Like when I kissed you on your collarbone, tongue and all, the sigh that you gave, full of air and indulgence, first times, and I've imagined this too many times, is how I felt every time, walking down King George street. I sometimes remembered the news, how the country is drying up, how everything is drying up, when filling my massive Jacuzzi. Sometimes; but mostly, it was mine to fill, and I pleasured myself every day. After two, I would dry myself off, dress to kill, and leave; always pausing for five minutes as I attempted to lock, and unlock the rusty door to my apartment. It looks so lived in now, and you wouldn't guess that once it was only white walls, and dusty furniture. You wouldn't believe, there'd be no one on the porch to observe the world.

He said I could talk to him in English, and that it was ok; although his teacher was a shroomy, and always gave directions to the next desert rave, they still managed to learn some English. In the bar, I have to repeat my order twice. "Do you have Long Island Iced Tea?" twice, and on the third time, she says, "Long island?" that was the lingo here. Yes, long island. Two. On the second one, I had to repeat my order three times, and his friend was telling me how he wanted to become a pilot. Oh, just wait, just wait until I finish this one. But it was not his bed I went to, later that night.

Two people were murdered on the shore, the week before; once by the waves, once by a gang. At midnight I cling to my uncle's arm, as we jump the waves. Tel-Aviv looked lived in today, I said to myself, from my porch. It always looks that way, the push and pull of people, walking in all hours; it is never forced, it just is. Like how leaves fall, and they grow again, in a land far away from here. "Long Island" I said, it's even funnier, because I live there, I tried explaining to him. A shot of; vodkarumgintequilatriplesec. I want to tell him, it's like what the mothers need to forget their lives, but I couldn't get it out. "Triple sex?" I pretend, and say yes. There is triple sex in my long island; too bad you only got a double.

I have braved the central terminal three times; each time I feel violated. A man says "Hey sweety, where're you from?" I try to ignore. He informs me that he is talking to me. I don't want to say. In the fringes are the immigrants, huddled 20 to a small room. The building spirals upwards, and there seems not to be an exit. I pretend to talk on the phone, even though I know, I'm not in any danger. The other women there know so, too. Later he says we'll go back to his place. He said I was beautiful, and only because it was 2am, two iced teas, I didn't roll my eyes. I knew, I knew. I didn't make the first move; it never did me well, but he just lay there, as he said it. "You know, you're really beautiful" almost surprised like. How he thought, perhaps, as I went to visit his mother and he saw me for the first time. He walked in, and pretended to look at DVDs.

I am stuck a week without money, and I would have walked the city, had it not been for the suffocating heat, like when he kissed me and didn't know how. Or like how he would hang on to me too tight, and I never ask why he has a limp. Everywhere, I am always sweating. When I speak, I scratch my palm, hoping no one will detect my slight accent. At the crafts market, I ask the artists where they learn to meld glass, and they answer me in English; when I first meet him, he asks if he should speak English to me.

King George street is like when he drags one finger between my breasts; it is the center, and it is mine. It leads the park and to the mall. To the beach, and the bookshop where I buy Nabokov for ten shekels. Further down, he says, you have a beautiful stomach. I think of all the rejections. I think of how you think I'm fat. I say, I should be getting back. Where the crafts fair ends, the carmel market begins. It is an ugly array of lighters and knives, tourists and arses. Wherein, the crafts fair shows me life here is possible; I see, like how they meld together sheets of glass to create a pendant that I buy for my mother. I think, maybe I can fit.

I walk up the hill with my uncle, to visit a friend of his from NA. His son, from when he was still straight and married, is a pilot, and the look in his eyes reminds me, I can fit only with a guy like Jonathan, who cannot kiss; who cannot walk. His girlfriend is sprawled on the bed, eyes closed; thin like a branch, with an ass like fruit. In the kitchen, NA friend hands me a fig, in a slight lisp that makes me smile, but I am sweating, I am melting, so I do not eat my favorite fruit.

Later, in the airport, I call Jonathan. I hate him. I have not called him, and he has not called me, spoken to me; save an awkward incident on the street, a random sighting. I say, I'm leaving. He starts talking fast, let's keep in touch, online, this and that (screenames are never exchanged). Finally, he says thank you. On my last night, I walk King George street from top to bottom. I pass the hippy clothing shop, the vintage dresses, the bar, that bar, long island. I pass the spot where a middle age woman begs for money to help pay for her mother's cancer. I pass the mall. Thank you. Like, thank you for showing me I can live here, but more like, thank you for being my first? Even though, I was hardly giving. Thank you for not asking? About my limp? Thank you for pretending, at least, to tolerate me. I said, Thank you; "You know, you're really an asshole." Sleepless nights back in Long Island, regretting how he was not perfect, how I went back a second time, how he was to be my destiny, is how I felt walking down King George street; not talking, just sweating.