Benny was embarrassed, no longer half asleep.
I’ve changed, you know.
I know.
You believe this, right?
Sure, I said.
I don’t believe you believe.
What do you want me to say?
Remember that conversation we had at my house, when I explained about my, uh, patterns with women?
You compulsively revisit a primal scene by trying to destroy fragile girls, but they kick your ass and have the last laugh. You can’t get off the bus, you’ll always be attracted to this type.
I might have put it more gently.
You aren’t contemplating a future with you.
My point is you’re not like them. I don’t want a fragile girl, I want you.
I’m glad for you, but I’m not sure what you’re saying.
I’ve gotten off the bus, Shira. Being with you is different.
Hmm, I said.
You don’t believe me.
Sounds like magic.
When I described my shit to you that night, something happened. You didn’t judge me, you just listened. I didn’t have to defend myself, which meant I heard myself. When Marie asked me to choose between you, I chose you, remember? It sounds New Agey, but in telling you who I was, in saying no to her, I created the possibility of change.
Jesus, Benny! You didn’t just say no! You humiliated her and she wrecked your store!
I didn’t say I was a saint. But this won’t happen with you.
I thought about that time in Benny’s kitchen when he’d been a centimeter away from crushing me like a bug. I wasn’t convinced. I wanted to be.
You said that to change your pattern you’d have to forgive your father.
That’s the weird part.
It’s all weird.
The more I turn away from the pattern, the less hold anger has on me. It’s the opposite of what I thought.
You thought you’d have to forgive him first, then you could get on with your life.
Something like that. But it’s more dialectical. I haven’t quite figured it out yet.
Are we talking about Esther again? I asked.
No, Benny said. Believe it or not, we’re talking about me.
Sorry.
Why don’t you continue?
Sorry. Okay.
It’s okay. It’s just that I’m having trouble staying awake. I want to hear the rest before I go.
Right, I said. Okay.
I’m going to make myself comfortable on your shoulder, he mumbled. My head, I mean. Not my entire self.
I turned the page, but was just back where I started.
That’s it, I said, riffling again through the pages. Oh, wait: there’s a footnote.
I pause.
You won’t believe this!
I bet I will, Benny said, his eyes drooping.
The bastard gave my story an epigraph!
Read it, Benny said.
Again, O Shulamite, Dance again, That we might watch you dancing!
Chapter seven, verse one. Bloch translation. Apposite.
You don’t know that. The citation, I mean.
Benny shrugged.
What do you know about the Shulamite? he asked.
She’s the female character in the Song of Songs; she dances for her lover. Did Romei write this because the young Shira dances for T. in “Confessions”?
Did you really do that? Benny asked, his eyes opening.
It’s fiction, remember? Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t. It’s not supposed to matter.
The point is, you displayed yourself to him, you signaled your availability, demonstrated your openness to him.
Something like that.
Dancing is a good metaphor for that.
Maybe.
Satisfied, Benny relaxed again against the sofa.
I think I know what he’s doing, he said.
He’s putting his stamp on my work. Twisting it, making it his own.
Benny thought a moment, burying his hand in his beard.
I don’t think that’s it. Look, in “Confessions,” you compare yourself to Salomé, dancing to get the head of John the Baptist on a platter. Salomé is a cynical figure, love doesn’t figure into her story at all. The Shulamite, on the other hand, is innocent. Her love is erotic but pure. And reciprocated. Romei is asking you to re-vision your past, to see yourself not as Salomé but as the Shulamite. Reject the calculating, Salomé part of yourself, identify with that innocent part, the part that loves easily, that feels herself loved. You loved that boy in “Confessions,” right?
I shrugged, blinking back something that might have been tears.
Benny continued, He’s saying that the thirty-five-year-old woman who wrote “Confessions” was disconnected from her inner Shulamite, if you’ll forgive yet more New Age imagery.
That’s what the story’s about, I said. Loss of innocence.
But the woman who wrote it despised innocence as much as her character did by the end of the story. The author can’t accord innocence even to her young, unspoiled self, so she compares her to Salomé. She should have compared herself to the Shulamite.
That’s enough, I said.
Benny took my hand, kissed it, but he wasn’t finished: There are some, he said, who think Salomé and the Shulamite are the same person, or two sides of the same person: both names derive from Solomon.
You want too much from me, I murmured. Both of you.
I don’t think so, Benny said, leaning over to kiss me. We want everything, that’s not too much. Is that really it, all he wrote?
I nodded and Benny lay back on the couch, extending his legs onto the coffee table. I held Romei’s pages close to my heart, feeling in them the end of things.
Had he given up? Had he said all he needed to say? What else was there to say? The ball was in my court, freeze-framed, awaiting my shot. I wouldn’t hear from him again, I wouldn’t hear from my mother. Any decision I made now I’d make on my own.
Almost.
I put my hand again on the bristled cheek of my beloved.
My beloved is mine, he said.
And I am his, I said, kissing his fingers, one by one.
You will always be beautiful to me, he whispered. I put his finger in my mouth, and he moaned.
And you to me, I whispered back, and kissed his arm, his belly, his tzitzit.
What would happen if I stayed over tonight? he murmured. I want you. I can’t stand this.
He pulled me up to him, coiled his arms around me.
I don’t like it either, I said into his chest.
You don’t?
I shook my head and stood up, took Benny’s hands, gestured for him to stand. Talk to me, I said. Tell me about Shir haShirim, and I lifted his T-shirt and kissed his long, slender belly, and when Benny said, Kiss me with the kisses of your mouth, I did, and when he invited me to his garden, I came.
59. SHUVI, SHUVI HA-SHULAMIT
What do you think happens next? I asked, stretched over Benny. On the wall of my room, Ahmad’s painting of Shira the Shulamite.
I’d say that’s up to you, Benny said, smoothing my hair. You know what I want.
I had to laugh.
I was thinking about Romei, I said, his story. What happens next? He ends it, what, nine years ago?
I’m more interested in our story.
Right, I said. Why don’t I get us something to drink?
No, he said, restraining me with his arms. I want you here. Please don’t go.
Okay. Well. Okay, I said, and rested my head on his chest. Shit! I said. What word did Romei use to describe the red nightgown? Did he say sanguigno? He was comparing me to Beatrice, when Dante first sees her, a child in crimson. I have to check!