The Ascent of Eli Israel (15 page)

Shawn thought it was so clever to spell the name FLICK in all capital letters, giving the illusion of the word FUCK as in the smudgy old comic books. He found a man named Sammi Shaloub who ran a camera store in East Jerusalem and who let Shawn use his darkroom for his black and white photos and would develop Shawn's color prints without asking any questions.

While Kravetz was busy studying, Shawn wandered through the city with his cameras trying to catch gold in his crosshairs. During his first week, he had been cursed in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher where he had an Australian girl, on the last leg of her three-year walkabout, slip out of her dress and lie on the Stone of Unction, smoking a cigarette where the body of Christ had been laid after he was removed from the cross. An Orthodox monk had chased him out with a burning censer into the stone courtyard, shouting “American” and “Fuck.”

“It's like a dirty butcher's slab,” Shawn had told Kravetz of the Stone of Unction, “and these pilgrims are tongue kissing it.”

At the Dome of the Rock where the Prophet Muhammad had begun his night journey to heaven, where Muslims prostrate themselves in prayer, he snapped a Swedish girl he had just met, face to the ground, dress thrown over her head, bare behind in the air, praying to the mighty Allah.
The Ass of an Angel
even got a quiet “tsk, tsk” from Sammi Shaloub.

Shawn found two urchins throwing rotten fruit at frightened tourists outside of the Jaffa Gate and he convinced them to sell his provocative postcards for two dollars each, and before long he had a squad of six kids selling his photos throughout the city.

It was a rainy December day and Shawn had been staying with Kravetz for more than a month. The Old City was only twenty minutes from their King George Street apartment and they made the journey together about twice a week in search of sickeningly sweet Nablus-style
kanafi,
thick Turkish coffee, prickly pears, and any old trinket that caught their eyes. Shawn had bought a bullwhip on his last trip to the Old City and chased Kravetz all the way home, snapping the whip at him as he ran.

The streets were slick and luminous, seeming almost to glow in the gray light, and they passed a fruit stand and carpet and souvenir shops that sold olive-wood camels and manger scenes. They passed people in the streets, Arabs, Jews, and Christians, and Kravetz looked in every face as it passed, swearing that he saw something in each that reminded him of Jana. A boy carrying a large wooden tray of pita bread on his head bumped into Kravetz and mumbled something in Arabic that Shawn figured must be about Kravetz's mother. A shopkeeper shouted out “Special price,” and waved a checkered kaffiyeh at Kravetz and Shawn as they descended deeper into the city. They reached a small mosque where, through the open door, they could see a man stretched out in prayer on the floor. Shawn had raised his camera and began to focus, but Kravetz said, “Let's go.”

They arrived at a darkened shop where old black and white photographs dating from the time of the Ottomans and the British mandate hung in the window. Kravetz could see photos of a sheep market outside of Damascus Gate, slick water buffaloes trudging through the malarial Hula swamp, pilgrims dragging crosses down the Via Dolorosa, a man with an impossibly large mustache smoking from a water pipe. Shawn entered the store followed by Kravetz, and greeted the man behind the counter, who, it seemed, had been sleeping with his head in his arms.

“Welcome,” the man said, jumping up.

The room smelled of old books and coffee, and a large color photo of the Dome of the Rock hung behind him. The man pulled back a curtain and disappeared for a moment, returning with a folded paper in his hand.

Shawn was looking at some color photographs of young boys throwing stones at Israeli soldiers. Kravetz could hear him chuckle, “Now that is what I call punk.”

“Five hundred dollars,” the man said, unfolding the piece of paper. “Only five hundred dollars. Look. Look,” the man said.

Kravetz could see what looked like Hebrew letters and a bloodstain, with a hole in the middle of the page.

“You remember the prime minister,” the man said. “Terrible thing.”

“Robert Capa,” Shawn said. “Bullshit pedestrian portraits. Look at this shit,” Shawn said.

He flipped through a book of photos dating from the first days of the State of Israel. Pioneers, Kravetz thought, and smiled.

“Look,” Shawn said. “Man building a fucking house, street scene Tel Aviv, ugly face no shirt, ugly face sun hat, rabbi, man with gun, eyepatch, ugly, ugly, ugly. These pictures are boring and ugly,” Shawn said.

From the time he was a kid, Kravetz had always thought that Moshe Dayan in his eyepatch looked dashing. “And I suppose you are here to capture the beauty of Jerusalem's golden light,” Kravetz said. “Its majestic architecture, from Herod to Süleyman the Magnificent . . .”

“No,” Shawn said, shaking his head. “I'm here to be interesting. This shit is boring.”

The man leaned in close to Kravetz, holding the page close to his face. He could see Hebrew lettering on the page.

“The Song of Peace,” the man said.

“There will never be peace,” Shawn said, picking up a book.

“Look,” the man said. “The Song of Peace.”

Kravetz remembered that the prime minister had been awkwardly singing the Song of Peace at the rally, only moments before he had been killed. He had folded the page and placed it in his breast pocket. “Only three hundred dollars,” the man said.

“Let me see that,” Kravetz said.

“No. No,” the man said. “You can't touch it.”

“Look at this,” Shawn called. He waved an old leather-bound book. “A guide book.”

“Two hundred fifty,” the man said. “Look. The bullet hole. A Jewish bullet hole.”

“Check this out,” Shawn said, mumbling something in mangled Hebrew. “I have many gold pieces and many treasures . . .”

“That is a pilgrims' guide book to the holy city from the time of the Crusaders,” the man said. He had a mustache that was just beginning to turn gray, and he wore a thick pair of glasses. He pulled Kravetz closer to him by the shoulder and said, “For you, two hundred fifty. That is his real blood. Smell it.”

Kravetz turned away. He had lost sixty dollars in a shell game in Times Square when he was sixteen and had no interest in being ripped off again. He turned back to Shawn.

“What else does it say?”

Shawn laughed. “Here. This one is great. ‘Come Hither, Woman, Thy Breasts Are as Comely as Doves.' Do you think that would work?”

“You've gotten away with worse,” Kravetz said.

“You know, it's the Crusaders who fucked this place up in the first place,” Shawn said. The man quietly folded the paper and put it back in his breast pocket. “You know, you've seen these Arabs with blond hair or blue eyes walking around. That's because they've been fucked by Crusaders, probably raped in the name of Christ.”

“Come on,” Kravetz said.

“You are living in the land of the perennially fucked,” Shawn said. “A fantasy land of ghosts and fucking kooks.”

“That's ridiculous,” Kravetz said.

“The place was built directly on the ashes of the Holocaust.”

“Bullshit,” Kravetz said.

“It wasn't? So was that a picnic over there in Europe? When the world stops feeling guilty about what happened over there, Israel will be wiped off the map.”

“I don't believe that,” Kravetz said.

“Let's go, man, this place stinks,” Shawn said, walking toward the door.

“Yes, yes, you go,” the man said. “But first you must buy. I have the bullets,” the man added, reaching into his pocket. “Look how they have been flattened.”

“So this is the golden Medina,” Shawn said.

“Yeah, why not?”

“Bullshit. Even Herzl, your father of modern Zionism, said the only thing special about a Jewish state would be that the prostitutes would be Jewish, the thieves would be Jewish. . . .”

“It's not that . . .” Kravetz started to say.

“No, it's worse,” Shawn said. “Living next door to terrorists, Scud missiles flying overhead, religious fanatics.” He pulled the door open, looked at the man, and said, “This is a fucking garage sale. I'm outta here,” Shawn said, curling his lips into a scowl.

Kravetz followed Shawn out into the street, not looking at the man as he left. Kravetz felt like arguing with Shawn, but by the time he caught up to him, Shawn was smiling. A pair of Arab women walked toward Shawn and Kravetz with their faces covered.

“Check it out, man.” Shawn tried to say, “Come hither, woman, thy breasts are as comely as doves,” as the two women passed.

“That's ancient Hebrew,” Kravetz said. “They're not going to understand that.”

The two women passed, ignoring Shawn and Kravetz. Shawn shouted down the street after them, “Your breasts are like two pillows, like two water balloons, two floppy, flapping, bouncing titties.”

“Shut up,” Kravetz said.

“They don't understand,” Shawn said. “It's like the time we were in Montreal and we would point at our wrist, as if we're asking for the time.”

“They knew you were asking them to suck your dick.”

Now another woman walked toward them, carrying a string bag in her arms.

“Come on,” Shawn said, “you try. We're going to get you laid.”

“No way. That's obnoxious.”

“Do you want me to get you laid or not?” Shawn said.

Two summers earlier, Jana had told Kravetz that she was going upstate for the summer solstice with some of her friends and that he couldn't come. “It's sort of a Baltic Bash,” she had said.

“Tribalism,” Shawn had said to Kravetz. “That cunt will never really accept you because you are not part of her tribe. Worse still, you're a Jew. She's probably cheating on you right now. Huh, some of that Polish kielbasa.”

“You're an asshole,” Kravetz said. “You're talking about my girlfriend?”

“Then why doesn't the bitch want you to go?”

Shawn was always putting doubts into Kravetz's head. At first Kravetz thought it was only jealousy, since Shawn never seemed to have a girlfriend for very long. But this time Kravetz was worried that something was going to happen. When Jana returned from the weekend away, she said the weekend was fine, but she drank too much. That worried Kravetz even more, and then he noticed the hair.

He told Shawn that she always had an inch-long black hair on her left breast, and when she came back from her trip it was gone.

“The bitch cut it off,” Shawn said, “because she knew she was going to get fucked. I'll bet she shaved her bikini line, too, for the first time in a year.”

That weekend Kravetz and Shawn got drunk at Haymakers and Shawn introduced Kravetz to Holly Jaundice, the singer of a local punk band.

“Have fun,” Shawn called after them as they stumbled out of the bar.

And now in Jerusalem, Shawn called down the street after the woman, mangling the ancient Hebrew as he shouted.

“Shut up,” Kravetz said. “Will you just shut up.”

Christmas Day, Kravetz decided he should have called Jana to wish her a “Merry Christmas.” Shawn had taken an Arab taxi to Bethlehem, hoping to catch some hysterical pilgrims in Manger Square. He still hadn't returned. Kravetz had picked up the phone several times and even dialed Jana's number, but always hung up before anyone answered. He thought that, somehow, thinking about her with the phone in his hand would be enough to make her pick up the phone and call him. He just wanted to hear her talk like old times, the way they used to. He wanted to apologize and to hear her say, “Me too.” Sometimes his hand slipped down and he began to stroke himself, but he couldn't think of Jana. It just made him too sad, as if she were a ghost he couldn't get his arms around.

New Year's Eve, Kravetz and Shawn went to Elijah's Cup for drinks. The bar was packed, and loud Israeli music boomed from the speakers. They found a table near the back of the bar and sat down. Kravetz could tell that Shawn had slept with at least two or three of the girls they had passed by the way they stiffened as he walked past.

“To a new year,” Shawn said. “This one's on me.”

Kravetz noticed a graffito etched into the table — The sex life of the Egyptian Sphinx was lonely / reserved for Egyptian Kinx — and said, “Don't worry about it.”

“At least let me buy you a beer. You won't even let me give you money for rent.”

“That's so I can throw you out whenever I want,” Kravetz said, laughing.

Shawn did not laugh. “I'm buying you a beer.”

They drank two or three beers, and Shawn hugged the waitress, saying, “Sylvester
Tov!
” Kravetz always felt good up until three beers, and looked around the room hopefully. It was only later that he began to feel gloomy.

A large crowd had gathered across the bar at the table where the infamous Asher was sitting in his usual seat. People stood on chairs and climbed onto each other's shoulders. They sang “Auld Lang Syne,” and swayed rhythmically.

“What's going on?” Shawn said, grabbing his camera before Kravetz could answer.

Shawn pressed his head between a pair of thighs, and Kravetz could see that Asher had a skinny, blond Germanlooking guy pinned to the table. Now the crowd was chanting, “Go! Go! Go! Go!” as Asher dipped a needle into a bottle of India ink. His eyes looked washed out and distant, as gray as dirty ice. Kravetz had heard stories about Asher, but never believed them. He raised his tattooed arm in the air, and jabbed the needle into the German's arm shouting, “Never forget! Never forget! Never forget!” The crowd roared with laughter, and Shawn burrowed his way through the crowd, onto the table. “I need light,” he called. “Move back!”

But the crowd only moved closer, as Asher continued to jab away at the poor German's arm. Kravetz could hear Shawn saying, “Perfect. Fucking perfect,” and imagined the title
So You Should Never Forget
appearing at the top of the postcard. And suddenly Asher was aware of his surroundings, and he reached up to grab Shawn by the neck with his cleaver-like hand.

“You,” he said, pulling Shawn close. The German was still pinned to the table with his other massive hand. “Do you remember . . .”

“What?” Shawn said, his nasal voice rising.

“Do you remember?” Asher asked, pulling Shawn closer.

Kravetz tumbled onto the table over the top of Shawn, landing on Asher's arm. “Yes, he remembers! That's what the camera is for,” Kravetz said.

“All right, break it up!” a black bouncer from Chicago said, pulling bodies away. “Everybody back to your tables before I bust some heads!” He turned to Asher. “Let's go,” and he led Asher out of the bar.

“You saved me,” Shawn said, running his fingers through his hair. “Fuck. I hope there was enough light.”

“We're even, okay,” Kravetz said.

Later, they were dancing at The Shelter, which was decorated like a 1950s fallout shelter. It was a new year, and Kravetz was drunk, as bodies spun all around him. He saw Shawn jumping around to the Ramones' “I Wanna Be Sedated” and felt his own blood pumping through him. Shawn appeared a few moments later, sweating, with a girl on his arm. “Stuart!” he shouted, “this is Amy!”

“Hi!” she said, extending her hand. She wore her blonde hair in a long ponytail, red lipstick, and a short skirt. The strobe light made her face look sunken and sickly. “Wanna dance?” She pulled Kravetz into the swaying mass of bodies, where soldiers' M-16s slapped against their arching backs as they danced. Two girls wearing gas masks and bikinis bounced past them.

Shawn called out, “You owe me, buddy!”

She put her arms around him and he smelled her beery breath. He thought of Amichai's lines again: “People use each other / as healing for their pain. They put each other / on their existential wounds, / on the eye, on the cunt, on mouth and open hand. / They hold each other hard and won't let go.” And he thought of taking her up his dark, noisy elevator, sliding his hand in her pants as he fumbled for the keys to his apartment. But it wasn't Jana, and she wouldn't say, “Thanks for fingering me,” and she wouldn't say, “I really love you,” after he fucked her. He turned to look in Amy's face but she was looking away toward a group of her friends dancing on the bar.

A few minutes later, Kravetz pulled Shawn outside into the cool damp air. His heart thumped so hard he thought he might throw up. Shawn lit a cigarette and mopped his face with the corner of his shirt. “What's going on?”

“I think I'm going to call Jana.”

“What do you mean? Aren't you having fun?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Kravetz said. “It's just, having my arms around that girl made me think of her. You know what I mean?”

“Bullshit,” Shawn said as an army jeep drove past, its blue light flashing. He pulled his Polaroid out of his jacket pocket. He aimed the camera at Kravetz and snapped a shot.

“I'm going to call her,” Kravetz said, ignoring the picture. He walked away from The Shelter.

“Do you want her to think you're weak?” Shawn called after him.

“I just want her to think of me.”

“Come back here and look at this picture,” Shawn called. “I don't want you to ever forget what the face of defeat looks like.”

“I'm calling her,” Kravetz said weakly, though he realized now that Shawn was right — he couldn't call her.