The Lover (24 page)

And I went straight out into the city with the hundred pounds.
At first I wandered around the streets, walking in the middle of the road and nearly getting run over. All the time feeling the hundred pounds in my pocket, stopping in the middle of the road and fingering it. I’d never had so much money all at once. And though it was a cold and rainy day I was free, like in holidays from school. And I walked among the people aimlessly, looking in the gloomy faces of the Jews, always so worried about their Jewish destiny. And though the sky was dark I was already sniffing the smell of spring. I wanted to shout out loud I was so happy. Because all the time I was thinking I’d be seeing that girl in a little while and I’d be able to fall in love properly and not just in my imagination. I walked and walked and nearly came out the other side of the city and turned back and this time started looking in the shops. Going in here and there to look at things, because aside from the pyjamas I wanted to buy a whole lot of things for myself. This time I wasn’t giving any change back. And they realized I was an Arab right away and they started looking in my bag, feeling the loaves of bread to check if there were bombs hidden inside them. So I ate some of the bread in a hurry and threw the rest away with the bag so they’d leave me alone and I just kept the book, tucking it under my arm. I felt lighter that way.

In the end, after I’d looked in the windows of toy shops, bookshops, radio and TV shops, I began to look for a pyjama shop, but there weren’t any pyjamas in the windows and I didn’t know exactly which shop to enter. Anyway, why did he insist on pyjamas? I could sleep in my underwear and buy something more important with the money. Suddenly I saw a high-class clothes shop that had pyjamas in the window but didn’t show any prices. I went inside and wanted to go straight out again because it was dark in there and there was nobody about. But as soon as I turned to go a thin old man came out from a dark corner. “What do you want, boy?” I said, “Pyjamas.” He asked, “Have you got any money?” and I took out the blue bill and showed it to him.

Then he grabbed my hand, he didn’t seem to mind that I was wearing dirty working clothes. He didn’t even realize I was an Arab. All he wanted was to get his hands on that little blue bill that I’d been stupid enough to show him and he did take it off
me in the end. He started taking all kinds of pyjamas out of boxes, fine silk pyjamas with tassels and fancy embroidery. He showed me pair after pair, spreading them out in front of me. And I stood there and couldn’t say a word because they really were nice. In the end he came over to me, took my
measurements
and told me to undress. I took off my shirt and sweater and he put a pyjama top on me and turned me towards the mirror to see if it suited me. Then he took it off and tried another on me, and every set of pyjamas was crazier than the last one, gold buttons and coloured tassels. When he saw I was struck dumb he chose some red pyjamas for me and said, “Look, these suit you best,” and folded them up and packed them in a box and wrapped the box in soft paper and put it in a new plastic bag and then gently but firmly he took the blue bill that I still held in my fingers and said softly, “That’s it.” I saw he didn’t mean to give me any change and I asked him in a feeble voice, “Do these cost a hundred pounds?” He said, “More than that, I’ve given you a discount.” I didn’t move, I felt stunned. And he smiled at me and said, “Where are you from, boy?”

And suddenly I was afraid he might be angry if he knew he’d been dealing with an Arab.

“From here … from this neighbourhood.”

“And your parents? Where are they from?”

“From Poland,” I replied, without even thinking, because they’d told us in school that all the Zionists came from Poland.

And I still didn’t move, weeping in my heart for the hundred pounds that had gone on just one pair of pyjamas. And still I didn’t touch my pyjamas, which were lying there before me in a bag. At last I said, “But I’ve still got to buy a toothbrush, I need a toothbrush as well, I can’t take such expensive pyjamas.” And then he went through a door into a back room and came back a few seconds later with a toothbrush, which was red and not exactly new. He put it into the bag and said, “There you are, boy, I’ve given you a toothbrush as well, I’ve made a deal with you.” But when he saw I was still rooted there, in a panic over the money I’d lost, he put the bag in my hand, took my arm and led me out into the street, closing the door behind him.

And so I was left without a cent, just with a set of crazy pyjamas wrapped in a plastic bag. Heavy rain started falling. I still
had five hours to go till four o’clock and I didn’t even have the money for the bus. I walked up to Carmel and arrived at his house, still with three hours to go before four o’clock. I didn’t want to wait on the stairs so I found a little shelter opposite and sat down there to wait, until somebody came along who didn’t even live there and said, “Move, get out of here.”

So I moved. I circled the streets of the neighbourhood, which was nice even in the rain, and went back and sat under the shelter opposite the house and waited for the time to pass. And again two men came along and said, “What are you doing here? What are you waiting for?” I didn’t answer, just got up and started walking around again. I’ve noticed before that as long as we’re moving, working or walking they don’t take any notice of us, it’s only when we stand still in some place that they start getting suspicious. And so I walked about, very tired and completely wet and even though the sun came out now and then it couldn’t dry me because I was as wet as a rain cloud. And I went back again to my shelter and it was already halfpast two and the children were coming home from school, first the younger ones and then the older ones. And I saw her arriving, the last of all maybe, running along without a raincoat, without galoshes, just in a short coat, soaking wet. I watched her disappear into the house. The sun came out again.

I threw
Stars
Outside,
that Alterman book, into a dustbin, it was like dough it had got so wet. Then his wife arrived. I recognized her right away by her green Fiat 600. Once I’d tightened the brakes and changed the oil for her. And she took out a whole lot of baskets and then stood and fumbled for a long time in the letter box, though I’d already checked it out and I knew there wasn’t any mail for them. Ten minutes later she came out again and drove away and came back with some milk and after half an hour she drove away again and came back with bread.

Slowly the street emptied and there was a strange sort of silence. People were arriving in their cars and disappearing into their houses with baskets, closing the shutters. And I was still sitting there opposite the house waiting for him to come. I was already sick of the whole thing. The door to the balcony was open and the girl came out to look at the sky. I tried to huddle
up small so she wouldn’t see me, but she stared down at me like she was trying to remember something. And the rain started again. Her mother shouted something and she went back inside. And now it started raining really hard and I thought I was going to be swept away, off the pavement, down the hill and into the sea that you couldn’t see because of the mist.

Already I was feeling miserable as hell, the rain was getting inside my head, driving me crazy. I was regretting the whole thing now, even love. Sitting alone in the street watching the sealed shutters, it was already after four o’clock and he hadn’t arrived yet and I was afraid I’d be stuck there all night in the street with the pyjamas. Perhaps he’d forgotten me and the job he wanted me for. But at last I heard his American car coming down the hill. Before he’d even had time to turn off the engine I’d opened the door for him. He smiled at me like we’d only just parted, and he asked, “Have you just arrived?” “Just now,” I lied. He said, “Good, come and give me a hand,” and he started unloading flowers and cakes and bread and nuts. Looks like everybody here cooks and eats his own food.

We climbed the steps to his house, he rang the bell and the girl opened the door and he said:

“This is …”

“Na’im,” I said, just moving my lips, The girl looked at me in surprise. And again I was stunned by her beauty. And the woman came out straightaway to meet us and when she saw me she took the flowers and the bread from me and said, “Why didn’t you come in before? Why did you wait outside all the time?” Adam was amazed. “You waited outside? In all this rain? You must be crazy.” I didn’t say anything, just wiping my feet all the time on the brown mat beside the door. And they said, “It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter, come inside,” but I went on wiping my feet, staring at the floor. In the end Adam took hold of my arm and pushed me into the house like he’d only just realized how wet I was. And I went inside and maybe they were sorry they’d said it didn’t matter because straightaway I made their carpet all dirty with mud. Then I took my shoes off and that made things worse because my socks were wet and torn and my feet were black, there was a black puddle under my feet and wherever I went in the house the puddle went with me. It was only then
they began to realize how much water I’d absorbed during the day. And so frozen and trembling before the girl’s stares, I started messing up their nice clean house.

There was nothing to do but shove me into the bathroom. It was the woman who realized the state I was in. She went and filled the bath with hot water and insisted on me getting in. The three of them started fussing around me, fetching towels, shifting the laundry out of the way. The woman was the most friendly, more than him, he was horrified at the dirt I’d brought into the house and maybe he was even sorry he’d asked me to help him with his job.

Before long I was alone, lying there in the hot bath with scented bubbles. In the hot water I slowly warmed up. It was nice lying in the Jews’ bath, in a little room full of coloured towels and all kinds of bottles. I don’t think anybody from the village has ever had a bubble bath like this in a Jewish house. Meanwhile they were looking around for clothes for me in place of the wet things that I’d taken off, but they didn’t find anything because they’d never had a son of my age, only a daughter, and they didn’t want to put me in a dress. In the end the woman, who was standing all the time on the other side of the door talking to me, suggested I put my pyjamas on while my clothes were drying on the radiator. I said, “Fine,” what else could I say, but I was so ashamed I could have drowned myself in the bath and to hell with this night job. I went on lying in the water, washing and scrubbing myself, at last I pulled out the plug and started cleaning the bath that I’d made very dirty. I dried it with a towel and I cleaned the floor as well and I even polished the sink, and I cleaned other things that I hadn’t made dirty but I didn’t know if they’d remember it wasn’t me. Already it was dark and I couldn’t find the light switch and so in the dark I put on the pyjamas, which were really crazy, and I thought of escaping through the window but there wasn’t a proper window there. I was scared to go out and I just sat there quietly in the dark. But they were getting worried about me and Adam opened the door and saw me in my pyjamas and burst out laughing, and the girl came running in to see me and she burst out laughing and the woman started laughing too, even though she came and took me by the hand and led me out of the bathroom. And I tried to
laugh too so they wouldn’t be embarrassed because they were laughing but somehow the laughing changed to tears. This was the end. I broke out sobbing. It was awful. It was all the weariness, all the excitement, I cried bitterly, it was years since I’d wept like that, not even when they buried Adnan. I couldn’t stop, like a baby, like an idiot, tears pouring out like the rain was still inside me, weeping and weeping before three strange Jews, before the girl I love who’ll never be my love.

Mommy and Daddy both said at once, “It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter, come inside,” but he was scared and confused, so serious, all the time wiping his feet on the door mat. A little Arab, one of Daddy’s workers, just think, Daddy’s got thirty workers like this and they’re all afraid of him. The poor kid had been waiting outside in the rain. But suddenly I recognized him, I’d seen him before, the boy who came here once to fetch Daddy’s briefcase. A nice kid. At last they got him inside, almost by force, they suggested he take his shoes off and he took them off, standing there in his torn black socks, still spreading dirt all around him. Such a silly boy, why did he have to wait outside in the rain? It isn’t a very nice thing to say but I was reminded suddenly of something that happened a few years ago. One day Daddy brought me a puppy that had been wandering around in the rain near the garage, it came rushing inside in high spirits (it didn’t think of wiping its feet outside) and immediately dirtied the floor and the carpet. And we washed it and combed it and fed it chopped meat, and we even bought it a leash and took it to the vet for injections, and the puppy was in the house for a month maybe until we saw he was growing fast and getting hard to control and somebody who knew about dogs told us “You’re rearing a donkey here, not a dog” and Mommy got scared and decided to give him away, even though I wanted to see how big he’d grow in the end.

And this time – it’s a boy, that is, a young man. Daddy’s brought him here to supper because he needs him tonight to break into the house of that man who disappeared.

Mommy took charge of him straightaway, took him under her
wing, because Daddy didn’t know what to do with him. Helpless ones like this are right up her alley, she waves a red flag and charges into battle. She took him by the hand and led him to the bathroom, he took off his wet clothes, she put them on the radiator to dry and sent him straight in to have a bath.

It seemed so strange having a guest in the house on a Sabbath eve in winter. It’s always so quiet here. We hardly ever have guests. Sometimes in the summer there’s some distant relative from Jerusalem who stays overnight but these last few years there hasn’t even been that.

Meanwhile, Mommy started looking around for clothes for him. But where do we have clothes for a boy of that age? You could put three of him in Daddy’s clothes. But Mommy went on looking, she even came into my room and started rummaging about in the wardrobe. I said to her, “Why don’t you give him a skirt? Why not, in Scotland they wear skirts.” But she got really angry, didn’t think it was funny at all. She began yelling at me, “You be quiet now, how dare you laugh at an unfortunate Arab? Keep your jokes to yourself.”