David Grossman - To the End of the Land

FICTION

In Another Life

Someone to Run With

Be My Knife

The Zigzag Kid

The Book of Intimate Grammar

See Under: Love

The Smile of the Lamb

NONFICTION

Writing in the Dark: Essays on Literature and Politics

Death as a Way of Life: Israel Ten Years After Oslo

Sleeping on a Wire: Conversations with Palestinians in Israel

The Yellow Wind

THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF

Translation copyright 2010 by Jessica Cohen

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

www.aaknopf.com

Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Originally published in Israel as Isha Borachat Mebesurah by HaKibbutz HaMeuchad Publishing House, Ltd., Tel Aviv, in 2008. Copyright 2008 by David Grossman and HaKibbutz HaMeuchad Publishing House, Ltd.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Grossman, David.

[Ishah borahat mi-besorah. English]

To the end of the land / by David Grossman ; translated from the Hebrew by Jessica Cohen.
1st American ed.
p. cm.
This is a Borzoi book.
eISBN: 978-0-307-59434-1
I. Cohen, Jessica. II. Title.
PJ5054.G728I8413 2010
892.436dc22 2010003915

v3.1

For Michal

For Yonatan and Ruti

For Uri, 1985-2006

HEY, GIRL , quiet!

Who is that?

Be quiet! You woke everyone up!

But I was holding her

Who?

On the rock, we were sitting together

What rock are you talking about? Let us sleep

Then she just fell

All this shouting and singing

But I was asleep

And you were shouting!

She just let go of my hand and fell

Stop it, go to sleep

Turn on a light

Are you crazy? Theyll kill us if we do that

Wait

What?

I was singing?

Singing, shouting, everything. Now be quiet

What was I singing?

What were you singing?!

In my sleep, what was I singing?

Im supposed to know what you were singing? A bunch of shouts. Thats what you were singing. What was I singing, she wants to know

You dont remember the song?

Look, are you nuts? Im barely alive

But who are you?

Room Three

Youre in isolation, too?

Gotta get back

Dont go Did you leave? Wait, hello Gone But what was I singing?

AND the next night he woke her up again, angry at her again for singing at the top of her lungs and waking up the whole hospital, and she begged him to try to remember if it was the same song from the night before. She was desperate to know, because of her dream, which kept getting dreamed almost every night during those years. An utterly white dream. Everything in it was white, the streets and the houses and the trees and the cats and dogs and the rock at the edge of the cliff. And Ada, her redheaded friend, was also entirely white, without a drop of blood in her face or body. Without a drop of color in her hair. But he couldnt remember which song it was this time, either. His whole body was shuddering, and she shuddered back at him from her bed. Were like a pair of castanets, he said, and to her surprise, she burst out with bright laughter that tickled him inside. He had used up all his strength on the journey from his room to hers, thirty-five steps, resting after each one, holding on to walls, doorframes, empty food carts. Now he flopped onto the sticky linoleum floor in her doorway. For several minutes they both breathed heavily. He wanted to make her laugh again but he could no longer speak, and then he must have fallen asleep, until her voice woke him. Tell me something

What? Who is it?

Its me

You

Tell me, am I alone in this room?

How should I know?

Are you, like, shivering?

Yeah, shivering

How high is yours?

It was forty this evening

Mine was forty point three. When do you die?

At forty-two

Thats close

No, no, you still have time

Dont go, Im scared

Do you hear?

What?

How quiet it is suddenly?

Were there booms before?

Cannons

I keep sleeping, and all of a sudden its nighttime again

Cause theres a blackout

I think theyre winning

Who?

The Arabs

No way

Theyve occupied Tel Aviv

What are you who told you that?

I dont know. Maybe I heard it

You dreamed it

No, they said it here, someone, before, I heard voices

Its from the fever. Nightmares. I have them, too

My dream I was with my friend

Maybe you know

What?

Which direction I came from

I dont know anything here

How long for you?

Dont know

Me, four days. Maybe a week

Wait, wheres the nurse?

At night shes in Internal A. Shes an Arab

How do you know?

You can hear it when she talks

Youre shaking

My mouth, my whole face

But where is everybody?

Theyre not taking us to the bomb shelter

Why?

So we dont infect them

Wait, so its just us

And the nurse

I thought

What?

If you could sing it for me

That again?

Just hum

Im leaving

If it was the other way around, I would sing to you

Gotta get back

Where?

Where, where, to lie with my forefathers, to bring me down with sorrow to the grave, thats where

What? What was that? Wait, do I know you? Hey, come back

AND the next night, too, before midnight, he came to stand in her doorway and scolded her again and complained that she was singing in her sleep, waking him and the whole world, and she smiled to herself and asked if his room was really that far, and that was when he realized, from her voice, that she wasnt where she had been the night before and the night before that.

Because now Im sitting, she explained. He asked cautiously, But why are you sitting? Because I couldnt sleep, she said. And I wasnt singing. I was sitting here quietly waiting for you.

They both thought it was getting even darker. A new wave of heat, which may have had nothing to do with her illness, climbed up from Oras toes and sparked red spots on her neck and face. Its a good thing its dark, she thought, and held her loose pajama collar up to her neck. Finally, from the doorway, he cleared his throat softly and said, Well, I have to get back. But why? she asked. He said he urgently had to tar and feather himself. She didnt get it, but then she got it and laughed deeply. Come on, dummy, enough with your act, I put a chair out for you next to me.

He felt along the doorway, metal cabinets, and beds, until he stopped way off, leaned his arms on an empty bed, and panted loudly. Im here, he groaned. Come closer to me, she said. Wait, let me catch my breath. The darkness filled her with courage and she said in a loud voice, in her voice of health, of beaches and paddleball and swimming out to the rafts on Quiet Beach, What are you afraid of? I dont bite. He mumbled, Okay, okay, I get it, Im barely alive. His grumbling tone and the heavy way he dragged his feet touched her. Were kind of like an elderly couple, she thought.