RAIN DANCE

CONTINUED from Zamfir.

Download this soundtrack . It has nothing to do with the text, just to prove that Rotem still has no taste.

'Get in!' she yells. The rain is wilder and the water looks dirty and rough.
'I'd rather keep my health intact,' I call back, realizing an instant later what a faux pas this was.
'Bitch!' she laughs, spraying my feet. She flaps about in the cold, in the waters that once carried her vomit and blood. But you never step into the same river twice.

A million of buzzing questions, and instead, I sit on a mossy slab of rock under an enormous willow umbrella. She climbs out, shaking her head like a dog, peeling off her shirt and wringing it in the rain.
She pulls on her boxers and pants, and stretches down beside me on the flat rock, dripping like an animal and as happy as a cub.

'I don't see the point of exposing different portions of yourself to the rain.'
She chuckles. 'You sound like Sara.'
'Shut up.'
She watches me. 'You've grown.'
'So have you,' I say, but when she cocks her head I decide she hasn't, and tell her so. 'You still have to up-to-no-good smirk.'
'I'm nearly 20,' she says proudly. 'I've spent so much energy reaching these digits, I forgot to grow up.' I giggle even though it's mighty dispiriting.

I watch her profile as she bends over to tie her laces, face submerged in shadows. I can stare comfortably, as she is lost in thought. Her expression seems sad; I know her body but now it shows unfamiliar scars.
There is one right where the bra strap goes, a cleft of dark skin - that's new. And one beneath her shoulder, rather twisted. I noticed the old ones when she leaped into the water: the slash at the buttock, the jagged cut down her back ribs, where the weapon must've bounced off as it cracked each bone, and the straight line down her thigh. This is what I want Vidoo to witness: an unwilling cutter. No, cuttee. Acts of external violence, violation of a perfect soft curve and a child's bone. Rotem would never damage herself.

When I think of child abuse I think of brittle bone crushed by a massive hand. Tiny skeleton, like a chick's or a rodent's, crumbling. I think of Rotem as a small child, the one I saw in the photos: tiny hands and feet, big bald head with huge hazel eyes, black Bermudas and a Bart Simpson tee. Striking forehead, a pout, a silence, an anger, add a slingshot if you will. I think of her pulverized under the violence of another colossus and my mind hurts. She does emit some enfant terrible airs, but maybe the bad-tomboy-on-the-block look is a cover-up façade of a more terrifying act.

The rain ceases as we begin our ascent uphill.
'You never told me why you came to Norham.'
Striding by, she plucks a tall weed. 'So I could meet you and the gang.'
'No, not the effects, the cause.'
'Cosmic predestination. An urge to celebrate Guy Fawkes' Day. I have no reason.'
'You suck as a bullshit artist.'
She turns around in her tracks to face me, spraying dew. 'Fine. I came to quit drugs. On my own. Among other things.'
I smile. 'Figured as much. What other things?'
'Alcohol. I needed to rehab myself undisturbed by authority.'
'What other things?' I repeat.
She doesn't reply. The grass is beaded with droplets which turn into mist as we pass.

In the car, she switches on the engine, and fixes a shot to a permanently-plastered contraption on her right arm. Then she rummages behind our seats, fishes a bag of blood, hangs it from the rearview mirror, spins the clear cord and mainlines it into her left arm. It's so macabre I feel dizzy.
She leans her head back.
'Some shit happened the Spring before Norham. Somebody died. I almost got arrested for possession, and I had a huge bout of alcohol poisoning.'
'You were 14?' She nods. 'So you were also gang-raped.'
'Nah, that happened at the end of that Summer. So by Springtime, I thought I was a survivor. Then everything crashed again and I had legal trouble. I was disowned. I knew no one could blow my cover at some crumbling godforsaken theological convent.'

'But you were carrying a few good kilos of shit. Why did you do that?'
'It wasn't mine,' she replies simply.
I remember discovering the nature of the heroin sachets hidden at the bottom of 6 grand Cadbury's cocoa cans, Rotem crying furiously because the principal ordered her to return the tins to the kitchens.
'And you thought it was some cursed smack or something.'
She grins. 'I didn't. But I needed your help, good pagan.'
'It was cursed! It got us into deep trouble.'
'I should really apologize to you about that,' Rotem frowns.
'Never mind. Now it all seems very funny, looking back.'
'The only amusing piece was selling it to that Aberdeen freak.'
I laughed, because I can still tangibly recall the relief. She never thought she could get rid of that crap that easily. 'You hummed Chariots of Fire all the way back to Norham.'
'No I didn't! I hate that tune. It's King of Geeky Themes.'
'You did too. Bellowed, actually.' And I have a flashback of a girl flashing a huge smile, skipping down red-brick alleys, hollering Chariots of Fire and splashing through all the greasy-rainbow puddles.

'If you come with me after Passover, I will tell you what happened pre-Norham.'
'Where?'
'Come to Germany, for a week or two.'
I shake my head. 'You keep doing that. You keep driving me into spontaneous decisions which could –'
'What?' she interrupts. 'Paralyze your career? I got you the bloody job – not to boast or anything, however you could afford a vacation, lest you'll burn out. And hey, I promised Vidoo to show her around Amsterdam. She wanted to see where one may order it with eggs.'
'Wasted maggot. Ok, ok, then what?'
'We'll stay at my grandfather's house in Frankfurt until UNICEF dispatches me again.'
I grimace. I hate that house. But information requires a trade system, and I will do anything for a piece of Rotem history.

TRAMPOLINE

STOP. Before you read this post, download my soundtrack . You know you can, today.

I launch on a mighty PMS rampage.
I hate PMSing. Hate the way I grow so profoundly sad it's tragicomic. Hate waking up to find out that matter and antimatter have switched sides, that my stomach is hollowful of the world's emptiness, and that the universe thickly coats my void.
I hate brushing my teeth and feeling like after a night of bad sex. So bad it sticks beneath my fingernails, so I sit on the tub's ledge and whimper.
To clean my mind very carefully, with a Yaqui tale.

Once there were two Desert Girls.
One from the East and one from the West.
They journeyed as Desert People do, and since they shared a Desert Soul, their paths were bound to cross.
Soon enough, they met in a metropolitan area and settled a deal to cleanse each other until they shall be ready to resume their respective crossings.
The only problem was that these two Desert Girls were young and inexperienced, and their passion for one thing assumed the shape of another and so on, and within the first deal there dwelt a multilayered fusion of significance and none at all, and soon enough they were deep in trouble.
When one spoke of Coyotes, the other dreamt of Wolves. When one imitated the Condor, the other sang a Hawk. They owned different Demons in their hearts, some Wild Boars, others Cougar.
Their deal was exploding.

Things were getting so bad that they decided to initiate a journey together, to heal and relate. But they forgot their Demons and Familiars have mixed.
Once far from their city of origin, one Desert Girl suddenly saw her death. It was instant and sweaty and shot through her veins with all the mixed histories. The second Desert Girl understood this was the effect of their initial deal, and decided to make a sacrifice in order to save the Desert Girl.
The sacrifice included blood and submission. It was involuntarily and meant another deal was struck. The web of consequence grew thicker.
But she managed to save the Desert Girl's life. She brought her sustenance enough to last her until the next city, where she was treated and cured somewhat.
But their Demons mixed indefinitely. The revived Desert Girl was haunted forever.

'I wanna call off work,' I tell Benny. It's 4:30 in the morning.
'What's wrong?' I can hear him twist in his bed over the phone.
'Nothing really,' I say, feeling stupid. 'My fingernails are dirty.'
Now he's very alert. 'Tell me everything. What happened?'
'Nothing, dear Lord. I'm PMSing. I let you PMS three times a month, you can let me have some time off.'
'It's not that. You're welcome to take a break whenever you burnout. I don't find escaping smart. Wanna talk, instead of evading?'
'I can't talk about this,' and suddenly I'm very irritated. 'Talk doesn't solve everything. I'll take Vidoo to the desert for a few days. We'll learn about Virgo and Spike. Anyway, she wanted to ride a camel.'
I hear him scratching something. 'Ok, it's your call. But really, you're a terrible example.'
'I know. Did I wake you up?'
'Of course.'

Geoff drives us until the road turns white, and we wait for my friend Yedid'yah to pick us up. He's a camel driver with very blue eyes in a very red face. He comes hurtling with a trio of female camels. The heat off the dunes dries away the intensity of the void within me. I relax, and the camel heaves her butt up and knuckles off her knees with rough bleat.

When the Sun inches lower, I know I should warn Vidoo. When the sun hits the ground, absolute darkness falls.
We do not build a fire. Just the two of us, on the shoulder of a hill. The silence is heavier than all the grains of sand.
As far as I'm concerned, there is only one other person who gets affected thus by the desert. The other Girl, from the East. Her reality swerves radically too upon stepping on stretching plains, dreams and lizards merge in a hallucinated-but-not pyrotechnics of silence.

'Tell me a story,' says Vidoo in the dark.
I tell her about the Desert Man and Child who went off, one to die, one to deliver an embroidered pouch of herbs and a pipe. I tell her how the Man dried off in the sun and the Child smoked the herbs in the pipe and brought forth blue grass and mythological monsters.
'Tell me a scary story,' calls Vidoo in the dark, so I quickly tell her about the Talking Snake, and the one about the Coyote Woman and the Sack of Bones.
'A really scary one,' she commands.
So I tell her about the two Desert Girls and she keeps quiet.
Then she asks, 'Did the sacrifice include a lot of blood and submission?'
'No, but it's the idea of sacrifice. It's so out, to sacrifice.'
'Out?'
'It doesn't happen, or carry such weight. Of course, people lay out for each other when it comes to drugs, whoring around to sustain one another. But I was nearly dead and it was too symbolic to miss.'
'Get over it,' she says. 'It happens. Shit happens. All the time.'
'Nobody ever gestured such for me.' I reply, which silences her due to her share of neglect.

I lean back against the cooling hill, facing the stars at their full, frightening glory. I cannot cry in the desert. 'We are so diseased.'
'But beautiful,' says her silhouette from the sea-green horizon.
'But beautiful,' I agree.
'One day, you'll tell me the whole story?'
I swear to.

By dawn we trek to the Trampoline. I found it a few months ago: a lone trampoline on top of a dune, Middle of Nowhere. There is nothing more exquisite – even for a Desert Person – than watching a sunrise upon a trampoline.
We climb solemnly onto the taut fabric, and await the bursting sun.

BARBEQUE, ME N' YOU

'Dude, this is like the world's greatest barbeque BO, man!' exclaims J.Z. as the gang sniffs the scene; dusk wafting with smoke and sparks. The whole town is barbequed.
Vidoo and I disperse firecrackers and glo-stix, while virtuoso MC Eddie raps a 'Bar-Yok-Hey' piece.

'I can juggle fireballs,' Freddie informs us.
'We don't care,' Benny replies diplomatically.
'But I really can, wanna see?' he steps towards the furnace.
Benny drags him back. 'Not now. You may use your cigarettes later.'
Freddie shoots me an imploring look, and I smile dazzlingly. 'Some talents better remain a legend, you know.'
'Hell yeah,' reiterates Mac. 'Imagine if Eddie ever went on air.'
'Oy vey,' I conclude as they hurtle unto the ashen ground, calling fair vengeance.

'I would love to die on this,' Vidoo points at the largest bonfire yet, a roaring brute of tires and school-benches. 'Burnt at stake,' she rolls the words on her tongue.
'I'd wanna die without needing salsa,' says Eddie, offering her a marshmallowed stick.
Suddenly I see the moon right behind the fire, camouflaged due to its flaming color. It's low, orange, and huge, slightly oval and disturbingly dimensional. I grab Vidoo's sleeve, speechless for a minute.
'Holy shiatsu!' hisses Mac appreciatively. 'Beastly!'
Earth becomes very quiet, and all I hear is the echo of crackling flames and the slow rise of the moon. A moon so violently golden, so pockmarked, like a burnt skull.
Houston, we have a problem.

Quick head count. And again.
'Ben, come here.'
I hear sirens. I know they are fire trucks, but premonition hits me like broken water.
'Dana, where the hell is she? She has a fear of fires.' As well as impulsive and self-harming.
We climb on a curb fence, scrutinizing the crowd, finalizing that Dana isn't present. Benny jumps down, instructing, 'Don't ask the kids. They'll get worked up. I'll go back to her dorm, and call you from there. Alert 2 counselors.'
He snatches Freddie's skateboard and kicks off. There is no way he could catch a taxi on these crowded streets.

Dana is the youngest child of an alcoholic father.
There is a twist to his personality: he happens to be a pyromaniac. Not the sort who get high on birthday-cake sizzlers. Upon dissipation, he would examine items with fire. It could be his dinner, dog or daughter's hand.
She developed a drinking habit early, together with pressing cigarette butts against her skin when stressed. Generally, she is a docile, passive girl who rarely commits to a decision with the same ferocity as her drug of choice: combustion.

A counselor contacts me, saying that Dana had a little incident, but Benny says it's all under control, should I be kind enough to get back soon, they'd love to see me. I call another counselor, asking him to supervise the bonfire-hoppers, and catch a ride to the dorm.
Dr. Patty is chain-smoking on the porch, with her favorite MDA crew. I rush to the kitchen, following a bloody trail.
Dana is bald, wrapped in a blanket huddling against Benny, who never touches a girl but must've bent his rule to adjust another. His arms wrapped tightly around her, he motions with his chin back to the porch.
'What happened?' I ask Patty.
'Slashed wrists. Nearly mutilated her scalp. Caught on act pretty early,' she smiles at me. I thank God for the moon. 'She's fine, just shocked. Apparently, Ben said she has Arsonphobia?'
I nod. 'We should've remembered it. Jesus, what neglect. We should've taken it into account, like potential asthma attacks.'
'What are you afraid of?' she asks, dragging on her cigarette.
'Malls and shopping centers,' I answer, perplexed.
'Imagine you took that into account every time you went out.'
'I'm different! I don't count,' I exclaim. 'But Dana is my responsibility.'
'Don't mention that word to a commissioned doc, ok sister?'
I nod.

Back in the kitchen, Benny rubs her fresh stubble. Her arms are bandaged and she's shivering.
'Hey Dan, nice 'do,' I say softly.
She looks up. 'Sorry, May.'
'Oh no, I'm sorry. We should've remembered. It's a bad day.'
'I like the bonfires,' she says. 'I looked at them from the window when my blood flowed. They aren't little flames of hatred.'
I clutch her hands firmly. She inhales the heady air, and continues. 'They're big and warm. They're like you two, they don't intend any harm. They like to party. They're beautiful. And just when I realized that, I also realized I'm going to die.'
Benny looks at me over her head, and we realize we can never express our appreciation for such a tribute.

VIVA LA VIDOO part ⅳ

Continued from Viva La Vidoo iii

'No, I really can't,' I whimper. 'I'm twenty. I am a student. Unstable and quirky. I can't.'
'Convince me.'
'Can't do that either. You convince me.'
Rotem doesn't hesitate. 'You don't want history repeating. You can save a life here: she goes back to US, she kills herself. This isn't a guilt trip – this is about your capability, not responsibility. But since you can, you should.'
I say nothing, because it's easy for her to say. I do – Honest Injun do – want to help, save a life, a universe, relieve nightmares. However, the price is well beyond my field of competence.

I try to emulate Rotem in more ways than I'm aware of, but there are limits. I cannot commit to an act which shall transfigure my life.
'I am physically unable –' I try, but she cuts me off.
'I'll pay you, semimonthly. I've got a lawyer who can get us a smooth arrangement. She'll be yours before she's released here, once the medical insurance is sorted.'
The legalities frighten me, the procedures and offices and other bureaucratically Jewish fiends.
'I don't want to push or blackmail you,' continues Rotem. 'Only, I think you're the best choice. I did consider adopting her myself, but I can't take in anyone my husband would be unable to deal with later on. I would have, en serio. But I'm dying.' Now I can see her soul right there in those clear hazel eyes, and I hear my heart breaking, and she looks away.
'Just blackmailed you, didn't I?'
I nod, either way.

Back in her room, Vidoo is asleep. The Dr. has left. I wonder is she truly is BPD, but I swallow it as a worst case scenario, thus nothing would freak me further. Rotem sits on the edge of her bed, and I settle back in the recliner.
'What if I take you to consult with some psychologists and rabbis?'
I shrug, because too many circumstances are shifting out of control. Rotem slips out of the ward to make some calls.

The smoothest way to impose a decision is to argue against it, which happens a day later as the core staff members convene by the ER.
'You can't possibly think you can take her in,' exclaims Eliana, and Benny charges further: 'May, you'll wreck your career and yourself. If I would adopt every lovably suicidal case passing by, I'd be one myself.'
'But I have to,' I emphasize since I can't explain. 'She keeps asking if she's in NYC. The only way to relax her is to promise she isn't, and won't ever be.'
'That's a temporary commitment based on delicate circumstance,' Benny plays el inteligente. 'What if she OD or slashes wrists under your care?'
At times like this, I pull a Rotem. 'I will take full legal responsibility. See if I give a flip. I swear it will not decrease my vocational performance in any way.'
'It will,' says Eliana.
'It won't, precisely because my job is directly related to most of her trouble. She'll leave the current program, yet I'll find a way to fund a DBT [here] agenda for her.

'No you won't,' suddenly the voice in my mind embodies behind me. 'I will fundraise.'
My colleagues stare at Rotem, possibly since she's the first person to stand a few inches shorter beside me.
She resumes despite the glances. 'I'll give you an initial amount now, and VIP reference to two DBT directors in the US. Rest assured that nothing will impair May's functioning: I'd trust her with my life, and have had. Adopting Vidoo will only improve her act.' And they won't argue against that smirk, or the cheque.

Somebody calls my name down the corridor: Sara, my pillar of sanity, with a perfectly heliumed get-well balloon.
'We need to talk,' she admonishes. Whenever we 'need to talk', she is reproachful.
'We can't talk now,' I say. 'I haven't slept much the past fortnight. I won't be very rational.'
'That's ok, you never are. But since you're making a decision here that would affect the entire family, I thought I should intervene.' Shucks, I forgot she's like, my closest relative.
'Fine, but not now. Keep your opinions to yourself until I can rebut them.'
Sara blocks my way to the ward. 'What makes you think you can adopt her?'
'Nothing. Rotem? No, no, not Rotem!' I yell, since she is about to strangle me with the balloon string.

'Don't ever give me Rotem for an answer!' she hisses. 'Not everything Rotem says is irrefutable. Do you understand that Rotem is not a medium for logical discussion? She pulls averages way off range. She could quit drugs on her own, you couldn't. She may adopt psychotic cases, you cannot. You're getting yourself into deep mud here. And Rotem is not a proof of your success.'
'Wait. She didn't decide for me. She put my feelings into words.'
'Your feelings?' Sara is puzzled. 'You haven't slept for 10 days and you're basing judgment on feelings?'
'Stop catching me by the word,' I always get livid when someone mouths my self-doubt. 'I wanted to adopt her all along. It's like meeting Mr. Right. I know it.'
'May, Mr. Right is a myth.'
'Well, it's a myth you can materialize. With hard work. And I'm willing.'
Sara rolls her finger around the string. 'Why, May? Are you trying to right some wrongs? Are you trying to be heroic? Do you need some loving?' she looks up. 'Do you have to put yourself into this position?'
'Sara, I don't hallucinate anymore,' I say, fully serious. 'However, I know this is what I should do. This is not another message from an old Coyote Spirit. I don't care what you or anyone else thinks. This is my call. Not wrong, not right, not heroic. It's the position I'm in.'
She scrutinizes my eyes. Then she passes me the balloon, shrugging. 'We're talking different languages again, insomniac. Do what you think you should, and you have my support. I just hope you won't get hurt.'
'I am doing this because I was hurt,' I say, and she stomps her foot.
'Which is why you can't adopt her! Heck, May, just do what you want.' She marches down the corridor, as I yell some thanks for the balloon.

BUCKS FOR A SIN

BEEP
First thing in the morning:
Sender: Shneider2
Message: yo.dont test us cos we smokd krak fri nite.here told u in advans.peace out
Sent: 05:14:22 07/05/06

I swing my legs out of bed, wash hands and check on Vidoo. Asleep, good.
As I boil water I call Benny.
'Got text?' I ask.
He grunts.

'G'morning, anyway. Schneider just confessed about some rock.' I cheerfully persist.
'Absolution, baby. Absolution,' he drawls. I hate waking up males at such magical hours.
'This is his umpteenth time running this routine. He know we'll test him.'
'You got my OK.'
'Cheers, boss. I just don't get why he'd announce it every time. I mean, does it make him feel more secure or something?' I sip my coffee, gesturing wildly to the phone. 'Do I care if he smoked crack or not? I do, but not in the way this is turning out to be. Smoke away your gray cells. Seek therapy. Bite me.'
'Know what I'm thinking?' Benny intervenes.
'Go ahead.'
'I think that for a woman your size, you talk quite a lot in the morning.'
Laughing, I apologize. 'Go back to sleep. You'll find the results on your desk.'

I pedal my pink bike to the center. Sunrise is humid and orchids waft heavily. For breakfast, Schneider and Co. each receive a plastic cup and line up by the john. Polo tests the steaming urine as I retreat to the office.
Schneider's natural spikes peek around the door. 'Can I talk to you for a sec?'
'Have a seat.'

He lounges, spreading his arms widely across my tiny desk. 'We're all positive.'
'D'uh.'
'And grounded?'
I nod. 'Plus, consider all your basketball matches postponed for the next 3 weeks.'
'Damn. Essays?' he asks comfortably.
'Of course. Due this afternoon. Decadence of act, future avoidance and prevention, the works.'
'And signed?'
'Schneider, this won't work if you're not committed to the program.'
'Don't get all corny, May,' he says. 'If not for the program, I'd be jettin' real stuff.'
'Now you're being corny. I don't care what you're capable of scraping. You're capable of quitting, so freakin' quit.'
'Yessir,' he grins.

I spin around in my chair and open the window. The night's moisture still hasn't left the world. 'Schneider, let's cut a deal. Two months you keep clean – real clean, codeine clean – and you get $1000.'
'No shit.'
'None whatsoever. On my honor.' Thank the fundraisers, punk.
'And if I don’t?'
'Then no 1000 bucks for you.'
'No, what do I do?'
'You mean, like a mutual bet? A reciprocal?' he nods, but this spins beyond my imagination. 'Name your price.'
He considers carefully. '50 bucks mean a lot to me.'
'150.'
'You're bad.'
I smile politely. 'That's my job.'

He watches me. His eyes are highly intelligent. I spend efforts on this kid because of his charisma, leadership and charm. Or in one word: potential.
I sense he has something else to impart, so I beckon him. 'You see,' he starts. 'I feel like a loser this whole time we're smoking, and then I feel better when I tell you.'
'I am not your biatch priest,' I remind him wearily.
'I know, but it's one of the stages of Teshuvah according to the Ramba"m, ok? It's Vidui Peh, which equals you, regret, amending the Maaseh and withstanding Nisayon.'
I stare, overwhelmed by – well, mainly by the prattling of rabbinical terms – then nod towards the door. '1000 bucks, Schneider, and an essay.'

Leaning on the doorknob, he announces: 'One day I'll come clean. I'll study well and respect myself. I'll make best use of my talents and be normal. I'll be more normal than normal: I'll be the best guy in the whole Yeshiva. I won't be guilty, and I'll do Yeshiva because I can face myself, not because I wanna be normal or respected. I will have a God, and consideration, and I'll be so fine, baby, that even you'd consider marrying me.'
Giggling, I remind him that all matches are pushed off for the next 3 weeks.

Yeshiva? Where the heck did that come from.
'Set your ambitions high,' someone once told me in a rehab. 'So you'll never be satisfied until you look back and see what a real person you are.'

ZAMFIR

CONTINUED from Morris Mini. I suggest you download this as it would explain the title and the nostalgia. As it downloads, you might be interested in hearing this.

'Do you want to go back?' Rotem asks. 'Back to the Andes?' The sun hasn't emerged yet, as the little car zooms through the quickest route out of London.
I know the answer. 'No. Maybe to the parts I've not seen yet. Like, the southern Chilean sierra.' I don't want to go back because my identity shifted; my sustenance, my theology, switched.
I can't go back. You stash your fears somewhere, like TNT cylinders, and run away, knowing they'll explode upon return.

Rotem frowns at the early suburban traffic, then fishes a CD case from beneath her seat. 'Look what I've brought,' she flicks it open. 'Zamfir. If we gotta be nostalgic, might as well die from it.'
Gheorghe Zamfir and Ennio Morricone are two musicians she would listen to curled up in pain in the cellar, retching and bleeding, and during withdrawal. In those days of the walkman and coupled earphones, she'd plug us both into surfs of whistles and percussion. She decided that those were the soundtracks to my childhood, which should be an anthropologically correct assumption.

Now Rotem taps the clutch and whistles along, often adding Spanish lyrics. You do not want to be her passenger: she's one of those crackhead drivers who could prefer the opposite lane due to a northwesterly breeze.
Since I have so many questions to rephrase and calculate, I remain silent. The landscape washes past in bluish mist and bare black branches, small cobbled bridges and dark rivulets. Rotem rhymes nonsensically to a sweet melody and I know that she is sick, nearly dead, so I must be precise with my words, as I cannot reinvent a memory.
'Why do you want to visit Norham?' I ask, finding simplicity the best policy.
'Dunno. I like riding ghost roller-coasters,' she shrugs. 'I like chewing on pieces of history. And when I think of Norham, I think of you and cinnamon roads. You do not take Ezekiel to the Red Sea or Mandela to Bosnia.'

'What made it so significant, a "piece of history"?' I say, confused by all the attached importance. 'You could've gone to Sicily or Pretoria, with somebody who has left a more pertinent effect on your life.'
'Effect?' she looks at me, and yes, we could wham into an 18-wheeler now. 'You had pretty pyrotechnical effects on me,' she smirks. 'I'm going back there because it's a nesting ground and winter is thick. Who giveth? Norham is our childhood, mi alma.' When she speaks Spanish her locution is soft and engaging, calling one 'preciosa', 'mi reina', 'hermana'. 'Neither of us had much of a childhood. We were sheltered there, if you want.'
I don't get half of this, but it rings reasonable. Both of us fought for bloody scraps until then, alone.
'Childhood doesn't require a biological age frame,' she clarifies. 'I'm talking about environs and stage of development. Call it a late bloom.'
So am I calling on my childhood? 'You talk as if you're at least 70 years old. You're not even 20 yet.'
She just whistles, a flock of black-faced sheep swimming past.

She parks before the shabby dorm building, now desolate. The trees are bare, which shocks me since I left them in full foliage. I don’t know why this jolts me.
We stare at the buildings that were our home for a good few months. Ha! Gotcha. This wasn't our home, but a mere functionary place we visited between rolling in the hills and smoking by the river. Ain't nostalgic whatsoever.

Rotem pulls the car away from that eerie street. As we head for the hills, she replies, 'You should know it isn't about age. If at 20 you've undergone abuse, assault, initiated prostitution, violence and chemical commerce to some extent' – she chuckles at herself – 'then you've traded your soul a dozen, a hundred, a thousand times, and you've no age at all.' She hits the gas. 'What is age, rather than a convenient social group? Once surpassed – or at the edge of your collective definition – who the hell cares? You're so old you've never been born yet.'

We step out of the vehicle, red and small within the lush swamp of the hills. I forgot how low and vast the sky could be. It still smells faintly of cinnamon, datura, dope.
'At 16,' she continues, knees brushed by wet stalks. 'You were way out of the sweet sixteen league. Your survival skills, your abilities to concoct drugs and dreams, the fact that you're escaped though two continents and an ocean, and switched a mind-frame. At 16 you were past massive neglect, emotional and physical abuse, endured prostitution and dealing. You could be 37 to all I care, or 4.'
We trudge to the river through the wild graze, soaked to our shirts. The rain starts pelting as soon as we hit the bank.

Rotem, who at 15, daughter to a paranoid IDF officer, knew how to reconstruct a submachine-gun, mastered martial arts from 5 different countries, adapted languages within 10 days and traded drugs and her own soul during the 6 years prior to Norham – that child kicks off her boots, wriggles out of her jeans and boxers and leaps into the water pollution. So I figure Time doesn't matter anymore, because not a day passed since Creation, on the shores of the Hiddekel.

CONTINUED on Rain Dance.

VIVA LA VIDOO part iii

continued from Viva La Vidoo ii

Confusion is a terrifying state, point blank. Semi-conscious Vidoo would spring up at the mere touch, and gape wildly at the attending personnel. Mutely, she shot us petrified stares, often mouthing, 'Where am I?', 'What happened?' or 'Who are you?'
She seizured and retched, and had to be tied down to the bed-frame. I kept repeating her name, location, and exclamations of love. Personally, I was crept out by this moribund phase, and clenched my teeth in fear and fatigue, and the correlations from my past.
Where am I?
'You're in the hospital, Vidoo. You're taken care of. It's ok.'
Where am I? Is this New York?
'New York? No. This is Israel. You're safe now. They're taking care of you. I love you.'
Is this NYC?
'God forbid, no. It's ok.'
She nods, leans her head back and dozes off. A few days pass.

Then Rotem stands in the doorway.
The monitor beeping, the nurse calls, the ringing phones, die. All I hear for some elongated seconds is blood thudding through my heart, with a triple echo. Vidoo, groggy, submerged in valium and antitoxins, notices her too and raises her head. I am so relieved, I crash my head against my knees and cry.
Rotem squats on the puke-splattered lino before me and holds me tight. She smells good, of outdoors and mountains and wildflowers.
She sends me home and stays with Vidoo, and it all seems very natural although they've never met before.

I sleep fitfully, plagued with ongoing nightmares of Vidoo dying, or reaching for me in a Stephen-Kingesque zombie fashion, eyeballs rolling and convulsing grip tightening on my throat.
The next morning I return to her bedside, which Rotem has decorated with latex-glove balloons, monkey pictures, a hospital sheet canopy festooned with little fiesta flags she sliced out of puke bags. My knees are still jelly and blood pressure low. The psychologist is due to evaluate Vidoo soon, informs Rotem. 'She is able to talk now, eh chica?'
Within 24 hours, all tubes have vanished, just a single arm attached to the IV. She is still bleary and nauseous, but the improvement is way off-scale, which I fully credit to Rotem.
A doctor steps in, a brisk Australian gent, who questions us briefly and dismisses us out.

At the cafeteria, Rotem bares her arm, ties a cord and fixes herself a shot. Sometimes I'd rather forget that she is nearly dead herself.
'You gave Vidoo her life,' she tells me, leaning back against the wall, eyes shut. I don't know what medicine is inside that syringe, but it seems to cause much pain.
'I did what I was supposed to.'
'You didn't have to stay with her, repeatedly proclaim your love – even when she's unconscious.'
'I didn't do it for her,' I retort, then shudder because I get a chill. Rotem opens her eyes. 'I have nightmares,' I tell her.
'The Peyote Witch is trippin' badly?' she teases, but she's concerned.
I don't care anymore. 'It'll go away. Nightmares always ebb off. Thing I'm worried about is Vidoo's upshot.'
Rotem squares her shoulders as if she's been waiting for this cue. 'What're the options?'
'Most probably, she'll be dispatched home. The program, however therapeutic, cannot cater for her.'
'She's BDP,' says Rotem.
'Says who?' [Borderline Personality Disorder – see article]
'My humble diagnosis. Done some research into self-harmers the past few years. Thanks to my renowned maternal surname,' she grimaces, 'I had enough nepotism to maintain contact with some bigshots in the field.'
'Since when are you into psychiatry?'
'I'm not. I happen to be the psychologist's psychopathic kid. But I did want to understand what happened to Bella.'
GONG.

Never, ever, ever ever, mention Bella. Even the carefree have taboos.
Bella, majestic and brilliant - a colossus of a woman - was fervidly admired by Rotem, who found in her the accomplice/debate partner she needed so badly. In Norham, they were known as 'The Girls who Knew Everything.' They could recite Goethe, the Ri"f and Ali G, argue over Kadishman's sheep and Fermat's law. I knew this relationship differed from the rest Rotem held, as she pleaded to please that Hassidic desperada with a lopsided eye.
Then, Bella was kicked out. Enraged Rotem decided to follow suit, and covered for her roommate Tanya's kleptomania. Thus she joined the expulsion epidemic, her last act being the last straw. However, Bella died just before Rotem reached her.

Therefore, you never mention Bella in Rotem's vicinity, cry for me Argentina and all.
'She used to cut,' explain Rotem now. 'As well as slam her fingers in doors and windows. I preferred to ignore that as it confused me. Once I left, I tried to find out more. Felt guilty, I guess, and furiously curious. Had to trace her murderer, so to speak. I corresponded and spoke to a few notable in the field, and swallowed enough scripture to compose a thesis.'
This is unsurprising. She has a habit of researching life. She studies her enemy and lover until she is versed with everything, down to favorite urinating position.
'And you're saying Vidoo's BDP?'
'Merely suggesting. Wait for the doc's verdict.'
'If so, then we definitely can't cater for her.'
'But you can. Adopt her.'
'Who?'
'You. Her.'
I stare. 'I can't.
She gives me her famous smirk.

Continued on Viva la Vidoo iv

MORRIS MINI

Although I'd rather stick to pre-drafted entries about Vidoo, I want to write about the UK. And Germany. And the in-betweens.
Rotem called daily to arrange a rendezvous, but I kept having urgent agenda to address. Of course, I am busy. I run the program. But as head-of, most of my actions are mainly gear-greasing, no more. Practically, I could meet her at any given hour. But I don't.

Vidoo hated both the UK and me for nearly 24 hours. Then she discovered Fiona, a tall, long-mascaraed, plump Goth, who smoked like a chimney throughout the Seder Night. According to Vidoo's scale, you gotta be to'ally nipple to chug a fag during a religious ceremony; you cannot possibly get any cooler. Well, theoretically you could, if you possess a depreciating Brit attitude and are vehemently, wholesomely, proudly depressed.
So Vidoo is happy. She wants to settle in London and be part of the Punk Scene. I haven't the heart to tell her it's dead, and Pink Floyd fandom is so emo, dude. But let her be. I gotta run faxes and speakers and rambles and paintball massacres. I don't have time to attend to my daughter's fresh smoking habit. Die, emo kid, die.

On Festival Saturday night, I sift through printed email, memos and facsimilieu. There were a few from Rotem, requesting to meet at King's Cross, or Victoria's, anywhere, the bloody Tate.
'How about I stroll there with a freaking rose and parrot-head umbrella, and search for her?' I say, suddenly pissed.
'Search for who?' asks Vidoo from her king-size. Although we currently reside in a swell suite [paid by sugardaddy Rotem], she managed to turn it into a magnificent pigsty bohemia.
'Search for Rotem, that's who!'
'What are you so pissed about?'
'I am busy; busy, busy. And she knows it. I can't just go have a cuppa and chitchat with any old ladyfriend.' I swipe at the paperwork, adding to the mayhem.
'It's not any old one.'
'Can't. Busy.'

Suddenly Vidoo is by the toilette dresser, whipping the rest of my papers off. 'Know what's your problem?'
'Entertain me,' I surrender.
'You are just really, really afraid. You don't want to love people, because you're so fookin' afraid.'
'Deep, guv'nor.'
'Wait, not finished yet,' she says self-importantly. 'You're used to losing people, right? Or, never having none. So obviously you're avoiding her because sooner or later you'll lose her. You've got some hardcore abandonment issues, just like you didn't want to take me in because I might die –'
'Not exactly –'
'Hold your gob, girl's trying to talk here. You are scared that one day there will be no Rotem, and you don't want to be alone in the world again. But you won't be. But you still avoid her, because you're scared. It's like being scared of dolphins, or a VW Bug. You should stop evading, over-protecting, reminiscing –' she chews her lip. 'I forgot what I was about to say. I'm not too good in following my line of thought. Must be all those drugs I dropped in the Sixties. Anyway, my point was: go see her.'
'I hate psychobabble, but I love you anyway,' I tell her.
'All this pop stuff is your fault, moron!'

Early next morning, the hotel phone rings.
'Fookin-ay', whinges Vidoo. She hears them out, and adjusts, 'Fookin-bloody-ay!' Someone is waiting for us in the lobby.
We storm downstairs in our bathrobes, and there she is by the upholstered armchairs: long black scarf reaching the back of her knees, old Wranglers, a torn tee baring her thin shoulder blades, and her trademark mustard boots.
It hits me that this is what I came back for: the chopped hair, the wide smile, the strong hug.

'Vida, could I borrow your ma?' she asks, after embracing her fully. FACT: she is the only person recorded to have ever done so.
'Get dressed,' Rotem commands. 'We're going to Norham.'
'What?' I struggle. 'I can't. I'm working. And where's your family? And how are we gonna get there, it's all the way up north!'
Rotem chuckles. 'I pre-positioned a substitute for you. Plus you're not really needed. My family will wait for us at Claridge's, and I'm going to drive you there. I bought a car.'
'Go on!' exclaims Vidoo, who turns to atypical gelatinous matter in Rotem's vicinity. 'Which?'
'Thata one.' She points at a small red thing, engine still going right outside the gilded doorway and annoying the porters. 'It's a Morris Mini.' Registering our shock, she waves us, laughing. 'I'm over my macho Suzuki period. I'm all mini-Zen now.'
I relocate my jaw, but Vidoo informs us that will never get there in that.
'Mark my words,' says Rotem with mock menace. 'We will get there in six hours, so we shall! Now get dressed, I'm waiting.'

VIVA LA VIDOO part ii

continued from Viva la Vidoo i

When I tell people I have a teenage daughter, they give me the Look.
That is not unusual on their part, since I tend to be on the receiving butt of a series of Looks. But I do wish strangers wouldn't doubt me so unequivocally when I tell them I've adopted her, since I sport heavy self-doubt as well, and that just ain't too helpful. That 'But you are just 20' exclamation mark line is so three months ago.
And forget, just forget about telling them it was a drug-induced decision, if not for my sake then from the hazy viewpoint of two highly relevant persons, one of which being the adoptee. Then I'd get those killer Looks I try in vain to imitate as I brush my teeth.

The actual kablooie occurred a week before Rotem's Israel visit. It's been four months since Benny and I initiated a group-therapy program at an Anglo school in the area. I spent weeks getting on personal terms with the teens, and Benny ran the administrative.
Overall, they were a bunch of chemical-abusers, each to an individual extent, every single member originating in a religious home, and most supplementing mood-swings to an extreme which suggested varying levels of clinical depression.

Vidoo was different. No, she wasn't. I was different about her. Duh, a professional mistake, but then I never chose my profession. She was more accessible, possibly since her angst was overridden by savage sadness. She was rarely violent or socially inept. She was quiet, and listened to country rock and was to'ally hilarious. We spent long afternoons listening right through her entire CD collection, an exclusive snob club affiliating Janis Joplin and the Eagles.
We purchased Kojak the Beanbag together, we rollerbladed and laughed. It was impossible to hug Vidoo or verbally express her some lovin', but see if I care. Not so long ago I hated everybody too, and shortly before that, I was property of drugs and dicks just the same. Which is probably a good piece of training, since soon enough she began to impart some shocking anecdotes, especially at strategic times such as supper.
'Gross, Vidoo! I'm so off my pasta, you fat bastard!' Claire would yell.
'...And then I woke up in car and he said, "You don't remember anything, right? Right? You like those Quaalies, doncha?" and I was so high I just nodded.'
'Ohmygod you have such issues. Did you feel anything?'
'Nope. There is no evidence, except in my imagination. I am missing these two or three days of my life.'
'You should miss more, God willing. Gross. This bastard pasta is to'ally nil now. '
'Yep. And Quaas are so Seventies, could you believe it?'
I found myself loving her, sans reciprocal but to hell with it.

She told me she cuts, though I was aware. She was a recovering anorexic and hungry for silent medicated sleep, so she purchased some meds over the counter. In a kick of conscience Vidoo sat on Kojak and reported herself. Habitually she knocked on my door at 4 a.m. to dispatch off a razor, teary-eyed and confused.
I never had to deal with self-harmers before, and turned to Benny with some aggression, informing him of my incapacity. He laughed as usual, and said that Hell yeah I can. 'I heard it's a self-inflicted paradise,' he grins. 'Sometimes I'm tempted for an endorphin rush myself.'
Taking on Claire's cue, I replied that he's a to'ally diseased fat bastard.

Then she stole back the medication and overdosed. I found her at the last stages, blue lips spluttering brown foam, purple limbs convulsing, eyeballs rolling. Traumatized, I acted placidly. Called an ambulance, a Benny, an insurance company. Filled her details, replied thoughtfully, searched for evidence.
We followed her to the ER and remained with her throughout a crazy night of close death and seizures and valium. But when it was mid-morning and Benny had to leave, I decided to stay for another week, or at least until she gets out of coma.
The real reason being that I was afraid to sleep.

continued on Viva la Vidoo iii

VIVA LA VIDOO part i

Here’s for the girl you meet down the street:
Cheers.
And: I wish we could chill together sometimes, before you die.

Here’s a Yaqui tale to illustrate why I am not being melodramatic:
One evening, many years ago, like 4 or 5, two girls were jumping on the bed, out of rhythm to Rammstein.
One was an Italian dopehead.
The other was an English Hassidic girl.
Then the Hassid flipped over and fell, and the Italian caught her clumsily, pulling her skirt a mite, and exclaimed, ‘Why, your thighs are all scratched!’
And the Hassid pulled up her skirt and retorted rudely: ‘So what? None of your business.’
So the Italian said, ‘But it’s gross. Why d’you do it?’
And the Hassid replied another question, ‘No one will ever see it, not even my husband.’
And because the Italian was afraid she was treading on glass, she swallowed that answer and never spoke of it more, not until many years later when the Hassid was dead and she herself wasn’t a dopehead any longer.

She told me that when I met Vidoo and a whole bunch of other self-inflictors.

Here’s another Yaqui tale, and as you all know, they’re all true stories, even the talking coyote ones:
Once upon a time, there lived a young girl in New York City.
That girl was fine and good and obedient. Maybe not obedient – she didn’t do anything wrong, nor did she do anything right. She was passive and quiet.
Yocheved was a little member of a big family, a little student in a big school, a little human in a huge world. And Yocheved drowned daily. Sorrow and solitude suffocated her life.
Days would pass before she uttered a complete sentence. Months before someone offered her a single good word. Years that she’s been left untouched by another soul.
So of course, she began to die.

Now this might as well be too melodramatic, and it is. But here is how people die:
They get used, and molested, even physically. Or just neglected. Therapy is offered in small or irrelevant sessions. They begin to pop pills. They can’t sleep, they can’t stay awake, they can’t breathe, they can’t stand the voices in their heads, they cut.
Then they might turn to other sources for pills, other forms of chemical silence and an expression of solitude.

Then somebody met Yocheved – now known as Vidoo, and decided to send her to Israel. Since her family were not ready to deal with her profligate ways, that person fund-raised her trip and tuition.
That’s where I come into the picture, as she entered one of the therapeutic programs I run.

continued on Viva la Vidoo ii