“So you can feel bet er when you see me? So you won’t have to feel so bad? For your sake?” he said, embarking on his second favorite subject.
subject.
“Wel , why shouldn’t I want to feel less bad?” Ra said defensively. “What’s good about feeling bad? And if there’s nothing good about it, why endorse it?”
Volvo ignored this question. Instead he said, “Nice van. You’re obviously filthy rich.”
“My wife’s rich,” Rafi said.
“Yeah, what is she, a drug pusher?”
“She’s a pianist, Volvo, and I resent that comment. And if you want to come to my house I’d like an apology.”
Volvo grunted. “Very touchy.”
“I don’t like racist stereotyping.”
“I don’t even know your wife!”
“You assume she’s Sephardi like me.”
“You’re total y paranoid,” Volvo said. “I have no idea what your background is and I couldn’t care less.”
“Good,” Rafi said. “I’m glad to hear it.”
“So, how did she get rich?”
“Her parents are rich. They own a bathing suit company, they export to Europe and the States.”
“Obviously they’re not Sephardi,” he said wickedly. “Just kidding!”
Rafi decided not to respond.
“I used to like to swim,” Volvo said glumly. “Wel , those days are gone.”
“I forgot to ask the two of you if there’s any food you don’t eat or don’t like.”
“I eat everything except shrimp, brain, tongue, bel y but on,” I said. “Or liver. I don’t want to recognize anything I’m eating, that’s the general rule.”
“I’m a strict vegetarian,” Volvo said. “I don’t eat vegetables.” He began to laugh in his crazy, hysterical way.
“I did make a lot of vegetable dishes,” Rafi said in a worried voice.
“He’s just joking,” I said.
“I am present,” Volvo said imperiously.
“Yes, how could we possibly forget?” Rafi smiled.
It didn’t take us long to reach Ra ’s building. He pul ed the van in front of a luxury apartment building and helped Volvo into his chair. I wheeled Volvo into the lobby and we waited while Ra parked the van. I felt sorry for the lobby. The building was striving to look like one of the newer ve-star hotels along the beach and there was something rather desperate about the lit le water fountain with its blue and green lights, and the black leather sofas set careful y around it. Daniel used to say I was the only person in the world who felt sorry for places.
In the elevator Rafi pressed the but on to the penthouse floor.
“Penthouse!” Volvo said. “How pretentious can you get?”
“Those are the largest flats,” Rafi said. “My wife needs room for her piano.”
Ra ’s wife met us at the door. Her name was Graciela. She had fair skin, a high forehead, and long black hair braided in back. She was tal er than Rafi and she was untouchable.
Graciela’s shiny piano took up half the living room. The at was beautiful: thick beige carpets, a panoramic view of the sea, simple Danish furniture, framed paintings and prints on the wal s. An inviting place, elegant and sophisticated and at the same time bohemian. It matched Graciela’s out t: a top made of dark crimson velvet and lace, with owers in relief on the dark velvet, and a matching skirt. The velvet changed color with every movement or change of light, like the sea.
“Hel o, Dana,” she said. “I’m glad you could come. Our daughter just fel asleep, too bad you missed her. She doesn’t usual y go to bed so early, but she had a birthday party in the afternoon and she was tired.”
I couldn’t answer. “Excuse me, I don’t feel wel ,” I said, and escaped to the bathroom. There I sat on the edge of the bath and tried to find a way to resurface. I wanted everything Graciela had, except maybe for the at, because I loved our place, and when we moved it would be into a house Daniel designed. It would be as elegant, as sophisticated, as this apartment. But the rest hurt me. Once, a long time ago, I too wore beautiful clothes. And their daughter, their daughter! I was thirty-seven.
Rafi knocked on the door. “Dana? Everything okay?”
“Yes.”
He’d lied to me. He said he would protect me and he did the opposite. He flaunted it al .
“Can I come in?”
“If you want.”
Rafi came into the washroom, leaned against the sink.
“It’s not what you think,” he said.
