Questioning Return

by Beth Kissileff

  He gazed at her blankly at first. She worried, Was this date was a colossal mistake? As she walked to the seat across from him to seat herself, he said, “Wendy. Hi. I’m in the middle of reading a great article. I was totally absorbed. It generally takes me a minute to get back to ordinary life.”

  “No problem. Sorry I’m late; I had trouble finding this place.”

  “You didn’t just walk up Ben Yehuda to Betzalel?”

  “I did, but the parking lot confused me.” Looking around, she added, “This place reminds me of this restaurant in Princeton, Market of Eden.”

  “There are kosher restaurants in Princeton? I didn’t know the community there was that big.”

  She frowned, “It’s not kosher. Why would you think that?”

  He looked at her and noticed now that she was wearing a sleeveless sweater, having swung the matching cardigan over her chair when she sat down. “Aren’t you religious?” he asked.

  “Did you think I was religious?” Wendy said, worried. He’s going to dump me before this date has even started. I can’t believe it. Did I mislead him? I didn’t say I’d never studied Torah before Atarah.

  “You were studying with Atarah; you were dressed modestly . . . I assumed,” the stress on the “u” of the word heightened his Britishness, “anyone at their house was.”

  They stared at each other, she angry and bewildered, he just perplexed. “Look.” He splayed his hands out, palms up, vulnerable. “Wendy, I’m . . .” He stopped, not sure how much to confess, but decided just to continue. “I invited you here; I’d like to get to know you. Order something. If you want to drink something cold, the choco kar is great. It’s like hot chocolate, thick and flavorful, but cold, with these delicious flecks of chocolate.”

  “I don’t know. We’re both busy; maybe I should just go. Thanks for introducing me to this restaurant. It’s nice.” She could see herself meeting Orly here and whining to her about the “un-date” she’d experienced in its precincts as she started to gather her pocketbook.

  “Wendy,” he reached out for her hand and grasped it gently, but firmly, for emphasis. “I really don’t care whether or not you are religious.” He let go of her hand and continued, “I just assumed you were. I was mistaken. I’m not totally frum myself. I grew up with it, but I’m not sure what direction I’m going in. Life is too complicated to have one set of answers; that’s part of my attraction to psychiatry. I’m interested in the nuances and complications of people’s lives, working to untangle them.”

  She breathed a sigh out. “Okay.” She paused and smiled. “I like complications too.” She paused to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear and leaned forward, “What bothers me most about the baalei teshuvah that I am interviewing is their certainty. They think they have a set of answers that will work for everyone in all situations. That is what has been so eye-opening about the Hideckels. They are religious without that smugness. They seem to believe in complexity, that it can add to a religious understanding, not take away from it, and is actually preferable, if I understand Atarah correctly.”

  “I don’t think we’re so far apart,” Uri said with a smile.

  The waitress came over and said, “Hazmanot?” Orders?

  Uri said to the waitress, “Od daka.” Another minute.

  Wendy said, “I haven’t looked at the menu but I’m not particularly hungry.”

  “I’ll order for you? I know what’s good here.”

  Part of her intuited that this might be an indication that he was some kind of control freak, but part of her didn’t mind letting him, with his obviously fluent Hebrew and interest in food, take charge.

  “Fine.”

  He addressed the waitress in Hebrew with their orders, and she left.

  “Do I get to know what I’m eating?” she asked teasingly, trying to resume the flirtatious tone she had earlier.

  “I’ll let you be surprised,” he said smiling.

  “It’s funny to be here with you as yourself, when we met in costume.”

  “How do you find me as a man?”

  “I’m just remembering what Atarah was saying at the seudah”—did I pronounce it right?” she asked, uncertain, and after he nodded, continued—“about Jacob being most himself when he proclaimed, “I am Esau, your oldest son,” because as Jacob the trickster, part of him really was engaged in becoming Esau . . . That in some way he was fully authentic only in costume.”

  Uri responded, “We met in costume; our shadow selves saw each other.”

  “I was only a gypsy because it is the default costume. You just need long skirts and lots of scarves. Why is Hillary your shadow self?”

  “Same, default. My roommate had that full mask and didn’t want to wear it. But I am attracted to power and Hillary has it. It is interesting to see how the other half lives, what women’s clothes are like.”

  “Ah ha,” she said archly.

  “Not that I want to do it on a daily basis; it’s just interesting to see what the differences are.”

  “It takes women longer to get dressed; there are many more options. I’m glad I wore something sleeveless today—it’s really getting hot. Does it bother you? I can put my sweater on,” she added hastily.

  “No, not at all,” he smiled. “You look great. I like you better without scarves on your head.”

  “So you don’t want a wife who will cover her hair?” Wendy said, provocatively fluffing the scarf around her neck for emphasis.

  He responded in kind, openly, “I want a wife who makes her own decisions. My mother doesn’t cover her hair except at beit Knesset.”

  “So you’re really not that religious. All the baalei teshuvah I interview are obsessed with that issue. A hat, a wig, do they let some bangs show, no hair, some hair under the hat . . .”

  “I’ve no interest in telling people what to wear.”

  “You just want to tell them what to think as a psychiatrist?” she said. Then, she thought to herself, why am I being hostile, to religion and to psychiatrists? I’ve got to be a bit nicer unless I’m not interested. He told me I look great, so I should at least give him a chance.

  “What do you have against my noble profession?” he teased, pretending to take notes on the notepad still lying at his side from when he was reading the article.

  “Nothing. I didn’t tell you yet the real reason I got to know the Hideckels, though.”

  He leaned forward, his hands on top of each other and elbows out. “Aaaah, there is more to the story.”

  “I may as well tell you the whole thing, now that I’m out of costume and outed as a secular woman. Then you can decide what you think.” She continued, “I have been going to Atarah’s classes and she invited me on Purim, but . . .” She stopped mid-sentence, deliberating about how to start. “Okay, so you know I am questioning return. I’ve been interviewing baalei teshuvah at various yeshivot around Jerusalem. Most of the time they craft their stories in a similar way: ‘I was in such and such a place, distant from Hashem, but Baruch Hashem, I met a religious friend or a teacher. Or, traveling, I decided to stop in Israel before or after hitting the beaches of Goa; it must be basherte; I’m so happy I’m frum. You know those ‘life is good’ T-shirts? They irritate me; they just seem to say, my life is good; yours isn’t. It seems like a taunt—I guess that is something I find in general about baalei teshuvah—they want to taunt you with how great their life is. Baalei teshuvah should have their own shirts: ‘Life is frum.’”

  Uri added, “‘Frum is good.’ With smiley face with a kipah.”

  Wendy laughed and continued, “In Jerusalem, you could make a fortune on those. I try to find my way into the cracks and fissures in their arguments, asking them, what do you not like about being religious, was there anything difficult to give up, how has your relationship with your family been affected? Basically, I try to get at the places where that smile of contentment is smashed and fractured.”

  “You are relishing making them squirm. Do all of them have difficult
ies?”

  “Hell, yeah.” She hoped he wouldn’t be upset by her use of swear words; maybe she shouldn’t have said that, but she was getting into her subject, getting relaxed, and that just came out. “It’s just a question of getting them to talk about it.”

  “What’s the connection with how you met the Hideckels?” he asked with a slow smile, amused at her excitement about her work.

  The waitress came with their food. Uri had ordered a choco kar for Wendy and for himself. He had also ordered a small platter of assorted small cookies, which she put between them, and gave them each a plate. He thanked the waitress in Hebrew and she left.

  “This is really good,” Wendy said after her first slurp. She continued to gulp as quickly as her straw permitted. “It makes me want to trust you. You have good taste.”

  He smiled and said, “If you’re hungry, have a cookie too. The baked goods here are the best in Jerusalem.”

  “Have you been to Don’t Pass Me By Tea and Pie in Nahalat Shiva? Worthy competition.”

  “I haven’t.”

  “Next time,” she said and then realized she shouldn’t so prematurely assume there will be a next time. She worried she would turn him off by assuming this.

  He didn’t respond, not wanting to commit one way or another. “You were in the middle of a story,” he reminded her gently.

  “Right,” she exhaled slowly, the animation with which she discussed her work gone for the time being, “I may be a bit harsh sometimes with the questions I ask people. One of the people I was interviewing, Shaul Engel, was a patient of Dr. Hideckel’s.”

  “Why do I know that name?” Uri mused.

  She gazed at him, clueless as to what would happen after this admission. “He committed suicide after our interview. In the suicide note, he wrote that after the interview, he realized he hadn’t changed as much as he wanted to. He didn’t want to subject himself to more temptations, so decided to end his life. He used a verse about the day of death being better than the day of birth,” she said sadly, biting her bottom lip to keep herself from crying.

  “I’m sorry, Wendy.” Uri looked at her carefully. “If he’d been under an excellent psychiatrist’s care, surely you aren’t to blame. You’ve interviewed plenty of others without anything”—he said it in such a British way, an-na-thing, she found charming in spite of the seriousness of the conversation—“so tragic occurring.”

  “That’s true, but I was telling you about my interlocutory style. I kept interrogating Shaul. He was getting upset. I could tell from his tone of voice.” She let out a big breath and added, “The worst part is that, beyond pressing him, I didn’t get the main thing he was trying to express.” Wendy was trying to hold back tears herself now. “I went back and listened to the tape the next day, and he is so clearly making a plea for help, saying how unhappy he is. He actually said . . .”—Wendy looked up at Uri with tears in her eyes—“he said to me, ‘It would be easier if I weren’t here.’ And I couldn’t understand that simple message from another human in pain.”

  Unsuccessful at staunching what was starting to become an uncontrollable flow of tears, she needed to exit before her sobbing became of notice to the other patrons. “Excuse me, I need the ladies room.” She picked up her bag and retreated to find a place to cry as she wished; she quickly asked a waiter directions. On finding her refuge, she locked herself in the teeny room with a high ceiling and a toilet with an old-fashioned mechanism, the rectangular basin on top and a long pipe connecting to the bowl. Wendy put the lid of the toilet down. She sat and put her hands on her face. She cried and moaned, “Why did I do it? Why didn’t I stop asking? Why can’t I pay attention to other people? I wish I could go back in time and listen, and keep Shaul alive. I’m a horrid excuse of a person.” Wendy continued to wail, alone. After a few minutes of crying, she thought, Okay, I am horrible, I know, but I can’t sit here feeling that permanently. Now what? I like this guy. He’s a psychiatrist but I don’t know how he’ll feel about a show of emotion like this on a date. Well, if he thinks I’m awful it’s okay since nothing with him would have amounted to much anyway; I’m leaving the country in three months. There’s always Matt when I go back to Princeton. She didn’t want to give up unless Uri had fled by the time she returned. She commanded herself, See if you can salvage this date.

  She wiped her eyes with the toilet paper, annoyed that the sink was outside the room with the toilet, as in most Israeli bathrooms. She’d have to wash her face at that sink in public, with waiters and waitresses walking by, and lurking customers waiting to do a ritual hand washing before eating bread. Hopefully, Uri would be sitting at the table reading his journal and not come look for her and find her like this, red-eyed, looking and feeling like shit.

  It was funny, the times she cried with men, she thought, splashing water on her discolored and mottled face. Usually, if she could cry, it meant she felt comfortable enough with them to really open up about what mattered—it might even be a cry of relief over having found someone who understood her. She couldn’t remember the last time she had cried with a man.

  What would Uri do when she returned? Wendy asked herself as she dried her face with the horribly scratchy brown paper towels still standard even in upscale Israeli restaurants. A fortune could be made in marketing high-end janitorial supplies in Israeli restaurants and hotels, where no two-ply, much less three-ply, toilet paper exists, Wendy concluded. There was a mirror above the sink, a small rectangle, slightly above Wendy’s eye level. She was able to see her eyes by standing on tiptoe. She put on mascara, foundation, and powder, and walked, deliberately, back to the table, where she found Uri sitting, gazing around at the other customers.

  “Sorry to be so emotional. I’ve been under so much stress about Shaul’s death. Every time I sit down to work, I worry, is what I’m going to say more important than the life of another person? It’s completely paralyzing. I’m always second-guessing myself. I feel so guilty—what kind of person am I to care about my work and not about another person’s life? Or feelings?”

  “You feel you were unnecessarily cruel, which may or may not be so, but Shaul’s death is not your fault. No one knows what triggers a suicide. Honestly. I’m not just saying that.” He looked at her and tapped her arm lightly with his fingers, for emphasis. “I don’t see you as a bad person. In fact, your honesty is admirable. Your attempts to get baalei teshuvah to be open about their struggles are so important. So many of us struggle with being religious but can’t or won’t admit where the difficulties are. I love your project. It’s . . . fresh. Innovative. It takes an outsider to look and really see the religious community. I admire your need to be honest with yourself—you may have pushed and probed him more than necessary, but you are not to blame for Shaul’s death.”

  “Dr. Hideckel also said that.”

  “You went to see him after Shaul died.”

  “Bingo,” she added. “He told me, if I felt like I wanted to atone, I could pray, give tzedaka, or study. He thought that as a student I might prefer the study option.”

  “He suggested that you go to Atarah’s classes,” Uri said with a smile.

  “I’m glad I didn’t have to explain this when we met,” Wendy added.

  “You shouldn’t feel that what happened with Shaul means you’re an uncaring person,” he said compassionately. “Academia doesn’t teach you to care—or need you to care. That you have to decide on your own.”

  “It’s frustrating. Besides Hideckel, the only other person who has listened to me is the Fulbright adviser here, Avner Zakh. My dissertation committee . . . I haven’t been able to talk to any of them about this whole Shaul thing. It isn’t part of what they are teaching. Just write and publish, that’s their mantra.”

  Uri ran his fingers through his thick brown hair. “Medicine is the same way. Worse probably. You get compensated for the numbers of patients you see, not quality of care or success of the treatment outcome. That isn’t for me. I will judge myself, ultimately, on ho
w well my patients heal, nothing else. That’s it.”

  “I hope you stay idealistic once you start practicing,” Wendy said sadly.

  “I hope,” he said, sipping his choco kar. He put his hand, palm down, in the middle of the table, as if to offer a challenge. “You? How will you know you’ve succeeded in academia?”

  A slow smile came to Wendy’s lips as she gazed at Uri. She also took a sip of her chocolate drink and a bite of her cookie. She loved capacious questions, ones where a huge net was tossed out in the effort to pin down and capture something of the elusive mixture of qualities that embodied the essence of the person sitting across from you. If a person cared enough to pry, to make these inquiries, it meant he wanted to get you, to know who you were, really. There was an element of marvel, Wendy thought. Here is an interesting person across the table; it’s possible to get to know him, what he’s about. Wendy was struggling with the complexity of wanting both to put herself in the most alluring light and being honest. She finally answered, “If my work changes the field, enables my colleagues to see paradigms differently, I’ll feel I’ve succeeded.”

  They each sat in silence for a few moments, sipping the choco kar. Wendy decided that she was not going to make the next conversational move. She would leave it to him, if he were motivated enough.

  He was. “We discussed why I was Hillary. Why were you a gypsy?”

  “Lawlessness, freedom? Being on the margins, outside societal restraint.”

  “We’re getting somewhere,” he smiled conspiratorily.

  “Maybe. Could be my attraction to this whole subject—and why I feel so guilty about Shaul. I want to be beyond, an invisible observer no one is aware of standing on the margins, noticing, recording. As the youngest in my family, I was always absorbing things that no one realized I was able to decode.”

  “Decoding—what the gypsy and the politician have in common.”

  “How?”

  “A politician has to decode what people want, know their hidden desires to craft appealing platforms. He or she has to know how to assess people’s needs, so they’ll vote. A gypsy also has to know what interests people in doing fortunes, to get paid.”