Assaf Gavron - The Hilltop

“Tell me,” Moran said after an aggressive blast on his horn to a driver who cut in front of him at the Latrun Junction. “I’ve always been curious. The women settlers there, there are… like, there are some good-looking ones, huh? Othni’s eldest daughter, and also, you know…”

Roni didn’t help Moran. He was still a little mad because Moran hadn’t allowed him to smoke a cigarette a few minutes ago.

“I mean, you’re secular, right? Gabi is a reborn, but you’re not, right? Gabi’s a good guy, by the way. Works well, quiet, I’ve often had a chance… Anyway, so, is there any action? If you understand what I mean.”

Roni felt tired. “Nothing, believe me.” Roni had almost stopped thinking about sex recently, surprisingly. He wondered why. Maybe the depression, maybe something on the hilltop stifled the urge. At first he wandered about within the same familiar horniness, dropped signals, and waited for a response. There was the sexy left-wing demonstrator, there was Shaulit Rivlin, whom he had eyed and for a brief moment thought there was a chance with when she threw her husband out of the house, and of course, the beautiful Gitit Assis, who had a thing with the Ethiopian. Bottom line, it’s just another barren secular fantasy — that smoldering below the surface of a conservative and modest community are intense passions, all you need to do is scratch the surface to get to them. Roni succumbed eventually to the doused mood, and only from time to time did he feel a flicker of yearning for a specific feminine body part — a curved and pristine calf, the smooth valley of an armpit.

“What do you mean? Nothing? C’mon, bro, give me something .”

It was strange. Roni knew exactly what Moran wanted to know. But for the first time in his life he was looking at things from the other side, the side that doesn’t understand the childish fascination with secrets, with the need to discover a different truth from the one apparent. With knowing that people have urges and give in to them.

An upbeat tune rang out in the space of the car and startled Roni.

“Hey, sweetie,” Moran said.

“Daddy,” came the sound of a small and cute voice. “I’m here. I’m at home.”

“Good, Mai, sweetie. What did you do today?”

How long, Roni returned to his previous train of thought, it’s 2010 already, holy shit. So long ago that he barely recalled the feeling and didn’t even feel sorry for himself any longer. Roni Kupper a monk, who’d have believed it. Religion — Roni went on talking to himself while Moran spoke to his eight-year-old daughter — was an interesting social attempt to deal with the fact that all men are addicted to sex and violence. He had learned in the last year that when it comes to sex, at least, it manages to suppress the urge.

He noticed that the further away from it he drifted, the more his mind was consumed by a new pattern of thinking, or perhaps an old one. The simplicity of life at the outpost, the distinct guidelines and order it dictated — he was enchanted by it. But on his way to Tel Aviv, with his body thrilled by expectation, with his musings about sex taking him by surprise from within the darkness of the cellar in which they had been imprisoned all this time as if to prove the point, he realized: It’s not for me.

Mai told her father something about her teacher and then played a song on the piano that Roni struggled to recognize. Then Moran’s wife came on the line. Moran said he’d be back soon and blew kisses into the air. They hung up and Moran said to Roni, “Well, what about that daughter of Othni, nothing there? She looks like one who’s about to explode under those long denim skirts. She looks hot to me, hot!”

Dressed in festive white, wrapped in a prayer shawl, eyes closed, Gavriel Nehushtan swayed purposefully beside the window that overlooked the Hermesh Stream riverbed. Sabbath evenings are always good, but this one was special, the synagogue was more beautiful than ever, inviting — with the rustic wooden beams and the roof impervious to the fine rain that hadn’t let up for an instant. The love and support and offers of help he received from everyone moved him. He won all-around praise, too, of course, for the renovation of the synagogue, and although he tried to deflect it onto Herzl Weizmann, he was the star of the show and would be one of the first in line to be called up to recite the blessing over the Torah the following day.

There are Sabbaths on which the sense of sanctity intensifies, and this was one of them: a new book, the Shemot Torah portion, the Burning Bush. The mood in the settlement was bleak, the trauma of the demolished cabin hung in the wet air, tears welled in the eyes of the people as they prayed. Visitors came from A. and B. and farther afield to express solidarity and support, the synagogue was full and warm. Contradictory feelings flooded Gabi’s soft heart, profound pain mixed with elation, and he swayed intensely, clapped his hands, his eyes closed, his face aglow, exalted be the living God and praised, the First, and nothing precedes His precedence. And also, he suddenly realized: a Sabbath without Roni. Without his sour, grouchy presence. It took him a while to admit to himself that it was a big relief, to notice that his praying felt freer and more profound.

In the middle of the service, he went out and walked the few dozen meters to the edge of the cliff and sat on the wet rock face. A fine rain fell pleasantly on the back of his neck, moistened his beard, the tears flowed from his eyes. You’re the real deal, Man, You’re the righteous One, You took me, small me, and placed me before this huge desert, and showed me the way, You’re such a sweetie. And if You took my home, like You took my son, You had good reason. He stood for the Amidah prayer. You’re a Hero to the world, the Provider of the wind and the rain, You are holy and Your name is holy. Gabi recited the Seven-Faceted Blessing and “A song of David. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want,” and returned to the synagogue for Aleinu L’Shabeach, the last prayer of the service.

After the service and more slaps on the back and kisses on the hand and a good Sabbath, he left the synagogue and walked along the path. Yesterday, after he was left homeless, more or less everyone invited him to sleep over at their place, and he spent the night in Josh and Jehu’s trailer. Now he was thinking about the fact that Roni wasn’t in his old trailer and considered for a moment sleeping there, and while he was still weighing his next move and had raised his head to the sky and drizzling rain, he heard someone sniff and stopped in his tracks and turned his head to listen. The soft and black night air enveloped him. Another sniff. And the tiniest of giggles. And then: “Shalom alechem malache ha-sharet malache elyon …” He frowned. It wasn’t surprising, it was the right time to hear the traditional Friday-night song, the families were sitting at the table and welcoming the Sabbath. But the voice sounded clear, nearby. It wasn’t coming from inside a house but from a yard. Someone was sitting in a yard and singing the song in a clear and hypnotic voice. Gabi stopped and listened. He wasn’t supposed to and didn’t want to do it, didn’t want to secretly eavesdrop on his neighbors, didn’t want to listen to the woman, didn’t want to disrupt his time alone with his God and his own plans to welcome in the Sabbath. But something about the voice rooted his feet to the spot and pricked up his ears. She hadn’t meant her voice to be heard in public, hadn’t sinned, she was singing in a small and sweet voice, like to a baby. He looked around him in the thick darkness and sang along with her in his heart.

It’s the Rivlins’ home, and it’s Shaulit, singing probably to Zvuli. He had noticed in synagogue that she looked different but didn’t register that it was the loose hair, the forgoing of the obligatory head covering of the married woman. Enough, he said to himself, go home now, and just then the sound of a scream came from inside the house and then a “Mommmmy! Mommmmy!” And another scream joined the first one, “Mommmmy, help! Where are you!”