Martha and Joe Shur walked along the bay for an hour before they decided to take the apartment. They had seen so many and decided against so many that it was hard to be sure any more. It was always the older Mrs. Shur who found the flaws. The ceilings were too low or the foyer was too small. The tiles might be broken in the bathroom or the walls might have cracks. “It isn’t as if you didn’t have a place to stay,” she would remind them. Sunday after Sunday they would come home with nothing accomplished. It was easier to decide without her. They paid their deposit and signed the agreement. Then for a while they walked around the flat field, overgrown with tall sweet-smelling weeds and swamp grass, where the new apartments were to be built.

Joe’s mother had hoped all along that they would include her in their plans. For weeks they had wavered back and forth, undecided, and then they had decided that she could live with them, but as soon as they talked about it Martha knew that it would be unbearable and she had cried so much about it that Joe had given in. Meanwhile the older Mrs. Shur did not know what they thought or planned. She waited nervously for them to decide.

She did not hide her disappointment when they told her. “It won’t make any difference,” she said. “We’ll see each other a few times a week anyway. You can’t get rid of a mother so easy. But you’ll be sorry when you have a little one that I’m not closer. And it’s a terrible waste of money to pay two rents. But do what you want, don’t let me tell you.”

They watched their house go up as eagerly as those in the suburbs watched their bungalows take form. They came back week after week to see what the bulldozers and derricks had accomplished even after the weeds were dry and dead and they could see the garbage, empty bottles, and old tires strewn all over the lots. They knew which windows were theirs.

The last few months together were difficult for Martha and her mother-in-law. The tensions that had been hidden for two years suddenly could be borne no longer. They quarreled about the lights and the dishes and the housework and then made up with tears and kisses. “You worked all day, go sit down and take a rest,” Mrs. Shur urged Martha when she offered to help in the evening. But as soon as the girl did sit down the woman showed resentment.

The evenings were quiet. “When you’re eating, eat,” Mrs. Shur would say. “Later you’ll talk.” But when they were done Joe would nap on the living room couch, his mother would do the dishes alone, and Martha would cut pictures of furniture and recipes from the magazines she bought.

The baby was to arrive a month after they moved in. The days moved slowly, anxiety, excitement, and anticipation each taking its turn. But time passed and the furniture was bought, the clothes accumulated in a frenzy of buying, and Mrs. Shur supervised the purchases. She knew about the quality of the fabric and the finish of the wood just as she knew how a suit should be made and how a dress should be finished inside. Martha could not argue. She was not permitted any mistakes. If she hesitated her mother-in-law would insist on buying for her whatever she must have. Martha waited.

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Four months later she woke in her own bed with a crib beside it. Joe called her from the kitchen. She heard him but she buried her face deep in the pillow. Then the baby cried and she jumped to pick him up. The door of the refrigerator slammed shut. Martha blinked when she came into the kitchen. The baby was on her shoulder, its moist young head wobbling as she walked. She carried a diaper and a botte in her free hand.

“There’s nothing for breakfast,” Joe said.

“What do you want?” she asked.

She looked at her reflection in the mirror over the telephone table. Her hair was tangled around her face, her eyes puffed.

“What do you want?” she asked again.

“Some breakfast.”

“There’s eggs in the refrigerator. The cereal’s in the closet. There’s bread on the table.”

“I don’t want any eggs.”

“The appetizing store was closed yesterday. It’s closed Wednesdays.”

“Then you should have gone on Tuesday,” he said. He fixed his tie and ran a comb through his hair. His cheeks were pink from shaving. He looked young and handsome. He stood holding the doorknob, looking at her crumpled nightgown that hung loosely beneath her cotton housecoat.

“Aren’t you going to kiss me goodbye?” she asked.

“Kiss the baby,” he said sharply. “He takes all your time anyway.”

The door shut behind him. The baby began to cry. Martha went to the refrigerator for a bottle but found they were all gone. She left him to scream in his crib and began to gather together the milk, corn syrup, and water for the formula. She read the directions carefully. She read them every single time and wondered why she could not remember from one time to the next. Then she thought the infant was holding his breath and she ran to the crib to get him. Then she couldn’t remember which of the ingredients she had put in the bowl and whether she had measured them properly. The bottles steamed in the sterilizer and the nipples were disintegrating while she hunted for the tongs that she had dropped behind the stove. “Shut up!” she shouted at the baby and she realized that she was crying too. Finally she held him while she poured the milk into the bottles. He sucked on her shoulder hungrily and fell asleep before the bottles were ready.

Martha had a work schedule posted in the kitchen. She had copied it from a magazine. It told her when to make the beds and sweep and cook the supper. At three o’clock she had finished her chores. The apartment was dusted and swept, the baby’s clothes were washed, the supper prepared, and the kitchen in order. Stephen slept on his stomach in his carriage, ready to go outdoors. Martha brushed her hair. It hung to her shoulders. She pulled her jacket down. It was tight and she couldn’t button the top of her skirt, but she didn’t look very different from the girl in the tinted wedding photograph that hung over the living room couch. She put the last blanket in the carriage and turned it so that she could get it out of the door.

The buzzer rang and Martha opened the little metal peephole to see who it was.

“It’s me! Open up, it’s me!” said Mrs. Shur.

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Her arms were full of brown paper bags. “How are you and how’s my little boy? How’s my darling little boy?” She put the bags on the kitchen table and went to the carriage.

“I was just taking him out,” Martha said.

“Now, three o’clock you’re taking him out? The sun is gone. He should be out twelve o’clock, not now. What’s the good of dragging him out now?”

“I wasn’t ready at twelve o’clock,” Martha said. “I just got finished. I have to go to the store. Do you want to wait here or do you want to come with me?”

“You’re taking him out like this? What’s the matter, you’re out of your head? This isn’t July. Where’s the woolen hat I bought him? I didn’t buy it, it should lay in a drawer. You call that a hat, it’s no thicker than a handkerchief.”

“It’s seventy-five degrees outside. I’m just wearing a thin suit. He doesn’t need a woolen hat.”

“What’s the degrees? It’s April. It’s changeable outside. In a minute it’s bitter cold. Listen to me. I raised a child already.”

“Look, I’ll be back in a minute. Why don’t you just relax? I’ll be back before it’s bitter cold.”

“Go then, but leave the baby with me.”

“No, I want to take him. It took me an hour to fix the carriage and dress him. It’s just for a few minutes.”

“What are you going to buy?”

“Whatever I need.”

“Why are you such a stubborn child? You don’t need anything. Whatever you need, I brought you. Come, look here. For supper tonight I brought you a chicken soup with barley like Joe likes and the chicken naturally and for tomorrow there’s pot roast with vegetables. All you have to do is heat it up. And here’s some chopped herring and an apple pie. I even found a piece of belly lox, white and fat as butter. You can’t buy such quality here. The stores are too fancy. And a pumpernickel and some onion rolls for breakfast. So what do you have to buy? I even brought a jar of chicken fat.”

Martha stood at the carriage and watched her mother-in-law spread the bags over the table and chairs. “Why do you bring so much?” she asked. “You don’t have to bring all this stuff. I made supper already. We don’t need it. Why do you bring things all the time? I don’t ask you to.”

“Look, Miss Independence, I’m a mother. You don’t have to ask me to bring. I don’t come here with empty hands. Tell me what did you cook for supper?” She did not wait to be told. She lifted the covered dish on the stove, sniffed, and asked, “What is this? You could throw it away and never miss it.”

Martha’s head throbbed. She bit the inside of her cheek till it bled. “It’s a salmon-noodle casserole.”

“And that’s a supper?”

“There’s fruit-jello salad and antipasto in the refrigerator.” She had suspended the fruit in lime jello. Each cherry was fixed. The peaches formed a star.

“Look darling, you can learn now that you can’t nourish a man on salmon noodles and jello. That you can eat for lunch tomorrow. My son needs a rich soup, a thick piece of meat. No wonder he looks like he does. I’ll be glad to bring it, if you can’t make it. And it won’t hurt the little one either. In another month a few spoons of soup is a hundred per cent better than all the cans in the store.”

“I’m going out,” Martha said. “I’ll be back soon.”

“I talk and you don’t listen. You can’t take a baby out like that. You’re fit to be a mother like I’m fit to be President. You’re a baby yourself.”

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Martha took her hand off the doorknob. The baby stirred in the carriage. “I don’t need you to tell me what to do,” she said shrilly. “Just leave me alone. Keep your stuff and leave me alone.”

“That’s a fine thank-you. For this I was at the butcher at eight o’clock in the morning. For this I traveled an hour on buses to come here. I didn’t expect such a thank-you.”

“Look, please stop. I don’t want to hurt your feelings.”

“You please stop,” she shouted. “Stop being such a baby and grow up. What have I done to you you’re so bitter against me? I did you some harm? I came to see your baby? I brought you good things to eat? For this, you say please stop?”

“All I want to do is go out for a few minutes. I haven’t been out for two days. I didn’t know you were coming. I didn’t expect you. I’ll be right back.”

“You didn’t expect me. I need a formal invitation. At least I should have the privilege to sit in the chairs I bought you. Or is that too much to ask?”

“Mother, what you gave us is ours now. You didn’t take a mortgage out on me,” Martha said desperately and then added lamely, “You could call me up. It would only take a minute to say you’re coming.”

“I know you’re home. Where would you go with a little baby? For the price of a call I’m on a bus and I’m here, even if you’re not so anxious to see me.”

“Please understand me. I want to do things for myself. I want to learn how to cook and how to keep house. I was working until six months ago. Why can’t you give me a chance?”

“I don’t give you a chance? My only pleasure is to help you. What have I but Joey and you and the baby? What are my pleasures? You’re my only pleasure. For what do I live but to see you happy? And for this I get ‘take your stuff and leave me alone . . . don’t mortgage me.’ Is this words to give a mother? Is that what you want to hear from Stephen? You can take my word that however you treat me, so exactly he will treat you. Remember that.”

The baby squirmed in the carriage and began to cry. “Oh my little bird, my sweet little bird,” the older woman crooned. She pulled the covers back and touched his diaper. “Wet,” she said, “wet as a cat,” and still crooning she said, “Don’t cry, little heart, your mama will take off her suit and put on an apron and take care of my best love.” She opened the cotton hat and unbuttoned the soft blue sweater.

Martha hurried to the bathroom. She shut the door behind her and stood in front of the mirror, panting as if she had been chased. She blew her nose and threw cold water on her face. When she came out the baby was half naked. His grandmother had powdered him. He kicked his heels and grinned. His face was bland and unconcerned. He looked just like his father.

“You’re still wearing your jacket?” her mother-in-law asked. “Oh my, look what you did to it.” There were dark semi-circles under the armpits. “Why don’t you wear shields? Why should you sweat so much, it’s not so hot today.”

Martha didn’t answer her. She replaced the baby’s diaper and said, “All right, you take care of him. I’ll be back soon.”

“It’s a pleasure,” sang the grandmother.

“It’s a pleasure to play with my little love.”

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Martha waited impatiently for the elevator. She jumped in quickly when it stopped, wary of the unpredictable door. She read the scribblings carved into the mahogany paneling and shrugged her shoulders. It was a brand new house. Some parts of it weren’t even finished yet and already somebody had scribbled. Outside she walked carefully between the carriages, tricycles, and wagons. The street was full of children. The mothers knitted, gossiped, and read, seated all along the house and the play area behind it. She didn’t see anyone she knew. She looked in the bakery window, but remembered the pumpernickel and apple pie. She stopped in front of the drygoods store and looked at the blouses and gloves and the baby clothes. She hesitated a moment and went in. Martha watched a woman who wanted a pink over-the-shoulder bag for bottles. The storekeeper had taken out a large variety, blue, black, and green, but the woman waited for a pink one. “It’s not practical,” the salesgirl said.

“Look, I asked for pink, do you have it? I want something different, something different and pretty. These are very ordinary. If you don’t have it, say so.”

The salesgirl gathered the bags together. “You want a diaper and bottle bag. What could be so different about a bottle bag? You can’t expect a Paris creation for four dollars.”

“Never mind,” the young woman said petulantly. “I’ll look around a little more.”

Martha tried to attract the salesgirl’s attention but she began to wait on a young woman with a little boy in a carriage. The young woman’s mother came into the store and said, “You’re still here?”

“I want some sleepers with the feet for a two-year-old boy,” the young woman said.

“A size four should be all right. Is that the baby?” the salesgirl asked pointing to the boy.

The mother nodded and the boy strained at the harness.

“Take a six,” the grandmother said.

The salesgirl held up the pajamas so that the young mother could see. She hesitated, not so much because the decision was so difficult, but rather as if she was in the habit of hesitating. “I need two,” she said. “I think a blue and a green.”

“The fours?” the salesgirl asked again.

“Take a six,” the grandmother persisted. “Hell outgrow.”

“Four,” the young woman said. “A four will be all right.”

The older woman tapped her daughter’s elbow, “Listen to me,” she said. “Take my advice.”

The daughter turned to Martha. “Listen to her. Did you ever hear anything like it? Why don’t I take a size twenty, maybe a forty-two would be good too? For Godsakes, if he outgrows it I’ll throw it away and get another. Do you understand? All my life I didn’t own a thing my size because of her. Nothing was ever bought for now. What do you want from him?”

“I only said he’s growing fast. Before you know, he’ll outgrow.” She said it meekly but stubbornly.

“Take a four and a six,” the salesgirl said. “You can bring it back if it isn’t good.”

The older woman sighed. The younger shook her head angrily.

Martha bought some stockings and followed the quarreling mother and daughter out of the store. They bickered and fought all the way home, not for any new reasons but to punish each other for old grievances. Listening to them somehow made Martha feel better.

Before she came into the house she decided what she must do. I won’t pay any attention, she told herself. I just won’t pay any attention to her.

_____________

 

When she opened the door she found her mother-in-law sprawled on the couch with the baby. He pulled her glasses and held a clump of her hair in his hand. He kicked his feet and squealed with delight.

Joe came in at six. The soup was simmering on the stove. His mother fed the baby a bottle. He kissed Martha in the kitchen. “I’m sorry about this morning,” he said sheepishly. “I brought you a sample sweater.” He hung up his jacket and squeezed her again. “Were you sore at me all day?” He shrugged his shoulders to show that he didn’t plan to talk about it any more. “When did Mother come?” he asked.

“She brought a lot of stuff for supper and she came at three o’clock,” Martha said. “I already cooked some. What do you want?”

“Gee, I don’t care,” he said. “I meant to tell you we had a big party today for the bookkeeper who’s getting married and I don’t want any supper. A cheese sandwich’ll be enough.”

When the baby was asleep they sat down together. Mrs. Shur had the soup she had brought, Joe his sandwich, and Martha the salmon she had prepared.

“Joey, eat something,” his mother begged. “I didn’t carry it here for myself.”

“Tomorrow, Ma,” he said. “Tomorrow’s another day. Did you see the sweater I brought Martha? It’s a fifteen-dollar sweater. It’s a sample.”

“If you’re eating, eat,” she said. “You’ll talk later.”

Martha carried the first forkful to her mouth and the baby began to cry.

“How they know,” the grandmother said. “Just sit down to eat and they know already. I’ll go hold him,” she said. “You eat, Martha.”

But Martha jumped up before her. “Your soup’ll get cold,” she said. She came back in a minute with the infant on her shoulder. She propped him up high and held him with her ear and her left hand.

“That’s the way I used to eat when you were little,” the grandmother said to her son. “How the sight reminds me.” She crumpled some crackers into her soup and said, “Well, here we are, the four of us all together. The soup is good, Joey. You should try some.”

They ate silently. The baby snored vaguely. The milk he regurgitated trickled down the back of Martha’s dress and he was warm and wet where his blanket touched her breast.

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