Amos Oz
Fima
1. PROMISE AND GRACE
FIVE NIGHTS BEFORE THE SAD EVENT, FIMA HAD A DREAM WHICH he recorded at half past five in the morning in his dream book, a brown notebook that always lay beneath an untidy heap of old newspapers and magazines on the floor at the foot of his bed. In this book Fima had made it his habit to write down, in bed, as the first pale lines of dawn began to appear between the slats of his blinds, whatever he had seen in the night. Even if he had seen nothing, or if he had forgotten what he had seen, he still switched on the light, squinted, sat up in bed, and, propping a thick magazine on his knees to serve as a writing desk, wrote something like this:
"Twentieth of December — blank night."
Or:
"Fourth of January — something about a fox and a ladder, but the details have gone."
He always wrote the date out in words. Then he would get up to relieve himself and lie down in bed again until the cooing of the doves came into the room, with a dog barking and a bird nearby that sounded surprised, as though it could not believe its eyes. Fima promised himself he would get up at once, in a few minutes, a quarter of an hour at most, but sometimes he dropped off again and did not wake till eight or nine. His shift at the clinic started only at one o'clock. He found less falsehood in sleeping than in waking. Even though he had long ago come to understand that truth was beyond his reach, he wanted to distance himself as much as possible from the petty lies that filled his everyday life like a fine dust that penetrated even to the most intimate crannies.
On Monday morning early, as a murky orange glimmer began to filter through the blind, he sat up in bed and entered the following notes in his book:
"A woman, attractive rather than beautiful, came up to me; she didn't approach the reception desk but appeared from behind me, despite the notice saying STAFF ONLY. I said, 'Sorry, all inquiries must be made from the front of the desk.' She laughed and said, 'All right, Efraim, we heard you the first time.' I said, 'If you don't get out of here, ma'am, I'll have to ring my bell' (although I haven't got a bell). At these words the woman laughed again, a pleasant, graceful laugh, like a burbling brook. She was slim-shouldered and had a slightly wrinkled neck, but her breast and stomach were well rounded and her calves covered by silk stockings with curving seams. The combination of curvaceousness and vulnerability was both sexy and touching. Or maybe it was the contrast between the shapely body and the face of an overworked teacher that was touching. I had a little girl by you, she said, and now it's time for our daughter to meet her father. Although I knew I wasn't supposed to leave the clinic, that it would be dangerous to follow her, especially barefoot, which I suddenly was, a sort of inner signal formed itself: If she draws her hair over her left shoulder with her left hand, then I'll have to go. She knew; with a light movement she brought her hair forward until it spread over her dress and covered her left breast, and she said: Come. I followed her through several streets and alleys, several flights of steps and gates, and more stone-paved courtyards in Valladolid in Spain, though it was really more or less the Bukharian Quarter here in Jerusalem. Even though this woman in the girlish cotton dress and sexy stockings was a stranger and I had never set eyes on her before, I still wanted to see the little girl. So we walked through entrances to buildings that led to back yards full of loaded clotheslines, which led us to new alleyways and an ancient square lit by a street lamp in the rain. Because it had started to rain, not hard, not pouring, very few drops in fact, just a thick dampness in the darkening air. We didn't meet a living soul on the way. Not even a cat. Suddenly the woman stopped in a passageway that had vestiges of decaying grandeur, as if it were an entrance to an Oriental palace, but probably it was just a tunnel joining two sodden courtyards, with battered mailboxes and flaking ceramic tiles. Removing my wristwatch, she pointed to a tattered army blanket in an alcove under the steps, as though removing my watch was the prelude to some kind of nakedness, and now I had to give her a baby daughter. I asked where we were and where the children were, because somehow along the way the daughter had turned into children. The woman said, Chili. I couldn't tell whether this was the little girl's name or the name of the woman herself, who was clasping my hand to her breast. Perhaps she was cold because of the nakedness of the skinny daughters, or else it was an invitation to hug her and warm her up. When I hugged her, her whole body shook, not with desire but with despair, and she whispered, Don't be afraid, Efraim, I know a way and I'll get you safely across to the Aryan side. In the dream this whispered phrase was full of promise and grace, and I continued to trust her and follow her ecstatically, and was not at all surprised when in the dream she turned into my mother, nor did I ask where the Aryan side was. Until we reached the water. At the water's edge stood a man in a dark uniform, with a blond military mustache and legs spread wide, and he said: Have to separate.
"So it became clear that it was the water that made her shiver, and that I would not see her again. I woke with sadness, and even now, as I conclude these notes, the sadness has not left me."
2. FIMA GETS UP FOR WORK
FIMA GOT OUT OF BED IN HIS SWEATY UNDERWEAR, OPENED HIS shutters a crack, and looked out at the beginning of a winter day in Jerusalem. The nearby buildings did not look near: they seemed far from him and from each other, with wisps of low cloud drifting among them. There was no sign of life outside. As though the dream were continuing. Except that there was no stone-paved alley now, but a shabby road at the southwest edge of Kiryat Yovel, a row of squat blocks of flats jerry-built in the late 'fifties. The balconies had been mostly closed in with breezeblock, plasterboard, aluminum, or glass. Here and there an empty window box or a neglected flowerpot stood on a rusting balustrade. Away to the south the Bethlehem hills merged with the gray clouds, looking unattractive and grubby this morning, more like slag heaps than hills. A neighbor was having difficulty starting his car because of the cold and the damp. The starter wheezed repeatedly, like a terminally ill lung case who still insisted on chain-smoking. Again Fima was overcome by the feeling that he was here by mistake, that he ought to be somewhere completely different.
But what the mistake was, or where he ought to be, he did not know this morning. In fact he never did.
The car's wheezing brought on his own morning cough, and he moved away from the window. He did not want to start his day in such a pointless and pathetic way. He said to himself, Lazybones! and began to do some simple exercises, bends and stretches, in front of the mirror that was dappled with dark islands and continents. The mirror was fixed to the front of the old brown wardrobe his father had bought for him thirty years ago. He should have asked the woman what it was he was supposed to separate. But he had missed his chance.
As a general rule Fima loathed people standing at windows. He especially loathed the sight of a woman looking out of a window with her back to the room. Before his divorce he had often irritated Yael by asking her not to stand like that, looking out at the street or the hills.
"What's wrong? Am I breaking the rules again?"
"You know it annoys me."
"That's your problem, Effy."
This morning, even his exercises in front of the mirror annoyed and tired him. After a minute or two he stopped. Calling himself lazybones again. He panted and added mockingly:
"That's your problem, pal."
He was fifty-four, and during his years of living alone he had fallen into the habit of talking to himself. He reckoned this among his old bachelor's foibles, along with losing the lid of the jam, trimming the hair in one of his nostrils and forgetting to do the other, unzipping his fly on the way to the bathroom to save time but missing the bowl when he started to piss, or flushing in the middle in the hope that the sound of rushing water would help him overcome his stuttering bladder. He would try to finish while the water was still running; so there was always a race between his own water and that from the tank. It was a race he always lost, and he would be faced with the infuriating alternative of standing there, tool in hand, until the tank refilled and he could have another go, or admitting defeat and leaving his urine in the bowl till next time. He did not like to admit defeat or to waste his time waiting, so impatiently he would pull the handle before the tank was full again. This would provoke a premature eruption which was insufficient to flush, and again he had the abhorrent choice between waiting longer or giving up and going away.