Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 20 of a new online serial novel, Divided Attention, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every Thursday or Friday. Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © 2010 by Israel Bookshop Publications

Manny pulled up at the curb.

“Have a good day, Rafi!” he said and waved from the window. “Hatzlach—Hey, what’s going on over there?”

The large, wide tree had lost all its charm. It stood there black and sooty, its blackened, leafless branches stark against the winter sky. Dozens of children stood at the base of the tree, pointing and waving animatedly.

“They’ve done it again?” Manny whispered in horror. “They’ve got to catch those bandits! Rafi, go ask them what happened.”

A curly-haired boy ran over to them, shouting something at Rafi, who shrank back and put his hand on the car.

“Rafi, did you see what they did here?” the kid breathlessly asked. He peeked into the car. “Are you Rafi’s father? Hi. My name is Meir Cooperman and I sit next to him,” –he pointed at Rafi—”in class.”

“What happened over there?” Manny asked, pointing at the swarming yard.

“They burned the tree, and the wall near it almost got burned! Everything’s black! They also threw rocks into some classrooms and the windows broke! Our classroom window is also smashed! And they spray painted the back wall!”

Manny sighed. “This is terrible. I hope they’ll be caught soon. Rafi, if you see your principal tell him I was very sorry to hear.”

“Oh,” Rafi said expressionlessly, and without smiling, he waved at the man behind the wheel and walked through the gate beside Meir Cooperman.

“Come,” Meir urged, energetic as always. “Look what they did behind the building. They drew the face that was painted inside last time with the tongue sticking out!”

Rafi stood facing the virtual carbon copy of his creation, only this time it wasn’t red; it was black. With a neutral expression on his face, he touched the drawing; his fingertips immediately turned black. “It’s not spray,” he told Meir.  “It’s paint. Black paint.”

“How do you know?” Meir asked, also touching the black face.

“Paint is wet. Spray paint gets absorbed by the wall,” Rafi said, and then breathing heavily, asked, “Why did they burn that nice tree?”

“You know lots of things!” Meir said with admiration. “Maybe we should make a secret club and catch them!”

“Catch who?”

“The guys who keep doing this to us! I think that Gavriel and Yudi would want to join. How about you? I think you’d be a great detective; you’re really smart and you’ll be able to help us a lot!”

***

After a light knock, the door of the third grade classroom opened and the principal gazed at the students with his warm brown eyes.

“Hello, Rabbi Paksher,” the teacher greeted him. “Boys, we’ve finished the perek. You can close the chumashim.”

Rafi’s hands automatically closed the chumash in front of him.

“Boys,” the principal said, pulling the door closed behind him. “I just wanted to talk to you myself, to calm down anyone who is afraid. Hashem has put us in this place, and we are doing the best we can. Obviously there are some people who are angry that we are here, but I’m sure that, b’ezras Hashem, they won’t hurt any of you. They just want to bother us a little, nothing more. What do you think we can do in this situation?” Keep Reading…

Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 19 of a new online serial novel, Divided Attention, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every Thursday or Friday. Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © 2010 by Israel Bookshop Publications

We have to be at peace with our decision, Nava’s father said to himself as he turned the wheel. Especially since you’ve consulted the rav. Yael had been right after all. The child would learn here for the time being, and when he would advance, they could move him to a regular Talmud Torah. If we want to go far, we have to start at a slow pace, especially since his Torah knowledge was extremely scant for a child his age in a normal cheder. Here, at least, many of the children came from backgrounds similar to his.

The car stopped with a slight squeal. Manny turned his head to the back. “We’re here, Rafi,” he said. “You can open the seatbelt and get out.” The child didn’t move. He sat hunched into the back seat, reminding Manny of that first half an hour he had been in their home. His eyes were fixed on the window, scanning the school. “Is it too hard for you because of your hands?” Mr. Cohen asked, and got out of the car to open the back door. “Here, I opened it for you. Now you can come out.”

Rafi crept out, moving in almost slow motion. He kept glancing at the building warily, especially at the big tree in the yard. Something about this place was very familiar, but he wasn’t one hundred percent sure. There had been a yard, a tree and a small window there, too. How many details had he absorbed during those cold, dark nights? Almost nothing. Maybe it was just coincidentally similar.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of, Rafi. The principal here is a very, very nice man. I’ve spoken to him by phone. I’m sure you’re going to love it here. You just have to remember to behave nicely, like you know how.”

Manny knocked on the door of the office and pushed it open a little. Rafi’s muscles stiffened so tightly that they hurt. He followed Manny leadenly, feeling as though he was in a huge soap bubble. In another minute, the bubble would burst and the principal would remember him right away. Keep Reading…

Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 18 of a new online serial novel, Divided Attention, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every Thursday or Friday. Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © 2010 by Israel Bookshop Publications

Rafi’s world was divided in two. The first part was in Kiryat Yovel, at home with Ima, and in class with Mrs. Davidi and the other children. There, he was Rafi who did what he wanted; the boy of whom everyone was afraid. No one dared say a word of rebuke to him. He was Rafi who was buddies with Ronny, and to whom Rina, the guidance counselor, tried to speak. But despite all these people in his life, he was really alone, so very alone, and he knew that no one was particularly pleased that he was there in the first place. Now, they were probably happy that he was gone, but soon enough, after they removed his cast and bandages, he would go back there and show them all.

The other half of Rafi’s world was here, with Mr. and Mrs. Cohen and Nava. In their home, he was suddenly the youngest and everyone was worried about him and asking how he felt. They seemed to have his best interests at heart, or at least that’s what they said. He tried to be good, like they wanted him to be, and it wasn’t very hard. Only sometimes, they had to remind him that it was better to speak nicely, but except for that, they didn’t say anything. Even when he occasionally got up at night and made noise, they didn’t get angry or tell him that it was nighttime and that he had to sleep. Mr. Cohen would sit next to him and tell him a story, and sometimes, Mrs. Cohen would peel an orange or tangerine for him, or prepare for him some grapefruit segments sprinkled with sugar. The only problem was that he couldn’t always find his ball and that annoyed him, because sometimes, kicking the ball helped him sleep better afterwards.

He thought that he liked the Cohen family, and maybe—he wasn’t sure—they liked him. It was really worth wearing the kippah for that; he was sure that they liked him even more because of it. They hadn’t bought him strings for his pants, nor had they taken him to the barber, even though he’d told them that he wanted this. Mr. Cohen had said they would “wait and see.” Rafi didn’t understand what exactly they were waiting for. Did they want to see how long his hair could grow?

Meanwhile, Shabbos had passed, and it was a really pleasant day in a religious house.  He went with Mr. Cohen to shul at night, and sat next to him the whole time, except when he went outside to see what the other kids were doing. He had stood and watched them play for a few minutes. A few of the kids had given him a glance, but none of them said a word to him, except for one kid who asked, “Hey, you, there, what’s your name? Why are you staring at us?”

Rafi had wanted to go over to that kid and show him who he was starting up with, but his hands suddenly felt very heavy, reminding him that they were more or less useless right now. That worked out pretty well, because he was sure that Mr. Cohen would not have liked the idea of him starting up with other kids, even if they had really started up with him.

On the way home, Mr. Cohen spoke to him about all sorts of interesting things, like the shul and praying and Hashem.

Afterwards there was Kiddush in a silver cup with grape juice. He kept asking for more grape juice, and finished almost half the bottle. And there were nice songs, and Mr. Cohen spoke about people who went to Egypt and had to work really hard there to build buildings that kept falling apart. Mrs. Davidi had once told them something like that; or perhaps it was last year, with Mrs. Simon; he couldn’t remember anymore. But Mr. Cohen sure told it over much better than his teachers. Everything at the Cohens was nicer than it was over in Kiryat Yovel. He was happy he was here now, and that he didn’t have to meet any of the people from there. Keep Reading…

Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 17 of a new online serial novel, Divided Attention, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every Thursday or Friday. Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © 2010 by Israel Bookshop Publications

Yael Cohen served her guests a plate of cookies and two cups of soda. “Which era interests you the most?” she asked in her soft, refined voice.

If Yaeli would have to sum up Mrs. Cohen’s personality in one word, that was the word she would choose: refined. As much as she tried, she could not possibly imagine this woman not being religious.

Tikva peeked at her. “Yaeli?”

“What?”

“Nu, which era?”

The truth was that Yaeli had not devoted even a second of thought to the matter before coming there. What difference did it make if they were writing about something that happened two hundred, five hundred, or even a thousand years ago?

“Maybe the unification of Germany,” she blurted, just to say something.

Tikva glared at her. “We don’t want to write about the Holocaust, remember?”

Yaeli sighed. “If you don’t mind my saying so, Tikva, the unification of Germany happened many years before the Second World War. It’s not the same thing at all.”

“Many years before?” Tikva echoed.

The historian, who had just finished filling their glasses with soda and was now capping the bottle, smiled. “Sixty-eight years, to be exact, if we are referring to the final unification declared in 1871, and not one of the previous stages.”

“I want something from longer ago,” Tikva said decisively. “The more ancient something is, the more interesting it sounds.”

“Could be,” Yael agreed and rose to look at the binders lined up on the top shelf. “Although you have to take into account that the earlier something happened, the fewer details we have about it. But let’s take a look at what we have….”

The curtain hanging over the window of the small room fluttered in the wind. A quiet voiced called out, “Ima?” Someone was talking.

Yael stopped and turned to the door. “Yes, Nava, what’s going on?” Keep Reading…