The interview with the deputy chief medical officer was very brief.
“I’d be glad to speak with the head of the department where Lily was hospitalized,” he said, after I told him about my marriage, Lily’s illness, and the ward where she had been admitted.
“Please wait outside, you’ll be called in.”
Before leaving, I managed to ask him to keep the matter discreet, since I feared that my brother, already a senior military physician, might find out. In response, he raised his left thumb and smiled.
A few minutes later, I was invited back into the room.
“I’ve been a doctor long enough,” he began, “to tell you that your wife is in the best possible hands. There’s no one like him.” He was referring to the department head.
“I’m glad – and I know it,” I replied.
“Unfortunately, I can’t fulfill your request. In the coming months, because of a shortage of doctors, you’ll be assigned to a combat unit.” He stopped for dramatic effect.
I felt a surge of tension, a kind of dizziness. For a moment, I thought he had misspoken, and at the same time, I wasn’t entirely sure about the non-combat service I had requested. Then he added, “But I promise that in the first rotation you’ll be stationed in Eilat, . Her department head said he believes that’s the best place for her. First, it’s only about an hour’s flight from Tel-Aviv. Second, the climate there is ideal for patients with her illness.”
At his words, I let out an involuntary sigh of relief. It felt as though I were on a seesaw, my emotions lurching back and forth.True, the disillusionment began with the disappointment at the end of the officers’ course, compounded by my deep concern for Lily’s health. My priorities were shifting daily, and although it seemed that what mattered most to me was to be with Lily, to live with her and care for her health, I still hadn’t made a firm decision.
“Tell me, why are you hiding this from your brother? If I were you, I’d be telling him about Lily with pride,” he pulled me out of my thoughts.
“It’s not about him. It’s about my relationship with my parents.”
The moment I said those words, I broke down and burst into tears. At the end of the officers’ training, I had teared up – but in the deputy’s office I cried openly. I cried and spoke. Spoke and cried.
“My parents, you know…” I said. “And me, I … I’m second generation. You’ll find I have all the classic symptoms of that syndrome – and some others too.”
I sat across from his stunned face and, for the first time, opened my heart. Not even to Lily had I exposed my deepest fears.
“I don’t want to, and can’t, hurt them. That’s why I decided to keep them in the dark and not tell them about Lily’s illness.”
He seemed to get it completely.
“The fewer the people who know, the more protected my parents will be. People tend to blurt out anything that doesn’t seem normal to them. I’m sure silence about Lily is worth gold. Only that way can we live, and try to lead a normal life.”
I explained that I didn’t want to see my mother consumed by worry, or my father pacing like a caged lion trying to calm her. Yes, it was an important matter – vitally important – but it became insignificant if no one knew of its existence. The fewer who knew, the better. Lily wasn’t looking for special treatment. She wanted to live normally – and who was I to deny her that?Of course, you can’t know what the alternative is without trying it, but we were quite comfortable letting things remain as they were.
“Of course,” he replied, as I wiped away my tears.
“Major, I ask again – please don’t let my brother know.”
“Not from me, he won’t. You may wait outside; my aide will give you your assignment orders.”
After a short stint with a frontline artillery unit in the Jordan Valley, I received my transfer orders to Navy Headquarters in Eilat, just as the department head who had treated Lily had recommended.
Chapter 36
Avni – Graduation Party
One evening, before we moved down to Eilat, Lily said to me, “My man, I have to choose three works.” I had déjà vu, remembering the time before she went to Avni.
“What for?”
“All the seniors are going to take part in the final exhibition at the Artists’ House in Tel-Aviv. The Sharett Foundation, a well-known philanthropic body, will award scholarships to outstanding students,” she explained.
The tension wore her out. Lily wasn’t built for exposure or competition, but she didn’t want to stay on the sidelines.
“Don’t you have someone there to help you pick the best paintings?”
