Then one Friday Nana could not get out of bed. The boy’s mother took her to Grace — New Haven Hospital and came home that night and told the boy’s father that they were keeping her in the ward while they did some tests. His father nodded his stern head and went out on the porch. The boy asked what was wrong and his mother said to leave his father alone just now. They stood by the parlor window and looked out at the dark street. After a while the boy asked his mother if having tests meant that Nana was going to die. His mother’s eyes got teary and she gave him a hug and kissed him and took him upstairs to wash and say his prayers and get tucked in.
On Sunday the pastor asked everybody to pray for Nana. He called her Our Sister. After church his parents took him to the hospital. It was a big brick building with dark hallways. It smelled. There was a new wing that was brighter but Nana was in the old part. There were twelve beds in her ward and there was a woman in every one of them. A lot of them had bandages, and a lot of the bandages were dirty. There wasn’t much light because the windows were mostly blocked by the building next door. There were liquids spilled on the floor. There seemed to be only one nurse. Nana was in the last bed, down by the wall. Screens were set up between the beds. Each bed had a wooden chair, so his mother sat next to Nana and held her hand, and his father stood on the other side and held her other hand. The boy wanted to rub Nana’s feet but they were covered with a sheet. His mother and father did not pay attention to him, so he decided to go look at the other women. No one seemed to mind as he wandered along the row of beds, peering past the screens, trying not to step in any of the spills. He noticed that all of the women in the ward were Negroes. Maybe white people never got sick.
That night the family ate cold fried chicken from the Frigidaire. His mother did not believe in leftovers on Sunday but she served them anyway. She seemed sad. His father looked just as stern as he did every other day. He scolded the boy for getting crumbs on the cloth. He scolded the boy for being too slow clearing the table. After prayers, he told the boy that because Nana was in the hospital, she would not be able to take care of him tomorrow. The boy wondered if that meant he would be able to listen to Baby Snooks. But his father was still talking. Neither I nor your mother can take a day off just now, he said, so you will have to go with me to work tomorrow.
The boy was surprised. To the hotel? he asked.
That’s where I work, his father said. Pray for Nana tonight, he said, and his voice sounded funny.
In bed that night the boy could hardly sleep. The hotel! He had never seen his father at work at the hotel. His father never talked about what he did there. But the boy was proud that his father worked at the hotel. It was taller than the church spires on the Green. It was taller than almost all of Yale. It was built out of red bricks, except the top stories, which were covered in white stone. People were always talking about the time Babe Ruth had stayed there. And Albert Einstein, although the boy only knew he was famous; he did not know exactly who he was. The president of the United States had stayed there too, although the boy had no idea which president. The other kids said the hotel had even been in a Hollywood movie, but the boy wasn’t sure whether to believe them.
On Monday morning the boy’s father put on a dark suit and a white shirt and a dark tie. He carefully combed his hair. He told the boy to put on nice clothes and his new blue shoes. They boarded the trolley even though the hotel was not that far away. His father said, We can’t afford to be sweaty. The boy liked the streetcar, the way it clacked along the tracks ignoring the other traffic. The engineer would blow his horn and the cars would get out of the way. Some of the drivers honked back. The boy listened to the crackle of the pantograph. He said it would be fun to drive a trolley when he grew up. His father said, I expect more than that of you. Besides, he continued, the city will be getting rid of the streetcars soon and there will only be the buses left. The boy asked why.
Money, his father said, with that stern disapproving look.
The boy gazed out the window as they passed Yale. He was watching for blue professor monsters. But he only saw the big kids who went there. All of them were white. Nana had told him that when his father was young he used to shine shoes for the Yale kids. He was not allowed to go into the buildings where the boys lived, she said, so he would stand under the window and the Yale kids would throw their shoes outside. He would take them home and shine them up and bring them back the next day. He would knock and one of the Yale kids would open the door. He would take the shoes and say, Wait here. Then he would close the door. The boy’s father would wait. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. Sometimes half an hour. Then the same Yale kid would open the door again. He would pay the boy’s father for the shoes he shined, fifteen cents a pair. That was a lot of money in those days, Nana would say. A lot of money.
The boy and his father got off the trolley at the corner of Chapel and College. The boy took his father’s hand. He stared up at the hotel. He was very excited. They walked right past the big glass doors. His father did not even turn to look. The boy was surprised. Aren’t we going in? he asked. His father told him to shush. They walked around the side all the way to the back where there was a wooden door that said Staff. Inside was a hallway. It was very crowded. People were walking this way and that. Most of them wore brown uniforms. The men had brown hats with shiny black bills. The women had little brown caps. The boy was proud of his father again because he was wearing a suit. There were a lot of doors in the hallway. One of them said Staff Men Dressing. His father told him to wait here. He went in. The boy waited. There was nowhere to sit so he stood up. There were notices on the wall about all the things the staff was not allowed to do while on duty. The door opened and a tall man came out. He was wearing the brown uniform and the brown hat with the shiny black bill. He walked straight toward the boy and held out his hand and at first the boy was scared until he saw that the man was his father. His father took his hand and led him to another room. The sign said Men Staff Lounge. The letters were faded. Inside were some old tables and chairs. A couple of men were sitting by the window with their uniform blouses open. They were smoking cigarettes. The boy’s father drew him into a corner and pointed to a bench and said he had to stay here and be quiet all day. The boy could not stop staring at this stranger in his brown uniform. His father said he would have a break in three hours and he would come and take him to the bathroom. He said there was a drinking fountain in the hall. His father was starting to say more when a man walked into the room and went straight up to him like people always did on the street. The boy wondered if he needed advice. But the man did not ask the boy’s father for advice or shake his hand. The man was fat and white and bald. He called the boy’s father by his Christian name and told him he was late and he’d better get about it if he expected to keep this job. Then he looked down.