Don't Let My Baby Do Rodeo

Author:Boris Fishman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2016-01-07T16:00:00+00:00

9

“Rubins,” Gabe Mishkin said, astonished, from the other side of the screen door. “Boy, baby boy,” Mishkin said. “A little thing, but you didn’t pick him up. They showed up at your damn house.” Mishkin’s face opened in recollection. “That was one of the all-time doozies.”

Maya also could not believe she was standing across from the adoption supervisor. Alex’s call to IAS had given them the news that Mishkin had retired. The woman who replaced him wore a tunic marked by gamboling nautical objects and, in her ears, two turquoise crosses—it was to this that Maya attributed their difficulty understanding each other. No matter what Maya said—and eventually even Alex spoke up, embarrassment settling on the room after the new case worker mistook a back scratch for a reach for his wallet, that is, a forthcoming bribe—the woman returned her fingernail to the bolded text in the upper-right-hand corner of their file: CLOSED ADOPTION. Eventually, she let out a long, besieged breath and walked to the doorway to ask her secretary for a Form to Request Contact. That was when Maya’s hand reached for the penholder on the woman’s desk and swept it onto the carpeted floor. Maya apologized loudly and knelt to collect the scattered pencils and clips, but not before taking a long look at the file that remained open on the desk. She got a bit of luck—her eyes landed on an address. But luck rarely comes pure—it was the address not of the birth parents but the forwarding for Gabriel Mishkin, retired.

Mishkin had bellied out with new weight and his facial hair had taken after the woods surrounding his home: three days of messy, pebble-gray growth on his cheeks, and the stymied coiffure that he had sported as a savior of unwanted children was now out past his ears, though it managed to look elegantly disheveled instead of abandoned. Belatedly, Maya remembered that it wasn’t only Mishkin who was eight years older, and wondered what thoughts about her and Alex’s appearance passed through his mind.

“You’re on my porch,” Mishkin noted, burying his reading glasses in the copse of his hair. His other hand held a book, a wedged finger marking his spot. The three of them listened to a fluting call from the woods. An answer came, a series of taps. “At least I called you with a warning,” Mishkin said. He smiled without opening his mouth.

“Mr. Mishkin,” Maya said. She had practiced the simple line with Alex on their way up the Thruway, a sour fog blanketing the starting gold and red of the trees. They had decided that it would be more persuasive coming from Maya. “We need your help.”

“They gave you my forwarding?” Mishkin said, startled.

“Not exactly,” Maya said.

“I see,” he said. “I’m not being very hospitable.” He unlatched and swung open the screen door. Maya thrust at him a box of cellophaned chocolates.

“By the look on your face, I better take this,” he said.

The home had two stories, the chimney of a rust-edged woodstove rising through a clumsily hacked opening in the ceiling.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.