He reached out to give me a hug, but I stiffened at his touch. A look of hurt flashed across his face. I felt a small twinge of pity for him as he walked away. As wrapped up as I’d been in my own problems, I sometimes forgot that the past year had been hard for him, too. But I squashed that twinge before it got any stronger. I just couldn’t feel sorry for someone who was ruining my life.
With a heavy sigh, I closed the door behind me and took a quick look around my new room. It was pretty plain. There was a wooden dresser, a mirror, and a double bed covered with an ugly flowered blanket. A wide window across from the bed offered a view of the surrounding hills and the busy intersection below.
I kicked off my shoes and collapsed onto the bed. Right now, all I wanted to do was rest. I couldn’t remember ever feeling so exhausted. It was like a truck had run me over once and then backed up to finish the job.
As I lay in bed waiting for sleep to come, images from the day passed through my mind. The bearded men in the airport … the smoker in the lobby … the head-scarved women with their babies … the soldiers. It was all so different. And yet, in a weird way, it was also kind of nice. Nobody here felt sorry for me. For the first time in a year, I didn’t feel pitied.
Maybe we did need to get away for a bit, I thought with a yawn. And it’s only for three months, after all.
Chapter 2
My body clock was totally messed up. I woke up the next morning before sunrise and, as hard as I tried, I couldn’t get back to sleep. So instead I began to unpack my suitcase and scatter some of my personal stuff around the room. My diary, my yearbook, and my yellow stuffed Frou-frou bear — a favourite toy left over from childhood — all found a home on the little shelf next to the bed.
Ah, Frou-frou! When I was little, he had literally been my best friend. For years I’d slept with him, confided in him, and taken him everywhere I went. Now, with his fur worn and tattered and one of his ears missing, he had made the journey to Jerusalem with me. Even though I was almost fifteen now, I really couldn’t imagine any house ever being a home without my Frou-frou.
The next thing I unpacked was Mom’s old cashmere sweater. I hugged it close, letting the memory of her soft touch take over. I missed her so much. For the millionth time, I found myself wishing that our lives didn’t have to be this way — that everything could go back to normal.
The last thing to come out of my suitcase was a framed picture of Mom taken the summer I turned thirteen. Even though her eyes were squinting slightly in the sunlight, it was a great photo. She was laughing at a joke I’d made right before I clicked the shutter. Although I couldn’t remember what the joke was now, the rest of the moment was still so vivid in my mind. The two of us had been eating Popsicles and relaxing in the backyard on a hot weekend afternoon in August. I had been playing around with the new digital camera I’d gotten for my birthday and Mom had volunteered to be my model. Of all the photos I’d taken that day, I remember thinking that this one captured Mom’s personality the best. Her eyes were lit up with joy, her mouth was slightly red from the cherry-flavoured Popsicle, the sun was shining through her brown hair like a halo, and the smile on her face was easy and natural and so happy.
Back home in Toronto, I’d kept the picture in my nightstand drawer, tucked under a book where I didn’t have to face the pain of looking at it every day. Now, I held it tenderly in my hands while I contemplated where to put it in my new room.
Mom’s eyes stared up at me from beneath the glass.
Ouch.
I folded Mom’s sweater carefully around the picture, opened my new nightstand drawer, and slid them both inside. After that, I took some time to look around my new home. One by one, I examined all the books on the wicker shelf. I tried out all the appliances, making sure each one of them was in working order. I flipped on the television set, surfing the channels for something — anything — that looked familiar.
And then I walked down the hall and found the bomb shelter.
It was a small room at the end of the hall about the size of a powder room. There was one window, which was sealed and covered in a thick plastic curtain. In addition to a couple of cases of bottled water and a folding chair, the owners had left a trio of gas masks, more plastic sheeting, and a roll of duct tape. I quickly figured out these were to be used in the event of a poisonous gas attack. There was a sign on the door with instructions in both English and Hebrew:
In Case of Emergency
Bring radio into shelter.
Ensure there is one gas mask for
every person in shelter.
Seal door edges with thick strips of
tape once bomb shelter is closed.
Seal the bottom of door with
a wet towel.
Do not leave until you hear the
“all-clear” signal.
Holy crap! The whole idea of a bomb shelter was frigging creepy. The air was stale and claustrophobic and the gas masks looked like lifeless alien faces lying there on the floor.
Later on, when I showed the room to Dad, he did his best to downplay it.
“Don’t worry about it, Mack,” he said, waving off my concerns like a pesky fly. “Every house and apartment in Israel is required to have one of these things. It’s like, I don’t know … seat belts in a car … or emergency exits in a movie theatre … or fire extinguishers in school classrooms. Just something that’s required by law for safety reasons.”
I rolled my eyes in disgust and wondered for the millionth time why he’d brought us here.
Yeah, right, Dad. A bomb shelter is no different than an exit sign!
How could I have known that one day I’d actually have to use it?
The next morning, Dad and I were given an orientation tour of the university by one of his new colleagues in the Institute of Archaeology.
“Hi, I’m Professor Anderson,” she said, shaking our hands and grinning widely. “But please call me Sharon. I’m the resident pottery specialist here at Hebrew U — although I’m originally from the University of Minnesota. I guess that’s not too far from your neck of the woods — relatively speaking.”
I liked her instantly. With her girlish blond ponytail and freckled cheeks, she looked far too young and pretty to be a professor, let alone an archaeologist. In fact, she didn’t look much older than a student herself. It was a big contrast to Dad’s colleagues back home, who had all seemed as old and dry as a bunch of prehistoric fossils.
Sharon led us around the grounds, pointing out the requisite places of interest. But for me, the best part of the tour wasn’t the buildings or the library; it was her advice about living in Israel.
“I know you guys just got here, so here are some ‘survival tips,’” she said as we all sat down for a drink in the campus cafeteria. “First of all, you should know that this is a country of soldiers. Many Israeli adults have spent some time in the army. You may have noticed from the way they drive here that their attitude is all about ‘survival of the fittest.’”
I nodded, thinking back to the taxi ride in from the airport. The mere memory of it sent a wave of nausea through my belly. I took a long sip of my ginger ale. Thank God you could get Canada Dry here!
“You’ve also probably noticed by now that security is a way of life here,” Sharon continued. “Be prepared to get searched when you enter the mall or other public places. And don’t be shocked to see armed soldiers everywhere you go: restaurants, shops, buses.”
The gingery bubbles melted on my tongue as I ate up her words. I knew that this was the kind of stuff I needed