The Kabbalah Master by Besserman Perle;

Author:Besserman, Perle; [Besserman, Perle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Monkfish Book Publishing
Published: 2018-03-19T04:00:00+00:00

ELEVEN

PINNIE WORRIED ABOUT WHAT SHE CALLED “the weirdness” her daughters had inherited from their father. Sharon had been twelve and Arleen ten when he died, too young to do anything but glorify him—especially his favorite, Sharon, the one he proudly called “my first-born” and whose head he’d fill with crazy stories before disappearing for days on end. She’d never really gotten over the shock of his permanent absence. Unlike Arleen, who’d raged and screamed when George died, Sharon had numbly retreated into silence.

George Kellner—aspiring writer and failed husband—may he rest in peace. Pinnie had married him after only two months of dating—if sitting in a rowboat on Central Park Lake listening to George lecture her on everything from Aristotle to Zen could be called “dating.” Occasionally she’d put in a word or two, but mostly she listened. She’d fallen in love with him almost as much for his formidable intelligence as for his looks, his smooth-skinned oval face and burning black eyes. In contrast to her own placid, easy-going sensuality, George was nervous and driven, consumed by goals and aspirations that were never to be fulfilled. He’d charmed her by reading his scribbled journal notes to her at the oddest times, compelling her to stop what she was doing and listen to the jumble of philosophy, economics, doggerel, and plots for detective novels he intended to turn into films. George’s imaginative and wide-ranging interests continued to stoke her desire for him even as their marriage faltered. Pinnie accepted the paradox presented by her husband, even after she’d confronted him and he’d admitted to his affair with a Venezuelan dyer in the shoe factory on Greene Street where he worked as a foreman.

It was on a cold winter evening during one of his extended absences from home—when she presumed he was with his lover—that George either jumped or fell to his death on the tracks at the Greene Street station of the Lexington Avenue subway. As soon as she got the news, Pinnie decided to tell her daughters that their father had died of a heart attack. Why further complicate an already complicated situation?

As for herself, she had no desire to marry again, one husband like George was enough. Besides, widowhood afforded her a newfound independence that, except for the cash-strapped state in which George had left her, she rather enjoyed. She could now polish her nails silver (which he’d hated), slip into one of the full, open-collared rayon dresses he’d called “cheap looking,” eat a whole box of almond-nut-honey chocolates if she wanted to, and spend her afternoons playing canasta with her neighbors. George had tried to expand her mind with books and classical music, and Pinnie had resented him for it. She’d had no idea how much she’d resented George’s efforts to educate her until the tragedy on the Lexington Avenue subway put an end to them. It was like having an iron bar removed from her chest. The only thing she’d been afraid of was that his Venezuelan mistress might turn up at the funeral, but to her relief, the woman stayed away.

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