When Judy failed to strike her lighter on the first try, Paul offered his own.  Judy glared as she lit her cigarette.  Once, just once, she wanted to do something for herself.  The wet October night blew into her coat and through her rolled stockings and up her skirt.  Sometimes, she thought, Paul was more golem than husband.

The Golem, read a poster with a horrible, man-like thing lurking in shadow.  With rain pouring and a parade of boxy, black Fords sending great washes across the sidewalk, the area under the marquee felt like a well-lit cave.  Paul left Judy there while he hailed a cab.  He had gasped when he saw the golem in the film.  It was horrible, he said; the movie should have stayed in Germany where it came from.

Judy rubbed her hand, cracked and dry from hours steeped in clay; she wondered why any sculptor would create something so misshapen and ever expect it to behave.  If she ever made a golem that horrible, she hoped it would die of shame.

A golem.  She snorted.  "Don't be silly," she said around her cigarette.

"Sorry?" said a man leaving the theatre with his fur coat slung over his arm.

"Not talking to you."

The man gave her a strange look.  For a moment, Judy let herself wonder:  If a rabbi could make something ugly that ran amok, could an artist create something beautiful that obeyed her every whim?

"Jude!" Paul called.

Judy snapped out of her daze, crushed her cigarette beneath her high-heeled shoe, and hurried to climb into the warm, dry embrace of a cab.

With Paul away at his bank—full vice president, as of the summer of 1920—Judy spent most of her time in her studio.  Now and then, she sold a sculpture, but most of her social circle was only interested in Japanese (or Japanese-style) pottery:  raku glazes, tea sets they pretended to use correctly, little sake cups into which they dumped bathtub gin.  Hunched over her potter's wheel with a cigarette between her lips, Judy went for three days without thinking about the movie.

Just after lunch on the fourth day, she snorted.  When the golem had been revealed on screen, she laughed.  Its hair was ridiculous, its skin greasy; if it had been clay it would have collapsed under its own weight.  The whole oily thing was wetware, too soft to leave unsupported, impossible to fire without disaster.

Poring over a plate destined for the raku kiln, she chuckled at the thought of a raku golem.  Painted in maple leaves, maybe; maple leaves were all the rage amongst the rich idiots Judy knew, and she had no issue with taking people's money for the sake of a stencil.  She imagined the horrible, top-heavy thing from the film, a swathe of leaves blowing across its chest like a sash.

But a female golem would be awfully pretty like that.  Judy wiped her hands on her slurry-caked overalls.  A golem was impossible—to start, she was an artist, not a rabbi—but a statue was simple enough.  A few calculations, kiln space and balance and weight and dimension, flitted through her mind.  An ash fell from her cigarette to the plate she was sculpting.  She looked down to find that she had traced a woman's profile in the middle of the shaped clay.

She spent the next day in the public library, making calculations and looking through books of photos from the reference section.  She also checked out a book on Jewish folklore that had a chapter on golems, though it seemed more like a symbol than a piece of research.  The plate she had thrown eventually hung on her studio wall, a scattering of maple leaves across the woman's cheek, not to be sold.



"Did you know you have to give a golem a name before it'll come to life?" she said over supper the evening she had finished the statue's armature.  A Friday.  The dining room felt orderly and dull after days in her studio.

Paul looked up from his roast beef.  "Are you still on about that stupid movie?"

"I liked it."

"You've got clay in your hair."

Judy glowered as she ran her fingers through her hair—so short, nearly as short as Paul's—to break the clumps of dried slurry.  The maid came through to refill their wine.  Judy snatched hers and swallowed half of it before Paul could tell her to slow down.

"It's a movie, Jude," he said; he had not noticed her wine.  "Listen, I ran into Matilda Grune and her broker when I stopped for lunch, and she practically begged me to ask you to make her another one of those little tea sets.  A green one, she said."

"I want to make a statue."

"You want to make a golem."

Judy pursed her mouth and dragged a piece of potato through its mint sauce.  The clock in the entryway chimed eight.

Paul shook his head.  "Fine.  Call it an advertising stunt.  God knows the papers would be all over it."

When Judy only took a bite of her potato (dry, needed salt—had not a moment before), Paul sighed and went back to his own supper.

"Why do you do this?  If it's not a movie, it's a book.  Christ, Judy, I know you're supposed to be creative and passionate and all that, but if you don't get your head out of the clouds, you're gonna wind up in the home!"

Judy set her fork and knife across her plate and started for the stairs and her slurry-stained overalls.

"For God's sake, Jude, listen to me," said Paul.  "I don't know what I'd do without you!"

Half an hour later, when Judy sat on the seat of her potter's wheel, sketching her golem's face, Paul knocked at the door.

"Jude," he called.

Judy paused, but went back to drawing.  Her golem would be beautiful; her golem would be kept safe, not sent into the world and told to guard it.

"Matilda Grune called, Jude.  She's having a party.  I've laid out your blue dress.  You look nice in that one."

"I'm not coming."

A moment—she thought she heard the faintest of sighs—and Paul said, "If you change your mind, you know the number.  I'll tell her you're making the tea set.  All right?  That's why you're not coming."

"I'll make the tea set."  Judy went back to her sketch when Paul's footsteps moved away from the door.

She had drawn three faces, and each time, something was off.  One was too young; another, too stern; the last looked like Paul if he were Pauline.  Judy dropped her sketchbook and got up to throw a stoneware tea set.

By the time Paul knocked to let her know he was home, she had drawn several more faces, and dropped both her lopsided teacups in the vat.



She did not see him for several days after she began putting clay over the burlap-and-wood armature.  The naked body was Theda Bara, more or less, and the pose was an Arab dancer's.  As Judy smoothed the clay, her fingers tingled, as though she were doing something important.  Whatever clay she was not working, back or thigh or wrist, she covered with wet cloths, but the blank face she wetted by hand until she could not keep her eyes open and had no choice but cover her creation for the night.

"I think you're in love with that thing," Paul said the night he brought her a tray of egg sandwiches and lemonade.  "Matilda wants to know where her tea set is."

Judy shut the door.

The next night, Paul brought supper again.  More egg sandwiches, more lemonade.  "Matilda Grune's having another party, and I want you to go.  Have a shower.  Clean off this muck."  He touched a smudge of slurry on her cheek.

Judy set her supper on a table next to the door.  "I don't want to see Matilda Grune.  Or her friends, or hear anything about her damn tea set."

"I'm worried you're losing your mind, Jude."

"I'm creating art!"

"You're replacing me!"  Paul's skin turned the sickly pink of stoneware.  "Jude, honest, anything you ask, I'll do.  Anything you want.  Just tell me, and I'll get it."

"Go away."

"Listen, how about we tell Matilda she can choke on her housekeeper's gin, and we go see a movie?  Maybe have some dinner.  Huh?"  Paul put his hands in his pockets and rolled back on his heels.  "There's a new Tarzan playing.  Remember how much you love Tarzan?  You don't want to miss a chapter."

"I'm working."

Paul's face darkened.  He bowed his head.  "Do I need to get Matilda over here to ask why you're ignoring her?"

Judy locked the door.  The doorknob rattled, but Paul did not use his key.  Judy sat for a few minutes and ate, reading through her notes.  According to the Jewish folklore book, a golem needed a name.  Just as it lacked a face, though, her golem did not have one.

That afternoon, Judy had tidied herself enough to go to the druggist for a book of baby names.  It claimed to contain over ten thousand, and had earned her a knowing wink from the lady behind the counter.  She opened it.  Elizabeth, Biblical and English, God is an Oath.  No.  Poppy, English, a poppy flower.  Again, no.  She leafed through, her supper forgotten.  Name after name felt wrong, too plain, too meaningless.

She froze as a key scraped at the lock to her studio.  The door hinges squeaked.

"Judy!"  Matilda Grune swept in, the beads on her purple party dress buzzing like wasps, her heels click-click-clicking on the concrete floor.  "Paul says I've got to talk to you about my tea set.  If you're worried about what shade of green I wanted—Oh, my."

Matilda stared.  Paul folded his arms and leaned against the wall by the door, giving Judy his best act-your-age scowl.  Matilda hesitated, then ran her fingers over the golem's naked breast; Judy set her book atop its stack and got to her feet.

"Art, dear?" said Matilda.  "Or marital trouble?"  She gave the golem's nipple a tweak.

Judy scooped a sodden lump of clay from her mixing vat and slapped it across Matilda's dress.  Matilda gasped.

"You'll get your damn tea set when you can mind your own business," Judy said.

"I assure you, Judy Lowe, there are plenty of potters who can make a tea set."  Matilda kicked Judy's stack of books so they scattered across the floor.  "Good night!"

Paul stared as though Judy had sliced Matilda's throat from ear to ear, then hurried after Matilda.

Judy stroked the golem's breast, smoothing the nipple back into shape.  "It's all right.  She's gone."

She placed her hands on the golem's hips.  They were cool beneath their wet cloth.  She wished her golem would come to life, would stay with her as friend, muse, anything and everything she wanted that Paul would and could not give.  She did not need a husband, someone to do everything for her as though she were a child; she needed....

She did not know what she needed.  But she would take her obedient golem over Paul any day.

"Awfully cozy, aren't you?" Paul said, in the doorway.

Judy jerked her hands to her chest.  She stepped on her plate of egg sandwiches, felt Paul's stare as much as she saw it—disappointed, angry; maybe a little bit worried if she let herself dwell for too long.

She bent to wipe her foot with a rag.  Paul hurried over to do it for her, but she shouldered him in the chest.

Paul took a step back and folded his arms.  "You're ruined, you know.  Unless you want to make that tea set for Matilda as an apology.  I'll make your excuses.  Tell her you're exhausted.  Maybe that you're planning to go away to the country for a—"

"Get out!"

Paul stopped.  Jerked.  Went stiff and still.

"She said you're perverted."

Judy shrugged.  Matilda could say anything she wanted; it did not make it true.

"I'm having an affair with her."

Again, Judy shrugged.

"She's pregnant.  It's mine."

"And I'm Warren Harding."  Still, Judy only relaxed when Paul slouched.

"Damn it, Jude," Paul said, more to the floor than to her.  "Snap out of this, would you?  You're scaring me."  He clasped his hands together.  "Come to bed with me.  It's only a statue.  You can finish in the morning."

Judy held her ground.  Finally, Paul turned away.  From the corner of her eye, Judy caught his profile.  He was sad and smooth and almost like a woman, lovely as flesh could ever be.  Judy held her breath.  She set his profile to memory and scooped up a handful of clay.  Her golem would have a face.  Her golem would have the most beautiful face in the world, sad and lost and perfect.

Clay in-hand, she crouched to look at her sketchbook, to see if there were anything in it she could work from should her memory fail.  The book of baby names lay open to the P's.  Pennina, Biblical, a precious stone.

Precious stone.  Judy squeezed the clay in her hand so it oozed between her fingers.

"Pennina."  The name tasted strange, like an unfamiliar drink.  Her lump of clay in one hand and the book in the other, Judy stood.  She pressed the clay to her golem's blank face.  "Pennina."

"Jude?"

"Goodnight, Paul."  Judy set the book on her potter's wheel and took Pennina's unformed face in her hands.

When she finally reached for a wire loop to carve the eyes, Paul was gone.


Another two days, and Pennina was complete.  A week more, and she was dry.  The next day, when the morning rain had stopped, Judy and two men whom she paid to carry sculptures to the kiln lifted Pennina onto a dolly and, as though she would shatter with a breath, took her to the great, brick kiln behind the house.

Two days later, she came out, white and strong and empty inside.  Judy thought she saw Paul watching while she painted Pennina with her raku glaze:  great swathes that would turn beige and green and shimmering blue, three Hebrew letters from the folklore book mostly recognizable on her forehead, and across her breasts and belly a flurry of maple leaves.  Before Judy closed a steel sheet around Pennina—the makeshift raku kiln—she put a hand to the uncured glaze on her cheek.  Judy hesitated—she felt like a child—and kissed Pennina's parted, silent lips.

"I love you," she whispered, and wondered if Pennina would feel the same when she came to life.  If she came to life.  Before Judy could panic, could think that Pennina might be mere clay forever, she closed the kiln and climbed her ladder to cover Pennina with straw and damp leaves and newspaper and two pillows' worth of feathers in order to bring out the splendor of her glaze.

Just as she crouched to light the kiln from the bottom, Paul said, "Jude."

"Leave us alone, Paul."

"Come on, Jude.  Step back.  I'll take you to a nice place to rest."

"No!"  Judy lit a twist of newspaper and thrust it into the kiln.  A few soft snaps, and the straw and paper went up with a whoosh.

For a long time, she stood on the stone pavement, watching smoke pour from the slits in the sides of the kiln.  She felt Paul next to her; her skin crawled where it came nearest to his.

Finally, the smoke diminished to a trickle.  With thick, asbestos gloves, Judy opened the kiln's pegs.  Pennina made soft pinging sounds when Judy doused her in water to cure the glaze.  But she held.  Shimmering, striped like a wood nymph, as lovely and sad as any dancer who ever lived—as any woman who ever lived.  Judy gripped her ladder as she stepped down.  Her knees wobbled.  Her insides felt ready to slide away.

Pennina stared with blank eyes, one blue and the other beige.  Her parted lips almost seemed to beg for her chem, her instructions, her name.

Judy had written it on a piece of rag paper.  Pennina.  Obey me.  Protect me.  Inspire me.  Keep me.  Love me.  The pulses in her wrists fluttering, Judy folded the chem into thirds and slipped the end of it between Pennina's lips.

"Judy, stop," said Paul, but Judy pressed the paper through until it fell into the pocket of Pennina's mouth, beneath her sculpted tongue.

Pennina did nothing.

Judy faltered.  She took a jerky step back.

"Judy."  Paul took her by the arms.  "Jude, babe, just come in the house.  I'll call the doctor—"

A flicker.  A flash of light.  Paul paused at a low grind, like a potter's wheel kicked to life.

The sound faded.  A mockingbird sang.

Pennina lowered the arm raised high above her head, and turned her head to find the source of the bird's song.

Judy clapped both hands over her mouth even as Paul's grip on her arms slipped away.  Pennina looked around, blinking, her eyes the colors of their glazes.  They seemed lit from behind.  Judy sobbed into her hands.

"Pennina," she whispered, and Pennina turned her head.  There came no creak of clay or crackle of glaze, only a soft whisper like maple leaves as Pennina took a step toward her.  Judy reached out.  Paul shouted.

Judy barely saw the blur, barely saw Pennina fall beneath Paul's weight, only heard a curious sigh as Pennina shattered across the firing stones.

Pennina's chem rested next to the shattered pocket of her mouth, though her face—most of it—lay intact.  She stared at nothing.  Judy felt as though she were made of smoke as she knelt and picked up Pennina's face.

"Why did you do that?" she said, and her voice sounded like the whisper of maple leaves in her ears.

"It's not good enough for you to lose your mind, is it?"  Paul's voice cracked.  He dashed a piece of Pennina's belly across the stones.  "I don't know how you made that thing move, but that was the worst thing you ever—"

"You took her away from me!"

Judy's voice rang against the house, against the  trees between their property and the next.  Broken edges of ceramic bit into her flesh as she clutched Pennina's face to her chest, and she smelled blood over the lingering scent of smoke and glaze.

"Jude."  Paul stared, crouching amidst Pennina's shards.  "It was a monster.  You made a monster."

"She came to me!  You saw her!  She loved me."  Judy's chin tightened, and her breathing grew wet.  "You killed her for it.  You're a murderer."

Paul blinked.  His look of shock melted to a sneer, and finally a distant, pained stare.

"I'm only what you made me, Jude."

"I didn't make you."  Judy turned away.  Blood tickled her arm as it trickled down to soak into her overalls.  She glanced back, and winced inside at how much Pennina looked like Paul.

"I didn't make you," she said again.  The world seemed to crumple as she fell to her knees.  The golem she wanted crunched on the paving stones, and the one she had never meant to create knelt behind her, as sad as any man who had ever lived.  He had done everything she asked, then run amok, just as they all did—flesh and precious stone alike.

Judy's head spun with the words on Pennina's chem:  obey, protect, inspire, keep, love.  She wished Paul had never fulfilled any of them in the first place.

"Please, Jude," said Paul.  "This isn't right."

Judy rested her lips against the broken edge of Pennina's forehead.  The whisper of late-autumn leaves filled her head, like the whisper of Pennina walking.  Dust and clay, she and Pennina, or so they should be.  She shut her eyes and hugged Pennina until flakes of ceramic broke off in her skin.

"I'm sorry."  Paul put a hand on her back, then both arms around her shoulders.  "I'm sorry.  I'm sorry, babe.  It wasn't right.  I'm sorry."

Judy could not find the strength to brush him away.  She clutched Pennina, her precious stone, wishing the arms around her were of clay and maple leaves.  Even as Paul led her into the house, murmuring about the doctor, she pretended that Pennina were the one holding her, protecting her, keeping her safe, and that her rampant, flesh-and-blood golem had never existed at all.