Open Heart (68 page)

Since it was relatively late, I was surprised to find my mother alone in the house. My father had gone to a general meeting of the employees of the Agriculture Ministry. His absence
encouraged
me to begin my confession immediately. Without beating around the bush, to the sounds of Michaela splashing in the bathtub, I went straight to the heart of the matter. I had
something
to tell them. Michaela had decided to return to India with Shivi. Yes, with Shivi. Stephanie was coming from London to join them. I was staying here. In the meantime. Not only because I had nothing to look for in India, but also because I had found what I looking for right here. I had found love. An old-new love for a married woman, now suddenly made possible. Possible in the sense that her husband had died. She’s older than I am, much older, and you can guess who she is. Yes, you can guess. Yes, you know who she is. If you don’t know, I’ll tell you. So you do know. Yes, it’s serious, and yes, I’ll have the strength to cope with it. How do I know? I know because the dead man is
supporting
me too. The dead husband. In what sense? In a
mysterious
sense, which you’ll never be able to understand, because I don’t understand it myself, but I don’t have to understand,
because
I can feel it inside me. My mother now sank into a silence so stern that I had to move the receiver away from my ear. In the end she was brief. She was too intelligent to try to argue with me now, especially since she could feel my tremendous agitation. She only asked me to promise her one thing: that I wouldn’t say a word about it to my father. I promised her at once. But she wasn’t satisfied by my promise, and for the first time in my life she asked me to swear to her. And I swore by the life of Shivi, who was soon to set out on a long journey.

For
now,
after
the
mystery
finishes
eating
the
porridge
served
him
by
his
young
wife
and
enjoying
the
sight
of
his
three
laugh
ing
,
frightened
children
throwing
crumbs
at
the
windowsill
to
appease
the
impudent,
obstinate
bird,
he
rises
to
his
feet,
picks
up
the
new
briefcase
given
him
by
his
wife,
and
with
sweet
so
lemnity
takes
his
leave
from
his
family
to
go
to
his
daily
work.
Although
judging
by
his
status
as
a
subsidized
ex-patient
of
a
reputable
institution
for
the
mentally
ill,
no
real
work
is
waiting
for
him,
when
he
emerges
into
the
bright,
sunny
morning
his
body,
which
is
as
supple
as
a
dancer’s
in
its
elegant
suit,
is
still
bursting
with
energy,
and
his
furled,
folded
umbrella
begins
to
wave
vigorously
in
the
air
as
if
an
entire
orchestra
were
following
in
his
wake.
And
even
though
we
can
assume
that
he
has
not
disclosed
his
destination
to
anyone,
the
second
bird,
circling
faithfully
above
his
head,
precedes
him
to
the
windowsill
of
the
travel
agency,
where
he
is
warmly
welcomed
by
the
travel
agents,
eager
to
know
at
last
where
he
is
bound.

Yes,
the
earth
has
suddenly
begun
to
move,
he
admits
with
a
shy
smile
shining
in
his
black
eyes,
now
clearly
visible
behind
the
polished
lenses
of
his
gold-rimmed
glasses.
But
the
mystery
of
its
movement,
he
continues,
is
no
different
from
the
mystery
of
its
stillness.
Is
there
really
any
need
to
travel
to
all
the
fascinating
and
seductive
places
whose
pictures
are
hanging
on
your
walls,
he
asks,
when
if
we
only
rise
a
little
above
time,
trying
to
sweep
us
along
like
a
strong
river
in
its
current,
where
we
want
to
go
will
come
to
us
wherever
we
are,
thanks
to
the
revolutions
of
the
earth
itself.
If
you
don’t
believe
me,
please
be
so
good
as
to
ask
the
bird
tapping
on
your
windowpane.

Is
a
new
sense
of
humor
budding
here
to
replace
the
one
that
was
withered?
wonder
the
travel
agents,
whose
computers
stopped
working
as
soon
as
he
entered
the
office.
If
so,
maybe
there
is
hope
that
an
unconscious
too
can
be
implanted,
to
re
place
the
one
that
was
amputated.

It was only when my head was already heavy with sleep on the pillow, while the calm breathing of Michaela—who had no
objection
to sleeping in the same bed next to me—murmured in my ears as I tried to close my eyes and mobilize the darkness inside me to overcome the splinters of light constantly coming into the house from the outside world, that I realized I had made a
mistake
. I should never have agreed, certainly not on oath, to my mother’s request not to say anything to my father, for in this way I indirectly admitted that there was something perverse about my love, which was apt to upset my father so much that the whole thing had to be hidden from him in order to spare his feelings. How else was I to understand my mother’s request? My parents had always been scrupulously open and aboveboard with each other, especially in everything concerning me, not necessarily
because
the bond between them was particularly strong but out of fairness and loyalty, which were the guiding principles of their lives—and now my mother was suddenly breaking the rules and betraying my father. Did she think that she would be able to convince me to give up Dori without his help? Or maybe the opposite—was she afraid that in the battle that had already
begun
between us, he might cross the lines and become my ally? In the feverish confusion of my thoughts I could not come to any clear conclusion about what my mother might do or how she might react, but I was sure that tonight she wouldn’t sleep a wink, and she might not even go to bed. I felt sorry to think of her suffering alone, awake in the night. If I were really a good, sensitive son, not only in the superficial manner in which I
fulfilled
my obligations, I would call her and tried to comfort her and reassure her, or at least give her an opportunity to express her anger, in words or silence. But since I knew that my father might pick up the phone instead of my mother, or during the course of our conversation, I did nothing. If she had decided to engage me in single-handed combat, she would have to do so without the solidarity of their marriage.

From that moment on, this principle ruled the relations
between
my mother and me. I was silent, and any initiative for further clarification was in her hands, just as the initiative for setting the date for the journey to India was in Michaela’s hands, and the only initiative left to me was in the pursuit of my
relationship
with Dori. But while my mother and I seemed to have been struck by a slight paralysis, Michaela continued her
preparations
energetically and efficiently, until the trip to India was drawn tight as a bow and all that had to be done to deliver the arrow was touch the string. Deliver in the sense of redeem, for Michaela’s devotion to the dream of the return to India was so great that it gave her journey a spiritual, almost religious status. Not redemption from me, of course, but from the materialistic and achievement-oriented reality around us, which Michaela was not yet resigned to spending the rest of her life in. And her joy was intensified by the fact that she was enabling others to benefit from the journey too. Not only Stephanie, who was calling us almost every day from London, but even Shivi, whose tender mind Michaela believed would absorb impressions that would last for the rest of her life.

In order to prepare Shivi for the journey, Michaela painted a third eye on her forehead every morning, red, blue, or green, which made her look adorable and increased her excitement over their departure. I tried to spend as much time as possible with her, picking her up whenever she held out her little arms to me. Michaela often could not take her along when she went about the business of preparing for the trip, since the car had already been sold, half the proceeds going to the trip and the other half to buying a motorcycle for me, not as big and strong as my old one but quick and light enough to be effective on the flat, clogged roads of the city. When Stephanie arrived on a charter flight from London in the middle of a clear winter’s night, I saw no problem in taking the motorcycle to the airport to pick her up, for her luggage consisted only of a backpack, which even my modest little motorcycle could take with ease.

Indeed, there was a kind of lightness hovering over all the preparations for the trip. The date had been set, and since Michaela had chosen to fly from Cairo, which could be reached by a cheap bus ride, the tickets turned out to be exceptionally inexpensive, especially in view of the fact that Shivi was not yet
one year old and was thus entitled to fly for free. This was Michaela’s reason for refusing my mother’s request to postpone the flight until after Shivi’s first birthday party, which might have consoled them a little for the separation from their
granddaughter
, the bulletin of whose doings was the high point of their day. Although they relied, as I did, on Michaela’s resourcefulness and experience and her grasp of the mysteries of the Indian mentality, the fact that the trip was open-ended naturally caused them
profound
anxiety, which Michaela tried to assuage to the best of her ability, not only because she was fond of them but also because she had learned to respect and appreciate them when they had visited us in London. Accordingly, she found the time to take Shivi to Jerusalem and spend a day with my parents to say
good-bye
and set their minds at rest with a detailed and practical
discussion
of the solutions to all kinds of problems that might crop up. In order to reassure them even further, she took Stephanie with her, to remind them of the solid common sense of her friend from London, who would act as both her traveling companion and a substitute mother for Shivi if, God forbid, something
happened
to Michaela, or if she simply felt like taking off for a couple of days to places unsuitable for small children.

As I could have predicted, my mother succeeded in persuading Stephanie to accompany my father and Shivi on a walk in the park so that she could remain alone with Michaela and tactfully try to find out what had really happened between us and whether there was any substance to my declaration of love for the “older woman,” whose name my mother still refrained from
mentioning
, even though she knew very well who she was. Michaela’s replies to her questions astounded her, not only because they were frank and explicit, for which she may have been prepared, but because they were given in terms of reincarnation and the transmigration of souls, as if the trip to India had already begun and Michaela were sitting with her friend on the banks of the Ganges, not in a Jerusalem neighborhood opposite a woman whose mind was as uncompromisingly clear as the Israeli light coming through the windows. My mother had grown used to Michaela’s rather obscure and esoteric manner of analyzing
human
situations in London, and as long as it concerned other people, usually unknown to her, she could react with tolerance, but now they were talking about me, her only child, and my
marriage, which was in danger of breaking up completely. But my mother understood that the infidelity was only a pretext for Michaela to realize her dream of going back to India, a dream that had been hovering over our marriage from the first day. In the middle of the conversation she therefore changed her tactics, suggesting to Michaela that her trip with Shivi was not
something
that must necessarily deepen the rift in our marriage but rather something that could open the way to a future
reconciliation
. Michaela agreed immediately, perhaps because she
suddenly
pitied this stoic woman who was longing for reconciliation and suffering torments of guilt over my behavior. And in order to gain my mother’s support for her trip, she explained how her and Shivi’s absence for the next few months could help me to
extricate
myself from a situation that would probably lead to
suffering
and misery. She believed that my feelings, if only for Shivi, would take me to India too, where it would be possible to strengthen me, precisely because reincarnation and rebirth were a natural part of daily existence there. “The two of you are
welcome
to come with him,” added Michaela in complete
seriousness
. “We’ll be happy to have you.” And her great light eyes were radiant with generous hospitality, as if the expanses of India were rooms in her private home. “It would be really wonderful to meet there, as we said we would in London.”