“I hadn’t noticed,” she replied in a sarcastic tone, afraid she was going to burst into tears. She pulled up a chair and sat down in front of him. She kept looking at him, how different he was from the insecure guy who had sat across from her at the restaurant.

“The apartment’s paid for till the end of the month,” he said, and told her he thought she’d be better off going to Germany. “It’ll make it easier to describe where you’ve been. It’s not the same without being there in person.”

She didn’t see the point trying to convince him to stay. She had come to terms with it quicker than she had expected.

“Were you happy with me?” she asked.

He smiled again.

“Yes,” he said. “Reality didn’t have the chance to mess that up yet.”

“Life isn’t black and white. You have to learn to live with the grays too,” she told him.

“True,” he said and got up. For a moment he seemed to be considering whether to hug her, and eventually decided he should. She got up but didn’t hug him back.

“But I can’t,” he said. “I’d rather have you without all the grays.”

His words were physically painful.

He turned around and walked out. She sat down in his chair, listening to the sound of his suitcase being dragged down the stairs.

14.

THERE WAS NO river view. No balcony either. But the hotel room was comfortable and cozy, and the people were as nice as he had said they were. She hadn’t actually planned on checking, but her phone automatically connected to the hotel Wi-Fi, and he had just uploaded a few photos from his homecoming party. She looked at the people surrounding him, didn’t recognize any of them. A bespectacled girl sat next to him for the entire party. She clicked on her profile but couldn’t find any information about her.

She lay on the bed. In a moment of desperation, she shared Amir Lev’s song about Holden’s ducks. She wasn’t sure what she meant to say by it. But maybe that was why she felt it was the most real thing she had ever posted in the virtual world.

How to Remember a Desert

1.

AND THERE, IN the white waiting room, she suddenly cringes, realizing Amichai was right. Had been right all along. That two people actually could be in the very same spot, without so much as a molecule separating them. That nowadays, you could squeeze into another person’s insides, hold on tightly without letting go.