Look for Me (15 page)

Daniel’s parents returned from Greece two days after he vanished. At that time we were still convinced that Daniel would be back in a day or two. We thought he just wanted some time alone; Nina said he needed “to reestablish his aura” and the doctors said he hadn’t finished his treatment, and his health problems would bring him back. In the meantime Nina was practicing a Japanese method of long-distance healing and she asked me to join her, but I was too anxious about Daniel to think about energy currents. I was certain he would contact me soon, but I also sensed that something was wrong.

Nina and I drove down to the airport and waited restlessly
for the plane from Greece. Finally, we saw Daniel’s parents striding cheerfully toward us. Daniel’s mother was a slim, determined woman who wore her hair in a bun. She was closely tied to national traditions: biking trips across the country, evenings devoted to folk dancing, public sing-alongs of robust pioneer songs and lachrymose ballads. Her husband was tanned and blue-eyed, and seemed to have drunk from the fountain of youth. They were a good-looking couple, hardy and self-assured.

As soon as Nina saw her parents, she began to cry. I had not slept in two days, and probably looked pale and disheveled. When Daniel’s parents saw the two of us standing there without Daniel, their daughter weeping, their daughter-in-law pale, they assumed the worst, and Daniel’s mother fainted next to her suitcase. There was a great deal of confusion, as everyone around us also thought we’d come with dire news, and none of our explanations seemed to have any effect. An ambulance was called and arrived within seconds; Daniel’s mother was lifted onto a stretcher. We tried to explain the situation to his father, but his mind had gone blank and he didn’t hear our reassurances, or else didn’t believe them. In the end we had no choice but to climb inside the ambulance, and only then were we able to explain to Daniel’s mother, who had revived from all the commotion, that Daniel was alive, and not in danger— that though he’d been badly burned and we were not sure exactly where he was at the moment, he was all right.

Daniel’s mother began to laugh hysterically at the news of her son’s resurrection, and was given a pill to calm her down. It seems that being too happy is also a disorder. We then stepped out of the ambulance, and everyone looked at us with pity. “Terrible, terrible,” they murmured. “Be strong.” We thanked them and made our way to the car, where we all burst into tears and laughter. Daniel’s parents hugged each other and
began to kiss passionately; Nina was embarrassed and told them to control themselves.

We gave Daniel’s parents a detailed account of what had happened. They didn’t seem at all surprised by Daniel’s disappearance. “He’ll contact us in a few days,” I said. “Don’t be so sure,” Daniel’s mother replied placidly, and I never forgave her, especially since she was right.

I never forgave her, and I never forgave their happiness. It didn’t matter to them that they could no longer see their son. They knew he was alive; he was collecting his checks and had even rented a flat, which meant that he had a plan and knew what he was doing. I concluded that they didn’t like me, had never liked me, and were secretly glad that Daniel had left me. Later I realized that I was wrong, but somehow our relationship disintegrated. Maybe I envied them.

Daniel’s grandmother died a few months later, and Nina opened a school for spiritual healing with Elena, the woman who had read
The Possessed
to her grandmother. I lost touch with Nina as well, though I’m still on her mailing list and occasionally I receive brochures inviting me to study various therapeutic arts.

T
UESDAY

I
WOKE WITH A START AT FOUR IN THE MORNING
. I had no idea how I’d make it through the next fourteen hours. If Aaron really had the address, I might see Daniel this very day; no matter where he was in our small country, I could reach him within a few hours. The idea was almost impossible to fathom. I had read
The Count of Monte Cristo
when I was twelve or thirteen, and I thought of it now. I remembered Edmund’s unlikely escape from the dungeon in a canvas bag—in reality he would have certainly drowned—but in the story he managed to cut himself loose, swim in turbulent waters to another island (after all those years in the dungeon he was still fit, with strong lungs), be rescued by sailors on a boat, find a great treasure (the drawing in my edition showed glorious jewels spilling out of a chest), and dispense justice. It was everyone’s fantasy. If Aaron know where Daniel was, if it was that simple, I would feel as fortunate as Edmund. On the other hand, I didn’t want to get my hopes up; it was possible that Aaron would only find the fake address, like everyone else.

At six in the morning I went out to buy the papers. When I returned to the building I ran into my neighbor Tanya, who was on her way to get cigarettes. She looked chic, as always, in a silky, silver-and-blue-striped dress, with a vermilion scarf around her throat, and her dyed blond hair fashionably styled. She often urged me to try Hair Rave, where the latest cuts were available from pierced men with tattoos on their arms. She felt I didn’t care enough about my appearance and often chided me. “At least brush your hair, dear,” she’d say. “And why always the same clothes? What about an attractive belt? You’re too young to give up, my love. There’s no crime in being sought after.” She herself was sought after by women and men across the country for her fortune-telling skills, which she practiced, according to the sign on her door, by means of tarot cards, palm reading, and something called “the Chinese method, learned firsthand from a Chinese master in Beijing.” I couldn’t picture Tanya in Beijing.

I was surprised to see her up so early; Tanya considered eleven in the morning the crack of dawn. She read my mind and said, “I had such a nightmare, I just had to get up. That’s the only thing to do when you have a nightmare like that.”

“What was it about?”

“Oh, it’s hard to describe. I was in some sort of medieval hell, I couldn’t get back to the present … nothing made sense. Absolutely terrifying, though.”

Impulsively I said, “Tanya, can you read my fortune?” I had never asked her before; the idea hadn’t occurred to me. No one could predict the future, not even Tanya.

Tanya wasn’t in the least surprised. “Of course, my darling one,” she said. “As soon as I get back.”

“I’ll wait upstairs.”

I waited in front of Tanya’s door. When she returned with her cigarettes she said, “Why did you wait outside! It isn’t locked. Come in, dear.”

Her flat was tidy but slightly dusty, possibly because she was myopic and too vain to wear glasses. The walls were covered with wallpaper on which delicate pink flowers hovered against a white background. There was a kitchenette in the corner and a door on the left that opened onto a tiny pink-and-white-flowered bedroom. In the middle of the living room stood a round polished mahogany table and four matching chairs. Embroidered cushions leaned precariously against the backs of the chairs. The cushions were new; I hadn’t seen them on previous visits. Each one bore the name of a different bird, which was represented in enlarged form at the center of the square. The birds looked immobile and rather aloof, as if they’d decided they had better things to do in life than fly. “Lovely,” I said, picking one up. “Where did you get them?”

“My mother made them, poor thing,” Tanya sighed. Tanya always referred to her mother as “poor thing” because she’d had a hard life, but in fact her mother seemed content. She was a bulky woman with a few missing teeth, and she always greeted me with a smile when I passed her in the hallway. But she didn’t go out much; she had arthritic knees. She liked to bake, and she often left plastic bags filled with cookies or cakes on my doorknob. Or rather, three plastic bags, one inside the other, each knotted tightly. I rarely ate these desserts; they were too sweet for me. I gave them to the octogenarian taxi drivers who sat idly in patio chairs at the taxi stand around the corner, waiting for customers.

“How’s your mother?”

“Fine, fine. Have a seat, dear.” She reached across the table, took my hands in hers, shut her eyes, and meditated. Then she told me to fold my arms on the table, rest my head on them, and shut my eyes. She came round to where I was sitting and began massaging my shoulders. I had not had a massage since Daniel left, and I’d forgotten how blissful it was. I lost all sense of time and nearly dozed off.

Finally she returned to her seat and I lifted my head. I was sure my eyes were red and swollen. Tanya smiled. Her smile was slightly crooked, and for a brief second I was afraid of her, but then it passed.

“I don’t need cards in your case,” she said. “Your case is simple. You’ll lose your job at that office, either because they’ll fire you or because they’re going to go bankrupt and shut down, I can’t tell. Don’t make any large purchases, you’re going to need whatever money you have. Try to focus on paying back your debts right away. You’re in good health. A new person is going to come into your life, with good results. That’s it for now, my darling.”

“Thanks, Tanya. How much do I owe you?”

“Usually I charge two hundred for the first reading, but I’ll only charge you fifty, because you’re going to lose your job. If you come again, I’ll give you ten percent off.”

I was impressed. Tanya had found a way to support herself without sex but with the same reliance on our need and desire for comfort, physical pleasure, and hope. Her pessimistic prognosis was hopeful in the sense that it offered the illusion of control; even if you were going to be fired, it helped if you knew it all along. In fact getting fired really had nothing to do with your own failure because, here, it was already in the stars.

But I wasn’t ready to leave: I was having an attack of credulousness. “You said a new person was coming into my life. A totally new person, or just new because it’s been a long time since I saw him?”

“Wait, I’ll try to answer your question.” She shut her eyes again. “It’s not clear, sweetheart. Maybe next time I’ll have more luck with that one.”

“Thank you, Tanya. I feel better.”

“Anytime,” she said, lighting a cigarette.

I paid her and she stuffed the money into her little change
purse, a yellow beaded pouch with a reliable bronze clasp. Two rows of green and red oval beads interrupted the yellow theme for additional decorative potency. Tanya’s change purse was the most optimistic personal item I could ever hope to encounter.

I had only slept a few hours during the night, but I was too anxious to nap. I stretched out on the living room sofa with an Anita Brookner novel my father had sent me, and tried to concentrate on the excursions her sentences took into casual revelation. Reading relaxed me, and with the open paperback lying on my chest like a protective talisman, I shut my eyes and drifted off. I dreamed Rafi was trying on different outfits, and asking me what I thought of each one. Some of the outfits were casual and some were formal, and I was upset because I didn’t know the price or what he needed them for, so how could I judge?

I woke up shivering. There was a woman in the room, staring down at me.

“Sorry, there was no answer, so I let myself in. I’m Mercedes. Are you sick?”

It took me a few seconds to decipher what she was saying. Then I remembered: Mercedes, the cleaning woman Rafi had promised to send my way. I was still not entirely awake and in my confusion I was surprised that she was a real person, and not someone Rafi had invented in order to make me feel better, the way parents invented tooth fairies for their children.

“Are you sick?” she asked again. She was a small woman with lovely slanted eyes and perfect, delicate features. She seemed to be on bad terms with her beauty, though, and did her best to ignore it: her black hair was held in back with an office worker’s rubber band, a shapeless print dress hung limply on her small body as if uncertain of its incarnation as female clothing, and her brown loafers looked like shriveled pumpkins. It
was hard to guess her age because she was so sturdy, but I thought she might be in her late forties.

“This place really
is
a mess, Rafi wasn’t kidding. Don’t worry, you won’t recognize it when I’m through. But maybe you’d like tea first? If I can find a clean cup here …”

“Yes, thank you. Thank you, Mercedes. Tea would be very nice.”

“You’re shivering. I think you may have a fever.”

“No, it’s nothing. It’s nothing, I’m fine. I’m just not awake yet.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll look after everything.”

I lay back on the sofa. Under ordinary circumstances I would not have wanted a garrulous, overbearing stranger in the house, but Mercedes’ certainty about her world and its offerings was exactly what I needed at the moment.

I heard her moving things around in the Dining Car. “Nice mural,” she called out to me. “If you don’t have detergent and stuff I’ll go buy. Oh … here’s some.”

She brought me a glass of sweet tea on a dinner plate. “I didn’t know whether you had a tray. Here, sit up, I’ll fix your pillow.”

I let her fuss over me. Then I watched as she began collecting garbage, dirty dishes, newspapers, and crumpled clothes with brisk, energetic movements. I felt I should get up and help her, but I stayed where I was.