A few days later, Nava called and told me that it was frowned upon, but OK, if it was so important to me, and I went down the stairs to the shelter with a new rolled-up crossword puzzle under my arm. My heart was pounding and I kept rubbing my cheeks to make sure I’d shaved. For the last few days, I’d envisioned the scene dozens of times, with a new scenario each time. But the only thing that never appeared in any of them was the possibility that no one would pay attention to me when I came in.
The draughts players kept looking at their boards. Mordechai kept showing his football album to some woman I didn’t know. Ronen and Chanit were sitting very close together, as if they were about to kiss. And Shmuel, my Shmuel, was staring at the wall.
I went over to the coffee corner and made myself some tea. It was too hot for tea, but I wanted to look busy. When I finished stirring the sugar, someone tapped me on the back. I turned around. Amatzia the vacillator was standing in front of me. He wanted to say something, but the words didn’t come out. I waited. Tell me, he finally said, scratching his chin, aren’t you the student with the crossword puzzles? Of course not, he answered himself before I could say anything, you can’t be. That one was … But maybe you are. That one looked pretty much like you, but a little taller. No, he was actually the same height. Almost.
That’s enough, Amatzia, don’t make him crazy, Joe said, coming up to us and extending his hand to me. How are you, Amir? You disappeared on us. We were starting to get worried that the Security Services had kidnapped you. No, don’t be silly, I said, shaking hands with him and Malka and Mordechai and Haim and Ronen and Chanit. Suddenly the whole club was gathered around me, as if they’d been waiting for Amatzia to take the first step. Malka asked, where have you been for so long? I was ill, I said, and Joe said, it’s too bad you didn’t consult us. We’re experts when it comes to medicines, and everyone laughed, including Nava, who was standing off to the side observing. Then Amatzia said, so did you bring us a new puzzle? quickly adding, we’re tired of puzzles. Actually, we did miss them a little, but what’s the point, what good does it do us to solve crossword puzzles? Even though it’s fun, it’s really fun, even though it’s a bit stupid. I said, yes, Amatzia, I brought a whole new puzzle and we’ll start working on it together in a few minutes. Everyone’s invited, even the ones who weren’t part of the crossword puzzle group before, I said loudly, looking over at Shmuel in the hope that he’d get the hint. But all he did was take off his glasses and start cleaning them.
After the puzzle was solved and all the members of the group applauded and made me promise not to be ill again, because they’re crazy about crossword puzzles, I took it off the wall, put a rubber band around it and stood it on its side. Then, empty-handed, I went over to Shmuel.
Hello, I said, sitting down next to him.
He didn’t answer.
Shmuel, I said, trying again. It’s me, Amir. Don’t you remember me?
He didn’t answer.
Shmuel, come on, I said, sounding as if I were pleading, don’t you remember that we used to talk? You told me about your theories. About how the world is divided into three colours …
Red, white and transparent, Shmuel continued my sentence and I breathed a sigh of relief without breathing. The red, he said, always wants to go to the extremes, to eat a red apple from the tree of knowledge or a white apple from the tree of life. And God won’t allow that. God is transparent. God is the middle road.
He kept talking, telling me about the three junctions of pain at which God revealed himself to him, and I nodded attentively, even though I’d already heard it all, in exactly the same words. A sweet sense of submission seeped into me with every word he spoke. He didn’t remember that he’d already told me. He probably didn’t even remember who I was. What’s the point of talking to him if he doesn’t remember anything afterwards? What’s the point of this whole club if it doesn’t improve the members’ conditions by a single millimetre?
Shmuel had reached the second junction, at which God had appeared to him as a dog, and I leaned back in my chair and looked around at what was going on in the room. Joe was playing draughts with Malka. And winning, as usual. His eyes darted in all directions, as usual, to make sure no one had come to kidnap him. Amatzia started to climb the steps to go outside, then stopped and came back down. And went up again. And came down. Mordechai was showing his football album to Nava, who had undoubtedly seen it a thousand times, but still she smiled, occasionally pointing to a picture and asking about it. And he answered. His voice mingled with hers, and with Shmuel’s, and they mingled with the cigarette smoke and the steam coming from the kettle, with the drawings that dripped from the walls, and very slowly I began to feel how the line that separated me from them and had disappeared so that I’d thought it didn’t exist, took shape inside me again. It was long and thick, and the fear that had seized me the last time I was here, the fear that I’d go back to the bad, shaky times of basic training, slowly faded and almost vanished.
Shmuel went on to the third junction and started telling me how he’d stood in front of the picture of the girl in that museum in Herzliya and felt God appear before him from a spot in the middle of her forehead. Feeling a pleasant tiredness spread through my body, I closed my eyes and thought: there’s something about all this that makes a person feel sane.
And then I thought: where is Noa now? And what will I do with all these thoughts I’m so used to sharing with her?
*
How often I imagined this moment. How much I wished for it and prayed for it and ached for it, and here they finally are, all the prints, hanging next to each other on the wall in Aunt Ruthie’s apartment: my mother in the centre, holding the letter from her beloved (in the end, I decided that was more interesting than a scarf), and on the right, the guy from the balcony wearing a shirt showing the dates of Nirvana’s last performances, which never took place. On the left is Suzanna, the new immigrant I found through the Association of Argentinian Immigrants, sitting in a white plastic chair on the promenade. A row below them is Kobi Goldman, the parking attendant and Orna Gad, the archaeologist, and Akram Marnayeh, an Arab I posed standing in front of a gate to a house in Jaffa holding a big, rusty key. And in the third and last row, three people who aren’t holding anything. One is a young poet, Lior Sternberg, who I saw give a reading of his poems on television and thought he had a longing face. The second one is the singer Etti Ankri taken from the back so you can’t see who she is. And the third one is me standing next to Aunt Ruthie’s painting, ‘Girl’.
I move closer to the wall, then back. I walk to the right and then to the left. It looks perfect from every angle. Everything is perfect. The composition of each picture separately. The way the pictures converse with one another. Especially the ones of me and my mother. The lighting. The background. The variety of backgrounds. Even the light-coloured frames I’d chosen, and at first thought were a mistake, looked right now.
So why doesn’t it do anything to me? I think, flopping on to the sofa. Why do I feel so dried up? Why can’t I think about anything but the fact that Amir hasn’t seen the project?
*
So Yotam, is this how you hide things from me? Amir asked, moving his bishop, and I thought: how does he know? Then he said, after all we’ve been through together, I have to hear from Doga that you’re moving away? He smiled to show that he wasn’t really cross. I moved my king back one square and said, you’re right. Every time I planned to tell you, it just never came out. Don’t worry, Amir said and moved his castle one square forward. The main thing is, how do you feel about it? Do you want to move to another country? And when is it actually going to happen? Really soon, I said, answering the easiest question, and blocked his castle with one of my pawns. My mum and I are going to Aunt Miriam’s in Sydney in two weeks to look for a school for me, and Dad is staying here a while longer to close down his business, sell the house and put the furniture in storage. And …? Amir said, jumping his knight forward, do you want to go? Are you happy about it? What difference does it make, I said, moving my king back one square to get away, no one ever asks me anyway. My mother and father sat down in the living room, turned off the TV while I was in the middle of watching Star Trek and told me they’d been thinking about it a lot and that it would be best for all of us. I told them they didn’t know what was best for me, but they said I was too young to decide and I had to trust them. So I asked how I was supposed to talk to the kids there, because I don’t know English, and they just laughed and said that was silly because I’m such a fast learner that I’d know the whole dictionary in a month. Well, they’re right about that, Amir said and captured my knight with his bishop. How do you know, I said, and captured his bishop with my pawn (why all these exchanges, I thought. What’s he planning?). First of all, Amir said, moving his castle one square to the right, you really are a fast learner. Look at how quickly you learned chess. And secondly, my parents also took me to Australia when I was a kid and I remember that it didn’t take me long to learn the language. You were in Australia too? I said, surprised, and captured his castle with mine. I had the feeling that he was setting a trap for me, but I captured it anyway. Yes, Australia too, Amir said, laughing and moving his queen, who’d been waiting quietly until that moment, to the far corner of the board and said, check. From that minute on, we stopped talking. My king was in danger and I had to protect him, no matter what. Amir attacked and attacked, and I found a way of rebuffing his pieces every time: I sacrificed a bishop and a castle and even four pawns so my king wouldn’t fall. I kept waiting for him to make a stupid mistake that would turn the game around, but he didn’t make even one. In the end, after my queen went, I had no choice and I surrendered. I hate losing, most of all in chess, but Amir didn’t leave me with the bitter taste of defeat for too long. He went to the kitchen and came back with two glasses of lemonade and said, nice of you to let me win before you go off to Australia. And I said, what are you talking about, I never let you win. I know, he said, of course. All I have to do is see how you sweat during the game to know that. I took a big gulp of lemonade and asked, so how was it in Australia? Very nice, Amir said. It’s a calm, quiet country. The people are nice, much nicer than the Americans. No terrorist attacks. No wars. Lots of nature. But they have all the mod cons: fast motorways, giant shopping centres, computer games. Wow, I said. It sounds cool. Yes, Amir said, I’ve been to a lot of countries, and it’s one of the best.