by Beth Miller
Booba was already ill when my parents’ marriage was arranged, and they knew from the start that she and Zaida would live with them. My father agreed to have his new in-laws to stay, as long as they had a separate space. This house was chosen specifically because of the annex, or ‘granny flat’, Mum said the previous owners had called it. The annex was tiny: one bedroom with an ensuite bathroom, and a kitchen-cum-living room. But my Zaida would sit on the squashy armchair, snuggle me on his knee, and say, ‘I have everything I need, right here.’ Even when I was very little, I was never in any doubt that he meant me.
It was impossible to think of Zaida, the strong, confident man who welcomed me in after school every day with a bagel and cream cheese, as being the same person as the confused, shrunken old man sitting idle in a home.
When the bedroom door opened I was so lost in my thoughts that for a moment I expected Zaida to walk into the kitchen, but of course it was Nathan. He was wearing a dark suit and tie, his hair combed, his beard neatly trimmed. He looked rather handsome. He must have been surprised to see me – or horrified – but he didn’t show it. He stood in the doorway and waited for me to speak.
‘Good morning,’ I squeaked. Not quite ready to look him in the eye, I focused on the table. ‘I hope it’s OK, I’ve made you breakfast.’
I wondered if he was thinking about us on the tube two days ago. Your voice has haunted my dreams. If he was, he gave no indication. ‘I heard someone moving about,’ he said. ‘I thought it was Miriam.’
‘Mum asked me to stand in for her. She went to Joel’s first thing, Malka isn’t having a very good pregnancy and Mum’s gone to help. I hope that’s OK.’ I realised I was gabbling.
‘You can stop asking if it’s OK. It’s fine. I don’t actually need anyone to get my breakfast, though. I’m not helpless.’
‘I know. I’m sorry. I’m just trying in a small way to say thank you for, you know. Pretending, the other day. For Zaida.’ I didn’t, you’ll notice, say that I also wanted to apologise for my following him and forcing a scene, because now I knew he must have told Dad that I’d been visiting Zaida at the home. This rather usefully stopped me feeling so bad about him. Anyway, it looked like he’d unintentionally done me quite a favour there.
Nathan sat at the place I’d laid out for him. ‘Is there coffee?’
I jumped up to get the cafetière, and poured coffee into his cup.
‘Is there any cream left?’ he asked.
‘Only milk.’
He grunted. ‘Milk’s fine.’
I passed the carton to him but he didn’t take it, just gave a slight shake of his head. Then I remembered that he couldn’t risk brushing my hand, accidentally touching me. I’d only been away a few months and I was already starting to forget important things. Though of course, we’d not only inadvertently held hands the other day when Zaida connected us, but brushed against each other on the tube. For some reason that thought made me feel even more unsettled, reminded me of how I felt lying in my room last night, in my old bed. I put the carton down next to him and we sat in silence while he added milk and stirred in sugars. Three. I made a mental note for next time I made him coffee. (Also, wow, three sugars; what sort of state were his teeth in?)
‘So, you’re probably wondering why I’m here,’ I said.
‘You told me. Blah blah Miriam, blah blah Malka.’
‘I mean, why I’m back at my parents’ house.’
‘I heard about it from Dov last night when I got in.’ He was trying to look bored, but I suspected it was put on.
‘Blah blah Dov, was it?’ I said, and watched as he started to smile, then switched it off as soon as he saw me looking.
‘Something like that,’ he drawled, hiding behind his coffee cup.
When I came over yesterday, there was so much to catch up on that I didn’t think about getting back until late. Alex was away in Cardiff and I didn’t fancy travelling to Brixton in the dark, letting myself into an empty flat.
‘Can I stay over?’ I asked Mum. ‘Maybe in the annex?’
‘Oh.’ She looked embarrassed. ‘There’s someone staying there at the moment.’
‘It’s Nathan,’ Gila burst out. She was so excited about me being there, that even though I could see she’d been sworn not to tell me, she wasn’t able to help herself.
I looked at Mum. ‘Uh, Nathan is staying in Zaida’s flat?’
‘Yes. Just temporary, you know. Till he gets on his feet.’
‘I thought he was at his parents’?’
‘He wasn’t doing too well there,’ Mum said evasively. ‘He might restart at Gateshead in a few weeks, after Rosh Hashanah.’
‘Stay with me and Becca in our room. Please, please,’ Gila squealed. ‘Your bed’s still there. I’ve got a couple of things on it, but I’ll quickly move them.’ She ran upstairs.
Dov laughed. ‘She’s got everything she owns on your bed.’
Becca, who till now had said very little, looked at me. ‘Every night for months, Gila would pray, “Dear God, when I wake up please let Aliza be back in her bed.” Tomorrow morning her prayer will finally be answered.’
I felt my tears start, and put a hand on Becca’s. ‘I’m sorry, Becs. It must have been horrible for you.’
She took her hand away. ‘You’ve honestly no idea,’ she said.
Clearly, Becca was going to take a while to forgive me. I went up to help Gila move her stuff, and made up my old bed. Dov came in and lounged on Becca’s bed, and when Jonny got back he came running upstairs and gave me a massive hug. The evening was a miraculous playing-out of all the times I’d ever imagined being back, the prodigal daughter. Then Uri and Esther came round.
Gila had told me that it was Uri who really took Dad on after the shouting at Zaida incident, and I whispered, ‘thank you,’ to him, but he didn’t answer, didn’t even look at or acknowledge me in any way. Esther was slightly less frosty and gave me a small smile. Dad was still out, so the only tension was from Uri and Becca. But even she melted a little by the time we went to bed.
We lay in the dark, us three girls, on our backs, same as always. It felt weird, but also utterly familiar, as though it was only a few days since I’d last been here.
‘Will you stay for ever?’ Gila asked.
‘I can’t. I’m married, sweetheart.’
‘Not really, though.’
‘Yes, really. Properly legally married.’
‘Not in shul. Not to a Jewish man.’
‘This is all I’ve heard for months,’ Becca sighed. She mimicked Gila’s voice. ‘It’s not a real marriage, so she’ll soon be back.’
‘Alex is lovely,’ I said to Gila, but also to Becca. ‘I’d like you to meet him one day.’
‘Does he know you’re here?’ Becca asked. She always did have a knack of asking the difficult questions.
‘Not exactly. Well, he’s away for the night. Working.’
‘Maybe he’s with his family,’ Gila said. ‘He could stay with them, and you could stay here.’
‘It’s lovely to be here,’ I said, ‘but I don’t live here now.’
The girls didn’t say anything else, and after a while I knew from their breathing that they were asleep. I stayed on my back, making out the old stains on the ceiling, the map of Africa, the flower that looked like an eye, as familiar to me as my own hand. I thought of Alex, in a B&B in a Cardiff suburb, surviving, as he had texted me earlier, on a microwaved chicken chow mein from a corner shop. Then I thought of Nathan, lying chastely in the annex in Zaida’s bed, and to my astonishment, my body prickled. I had never before had such feelings about Nathan. To hush my treacherous body, I rested my hand lightly on my private area, and fell asleep in that position.
Faced now with the real, daytime Nathan, those feelings seemed ridiculous. He was mildly handsome, pleasant-looking without being attractive, I decided. The frisson when I thought about our bodies pushing against each other on the tube had passed. I twisted the wedding ring on my finger, and t
ried to think of something to say. Would asking him how he slept be considered too salacious? Probably. I was about to say something about the post-fire redecoration of the kitchen, to stop the silence yawning on, when Nathan said, ‘How was Kap, when you showed up?’
‘He wasn’t home. I haven’t seen him since our little disagreement at Beis Israel.’
I waited for Nathan to confess that it was because of him that Dad had known I was there, but he didn’t.
‘I think everyone’s made him feel pretty bad that he yelled at Zaida,’ I continued, hoping to make Nathan feel bad too.
‘He’s a hot-tempered man, is Kap. And you’re…’ Nathan petered out.
‘I’m what?’
‘Nothing.’ He shoved a spoonful of fruit salad in his mouth and said, ‘Mmm, delicious.’
‘Don’t stopper your mouth with strawberries, Nathan! What were you going to say?’
Nathan smiled. ‘It’s so easy to remember the bad things about a person who’s hurt you. I’d forgotten the things I liked about you.’
To my astonishment, the prickling night-time feeling fluttered inside me. I stared at him, the colour rising on my cheeks. I felt utterly wrong-footed, and he looked a bit taken aback himself. We stared at each other for a moment, then both looked away.
From some distance, I heard him say, ‘Will this be a regular thing?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. Which ‘this’ did he mean? Encountering each other? The making of breakfast? Me hanging about in the annex? The banter? Or the frisson that shivered between us?
He drained his coffee and stood up. ‘I’ve got to go.’ He’d eaten nothing but a few strawberries.
I stood too, and moved to the door with him in his wake. He put on his hat and coat.
‘I could quickly wrap a couple of bagels for you,’ I said.
‘Yes, OK. Thanks.’ He stood waiting while I rummaged around for cling-film and a sandwich bag. I held the bag out to him, but he did another tiny shake of the head, and I put it down on the table next to the door. He picked it up and put it into his briefcase.
‘Bye then,’ he mumbled.
‘Bye.’
‘I quite like muesli,’ he said, his hand on the door.
‘You do? What sort? I can get some easily. With nuts, or the fruit kind?’
‘Any, I don’t mind.’ He looked as if he wished he hadn’t said anything. ‘Well, bye.’
As he opened the door, he looked at me, at my hair particularly, and gave another headshake. That could get annoying pretty quickly. Then he went out.
I walked over to the mirror. The wig – the sheitel – that Mum insisted I wear, one of hers, was completely squint, tilted over to the left and showing a considerable expanse of my own hair. Christ! I served him breakfast looking like a crazy drunk woman. I let out a blast of laughter, relieving some tension, and took the sheitel off. There were droplets of sweat all round my hairline. I wondered how my mum managed, wearing hers all the time. Or Deborah. She wasn’t exactly averse to complaining about most aspects of her life with little prompting, but I couldn’t remember her ever mentioning it.
Mum hadn’t let me go into the annex without it. ‘You are a married woman, and your hair is a private matter between you and your husband.’
It was too confusing to start arguing that my husband couldn’t care less whether other men saw my hair or not. Mum didn’t lay down rules as regularly as Dad, but once she did, there was never any point arguing. In her own quiet way, she’d always been as hard to defy as Dad. It was amazing, really, that I had managed to disobey them both so thoroughly.
I sat down and worked my way through Nathan’s breakfast. The platzels made me think of my Sunday mornings with Zaida. I came to the annex every day, but Sundays were our special day. Sundays meant onion platzels. Bagels he ate the rest of the week, or pitta bread, but for some reason platzels were special.
Even on a Sunday, no matter how early I arrived, Zaida would be up and dressed. I never saw him in anything other than a full three-piece suit and tie. Dov and I used to speculate that he wore a tie with his pyjamas. He was still in his suits at Beis Israel, though he must be boiling in them, the heat of that place.
On Sundays he might already have been to the bakery up the road by the time I arrived. Not Grodzinski’s, he thought their staff were unfriendly, but Sharon’s, where the platzels were five pence more expensive but the man who served him was ‘a mensch’. If he hadn’t been yet, we would walk there together, and he would let me carry the warm paper bag back.
My Zaida preferred onion platzels to any other kind, and I learned to love them too, to delight in the sweet taste of the translucent onions, which were stuffed into the little hole on the top of the roll. These platzels had a design flaw, for the onion would fall out as you ate. I once pointed this out to Zaida, but he, eternal optimist, knew how to spin anything into a positive.
‘That’s the best bit, choochie-face,’ he said, beaming at me. ‘You spread the cream-cheese on the platzel, you eat the platzel, and then, just when you think you’ve finished, you find these little bits of delicious creamy onion to nosh.’
I wish I could see the world as he used to see it: a place of continuous and unfolding delight. I wish he still saw it like that.
New Experiences
Go on a rollercoaster – You have embarked on a metaphorical rollercoaster with me, so let’s go on a real one too.
Swim in the sea – I know you said you did this as a child but it’s something we should do together soon. Exhilarating in this country; wonderful in warmer places.
Go abroad – You’ve been to Israel but there’s a whole world out there. Where shall we go?
Football match – I’m not mad about football but there is something exciting about a live match. I prefer cricket but I won’t make you sit through a game, they go on for days.
Theatre – Let’s see something brilliant in London. You choose.
Drink a pint in a pub – I know you’ve already been to the Prince Albert, but this is the next frontier: drink a pint of beer. Well, let’s start with a half. It’s an acquired taste.
Gig – There’s a few big ones later this year that we could think about: Van Morrison at the Albert Hall, Lou Reed (Albert Hall again), Bob Dylan at Wembley (tough one to get tickets for), or for something a bit different, Shirley Bassey at the Festival Hall (you might like her – big diva, like your good self).
Meditate – I can teach you. It’s brilliant for emptying the mind (I know yours sometimes feels a bit busy).
Watch a film in the back row of the cinema – The traditional place for kissing and holding hands.
Jeans – Buy and wear a pair. A derriere like yours shouldn’t be hidden away.
Ice-skating – I haven’t been since I was a kid. I think you might like it.
Play a slot machine in an amusement arcade – A great thing to do at the seaside. Hours of fun for a couple of quid.
Try on a Wonderbra – I admit this one is probably more for my own benefit.
Twenty-Three
October 2000
My favourite festival when I was little was Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles. I loved it because we’d build a shelter in the garden, from wood slats and branches. This took several days. Dad and Uri always did the bulk of the building, and when it was finished we younger ones would crowd in and decorate it, inside and out, with leaves and flowers.
In Springfield Street they’d soon be getting ready to celebrate Sukkot. Meanwhile, in the Real World, Alex and I were in Brighton with Kim and Vicky. I’d secretly decided to actively avoid Vicky, for the rest of my life if possible, and had managed not to see her since Easter. But a few days ago, Kim had come over and asked Alex and I to join him and Vicky on his birthday outing.
‘I want to go on the Turbo Coaster on Brighton pier, but Vicky’s too pregnant to go on it.’
‘Isn’t life with Vicky enough of a rollercoaster for you?’ Alex said.
‘I’ll come on it wi
th you, Kim,’ I said.
‘Really? Awesome!’
‘Yeah, Eliza’s a veteran of these things,’ Alex said. ‘Well, she’s been on one, anyway.’ His voice sounded angry, but he looked normal. I stared at him but he wouldn’t catch my eye.
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘at Thorpe Park.’
‘Did you like it, Eliza?’ Kim asked.
‘I loved it.’
‘She screamed the whole way,’ Alex said. ‘I like a woman who screams.’
Kim flicked a glance at me. He was clearly wondering why Alex was being so rude to me. I pretended nothing was up. ‘I’d like to go to Brighton,’ I said. ‘My family went there once when I was little, but I don’t remember much about it.’
‘It’s the perfect place for a birthday outing,’ Kim said. ‘Rollercoaster, chips on the beach…’
‘Bit fucking cold for chips on the beach, isn’t it?’ Alex said.
‘You old grouch,’ Kim said. ‘You up for it, Eliza?’
‘Definitely.’
‘There’s some things on the “New Experiences” list you could do while we’re there,’ Alex said, brightening. ‘Slot machines, swim in the sea…’
‘Hang on,’ Kim said. ‘How come it’s too cold to eat chips on the beach but not too cold for Eliza to swim?’
‘She can dip her toes in.’
‘I have swum in the sea, you know,’ I said.
‘Not since you were a kid.’
I shivered at the thought of it. ‘I might save that one for next summer.’
Kim got up to go. ‘Your birthday next month,’ he reminded Alex, as he shrugged on his leather jacket. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘Dunno. Something grown-up, I should think. Dinner and a movie. Not candyfloss.’
‘Oh yes, you’re so mature.’ Kim gave Alex a playful push, and Alex gave Kim a considerably more forceful shove back. ‘See you Saturday, guys.’
