The Wanting by Michael Lavigne Page B

open her eyes?”
    “I’m sorry, no.”
    “It was just for a split second.”
    “Sometimes people in a coma do open their eyes, but it’s just a reflex. But in this case, I was looking at her, too. It didn’t happen. You wanted it to, that’s all.”
    “There was writing on them.”
    “I’m sorry?”
    “On her eyes. There was some kind of writing on them. I think she was trying to communicate.”
    “Sweetheart, maybe it’s time for you to go home now,” she said.
    “Let me show you. Look, I’ll just open her eyes.”
    She tightened her grip on my arm. “Don’t touch her!”
    “It’s all right,” I assured her, “really.”
    She must have pressed a button or screamed or something because the room was suddenly filled with people—men actually—and they swallowed me in choke holds and armlocks and dragged me outside. Vaguely I heard Carmi saying, “I don’t know how the hell he got in. I thought he was still in his car.”
    When everything finally calmed down, I said, “You can call the police if you like.”
    “Look,
habibi
,” someone said, “it’s okay. We get it. You’re suffering. But get some help, okay? Get help.”
    Someone else said, “There are places that specialize in that. In terrorist victims.”
    “In Jerusalem. At Herzog.”
    “Just go up there. Check yourself in.”
    “He doesn’t have to check himself in. He just needs rest.”
    “He needs help. Are you seeing a shrink?”
    “But that’s who sent me here,” I said.
    I looked to Carmi for some sort of support, but instead he more or less shoved me all the way to the Fiat. He waited impatiently until I started the engine and only then felt it safe to go back to his Coca-Cola and magazine. I pulled out of the driveway.
    Obviously she hadn’t opened her eyes. Obviously there was no writing on them. Still, I said to myself, what had those letters meant?
    I felt my head drop to the steering wheel and let out a cry of pain. I had landed on stitches that were still unhealed. I pulled the car to the side of the highway and sat there for a very long time.

    Dear You,
    My father is a complete a-hole and I don’t care if he reads this. Totally messed in the head. So I come home and he’s not there and this afternoon is the presentation at school, so of course I waited and waited and it was already five fifteen and I was all dressed and I don’t know, I called Shana, and her mother said we should go over together, I shouldn’t wait, we could walk. So we all walked to school. She said don’t worry, he’ll be there. Tonight was awards night, and I won third for my Green Israel project, which he helped me design, by the way. It was so stupid—I saved a seat for him andeverything, between me and Avi Issachar’s father who kept making funny noises with his nose—and I couldn’t concentrate because I kept looking at the door waiting for him, so I entirely missed them calling my name, and the principal said I guess she’s not here, and Shana’s mom yelled, “Yes, she is!” and had to nudge me. Oh God, I wanted to run out of there as fast as I could, but of course I didn’t, I just went up to the stage—and the guy from the Technion shook my hand and said something I can’t even remember although I bet it was really important, like you have a scholarship when you grow up, or here’s a million shekels or something, your idea is absolutely brilliant! Who knows what he said! I didn’t even notice the plaque in my hands until I sat down—next to an empty seat, of course. Everybody else’s father was there. Most kids had
two
parents there, even the divorced ones. I don’t care if he is a terrorist victim. I hate him.

Chapter Six

    A LLAH , Fashioner of Forms, Indulgent One, I pray, release me!
    Was it because I didn’t go inside that stupid bus? Is this the source of Your enmity toward me? If I could do it again, I swear before You I would step on that bus! I would show no mercy! I wouldn’t care one bit about the girl