Orchard (9780062974761)

by Hopen, David

  “That’s why Rava is my hero,” Oliver said reverently. “I’m very machmir on that.”

  “You’re machmir on that all year,” Noah laughed, “not just on Purim.”

  Even Rabbi Bloom allowed himself a momentary chuckle. “A simple dictum to drink yourselves into oblivion, an activity of which Mr. Bellow seems quite fond, is hardly aligned with Torah values. The danger of doing so, after all, is made apparent in the Gemara.”

  “The feast of Rabbah and Rav Zeira,” I said.

  Rabbi Bloom nodded. “Rabbah, Gemara Megillah tells us, drank himself into such a stupor that he accidentally murdered Rav Zeira, only to pray, successfully, for his resurrection.”

  “On-demand resurrection,” Amir said. “What a convenience.”

  “When the next year came around,” Rabbi Bloom continued, “Rabbah again invited Rav Zeira to his seudah. But Rav Zeira declined with the perfect response: ‘Miracles do not happen every hour.’”

  “Love it,” Noah said.

  “The point, of course, is that there’s something deeper at play in a night of sanctioned drinking. Why are we encouraged to reach the point at which we do not know?”

  “To set ourselves free from the everyday,” Evan said. “To separate from ourselves and see things in a new light.”

  Amir bit at his fingernail. “Is this the Zohar speaking?”

  “What sort of new light?” Rabbi Bloom asked.

  “Alcohol is just another way to overthrow the burden of self-consciousness,” Evan said. “To move beyond our usual restraints. If we drink properly, we can enter a reverie of sorts.”

  “We play characters, we drink, we step outside our bodies,” Rabbi Bloom said. “We do all this to peer beyond the self. And it’s cleansing, it allows for unique self-examination. But it’s also much more. It’s theater. It’s when we tap into unfettered creativity, when we are swallowed up in something greater.”

  “It’s when we feel divinity,” Evan said.

  “We do aim to feel kedusha. For when we’re dressed only in our bodies, we have a harder time elevating our vision. During Purim, while confronting the national tragedy that nearly resulted in our annihilation, we break with the routine to which we’ve become accustomed. Such is the inextricable link between Purim and Yom Kippur. On both days, averted disasters, flirtations with death, give rise to a new relationship with divinity. On Yom Kippur, the Kohen Gadol casts lots to determine which goat will live. On Purim, Haman, may his name be erased, casts lots to determine the timing of his genocidal decree. So on both days, human life hinges on caprice. But on a greater level, both days, in aspiring toward maximal holiness, demand rituals that defamiliarize the world as we know it so that we can give ourselves to creativity and godliness.”

  “Jeez,” Oliver grumbled in the hallway after we were dismissed, “here I was thinking that Purim was all about watching my father drink himself under the table. Silly me.”

  “Yeah, sort of ruins Purim for you, doesn’t it?” Noah joked.

  “No,” Evan said. “Just the opposite.”

  * * *

  WE HAD MEGILLAH READING IN SCHOOL. Amir, dressed as Danny Zuko—leather jacket, laughably tight pants, hair greased into place, sideburns elongated to the appropriate length—read for us in the assembly room. Rabbi Bloom, as Herodotus (monk’s robe, fake beard, walking staff), presided over the service from the front stage. It was a rowdy reading, freshmen setting off sirens and shooting streamers at every mention of Haman, Rabbi Feldman, dressed as Waldo, chasing someone in a gorilla suit. Oliver, a sexy mailman, circulated flasks. Evan arrived as Harry Houdini, Noah and Rebecca as basketball player and cheerleader, respectively, Remi as Catwoman and Davis as President Taft stuck in the bathtub, rubber ducky and all. Sophia drew sharp breaths in a long, white sleeveless dress, embroidered in gold, with flowing silk attachments at her back and bright bracelets adorning her wrists and forearms. A golden, beaded tiara crowned her head.

  “Who is she?” I asked Rebecca, attempting to contain my desperation, lowering my voice so that Kayla, to my left, wouldn’t hear.

  Rebecca smiled knowingly. “Athena. What’d you expect?”

  After the reading, Evan, to our surprise, announced he’d be throwing a party. I’d still never been inside his house and figured his rift with his father would make any sort of hospitality unpleasant. Yet, as he explained in the parking lot, while everyone shuffled into cars and headed toward his cul-de-sac, his father was away on business, leaving him free rein over the house.

  I convinced Kayla to join. She was in a sour mood, displeased I’d actually shown up as Hamlet, a move I was already regretting. Typically, Kayla declined my halfhearted invitations to join my friends, yet tonight, after some prodding, she agreed. She piled next to me in Oliver’s Jeep, grimacing at the residual smell of smoke, her absurdly long dress folded over my lap.

  Evan’s backyard was perfectly standard for the upper echelon of my friends. At the center of a large swath of grass was a circle of stones, inside of which was a stack of timber, positioned into a ten-foot-high teepee.

  “A bonfire,” Evan explained as the backyard began to fill. He lit the center aflame and stoked the fire with gasoline. “Purim Same’ach to all.”

  Students from all grades attended, still in Purim garb, hauling packs of beer and bottles of vodka. It was a strange sight: Cinderella, Pacman, a Hasid, Mickey Mouse, James Bond all dancing around the fire, swigging from bottles, sharing joints. Oliver was playing music from outdoor speakers. Amir broke out a guitar he found inside Evan’s living room. Having ensured the fire’s vitality, Evan disappeared into his house.

  “Want something?” I asked Kayla, taking her hand. She was surveying the backyard in disgust: binge drinking, smoking, several couples utilizing the cabana, a sophomore already sick in the garden. I was reminded of the way my father examined the layout of the Harris barbecue many months earlier. “Maybe let’s get you a drink?”

  “So this is what you guys do,” she said, gravel-voiced. “Like, is this just another evening?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You really drink this much, Ari? Because, to be honest, I’m pretty . . . horrified. This isn’t you.”

  I dropped the nearly empty beer can I was holding and, twisting my foot, crushed it into the grass. “Not at all,” I said, trying to sound light, jovial, kicking mud from my sneakers. “I never keep pace with these people.”

  Oliver approached, with Amir, Noah and Rebecca in tow. He was swaying on his feet, shirt removed, a handcuff dangling from one wrist. “You know,” he slurred, pointing at Kayla, “I . . . I bet you still tell the difference.”

  I couldn’t blame her for looking revolted: Oliver was gimlet-eyed, reeking of smoke, doused in sweat and vodka, his left nostril inflamed. “Pardon?”

  He stifled a drunken belch. “Mordechai. Haman. Good versus evil. Ying and Yang. Methinks you’re not drunk enough for Purim.”

  “I’m not even slightly drunk, thanks very much.”

  “Leave her be,” I told Oliver, physically moving him aside. He nodded obediently, stumbling off toward another circle to recite the same line.

  “Well, Kayla,” Rebecca said loudly, clearing her throat and observing Oliver out of the corner of her eye, “it’s nice to finally have you out with us.”

  “Yeah, I mean, we’ve been asking Drew about you incessantly. All these excuses?” Noah said, bottle in hand, trying to sound inviting. “We thought maybe he was hiding you or something.”

  “How funny,” Kayla said, brushing away, “no one seemed to ask a year ago. Or a decade ago. Excuse me.”

  “Right, then,” Amir said as Kayla stomped off. Rosy-faced from Svedka, he poured himself another shot. “Merry Purim, kids.”

  Rebecca elbowed my ribs. “You’re not going after her?”

  “I’ll let her cool off,” I said, finding myself another beer. As I stared off into the crowd, cringing at the prospect of dealing with Kayla, I noticed the patio doors t
o Evan’s house burst open. A golden glint: dark hair, a tiara, a figure in white gliding through night. Before I could stop myself, I stole away after her.

  “Sophia?”

  She stopped abruptly in her tracks, her eyes—red slits, slightly puffy—tracing the ground. “Hamlet,” she said, finally glancing up. “Been a while.”

  “Yeah, feels like it.”

  “Guess you’re talking to me again.”

  “It’s not like that,” I said awkwardly.

  She dabbed slightly at her right eye. “Really? You haven’t been avoiding me at all costs?”

  “Soph.” I poured the rest of my beer onto the grass. “I don’t really know what you expect from me.”

  We watched the stream of foam dissolve into dirt. I closed my eyes, visualizing her bedroom, the way she undressed. I wanted to remember what it was to kiss her. I wanted confirmation that our relationship hadn’t existed only in the confines of fantasy. “That’s quite an outfit,” she said.

  “Didn’t think you noticed,” I said lamely. Enormous waves of shame battered me: black, subterranean shame for my pathetically public display of affection, for standing with Sophia while Kayla wandered furiously, for losing Sophia in the first place.

  “You didn’t think I noticed you at the recital, either.” Again, she swiped hastily at her eyes. “That feels like a lifetime ago, doesn’t it?”

  It did, I told her.

  “You’re here with her?” she asked, puncturing a stretch of silence.

  “With Kayla? Yeah, I am.”

  She examined our surroundings. “Where is she?”

  “Around. Circulating.”

  Creed Sublime Vanille. Downturned eyes. Bare, slender arms. My heart attempted its desperate exit through my throat. “What were you doing inside?” I asked.

  “I’m leaving now.”

  I felt nauseous. My visual field temporarily threatened to disintegrate. “He’s in there?”

  “You should find Kayla,” she said.

  A great crashing from inside the doors: glass breaking against the floor. Over and over until, just as quickly as it started, it stopped.

  Panicking, I moved toward the house. “What the hell was that?”

  “Ari,” she said, quiet fear in her voice, “leave it alone.”

  I tried the door, but it was locked. I hammered the curtained windowpanes, peered inside. No light, no sound.

  A hand—gentle, flinching—on my shoulder. “Don’t go in.”

  “Why not?” I turned to face her, but she had dissolved into the night.

  A clear night, stars abound, rare for Florida. I was breathless, dizzy with anger. I reeled about, sweating from the damn fire—still burning, several freshmen tasked with adding fuel every so often—and joined Amir in one of the cabanas, hitting a joint with Lily and Gemma. I accepted two shots from a passerby, gagged on the second, dumped the cup on the floor. Pleurant, je voyais de l’or—et ne pus boire.

  I spotted Kayla across the yard, chatting spiritedly with a junior, another of her math students. My vision swam slightly, the landscape tilting so that it assumed a fatigued, sunken quality.

  “Should probably go after her,” Amir said, high-pitched. He passed the joint, his face frozen in a weed-induced, wide-eyed smirk.

  I inhaled deeply. “Yeah,” I said, rising, coughing, “I should.”

  “She’s your girlfriend or what?” Gemma asked, contorting her face with distaste. And then, whispering to Lily: “Talk about a fall from grace.”

  Staggering slightly, I made my way across the yard, walking too close to the fire, around which people engaged in drunken simcha dancing. I loosened my robes, realized I was still carrying Yorick in my pocket. I rubbed his head and, gently, added him to the pyre.

  A forceful hand on my midriff. Lips on my neck, a tongue probing my right ear. “Where’ve you been?” A low, seductive voice: the hair on my neck stood in place, my body falling limp. “Forgot about me?”

  I turned. Remi, still masked, blond hair spilling over her black suit, held my body. “Eden?” She teetered backward, releasing my hand. “What the actual—” Her eyes narrowed in revulsion. “The fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  “What am I doing?” Goose bumps overtaking my arms, a feral stirring in my chest. “You grabbed me.”

  “I thought you were Evan.” She rubbed her hands on her latex outfit, as if to disinfect them. The voice is the voice of Jacob, I thought, nausea building in my chest, yet the hands are the hands of Esau. “Jesus Christ. Just in the dark, from the side—you looked exactly like him.”

  I kept moving, my head spinning perilously, approaching Kayla at the edge of the backyard, nearly tripping over a sprinkler buried in the grass. “Kayla,” I said, restraining myself from grabbing her hand, praying she hadn’t seen me with Sophia or with Remi, “hi.”

  She nodded at her friend, who made a show of rolling her eyes in my direction before disappearing reluctantly. “About time, Ari.”

  “I’m really sorry.”

  “Where were you?”

  “I got—distracted.”

  “You reek.” She fingered her copy of Frankenstein. “It really is frightening. You’re an entirely different person around them. I mean, you’d never in a million years act like this without them, would you?”

  “I’m not,” I said. “I swear. I didn’t mean—”

  She kissed my cheek, allowing her lips to linger over my skin. “I’m going to leave.”

  “I’ll drive you home.”

  “Tell me you’re joking.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re high, Ari!”

  “Yeah, but hardly.”

  “Not to mention you don’t have a car here.”

  “True.” Running my fingers through my hair, trying to think on my feet, trying to sober. “So we’ll walk.”

  “I’ve already called my mom.”

  Confused silence. We turned to find Evan—black tailcoat, magician’s hat, shackles over his shoulder—striding toward the bonfire. He looked calm, as if nothing had happened behind those doors just minutes before, and carried a large, square frame, wrapped in a blanket. “Your attention, if you will,” he called out. Bodies moved gradually toward the fire, encircling him. Evan set down the object and instructed Amir—incoherently high, too high to object—to play on with the guitar. “After Purim,” Evan shouted, pacing before the fire, “we read of the Red Heifer in preparation of Pesach.”

  “What is this,” Kayla whispered, “a sermon?”

  Frenetic, drunken chords from Amir. “But on Purim, holiday of opposites, the Red Heifer, sacrificed to God as an atonement for our sins, finds its analogue in the Golden Calf, of all things, an idol, our most monumental sin. Why? Because purity and idolatry are two faces of the same coin. We must understand the relationship between what the Zohar calls leaving and returning, our urge to overcome this world and our urge to sanctify it. Now, seeing as we don’t have enough gold lying around tonight, I brought the next best thing.” He bent down, unwrapped the package: a small oil painting of a cubist bull, eyes crazed, legs splayed at excruciating angles, muscles rippling under its hide, a sword buried in its gray torso. “Our own bull,” Evan said, hoisting the painting above his head. His eyes resembled the bull’s: swollen, frenzied, pale-green in this light. “Our own way to mix kedusha and the sacrilegious, to purify ourselves through fire, to make ourselves a bit more worthy of seeing God. I hope my father doesn’t mind.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Kayla said, “is that a Picasso?”

  “Behold,” Evan yelled, tipping the painting into the fire, “the oneness that is hidden.” The music beat on, people screaming, rushing the bonfire, offering contributions—costume accessories, beer bottles, dollar bills, Amir’s guitar—our high priest at the center, watching Picasso turn to ash.

  March

  I have a horrible fear that my heart is broken, but that heartbreak is not like what I thought it must be.

  —Shaw, Heartbreak Hou
se

  I was clearing plates after dinner one night when my father broke his silence.

  “Aryeh,” he called, playing with his shirt collar. I stopped, lowering the piles of dishes I was carrying. “I have to ask you something, if you don’t mind.”

  I sat. My mother was in the kitchen with the faucet running.

  He looked me over, chewing his nails. “Do you enjoy being here?”

  My phone lit up with five texts from Kayla. I made a point of reading them before answering. “What does that mean?”

  “I’m asking if you—if we—are better off in this place.”

  “Better off than in Brooklyn?” I placed my phone back down. “Well, yeah, of course we are.”

  “You can say that so easily? Don’t you think you’ve—changed here?”

  “Sure I’ve changed. But, I mean, in good ways, I think,” I said, trying to contort my voice so that it sounded slightly more convincing.

  “When Hashem tells Avraham lech lecha, what do you think He intended for Avraham to become?”

  “I guess a filicide, right?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Nothing, sorry.”

  My father’s face dimmed. I thought then of Jacob finding Joseph’s bloodied tunic. Believing his son devoured by some beast, Jacob tears his clothing, dons sackcloth, refuses to be comforted by his other children. Rashi attributes Jacob’s inconsolability to a metaphysical phenomenon: a person cannot find solace over someone still alive, for it is heavenly decreed that only the dead, not the living, are to be erased gently from the human heart. Seated across from him at our modest table, I told myself that this is what my father must have felt: an inability to accept what supposedly remained of his son, agony at being trapped in a liminal state in which I was still there with him, still his boy, and yet slipping quietly into another realm from which he could not save me. “He knew Avraham would change, of course,” my father said, “because it’s only natural to change when you leave your birthplace and discover new worlds. But He hoped—He expected—that any change would be elevating. An ascent in kedusha, after having overcome the obstacles of a foreign country. A going away from home toward yourself, not a going away from yourself.”