Mahmoud finds a treasure

 

Mahmoud drilled the last hole in the wall of the future kitchen, then inserted the screw anchors into all of them. He sighed and climbed down the ladder. Two more hours until the lunch break. For now, he could have a coffee and cigarette, while Shuki and Yaakov were hanging the kitchen units. He was getting too old to be climbing up and down all day. His knees hurt, and his back creaked. His eyes were not as sharp as they used to be, and his bladder was beginning to give him the trouble of old men. Yet, he could not admit it even to himself, because who would feed the family, if he couldn’t? He knew that day would come eventually, sooner rather than later, and if the Jews were looking forward to their retirement, grandchildren and travelling, he could only look forward to silent resentment of his daughters-in-law and the forced obedience of his sons. He was not a citizen of Israel, so no pension awaited him in his old age.

There wasn’t enough cardamom left, and the coffee tasted weak, pale, just like the face of that new boy Yaakov just hired, Shalom. What a funny name. Arabs named for war; Jews named for peace. Weaklings. He shrugged. This was the way of the world.

“Mahmoud! Where the devil are you?” – Yaakov yelled. They needed another man to support the units. Yet, Mahmoud did not reply. Just another minute of rest. He shook the ashes off his cigarette, staring fixedly at his dirty and scarred hand, and thinking that one day, the hands of his newborn grandson, Amir, would look like that, too, unless he could scrape up some more money and send him to university in Cairo. The boy should be a lawyer, he is so smart, always making arguments. He sighed again. “I’m coming!” – he yelled in the direction of the kitchen.

That was exactly when the building shook. Something crashed down in the kitchen, and breaking glass sang out a sad note right behind him. It was as if a giant took a deep breath in the mountain under them, stretching after centuries of sleep, and began chewing the sheer rock under the new building. It sounded like a whole escadrille of fighter jets flying overhead. Then the floor became soft. Marble tiles turned into the dunes by the coast near Ashdod, even though they were on a hill overlooking Jerusalem. The Jews in the kitchen yelled something out in Hebrew, and thundered down the unfinished stairs. Mahmoud made his way down, too, quaking with the most primitive and instinctual fear, the same one that makes animals find their way out of a burning forest, without a thought or a plan. Yet, at the bottom of the stairs, instead of turning to the exit, the light and air, he pushed his way past the bales of sand meant for the floors, into the basement, where the storage rooms were meant to be, and squatted down by the rock wall, not yet dressed in stone. The tiles prepared for the job were piled up haphazardly in three different places, and Yaakov just hasn’t found anyone to blame for that yet.

The giant under him yawned, and Mahmoud saw the vast mouth of the earth opening up to swallow him. Forgetting all the right prayers, he covered his eyes with his hands and waited to be crushed by the hundreds of tons of concrete towering over his head. Then, the grinding noise stopped, the floor was solid again. Mahmoud opened his eyes and thanked Allah for surviving. He was covered in mud and pieces of rock, scratched and bruised, but otherwise unharmed. His heart was still racing, and he got up shakily to go back upstairs, when he realized… There was a mouth of a cave staring at him, and inside it, piled one on top of another, there were three ancient-looking amphoras and five stone chests.

Outside, the sirens wailed. He heard the other workers yelling out his name and asking if he was OK. He realized he had two minutes at most, before the treasure was found and claimed for the State. Yet, this was his once in a lifetime chance – to stop slaving on building sites, to send Amir to university, to add another floor so his son Nasser could take a wife, at last… He looked around frantically. The amphoras were too big and heavy to hide, and he had no time to check what was inside them. He knew scrolls could fetch the most, but he couldn’t see any scrolls anywhere. On top of the stone chests, he noticed a small metal box. When he lifted it, he gasped at its weight – it fitted in the palm of his hand, but weighed at least as much as an adult-sized bike. It’s got to be something special and expensive, to be stored like that, in a lead container. He shoved it hastily into the pocket of his jeans, hoping it wouldn’t tear, and turned to leave the newly formed cave.

“Here you are, man!” – Yaakov clapped him on the shoulder. Then he breathed out an oath. “Look what we’ve got here! A treasure!” He stood there for a while, just staring in awe at the mysterious containers. Then he ran out to call Antiques Authority. Mahmoud followed him, “We mustn’t touch anything! I thought all building projects were approved by archeologists, but look at this here! Come on, you will be rewarded for finding this!” He rubbed his palms together, his corpulent belly swaying right and left with the move. Then he pulled up his jeans and adjusted his kippa. Mahmoud shivered with distaste, and turned to leave. He wanted to have a look at the thing he took – curiosity was gnawing at him. Yet, he couldn’t exactly take another break now, when they were all discussing the earthquake and the treasure. They finished hanging up the kitchen and installed the sink before a phone call came, ordering them to stop all works at once until further notice. The archeologist on duty was on his way.

They sat outside, smearing thick hot pita bread from the bakery with labane or hummous, still talking about the earthquake. Many old buildings had collapsed… they all knew someone who lived in those areas. Shalom, being the youngest, chopped up some vegetables, and Shuki brewed some more coffee. Mahmoud got up slowly and headed for the nearest bathroom. They all heard a blood-curdling long scream. Then silence set in.

By the time Yaakov finished breaking down the solid wooden door, there was nobody left to save. In the bloody mess on the floor they found some severed fingers, sliced off as if by a giant razor, and Mahmoud’s leg, cut off with geometric perfection. But the strangest thing of all was that the toilet bowl was sliced in two, as well, with the same uncanny precision. Yaakov had enough time to see that the floor was being sliced with something invisible, cleaving the wall on the floor below them into two neat halves, moving slowly and deliberately towards the belly of the earth. It was small, grey, and it smelled of something like burning vinegar, but the metallic smell of blood overpowered everything. Then he slammed the door, and vomited all over himself and his workers’ shoes, undigested pieces of pita mixing in with the stream of bright-red blood leaking out from under the door.

What he remembered later, when the TV and radio hosts wanted to speak to him, was just the freckled young face of the archeologist, with beads of sweat glistening on his forehead, screaming out one word: “Shamir! Shamir!” and talking some nonsense about the Temple and the Messiah and everything being real. “How did you just let it go?!” – he demanded. “You catch it, idiot. It just killed a man here.” – Shuki spat out at him then. The archeologist was pulling his hair out, wailing that not a soul would believe him about this. Yaakov refused to be interviewed, saying the event traumatized him too much, and they all clucked their tongues and said they were so sorry. Shuki delivered stories worthy of the “Thousand nights” to anyone who would listen, until the public lost interest. Shalom had simply disappeared – his bride wanted nothing to do with him, until he denied any connection to the event. Mahmoud’s family received a hefty compensation from the company, after signing the report that spoke of a concrete mixer knife being dislodged by the quake. The family built another floor in their concrete shell of a house, enough for two more sons to take wives. The archeologist was hospitalized with a nervous breakdown, and Yaakov made his wife cook extra shabbat meals, so the only man who understood what happened could recover and explain. Biblical scholars from all over the world made their way to him, yet he stubbornly refused to speak to anyone, until the memory of the event was scattered by the four winds of Jerusalem, carried into the Judean desert by the winter gales and burnt to a crisp by the heatwaves of the summer.

Yet, if you creep quietly into the back yard of the building set slightly back from Jeremiah Street in Jerusalem, and ask the neighbours about the treasure, they will confirm every word, and even show you the graves of Yaakov the Builder and the young archeologist, who never recovered his sanity, after you solemnly promise to never, ever share this story with anyone else.

 

All matters of healing

 

All medical institutions smell the same – of disinfectants and waiting. There’s also a whiff of human suffering clinging onto the walls. Grimy baby toys with cracked wooden rings, mounted on the wall by paediatrician’s offices should probably be warded off with red tape for all the germs they carry. Grim leaflets describing the terrible effects of smoking and obesity, and the benefits of extra vaccines call in vain to the visitors, who are too absorbed in their own worries. And only the pious men in black hats rock back and forth over heavy volumes printed in eye-twisting miniscule letters, while their toddlers in faded onesies and distended diapers explore the shiny bleach-flavoured floor and smile up at kindly old ladies.

Unlike those morose places, alternative medicine places smell of sweet almond oil, incense, and pampering. They are scattered all over the ancient city, spicing up the wild stew of Jerusalem with their tingling Chinese music. This particular college also smelled of burning sage, brand-new things packaging, and lavender oil. In the classrooms, students slouched over massage tables, taking notes and relaxing, as the wind chimes at the entrance rang in tune with the weather and the time of day.

When God made the Jerusalem of Old, He set the hills running, rising and receding like the waves of the sea, until He ordered them to be still, and they moved no more. Then, over the millennia, the city climbed up them, and spilled over into the adjacent valleys. Then, eighty years ago, when survivors made their way home to build their State, He felt so emotional and needed to wipe His eyes, and so it happened that He dropped his spice rack right in, and every flavour spilled out, filling the city with all kinds of faith, love and madness. Musing along those lines, Diana sat on the steps of the college, cradling her lucky teddy bear, wrapped in her lucky blanket, printed with the logo of Beitar football team. Today was the day that would decide her whole future. If she passes, she will be a fully qualified and certified “Touch Specialist”, as they liked to refer to it. Massage, reflexology and Su-Jok were her passions. Actually, she had no doubt that she would pass, but the teddy bear was still necessary. She was too nervous to think straight. Next to her, a tall Russian girl called Julia was trying her best not to smirk about the teddy bear, or comment on it. Her giant mug, decorated with the coat of arms of St Petersburg, had a branch of liquorice bush sticking out of it, and Julia was being careful not to take her eye out while drinking. Right above them, Dor the guitarist was quickly going over his notes for the exam. His hair, dyed fluorescent yellow and purple, was gathered in a neat pony tail, and even his torn jeans looked more neat than usual. He was chewing on an apple – again. As a vegan “raw foodist”, he was perpetually starving, and had to “feed”, as he called it, even in class. Bananas, apples, celery sticks and even raw beetroots disappeared one after another behind his ginger stubble, yet his cheeks remained sunken, and the dark circles around his eyes could hardly be blamed on “lack of sleep”.

Sarit the secretary same out to invite them in for the exam. Leah, a short lady with swollen feet and distended belly, which hasn’t had the time yet to shrink since her most recent birth, adjusted her multi-layered turban and settled in the front row. Outside, her husband was walking back and forth impatiently, with the baby in a sling on his front and an army rifle hitting his legs in the back, drinking coffee and waiting to whisk her back to Psagot, a tiny settlement hugged on all sides by the hostile city of Ramalla, where their other children waited. Dor settled next to her, still chewing. In front of him he put a soy pudding with a plastic spoon, and a waxed cloth bag decorated with red polka dots, full of sprouted beans and celery sticks. Diana, Julia and the others sat right behind, in the second and the third rows. Liat, the mysterious Tel Avivian who barely ever spoke, settled in the desk chair by the window. She kept on pushing her sunglasses up to hold her hair back, and twisting the ring on her left hand as she wrote the answers slowly and deliberately. Fatma and Amira sat together and on the edge of the classroom, as they always did, their black hijabs and long dresses in sharp contrast with the colours of the clothes everyone else wore.

Diana put her teddy bear as close as possible to her exam paper, and began filling the pages with her slanted handwriting, losing all sense of time. How do you treat a pulled gastrocnemius muscle? And what about rotator cuff injuries? Oh, those were nasty, that she remembered… Maybe some gentle stretching? Heat? Cold? She couldn’t remember…

Time passed, sticky with effort, stretching and contracting in the rhythm of their knowledge and confidence, punctuated by Dor’s chewing and Julia unwrapping her carob protein bar.

At last, the time was nearly up. Julia was predictably the first to hand her exam in, and as she opened her phone, it bleeped unpleasantly with the warning sound they all recognized at once. The security alerts app sound like a barbed wire going through your ribs. All the heads turned. “Do not disturb your friends!” – Sarit hissed at her in a worried whisper. Then she grabbed Julia by the wrist and breathed in her ear, “Where?”

“Tel Aviv. A shooting attack on Dizengoff. Three dead, twelve wounded”, - Julia’s accent was suddenly much more pronounced. Red blotches appeared on her cheeks, then spread to her forehead. She tugged at her neckline, then reached into her backpack for an asthma inhaler.

A gasp travelled around the class. Dor stopped “feeding” and hastily swallowed so he could talk. “Have they caught the terrorists?” – he asked.

“Say what?” – Liat jumped out of her seat, letting the exam papers slide down to the floor.

“Hush, hush! Nu, really! It’s the exam!” -Sarit was flapping her arms like a wounded flamingo, her pink sleeves flying up and down, but her voice was not steady.

“I don’t care… “– Liat whispered. The colour drained form her face and she ran to her backpack, then tried to pull the string open with shaking hands. On the third attempt, the bag opened, but her phone and wallet fell out, scattering credit cards, bus cards, and discount cards all over. She ignored them, and began dialling numbers. Diana left her exam, and started to pick up the scattered items.

Julia focused her gaze on the two Arab girls, still sitting in the corner, as if trying to highlight their separateness. Fatma suddenly found the tip of her pen very interesting, she could not stop studying it in minute details. Amira was staring out of the window, as if the panic and distress of the people around her was contagious, and she wished to avoid it. They would not look at each other, or at the other students. Then Fatma began studying the acupuncture chart on the wall.

Diana picked up the last card, only to realize that it was a yellowed photograph of a boy in a soldier’s uniform. She handed the items to Liat, who was still clutching at her phone by her ear. Their eyes met, and Liat’s voice suddenly filled the room.

“Yes, that’s my brother, thanks for asking.” – Her tone was bitter, her voice rang like crystals of ice in a glass vase. “Second Lebanon War. He was trapped in a burning tank. We buried what was left of him without looking, there was nothing left to identify. My uncle died in the two helicopters accident over Shaar Yashuv. My father fought in Yom Kippur War. My grandma walked out of Auschwitz on her own two feet, even though she weighed just over thirty kilograms. Her grandfather was killed in a pogrom in Russia. I’m just an Israeli, like all of you.” – she looked around the room. “Well, like almost all of you” – she added, even more bitterly. “Sorry for oversharing.” – She shoved all the cards into her backpack, without looking at them, and walked out in long purposeful strides. Sarit carefully folded the exams into the damp blanket of silence and fear that settled over the classroom. “You can leave, if you need to…” – she offered hesitantly.

Diana hugged her teddy bear close. If only it could offer some comfort to people like Liat… then she had another idea. She dragged one of the empty massage tables into the centre of the room. “Who wants a reflexology break? Come on, this is exactly why we studied this… so we can help people. You can hug him as I’m treating you. Anyone?”

“I’ll add in a head massage on the other side” – Dor piped in. His eyes were wet, and he wiped his nose on his sleeve.

“Sure,” – Leah was the first one to climb on the table. “Then I’ll take over form you.”

More students walked in, unaware of what just transpired.

“Breathe into your pain…” – Dor muttered, making sure not to touch the complicated turban as he pressed points in Leah’s neck.

“It’s absurd that the sun is shining just as before, and yet, we lost three more people…” – Diana found herself pressing Leah’s feet so hard that her "client" winced. “Sorry…” – she sighed. Leah nodded.

The wind chimes at the entrance were singing the tune of summer. Sarit lit a candle under the oil burner, then dripped a few drops of lavender oil inside. “To calm the students…” – she thought. Another "client" climbed up onto the treatment table.

Nobody noticed Amira and Fatma leaving.

 

When Shraga met Natasha

 The “Shouk” – Machane Yehuda Market – has a rhythm of its own. It stirs awake just as the first sleepy commuters stop for a coffee with a delicious croissant, filled with sweet cheese, chocolate, or halva. It pumps itself alive when the first vegetable merchants tip over the cardboard boxes they brought from the Israel’s fertile South, and the exotic fruit sellers arrive from the cooler North, and start arranging neat boxes of blueberries, raspberries, dragonfruit and starfruit in a way that makes older people remember their first Tetris.

It has a weekly rhythm, too. On Sunday, the meat and fish counters remain closed…the market slumbers. The quirky little bars open for just a few customers, and close early. Every Thursday, the Shouk starts buzzing almost at dawn, and finishes dancing long after midnight. The smell of sweet dough fills a customer’s nostrils and leads him, unwavering, to the bakeries, spilling over with sticky chocolate rogalach, cheese cakes of all kinds, savoury breads and everything in between, and any resistance is futile. The dry fruit and nut sellers chase after slim Japanese tourists with pieces of halva and bad English, after those point their sophisticated photography equipment at all the sweet and sticky wares. At least two shops grind coffee on the spot, and the customers are seduced into a semi-conscious shopping spree. Large groups of Americans stampede through the alleyways, spending an average Israeli salary on nothing much, and communicating so loudly that even the sellers, hoarse from yelling their prices, are amused. Older ladies come through the stalls staggering under the weight of their purchases; Ethiopian women with babies tied onto their backs add the weight of shopping bags onto the weight of the sling, as both seem to be cutting deep into their shoulders. Young Bedouins flirt with the customers, carry weights beyond human capability, and yell so loudly that no competitor could be heard – all at the same time. The smoked meat and salami stall attracts elderly Germans in shorts, brandishing professional cameras. Luckily, there is cold beer right next door. Tiny Philippine women push the frail nonagenarians in their wheelchairs, people whose names would once make the enemies of Israel shake in their boots, who now cannot recall them – just as the country can’t. The water used to rinse the fish as it is being cut up runs down the pavement, directly into the sewage system, stinking up everything in its way if the day is hot. Then, as the heat begins to recede, the tourists leave, and the customers from the nearby neighbourhoods start wandering in, pulling red and blue chequered trolley bags after them, just as the prices drop towards the closing time, and broken English evaporates from above the stalls.

On one such Thursday, two children were seen walking very determinedly towards the Shouk. The older girl, about eight years old, was pulling a younger brother after her with one hand, and a chequered trolley – with the other. Both were dressed in the regular manner of religious Jews, the boy had a large brown kippa on his head, and the girl wore a long-sleeved shirt and a long skirt. “But I don’t wanna go…” – his sobs were already quieting down, and he trudged along out of sheer habit. Once they got into the central alleyway, the girl expertly bypassed the beggar at the entrance (“The Rabbanut and the government are in it together! Together, I’m telling you!” – he was announcing to all and sundry. “We keep on electing them since the 80, but they are a regular cartel! A cartel, I am telling you!”) He shook the tin box full of coins in their direction, but soon was diverted by a group of tourists from the North. (“Haifa! You’re all stinking commies! The red Haifa!”) The tourists ignored him, but some reluctantly placed more coins in his box, just to keep him quiet. (“Hey! You are the wise men of Chelm! Elija the Prophet will pop you like a balloon! All the Leftist university self-haters!”) – he yelled after the educated-looking couple, who seemed a bit confused by the commotion and hurried away as fast as they could.

The girl kept on pulling both the boy and the trolley, and soon they passed the next seller (“Our prices are coming down-down-down- at you!) With every “down” his head bent lower towards his wares – bags of bread rolls and pita bread, chocolate and apple cakes, and plastic boxes filled with rogalach. Then he began his chant anew. Right by him there sat another beggar, a more sophisticated one. A withered crone dressed in a bridal headdress always sat there, collecting coins for young penniless brides. By her side, a tiny, but powerful speaker was blasting traditional Jewish wedding songs. On the other side, a vendor selling herring and pickled olives called over to the emaciated-looking porter, who was pushing a three-meter-long trolley full of compressed cardboard boxes. “Come on, I’m drowning over here! What’s wrong with you today? Out of strength, huh?”

The porter stopped and stared, then admitted reluctantly: “Yeah… I’m dieting.”

Two meters down, the next beggar heard him. A corpulent woman with three chins and diabetic sores on her bare feet, dressed in a dirty sweatshirt despite the sweltering heat, began laughing. It wasn’t just any laugh, though. It involved her whole body. Fist, her face and chin began shaking, then her shoulders, then her enormous belly shook in spasms of glorious pure laughter, the kind that cleanses the soul through the eyes. “He… is… dieting…” – she managed, then shook even more violently, nearly rolling backwards with her tiny chair. The herrings man shrugged, then tossed the cardboard boxes somewhere behind his back. “We don’t keep weaklings, Mahmoud.” The porter nodded solemnly, still staring at the laughing woman. “Fine.” – he picked up a roll from the man’s counter and just bit into it with what looked like all his thirty-two teeth at once.

Unnoticed by any of them, the girl and the boy ducked under an empty counter, onto which everyone else was tossing their refuse of the day – rotting apples, addled corn, blackened celery, bread rolls that had fallen on the floor. Now they were hidden from everyone, and could only see people’s legs and feet. Yet, as they were shocked to discover, they hadn’t been the only ones to think of it. There was another little boy already sitting there, and filling his trolley with bits and pieces. Right then he was busy trying to stuff in a whole cabbage, his long blond ‘peyos’ swinging right and left. His trolly wasn’t the same as theirs – it was an old baby carriage, with a large plastic box fitted in instead of the baby’s seat, and he was pushing the cabbage into the net underneath it. Quicky, before the boy was finished, the girl grabbed a few apples from the top and shoved them into her trolley. He turned around at the noise, and frowned. “I found this place first.” – he stated. “So?” – the girl replied. – “It’s a mitzva to share.” Something landed on top of them with a thud, and all three jumped up to see what it was. Four beetroots, one of them cracked in half. The girl grabbed them first, and quickly stowed them away in her trolley. Silence sat between them for a while. “I want a drink” – the little boy sighed, at last. “Go ask Dudu. You know he always has cups, and a tap.” Dudu was the fishmonger, but to get to him, the little boy would have to cross about ten meters of the crowd, and he was afraid of not finding his sister afterwards. “You go… Natasha, nu please…” – the last two words were said in Russian.

“Natasha? What kind of a name is that?” – the blonde boy wondered. “It means “abandoned” in Hebrew. You know, like your mother dumped you, and that’s why you’re now collecting rotten vegetables.”

“As if you’re not doing exactly the same” – Natasha snorted at him, then turned away angrily. “My name is Neta, actually. And this is David.” She pronounced it “Daveed”, the Russian way.

“So why did he call you Natasha?” – the boy wondered again. “I am Shraga, by the way. It means ‘flame’ in Aramaic, and it’s because my family had a fire from Chanuka candles right after I was born, so they saw it as a sign that I will learn Torah well.”

“Not every name is special like yours,” – Natasha, or Neta, argued, and Shraga had to agree. “Nobody abandoned us.”

“Me neither. It’s just that there are sixteen of us, and … nu, we need a lot of food. My sister is coming soon.”

David nagged her again for water, and she clambered out of their haven to go and ask Dudu the fishmonger for three cups, which she carried back very carefully, successfully manoeuvring between the shoppers, right until she let out a startled gasp. In front of her stood a tall woman with a black bag decorated with a hammer and a sickle, and the letters for “Moscow” in Russian. Her jet-black hair was cascading onto her shoulders and an unnaturally prominent chest, which drew in the looks of passers-by of box sexes. Pompous boots with high heels made her tower over most other shouk visitors. A similar-looking teenage daughter was leaning on her arm. “What is this urchin doing here?” – the woman thundered in Russian, just as Neta dropped all three cups at her feet, soaking both herself and the woman. “I thought you and your family were both happily gone to hell!” – her voice was so high-pitched and shrieking, that little David, still hiding under the counter, closed his ears with his palms. “No, we’ve gone home, Larisa Petrovna. But what you are doing here, I wonder. I thought you hated us all.” – Neta answered, bending down to pick up the cups, just as the woman delivered a precise kick on her knee, and Neta fell backwards, knocking her head on a front wheel of a bike, which a confused-looking black man with dreads was walking through the alleyway. “I live here, little urchin. And there is nothing you can do about it.” – she replied, lifting her head proudly. “You’ve got to know how to manage in this life…”

Her tirade was interrupted by screams. “Noooo!” “You don’t do that, no, you don’t!” “Don’t you touch the girl!” The whole Shouk was screaming. Shuki, the vendor who sold vegetables, and Nasser, who worked for the bakery, Mahmoud the porter, Tomer who sold pickles, and Avram who sold Judaica, all three beggars, and all the other vendors and visitors, were all yelling at the black-haired woman, who turned her back and fled, muttering something about “sneaky Jews” under her nose. The biker with dreads helped Neta get up, and the kind lady with a guide dog stood nearby until Dudu brought the kids three new cups of water. And then the river of the crowd resumed flowing, the porters carried on pushing the massive trolleys, the vendors began screaming again, as if no incident took place just seconds ago.

“Who was that?” – Shraga wondered. Neta was wiping her stinging tears with the back of her hand and couldn’t answer. So David did, instead. “She was our neighbour in Moscow. She absolutely hates Jews, I don’t know what she is doing here.” And he patted his sister awkwardly on the head. “She hated us especially, because we have a lot of kids. She used to call us ‘gypsies’ and …” – he stumbled, looking for a word in Hebrew.

“I understand.” – Shraga nodded. “She is a regular shikse puritz.”
“A what?” – Neta asked.

“That’s in Yiddish. Means she is rich… and she’s not one of us.”

“Nope, she isn’t. She used to yell at us every time she saw anyone from our family, she called the police every time the baby cried…” – she squashed down another sob, and jumped up to catch some celery sticks that just landed on the empty counter above them. Then Shraga caught a peach, and David helped him pick up another one, which rolled away into the gutter.

“You’re a fool, David. You should’ve taken it,” – Neta said in Russian. – “Mama would’ve made a Charlotte cake for Shabbos.”

“You said yourself it was a mitzva to share.” – David protested, also in Russian. “You’ll see, we’ll get more peaches later.”

And that’s exactly how it was. Their trolley filled up as the afternoon wore on. Three avocados, five squashed peaches, ten pears, which the vendor simply put on the floor in front of them, and they shared it fairly with Shraga, and even a box of rogalach that spilled onto the floor. David grabbed one immediately, and was now nagging Neta for another cup of water. “I’ll go this time,” – Shraga offered. He managed to get back uneventfully, and then they all shared a piece of potato kugel, which the pickles vendor shoved at them under the counter.

The day was rolling towards sunset. The screaming vendors began losing their voices. The fish juices, rolling towards the gutter, began to give off an awful smell. It was almost closing time. Dudu bent down under the counter, and handed Neta a package with some frozen carp. Seeing Shraga, he felt bad, and went to bring another package. The old beggar removed her bridal crown and folded it away into her trolley. Now it was time for her to go shopping, as well. The first beggar had been quiet for a while, now he was having a chat with a younger man, who kept on wincing and clutching at his heart. On his right wrist there was one of those bracelets that inform the ambulance team of the patient’s condition in case of emergencies. “God hasn’t made a disease which a good shot of Arak cannot cure!” – he declared, pushing a plastic cup at the man. “Uncle Rahamim, I’m not allowed alcohol, I told you!” – the man protested. “Just take! It’s been blessed by the holy Abuchatzira family, I don’t remember exactly by whom. One of the grandchildren. It’ll cure you. You’ll see.” The man gave in and sipped the burning liquid cautiously, allowing a huge smile to spread on his face. “Oh, but this is good, uncle!” One of the vendors handed him a packet of sunflower seeds, saying “You should have a full recovery, Amos!” On the other side of the street, beyond the railway line, a big white van stopped in the area where no cars had been allowed for decades, and four Nah-nah dancers got out. They clambered on top the van and started dancing in coils of sweet marijuana smoke, their peot and tzitzit flying with every move.  As always, they immediately attracted a crowd. Coins began falling into the large metal bucket they placed in front of the van. Almost at once, two policemen mounted on massive shaggy horses rode up, their faces almost level with the chassidim on top of the van. Asking them to move had no effect, and the policemen rode off in search of support.

Under the counter, Neta was stretching her aching legs. Really, it was long past the time when her mother was supposed to come and take them home. She hoped nothing had happened to her. David was whining again, this time saying that he needed the bathroom. Shraga took him through a crack in the wall to the neglected parking lot beyond, where the thick grass allowed the boys to relieve themselves unseen. Judging by the smell of the place, they were not the first ones to think of it. Just as they slipped quietly back under, the ground under them shook with a distant explosion, and they heard a deafening “boom.” The Shouk went absolutely silent, as if it was completely empty on a Saturday afternoon, and only the Nah-nah music continued playing for a few more seconds, like in a surreal nightmare. Then, the sirens came to life. Wailing came from all directions at once, speeding towards the place where innocent Jerusalemites were now writhing in puddles of their own blood, some of them taking their last breaths on this earth. “Where? Where?” – everyone demanded to know. “King George street!” – someone spat out. The shoppers ran towards the opposite exit of the market, the one opening up at Agrippas street. “May they all burn in hell, the seed of Amalek!” – the beggar at the entrance to the Shouk poured more arak for his nephew, who tipped it into his throat in one go. “Amen, uncle! May God make all the snakes disappear!” Then, he lowered himself carefully onto the bare ground, staring up at the pigeon-infested ceiling of the Shouk. For the first time in years, the fear of death let go of him, and he saw a beautiful turquoise angel floating in the air in front of him. He briefly wondered if it was a pigeon, then decided against it. It was so wonderful not to worry about anything at all. “Amos! Amos!” – his uncle was shaking him. The angel beckoned.

The three children sat under the counter, frozen in horror. All around them, the vendors were closing shop, pouring buckets of unsold produce on top of them, but now they did not care. The Shouk was emptying out, and two police cars stopped at the front and at the back each, letting people out, but not in. “How will our mothers find us?” – Shraga wondered. “I cannot carry all this alone!”

“We can’t, either. We live all the way in Ramot, you know. The buildings that look like beehives – there.” – David contributed. “It’s a long bus ride.”

At the opposite ends of the Shouk, two women were arguing with the police, both out of breath from running. Bayla’s small pill-shaped hat on top of her wig was sitting askance, she was wringing her eczema-blighted hands, crying to be allowed to look for her son, who was definitely inside. At last, the police woman relented and let her through, immediately stopping a dozen more citizens who wished to follow suit. The sun was setting, and a cool blast of wind carried in the sounds of the concert from the Sacher garden, the smell of a BBQ all the way from the Jerusalem Forest by Har Nof, and the emotional voice of the radio host, counting the dead and the wounded, from somewhere right on top of the Shouk. The last wailing ambulance sped away, carrying the wounded to hospitals, and all was quiet again, eery and sad silence settling over the city.

Elena was not as lucky as Bayla, and the police did not heed to her rumblings in a very poor Hebrew, so she had to get in from a less known entrance, bypass a dozen restaurants and pubs, and only then she managed to get to her children. The torn shoelace on her right sneaker untied again, and she was forced to stop for that, as well. Neta and David jumped on her, crying and overjoyed. “You’re alive, mama! And wait till you hear whom I saw today!”

“Not only I am alive, but we’ll have a Shabbos worthy of kings!” – and she began gathering up more vegetables from on top of the counter into the bags she brought. Just then, Bayla arrived to pick up Shraga, who jumped out towards her, blabbering in quick Yiddish about the events of the day. The two women measured each other head to toe in the now fully empty alleyway, immediately estimating the other’s religious affiliation, social status and more, in the way that only Jerusalem mothers can. Despite them both being devotedly religious, normally they wouldn’t have even two words to say to each other, but today the words came up without any effort. “Shabbat shalom,” – Elena wished. – “And to you all!” – Bayla responded. “I see you’re new here, if you need any information, you know… schools… shopping…” – she stumbled. Confused by the soft Yiddish accent and her own raging emotions, Elena nudged her daughter for translation. “Thank you, thank you,” – she managed then, and the two mothers turned in different directions at the exit from the Shouk. Shraga looked back and winked at Neta, just as dozens of policemen began a thorough search of the market.

“See you next week,” – he mouthed.

Neta nodded to show that she understood.

Every Thursday, the Shouk starts buzzing early…