The Fifteenth Representative, Hilla Dagan [free reads TXT] 📗

simply don’t see every day, rather chinches the deal. And that’s said through experience, so you can keep your tongue in cheek. That’s never been the focus of my story—something I’m sure some men and women find disappointing.

And to those ladies—I’ve got a beef to pick with you. None of what I have was stolen, the opposite is true. I worked like a mule for everything I have—the same things you people wouldn’t do yourselves. Thus, feeling jealous of me is petty and irrelevant. And it’s not like your men wouldn’t be looking at someone else if they weren’t busy staring at me. Everyone has their fantasies, and that’s the way they should remain. That is the definition of a fantasy, after all, otherwise it’s simply reality. And then what? Look for another fantasy? It’s never ending. What would you want in the end? To fly to the moon? It only seems like a small step, but it’s hundreds of thousands of kilometers, with no oxygen and an unforgiving atmosphere. Google it. You’ll find both pictures of me and of the Moon.

I grew up in Morasha, Ramat Hasharon.

Living in Ramat Hasharon sounds great. Morasha, less so. Take my word for it. This is also said through experience.

I went to school like everyone else, and I tied to be a good student. Decidedly not like everyone else. I also succeeded—again, not like everybody else. It’s never easy succeeding. It only seems that way from an outsider’s perspective. There isn’t someone who hasn’t busted their ass on the way to success. If they hadn’t, enjoying it wouldn’t be half as sweet.

It’s much like the way George Harrison put it in one of his songs that he sang with a few backup singers, among whom were Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, and that guy from the Light Orchestra. The one with the beard. They got together to sing for a little while and, luckily, someone was smart enough to press the record button.

My dad lost all our family assets when he listened to some smartass who was meddling in things he had no business meddling in. That basically doomed the whole family to forever have to work hard to get by. At a very young age, I decided to put my big girl panties on, so to say, and let the whole world see what I could do. I felt special.

I once asked a friend of mine whether she’d ever had something fall from behind her, then instinctively reach her hand behind her back and, in a matter of milliseconds, manage to grab hold of the falling object—all without looking. She told me she hadn’t. I persisted and asked whether she ever felt like Superwoman , and she answered with: “What’s up with you? Everyone feels that way, sometimes.”

I feel like that constantly, and it’s not fun.

I love challenges and I’m terribly competitive. I’ve got big ambitions, and I’m not ashamed of that—not of any of them.

Oh, but I do smoke. It’s a problem.

Well, nobody is perfect.

At the age of thirty-seven, I live in my own house and own another which I rent out. Such is the life of those who live in planes and hotels.

When you fly out as often as I do, you don’t pay rent. My boss at Greenpeace made sure I was well traveled because I’m great at convincing people. I’m only limited to my own set of boundaries. I don’t take orders from anybody, something which is a base condition for any place I work for. They trust my judgment and I bring in unparalleled results.

Natasha is my boss.

I had an affair with her husband fifteen years back, and she’s still completely unaware of that fact.

He is a real character… annoying as hell and tear-inducingly funny

Somehow practically brilliant and a complete idiot at the same time.

A disgusting chauvinist who is, quite possibly, the hottest man I’d ever met, with eyes so blue and wise I could have drowned in them.

I don’t know if I hate him and hold in him in very little regard, or whether I’m clinging on and in love. Probably in love.

It’s August. It’s sweltering. And I’m late.

Lucky I put on deodorant.

Chapter Three

I arrived at the train station on time. The heat of this country though—it could make you lose your mind. And the humidity… that was the main problem. It makes it feel so much hotter than it really is. It also makes you sweat a lot more. That’s why I love Sinai—no humidity.

Sun, beaches, freedom… hundreds of pairs of eyes looking only at me. And yes, I do enjoy the attention. Sinai was also the place where I became fully self-aware. It made my life a lot easier, but it also kind of ruined it, too. That’s what happens when people look right at you but don’t actually see you. It’s like looking at a country’s boarder but never visiting—never meeting the people who live there, seeing their houses and the families in them, never tasting their foods, smelling the different smells in the country’s streets, not encountering the peoples’ character, anger, smiles, general vibes… its history…. Does it sound colonialist? That’s because it is. People want my natural treasures while not truly listening to anything I have to say, only ever pretending. I know that fakeness well, and it makes my blood boil.

During the summer before my last year of high school, a group of us made plans to go to Sinai under the guise of a taking a trip to Eilat. There was no way my parents would allow me to go visit my cousins in Egypt. My parents are from the school of Jabotinsky. And they’re both right wing and Friday night dinner isn’t Friday night dinner if you don’t have a good political debate. Those who want to survive meeting my father, should best shut up and eat their food, unless they want to be added to the menu.

Those who I invite over for dinner at my