Husband and Wife by Zeruya Shalev

Author:Zeruya Shalev
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grove Atlantic
Published: 2006-06-11T16:00:00+00:00

Thirteen

What am I doing here between the bushes, hesitating at the gate, almost pressing our entry code and retreating again, walking up the street, returning to the car as if I’ve forgotten something, trying to give her an opportunity to call me, to suddenly pop up from some corner, yes, no doubt about it, it’s her I’m waiting for, it’s her I thought about all night, not Udi, who went on sleeping on the living room sofa, vacating our double bed that I abandoned long ago, sour with the breath of his illness, and I had a hard time falling asleep in the strange bed, as if I’d landed up in some filthy bachelor apartment, and I thought only about her, not about Udi and Noga, on purpose to punish them, about her shamed belly and hurt eyes and tangled fate, and the longer the night lasted the more clearly I understood the depth of her distress, how could she sleep at all, the blow of his abandonment churning in her stomach and filling her bed with hate, how could he have jumped out of the ship of her life, leaving her to the cruelest of decisions, and I hoped that she wouldn’t come back to me, for how could I help her, but now I’m waiting for her, scanning the empty street, a river of boiling asphalt, with thirsty cars crouching on its banks, what will she do, she has no one to turn to, and I have let her down. In the end I have no choice but to go inside, and I press the secret numbers of the code reluctantly, the girls are already clearing away the breakfast dishes, the smell of greasy omelets and salad with lemon rises from their clothes, I snatch the last roll from the breadbasket and furtively dip it into a plate full of leftover salad and little triangles of omelet, I don’t even care whose leftovers they are, as if they are all my children here, and here’s Hani smiling at me in embarrassment, even more embarrassed than I am at catching me red-handed, falling on the leftovers like an alley cat. Is this your plate, I ask, and she nods hesitantly, but she’s obviously lying to make me feel less uncomfortable, and I smile at her and pick up a cold triangle of omelet in my fingers, to show her that I stand behind my decision, just as I urge them to do, and it seems to me that I see a gob of Ilana’s spit sparkling there, she always sprays spit from her mouth, but I have to swallow it, my stomach is already turning over, and with an effort I ask her, how’s the knitting getting on, and she proudly waves a pink cloud in the air, in a few days I’ll finish it, I can’t give birth until it’s finished, and I say, wonderful, and give her an absentminded pat on the shoulder.

In the distance I hear

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