Safekeeping (52 page)

“It's still a promise. I'm tired of not keeping my promises.”

Adam lunged for his sneakers, and the walls and floor lunged with him. He stumbled, then forced himself to stand straight, but this time the walls didn't follow, or followed too slowly. He was going to be sick. He staggered for the bed and sat with his head hanging between his knees.

Ulya sat beside him, resting her hand on his back. “Adam, why do you have to give the old woman the brooch?”

His voice was muffled. “Because it would make me feel better.”

“Why would it make you feel better?”

He raised his head. His face was bright, his eyes glossy. He was on the verge of tears. A grown man crying, it disgusted Ulya. Why did he feel so sorry for himself? He could hardly be luckier. He was free. He was a man. He had American citizenship, an apartment in Manhattan. He didn't have to run away from his country, leave his family, not knowing whether he was ever going to see them again. He wasn't told he couldn't get pregnant and then got pregnant. He was his own biggest problem.

She wrapped her arm around his shoulders. “Just tell me, Adam. Why are you doing this? What do you want?”

Adam's face crumpled. He took the brooch out of his pocket, and Ulya's insides lurched. Gazing at it in his hands, Adam sobbed so hard he had to gasp for breath. His nose pinched and whitened while the rest of his face blotched under a film of tears. Snot poured over his lips. In a high voice, barely getting the word out between the gasps for air, he said: “L-l-l-love.”

“What?”

“I w-w-want l-l-love.”

Ulya tightened her arm around Adam, not only to keep him from going to the old lady, but because, to her surprise, she felt pity for him. As he gulped, chest heaving, she stared down at the brooch. Could she really take it from him? He said he would kill himself if he lost it, and now she suspected that might be true. But then, what was he going to do if he got to keep it?

And then she had a revelation. A stunning one. Not only could she take the brooch, she should. Never mind Adam's pain. Never mind her selfish wants. She should have the brooch—objectively. If she were a stranger looking at this from the outside, it would be obvious that out of all the people the brooch could go to, it should go to her. Who else? Adam would soon lose it somewhere or pawn it for booze. The old lady was days from the coffin, if not hours. Her son would give it to the kibbutz, which would divide its value amongst its hundreds of members, leaving each kibbutznik
a hundred dollars or so. A hundred dollars didn't change a person's life. She was the only person whose life could be transformed by the brooch.
Her
hands were “the right hands.”

She said, “I can love you.”

Adam had calmed some. His chest shook, but he no longer wheezed for air. He still couldn't believe Ulya, didn't see how her loving him was possible, but it felt so good to hear those words.

“Say it again.”

Ulya thumbed a tear from under his eye, telling herself that she had nothing to do with this pain of his, if anything she was alleviating it for a bit. “I can love you, Adam.”

“Again.” He chewed his bottom lip. “Take out the
can
.”

Ulya drew a deep breath. This was worlds harder than anything she'd ever had to do in the past to steal. And that was fair, she supposed. It was worth worlds more.

“I love you, Adam.”

Adam closed his eyes, while she kissed his hot, wet cheek. His temple. She could tell she wasn't going to have to go near his penis again. Sex wasn't what was keeping him here. She draped an arm around the front of his chest, and brought her mouth to his ear. “I love you.”

Adam felt her pushing him back, felt his head landing on the bed. He should go to Dagmar now. He really should. Even if she was a fucking liar.

Ulya glanced at the brooch, still between his index fingers and thumbs, resting on his stomach. She lay down next to him. “I love you, Adam.”

Adam couldn't believe she was saying it again and again. Like a dream. Maybe he was dreaming? Had he already fallen asleep? If not, he should get up and go. Right now.

As Ulya kept whispering “I love you,” waiting for Adam to pass out, she again pictured herself hurrying down that country road—maybe in just a few minutes—and it occurred to her with a shock of excitement that she didn't know—not for sure—which direction she would walk once she got to the bottom of that road. Maybe she wouldn't walk toward the Arab village after all. Maybe she would walk in the opposite direction, toward Haifa, where she could catch a bus to the diamond district in Tel Aviv. The brooch would provide her with more than enough money for a nice hotel while she got an abortion, a flight to New York, a green-card husband. Though she wouldn't even get to say goodbye to Farid.

Adam's breathing deepened, evened. Had he fallen asleep? She was afraid to say
I love you
again and afraid not to. What was more likely to disturb him? She gently lifted her head. His hands had relaxed, palms resting down on his stomach, the fingers surrounding the brooch, but no longer touching it. It was there for the plucking. Should she go for it now? Move too soon, she might wake him up; wait too long, and he could rouse on his own, feeling better, the chance lost.

She would wait until she was ready to run out of the room before going for the brooch. The last thing she wanted was to be caught with it in her hand and face that violence in his eyes again, especially when he was so drunk. Careful not to disturb the mattress, she held her breath and curled up to a sitting position. Then, feet on the ground, she leaned forward inch by inch, imperceptibly rising off the bed. Once again, she was a performer without an audience. Controlling her body like a dancer.

She stood over Adam, lying so peacefully. She had a flash of how he would feel tomorrow morning when he woke up. She pushed the thought from her mind. She had to concentrate. She bent forward and prepared her fingers around the brooch.

One . . . two . . . three.

She closed her fingers on it. The plan had been to gently lift the brooch from his stomach, but her hand trembled too much. She jerked her hand up, and held the brooch an inch above his body, waiting, watching his face.

He didn't move.

Now she had to get out of here. Fast. Silently. She tiptoed for the door, leaving her sandals by his bed. The little dog slept on the other bed, its eyes two black slits. She softly pressed down on the door handle and slipped outside.

She bolted across the quad for her room. The Russian guys around the picnic table watched her curiously, the same guys she used to dread teasing her about Farid. Farid—she did love him, but in twenty years, when she was a middle-aged woman still living in Israel, would she regret it? The idea of never seeing him again broke her heart, but this didn't tell her what she should do. She knew she would miss her mother, but she still left Mazyr.

She flung open her door and charged for her dresser. No time to make a decision now. She had to get out of here. Hurling T-shirts out of the drawer, she fished out her Israeli passport and stuffed it with the brooch in
her purse. She slipped on her work boots—she needed to be able to run—and hurried to tie the laces while glancing at the door, frightened that any second Adam would break through it.

She couldn't leave, however, without her most prized possession. She yanked the old suitcase from under the bed and rushed to unsnap it. There it was, not a golden family heirloom, but still.

As Ulya left the room, clutching her magazine, she didn't know which way she would walk when she reached the junction at the bottom of the hill. She would only know for sure when she got there.

A
dam woke up to Golda licking his cheek. It was early in the morning, the light soft. He lay on his back, brain thumping against his skull, stiff from sleeping with his legs hanging off the bed. He sat up, a feeling of alarm coming over him before the reason why. He felt an absence against his thigh. He jumped to his feet, dug his hand into his pocket. No. Why were Ulya's sandals on the floor? No, no. He tore the blanket from the bed, shook the sheets. Ulya's bra fell out.

He ran in his stockinged feet for her room, thinking, she better be there, she better be there. The door wasn't locked, not a good sign. He threw it open and found her dresser drawers hanging ajar, shirts flung all over the floor. The ratty blue suitcase lay open, empty. His heart pounded behind his eyes. He buckled over, leaning on his knees. The vomit came out in staggered spurts like water from a rusty pipe. The clear puke puddled on the ground, specked with dark beans of blood.

Claudette, returning from Ofir's, found Adam lying on the floor next to the vomit. She crouched beside him. “Adam? Adam, are you all right?”

He hugged his legs into his chest and buried his face into his knees as if trying to curl himself into nonexistence.

“What's wrong? Should I get a doctor?”

“It's gone.”

“What's gone?”

When he didn't answer, Claudette laid her hand on his shoulder, something she never would have been able to do a few months ago. “What's gone, Adam?”

“I can't give it to Dagmar now. The cunt stole it.”

Claudette took in the chaos of the room, and the understanding sank in that her roommate had taken the brooch in the same way she had stashed that bottle of shampoo into her work shirt. How could she do it? To Adam? To a dying woman? Only the brooch didn't matter to Ziva, did it? She didn't even like it.

“You don't need the brooch to go to Dagmar. She only needs to hear that your grandfather didn't hate her.”

Adam pushed Claudette's hand off him. All for a drunk fuck. No, wait. Did he even fuck her? He remembered her breath in his ear, the whispered “I love you.” It was so pathetic. He had traded the brooch his family had safeguarded for seven hundred years to pretend for a minute that someone loved him.

“I can't.”

“Please, Adam. Go now. It can't wait until tomorrow.”

Tomorrow—the idea of it made him want to throw up again. Another night followed by another morning and another night and another morning. “Leave me alone! Please!”

“I think it will—”

Claudette stopped midsentence when Adam started convulsing as if he were caught in an electrical current. The spasms intensified. He rolled onto his back and shuddered, hands opening and closing, head shaking. His eyes bulged. He sucked air through his nose in loud snores, and white spittle foamed at his mouth.

“Adam! What should I do?” Claudette wanted to run for a doctor but was afraid to leave him. “What should I do?”

Adam coughed, and the shaking calmed. He hacked, trying to clear his chest. Then he sat up. Breathing heavily, shiny with sweat, he looked around in confusion.

Claudette kneeled in front of him. “You had a fit.”

“What?” His voice was small, childlike.

“You had a fit.”

He squeezed his eyes, wiped his mouth. “Now?”

“Yes. Is there anything I can do?”

“Get me something to drink.”

“Water?”

“No. Alcohol. Please. It'll make it stop.”

“From where?”

“I don't know. But please. If you get me something, I'll go to Ziva.”

Waiting for Claudette to return, Adam sat on the floor, back against the bed, eyes on the faded lilac lining of Ulya's old suitcase. How many people had owned this suitcase before her? Had it been packed for a long-ago honeymoon? An out-of-town funeral? Zayde dancing with his imaginary partner: that's what the lining looked like to him. How much time and place and loss and regret could be packed into one life? He was too weak for it. He didn't care how low he was on the suffering scale. Life came with so much fucking pain, even the bare minimum—level one and a half—was asking too much.

Claudette rushed in with a bottle of vodka. “I got this from Eugene.”

Adam took the bottle—only a quarter full but better than nothing—twisted off the top, and chugged. The warmth hit his stomach, soothed his trembling. When the numbness reached his head, he used the bed to push onto his feet. “Let's go.”

They stopped by his room for his shoes, and he grabbed the goodbye letter. Golda tagged along as they climbed the steppingstones. They walked alongside the dining hall's wall of windows in silence, just like they did that first morning after the interview in Eyal's office. Adam kept his head turned so he wouldn't have to see his reflection.

Claudette opened Ziva's front door and blocked Golda with her foot. She led Adam through the quiet of the apartment. Adam's hand came up to pat his hair, but then, realizing what he was doing, he stopped. Styling his hair, that was hilarious.

When they entered the bedroom, the old women didn't turn from the window to greet them. The air was stuffy with death and the talcy smell of old age. As they approached her bed, Adam waited to see the old woman's expression when she laid eyes on him. Would she still feign ignorance? He would have thought he'd feel more hate in the presence of the old liar. Last night he would've, but this morning, all his hate was consumed on himself. There wasn't much left even for Ulya.