Strangers In Our Midst

Geri Lipschultz

Grandma

I tell people only what I want them to know. Why should they know my business? My daughter-in-law sees me sitting here. She sits down on the rocking chair and asks me am I okay.

"Sure," I tell her. "Why not?"

"It's late. I thought you'd be sleeping already."

"It's hot," I say.

"Just try to relax," she says. "The attic fan is on."

"Okay."

She says I look like I’m thinking. I just smile. She tells me my grandson, Billy, studied the Asian culture in his university. He learned that the Chinese don't express their feeling. "Is that true?" she asks.

"My mother never kissed me. My father never kissed me. No one told me they loved me. The last time I ever saw my father, I was eight years old. Not like here, kissy, kissy."

Rachel - she has a sense of humor. She gets a gleam in her round eye, says, "Grampa must have had some kissy-kissy! You have five sons!"

But Grampa and I, we don't have that kind of love. "Grampa, he saved my life, Rachel," I say to her.

"I know," she says. "Is that what you are thinking about?"

"Not especially."

"Don't you think you ought to take off your hat, Mom?"

"You know where I can catch the subway?"

"Tomorrow, Stuart will drive you back to the city. I'll tuck you in."

"No, thank you."

Rachel yawns, her hand with a jade bracelet covering her mouth. She reaches over and takes my hat from my head. Then she stretch-stretches her body and places my hat on the far end of the couch. She gets up, looks around, turns off the light, says, "Good night, Mom. Please try to sleep."

"Okay," I say. Soon as she gets up from the rocking chair, a man comes and sits down. He watches me. I try to close my eyes, but then he climbs on top of me.

"Get off," I say. I sit up again. I reach for my hat, and then I pull myself up. Everything is dark, except now there are two men. I pick up my bag, and I watch my step. I tell these men to leave but they don't. They just look away. So, I will go, then. I tell the dog to shoosh, but he barks. The only one that knows something is happening is the dog. But who believes a dog? He barks no matter what. He sees what I see, and more. I go out the damn door. I take my tiny steps. No railing, so I’d better watch. That dog barks still. Nobody notices. They think it’s a squirrel. Or a bunny. They don't think Grandma.

Now, outdoors. Dark. Usually I'm afraid, but no more being afraid for me. Somebody tries anything; old lady has got her gun. I practice saying, "I got gun. I got gun."

Even I believe it.

"I got gun."

I say it low, scary-like, "I got gun."

It's Aurora's toy, but I cover it in cotton, so it looks real.

Only use if necessary.

I have got food. Aurora gave it to me. She must think I am a pig.

Another thing I have, too. My secret. I have got it deep in, sewed up.

I have never liked to travel. One trip to America. Almost sixty years ago. I sat in the park. Waited for Grampa to come home from his job. Just wait, all night. I was not afraid then, either. Imagine if I sat in the park now?

My son Stuart, his wife is nice enough, but she's no daughter. Grampa always said, too bad we have no daughter. But I don’t need anyone to take care of me. I got my nursing degree. I got medals for service. I worked for the Veteran's hospital. Thirty-five years. I retired – then it just happens Grampa gets sick. For two years I took care of him. I lost twenty-five pounds. Now I have just gained three pounds. My daughter-in-law, she's a good cook. She learned from Grampa. Still, she's no daughter.

I'm smart. No one fools Grandma. I know what they plan for me. I saw what happened in the hospital, what they did to the old people. My sons, they have got my deed. I have asked for it, and I can’t find it. It means they have got it. It’s not right, that I worked thirty-five years as a nurse, and they don't want me to live in my house. Now, the villains come to my house. So, Stuart takes me here, to Jersey. I'm gonna take it back from those imps. I got my bag, and my Aurora gun.

Otherwise they will throw me in the hospital again. I ask what is it come to that they experiment on the staff, now? They took off my panties. For what? I know I'm fine. They put the needle in me, and my arm is still black and blue. They let me soil myself, and then they took away my nightclothes where I had put my wallet. But no one tricks Grandma. I got up and went through the basket of nightclothes. I found my wallet with two hundred dollar bills. A night worker, he slugged me, put me back in my bed. That's why my arm is bruised.

I had a million tests. Every one of them came out negative. They think I'm crazy, but it turns out to be the drugs. They could have killed me.

Aurora's brother, Billy, he laughs at me. He says, "Grandma, there's no one there."

I say, "That is what you think."

And now, I have got this gun.

It is dark, and I am tired, but no sleep.

*

Aurora

I hear her now. She told me not to tell, but still I am knocking on my parents’ bedroom. They do not answer. I am sure my grandmother is not in her bed. I hear the dogs. Both of them. Even Hansel, the old stinker. Barking. My grandmother told me that she wanted to leave. I thought she was joking. She told me not to tell anyone, not even my mama. "Mama gets VERY angry," said Grandma. "Do NOT tell. It is our secret." But now I don’t know what to do. I sneaked out of bed because I heard her, and now she’s not on the couch. I keep knocking, but they don’t even hear the dogs. I know she's out there. I'm afraid she will get hurt. I go upstairs and tell Billy. He's my brother, so he'll help me.

"Aurie," he says, his breath full of monkey gas. "Aurie, what's the matter? Why are you crying? Aurie, you're going to wet my bed. Mom will think I peed in my pants."

But even that doesn't make me stop. Not even for a second. I'm in that state where I think I'm running out of breath. Billy lunges out of bed and stands me up. Then he carries me close to his chest and rubs my back. Before I know it, I've told him everything I promised not to tell.

Billy's screaming now. We're at the back door. It's so dark out you can't see anything. He's calling, "Grandma, Grandma." Finally, he turns on the light, and we see her sitting there, on the deck. She doesn't look up.

"She's not even turning her head," Billy says. "Go get Daddy."

"He's sleeping," I, who have already tried and failed to do this, say.

"Tell him that Grandma's on the loose, again."

Daddy hears me now. He puts me in bed with Mama, and we cuddle, close as can be, our spit and shadows all mixed up, and I'm falling asleep in her warm shadow.

*

Grandma

I've got five sons, but Stuart, he's the best. He is always good, never gives me any trouble. This guy, he looks like Stuart, but Stuart doesn't live here. He is in Jersey.

"Mother," he says, this man. He calls me Mother, just like Stuart. "Come inside."

"I don't know you," I say. "I am not going in your house. I will find my own house."

"This is your house, Mother," says this man.

"I know. So why you do want to go in my house?”

"It's my house, too."

"Go home," I say. "Leave me alone or I call the cops." I am not afraid. I hold onto my pocket book where I have hidden Aurora’s gun, but it's not necessary. Not yet. My eyes trick me. That’s what they say. He looks like my son. But I think I know my own house, thank you. I say it to the man who looks like my best son.

"Of course you do," he says.

I see that he is walking close to me. "I am not afraid of you," I say.

"Mother," he says again, and then he grabs me. I know he wants my money, but I am no match for this man. I just hold still, no fight. I wait for an opportunity to take out Aurora’s gun.

"I gonna have to get help," he says, this man.

He leaves, but I prepare for when he comes back. Where did I put Aurora’s gun? Ayi, I try to get off the floor of this house. That dog, he pushed me down. I yell for Stuart. He will come. He's good. A doctor. He works hard. His wife is lazy. American, that's why. Kids lazy, too. Billy, he watches video all day. Aurora is like Grandma. We are born in the year of the Serpent. Strong. Lucky. Nobody knows what we think.

*

Billy

It's not that she's heavy. In fact she's goddamn light. But it creeps me out to pick her up, even when I'm just helping my father. So far, she hasn't resisted, just somehow, her passivity itself feels like a kind of resistance, makes it something I just don't want to do. As if I could refuse my father. God knows how long she'll stay on the couch. They oughtta leash her up. That's what mom says. Mom's funny about this, but Dad's not. He says, "Wonder if she'd be so funny if it were her mother." And she says, "If it were my mother, she wouldn't be in our house." And he says, "Your mother had an easy life." So it goes. I wonder if they'll get a divorce over this. They should have gotten divorced years ago. I would have divorced both of them. I mean I love them and all, but they don't go together. If I were to write a book, this is how it would begin. "My parents decided to get a legal separation the summer after my freshman year of college, when my grandmother came to stay with us." Great. Just great.

I'm trying to back to sleep, but I'm having trouble, so I go downstairs real quietly because I don't want to wake her up. I taught myself how to walk like this when I was younger than Aurie, when I used to sneak past my parents' room when they were asleep or galloping. I call it galloping because that's what I thought they were doing when I was little. My parents are animals--that's why they don't get divorced so easily, I figure. Anyway, I was always stealing cookies that my other grandmother would bring when she visited. She passed away seven years ago when Aurie was just a toddler. All Aurie remembers of her is what we tell her, endless varieties of things Mom is forever planting in her brain. I'd love to have one of those cookies now. But no one can duplicate them because she made them without a recipe, just a feel. I'm an exact kind of guy, and I can't bear it when things aren't precisely the way I expect them to be, the way I've been led to expect them, that is, and in that way I'm like the Teng side of the family. My hidden temper I've also inherited from them. Otherwise, I'm all Goldsmith. I even look like her, my mother. But not Aurie. Aurie came straight from China, by way of the Jews. Anyway, here I am, settling for a piece of goddamn fruit, a nectarine that someone put into the refrigerator before it ripened. I'm chomping into its icy interior, still looking for something better, when I feel a sudden tap on my bare back. I'm jumping out of my skin, startled, and a scream escapes from my throat. "What? Grandma?"

"What this?" she says.

"The refrigerator, Grandma," I say stupidly. "Are you hungry." I look past those eyes which are caves. She is carrying her two little bags, one on her shoulder, stooped down so that she's about at my chest. She is looking plaintively at me. She has on that white beret with the topknot. I take a quick gander at the clock. It's three A.M.

"I am going home now," she says. "Can you please tell me where I can find the subway?"

I take another bite and swallow, and then I lead her back to the couch, which is covered in bedding. I twist on a lamp and point to the clock on the mantle, which clearly tells its time, Roman numerals and all. "See how late it is, Grandma," I say. "The subways are not running now. Now you go to sleep. Tomorrow you can go back to Queens. Daddy will drive you. There are no subways in New Jersey, Grandma."

"Oh," she says. She stands at the foot of the couch with that vacant look, her whole body the letter C.

"Time to go to sleep, Grandma," I say, exasperated.

"Okay," she says but has not made any effort to lie down or even drop her bags.

"Want me to help you?"

"No, that's okay," she says.

"Why aren't you lying down?"

"Shhh," she says, her finger in front of her mouth.

"Don't worry," I say. "Aurie and Daddy are fast asleep. They sleep soundly. Nothing wakes them."

She nods, and then whispers, "Somebody is in the bed."

"There's no one in the bed, Grandma."

"You don't see a man there?"

"Where?" I am looking all around the house.

"There," she says, pointing at the pillow on the couch which has been her bed for the better part of the summer.

"It's a pillow," I say and make some mad attempt to stamp out the hallucination with the palm of my hand, the same inane thing I've seen my father do. "See? It's nothing." I've never been so convincing.

Somehow I get her to put her bags down, remove her hat and lie down.

I pile three blankets on top of her, even as she tells me to stop. I figure three blankets probably weigh more than she does. They might hold her down until morning. Almost as good as a leash, I'm thinking, sadist that I am. I give her a kiss good night, planting a little one on her smooth, cool cheeks, which have, I'm sorry to say, a wretched smell.

"Goodnight, Grandma."

"Too hot," she cries, but I pretend not to hear. I turn off all the lights but the one in the hallway, which leads to our one bathroom. As I march up the stairs, I pray to all the eastern and western gods that my grandmother will not have to pee.

*

Grandma

I see them, but I don't say anything. My daughter-in-law, she told me to pretend they're not here.  But how would she feel, to sleep with a strange man on top of her? I don't dare close my eyes with that villain in the rocking chair. Why does he keep staring at me? Five people looking in the window. But the dogs do not bark. Where is he now? Oh, there he is, snoring on floor. The other dog is upstairs with Billy. He only barks if other one does. Whoever thought Grandma would live with dogs in the house? Well, it's not my house. I tell Stuart I feel like a chicken without a house when I am here. Stuart says his house is my house. My house in Queens is lucky. It just happens that I'm alone now. It has been three years, almost. Can you believe it?

How can I sleep with so many blankets. I reach inside to make sure my wallet is in my pocket, then reach back out to pull off one layer. Hard to move my leg. It feels like I'm crushing to death. Slowly, I kick- kick covers off, and sit up. It's cooler that way. I wonder what time is it. Still a little dark out. I get up slowly, little by little, and step by step to the bathroom. Knock- knock- knock, then go in and do my business. I turn the handle but the door jams. Grandma, pull! I pull- pull- pull. Then push-push-push. Try again, pull- pull- pull - then push- push -- OH.

Big sound, like a tree falling, crunch of bones. They're mine. I fall. If I cry, they will take me to the hospital. So no sound comes out from me. Oh, it hurts. But I am fine. I move fingers. I move toes. Fine. Hear steps. Uh-oh. Someone is going to find me. Lucky, I got my wallet right here. All my identification.

Lucky, just Aurora.

"I am fine, Aurora. Pick me up."

She tries, but then she falls. She cries. "You hurt?" I ask. But she just cries more.

Then Rachel stands like a tower over us. My daughter-in-law is quite tall.

"What happened?" she wants to know.

I smile. "I am fine."

Aurora climbs into her arms, whimpering. She is okay, too, says her mom.

She tells Aurora to go into the bedroom, and she asks me if it is okay to pick me up. She tells me she remembers I am a nurse, so I know how bad it is to move a patient with broken bones. She walks me slowly to my bed.

"Want me to wake Stuart?" she asks.

"No, he asks too many questions. If he were here, I would still be on the floor."

"Mom," she says. "Why are Aurora's toys in your bag?"

"Probably she was playing," I say. I look at her hands going through my things. "What do you think you are doing?"

"I should probably do your laundry," she says, "before Stuart takes you back."

"I don't need you to do anything."

"What's this - food?"

I don't say anything.

"How long has this been here?"

"Aurora," I say. "We are going on a picnic."

"Oh, really?"  She speaks with a sarcastic tone. Then she takes the food in her hand but leaves the toy gun and says, "Please, mom, get some sleep, will you?"

"I am wishing the same thing," I say quietly, but she is out of the room, already.

*

Aurora

Daddy smells. He makes funny sounds in his sleep. Percussion, Mama says. Sometimes I go back to my own bed when she gets out of bed first. They only let me sleep with them when I get upset, now. It used to be that my bed was in their room. Then Billy moved up to the attic. And then he went to college. This summer he's back upstairs, and I'm mostly in my own room, except when I get upset. Even then, sometimes, I'm in my own room, which used to be a boy's room, until they painted it pink with purple and white trim, all prettied up for me. I'm not shamed to say that I'm a girly kind of girl, the kind of girl who likes ballet and dolls, but I am crazy about baseball, and tennis, and cowgirls. Oh, and my violin. I love my violin, but basically, I like to pretend.

Right now I'm lying in my own bed thinking about sleeping. I'm holding onto my doll and asking for the fairies to stay in my dreams, even though it's early morning and they probably have things to do. There's a pale yellow light behind my lace curtains, and if I weren't so tired, I'd just get up and turn on the light and close my door and play school. I'm pretty tired, though. I can't really hear what Mama is saying to Grandma, but whatever it is, I hope she stays in that bed for a while.

"Hi Mom," I say, because suddenly there she is right next to me in my bed.

"Are you okay, Aurora?"

"Yes," I say, and I grab her. "Stay!"

"I'll stay for just a while," she says.

And we snuggle into my best peace.

*

Stuart

Stuart E. Teng. The E stands for a famous emperor who saved the world from darkness and floods, the latter by digging ditches. My brothers were emperors, too. They saved the world, too, from monsters and famine and disease. In one version of a story we are not permitted to tell even our own wives, both my father and mother were orphans. That's why they imposed world-saving destinies upon their babies. By the way, Teng is a creation, a name worth thousands, what those in the know call a paper-name. They don't remember their real last names, and their adopted names were stashed for the name Teng, which means "hurt," but it saved their lives. My mother survives, because the Chinese woman learns quickly that her only hope is in outliving the superior females, whereas the Chinese male has to make the best of it while he's young and adored. As for my mother, she persists, but she's unraveling, and her skein of yarn seems endless. Haldol, Risperdol, Zoloft, Selexa - the poetry of her litany. My father became an unsung hero in America, an inventor he was. And now he's beastly dead, as they said about Stephen Dedalus's mother. I can relate to Stephen. In fact, I wanted to name my first born son Stephen, but I acquiesced, and he became William, after the patriarch in my wife's family.

"I don't want an artsy-poet for a son," she said. "I want a man, a solid man."

"Why did you marry me, then," I asked. It was not the time to ask such a question. She was erupting.

"You were sexy, Stuart," she screamed, and out popped William.

It's a question I always ask her. Again and again. But now I have the better sense to keep it to myself. When I ask, the only one hearing it is my artsy-poet self. I do not resemble the stereotypical Chinese male, which greatly disappointed my math and science teachers. I'm a useless dreamer.

In my mind, I provide the answer, "And you are still sexy. Yes, my love. Yes. Sexy is all you need be for me."

Ah, she's back again, my wife. I was in the middle of this terrible dream, one in a series. I call them my divorce-dreams. In them, we are getting a divorce, but we never seem to split. The truth is someone else's dream. How many men would die to have a wife who keeps them around for sex. That's what she says - that's the real part. So, now she's back. I am thinking hot thoughts, which is all I have to do with my wife, because no matter what, no matter what we have been through, childbirth and the subsequent sewing up of her vagina two times, the fights, the accusations, the horrible names she's coined for each member of my illustrious family - no matter about any of this, I love my wife. No matter what time of day or night it is, I can imagine myself into being, so to speak. This is what I do when Aurora is not in the room, which is the only time Rachel locks the door. When Rachel locks the door, all hell can break loose in this house. But when she locks the door, it's serious. It means she wants to talk to me, or she wants something else that's even more important than talking.

My wife is an iconoclast in every way. I don't need to be a participant in any discussion to know this. All I need to do is listen - to my brothers, my friends - you name it. How many women in this world prefer sex to talk?

"Make your choice," my wife says, after she locks the door, examining us both for our readiness. Then she kisses me, and we are both one horse instead of two, and we are racing to the sky, and now we are turning into fire itself, but we are both closed eyes, soft breaths. One big muscle, then we are water, floating, sinking, and diving.

I am not the first to open my eyes. I am self-conscious about the thick mud that I share with every other Asian man on this planet. It would be hard to find something poetic to say about the color of my eyes, although she has told me that stars shine in night skies. Hers, however, are the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, and the teal green seas of the Riviera. I swim into that double-ocean of her soul, and still, I feel warm, supported. Ah, a rock. She speaks.

"I will not be one of two women manning a house."

"But my mother can barely run her body," I protest. "You must take pity on her."

"How long is this to persist?" she says rhetorically.

How can we possibly know? All tests reveal she is perfectly healthy. "We don't know."

"Could be my entire life," she says. "I want a divorce."

Do not let it be thought that we are physically parted. We are preparing for yet another flight. Like athletes, like warrior-lovers, we are moving, wrestling, breathing. Underneath the blanket of our skins, we are gods, creating and destroying the world.

No divorce, please, I would like to beg. Instead, I say, "I understand."

*

Grandma

I lie here on their couch, listen to sounds a house makes. My house in Queens, it's a lucky house. You don't hear a peep, just when the heat comes on. But now summer, no heat, except the natural one. Sounds make circles in my ears, make me see things, even when my eyes are closed. I reach down, feel where I sewed my money - still there. Then I open my eyes, see the people scurrying away. They think I don't catch them. Nobody can hide from me. Look at that dog like a rug all spread out on the floor. He's panting. It's hot. I am panting, too. Everybody in house is panting. The sound I hear. Big sound. Not the sound I make, ever. Except what Stuart and his brothers say about my nightmares. That I sound like a man. A man comes out of my voice. I feel scared. That sound makes me uncomfortable. I get up, take a walk, and knock on the door.

"Excuse me," I say.

Still I hear panting. Sounds like somebody being killed. "HELP!"

Nothing, just panting. "HELP!" I say, again.

"HELP, HELP, HELP, HELP, HELP." But nobody hears me.

I know what to do. I go to the telephone. I call the police. It's the same everywhere. Nine. One. One.

"Emergency," they say.

"HELP," I say.

"What's the matter," they say.

"Somebody being killed here," I yell. "Please come fast."

They ask for address. "Jersey," I say.

"Where Jersey," they say.

"It's next to Queens," I say. "First the Triborough, then over the George Washington Bridge. That's all I know."

"We need more than that," they say.

"You are no help," I say, and then I put the phone down. I still hear panting. I go back to the couch, and I sit down. I take time to think. Then I go back to the bedroom door. Knock, knock. No answer. This time, I try the door handle, but the door is locked. Somebody is taking a long time killing them.

I pick up the phone, call the police again. This time, they say they're coming. They'll be here soon. Promise.

This happened before in Queens. I remember one time, a hundred people in my house. I don't have enough beds in my house for them. I couldn’t get them to leave. "Don't have enough beds," I say. "Get out!" But they stayed, even though I said, "What you think I am running here, a boarding-house?" They looked at me but didn’t move. The little girl, she is not a problem. She likes to sleep on the couch. But the rest. How can I sleep with them in my house? So I called the police, and they came.

It's hot, but I put on my little robe for when the police come. Why are they not here yet? Maybe they are not coming. I find the switch to the big lamp now, put lights on. The dog looks at me. It's quiet in here now. I go to the bedroom door. I hold my breath. Knock- knock.

"What is it?" That is Rachel's voice.

"Mother? You okay?" says Stuart.

"Sure," I say. "What about you?"

"Please get some sleep, Mom," says my daughter in law.

"What?" I say. "You are not dead? I thought someone is in there with you."

Suddenly the dogs bark. Big knock on door. They are here.

"Please open the door," I say.

"Stuart, what the hell is going on," says Rachel.

Stuart, he opens the door. He is wearing just underwear.

The dog is going crazy, barking, jumping up and down.

"Stop," I tell the dog. "It is all right now."

He doesn't listen, though. He keeps on barking and jumping, his little paw scratching the wood door, probably making a big scratch-mark. Stuart goes to the door. He goes outside, closes the door behind him. The dog is barking like crazy. Even the old dog comes down, and he barks, too. Whole family up. I see a police car outside with red lights going round and round. Sirens.

"Wow," says Billy. "What did you do, Grandma?"

"I called the police," I say hush- hush.

"You called the police?" he repeats after me.

"Yes," I say.

"Why?" he says.

"Scared," I say. "Too many people in the house."

"You called the police?"  Little Aurora, her eyes open up wide." Her voice like a frog. She says, "Uh-oh, Grandma. Somebody gonna put a leash on you."

"Who says that?" I ask her.

"Grandma," says Billy. He walks me to the couch, and I sit down. "You shouldn't have called the police. You should have awakened mom and dad."

"I try," I say. "But ---never mind."

Big sound of Stuart coming back through the door. He slams the door. His face is red. He is faht-hee. Looks straight at me, the one who gained sixty pounds with him in my belly and carried him so much I get curvature of the spine, and now he has this big house in Jersey and sends his big boy to a fancy college. I watch that sweet face of my best boy get all twist-up ugly. He is angry like a kid. Like Grampa, sometimes. Unreasonable. He stands over me look like he is gonna hit me. Is this what we come to America for? I ask it to Grampa. The kids are quiet. Nobody says a word. Stuart looks around. I wonder what he is looking for. Maybe he is gonna throw a chair at me. Where is Aurora's gun? Oh, in my bag. I reach down and grab. I remember because I practiced it. I look at the man who resembles my son Stuart, and I say, "I got gun."

Scary-like: "I got gun."