So I got a scholarship to UB, then worked all summer to earn money that would cover my other costs—books, bus fare, clothes. They could muster no objection to this plan and I graduated last year with a degree in political science. Now I have to apply the same line of thinking to the problem of moving out. What are my parents’ objections? Cost. (So I took the job, working at Jack’s jewelry store, although I have no affinity for retail—all that lying and persuasion.) Safety. A roommate, then. Morals. Not just any roommate. Someone reliable, grounded. And, it goes almost without saying, Jewish.
Maddie Schwartz might be just the ticket. If she needs to sell her ring, she should welcome a roommate to share her bills. True, everyone is saying it’s odd that she didn’t take her son when she left Milton, but it must be Milton’s fault. Everyone in Northwest Baltimore is just waiting for the day that Milton shows up with a secretary or a nurse on his arm. Whoever it is, it will be a comedown from Maddie.
It’s been years since my family could afford the country club, but I remember stories about Maddie Schwartz when she was Maddie Morgenstern. I think it was my brother Nathan who had a crush on her. He’s the one who told me what a sensation she caused the day she wore a flesh-pink suit. And smart, too—graduated high school at age seventeen, did two years of college before she married. Of course, she’s almost old enough to be my mother, but why draw attention to that? My oldest brother could be my father if it came to that. Age-wise, I mean.
Besides, Maddie is nothing like my mother. My mother was born old. In photographs from the 1920s, Papa has the look of a dandy about him, someone who enjoys himself; Mama looks stern and unhappy, even as a child. But then, Papa was second generation, whereas Mama was three when her family came over. It makes a difference, all the difference sometimes. We never speak about the family members who didn’t get out in time. “What is there to say,” Mama said when I asked.
No, Maddie is my best shot. But I didn’t know how to get in touch with her. She’d given me her mother’s number; I suspected she didn’t have a phone. (More evidence that she was living hand to mouth.) I would have to bide my time.
Then, just last week, I ran into Maddie’s mother, Mrs. Morgenstern, at the deli counter at Seven Locks. (That’s another thing I want to escape. My mother makes me do most of the shopping, saying it’s good training for when I keep my own house.)
“Mrs. Morgenstern,” I said shyly. “It’s Judith, Judith Weinstein? From the club?”
She inspected me over the rims of her glasses. “It’s been years.”
It was hard to decode that innocuous statement, to know whether Mrs. Morgenstern was commenting on the passage of time or the scandal of bankruptcy that took the Weinsteins out of elite circles when I was still a child. I guess the fact that I can’t figure out her intent proves what a lady she is.
“I was wondering if you knew how I could get in touch with Maddie? She was in the store the other day and”—I reached for a plausible reason—“something’s come in that’s closer to what she was looking for.”
“Really? I can’t see how Madeline would be in the position to buy anything. But she always was impractical that way. At any rate, she has a phone now. She moved downtown.”
She took out a tiny notebook and wrote down the seven digits. Three three two—not an exchange I know. Mrs. Morgenstern’s handwriting was remarkably like the woman herself, very straight up and down, pretty yet intimidating. I didn’t think a mother could be more domineering than my own, but Mrs. Morgenstern seemed to have her own way of getting what she wanted.
That was Friday. I waited until today to telephone. I figured Mrs. Morgenstern must have shared the encounter by now, so Maddie won’t be too surprised by my call. And I had mentioned the Stonewall Democratic Club meeting.
I phone at eight, figuring that’s civilized. A woman living alone should have finished dinner and the dishes by then, would be preparing to sit down and watch the evening shows. The Big Valley comes on at nine. I like to watch that myself, although my mother’s run-on commentary—“Barbara Stanwyck looks younger than that man playing her son, she’s right, you know, women do have to take responsibility for leading men on, even if they’re crazy like that, what do they call those pants, gauchos?”—makes me want to scream.
The phone rings and rings. I let it go five, eight, twelve times—a person could be in the bathroom. Or maybe I dialed wrong. I try again, just to be sure.
Maddie answers on the second ring, breathless.
“Maddie? It’s Judith, Judith Weinstein.”
“Oh my—I mean, was that you before? Letting it ring and ring? I couldn’t get to the phone and I thought, no big deal, but when it started again, I was worried it was something to do with my son—” Her words seem to be tumbling through all sorts of emotions, relief and irritation and something I can’t pinpoint.
“I’m so sorry. I only dialed again because I thought I dialed wrong the first time.”
“What do you want?” Her tone borders on rudeness. But she was worried.
“Just to follow up on what I mentioned. About going to the Stonewall Democratic Club. I really think you might like it. I can even pick you up if I borrow my parents’ car.” Obviously, I want to check out the apartment, see if it is big enough. If not, I’ll have to persuade Maddie to take a two-bedroom.
“Oh.” It’s as if she has no memory of our conversation. She seems vague. If I didn’t know better, I would think she’s a little drunk. But nice Jewish ladies don’t get drunk on a Wednesday night.
“There’s a meeting next week. It’s interesting. I know, it seems like it’s not important, supporting Democrats in a state like Maryland, but you can’t take things for granted. The primary matters and there are so many ways to get involved.”
“Can I call you back? Not tonight, but—later this week?”
“Sure, I’ll give you my number.”
Maddie must have put the phone down. I hear the kinds of sounds one makes when trying to find paper and pencil, but also—something else. A rumble, a sharp little yelp from Maddie—“No! I mean—no!” As if she has banged her hip into a drawer, but also, it seems to me, as if she enjoys the sensation.
“I’m ready,” she says, and I rattle off my parents’ number, although by now I never expect to hear from Maddie Schwartz. Maddie Schwartz, I’m pretty sure, does not spend her Wednesday nights watching The Big Valley. I am surer still she does not want a roommate.
Settling in with my parents in front of the television, I try not to sigh as my mother talks on and on, sharing her every thought, some of them even related to the program we’re watching. My father is silent, as usual. He never really came back from losing Weinstein’s Drugs. I always thought that part of the problem was that his name was intertwined with the store, that seeing the business fall apart and the signs come down was like watching his own body dismantled and sold for pennies on the dollar.
Tonight, he allows himself one comment and it’s about the actress playing Audra. “She’s really striking.” Mama takes great offense. “Oh, so now you like blondes. That’s a nice change of pace for you.”
I have to find a way out of this house.
February 1966
February 1966
Maddie laid her head on the gingham cloth, marveling at what she was about to do. It seemed so unlikely—dangerous, even. But Ferdie wanted her to do it. Not that he had said as much, not in so many words. He hadn’t really said anything at all, just tried to run his fingers through her hair, only to have them repelled by the hairspray she needed to keep her longish bouffant in shape.
“I know a woman—” he’d begun.
“I assume you know a lot of women,” Maddie had teased. She did assume that. Ferdie might even have been married for all she knew. What did it matter? There was no way they were going to go any place outside her apartment, not with her divorce pending and not with—it just wasn’t a good idea, the world being the world, Baltimore being Baltimore.
“A woman for hair,” he’d said. “What they call a kitchen magician. She’d do it cheap.”
“Do what?”
“Iron it.” The word had come out as one syllable, arn. Ferdie was fourth-generation Baltimore, his roots deeper than Maddie’s. The Platt family had come north from the Carolinas after the Civil War, and thanks to a lawsuit in the early fifties, he had been able to attend Poly, a fact he had managed to drop into conversation early on. One had to be an outstanding student to go to Polytechnic, the all-boys public high school for those with an engineering bent, yet Ferdie was mysterious about the gap between his high school graduation and his decision to join BPD. To Maddie’s ear, he sounded like any working-class Baltimorean, with his long O’s and extra R’s. The first few times he had called her, on the phone he had insisted they needed, she had thought it was some strange white man. Although he was far from a stranger by the time she moved to the corner of Mulberry and Cathedral Street.