On Division by Goldie Goldbloom

Author:Goldie Goldbloom
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

* * *

“Where is the girl that came in earlier?” Val asked later, her big hands flapping. “I can’t find her.”

“She’s gone. I spoke with her and she didn’t agree to have an internal examination yet, and anyway, she needs an adult present, so I made another appointment for her and sent her home. I know where she lives. If she skips the appointment, I will bring her with me on the bus.”

“I’m disappointed that you didn’t ask me, but I’m also impressed,” Val said. “No one else could get a word out of her. She’d been sitting there for an hour when I sent you in. Who’s the father?”

Surie hesitated. The reputation of Chassidic Jews would sink lower if she revealed how the pregnancy had happened. “It is a miracle that she came in at all.”

“Did you talk to her about the possibility of an abortion?”

Was that part of Val’s job? Surie would never discuss such a thing with anyone. It was forbidden even to kill wasps on a holiday, flies on Shabbos, spiders. Even in her worst, most desperate moments, early in the pregnancy, she hadn’t considered that word she didn’t even like to think.

“Killing an unborn child is murder.”

“But how will she bring the child to term? What is she? Twelve? Thirteen? Surely that will be worse for her?”

“She’s already in the second trimester. There’s nothing to talk about, so stop. Her parents will send her away to be a ‘mother’s helper’ somewhere and the baby will be adopted, and it will be hard, very hard, on the girl. Or if her mother is young enough and fat enough, the family will say she is the mother of the baby. The girl will be able to stay in the community and she will eventually get married and have more children. It’s not a perfect solution. But I don’t think there is a perfect solution.”

“But was it her father? Or a brother? An uncle? You shouldn’t have let her leave the clinic until we made sure she was going home to a safe environment.”

Surie shook her head. “It was a therapist. In the school.”

“Oh my God!” Val cried. “I have to call ACS.” Then, seeing Surie’s blank expression, she said, “The Administration for Children’s Services. They have to arrest this maniac before he hurts anyone else.” She lifted the phone, but Surie put a hand on hers.

“Wait,” she said. “Let me speak to the family. I’ll call the community police too. He’ll be watched.”

And after speaking with the girl’s mother, then what? Would she dare go to the home of the therapist, to make sure that he really wouldn’t hurt any other children?

His innocent wife would let Surie in and offer her Passover cookies with a look of puzzlement. What’s wrong? she would ask. Can it wait? And Surie would say no, it couldn’t wait, and she’d take a bite of the biscuit, which would taste of dry potato starch, and she would have to gag it down

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