Cave Under the City Read Online Free PDF

sticky-eyed baby. “I only went down for a second. I came back, didn’t I? What did you wake up for? I heard you all the way out in the street. What are you afraid of? I left the light on.”
    He burped. It smelled like burned meat.
    â€œI have a right to go downstairs. I don’t have to be with you every second. Clam up, will you?” I mixed Ovaltine with water. There was no milk in the house. It tasted terrible and I spilled it down the drain.
    Later, I lay in bed. The light came in from the street. Somebody had a radio on. I heard a woman shouting and I thought of my mother, and my grandmother all by herself. Tomorrow, if my mother wasn’t here I was going to go to the hospital. My mother would tell me what to do. Come home, I’d say. You can stay in bed, Momma, and give the orders. I’ll cook, do the shopping. I’ll take care of Bubber, too. Tonight’s not a good example, Momma.
    I pulled the blankets over my ears. The last thing I remembered was thinking about breakfast. I’d make oatmeal with raisins and brown sugar.

8
    Bubber woke me in the morning. He was sitting on my back singing. “O beautiful for spacious pies, forever waves of rain.”
    â€œOff!” I humped up with my feet, then dug my head under the pillow.
    â€œFor purple mountains magic ski, above the fruited plates. Amer-i-ca, Amer-i-ca …”
    We were going to the hospital today.
    â€œAmer-i-ca, Amer-i-ca, God shed his grapes on me.”
    I got up and checked the door. No milk. Yesterday was the day we were supposed to pay. There were two bottles of milk and a pint of cream in front of the Chrissmans’ door. I went back inside and made oatmeal. Bubber picked out the raisins, then ate a couple of spoonfuls. He wanted butter and milk with his cereal. “That’s all you’re going to get until we see Momma and get some money.” He went to his room and came back with four Indian-head pennies.
    I found a quarter in the lining of my mother’s pocketbook. I went through my father’s pants. All I found was lint, but in the handkerchief pocket of his good jacket I found a dollar bill. “Look at this,” I said, “a dollar bill!” It was like magic finding it. Great feeling.
    We didn’t leave the house till the kids had gone to school. There was a man singing in the courtyard, his hat on the sidewalk. I wrapped a penny in newspaper and aimed for the hat. It landed in the bushes, but he found it. Musicians come into the courts all the time, playing for pennies.
    We tiptoed down the stairs, but instead of going out on the Barker Avenue side, we went out through the cellar. It was dark and smelled garbagey. A cat leaped out of a can. Bubber held my arm until we came out on the park side.
    We walked to Fordham Hospital through the park and the Botanical Gardens. The Gardens’ gate was chained shut on our side, but I knew a way in by the pond. Once we were inside, nobody stopped us. A crow hee-hawed and Bubber hee-hawed back.
    The hospital was a long red brick building with a lot of skinny windows framed in white. Which window was my mother’s? Maybe she’d call down to me, the way she did at home.
    There were people going in and out of the hospital. Nobody paid any attention to us. Inside, next to the entrance, was a little newsstand. I’d never been in a hospital before, except when I was born, which I didn’t remember. The only other time was when I had my tonsils out. All I remembered about that was how my throat burned and I cried for ice cream.
    â€œWhat’s that?” Bubber said, pointing.
    â€œDon’t point. Just look. That’s a Jesus Christ.”
    â€œWhy’s he like that? Is he sick?” Bubber made his arms like the Christ.
    I glanced at the man behind the news counter. He had white eyes. He was blind. “Don’t worry about it,” I said, pushing Bubber along.
    â€œCan I help you boys?” The