All the Light There Was (23 page)

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t go. I just said it would be a waste, but if that’s what you want, who am I to object? I’ll be happy to be the godfather.”

Jacqueline said, “I hope you know that I’m planning to baptize our baby when the time comes.”

“Do you all hear the way my wife is talking to me?” Missak asked.

My father shook his head. “What can we do? It’s too hard to fight, boys. Just give in now.”

The night was a long, bumpy road as I was knocked in and out of sleep by the sharp cries of the baby, who slept in a basket on a chair next to my side of the bed. When he started to cry, I groggily pulled him from the basket and into the bed to nurse. I didn’t know how he did it, but Barkev managed to sleep through the cries, the feeding, and the change of diapers. I finally settled the baby into the basket and was about to drowse when Barkev started grinding his teeth and muttering in his sleep. I put the pillow over my head and squeezed my eyes shut, but the moaning grew louder until Barkev started out of his nightmare, jumping up in bed. I sat up, and with a handkerchief that I kept on the nightstand, I wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Go back to sleep,” I murmured.

Not fully awake, Barkev stared at me with wild eyes before flopping down on the bed, gone back to whatever monsters awaited him. I dropped to sleep like a stone falling to the bottom of a pond. But my time there was all too brief. Soon the baby’s cries pulled me to the surface again.

In the morning, I was jittery with exhaustion. We all had breakfast together before my father-in-law and husband headed off to their atelier. When Virginie left carrying her satchel of books and notebooks, I watched her with envy. I felt as though my brain had shriveled to the size of a walnut. Or, worse, I felt like a cow, wrapped in a hazy, wordless existence of milk and interrupted sleep that bound me to the tiny, helpless animal I now held in my arms.

My mother-in-law said, “After you feed Bedros, give him to me. You need to lie down. Don’t worry about washing the diapers. I’ll do that. And in the afternoon, when he sleeps, you should sleep as well. This won’t last, you know. In a few weeks or maybe a month, he’ll settle at night. Then it will be okay until the teeth start coming.”

I stumbled back to the bedroom and paused to look at the pale face in the mirror over the chest of drawers. “You are the mother now,” I told myself sternly. “You are the mother.”

The next Sunday we all went to the cathedral, where naked Bedros Pierre was laid on a white christening blanket. Father Avedis lifted the baby by his back and feet and dipped him into the baptismal font. The baby squalled loudly and flailed his limbs, but when the holy father anointed his small nose and lips with the muron, invoking the blessings of God on his five senses, the baby stopped yelling and stared up soberly at the faces of the priest and the rest of us gathered around him. Father Avedis touched the oil to the baby’s forehead, hands, and feet.

As we were on the way home by Métro, I said to my brother, “I hope you were listening to Father Avedis’s instructions as to your responsibilities as the godfather.”

Missak snorted. “You mean the part about making sure that he goes to church?”

“No. The part about your having to give him a bath three days from now and then take the water and pour it under a tree.”

“Are you serious?” he asked.

My mother, who was holding the baby, said, “Of course she’s serious. You can’t let the holy muron go down the drain. You take the basin down to the courtyard. There’s a small bush there that will be good enough. No one’s asking you to go all the way to the park.”

Virginie said, “You can make it a birdbath with a cup of water.”

Jacqueline added, “Or a sponge bath, and then you can bury the holy sponge under the bush.”

My mother-in-law admonished, “Don’t joke, girls. Show some respect.”

I glanced at Barkev, who seemed not to have heard a word. He was staring out the window at the passing walls of the dark tunnel.

Within a few weeks, Pierre did begin sleeping better, as my mother-in-law had predicted. Daily life began to seem more manageable. Barkev was still having bad dreams at night and was distant and distracted during the day, but the baby was starting to be entertaining. His skin was soft as an apricot’s and he stared soulfully up at my face.

I smiled down at him. “That’s right, Pierre, I’m your mother.”

Then one day—as I was holding him in my lap, speaking nonsense in a high-pitched voice that would have seemed ridiculous to me only a few months before—Pierre smiled. It was a funny, pink-gummed smile, but it was thrilling nonetheless and made up for sleepless nights and chapped hands.

Later that afternoon Jacqueline stopped by the apartment and said, “I have a surprise for you downstairs.”

“Why did you leave it down there?” I asked.

“It was too big for me to carry up.”

“What is it? A washing machine? How did you know?”

Jacqueline said, “Come with me. And bring the baby.”

“The baby?”

“You heard me. It’s a beautiful day and the two of you need some fresh air. You’ve been spending too much time cooped up in this apartment.”

We reached the ground floor, and there was a tall black-and-chrome perambulator sitting next to the mailboxes.

“Oh!” I gasped. “It’s beautiful. Where did you get the money for something like that?”

Jacqueline took the baby from me and placed him in the carriage. “I found this at the flea market. Your mother reupholstered the inside and sewed some new sheets. Look at this sweet quilt she made. Missak painted the outside and polished the chrome. Your father put on new springs and wheels. And here it is. Ready for the prince pasha.”

I pushed the pram out to the sidewalk. “Buttes Chaumont?”

Jacqueline said, “Let’s go.”

As we strolled toward the park, I noted the approving faces that peered into the carriage to admire my baby. Pierre, who was staring up at the tree branches under which we passed, cooed and gurgled and mewed and bleated.

Jacqueline said, “Listen to him!”

“Sometimes he sounds like a whole barnyard.”

We reached the park, and we sat on a sunny bench near the lake. I turned the stroller so the sleeping baby was in the shade.

“It’s perfect,” I said, gesturing toward the perambulator. “When your baby comes we can take turns using it.”

Jacqueline took a deep breath. “Probably not.”

“Why not?”

“We’re moving to Alfortville next month,” she answered.

“What? Why?”

“Missak found a job with a printer out there. He’s an old guy who wants to work only a few more years, and he doesn’t have anyone to leave his business to. Missak hopes to buy him out when he retires.”

“Where will you live?”

“The chicken king is going to rent us one of his houses. It’s only a few blocks from the printer. It’s a ten-minute walk to the church. We’ll do the christening there instead of at the cathedral.”

“Do my parents know?” I asked.

“We’re going to tell them tonight. They will be upset at first, especially your mother. But Maral, it’s tough living all piled on top of one another the way we are. Your mother has her own way of keeping house and she wants everything done just so. The glasses must be washed before the plates, the laundry must be folded so the shirt fronts have no creases, and there’s even a special method for sweeping. She’s always looking over my shoulder. Can you imagine what that will be like after the baby is born?”

“What do you think it’s like with my mother-in-law?”

“But you are used to it. Your mother and your mother-in-law are alike. In our apartment, we had so many kids underfoot, my mother didn’t care if every pin was in its place or not. I love your mother, but she’s driving me crazy.”

That night while the baby was sleeping and the two of us were lying side by side in the bed with the lights out, I reported the news to Barkev.

He said, “Your brother told me.”

“What do you think?”

“It’s a good plan for them.”

“What about for us?”

“Not now,” Barkev answered.

“But maybe later?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

“Because of money? Cousin Karnig would give us a deal.”

“Of course it’s money. But not just that.”

“What else?”

“Other things.”

“Well, talk to me. I’m your wife.”

He said sharply, “I’m having trouble at work.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“It’s not just my hands now. Sometimes I lay the leather out in front of me and can’t remember how to assemble the parts.”

“What do you do then?” I asked.

“I have to leave and walk around for twenty minutes until it stops. When I come back, my hands are steady and I can piece the shoe together with my eyes closed. But I can’t tell when it’s going to happen.”

“Does your boss know?”

“Yes,” he said. “He’s been okay. But it can’t go on like this. On a bad day, I do half the work I should.”

I didn’t know what to say. It occurred to me that the baby and I were a burden to him. “I wish there were something I could do for you.”

“There’s nothing you can do.”

“Do you dream about the camp?” I asked.

“I told you I don’t remember my dreams,” he said.

“Do you ever see any of the others who came back?”

“No.”

He said this one word in such a way that no others were possible.

In the silence that followed, I heard the baby sigh in his sleep. The clock on the nightstand ticked. The darkness in the room expanded until it stretched as wide as the sky. There were no stars and there was no moon, no point of light anywhere at all.

T
HE SUNDAY AFTER MISSAK
and Jacqueline’s baby was born, my father borrowed a car so we could drive to Alfortville. My parents sat in the front seat; Barkev and I were in the back, with Pierre sitting on my lap. It was a hot August day and I smoothed back the baby’s damp hair. Once the car passed the city limits and picked up speed, the rush of air coming in the windows brought relief from the stifling heat.

We pulled into the driveway of the gray stucco house with gold shutters on a tree-lined street, and Jacqueline’s mother waved to us from the front door.

“Welcome, welcome,” Sophie Sahadian said, gesturing us in. “Missak went to the bakery for bread, but he’ll be back any minute now.”

Jacqueline, who was dressed in a housecoat and slippers, sat on the couch holding the new baby. “Look at this little monster. He eats all the time, and he’s killing me.” She thrust the baby at her mother. “Burp him, will you? I want to show Maral the house.”

I handed Pierre, who seemed big and noisy in comparison to the newborn, to my mother.

Jacqueline led the way up the stairs to the second floor. “Did it hurt when you started nursing? It feels like that baby has teeth. It makes me want to cry.”

“I was a little sore in the beginning. He’s still so tiny!”

“Are you kidding? He’s giant. That was some delivery.”

“Alexandre is a nice name. You can call him Alex for short. Does he have a baptism name?”

“To please your parents and the priest, we picked Avedis. The baby’s bedroom is here,” Jacqueline said as we reached the second-floor landing; she pointed into a sunny nursery, where there was an oak crib with frolicking lambs carved into the footboard.

“What a beautiful crib!”

“Cousin Karnig made it,” Jacqueline said, closing the nursery door. “The bathroom is here in the middle. Look at that big bathtub! No more zinc basin.”

“Do you just sit in there and soak?”

Jacqueline shut the bathroom door. “Who has time? And our room is on this side. Come take a look while I get dressed.”

“It’s so bright and green,” I said, gazing out the bedroom window at the backyard as Jacqueline changed into a skirt and blouse.

“Come see the rest,” Jacqueline said.

I followed her down the stairs to the kitchen, which held a small table with four stools and had a long white counter along one wall. The stovetop had four burners, and the oven was big enough for two trays of bread sticks to bake at once. Jacqueline flipped a light switch on the wall and opened a door to another flight of stairs that led down to the basement. In the low-ceilinged cellar, damp diapers were pinned to a rope line strung between two pipes. In one corner there was a new washing machine with an agitator and a wringer. No more washboards for Jacqueline. I looked down at my chapped, roughened hands.

“Girls,” Sophie Sahadian called from the top of the stairs, “it’s time for lunch.”

Lunch was spread on a picnic table in the backyard. I laid Pierre on a blanket in the grass while Alexandre slept in a perambulator nearby.

My father clapped Missak on the back. “A boy to carry on the family name.”

Missak said, “He was the biggest baby in the hospital.”

Jacqueline said, “You sound so proud, like you had something to do with it.”

“Oh, no,” Missak answered, “I know it was all you,
anoushig.
”

“Since when do you talk like that? What have you done to him, Jacqueline?” I asked.

“He’s gone soft in the head since the baby was born,” Jacqueline said.

When we arrived home that night, the apartment felt more cramped than usual. So did our bedroom; the baby had graduated from the basket to a crib, and it blocked access to one side of the bed. After I was in my nightgown, I put the baby on the top of the bureau to change his diaper. Barkev sat on the bed as he took off his shoes.

He asked, “Are you sorry you married me?”

“Why would you say that?”

“When you see Jacqueline’s house, don’t you wish you married someone else?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Sometimes I wonder if you married me out of pity.”

“Barkev, that’s not right.”

“Well, why did you?”

“Because you asked me, and because I cared for you.”

“Or because you loved my brother but I was the one who came back?”

By this time, Pierre was in his pajamas. I took him to the small armchair in the corner to feed him.