Natasha and Other Stories Part 4

-He knows the language. He can read all the prayers. If he wants to leave maybe we should let him leave already?

-Take the money from my salary.

-I didn't say it was the money.

-Take the money from my salary.

-You want to redo the kitchen. That's also from your salary.

-If that's my choice, I can live without the kitchen.

My mother was resolute. Nothing I said helped my case. So that April, just after Pa.s.sover, I put Jerry Ackerman in the hospital.

Most days, on his way to the office, my father would drop me off at school in his red 1970 Volvo. On a Friday, after gym, Jerry Ackerman said something about Solly Birnbaum's small hairless p.e.n.i.s and Solly started to cry. Solly was fat, had webbed toes, and was reduced to tears at the end of every gym cla.s.s. I had never defended him before but I seized my chance.

-Ackerman, if I had your tweezer-d.i.c.k I wouldn't talk.

-Why are you looking at my d.i.c.k, f.a.ggot?

-Ackerman thought he had a pubic hair until he p.i.s.sed out of it.

-f.u.c.k you, Berman, and that red s.h.i.+tbox your father drives.

In Rabbi Gurvich's office, Dr. Ackerman said that I had banged Jerry's head so hard against the wall that I had given him a concussion. Dr. Ackerman said that Jerry had vomited three times that night and that they'd had to drive him to the hospital at two in the morning. Dr. Ackerman asked, What kind of sick person, what kind of animal would do this? When I refused to answer, my mother apologized to Dr. and Mrs. Ackerman and also to Jerry.

This wasn't the first time my mother and I had been called into Gurvich's office. After our move into the new neighborhood I had begun to affect a hoodlum persona. At school, I kept to myself, glowered in the hallways, and, with the right kind of provocation, punched people in the face. Less than a month before I gave Jerry Ackerman his concussion, I'd gotten into a fight with two eighth graders. Because of dietary laws, the school prohibited bringing meat for lunch. Other students brought peanut b.u.t.ter or tuna fish, but I-and most of the other Russians-would invariably arrive at school with smoked Hungarian salami, Polish bologna, roast turkey. Our mothers couldn't comprehend why anyone would choose to eat peanuts in a country that didn't know what it meant to have a shortage of smoked meat. And so, I was already sensitive about my lunch when the two eighth graders stopped by my table and asked me how I liked my pork sandwich.

For my fight with Jerry Ackerman, I received a two-day suspension. Sparing words, Gurvich made it clear that this was never to happen again. The next time he saw me in his office would be the last. To hit someone's head against a wall-did I ever think what that could do? If I got so much as within ten feet of Ackerman he didn't want to say what would happen. He asked me if I understood. My mother said I understood. He asked me if I had anything to say. I knew that what I had to say was not what he wanted to hear.

On the drive home my mother asked me what I was trying to do, and when my father got home he came as close as he ever had to hitting me.

-Don't think you're so smart. What do you think happens if you get expelled? You want to repeat the grade? We already paid for the entire year.

On the street, I told Boris, Alex, and Eugene, but they weren't impressed.

-Congratulations, you're the toughest kid in Hebrew school.

I returned to school the week of Holocaust Remembrance Day-which we called Holocaust Day for short. It was one of a series of occasions that punctuated the school year beginning with Rosh Hashanah in September and ending with Israeli Independence Day in May. For Chanukah, the school provided jelly donuts and art cla.s.s was spent making swords and s.h.i.+elds out of papier-mache; for Purim, everyone dressed up in costume and a pageant was organized during which we all cheered the hanging of evil Hamman and his ten evil sons; for Pa.s.sover, every cla.s.s held a preparatory seder and took a field trip to the matzoh bakery; for Israeli Independence Day, we dressed in blue and white and marched around the school yard waving flags and singing the Hatikvah, our national anthem.

Holocaust Day was different. Preparations were made days in advance. The long bas.e.m.e.nt hallway, from the gymnasium to the pool, was converted into a Holocaust museum. Out of storage came the pictures pasted on bristol board. There were photocopies of Jewish pa.s.sports, there were archival photos of Jews in cattle cars, starving Jews in ghettos, naked Ukrainian Jews waiting at the edge of an open trench, Jews with their hands on barbed wire waiting to be liberated, ovens, schematic drawings of the gas chambers, pictures of empty cans of Zyklon B. Other bristol boards had Yiddish songs written in the ghettos, in the camps. We had crayon drawings done by children in Theresienstadt. We had a big map of Europe with multicolored pins and accurate statistics. Someone's grandfather donated his striped Auschwitz pajamas, someone else's grandmother contributed a jacket with a yellow star on it. There were also sculptures. A woman kneeling with a baby in her arms in bronze. A tin reproduction of the gates of Birkenau with the words Arbeit Macht Frei. Sculptures of flaming Stars of David, sculptures of piles of shoes, sculptures of sad bearded Polish rabbis. In the center of the hallway was a large menorah, and all along the walls were smaller memorial candles-one candle for each European country. On Holocaust Day, the fluorescents were extinguished and we moved through the bas.e.m.e.nt by dim candlelight.

Holocaust Day was also the one day that Rabbi Gurvich supervised personally. Gurvich's father was a Holocaust survivor and had, that year, published his memoirs. We were all encouraged to buy the book. When the copies arrived, Gurvich led his father from cla.s.s to cla.s.s so that the old man could sign them. Whereas Gurvich was imposing-dark, unsmiling, possessing a gruff seismic voice-his father was frail and mild. In our cla.s.s, the old man perched himself behind the teacher's desk and smiled benignly as he inked each copy with the double imperative: Yizkor; al tishkach! Remember; don't forget!

Even though I had spent the two days of my suspension fantasizing about killing Gurvich and Ackerman, I returned to school and avoided them both. Gurvich was easy to avoid. With the exception of Holocaust Day, his primary role was that of disciplinarian and-unless you were called into his office-he was rarely seen. Ackerman was different. The only cla.s.s we shared was gym, but in the mornings I saw him grinning as I got my books from my locker; at lunch I sat across the cafeteria as he conspired against me; and at recess, if he was playing, then I abstained from tennis-ball soccer.

For Holocaust Day we were called down into the bas.e.m.e.nt by grades. The hallway was long and, arranged in orderly columns, an entire grade could fit into the bas.e.m.e.nt at one time. After Gurvich made the announcement over the intercom, we followed our teachers down. We were quiet on the way and silent once we got there. Some people started crying before we entered the bas.e.m.e.nt; others started to cry when we reached the dimness and saw the photos on the walls. As we filed in, Gurvich stood waiting for us beside the menorah. When everyone was in the bas.e.m.e.nt, the double doors were closed behind us and we waited for Gurvich to begin. Because the hallway was extremely reverberant, Gurvich's deliberate pause was filled with the echo of stifled sobs, and because there were no windows and the pool was so close, the bas.e.m.e.nt was stuffy and reeked of chlorine.

Gurvich began the service by telling us about the six million, about the vicious n.a.z.is, about our history of oppression. His heavy voice occupied the entire s.p.a.ce, and when he intoned the El Maleh Rachamim, I felt his voice reach into me, down into that place where my mother said I was supposed to have the thing called my "Jewish soul." Gurvich sang: O G.o.d, full of compa.s.sion, who dwells on high, grant true rest upon the wings of the Divine Presence. And when he sang this, his harsh baritone filled with grief so that his voice seemed no longer his own; his voice belonged to the six million. Every syllable that came out of his mouth was important. The sounds he made were dictated by centuries of ancestral mourning. I couldn't understand how it was possible for Gurvich not to cry when his voice sounded the way it did.

After Gurvich finished the prayer, we slowly made our way through the memorial. I stopped by photos of the Warsaw ghetto during the uprising and then beside a portrait of Mordecai Anilewicz, the leader of the ghetto resistance. I noticed Ackerman behind me. He was with two friends and I turned my head to look.

-What are you looking at, a.s.sface?

I turned away. I concentrated on moving down the hallway but felt a shove from behind and lost my balance. I managed to catch myself along the wall. My hand landed safely on top of a child's crayon drawing, but my foot accidentally knocked over the Czech memorial candle. Everybody in the hallway froze at the sound of the breaking gla.s.s. I turned around and saw Ackerman snickering. Matthew Wise, Ackerman's friend, stood between me and Ackerman. Wise was bigger than Ackerman, and I was sure he was the one who had pushed me. Instinctively, I lunged at Wise and tackled him to the ground. I was on top and choking him when Gurvich grabbed the back of my s.h.i.+rt and tried to pull me off. Even as Gurvich pulled me away I held on to Wise's throat. And when Gurvich finally yanked me clear, I saw that Wise was still on the floor, trembling.

While the rest of my cla.s.s finished going through the memorial, I waited upstairs in Gurvich's office. I waited, also, until the sixth grade went down to the memorial, before Gurvich returned.

I sat for half an hour, maybe longer. I imagined the horrible consequences. I foresaw my mother's reaction and, even worse, my father's reaction. I didn't regret what I had done, but the fear of squandering so much of my parents' money made me physically sick.

When Gurvich finally walked into his office, he didn't sit down. Without looking at me, he told me to get up out of my G.o.dd.a.m.n chair and go back downstairs. I was not to touch anything, I was not to move, I was to stay there until he came.

Back in the bas.e.m.e.nt I waited for Gurvich by the menorah. I didn't know where else to stand. I didn't know where in the memorial my presence would be the least offensive to Gurvich. I stood in one place beside a picture of Jews looking out of their bunks, and somehow I felt that my standing there would anger Gurvich. I moved over to the sculptures and felt the same way. I wanted to strike some sort of anodyne pose, to make myself look like someone who didn't deserve to be expelled.

I was tracing the ironwork on the menorah when Gurvich pushed the double doors open and entered. Very deliberately, as if he didn't know what to say first, Gurvich walked over to where I stood. I took my hands off the menorah.

-How is it that all of this doesn't mean anything to you, Berman? Can you tell me that?

-It means something.

-It means something? It means something when you jump on another Jew in this place, on Holocaust Day? This is how you demonstrate it means something?

He raised his voice.

-It means something when you act like an animal to the memory of everyone who died?

-What about Wise? He pushed me into the wall.

-Wise had to go home because of what you did, so don't ask me about Wise. Wise wasn't the one choking another Jew at a memorial for the Holocaust.

I didn't say anything. Gurvich tugged at his beard.

-Look around this, Berman, what do you see?

I looked.

-The Holocaust.

-And does this make you feel anything?

-Yes.

-Yes? It does?

-Yes.

-I don't believe you. I don't believe you feel anything. He put his hand on my shoulder. He leaned in closer.

-Berman, a n.a.z.i wouldn't do here what you did today. Don't tell me about how you feel.

-I'm not a n.a.z.i.

-No, you're not a n.a.z.i? What are you?

-A Jew.

-What?

-A Jew.

-I can't hear you.

-I'm a Jew.

-Why so quiet, Berman? It's just us here. Don't be so ashamed to say it.

-I'm a Jew, I said into my shoes.

He turned me around by my shoulder. I may have considered myself a tough little b.a.s.t.a.r.d, but when Gurvich gripped me I understood that mine was a boy's shoulder and that his was a man's hand. He put his face very close to mine and made me look at him. I could smell the musky staleness of his beard. For the first time, I felt I was going to cry.

-So that my uncles hear you in Treblinka! he commanded.

He tightened his grip on my shoulder until he saw it hurt. I was convinced he was going to hit me. The last thing I wanted to do was start crying, so I started crying.

-I'm a Jew! I shouted into his face.

My voice rang off the walls, and off the sculptures and the pictures and the candles. I had screamed it in his face wis.h.i.+ng to kill him, but he only nodded his head. He kept his hand on my shoulder and waited until I really started to sob. My shoulder shuddered under his hand and I heard the repulsive sound of my own whimpering. Finally, Gurvich removed his hand and backed away a half step. As soon as he did, I wanted him to put his hand back. I was standing in the middle of the hallway, shaking. I wanted to sit down on the floor, or lean against a wall, something. Anything but stand in the middle of that hallway while Gurvich nodded his rabbinical head at me. When he was done nodding, he turned away and opened the double doors leading up to the stairs. Halfway out, before closing the doors, Gurvich looked back to where I hadn't moved.

-Now, Berman, he said, now maybe you understand what it is to be a Jew.

NATASHA.

It is the opposite which is good to us.

-HERAc.l.i.tUS.

WHEN I WAS SIXTEEN I was high most of the time. That year my parents bought a new house at the edge of Toronto's sprawl. A few miles north were cows; south the city. I spent most of my time in bas.e.m.e.nts. The suburbs offered nothing and so I lived a subterranean life. At home, separated from my parents by door and stairs, I smoked hash, watched television, read, and m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.ed. In other bas.e.m.e.nts I smoked, watched television, and refined my style with girls.

In the spring, my uncle Fima, my grandmother's youngest brother, married his second wife. She arrived from Moscow for two weeks to get acquainted with him and the rest of the family. Dusa, our dentist, had known the woman in Russia and recommended her. She was almost forty and my uncle was forty-four. The woman was the latest in a string of last chances. A previous last chance had led to his first marriage. That marriage, to a fellow Russian immigrant, had failed within six months. My uncle was a good man, a hard worker, and a polymath. He read books, newspapers, and travel brochures. He could speak with equal authority about the Crimean War and the Toronto Maple Leafs. Short months after arriving in Toronto he took a job giving tours of the city to visiting Russians. But he wasn't rich and never would be. He was also honest to a fault and nervous with people. My grandmother's greatest fear was that he would always be alone in the world.

Zina, the woman, had greasy brown hair cut in a mannish style. She was thin, her body almost without contour. The first time I saw her was when my uncle brought her to our house for dinner. She wore tight blue pants, high heels, and a yellow silk blouse which accentuated her conspicuously long nipples. The top b.u.t.tons of her blouse were undone and a thin gold chain with a Star of David clung to her breastbone. When she kissed me in greeting she smelled of sweat and lilac.

Zina strode into our house as if she were on familiar territory, and her confidence had the effect of making my uncle act as though he were the stranger. He stumbled through the introductions and almost knocked over his chair. He faltered as he tried to explain how they had spent the day and Zina chided him and finished his sentences. When my mother served the raspberry torte, Zina fed my uncle from her fork. In Russia she was a "teacher of English" and she sprinkled her conversation with English words and phrases. The soup my mother served was "tasty," our dining room "divine," and my father "charming." After dinner, in the living room, she placed her hand on my uncle's knee. I was, as usual, high, and I became fixated on the hand. It rested on my uncle's knee like a small pale animal. Sometimes it would arch or rise completely to make a point, always to settle back on the knee. Under her hand, my uncle's knee barely moved.

After her two weeks in Canada, Zina returned to Moscow. Before she left, my mother and aunt took her shopping and bought her a new wardrobe. They believed that Zina would be good for my uncle. The last thing he needed was a timid wife. Maybe she was a little aggressive, but to make it in this country you couldn't apologize at every step like him. My grandmother was anxious because Zina had a young daughter in Moscow, but she conceded that at this age to find a woman without a child probably meant there was something wrong with her. My uncle did not disagree. There were positives and negatives, he said.

The decision was made quickly and days after Zina's departure my uncle wrote her a letter inviting her to return and become his wife. One month later, Zina was back in Toronto. This time, my entire family went to the airport to greet her. We stood at the gate and waited as a stream of Russian faces filtered by. Near the end of the stream, Zina appeared. She was wearing an outfit my mother had purchased for her. She carried a heavy suitcase. When she saw my uncle she dropped the suitcase and ran to him and kissed him on his cheeks and on his mouth. A thin blond girl, also carrying a suitcase, picked up Zina's abandoned bag and dragged both suitcases through the gate. The girl had large blue eyes and her straight blond hair was cut into bangs. She strained toward us with the bags and stopped behind Zina. She waited patiently, her face without expression, for her mother to introduce her. Her name was Natasha. She was fourteen. My mother said, Meet your new cousin. Later, as we drove my grandparents home, my grandmother despaired that the girl's father was obviously a shaygets.

One week after their arrival, everyone went down to North York City Hall for the civil ceremony. A retired judge administered the vows and we took photos in the atrium. There was no rabbi, no chuppah, no stomping of the gla.s.s. Afterward, we all went to our house for a barbecue. One after another people made toasts. My uncle and Zina sat at the head of the table like a real married couple. For a wedding gift they were given money to help them rent a larger apartment. My uncle's one-bedroom would not do. This wasn't Russia and the girl couldn't continue to sleep in the living room. The one time my grandparents had gone to visit, Natasha emerged from the shower naked and, without so much as acknowledging their presence, went into the kitchen for an apple. While my grandparents tried to listen to my uncle and Zina talk about Zina's plans to get her teaching certificate, Natasha stood in the kitchen and ate the apple.

At the barbecue, my mother seated Natasha between me and my cousin, Jana. It was our duty to make her feel welcome. She was new to the country, she had no friends, she spoke no English, she was now family. Jana, almost two years my senior, had no interest in a fourteen-year-old girl. Especially one who dressed like a Polish hooker, didn't speak English, and wasn't saying anything in Russian either. Midway through the barbecue, a car full of girls came for Jana and Natasha became my responsibility. My mother encouraged me to show her around the house.

Without enthusiasm I led Natasha around the house. Without enthusiasm she followed. For lack of anything else to say, I would enter a room and announce its name in Russian. We entered the kitchen and I said kitchen, my parents' bedroom and I said bedroom, the living room, which I called the room where we watch television since I had no idea what it was called in Russian. Then I walked her down into the bas.e.m.e.nt. Through the blinds we could see the backyard and the legs of our newly incarnated family. I said, That's it, the whole house. Natasha looked around the room and then shut the blinds, rendering the already dim bas.e.m.e.nt almost dark. She dropped down into one of the two velour beanbag chairs I had in front of the television. Chairs that I had been earnestly and consistently humping since the age of twelve.

-You have all of this to yourself?

-Yes.

-It must be nice.

-It is.

-What do you do here?

-Watch television, read.

-That's it?

-That's most of it.

-Do you bring girls here?

-Not really.

-Have you had s.e.x down here?

-What?

-You don't have to say if you don't want to. I don't really care. It doesn't mean anything.

-You're fourteen.

-So what? That doesn't mean anything either. I've done it a hundred times. If you want, I'll do it with you.

-We're cousins.

-No we're not.

-Your mother married my uncle.

-It's too bad. He's nice.

-He is.