by Naomi Ragen
“Look, over there,” her mother said one morning, nodding toward a young couple with tattoos. “They’re yours.” She snickered snobbishly.
“Can I help you?” Daniella asked, smiling, feeling an immediate kinship with others her mother had found unworthy of her precious time and attention.
“No,” the young man answered, a half smile, ironic and dismissive, on his face.
“Sure,” the young woman said, glaring at him. “We’d like to see an engagement ring. But with a black diamond.”
Daniella swallowed. Was there such a thing? A black diamond? Wasn’t the whole beauty of a diamond in its whiteness, its dazzling purity?
“Just a moment; I’ll check what’s available.”
“Of course there are black diamonds! Right over there, see? The black and white diamond cocktail ring,” her mother hissed, moving her head slowly from side to side at her daughter’s hopelessness. “They are extremely fashionable and very expensive.”
“Like how expensive?”
“For a real, unenhanced one of a decent size? Thousands.”
“And ‘enhanced’? What does that mean, by the way?”
“It means heated and filled with a substance that will change the color to whatever color you want.”
“A fake?”
“No,” her mother said patiently, holding back a sigh. “Real diamond, fake color.”
“Do we carry those?”
“Sure. Everyone does. They’re over there, by the fissure-filled rubies.”
“Fissure-filled?”
“Natural rubies are pretty ugly. Mostly they fill the holes inside with glass to make it prettier.”
“So, this is all a big fake?”
She bristled. “There is nothing wrong with improving on nature. Why should millionaires be the only ones to wear a black diamond or a pretty ruby? Your customers are waiting.”
They were talking softly but with growing vehemence to each other. When she drew near, they stopped, falling into a sullen silence.
“We have black diamonds. Enhanced black diamonds.”
“Are they real?”
“Yes, they are real, but they get a little help in the lab with their color.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” The young woman shook her head. “I wanted a real one.”
“Can I ask why? White diamonds are so much more—”
The girl cocked her head, staring belligerently.
Daniella swallowed. “Traditional.”
The young man spoke up. “Black diamonds come from a supernova explosion that took place even before our solar system was formed. They dropped to the earth like meteorites.”
“They absorb light,” the girl said. “They don’t give it back. They trap it, hold it, like a secret inside. That’s what I want.”
Something about what she said startled Daniella. The idea of total blackness secretly holding light. It reminded her of a lecture on kabbalah she’d heard at a National Council of Synagogue Youth conference during tenth grade. Kabbalah had been a big fad at the time, a few girls in her class wearing red strings on their wrists, something she found silly. But something of the kabbalistic idea of ten holy vessels containing God’s primordial light had remained with her as a magical image, like a fairy tale myth.
She showed them the black diamonds, little one- or two-carat solitaires costing a thousand dollars or less. The girl tried one on. It was way too big for her.
“We can make it any size you need,” her mother chimed in with her eager merchant’s smile.
“Sure,” Daniella agreed, embarrassed she hadn’t thought to say it herself.
“Can we pay out for it?”
“My mom is the expert on that,” Daniella said, smiling, and taking a step back.
Her mother stepped up to the counter with a practiced smile, giving them prices, offering special discounts that expired within the hour. The couple seemed convinced, promising to decide quickly and return.
Once the couple had left, her mother nodded approvingly.
“That was good. You’re learning.”
“But they didn’t buy in the end.”
“They’ll be back.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because she won’t sleep with him until he buys it for her,” she said, yawning.
Slowly, Daniella learned the business, the value of the gems according to their size, color, and clarity, the cost of each gram of precious metal, each decorative, colored gemstone. Most important, she learned to evaluate the men and women who were buzzed in wanting to buy them, becoming as cynical and accurate a judge as her mother, and with it, learning a healthy dose of self-contempt. What a shallow way to judge people, by the material and fit of their clothing, the kind of shoes they wore, the type of handbag they carried! Even worse, though, was how accurate these things were as indicators of their value as customers.
She hated that people could be labeled and dismissed so easily. Every day, she hoped for a surprise, for some bearded stranger wearing purple Crocs and a Metallica T-shirt to ask for a delicate pink morganite. But it never happened. Except for the young couple who wanted the black diamond, there were no surprises at all, until the day she was standing behind the counter and suddenly found herself in a puddle of her own making.
“Call Shlomie!” she begged her mother, as they hurried out to the car for the ride to the hospital.
Impossibly, Shlomie was waiting for her at the entrance. She was so happy to see him! Her loyal, sweet husband! Here to rescue her from her mother!
“I can’t be with you during delivery—it’s not allowed,” he whispered to her. “And I can’t touch you. The moment you started labor, you’re a niddah. But I will help all I can,” he assured her. She felt devastated he wasn’t going to be by her side but had no time to dwell on it, the contractions coming fast and furious.
“It won’t be long now,” the midwife said.
She was wrong. The labor took hours and hours. The pain was excruciating.
“Please, can’t you give her something?” her mother begged the doctor.
“She signed up for natural childbirth, and it’s too late for an epidural. I’m sorry.”
In the end, the baby’s heartbeat started to show distress.
“I want my husband!” Daniella shouted. But he was nowhere to be found. Then she forgot about Shlomie completely, engrossed in the expression on the faces of her doctor and the midwife as they exchanged somber glances of terrifying seriousness, nodding in wordless agreement.
The next thing she knew, they were cutting her and inserting a vacuum extractor as the midwife pressed down hard on her stomach. It was like a Holocaust movie, she thought with horror. But seconds later, there was the cry of the baby.
“A beautiful, healthy girl!” the midwife said as she wrapped the baby in a blanket and showed her to Daniella.
“A girl,” she whispered, shocked as she stared at the tiny, bluish, wrinkled bundle. She was accustomed to magazine photos of plump three-month-olds masquerading as newborns; this was her first encounter with the reality of a human being newly emerged from the womb.
“What’s wrong with her? Why does she look so old, so damaged?”
The midwife and doctor laughed. “She looks exactly the way every newborn baby looks, maybe a little bluer because she had a bit of a stressful entry. But by tomorrow, she’ll be pink and shiny and new—trust me,” the doctor assured her.
He would say that, Daniella told herself, not in the least reassured. Doctors always worried about their malpractice insurance going up. So she wavered between hopefulness and the fear that something had gone terribly wrong because of something she’d done. Maybe it was her resistance to the idea of being pregnant, her despair at having her plans disrupted? Perhaps all that stress had somehow been communicated to the child in her womb? If there was anything wrong, she would never forgive herself. She prayed, “Please, God. Don’t punish her for my sins. Let her be perfect.”
The prayer w
as still on her lips when they wheeled Daniella to her room. Physically and emotionally exhausted, she closed her eyes and slept. When she awoke, Shlomie was standing beside her bed, a huge smile on his face. He was flabbergasted when he saw the silent tears roll down her cheeks. “Was it very hard?” he asked kindly.
“Oh, Shlomie, it’s not that! There’s something horribly wrong with her! I just know it! And it’s all my fault.”
“No, no. The doctor said she was perfect. Eight pounds six ounces. A beautiful little girl. You did a great job.”
She shook her head in despair. “She’s wrinkled and ugly! We’re never going to marry her off!”
He threw back his head and laughed. “You just need rest, Daniella. You’ll feel better tomorrow. The doctors want me to go now.”
“No, Shlomie, don’t go!” She reached out for him, holding his arm.
Gently, he pried himself loose. Religious law forbade physical contact between a husband and wife after childbirth until the bleeding stopped and the woman could immerse herself in the ritual bath for spiritual purification. It was a stricture that no one could really explain.
“I don’t understand that. Why should bringing forth a new life make a woman impure? It’s the holiest thing a woman can do, isn’t it?” she asked him.
He shrugged. He knew no more than she did. “Some say it’s because of all the curses a wife lobs at her husband during labor.” He smiled, showing her he wasn’t serious.
She found herself weeping softly, the whole experience overwhelming in its unfamiliarity, its shocking immodesty and pain. It was like nothing she could have imagined. Raw, animalistic, the opposite of the lofty spiritual experience she’d led herself to expect. She hurt all over.
She spent a fitful night trying to find a comfortable position, taking forever to turn slowly from one side to the next, afraid each small shift would evoke the knife-like, stabbing pain where they’d stitched her up. In the morning, she was exhausted.
Shlomie came at eight, bringing a small bunch of flowers.
“Did you see her?” she demanded.
He smiled. “I went to the nursery and I looked into the window at all the babies. And I focused on this one baby. It was so healthy looking, with such a full head of black hair, and it was laying there, kicking its little feet and waving its arms but not crying. Just looking around at the world. And I thought: What a perfect baby! Then the nurse came over and asked me my name. When I told her, she went over and picked it up—the very baby I was looking at!—and said, ‘This is yours.’ God be blessed!”
She saw his smile, so genuine and heartfelt, as the tears streamed down his cheeks. And she thought: I can do this. Be married to this man. Have his children. It was all right then, the baby, her husband, her marriage. God had not punished her. He had blessed her. Because He was kind. He was compassionate.
“Don’t cry,” she told him softly. “Don’t cry.”
They named her Amalya, because it sounded so Israeli, and they wanted an Israeli child. Soon after Amalya’s first birthday, Daniella found herself pregnant again. Busy raising her little daughter, the pregnancy went amazingly quickly. But three months before her child was born, Shlomie lost his job.
“Chabad is sending someone down from New York.” He shrugged. “They say they’ll give me a good reference.”
But with the economy, no one was hiring. She had no choice but to turn to her mother.
“Do I look like an ATM?” Claire shouted. “But I’ll tell you what I will do. I will offer that husband of yours a job in the business. He can earn a salary.”
“You want him to sell jewelry?” Daniella asked, aghast.
“No. He’d be useless at that. But he can do deliveries.”
Shlomie agreed, but after a month, the number of parking tickets he accumulated was more than his salary.
“He’s useless,” her mother reported.
The birth was the opposite of Daniella’s first, taking less than two hours. Wiser, this time she got an epidural and the delivery was almost painless. Unlike Amalya, her newborn son was remarkably beautiful, with a pink complexion, light blond hair, and brown eyes like her own. They named him David, after the Jewish king of Israel, but everyone called him Duvie.
Soon after his bris, she confronted her husband. “We need to make Aliyah, Shlomie. Like we planned. We can’t wait anymore. I’ll just get pregnant again.” Concerned for his dignity, she didn’t mention that her mother was about to fire him.
He was thrilled, the impracticality of moving across the world with two babies and no job not entering his mind at all. He lived with faith. He was sitting in God’s palm, and God would take care of him.
They arranged to send their things, a dining room set and china closet that Daniella adored and refused to part with—notwithstanding her purported desire for a modest lifestyle—as well as their dishes and pots and pans (all four sets: milk, meat, and Passover milk and meat). They arranged to live in a Jewish Agency Absorption Center for new immigrants in Kfar Shoshan until Shlomie found work and they could afford to rent an apartment.
They left on a dark, gray winter’s day, a month before the turn of the century. It was a new millennium, and a new life, Daniella exulted. Two-year-old Amalya and two-month-old Duvie were wrapped up warmly, their small faces barely visible inside their hats and scarves and snowsuits.
They emerged from the jumbo jet in Tel Aviv to a shining sun and the vast blue skies of the Mediterranean. Happily, they unwrapped themselves and their children, basking in the spring-like warmth. It felt like a new world, a new beginning, all the old failures and doubts sloughing off with their heavy winter clothing.
Someone from the Jewish Agency was there waiting to meet them, holding a placard bearing their names. He accompanied them through customs, then helped to wheel their heavily laden luggage carts filled with suitcases, baby carriages, and infant car seats through to a waiting van. They set up the car seats, strapping in their children and then themselves. Exhausted, they leaned back, surrendering to the forward momentum of the vehicle as it carried them toward their unknown destination. Their eyes feasted on the scenery, enchanted by the blossoming plants, the verdant green fields, the dazzling glare of uninterrupted sunlight, and the endlessly deep blue sky. It seemed not only like a different country but a different planet, a parallel world to the cold, grayish Pittsburgh winter they’d left behind.
Somewhere near Tel Aviv, the van took a left turn and the tangy scent of oranges suddenly filled the vehicle. They drove down a narrow, winding road through orange orchards heavy with ripe fruit as far as their astonished and delighted eyes could see.
Shlomie reached out, gently squeezing Daniella’s hand. “We did it!” he rejoiced. “We’re really here!” She squeezed him back, his joy infectious, putting to rest for the moment all the unanswered questions that flitted through her mind like dangerous insects she wished she could swat away.
The driver parked the van in front of the Absorption Center, a modest, low building with porches that looked pleasantly like a motel. Ushered inside, they were met with a flurry of greetings and paperwork, all in Hebrew. Finally, they were given the keys to their apartment.
It was almost brand new, smelling of fresh paint and turpentine and unopened new kitchen cabinets. It had two tiny bedrooms, an even tinier kitchen, and a small open space with a couch and chair. Daniella looked around, shocked. The whole thing was barely larger than her teenage bedroom.
“It’s only for a little while,” Shlomie comforted her, bustling around to find a place for their luggage and numerous bags, an impossible task he soon abandoned. Duvie began to wail, and then Amalya chimed in, whining with exhaustion and hunger.
“Do you want me to change the baby?” Shlomie asked. He was being generous. He never touched diapers.
“No, I’ll do it. Why don’t you find a grocery store and get us something to eat?”
“What should I buy?”
“Well, that depends on what they have, do
esn’t it?” she answered, exasperated. “Buy what you can.”
“Right,” he said, going out the door.
She sat down and unbuttoned her dress, taking out a breast. She felt the immediate determined latch of Duvie’s eager lips around her nipple. Amalya pulled at her dress, whimpering.
“Hungry!” she complained.
She caressed her daughter’s plump, red, unhappy face gently with her spare hand.
“I know. Mommy knows.” She got up, balancing the baby carefully in the crook of her arm so as not to disturb his nursing, then walked through the rooms searching for the diaper bag they’d taken on the plane. Hopefully, there still might be some fruit or perhaps an uneaten sandwich. As she searched, Duvie left off nursing, his wails becoming louder and more insistent in a way that was becoming unfortunately familiar to her. Her heart clenched. Once allowed to start down this road, if not immediately distracted, he became impossible to pacify. Like a ticking time bomb, he would simply explode. It was dreadful.
Where the hell was that bag! she thought desperately. But Shlomie had just piled everything on top of each other. She needed both hands to unravel the mess. Reluctantly, she put a pacifier into Duvie’s mouth, laying him down on the bed. At this, his cries ceased as he held his breath, almost turning blue, before releasing a wail like a crack of thunder.
Finally she spotted the bag. Wrenching it free from a pile of suitcases, she rummaged through it desperately. But all she found was one small box of raisins and a few broken cookies.
“Here, here, take this, Amalya sweetie,” she said, handing it to her. “Soon Daddy will be home with real food.”
Amalya took it gratefully.
Duvie, in full-blown meltdown, was by now choking with rage, the silences between his cries lengthening disturbingly as his legs flailed and his tiny hands tattooed his stomach.