Page 11 of The New Girl

“Gabriel told me to go to America and spend the rest of my life with you.”

“Why didn’t you take his advice?”

“Because this is my home.” Mikhail gazed at the patchwork quilt of farmland beyond his window. “Israel and the Office. There was no way I could live in America, even if you were there.”

“I could have come here.”

“It’s not such an easy life.”

“Better than the alternative.” She immediately regretted her words. “But the past is the past—isn’t that what you said?”

He nodded slowly.

“Did you ever have any second thoughts?”

“About leaving you?”

“Yes, you idiot.”

“Of course.”

“And are you happy now?”

“Very.”

She was surprised at how badly his answer wounded her.

“Perhaps we should change the subject,” suggested Mikhail.

“Yes, let’s. What shall we talk about?”

“The reason you’re here.”

“Sorry, but I can’t discuss it with anyone but Gabriel. Besides,” said Sarah playfully, “I have a feeling you’ll know soon enough.”

They had reached the southern fringes of Netanya. The tall white apartment houses lining the beach reminded Sarah of Cannes. Mikhail spoke a few words in Hebrew to the driver. A moment later they stopped at the edge of a broad esplanade.

Mikhail pointed toward a dilapidated hotel. “That’s where the Passover Massacre happened back in 2002. Thirty dead, a hundred and forty wounded.”

“Is there any place in this country thathasn’tbeen bombed?”

“I told you, life isn’t so easy here.” Mikhail nodded toward the esplanade. “Take a walk. We’ll do the rest.”

Sarah climbed out of the car and started across the square.The past is the past...For a moment, she almost believed it was true.

8

Netanya

At the centerof the esplanade was a blue reflecting pool, around which several young Orthodox boys,payessflying, played a noisy game of tag. They were speaking not in Hebrew but in French. So were their wigged mothers and the two black-shirted hipsters who eyed Sarah approvingly from a table at a brasserie called Chez Claude. Indeed, were it not for the worn-out khaki-colored buildings and the blinding Middle Eastern sunlight, Sarah might have imagined she was crossing a square in the twentieth arrondissement of Paris.

Suddenly, she realized someone was calling her name, with the emphasis on the second syllable rather than the first. Turning, she spotted a petite dark-haired woman waving to her from across the square. The woman approached with a slight limp.

Sarid, Sarid, Sarid...

Dina kissed Sarah on both cheeks. “Welcome to the Israeli Riviera.”

“Is everyone here French?”

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