Yitzhak Goren - Alexandrian Summer

“I … I’ll make you a queen! A queen.” This is how David expressed his feelings.

“I’ll be yours, David,” she said. Then she was scared. Was that it? I’ll be yours? So simple? Her breasts were cupped in his hands. The sense of pleasure alarmed her. How did such an explicit promise leave her mouth? Would she keep it, or break it come dawn? She could feel the weight of the threat to her independence, until her lips finally managed to voice that redemptive “if.” That “if” that turns the tables.

“If?” His bare feet sank into the sand. He’d been sure the path had been paved straight ahead, and suddenly he was at a crossroads. A choice. He didn’t know what to tell her. When she gave her condition, he felt an urge to slap her face. That’s what his father would have done. But he couldn’t make his hand do that. Since he’d done nothing immediately, he’d missed his chance for a violent response, and had only the path of stuttered words and prolonged silence.

“If you really love me,” she chirped, “there should be no question about it.” And she redid the buttons of her blouse. David saw her breasts disappearing behind the batiste.

“But why?” he asked. “Why? What does one have to do with the other?”

“It’s either me or racing,” she repeated, persistent. “Either me or racing either me or racing either me or racing either me or racing …”

He asked her why again and again, trying to get some answer to put his mind at ease.

“Either-me-or-racing!”

Lilly Elhadeff was prepared to accept him just as he was, while this one asked him to give up his passion, his destiny, his pride, his promising career … What would he tell his father? He might have given it all up just to get her. Why not? All those cream puffs he was missing out on, all that fat-dripping bacon he couldn’t eat because of that damn diet … If he were a clerk at an insurance company or a cotton marketing firm, or even at the stock market, as his father used to be, before being bitten by the racing bug, he could eat as much as he wanted. He might have given up horse racing and thanked her for rescuing him from the terrible stress, the draining competition, the paralyzing fear of failure — but he knew his father wouldn’t stand such a blow. How could he do that to his father?

“It’s either me or …”

And besides, why? Why?

Why? She herself didn’t know. Just a momentary impulse. Perhaps a test of his love? Or maybe just an excuse. It was obvious he could not consent to her demands, and this way she could say that he was the one to ruin their chances. And besides, if he did agree to give up this career that set him apart from the anonymous masses just because of the whim of a bored woman who didn’t even love him, her contempt would only grow stronger. Why can’t she stop comparing them to her father? Would she ever find a man like her father? Ultimately, she thought, Lilly Elhadeff will have David and I’ll remain with my yearning for the perfect man, a man who doesn’t exist … But how could she give up this independence, this wonderful, intoxicating, dizzying freedom? She enjoyed this game of femme fatale , or maybe it was merely her fear of being enslaved to a man, having to play the game for keeps, grow up and become the boring, bored other half of a “ Madame et Monsieur .” Suddenly she wanted to go home, just to run home and sleep …

“Why?” he kept asking.

“Why? Because I don’t want to marry a jockey. A horse is not a stable career, you see? Horses are not a profession, not a future. Horses! Who could live with a man who loves his mare more than his wife? Who could live with a man who weighs himself three times a day? How your mother could have put up with your father, that’s her business …”

“Leave my mother out of this, you hear? Leave my mother out of this!” He shook her angrily. What he wouldn’t give to break her, she was so fragile, only a woman.

She said coolly, “You’re hurting me, Mama’s Boy.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to.”

“That’s just it, mon ami , you didn’t mean to, but you were ready to whip me. If that’s how you’re acting now, just think what I have to look forward to once we’re married! What can I say, my friend, I want things that … you’re a nice boy, but …” Finally she gave up on trying to explain, and summed it up in words he could understand: “I want security, I want money …”

“Money?” David cried and burst out laughing. “That’s what you’re concerned about? You know how much I made today at the race? You want to know?” and he spat out the amount proudly.

The jingling of coins made a ruckus in her head. That was as much as an average clerk made in six months, she thought with a hint of bitterness and a measure of admiration. She tried to keep cool, maintaining the expression of ridicule.

He added with excitement, “My value on the jockey’s stock market, my rating, is rising daily. And my mare, Esperance, also has a high rating. People put their money on us, their savings, their lives. They trust us. They’re willing to bet on us. Their paychecks, their children’s food. They’re willing to put it all on me, and you’re still hesitating?”

He waited silently. She didn’t say a word either. She didn’t know what to say. She’d never been this close to surrendering. Had he stopped talking that moment, had he grabbed her and kissed her, taking her breath away, crushing her bones and ignoring her stuttering protests, she might have been won over by him. But he was drunk on words, on the bright future filled with money and on the woman he would marry. “If I keep winning like this, I’ll be a millionaire!”

“ If you keep winning!” That was the best response she could muster to his arrogance. All this talk of legendary wealth, of the excitement of betting — win all or lose all— worked its magic. Her eyes glowed a bit, and she looked at him, expecting him to crush her doubt with his strong arms.

Had David not been so self-involved at that moment, he might have noticed that look that said, “Take it all, but do it quickly!” and swept her away. Instead, he continued to glide on the wings of the dream of his own grandeur. “I’m only just beginning, really. They say I have a great future ahead of me. It’s all ours. Yours and mine. I’ll share it all with you, you get it? We’ll go to Europe, to America, to the Far East. The high life! Next summer, when we come back for the racing season, we’ll be able to spend the season at the Windsor or the Cecile Hotel — such luxury! We won’t have to make do with a meager room at —”

“Like the one you have this summer?”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend. The rooms we rented at your place are anything but meager. I like it there. Your place is in an ideal location, walking distance from the track … but you’ve got to admit, it isn’t exactly the Cecile.” He laughed arrogantly. His confidence grew as he kept talking, “And there are ways for me to make even more money. I can gamble myself. I know which horse and which jockey to put my money on. Ha! True, the rules prohibit it, but between you and me, everybody does it, using a third party. And then, my dear, the sky’s the limit!” He took a deep breath and fixed his shimmering eyes on her, as if saying, Now, my fair lady, let’s see you say no to this!

“You think I can be bought?” she said coolly, but her voice wasn’t as steady as she wanted it to be, which annoyed her.

“Any woman can be bought, baby!” David Hamdi-Ali quoted Humphrey Bogart or Clark Gable.

She burst out laughing, but even her laughter was more hesitant than she’d wanted. Her laughter slowly died down, and she wanted to speak, but didn’t know where her words would lead. She’d already decided to gamble, to go with the flow. Wherever it may take her. Her nostrils filled with the smell of the salty breeze, and the moon was low, heavy and ripe. A heaviness also filled her breasts and stomach. She wanted to speak, but was thinking about other things. Her entire body was aware of her feminine blossoming, that wondrous summer bloom that took over young girls, until their lips parted with sweet moisture, and every muscle in their bodies was alert for something … for … “for a wedding, come on!” Grandma would have said impatiently. But this feeling meant freedom, she protested, while a wedding … she was scared of a wedding, of that constant friction with a stranger, who may see himself entitled to make all sorts of demands, view her as responsible for all sorts of duties, and worst of all — would never change. He’d always be the same man, morning, noon and night. Dancing with the same man, going out with the same man. The same hands caressing her body, maybe even beating it … She trembled when she recalled her cousin Adele, the eldest daughter of her aunt Tovula, who took a beating from her husband once in a while, and with a belt … What did she need this for? And why so soon? Especially considering how her parents gave her complete freedom, trusting her judgment, trusting her not to get into trouble. She wouldn’t get into trouble, but how about some pleasure? She had to remember, and look out, not let any of them cross that thin, fragile line that separated fun from enslaving devotion. Besides, and maybe this is the main thing, she didn’t want to part with her parents, and she missed her brothers in Israel. It might be odd to add this after all this talk of freedom and independence, but she knew she’d never feel better than at her mother’s side, and she wasn’t ashamed to admit it. But not to David Hamdi-Ali, of course. To him she said only, “What you’re saying is very exciting, David, really wonderful, engaging stuff, this horse racing of yours. I can see how important it is to you —”