Daniela was treated like a dog.
Ka-Tzetnik survived Auschwitz and wrote House of Dolls soon after he arrived in Israel. I learned that there was this detention centre near Haifa after World War II where new refugees like Ka-Tzetnik were processed and held. I read that people were sprayed in that centre with DDT.
I thought about Barbra’s head measured and taped.
I never went back to Jim’s bookstore again.
‘Would you like some?’ The shyster offered me his fresh pipe, outstretched.
I shook my head no. I’d already had too much. Toxic smoke singed my throat hairs. My throat felt like rope fray. God, this was a relapse. Was this a relapse and I could not admit it? It felt just like the first time all over again.
I heard her barefoot galloping downstairs. Shit churned in my gut. My tongue trapped in a trench.
And she stood there, six feet of her, back in the doorway. Short hair slicked, no bra, in my T-shirt. A ratty yellow towel knotted round her like a skirt.
‘I wanted to see the old room,’ Barbra announced.
Water drops slid down the side of her face.
‘Very good, very good,’ the shyster said.
Barbra trotted down the three steps to the family room.
Her tits bounced. Her knees cracked. She sat right on his lap. I felt sick, I felt triggered by her back here again. The shyster’s hand clamped on her thigh. Ariane called that part the flank. Moon-shaped wet spots spread out from her pits. That was my shirt. Pellets of snow hit the screen doors.
‘When is he going to forgive me?’ Barbra whispered.
The shyster’s claw travelled under her towel. I was having a relapse. She put her mouth near his collar. She started licking his neck. Loose white hairs electrified round his forehead.
‘Stop it,’ I croaked.
It was happening again. Her tongue was out, she was licking for salt. The shyster slowly nudged up her towel. I remembered the feel of her burning goose flesh. My neck tightened in pain. Her licks turned robotic.
‘Stop,’ I repeated.
God, I loved her hot fat. She’d lost too much weight. I wanted to hear all about the last seven years. Her tongue’s doggy licking, my cock got so hard. My father said I would forget about her one day. Bornstein said I had to forgive her one day. But the goddess who had indoctrinated me was now moaning in our family room on top of a geezer and I still felt the need to fucking fuck her. Or love her.
God, I hated the endless loop of this thing.
§
Ariane lunged at me at the front door. Her icy nose hit my cheek.
‘My brakes froze. I need a hot drink,’ she said.
Snow melted on her coat and all-weather bike pants. Did she notice their duffle bag slumped on the floor? Did she notice the haze that had slipped over my head? We walked to the kitchen, cold hand stuck in hand.
‘So, what happened with Sugarman today?’
I still hadn’t looked Ariane in the eyes. We’d talked about that a few weeks ago – how she didn’t like it when I didn’t look her in the eyes when we first saw each other.
‘I quit and she quit,’ I reported, robotic.
‘Fuck. That absolutely sucks.’
I knew she’d imagined us in the States together next year, both of us doing our PhDs. Ariane was the one who’d encouraged me to focus solely on the life and work of Ka-Tzetnik 135633 even as Sugarman said that I had to be careful not to smear Holocaust fiction a priori by ignoring survivors’ textual multiplicities.
At first, I’d wanted to call my thesis The Hoax of Early Holocaust Literature, and Sugarman, my advisor, had refused it.