“Uri,”
“Yes, Aychuk.”
“We really will get married one day, won’t we?”
“I can’t wait for it,” his hand on my head, his face smiling. That smile, all over him, I remember it so well.
“So strange that suddenly you know what’s right, you simply know.”
“I knew it ages ago, Aya.”
“I want to ask you something.”
“What, Aychuk?” He straightened his back a bit, shifted my head to the other leg. His arm was along the length of my hair, and suddenly - a kiss was planted on my forehead. And that same smile.
And the blue skies.
“Uri, when we grow up, really grow up...”
“We’re grown up now.”
“No, I mean really grow up, when we’re adults, like when we’re around thirty.”
“I can just imagine it, Aychuk,” his fingers unravelled my plait.
“Let’s say that one day you do something at work, something that’s not right, and they’re angry with you. Do you think you’d tell me?”
“Of course I would.”
“And let’s say that one day some woman starts coming on to you. Would you tell me?”
“No one would want to.”
“Why not?”
“That’s just how it would be. I’d be with you.”
“But let’s just say …”
“I’d tell you.”
“… and if you have all kinds of girls who happen to be your friends? And if you were a youth counsellor, the girls you’d be counselling…would you tell me?”
“Aychuk,” he said, his hand stroking my face.
“What, Uri my love?” I remember the tranquillity diffusing slowly through my body, spreading all over me, the tranquillity that comes from Uri. Such a complete peace, so perfect, it was just then that I felt it for the first time, there on the grass, under the sky.
“We’re going to be together our whole lives. Like now, nothing will change. And we’ll tell one another everything.”
***
And now, what of us now? What of our love? Does it hover above the palms of our hands, struggling, like a moth? Is it still fluttering there?
This habit, the habit of talking with Uri. Words, the flow of words, like commands that direct our lives – what will become of them? Should I somehow stop the words? Stop the words, but not the love. Is it even possible? How can such indecision be possible? And how can I live with it? With Yaron who’s gone, with life which is slipping by, and with the words that have ceased?
Words. The very foundation, the building bricks of our lives. I remember once reading in some book, “Couples don’t need full communication, reliable communication is sufficient… You shouldn’t lie but you also don’t have to tell absolutely everything,” I read that and quoted some psychological theory to Uri. So someone thinks it, we said, it’s his right, some people live differently from us. But now, what about now? Is it still right for us to tell each other absolutely everything? Is it permitted to make a change in the foundations, or is it the opposite – completely beyond the pale? And if it’s allowed – should we? And how, how can it be done? Uri and I, and the way we talk with one another, that’s like the Ten Commandments for us. How can the foundations be moved and the house remain standing?
24. Hagar
“You can’t seem to leave these letters alone, Hagari,” Yael said to me. Somehow, one day, I had found the courage to tell her that I had come upon them by chance at home. And I even told her that on Yaron’s fiftieth birthday, Aya had phoned him, just like that, out of the blue, and that they had met that one time. And that those letters, they seem to draw me to them. “I’m trying to help you and I don’t seem to be getting through to you. You’ve been stuck in them for months, why can’t you just forget them?” “I just can’t, Yaeli, I just can’t get them out of my head.” “That Aya woman wrote those letters a thousand years ago, so why would it make such a difference to you now?” My knees started to go wobbly on me, I just couldn’t control it. How could I explain to her that those letters were almost searing my hands, I actually felt that they were burning me. Yaron must have read them a thousand times. How could he be like that with her? Why has he always been so different with me, what’s wrong with me? Maybe something really is wrong with me. And Yaron, in those letters, sometimes I can’t believe that it was him, maybe they were letters to some other Yaron.
And that picture of the two of them.
And the invitation to the wedding.
Finally Yael decided that there was no choice.
“Hagar, I’ve been thinking.”
“What…?”
“Usually I’m not a big fan of it. But maybe in this case it’d be worth it.”
“What would be worth it?”
“To try going to someone. Maybe someone can help you get out of this.”
“Believe me, I’ve already thought of it.”
“They say that it can help. And you don’t seem to be able to shake it off. “
“Perhaps… yes. It’s been going around in my head for a while. But you need so much courage. And I haven’t the faintest idea who I’d go to.”
She threw out the name of Dr. Yoav Marom. She’d heard how he’d helped a couple at the university. I said all right, if I’m getting into this then I’d better go to someone well-known, a real professional. She got hold of the number for me. It took me a full month to pick up the phone. I kept putting it off again and again, but in the end I managed to force myself to do it. I hoped that he would answer straight away. There was an answering machine with his voice, asking to leave the name and number, he would call back. I stammered, I could hardly utter a word.
I waited for three weeks, I had my mobile with me the whole time, then, finally, I decided to call again; maybe he hadn’t got my message. There was the same recording; I somehow mumbled my name and number again. Then there was the Hanukah holiday, it was already December, and then another month. I waited and waited.
“What’s up, Hagar?” Yael asked, “Look how it’s driving you crazy.”
“He must be too busy, or maybe he’s gone away and it’s taking him time to call back. And I stuttered so much there, why should he even want to ring me back.”
“For heaven’s sake, Hagar, what’s that got to do with it? And apart from that, why are you fixating on him? We can look for someone else.”
I didn’t agree. It had taken me time so long to decide to go to someone; and Dr. Marom - the internet is full of him, of his articles, he has a huge reputation. It’s as if I already know him, I’m not going to start looking for anyone else now.
***
I had just finished running. And I had also just finished my stretches, my breathing was returning to normal, my pulse had come down. I was about to slip into the shower, my clothes already tossed into the laundry basket; it was just then, as I was standing there like that, the strap of the heart monitor still on me, the phone suddenly rang. Caller ID withheld.
“Hello, could I speak to Hagar?”
“Speaking.”
“Oh, hello, Hagar. Yoav speaking. Yoav Marom.” Suddenly I could feel my heart pounding, the pulsometer buzzed. I shut it off, threw on a towel, and ran into the bedroom to get my diary.
So we set a date, the 22nd of February, at nine-thirty in the evening.
“I’m looking forward to our meeting, Hagar.” A baritone voice, deep, calm.
Why couldn’t I just say thanks, like that, simple? Why this sudden stutter?
Another three days. Finally.
Lucky I didn’t lose my patience, and lucky I’d been close to my mobile all that time.
25. Aya
It’s already March, spring is in the air. There’s already been one heatwave. “I have nothing to wear,” Liora says to me, growing in front of my very eyes. She seems to grow from season to season, her clothes are getting shorter. “We can go into town this evening,” I promise her. The days are getting longer and t
he clocks have been switched over to summer time.
But the darkness hasn’t got shorter.
And Yaron.
How long is Yaron going to stay in the shadows? “I don’t see how there could be any connection between us,” his words echo within me.
“He told you that it’s impossible… there’s no such thing.” Uri’s words.
What’s impossible? Who says?
How can I possibly give in?
How many years will have to go by before we meet again?
How will I look?
How will I be?
Will I be?
And in so many years’ time, what would seeing me do for him then? Not a thing.
And me, how would I be able to see him? How would he be reflected in my eyes?
I can’t. Just can’t.
There’s no way I can let this go.
Don’t let go. And don’t put it off.
Never, not even once, have I ever given in.
And Uri, what about him? After all these years in which there was no need to ask a single question. Everything was so simple, so right, just like it should be. And now, all of a sudden, this weird question. “Uri,” my body turns to him as we get closer, “I have to talk.” My hand searches for his. What are words, such strange creatures, creatures in need of touching, for without touch they fall silent.
“Tell me Uri, I need to ask you something.”
“What, Aya?”
“Were there ever things you gave up for me, in all these years that we’ve been together?”
“I don’t understand what you’re asking.”
I feel him breathing, his hand in mine. It’s only like this that we can talk; it was always like this, always, as long as I can remember.
“I never gave in over anything,” the thought suddenly strikes me. “Could it be that it was always you who gave in and I didn’t even notice, could it be that?”
Thinking, reliving. So many years go through his head.
“No, Aya, I don’t think so,” Uri says. “Maybe just some minor things, unimportant stuff. But I never gave up on what was important, and I never missed out on anything because of you. On the contrary,” Uri finished up quietly, and drew me close to him.
“But now,” he added, ever so quietly, those words which I’d already heard. “I’m just waiting for you to let go of those letters. And forget Yaron. He doesn’t belong here.”
***
I left the letters, and the neatly organised piles, in the locked room. A novel might help me; maybe I would be able to immerse myself in the lives of imaginary heroes.
Couples’ Games by Shelly Yechimovitz caught my eye from the bookshelf, pulling me into Lala’s life. Married, happy, uncomplicated. Two daughters, work, everything running smoothly. A regular life, a good life. Like home cooking, their home sex is familiar, nourishing, good. Touli, her husband, the envy of her girlfriends, the best husband in the world. For twenty years he’s been the most faithful man on Earth, never glancing at another woman. Goes along with everything she wants, happy to comply with all her wishes. Then, one day, Lala falls in love. All excitement, anticipation, her heart beats wildly, as if there’s no air. She’s unfaithful, deceitful, she hides, she lies, she betrays him, and again she betrays him, destroying everything; she reduces their life to ashes, leaving no way back. “I’m sick,” Lala confesses. “It’s a dreadful illness, the disease of love.”
Did I fall sick too, then, when I met up with Yaron? But what could be the nature of this sickness, when my heart is with Uri? Only Uri – and yet, do I have this sickness? It’s just a miracle that I didn’t catch that sickness the way that Lala does, for it’s not something that you do, or don’t do, it’s something that befalls you, an accident. “You’ve got to read it,” I say to Uri, handing him Touli and Lala. Commonplace stories, we’ve all read hundreds like them, suddenly assume a completely different significance. And Uri, after me, starts reading, gripped by the pages.
Passover Night
[8]Spring is in full bloom, a frenzy of cleaning in the air. And Passover is coming up, it’s next week. A natural opportunity, it could be so simple to call. Hi Yaron, hello, how’re you doing? I just thought I’d call to wish you a happy holiday. All right, I haven’t forgotten his words, I don’t see how there could be any contact between us, all right, so what, just to say hello. Not a huge deal. That’s what people do, at least the normal ones, the ones I’d like to count myself amongst.
Passover night. Can’t miss the date. It’s almost noon, things can’t be put off forever. Time isn’t infinite. It’s now or never.
Decide. Yes or no.
Yes.
“Hello Yaron, it’s Aya. How are you? I just wanted to wish you a happy holiday.”
“Aya? You’ve taken me by surprise. It’s good to hear from you.” He recovers quickly, filling me in on important family news, and then hurries to get off the phone. “You know how it is, just before the holiday, the whole world’s out shopping. I have to run. Happy Holiday.”
“Happy holiday,” I reply to the cut-off signal. The phone lies mute in my hands.
I’d tried to get away with it, but was caught, instantly, red-handed. My wild heartbeat tells me – I’m here. No excuses, no shortcuts. It was like someone had popped up, instantly, shot out his hand, demanded payment. That feeling of guilt.
Calm down, I tell my wildly beating heart. It’s all right, it’s the right thing, that’s what I had to do. Go away, get back where you came from, I told my conscience, which had suddenly reared its ugly head in front of me. I’ll find the time, I’ll tell Uri – later – it’s impossible now, with the whole house on tenterhooks, and tonight’s Passover night.
Twilight. A wide horizon, a turquoise and pinky sky glimpses between the trees, smiling into the house. The air is full of festivity, flowers in the house, a white tablecloth. A magenta sun is setting, evening falls, and the commotion increases. Different generations come together, embrace; elders with youngsters, the adults swing the little ones up to the ceiling, the walls of our home echo with joy. A whole clan fills the house; dishes come and go as if on a conveyor belt, like a frantically busy beehive. And inside it, as if inside a transparent crystal ball, the happiness that fills up the house, the clan, Iddo’s laugh, Liora’s new dress, the hidden piece of matzah, the stack of dishes, everything’s so good, just look at all this happiness, I whisper to Uri.
Night. The dishwasher goes silent, at last. We’re tired, so utterly worn out, withdrawn into ourselves. Me and Uri. Our love, stirred up, as always, by happiness – its big sister, bubbles up, flowing, growing, getting stronger, like a wave, touching, quivering, arriving from the most hidden recesses of the body, to all its extremities.
Floating, all of me, towards him, inside him, the two of us pressed tight, together, hermetically glued as if with contact glue, or perhaps it’s a magnet, from head to foot, inside a bubble of happiness. That’s the word.
Not yet, it’s not the time, I haven’t yet found the opportunity to tell him. I called Yaron. Everything is so good, how can I spoil it? And we have guests staying over. Must wait.
A new morning, a holiday, the hours pass slowly. Yet my Uri, his shoulders drooping, hunched, shuts himself away in our room, withdrawing into Touli and Lala. What’s happening, I say in my heart, wasn’t it so good for us?
Night. Darkness. It finally strikes me, something must be amiss. I decide to ask his frozen face, his stiff neck. Uri, what’s happening? I gaze anxiously at his profile, his eyes fixed on the ceiling.
“You called Yaron,” he says, quietly, doesn’t ask.
Shocked. No words. How could you know, I say in my heart. And I continue wordlessly, I wanted to tell you, I just didn’t find the right moment, the guests, such a big clan, and we were so happy together, it was so good. I remember how good, a quivering in my stomach, crawling on my back, I meant to tell, I know in my heart that I did mean to. Yet still.
He felt. He understood. Was it from the h
appiness in my heart, or from the book he was holding? Was it Touli who whispered in his ear? Touli, the best husband in the world, the most devoted, with only his wife in his heart. And yet he, Touli, was the most betrayed.
“You rang to wish him a happy holiday,” he says again, not asking.
He hears my silence.
He hears me saying, in my heart, Yes, that’s true.
“Life used to be so good with us,” his quiet words linger sadly in the darkness.
26. Hagar
“A gentle and pleasant man,” Yael pointed out. It was on a blog which someone had written about Dr. Marom.
Gentle and pleasant. It’s true. He has this politeness about him. And he’s nice.
Nice.
Once, long ago, just before we got married, we were getting ready to move into our first flat together, and I went with Yaron to an electrical goods shop. I remember that a new DeLonghi stove caught my eye right as we entered, one of their new line, although it was a little pricey. We stood there and they explained to us about it, and all the time, going through my head, were the dishes I would be able to make with it. I remember that I even thought about that noodle dish with raisins that Yaron loves, they call it kugel; and I thought of tsimes – sweet carrots blended with prunes. We never serve these dishes in our home – my mother never makes them, but by this time I had been asking Yaron’s mother to teach me. The salesman was very nice and demonstrated all the new features of the stove for me. When we left the store, I said to Yaron that I thought that the DeLonghi was the stove, and made a comment about the salesman being very nice. “For God’s sake, Hagar, that’s professional ‘niceness’, it’s his job. Show me one salesman who isn’t nice. Sometimes you drive me crazy.” I didn’t respond. He was right. But in the end he bought me that stove.
So We Said Goodbye: A Contemporary Fiction Novel Page 11