Now You See Me... by Rochelle Krich Read Free Book Online

essay.”
    She left the room through a doorway that led to the hall and shut the door behind her. I was alone with the rabbi. For over a decade I had fantasized about confronting him, but this wasn’t the time.
    “Tomorrow is
Shabbos,”
he said. “I keep wondering where Dassie is, what she’s doing. What kind of
Shabbos
will she have?”
    I didn’t know how to respond to that.
    “It’s been many years since you’ve been here, Molly.”
    “Fourteen.” I broke off a cluster of flame grapes from the platter on the table and slipped it onto a plate.
    “To be honest, I wasn’t sure you’d come. I know you’re still angry with me.”
    I plucked a grape and silently recited the blessing before biting into it.
    “It wasn’t my decision, Molly.”
    “You allowed the school to suspend me for something I didn’t do. You let Rabbi Ingel harangue me in front of all my friends and teachers.”
    For a moment I was back in the large, crowded cafeteria. Ingel, tall and rotund with blond hair cut so short it was almost invisible, loomed over me, his blue eyes sparking with fury that contorted the otherwise ordinary features of his clean-shaven face. His words, thundering with a ferocity that bounced off the walls in that awful silence, torched my cheeks and pierced my heart. I couldn’t breathe. I willed the floor to open up and swallow me.
    “Rabbi Ingel was agitated, Molly. He—”
    “He called me a liar and a cheater, and you didn’t say anything.” My cheeks flamed. My voice quivered with fourteen-year-old hurt. “He said my children would be liars and cheaters.”
    Rabbi Bailor sighed. “Rabbi Ingel told me the next day that he wished he could take back what he’d said. He was agitated. He said you got hold of a copy of his final and circulated it before the exam.”
    I shook my head.
    “Why would Rabbi Ingel accuse you of something you didn’t do, Molly?” he asked gently.
    “Because he never liked me? Because I asked questions he couldn’t or wouldn’t answer? Because he didn’t want to give me an A? Because he couldn’t imagine that one of the ‘good girls’ who sucked up to him could have done what he accused me of doing?” I took a breath. “The answer is, all of the above.”
    “Rabbi Ingel told us he had proof.”
    “And you believed him. That’s what hurts. You
knew
I’d never do something like that. But you didn’t defend me.”
    “The truth is, Molly—”
    Nechama entered the dining room. I wondered how long she’d been on the other side of the door, what she’d heard.
    She handed me a manila folder. “Here’s the essay, and Hadassah’s yearbook photo.” She glanced at her husband, then at me. “Is everything all right?”
    “Everything is fine,” I said.

Chapter 7
    Aliza had talked to her sister around seven on Saturday night.
    “I was getting ready for a date, and she was on the computer,” Aliza told me. “Dassie’s
always
on the computer. And I’m always going on dates.” There was a hint of sadness behind the wry smile.
    She was nineteen, petite and more striking than Hadassah, with her father’s dark eyes and a long sleek waterfall of dark brown hair that she kept pushing behind her ears. With her midcalf skirt billowing around her, she sat cross-legged on the baby blue matelassé spread on one of the two twin beds, surrounded by skirts and sweaters, stuffed animals, and an assortment of throw pillows that picked up the blue and mauve in the floral wallpaper. More clothes lay on Hadassah’s bed. Aliza had shoved a pile aside so that I could sit.
    “I’m going to the Valley for
Shabbos,”
she said after apologizing for the mess of clothes. “A high school reunion. My parents said I have to go. I’m supposed to smile and pretend everything’s fine, when Dassie could be. . . .” Her lips trembled. “I can’t believe she ran away with a guy she met in a chat room. Why would she do something so
stupid?”
    “Hadassah never confided in you about being