Read Online The Ghost of Hannah Mendes by Naomi Ragen - Free Book Online
Authors: Naomi Ragen
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cheerful and make breakfast or be nice to anyone. Most of all, if she felt like crying, she didn’t want anyone trying to comfort her.
She gave him a friendly tap on the shoulder.
“Julius, don’t you have a job to go to?”
“I thought I’d take the day off and spend it with you.”
Uh-oh, she thought.
The doorbell rang again.
She threw her long legs off the bed, pulling a robe around her, pushing her curly, copper-colored hair off her forehead.
She really was a stupendously beautiful woman, the man in her bed congratulated himself, unaware that this was the end and not the beginning. Really stunning in a big, Cindy Crawfordish, voluptuous sort of way. He lifted his head to get a better view, propping his chin on his palm, almost as delighted with her as he was with himself.
She walked, lithe and noiseless as a cat, to the armed fortress that was her front door. Beneath all those crossbars, bolts, locks, and chains, she knew there was a peephole. But with all the scratches and accumulated dirt, you couldn’t really see anything through it anyway, even if you made the effort to unearth it. Besides, if she couldn’t recognize the voice, there was no way she was opening the door.
There had been a time, she recalled, when—fresh out of her ivy-covered dorm in Boston—she’d never even asked who it was, happy to open the door and speak to anyone: Jehovah’s Witnesses, Hare Krishnas, March of Dimes volunteers, salesmen, neighbors, strangers…It had taken only one bad experience to end all that.
“I’m going to look through the peephole, and if I don’t open the door it means I don’t want you, so just go away, got that?” she said, having found this statement very effective for most callers, and well worth the minor unpleasantness it sometimes caused.
She held her hand against the door, as if willing it to stay shut. The banging became more insistent.
“Who is it?”
“Suzanne, don’t you recognize me? It’s your grandmother.”
She leaned her back up against the door, surveying the wreckage that was her living room, and beyond to where her naked new companion lay waiting for her imminent return. Her shoulders sagged.
“Well, well, perfect timing,” she whispered to no one in particular, opening the bolts, deadlocks, chains, and assorted iron bars.
Neither woman moved.
What was called for here? Suzanne considered, the taste bitter in her mouth (her fault? her recent partner’s?). Polite cheek-brushing? Outstretched arms? Full kisses, sighs of familial warmth and exhilaration?
“Please, Suzanne, I’m too old to play games. Are you going to invite me in, or encourage me to leave? Either way, I really want to know soon.”
Suzanne opened the door wide, feeling an unreasonable sense of defeat as she watched the old woman invade her home. A few months ago, I would have slammed it in your face, she thought.
Catherine’s steps were hesitant and contemplative, full of painful awareness of the transformation that had taken place since Renaldo’s departure. All the posters were gone, those beautiful Impressionist prints from the Musée d’Orsay; the Bronzinos from the Uffizi; and the Italian Renaissance prints from Venice. Suzanne had brought them all home after her senior year at the Sorbonne, the way she’d brought back Renaldo.
Instinctively, she searched the shelves holding the glazed-ceramic animals from Mexico and Brazil that Suzanne had begun collecting under Renaldo’s influence. They, too, were gone, the shelves empty and dingily bare. Even the large, bright canvases depicting healthy, brown women in Aztec splendor—Renaldo’s specialty—were no longer visible.
Except for the photographs on the piano, anyone could live here, any Bronx shopgirl, any Flatbush Avenue secretary, Catherine thought, feeling a little heartsick.
“Here, Gran, sit down, you must be exhausted,” Suzanne said suddenly, pushing a few scattered clothes to one side of the threadbare couch to create a
She gave him a friendly tap on the shoulder.
“Julius, don’t you have a job to go to?”
“I thought I’d take the day off and spend it with you.”
Uh-oh, she thought.
The doorbell rang again.
She threw her long legs off the bed, pulling a robe around her, pushing her curly, copper-colored hair off her forehead.
She really was a stupendously beautiful woman, the man in her bed congratulated himself, unaware that this was the end and not the beginning. Really stunning in a big, Cindy Crawfordish, voluptuous sort of way. He lifted his head to get a better view, propping his chin on his palm, almost as delighted with her as he was with himself.
She walked, lithe and noiseless as a cat, to the armed fortress that was her front door. Beneath all those crossbars, bolts, locks, and chains, she knew there was a peephole. But with all the scratches and accumulated dirt, you couldn’t really see anything through it anyway, even if you made the effort to unearth it. Besides, if she couldn’t recognize the voice, there was no way she was opening the door.
There had been a time, she recalled, when—fresh out of her ivy-covered dorm in Boston—she’d never even asked who it was, happy to open the door and speak to anyone: Jehovah’s Witnesses, Hare Krishnas, March of Dimes volunteers, salesmen, neighbors, strangers…It had taken only one bad experience to end all that.
“I’m going to look through the peephole, and if I don’t open the door it means I don’t want you, so just go away, got that?” she said, having found this statement very effective for most callers, and well worth the minor unpleasantness it sometimes caused.
She held her hand against the door, as if willing it to stay shut. The banging became more insistent.
“Who is it?”
“Suzanne, don’t you recognize me? It’s your grandmother.”
She leaned her back up against the door, surveying the wreckage that was her living room, and beyond to where her naked new companion lay waiting for her imminent return. Her shoulders sagged.
“Well, well, perfect timing,” she whispered to no one in particular, opening the bolts, deadlocks, chains, and assorted iron bars.
Neither woman moved.
What was called for here? Suzanne considered, the taste bitter in her mouth (her fault? her recent partner’s?). Polite cheek-brushing? Outstretched arms? Full kisses, sighs of familial warmth and exhilaration?
“Please, Suzanne, I’m too old to play games. Are you going to invite me in, or encourage me to leave? Either way, I really want to know soon.”
Suzanne opened the door wide, feeling an unreasonable sense of defeat as she watched the old woman invade her home. A few months ago, I would have slammed it in your face, she thought.
Catherine’s steps were hesitant and contemplative, full of painful awareness of the transformation that had taken place since Renaldo’s departure. All the posters were gone, those beautiful Impressionist prints from the Musée d’Orsay; the Bronzinos from the Uffizi; and the Italian Renaissance prints from Venice. Suzanne had brought them all home after her senior year at the Sorbonne, the way she’d brought back Renaldo.
Instinctively, she searched the shelves holding the glazed-ceramic animals from Mexico and Brazil that Suzanne had begun collecting under Renaldo’s influence. They, too, were gone, the shelves empty and dingily bare. Even the large, bright canvases depicting healthy, brown women in Aztec splendor—Renaldo’s specialty—were no longer visible.
Except for the photographs on the piano, anyone could live here, any Bronx shopgirl, any Flatbush Avenue secretary, Catherine thought, feeling a little heartsick.
“Here, Gran, sit down, you must be exhausted,” Suzanne said suddenly, pushing a few scattered clothes to one side of the threadbare couch to create a
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