"Drunk on Manischewitz"

“I don’t know what she wants from me…I mean, I honestly don’t know what that woman wants from me,” a woman says in a tone used for daytime.



I stop in the middle of the kitchen and squint through the tacky curtains: my mother and Mr. McGee. I tiptoe closer to see Sam Fluchter wrapped in a Def Leopard blanket (compliments of Mr. McGee, I presume), a Manischewtiz wine bottle swinging in her hand.


“She probably just misses her grandkids. It’s not her fault—“


“No, nothing is ever her fault! She’s blamed me from day one. I know she wishes I never married her son.” My mother says this last part like there are rocks at the back of her throat she can’t swallow. I hear a swish from the wine bottle and a few feminine sniffles. But I no longer care to see what is going on under the fancy porch light Mr. McGee put up for us last week. My hands are too busy looking through Sam Fluchter’s purse she neglectfully left open on the counter. It is much worse than I thought: five packs of Trident bubble gum just asking to be ripped open. And at the bottom of the bag, a scattering of Trident wrappers, like paper snow against her wallet and lipsticks.


Grandma Ruth is one of those old people a person could never imagine looking young. Her skin makes me think of crepe paper that is just a few touches shy of disintegrating. It’s a good thing we are Jewish and don’t believe in embalming the dead because Grandma Ruth’s skin is way past the point of preserving. I’ve shared this thought with my mother and she told me to appreciate the hard life Grandma Ruth had in the Nazi camp. Until tonight, mom was always flowers and violins when it came to Grandma Ruth. This is what I’m thinking when I open our front door.


“Let me tell you, there is nothing fragile about that woman!” She is chewing gum—a truck driver in a pixie’s body. “You should see the way she hauls boxes of produce around her store, like they’re made of feathers! There’s no reason she can’t get on a plane and—Amelia, honey, what are you doing here?” Her head tilts to the side as she gives me a lazy, playful grin. She blows a bubble and it explodes against her nose. “Oh, crap-ola!” she giggles, pulls the gum back in her mouth and takes a swig of her Manischewitz.


Even under the shadowy light of our make-shift porch, I can see the flush in Mr. McGee’s cheeks. His big lips switch like a horse’s tail from one side to the other. “OK, I think it’s time we all call it a night!” He winks at me, but it is not with the usual goofy flair. It is a conspiratorial wink that screams help me! So I get on the other side of my mother and help Mr. McGee guide her to bed.