The Others by Sarah Blau (e reader for manga txt) 📕

I remember her well from college. Even then she was as thin as a steel wire, with woolly hair and that awful skin permanently caked with what looked like buttercream frosting. She was the lead organizer of the various student protests on campus, and we used to laugh at her, saying that it was the only way she could interact with boys. I remember watching her sprawled on the floor, colouring the giant sign they later hung across the university bridge: “Don’t Give Them Guns!” Colouring in the outline of a rifle, her hand was just a few inches away from Boaz’s, the hottie from the student union who was colouring the background. She kept moving her hand closer to his until the backs of their hands almost touched. When she noticed me staring, I smiled, and she quickly pulled her hand away. It wasn’t just me, she loathed all of us, the whole group.

And there was that Purim party, when she dressed up as a baby, with a giant pacifier plugging her mouth and a white baby bonnet on her scouring-pad hair. It seemed like she had chosen that costume just to provoke us, but she looked so pathetic and wretched that I almost felt sorry for her (and it wasn’t entirely her fault, back then costume catalogues didn’t offer a sexy baby ensemble). We, on the other hand, dazzled in carefully selected, artfully chosen get-ups. Dina, tall and striking in her wavy cape, approached her, plucked the pacifier from her mouth and, ignoring the thread of shining spittle stretching from the dummy, kissed her right on her lips.

“Happy Purim, baby,” she purred and winked at her. “You’re such a cute little baby I almost want to adopt you.” And another kiss, this time on her cheek, after which Dina turned and walked away with the three of us trailing behind her, capes billowing. Taliunger stood frozen to her spot in the middle of the auditorium, stupefied, eyes darting in panic, a filament of spit dangling from her lower lip. The hateful glares would come later.

So why is Ronit looking at her now with such affection?

“Did you know that Tali is married to Neria Grossman?”

Well then.

There’s nothing but care and concern in Ronit’s voice, but her eyes tell a whole other story. Remind her that you broke up with Neria and not the other way around, go on, remind them both! But on the all-female playground, Taliunger won a crucial match, and this fact is lost on no one.

“Tali and I are neighbours,” Ronit goes on, “but actually, if you moved back to Bnei Brak, that means we’re all neighbours.”

Taliunger (I should start getting used to Taligrossman, since there’s next to zero chance she kept her maiden name) looks at me, opens her little mouth to say something but changes her mind and snaps it back shut. In lieu of words she offers a few fake coughs, the kind that hide a nasty remark.

“Maybe the three of us can be a group,” she finally says, curtly. Ronit and I exchange glances.

“You never got married, did you?” Tali asks me in a statement posing as a question, her little mouth a crack in the thick stratum of make-up.

“Nope,” I reply casually.

“And what about kids?” That’s an outright challenge, and we both know it.

“What do you think?” I ask her. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

“No,” she replies, “I’m guessing no kids.”

“Well, your impressive crop is enough for both of us.”

“Mine and Neria’s,” she corrects me in a sickly sweet tone, and I feel like congratulating her for lasting as long as she did without mentioning him. Just as she utters his name, one of her twins bursts into such deafening, blood-curdling cries that we freeze into stillness. Twin one’s wailing naturally triggers twin two’s howls, and as if to prove he can hold his own, the Haredi baby at the nearby table, who had calmed down in the meantime, joins the horrendous cryfest. The cacophony soon melds into one shrill, scathing scream, as if the three babies have formed an amateur a cappella ensemble.

Tali leans over the stroller to soothe the twins, and her soft maternal touch and comforting words stir inside me the memory of little hands reaching out for me, a voice calling out from the darkness, Munchkin! Itty-bitty baby! Who wants a cuddle? No, I’ll drop her. No, you won’t, don’t be an idiot, who wants a cuddle, who? And that smile, I’ll drop her. No, Dina, you won’t drop her, how could you? They glued her to your hands.

10

“YOU WANT WHAT?” Eli’s hamster eyes narrow before me. I reach for the Coke can on his desk, resting atop a towering pile of papers, but he stops me. Not today, Missy.

By the way he just put his hand between me and his Coke, I realize this is going to be even harder than I thought. Ever since we talked about “the detective,” as Eli refers to him, he’s no longer my easy-going, easily manipulated friend.

“I want you to come to Ronit’s birthday party with me,” I repeat, nice and slow, and add, “It’s tonight. Tali Unger is coming too.”

It’s always best to give out all the information at once. Or at least, most of the information. And Eli has heard enough from me about Miss Unger.

“Explain it to me. Why exactly do you want to go to that party?”

Take a wild guess.

“Because I think Ronit is involved somehow, or she at least knows more about the murder than she’s letting on. I didn’t care for that chance encounter with Tali Unger, not one bit.”

And that’s certainly the truth. Not that I wanted to go, but watching Tali squirm when Ronit invited me to her party, I just had to say yes. A thousand times yes. You can’t have it all, Miss Taliunger.

“Oh, yes, Tali Unger. The woman who prevailed where you failed,” Eli quips, feigning a light-hearted laugh, but we both know it’s true.