Wifey Read Online Free PDF Page B

realizing that the change was only temporary and would leave her as small-breasted as before, unlike her sister, Myra, who had inherited Aunt Lottie’s mammoth breasts, and who had, two years ago, undergone a breast reduction operation because “you can’t imagine what it’s like to carry around a pair of tits like these!”
    “Too bad she can’t give some to you,” Norman had said at the time, adding, “ha ha . . .”
    “Yes, too bad,” Sandy had answered. “Ha ha ha . . .”
    “ S O, WHEN IS MY LITTLE S ARAH going home?” Enid asked, reading the cards lined up on Sandy’s dresser.
    “Her name is Jennifer,” Sandy said, “Jennifer Patrice. Didn’t Norman tell you?”
    “He said
Sarah.
”
    “Well, yes, in Hebrew it’s Sarah, but we’re going to call her Jen.”
    “I don’t believe it!”
    “It’s true,” Sandy said. “I’ve already signed the birth certificate. Jennifer Patrice.”
    “Mona, tell me I’m dreaming,” Enid said, with one hand to her head, the other to her chest.
    “The baby is hers to name,” Mona said. “You had your chance with Norman and Fred.”
    “Oh, God, oh, God.” Enid swayed, then sat down. “I feel weak, like I might faint.”
    Mona poured a cup of water for Enid. “Try to relax,” she said, “don’t get yourself all worked up for nothing . . .”
    “Nothing? You think my son didn’t want to name his own baby after his father, may he rest in peace. No, it’s her . . .” Enid said, with a nod toward the bed. “She thinks she’s too good for a simple, beautiful, biblical name like Sarah.” She sipped some water.
    “It’s not that . . .” Sandy began.
    “Miss High and Mighty!”
    So she’d been christened too.
    “Miss High and Mighty is too good to care about her poor old mother-in-law and did I or didn’t I once send her picture to the
Courier-News,
making her a celebrity?”
    “Please . . .” Sandy said.
    “And how much time do I have left? A little happiness is all I ask.”
    “Stop it . . .” Sandy said, “please, stop it!”
    The nurse poked her head in the doorway. “Ladies, could we try to remember we’re in a hospital?”
    Enid turned to face Mona. “I’ll tell you this, my enemies treat me better than my daughter-in-laws. You don’t know how lucky you are to have girls instead of boys. With boys you wind up with tsouris . . .”
    “At least be happy the baby has the Hebrew name you want,” Mona told her.
    “To me she’ll always be Sarah, no matter what Miss High and Mighty calls her.”
    “Her name is Jennifer, dammit!” Sandy shouted. “And I’ve got the birth certificate to prove it!” She could no longer hold back her tears.
    “Ladies, ladies.” The nurse returned, shaking her head at them. “I’ll have to ask you to leave now. Look at our patient.”
    Sandy was crying hard. “Take care, darling,” Mona said, kissing her cheek. “I’d better go too. She shouldn’t drive like this.”
    The nurse gave Sandy a sedative and she slept through feeding time and missed evening visiting hours.
    Sandy was filled with guilt. It wasn’t just that she liked the name Jennifer, and certainly she didn’t dislike the name Sarah. It was that she couldn’t, wouldn’t name her child after Samuel D. Pressman. Sam Pressman had never addressed Sandy by name. He’d called her
girl
or
you,
not entirely without affection, but without concern. Samuel David Pressman, owner of Pressman’s Dry Cleaning Establishment, a chain of four stores in Plainfield, Roselle, and New Brunswick, catering to the
Black is Beautiful in Cleaned and Pressed Clothes
business. And in each store a doberman slept in the front window, a reminder that burglars should take their business elsewhere.
    Two months after the funeral Enid decided to give up her organizations, her luncheons, her shopping expeditions to Loehman’s and her afternoon Mah-Jongg games for the sake of the business. “I can’t expect my boy to do it all by