A. Yehoshua - A Late Divorce

“So who’s this boy who calls you Boxer?”

“He’s from 3A.”

“What’s his name? Who are his parents?”

“I don’t know.”

“But what’s he like?”

“Kind of skinny. Small.”

“So what are you afraid of him for? Sock it to him where it hurts.”

“I already did.”

“When??”

“Yesterday. I knocked him down. He even bled.”

“Easy there, Gaddi, easy. We don’t want to leave any marks. Don’t forget that you’re in a special class already.”

But you’ve got to hand it to him. He can take care of himself even if I do now notice a black-and-blue mark on his forehead. The way those quiet brown eyes take me in that mouth quickly shoveling it away it’s the same nervous hunger that shot me up to a meter eighty-one even if I have ten kids someday and I won’t the fat little sweetheart will always have a special place in my heart.

“C’mon, Gaddi, that’s enough. I’ve got to go. I have a crazy day ahead of me.”

A crazy day with crazy people. But what do I care I said I’d do it and I will as long as they let me do it my way. Just let the family keep out of it and I’ll hand the old folks their divorce all signed sealed and delivered. A really neat job. Just all of you keep out of it. If there’s an ounce of sanity among you you’ll leave it to me to find a painless way out of this forty-year-old neurotic mess. You’re lucky to have found a lawyer to marry into this family of yours so have a little faith in him after all you’re not paying me a cent for this relax I wouldn’t think of taking it anyway.

“C’mon, Gaddi, you’ve had enough. You’ll be late for school. Leave room for your ten o’clock snack.”

The kid’s gotten used to eating too much when no one’s looking. Ya’el comes into the kitchen half asleep gray these last few days have been the death of her I get up to give her a big hug and a kiss not that I feel like it just to show her I’m still boss.

“You’re sure you don’t want me to come with you?”

“Absolutely not. You’ll only complicate things. As soon as she sees you she’ll think of some new way to be crazy. With me she talks plain prose, with you she starts spouting poetry. Let me do it my way, for God’s sake. Why don’t you spend some time with your father? You haven’t seen him for three years. What did you take off from work for? And there’s still the family seder to think of, why should you run around with me all day? I’m going. If the secretary calls, tell her to sit tight and that I’m on my way…. Yes, I’ll see the doctor first. It’s not just a medical issue, it’s a legal one too. What’s this? What’s in this bag?…Vitamin powder for the dog? I swear to God… All right, all right, I’ll give it to her. A work of genius could be written about that dog if only you could find the genius to write it. Don’t you have some new novel for her to read?…All right, all right. I’ll call during the day. We’ll be in touch. Don’t worry, and whatever you do don’t forget to tell the secretary to wait. Gaddi, I’m off!”

Yesterday it rained and gusted today the sun’s beating down how can you expect stability in a country with such weather? The can keep streaming down the hill no one stops to let you in you might think from the rush that people actually work around here they just want to punch in quick so they can go moonlight somewhere eke. Honk you stinking Subaru screech till your brakes burn it’s my road too I pay enough taxes for it.

To think that once I went to this school too I’d kill myself if I had to go back how scared I was of those shitassed teachers but he looks like he actually enjoys it the jaunty way he bounces out of the car. Where are those traffic monitors they promised? Don’t tell me young kids have started striking too. I’ll just wait to watch him cross the street. I don’t like to think of his walking home by himself with all these crazy cars zooming around. Honk honk your head off you fucking Volvo you just wait till my son crosses the street you bitch if you’re itching to kill some child this morning go find another one than mine.

That’s it. I can’t see him anymore among the children. When they’re babies you don’t feel a thing for them but the older they get the wilder you become about them. That’s all life is in the end just a few people no matter how grand no matter how complicated no matter how wretched so spare them a smile if you can.

“Morning.”

My secretary is huddled by the electric heater small dark and bitter if she goes on like this only the heater will want to marry her.

“Are you cold, Levana? And here I was thinking I’d actually seen a little bit of sunlight outside — or was I mistaken?”

She glances up at me darkly with that look that’s already driven more than one client away.

“For the forty thousand pounds that I pay you per month plus all the fringe benefits don’t I at least deserve one smile in the morning? Or do I have to pay extra for that?”

By the time she gets it and gives me a twisted smile I feel sorry for having made fun of her. And it’s only on her good days that she gets one out of every ten jokes that I tell her. When I opened a private practice two years ago after getting fed up with financing a new Cadillac for Mr. Advocate Gordon each year I was advised by those in the know to take an old maid with two years of high school it will cost you less they said and you can be sure she’ll sit faithfully in the office and not run to the doctor every day with a sick baby what they forgot to mention was that you can also be sure of perpetual gloom stuck to a chair a foot away from you and of a big hike in the electric bill.

“Was there any mail?”

“No.”

That aggrieved tone of voice. They can’t forgive us for having rescued them from the caves of the Atlas Mountains and introduced them to civilization.

“Did anyone call from the district court to let us know if they’ve set a date for our murder trial?”

“No.”

“Did Mr. Goren call to tell us when he sent that check of his that he never sent?”

“No.”

“Did anyone call this morning, was anyone in the office?”

“No.”

I pay her forty thousand pounds a month to hear her say no all day long. Two hundred pounds for each no.

“All right, then. Call Goren right away and tell him that I still haven’t gotten his check and that if he doesn’t get it to me this morning I’m not going to the rabbinical court tomorrow and he can stay married a few years more ”

A fancy divorce settlement that I finished two months ago. In the end it upsets people to realize that they’ve gone to a lawyer when they could have gotten the same deal on their own if only they’d kept their cool. Maybe they could have but it takes a certain amount of intelligence to know when you’ve run into a blank wall most people prefer to bang their heads against it and then hire a lawyer to explain to them that it can’t be moved. Why is she looking at me like that in a minute she’ll be asking me what Goren’s number is.

“I don’t know Mr. Goren’s telephone number.”

“And why indeed should you? I’ve only given it to you thirty times. It’s a pity you can’t move away from that heater, because if you could you might free your legs enough to get to the telephone book. When is your birthday?”

“Why?”

“I want to know. Is it a secret? Do I have to find it out from the police?”

“June tenth.”

“Then maybe you could move it up a bit so that I can buy you the present I’ve been meaning to — an electric blanket to wrap yourself in so as not to be addicted to that heater…”

Those dark Moroccan eyes regard me does she get it or am I jerking off another joke in vain she’s already cried more than once over my jokes in a second she’ll cry again I’ll have to add the cost of all that Kleenex to the electric bill.