A. Yehoshua - The Liberated Bride

“I’ve received a letter from Ofer,” she said at once, using the son to shield her from the prying father.

He shivered with joy.

“A short one. And a nasty one. He was very hard on me. That’s no way to comfort anyone. But it doesn’t matter. I took it for what it was.”

“You see?”

“See what?”

“Despite all the time that’s gone by, he hasn’t given up.”

“But on what?”

“On wanting to know. To understand. Like me.”

She shook her cropped head angrily. “You’re wrong. His letter had nothing to do with that. I’ve already told you that he understands all he needs to.”

He felt his confidence shaken by her firmness. He reached out a fatherly hand that fell short of touching her. In the mirror he saw Fu’ad moving slowly across the empty dining room. The maître d’ cast a glance at their dark corner and disappeared.

“Listen carefully, Galya. If I thought for a moment that he understood why you left him, or had come to terms with it, I’d never have stooped to come here again.”

“But why is it stooping?” she protested hotly. “You mustn’t say such things, Yochanan. I was very touched by your last visit. I’m touched by this one, too. We’re all grateful. If only there were some way I could help…. But you mustn’t try to make me feel guilty or take your anger out on me. I have enough problems.”

A desert wind riffled the curtain. Rivlin took the plunge.

“I’ve already told you…”

“What?”

“That I haven’t much time left.”

“How do you mean?”

“I told you.”

“But what’s wrong with you?”

“The details don’t matter. I don’t like to discuss them. I’m not asking for pity, only for justice.”

“But what does this have to do with justice?”

He bowed his head and said nothing, feeling a stirring in her.

“You’re torturing yourself for no reason. What does it matter? People get together and break up all the time. I left your son because we couldn’t go on the way we were. Because it would have been wrong to. Ask him. Why should I tell you what he won’t?”

“He would like to. He can’t.”

She made no reply.

In the mirror behind her Rivlin saw her ponytailed husband peer into the dining room.

“Fine. I won’t bother you again. Just do me one last favor. Answer his letter.”

“But he told me not to,” she said with a triumphant gleam. “Those were his last words.”

“Never mind.” His anger turned against his son. “Write him. It doesn’t matter what. Just give him a sign. If he swallowed his pride enough to send you a condolence note, he must want an answer even if he denies it. Give him one. Anything. A few words. It makes no difference what they are. Do it for my sake. You owe me that much.”

“Owe you?” He felt her waver.

“Morally. We treated you like a daughter from the minute you set foot in our home. We couldn’t have loved you more. Whatever you wanted, whatever you asked for, even hinted at, was yours. We never said a word when you broke up the marriage. We just gritted our teeth, Hagit and I. We tried being high-minded about it.”

She nodded slowly in confirmation. The word “high-minded” swept him along.

“Even if you think you owe us nothing, do it for your father’s sake. Don’t leave me in the dark. I won’t come again, I promise. This is the last time. Not even Hagit knows I’m here. She would be furious if she saw me pleading with you like this. Promise you’ll write to Ofer. Even if he doesn’t want you to. Just this once.”

“But what should I say?” she whispered despairingly, like a student bewildered by a teacher’s demands.

“Anything. Make him realize he understands.” She weighed his words carefully before making a movement with her head. He couldn’t tell if she was nodding it or shaking it. Her eyes were damp with what looked like old tears. Again, something told him that she was pregnant.

The tall husband passed again across the mirror. The two blue-eyed, evangelical elephants reentered the dining room and wandered slowly through it, lifting the tablecloths as though looking for something they had lost.

20.

“YOU DIDN’T BELIEVE me. Well, now you’ve seen for yourself. She gets more lucid from day to day. She even remembered the names of places in South America that Yo’el told her about three years ago. It’s not just her memory, either. She can explain things, see connections. And she’s so funny! She has a sense of humor she never had before. Did you hear what she said about Yochi? It’s too bad, Yochi, that you weren’t there. Where were you all that time? You would have enjoyed her. Imagine: she not only thought of asking about your work, she even remembered it had to do with Algeria. At first she said Morocco and then she caught herself. When I told her you were stuck she asked me to tell you she understood. She has real empathy. I’m sorry you didn’t stay. Where on earth did you disappear to? To think that for years the psychiatrists sent her from one institution to another without holding out any hope! It’s no wonder I bristle whenever one of them gets on the witness stand and spouts some diagnosis.”

“Don’t generalize.”

“You’re right. One mustn’t. But I’ve seen enough to be skeptical about the experts. I can understand wanting to make a science of mental disorder. But do it modestly, with a sense of proportion. After all, they’re not pathologists analyzing DNA in a lab. How can they label every hoodlum psychotic or schizophrenic or posttraumatic?”

“Give us the bottom line,” Rivlin said, accelerating as they came out of the last turn of the descent from Jerusalem. “What are you saying, Hagit? That your aunt was making believe? That all the time we ran after her from asylum to asylum we were really going from theater to theater?”

“She wasn’t making believe. I’m not saying that. Her torment was real. She didn’t believe she deserved the love that our mother and all of us gave her, and that drove her to extremes of anxiety. It never occurred to her that we needed her love, too. Did we ever tell you, Ofra, how we first realized she was getting better?”

Ofra nodded. Although she had heard the story many times, she was always ready to hear it again.

The road to the airport was lightly traveled on Saturday afternoons. The anticipation of seeing Yo’el made the trip a pleasant one. Hagit was still too full of the lunch with her aunt and the family anecdotes to probe where her husband had been. It was just as well, Rivlin thought. Although he could have padded his account of the time he had spent with the Suissas, he preferred not to. His failure at the hotel only made him feel more guilty.

“Actually,” he said, interrupting his wife’s entertaining but familiar account of her aunt’s recovery, “Hagit owes her aunt a great deal.”

“How is that?” Hagit asked.

“Didn’t she once shock some sense into you as a child by telling you how awful you were?”

Like a healthy person recalling past illnesses, the judge liked to be reminded of a time when she hadn’t been nice. Now, she looked lovingly at the husband who — if only to tease her — remembered her childhood so well.

“When was that?” Ofra asked, glowing in the backseat at the thought of Yo’el’s arrival.

“Don’t you remember how our parents used to send me to her in Jerusalem during summer vacations? I spent weeks there. Once she told me I wasn’t nice to be with. It made a big impression.”

“How old were you?”

“About twelve. I worshiped her then. Every word of hers was holy. It had a great effect.”

“It’s too bad it didn’t last,” joked her husband.