You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone

“Adina is very busy with her music,” Ima says. Rescuing me, because my mother is always on my side. I smile at her in thanks. “She doesn’t need a boyfriend if she doesn’t want one.”

“How does Eitan like Israel?” Aba asks.

“Loves it. But he misses his mother’s cooking. Would you believe it?”

More laughter. I drain my glass of wine.

“Whoa there.” Aba winks at me. “Should I get you the whole bottle?”

“Please,” I say, and he chuckles before drawing us all into a discussion on the history of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

Before he met Ima, Aba didn’t keep kosher or observe Shabbat, but the traditions were important to her, and therefore they became important to him. He studied Hebrew, though he’s never mastered the language, and read tomes on the history of the Jewish people. These days he’s more devout than she is. I suppose there’s a reason he thinks we should keep putting on these shows of prayers and blessings. He thinks his faith, which hasn’t faltered the way mine has, will somehow save us.

Wide-eyed, Tovah digests Aba’s every word. If Ima is always on my side, Aba is always on Tovah’s. I have heard this story dozens of times, so I chew my food silently. What Tamar said about Eitan hit too close to the truth. The Mizrahis’ son was my very first crush. We talked about music and he laughed at my jokes and made hours-long dinners less boring. When I was fourteen and he was eighteen and we’d drunk too much wine after Passover, he invited me into his room. Said he wanted to show me a keyboard piece he was working on, that we could play a duet. It was a few weeks after Ima had been diagnosed. I felt like I had no control over anything in my life, except maybe this. Him.

I kissed him first, mostly to see if he’d kiss back. He did. And more. Zippers unzipped and buckles unbuckled and skin met skin. Everything felt good.

“Are you sure?” He was breathing hard. “You’re only fourteen. . . .”

I hated the way the word sounded. Fourteen. “Do I look fourteen to you?” We both knew the answer was no.

I had already researched consent laws. In Washington, a fourteen-year-old can consent if her partner is four years older or less. Eitan had just turned eighteen, and I was a few months from fifteen. He told me again and again how beautiful I was. We were probably in his room for a grand total of eight minutes; still, the ways he touched me made me love my body even more. Made me love the power I had over him. The first time didn’t hurt much, but the second time was so much better, and the third, fourth, fifth, which happened over the next several months, were excellent.

I liked it so much. I liked him. I liked sex. Our families never figured it out, and Eitan went to college and I moped through my sophomore year, stalking his Facebook updates and waiting for messages, hoping we’d get back together when he came home to visit. And we did, but he always seemed to forget about me whenever he left.

I didn’t tell Tovah, though we were still close back then. She was still giggling with her friends about how cute some boys in their class were, and what I had done felt so adult. I knew she wouldn’t understand.

“Adina,” Tovah says, and I blink. “Aba asked you a question.”

“Oh. What?”

“He asked why the shofar is blown on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.”

The shofar is a ram’s horn, and all I know is that I can’t stand the toneless way it sounds.

I shrug, Tovah sighs, and Aba asks if she can answer the question. Of course she replies correctly. Gold fucking star. Tovah plays along with this whole religious charade, doesn’t realize none of it matters. Soon we’ll get our results and none of this prayer will have changed a thing.

Tovah and I are washing dishes in the kitchen after the Mizrahis have left and after Ima has taken her nighttime meds, which I refuse to call kinuach, the euphemism the rest of my family uses. I will call them what they are.

“You don’t have to be such a brat about our religion,” Tovah says, dragging a sponge back and forth across a plate.

Brat. For some reason that word stings more than “bitch.” It sounds young, a kindergarten taunt. Tovah’s insults haven’t matured yet.

“And you don’t have to be a sheep about it.” I take the clean plate from her and start drying.

Tovah’s grinding her teeth. I can hear the scrape of enamel against enamel, sending a shiver up my spine. She’s quiet long enough for me to know I’ve stung her back.

“It’s what I believe,” she says softly. “How am I a sheep if this is what I truly believe in?”

I set the plate in the cupboard too loudly. “That’s what I don’t understand. How you can still believe after what God did to Ima?”

“God didn’t do anything to Ima. That’s what you don’t understand.”

I wonder how she can be so sure when she barely spends time with our mother. “I’m sorry I can’t remember all the minutiae of this religion.”

“Our religion,” Tovah corrects, handing me another bowl. “Don’t you care about where Ima came from?”