“Are you a writer?” she asked, her eyes wide with admiration and wonder.
“A lawyer.”
She didn’t try to hide her disappointment. “And what’s the connection between a lawyer and a writer of novels and fairy tales?”
She was expecting a short answer, certainly not such a serious and detailed response. “Lawyers are occupied extensively withwriting their arguments for the courts, and language is their main weapon. John Grisham, for instance, was a lawyer turned writer. And there’s Robin Sharma, who was also a successful criminal lawyer.”
She thought for a moment. “But how do you explain that? How do you explain the need of certain lawyers to write novels, or fairy tales as you’re doing, or in general, to write books that aren’t exactly related to law and the courts?”
His tone became relaxed, like that of a storyteller with an audience of one.
“Every day, a lawyer meets with his clients and hears their personal accounts and hidden secrets: He listens to a woman who wants to destroy her husband in retaliation for his behavior, as she shows him photographs provided by a private investigator; his heart goes out to a young mother whose daughter died due to medical negligence; he is privy to the story of a senior partner in a commercial corporation who suspects that there is industrial espionage inside his firm. The lawyer searches for legal precedents, he questions witnesses, he studies the case from every possible angle. Perhaps the nature of this work that brings a lawyer into contact with rare human encounters, is what sparks within him the urge to write novels or stories that don’t necessarily deal with the law.”
She remained silent because she couldn’t find the right words to say, and he studied her full, closed lips. She had straight blonde hair, light glowing skin, and brown eyes that reflected both goodness and sadness. “And what about you?” he asked.
“What do I do?” she asked and he nodded affirmatively. “You may be surprised,” she said with a smile, “I’m a graphic designer!”
“Why would that surprise me?” he didn’t understand.
She pulled her chair closer to the table and leaned towards him.“Because I’m a graphic designer for one of the biggest publishing houses in Israel.”
“Really?!” he sat up straight like a curious golden retriever. “You design book covers?”
“Yes, among other things.”
“So, what kind of cover would you design for my book, for instance?”
She leaned back and clasped her hands together. “To answer that,” she said, “I would need to hear the full story.”
It began raining again, with large raindrops tap-tapping on the windowpane. “Do you have time?”
“Five hours, tops.”
“Right… so let’s pretend,” he suggested, “that I’m a wise, old man relating his story to a circle of eager listeners sitting around a campfire. Imagine this—a dark night, a bonfire with thick wooden logs being consumed by the flames, and a star-studded sky. I stand up to tell the story and… in my heart, I dedicate the story to you. What do you say?”
“Right on, Ro’el... let’s light a fire.”
Chapter Three
“And it came to pass the same day that the Lord did bring the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt by their hosts.”
Book of Exodus, 12:51
Fresh, moist green grass welcomed the visitors who reached the gates of the School of Law at NYU. It was a pleasant New York afternoon and the sun sent its caressing rays between the skyscrapers that seemed about to gash the light-blue skies. The Dean of the school, Prof. Bill Green, watched from the sidelines, noting everyone who arrived—and especially those who didn’t. The attendees included esteemed professors from the Liberal Arts departments, alongside renowned lawyers from top law firms whose names occasionally appeared on the front pages of the New York Times whenever a legal scandal shook the American public. The festive list of invitees was topped by the New York mayor and his deputy, who made it a point to attend. Everyone wanted to pay their respects to Professor Green on the day that NYU’s School of Law was endowing its postgraduates with their well-earned Master of Laws degrees.
Yiftach Posner was seated in the audience, watching as the honorable speakers came up to the podium one after the other to deliver their speeches. Yiftach had recently turned twenty-eight. He was a thin young man who stood 6’2” tall. He had light hair, large, intelligent eyes with a unique mix of pastel blue and spring green, a sculpted nose and a well-built, muscular body. Two-and-a-half years earlier, he had been overwhelmed with excitement when Tel-Aviv’s Criminal Department of the District Attorney’s Office informed him that the State Attorney Generalhad decided to finance ten young attorneys, the most promising among the Office’s young generation of lawyers, to complete their Masters of Law in the United States, and Yiftach was one of the chosen ten.
Embarking on this new journey, Yiftach had to leave behind his girlfriend of six years, and she alone would live in their centrally located rented apartment in Tel Aviv. Nearly every night, before his head hit the pillow, Yiftach would Skype with Nicole, expressing his longing for her, and together they would imagine the moment they would be united once again. After fifteen months of New York loneliness and thousands of miles of land and sea between them—using a camera from his old laptop—Yiftach knelt down on one knee and proposed to his sweetheart, asking her to share with him the rest of their lives together. Ricardo, Yiftach’s roommate who was hiding behind the living room sofa, freed a transparent fishing line that was tied to a net at the ceiling, releasing dozens of red and white balloons. Aristotle—an arrogant parrot who was abandoned by the apartment’s former tenants—flapped his wings in fright as the balloons came pouring down like blessed rain. And Nicole gazed, tearful and excited, as the computer screen reflected the image of a New York studio apartment with dozens of balloons flying all around, a screeching parrot and, in the midst of it all—her beloved on one knee, asking her to marry him. They decided that when Yiftach returned home in August, they would start to plan their wedding.
Ricardo, who shared the studio apartment with Yiftach, was also a law student completing his Masters of Law degree. He belonged to a wealthy and educated family in Lisbon. His father was a neurologist at a hospital in the Portuguese capital city and his mother was a successful public relations professional. Ricardo was short, with dark skin and close-cropped black hair. His kind brown eyes always seemed to be smiling. Although boththese young men were students at NYU’s School of Law, they hardly met during their studies. Yiftach’s focus was on criminal law, whereas Ricardo invested his energies in studying the ins and outs of Trade Law. There were very few mandatory basic courses that they both attended, so they would make up for lost time when they returned home in the evenings from long, exhausting days at the university. Nearly every evening, they would combat their longing for home with heart-to-heart talks and cheap beer.
Two months before completing their studies, Ricardo was chosen for a highly sought after position with a large firm in central Manhattan, and he knew he wouldn’t be returning home until he had saved enough money to repay his parents the tuition costs for the past two years. And perhaps—as was his wish—he would be able to amass enough of a fortune to build the hotel he always dreamed of—a pastoral complex with many huts on the island of Koh Tao in southern Thailand, catering to snorkeling fanatics. Yiftach, on the other hand, knew that as soon as he completed his Master’s degree he would be returning home to Israel. As was stated in the signed agreement with the State Attorney’s Office—in return for financing his studies, he was committed to work at the State Attorney’s Office for at least five years. But, above all, he was going back to Nicole and would never leave her again. Time passed as if it were holding a tiny hoe digging and opening a path abroad until July finally came around and, with it, the graduation ceremony.
Professor Green was Master of Ceremonies. The first speaker was Michael Epstein, a renowned attorney and senior partner in a huge New York law firm specializing in Trade Law. The major thrust of Epstein’s speech focused on the optimal management of complex merger transactions, escorted by a team of skillful lawyers specializing in such transactions. Everyone understood that Epstein’s speech was nothing more than a clandestineadvertisement for his firm, which frequently conducted mergers and acquisitions in the business world. It seemed clear that the contents of his speech deviated from the rules of professional ethics.
***
“I don’t understand,” Tammi interrupted him.
