Nathan Englander - What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank: Stories

For Rachel E. Silver

Contents

What We Talk About
When We Talk About
Anne Frank

T heyre in our house maybe ten minutes and already Marks lecturing us on the Israeli occupation. Mark and Lauren live in Jerusalem, and people from there think it gives them the right.

Mark is looking all stoic and nodding his head. If we had what you have down here in South Florida , he says, and trails off. Yup, he says, and hes nodding again. Wed have no troubles at all.

You do have what we have, I tell him. All of it. Sun and palm trees. Old Jews and oranges and the worst drivers around. At this point, I say, weve probably got more Israelis than you. Debbie, my wife, she puts a hand on my arm. Her signal that Im taking a tone, or interrupting someones story, sharing something private, or making an inappropriate joke. Thats my cue, and Im surprised, considering how much I get it, that she ever lets go of my arm.

Yes, youve got it all now, Mark says. Even terrorists.

I look to Lauren. Shes the one my wife has the relationship withthe one who should take charge. But Lauren isnt going to give her husband any signal. She and Mark ran off to Israel twenty years ago and turned Hassidic, and neither of them will put a hand on the other in public. Not for this. Not to put out a fire.

Wasnt Mohamed Atta living right here before 9/11? Mark says, and now he pantomimes pointing out houses. Goldberg, Goldberg, GoldbergAtta. Howd you miss him in this place?

Other side of town, I say.

Thats what Im talking about. Thats what you have that we dont. Other sides of town. Wrong sides of the tracks. Space upon space. And now hes fingering a granite countertop in our kitchen, looking out into the living room and the dining room, staring through the kitchen windows out at the pool. All this house, he says, and one son? Can you imagine?

No, Lauren says. And then she turns to us, backing him up. You should see how we live with ten.

Ten kids, I say. We could get you a reality show with that here in the States. Help you get a bigger place.

The hand is back pulling at my sleeve. Pictures, Debbie says. I want to see the girls. We all follow Lauren into the den for her purse.

Do you believe it? Mark says. Ten girls! And the way it comes out of his mouth, its the first time I like the guy. The first time I think about giving him a chance.

Facebook and Skype brought Deb and Lauren back together. They were glued at the hip growing up. Went to school together their whole lives. Yeshiva school. All girls. Out in Queens through high school and then riding the subway together to one called Central in Manhattan. They stayed best friends forever until I married Deb and turned her secular, and soon after that Lauren met Mark and they went off to the Holy Land and went from Orthodox to ultra -Orthodox, which to me sounds like a repackaged detergent ORTHODOX ULTRA , now with more deep-healing power. Because of that, were supposed to call them Shoshana and Yerucham. Debs been doing it. Im just not saying their names.

You want some water? I offer. Coke in the can?

Youwhich of us? Mark says.

You both, I say. Ive got whiskey. Whiskeys kosher, too, right?

If its not, Ill kosher it up real fast, he says, pretending to be easygoing. And right then, he takes off that big black hat and plops down on the couch in the den.

Laurens holding the verticals aside and looking out at the yard. Two girls from Forest Hills, she says. Who ever thought wed be the mothers of grown-ups?

Trevors sixteen, Deb says. You may think hes a grown-up, and he may think hes a grown-upbut we, we are not convinced.

Well, Lauren says, then whoever thought wed have kids raised to think its normal to have coconuts crashing out back and lizards climbing the walls?

Right then is when Trev comes padding into the den, all six feet of him, plaid pajama bottoms dragging on the floor and T-shirt full of holes. Hes just woken up and you can tell hes not sure if hes still dreaming. We told him we had guests. But theres Trev, staring at this man in the black suit, a beard resting on the middle of his stomach. And Lauren, Id met her once before, right when Deb and I got married, but ten girls and a thousand Shabbos dinners laterwell, shes a big woman, in a bad dress and a giant blond Marilyn Monroe wig. Seeing them at the door, I cant say I wasnt shocked myself. But the boy, he cant hide it on his face.

Hey, he says.

And then Debs on him, preening and fixing his hair and hugging him. Trevy, this is my best friend from childhood, she says. This is Shoshana, and this is

Mark, I say.

Yerucham, Mark says, and sticks out a hand. Trev shakes it. Then Trev sticks out his hand, polite, to Lauren. She looks at it, just hanging there in the airoffered.

I dont shake, she says. But Im so happy to see you. Like meeting my own son. I mean it, she says. And here she starts to cry, for real. And she and Deb are hugging and Debs crying, too. And the boys, we just stand there until Mark looks at his watch and gets himself a good manly grip on Trevs shoulder.

Sleeping until three on a Sunday? Man, those were the days, Mark says. A regular little Rumpleforeskin. Trev looks at me, and I want to shrug, but Marks also looking, so I dont move. Trev just gives us both his best teenage glare and edges out of the room. As he does, he says, Baseball practice, and takes my car keys off the hook by the door to the garage.

Theres gas, I say.

They let them drive here at sixteen? Mark says. Insane.

So what brings you, I say, after all these years? Debs too far away to grab at me, but her face says it all. Was I supposed to know? I say. Jeez, Deb must have told me. She told me, for sure. My fault.

My mother, Mark says. Shes failing and my fathers getting oldand they come to us for Sukkot every year. You know?

I know the holidays, I say.

They used to fly out to us. For Sukkot and Pesach, both. But they cant fly now, and I just wanted to get over while things are still good. We havent been in America

Oh, gosh, Lauren says. Im afraid to think how long its been. More than ten years. Twelve, she says. Twelve years ago. With the kids, its just impossible until enough of them are big. This might beand now she plops down on the couchthis might be my first time in a house with no kids under the roof in that long. Oh my. Im serious. How weird. I feel faint. And when I say faint , she says, standing up, giving an oddly girlish spin around, what I mean is giddy.

How do you do it? Deb says. Ten kids? I really do want to hear.

Thats when I remember. I forgot your drink, I say to Mark.

Yes, his drink. Thats how, Lauren says. Thats how we cope.

And thats how the four of us end up back at the kitchen table with a bottle of vodka between us. Im not one to get drunk on a Sunday afternoon, but I tell you, with a plan to spend the day with Mark, I jump at the chance. Debs drinking, too, but not for the same reason. For her and Lauren, I think theyre reliving a little bit of the wild times. The very small window when they were together, barely grown-up, two young women living in New York on the edge of two worlds. And they just look, the both of them, so overjoyed to be reunited, I think theyre half celebrating and half cant handle how intense the whole thing is.

Deb says, as shes already on her second, This is really racy for us. I mean really racy. We try not to drink much at all these days. We think it sets a bad example for Trevor. Its not good to drink in front of them right at that age when theyre all transgressive. Hes suddenly so interested in that kind of thing.