations, but 
with the melancholy of lost innocence. 

Many of the shows weren't that good, in fact some were just terrible,
but the basic ideas teased the images in my mind and made the story 
plots better than they were. The radio made me the creator of my own 
theatre. I was the writer, director, scene designer, cinematographer 
and the actors of the play. 

Every Christmas, at the end of each program, the actors would step out
from the restrictions of their characters and wish me a Merry Christmas 
and each time they gave me a warm special Christmas of my own. 

"My Sollinue, are you asleep?" My Mom's soft, low, deeply rich voice
invaded the room and broke into my private, place. I was angry at her 
for what she put me through with Harold, so I ignored her and pretended 
to be asleep. Mom sensed that I was faking sleep. She stroked me with 
her infectious laugh, then gently kissed my forehead. Her warmth 
penetrated my tense wall of protection, melting it all away and 
everything was right again. 

After all the pain Harold inflicted on me that night, I was still alive.
Eventually Harold's violence and my fear became part of me, from living 
with it day after day, year after year. It never got easier, but just 
like any other habit, it was a part of my daily routine. I got used to 
it. 

At night, Spotty's nails tapped an uneven rhythm on the linoleum floor,
as she strolled through the long hall between Millie's room and mine, 
sharing her love by sleeping with each of us for part of the night. 
Late at night, it was Spotty's apartment and we belonged to her. And 
when all of her possessions were quietly gathered together in the same 
place, this was when she patrolled the apartment to protect what she 
owned. 

...                                                                  (c)
2003 Sol Rothman - All rights reserved. 

E-mail: rothmanstudios@earthlink.net 


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