Hold on to the Sun

by Michal Govrin

  In the street, the people going out to enjoy themselves crowded in front of the snack bars and made walking difficult. Elijah and Hila were forced to the edge of the road whenever a bus passed and emitted a jet of hot soot, but he was still sheltered by her presence in an island of calm. For a moment they walked with their shoulders touching, and the tremor which passed through Elijah’s body lasted no more than a second. Then, something made Hila burst into a long, clear peal of laughter. He, too, joined in, and was rocked back to his place.

  Hila hurried, so as not to keep her family waiting for the havdala ceremony and Elijah hurried behind her. When they reached the little street sheltered from the noise of the city by its gardens and trees darkening against the starry sky, he said without waiting to be asked that he would not come in now, but would first go to say the evening prayer.

  He stayed outside next to the gate and waved to Hila hurrying up the steps, bathed in the light shining from the windows. His fingers accidentally came to rest on the gate’s knob, and he closed it slowly. As he walked away, he thought he heard her voice, the beginning of the blessing. Then he was swallowed up in the darkness. He was no longer afraid of meeting any of his acquaintances—now he had a refuge from them, and all the way he took care not to emerge from the shadows of the gardens at the pavement’s inner edge.

  In his room, he groped toward the window in the dark and looked at the lights twinkling in the distance. And still he postponed his prayer. When he had finished and turned on the lamp, his eyes refused to adapt themselves to the light. Nevertheless, he went into the kitchen and reached into the cupboard to pull out the candles to join wick to wick. But it seemed to him that the paper package was empty. He took it out to examine its contents on the marble counter and found that he’d indeed used the last of the candles the night before, without leaving any for the havdala.

  It was late, and Elijah began to pack his canvas case with the things he would take back with him to Tel Aviv the next day. In a separate bag he sorted out his textbooks and looked for the copybooks he would need in order to begin preparing for his exam. Finally he removed the napkin and sat down at his desk. He began to study the diagrams and tables of calculations. For a moment, it seemed to him that this time he would not be able to last until the end of the week. He bent down close to the lamp and his fingers hovered upon the desk, touching and not touching.

  EVENING RIDE

  She was leaving the house when twilight had already begun. The faint blue light of the setting sun filled the yard. A sudden break in the clouds cast shadows despite the lateness of the hour. In truth, she didn’t really know how late it was. Since coming to the house she had gradually lost the habit of looking at her watch, and in the end she’d taken it off to protect it from the mop water and never put it on again.These days only the slowly changing light of the north country, almost forgotten during all these years, told her the time. Now, too, without knowing why, she suddenly left the house, dropping her work in the middle, as if compelled by the sun—which had emerged after a rainy summer day—to go out into the setting light.

  She had to bend down under the wooden staircase in order to unlock the bicycle. Crouching behind the seat, her fingers groped for the lock. Many alien movements had erased from her hands the old habit of releasing the iron bolt in one easy motion.

  From the neighbor’s yard came the sound of raindrops, slipping from the bushes onto the paving stones of the garden. The smell of wet grass, too, and of cold. In their big bay window the table lamps were already glowing. But the soft light, framed by window plants and curtain edges, didn’t pour out to join the radiance of the twilight. There was no one to be seen in the illuminated living room, nor in the garden, nor in the street into which she led the bicycle, both hands guiding the handlebars over the wild bushes which had grown up in the yard.

  The movement of riding carried her swiftly through the streets of the little town. No one noticed her hushed passage past the lit windows. Her body swayed with the deep movements of turning the pedals. For a moment she forgot the thinness of her limbs, the illness. The wind beat against the nape of her neck and made her sparse hair fly. She abandoned herself entirely to the effort of keeping her balance.

  Without paying attention she passed the last houses of the little town, already crossing the stretch of birch trees and lawns leading to the woods.

  Suddenly she had an intense desire to look down and see the swans sailing on the lake below. She pedaled up the road, and a vague anxiety took hold of her.Who could guarantee that the swans were still sailing on the lake? After all that had passed.Who could guarantee that the lake was still there at the bottom of the slope?

  But her fears were groundless. The artificial lake was there, and a few grey swans, too, were floating on the shallow water of its bed. The water looked almost black, perhaps because of the clouds, which had again begun to cover the already grey sky.

  Next to the lake was a café. She rode past the hedge enclosing it. Painted iron tables stood on the lawn. But the playground—separated from the rest of the café by a low, red fence, and its swings, the playground where she used to come with her mother and her brothers—was not there. Tennis courts had taken its place. At this late hour there was no one sitting at the tables, and she hurried past the tennis courts. On the farthest one a white-clad couple was playing. For a moment the man interrupted chasing the rolling ball and contemplated the emaciated, untidy figure riding by.

  The trees at the side of the road were dark because of the clouds, which hastened the descent of the night. The bicycle path was swallowed up in the road, and the speeding cars whistled past her, very near. The effort began to affect her breathing.

  She reached the main road and no longer knew where to go. In her mind’s eye the old sights came back clearly. The little town with its streets and crossroads, the pathways that led to the sea, and the bicycle paths descending the dunes between the rows of wire fences in the scrubby fields on the slopes.

  Again the sun emerged from the clouds, very close to the horizon and the distant roofs. She continued along the main road to the beach knowing that she wouldn’t take the shortcut past the place where the synagogue had stood. She only took care, as back then, not to get caught in the grooves of the tram-tracks.

  Beyond the promenade the light was still abundant on the white sand dunes. She gripped the handlebars tightly and went down the path between the wire fences and the black bushes. The low-lying light ran over the water and twice chased her silhouette.

  But I’ve already ridden past these very bushes. I was so happy then.

  She could not understand any more why she’d returned to the empty house, which she was cleaning for herself. A sharp sense overtook her that death would come soon.

  She didn’t loosen her tight hold of the handlebars. The twilight, too, continued. There was no change in the steady dark blue of the sky. As she passed down the road between the trees, shadows struck her face.

  In the little town the living rooms were already on display behind the big bay windows, alien lives illuminated by a warm light behind curtains and vases of flowers. Not a living soul passed in the streets through which she rode. Her body swayed with the movements of the pedals, rising and falling. Without thinking she went on silently riding. Back to the house.

  JET LAG

  He set out on a short business trip. Only a few days roundtrip. The names of the distant cities written on his ticket were like points on a child’s globe. Without lengthy good-byes, he parted from her early in the evening and hurried to the cab already waiting in the street. He didn’t notice when he traveled down the hill and out of the city limits because he was busy studying his list of appointments; and he spent the long hours of the flight reading newspapers and tossing drowsily between mealtimes. In the round windows the sun rose, crossed the plane’s path, and receded into the distance. The straining engines caught up with the retreating light.

  When they landed all he had to do was turn th
e hands of his watch eight hours back, collect his luggage, and leave the airport. He jumped into a cab and showed the driver the address of the corporation whose building was already familiar to him from the little colored picture on the airmail dispatched preceding his trip. On the way he looked at the palm trees planted along the bay and at the Latin faces of the passersby. And when they arrived at the foot of the glass tower, he was taken aback for a moment at the sight of the ramshackle mud houses around it.

  On the top floor, the members of the board of directors were already waiting for him. They relieved him of his light suitcase and led him down the long corridor to the conference room.

  During their negotiations that morning, significant progress was made in the preparation of the global contract. Lunch was served between the paragraph covering marketing and the paragraph covering payments. At two thirty, at the end of the conference, Nicola Gupetti, deputy manager of the sales department, smiling possessor of a thin, bristling mustache, took him in his car to the hotel where a room had been reserved.

  As soon as the bellboy left the room, he opened the blinds. It was three o’clock in the afternoon. Down the shimmering street four dark-skinned women were walking, their soft shadows sinking into the pavement. On their heads they were carrying wicker baskets full of many colored fruits and herbs, and the echoes of their conversation had a special, musical ring. The warm air was saturated with the smell of the distant sea—on the map a blue stain climbing upside down, northward. He shaded his eyes with the back of his hand. For the first time he thought: three o’clock here, eleven o’clock at night over there. He drew the curtain, and went to lie down for a short rest before the meetings resumed in the afternoon. He had given up in advance any idea of exploring the city. His schedule was too crowded and he was flying back the next day in the afternoon. He took off his shoes and lay down in his clothes on the bedspread. For a moment he clung dizzily to the bed which went on slipping southward out of the hold of gravity’s forces. Then he took up his papers to study the agreement formulated in the morning meetings.

  At exactly quarter to five he descended to the lobby of the hotel. By then he had washed and changed into the fresh suit of clothes which he’d taken out of his bag. His wet hair gave off the foreign, sweetish smell of the hotel soap. The lobby was dark. The door, padded with green leather, was closed, and the curtains were drawn. Dark lampshades cast narrow circles of light. At thirteen minutes to five Gupetti came in, and smiled with the mustache that sat in a straight line on his upper lip. He followed Gupetti to the exit.

  The glare in the street had softened since midday, but the light was still full and yellow.

  “Don’t forget that the shadows here fall to the south,” Gupetti smiled, and his mustache stretched.

  He stared at Gupetti uncomprehendingly.

  “You see,” continued Gupetti in his genial tone, “here at noon the sun is in the north, and at night, too, the stars are different.”

  On the top floor of the corporate tower they took their places in the purple armchairs among the little palms of the hothouse in the sky. In the smoked glass of the windows the sea clung to the edges of the horizon under the equator’s line. The draft of the contract was drawn up to everyone’s satisfaction and in accordance with the hopes he’d pinned on this trip. And when they descended in the elevator at the end of the conference, the lights were already on in the glass floors of the tower, and the imprint of its windows fell onto the mud huts clustering round its feet. Gupetti led him to a restaurant in one of the dark streets. But the fatigue of the past two days was having its effect, and he hardly ate anything. However, he drank to the dregs the fruit drink which startled him with its heady sweetness.

  When he lay down in the big bed, he removed his watch and turned to switch off the lamp. Nine o’clock here, five in the morning there. He lay awake for a long time. Because of the heat, he left the window open. Through the slats of the blind soft sounds rose from the street, rocking his body as it strained after sleep. A noisy fly drew buzzing lines through the room. Just before he fell asleep the bed began to travel again, and he slid into the night with rhythmic jolts, far from the light of day rising at that moment in the corner of the world from which he’d come.

  Just before dawn his sleep was interrupted. There was a pale, rosy light in the room. Outside, the distant throbbing continued. The warm air was full of soft scents. With sullen impatience he remembered the hours he’d still have to spend waiting here before cleaving his way back through the journey of light. The jet lag complicated his calculations, and he abandoned them halfway through. In the end he gave up and got out of bed. He opened the blinds to the column of light reddening between the buildings. The empty street was littered with leftover fruit and peels.

  The padded dining room door was still shut. He turned toward the exit. The morning hours were at his disposal. The closing session of the business meeting would only begin at three o’clock.

  The beach was white and empty. The sun glared. He sat down in the shade of one of the palm trees on the bay. A few shells were stuck together in a glittering lump. The light invaded the beach in splashing foam and poured out of it in streams of white bubbles.The little lump of crystals of light appeared between the currents and disappeared. Appeared and disappeared.

  It was only eight thirty. More than anything else, he was thirsty.

  He was swallowed up in the stream of people, in the shade of crowded stalls. At one of them he drank bitter fruit juice, and with the other people crowding the marketplace watched an old crone dancing, tracing convoluted circles on the ground. The shaking heads of the spectators magnified the movements, and their shrill cries pierced the rhythmic beat. Suddenly the dark face of a woman bent down close to him. Her face was oval, her features carved. Her full lips split in a thin gash, and in her eyes the irises arched as if in soft, white lakes. Between the stalls a smell of black-pipped bursting fruit rose into the air. He pushed away the hair which had fallen into his eyes.

  At one fifty he returned to the hotel. On the way he stopped twice in the shady streets retreating from the sea in order to drink. He hadn’t eaten since the morning. When he raised his hand to push open the hotel door, its shadow was dragged southward, toward the darkness in the direction of the Pole.

  In his room the sheets were smooth, and there was a sweetish, foreign smell left behind by the chambermaid. He emptied the contents of his jacket pockets onto the little dressing table, under the mirror. He straightened out the crumpled airline ticket. He spread out the local banknotes, with the picture of a tower and avenues of palms against the background of the sea. He tucked the ticket into his passport, next to the exit visa in the name of Yehiel Nammi. And only then he raised his eyes to the oval face bending forward in the mirror.

  Later you quickly take the suitcase out of the cupboard and put shirts and used underpants in it. You pull the pajamas out from under the pillow. Without undoing the laces, you take off your shoes, and go into the bathroom. At eighteen minutes past two you descend the stairs to the gloom of the lobby. Above the counter the head of the reception clerk floats in a narrow circle of light.You wait restlessly. At two twenty, as agreed, Gupetti enters in the wake of a swift shaft of glaring light. He relieves you of the suitcase and is swallowed up in the circle of light next to the receptionist. Head to head, they settle the account with a clear ring of coins. At two thirty you leave behind him.

  On the way you seek her through the car window among the women, leaving soft shadows in the afternoon glow. Not far from the beach Gupetti parks the car, and the two of you hurry through the swarming queues of the central post office to the telegram counter. You make a quick calculation, and write with the pen attached to the marble shelf: To Zipporah Nammi, returning tomorrow at six a.m. Yours,Yehiel.You wonder for a moment if the message will manage to get there in time, and hurry out of the crowd behind Gupetti.

  On the twenty-fifth floor the president of the corporation meets you outside the elevato
r and greets you in his soft accent, full of whispers. He cups your hands in his broad palms. Gupetti follows you to the conference room, carrying your bag. In the smoked glass windows the town and bay revolve as if in a furnace. The secretary reads the contract out ceremoniously. You all sign. The doors are opened by waitresses whose muscular bodies exude the scent of herbs. You bite into colorful pieces of fruits. The juice bursting from the skins floods your tongue.

  There are ninety minutes to go before you have to report to the airport. They don’t want to deprive you of the time left.The director of the corporation gives you a friendly pat on the shoulder and leaves you in Gupetti’s hands, as if he knows how eager you are to press your face once more to the window of his old car. You glide silently through glass stories of the building and land at the entrance.You hasten after Gupetti in the red light dripping with salty warmth, and cross to the opposite pavement as if it were the illuminated bank of a dark, yellowish river.

  Gupetti guides the car through the avenues lined with palm trees rising up opposite the bays. Beneath you, the sea retreats from dark blue into orange. The rhythmic hum already familiar to you shakes the old springs of the seat. With both hands you hang onto the window frame. The pavements recede from warm orange into the red of the scattered peels. Women carry baskets of straw and fruit on their heads, gilding like tall torches.You examine their tender necks and their cheeks hollowed out like soft, carved wood, and for a moment or two it seems to you that you can decipher something in the way the palms of their hands are entwined in the straw.You sink back into the springs of your seat. Gupetti navigates from the old-fashioned dashboard without breaking the silence. At sunset he points to the glass of the corporate tower in the distance. At that moment a white light goes on in all its floors. He makes a u-turn. You’re still busy watching the shadows walking in the darkness. The evening warmth is sweet.Your breath comes in gasps.