I drove to Sde Boker slowly.
Dikla was engrossed in her phone, texting busily to someone.
Shira fell asleep. Or pretended to be asleep. Which dealt a death blow to any chance I could catch a glimpse of her face.
When we arrived, she wanted to say goodbye at the gate.
But the suitcases, I said.
I’ll manage, she said, putting an end to the conversation.
Then there were another few seconds of silence. And desert wind. And the wait for a divine voice to come from the heavens as it did when Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac: Lay not thy hand upon—
Then she kissed us both on the cheek.
And said to Dikla, Mom, don’t cry. It doesn’t suit you.
We remained standing in front of the gate for a few seconds. Watching as she walked away. Then we got into the car and sat there in silence. Not speaking. Not moving. For quite a while.
You’ll definitely write about this trip, won’t you, Dikla finally said.
What? Where is that coming from now? I said.
But she chuckled and said, I hope you’ll at least write the truth.
The truth?
I know you. You’ll add a quote from some poet. Describe the desert. Do everything not to incriminate yourself. Oops, sorry—not to incriminate “the character of the father” in the story.
Incriminate myself? In what, exactly?
Are you serious?
Explain it to me, incriminate myself in what?
When, in your opinion, did we begin to lose Shira?
It wasn’t a specific moment, Diki, it was an ongoing—
I’ll tell you exactly when it was. When you wrote about her in that book.
It wasn’t about her—
You think she’s stupid?
But she never—
Read it? I know that in your fantasy, she’s only supposed to read your books on her future trip to South America. But reality doesn’t always line up with your fantasies.
How do you know?
I read it in her blog.
What blog?
Ophelia’s Blog. A friend sent me a link, and after the third post, I realized it was her. Here. Read it.
From Ophelia’s Blog:
My Dad
My dad tells stories. That’s his profession. He tells stories to other people. And sometimes to himself. Let’s say he really loves to tell himself that he’s a good person. And a good dad. And if something doesn’t fit that image, he ignores it. For example, if he takes things from his daughter’s private life and puts them in his book without asking her permission, he’ll tell himself that he’s disguised it enough so that no one will notice. He really loves that word “disguised,” my dad, and he’s right. When the book came out, no one really noticed that he stole from his daughter’s soul. Except for his daughter, who read a passage from the book on the Internet. And didn’t say anything about it to him because the moment she realized that anything she tells him might appear later in one of his books, she doesn’t want to share anything with him anymore.
My Mom
Mysterious. I wish I could be as mysterious as my mom. And regal. I have a kind of ordinary walk, and she always moves like a dancer, straight and tall. I can’t hide my feelings. If I love someone, I have hearts in my eyes. But she—she doesn’t give of herself easily. Only in small doses. And only to someone she really likes. Let’s say, I have about ten girlfriends and though I divide bits of me among them, I actually feel alone most of the time. My mother only has two friends, Gaia and Hagit, but they are really close. In any case, she’s fine with being alone. She’s not afraid of it. And she always seems to be holding on to a secret. That’s probably why Dad and other men are crazy about her. I think her secret is that she doesn’t know how to be happy. But I’m not sure.
My Mom and my Dad
They once loved each other very much. I tell that to my sister, Noam, and she doesn’t believe it. So I tell her that I’m the oldest and I’ve been in the house the longest, so she has to believe me. There used to be things like this too: Dad and Mom do a slow dance in the living room after Friday-night dinner. Dad and Mom laugh their heads off in the middle of the night. Dad and Mom go on vacation alone and leave us in Ma’alot with Grandpa. They don’t go on vacation alone anymore. And there’s always a kind of tension in the house, mostly in the area of the kitchen and the living room. As if, any minute, something’s going to fall and break. That’s another reason I want to move to Sde Boker.
—
I don’t remember anything about the drive back. Only that, at some point, it started to pour. And all at once, it stopped completely when we reached our street. The wipers kept working. Of all the songs in the world, David Bowie’s “Absolute Beginners” was playing on the radio. We stayed in the car for another few seconds. We didn’t speak. We had the feeling that when we stepped out of the car, we would be stepping into a totally different life. Why are there no Japanese in your books?
Because of what they did to David Bowie in Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence.
Writing is sometimes (perhaps always?) an attempt (destined to fail?) to get even.
—
Dikla was the one who introduced me to Bowie.
A few weeks after we started dating, we reached that moment when you feel secure enough about the future to ask about the past. So I asked who her first had been. David, she said.
David? I wondered. It sounded like the name of a volunteer on a kibbutz.
Bowie, she explained. Some people call him Ziggy Stardust.
Wow, I smiled, that’s a pretty high standard.
I had no choice, she said, and I didn’t smile. Boys in Ma’alot never gave me a second glance.
They probably wanted you but were scared, I said.
No they didn’t, she said. They just wanted other girls. More easygoing ones.
So…You hung a lot of
