“I’ll tell you then. In the Technion they give them a raise every month. He’s bringing home at least four thousand clear.”
“Clear of what?” asks Osnat angrily.
“Clear of tax.”
“Oh …”
And again that uncomfortable silence. Why the hell should she care how much Osnat’s dad earns?
“As for Dafi’s father” — suddenly she turns to me with a scornful smile — “I don’t ask you because you really don’t know, he doesn’t know himself. He’ll be a millionaire soon with that garage of his, though your mother does her best to keep it a secret.”
It’s my turn to be startled and struck dumb. The witch, sitting there in that chair with her bare legs, smooth as pats of butter, her toenails painted with bright red nail polish. When I see her sitting like that I know which half of her isn’t Jewish, the lower half for sure.
The odd thing is that Tali never interrupts her mom when she starts to prattle, pays no attention to her, just sits there quietly in bed, staring out the window, not caring that her mom’s getting on our nerves. We start groping for another subject, we start telling Tali something and suddenly there’s another blast from the corner of the room.
“Tell me, girls, do you need a new dress every week, like Tali?”
We look at Tali but she’s so calm you’d think she doesn’t understand what we’re talking about.
“Tell me, tell me … I get only twelve hundred pounds a month and I pay out three hundred in rent. Please tell her she shouldn’t ask for a new dress each week, once every two weeks is enough. Maybe you have some influence over her.”
We want to escape from here right away, like Tali’s dad, but that would be hard on Tali. Osnat starts cleaning her glasses, her hands shaking. I see that she’s getting into her usual state of panic, but she’s not saying anything, neither am I. Knowing that any reply will get a scornful comment. We ignore her, going back to our conversation, whispering, muttering in low voices, sneaking a sideways glance at the woman sitting there in the doorway, her hard face, the blond hair scattered over her shoulders. Perhaps after all her un-Jewish half is the top half, I think. A quarter of an hour passes, we’ve almost forgotten her, and then –
“What do you think, should I keep Tali at the school? Is it worth it?”
“Why not?” we both start up.
“But she’s a very poor pupil.”
“Not true,” we protest, giving her the names of children in the class who are worse than Tali.
But her mom isn’t impressed.
“Is she really going to get a living out of all this? Maybe she should leave and just get a job …”
But we’re scared of losing Tali, we start to explain the importance of going to school, education, the future … and her mom stares at us angrily, intently, listening with interest but sticking firmly to her opinion.
“In another two or three years Tali can get married, Tali’s very pretty, everyone knows that, she’s prettier than either of you, she’s sure to get snapped up … so why should she stay at school?”
Now I begin to see the funny side. But Osnat goes pale, stands up, ready to go, whenever people talk about physical appearance she gets awfully up-tight.
“But maybe you’re right, Osnat,” she continues in her calm, irritating voice with the Hungarian accent. “It’s good she should have some qualifications, I’ve got no qualifications and I’ve paid dearly, I thought love was enough …”
And her face twists as if she wants to curse or to cry, she runs out of the room. We look at Tali. Her mom’s worn us out completely, but her it didn’t touch. She’s not normal, smiling a thin smile to herself, dreaming, playing with the edge of the blanket, nothing matters to her.
Osnat wants to go but Tali says softly, “Just a moment, what was the homework?” and we sit down again, this after all is what we came here for. Her mom suddenly appears again, but this time with cream cakes and coffee, she sits down in the chair again, chain-smoking, we wait for the next blow but she says nothing. At last we say goodbye to Tali, her mom goes with us to the door in silence, then at the door she suddenly catches hold of us, violently, whispering, her face full of pain: “But what does she say? She never talks to me … what does she say?”
And we’re still groping for words and she hugs us tightly. “Don’t abandon Tali, girls.”
And she lets us go. We’re stunned, we can’t say a word, walking in silence down the street, stopping outside Osnat’s house, unable to speak but also unable to part company without saying something. It’s as if Tali’s silence has stuck to us as well. At last Osnat confesses, “If my parents split up I’d kill myself.”
“Me too,” I say at once, but with a stab of pain in my heart. She can say things like that because in her house there’s love and kissing and cuddling and “my darling” every afternoon. But in our house it’s so quiet. I look up, she’s staring at me, as if she’s testing me.
“Ciao,” I mutter and quickly walk away.
ADAM
Maybe we should part. It’s the beginning of summer. Oppressive heat, I wake up covered in sweat, it’s nearly midnight. Where’s Asya? I get up. The light’s on in Dafi’s room, but Dafi’s, asleep, a book lying open on her face. I pick up the book, put out the light, but there’s still a light on in the house. I go into the study. She’s sitting there, small and thin beside the big table, her hair still wet from the shower, wearing a tatty old bathrobe, her little bare feet swinging. The room is full of big shadows, the table lamp hardly lights the papers and the books in front of her. She’s startled by my sudden appearance. Is she still afraid of me?
She’s decided to try to write over the long vacation a source book for the teacher of the French Revolution, collecting new material, with explanatory notes for teachers and systematic questions. She goes around to the libraries collecting books, thick and heavy dictionaries filled with the old French terminology.
I sink down on the bed beside her and smile at her, she smiles back at me and then goes back to her books. It doesn’t bother her at all that I’m sitting beside her watching her. She’s so sure of the bond between us that she doesn’t even need to lay down her pen and say something to me. Could anyone want to take her from me?
It’s a long time now since I’ve touched her. She says nothing. I watch her with squinting eyes. Her pale breasts show through the open bathrobe. If I was to go to her now and hold her she wouldn’t resist, she might even be glad, surely she hasn’t lost her desire as well.
“Do you still dream?”
She lays down her pen, surprised.
“Sometimes.”
Silence. Perhaps she’ll tell me a dream, like in the early days, it’s years now since she’s told me one of her dreams. She seems troubled, staring at me intently, then she picks up her pen, reads what she’s just written and crosses it out.
“Aren’t you tired?”
“Yes, but I just want to finish this page.”
“Making progress?”
“Slowly. This old French is very complicated.”
“You’re always having to study something new.”
She blushes slightly, a gleam in her eye.
“Do you want me to stop?”
“No, why? If it’s important to you …”
“No … I shall stop now.”
“No, there’s no need. If you’re not tired.”
I stretch out on the bed, put a cushion under my head, feeling heavy and drowsy. I didn’t say that I don’t love her, I haven’t said that yet, only I’m sure this can’t go on much longer. To the sound of the scratching of her pen and the rustling of her papers I begin to doze, until I hear her whispering, “Adam, Adam.” The room is in darkness and she’s standing over me trying to wake me. I don’t move, I want to see if she’ll touch me, but she doesn’t touch me, she hesitates for a moment and leaves the room.