In the chap­ter “The Hot Dog,” Chona awak­ens in her hos­pi­tal bed a week after an assault, feel­ing the com­fort­ing echoes of the prayer Barukh She’amar. The sacred words cre­ate a sense of light and hope, and she reflects on a cher­ished child­hood mem­o­ry with her father, feel­ing grate­ful for his love. How­ev­er, a deep real­iza­tion strikes her – she sens­es she is dying and must com­mu­ni­cate this to Moshe, her hus­band.

As nos­tal­gia min­gles with a strange, for­bid­den aro­ma, she dis­tinct­ly smells a hot dog, recall­ing a past adven­ture with her friend Ber­nice. This mem­o­ry, how­ev­er, is shat­tered by pain, bring­ing her back to the present moment. Look­ing around the room, she finds Moshe asleep in a chair beside her. His pale, exhaust­ed face fills her with guilt; she reflects on their years togeth­er, express­ing regret over her crit­i­cisms of him and her detach­ment from life’s joys. The pain in her stom­ach inten­si­fies, forc­ing her to wish away the hot dog smell, prompt­ing a moment of inter­ac­tion with Moshe.

The room fills with famil­iar faces, but the absence of Dodo weighs heav­i­ly on her heart. A flash of guilt over­whelms Chona for the toll her strug­gles have tak­en on Moshe. She strug­gles to speak but man­ages a jok­ing remark about Ber­nice eat­ing the hot dog, only to real­ize the pain this brings her. Despite her tur­moil, she feels a sense of con­nec­tion with her friends and fam­i­ly, shar­ing a moment of laugh­ter with Ber­nice before the agony draws her away into uncon­scious­ness.

Rab­bi Feldman’s voice begins the Mi She­beirach prayer for heal­ing in the back­ground as Moshe even­tu­al­ly requests every­one to leave, allow­ing a brief moment of inti­ma­cy between them. Out­side, a diverse group of well-wish­ers gath­ers, expe­ri­enc­ing dis­com­fort and ten­sion as they await news of Chona. Con­ver­sa­tions reveal com­mu­ni­ty his­to­ry and rela­tion­ships, par­tic­u­lar­ly about the syn­a­gogue built by Chona’s father. Amidst the somber mood, the ten­sion esca­lates when the group hears Moshe’s grief-strick­en cry echo down the hall, result­ing in a col­lec­tive, heavy move­ment toward Chona’s room. The chap­ter clos­es with a bleak sense of his­to­ry and for­got­ten strug­gles as they con­front an uncer­tain future, reflect­ing on the tri­als faced by their ances­tors.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

A
18
The Hot Dog
week after she’d been assault­ed, Chona, lying in her hos­pi­tal bed,
found her­self awake with the words of the song-prayer Barukh
She’amar swirling about her head like but­ter­flies. She felt the prayer more
than heard it; it start­ed from some­where deep down and flut­tered toward her
head like tiny flecks of light, tiny bea­cons mov­ing like a school of fish,
con­tin­u­al­ly swim­ming away from a dark­ness that threat­ened to swal­low
them. She was wit­ness­ing a dance, she real­ized, one that orig­i­nat­ed in a
place far out of her view, some­place she had nev­er been before. Her lips felt
sud­den­ly dry. She was over­come by a sud­den mas­sive thirst and must have
announced it, for water came from some­where. She felt it touch her throat
and heard the words of the prayer, “Blessed be the One who spoke the
world into being.” She was grate­ful. She loved that prayer as a child. She
sang it with her father as she held his hand on Sab­bath morn­ings as the two
walked to shul. It always drew the same response. He’d chuck­le and say,
“You can nev­er go wrong when you express your love to the mas­ter of the
world,” then slip a mar­ble or a coin or a small gift into her hand. Won­der­ful.
How come she hadn’t remem­bered this before? Then she sensed, more than
felt, a hand slip­ping into hers, and she knew then that she was alive and that
he was near, some­where, her Moshe; and in the recess­es of her mind, far
from the con­scious place where it should have been, and for­ev­er from
where it might ever be again, she heard once again the sweet trum­pet, the
love­ly cor­net, that beau­ti­ful long­ing, the mes­sage that ever­last­ing love,
for­ev­er impressed, for­ev­er stamped, for­ev­er not­ed, the one great piece of
sen­si­bil­i­ty stamped into the life of those lucky enough to receive it,
remained. She also knew at that moment that she was not long for this
world, that she was dying, and that she must tell him and release him.
With that knowl­edge came the smell of some­thing strange. Some­thing
tre­fah, for­bid­den. Unmis­tak­able in its odor. And deli­cious.
A hot dog.
There was a hot dog in there some­where, in her dream. In the room.
Some­where close. The aro­ma was unmis­tak­able. It was so strong and
present, she felt embar­rassed and unclean, for the two things did not belong
together—the pre­co­cious call of the uni­verse and the slop­py, hap­py piece of
tre­fah that her friend Ber­nice con­sid­ered life’s great­est treat when they were
in school. She had tast­ed one once. It was deli­cious. She and Ber­nice had
ven­tured to Fatty’s dilap­i­dat­ed ham­burg­er stand up on Pigs Alley when—
Was she fif­teen then? Was it after Mrs. Patterson’s cook­ing class? Then, as
her mind pushed into the mem­o­ry, she felt pain slice in and smash the
mem­o­ry to bits, ren­der­ing it cold—pain, real pain, in her mid­dle sec­tion,
inside, some­where deep—and the faint cloud of mem­o­ry and the aro­ma
van­ished; and slow­ly, grad­u­al­ly, she opened her eyes and peered around the
room.
She found her hand in Moshe’s, who was asleep on a chair next to her.
He sat par­al­lel to where she was lying, fac­ing out­ward so that his head
could be near hers, just inch­es away, but in full slum­ber, his chin at his
chest, his hand cradling hers. He looked ghast­ly, pale and exhaust­ed, and
her guilt was so extreme she want­ed to call out, “What have I done?” But
she could not. The young man who wan­dered into her father’s base­ment
that Novem­ber after­noon twelve years ago, so fun­ny and inno­cent, with a
pock­et full of fly­ers and not a dime to his name, so charm­ing, always so
pos­i­tive, was gone. In his place was a fright­ened, down­trod­den, mid­dle-
aged man. She want­ed to beat her­self over the head for the times she’d
chas­tised him for being so naïve, for eat­ing loss­es from musi­cians who
flayed him with their drink­ing and bor­row­ing and con­stant quar­rel­ing, and
for yam­mer­ing in his ear, say­ing, “Why would you do some­thing so
stu­pid?” She felt rent in two by guilt, for not once in all their years togeth­er
had he mut­tered a word of griev­ance or protest about her store, which nev­er
made a dime, and her unwill­ing­ness to move off the Hill or that she’d been
unable to give him a son or daugh­ter. He was a true Jew, a man of ideas and
wit who under­stood the mean­ing of cel­e­bra­tion and music and that the
blend of those things meant life itself. And how she regret­ted, watch­ing his
face locked in grief even as he slept, his lip trem­bling, that she’d frit­tered
hours away read­ing about social­ists and unions and pro­gres­sives and
pol­i­tics and cor­po­ra­tions, fight­ing about a mean­ing­less flag that said “I’m
proud to be an Amer­i­can,” when it should have said “I’m hap­py to be
alive,” and what the dif­fer­ence was, and how one’s tribe can­not be bet­ter
than anoth­er tribe because they were all one tribe. An extra­or­di­nary wis­dom
came upon her, one she had not imag­ined pos­si­ble, and she want­ed to share
it with him in those first—or per­haps last—moments of her con­scious­ness.
But after see­ing his love­ly face, she felt yet again an enor­mous burst of pain
from her stom­ach and her head. It was so great that it felt as if her arter­ies
were rip­ping out the back of her skull, and the lit­tle white flecks of mag­ic
that zipped about ahead of the chas­ing dark­ness as the Barukh She’amar
danced in her dream went zip, poof, then flut­tered away and was gulped by
the dark and the won­der­ful­ly hor­ri­ble odor of the hot dog that seemed to
press against her nose. She waved a hand in the air and said, “Throw that
thing out.”
Out of the cor­ner of her eye, she saw fig­ures in the room move. There
was a quick shuf­fle of feet and Moshe was awake.
He saw her gaz­ing at him and his face bright­ened. “Throw out what?” he
asked.
“The hot dog,” she said.
Moshe looked around the room. Her gaze fol­lowed his. Sur­round­ing her
bed stood Moshe’s cousin Isaac, Rab­bi Feld­man, the twins Irv and Marv
Skrupske­lis, and behind them Addie, Nate, and Ber­nice. There was
some­one miss­ing.
“Where’s Dodo?” she asked.
“We’ll get him back,” Moshe said.
But she did not hear the rest, for the suf­fer­ing at the moment was too
great to dwell on what had hap­pened in the store. Dodo had tried to defend
her, poor thing, and he’d been denied. She saw Moshe spin out of his chair,
still clasp­ing her hand, and place his oth­er hand on her face, kneel­ing beside
her bed. He said a few words to her, but she could not hear or speak. She
felt move­ment on the oth­er side of her bed and glanced over to see Addie,
who grabbed a tow­el and wiped her face. Ber­nice was behind her and
looked ashen, which touched Chona, for Ber­nice was very shy, and she had
not seen Ber­nice away from her house in Chick­en Hill since they were
chil­dren.
“Are you eat­ing a hot dog, Ber­nice? That’s cheat­ing.”
It was a joke, and Chona was imme­di­ate­ly sor­ry she said it, not because
both knew Ber­nice wasn’t kosher but because the act of speak­ing sent a
thou­sand dag­gers of pain through her insides. Ber­nice appeared con­fused,
and it was only after Moshe turned to her and trans­lat­ed did Chona real­ize
she had spo­ken in Yid­dish. Ber­nice, her gor­geous dark face always so grim,
the smooth black skin of an unmelt­ing armor draped over the gor­geous nose
and full lips, smiled sad­ly. That was a rare thing to see. It was as if a sweet
driz­zle of desert rain had come into the room and washed them all.
Ber­nice, a tor­rent of sad­ness drip­ping off her long, beau­ti­ful face, said
soft­ly, “No, Chona. I haven’t had a hot dog.”
That was the last Chona saw of Ber­nice, for the pain was too great for
her to keep her eyes open so she closed them. She heard anoth­er shuf­fling
of feet and Rab­bi Feld­man singing, inton­ing the prayer of Mi She­beirach
for heal­ing, man­gling it with his hor­ri­ble can­tor­ing, and she want­ed to thank
him and say, “Well, you’re improv­ing,” even though he was not, but she
appre­ci­at­ed his pres­ence. And then she heard Moshe’s voice speak­ing
firm­ly, almost angri­ly, to the room, say­ing, “Get out. Please. Every­one.”
She heard more shuf­fling of feet and sensed bod­ies leav­ing. They were
alone. As always, Moshe knew what to do.
—
IN THE HALLWAY of the Read­ing hos­pi­tal unit, the odd group of well-wish­ers
gath­ered in front of the nurs­es’ sta­tion. Three white nurs­es glanced at them,
then turned back to their charts. No one both­ered to men­tion if there was a
place for the group to go, so they stood there. There was nowhere to sit, no
cof­fee to drink, no kind Pres­by­ter­ian min­is­ter to offer words of solace. They
just stood uncom­fort­ably as the odd clump of Amer­i­cans they were: Jews
and blacks, stand­ing together—Marv Skrupske­lis lean­ing on the wall in
workman’s cloth­ing, his large fists balled in his pock­et; Irv, fresh from work
at the shoe store, in salesman’s garb, sus­penders and white shirt; Isaac, tall,
proud, impos­ing, and impec­ca­ble, clad in a wool suit and black hom­burg,
his stern face etched in stressed sor­row; Rab­bi Feld­man, his ner­vous hands
fin­ger­ing a worn sid­dur (prayer book). A few feet from them stood Nate
and Ber­nice, worlds apart from each oth­er, star­ing at Addie down the hall,
who stood ner­vous­ly out­side the door­way to Chona’s room, her hands
clasped before her chest, peer­ing inside.
There was noth­ing to do but talk, which at times like these is all that’s
left.
Rab­bi Feld­man gen­tly touched Isaac’s arm and spoke in Eng­lish. “How
was your trav­el from Philly?” he asked.
Isaac shrugged.
“I take it you received my let­ter?”
“What let­ter?” Isaac said.
“The one I sent telling you about the shul and the rumors about what
hap­pened at the store. We want­ed to con­tact the pol—”
Isaac thrust a quick fin­ger in the air to silence Feld­man, who was
intim­i­dat­ed by the bar­rel-chest­ed well-dressed stranger with the stone face.
He had nev­er met Moshe’s cousin. He had only heard rumors. A hard man.
Not to be fooled with.
Isaac turned to the Skrupske­lis twins. He spoke Yid­dish. “Which of you
were here when Chona’s father built the shul?”
Marv was silent and looked away. He was the grim­mer of the two
Skrupske­lis­es, and no rich Roman­ian the­ater own­er from Philadel­phia
would speak to him like he was chopped liv­er. It was Irv who answered.
“We were here.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“Did he build it?”
“Of course he did.”
“Alone?”
Irv shrugged. He was in no mood to answer demand­ing Roman­ian
the­ater own­ers who gave him the third degree.
It was Marv who spoke out. The gruff Lithuan­ian answered with the kind
of grav­i­ty and direct­ness that Isaac appre­ci­at­ed. “He built it with a col­ored
named Shad.”
“So the col­ored would know where the water pipe is con­nect­ed to the
pub­lic faucet’s well?” Isaac asked.
“He’d tell us but he’s dead.”
“Who worked with him?”
Marv nod­ded at Ber­nice. “That’s his daugh­ter. Her broth­er might know.”
Isaac glanced at Ber­nice, then at Nate, who stood next to her. He start­ed
to say some­thing, then stopped. Instead, he said, “I’ll see it repaired.”
Marv shrugged. “Go ahead if you want. Doc Roberts, though, that’s
anoth­er mat­ter.”
“I don’t know that name,” Isaac said.
Rab­bi Feld­man said, “I wrote about him in the let­ter to you.”
Isaac didn’t respond. He didn’t even look at Feld­man. The man was
weak. Weak Jews were a waste of time. Weak Jews would nev­er sur­vive in
Amer­i­ca. Or any­place. He kept his eyes trained on Marv. The two men eyed
each oth­er for a moment. Then he turned to Feld­man and said, “I told you I
don’t know that name.”
“It was in my let­ter.”
“I nev­er received any let­ter. And I nev­er heard that name.”
Rab­bi Feld­man start­ed to inter­ject that he had clear­ly spelled out the
whole busi­ness in his let­ter and that the let­ter was prob­a­bly mis­placed or
lost, but he was inter­rupt­ed by Moshe’s long, pierc­ing howl, which rang
down the hall­way. The group turned and saw Addie at the door­way of the
room, her hand clasped to her mouth now, her shoul­ders hunched as she
stepped into the room.
The odd group of well-wish­ers slow­ly moved down the hall­way as
Moshe’s sobs cas­cad­ed up and down the walls, bounc­ing from one side to
the oth­er. The dis­course on Doc Roberts was for­got­ten now as the group
tromped for­ward, a rag­tag assort­ment of trav­el­ers mov­ing fif­teen feet as if it
were fif­teen thou­sand miles, slow trav­el­ers all, arrivals from dif­fer­ent lands,
mak­ing a low trek through a coun­try that claimed to be so high, a coun­try
that gave them so much yet demand­ed so much more. They moved slow­ly,
like fus­gey­ers, wan­der­ers seek­ing a home in Europe, or erú West African
tribes­men herd­ed off a ship on a Vir­ginia shore to peer back across the
Atlantic in the direc­tion of their home­land one last time, mov­ing toward a
com­mon des­tiny, all of them—Isaac, Nate, and the rest—into a future of
Amer­i­can noth­ing. It was a future they couldn’t quite see, where the
rich­ness of all they had brought to the great land of promise would one day
be zapped into noth­ing, the glo­ri­ous tapes­try of their his­to­ry boiled down to
a series of ten-sec­ond TV com­mer­cials, emp­ty hol­i­days, and sports games
filled with the patri­ot­ic fluff of red, white, and blue, the cel­e­brants cheer­ing
the accom­pa­ny­ing daz­zle with­out any idea of the hor­ri­ble strug­gles and
proud pasts of their fore­bears who had made their lives so easy. The
col­lec­tive his­to­ry of this sad troupe mov­ing down the hos­pi­tal cor­ri­dor
would become tiny blots in an Amer­i­can future that would one day
scram­ble their proud his­to­ries like eggs, scat­ter­ing them among the
pop­u­la­tion while feed­ing men­tal junk to the pop­u­lace on devices that would
become as com­mon and small as the hot dog that the dying woman thought
she smelled; for in death, Chona had smelled not a hot dog but the future, a
future in which devices that fit in one’s pock­et and went zip, zap, and zilch
deliv­ered a dan­ger far more seduc­tive and pow­er­ful than any hot dog, a
device that chil­dren of the future would clam­or for and become addict­ed to,
a device that fed them their oppres­sion dis­guised as free thought.
Had the group of strag­glers mop­ing down the hall­way seen that future,
they would have all turned en masse and rushed from the hos­pi­tal out into