Korê in New York

What happens when a kid refuses to leave the past behind? What happens when the past won't go away? Read on and don't worry about the emotional damage.

1. Returnings

   I came to my senses hanging on to the boardwalk railing in Coney Island. I knew what I had to do and it was not going home, not empty handed either. Larisa watched me search the Fairway web site on the computer in her family’s living room while a younger brother looked on afraid I was a bad influence. Well I was, but not in the way he thought.

   “Can you come with me to Red Hook to Fairway?” I asked my friend. “I need to pick up a few things.”

   “It’s seven thirty,” Larisa’s mother poked her face out of the kitchen.

   “That’s still early,” I answered and then wished I had been more tactful. “It will be light for at least an hour and the store closes at ten. We’ll be long gone by then.” Simple logic does not work with most adults. “My Dad is coming home from abroad very late tonight. He’s been gone for two weeks. I need to make him something so he doesn’t open up an empty refridgerator. Also, my stepsister ran way to North Carolina.”

   “I’m sorry,” sighed Larisa’s mother who then said something in Hebrew.

   “Can we go to Red Hook so I can pick up a few things to make my Dad a Waldorf Salad please?” I asked.

   “You want to make a what?” asked Larisa’s mother. This was a misstep, not that I was suggesting pork chops. Dad did not eat pork or any red meat. He did not even eat chicken or turkey if he could help it.

   “Waldorf salad, but without the nuts.” Nervy despised nuts. “Celery, apples, golden raisins, dried peaches, manyonaise, lemon juice, and spices. I need to get the celery and dried peaches.”

   “OK,” answered Larisa’s mom but she said her daughter had to come back by herself and then she asked if we knew the way. We’d need to take a train and then a bus. We’d take the bus back together and then head our separate ways on the subway. Larisa’s mother had just given her daughter noblesse oblige. I was not the only kid in the world with such privileges and boy did that feel good!

   That said, Larisa was not used to being out at night. She asked me why I had suddenly thought of Waldorf Salad. “I’ve been wallowing in self pity and not thinking of my family,” I answered.

   “You were depressed,” Larisa commented.

   “Who wouldn’t be. It’s not easy when a stepsister runs away and you don’t know where your sister is living this summer, and…” I thought of Kyril. I did not want to think of Kyril. He and I are basically through. That makes a nice, neat ending of things. I should know, however, from my experiences with the Fast Crowd that there are no nice, neat endings to anything.

   We made the train to bus transfer without a hitch. I liked that the subway was full of working people, men in coveralls, women in medical garb, others in soiled clothes, going and coming to second shift  jobs. Everyone had a job. I had a job. I was a daughter, a sibling, a student, a lighting tech, a computer programmer, and a restorer of old computer equipment. I could use office software and interpret literature and had a mind for historiography. It was time to be the important person who I really was.

   Larisa watched me seek out the dried fruit department and buy the red package of Sunmaid dried peaches and a big head of celery. I was not sure what to do with the leaves of the celery, but I’d save them for the relish tray. I explained about relish trays to Larisa as we waited for the bus to take us back across Brooklyn. It was dark now. The buildings were black canyons with white, blue, and yellow lights where people were eating supper, or watching TV, or having quiet conversations, and occasionally ugly fights.

   It felt very sad saying goodbye to Larisa at the subway. I realized I was full of raw places inside. Some of them were raw places I forgot about day to day. Tonight they were all out as if someone had taken my skin and turned it inside out so they could see all the neat stuff on the  underside of it.

   Of course Dad aws not home. Flemming, who was on duty that night, told me so. He also remarked that it was nearly 10pm. I told him it was all right with RoAnn. I had called from the Fairway in Red Hook. I did not realize until I was on the elevator that Flemming did not ask what I bought or comment on the celery. How many teen age kids walk around with a celery?

   RoAnn was in the Office/Study. Nervy was all ready asleep. RoAnn asked if I was going to study. I studied for an hour, which did not feel like much, and then I went to make the Waldorf Salad. RoAnn, who thought I was eating, came in the kitchen to keep me company. She asked what I was making. She wrinkled up her nose. “It’s good,” I insisted. “I don’t even think about stuff like this,” she sighed.

   “Somebody has to,” I answered. “It’s my ecological niche.”

   “You’re right,” RoAnn smiled sadly.

   “Did you and Ivanna talk tonight?” I knew where the conversation had to go. It really was not so bad.

   “Yes and we argued and we fought. We always do.” RoAnn kept smiling. RoAnn’s job was to be braver than any one else, and that included me.

   I finished making the Waldorf Salad and took some goodies from the relish tray, made my sandwiches, and replenished the tray so I could have my dinner for tonight and Nervy’s and my lunch ready for the next day. I knew my part. RoAnn had coffee and an ice cream sandwich while I ate dinner.

   She asked me about the trip to Red Hook and “what posessed you to go there?”

   “I realized it was faster than going all the way up to Harlem and that Dad needs something when he gets here.”

   “Smart move,” RoAnn complimented me.

   I studied well into the night, and then I realized by around two in the morning that I was in no mood for sleeping. I think I fered nightmares even if they are only dreams. I put down the Math B and decided to check for Dad. He was not home yet. I hoped he would get home before I had to leave for school. Then I checked the cupboards.We had no wrinkled olives and the fruit bowl in the fridge looked a bit empty.

   I got some Dwayne Reade bags and put my winter coat over my nightie. RoAnn heard the dead bolt lock turn.

   “Where are you going, Kore?” It takes a lot to make RoAnn sound genuinely alarmed. She also had been asleep and looked sad and dissheveled.

   “Down to the pantry closet. I’m going to replenish the shelves.”

   “Can’t you sleep?” RoAnn asked me.

   “No,” I told her.

   “OK, be back soon,” she gave me her blessing. There is not much you can do for insomnia except something useful. I needed Dad, I realized. I needed him in the worst way.

   And when I came upstairs, I found him sitting on the day bed in the Office/Study. He had come in while was gathering jars of olives for the kitchen. RoAnn had come out of bed to talk to him in sad whispers.

   “You need your sleep Kore,” Dad greeted me.

   “I can skip it for one night,” I answered. “Go check the fridge Dad,” I advised him. He sampled the Waldorf Salad.

   “Do you hear anything from Kyril?” I asked. The words tumbled out before I could stop them. I hated myself for even speaking them. I wanted nothing to do with Kyril, and why should Dad. Kyril was a lost cause, but that was what I used to think about Nervy Worm.

   “I email him and he doesn’t respond. He refuses visitation.” Dad dismissed his only son in two statements. “I do keep in touch with the family that is taking care of him. They remind me of people I used to work with in Pennsylvania….I’m glad I’m not doing mine remediation any more.”

   “Is working for ECBAS better?” I could not resist.

   “In some ways. I get to design stuff instead of clean up other people’s messes. It pays well too and when it’s over…I’ll find something else.”

   “Are you afraid Kyril will go back to Barry?” I asked.

   “Do you know where Barry is?” Dad countered. He was up for this game, and RoAnn wasn’t stopping it.

   I shook my head. I was glad Barry was gone and I did not have to miss him. Still I made a wild guess. “Jail!”

   “No, Scranton, PA. He never left. He was a football coach at the high school and still is not that they have many games now that the high school is Academic Optional or whatever the Pennsylvania version of it is.”

   “You kept track of him?” I wasn’t sure Dad was lying. Maybe I really was tired.

   “Yes. The past never disappears,” Dad said. “It’s a question of making more of it.”

   “You’re not telling me to live in the present.”

   “You’re here and present now,” Dad said and nearly laughed. I realized we all needed sleep but in two hours, I had to get dressed and head to school. Dad would sleep in. Dad would watch Nervy and me while RoAnn went up to Ithaca to try and get Ivanna back. Dad was going to be here for about a week and a half. That should have made me ecstatic, only now there was too much going on and if you want to think about it, I was very much living in the present.

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