A Remarkable Kindness Read Online Free PDF Page A

woolen coats in the sun, never seeing their parents or siblings again. As Eli had stood up, she’d felt him brush against her shoulder as if by accident, and then she’d stared through the window as he walked away, vanishing into the crowd on the street, so good at making himself disappear.
    The game began again and Aviva now followed Rafi. He paced the gym floor the way he used to pace for nights on end after Benny had been killed. Aviva would wake up and find Rafi standing in the living room as though he were looking for something, and the two of them would hold each other in the darkness, the sea pounding against the shore, drumming the truth into their heads. He’s gone, he’s gone, he’s—
    â€œCome on, Aviv!” Eli was shouting. “Aviv, pass to Noam! Pass to Noam!”
    A player on Rafi’s team fouled Aviv and then the other team’s coach, a toothy bald guy, called a time-out. The score was forty-eight to forty-seven, Rafi’s team down by one. Two seconds left inthe game. When they resumed play, a boy from Rafi’s team stole the ball. Wahid, their best player—Rafi had told Aviva about him—scooted around Aviv, sideswiped Noam, and sank the ball. The buzzer sounded. Rafi’s team won.
    â€œGo fuck yourself!” Noam shoved Wahid.
    â€œYou son-of-a-bitch!” Wahid pushed him back.
    Suddenly, all the other players were swept into a brawl. Rafi ran to break up the fight, Eli jumped out of his seat and bounded down the stairs, and Aviva sprang up after them, propelling herself through fists and elbows, knees and knuckles, the flash of teeth like knives. A boy yanked her out of the chaos and she tried to shoulder her way back in, but then she gave up. “Stop it!” Aviva shouted. “Stop!”
    Eli wrenched Noam off Wahid and threw them apart. “Noam!”
    All of a sudden the boys untangled, separating themselves.
    â€œ Inte mnih? ” Rafi asked Wahid in Arabic, throwing his arm around him. Are you okay?
    Aviva waited. She watched Rafi and Wahid walk back to their bench, but she followed Eli, who was dragging Noam across the gym. She noticed the bulge of Eli’s pistol under his shirt, tucked into his waistband, pressed against the small of his back. She suspected that he’d always carry a pistol, though he no longer worked for the Company, almost as if it were a part of him.
    â€œDon’t you ever, ever do that again!” Eli pressed Noam against the gym wall, leaning in close to the boy’s sweat-stained face.
    â€œWhat’s it to you?” Noam spat.
    â€œWhere are your parents?”
    â€œWhat do you care?”
    â€œLook, he realized he was wrong,” said Noam’s coach.
    â€œThat’s not good enough,” Eli said.
    â€œNoam,” the coach said shortly, “tell him you were wrong.”
    â€œI’m not apologizing to any Arab.”
    Eli nailed Noam harder against the wall. “How do you know that one day you won’t be in the same army unit with him? The Druze make better soldiers than you ever will.”
    â€œAbba!”
    Aviva turned to see Aviv grab on to Eli’s shirt, trying to yank him away from Noam. “Let him go!”
    â€œAviv!” Eli shoved Aviv’s arm away. “This drives me crazy!”
    â€œI’ll talk to Noam,” the coach said.
    Eli jerked up his chin and dropped his hands. “You make sure you do.”
    A VIVA FOLLOWED E LI up the cement steps and they sat down again, in different twanging seats.
    â€œThat was awful.” Aviva reached for her handbag to get a tissue to wipe her eyes, her arm accidentally brushing against Eli’s thigh. There was everything she loved about Rafi, but each nerve ending in her body now stood up, awakened. She hesitated, taking a few breaths to calm herself down. “Eli, can we meet up again?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œSo, this is it?” She felt her entire being snuffed out once