A Wall of Light (18 page)

N
OAH’S DIARY
, N
OVEMBER
16, 1987.

In the news: a groom was arrested because he used fake credit cards to buy things for the wedding. The judge said he could get married but he’d have to be handcuffed the whole time. That judge is a sadist.

T
he whole family plus Oren went to see
The Threepenny Opera
, a big production. It was pretty terrible. Oren fell asleep, Sonya was bored, Dad looked grim, Mom looked disgusted, and by common consent we all left at the intermission. Only Gran was happy. We were a little worried that she would be disruptive, but she sat quietly in her seat the whole time and seemed very absorbed in the production. When we were driving home she surprised us all by singing “Pirate Jenny” perfectly. She remembered the melody and all the words in English, with a bit of German mixed in. We applauded when she finished. The brain is a strange thing.

Mom is very depressed. Usually she’s angry but lately she’s been really down, not talking, not taking an interest in things, not even getting excited about her Big Case, the one that’s a secret. I prefer it when she’s angry. The only time she was her old self was when the pathologist at Abu Kabir said on the news, defending his erroneous report about how a Palestinian died, “Pathology is not an exact science.” Mom gave a guffaw. She said, “Yes, you can tell whether someone died at six or ten in the morning, but not whether he died of pneumonia or because he was beaten to death.”

Then she went back to her depression. She’s been following Vanunu’s trial. She hasn’t been allowed in—no one is—but someone who knows what’s going on keeps her informed. She said they’re going to bury him alive and never let him see the light of day again, ever, and she’s only surprised they didn’t murder him.

On top of that, a guy she knew, someone called Awad (I’m not sure whether that’s his first or last name), an American-Palestinian who came here to preach nonviolence, was deported. For weeks it’s been Awad this, Awad that, I figured soon we’d find out what Awad had for breakfast. I wouldn’t be surprised if Dad was starting to get jealous. But anyway, he had to leave. Yesterday I heard her tell Dad, “I don’t know how much more I can take.”

It took her a really long time to get a date for her Big Case, but it’s finally coming up in two weeks. You’d think she’d be really excited and happy, but she isn’t. She still thinks her case will create a big stir, but she’s not sure anymore that it will really change anything. I’ve never seen her so gloomy! Maybe she’s going through menopause.

L
ETTER TO
A
NDREI
, J
UNE
3, 1957

D
earest, I do hope you are feeling better, and that you are not too gloomy. Please keep up your spirits, for my sake! Do you know, our play is still running! I must say it isn’t easy working during the day and acting at night, even if one has a small role. It’s very tiring, though luckily I’ve been able to shorten my hours at the café because the theater is actually making a bit of money now and we, the actors, are getting paid. This play is such a hit, some people are coming to see it again and again. It’s been extended several times and might continue for a few months.

That is not to say that there have not been several problems. Oliver/William quit and it was hard finding a replacement. But Orlando’s brother, who had seen the performance seven times, came to the rescue and is doing not too badly. With a good director, even amateurs can be fine.

Sometimes fights break out in the audience. It’s disruptive. We used to try to go on, but now we have a new policy. There’s a big sign that says: In the Event of Fights in the Audience, the Play Will Be Discontinued and There Will Be No Refunds. This way, when a fight breaks out, everyone puts pressure on the culprits to leave the hall.

There are other noise problems. Some of these audiences are not used to proper theater. They bring small children who suddenly announce in a loud voice that they have to go to the bathroom. People who don’t want to admit that they are going deaf yell out that they can’t hear, as if it’s our fault and not the fault of their ears. But despite these setbacks, the audience has a great time. They are starving for entertainment.

I imagine you sitting in the audience every single time I perform. I’m so worried about those mailbox thieves! What if Heinrich sent a letter and it never reached me? But Carmela said (in a very affronted tone of voice) that mailbox theft is not a problem “in this part of the city.” She thinks the last letter, which I found torn open and on the ground, was accidentally opened by another neighbor, who then realized his mistake and left it on the mailbox ledge for me, from where it must have simply fallen to the floor and drifted outside. She’s sure no one was going through the mail looking for money. I don’t share her certainty. She’s quite snobby, and she says that sort of thing only happens in places like our old neighborhood, which she calls a haven for hoodlums.

I think of you.

S
ONYA

I
felt my lover’s hand on my arm and I lifted my head. Tears were streaming down my cheeks and my nose was starting to run. Khalid handed me a little packet of tissues wrapped in cellophane; the Hebrew letters on the packet, seemed out of place here. I pulled out a tissue, and as I blew my nose Khalid passed me my letter. In the last available space he’d written,
“I was not laughing at you, Sonya-Sophia. I laughed because you are such a funny person, nothing coming from you is predictable. You are always surprising me. I’m happy you’re here. I like you very much.”

I am deaf, I thought. I am deaf, and no man will ever want me. No hearing man will ever want me. All those men who asked me on dates, they probably just wanted to have sex with a deaf person, to see what it was like. And that’s the real reason I’d said no. I pretended it was a matter of principle, but it wasn’t: I had said no because I was unwilling to give in to my vulnerability. I hated my life.

Khalid motioned me again to come with him—he would soon get fed up with having to mime and motion everything, I thought glumly. He led me to the little hallway, to the closed door facing the entrance. I had assumed the door led to a closet, but when Khalid opened it, I saw that the door concealed a steep flight of wooden stairs—like one of those secret passages you saw in war movies. We climbed the stairs single file. When Khalid reached the top, he took my hand to help me with the last step, which was twice as high as the others.

We were in a wide, low-ceilinged room with two windows, a double bed, a small night table, several bookcases, a computer desk, and two folding beds leaning upright against a corner wall. A fan whirred silently in the corner, intensifying the smell of lemon cleanser mixed with something else—a spice, possibly cardamom.

Khalid made the sign for “wait”: thumb against index and middle finger. He disappeared and returned with a kitchen chair. He brought the chair over to the computer and we both sat in front of the screen.
“I’ll show you something,”
he wrote on a blank page. He knew how to touch-type, and his fingers raced across the keyboard. I wanted to bend down and kiss them. Or lick them, like a cat.

What he wanted to show me was his Web site; it included an attractive table of elements and an essay he’d written on groundwater problems in the troposphere. He returned to the page and typed in,
“What do you teach?”

Ordinarily I would have been interested in reading his essay and telling him about my own work. But I only felt insulted and depressed. This was all I was good for, apparently. I sulked and shook my head.

“Sonya-Sophia, what can I do to make you happy again?”

I wrote, beneath his question,
“It doesn’t matter. I had better go, and you need to look after your mother. I’m sorry about her death. I came at a bad time.”

“I’ve been expecting this for many months. I don’t want you to leave yet. You take my mind off this bad day.”

“I’m feeling the pangs of unrequited love,”
I wrote dramatically.

Khalid tried not to laugh this time. He wrote,
“My girlfriend, the one I nearly married, she married someone else, but she still writes to me. I never answer, but every few days I have a letter from her. Look.”
He entered his e-mail and opened one of the letters.

Dear Khalid, I don’t know whether you are deleting all my letters. Maybe you have blocked me. Today I was at the eye doctor, I need a new prescription. Remember you said you liked those glasses with the dark frames? I’ll keep the frames, just get new lenses. Eddie is away for the weekend at a golf tournament. I think about where you are. I read all the news, everything I can, and I never know whether you are safe. You don’t write to me, and I know I deserve it. If you said, “Debbie, come here,” I would be there in twenty-four hours. But I know you will never forgive me. No, I would not be there in twenty-four hours, because first I would have to go on a diet. But as long as I don’t hear from you I don’t really care. But why am I writing about superficial things when you are dealing with such serious situations? What would you do if I showed up at your door? Debbie.

“She still loves you,” I said. “What about you?”

He shook his head.
“It’s gone. I can’t help it. We were engaged, we were planning our wedding, and just before the invitations went she let her parents talk her out of it. Now she is sorry, but my feelings have undergone change. She knows this.”

“Poor Debbie! Can’t you forgive her?”

“It isn’t a matter of decision. I went through anguish and then I came out of it, and I can’t go back. It’s impossible. Nothing is left.”

“Is her husband cheating on her? She sounds lonely.”

“I’m sorry for her, but what can I do? I hope she doesn’t show up, but I don’t think she will. That was her problem, not seeking adventure, since in adventure comes knowledge. She didn’t like to take a risk, even try new restaurants—always it was the same pizza pizza pizza. Or Chinese food. In the end she was afraid of me, she lost her trust. Her parents scared her, but she was scared too easily.”

“Do you have a photo of her?”

He opened a drawer and took out an inlaid wooden box. The box was filled with photographs. He flipped through them and pulled one out.

Khalid and Debbie were standing under a tree on campus; there were other students in the background. Debbie was much shorter than Khalid, with round cheeks, glasses, and long brown hair. She looked smart and pretty. They were both smiling happily, and he had his arm around her shoulder.

“What was she studying?” I asked.

As if we were playing charades, he got up and began to mime the answer. People eating, fighting, loving, and an outsider looking at it all in a detached way, stroking his chin and making notes.

“Sociology!” I laughed.

He sat down and wrote on the screen,
“I’m happy to see you laugh, Sonya-Sophia.”

“Can I see the other photos?” I asked.

He seemed uneasy and I quickly said, “Never mind, it’s okay.”

“I don’t have any secrets,”
he wrote.
“But it’s boring for you. Relatives, people you don’t know … You can look if you want.”

He handed me the box. I hesitated, but he extracted all the photographs and placed the pile on the palm of my hand.

I felt as if I’d been offered a treasure from some long-sealed Egyptian tomb, and my heart began beating quickly. At the same time I knew that these glimpses into my lover’s life, a life that had nothing to do with me, would only intensify my suffering.

I went through them one by one. I knew, when I came across a picture of a man wearing glasses, that this was his father, and I also recognized a young woman as his mother; a wedding photo confirmed my guess. And there was Khalid, six or seven years old, standing next to a bicycle and grinning. But most of the snapshots were indecipherable: faces staring into a camera, old and young, children and babies, entire families gathered on a lawn. An ancient, creased black-and-white photo of a white stone house. One of the lost houses, I assumed, in one of the lost villages. Once again tears began to roll down my cheeks.

“This is what I was afraid of! You see, I have already figured out some things about you,”
Khalid wrote on the screen.

“I don’t know anything about you,” I said. “I wish I did.”

“I’ll give you twenty questions, like in that American game,”
he answered.

“Don’t make fun of me.”

“We’ll be friends, Sonya-Sophia, and you will find out all about me and you’ll wonder why you ever thought I was something special. All my measles, mistakes, foolish dreams, and crimes.”

“You never committed any crimes!”

“Yes, I did. At fifteen my friends and I stole a car and went to drive without any license for two hours. Lucky thing, we never were caught. My father would have let me have it.”

“What did you father do?”

“Teacher, driver, food stand, politics, and finally import-export. He’s still alive, he’s in Qatar. But he has another woman there, and I haven’t decided when to tell him about my mother’s death. He paid for my university, I’m grateful for that.”

“I’ve never had any relationships,” I said, gazing at the photograph of Debbie and Khalid under the tree, which I’d left at the top of the pile. “I never dated anyone at all.”

“I’m very sorry at how I behaved this morning. I had no idea.”

“No, don’t apologize. You must have thought I was very promiscuous—and who can blame you! And then you thought I was mad. You should have seen your face!”

“I admit I thought this was your hobby.”

I wrote,
“All these years I thought I wouldn’t fall in love with anyone who didn’t know how to sign. But maybe I was afraid of this happening, of falling in love with a hearing man who wouldn’t want me because I’m deaf. It was very unrealistic coming here, I can see that now. But it still hurts.”

“For most people it takes more than thirty seconds to fall in love, Sonya.”

“Are you saying there’s hope?”

“Falling in love and feeling you could fall in love both take time. They are almost the same thing.”

“How long did you know Debbie for?”

“We were in the same comparative literature course. I knew her a few months, it was gradual. We went to see a movie and we didn’t like it, so we walked out, and she came to my room, and it started. Even then I didn’t love her right away. It took me a long time.”

“But you would never love a deaf woman.”

“Love doesn’t have a prerequisite. Please don’t think there is any reason besides that I don’t know you.”

“Are you just saying that to be kind? Be honest. I need you to be honest, and I promise not to cry again.”

“I wouldn’t lie to you.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t answer your question about what I teach. My field is probability. I’d like to make a really important contribution. I’ve made a small contribution, but I want to make an important one. I feel I’m coming close, I’m really at my height now. But it would be hard to explain to someone who isn’t in the field. I live with my brother, he’s a lot older than me. He was already married when I was born, and we all lived together. The house you saw, we bought that later, with money an anonymous person gave us when I lost my hearing.”

“How did that happen?”

“I had a kidney infection because I was afraid of our toilet—it made scary noises. So I stopped drinking as much as I should have. And someone in the hospital, they never found out who, gave me a huge dose of something called gentamicin. My kidneys couldn’t get rid of the toxins, and my hearing was damaged.”

“They have implants now that can restore hearing.”

“Not perfectly, not reliably. But it’s true, there’s been a lot of progress in that area.”

“How do you teach?”

“I have a translator in the classroom and during appointments—Ma’ayan.”

“Ma’ayan, a nice name. A water well. From the same root as our
ayin,
which means
source
also in Arabic. Did you sue the hospital?”

“No, we never thought of it. Then we got all that money just a few weeks later.”

“Maybe the doctor responsible sent this compensation so you wouldn’t investigate and sue.”

“I don’t think so. My brother worked at that hospital and he said the doctors looking after me weren’t that wealthy.”

“It’s possible the doctor took a huge loan to prevent you suing and he is paying it back bit by bit, like in the story of de Maupassant, with the necklace.”

“Maybe. I’m much more curious about who my father was. My mother never told me. My brother’s father was a physicist in Russia, but my father was someone my mother met in Tel Aviv, where she was a waitress.”

“I had a friend who didn’t know who his father was, and it turned out it was the next-door neighbor, who was hanging in there all the time. Often it’s someone you know and who knows you.”

“We had lots of people visiting, but no one came regularly and no one showed any particular interest in me. I don’t think my father knows about me.”

“Do you resemble any of your mother’s friends? Anyone with such curly black hair and charming eyes?”

“Well, one of her former friends does have curly black hair, or at least he used to—it’s thinning a bit. He teaches philosophy at the university, I once took a course with him. But he’s famous for not having any children. He had a vasectomy.”

“When?”

“His wife got pregnant, and he made her have an abortion. And it was very traumatic for him, so he had a vasectomy. He wrote articles about it, and he’s even written a book about why it’s immoral to have children.”

“Maybe he was with your mother before he had his operation.”