It was the first time Mutti had ever praised Elsie’s beauty over Hazel’s, and Elsie understood all too welclass="underline" Mutti didn’t believe Hazel was ever coming home.
“Here, dear.” Mutti handed over the dress. “Take this before I ruin it with flour,” she said, though she had yet to begin baking. “Promise to show me how it looks on before you leave.” Mutti shut the bedroom door behind her.
Elsie laid the dress on the bed so that the brown skirt spread wide like a peacock tail. Hazel would’ve been lovely in it. A striking garment, it was as if Mutti had threaded the fabric of her heart onto each sleeve and hem. Elsie hadn’t worn anything so fine since Josef’s gown on Christmas Eve. This, however, was more precious than all the chiffon of Paris, all the silk of Shanghai, all the wool of Castile, because of everything it had survived—everything they had survived. She slipped out of her muslin robe and undid the dress’s waistline. Snaps of electricity arced between her gauzy slip and the copper buttons.
In the mirror, she admired herself, astonished that the dress made for Hazel’s measurements fit her to a T. Her figure had blossomed over the past few months. Even with her recent lack of appetite, her chest and hips were rounder and fuller than ever before. She buttoned the dirndl, dotted her wrists with rose shampoo, grabbed a matching hat from the closet, and gave herself one last inspection. She was ready. Almost.
The outfit needed something. Pizzazz, like the American poster girls in the R&R Center. A flash of red fluttered in the outdoor window box. Red geraniums against the summer breeze. She pinched the largest cluster at the base and stuck it in the brim.
Now, someone in the carnival crowd knocked her hat askew. The bloom fell and was smashed by clogged feet. Elsie readjusted once they reached the Johanns’ bäckerei booth. The artfully arranged pretzels looked like they’d spent too little time in the soda ash bath and too much in the sun, in her opinion.
“Two.” Robby made a peace sign with his fingers.
“Nein,” Elsie protested.
“You’ve got to eat something.” Robby frowned. “Are you bent on getting pie-eyed?”
She’d drunk an entire beer stein alone. The malt magically settled her stomach. She craved another, but knew it unwise. Her head already felt a blissful airiness. Papa told her that dark lager, like dark chocolate, had that effect.
“They’ve got fried kreppels. How about one of those?” pressed Robby.
Petite sugar dumplings floated on tufts of brown paper, leaving slick shadows beneath.
Her mouth watered. “Ja.”
Robby ordered one pretzel and one kreppel. Sam and Potter were content with their beers and distracted by two busty girls wearing frilly, low-cut dirndls.
The kreppel was warm in Elsie’s palm. She bit expectantly only to find the sweetness cloying. Gulping down the morsel, she handed the remaining portion to Robby. “Take.” She screwed up her nose and waved it away.
“Not up to Schmidt quality?” he teased.
“Schmidt?” interrupted a woman in line behind them. She was round in the belly with a similarly pregnant pustule on the tip of her nose. “Hazel Schmidt?”
Elsie tried to focus past the blemish. “My sister,” she clarified.
“Oh! Then you must be familiar with Josef Hub?”
The kreppel nearly came back up. She tried to walk away, but the woman followed.
“He was looking for your sister. Did he ever find her? He was the commander of her fiancé’s unit in Munich. Peter Abend?”
Elsie turned so that Robby was to her back. The woman did the same and continued.
“I used to be a Naz—an archive secretary in Munich. Never forget a name.” She rubbed her belly. “Josef and I were acquaintances before I met my husband.” She pointed over her shoulder to a corpulent man waiting in line. “Josef asked me to pull the file on Hazel Schmidt, which of course I never would have done. That was classified information then.” She straightened her shoulders defensively. “We lost touch. I wondered if he ever found her.”
“When was this?” Elsie’s heart fluttered, hope alive.
“Hmm …” She tapped her fingers on her belly bulge. “1941-42. I can’t remember. It seems like a lifetime ago, doesn’t it?”
It did. Elsie recalled the first time Josef strolled through the bäckerei doors in his starched uniform, tall and dignified; it was like a scene in a dark movie theater, out of focus around the corners.
“So much chaos when the Reich fell. I haven’t heard from Josef in months,” said Elsie.
“So you did know him. A good man.” She cleared her throat. “Such a shame.”
The summer sun blazed hot despite Elsie’s hat.
“A shame?”
“You’ve heard the news?”
She shook her head. Her ears burned.
The woman looked to her husband, then leaned in close. “They found him and a group of SS officers on a docked boat in Brunsbüttel. Mass suicide.”
Elsie blinked hard. Her vision tunneled.
“Everyone had been shot—a bloody mess. But not Josef. His was lethal injection, so they say,” she whispered.
Elsie sipped in the air, but it did no good. Acid rumbled up her throat and before she could turn away, she vomited on the woman’s wooden clogs.
Robby rushed to her side. “Elsie?”
She knelt to the ground and gripped the blades of grass to steady herself.
“I’m sorry. It’s the drink,” Robby explained to the woman. “She’s been sick all week. Hasn’t been able to stomach much.”
The woman stamped the pottage of fried dough from her toe. “It’s fine. Reminds me of myself not too long ago—terrible pregnancy sickness with this child.”
Elsie focused on a bright dandelion, its yellow bud wide open. Her head still spun, but the din of the crowd quieted. She put a hand to her stomach. Impossible.
Chapter Thirty-seven
EL PASO BORDER PATROL STATION
8935 MONTANA AVENUE
EL PASO, TEXAS
—–Original Message—–
From: reba.adams@hotmail.com
Sent: February 14, 2008 6:52 P.M.
To: ricardo.m.chavez@cbp.dhs.gov
Subject: Thinking of you
February 14, 2008
Happy Valentine’s Day, Riki!
I tried your cell but you must be finishing up at the station. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to watch the sun turn the sky all our favorite sherbet flavors. How many did we count that one time—thirty-three different sky scoops? That’s two more than Baskin-Robbins. My favorite will always be passion fruit pineapple marshmallow cream. That scoop right above Sunland Park, New Mexico. So if you see it tonight, give it a little taste for me.
It’s a different kind of sunset here on the bay. A little watered down in my opinion. But the apartment is beautiful. My editor, Leigh, helped me get the place—fully furnished, too. There was a long waiting list at this apartment complex, but one word from her and they bumped me to the top. You’d like it. You can see the water from my balcony. Leigh’s a real ballbuster in the office. Kind of reminds me of Elsie with an organic, Napa wine, locavore twist. Hoping this is just hell week and things ease up after I’ve been initiated.
My first story assignment is on the new trend in nightclub-restaurant hybrids. Interesting. Leigh says she wants me to get my feet wet in the city scene, but the majority of my work will be in the editing room, not the beat. I’m wondering what exactly that means.
San Fran is a lot bigger than El Paso, that’s for sure. A lot bigger than Richmond, too. I went walking downtown yesterday. I thought I’d see a couple city staples—the Fisherman’s Wharf, the Ghirardelli Chocolate Factory, the Boudin Bakery. I bought a bread roll in the shape of a turtle. Seriously, it was the spitting image, and it tasted about the same. Bland as pond water. You’ll have to tell Elsie that nothing compares to her brötchen—not even the famous big-city bakeries.