After the Fog

  Bonaroti, the most outspoken of all the doctors, appealed to Rose. All six were kind and went about their business with steady hands, but none were as colorful and straightforward as Bonaroti despite his stirring up trouble with the mills. If he didn’t do so much for the people of Donora she might have held his rabblerousing against him.

  And, he had cared for Henry’s Uncle Sam before he died, ensuring he received the best attention a person with few means could. After Rose and Henry had emptied their bank account in caring for Uncle Sam, Bonaroti stepped in and added to the funds. Rose would never forget that, and was forever indebted to him.

  Opening the doctor’s office door sent a bell tingling. The receptionist, Miss Cathy looked up and grinned, her bucked teeth hanging over her lower lip. Rose lifted her hand to say hello and Leo plopped onto his knees on one of the wooden, slatted chairs by the floor to ceiling windows. He fiddled with the strings that worked the curtain pulls. Rose smacked his bottom.

  “Now you sit,” she said. “I have work to do in the back. Don’t cause Miss Cathy a lick of trouble.” Rose should have headed up the hill, done her chores, and soothed her husband’s soul that surely smarted from his firing, but she needed to file her reports. More than being committed to her responsibility, she wanted to read Theresa’s file, to ferret through the girl’s medical history. She told herself it was Theresa’s discomfort she wanted to reduce and she did want that, but she also knew the information in the files might alleviate her own.

  Leo ran his finger down the window glass, making squeaky noises.

  “Dammit, Leo,” Rose brushed his hand from the glass. “Looky here.” Rose knelt in the chair beside him and used her coat sleeve to wipe away his fingerprints.

  As she did, she noticed a woman step partially into view, her head bent down. Another woman leaned in as though whispering in the first one’s ear. Something in the hazy sight of them magnetized Rose. She strained to see more. They shifted out from behind the building, but were still obscured by the dark fog. The first woman was familiar. Rose moved closer to the glass, wiping it with her cuff. Was it? It couldn’t be. Then there was that signature toss of her long hair. Hair that should have been held neatly back with a gumband, making a pretty ponytail. Rose pushed her forehead against the glass. What would she be doing down on Thompson? Magdalena.

  “What in Gilmore cemetery hell is going on?” Rose said. She pushed away from the window to find out.

  “Magdalena!” Leo yelped and scrambled ahead of Rose, heading out the door. Leo ducked in between people walking down the street, running behind the women Rose had seen together.

  By the time Rose reached the spot she’d seen Magdalena and her friend standing, only Leo was there, looking as confused as she felt.

  He lifted and dropped his shoulders. “It wasn’t her, I guess,” Leo said.

  Rose turned in a circle, squinting into the fog. “You sure?” They couldn’t both be mistaken.

  “She woulda stopped when we called if it was, right?” Leo said.

  Rose made a final rotation and stopped at the sight of Miss Ester’s Dress Shop, her storefront hidden by the fog, an eerie outline of ghostlike mannequins in the window, calling Rose’s attention in a way it never had before. Rose clenched her jaw. That’s what Magdalena was doing down here, Rose thought. Had she already quit school?

  She stuck her hand out to Leo. “This way, Leo. We’re going to pay a visit to Miss Ester and set a few things straight.”

  Rose stepped off the curb to cross the street, but heard voices coming through the fog, panicked words, carrying on the shrill screams of someone who was seeing another in pain or danger. Rose moved toward the voices and didn’t get far before she saw Nurse Dottie and Doc Bonaroti huddled on the sidewalk with Shirley Pollack.

  Shirley coughed and hacked, hands on her knees. “Down at G.C. Murphy, Mr. Schmidt collapsed.” Shirley grasped Bonaroti’s arms and used them to straighten up.

  Dr. Bonaroti balled his fists and turned Shirley away, heading back down toward McKean Avenue. “It’s these blasted mills. No rational human can deny it. That zinc mill is a monster!” He poked his finger toward the zinc mill. “Rose, get our bags. I’ll meet you at Murphy’s. Dottie, head to the McCallister’s and we’ll finish our discussion later.”

  Rose sent Leo home with strict instructions to stay on the inside of the sidewalk and move slowly, not stopping until he was safely in the house.

  She moved as quickly as possible, her own lungs a little short on breath—the air burning as her body worked harder. She teetered somewhere between a shuffle and a run. She dodged people in the daytime darkness, the streetlights barely showing through the atmosphere, their beams, impotent now.

  Out of breath, Rose finally reached where Schmidt lay on the ground. His face was smog grey, as though he’d been colored with it from the inside out. He was writhing on the cement. Rose waved her hands in front of her, trying to shoo the fog away like smoke, but there was no displacing the heavy blackness.

  Bonaroti knelt over Schmidt’s chest, trying to keep the man from flailing around, and to assess what exactly was causing Schmidt’s shortness of breath. Bonaroti put his ear at Schmidt’s mouth and laid his hand on his chest.

  “He’s breathing, but it’s shallow,” Bonaroti said. “This isn’t like his normal attack. He’s never fallen over like this.”

  Rose knelt down and lifted one of Schmidt’s arms over his head while Bonaroti applied pressure to his back. His breathing weakened further.

  “Put him flat, put his legs over your bag,” Bonaroti said. “Let me try something.”

  Rose followed directions, but was perplexed.

  Doc put his ear to Schmidt’s mouth and put his fingers on the man’s neck. “He’s not breathing anymore. Heart’s still beating, though.” Rose was astonished. He gave him several breaths right from his mouth into Schmidt’s.

  “Doc? That’s not an accepted…”

  “Look,” Bonaroti said as he straightened and began to push on Schmidt’s chest. “His color’s coming back. Here, take his pulse. I’ll give him some more air if needed.”

  Rose lifted Schmidt’s wrist. It was splattered with white house paint, making his bluish hue even more evident.

  She put her fingers in place for the pulse. “There it is. Weak, but there.”

  Bonaroti and Rose worked together, shifting back and forth, Rose pulling his arm up, checking his pulse and Bonaroti giving breaths. They were relentless until Schmidt’s wife appeared on scene, horrified at the sight of Rose and the doctor bent over her husband. Rose realized how strange it must have looked.

  Mrs. Schmidt whacked at both of them, sending Rose back on her heels, her mouth smarting from taking one of the grieved woman’s blows.

  Bonaroti cradled Schmidt’s body, trying to keep his airway open.

  Mrs. Schmidt draped herself over her husband. “He’s grey! Grey as the fog!” she said.

  Rose bent down, trying to pull the woman away, to comfort her while Bonaroti worked. But the woman shrugged, bellowing to leave her alone.

  Chuck, the gasoline attendant, arrived on scene in a rusty blue pickup truck. With his one arm, he pulled an old door from the bed to use as a stretcher. They heaved Mr. Schmidt onto it, hoping to get him to Charleroi Hospital in time to relieve his labored breathing.

  The men struggled to get the large man into the back of the truck, and Rose walked Mrs. Schmidt to the front where she would ride.

  When Bonaroti hopped in the back with Schmidt, Rose closed the tailgate.

  “Those damn mills are killing us all,” he said.

  “Don’t bring the mills into this, Bonaroti.” Mrs. Schmidt said. “Little Jim’ll lose his job, his pension and then we’ll have nothin’!”

  Chuck’s truck engine wouldn’t turn over, the engine howling in protest.

  “Rose,” Dr. Bonaroti said, his words snapping with military directness. “Sebastian called. Tomorrow, head back there. Read Theresa’s file, first. Sch
ool them in all they need to know about caring for her. They’re opposed to giving her Asthmador but I’m sure that would ease her discomfort.”

  Rose nodded, concerned that phone calls from the Sebastians were made so soon after her visit.

  “Old man Sebastian,” Bonaroti said, “was rambling some sort of nonsense. I’m not sure about what. But, he mentioned he wanted Dottie to see Theresa and I said, no, she’s a mill nurse. I can’t see his daughter tomorrow. Schedule’s filled up already. Calls piling up like slag in Palmer Park. Go back and fix whatever problem that man has. We aren’t playing musical nurses just because he has a...”

  Rose leaned in to hear better, but the engine finally turned over and the truck pulled away. She lifted her hand to wave and watched as the taillights disappeared into the fog. Why had Sebastian mentioned Dottie, of all people? Rose’s stomach twisted. That nurse would not replace her. Especially when it came to Theresa. Rose knew Doc trusted her and that’s why he told her to read the files and follow-up the next day. Rose ran the events of the last hour through her mind again as she moved back through the fog.

  Rose looked at her watch. Cathy would have left the office so Rose would head home and file her reports the next day. She hoped Mrs. Schmidt would be more grateful that her husband was alive than put off by the rescue technique Doc had used. She knew it made sense to do what Bonaroti did—they did it for babies all the time—but it was strange for family members, like Mrs. Schmidt to see someone blowing air into another person’s mouth and pressing on a chest.

  Rose and Bonaroti had studied James Elam’s account of breathing for a polio victim in just this way. It had worked and that was good enough reason to consider employing it even though it had yet to make the medical annals as accepted practice. She was fortunate to work with such a courageous doctor and she knew together they were making a difference.

  Still, Rose did not need a complaint filed against Bonaroti while they were trying to secure funds. She exhaled. She tried to remember how her day had started. It seemed as though the events that marked it were lived by someone else. Rose stopped to catch her breath after a few steps home. Her heart pounded and she felt dizzy. She grasped the railing on the stairs.

  The birthmark came back to her, the memory of the tiny infant who bore one, and Theresa. Rose looked back over her shoulder. She almost turned to go back to the office to read the file. But she didn’t. She started back up the steps, moving slowly, entertaining the thought that Theresa might be hers, not wanting to know for sure.

  Chapter 9

  Rose wiped her feet on the mat outside her home, the mindless motion soothing her. The whistle for the shift change had blown about the time Schmidt was tumbling to the sidewalk. And now, as Rose tried to block Mrs. Schmidt’s screams from her mind, she could hear the chorus of housewives hollering the names of errant children who’d not yet returned for dinner. Like a strange piece of music, notes played together, though not quite fitting, Mrs. Sullivan’s voice then Mrs. Gregorchek’s then Mrs. Carpenetti’s, then the chorus of the Westerman sisters and on it went until every child was home, eating dinner with family before the men of the house had to go to sleep to get ready for the early morning shift or leave for the all night one.

  Rose unhooked her coat and hung it on the wall. She could hear Johnny’s gang in the living room. Band practice. Nearly every day after football practice, they would gather at the Pavlesics, laughing through the occasional twang of a guitar, crack of the drums, and pop of a trumpet as they warmed up their instruments. In between all the chatter, Johnny’s voice rose, his jovial spirit and endless stream-of-consciousness punctuating the other boys’ thoughts, making them buckle over in laughter again.

  Rose leaned against the wall outside the room, wishing she could capture all of the boys right there, never let them grow up, allow Johnny that kind of fun for the rest of his life with the gang he’d known since the day he was born. That wasn’t possible; the other boys would start in the mill as soon as they decided they’d had enough of their senior year of high school or immediately after graduation. And these guys, talented as they were in music, had no choice but to starve as an artist or eat well as a card-carrying, union steel worker. But Johnny had choices.

  The smell of chicken, potatoes and buttered green beans made her think she’d been too hard on Sara Clara. Perhaps the girl came to her senses and actually did something useful today.

  Rose needed to wash up, change into a dress, and find out what the hell had happened with Magdalena that she would want to quit school. After that, she’d get down on her knees to pray that Henry had found a job.

  Rose’s attention was drawn to the notes of a song. The boys had actually stopped talking, Johnny had taken the liberty to shut himself up long enough to play the trumpet. That was an ongoing joke of the fellas, that they pushed him to play trumpet over piano. At least for five seconds, he wouldn’t be talking incessantly.

  Rose watched the boys clustered around the room. Johnny slipped and slid around the floor, moving with his trumpet as though he’d born with it attached to his body. Pierpont Jasper—the lanky colored kid never without a suit and bowtie, whose limbs looked nearly rubber, started his sax solo. Dicky Solvinsky plucked at the piano, his plump belly folding over his belt. Prunzie Schaffer rattled away on the drums and Wild Bill Rodriguez fitted his violin into the collection of bluesy sounds. Modern music, Johnny called it, not like Rose’s pre-war swing.

  The bluesy notes seemed to speak more than simply emit sounds. The boys’ music reached right into her soul and made her want to cry. Maybe the boys were better at music than Rose had allowed. Maybe there was…no, no, no, heading down a road of music will only, surely, lead back to these mills. She reminded herself that it was her job to deny Johnny this flight of fancy—a “life” with the band. He’d regret that choice in ten years. She would not allow him to make a stupid decision, and risk everything. Now with Henry losing his job, Johnny’s future depended more than ever on securing a scholarship—on the game he’d be playing on Saturday.

  How could Henry have done such a careless thing?

  Rose then thought of Theresa Sebastian, and understood how Henry could have been so stupid. Rose had been stupid once, too. Her lie was long and deep and kept secret her entire marriage. Rose rubbed her temples. Too much thinking and not enough action for one day.

  “Hey Mum.” Johnny dashed across the room and all the fellas stopped playing. He planted a kiss on Rose’s cheek. “Hey, the fellas are stayin’ for dinner.”

  “Sure, sure. They might not want to, though.”

  The three boys on the couch leapt up. “We want to, Mrs. Pavlesic. Anything for a meal at your place,” pudgy Tommy Tubbs said, rubbing his belly.

  “But, I uh, I don’t know who made dinner. I just got home.” Rose felt as though the numbness that had gripped her was affecting her ability to talk. She just wanted to hide.

  “We’ll sweep the porch and the walkway,” Pierpont said.

  Rose would normally have teased Pierpont saying he and the fellas had a lot more than sweeping to do to earn one of her dinners.

  “Sure, okay, fellas. Sweeping. That would be nice.”

  “Hey Mrs. Pavlesic, let me feel your muscles, come on, let me see that bicep.”

  Rose laughed at that. “Get the hell out and sweep, the only muscle I’m interested in seeing is yours pushing a broom.”

  She wished she could trade places with those boys, any one of them. The words of Father Tom or whatever his name was, filled her mind—forgive yourself. The boys went back to their instruments and Rose headed to get two brooms. She wanted to forgive herself, but couldn’t. Now maybe with Theresa right in front of her, she could finally do that, she could tell her the truth.

  Rose opened the closet door and a tumble of hats and gloves fell to the floor. Theresa had not suffered as Rose had worried. She had not had her face bashed in like her friend Helen. Rose scooped up the woolens and shoved them deeper onto the shelf. With broo
ms in hand, Rose headed back to the boys, listening to them play, nodding at the skill she could no longer deny. Rose told herself to let her past go. To find a sense of peace in knowing Theresa was alive and relatively well. Well enough. But, she couldn’t. As much as she wanted to, she just could not.

  * * *

  Magdalena stood outside the bathroom door. Her bare toes furrowed into the worn rug. Her stomach contracted, releasing acid every few seconds. She pushed her hair back from her face with both hands and drew a deep breath.

  She needed to talk to her mother, explain why she’d changed their plans. But could she do that?

  Maybe Magdalena shouldn’t. Not right then. Not when she’d just walked in the door.

  Magdalena grasped her throat. Her mother was so strong, so practical. Surely she would see the sense Magdalena’s plan made once she learned the whole story. Her mother would be pleased that Magdalena found someone who loved her. Like Henry loved Rose.

  Tears filled her eyes. But, Magdalena did not love him. She had done something wrong and had no valid excuse. She would have to lie and sacrifice her dream of being a scientist and marry him, so her family would not be shamed. But, disappointing her mother?

  Her father had seemed to know how it felt to disappoint Rose even though he didn’t say how he had. Everyone in the house was afraid of Rose, but Magdalena.

  Magdalena pushed open the bathroom door and forced a smile at her mother.

  Rose pulled her brush and lotion from under the sink. “Hi Magdalena. Give me a minute.”

  Magdalena sat on the side of the tub. Rose peeled off her uniform, and stood barefoot, her white slip shifting up and down as her mother reached for soap and stretched for her shampoo bottle. Magdalena knew exactly where her mother had been that day just by looking at her slip.