The Border of Paradise: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

Kewpie doll in an enormous camel coat.
    “Hello?” she asked. “Francine?”
    “No,” I said.
    “Oh! David? Are your parents home?”
    “They’re not back from church yet. They’ll be here in a little bit.”
    “Oh.”
    I wondered if she wanted me to invite her in to wait. Not wanting her to, I didn’t ask, and she didn’t inquire. Finally she said, “Do you think they’ll be very long? I’d like to speak to your mother.”
    “They should be back soon.”
    “All right.” She turned to look back toward the street. It wasn’t snowing, but she must have been cold, because her nose and ears were bright pink, and she shivered even with that coat on. She didn’t seem to want to leave. “I’m praying for you,” she said. Then she hurried away, and I watched her leave with astonishment. Praying for me? Did the Orlichs chat over dinner about how David Nowak was damned? Did they speculate about whether he still said his prayers? (I did, fervently, daily, nightly, as if to make up for my lost Sundays.) What must Marianne think? I began to chew on my lip, shortly feeling the hot sting of a wound. I’d convinced myself that Marianne, whom I hadn’t spoken to since Christmas, hadn’t noticed my absence, but if Mrs. Orlich was praying for me…
    My parents came home soon after. I was still at the kitchen table. “What’s wrong with your lip?” Matka asked, unbuttoning her coat.
    I said something about biting down wrong on a piece of toast.
    “It looks like it hurts. Put something cold on it.” She removed her coat and hung it in the hall closet. “We have leftover pot roast.” She glanced at my father, who climbed the stairs without acknowledging either of us, and in his silence I was certain he blamed me. All of Greenpoint knew that the heir of the Nowak Piano Company was ready for the funny farm, thanks to my sartorial prohibitions.
    “When did you have your toast?” she asked.
    “Breakfast.”
    “You still want pot roast? Your father is probably going to want to eat soon.” She entered the kitchen. “And you’re wearing my robe. I don’t know why you do these things—these things that you know Ojciec won’t like.”
    I tugged at the belt. Finally I said, “Mrs. Orlich stopped by.”
    Matka opened a cupboard. “What did Caroline want?”
    “She wanted to talk to you, but she didn’t say about what.”
    “Did she leave a message?”
    “She didn’t say much,” I said, and hoped that would end it.
    “You mean you don’t want to tell me what she said. Go on.”
    “She really didn’t say anything to me,” I said. “She said she would come back and tell you herself.”
    It was true. Hours later, my father was hidden away in his study, my mother was cleaning the kitchen, and I was in my room, reading, when I heard the doorbell. Mrs. Orlich had returned. Sensitized to the sound of my name, I put down my pen, went to my open bedroom door, and stood in the hallway to the left of the top of the stairs, which allowed me a view of Mrs. Orlich’s cobalt hat through the railing.
    “Please, come in and have something to drink,” my mother said.
    “No, no,” said Mrs. Orlich. “I’ll be out of your hair in a moment.” She said something else, so quietly that I couldn’t hear, and then: “Francine…”
    “Yes?”
    “I want you to know that I don’t think ill of you or Peter at all. Not because of David. I know that you’re doing the best that you can with him.”
    “That’s kind of you, Caroline.”
    “I mean it. I wouldn’t come to your house, in this weather, without Bunny, if I didn’t mean it. I—I know you’re good people.I know that David is a good boy. You see, I think that his type of neurosis is only temporary. I know an analyst who says so. Now don’t worry—I didn’t mention your family by name, of course, but I’m acquainted with an analyst, a very good one, and I took it upon myself to ask him what he thought of the situation as I presented it in the abstract. He