by Amos Kollek
“My opinion is as good as anyone’s, especially now, when I have vision. But you were saying?”
She placed her arms on my chest, her hands resting lightly on my sleeve.
“After I had finished my third year, I went back to New York. Not visiting my family there, and without much of a plan. One day I was riding on a bus, somewhere near Harlem, looking around in the streets and getting depressed. There were three young Negroes in the backseat behind me. They were making all kinds of dirty remarks about me, which I ignored. One of them kept repeating, ‘Milking white cow, milking white cow,’ and I thought he was probably retarded. When I finally got off the bus, they got off too, and followed me, still making their remarks, and not in a low voice, either. I thought they might try something, but I didn’t give much of a damn. I was walking slowly, taking a good look at the small, filthy streets. I wanted to get a better understanding. See what I mean?”
“Yes.”
“Then, maybe after ten minutes or so, the three of them caught up with me. They grabbed me and dragged me to a yard at the back of a house, and raped me. Maybe rape isn’t such a good term. I didn’t offer any resistance. Being on the pill, I didn’t see much point in putting up a fight, and they did seem surprised at that. I almost went as far as telling them it didn’t matter to me, just in and out, that’s all. When they had finished, they cursed me some more, and the one that had been saying ‘milking white cow,’ when he had had his turn, slapped me in the face, and kicked my dress over my head while I was lying on the ground. He called me a whore and a slut and a fake, and then they left. I went back to my room and washed and changed and put fresh make-up on my face, and told myself there was nothing more to it. I said to myself that it didn’t matter at all. But a bit later I felt disgusted with myself, and I thought to myself that these things have to be important. If parts of my life are not important, then all of it is not important. Life is all I have got. It cannot be worthless.”
She looked abruptly down at me and then turned away. I stared at the glittering glass which framed the sea and through the haze I could see very clearly Joy lying on the ground with her white dress over her face and her legs kicking helplessly at nothing. Then the figure blurred away into the waves but it was still somehow there, lying motionless in the french window, and it was not the same. It was Ram sprawled on his back in the sand with the blood running all over his chest making everything red except his face. His face was untouched.
“I am glad he didn’t get it in the face,” I murmured. “He had such a beautiful face.”
“You see,” Joy said indistinctly, from above the fog, “at least to some extent one must be able to determine his own life.”
“What does a man profit, if by gaining the world, he loses his own soul?”
“No,” she said, “that is not what I’m talking about.”
I buried my face deeper in her blouse, and the bottom button opened. I pressed my lips to her stomach. She didn’t move.
“I went to England,” she continued, “because I needed a change and because, having a sister there, it seemed the most reasonable place to go. I liked it there, so I stayed for a few months, but it wasn’t what I was looking for. I needed a more extreme change. Somewhere younger and with more enthusiasm, where things were created, not destroyed. So that’s how I finally ended up here.”
She stopped talking. I didn’t say a word. I lay dizzily, my face buried in the warm safety of her lap. I didn’t want to move.
“Well,” she said after a while, “that is the entire story.”
I opened my eyes and looked up.
“It is all wrong,” I told her brown skin and her red blouse. “It is all wrong.”
“What?”
“For you to be stuck here with me, you being enthusiastic about building a brave new country, and looking for ideals and meaning with all that energy. You may very well be the right girl, but I am definitely the wrong guy. It is a pity, though, because I am quite drunk now and apt to feel sad and pathetic about things I would generally not even notice. It is a shame, it is all wrong.”
“You just talk,” she said, touching my mouth with her fingers. “You like feeling cynical and original. It feeds your need for superiority. It makes you feel older.”
“I am twenty-two.”
“That makes two of us.”
She pulled her hands to her hot face, and pushed her hair behind her ears.
I picked myself up and dropped into the easy chair at the corner of the room. I couldn’t figure out where the hell all this was leading to.
“I want to swim,” she said suddenly.
“Well, what’s stopping you?”
She got up.
“Coming?”
“No.”
“O.K.,” she said, “I’d like to use one of your towels, if it’s all right with you.”
“Sure,” I said, “go right ahead.”
I shut my eyes and drifted gratefully into a haze.
When you are small you want to be great you want to be greater than your small friends and you want to show them that you are superior and that you can make it where they failed and sometimes this may drive you real hard but even then by the time you have made it and are great some maybe twenty years later there is no one to show because all those that mattered have been killed and buried a long time ago so what is the use of all the efforts people don’t last anyhow there is no point in caring about them one day they are here the next they are gone inanimate objects are more reliable at least you can lock them up in a safe.
The door slammed and I heard her retreating footsteps.
Is it my fault that this stupid idiot Ram goes and gets himself shot clean in the heart when there is the whole goddam platoon standing around him and nobody else ever gets so much as scratched and it is just stupidity itself to go and risk things you don’t want to lose and then say oh yeah mother I’m really sorry I lost them they were so beautiful but they went away and what am I gonna do now when there aren’t any of them left that is why you either don’t like things or else don’t risk losing them just because this is the fashion and goes well with society’s taste how many lives do you think you live I don’t want to fall in love with this girl that isn’t what I want just to screw her I don’t want this blond face to haunt me I don’t need faces to see in nightmares. I didn’t ever see such white high waves as these screaming so loud and this yelling wind where did this girl say she was going oh you have to be crazy to go swimming on such a night and you can’t go very far or very long not against those waves you can’t really you had too much to drink can’t even move my legs properly never expected it to be so hard to walk a few dozen feet.
I stumbled heavily to the water line, shivering as the cold water swept over my feet. I couldn’t see anything at all. The sky was masked with heavy clouds that hid the moon and the stars. It was dark and wet and the constant blowing of the wind was the only sound. I started yelling her name and my voice hardly reached my ears. Well, I thought to myself, this is what you get, goddammit. I turned my back to the water. Then I saw a remote faint orange light coming from the end of her cigarette. It threw a dim, obscure light on her face. As I walked toward her, I wondered how she had ever gotten it lit in that wind.
“The water is terribly cold,” her voice said, “but most refreshing. It makes you feel like new.”
“Oh,” I said.
Coming close, I saw her sitting on the sand with the towel wrapped around her. Her hair hung, wet and dark, on her shoulders.
“It’s so beautiful,” she said, looking over my head as I knelt and sat down beside her, “and I am freezing.”
Chapter Ten
“I HEAR you got yourself a girl friend,” Gad said.
We were sitting in his room, smoking two big Havana cigars I had taken from my father’s house.
“Say,” I said, “do you think the Russians are going to fight us?”
“Fight us?” he laughed. “What the hell for? They’ll
just tell us what they want done, very peacefully. They won’t have to threaten. We’ll do it anyway.”
“No need to exaggerate.”
“Come on,” he said, “America couldn’t lift a finger for us even if she wanted to. They are out of the game, and we can’t handle the Russians. With the way the morale in the army is going, we soon won’t even be able to handle the Egyptians.”
“So what’s left are the Chinese.”
“Yes, but we should have thought of that before, not when they are already on the other side and liking it. How is she?”
“Who?”
“The American girl.”
“All right.”
“Going to convert her?”
“Stick around and I’ll let you know.”
“You know, Nixon’s a bastard. It shines on his face so you can see it for ten miles,” he said. “He had always been anti-Israel anyway. I just hope our government knows it, too.”
“Yes. It is a pity, actually, that Ted Kennedy had to go for a swim. We might have been better off otherwise.”
“Don’t worry. By ’72 it won’t matter any more.”
“Listen,” I said, putting my cigar in the ashtray, “what I actually wanted from you were your economics papers from last year, all you’ve got. I don’t want to be writing a lot of papers this term.”
He laughed softly.
“I’ll have to see if there are any of them left,” he said, brushing his curly black hair with his fingers. “People have asked for them before.”
“Come on,” I said sweetly. “I’m sure you haven’t been that generous.”
He laughed again.
“Some of them have been young, attractive females,” he said. “I was tempted to bribe them.”
“Oh, you don’t need that, Gaddi. You could just talk them into it.”
“Without a white sports car? Could you?”
“I haven’t got your personality.”
He inhaled luxuriously from his cigar and did not speak.
“Try and take a look in that cupboard,” I said indulgently. “You never know what surprises can come out of cupboards.”
“It’s only in the movies that they’re already undressed and willing,” he said. But he got up reluctantly and walked to the other side of the room and pulled out the drawer. I came after him.
“There are two here,” he said. “See if they can be of any use.”
“They’ll be fine.”
I folded the papers carefully and put them in my breast pocket. Gad was a good student; he got all A’s.
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Maybe you’ll invite me for a cup of coffee some evening. I’d like to see the girl. What’s her name?”
“Joy,” I said, walking with him to the door. “I don’t know. You see, she isn’t really my girl friend.”
He smiled.
“Then it would be even better,” he said.
My relationship with Joy was something I found hard to define to myself. I saw her quite often and we had a good time together. But the platonic nature of it had disturbed me. I used to pick her up at her house and go to a movie, or for a drink, or to swim at the beach. We had long talks and she often kissed me, wrapping her arms around me and pulling me close to her, but it never got further than that. I didn’t know what to do about it. Occasionally, I planned to call it quits, but I didn’t.
When I had told my father, toward the end of one month of work that I was dumping the job, he didn’t offer any objections. He said that that was O.K. with him but suggested I get more involved in the activities of the young group in the party. This, he thought, was more practical and involved less effort. I accepted the idea.
I started giving writing more time, and toward the end of another month, had finished a detailed outline that ran over a hundred pages. It was, in fact, a lot more than an outline. The whole book was not planned to have more than two hundred pages.
I passed the exams of the first semester with good marks, and my mother sighed with relief. She believed that the only things you know are those you learn which is, of course, true, except that, for her, learning could be done only within the walls of an institution especially established for that purpose.
Even my social life became more active. It was linked to the increasing number of dead soldiers per week. There were often gatherings of our graduating class in the beautiful cemetery on the hill. They became occasions for hearing and telling the latest jokes about the “situation.” We felt awkward standing solemnly, looking at the new tombstones instead of lying inside the coffins. There wasn’t anything suitable to do, except say our apologies and smile stupidly at one another.
One afternoon, shortly after the beginning of the second semester, there was a funeral for a classmate named Mickey who had been killed the day before. I came late and because of gym, missed the ceremony. Gym was the only class I couldn’t miss, because one absence was sufficient to add another semester of it to my studies. I didn’t want anything added, so I didn’t miss a class.
As I came hurriedly through the stone gate of the cemetery, I saw Eitan walking idly toward me.
He was of medium height with sandy hair and eyes. His mouth was constantly curled up higher on the right side than on the left, which gave the impression that he was always smiling. It also made his right eye narrower than his left one. He insisted that it made him look like a movie star.
“Over already?”
“No,” he yawned. “It’s getting too long for me. There is a shortage of girls this time and those present are no good.”
“Yes, Mickey was no lady-killer.”
“You’re telling me. It’s just no fun.”
“You shouldn’t leave, though. I heard that after the ceremony we stay to pick our own plots.”
“Oh yeah?” he asked lazily. “In that case I’d better stay; the competition being what it is. I thought of taking one overlooking the city.”
“There were six this week, weren’t there?” I asked. “That almost beats the road accident score.”
“One Egyptian soldier was wounded though, and I wonder who did it.”
“I hear they changed the proverb ‘Generations come, generations go’ to ‘Generations go, generations go’.”
“Ho, ho.”
“At least our planes are still attacking. That’s something.”
“Yes, but they are attacking our posts now. That’s why there are so few shot down. It’s a brilliant idea—eliminates casualties and sustains activity.”
“I don’t know.”
“I saw a couple of Russians at the movies the other day. They assured me they want no violence.”
“Didn’t know they were actually here.”
“Yeah,” he said. “That’s sort of un-nice.”
“I do have lots of relatives abroad. I am not worried. I could always visit them if things got bad.”
“Been a nice twenty-two years, though. It was an experience.”
“Listen,” I said, “I think I’ll go in. Are you coming?”
“No. I guess I’ll drift home.”
“See you next time then.”
I walked in and joined the line passing by the newly dug grave, each person in his turn shaking hands with the family. The parents stood with their three other sons and muttered their thanks to the embarrassed offerings of condolence. I shook their hands and walked away without saying a word. I didn’t know them.
I was glad to be back in my sports car. Passing a red light at full speed, nearly running over a woman and her baby, brought back to me the feeling of life.
Ruthi had drifted out of my mind. In fact, she had never really been there. She was a nice girl but I did not especially like her. Despite her good looks, she was too tough for me. After I had made love to her once, the attraction was gone. I felt no desire to experience it again. We did remain on friendly terms, though. She was not the type to be heartbroken. It did not take her long to acquire a new boy friend, a good-lo
oking captain in the tank corps. She liked professional soldiers, and they seemed to like her. I had no objection.
Sitting in my room one evening, I went through the hundred typed pages of my novel and decided it was time to have an objective opinion. I packed it carefully into a plastic case and drove over to Joy’s house. I found her sitting in her living room, wrapped in her red robe, and having Turkish coffee with Muhammed.
“Hello,” she said, as I closed the door behind me. “Come and join in. We are talking about the Palestinian nation and whether it exists or not. It’s very interesting.”
I remained standing with the plastic case in my hand.
“Some other time,” I said, controlling my irritation. “I meant to take you for a ride.”
She was silent for a moment.
“Sit down,” she said finally. “Where are your manners? Don’t you see I have a guest?”
“I wanted to talk with you,” I said dully.
“Sit down and behave. We will talk.”
“No, this won’t do,” I said belligerently. “Are you coming or not?”
She looked at me curiously, and in her eyes, glowed anger. Muhammed looked neutrally into his cup.
“What is the matter?” she asked tensely.
“Nothing. I want to go, that’s all.”
“Maybe I should leave,” Muhammed said gently.
“No, please don’t,” she said.
Then she turned to me. “You’d better sit down and cool off.”
I looked at her helplessly, and the need to take her in my arms and squeeze her and suck her breath with my mouth was almost too strong for me to bear.
“No,” I said. “I don’t want to. Are you coming or not?”
“No.”
“O.K. Good-bye then.”
I turned and walked out, closing the door behind me.
I drove around town, cursing aloud, trying to hit the sidewalk when taking the curves and violating each and every traffic regulation. But there were no policemen around and the pavements did not curse back. I had a bad headache, my usual sympton of a bad mood, when I finally stopped by Ruthi’s house.
I did not really want her, but I needed a girl and there was no one else I could think of. The fact she now had a boy friend added some interest to it all. The hell with him, I thought, climbing the stairs violently. I’ll screw her just the same.