Their words crashed together, slamming against her temples. As ruthless as any hit she’d ever taken at the gym.
When Naomi had first decided to star in adult films, she’d conducted an exercise alone in her room. She’d written down every word she could think of that disparaged women and sex workers, her hand shaking as she formed the letters, carefully, one after the other, on scraps of paper until they covered her carpet. When she was done, there were close to a hundred of them. Each sharper than the last.
Words meant to leave shrapnel in their victims. Words with teeth. She made herself look until her vision blurred. If she couldn’t take them alone in her room, she’d never survive. Naomi read the slander, the curses, the labels, one after the other. She let them sink beneath herskin, testing their weight. It got easier after she started imagining herself as a master of poisons, building up a tolerance by letting the insults pollute her body, her mind, until she built up a resilience. Her plan to reclaim her identity required that sort of immunity.
It had taken a week for her to be able to say some of them out loud without growing nauseous. The first two nights, she’d actually thrown up. Not from the definitions, but from the memories they evoked.
A different hallway, the mass of people younger then, and with less to lose. The startling knowledge that life as she’d known it was over, wiped clean, or rather dirty, by a single night. A single boy.
Sluthad been the clear favorite back then. She’d wondered once, years later, half laughing, if it was because of the hardTat the end. The satisfying way teeth came together at the back of the word. She’d considered, briefly, getting it tattooed somewhere on her body. So that the next time someone called her a slut, she could flash them her wrist or her shoulder and answer, “Damn straight.”
The thing that had stopped her in the end was an old rule. Leviticus. She couldn’t be buried with her Jewish family if she bore the ink. Enough doors had slammed in her face by that point; she wasn’t going to invite another one just to prove a point.
What a fool she’d been to think she and Ethan could get away with just deciding to date. She’d let herself grow complacent, confident from the lectures, the casual acceptance of the younger community members, their eagerness and excitement.
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” an older man said to her now, pushing himself forward so he could get right in her face.
A moment later, Ethan was in front of her, stepping between her and the crowd that had gathered outside the classroom, creating a barrier with his body. Enough that she could finally process what was happening. Protesters. News crews. Anxious JCC members, brought out of their Zumba classes and bocce ball games to investigate.
“How dare you talk about shame,” Ethan said, rage rolling off him in waves. “In a world that knows so much injustice, so much suffering, you’ve come here to scream at people you don’t know about practices that are none of your business, feet from where children play.”
“I’m sorry, Rabbi Cohen.” A short woman with gray curls was touching his arm. “I tried to keep them outside, but they wouldn’t listen.” The director of the JCC, Naomi realized. “I’ve called security. They’ll be here any moment.”
Ethan turned so his whole body faced Naomi. “I want to get you out of here,” he said, leaning in to speak against her ear. He pulled back to look at her, his jaw strained, changing the planes of his face into something hard and unyielding as stone. “What do you want?”
What did she want? She wanted to sit down with her back against the cold concrete wall. She wanted to wrap her arms around her knees and lower her head until she couldn’t see any of this, could pretend it was a nightmare. Forceful but fleeting. She’d had plenty of them over the last decade, similar enough in pitch that the idea wasn’t a stretch. But she didn’t say any of that.
“I want to finish my seminar.” She brought her mouth to his, quick but soft, a reminder that what they had was sweet enough to challenge the vitriol in this hallway. Maybe even the vitriol that lay outside too. Anti-Semitism was the reason this JCC and every other had security guards at all hours. “I trust you to take care of this.”
He nodded, worry so harsh across his face that she wanted to smooth it with her fingertips.
But she never left an audience waiting. Naomi pushed her way back to the door, moved to the lectern, and adjusted the volume on the microphone. “Sorry about that.”
The auditorium was out of sorts, people halfway out of their seats, eyes anxious and unsure.
A hand went up: Molly, of course. “Ms. Grant, are you sure you’re okay?”
Behind the door, new voices joined the throng, louder, calling for order and meeting resistance.
Craig and Dan got up silently and stood on either side of the doorway, facing in, arms crossed and eyes fierce, nodding at her from adopted sentry positions.
Naomi’s heart clenched. Tears welled in her eyes. She’d known censure and scorn before, but this part was different. The part where there were people on her side, taking up her defense. The part where she had more to lose than her dignity. The part where she was fighting not out of spite, but because she believed that one day her rebellion might make it easier for someone else to know peace.
She nodded back.
“I know I’m supposed to keep talking about sex, and I promise I have a lot more to say on the subject. But before I do,” Naomi said, “I want to acknowledge something about modern intimacy that falls outside the original bounds of the syllabus.”
Tender like the ocean returning to shore, no matter how many times it’s sent away.
“This world is full of people who would rather hate you than examine the pain in their own hearts. They will try to limit who you can love, who you can spend time with, who you can fuck. Some of these people will act like their condemnation is in your best interest. Like one day you’ll thank them for showing you the error of your ways. Some of them feel better about their own lives when they can deny the validity of yours.”
The voices in the hallway were fading, footfalls carrying them away like dust on the wind. She released a breath and then another, rolled her shoulders back, offered her skittish audience her best attempt at a smile.
“I’ve been a social pariah for many years now, and I can tell you that it’s worth it to not spend a second of your precious time on earth worrying about what other people believe you should do, believe you should be. Your body is a gift. Your life is yours alone.”
This time when her eyes shot to the door, it was because Ethan was standing there, arms crossed over his chest, color high in his cheeks, the curls on his head in disarray. His mouth made a now familiar shape.Heylike ‘you’re safe.’
She wrapped her hand around her opposite wrist, held on tight.