“I think it would help the group if you shared the specifics of the moral dilemma you were talking about? Because surely one cannot separate the needs of the individual from the community—”
“No, no, that would be impossible,” Aaron replied aggressively, suddenly fearful his mind might be read. He stood, pushing his chair back, his bulk suddenly filling the room. “I’m sorry.”
He stumbled blindly to the back of the room, then, without knocking, opened the door to the women’s meeting. “Miriam,” he said sharply, interrupting a heated debate on fertility cycles, the moon, and religious law. He peered short-sightedly into the array of seated women, a jarring medley of colorful long-sleeved sweaters and headscarfs punctuated by several rather glamorous wigs. There was a flurry of activity as everyone turned to see who the audacious intruder was.
Worried, Miriam rose to her feet. “Aaron, is everything okay?” she asked, aware of th
e whispered disapproval around her.
“Yes, but we are leaving now,” Aaron announced, indifferent to the women. Flushed, the new wife mumbled her apologies as she pushed her way past the seated matrons.
The rabbi stopped them at the front door and took Aaron’s arm.
“I hope we haven’t said anything to offend you? Normally you are so good at debate.”
“No, Rabbi, it’s just that tonight I have no energy or patience to discuss philosophy. There is too much real life out there to worry about.”
Aaron stepped out into the street, the bluish air freezing his cheeks and beard.
“Come.”
Miriam, wrapped by now in a voluminous gray woollen coat and hat, whispered a quick apology and left the chagrined cleric standing in the doorway.
“May the burden he is carrying be lifted,” the rabbi muttered before closing the door against the wind.
Outside it had begun to snow. Aaron, in a bid to clear his whirling brain, took a few deep breaths of the icy air. What did it matter about the file? He had his wife and his family. Now slightly ashamed of his behavior, he checked to see whether the street was empty—it was—then quickly brought his wife’s hand up to his lips to kiss. Physical contact between men and women in public was a religious transgression, even between married couples, but Aaron couldn’t control his affection. Miriam smiled back and they strolled together, like an established married couple should, relaxed and unworried by the swirling snow.
On Union Street Aaron noticed that a light was still burning in the window of Number 770, the great synagogue. Excusing himself and promising he’d be home ten minutes after her, Aaron left Miriam and ran across the road. The door was still open. Knocking the melting snowflakes from his shoulders Aaron entered.
He sat in the back row, fingering his prayer shawl beneath his black coat as he stared at the Torah, its scrolls encased in silver and gold locked behind the gates of the ark. Then, sighing deeply, he bowed his head and began rocking, mouthing a meditation given to him personally by the Rebbe himself before he passed over to the other side.
Five minutes later the claims assessor stood, astounded at the clarity that streamed through him. He knew exactly what to do; there would be no more agonizing, no more arguing with himself. Cheered immensely by his newfound resolve he left the synagogue.
Miriam lay in bed waiting for Aaron to finish in the bathroom. She could hear him brushing his teeth, knew that after that he would step on the scale, then sigh, then—if they were going to make love—he would splash on aftershave before unlocking the door and climbing carefully into bed beside her, as if frightened of waking her. She, of course, would be playing along, her heavy flannel nightgown pulled down below her knees; her hair, long and luxurious, now exposed for her husband’s eyes and spread artfully across the pillow; her eyes pressed shut, pretending she is sleeping.
He was opening the bathroom door now; the floorboards squeaked as he attempted to walk silently across to the bed. Miriam sniffed quietly. Yes, there was the faint smell of aftershave. Immediately her heart quickened in excitement; she even imagined herself moistening at the scent. It was their signal, his first move in the elaborate game of courtship they’d built up over the year.
Both virgins, their first forays into lovemaking had been disastrous, a parody of clumsy gestures they’d gleaned separately from friends and clandestine glimpses at instructive magazines to which they had no proper access. Having grown up within the Orthodox community, where sex was considered a sacred and spiritual communication between married people, they were both desperately timid. It was a naïveté that was understandable, but a considerable hindrance to a practical knowledge of important working parts.
It had taken a week before Aaron was able to penetrate Miriam at all, his fear of hurting her superseding his desire. It was only when Myra found her daughter-in-law weeping in the corner of the dim bedroom one morning that she discovered their utter lack of experience. Myra, a pragmatist and ex-libertine, would have none of it.
“Oi gevalt!” the ninety-year-old had exclaimed after laughing a little then weeping a little. “Such pleasure is sanctified by God! Look at the Song of Solomon! To worship your husband’s body and he yours is not a sin but a spiritual duty. In fact, according to religious law if he is not pleasuring you there are grounds for divorce. But even Sarah and Abraham needed a little instruction.”
Grabbing the young woman’s hand she pulled her up to the crowded bedroom at the top of the house where Myra had slept since the death of her husband some fifty years before. She pulled an ancient copy of The Joy of Sex from the bookshelf, dusted it off, and pushed it into her daughter-in-law’s hands.
“This you read, you learn, and then you leave it accidentally on purpose on Aaron’s desk. If he asks, it is mine from my sinful days. Believe me, it will work.”
And so it did. A few weeks later at the mikvah, the bath attendant was prompted to ask Miriam why she was smiling so much.
“Because my husband has sent me to heaven at least five times this month.” A reply that caused the bath attendant, a sober woman in her fifties, to smile too.
In short, Aaron’s clumsiness had been replaced by an enthusiasm tempered by a newly acquired knowledge he was happy to practice on his wife. No wonder Miriam now waited in the bed with such impatience.
She lay quietly beside her husband for a few minutes, anxious for him to make his customary move—a deft caress of her breasts beneath her nightdress—but nothing happened. Finally abandoning any pretense of submissiveness she reached across and touched his penis. It was limp.
“Sorry, honey, it’s work.”
Miriam switched on the bedside lamp. “Is it the file?”