Olga Grjasnowa - All Russians Love Birch Trees

I fell silent.

“Masha, are you still there?”

“What did you say?” I asked hesitantly.

“That this is complete bullshit. That my daughters would never sleep with Jews, that I didn’t even have a daughter. Besides, that I’ve slept with a Jew. And not only slept with. Loved.” This last part Sami said very quietly, hardly audible.

Elias stood next to me, completely immersed in cutting vegetables, his movements fast and precise. His bangs had grown out, so that he looked a little like Harry Potter.

I choked, tears welling up. I could have said something, but instead I reached out for Elias and asked, “Then what?”

“Well, yesterday somebody scrawled a swastika onto my front door.”

I thought of an incident in an American zoo: A boy was so enraptured with a baby penguin that he sneaked into the compound and stuffed him into his backpack. The penguin suffocated. Sami had told me this story, when I told him for the first time that I liked him, by which I meant, loved. He never forgave me for using that word. Rightly so, as I was to find out later.

The next day I called in sick, went up to the deck, and looked out at the ocean. The water shimmered. The air was warm. I went back to bed.

I forced myself to call my parents. The conversations were a drag, but I was still playing the role of successful daughter. Except that they didn’t buy it anymore and had begun searching for cracks in the paint. But my grief was no illness and Israel no sanatorium. My father had even sent me a telescope that almost didn’t make it through customs.

And all along, I didn’t know why I couldn’t just talk to them. A few minutes into a conversation and I’d already had enough. Had nothing to say and wasn’t listening anymore. Ironic, as I made my living from listening. I wished that I could show more interest and care for them, but I neglected them and lied to them about the state I was in.

On the other hand, when I talked with my mother on the phone, sometimes I was hit by a longing for a home, even if I didn’t know where that was. What I desired was a familiar place. In general, I didn’t think too highly of familiar places. To me, the term homeland always implied pogrom. What I longed for were familiar people. Except that one of them was dead and the others I couldn’t stand anymore. Because they were alive.

Tal and I were watching the sunset. The air covered us like a duvet. This time the sun set without dramatic changes of light. The waves swam toward the shore and the light slowly disappeared behind the bulwarks. Everything was in its place, the beach empty with the exception of a few couples and the rare jogger.

She lay right in front of me, head turned to the side, eyes closed. I watched her belly rise and fall. Two large birds were tattooed into her shoulder blades, black and precisely drawn. They might have been blackbirds or bluethroats. She had tied her hair in a bun, revealing the tattoo on her neck — four tiny Hebrew letters: aleph, he, beth, he. Ahava . Love. I began massaging her back, first along the spine, then the shoulders and arms. When I looked at Tal I felt slightly nervous and sick to my stomach, accompanied by a faint gag reflex. Maybe I simply had to fill in a blank and Tal was as good as any.

Tal let out a contented moan and slowly relaxed. I opened her bikini top. My fingers now kneaded specific muscles, then I stroked her back with my flat palm and finally I bent down and traced her back with my mouth, from tailbone to neck.

A military plane passed over us and left a white condensation trail in the sky.

“Maybe they’re finally off to bomb Iran.”

I couldn’t tell if she was joking.

“A Douglas A4,” Tal said.

The condensation trail dissolved. I took a sip from the water bottle in my bag. A cool breeze swept by. I lay down on top of her and breathed in the scent of her skin.

It was a while before I got my bearings. I’d taken a lot of sleeping pills the night before — to be expected, given the date — and was now having trouble orienting myself. I had been awoken by jackhammers. The noise invaded my bedroom through the open window along with the fine sea breeze.

I padded barefoot onto the deck to make sure that the world outside of my apartment still existed. It did. The sun burned in the sky, old ladies and gentlemen marched toward the beach, cars honked, and the renovation of the house at the end of the street was in full swing. My neighborhood was in a permanent state of noise. In the morning the heavy cleaning trucks arrived, followed by construction, hammering, drilling, and later the buses, cars, and Vespas. And the passersby contributed their fair share.

I went back in to shower. I’d forgotten to turn on the boiler and the water was cold. I dried myself off, went to the kitchen, dissolved an aspirin in a glass of water, and made Turkish coffee. I took Elisha’s photo from my wallet, leaned it against the wall, and lit a candle in front of it. I often looked through his photos, and in my mind reexamined every second of our last night. Why hadn’t I woken up earlier? How could I have prevented his death?

This photo had been taken in Morocco, during our sole, but long, trip together. Elisha was smiling into the camera. My face was buried in his hair. Looking at the photo I smelled him and clearly saw the texture of his skin in front of me. In a tea house, I had asked a man with a mouth full of gold teeth to take a picture of us. The man immediately identified himself as a tour guide and tried to talk us into a guided tour. I politely declined while Elias was busy adjusting and double-checking the settings on the camera. I dissolved another aspirin in water, quickly got dressed, and left the apartment.

The conference was organized by the French embassy in a hotel not far from my apartment. I hurried along the beach promenade toward the hotel: the sea and blue beach chairs to my left, to my right towering hotels, built in honeycomb design. The street was crowded with taxis and Vespas. I arrived sweaty and out of breath, opened my bag for the security check at the entrance, and was let in. I picked up my badge at reception and went straight to the booths.

I’d been booked on short notice, as a replacement and after lots of back-and-forth. As a result, I was nervous as hell. I introduced myself and the two other interpreters — the one for Hebrew and one of the English guys — shook my hand. As it turned out, the head of our team was nowhere to be found and neither was my booth colleague. More and more interpreters showed up. Nobody knew anything and it was only a few hours until the conference was set to start. We didn’t know where the organizers were, nor did we have the documents or even the order of the speakers. My palms were slick with sweat.

My colleagues stood in a circle, looking very relaxed, assuring me that this conference would be a cakewalk. Among them a few legendary interpreters. My shivering intensified. A colleague grabbed my elbow and pointed to a man walking toward us, whistling. Our head of booth had long slender limbs, closely set eyes, and frameless glasses. His whole presence was somehow disarmingly amiable, even though I knew that this was an illusion, as he was famous for his choleric fits. He introduced himself, handed out the documents, and assigned us to our booths. When I asked about my booth colleague he smiled mischievously and said, “That would be me.”

“What an honor,” I said and swallowed hard.

“We’ll see about that,” he said. “You’re our youngest colleague and if I’m not mistaken, this is your first time working for us. I’ll keep an eye on you. You have to know that this will be a pretty easy event. It’s only about cultural exchange. Nevertheless, focus and hand over immediately when you start to struggle. I expect the utmost professionalism!”