A Room of Their Own

by Rakefet Yarden

  “What happened there?” I asked quietly.

  “I don’t know anything about you, Rotem,” she said without looking at me.

  “What would you like to know?”

  “I don’t feel that it’s right to ask you questions,” She said.

  “Ask me, and I’ll answer as best I can.”

  She momentarily looked up at me. “You were sexually assaulted, right?”

  “Right.” I looked at her. One out of every three women, I thought to myself.

  She didn’t want to know any more than that.

  “He would come to watch over us when Mom went abroad to conferences and Dad was doing night shifts,” Dani said. “He’d make dinner, always giving us extra dessert. He’d tell us bedtime stories, hug us, and leave the room. On those nights, I’d dream about monsters in all sorts of shapes chasing me until they’d catch up with me and block my path, sit on my stomach. He’d wake me up with a light caress and say, ‘Dani, sweetie, you had a bad dream again. Poor dear. Grandpa’s here.’ And it just continued that way. One time he even told Dad, ‘The kid screams in her sleep. Maybe you should check to see if anything’s happened to her at school.’ Such nerve!”

  Dani lifted her feet up to the armchair and hugged her knees. “One night, I had a cold, and I couldn’t manage to fall asleep because I had trouble breathing. I was in bed with my eyes shut, planning my costume for the school Purim masquerade, and then he came into the room.”

  Dani was quiet again for a minute. “He came closer, slowly pulled the blanket off me, and put his hand on my stomach. I froze. He slowly advanced down my stomach. Don’t look at me,” she suddenly requested then continued. “I eventually managed to cough. I didn’t open my eyes.” Dani froze, and disappeared for a good few minutes.

  “He told me, ‘Your blanket fell off the bed. Let’s tuck you in so that you don’t catch cold, Dani.’ Then he left the room, and I realized who that monster was that always chased me at night. I didn’t tell them. Grandpa was like God to them. They would have probably just said that I’d dreamt it, or something like, ‘Your mind’s just in a loop from all those books you read all day long.’ So I just stopped eating. I thought that it would keep him away. Always complained that we were too skinny. It worked. I think that was the point when he moved on to Tal. She always did sleep deeper than me.” Dani gave a sad smile, silent, recoiled.

  A thick dark cloud of gloom spread over the room.

  Dani looked at the clock. “I need to go. Time’s up.”

  “Do you really need to go, or do you need five more minutes?” I looked at her.

  Her eyes answered me.

  “Sit for a bit longer,” I asked.

  Let’s scatter the cloud together, I said in my mind.

  Morning with Yulia

  I woke up from the sound of bells and a little boy hopping on my bed to their beat. Looking at the phone and seeing that it was 7:30, I felt the stress beginning to rise, and then remembered that it’s Wednesday. It’s my morning off. But I still need to take Yotam to school. When will he finally grow up and be able to go on his own? We rode our bicycles there, me on my silver bike, Yotam on his green mountain bike, and Snoopy, running after us all the way there. He’d occasionally stop to sniff something, then speed after us and catch up. I’d found it impossible to keep up with him before I got this bicycle. A hound that requires vast spaces which, in the city, can only be found by the sea. How can anyone live in a city without a beach?

  After Yotam waved goodbye and went into the school, Snoopy and I continued to Rehov Bograshov and joined Yulia at our usual corner on the beach. Yulia’s been with me since pre-school, but with a few breaks. Her family had immigrated here from Russia straight to Kiryat Shemona, just like my family. Her parents worked long days at the factory, and she used to spend hours on end at our house, enchanted. “You’re so lucky that you never get left alone,” she’d say. You wouldn’t believe how lonely it can get in a house full of children, I’d think to myself, not sharing it so as not to burst the fantasy bubble, maintaining my superiority in any way possible.

  When we became adults, Yulia fulfilled her dream of having a big family, and I fulfilled my dream of having a small family. I’d always insisted on keeping room for other things, while Yulia enthusiastically delved into her dream home. Forty students as a high school teacher, five children of her own and one husband don’t leave too much spare time for childhood friends or for anything else, for that matter. For years I was busy feeling insulted and keeping track of which of us was there for the other one more, and which was less. I grew distant. Along with Emily’s distance, I just told myself that I didn’t need anyone, and that it was easier to be alone and without all the petty nonsense. After a few months, when I’d already started sensing the weight of life’s burden, Yulia suddenly called me.

  “How are you, Rotem? I miss you. We haven’t spoken since last Passover.”

  I imagined her embarrassed on the other end, playing with her curls, but I didn’t feel like giving her an easy time. “Yeah. Why is that?” I asked.

  “Why? Come on. You know: Life. There’s not much free time, and to be honest, you didn’t seem to be that enthusiastic about it either. Never mind all that. I’ve gone back to painting, after a whole year. I’ve run out of air. Will you join me?”

  “But I don’t paint.”

  “Of course you do, you just paint through words. Just bring your laptop with you and come meet me. Healthy snacks and herbal tea on me.” Yulia always takes care of all the details. And so, as direct as always, she re-entered my life.

  At our usual corner, the mat was already spread out with a thermos on it, as well as cups, fruit, and a newspaper. Yulia was wearing comfy pants, a light-blue sleeveless shirt, and a wide-brimmed straw hat tightly covering her head. She was assembling her drawing stand and spreading out her paints the way fishermen spread their nets, preparing to catch fluttering pieces of life within them. I took the laptop out of my bag. A pleasant morning breeze came from the sea, turning the newspaper pages all the way to the headline on the back page. “Complaint filed about affair between patient and therapist. She: He took advantage of me. He: It’s true love.”

  “What do you have to say about that?” Yulia gestured towards the headline that caught her attention.

  “What do I have to say about it? I claim the throne, so what? You’re asking me the way people question religious folks after it turns out that some rabbi behaved immorally. There are unequal relationships everywhere, not just in therapy. There’s always someone who wants to save someone, and someone who wants to be saved,” I said.

  “Saved, or taken advantage of. I get it when patients fall in love with their therapists. That seems pretty logical to me, even called for, considering someone smart and kind listens to you for an hour a week. But I don’t get it when it’s the other way around,” Yulia said.

  “I think that it doesn’t really have anything to do with being a therapist. Some people just get off on it, on having someone dependent on them.”

  “Has it ever happened to you?” Yulia asked me.

  Snoopy was catching some waves. He then ran out of the water and shook himself dry with his tail high in the air, droplets glistening on his fur. I managed to leap up and rescue the laptop just before the unexpected shower.

  “Some patients admit to it sometimes, and I try to talk about it without embarrassing them. If they were to spend one day of their lives with me, they’d soon realize that it’s not as much fun as our sessions, where they have my full attention.”

  “But has the opposite ever happened to you, where you found yourself falling in love with a patient?”

  “Actually, no. I don’t find mental nudity and neediness sexy, and anyway, I don’t believe that people can be saved from themselves for a long time, either within the clinic or outside it. Ever since Yochai, I’ve no longer wanted that r
ole of keeping people alive. Which reminds me: I sat here with Omer this week, Emily’s son.” Just like every time Yochai comes up in conversation or in my mind, I quickly changed the subject. “He wants to go rescue his mom from herself. Emily got a slap in the face from life, and I didn’t manage to be there for her, as usual. On the contrary, I added more pain to her suffering. She held it together for two years, until she upped and went to Ma’ayan Baruch last year. I didn’t even know about it.”

  “It’s always been like that between you two. She’ll probably get in touch soon. She always comes back. You’re sisters.”

  “Yeah, I hope you’re right. It’s been a while now, and this time I really did go too far. I really didn’t intend to tell Omer about what had happened with his father, but is it really so terrible that a child who’s no longer really a child, understands that his father wasn’t a saint? It’s one thing for the whole world to continue believing it, but doesn’t he deserve the truth? It was during the shiva. Bad timing, and I came out tactless and embarrassing, as I always do. I realized that she didn’t have any extra energy left in her at that point, and I waited for her to get through it. I’m still waiting.”

  “So why not go with him?” Yulia asked.

  “What, and just suddenly show up there? She doesn’t talk to anyone. They have a new thing now of not getting in touch with anyone for a whole year, and just staying focused on the body of pain. Can you imagine that, not speaking to your children for an entire year?”

  “She must have gotten quite a slap in the face. What do they do up there?”

  “Vipassana workshops for the masses. Can you imagine Emily in hippie clothing? Just the thought of it makes me giggle.”

  Since when have I been so judgmental? When you were born, I answered myself. That doesn’t skip over me, or, more precisely, it begins within me. In an attempt to shed it off, I turned to complain about something else.

  “I can’t write. You’re so lucky to be painting. It looks so much easier,” I said.

  “Then why don’t you, if it’s that easy? “Stop the speaking nonsense,” as Mama Yelena always says. If you stop writing about yourself, then you won’t get stuck. How many diaries have you filled since you learned how to write? Why don’t you try writing about something else?” Yulia suggested.

  “How would I know how to write about something else?”

  “Life always seeps in, no matter what we do. Take a step back from the big picture.”

  “You’re painting a self-portrait, too,” I tried, knowing all too well that no one can really argue with Yulia.

  “True, but I paint from the side, not from the inside. Try to imagine what you’d be without the disappointment towards your sister.” Yulia then went quiet and fixed her eyes on the painting, trying to capture a pensive facial expression.

  “Do you have any idea how many canvases I’ve filled with images of seas and forests? Rotem, you can’t empty out the ocean - which is also something that my mother always says - so stop trying to do it. All you’re doing is draining yourself of your tears.”

  Her decisiveness and self-assured statement irritated me. It also reminded me of Emily. I remembered why I hadn’t been in touch with her for all this time, and I also realized that I’d missed them both, and missed that aspect of them specifically. They never prettify or hide anything and say what they think even when it’s unpleasant for me to hear. All right, then argue your case, I told myself. If they can say what they think, then so can you.

  “You don’t get it, Yulia. It’s been years since the last time I really cried. I’ve just been quietly weeping, without understanding what pains me and why. It turns out that it’s much easier to be angry than to ache. What can I do? I love her, and she’s totally shut me out. She just left, disappeared into herself. When faced with Omri, I’m a real big hero, explaining to him about acceptance and mourning, rambling on about the same clichés as she does.”

  “Here’s an idea for you, Rotem: Instead of whining all on your own, why don’t you find yourself a partner?”

  “Again with your partners?”

  “Wait, don’t pounce on me yet. I’m not talking about a guy. I get it, ever since Yotam first looked at you with his sparkling eyes and said, ‘I love you, Mommy,’ no other man could ever touch your heart again. Here’s a writing assignment for you: a nighttime encounter with a jackal. I do this with my literature students, and they always come up with crazy stories. And here’s another idea: There’s no such thing as being totally shut out. You said that they do Vipassana workshops for the masses? Then go there and be silent for a while. It could do you some good.”

  “After the army I traveled through Ladakh, and someone I’d met at a Jewish tent there asked me to join him for a Vipassana. I told him, “No way! I’m not going to sit down for 10 days without talking.” What I wouldn’t give for that kind of peace nowadays. . . But to be honest, it still scares me. If I’m already taking time off everything for 10 whole days, I’d prefer a hammock on the beach with a frozen margarita and a steak. Why do I need to sit on a mat and stay silent in order to find some peace?”

  “Eleven days,” Yulia said.

  “Huh?” I asked, confused.

  “You have to take into account an extra day for settling in and practicing. Then you start, and you land back in the world again on the tenth day.”

  “All right . . . Wait a minute! How do you know? Do you mean to tell me that you’ve done it and never told me about it?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “I did it two years ago, after settling matters with my family and telling my mother about what had happened with her brother 200 years ago. I thought that I was able to put it behind me, and that I could sit with myself without falling apart because of what had happened. I didn’t want you to make me doubt myself and stop me. I knew you’d think that I was taking a risk, that I’d go back to the pills − or worse, that I’d be hospitalized, even though 25 years had passed since my breakdown. You talk a lot about self-reflection, and you work with it too, but you’re also scared of it. Admit it.” She squinted at me, and then returned to her painting, swapping brushes. “I already felt strong enough from my job and the kids and therapy, everything I’d built for myself over the years. Childhood friends are like sisters, remembering everything from years back, like frozen time capsules.”

  “Wow.” I collapsed inside. “I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry. How was it?”

  “The Vipassana?” Yulia smiled. “It was the best thing I could have given myself. Even better than a margarita on the beach.”

  Yulia peeled an orange and poured tea from the thermos into little glass cups. The scent of oranges arose, and alongside it resurfaced a little girl sitting on her bed for days, waiting for her sister to come back from her school trip. It was the first time she’d slept without her, and it had already been two nights. She didn’t go to school because her legs were weak.

  At night, once the sister returned, their father says, “There, your Emily’s come back to you.” The little girl is so embarrassed. Just wants to leap onto her sister and hug her tightly, but she doesn’t budge. In order to conceal the excitement in her eyes, she jumps onto the backpack and asks, “Did you leave me any candy?”

  Emily gives a coy smile. “No, it was a long trip and the food was gross, so this is all that’s left.”

  She wants to hug her, but instead of wrapping her arms around her, she quickly opens the backpack. It’s indeed almost entirely empty. Nothing but the strong scent of three neglected oranges at its bottom.

  No. I shook off my slivers of thoughts the way Snoopy shook off the seawater. I’m not going. I promised myself that I was done with all of that. I’m not chasing her again. I don’t need anything from her. The little girl who’d waited for her for so long, who was so embarrassed to admit she’d missed her sister that she ended up having to talk about stupid snacks − that little girl�
�s no longer here. Omer can take care of his mother’s affairs all by himself, and besides, even if I’d wanted to go, what would I do with Yotam?

  “Come on, Rotem, give in to your love already. Maybe that girl’s grown up, and underneath her is a trusting woman? Look at how you’re still embarrassed to admit that you really love her, even now.”

  “You’re the only person in this world who lets herself talk to me like this, sticking the whole truth in my face. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I know, of course I know. And don’t worry about Yotam, while you’re away with your silence, he’ll be in full volume with my five little chicks. That way he’ll really learn what it’s like to have siblings. Think about it this way: If the workshop really is open to everyone, then they can’t prevent you from experiencing the great light, right?” Yulia winked, and then added another wrinkle to her wise face in the painting.

  Last Night I Met a Jackal

  We spoke for a bit. Yes, I know that sounds a little abnormal but he approached me, so what could I do other than answer him?

  “A-woooooo,” he howled.

  And I answered him in the same manner.

  “A-woooooooo,” perhaps a bit longer.

  I once got into trouble for howling like that.

  What do you mean “like that?” he asked.

  Honestly. All these years I was certain that it was like a cat,

  but now that I’ve heard you, it turns out that it’s like you.

  Lamenting, a long and desperate howl.

  I’d searched for a way out. I didn’t know where to lead the sorrow,

  the confusion and the helplessness, and what names to give them.

  After all, names are a recent invention of ours, the humans.

  Jackals such as yourself don’t have to deal with names.

  They resided in my body, lacking shape and reason. The entire world seemed to me

  to be an unsolved riddle, just like the Poogy Tales.

  Poogy leaves on a train from Tel Aviv, and at the same time he also