Below is a retelling of the long and terrible saga of the fridge, inspired by that holiday I miss so much in Israel, Halloween. Readers with weak stomachs beware.
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It was a dark and stormy night in Beit Shean.
The heavens had opened up as the final bell of school rang, and I walked home amongst a rush of students dancing and shrieking in the first real rain of the season. Baruch Hashem, the teachers exclaimed, praised be to God. The rain will feed our crops, cool our foreheads, wash our city clean. What a blessed day.
Do not be fooled.
Walking home, I thought about my fridge. It was metal with fake wooden paneling and latches to keep the doors from swinging open. Perhaps it was once the pride and glory of an Israeli in the time of Golda Meir, but now it lay in disrepair in our kitchen. Wires twisted like the innards of a wild animal and crossed in and out of melting ice blocks that held debris in perpetual brownish suspension. A gaping hole allowed you to reach your fingers through the unopened door and touch the food inside, reducing the fridge to a glorified pantry, the freezer to an ice box. Opening it was like reaching your arm into enemy territory- one would take a huge breath, plunge an arm deep into the belly of the beast, and pray for two intact limbs at the end of the ordeal. My roommates and I had been reminding our madrich of the situation for weeks, first gently, and then not so gently. The technicians were finally coming today, and I was hoping to come home to a fixed fridge.
I rounded the corner to my house. A dead bird lay on my stoop. I paused to stare at the oily black feathers, the twisted neck, wondering if it's life was worth the few hours of electricity it managed to take with it to the grave. I hoped the rain would wash away the smell of death that clung to the modest patch of grass outside my window.
Home, I make a beeline for the fridge, and sigh to see it unchanged. I am thirsty after a long day, and open the freezer, the only place where water will stay cold. Suddenly, I am hit by a wall of smell. I stumble backwards, unable to breath, my brain trying to catch up to my overwhelmed senses. My eyes streaming, I throw up my arms to protect against an oncoming attack. When there is none, I slowly relax my stance and peer into the offending appliance. A smell so terrible words do it no justice was emanating from the freezer. Has an animal crawled into the fan and found its end? If this were a cartoon, I would be enveloped in a cloud of acid-green, and squiggly lines would enter my nose and make my eyeballs swirl. Alas, this is life, not fiction, and life is far more terrible and less neat. Horrified, I shut the freezer, secure the latch, and run for cover in my room.
My roommates come home to find me cowering under blankets, wide-eyed and muttering to myself. They coax me out with promises of market stands piled high with gleaming produce. We give strict instructions to another roommate to bring this added problem to the attention of the repairman, and leave to wander the wide aisles full of persimmons and pistachios.
An hour later we come back, our arms filled with fruits. The door is ajar. Embolded by confection, I cautiously tiptoe across the threshold. There, pooling on the tile, is the most foul-smelling fluid I have ever seen. Brown and insidious, it slid across the floor like a serpent preparing to swallow its prey. Stunned, I watch the almonds fall from my hands and clatter on the floor, where they wait to be enveloped by the swirling mass.
My eyes flash to a corner yet untouched by the mess. Inching across the perimeter, I make my way towards the kitchen. There, heaving and sweating in the heart of the room, lay the beast. Its doors were splayed open like gaping mouths, and water dripped from icicles like terrible teeth. Fraying wires writhed like pathetic worms in the growing liquid that bled from its open jaws, and cucumbers and carrots lay strewn across the counter like forgotten soldiers in a field. The technicians brandished their tools against the terrible fridge in a losing battle, like a man who faces a tidal wave with a towel.
I know for the sake of my roommates, the repairmen, and my own pride, that I must do something, and fast. I take a deep breath, and dive for the cleaning supplies. I slip, and a toe touches the foul substance lapping at my feet. I shriek, and lunge towards the dish rags. I am safe for now, and begin the attack. I am everywhere, spraying, bleaching, wiping, mopping, and yet I cannot take back that slip into the spill. It is spreading, spreading, through my foot and up my leg, and I am aware of the dull buzzing in my head growing ever louder...
-----
It was a dark and stormy night in Beit Shean.
The heavens had opened up as the final bell of school rang, and I walked home amongst a rush of students dancing and shrieking in the first real rain of the season. Baruch Hashem, the teachers exclaimed, praised be to God. The rain will feed our crops, cool our foreheads, wash our city clean. What a blessed day.
Do not be fooled.
Walking home, I thought about my fridge. It was metal with fake wooden paneling and latches to keep the doors from swinging open. Perhaps it was once the pride and glory of an Israeli in the time of Golda Meir, but now it lay in disrepair in our kitchen. Wires twisted like the innards of a wild animal and crossed in and out of melting ice blocks that held debris in perpetual brownish suspension. A gaping hole allowed you to reach your fingers through the unopened door and touch the food inside, reducing the fridge to a glorified pantry, the freezer to an ice box. Opening it was like reaching your arm into enemy territory- one would take a huge breath, plunge an arm deep into the belly of the beast, and pray for two intact limbs at the end of the ordeal. My roommates and I had been reminding our madrich of the situation for weeks, first gently, and then not so gently. The technicians were finally coming today, and I was hoping to come home to a fixed fridge.
I rounded the corner to my house. A dead bird lay on my stoop. I paused to stare at the oily black feathers, the twisted neck, wondering if it's life was worth the few hours of electricity it managed to take with it to the grave. I hoped the rain would wash away the smell of death that clung to the modest patch of grass outside my window.
Home, I make a beeline for the fridge, and sigh to see it unchanged. I am thirsty after a long day, and open the freezer, the only place where water will stay cold. Suddenly, I am hit by a wall of smell. I stumble backwards, unable to breath, my brain trying to catch up to my overwhelmed senses. My eyes streaming, I throw up my arms to protect against an oncoming attack. When there is none, I slowly relax my stance and peer into the offending appliance. A smell so terrible words do it no justice was emanating from the freezer. Has an animal crawled into the fan and found its end? If this were a cartoon, I would be enveloped in a cloud of acid-green, and squiggly lines would enter my nose and make my eyeballs swirl. Alas, this is life, not fiction, and life is far more terrible and less neat. Horrified, I shut the freezer, secure the latch, and run for cover in my room.
My roommates come home to find me cowering under blankets, wide-eyed and muttering to myself. They coax me out with promises of market stands piled high with gleaming produce. We give strict instructions to another roommate to bring this added problem to the attention of the repairman, and leave to wander the wide aisles full of persimmons and pistachios.
An hour later we come back, our arms filled with fruits. The door is ajar. Embolded by confection, I cautiously tiptoe across the threshold. There, pooling on the tile, is the most foul-smelling fluid I have ever seen. Brown and insidious, it slid across the floor like a serpent preparing to swallow its prey. Stunned, I watch the almonds fall from my hands and clatter on the floor, where they wait to be enveloped by the swirling mass.
My eyes flash to a corner yet untouched by the mess. Inching across the perimeter, I make my way towards the kitchen. There, heaving and sweating in the heart of the room, lay the beast. Its doors were splayed open like gaping mouths, and water dripped from icicles like terrible teeth. Fraying wires writhed like pathetic worms in the growing liquid that bled from its open jaws, and cucumbers and carrots lay strewn across the counter like forgotten soldiers in a field. The technicians brandished their tools against the terrible fridge in a losing battle, like a man who faces a tidal wave with a towel.
I know for the sake of my roommates, the repairmen, and my own pride, that I must do something, and fast. I take a deep breath, and dive for the cleaning supplies. I slip, and a toe touches the foul substance lapping at my feet. I shriek, and lunge towards the dish rags. I am safe for now, and begin the attack. I am everywhere, spraying, bleaching, wiping, mopping, and yet I cannot take back that slip into the spill. It is spreading, spreading, through my foot and up my leg, and I am aware of the dull buzzing in my head growing ever louder...
this is extremely well written, funny yet terrifying. ARE YOU ALIVE???
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