“What was that?” she smiled at me after I slapped her thigh. She took off my shirt, and I pushed my hands under her sushi work shirt, scratching her back from her neck to the hooks of her bra.
“Yes,” she said, as if she found something she was looking for. “Do it again.”
She looked me in the eyes. Returning her gaze was as easy as looking at the sun. She grabbed my hair and pulled hard, putting me inside of her. “Again,” she begged. Every time I spanked her, she rode me even harder. Gunshots. I stuck my nails in her back and pulled her to me. She pulled my hair, and the pain brought me back to her. I was crushing her, and she hardly had enough air to moan. I felt my hands slipping with sweat or blood. Donna pushed me and arched her back when a loud moan filled the room. Even Yemima responded with a sound of her own. I rolled her over onto her back, we sped it up, and I held her hands above her head so she couldn’t resist. The roaming thunder was coming, but she bit me in the neck, and it disappeared. The only sound was the springs of the bed rooting for me. She moaned in my ear, and it drove me mad − doubling, or even tripling my already racing heartbeat. I was deep inside her; she was breathing heavily, sweating. It was happening, it was coming.
Chapter 34
We celebrated Hanukkah dinner in Afula at my uncle’s house − Libby’s parents.
Sharon urged Doreen to light the three candles of the Hanukkiya on the table, since she was the youngest. Sharon and Dad sat on one side of the white table, my aunt and uncle on the opposite side. In the middle were my sister Doreen, my cousin Hanan, and his sister, the one and only Lady Libby. She joined later because she wanted to see the end of the first half of the Arsenal soccer game.
“I am not the youngest,” Doreen said, looking over at Hanan, who was busy scraping the plate with his fork and singing a song he had been busy with the whole day. There was a short, awkward silence, and then I said, “Give it to me. I’ll light it.”
“No way!” Doreen said, pulling the Hanukkiya towards her, making me wonder which grade this 20- year-old girl got stuck in. Sharon threw me the matches and the curled candle. “Here,” she said. “Light the shamash, and then light the rest of the candles with it. “
As always, Libby didn’t wait for dessert, pulling my sleeve when she left the table after the main course and headed for the balcony. I took two jelly donuts and followed her. Libby had already lit the hookah when I got there.
“No thanks,” she pushed back the plate with the donuts, patting her stomach that was slightly sticking out beneath her old jeans.
“Here, light it up,” she said and handed me the pipe. I puffed out smoke and looked down at the view of the quiet Henkin St. Libby’s parents are 65 years old, and they’re considered the youngest in the area. Once when my father and I visited them, one of the neighbors asked us to help her send a fax message.
“So Froggie, what’s the deal with Seffi Keinan?”
“He’ll be found in the end.”
“Why is it taking you so long?”
“To make it interesting.”
“Very funny.”
“They’re doing a good job of keeping him hidden. Maybe they smuggled him into Jordan. I don’t have the information either. Even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you anything. You must know that.”
“Do you even care about him?”
“Me? I go to work. What more can I do?”
Libby didn’t like my answer. “You realize that you people should be the ones who care the most about this soldier.” She took a deep puff from the hookah and then gave me all of her fire about what she was not happy with with the country.
“What do you want me to do? Cry at night? Send him Reiki waves? What more can I do than actually look for the guy in the villages?”
“Show some empathy.”
“I have my own problems. The ISA wants to successfully complete this mission at least as much as you do.”
“It’s not a mission. It’s a boy.”
“He’s not a boy. He’s a soldier.”
“Speaking of children, what about you?”
“As far as I know, I don’t have any, thank God,” I said and snatched the tube from her. My first puff was so deep, I almost had smoke coming out of my ears.
“You’re a million miles away,” she said.
Her left heel was tapping the floor at a set rhythm. It was one of those moments when I knew that she knew that I knew.
“You know that I maintain client confidentiality. You can tell me anything.”
“Anything?”
“Anything.”
“Great. What a shame I have nothing to tell you.”
“Very convincing.” She smiled her sly smile. “The question is, which part of you is talking to me right now?”
As I put out my hand to cancel what she was saying, I almost knocked over the hookah.
“Who am I talking to? The sweet and sensitive Froggie, or the tough ISA guy?” she insisted.
“It’s the same person. You’re just trying to play with my mind,” I said.
“I know it’s the same person. The question is whether you’re succeeding in living with the contradictions.”
“Don’t you live with contradictions?”
Libby took the pipe and inhaled deeply.
“I do,” she agreed. “Everyone does, but this is the important question.” She stopped to take another puff, as though it helped her process her thoughts.
“The important question is whether your story has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Whether you’re at peace with what you do. If you manage to create a coherent narrative for yourself. It depends on the gap between your actions and what you believe in.”
I sank into the old straw chair I had been sitting on since I was a kid. It was one of the most comfortable I had ever sat on. Her parents hadn’t bought any new furniture for more than a decade − maybe out of fear that Hanan would damage it during his panic attacks.
“Let’s not talk about you for a change,” I said, kicking her in the leg. “How is it that you know so much about emotions and love, yet are still alone?”
It was the million-dollar question, the source of all the awkward silences in the family. Libby took a deep breath of smoke. She wasn’t affected.
“Why would you ask that of all questions?”
“Why do we always talk about me?” I insisted.
“It never bothered you before,” she said with a smile. “You know what? Fine. I’ll play along with you”.
“I’m listening.” I took the pipe from her.
“Since the wedding was called off, I lost faith in the process.” She sat up straight and marked sharp lines on her knees when she said this. “I go out with guys occasionally, but relationships without trust are not relationships − especially when one side is opposed to the process like I am.”
“So you don’t trust the process, and the result of it is . . .”
“The process doesn’t believe in me.”
“What is that called in psychology?” I tried to remember one of the lessons she taught me. “The pigeon effect?”
“The Pygmalion effect.” Her eyes always lit up when I remembered something she had taught me. It didn’t happen often.
“So what are you doing about it?” I asked.
“Believing it’ll be okay,” she said slowly, making it very unconvincing.
“It’ll be okay? That’s not an answer that Libby gives.” I handed her the pipe. The burning coal was starting to die down.
“Yes, but I believe it’ll be okay. I just need time and patience.”
“It’s nice to see that you’re optimistic. I’m already in a relationship, and I don’t see any reason to be optimistic.”
“Why not?”
“Don’t switch the focus of the conversation,” I warned her, although we both knew it was a cr
y for help.
“Unlike you, Froggie,” she took a deep puff, trying to get most of what was left in the hookah, “I live with built-in uncertainty.”
“Don’t you want to settle down?” I asked her.
“So many things have to be compatible. Intellect, attraction, character − and besides that, you have to love each other enough to overlook all the things that are not compatible.”
“Sexually compatible,” I said to myself out loud. “What do you think of women who like spanking in bed?”
“They’re great,” she answered with a straight face. “Asher Zigi has a song about violent sex. You know Asher Zigi?”
“I do,” I told her.
“How do you know him? He isn’t that famous yet,” she said, handing me the pipe.
“No, thanks,” I said. “There’s no more smoke.”
Libby removed the burned-out coal and lit a new one. The hookah came back to life.
“Donna took me to his concert two years ago, when he was an acting student at the Nissan Nativ School. What do you think about that?”
“He’s a genius,” she said.
“Okay. And the bottom line?” I asked.
“What’s your bottom line? Did Donna beat the shit out of you? Is that your problem?”
“Come on. Get to the point!” I said and kicked her in the leg, exhaling smoke in her face. She tried to disperse the cloud of smoke with her hand.
“How do you make all that smoke?” she asked me, teasing me on purpose.
“Am I going to get an answer today?” I asked.
She was sapping all my energy. I took another deep puff and exhaled it into the space between us. Then she finally started talking.
“Sex is communication,” I heard her say on the other side of the smoke. “Communication can be a conversation about emotions or about what position to do it in today. You could say that sex is the unity of two people who love each other and all that crap, but it is also scratching and sweat and bodily fluids. It’s part of the communication between lovers.”
The smoke dispersed, and I saw Libby. I preferred the smoke. I took a deep breath, and Libby asked me to give it to her.
“Go on,” I said, and blew a new wall of smoke between us.
“You’re used to thinking of violence as something wild, something limitless, but maybe it’s much healthier sexuality. Sado-maso has clear rules,” she said, taking the pipe and blowing as hard as she could. She only managed a small bit of smoke. “What limits do people who have sex every two weeks, just to say they did it, have?”
“Umm, close limits, I think.”
“Vice-versa, Froggie. They don’t have limits. They never discuss what they expect from each other, never have a real conversation about their sexuality. That’s where the fear of the unknown comes from; that’s where anxiety lies.”
We were silent for a while. The hookah gurgled.
“That’s where set fixations are determined,” she continued.
I considered asking her. Damn it, why not? It’s not often that we have a real talk.
“Okay. Say someone has a problem in bed. Could it be different for him if he tried something different for example?”
“I don’t think I understand.”
“Let’s say . . .” I started thinking, but then all the bells began ringing in my head. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it matters, my little Froggie failure,” she tapped me on the head twice with the pipe and put it down on the ground. She leaned towards me and gave me her best analyzing look and said, “Start talking.”
“All right. If, for example, someone has a problem in bed, it doesn’t matter who . . . Could violence solve it?”
Libby took the burnt tobacco remains and threw them in the flower box. Dad and Sharon waved to us through the glass door. They were going home.
“Possibly.” She was very curious. “Did Donna surprise you?”
“I think I surprised her.”
“How did she react?” Libby asked quietly.
“She was happy because I managed . . . because it was good.” I suddenly remembered that Libby knew a lot, but not everything.
“How did you feel about it?” She was whispering, maybe because she didn’t want her parents to hear us.
“Strange.”
“Why?”
“Because afterward, she said she didn’t think I was like that. She was happy we let go like that.”
“It sounds like she has experience in wild sex,” Libby said.
“True.”
“And you don’t like that.”
“I don’t know.”
“Is it hard for you to think about another man doing it with her?” Libby put the hookah coal in the flower box on the balcony.
“Doing it?” I coughed because the thought of another man wouldn’t go down.
“Scoring her! Banging her! Screwing her until she speaks Japanese!”
My spine shuddered.
“Hey! take it easy.”
“So what’s bothering you?” She wasn’t very impressed.
I considered telling her about my problem, or the cheating, or both. Maybe it was better not to say anything.
“You’re eating yourself up inside. I can see that.”
I had trouble breathing, as if a belt were being tightened around my ribs.
“You ask me general questions and expect specific answers,” Libby said, as she poured out the hookah water into the flower box. The fizzing sound of the water on the hot coal sounded like the whispering of a secret.
“When I was abroad, I was with . . . It’s because we didn’t manage to have sex. Because of me. I have . . . I have a problem. Over there, in Baku, where I was, I did it. I was with someone . . . her name is Liza. She was violent in bed. It was a bit strange but I did it. Like, almost. But I was so close. Then back in Israel, Donna and I also had sex like that. A bit rough. It didn’t come back, I mean, I did it. I think because of how we did it, it went well. I . . . “ My nose was running, tears welled up in my eyes. But all the brakes in my body tried to hold me back.
In “perfect” timing, Sharon opened the glass door behind me, asking If I wanted to come home with them. I didn’t turn around, but Libby moved forward and closed the door as soon as it opened.
“Not now,” she told Sharon. They both turned around and went back to where they were before.
“I really don’t know what’s going on,” I mumbled.
Libby sank into her straw chair with her hands folded.
“You cheated on her?” Her look stabbed me. “You little shit.”
A cold, lonely feeling strangled me..
“Froggie, my dear. I only heard your side and I’m 100% convinced you’re an asshole.”
“What does that mean?”
“That shows how much you love her,”
“Really? So do we have a chance?”
“…But also that she deserves much better.”
Chapter 35
Captain Billal didn’t care about the cast, nor the stitches. Even the fact that the occupational therapist ordered him to stay home - was of no interest to him.
I waited in the car outside the Giller family residence in Har Adar, near Jerusalem. I waited for about half an hour. Dudi told me to pick him up because he was injured. The front door slammed open and out came two loud figures.
“Lev! Lev! You’re not leaving!” she screamed at him.
He continued to walk towards the car I was in. He carried his khaki-colored bag on his back and the ruggedized tablet he was given by the district director so that he could remain up to speed from home. In his left hand he didn’t hold anything; it was in a cast. Two large stitches decorated the middle of his forehead and his eyes were locked on the vehicle.
“Grow up alre
ady, Lev! Are you even listening to me?” she shrieked at him as he continued walking, slowly and steadily. On the radio, commentators were explaining that the terrorist infrastructure is apparently run from Lebanon and Iran, and its main objective is to keep the ISA busy so that it focuses on defending itself instead of chasing them. So far they’ve been having unbelievable success.
The night before, Captain Yunas was stabbed twice outside his house. A week later, he would become the first ISA casualty in a decade. It was so strange to see his picture and name on the television screen, with a black background and a candle: Yoni Eshchar, from the town of Omer. Apparently captains have real lives as well.
He was the fourth one attacked in the last three weeks. ISA operations were not being carried out because there were not enough guards. Many were called in for reserve duty, in preparation for a possible regional escalation. The guards working were on protection duty, like the one I was on that evening, securing the movement of the captains from their homes to the office. Half of the field operations were canceled, while at the same time it seemed that the activities of Jonod Al-Takhrir had doubled, paralyzing the ISA.
“They got to Yunas. They’ve gone too far,” Billal said, his shirt almost ripping when his wife grabbed it, trying to stop him from leaving. “The game is over!”
“Enough already, Billal!” she screamed at him, hopelessly trying to stop him.
He did stop and turned to her. “What did you call me?”
“Billal! Billal! Captain Billal! Isn’t that who you are?”
“Limor! Watch it . . .”
“Don’t tell me to watch it! I should have watched it when I married you. Now it’s too late for me.”
They stood facing each other like cats in a fight. She didn’t notice me. Through the side-view mirror, I could see the tears on her red cheeks.
“Get inside and close the door!” He noticed his two children standing in the garden watching them.
“Limor,” he turned to her softly, “they’re trying to paralyze our unit. We can’t let them.”
“Enough already!” she cried, “I don’t want to hear about your unit! You’ve been chasing them for 10 years. Now they’re chasing you. When are you going to grow up? Let go of it already. I married Lev Giller, not Captain Billal. You told me that . . .”
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