917-861-3162
Joone
by Susan Saraf
Joone
Unfortunate Coincidence
By the time you swear you're his,
Shivering and sighing,
And he vows his passion is
Infinite, undying,
Lady, make a note of this —
One of you is lying.
~Dorothy Parker 1926
* * *
He’s away for the weekend and she considers life without him. She puts their baby, the reason they could never regret their relationship, to bed. It’s seven o’clock and so far business as usual. Jonny only comes home before seven if she doesn’t beg and usually after a long day, alone with the baby, she can’t resist. It’s an element of his psyche he claims to be unaware of; a part of him that rebels against doing anything that could even mildly suggest being controlled. His not coming home before seven pisses her off almost daily. She attributes the trench that has formed between her thirty-year-old brows, solely to his lack of punctuality. What his friends and family fondly refer to as Persian Time.
She lay their baby boy, Jakey Wakey Come On and Shakey, 'short' for Jacob, in his crib. Savoring the smell of his powdered cheeks, tucking his pacifier into his pink bow lipped mouth and arranging his teddy bears up by his fair chub rolled neck, so he can cuddle with his friends, the friends of an eleven month old. She brushes his forehead with the tips of her manicured fingers, whispering their nighttime ritual in a soothing voice that works for both of them: comforting him while making her feel creative, like what she’s heard it means to be a good mother. Unconsciously (but almost everything she does these days is unconscious) improvising off of a popular children’s book, “Good night trees, good night leaves, good night grasshoppers, good night penguins, good night Nana, good night Papa, good night Sahroya Joone, Bubby Joone…,” she hopes the words will work him to sleep.
Slipping out of the nursery she closes the door behind her. She listens to the house. She listens to her body. She’s listening to hear if she feels the least bit alone. She doesn’t. She will continue to test herself like this throughout the long weekend, but is it valid? Can you discover if you can live without someone when you know they are coming back? Of course she always wondered what her life would be like without this one or that one, but now there were other people to consider, other lives besides the pair of them to be directly effected. Sarah had to be certain it wasn’t a matter of whimsy, a reflection of mood or hormones. That there was no bending of the circumstances to fit an emotional irreversible impulse.
The heats coming up through the radiators from the basement; they live in an old colonial farmhouse on Long Island bought from the children of the man who built it with his own hands nearly a century ago. It is a much smaller version of the one she grew up in twenty five miles away, before she lived in an apartment alone in New York City.
The sound of steam and the clacking of the pipes feel as warm and comforting as a bowl of mashed potatoes, it smells as good too. Walking down the stairs she holds the metal railing with her left hand; it feels cool. She’s afraid she might snag her palm on a ragged piece of metal on the banister, even though the thought is irrational. The railing is original to the house, smoothed by use for over 9o years. Still, she pulls her hand away. When she reaches the landing and turns into the dining room she checks the thermostat out of habit. She’s always policing Jonny, making sure he doesn’t sneak it up a degree and waste money on heat when he could put on a sweater. It feels good to check the thermostat; she turns it up one degree because she can, because Jonny won’t see her being a hypocrite.
The kitchen is in front of her, looming like an unpaid bill. What should she make for dinner, for herself? Opening the refrigerator door she is stricken by the waft of dill and kebab and how easily she forgot that her in-laws had brought it over just hours before. She is sickened by the smells, more from the idea of being dependent on her in-laws then the actual herbs and spices used to marinate the meats. I[c]nstead of seeing the free home cooked and delivered meal as a gift, the idea that as a grown adult, a mother and a wife, her mother in law is asserting her food into their refrigerator, makes her feel suffocated.
Sarah decides on a glass of Chardonnay, a baguette slathered in butter, sprinkled with Sea salt and a Vicodin. She brings her party for one into the den and sets it on a nesting table; sits on the couch resting her feet on another nesting table, the next size down. She can smell the cold air outside coming in from a drafty window like a rumor. She feels decadent and content and indulgent sitting in front of the flat screen TV. She turns to the home improvement channel, on it the image of an exceptionally good-and-young looking elderly couple talking about how often he pleases who is meant to be his gorgeous albeit post-menopausal wife. Sarah[e] can’t remember the last time she was pleased, at least by another person.
She looks at the snow falling outside the French doors Jonny installed by himself last spring. She was so proud of him then, they were proud of each other. She herself bragged to anybody who’d listen, calling him by the pet name she created, “Did you see our French doors? Shaz did it all by himself! Saved us a ton and it looks like a real guy did it.”
They laughed together whenever she said that, “a real guy”, it sounded backhanded but she didn’t mean it that way. The right word would have been professional. Other than that, she was weary of overselling her husband, showing off- a lot of women weren’t so fortunate. They have to pay out for that kind of work and she didn’t like to court jealousy.
She thinks to herself, Jake is sound asleep and I am trapped inside with my wine, bread, butter, salt and TV, waiting for my Vikey Rikey to kick in. This is too good to be true. She checks in to see if she misses her husband yet. Nope. In fact she begins to think they should do this more often, plan two or three trips apart a year, weekends away to collect themselves, remember who they were before they merged (collided?) into one.
She turns on the country music channel to stir something up. Someone named Conway Twitty is singing about Linda being on his mind while he’s sleeping next to his wife, whom she gathers is not named Linda. It’s a good song- he’s such a dog! She switches over to the Classic Rock channel, more her speed. Honky Tonk Woman plays, she can remember singing it in a bar in San Francisco ten years ago, maybe Grant and Green was the name of the bar, in a boozy haze of misplaced dreams she stepped up to the microphone and joined the band in song, she thought maybe she’d be discovered, this millenium’s version of a female Jim Morrison, but it turns out all she could do was drink like him.
This makes her miss those days, but not Jonny. She tells herself to enjoy the present- the decadent, contented, indulgent, feet up on the nesting table, butter spread on a French baguette sprinkled with sea salt washed down with a glass of chardonnay, baby sleeping peacefully, man finally being away after three years, self-gratifying present.
If only our minds did what we tell them to before our feelings have a vote.
Instead she has a second thought. Drinking her wine, the drug kicking in, she thinks, “This would be even better with a cigarette.” Before she runs the thought through to its inevitable dangerous conclusion, she finds herself with her coat on walking out the front door. She is walking into town to buy a pack of cigarettes. She is walking away from her sleeping infant, who lay sleeping alone, helpless in his crib. She is walking high on alcohol, Vicodin and the idea of freedom.[f]
****
The fluorescent lights and smell of newspapers hit her as soon as she enters the bodega. Somehow she feels drunker, and guiltier, in the light. She wants to get in and out as fast as possible, the time away from the house pressing. She stamps her snowy boots on the wet black rubber doormat as the man behind the counter nods hello. He is wearing a yarmulke. He is not Mexican[g]. This strikes her as outside the norm. But ‘when in Great Neck’...she laughs to herself. She walks over to the counter, she notices the lottery tickets on rolls next to his head and flushes. She makes the analogy in her head of how this moment in itself is a gamble.
“American Spirits,” she says, noticing a slight slur of her “s”.
“I.D.” He says.
“Really?” She asks, feeling an opportunity for small talk, to get him to believe she is sober; to like her. She digs in her coat pocket for her license. She is careful to articulate. “That’s exciting stuff. You think I look younger than 18?”
“It’s the law, we need to scan a license to sell,” he says flatly.
“Oh, well, I’ll pretend it’s because I look like a teenager!” she says, again trying for charm. She hands him her driver’s license.
H[h]e looks at it and then at her.
“Roshanzadeh,” he says, with an expression of recognition she can’t decide the meaning of.
“I’m sorry?” she asks, her mind is too foggy to calculate the ramifications, but her instinct tells her there will be some. “How much?”
“$8.50,” he says. Sarah cannot understand why, but she feels the proprietor [i]quickly go from disenchanted to downright cold.
Sarah puts a twenty dollar bill on the counter. He gives her change. She walks to the door, the sound of bells jingle as Sarah pushes herself through the heavy metal and glass door before she remembers what she forgot.
“Matches?” she asks.
Outside, cigarettes in her pocket, time compresses. She is thunder struck by the urgency to get home. She is overcome by the lunacy of her risk. As soon as she turns the corner off of Middle Neck Road onto her unplowed block, she starts running as best she can. She falls in the snow. She g[j]ets up. She falls again. She gets up. She decides it’s a better idea to walk quickly and carefully than to fall every time she takes a run. She sees lights on the snow and hears the sound of a car engine behind her, she turns and sees an SUV with large red and blue lights on top driving down the heavily snowed street. She keeps her eyes focused ahead. The vehicle slows down even more next to her. She looks and sees its white with blue letters and a police shield, Great Neck Police Department. Upon seeing[k] the vehicle, there is one word that runs, immediately and persistently on a loud loop through her head. It begins with F.
There are two officers, one driving, one in his twenties, she guesses a rookie, in the passenger seat, his arm resting on the open window. She smiles and keeps trying to plow through the snow. The feeling of the car riding beside her is surreal, or maybe that’s the buzz. She feels a drip of sweat slide from under her hat and freeze on her cheek.
“You okay, Miss?” the rookie calls.
“Yup,” she says. Pointing ahead of her, smiling without teeth. “Just… home.”
“You need a ride?” he asks again.
“No, thanks, I’m up the road,” she says, looking over smiling. Her entire body is pulling inward. The wind whips her face like slaps from a frozen palm leaf[l] but her only compulsion is getting home before anything else happens. Entirely focused on the police car riding beside her, she falls off the curb she didn’t notice through the snow. The SUV comes to a full stop along side her. As she tries to pick herself up, she feels a large hand grip her upper arm. It’s one of the police officers pulling her. Any sense of euphoria disappears; she is as alert as a man at full salute.
“Come on, Miss,” the rookie cop calls from his seat in the patrol car. His face appears optimistically unfettered by time or torment. His voice and cadence tell’s her he’s not one for anger. No one would ever be able to take him that seriously. His cheekbones are high and red from the cold. His full lips turn up to the point that he looks like he’s on the verge of laughing. Sarah feels stoned again, until she hears what he says next. “Someone called in a complaint. We’ll get you home safe.”
“No, no, I’m fine,” Sarah says, her heart racing, her cheek stings, she sees a spot of red blood in the snow. She recalls the man in the yarmulke behind the deli counter, he must have called her in, that’s what his nasty energy meant. The Hassids detested non-kosher Jews. As soon as he saw her name he went cold. [m]“Really.”
She hears crunching in the snow, the rookie is still in his seat. Delayed she realizes that the older man is the one handling her. She is once again conscious that she is still under the influence.
“Have anything to drink tonight?” the patrol officer asks, holding her up. His breath smelled like stale coffee and peanuts. “That cuts not lookin ’ [n]too good.”
“I’m fine,” she says. Her voice sharp, she pulls her arm away. Then the thought, “drunk and disorderly” hits her. She says softer in her most respectful voice, “Thank you, officer.”
“Come on, we’ll give you a ride.” His voice and cadence tell her he is quick to temper and everyone takes him seriously. His face is as round as a honeydew m[o]elon, his cheeks suffer from rosacea, spidery veins in pink, purple and red creep from his nose and crawl about his cheeks.
Sitting in the back of the patrol SUV, she insists this can’t be happening. She thinks she better loosen up and act friendly. She needs to convince them that she’s normal, just a regular gal out for a stroll! In three feet of snow on a frigid cold dark night-with a gash on her face and a baby in the crib.
“It’s right here on the left,” she says, in her best regular gal voice. “Blue house, shitty shingles.”
She hears the officer on his radio as they stop in front of her house.
“Is he like communicating to headquarters or something?” She hears that slurred S again, and tries to make up for it in the next sentence. She makes a feeble effort at slang, as if they are equals, in this thing called ‘miscommunication’ together. “Feel so bad you guys having to waste your time-ski like this.” ‘Time-ski’, that was the word she chose as the great equalizer.
“We need a bus,” the driving officer says. “Copy.”
Sarah assumes he is already on to his next call, that she is safe.
“108 Cedar Street,” he speaks into the radio. “[p]Looks like a contusion on left cheek, was lucid, now incoherent, says she’s been drinking, but could be blunt force trauma.”
Sarah hears him give her address. Jake. They’re going to take her and leave Jake.
“Oh, no I’m fine.” She says, opening the car door, “Thanks, though.”
“Afraid we can’t let you go- we’ve got an ambulance coming,” he says, getting out of his car, stepping in front of her.
“No, NO!” she says, frantically, trying to get past the officer, up to her door, “I’m fine, I have to go.”
Sarah feels as if her head is being held under water, she has got to get into the house. She must get to Jake. The other officer steps out and in front of her, they stand side by side like two solid blue oak doors.
“My baby is inside!” she screams.
The seasoned cop quickly reaches for his cuffs with one hand and her wrists with the other. Before Sarah can think another thought she feels the cold hard clasp of metal clamped around her bones.
“You can’t do this. He’s sleeping. He’s a baby. He’s going to be hungry.”
“Miss, how old is the child?” the rookie asks.
“Eleven months,” Sarah says. “He’s in his crib, upstairs, he needs me.”
The patrol officer tells the rookie to go in and find the baby. Within a moment as the blue and red lights circle and flash changing the white powder into the color of a snow cone, Sarah is backed up against the car, being patted down. She is being read her rights. Before she can say “I understand” the patrol officer stuffs her into the back of the SUV. He gets back into the front seat for a sip of coffee and a look at his notes. He picks up his radio and makes contact with the person on the other end.
“What’s happening?” she asks. It is all so fast.
“You’ll wait here until the ambulance comes, you’ll get checked out at the hospital.”
Sarah sees the rookie officer carrying her sleeping baby boy. Her mind seethes watching him. He walks clumsily down her front path, as if it isn’t icy, as if he were carrying a sack of laundry not a fragile baby that needs tender care. She is unaware of her own hypocrisy, the way all stoned mothers are.
“You can’t do this! He needs me,” she screams. “Where are you taking him?”
“Miss, you gave up all rights to that child the second you left him unprotected and alone in your house.” The patrol officer spits definitively into her face.
“My name is Roshanzadeh!” she yells. “My father in-law is Isaac Roshanzadeh.”
Life comes to a halt.
“That is his grandson,” Sarah says, gasping. “I am his daughter in-law.”
“Oh, man,” The patrol officer says. He takes off his leather gloves, throws them on the ground exposing his p[q]oultry colored hands. He places them on his wide hips as he walks in a small circle in an effort to process this information.
“Yo, boss, who the hell is Rosie-whosie-whats?” The rookie asks, placing himself together with Sarah’s baby into the front seat.
“Roshanzadeh,” he says. “The head of the IATF.”
“What’s the IATF?” The rookie asks.
“The Iranian-American Trust Foundation,” he says.
“I’ll need to see I.D.” The patrol officer demands. “You look more Dublin than Tehran.”
“It’s in my right back pocket,” Sarah says.
“I patted you down pretty good but I don’t like surprises. Any needles? Anything I could be stuck with?” he asks. “Knives? Drugs? Paraphernalia?”
“No, sir,” Sarah says.
He pulls aside her heavy coat locating her back pocket. She is surprised to find a familiar Irish surname on his badge, McKenna. Cops aren’t as Irish as they used to be, especially in Great Neck. She feels relief the way one does when seeing someone (no matter how distantly familiar) in a foreign place. “Oh wow! Just a shot in the dark but, are you Irish?” She feels shamed when he doesn’t bother to turn in her direction before completely dropping the task .[r]
“Yo, kid, get her license out of the back right jean pocket,” McKenna orders. “Things are painted on. She’s clean.”
The rookie easily finds his way to her back pocket, slips nimble fingers in between the stretch denim, retrieves her license and hands it over to McKenna. She barely felt a thing.
She thinks if she were looking at this from McKenna’s point of view she wouldn’t be eager for the relation either. Yet in a pathetic appeal for common ground, much like her futile attempt back in the deli, she announces triumphantly, “I’m Irish too- my maiden names Callahan!”
McKenna ignores her, instead repeating her drivers license number into his CB. He takes the time to fill in the void while awaiting confirmation on Sarah’s ID.
“You do nothing for the Irish, we’d appreciate it if you’d stick to being a Persian.”
Sarah holds back a sob, her own parents had said as much when she introduced Jonny to her family. He and her mother had not recognized their love. Their comments were:
“Don’t go looking for trouble, you found it.”
“There are no guarentees but that you will never be happy. That’s one.” [s]
“We can’t imagine two people with less in common.”
“ I mean I don’t even know what that is? What is that “a Persian??” That’s like something they made up to hide who they are, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I never saw the beat of it.”
“We will not come to the wedding, we are not Jewish, you are not Jewish and your children, should you be fool enough to have them, are not Jewish. And you can bet your last buck if your children aren’t Jewish you will be S.O.L. (shit out of luck.) T[t]hey will make hell look like a five star resort. Good God.”
The words felt archaic to Sarah then, absurd.
Haunting now, as she sat in a patrol car, convinced she has lost her life, her son. Then as the voice over the radio validates her name, address and drivers license, McKenna’s body does one better than acknowledge her, it gives up.
“I’ll put a call into the C.O.,” Officer McKenna says. Disappointed, he cocks his head to the right. “Where’s that bus? Uncuff her.”
In a glorious move, the rookie fastens Jake in the front seat before he comes around to the backseat. Sarah scoots her body out to the edge of the leather seat. She stretches her arms in a V out toward the open door where he is standing at arm level, so that he may indeed release her.
“An Irish-Catholic and a Persian-Jew?” The rookie asks, “Whaddya two do lose a bet?”
“Looks like it,” Sarah says, motioning to the handcuffs while staring at Jake. There is an iron cage between them.
He bows his head apologetically then quickly releases Sarah from her handcuffs. Her wrists are sore and like the rest of her tired. She attempts to slide out of the SUV following him to collect her son from his place in the front seat when he stops her by putting his hand on her shoulder. It is calm but the message to stay put is clear. He himself climbs back into the front, again with her sleeping son, who’s head looks like it could use balancing.
“So it’s over?” She asks, her mouth so dry she can barely get the words out. Her wrists sore. “We can go?”
There is no movement from the front seat. No sound. No answer.
A length of time elapses where she is awaiting her fate. It seems impossible that she does not have natural access to her son. How could this have happened? She see's lights go on at her neighbors across the street, the shadow of a body peeking through a curtain. She is not privy to the luxury of wondering what other people might think, all she cares about is getting Jake back in her arms.
“C.O. says we’re done for the night,” The patrol officer says. “Get her and the kid outta my vehicle. Where’s that bus? Ya canceled or what?”
“Yea I canceled,” the rookie says. He opens Sarah’s car door and helps her down from the SUV before opening his passenger side door to unfasten Jake. “Was stuck in the snow, doesn’t look like it’d have made it anyway, Mick.”
As soon as she hears the click of the seatbelt, Sarah slips her body in front of the rookies to scoop Jake up. He is still sleeping, his cheeks flushed, they smell as close to heaven as any mortal could ever hope to near. Finally, he’s back in her arms. How could she have been so stupid. So selfish? How? She almost wants them to put the cuffs back on her. She knows this baby deserves better. She knows and yet she can’t let him go. What mother wouldn’t lie, cheat and steal to keep her baby, no matter the charge? Isn’t that a worse mother? Sarah needs to believe that, if she believes anything else...
it’s over. The best she can vow is “never again.” That’s a promise she’s not sure she can keep. If anyone had asked her if this night would have been in her history she’d have laughed out loud at the thought and yet here she is.
How?
“Cancel again in case, all we need is more noise from News 12...cops stranded ambulances and...”
McKenna’s face suddenly turns as red as a beat. He reels on Sarah without warning he tears the baby out of her arms and clutches him to his parka. Jake startled let’s out a wail. The rookie stands there stunned.
“You’re one lucky girl, you know that?” He attempts to spit a blob of dip into the snow, a chunk of gummy brown lands on her sleeve. “Any other night, you’d be cuffed to a bed at LIJ, crying to Daddy in-law, begging Child Protective Services not to take your kid.”
Sarah knows she should be crying, instead this is how her body reacts. It fills with cement. A rock hard stillness comes over her, controlling her from top to bottom.
The rookie might as well of disappeared into the ether. She thinks to look to him for help, but her body refuses to fold. He no longer exists. Her eyes never leave McKenna’s. Not even to answer her son’s cry. She stares the patrol officer down as if she is three times his person with seven times his strength. She sticks out her square Irish jaw like it’s a middle finger.
“I understand,” she says. “Mick.”
“Don’t mistake kindness for weakness,” he says, putting his right pointer and middle fingers tight together, he shoves them under her nose. Jake squirms, crying reaching out to her, he almost loses his grip on the baby. “You were thisclose to losing your son.”
“I think you’re very strong,” she says, evenly. “Now, may I hold him?”
[a]Anne Horowitz 10/5/14 10:12 PM
Should this be reversed? Jacob, short for Jakey Wakey etc.?
[b]Anne Horowitz 10/5/14 10:26 PM
I’m not actually sure what this means: “that there was no bending of the circumstances to fit either.” Either what? The phrasing isn’t clear there.
[c]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 12:08 PM
The grammar on this sentence was a little twisted, here’s an attempt at clearer syntax. We can still adjust it.
[d]Anne Horowitz 10/5/14 10:40 PM
Every sentence in this paragraph except the last one begins with “She.” I suggest making some changes to vary the sentence structure.
[e]Anne Horowitz 10/5/14 10:43 PM
This is the first time you’re telling us her name. Is this intentional or do you want to mention it earlier?
[f]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:09 AM
This may be something we need to talk about, when we start to edit the book. We don’t know Sarah well enough to put this in context, since it’s basically the first thing we see her do. Does she have a pattern of this kind of behavior? It’s hard for the reader to “be on her side” when this is the first thing we learn about her—that she takes a Vicodin and walks out on her baby :/
[g]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:14 AM
I’m concerned this could come off as weirdly racially tinged, since it’s out of context. Is Sarah from a neighborhood where most bodega owners are Mexican? Has she only recently moved to Great Neck? Maybe we should just cut this bit? She has only recently moved from teh city but i agree, if it muddies the water. Cut.
[h]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:18 AM
I suggested a small trim here to keep the scene moving.
[i]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:21 AM
I’m suggesting a couple of trims to keep it tight.
[j]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:29 AM
Made a suggestion to reduce the number of “She”s.
[k]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:33 AM
I adjusted this for grammar (“Upon seeing” created a dangling modifier.)
[l]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:44 AM
This image with the frozen palm leaf feels a little quirky and distracting, especially since you wouldn’t have a palm leaf in Great Neck in the winter. I’d consider taking it out.
[m]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:52 AM
Would you consider taking out this part about the man’s motive being hatred of non-kosher Jews? Do you feel like it’s essential? It seems to add an ugly undertone that the story doesn’t need, to be compelling. I understand how that may feel ugly. The truth is what it is. IT’s not pretty at first sight. The Hasidic Jews operating against reformed jews is crucial to a thread later in the book and specific to the area- it literally has happened at parties I’ve been too! They have come and shut down the grills! Haha! It’s not in an ugly way. We need to understand how fear of losing identity and religion is operating on everyones level. I need to do a better job of putting it across. I think the best way is to just tell it straight out. But if you feel offended, that’s not going to work. I’m not afraid of being PC, the world is actually, especially within my family of first generation older immigrants dealing with clashing cultures, not at all all PC. They are racist, in all degrees. Mostly to the extreme. It’s not a lynch mob mentality. It’s so that they can preserve, grow and protect what they know. What they beleive has kept them safe, good and thriving.
[n]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:55 AM
I’d avoid trying to capture his accent by leaving the G off—it can look a little corny.
[o]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 10:59 AM
A little weird to say “his cheeks suffer from…” so I adjusted.s
[p]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 11:07 AM
Deleted her address since she says he gives it, just below.
[q]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 11:19 AM
Not really sure what’s meant by “poultry-colored hands.” You mean like raw chicken? OMG I LOL’d wtf was I thinking? Thank you.
[r]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 11:27 AM
Made some suggestions to shorten a little bit.
[s]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 11:33 AM
I don’t actually get this one.
[t]Anne Horowitz 10/6/14 11:36 AM
I get lost here—why will she be SOL if her children aren’t Jewish? Who is “They”? Who will make hell look like a five-star resort?