The Face of Ze'ev

The cab launched and swerved through the winding subarbs of Jerusalem. I took in a lungful of warm, tarmac-and-olive tinged air, and I knew I was back. How long had it been - three, four years?
The car juddered to a halt on Shalom Alechem street. I payed, tottered into the flats with my case and mounted the cream-white stairs, each slap of my sandles echoing up the nine-story stairwell. A black-hatted man with a prayerbook bumped into me, grunted 'oiyh' and strode on.
As I swapped my case for the other hand and wiped the sweat from my forehead, I could almost hear the excited shrieks of Ze'ev and I, from the days when we raced up these stairs, pushing, panting, elbowing each other aside. Ze'ev always beat me.
I tried to imagine what my cousin's face must look like now, but couldn't. My strongest image was of him running about spasmodically firing an invisible rifle. Now he was a real soldier with a real gun.
I could not help guessing what had happened to him in Ramala.
'Ze'ev is in hospital,' Yonatan had told us down a hissing line. 'A mild injury, he will be out soon.'
That was two months ago, and Ze'ev was still not out.
During this time I had told myself it wasn't serious. Ze'ev had only been serving for half a year; how risky a job could he have? Besides, if anything bad had happened aunt Rinah would be in a state by now, given her mental history, and no one had said anything about Rinah.
No one had said anything.
When Yonatan called at the end of the second month I said, 'What's happened to Ze'ev and when will he be out?'
There was a pause. 'Soon,' he said. I heard a wavering voice singing in the background.
I swallowed. 'How is Rinah?'
Yonatan breathed down the line.
'Listen, how soon can you be in Jerusalem?'

Two days and a flight later, I reached the seventh floor and rang flat sixteen.
'I've got it, I've got it!'
Rinah flung the door open and siezed me, squeezed me, wailing like a siren, and then she pushed me back for inspection, eyes alight.
'Look at you!' she said, 'How can... Why are you so tall? Why?'
Her eyebrows arched, mouth ajar.
'Maybe you shrunk!' I said, and laughed meekly.
She just grinned dreamily. Without warning she clenched my elbow and levered me inside, tugging me through to the kitchen. Yonatan was at the table, his broad and unshapely frame stooped over some kind of timetable, thick fingers keeping it still. He looked up and gauged me, said ‘Shalom’ in a low bland voice, and then returned to the timetable. Rinah prodded me.
'I can't wait to hear what's happened in your life, Jakey!'
Jakey? What was I, six?
'Listen,' she said, 'I'm making lamb chops. You love lamb chops, I remember!'
She niggled my cheek with a finger.
'I'm vegetarian, actually.'
'We don't do vegetarian here,' said Yonatan without looking up.
Rinah rolled her eyes, hands on hips.
I thought of starting a conversation, but Yonatan stood up abruptly and said:
'Yacov, I need to speak with you.'
Since childhood no one had ever called me by my Hebrew name. In Yonatan's voice it held a kind of gravity. He came over, put a hand on my back and guided me to their balcony.
The sun was getting low and the clear sky dissolved to a lilac haze on the horizon. The dense sprawl of stone houses along the hill was now glowing luminous peach. Traffic rumbled softly below. Yonatan gripped the rail, gazing out.
'We always wanted more children,' he said, and then hesitated. 'An only child can not do military service. Ze'ev was sneaky. He invented a brother, called Yacov. Did you know that?'
'No,' I said, touched. 'No one ever told me.'
Looking out I could see the playground where Ze'ev and I used to spend hours after school playing catch and football, where I once killed a cat but somehow Ze'ev was punished for it. I turned to my uncle.
'So he's OK?' I said. 'I mean...if he's nearly ready to come home.'
'I will go to him tomorrow. He will be home with me in a few days, like I said.'
'But what's actually happened? You did say you'd make it clear.'
Yonatan looked behind him as if someone were evesdropping.
'I'll be careful,' I said. 'I wont say a word to Rinah. I understand the terms.'
'I hope so, because she is very fragile now. Times like these...You remember when my mother died? In the Shiva she broke down and went to a hospital for two weeks. She has been on medication for many years. And since Ze'ev has gone...I think she is taking more than she should. Be gentle, and you will make things easier for her while I am gone. She remembers you well.'
'So, tell me about Ze'ev.'
Yonatan gave me a questioning look.
'Something happened in Ramala. We were not told what, but they said he had a mild injury... Then we get a call asking me to speak with him, because he is not talking to anyone else. I say “Ze'ev?” I wait for, I don't know, two minutes, and he says “Mi zeh?”
'Next thing, he needs help eating, going to the bathroom....Of course Rinah cannot know this. Whenever I have been to see Ze'ev, it is without Rinah. This is best for her. While I am away you must speak about other things. Only call me in an emergency.'
'But, has he been improving?' I asked.
Yonatan was growing impatient.
'He will be out in a few days, like I said.'

Inside, the three of us ate in silence. For the first time since I was six, I had lamb chops.

The next day I awoke to find Rinah ironing clothes next to my bed.
'Boker tov, sleepyhead,' she said, thrusting the iron back and forth, humming a nursery rhyme I couldn't place. The finished clothes were in a pile. In fact—
'Are those my clothes?'
'Of course. I unpacked for you and put the dirty ones in the wash. Everything else is in the drawers.'
'Is Yonaton here?'
She shook her head.
'I'll make you some breakfast. Come on, its ten already.'

In the kitchen she said, 'sit there,' pointing to what I assumed was Ze'ev's seat.
She made me eggs on toast. When I began, she brought out my digital camera.
'I was looking through your pictures. Is this your girlfriend?'
'Well, no, actually.'
'What about her?'
'Rinah, I was wondering if you had Yonatan's mobile number. Just in case.'
Rinah put her ropey arms on the table and leaned in.
'I can find you a lovely Jewish girl here.'

Early evening Rinah sent me out to get groceries. There were seven bags in total, and I had to stop every hundred metres to rest. Back at the flats I heaved up the seven flights of stairs. Finally I staggered into flat sixteen to see Rinah perched on the edge of the sofa, hands clenched together, staring vacantly into the air. She jerked round, and said 'Where have you...Why were you away so long? I didn't know when you'd be back!'

Before bed that night I noticed framed photo on the bookshelf. It was of Ze'ev and I dressed up as clowns. I remembered. It was the day before I moved to England.
During the night I dreamt I was in a dark circus, atop a tightrope platform with young Ze'ev. He began to edge along the wire, away from me, but with every step he grew taller. Soon he was eight feet tall and the wire looked fit to break. I had a lassoo, which I threw around his waist, but he was too big and I would never bear his weight. I shouted 'turn back!' but he wouldn't listen.
Snap.
I awoke to find myself sweating. I got up and went to the balcony for my first cigarette since arriving in Israel. I had been trying to quit, but by God it tasted good. From nowhere Rinah appeared, face full of horror. She hurried over, snatched the butt from my hand and threw it over the balcony.
'You're disgusting,' she said, finger held out. 'You're not to do that in our home, you hear me?'

The next day I got up as late as possible, then took a very long shower. I returned to my room to find that the picture of Ze'ev and I was missing. I dried, got dressed, and as I pulled on a t-shirt I saw, on the bedside table, a wooden-framed picture of me. It was from my digital camera.

Later I surprised myself by doing press-ups, but on the eighteenth one I heard choking and thumping noises down the hall. I burst into the bathroom and beheld Rinah sprawled on the tiles, dripping with bathwater, gasping for air. Her belly and breasts sagged as she struggled to all fours, pointing manically toward her bedroom.
I found the inhaler next to her bed, bounded back and placed it to her mouth. She took deep breaths, and within a couple of minutes she was breathing steadily. She wrapped a towel round her body, trembling.
'There we go, there we go,' I said with a sigh. I made to leave quickly but she pulled me back and hugged me.
'Thank you,' she said.
My arms were hovering in the air, so I brought my hands to my head.
'The water's seeping through my clothes,' I said.

I managed to avoid speaking to Rinah for most of the day, but the following morning she called out to me in a hoarse voice.
'Yaa-cov. Tired' le aruchat boker lifnei she ze yitkarer.'
In the kitchen I sat down opposite her. Rinah was blinking profusely, tearing off pieces of a napkin bit by bit.
'You know I barely speak Hebrew any more,' I said, but she didn't seem to hear.
'Sweetheart,' she said hoarsely, 'make Ima a lemon tea.'
I stood up slowly and placed my palms on the table.
'Rinah, do you realise what you said?'
She looked at me, vaguely perplexed.
'You are not my Ima. My Ima is back in London.'
Rinah took a new napkin and began to tear it. Her lips moved silently.

I had to get out. I ran down the seven floors, grabbed a bus into town and got off at Ben Yehuda street. People swarmed in all directions. I jogged down the street, squinting in the brightness, nearly toppled a pram. I reached a falafel bar, but in the queue I was approached by an American chareidi man.
'Wanna lay tefilin?'
'Will you go away,' I said in a pronounced tone. This turned a few heads, so I walked off. I grabbed a taxi back to the flat, arrived, and the driver asked for forty shekels. Forty!
'Are you taking the piss?' I said, fingers curled in the air.
The man was rambling loudly in Hebrew. I stepped out, threw a pair of ten-shekel coins at him, and bolted inside.

Back in the flat, Rinah rushed up to me in tears and cupped my face with her hands. I pushed past and looked around for her filofax. Where had I seen it?
'You can't do this!' she said. 'You can't leave without tellng me!'
I found it, flicked through and found Yonatan's number. I grabbed the reciever and dialled.
'What are you doing?' she said.
The line started ringing, and I preyed for an answer.
'Speak to me!' she shrieked, and in a flash she had siezed the reciever and dashed it to the floor. It lay in pieces.
'Rinah, I have to speak to Yonatan. I have to know what's happening. This is fucking ridiculous!'
Rinah held onto my forearm, spouting Hebrew. I pushed forward and she fell back, sprawled on the floor, arms shaking. I felt my heart race, words echoing in my ears. Silence filled the room.

There was a click. The front door swung open. In walked a stranger, guided along cautiously by Yonatan. Yonatan let go of the stranger's arm so he could stand freely. The figure was tall but stooped and drained. His skin was a pallid yellow, and the pupils in his eyes were pin-pricks. His head tilted slightly to one side and...Oh Christ.
He did not seem to recognise the flat.
Rinah approached her son edgily, reached her arms around him and pressed her face into his chest, breathing quickly, heavily.
'Your hurting him,' said Yonatan. 'Be careful.'
Rinah was wiping her eyes on his shirt. Ze'ev, staring straight ahead, said nothing, but made a weak attempt to shrug her off. Then he began to mumble.
I stepped forward, hoping to offer something, but Yonatan waved me away. He was keeping check, and there was nothing I could do.
Ze'ev looked at me. I remembered the cat. The furry corpse in the playground, head crushed by my football. I had cried that day, but when my father demanded facts, Ze'ev stepped up and said 'I did it.' I would never forget that, his unshakable courage. In that moment I wished more than anything to be like Ze'ev.
I looked at him now, vacant and unblinking. I longed for recognition, but there was none.