Ben’s slept naked, His Klansmensch uniform’s been washed, bleached of vomit, dreck accumulated, has been dried, pressed, is hung in one of Israel’s garmentbags, draped over the hutch of the desk too crowded with clutter to work: birthcertificate, photos for a miscarried passport — this uniform the only estranging item, the only touch not to be found in the original remade.
All of a sudden, hazily, halfway between eyes shut and up, there’s a hold of alarmclocks, thirteen of them ringing halls at once — and so, finally, to rise Himself to silence. His sisters’ schoolday warning, to begin their waiting for the coldest shower. Ben’s shvitzy, feels like oy. He rolls around, grinds the sheet of a foreskin into the bedsheet, fumbles for the glasses He’d been born with. He finds them, stumbles out the door toward the sirens, hanging a right and into the bathroom first, His and His alone intended, even if His sisters would still be alive and requiring an emergency toilet, in which He proceeds to wipe eighteen minutes from the earth — life’s ritual already, routine. He pisses salutiferously, to greet the day with health, this steaming stream, to foam wild drops on seat and floor the purest white. To shower in an excess of scald, hot water over then lukewarm, to towel Himself; hot water the one true luxury in the Israelien house: how they’d bought a dysfunctional heater from a relation, Hanna’s, an uncle; with fourteen then fifteen before one in the house, pleasurable showers had been miracles, like sunrises — you had to get up early, or else outgrow them. To the mirror, now, to shave the face of its growth. He slices Himself, wads, washes. Adolescence is to remain with Him, a shadow’s shade. Pimples congregate, constellate as acne. He airs His pores to puss then sucks His fingers. No shame in that, no loss — all will have stubbled back by nighttime. He doesn’t yet scrub His teeth, abstains from flossing — that’s left for after brunch. What’s cooking, what’s not: there’s another noise from downstairs, between the smashing rings, the ding ding bells, an oven’s timer’s rattle…
And that burning smelly taste, a crash of tongue in mouth.
In only a robe, His mother’s and her voice, then that ringing still. Ben heads downstairs, stopping on the way in the rooms of His sisters, vacant, and then that of His parents, too, to silence their alarms — rooms all empty now of nothing save them, that that gave these possessions their utility, their use and so, their meaning: personal effects already unpacked, replaced, dusted more inclusively than Wanda ever was able, was ever bothered: their teddybears, who remembered their plush petnames; pillows hugged into the shape of hearts, desktops of plastic dinosaurs, above a shelved abundance of junior encyclopedias, dictionaries; on the walls, their school certificates and diplomas with the signatures of adults responsible, principal, superintendent; posters and playbills from the shows up on Broadway, they loved them; like that spectacle with the cats, and that sad extravaganza, Phantom Fiddler on the Roof of the Opera. A silence totaled with His parent’s and their unit, Hanna’s — Israel never used an alarm, could never sleep; he used a clock to tire not to rouse. Ben makes His way down the hall to the stairs, which darken, why so closed, so much space and claustrophobic — with its windows draped in tarpaulins, no views afforded of outside, He’s kept slept from any vista.
And so with a trepidant hand, Ben lifts a shroud and through its pane below beholds…no, let’s not think about that just yet — hymn, let’s eat first, get a little food in us and, nu, then we might be in a position to think things through, a city…clearly. All the photographs along the stairwell have been draped as well, along with the mirrors, as if in mourning — then that other sound again, which rang itself between the shrilly weltering calls, still rings: on the way down the stairs, that din, the hum, of noises, alarms lesser in volume if more immediate in threat: the sounds of drilling, of hammering, sawsawing…at the foot of the stairs, this team of workers redrilling, rehammering, reawing, some; others resanding, restaining, repainting; in the kitchen as Ben greets them without word, only the mute of a nod unre-turned, them in their overalls, with their muscles and dim, seriously straining faces — rerepainting, as Hanna’d just done it, had had it done what, six months ago, maybe seven; some of them working as high as prosecutable up on the forbidden rungs of stepladders, others taking their breaks with schnapps, cigarettes, and foreign food. That’s that smell, the smoke. He walks along the kitchen edge, past the furthest island counter, the bathroom and its soft cry, a ply of whimper…there’s a rap, stifled — He tries the door, it’s locked.
Who’s there?
It’s a ringing to drown a moan, then at that other door, but which, too many — there’s a knock, knocked sharp and mean. And not at the side or porch, but at the front, which is never and peculiar, and so leaving the handle and the end of that hall, its door down toward the garage, Ben makes to answer through the kitchen, around its unperturbed workers, the long way, the touristic, scenic route…He can’t bear this gettingbearings, but its freedoms are intriguing. Nothing much has changed, though: His house had always been a switchboard, the nexus of all calling. Always strangers getting in touch, checking up and catching. I’m here to install, I’m here to fix, I’m here. Though Ben had only known it for a week, it’s His, this kitchen He’s wandering through, His mother’s Hanna’s open to disarray, the innards of each drawer spilled, exposed if meticulously — scandalous, that there’s nothing much to hide…a quick ragging, a rash of appropriate towel. It feels almost too — what, an excess perfected, of what even the most attentive maternal might accomplish, almost an onscreen test kitchen, like up on the television, now again set high above the livingroom, the den, without signal. I’m here to hook up, I’m here to put you online, I’m not sure why I’m here. Dingdong cable babble. A store display of home appliances, it retails as, and so to make it home again He passes His hands over it, the formica just wet from sponging — sponged by the same brand used exclusively in the Israelien household, endorsed posthumously by Hanna, only ten shekels, and only at Wiltinghills. Then the cabinets, opposite the counters milk, opposite the counters meat, with the middle mediating digestion of the pareve prep marble, once again stocked with sticky wicks with candles at their melt, the spices to the right and left, the Kiddush of the cups — the fourteen of them then the fifteenth, His, to’ve been gifted to Ben though only after that pleonast procedure, graillike lost the bris. As if to say, thanks for letting us cut you kid, here’s a cup for your troubles, as silver as money…a yarmulke, don’t wear it all out in one place — you’re good people, you’re golden, let’s do this again. Arranged as if never moved upon their wedding present tray: the large cup hath His father, His mother’s lesser cup, which’d both come with the set, initialed, dated, then the twelve ones in declining size of His older sisters; guests had drunk their Kiddush from ordinary glasses, impressively fluted within the cabinet next. Israel, he’d make the prayer — would bless the bushels crushed, drink then pour out the wine to His mother, and only then to the cups of His sisters, who’d argue about who’d get poured first, would ambush their father with viney whines, but first was always Hanna; they all wanted the wine that’d touched his lips, needed the exact liquid that’d tasted mouth and then receded, Aba, kvetching with such determination it’d been difficult to second guess, or twelfth.