by Meir Shalev
“That’s it,” said Eitan. “Now we just have to wait.” And he paid the workman his wages and sent him home.
3
The sun went down, and a few hours later, when total darkness had fallen, Eitan and Dovik and I took the little cardboard box and a plastic bag containing four large bulbs of white squill and walked to the cemetery. Dalia didn’t come along. She said, “I’m not ready to be part of this thing,” adding: “Just be happy I’m not going to the police, which should have been done in this family a long time ago.”
We were unafraid. The Tavori family is not afraid of phenomena like Dovik’s Dalia. Dovik, who by now had calmed down, smiled as he told her, “We overcame him, we’ll overcome you too.”
We arrived at the cemetery. Eitan dug a narrow trench in the small space between the graves of Neta and Grandma Ruth, to bury the bones there.
He dug quietly, with his small pickax and the shovel he found in the shed before it was destroyed, and when he got to a depth of about sixty centimeters he set down the box, added a layer of earth, then two of the squill bulbs, and covered them. On the other side of Neta’s grave he planted the other two bulbs, all of them sprouting the first green leaves of autumn—in case someone might see signs of digging and wonder why.
Dovik watered them and we went home. When we arrived Eitan said he had to check on the new floor, to see if it had started to harden. He looked and touched and said that if anyone wanted to leave their handprint, this was the last chance. Dovik called Dalia, and that’s what we did: Dovik set down his hand, Dalia hurried over, imprinted her hand so their pinkies were touching, then Eitan and I, our hands identical and close.
“Nice floor, Eitan,” I said. “You just poured it, and I already forgot that terrible shed that stood here.”
“It’s for you,” he said. “To please you.”
“You have.”
“I’ll give it a little water,” said Dovik, now completely calm, “so the concrete won’t crack.”
“No need,” said Eitan. “I just felt a raindrop on my head.”
“So did I,” I said.
A raindrop, and then another, and all of a sudden the clouds opened and the first rain of the season came down on schedule. Pounding rain, as ever at our moshava.
The windows of heaven opened—like in the Bible—fat drops struck, lightning slashed the darkness, distant thunder rumbled and roared, the skies became a cage filled with animals.
Dovik and Dalia fled home; Eitan and I went to our house. We stood together in the window and looked outside. Eitan put his hand on my hippy, rested his head on my shoulder. The rain grew stronger, arousing memories and seeds, digging new channels, destroying evidence.
Eitan said, “It’s funny, Ruta. Somebody had to come all the way from China to find that poor baby.”
I said, “It’s not funny, but it’s very true.”
4
That winter was a very rainy winter. Thunders thundered, lightning streaked, chilly winds blew. The wagtail heralded the rain, the redbreast danced between the drops.
Rain fell in sheets and formed little ponds, hail pummeled the roofs. It was a winter that earned the name “that winter.”
And when that winter ended and we went on our first spring hike without Grandpa Ze’ev to his wadi, we were greeted by a surprise he would have appreciated: under the carob tree, in a spot where nothing had ever grown, a little family had flowered, a riot of poppies and lupines and blue thistles, and little leaves of buttercups and cyclamens.
Dalia said, “How symbolic, this is his true gravestone.”
“One more line like that, Dalia,” I told her, “and I’ll bash your head with a rock.”
Dovik laughed and Dalia said, “So how do you explain that in the very place he died the flowers he loved are now blooming? What is that, if not symbolism?”
Dovik said, “It’s because he fell here, and when he fell so did the seeds he gathered, and that’s how they planted themselves here.”
“I love it, Dovik, how you explain things to me,” said Dalia, and took his hand.
FORTY
THE SUMMER THAT CAME AFTER THAT WINTER
(Draft)
I write:
That summer was very hot. Burning winds blew. Days dragged on, months dried out, like an empty reservoir.
Cicadas and jaybirds sang along, one by one and in noisy bands: came when summer came, stayed when it stayed, went when it went. That summer ended slowly.
Only a few words were spoken. Not about the time that had passed, not about that snake, not about what I imagined that Eitan did in the wadi, near the big carob tree. Words that could make things better, not to explain and cover up.
I tell:
In that summer my first husband came back to me. Returned as a baby born of itself. Born, and grew, and as with babies, every day another good thing: a first smile, first word, already sitting, standing, walking, talking. Lighting a fire. Trying to be funny. Smiling. Did he remember all these? Did he invent them from scratch? Whatever. He is with me, here.
I see:
He lost weight, soon he’ll be back to his old shape. One day I took him to Dovik’s pond, not so secret anymore. We got undressed in front of each other. From a certain angle of the eye and the sun I saw his skin was getting golden. This is good. When we got back we went together to the cemetery.
I sleep:
With him.
Only him.
I talk:
With my brother. His name is Dovik. Named for Uncle Dov, who in his wagon brought us a rifle and a cow and a black rock, and the mulberry tree and Grandma Ruth.
“Nothing has changed in this family,” I said to him. “We were and still are like the basalt in the wall of Grandpa Ze’ev’s house. He and Eitan and you, and I’m that way too. But we won’t take it out the way we demolished the shed because if we take it out the whole house will crumble.”
Dovik didn’t answer. He stuck a spoon in the stewpot where he mixed his limoncello, tasted it, and offered it to me for a taste and an opinion.
I shook my head no.
“But what do I care?” I went on. “The main thing is that Eitan is back. Back home to me. At least him, if not our son.”
Dovik didn’t answer.
“And what’s funny in this whole unfunny story,” I said, “is that he wasn’t saved by my love or healed by my patience, but by virtue of Grandpa Ze’ev. By virtue of the work he made him do, by virtue of his last will—to avenge his blood.”
Dovik didn’t answer. Like Grandpa Ze’ev, he also doesn’t like it when people talk too much about certain acts and certain times. I shut up. I remembered: I’m also that way.
About the Author
One of Israel’s most celebrated novelists, Meir Shalev was born in 1948 on Nahalal, Israel’s first moshav. His books have been translated into more than twenty-five languages and have been best sellers in Israel, Holland, and Germany. His honors include the National Jewish Book Award and the Brenner Prize, one of Israel’s top literary awards, for A Pigeon and a Boy. He has been named a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Art et des Lettres by the French government. Shalev lives in Jerusalem and in the north of Israel.
About the Translator
Stuart Schoffman worked as a journalist at Time and a screenwriter in Hollywood before moving to Israel in 1988. He has written about Jewish and Israeli culture and politics for many publications including the Jerusalem Report and the Jewish Review of Books. His translations from Hebrew include Beginnings by Meir Shalev, Lion’s Honey by David Grossman, and three novels by A. B. Yehoshua: Friendly Fire, The Retrospective, and The Extra.
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