He said, “Your hair’s uncovered.”
Rina’s hand reached for her head. She dashed out of the room and retrieved her scarf. Though her head was pounding, she wrapped it tightly around her hair, hiding all of it from view. She found a bottle of Peter’s Advil and helped herself. Then she went back into the kitchen. Went back to unpacking groceries. “Why’d you come here?”
“To apologize. At least, can you look at me?”
Rina turned around. Though his face was drawn, his complexion looked healthier today than yesterday. She realized it was because he had shaved and his hair had been washed.
Softly, she said, “I could never stay mad at you. It never happened, okay?”
“But it did happen.” He locked eyes with her. “My behavior yesterday was wretched by anyone’s standards. For someone who dares to call himself a man of God, it was abhorrent. I took my frustrations out on you. I’m very sorry.”
Rina turned away. “No need to apologize. I know what it’s like to experience rotten times.”
“It’s no excuse.” Bram stood, walked over to the open door, stared into the backyard. “Rina, I have spent the entire night thinking about what you asked me-”
“Bram-”
“You asked me a question. It deserves an answer. Bear with me, all right?”
Rina was silent.
“I have tried to relive every moment I was with Yitzy…from the time I first met him until the last time I saw him. My own mental video of the times we spent together alone…which was very substantial.”
He ran his hand through his hair.
“I can honestly say to you that there was never, ever, even a wee hint of impropriety on my part. In all the time I knew him, Yitzchak was what he was. A righteous Tzaddik and a loving father and husband. And my behavior toward him had always been above reproach. But…”
He swallowed hard, his eyes fixed upon the corral.
“But there were…as you put it…feelings.”
Rina said nothing.
“There were feelings,” Bram faced her. “Vague sexual feelings.”
Rina leaned against the counter, studied her hands. “Toward Yitzchak.”
“At the time, I had assumed so, since they came on shortly after I met him and disappeared shortly after he died.”
He shrugged.
“I didn’t know quite what to make of them, since they were a new experience for me. Discounting that aberrant time in both of our lives, I’ve always been a man of large spiritual needs and small physical appetites. I don’t eat much, I’m rarely thirsty, don’t drink alcohol beyond an occasional beer. I’ve never taken drugs, never even smoked a cigarette.”
“Nothing wrong with that.”
“Not at all.” He paused. “And…also…I’ve never had much in the way of a sex drive. Something that’s apparently not genetic, judging from the way my brother chased girls in high school.”
Rina looked at him, said nothing.
“So when I got these feelings,” Bram said, “I really didn’t know what to make of them. I just…attributed them to Yitzchak…then went ahead and ignored them. They certainly didn’t get in the way of our friendship.”
“Did he…” Rina took a breath. “Did Yitzchak ever display…” She turned away. “Never mind.”
“The answer to your unasked question is an emphatic no.”
Rina covered her mouth. “Good gracious, how could I even think…” She started ripping through her grocery bags, placing items on the counter.
“Can you stop?”
“I don’t want to.”
“You’re making me nervous.”
She spun around. “What!”
“Why are you killing the messenger? I’m not even giving you bad news. There was never anything between us except fraternal love. Yitzchak was not gay. So calm down.”
She flopped into a kitchen chair. “I’m not handling this right.” She looked at him. “You know, Bram. I don’t think I ever really thanked you-”
“You thanked me.”
“No, I didn’t-”
“We’re getting sidetracked. I spent an entire night in tortured self-reflection on this. Can you please let me finish?”
“I’m sorry. Go on.”
“Mazel tov. Where was I?”
“Your vague feelings didn’t get in the way of your friendship with my late husband.”
“Right.” He continued his narrative. “It wasn’t until later…after Yitzy died…during that too brief time we saw each other…that I was able to interpret my sexual feelings for what they were.”
He sat back down at the table, avoided her eyes. “With all my heart, I believe in Jesus’ words as holy. I wouldn’t be much of a priest if I didn’t. Both of our religions forbid adultery. It is the sixth commandment of my law, the seventh of yours. The Savior, Jesus Christ…”
He hesitated.
“My savior, Jesus Christ, has also amended the commandment to condemn desire. He teaches us that lusting for another man’s wife is equivalent to adultery of the heart. And back then, as a newly graduated seminarian, His words were something I took very seriously.”
He paused to collect his thoughts.
“I know that in this day and age, it’s fashionable to minimalize…even romanticize adultery. Follow your heart and damned be the consequences. In truth, betrayal is a horrible, destructive beast…damaging everything in its path…those who betray…and those betrayed.”
He glanced at her, looked away.
“It absolutely destroys self-esteem…crushes and flattens it like asphalt under a steamroller. In my case, it was particularly hurtful…because I was two-timed by my identical twin. I don’t know what Dana’s motivation was. But I did know her problem with me couldn’t have been lack of a physical attraction. Because she traded me for my mirror image. So I was left to think that there had been something terribly wrong with me personally.”
“There was nothing wrong with you, Bram,” Rina said gently. “You were all kids. And kids do dumb things.”
“Of course. And I absolutely bear no ill will to Dana.”
He stood, again walking over to the open door.
“As far as Luke goes, I love my brother very much. I’d do anything for him. Forgiveness was never the problem. It’s the forgetting. Because try as I may to forget, I can still viscerally remember how much it hurt.”
Rina sighed. “You always talked about it in such a detached way. I never knew how much you were suffering.”
“I don’t even know why I told you about it in the first place. It must have just…slipped out during one of our marathon discussions. The hurt might have come and gone had the situation not been complicated by Dana’s pregnancy, which necessitated a confession to my folks.”
“What a mess!”
“A mess, a disaster, a fiasco, an ordeal…all of the above.” He raised his brows. “Up until then, I had always thought that, no matter what, I was safe from my father’s wrath. So there I was, too embarrassed to admit to anyone that I’d been screwed over by my own brother, ashamed that I wasn’t the kind of guy I thought I should have been, taking the blame for something I didn’t do. And there was my father…ready to throw me to the wolves.”
Bram let out a small laugh.
“Imagine what Dad would have done to Luke had he found out the truth. The doctor’s vituperative tongue gave me a lot of empathy for what my brothers had been going through.”
“Your father adored you.”
“Yes, in the end, I believe he did. And for all his faults, I adored him as well. But this is all beside the point.”
He licked his lips.
“Like I said, these hazy sexual feelings came on after I met Yitzchak and left after he died. But, in fact, what I’d experienced hadn’t been exclusive feelings for him. They were feelings for you, Rina. But being as you were a married woman, and the thought of adultery-even adultery of the heart-was so odious to me back then, I simply transferred them onto what I perceived was a less sinful target. Which was your husband. Easier for me to think of myself as gay than as an adulterer.”