“Better focus on your glamorous job,” Taliunger whispers to me, so close I can feel her greasy make-up smudging my ear, “since, really, that’s the only thing you’ve got.”
Her straightforwardness surprises me. This is not how I remembered her. Dina was the straight shooter among us, and Taliunger a stealthier, back-stabbing type. But I guess motherhood forces you to look life in the face, and not waste time with detours.
To tell you the truth, it’s one of the things that always scared me, the changes your kids force on you, changes of the most profound kind, far-reaching kind, drastic changes in your behaviour and attitude.
What can I tell you? Even if you’re not that great, it doesn’t mean you’re willing to change.
Still with our backs to the wall, we’re staring straight ahead as Abraham banishes Hagar to the desert, see? He’s willing to sacrifice his other son too.
“Just for the record, my job is just as glamorous as yours,” I whisper to Taliunger, “and the invite to the conference still stands.”
“Unfortunately, it’s right when I’m putting the kids to sleep,” she replies.
A part of me is slightly disappointed with her answer, That’s your comeback, really? The kids’ bedtime?
I look at the weary, aching Sarah, and even though I’ve seen this movie dozens of times, my heart sinks. Because no matter how full her life is, so much living and doing alongside her husband, it’s not enough for her, and for the first time, I can’t help but wonder whether all my living and doing is enough for me.
The note with the “Israeli Idol” finalist is pulsing in my hand. Thrump! Thrump!
Thank God, the movie’s over. I can’t bear to stand next to Taliunger even one more minute, and the feeling seems to be mutual, because once the lights are flicked back on, we each dart to opposite ends of the auditorium.
Now we’re walking the kids in single (and crooked) file to the wax pavilion, and I wave the extra guard over to join us. I feel like I’m on autopilot, reciting the safety procedures, lecturing about the figurines, saying all the right words but with a heavy, cloudy mind.
Suddenly I hear the guard shouting, “What did you do?” with unbridled aggression.
I rush across the auditorium, in the direction of the Michal figure, who’s sitting there with her frozen gaze, my “tefillin” burning into her arm, and next to her stands the sweet, pigtailed owl holding a pen, her tiny body shaking.
“I just drew a flower next to the scratch,” she stutters and extends her arm innocently, showing me the tiny flower doodled next to her red scratch. Unfortunately, she drew it with the same pen I used to scribble the tefillin on Michal.
“Tamara!” Despite her petite size, Taliunger seems to tower over the owl like a gloomy presence. “What did you do?! Bad girl! Bad!”
And you’re a bad, bad counsellor, I want to say but don’t, and just when I’m about to intervene, the special ed assistant appears with the chief security guard, an older man with a raging red face, and they’re all closing in on Tamara, who’s curling into herself, trembling and blubbering, “No… I didn’t… not me…”
“Don’t lie, Tamara!”
Taliunger is much angrier than is warranted by such a minor event, Where’s all this anger coming from? How old is this anger? But unfortunately, she’s not the only one – they’re all glowering at Tamara with daunting disapproval, and my heart goes out to the little girl whose pigtails are fluttering with fear, but I can’t utter a single word.
Well, speak up!
I can’t do it.
Speak up!
I can’t.
Speak!
Can’t.
Even Michal is staring at me with her cold eyes, What are you waiting for? Go on! Help your little girl!
But that’s just it. Tamara isn’t my little girl. I have no doubt that if she were, I’d find it in me to confess, right away, without blinking. Because that’s what your kids make you do; they make you forget about yourself, about your habits, your fears, the many moments of shame and avoidance that have shaped you into who you are. Your kids will make you stretch the limits of your selflessness beyond recognition.
And that I just can’t do. Can’t.
Gloom lingers like a fog over the house.
I spend the entire evening sitting and staring at the walls, feeling depleted. The note with the “Idol” finalist’s phone number is neatly folded in my hand, but I can’t move, let alone speak. Tamara’s tiny, insulted owlish face is floating before me. Who wants a hug? Who wants a cuddle?
I’m still wall-watching when my phone bleeps with an incoming message. It’s a picture sent from an unknown caller, and I zoom in and see a blue, contorted face. A few moment pass until I realize it’s a picture of a drowned witch, with weights tied to her ankles and a rope coiled around her entire body, only her hair loose, unspooling like ribbons in the water. Her dead eyes are looking straight at me. It’s me.
22
NO, IT’S NOT ME, CAN’T BE.
Of course not, you were never a real witch, no matter how hard you tried.
I hold the phone up and eye the picture. It’s a painting. Whoever sent it obviously put in some serious effort. The resemblance is there, mostly around the jawline, and the thin hair floating around. Maybe something in the shape of our mouths. But the face in the painting is bloated and ugly. The face of a witch who failed the test.
With a detachment that surprises me, I continue to study the painting. It’s clearly a scene depicting the infamous “swimming test” from the Middle Ages, and even though I can’t determine the exact period, there’s something familiar about it; it rings a muffled but important bell, remember! But I can’t.
The swimming test was simple and cruel: if you were charged with witchcraft,
