Twilight Time

by Michelle Reale

Bernice had barely gotten to Nardo’s house, sweaty and breathing hard, before he’d told her she’d better get something started on the stove. She wiped the moisture off her forehead and sat on the chair nearest to the front door, taking off the knee-high stockings she insisted on wearing with her sandals. Her thick bunions cracked the leather around them, and her brittle toe nails had a bluish hue. She roughly rubbed her old feet, wiggling toes and rotating ankles. The heat had made her sleepy, and she would have liked to rest a bit, cool down from the heat, but she didn’t want to keep her man waiting. Nardo stood up from the couch, where he’d been watching her, controlled but with the slight facial tick that preceded impatience. Despite the cluster of sun spots in her eyes, she could discern Nardo’s jaunty chin flick towards the cellar. She stood up from the chair and wobbled a bit, pulling her dress down in the back and smoothing the damp crinkles out in the front, while humming lightly. Nardo, looking aged in sharply creased pants worn shiny on the seat and a thin short sleeved shirt, lead the way. She followed, swaying slightly back and forth down the cellar steps.

Not much of a cook, Bernice opened up a jar of spaghetti sauce and boiled a pound of linguine. She thought of her dead husband, Sidney, an artist, and how food was never important to him. For most of their married lives, they lived like Bohemians, drinking wine and eating while standing at the kitchen sink or at the refrigerator door. Then she would read and listen to their precious jazz records, letting them crackle late into the night. Sidney would light a cigarette and smoke it all the way down while he sat on a low stool, legs spread wide in front of one canvas or another. They lived in a world all their own, Jews by culture only, which had infuriated both of their families. They’d left everyone behind, with barely a glance, after marrying. Nardo was nothing like Sid. Nardo was controlled and quiet. Bernice fancied that he simmered, whatever that meant at his ripened age.

Bernice watched Nardo across the table staring into space, his fork suspended over his food, as if deciding whether to take another bite. The hard set of his already jutting jaw was the last strong statement his body seemed able to make as he stared straight ahead chewing like it was his job. The dark basement kitchen was cool despite the heat and humidity outside. Bernice cleared her throat and hummed a bit, a tune she’d heard on Dancing with the Stars, which she watched religiously. It made her long, however improbably, to hold a man close and dance into the night. With curiosity, she fingered a stiff, wild hair growing from her chin and concentrated hard as she tried to pinch it with her fingernails and give it a pull. She forgot herself during the effort. She looked up to see a faint flicker in Nardo’s eyes, as if he’d forgotten for a moment that she was sitting right across from him. His cold Reunite wine stood in its cloudy, thick rimmed glass untouched. She ate slowly, trying to make the food on her plate last, but felt an extreme hunger. She decided that while she did the washing up, she’d scarf what Nardo would, once again, leave uneaten. Nardo pushed his plate away and gave a sigh from his depths. Bernice grimaced with disgust that bloomed through her belly at the impossible length of Nardo’s yellowed fingernails. He tapped them on the grey Formica table top, as if waiting for something. Without even a word of thank you for the meal, he stood, pushed in his chair, and shuffled out of the kitchen up the stairs. The back of him, his small, sloped shoulders and the deep wrinkles on the back of his neck reminded her, with a painful twinge, of something she’d felt long ago. It excited her and made her sad at the same time. She wished she could remember what it was. She gave her large head with the mass of white hair a shake as if to knock a memory loose. She looked at the cold pasta on Nardo’s plate and gagged. Why had she thought she’d want to put his leftovers in her mouth?

Her cotton dress hung unevenly as she made her way slowly around the kitchen. She listened with interest to what was going on outside. The sounds reached her muffled, as though they were coming from under water, submerged. A sliver of late afternoon sun shone weakly through the ground-level window, illuminating the bubbles in the sink. With slow circular motions, Bernice rubbed the plates longer than she needed to. She closed her eyes and reveled in the caress of the warm water on her stiff hands. She felt lonely. The feeling turned to panic and made her feel brittle and confused.

She’d known Nardo for only a few months. She took a bus and a train from Northeast Philly, then walked the three blocks from the station to Nardo’s row home on Garibaldi Street. “Come, stay!” he’d said, in his Italian accent, tipping his fedora back, which he wore no matter the weather. They’d been standing awkwardly at St. Monica’s on senior night. Her friend Frieda, never married and always suspicious, had met him the same night and said he “acted like a lord” with no reason to and that she could tell he didn’t have a “pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of.” At 80, Bernice was attracted to the small proud man and felt that he might have seen something he liked in her, too. She stood slightly taller than him, though more stooped. She liked to be needed and foolishly ignored the fact that Nardo’s initial talkative nature gave way quickly to a menacing silence. More significantly, they hadn’t yet touched, though she longed to feel the back of a man against hers in bed. But right away Nardo insisted that Bernice sleep in the extra bedroom. At first sight the small room looked clean enough. Closer inspection revealed the sheer curtains were stiff and thick with dust and the sand colored chenille bedspread was worn and moth eaten. Bernice endured the room on the weekends, alternately passing the time coughing from the dust and tossing around in the twin-sized bed waiting for the morning light

Bernice climbed the steps from the cellar and found Nardo in his bedroom. He looked like a small child on the big bed. His fedora sat like a silent witness on the nightstand. His shirt lay carefully at the bottom of the bed. Bernice stood at the doorway her throbbing hands at her sides. She knew he was awake but pretended not to be. She walked evenly, for once, towards the full sized bed in the small, but ornate bedroom. Curtains with Roman columns printed on them framed the irregular-shaped window. Two golden lamps, with dull faux-crystal drops stood tall but sad and unused. Bernice imagined it all must have looked grand many years ago.

Nardo opened one eye, saw Bernice and closed it again.

“Get outta here, leave me alone,” Nardo said, waving one hand in the air, sounding breathless.

“Ah, Nardo, calm down. I want to be with you, just a bit, okay?” Bernice sat carefully on the edge of the bed and began humming her tune at a higher pitch and tapping her feet on the worn carpet. She looked around, clapping her hands softly.

“Whaddya want? Huh?” Nardo asked, momentarily resigned to Bernice’s presence.

“So quiet today, Nardo. What’s wrong? Tell Bernice!” She thought light heartedly of how Nardo’s questions sounded like the kind that take place between married couples.

She felt a faint stirring, so deep, struggling to come to the surface and then felt confused again. She looked at Nardo’s small frame and felt an aching tenderness. He’d forgotten his anger and closed his eyes again. She wanted to curl her body around his and rest her head on his chest. A glance at the large crucifix above his bed, draped with black rosary beads, made her think of all of the sacrifices one makes for love. She reclined roughly on the bed. Catching her breath after a moment, she placed one shaking hand lightly on her breast, the other on Nardo’s thigh. She slowly exhaled.

Suddenly, she was wearing nothing but a long string of white pearls around her smooth, long neck. She flexed her legs inside seamed stockings with a garter belt. She hummed and then a soft moan, starting in her throat, escaped from her lips. Her wide bottom wiggled with subtle joy. Nardo sat up straight to a sitting position, looking confused. It was twilight, and he struggled to remember where he was. He held his tiny fist up high ready to strike.

“Get the hell outta here! Go home!” Nardo screamed; spit collected in the corners of his mouth.

Bernice flinched and gasped. She could hear his rage, but felt as though she was still stuck in her dream before pulling herself through the thick membrane of a quick, deep sleep. Her body retained the memory of her strange arousal, and she was amused to find her dress twisted and hiked up above her knees. She slid off the side of the bed, turned around and saw Nardo holding his head in his hands. Though his back was to her, she saw his convulsing shoulders. She stood transfixed for a moment at this rare show of emotion. She shook her head sadly and thought of how everyone only gets to know the tip of the iceberg of another’s life. What we hold deep, she thought, could be summoned and perhaps carry us through when nothing else would. With starling clarity she realized, like the idea was new, that she no longer had an ocean of time left.

“Dirty Jew,” Nardo hissed over his shoulder.

Bernice sighed. That’s how it always is, she thought. She walked unsteadily back to the extra bedroom, holding onto the walls as she went along. She would stay awake until she could take the first train home. She heard Nardo in his room, like a fallen king, wailing because he apparently still longed for the past glory of whatever life he used to live. Bernice blinked at the warm tears that flecked her rough face. She began humming a familiar tune. At some point, she forgot how the rest of the song went. Her head hurt with the effort of remembering.

With a start, she realized she’d left the light on in the basement kitchen. She decided against going down to shut it off. Nardo would be furious at the waste, but Bernice didn’t care. It just didn’t matter anymore. She’d be gone by morning.

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Michelle Reale's fiction has been published in Penquin, 3711 Atlantic, Verbsap, elimae, Underground Voices, Apt, Lily, Yellow Mama, Bewildering Stories, and many others. She works in a university library and is nearly finished with her MSLS degree in library science.

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