Read Online The Things a Brother Knows by Dana Reinhardt - Free Book Online
Authors: Dana Reinhardt
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wanders off under the arm of her boyfriend.
I go to see Dov.
I don’t call ahead. I figure my chances of finding Dov at home are pretty good. He never seems to do much beyond visiting us and loitering at the Armenian deli.
I arrive at the building just as someone is leaving. I slip in the front door and walk up two flights of stairs to apartment G.
I hear his voice from across the room.
“Hold your horses! I’m coming! Just a minute!”
Dov sounds harassed even though I only rang the buzzer once.
“What, what?” he’s saying, but then he slaps on a broad smile when he sees that it’s me. “Oh, look. The Avon Lady came calling.”
“Hi, Dov.”
He kisses my cheek. “Come in, come in. Can I get you a coffee? A soda? A shot of whiskey?”
“I’m good.”
Dov’s kitchen, living room and dining room are all part of the same square space. He has a worn-out plaid couch and a TV. A round table with two mismatched folding chairs. His bedroom is dark. The window looks out onto the brick wall of the building next door. He sleeps on a single mattress.
It’s the apartment of someone who long ago threw in the towel.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?” He pats a spot on the couch next to him.
I sit. Dov puts a hand on my knee.
“I don’t know.”
There’s a picture of my grandmother in a frame on Dov’s nearly empty bookshelf. Dov doesn’t keep books. He buys them used from the library and donates them back.
The photo is black-and-white. She’s sitting on the beach under an umbrella, her hair tied back in a checkered scarf, caught mid-laugh. I wonder what that laugh sounded like. How she smelled. If she had soft skin.
After she died, Dov left the kibbutz and moved to Boston to be near their only son. I was born six months later.
We sit side by side on the couch without speaking. Somebody is screaming at somebody else in an apartment upstairs. A dog barks feebly from the courtyard below.
Dov must have some idea of why I’m here. He’s not totallyclueless. But Dov just sits. The picture of patience. A man who has nothing but time.
I take a deep breath and let it out. “I’m worried about Boaz.”
“Oh,
motek
. Of course you are,” Dov says. And then, “We all are.”
“So why isn’t anybody doing anything?” My shirt is sticking to my back. I had to walk fourteen blocks from the nearest T stop.
“Maybe I’ll take that soda now,” I say.
Dov shoots up from the couch, happy to have a task. He roots around in his cupboards and then pours a generic brand of cola into a jelly jar with ice.
“Listen, Levi.” He sits back down next to me. “We all have our ways of dealing with the shit life serves up. The terrible things we’ve seen. The pain of loss. Change. Whatever.” He turns my chin to face him. He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “We have to let him go through what he needs to go through. We can’t expect too much too soon. It’s not what we hope for, but it’s to be expected. We just have to wait.”
“Dov,” I say, and I feel my cheeks redden, “I’m tired of waiting.”
There’s a danger in what I’ve just said. Or at least in the way it sounded. I’m keenly aware from growing up around Dov and Abba that self-indulgence isn’t something to be tolerated. It’s a singularly American phenomenon, Dov and Abba believe—the child who thinks the world revolves around him.
It’s not really what I mean, though. This time, for a change,I’m not really talking about myself. And maybe Dov gets that, because he doesn’t scold. Instead he says, “I know,
motek
. It isn’t fair.”
“I know about waiting. It does nothing. No good at all. But it’s all anyone’s doing.”
Dov looks at me carefully.
“Your parents, you know. They do their best. They’re trying to give him the space he needs.”
“I guess so. But … I think there’s something else.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. It’s just … I think he’s up to something. He’s planning
I go to see Dov.
I don’t call ahead. I figure my chances of finding Dov at home are pretty good. He never seems to do much beyond visiting us and loitering at the Armenian deli.
I arrive at the building just as someone is leaving. I slip in the front door and walk up two flights of stairs to apartment G.
I hear his voice from across the room.
“Hold your horses! I’m coming! Just a minute!”
Dov sounds harassed even though I only rang the buzzer once.
“What, what?” he’s saying, but then he slaps on a broad smile when he sees that it’s me. “Oh, look. The Avon Lady came calling.”
“Hi, Dov.”
He kisses my cheek. “Come in, come in. Can I get you a coffee? A soda? A shot of whiskey?”
“I’m good.”
Dov’s kitchen, living room and dining room are all part of the same square space. He has a worn-out plaid couch and a TV. A round table with two mismatched folding chairs. His bedroom is dark. The window looks out onto the brick wall of the building next door. He sleeps on a single mattress.
It’s the apartment of someone who long ago threw in the towel.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?” He pats a spot on the couch next to him.
I sit. Dov puts a hand on my knee.
“I don’t know.”
There’s a picture of my grandmother in a frame on Dov’s nearly empty bookshelf. Dov doesn’t keep books. He buys them used from the library and donates them back.
The photo is black-and-white. She’s sitting on the beach under an umbrella, her hair tied back in a checkered scarf, caught mid-laugh. I wonder what that laugh sounded like. How she smelled. If she had soft skin.
After she died, Dov left the kibbutz and moved to Boston to be near their only son. I was born six months later.
We sit side by side on the couch without speaking. Somebody is screaming at somebody else in an apartment upstairs. A dog barks feebly from the courtyard below.
Dov must have some idea of why I’m here. He’s not totallyclueless. But Dov just sits. The picture of patience. A man who has nothing but time.
I take a deep breath and let it out. “I’m worried about Boaz.”
“Oh,
motek
. Of course you are,” Dov says. And then, “We all are.”
“So why isn’t anybody doing anything?” My shirt is sticking to my back. I had to walk fourteen blocks from the nearest T stop.
“Maybe I’ll take that soda now,” I say.
Dov shoots up from the couch, happy to have a task. He roots around in his cupboards and then pours a generic brand of cola into a jelly jar with ice.
“Listen, Levi.” He sits back down next to me. “We all have our ways of dealing with the shit life serves up. The terrible things we’ve seen. The pain of loss. Change. Whatever.” He turns my chin to face him. He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “We have to let him go through what he needs to go through. We can’t expect too much too soon. It’s not what we hope for, but it’s to be expected. We just have to wait.”
“Dov,” I say, and I feel my cheeks redden, “I’m tired of waiting.”
There’s a danger in what I’ve just said. Or at least in the way it sounded. I’m keenly aware from growing up around Dov and Abba that self-indulgence isn’t something to be tolerated. It’s a singularly American phenomenon, Dov and Abba believe—the child who thinks the world revolves around him.
It’s not really what I mean, though. This time, for a change,I’m not really talking about myself. And maybe Dov gets that, because he doesn’t scold. Instead he says, “I know,
motek
. It isn’t fair.”
“I know about waiting. It does nothing. No good at all. But it’s all anyone’s doing.”
Dov looks at me carefully.
“Your parents, you know. They do their best. They’re trying to give him the space he needs.”
“I guess so. But … I think there’s something else.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. It’s just … I think he’s up to something. He’s planning
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