From a Sealed Room

by Rachel Kadish

  We walk the rim of the wadi. Dov and Rina step ahead, holding hands; Gil is not far behind me. I concentrate on keeping my footing, as if a sudden urge might overtake me and, before I had time to stop myself, I might step to the edge and slip silently down.

  Dov indicates the striated rock and the sharply diving sides of the channel; he is explaining flash floods for my benefit. The winter rain that falls in Jerusalem, he says, travels in growing rivulets over saturated soil, gathers force for kilometers, then bursts through the desert to carve the wadi deeper each year. He points out the smashed carcass of an automobile molded to a rock wall at the bottom of the ravine. “That’s the force of the water when it hits. About an hour after it rains in Jerusalem, you’ll see quite a spectacle here. That is, if you’re fool enough to stand above a flash flood. Not a cloud in the sky, and then there comes a river.”

  I stare at the twisted metal frame that was once a car, slammed far below us in a blind embrace with rock.

  “People die every year,” Rina comments from behind Dov. “Hikers. Kids. People who haven’t listened to the flash-flood reports. In the desert, the water can be as dangerous as the sun.” She peers down into the universe of air just beyond our feet. “Still, you should see this place when it’s in bloom. There’s nothing like the desert after a flood.”

  Only a few steps farther up the path, Dov points out the round black mouths of caves in the cliff opposite. “That’s where monks and other religious types used to go for isolation. You know, voices crying in the wilderness . . . this was one of their spots.”

  Rina leans into Dov’s sturdy body. “I couldn’t last ten minutes in isolation like that.”

  I squint across at the caves, each seemingly inaccessible; only after a moment do I make out the vague outline of a narrow track leading to one. I try to imagine days of silence along this curving channel of rock. Birds sweeping close then away, feverish hours blending into one another. And through it all, the slow shaping of prayer, psalmists and lunatics chanting their faith against the parched world beyond cave entrances. I know from the “Interesting Facts” section of my guidebook that ancient written Hebrew had no spaces between words, and I imagine phrase merging with phrase, sound upon sound upon sound, until it is no longer possible to know where one word of prophecy ends and the next begins.

  I think of the woman from the apartment downstairs.

  The strangeness of our parting returns to me now, and I puzzle over it once again. I recall the luminous expression on her face as she waited for me to respond, then its abrupt snuffing. She didn’t say what was wrong, she didn’t respond to my hand on her shoulder; when I brought her a glass of water she dropped it to the floor, she gripped my arm and stared at me as water pooled around her shoes.

  Who will put out this fire? she said. Who if not you?

  Closing my eyes against the bright twisting layers of rock, I’m hit with a longing sharp as homesickness: I wish the woman from downstairs had come with us.

  “I didn’t say that!” Rina’s footsteps crunch against stone as she brushes past me.

  My eyes fly open.

  “And if you want to believe it,” she tells Dov with quiet intensity, as though Gil and I were not standing between them, “then stay in the damn army your whole life and see if I care. Drop me a letter someday and tell me how it went.”

  Dov stands watching a hawk sail high across the wadi. His jaw is clenched with unspoken retorts.

  The four of us stand at the verge, forearms shading our eyes.

  “It’s getting hot,” Gil says.

  “Let’s go,” Dov agrees. “The more driving we do before noon, the better.”

  At the base of the hill, I settle into the sun-blasted air of the car’s interior. I tell myself, without knowing whether I believe it, that if the woman from downstairs were here with us this morning she could interpret the seared wilderness, and my cousin’s strained hospitality, and Gil’s unreadable face, which fills me with hope and unease. I swear to myself that when I return to Jerusalem I will figure out what she wanted, and find a way to give it to her.

  Consulting a map, Rina grimaces. She raises a water bottle to her mouth and takes a long drink. “Here comes the fun part of the drive.”

  You have betrayed me.

  Air pools stagnant in this hall. Every patch of darkness every shadow reveals its shape to me.

  O American.

  A whispering beats against my eardrums, Halina’s voice is harsh, my hands grasp in vain for hers but touch only each other So you see, she says, the American did not make us whole.

  All night I sit straight-backed against this apartment wall, my suitcase beside my knees. Day rears across the sky, too quickly. I press my throbbing temples, I must think. No food or drink passes my lips, my heart beats with stubborn precision.

  O my American. You did not soothe their pain. You did not comfort me. Your promises Your promises were lies.

  You are quiet as these sabbath streets, other pilgrims climb to Your door but You turn them away in Your displeasure.

  Answer me quickly, American; my spirit can endure no more.

  At last sabbath fades, the blacks bid wistful farewell. An evening, a morning, a new day. Above me You stir. First a ringing to wakefulness, then a smell of coffee.

  Suddenly You are before me. You walk burdened with the Israeli. Your head is sunk You watch Your sandaled feet on the stairs, You are careful of every step. You do not turn to see me crouched here in this doorway.

  But I see what it is You carry. You hurry past me but You cannot hide from me the suitcase You bear.

  So You would escape from me and leave me here in dust, my knees folded to sky You would escape me like a new-hatched bird beyond a fence, flying to Your own redemption while the earth below You burns.

  You leave this stairwell silent, voices call from the street below. Slamming of metal doors, quick steps. A car engine jumps, fades into the distance before I have risen to my feet.

  You shall not abandon me. You shall not. O American, teach me to do Your will, for You are my only hope. I shall stand on these stiffened limbs, I shall follow You with all my heart with all my soul with all my means, for without You there is nothing.

  Halina, I whisper to the pearl-lit dawn as I descend in the footsteps of the American. At each labored step my suitcase bruises my leg. We must believe.

  And my faith is rewarded, for You will not forsake me after all. On the street it is easy to find the one You have left behind to guide me to You. Her arms swing with vigor, her mouth breathes melodies. I am Your ever-grateful servant I shall follow.

  Dov drives with his hands at the base of the steering wheel. His face is hardened in a squint.

  I’ve never seen land like this. The hills rise on and on around us, a uniform brown save a sprinkling of tangled weeds. Most are striated by narrow tracks constructed by the Bedouin to ensure that not a drop of scant rainfall be wasted; the rocky domes spiral toward the sky. On one arid slope a Bedouin boy stands amid a weary-looking flock. Heads dipping rhythmically between their bony shoulders, the goats nod up the hill around him. The boy wears Western clothing and a tattered white headscarf; his face is hidden from us. When we’ve passed him he turns, and watches until we disappear beyond another crest.

  My head vibrates with the brightness. I’ve forgotten my sunglasses and I close my eyes now and again for relief. All around the Subaru, rocky ground touches pale blue heaven, with no clouds to blur the harsh line of horizon. There is no more than a hint of green to ease the eye, or distract it from gazing toward limits. The vaulting sky lifts my gaze, the glaring sun casts it down, and still the hills continue. I rest my palm on the window frame, and jerk back from the glinting strip of metal.

  The highway makes a last pass between multiplying domes and then, impatient with playing in the atrium of the wilderness, twists to one side and enters the hills. The engine labors as we begin a first sharp ascent; not until we’ve crested the second do I remember to exhale.
The road twists and curves on itself as we climb the hills deeper into the Arava. At each hairpin turn, the veined and marbled desert spreads farther below us; only a flimsy guardrail and a scattering of pebbles mark the edge of the road.

  Dov has long since dropped out of conversation, and he concentrates on the view through the windshield. As we approach each curve, Rina reaches over and honks the horn to warn any oncoming drivers. Dov consents without a word. The two of them gaze fiercely at the road, eyes half shut against the glare.

  The questions I’d thought to ask Dov and Rina, the comments designed to show them I am not so sheltered as they think, now settle in a knot in my throat. What do you think of Rabin? What of Peres? What in your estimation is the impact of ongoing conflict in the territories?

  The spiraling car points into the noon sky. I don’t want Dov to be distracted, I don’t want him to hit his eyes from the road for even an instant to mull over some quirk of my Hebrew accent. I sit back and try to focus on the view swinging in and out of sight before us.

  At one curve my fears are realized—the Subaru’s horn is answered by a deeper one from above. Dov pulls to the right and brings the car to a stop. We wait flush against the face cut into the hillside, my window inches from blond rock. Ahead of us looms a tourist bus, glittering blue and dust-coated. It swings out in an impossible arc sure to carry it off the narrow road and tumbling into the valleys and plains below. Through the tinted windows of the bus I see the shadows of silent Americans or Europeans, looking out at a landscape as foreign as the moon. Swinging back toward us, the bus passes so close that when Dov reaches out a hand and pats its metal flank, we seem to be traveling through a tunnel of rumbling shadow.

  After the bus is gone, I stare onto empty road. I blink at a new world of bright and blessed silence.

  Dov starts the car up the hill again.

  With the field glasses to his eyes, Gil scans the desert spread like an ocean floor below us. “Not even a camel out there today,” he remarks.

  Dov’s fingers tap the steering wheel. I see him brace for the next curve.

  “You’d need to be a camel to go out at noon,” I say. “Or else drive a tanker full of water.”

  Gil sucks his teeth as if displeased, but I see that he is flirting with me. “It’s not such a big deal, Little Miss American. All you need is a water bottle and a good hat.”

  “Yeah, well. A big water bottle. And a huge hat.”

  Now Gil is grinning. “Little Miss American.” He repeats the new nickname like a badge of honor. He winks at me. “What kind of imbecile would want to run around in the desert at midday, anyway.”

  Gently Rina places her hand on the back of Dov’s neck. I recall now what Fanya said about Dov: a friend dead, of dehydration.

  But Dov drives on as if he’s heard nothing.

  Gil leans back, pats my thigh. “The only ones fool enough to enjoy it are those macho special-unit trainees. They’ve got to prove they’re as tough as the camels, and as dumb.”

  Even the forced smile fades from Rina’s lips.

  The heat of the day is gritty between my teeth. My head begins to hurt from the sun.

  “How about lunch sometime soon?” Gil says. No one answers him.

  “There are a lot of reasons to be in the desert.” My words fall into the silent interior of the car. “Sometimes if you’re in the desert there’s nothing you can do, sometimes there just isn’t enough water. Sometimes no matter how much you bring with you it’s not enough.” I know I sound idiotic but I can’t stop.

  Dov has shrugged free of Rina’s hand. He edges forward in his seat, his weight hovers over the steering wheel.

  “It’s easy to get stuck without water,” I conclude.

  Rina is watching Dov.

  Searching the bags by my feet for our lunches, I cast about for a way to return conversation to more neutral ground. I ask myself, What would my mother say to defuse this situation?

  I straighten. “What do you two think of the reports of peace breakthroughs in Oslo?”

  Rina turns and stares at me in open incredulity.

  Dov is driving faster. The next curve slings me against Gil’s unyielding shoulder.

  Gil gives a short laugh. “Where did that come from?”

  I think I’m going to cry. “I want to know what they think the future is going to be. I want to know if they think there’s a way out of it all.”

  “A way out of it all?” Gil hoots. “What, you mean a way out of war?” His speech has turned caustic. “No one’s going to find a way out of that one, honey. Not the right, not the left. No one’s going to clear up this mess. Not in this world, anyway.” He falls silent for a few seconds. Then, in a softer voice, he asks me, “Didn’t you see my exhibit?”

  I catch Rina looking at Gil in the rearview mirror, and the expression on her face is pure distaste.

  “I’m just asking what they see in the future,” I repeat dully.

  Dov has twisted in his seat to face us.

  Rina reaches for the steering wheel. “Dov, the road.”

  Dov is looking at Gil with a pure, unreasoning rage. I know immediately from the knocking of my heart that I’ve seen this expression before. Dov turns back to the windshield; his hands are trembling, as if he, too, is afraid of what might happen next. The car drifts wide on a curve, spitting sand over the side of the road.

  “Give me the binoculars,” he says lightly.

  “What?” Gil’s face is frozen in an incredulous grin. When Dov does not answer, Gil laughs hoarsely. “What, you’re going to throw my binoculars out the window because I said something you don’t like about politics?”

  At first Dov offers no reply, and I think he is going to retreat to his earlier indifference. Then he speaks. “Give me the fucking binoculars.”

  “Why should I?”

  Dov doesn’t answer.

  Gil looks at me. I look back at him. I have nothing to offer. We sit side by side on the narrow jolting seat.

  Cradling the binoculars, Gil hesitates. Then, without a word, he holds them out to Dov.

  Something about Dov’s laughter makes me shrink back in my seat. He lifts the binoculars, and then he is holding them to his eyes with one hand and patting the shimmying steering wheel with the other as he would a restless animal. The car veers toward the rock face, toward the line at the center of the road, and back.

  Rina swears and grabs at Dov, but he shakes her off with one swing of his arm. “Dov,” she shouts. “Dov, are you crazy? Give me the binoculars.”

  The car jolts ahead, swerves toward the center of the road and then across, narrowly missing the pebbled edge before swinging back toward the center. Below us the hills turn slowly. Dov is driving with one palm flat against the wheel. He holds the binoculars to his eyes, his face is contorted with laughter. “I’m looking into the fucking future,” he whoops. “I’m looking into the future to see what’s ahead.” There are tears running down his cheeks.

  Gil and I are thrown against each other and against the metal frame of the Subaru, and as Dov drags the wheel to the left I see the desert floor spin below, a garden of rock and heat and sun. Gil is gripping my hand tightly; all I can think is that my fingers will break. Then we swing once more, and I am aware of boulders, heaving below like waves in an ocean. Stones dance in circles and spiral to the heavens like mountain goats; hills skip forward to greet us, we will meet them in midair, fly to their embrace and lift our faces to the sun as we fall. I am free, I think. I am falling, I will plunge to that burning valley. How easy it is, after so much struggle; we are like puppets, Gil and I, flung about this metal frame that strains toward the desert floor.

  Only Rina is real. Rina, sitting in the front seat screaming Dov’s name. In her face is an intensity of will; her green eyes shine with a single message I can barely fathom: Stop.

  “It’s the future, look at it, it’s beautiful.” Dov is yelling, his voice sings with sorrow. The car spins out in its widest arc, the gravel at the edge o
f the road rains up against the metal below my feet. The car tilts at the edge of the paved surface and I know that the wheels are about to go over; there is a look of great regret and understanding on Dov’s face. Gil grips my hand between both of his.

  Then we are slowing. We have slowed. We are nearly at a stop. Dov has dropped the binoculars. He is staring ahead, his shoulders slumped, every bit of strength drained from him. Rina’s hand is on the steering wheel. Her eye on the road, she edges the tilting car back toward the pavement. “It’s going to be okay now, Dov,” she is saying. “It’s going to be okay. Let’s stop the car.”

  We come to a stop. There is absolute silence. Gil is paler than I have ever seen him. He stares straight ahead. Dov sits with his forehead to the wheel, caught in a dream. Sun beats on the metal, inches above our heads. If Dov were to open his door it would swing out over air. His foot would land, lightly, on a few inches of loose stone. Then nothing.

  “Do you want me to drive?” Rina asks. “I’ll drive.”

  Gradually, Dov seems to wake. “No.” The single word is filled with awe. He lifts his head and looks past Rina, out the side window, at the road. “No,” he repeats. “I’m all right.” Then he’s silent. His eyes beg Rina’s forgiveness.

  He steers the car gently back toward the center of the road and carefully pilots us up the hill.

  Near the top I am able to slip my fingers out of Gil’s hands. He does not look at me; he looks out the side window toward the safety of the rock face. His jaw is trembling. “Crazy fucker,” he says to the window.

  Dov does not seem to hear him, and soon the road levels out onto a ridge.

  The barred and locked skies declare it. These glaring streets mock my failure. I am lost.