Life in a Box

by Einat Lifshitz Shem-Tov

The kiss I received on my cheek, and Roy’s shiny eyes, confirmed what I was thinking.

  ***

  The next day we met again. We sat on the rocking chairs and rocked a steady rhythm.

  “What do we do now?” he asked.

  “You’re the investigator, don’t you have any ideas?”

  “I’ve never had to locate people.”

  Suddenly, an idea came to me like fireworks. “The bracelet,” I called out. I went inside the house, came back with the little plastic bracelet, and held it out to Roy. Roy brought it close to his eyes, trying to read what was written.

  “It’s a little blurred, but it definitely says Sonia Schwartz,” he said with a smile.

  We decided to start checking the hospitals in the area, even though it was obvious we were shooting in the dark; Sonia Schwartz could have had the child at any hospital in the state.

  We called a number of hospitals, but they all gave the same answer: “We don’t give out information about women who gave birth with us unless you have a power of attorney from the woman herself.”

  After a few days, I said, “Roy, it looks like we should forget the whole thing. We haven’t gotten anywhere at all, and we have no idea how to continue.”

  “No!” I turned my head at the decisive tone of his voice. “I’m not giving up! There must be a way to locate people,” he said with determination.

  “I don’t have any ideas,” I replied.

  “We could put an ad in the newspaper,” he suggested.

  “Roy, listen,” I said, as if I were talking to a small child. “This futile search has led us nowhere, especially nowhere we want to be.”

  “Eva—”

  “No! Hear me out. The search for this woman isn’t going to change our lives. Even if we find her, that will be the end of it. We’ll go back to our boring lives. So, what, are we going to look for another adventure then?” I asked condescendingly.

  Roy kept his thoughts to himself. He got up from the rocking chair all at once—the movement was so sudden that I almost lost my balance—and turned and walked away from the house.

  I couldn’t sleep that night. I tossed and turned restlessly and sleep refused to rescue me from my misery. Some of the time was spent half-dreaming, and sometimes I nodded off for a short time, only to wake in a panic. Something was preventing me from sleeping despite my exhaustion. Thoughts were racing through me like ping-pong balls. One optimistic thought would be trampled by a pessimistic one—light crushed by darkness, desire canceled by desolation, the dream shut out by the bleak reality. Visions mixed together with thoughts and images came and went. I got out of bed defeated and weary.

  I turned on the television in the living room just to feel less alone, and then made myself a cup of tea, sat down in the living room, and stared at the screen, not really seeing anything. The pictures vacillated at an uncontrollable pace, which only increased my dizziness. I was tired but couldn’t sleep. And then it appeared again at the edge of my vision. It crossed by the kitchen and continued on toward the front door. Curled up on the sofa, with droplets of reddish tea dripping onto my white nightgown, I waited a moment and then turned my head in that direction. I was my father’s daughter, and he should be proud of me even after his death.

  I sat still and waited, but nothing happened. I fought the urge to get up and peek, but remained seated, staring in the general direction. Finally, gathering all my courage, I pushed myself up from the couch and slowly walked in the direction from which the something had come, looking behind me to be sure there was no one there. Taking tiny steps forward along the hallway leading to the front door, I kept close to the wall, my hands embracing it with each step. I hesitated for a moment, wondering whether to just let the whole thing go and return to my bedroom. Thoughts were swirling around my head like a kaleidoscope.

  My legs began to shake more and more as I came closer to the hallway. The kitchen light lit a part of it, but I had to turn left, into the dark, to follow the thing. At the wide entrance to the living room. I wanted to thrust my head around all at once to see what was ahead, but feared that the sudden movement would affect something. Moving my head as slowly as possible, I twisted my neck in the direction of the door—nothing.

  Standing anchored to my spot, holding my breath, I strained my eyes and waited, not knowing for what, but expecting to see something. But nothing happened. Taking small steps, I turned toward the front door. My hands held on to both sides of the wall, my body was tight as a drum, and my eyes stared straight ahead. Terror and the resolve to continue battled with each other fiercely. I continued slowly, one step followed by another. The rustling made by my legs sounded like a thunderstorm to me. I had almost reached the end of the hallway and nothing had happened. The house was quiet—too quiet; only the sound of my breathing could be heard.

  At the end of the corridor, the front door was closed, as usual, as was the door to the basement. Everything looked normal. I tried to open the front door—locked. But the door to the basement opened with a soft groan. I looked into the darkness. Should I go down or retreat to my bedroom? My deliberations continued for a few seconds, and then my feet began to move involuntarily toward the basement. I put my hand out to turn on the light switch and a dim light filled the room. I went down step by step.

  The scent of mildew was all around. Have I ever been down to the basement before? Maybe when I was a little girl. I never had a reason to go down to this dark place. I reached the last step and looked around, my eyes trying to adjust to the faint light coming from the top of the stairs.

  The place was neatly organized. There were boxes on the right side of the basement and old furniture and junk on the other side. I noticed a baby crib that was probably mine before I graduated to a single bed. I also saw my old bicycle. I went over to where the furniture sat, looking like old men with no purpose. I looked behind some of the items and discovered other pieces of furniture.

  The stench of mildew was more pronounced, as if to signal me that it was time to leave. I stayed where I was and looked in the other direction, where all the cardboard boxes were arranged like soldiers. I was planning to go over to them, but my body appeared to be against the idea; I stood and looked at them from afar, and my feet refused to go any further. The stairs to my right were tempting me to go up and close the door behind me. My body finally roused from its fixed position and my feet advanced in the opposite direction. Something was written on the boxes, but I didn’t recognize it. I touched them, and a thick layer of dust came off on my fingers.

  There were boxes of various sizes. The smaller ones were placed on top of each other and the larger ones sat beside them. They were carefully arranged, with not an inch between them. It was obvious that my father was responsible for the arrangement. He loved everything to be in its place. He always said that the world is an organized place with a distinct order. The temptation to open the boxes and discover their contents was enormous, but the dim light in the basement would never be enough to see clearly. Tomorrow, at daylight, I will return and find out what is hidden inside the boxes.

  When I reached my bedroom, I couldn’t get to sleep, instead going over what had transpired in the last hour: the uncertain something seen from the corner of my eye, and my feeling that someone is here, watching over me—someone who wants me to know it. I smiled to myself. The panic that had taken hold of me earlier was gone, and in its place was an inexplicable feeling of relief.

  A pleasant warmth spread throughout my body, acting as a kind of shield from the fears I had been experiencing lately. A peculiar feeling of security now took their place. I murmured into the pillow, “Dad, I know… I feel you…”

  From that night on, I was no longer afraid. On the contrary, I even became friendly with the something. When it didn’t appear for a long time, the fear inside me would stir. I became dependent on its presence. I wanted it to come; it chased away my loneliness. I called it “Dad.” It seemed that my strong and confident father was able to deceive even th
e heavens above to return to me—in his death, as in life, he controlled everything around him.

  8

  “Brown, you came back to us… Is your journey of self-involvement finally over?” Donna rejoiced when I got to the office, shooting an inquiring look at me. Her pencil-drawn eyebrows were raised and her pointed heels made her tower over my desk. She bent down toward me and her eyes focused on mine.

  “Just a minute, Brown, don’t look away. I want to see if there’s any life in those eyes,” she continued.

  “I finished that report you asked for,” I said humbly.

  “Oh… So now we’re efficient too,” she said with her usual sarcasm.

  I didn’t respond.

  “And very serious,” she said in mock seriousness.

  I couldn’t hold back anymore and smiled.

  “Yes…we are definitely back among the living,” she exclaimed.

  I received the same reaction from Roy when I called him and asked him to come over. It was one of the first times that I had initiated a meeting with him. In our many years of friendship, he had always been the one to call or suggest we get together. He was so surprised at my call that he said he would be over within the hour.

  “I think we should continue to try and find the mystery tenant,” I said as we sat down on the porch with a cold drink. Roy waited for me to continue. “You were right. It’s possible that the phone call or the check was very important to her. Probably more letters will come… I think we should continue.”

  Roy looked down at the drink in his hand, and then lifted his hand to my face, the tips of his fingers brushing my cheek almost imperceptibly. Finally, he said in a quiet voice, “OK, let’s go for it.”

  ***

  One week after that conversation, Roy told me that something had changed in me lately.

  “Yeah, I feel it too,” I answered.

  “Did something happen?” he asked.

  “Yes… no… I don’t know. I’m now more than twenty years old. Until now, I haven’t done anything significant with my life. It’s bothering me. It would be terrible to look back as a fifty-year-old and not have done anything with myself—to come and go and never even be noticed. I want someone to miss me, to think about me… Oh, I’m just babbling…”

  Roy moved closer, put his arms around me, and whispered in my ear. “I’m here.” I could feel his breath on me. I leaned my ear against his chest, which rose gently with each breath. We stayed like this for several minutes. I avoided raising my eyes, afraid of what I might see in his face. His rapid breathing was calming.

  We met again the next day. Neither of us mentioned the intimate moment we shared the day before; we just exchanged ideas about how to go about looking for Sonia. We had begun calling her by her first name, as if she were an old acquaintance.

  “I think we should go to Chicago and show the bracelet at hospitals in the area. Maybe every hospital has its own kind of bracelet, or different colors…” I said, drawing out my words. “It would really help if you wore your uniform and clipped on your police ID badge.”

  Roy didn’t like the suggestion, but two days later, he arrived dressed in his police uniform—one of the rare times I’d seen him in it. During most of the time he had worked for the police, he hadn’t had to wear uniform.

  “It suits you.” I smiled.

  “I’m not comfortable at all,” he answered self-consciously.

  The truth is the uniform made him look terrific. Suddenly he looked older, more serious, attractive.

  I looked down and said, “Let’s get going.”

  Chicago is blessed with over a hundred hospitals. We focused on those that had a maternity ward. The first one we visited was in a relatively new building, but despite its young age, the walls were already sullied with dark stains. The structure was plain in design—straight lines, narrow windows and square entrances.

  Roy cleared his throat and the nurse raised her head to look at us with inquisitive eyes. On our way to Chicago, we had improved our story regarding Sonia Schwartz. I knew that if we told it the way it was, we would never get help, so we told the nurse that we were looking for Roy’s biological mother. We told her that his mother disappeared when he was a baby and that he recently found this bracelet, which he was hoping would lead us to her. Roy put on the face of a lost child. The nurse looked at his face, and because of his pitiable and yet impressive appearance, she gave him her full attention.

  “Show me the bracelet,” she requested. I gave Roy the bracelet and he placed it in the nurse’s hand. She turned it over in her hands, then let out a sigh and said, “I’m sorry. We’ve never produced this type of bracelet. Every hospital has a different type of bracelet to identify the newborn baby.”

  “Could you have had this type of bracelet in the past?”

  “No, dear, this hospital has only been around for ten years, and nothing has changed much since then.”

  We thanked her and went on to the next hospital on the list.

  The next hospital looked more pleasant. The walls were painted in joyful colors; characters from Disney cartoons were drawn on the walls, and each room was named after a character; there were colorful flowers in vases on the chest of drawers in each new mother’s room; and green and white balloons tied with a ribbon swayed happily at the nurses’ station.

  One of the nurses came up to us and asked if she could help us in any way. I explained the reason for our visit. The smiling nurse politely asked us to follow her, and led us into the Winnie the Pooh room. She sat on a ball-shaped chair, crossed her long legs, and looked at us with her complete attention. She said, “Look, you seem like nice people, and I would love to help you, but you are looking for a needle in a haystack. Are you planning on checking every hospital in Chicago? I mean, there are more than a hundred hospitals in Chicago alone, and even more in the outlying areas.”

  Roy and I looked at each other. The nice nurse said that in any case, they didn’t use this type of bracelet. “This is a very old bracelet,” she said. “How old are you?” she asked suddenly, turning to Roy.

  “I’ll be twenty-two soon.”

  “I would exclude hospitals that didn’t exist before twenty years ago, then.”

  When we left the hospital, we felt very stupid. We were so excited to begin the mission that we didn’t think of all the important details. Actually, we didn’t think at all. We didn’t plan anything, we just went on our way, thinking our lives would take an interesting turn.

  We sat silent and ashamed. Neither one of us wanted to bring up the obvious. Finally, Roy said, “Look, it would be really easy to decide to just stop, but I think we should continue.”

  I also wanted to continue, but it was clear that we were deluding ourselves. We were chasing after a ghost, convinced that finding it would change our lives. I said, “Let’s go on, but let’s be smarter about it. You have to think like a policeman. You need to use your friends on the police force. We can’t do this alone.”

  He said, “OK, I’ll ask someone from Missing Persons what we should do.” Roy started the car, turned it around, and began driving us out of the city. We sat in silence the entire way, each one lost in his or her thoughts.

  That night, I decided it was time to take action. I turned on every light in the house, opened the windows, and went down to the basement with a new light bulb in hand.

  This time I was sure of my steps, going straight up to the empty light socket and screwing in the new light bulb. I went over to the boxes—the small ones first—and, using a knife I brought with me, opened one. A cloud of dust erupted from it and caused me to choke.

  The box was full of notebooks—my math notebooks from the first grade. Farther down the pile were other notebooks from elementary school, containing the first letters I had ever written. Some of the covers were torn; my father must have taken the time to fix them. Flipping through the notebooks, my imagination took me back to when I wrote in them. Even though hardship was my lot in life, I had been very neat. Lett
ers that were printed crookedly rested on the guidelines and my name was on every page. I took the notebooks and the workbooks out of the box one by one until I found the sheets of paper lying at the bottom.

  I took one of the pages in my hand. My school logo was printed on the right side of the page. It was a letter. “Dear Mr. and Mrs. Brown: I would like to set up a meeting with you regarding your daughter’s grades. For the last several weeks, Eva has been showing up without the required homework, and we need to discover the reason for this behavior. I can meet with you on Monday at noon. Sincerely, Mrs. Prewitt, Homeroom Teacher.”

  The next page I took out of the box used the same wording and was sent one week later. It said, “Dear Mr. and Mrs. Brown: Since you were unable to attend the previous meeting, please meet with me in one week, Tuesday at one o’clock. If this is not convenient for you, please let me know in advance. Sincerely, Mrs. Prewitt, Homeroom Teacher.”

  The third letter, sent by the school principal, contained an urgent request to meet with him. My parents were again required to let him know in advance if they were unable to attend the meeting.

  There was another stack of letters containing the same message. In each letter, a new meeting was set up.

  In the last letter, at the bottom of the box, the principal notified my parents that it was he, the homeroom teacher, and the school counselor intended to come for a home visit. His signature at the bottom of the page looked extremely angry.

  The page in my lap was stained with my tears.

  I couldn’t stay in the basement any longer. The weight of my emotions was so heavy that my legs could barely carry me up the stairs.

  The brightly lit house did not help the feeling of shame I carried with me from the basement. I could see myself as a young girl at school, whose parents couldn’t find the time to deal with her learning difficulties.

  I sat in my bed for a long time, hoping that the something would come. I wanted to ask him why he ignored the letters, why he never came to school, why he didn’t deal with my learning problems. Surely the feelings that had overcome me now were the same ones I felt as a girl, except then I wouldn’t have dared to ask my father to take care of me. Back then, as a young girl of seven or eight, it wasn’t in my nature to tell him that I was full of shame and embarrassment every time the teacher looked at me with pity.