Snow 2: Back Alley Peddler
Chicago, Illinois, 1940
Taking small, shuffling steps, dragging the leggings and pants, the boy went from the kitchen to the bathroom. Unbuttoning the underwear, dropping it too his knees, sitting on the toilet, he put his chin into his cupped hands and, turning red in the face, strained… but nothing happened. He lifted and buttoned the underwear, pulled the pants and leggings up and went back to his mother, whose patience was beginning to wear just a little thin.
“Come on, Mitchell, let’s get you dressed and out of here.”
Outside, at last!
The snow had all but stopped falling, but even there on the porch it was up to the second buckle of his galoshes. Standing a minute, breathing deeply, filling his lungs with crisp, clean air, he watched as the vapor of his breath dissipated in the air.
Steel runners bumping from step to step, dragging his Flexible Flyer behind him by the piece of laundry‑line that had been slung through the handle, he carefully, slowly, made his way down the stairs that Joe had shoveled earlier but hadn’t time yet to spread furnace cinders over. More blowing snow had fallen onto the steps and, hampered by the bulk of his clothing, holding the banister with his right hand and the rope of the sled, held near the handle with his left, Mitchell struggled down the three flights of stairs.
Finally, downstairs, Joe had shoveled a path from the steps to the entry of the wooden fence that separated the yard from the alley. The mounds were too much to resist. Dropping the sled, taking a running start, throwing his body onto a fluffy embankment, Mitchell rolled over the top and down the other side. Standing, covered in snow, he flung himself over the mound again, onto the shoveled sidewalk, bringing a small avalanche with him then did it again.
“Hey, you! Lipensky!” Joe yelled at the boy from the basement substructure. “Shtop vit der shnow! Get the hell out vitch you! I han’t shovlin’ shnow from der sidevalk hall day so you kin get it full vit der shnow hagin! Get hout! Go play in der halley!”
To a janitor, snow, after all, only meant three times the work, and being short‑tempered anyway, Joe didn’t look at the wet, heavy stuff through the eyes of a six-year-old child.
“Okay, Joe!” Taking the sled, he trudged kitty‑corner through the unshoveled portion of the yard, out the gate and into the alley.
Trucks, cars, and the horse‑drawn wagons of peddlers traveling the streets and alleys made compacted furrows that, with melting and re‑freezing, become hard as concrete and slick as… well, ice, and vehicles were often forced to travel in unwanted directions as their wheels become captive in the deep ruts. By this time a few trucks had driven the T-shaped alley compacting the snow into twin strips on either side of the ridge.
Holding the sled against his chest, Mitchell stepped onto and into the soft ridge. As he began to run, he could hear the sounds of his breathing and, as it rubbed between his well-clothed thighs, the swishing of the smooth fabric of his leggings. Taking nine or ten longs strides, he flung himself onto one of the slick strips. Momentum took the sled twenty or thirty feet. At the “T” section of the alley he was able to steer out of the rut and, aiming towards a garbage can, he waited till the last second, then rolled off letting the sled crash into the can. Standing, brushing snow from his coat, reclaiming the sled, about to repeat the feat going in the opposite direction with the fence as his target but, “Hi, Nick!” stopped because Nick and Erma had entered the alley.
“Hi, Mitchie!” Nick yelled from the high seat of the wagon. “Whoa, Erma!” Thick plumes of vapor streaming from her wide nostrils, the horse stopped on command, lifted her tail, and with a “fart” that he could hear, though Mitchell was about fifteen yards away, Erma deposited a huge plop of steaming manure onto the clean, white snow.
So much for sledding in that direction.
“’AY, BEANS! FRESH LIMA BEANS!”
Sun or snow, peddlers traveled the alleys.
“CARROTS! APPLES! FIVE CENTS A POUND! BANANAS! ’AY, BEANS, FRESH PEAS!”
“Nickey! You‑whooo! Nickey!”
Turning, trying to locate the distant voice, spotting her, “Oh, no!” Waving at, answering… “Mrs. Lefkin!” the lady that lived at the far end of the third floor in Mitchell’s L-shaped building. “What can I bring for you today, Mrs. Lefkin?”
“Nickey, if you vould be so kind,” calling through cupped hands, “bring for me von bunch carrots, von pound hepples.”
“Madonn!” Nick said to himself, looking across the snow-covered yard and up the three flights of slippery stairs. Shrugging his shoulders, glancing at Mitchell, he climbed off the wagon, went to the rear, shook open a brown paper bag, took three Jonathan apples from a bushel basket, weighed them on the Toledo scale that hung from a hook at the rear of the wagon, put them in the bag and picked a bunch of carrots out of a crate, as all the while he looked for another customer, hoping he wouldn’t have to make the arduous journey for only fifteen cents. “FRESH FRUIT! VEGETABLES! PEAS!” But no one else called so, pulling his cap down and his collar up, the peddler started his trek.
Watching from the window, waiting till her son had started down the stairs, thinking, That should keep him busy for a while, Myra went into the bathroom, turned the water on, and, while waiting for it to get hot, brushed her teeth. Steaming water coming from the spigot, she’d adjusted the mix, disrobed, put her shower cap on, stepped into the tub and pulled the curtain closed…
Turning the water off, she’d wiped herself, then the fogged mirror… Through brushing her hair, she had taken a bottle of toilet water from the medicine cabinet, poured a generous amount into her hand and rubbed it over her chest and under her breasts. Putting the robe on, thinking, Just in case, returning to the kitchen, Myra locked the door.
Exactly as she had left him, Walter still slept facing the wall with his right arm under the pillow.
Taking her robe off, slipping beneath the blanket, spoon fashion, she cuddled against her husband. “Walt…” No response. “Walt!”
Hearing her, feeling the warmth of her body, he put his hand on her smooth, damp hip and arching his backside, stretching his arm, Walter caressed the fleshy cheek of his wife’s left buttock.
“Hi, honey. Guess what?” Whispering in his ear, reaching over his hip, slipping her hand through the fly of his pajamas, holding her husband’s flaccid penis. “We’re alone.”
Fully awake. Oh, yeah! Walter’s penis was… Oh, no. It was no longer flaccid, and…
“Mommy!” Mitchell didn’t know why the door was locked and, pounding on it, “Oh, Maaa‑me!”
“…Oh, shit!”
“Sorry, Walt.” Coming off the bed, slipping her arms into the robe, “I’ll just see what he wants and be right back.” Smiling at her husband, “You’re not going to go anyplace now, are you?”
“Myra,” throwing the blanket back, “where would I go?” Walter exposed his turgid penis.
“Mitchell,” clutching the robe closed, “what do you want?”
“I called you from downstairs and you didn’t come. Can I go out front and play?”
“Yes!” Relieved he doesn’t have to “make” again, “But don’t go on the street! You stay in the “block”! You hear me?”
The block was his world. This gave him his entire world to explore. “Yes, Mommy.”
The block is absolutely square. It is bounded on the north by busy Ogden Avenue with its silver tracks and clanging streetcars, on the south by Nineteenth Street, the east by Christiana Avenue, and the west by Homan Avenue. The block is sliced in half by an east/west alley that runs from Homan to Christiana, and the southern half is halved again by yet another short alley coming off Nineteenth Street, that ended at the high, wood fence of the boy’s large, concrete‑ covered back yard.
Slamming the door shut, Myra rushed back to the bedroom.
His head propped against the headboard, lying on her side of the bed, Walter was smoking a cigarette. Taking a deep, final drag, he offered it to her. Sitting on the edge of the bed, Myra took a light draw and handed the cigarette back. Snubbing it out in the ashtray on her nightstand, patting the bed, he moved to the side, making room for her.
Pulling the blanket back, Myra saw that he’d taken his pajama bottoms off, and that he was “attentively” waiting for her. Shrugging out of the robe, not overly proud of the appearance of her nude body, she crawled under the blanket quickly.
Kissing deeply, lying to the side and above her, Walter’s hand on Myra’s breast, and Myra’s hand… exactly where he wanted it.
Snowplows clearing streets after a snowstorm make high drifts along the curb, sometimes burying cars under tons of snow. Standing at the intersection of Homan and the alley, the boy looked in both directions, and what he saw, for as far as he could see, broken only by streets and alleys, was one long mountain range of snow.
Oh, boy-o-boy, he thought, I’m gonna play The Lone Ranger! Shoving the plate‑glass door open…
Cuddling closer yet, his hand moved from the softness of his wife’s breast to the warm moisture of her vagina, and as their lips met again, moving fully atop her body, positioning himself between her thighs, as Walter was about to…
His son pushed the button under the mailbox marked Lipensky, waited a moment, pushed the button again, holding it this time as he counted: One, two, three, then ran up the five steps, pulled the inner door open and waited for his mother to…
“Mitchell,” she yelled from three stories up, “is that you?”
Not knowing why she sounded so angry, “Yes, Mommy.” he answered timidly.
Calming herself, restraining herself, “Mitchell.” Fighting for control, “Uh, honey, what do, uh, what do you want?”
“Mommy, I wanna play Lone Ranger. Can you put my gun ’n’ holster in a bag an’ throw ’em out the window?” Adding, “Please!”
“Yes, Mitchell,” speaking with exaggerated patience, “I’ll go get them. Where are they?”
“In my toy box, Mommy.”
Upstairs, the door on the south side of the landing slammed shut.
Running outside, he climbed to the top of the plowed snowdrift opposite their living room window and looked up.
Passing the bathroom, she heard the sound of running water behind the closed door.
In the back bedroom, Myra rummaged in Mitchell’s toy box till she found his Roy Rogers cap pistol and holster, and, just to be on the safe side, put a new roll of caps in the gun. Going into the pantry, she got a brown paper bag, put the gun and holster inside, crinkled the bag for insulation, then put that bag into another bag. Back in the living room, she tried to pull the window open, but it was frozen shut, so she hit the frame with the palm of her hand. “Damnit!” bruising her palm. Straining, she pulled upward on both handles… Giving suddenly, the window banged upward, toppling a six-inch high drift of snow that had blown onto the windowsill, onto her bare legs and into her house slippers.
“Mitchell,” leaning out the window, losing all vestige of self‑control, “here’s your damned gun!”
The boy watched as the bag sailed down, landing safely in a cushion of snow.
“Now leave me alone!” Slamming the window shut, she sat on the windowsill, breathing deeply, trying to regain the composure she had just lost.
Coming from the bathroom nude, Walter was smoking a cigarette.
Looking at her husband, smiling dementedly, reaching down, removing a slipper, holding it up for him to seen, Myra then up‑ended it, spilling water and a bit of snow onto the carpet.
“Where the hell’d that come from?”
“Oh, I got bored waiting for you to come out of the toilet and thought I’d play in the snow awhile.”
Not knowing where the slush had come from, or how it got into her slipper, but more than just a smidgen anxious to get back to his previous position, shrugging his shoulders, Walter asked, “Uh, you still want to…” jerking his thumb in the direction of the bedroom.
“Do I still want to make love?” Bouncing the tip of her forefinger up and down over her blowing lips, making a kind of “flubbering” sound, taking her robe off, dancing in a circle, swinging it madly over her head, “Do I want to make love, the man asks!”
Her self‑conscious modesty having kept him from seeing his wife’s fully nude body very often over the past few years, watching Myra’s bouncing breasts and jiggling buttocks, Walter thoroughly appreciated what he saw and his body responded.
Stopping, she watched the upward progression of his penis. “Yes, Walter, I do still want to make love.”
“Me, too, baby,” he said, excitedly. “Me, too!”
“Yeah, so I see! But you’d better hurry, Walter,” turning, running into the bedroom, diving onto the bed, “before the kid finds a phone and calls us.”
