From This Wicked Patch of Dust

New Worlds

131 New Worlds April–May 1989 They had returned to Lilah’s apartment. After she served him a small shot glass of Grand Marnier, they kissed on the sofa (her roommate was out for the evening), and she locked her bedroom door. Yet he wondered whether the car alarm he heard in the distance was from his rental. Soon Ismael and Lilah were in bed together, and the world around them fell away into the darkness. Only then did his car cease to exist in his mind. After Ismael woke up and made hazelnut coffee for both of them, he slipped on his jogging shorts. He ran toward the Charles River and passed Pembroke Street and a few broken beer bottles on the sidewalk. Hallelujah! His Dodge Colt appeared untouched. “So who’s going to be there?” asked Ismael as he steered the car onto a windy, tree-lined road dotted with New England Colonials. He stopped in front of the Wellesley town square, with a red-brick church on a hillside. Its blindingly white steeple pierced the sky like a needle. “Turn right and just follow Lexington for a while. My sisters, maybe Danny, Becky’s boyfriend, and maybe one or two of Deborah’s friends from Harvard. My parents, of course.” “You sure what I’m wearing is fine?” “Sure.” “How long do we have to stay?” “Until after the meal. I haven’t seen them for a while. I’ve been so busy at work. My mother invited us to stay over,” Lilah said, her blue eyes staring straight ahead. He glanced at her. “I don’t know. Maybe.” 132 “Why don’t you like my parents?” “Why do you say that? I’m going, aren’t I?” “Did you send your parents an Easter card? It’s this Sunday, isn’t it?” “Yeah, I’ll do it tomorrow.” “We could send them Easter lilies. Wouldn’t your mother love that?” “She would. When are you coming back to El Paso with me?” “Whenever you want. Take the next right and just follow the road until you get to my house. You remember, don’t you?” “More or less. I didn’t pay much attention when your father picked us up at the train station.” The houses were nestled inside a suburban forest. The meandering driveways and hedges seemed trimmed with a plumb line. Lilah’s gray and white house was behind a row of trees and a low grayish rock wall. The two-acre property sloped downward toward a line of trees at the entrance of a preservation land trust that was the Kantors’ backyard. He and Lilah had hiked for hours in this forest of labyrinthine paths. Lilah knew them by heart. The picture windows of Lilah’s house felt to Ismael like giant eyes following their every move. Lilah’s mother opened the door. People milled about in the spacious living room, in the kitchen, and around the long, diligently arranged table with a Haggadah in front of each seat. He smiled, shook hands, and introduced himself, saying as little as possible. Ismael knew how to work this kind of crowd. As an undergraduate, he would have been intimidated by the wall-to-wall picture windows overlooking the woods, the fine white-and-gray china on the table, and the bifurcated etching of an orchestra conductor on the wall. The baritone of Lilah’s father reverberated in the background as he lectured Danny in medicalese. Mrs. Kantor (or Jenny, as Ismael had not yet dared call her) hugged him awkwardly, and stared at him for a second too long as if to say, “Well, here you are again. How nice.” Lilah’s blue eyes widened as she hugged her sisters, embraced her mother, and kissed her father. She ushered Ismael in to present him to 133 the guests and to show him his seat at the Passover table with a quick step and verve that radiated her joy at coming home. They took turns reading the story about the slavery of the Jewish people in Egypt and their miraculous escape from the decree to slaughter their firstborns. When it was Lilah’s turn and she read the passage, “And the mountains skipped like lambs, the hills like rams,” she snorted loudly. Everybody knew those had been her favorite lines as a child. Ismael was secretly pleased to see Lilah’s eyes sparkle...