Free I Am Forbidden by Anouk Markovits Page B

excitedly about this year’s entering class, the largest ever, forty-five, bless the Lord, almost a hundred in the entire seminary, the principal was very happy, bless the Lord, this year’s T1 girls were all so special.
    “T1 girls?” Atara asked.
    “Teachers 1—for Teacher’s Training College, but the teacher’s degree is granted only if one stays the entire three years.” The girl’s voice held a note of regret.
    “Marguit is engaged!” the second girl chimed in.
    Mila and Atara shook Marguit’s hand. “Mazel tov!”
    “Esti, too, is engaged!” Marguit teased.
    “Mazel tov!”
    The taxi stopped mid-block in front of a three-storyhouse. The older students explained that the seminary comprised four adjoining houses with interconnected corridors. No, Mila and Atara would not share the same room; all T1 girls were encouraged to make new friends.
    S IX BEDS in two facing rows under a bare bulb. Cloth of faded green-and-wine corduroy screened six shelves. A loud bell, the bulb went out. The orange coil of the wall-mounted heater glowered and went dark. In the middle bed of the row facing the window, Atara pulled the coarse blanket to her nose. She would try; she must. She would learn to fall asleep without reading—where would she have hidden a book and a flashlight in a room shared with five girls? Lulling herself, she fell into the sensation that a train was rocking her to some farther destination,
tournent roues, tournent roues … tournent … tournent.…
    In the adjoining house, in a room with two facing rows of beds, Mila also lulled herself. Comforted by the fervor she sensed in the other girls whispering their bedtime prayers, she joined in:
“Michael is to my right, Gabriel to my left, Uriel is in front.…”
    Mila woke full of anticipation. She was thrilled to belong to the first generation of Hasidic women who would be studyingScripture. She looked forward to meeting girls from different walks of orthodox life: from Hasidic communities and Misnaged communities; from Litvak, Yekke, and Polish families; from every corner of Europe, from the two Americas, from Australia and South Africa—all in long skirts and long-sleeved blouses, girls among whom she would be, at last, normal.
    The class schedule was: Pentateuch, Prophets, Midrash, Jewish Thought, Conduct. During Pentateuch class, Mila wondered: Had her father come across this very interpretation? Had gematriah enchanted him as it enchanted her? To Mila, gematriah felt occult yet cerebral, mystical yet rational, drawing the Hebrew words of Scripture into the more universal language of numbers.
    During afternoon study hours, Mila whispered to Atara, “Did you notice? The letters in the word
(messiah)
sum to 358, which equals the sum of
(snake)
.” Mila recounted the commentary: This equation corroborated that redemption and sin were not exclusive of each other.
Fear not to go down to Egypt
, the Lord tells Jacob; Jacob must go
down
before he can raise a great nation. Descent for the sake of ascent. Redemption
through
sin was a sign of messianic times.
    Most of all, Mila cherished the third Sabbath meal at the seminary, when all the girls sang and danced and circled Queen Sabbath to detain her a bit longer. In the last glimmer of sundown, the girls intoned longingly,
Prophet Elijah, come to us with the messiah
, and Mila daydreamed: Who among them would give birth to the messiah, son of David, who among the girls would deliver the world from suffering?
    A FTER all the years during which Atara’s secular reading had pulled them apart, Mila loved to prepare for classes with Atara, she loved how Atara studied every page of the Mikraoth Gedoloth, the Expanded Rabbinic Bible, not just the assigned commentaries. Teachers began to call on Atara to explain obscure passages, and classmates consulted her during study hours.
    Yet, however earnestly Atara tried to embrace the seminary, Mila feared that it might not last. She could tell from the rigidity