Apart From Love Read online

  Apart From Love

  A Novel

  Uvi Poznansky

  Apart From Love. ©2012 Uvi Poznansky.

  All rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Published by

  Uviart

  P.O. Box 3233 Santa Monica CA 90408

  Website: uviart.com

  Email: [email protected]

  First Edition 2012

  Printed in the United States of America

  The characters in this book are fictional. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Book design, cover design and cover image by

  Uvi Poznansky

  For my husband

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: The White Piano

  Chapter 2: Father And Son

  Chapter 3: No Omelette For Me

  Chapter 4: Apart From Love

  Chapter 5: It Is Not Too Late

  Chapter 6: A Promise, Aborted

  Chapter 7: N Over L

  Chapter 8: A Woman, Forgotten

  Chapter 9: Where Was There

  Chapter 10: Keeper Of Secrets

  Chapter 11: In My Defense

  Chapter 12: A Place Called Sunrise

  Chapter 13: She Is Looking Out The Window

  Chapter 14: The Family We Are

  Chapter 15: Go Back To Your Mama

  Chapter 16: My Own Voice

  Chapter 17: Leonard And Lana

  Chapter 18: The Entertainer

  Chapter 19: Nothing Surrendered

  Chapter 20: Above All, Survival

  Chapter 21: The Heartbeat

  Chapter 22: Dead Man’s Fingers

  Chapter 23: A Wall. A Space. A Wall

  Chapter 24: Only An Empty Dress

  Chapter 25: The Naked Bulb

  Chapter 26: She Deserves Better

  Chapter 27: A Price Would Be Paid

  Chapter 28: Bei Mir Bistu Shein

  Chapter 29: The Long Wait

  Chapter 30: The Source of Trouble

  Chapter 31: Around Me Around Him

  Chapter 32: No Second Look

  Chapter 33: Not The End

  Chapter 34: Am I Covered

  Chapter 35: Lay Me Down

  Chapter 36: Play. Stop. Eject

  Appendix 1: Editorial Notes

  Appendix 2: About The Story

  Appendix 3: About The Author

  Chapter 1 The White Piano

  As Told by Ben

  About a year ago I sifted through the contents of my suitcase, and was just about to discard a letter, which my father had written to me some time ago. Almost by accident my eye caught the line, I have no one to blame for all this but myself, which I had never noticed before, because it was written in an odd way, as if it were a secret code, almost: upside down, in the bottom margin of the page, with barely a space to allow any breathing.

  The words left some impression in my memory. I almost wished he were next to me, so I could not only listen to him, but also record his voice saying that.

  I imagined him back home, leaning over his desk, scrawling each letter with the finest of his pens with great care, as if focusing through a thick magnifying glass. The writing was truly minute, as if he had hated giving away even the slightest hint to a riddle I should have been able to solve on my own. I detested him for that. And so, thinking him unable to open his heart to me, I could never bring myself to write back. In hindsight, that may have been a mistake.

  Even so, I am only too happy to agree with him: the blame for what happened in our family is his. Entirely his. If not for his actions ten years ago, I would never have run away to Firenze, to Rome, to Tel Aviv. And if not for his actions a couple of weeks ago, this frantic call for me to come back and see him would never have been made.

  And so I find myself standing here, on the threshold of where I grew up, feeling utterly awkward. I knock, and a stranger opens the door. The first thing that comes to mind: what is she doing here? The second thing: she is young, much too young for him. The third: her hair. Red.

  I try not to stare—but to my astonishment, this girl with the kittenish eyes seems to be my age, so much younger than I have previously expected. Her name is the one thing I know for sure: Anita. She moves fast, and with a slight sway of the hips, just like my mother, which makes me want to forget, for a moment, that she is not.

  She lays a hand on my suitcase, and she drags the thing—as if it were a wounded hostage—into what used to be my room. I walk in behind her, captivated, at each step, by folds playing across her tight, short skirt.

  “There,” says Anita.

  And she kicks the thing to the corner of the room, shoving it along the way from side to side to make it fit, somehow, under the shelf, where some of my old childhood knickknacks are still on display.

  And there, half hidden behind my old baseball mitt, is a flimsy metal frame with a dusty glass, under which is a picture I have nearly forgotten: a picture of my family from ages ago.

  Here is me, a ten years old boy smiling timidly, with a metal brace shining across the front teeth. Here is dad, hugging me with his right hand, and mom, hugging me with her left. The ring on her finger happens to catch the light. Their cheeks nearly touch, because they were such a perfect fit—or so I thought.

  Meanwhile, Anita turns on her heels to ask me, “You tired?”

  “No,” I feel compelled to lie, because who is she to ask me anything.

  “OK, fine,” she says, shrugging. “Want some warm milk or something, before bed?”

  To which I say, “What, you think I’m a baby?”

  With one swift step Anita is right here beside me, which takes me entirely by surprise. With no shame whatsoever, she looks me up and down and bursts out laughing, a deep, throaty kind of a laugh.

  “You? A baby? Oh, no,” she says. “Definitely not that. What are you, twenty-five now?”

  “Twenty-seven.”

  “Your father told me so much about you.”

  “Really? He did?”

  “I feel like I know you already,” she points playfully at the picture. “See there, how tight they used to hold you?”

  I shrug, and she goes on, “I can almost hear them say, Don’t touch this, Ben. Don’t touch that. I can almost hear you, too, like, Don’t touch me here. Don’t touch me there. Just don’t. Don’t you dare.”

  And before I can say anything, she takes hold of my right hand, then my left, swings me playfully around the room, and pushes me directly to bed, with a twinkle in her eye. “So? Want a goodnight kiss?”

  “No,” I say, because who is she to play mother to me.

  “You sure?” she says.

  Which is when I sense for the first time that she may be lonely here, in our old apartment, surrounded by these yellowing pictures, besieged by forgotten history, which must seem so distant to her, because it belongs to others. She must be lonely as only a new bride can be, with my father out there in the hospital.

  “Sure, I’m sure,” I say, with an unsure voice.

  “You look awful tired, lying there,” she says. “Don’t fall asleep with your clothes on.”

  “What do you care?” I say. “And oh, by the way, Mazel Tov... So sorry, I totally forgot, I ought to congratulate you.”

  But she does not seem to mind what I say, or for that matter, what I do not, and I know it, because a second later her lips are on me—on my forehead, really—moist and soft, and her hair brushes my face, it is fragrant, and this is like no goodnight kiss I have ever fe
lt before. So I close my eyes and breathe her in, wishing, suddenly, for more.

  Anita spreads the blanket over me and it comes down heavy, heavy enough not only to stop me from shivering—but also to fix me in place, straighten my limbs for me and then, iron out every fold on my skin. I am home, the same home I was in such a hurry to leave ten years ago, just before my parents divorced.

  I turn over to the wall, and immediately turn back, trying to catch her scent, which Anita has left behind her, quite carelessly, before halting there, by the light switch. Which makes me wonder: will she stay—or will she go?

  With a click she turns off the light, and then closes the door on her way out.

  I find it hard, you see, to be hostile to her, or to blame her for the accident, because at first glance she looks innocent, almost, and because her fragrance is so potent, to the point of making it known that she is in heat, and because this place, where I grew up, seems to play tricks on my mind.

  In my weakness I feel, all of a sudden, like a child, a man-child gazing at the light, the pencil of light rolling in right there, under the door.

  So there I lie, staring at the ceiling, where shadows are flickering, as if they were trapped here from a time gone by. I remember the voices seeping through the wall from the direction of my parents’ bedroom.

  Mom said, “What’s the matter, Lenny?”

  And dad said, “Oh nothing, dear.”

  There was a long silence, after which mom said, “Are you having a thing again?”

  And dad said, “What thing?”

  And she says, “You know exactly what I am talking about.”

  In place of an answer he tries to hush her, saying, “The walls here, they are so thin, dear. The neighbors, they may hear you. And the boy, he’s barely asleep—”

  “Don’t—don’t you hush me now, Lenny! I want an answer from you. I want the truth.”

  “Please, Natasha, not that again.”

  “Yes or no, Lenny! Are you having an affair?”

  “No, dear, but even if I did, you know well enough that it would mean nothing, just nothing to me.”

  “Who is she, this time?”

  “You,” he said, turning serious now. “You are the woman I adore.”

  That was no lie. He did adore her—but at the same time, dad seemed to believe that a man was entitled to have some fun on the side. After all it was mom who encouraged him to leave the apartment every evening when her students came in for piano lessons. Which was why he started idling around, and spending so much time at some ice cream shop, down at the pier, where that girl, who stood behind the counter with her two scoops on top, was only too happy to serve him.

  So mom ended up throwing her ring at him. It rolled away—perhaps under the sofa, perhaps elsewhere—and never recovered, because it reminded each one of us of that time, and of being hurt.

  Not long after that, they divorced. I dropped out of school and travelled away. And that girl, so I was told by my aunts, moved in with my father right away. Incredibly, they reported, she looked like a younger version of mom—in every respect but one:

  Anita was a simple girl, even vulgar, and with no high school diploma. In short, she was what my father must have needed at the time: a real change. Someone who would look up to him.

  Nearly ten years down the road, Anita told him she was pregnant, which brings us to the time of the disaster, which can also be described—if you care to celebrate it—as a wedding.

  I check my watch. Ten minutes past midnight.

  Tired as I am, the closest I can come to sleep is tossing until the sheet gets all coiled around me like a rope, which makes something rustle there, in the back pocket of my bluejeans. I draw out the envelope, which my aunt handed me only an hour ago, on the way from the airport.

  “Here, Ben, this here, it’s for you,” said my aunt in a low, secretive voice, which I took to mean that we should avoid talking right now about what was inside.

  I nodded back in vague gratitude, hoping, really hoping it was money, and why not? I was nearly broke, because of buying the flight ticket to LA on such a short notice.

  Meanwhile, aunt Hadassa pulled a small mirror from her purse and nudged her puffy, white hair. It was build up and tilted, somehow, over the eyebrows, which were painted in impossibly high arches.

  The cab came to a stop. I got out.

  “Oy, you look so much skinnier now,” she sighed, her bulging eyes afloat, suddenly, in tears. “No one to take care of you, I’m sure. Quick, give an old woman a hug! My, my, look at your cheeks! I cannot even bring myself to give you a good pinch! You know, in 1939, when I lived in Paris there was such a shortage of food—”

  It was the wrong moment to tell her that I had heard that story before, so I just wrapped my arms around her, taking in the smell of bad teeth, hair spray and chicken soup. It was mildly nauseous, so I straightened my back, stuck the envelope in my back pocket, yanked out my suitcase and waved goodbye.

  The cab, with aunt Hadassa blowing a kiss in it, trailed away into the night.

  Twenty-one minutes past midnight.

  The pencil of light has just turned charcoal. I find myself troubled by the fact that the envelope, which I feel between my fingers, seems too thin to contain what I hoped it did.

  For a second I prick up my ears, thinking I have just heard Anita’s footfalls outside my door. She must be as restless here as I am. Then, all is quiet again, so I get up, fumble in the dark to turn the desk lamp on, then tear the thing open, only to find my hope dashed.

  Inside, there is nothing but words.

  Dear Ben,

  I’m afraid you may see this letter as an exercise in spreading gossip, which I insist, is not my intent at all, but as rumors go, this woman, Anita, is known to be nothing but trouble, so I must warn you. Stay away from her. She’s a slut! I told your father the same thing, and much good has it done me.

  I am saying all this not only because she disinvited me from that wedding. In my time, women were decent enough to think twice before taking someone else’s husband. Sex was far from being a necessity, and I can promise you one thing: becoming an old maid never killed anyone.

  At any rate, you would be right to doubt some of what I am going to include here, because of course you cannot believe everything people tell you, but I suppose there is some truth in it anyway, which I strive to find as best I can.

  My sources, whose names I am not going to divulge, were amazed at this woman right from the start, when they peeked through a half open door, expecting to find your mom there, even though it was a week after that ill-advised divorce. Instead, they took a glimpse of Anita. She was biting into an apple, and wearing not a stitch of clothing—with the possible exception of a little red bow in her piggy tail.

  The same sources tell me now what an incredible amount of attention she gave, just a month ago, to shaping every detail of her crowning moment, when she, the new Mrs. Kaminsky, would make her grand entrance, appearing openly at long last—for all to see—with your father.

  Mind you, there was to be no rabbi, no chuppah, no stomping of the glass, even. Instead, she came up with a what you might call a whimsical notion, the notion of flying with him in a hot air balloon, and then landing, somehow, in a clearing amidst the guests. Arrangements, I hear, were soon made—despite your father’s fear of heights which, for some reason, he neglected to mention.

  Oy, the poor dear! He was saved, that fateful day, from boarding the craft; saved, thank God, on account of a blunder, an honest mistake by the owner of the hot air balloon, who—according to hearsay, which I usually disregard—ended up losing his license, due to the fact he had overloaded the basket, a week earlier, with thirty kids, more or less.

  Mind you, that man may have miscounted them. The balloon had come dangerously close to tipping over when the wind whipped up, sending it adrift: first south, heading to San diego, and then across the border, past Tijuana, and farther down, deep into the inner parts of Mexico.

  I
t was at the last minute, then, that Anita had to come up with something new, something splendid and sophisticated and stylish, and above all, suitable for a grand entrance. Your father tried, in vain, to suggest this idea and that; in response to which she said, No, this is not classy enough, and No, that is not classy enough either—until her eyes fell, of all things, on the piano: your mom’s piano!

  It is at reading that last sentence that my chin drops in alarm. Mom’s piano is dear to me. It is an exquisite grand piano, with ornately carved decorations, designed for some royal palace. My father bought it for her just after their honeymoon. That was the time she still entertained hope, a great hope to become a distinguished concert pianist, because after all, she came from a long line of musicians. Her great grandfather was the famous Abraham Horowitz, who graduated from the Kiev Conservatory at the turn of the century. He rose to stardom rapidly, and toured every large city in Russia, where he was often paid with bread, butter and chocolate, rather than money, because these were tough times.