ON ROSH CHODESH, ON THE NEW MOON, THE FIRST OF TAMMUZ, when Joshua caused the moon and the sun to stand still until Israel was avenged, the month of calamities, Yussel called Shoshanna because he knew she’d be upset another month was beginning and still they weren’t together. A man wants his wife to be predictable so he feels safe and then he’s mad at her for being predictable. For being boring.
Shoshanna finally answered. “What’s wrong?”
“I wouldn’t tell you if something’s wrong?”
“You’re eating?”
“Of course I’m eating.”
“You’re fasting?”
“On fast days I fast,” he lied and didn’t lie.
“You sound … your voice is thin, Yussel.”
“I’m fine. Why are you crying?”
“I’m not crying.”
“Were you crying?”
“Yussel, you’re making me crazy.”
“I’m sorry. I won’t call you anymore.” He could see her little hand on her throat. What was he doing?
“Are the kids okay?”
“Yussel, you’re frightening me. Is something going to happen?”
“That’s how the world works. Something’s always going to happen.”
“To us?”
“Of course not.”
“I thought you’d say that.” There was a long pause. “I had a letter from Ruchel. She’s coming out soon. She hopes and prays every night that all of us will always be friends no matter what.”
No matter what what? Chaim was up to something. “Is that why you’re crying? Over Chaim?”
“No.” She didn’t elaborate. She didn’t have to. She wanted to come down.
“If it makes you happy, you should know I go to Chaim to daven because I haven’t got a minyan here. I see him twice a day and all Shabbas.”
“I heard. But still you don’t talk to him. I also heard Natalie ran away.”
“I didn’t know that.”
Shoshanna sighed. “You’re supposed to know. She needs guidance.”
“Who told you?”
“The same person who told me you do nothing but fast and take naps.”
“It’s a trick I learned from my father,” Yussel lied. “The weirder you act, the more prestige you get.”
“Yussel, when are you coming to get us? It isn’t right we should be apart so long.”
“Maybe you should take the kids home to your mother until I’m ready for you.”
There was another long pause. Yussel was familiar with those long pauses. Sometimes they were followed by days of exaggerated silent servitude, as if she were mimicking someone she really wasn’t. He didn’t like long pauses.
“Don’t start trouble, Shoshanna. Don’t play smart with me.” He meant dumb. He didn’t know what he meant. When his mother challenged his father, that’s when their troubles began. He’d always had a sneaking suspicion that when women wanted to get along with their husbands, they played dumb.
“I’m not playing smart, Yussel. I am smart. You don’t want to know I’m smart. You don’t want to know from my being smart. You think I’m only smart about coupons for diapers and instant coffee? You look at Babe, you say, sure, she’s smart, but she can’t make a man happy. You look at Natalie, you say she’s nuts. You always have an excuse not to look at us. We’re nuts, we’re bitter. We’re too fat, too little, too big, too weak, too strong. Any excuse not to look at us as humans, not to listen to us. You always have an excuse not to look at me, not to hear me. I’m little, I’m sweet, I’m innocent, I’m dumb. Hey, Yussel, dinner’s ready and I’m pregnant again. Then you look. Then you hear.”
“God protect me from your mouth. I don’t want such trouble from my own wife.” He knew she was trembling all over like a butterfly flying against the wind.
“I have the right to ask why your family is not yet with you. I have that right.”
“Okay, soon.”
“Yussel! It’s been since Shavuos. In seventeen days it’s the fast of Tammuz. I won’t be able to travel from then until after Tishabav. That’s almost the whole summer without you. What are you doing to me?” Shoshanna dropped her voice melodramatically and quoted, “‘Her enemies have her between the fences.’”
“Don’t quote at me, Shoshanna. I’m not your enemy and it’s me who’s trapped. Not you. Look, this is my problem, Shoshanna. Leave me alone. Let me resolve it.”
In the sand he’d built her too small and too zaftig. In the grocery store, he found out he’d made her legs too short. In the bank, he found out he’d made the breasts too big. In Woodpecker’s Hardware, he found out her waist was longer, narrower. In the Rexall he realized she was bigger, leaner, taller all over. When Adam fashioned Eve, who was his second wife, he fashioned her the way he wanted her to be and then, for the rest of time, yearned for something else. Yussel, in the sand, had made the same mistake as Adam: creating a woman he could handle, making her soft, round, small. The real Lillywhite was something else. He wondered for a moment how much he’d fashioned poor Shoshanna to suit himself or how much she’d fashioned herself to suit him. Maybe he was the monster. Maybe that was why he was yearning for Lillywhite, because he’d forced Shoshanna to remake herself to please him. Yussel dismissed the idea because it was too awful.
Each time Lillywhite was placed in front of him, he didn’t look on her face. Even if his father of blessed memory, even if HaShem had put her in front of him, although the Angel of Destruction was more likely to have arranged such meetings, he didn’t look on her face. Also he didn’t breathe. He kept his eyes fixed on the floor, on the sidewalk, raced back to Bingo’s cab, roared off, forgot everything he’d come to town for, had to go back, would see her again. He had the feeling she was waiting for him, strutting around in crotch-tight pants and high-heeled boots. Once he saw her in the Rexall sitting in a booth with Indian Joe. That day, the sidewalks empty, her Porsche parked behind Bingo’s cab, Yussel picked up a garbage can filled with chicken wings, dumped it onto the front seat of the Porsche. A Publisher’s Clearinghouse Sweepstakes mailer stuck to the bottom of the can. You may have just won ten million dollars. Yussel replaced the garbage can precisely on the sidewalk.
One morning his father was outside by the lake, feeding a half-dozen deer little square leaves from his pocket. The deer were crowding him. He waved them off, turned to Yussel, leaned on his lead door. The wooden door now had thick iron grates. “You ask me why grates? Things are getting worse. You aren’t paying attention. You must pay attention, Yussele.” Under the grates, he wore a white satin bathrobe with gold embroidery, as rich as the Torah covers, with Lions of Judah the size of housecats embroidered, thick and crusty, on the back, on each front panel. His father, this poor soul locked into Hell, trying to get into Heaven, as if he were walking down Oleg Cassini’s runway, put a hand on his hip, turned from the hip like a model, chin high, eyes half-closed, turned, swiveled his doors ever so slightly and approached Yussel. “How about these?”
The pajamas were white damask with borders of small gold lions on the cuffs, the lapels, the collar, and the pocket fold. He loved his father. He really loved him, and when he was human, like now, showing off his pajamas, coy, vamping, a little embarrassed, wanting Yussel’s approval, Yussel adored him.
“They’re you, Totte.”
“I had a message you needed to ask me a question. I came right away.”
“Totte, you talk to Him, to his angels, to someone. You’re standing in line. You said you stand in line, right?”
“Well, not exactly. I stand in line but talking … don’t forget I’m not exactly up there with the rest of my Yeshiva class. The closest I can tell you, it’s like a big room full of spaghetti, or spiderwebs. Something living, maybe protein. You tell someone your problem or your complaint. They discuss back and forth, back and forth, and if they grant you the decree, they point out you should pull on one of the lines. Then the whole place starts to quiver because the line you touch is connected to every other line. Of course I’m talking in metaphor.”
“I don’t want to know. I want you to ask a question for me.”
“Sure.”
“Find out what HaShem wants me to do. Why He keeps putting this redhead in front of me.”
“Yussele, for shame. That’s looking at answers in the back of the book. That’s cheating. You have to do the problem by yourself. Otherwise, what’s the point? Vey iz mir. I can’t believe I was ever so dumb.” His father was out the door, stuck his head back in. “Am I to understand you are giving some consideration to the possibility that the redhead is intended?”
“I’m examining possibilities.”
“There is only one possibility: everything is intended.” Then went off singing his yom diddle yom diddle ai diddle dai dai.
Yussel tried to keep busy, tried not to get involved with anyone. He found projects. He put in a toilet. He put in a sink. He dug holes where he didn’t need holes. He stretched Plexiglas across wooden frames and made storm windows. He tarred a path from the highway to the front door of the Arizona. Babe, all the time, would remind him. “Yussy, you didn’t call her yet? She could ruin us all, Yussy. She owns everything around here. You owe her an apology. Maybe if you said you were sorry, she’d turn off the music. It’s getting louder and louder, her music. Maybe she’s just waiting for you to call. It wouldn’t hurt to call, would it, Yussy? Listen, all you have to do is say hello. Watch my lips. Hel-lo. You say, I’m sorry. You invite her for Shabbas, tell her it would be interesting. Try to be nice, Yussy. It wouldn’t hurt to be nice, would it? How could it hurt, one phone call to a neighbor?” He didn’t bother telling her what one phone call to Chaim had precipitated.
Another day his father sat alone in the kitchen, drinking a cup of coffee, sorting through a pile of requests to HaShem on little cards, from his grave. Some kvitls he put in his left pocket, some in his right. He wore a Milk of Magnesia bottle-blue dressing gown with Chinese gold medallions and a mandarin collar. The belt had long black silk fringes. His black felt slippers had a gold Chinese medallion on each toe. “A little over a month, you’re still here, and you’ve accomplished all this. This is terrific.” He gave Yussel a long hot look. “And maybe that’s why HaShem sent the redhead to you … to make certain you stayed. Intended. Intended. Intended.” He offered Yussel a square leaf from the pocket of his robe. “On Shabbas they let us pick fruit. But this …”—his father reached deep into his robe and withdrew a large and perfect pineapple with bright green leaves—“this we grow locally. We have a guy who hates to grow pineapples.” Yussel tasted a square leaf. Juice sprung from it—it was like chewing Chiclets. He spit it out.
His father took the remainder of the pulpy leaf from Yussel’s hand, put it back in his pocket, put the pineapple on the kitchen table. “A fruit from Heaven, he spits it out. Boy, when you’re ready, you’re ready. When you’re not, you’re not. Thank God for the redhead.”
All the men, except Slotnik, who was studying, formed a Building Committee. Feldman had a fight with him, said he had to contribute. Slotnik offered to pray for the success of the Building Committee. Feldman gave up. The Building Committee made plans. By fall, before the holidays, the dormitory on the north end would have a dozen beds for women, a separate place for families, another section for men. Every day trucks dropped off bags of mortar, loads of siding, kegs of nails, Sheetrock. Babe thought they were from the people who were putting kvitls on the grave, which meant their prayers were being answered. yussel kept saying, “there’s no free lunch.” grisha kept saying, “sure there is. if you’re eating at HaShem’s table.” On the south end of the Arizona, next to Grisha’s room, they added another room big enough for a single bed. Yussel told everyone the new room with the single bed could be for his mother-in-law or maybe his stepmother, someone. He moved into it before it was finished because that room was for him and Lillywhite. If she’s intended, Yussel decided, my imagination may as well be comfortable, have some privacy.
“Yeah, well,” his father said from noplace. “I don’t think it’s intended you’re comfortable, Yussele. You better watch out. There’s a paradox here. Don’t forget, He gives you free choice but He’s the only one Who knows the consequences of your choices.”
They wouldn’t leave him alone in his room. “In case you forgot, Yussy, I’m Babe. Today’s Wednesday. How many times a day do you have to take a nap? Over a month you’ve done nothing about the water rights. You don’t have the deed; you haven’t apologized to Lillywhite. What’s the matter with you? What are you doing in there anyway? You should call her. She saved my life, Yussy.”
“We all make mistakes.”
“Very funny.” Babe waited for Yussel to answer. He didn’t. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you about the water rights, Yussel. Your father also did this with the bed when he wanted something. You want something, Yussy?”
“I’m not my father.”
“Look, if there’s something we haven’t done, something someone’s said to you. You want us to call you Rabbi, we’ll call you Rabbi. You want Nova and bagels, I’ll fly them in from L.A. Just tell us what you want.”
Natalie came. “There are people here to see the lake. They want you to pray for them. I don’t want to interrupt your meditation, but they want to give you money, building supplies, join. They say you’re bringing good luck and prosperity to their town. They thank you. Also would you like to join the Rotary Club? And there’s a man here who wants a blessing for his tennis elbow.”
“Tell him to ask God. I’m busy.”
Yussel heard trucks arrive, unload, leave. Heard building sounds, a cement mixer, Lillywhite’s music sneaking in under Ernie’s tapes. He dreamed of her dancing in the dark, taking a slow boat to China, singing in the rain. She played. She sang. He ached.
Ernie banged on the door to the little room. “They brought a truckload of two-by-fours. You mind if we start some sub-flooring for the dormitory? Also someone sent over cement. Do you mind if we start pouring for the mikveh?”
Yussel didn’t answer.
“He doesn’t mind,” Ernie shouted to somebody, “so let’s go!” Yussel had never heard Ernie excited in his life. Hammering started that afternoon, went on forever.
Natalie slipped a handful of kvitls under the door. Yussel read the little notes. “Dear Rabbi, pray for my mother who is crippled. Gloria Figuero.” “Dear Rabbi, pray for good luck on my new Martinizing business. Claire Alvarez.” “Dear Rabbi, pray for Chaim that he should love his wife. Mendl.”
“How did you get these, Natalie?”
“From your father’s grave. Now everyone knows who you really are.”
“Excuse me?”
“The lake. You can’t deny what you did.”
“Natalie, if anyone’s responsible for the lake, it’s the shmuck Indian, Rosebud. Not me. Let them take their requests to him.”
Outside, the cement truck rolled around. It was bright red and had ROSEBUD painted on its door panels. Babe ran from crew to crew giving orders. Her name-in-diamonds bracelet and her name-in-diamonds necklace flashed in the sun like artillery. The mikveh walls already had tiny high windows for light. The first floor of the men’s dormitory was complete. Bingo and Slotnik’s son danced over the trusses. The Blondische had become a concrete mavin. Ernie knew all there ever was to know about cutting glass. Indian Joe, wrapped in a faded blanket, sat on the Rabbi’s grave, laying out his bundle of sticks. Natalie was shouting mantras to increase productivity, menus to improve everyone’s sex life. Rosebud, with a shirt on, was taking orders from Babe. Two dozen seagulls Yussel knew had flown in from Far Rockaway were roosting on the Shanda, cleaning their feathers, carrying on. Sometimes Yussel found himself stroking his cheek the way she’d stroked his cheek, and he shuddered under his own touch. He began to imagine things he had never dared imagine. And up on the mountain, she played her music with a vengeance. She played “All of Me” until Yussel felt he had to climb out from his skin. Yussel immersed himself in the mountain pool every day for the dreams he had every night. Also he hoped to see her there, on the horse, hoped this time she’d kill him and he’d be done with her. Yussel wondered if anyone he knew had ever been in love, decided maybe his father, no one else. He thought maybe he should talk to someone, read a book, but what could he read? Who could he talk to? Grisha? Chaim? Oh, Chaim would tell him all right. And then tell everyone else. Also Chaim would go after her himself. He thought seriously about calling his uncles, decided it would be a terrible mistake.
Yussel called Chaim. “Chaim, meet me at the drugstore.”
“Why the drugstore?”
“What I want to discuss doesn’t belong in the sanctity of our homes.”
“I’m pretty busy.”
“Chaim, I’m asking.”
The drugstore was next to Woodpecker’s, which was having a summer sale on blade sharpeners. The drugstore had pink-and-brown marble tables, mahogany walls, lots of sexy magazines in plastic wrappers, postcards, video tapes. Kids who needed haircuts fondled toys. Square-jawed mamas painted rough hands with lipstick samples, thumbed through movie magazines, told their kids not to touch anything. Chaim wore his cowboy hat, smelled of Brut. His shoulders were hunched over the table. He still looked like a victim. Yussel felt a surge of warmth in his chest. Chaim might help him.
“Your car needs new struts, Yussel.”
“You drove it across the country. That’s a rough trip.”
“You sell me something in good shape and suddenly it needs major work?”
“I didn’t sell it to you. You bought it from Bernie.”
“You got money for it, didn’t you? Any court would say you sold it to me.”
“Now you’re taking me to court, Chaim?”
“When I get the bill, I’ll send it to you. Then we’ll see.”
The waitress brought two coffees in Styrofoam cups. Yussel and Chaim wrapped their handkerchiefs around them to hold them. A family of blond kids came over from the toys to watch them. One carried a kitten in a basket. The little sister stroked Yussel’s fur hat.
“Listen, Chaim. I have to talk to you. I have to talk about …” Yussel gulped. “… love.”
“What about love?” Chaim shot back.
“Have you ever been in love?”
Chaim glared at him. “You accusing me of something?”
“No, no. Believe me, Chaim, I’m asking you.”
“You’re accusing me.”
Yussel let the kid try on his hat. “I’m not accusing you of anything. What are you so defensive about?”
“I don’t like you accusing me.”
“I told you …” The little girl put the kitten in Yussel’s hat. Yussel took his hat back, handed the kitten to the girl.
Chaim’s voice rose. The kids backed away. Their mother swooped over, hustled them to the sidewalk.
“Chaim, listen, you’re accusing me of accusing you,” Yussel tried to explain. He didn’t want Chaim to leave him.
“Just stay away from me. Just keep off my property.”
Yussel was bewildered. He put his hat on, patted the kitten in its basket, paid for both coffees, followed Chaim out the door. “How can I keep off your property if we have to go to you twice a day to daven?”
“Then to daven only. Otherwise, I don’t want to see you. Understand? I don’t want to see you.”
He called his uncles. Moses from Abnormal Psychology said, “It’s perfectly natural. You had erections in your mother’s womb, so what are you worried about? Just don’t do anything about it and it should go away.” Gimbel from Humanities said, “Come home. The desert’s no place for a Jew.” Nachman from Law asked Gimbel, “What are you telling the kid, Gimbel? Moses shouldn’t have been in the desert?” Then he told Yussel to make sure his leases were in order. Moses said, “You should defuse her. Invite her over to meet everyone. Your wife, your kids. Let her know who you really are.” Gimbel added, “And take sleeping pills so you don’t lie in bed too much at night. We’ve all been through it.” Yussel and his uncles were not/could not possibly be talking about the same thing.
One terrible night, near midnight, Yussel, light-headed from hunger, dry-mouthed from the thirst of yet another fast, was trying to run a wire to attach an outlet for the Eternal Light above the altar on the dance stage. Nobody was around. Grisha was snoring his great moist snores in his little room off the bar. Yussel stapled the wire along the woodwork, once into his own thumb. It came to him, what if he called her? Yussel paused with the staple gun in the air. What if he called her? What if you called her? Are you crazy? What if he just picked up the phone and called her? What would happen?
Yussel put the staple gun down, removed the staple from his thumb, went outside, was surprised it was raining. It was raining so hard he couldn’t hear any music. The rain beat on his shoulders, ran down his face, splashed above him in the water tower, fringed the mountains. Yussel sucked his thumb where the staple holes were. And asked himself, Are you crazy? And answered himself, Yes. Then he went back in, listened at Grisha’s door, heard the steady snores, tiptoed to the phone, stood over it. It was so small. It’s two A.M., Yussy. You’re a married man, a pious man, a Jew. You’re crazy to call her.
So he picked up the receiver, dialed information, told the operator he wanted to talk to Lillywhite Stevie. He whispered into the mouthpiece, had to repeat himself twice, louder each time. Sweat dripped from his collar down inside his shirt. “Lillywhite.” A Mountain Bell computer voice gave him a number. He punched the number.
She answered. Her voice was clear, polite. “Lillywhite.”
“Listen, what do you want from me?”
“Aah.”
“You make me deaf with your music. You beat me up. What do you want?”
“Who is this?”
“Very funny. I asked you what do you want.”
“I want you to know I exist.”
“Okay, you exist. Leave me alone.”
“You called me. You see me and you don’t even look at me. I exist as filth and evil to you. I know you guys.”
“I’m a married man.”
“I’m not talking about marriage. I’m talking about existence.”
“Philosophy isn’t my field.”
“If you called me up at two in the morning, you have something to talk about with me, don’t you?”
“I asked you, what do you want? Why are you making me crazy?”
She sighed. “You look like someone I once knew.”
“Redford it’s not.” Yussel sat down. “All right, I’m listening.” He sounded exactly like his father. “I’m listening.”
“You rented a room in Cambridge. We had to share a bathroom. You were Orthodox, forty. You weren’t a Hasid, but you wore a yarmulke. You were studying something at Harvard with permission from your Rabbi. That’s what the landlady told me. My father had just died. We weren’t speaking. I’d walked out on him and everything Jewish. You probably didn’t even think I was Jewish. You were right. I’m not. I wanted to tell you about my father, how he was a religious man, how he brought me up to be religious, how he sold pesticides that caused abortions in Third World countries, how I called him a murderer, how he had a stroke, how he died. I wanted to talk to you. I wanted to tell you that I never said good-bye to him, or I love you, or I’m sorry. Or anything. I just pulled the plug. And there you were, a religious man, with answers, in the room next to mine. You never came out of your room except to go someplace to pray, use the bathroom, get the mail. I wanted to ask you about pulling the plug. I wanted to ask you if I killed him. Once you came into the kitchen and saw me cooking sausage. “What’s that?” you asked. You looked at me as if I’d shit on the floor and was frying my stool. “Sausage,” I said. “Pig.” From then on you ate cornflakes with grape juice in your room three times a day and raw vegetables and never came near the kitchen. I heard you in your room next to mine, singing, praying. You washed your clothes out every night and hung them in our bathroom. I wanted to talk to you. I needed to talk to you. I wanted to go with you to synagogue, to ask you if I should have pulled the plug, to ask you where souls go, to ask you why things happen. You looked like you knew. Once when you went for the mail, I looked in your room. It was filthy. It smelled of old socks. I saw the broccoli and the paper bowls of soggy cornflakes purpled in grape juice. One morning I followed you to a synagogue to pray for my father. It was a big mistake. I was climbing the steps to the women’s section. They were concrete steps. I had to pass a dozen dry old men in the men’s section. One pulled up his pants leg and showed me that his flesh was still firm on his ankle. You know how old men smell in the morning? I fell on the concrete steps, on my face, right next to the old men. Not one saw me. Not one helped me up. I had blood all over my face. Not one stopped to help me. I didn’t exist. One day you knocked on my door. I thought the moment had come, you’d heard me, you knew. ‘At night,’ you said, ‘when you use the toilet,’ you said, eyes on the radiator behind me, ‘could you please put the seat up so when I go to use it in the morning, I don’t have to touch it before I pray?’ I took your boots and burned them in the incinerator. Remember your boots were missing and no one knew where they were and you kept accusing everybody? You were right. You refused to pay your rent until you got your boots back. Finally the landlady kicked you out.”
Her pain clung to him like a garment of fire. Yussel wanted to hang up right then and there. He didn’t want to hear pain. He heard pain. He remembered his great-great-grandfather in Kiev who had the hiccups, who didn’t feel the white-hot iron on his back. He thought about the Cossack who felt it and jumped out the window. He wanted to jump out the window, roll in the snow, run home. The only trouble was, he was the Jew. The Jews stay. They can’t help it. “I want you to leave me alone. I’m a married man.”
Her voice dropped. “Then let’s not talk about marriage.”
“Who’s talking about marriage?” Yussel snapped. “I’m talking about sex.” Yussel hung up.
Nothing happened. Grisha was still snoring. The world was still turning on its axis. The rain was still splashing in the water tower, filling the mikveh pool. She’d turned on Ella Fitzgerald so loud Yussel could hear them both singing over the beat of the rain. In the morning, Grisha knocked on his door to wake him up. There were no reports of his kids terminally ill, no car accidents, no wife leaving him. Nothing happened except in the morning, two things. His Uncle Nachman called, said “Yussel, it’s almost the fast of Tammuz. For the next three weeks, from now to Tishabav, you know to avoid situations of danger.” And the other thing, mid-morning, when he looked out the kitchen window, he saw Chaim standing in front of the mikveh, towel slung over his shoulder, whistling.
Yussel blocked his way to the door of the mikveh. Chaim stopped whistling, smiled his visit-to-the-dying smile. “Ask Babe.” Whistled.
Ernie was tying string around a square of stakes. Natalie pounded the stakes into the ground with a soup ladle. Some local men who might have been Figueras and Alvarezes were delivering large wood joists. Grisha sat on his stool, singing psalms. Babe and Bingo were smoothing mortar in Ernie’s square with new trowels. “Like sheep you stand there while this wolf pollutes our mikveh?”
Bingo touched Yussel’s arm. “We took a vote.”
“I voted against, Rabbi,” Natalie called to him.
Mendl from Rikers Island walked out of the mikveh. Chaim walked in. Mendl dried his hair with a towel in front of Yussel. “Mendl, tell Chaim only for Shabbas, once a week, Mendl, and you have to call first.”
“A man could have an emergency, Reb Yussel.”
Yussel lifted his hands in front of him, which meant go no further. “In an emergency, of course.” A flush moved up around his neck. Everyone went back to work. Yussel took a walk around the new lake.
The next night, almost midnight, just as Yussel was picking up the phone, Grisha came out of his room to go to the bathroom. His pajama tops were safety-pinned to his pajama bottoms. Grisha asked him who he was calling at such an hour. Yussel told him he was calling his broker but he wasn’t answering.
“He lives in China he’s open for business at such an hour?” Grisha shuffled to the bathroom where he stayed forever.
Yussel finished the wiring for the Eternal Light, dusted the bookshelves, thought he should see if Grisha was okay, sanded the bottom of the front door, which was swollen from the flood, sanded it until it swung closed easily, knocked on the bathroom door, asked Grisha if he was all right. Grisha growled, grunted. Finally Grisha came out scratching his behind. “You reach him yet?”
“Who?”
“Your broker. The one who dances naked in a room full of books.”
Yussel punched a bunch of numbers, hoped it was the right amount. Grisha shuffled past him, slammed his bedroom door. Yussel yelled, “It’s still busy,” at the door. When he could hear Grisha snoring, Yussel dialed the number, said, “Hi,” very softly. “Guess who.”
“I know you,” she said to him as softly. “You were my father’s doctor, when he was dying. You stormed into the room with ten students following you. You filled the room. The nurses retreated. The students had notebooks, took down every word you said. You pulled the sheets from my father’s body and examined my father, put your hands on his body. You wore a ring from Yale. There were tufts of black hair on your knuckles. I could imagine the tufts on your body. Maybe you were fat. I didn’t see that. You were big, oxlike, a peasant-king. Strong, powerful, with that gorgeous Jewish mouth. You were Chief of Internal Medicine at Albert Einstein. You looked like those old sketches of Semites drawn by anti-Semitic anthropologists. The strong sweep of nose, the soft lips, the deep black eyes, the wings of brows, the beard, Oh God, the beard. You put your hands on my father’s body, explored, listened, touched, rolled him over, bent down, listened to his heart. Suddenly I’m in the bed being touched, listened to, explored by those hands, by that knowing arrogance, by that wisdom that knows death. You look up and say, ‘Your father is dead.’ All I wanted was that you would touch me with those hands. I followed you from the room. You turned, looked at me. Tell me things with those hands. Listen to my heart with those hands. ‘Yes?’ I didn’t know what to say. ‘Did I kill him? Did I do it?’ Your lip curled up. Your students surrounded you, held notebooks, pencils in the air. ‘You should talk with his attending physician. We’re paging him. Excuse me.’ And you turned to your students. ‘Now, where was I?’ Where are you? The man who knows why my father died, why we die, whose hands will touch me and know my destiny, where are you? Are you that man? I hope for your sake you aren’t, because I’ve known since I’ve been looking for you, I would rip you apart for ignoring me. And I would love you until I died.”
“This is what you want from me? To tell you why your father died?”
“I want you to show me something moral.” They were both silent. Then she asked, “What do you want from me?”
“My world would be destroyed. I’m a married man, a pious man.”
She shifted suddenly, revengefully. “Is it true you guys use a sheet with a hole in it?”
“No, we use the sheet to cover up your faces.” When he heard himself say this, he understood why he’d punched her the day of the flood.
He spent that night in the narrow bed in the small room off the kitchen with Lillywhite, listening to her heart, pulling off her blankets, rolling her over, listening to her heart, listening to her sing out his name. He lay awake until the sun rose. What she said she wanted and what she sang she wanted were two very different things.
In the morning, Grisha asked, “So how’s your broker?”
“Fine.” Yussel tried not to swallow.
“I thought last night maybe he was sick.”
“Brokers, Grisha. You know how the market is.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know all about the market.”
The women lined up outside the mikveh with towels over their arms. They sat outside in the afternoon sun, made the men leave, lifted their hair off their necks to let it dry. By sundown, thunderheads piled up like freight trains over the mountains, her music came on.
He called her from the Texaco. “Talk to me. I’m listening.”
“I know who you are. You’re the past coming to get me. You’re five thousand years old. You won’t look at me. I see you every place I go and you won’t look at me. I’m the future and you’re the past and the world would split in half if we touched each other here, here in my bed, here in the present.”
“How did this happen?”
She whispered. “You called. You stay up all night. I stay up all night. I sing to you. You sang to me.” Her voice changed, softened. “The first day up in the mountains, at the pool, I saw your eyes when you smiled. Your smile lit up your face. It lit up the woods. And then you sang in the canyon and I heard your heart. I hate you guys. I always have. But you have something I want.”