All I Love and Know Read Free Page A

filled with cheese or spinach. They’re a very popular finger food in Israel.”
    â€œI see,” Matt said.
    â€œMom,” Daniel said, “why don’t we wait till we get there, and maybe this shiva thing will just work itself out.” He closed his eyes.
    Lydia nodded, drew herself up, and said to Matt with a strange pride, “The place down the street from Joel’s house has some of the best bourekas in the city.”
    When she headed back to the front of the airplane, Matt said, “Well, that was a surreal little exchange.”
    Daniel’s eyes were still closed. “She’s trying not to have to imagine how much of her son’s body has been blown to bits.”
    Matt bit his lip, scalded.
    Daniel opened his eyes and looked at him with a weak appeal, laid a hand on top of his. “Forgive me if I’m an asshole, okay?”
    â€œOkay,” Matt whispered, squeezing Daniel’s cold fingers, unspeakably grateful for the gaze that seemed to recognize him for the first time since the news had come.
    â€œDo we have a piece of paper and a pen?”
    â€œSure, baby.”
    Matt fished them out of his travel bag, and Daniel sighed, then bent over the paper and began writing in Hebrew. Matt looked at the round strong veins on Daniel’s working hand, which passed rapidly from right to left. “What are you writing?” he asked.
    â€œA eulogy for my brother.”
    Daniel covered the page and then stopped and gave Matt a stricken look. He set the pen down, took off his glasses, and started to cry. Matt gripped his hand. He had never seen Daniel cry until last night, and he was a little scared he’d cry like that now, in public. He’d seen him well up once or twice, and that was shattering enough to witness. But not really crying, and certainly not crying like that, writhing, screaming his brother’s name, his teeth bared and his face sealed off and unseeing so that he seemed like one of those creatures, like otters or monkeys, whose faces lie on the disconcerting boundary between human and animal. Now Daniel was quiet, tears streaming down his face. Oh, Matt’s heart clamored, what should I do? How could he be a comfort to this man who had been such a comfort to him? And those kids! Noam was only a baby! He wasn’t up to it, he knew it. He would blow it again, the way he had with Jay, with all of the bad-mouthing and posturing, and his boycotting the memorial service, and the crushing fear that he had failed to be there for his best friend in the right way.
    Oh poor poor Joel , Matt thought, and Ilana’s face too flashed into his mind, big and raucous, and her sloppy ponytail, and tears rushed, hot and brutal, into his eyes.
    SEVEN HOURS LATER THEY stood at the airport curb, huddled around a small, curly-haired woman—Yemenite, Daniel would later tell him—holding a walkie-talkie and wearing a neon-green vest marked with bold Hebrew lettering. Her name was Shoshi, and she was the social worker sent by the city of Jerusalem. The Middle Eastern morning sun was bright and penetrating, and they had taken off coats and jackets and put on sunglasses. Around them, cars jostled and honked, and trunks slammed shut. Taxi drivers in open-necked shirts and Ray-Bans jingled keys in their hands as they approached exiting travelers. While Shoshi and Daniel spoke in Hebrew, nodding rapidly, Matt bent over and pulled down his right sock, his heart still thrumming with excitement and indignation at the lunatics in baggage claim. People had bumped into him and shouldered in front of him, and an elderly man on a fanatical push to the conveyor belt had jammed his luggage cart into Matt’s heel, knocking his shoe clear off. Matt had wrestled it back on, surprised by the rage surging up his throat, and the rude old prick hadn’t even apologized. Now Matt gripped the handle of his own cart with renewed, glowering concentration. He heard a lot of