The Pure

operative.’
    ‘Life in the fast lane.’ Avner snorted, finished his coffee, and sat back. ‘I don’t like to see you in a mess, Adam.’
    ‘I don’t like to see you at all,’ said Uzi, eating a sugar cube.
    ‘You’re like a horse,’ said Avner, ‘the way you eat sugar. It’s like a horse.’
    They fell silent. Uzi picked up his coffee cup, saw that it was empty, put it down again. He was still feeling jumpy, he needed a cigarette. Come on, Avner, he thought, enough with the small talk. But Avner wasn’t ready. Not yet.
    ‘How’s that girl?’ said Uzi for something to say.
    ‘She does the job,’ Avner replied. ‘What about you? Getting much action?’
    ‘Not really,’ said Uzi.
    ‘I should set you up. I know lots of girls.’
    ‘Matchmaker, matchmaker.’
    ‘That waitress, for example. Don’t tell me you didn’t notice her,’ said Avner. ‘She’s got a reputation. She’ll suck your cock. All you’ve got to do is walk up to her and put it in her mouth.’
    ‘Fuck you, Avner,’ said Uzi, ‘you just want me to get it bitten off. I’m going outside for a smoke. Stay here if you want.’
    He got up from his chair and left the café, ignoring Avner’s remarks. Once in the street he felt a desperate anger arise from nowhere. Whatever Avner was going to say, why didn’t he just come out and say it? All this beating about the bush. Uzi fumbled with his cigarettes. He was enraged, he needed to let fly. What a load of shit. It was always the same with Avner. He had known that meeting him would be a mistake. But in a perverse way, he thirsted for the anger, the resentments, the hatred. They reminded him of home.
    He smoked the cigarette as his temper smouldered. His ear began to itch again, and he passed his hand over his face in frustration.
    ‘Uzi.’
    ‘What do you want? You said you would leave me alone today,’ he mumbled, trying not to look as if he was talking to himself.
    ‘I think we should discuss Avner Golan.’ It was the older voice this time. He hadn’t heard the Kol sounding so old in a while.
    ‘Look, I can handle this myself, OK? I’m not a baby. I don’t need you.’
    ‘I’m your friend, Uzi.’
    ‘I don’t need you. Not today.’
    The voice paused, thinking. ‘OK,’ it said at last.
    ‘Too fucking right.’
    ‘Believe in yourself.’
    ‘Yeah, whatever.’
    Uzi shook his head as if to rid it of all remnants of the Kol. Through the window of the café, Avner could be seen chatting to the waitress, making movements with his hands as if he was describing a watermelon. A group of teenagers walked past, looking ridiculous in impossibly tight jeans, asymmetric haircuts, Ray-Bans. They were children. Everyone in England was a child. Nobody knew what real life was about. He finished his cigarette and, fortified, went back into the café. Avner dismissed the waitress charmingly and turned back to him.
    ‘Better?’ said Avner.
    Uzi shrugged. ‘No worse.’
    ‘I haven’t ordered you another espresso.’
    ‘I didn’t expect you to.’
    This time, Uzi let the silence hang.
    ‘Right,’ said Avner at last, ‘let’s get down to some tachless .’
    The Hebrew word clashed with the French and Uzi glanced around the café.
    ‘Relax,’ said Avner in Hebrew, ‘just take it easy. That’s no normal waitress. We’re safe here. If anyone followed you here, they’re not listening to what we’re saying now.’
    ‘You’re trying to fuck with my head.’
    ‘Here’s the deal,’ said Avner, dismissing Uzi’s anxiety with a sweeping motion of his hands. ‘The way I see it, we’re in the same boat.’
    ‘Really? How do you figure that?’
    ‘You’ve always been a head-in-the-clouds bastard, the only idealist I’ve ever met in the Office. Me, I’m like everyone else, just in it for the money. That’s why we always worked together so well. But right now, we’ve both been screwed by the powers that be. That’s all that matters.’
    Uzi scowled. ‘I quit because of the corruption. You were demoted because you crossed the wrong guy. That doesn’t put us in the same boat.’
    ‘Details, details,’ said Avner cheerfully. ‘The point is, you and I can make money together. And at the same time, do some good.’
    ‘Do some good?’
    ‘I have a proposal for you.’
    Uzi found himself already needing another cigarette. Avner picked up the signs; he waved the waitress over and ordered Uzi another espresso. They were silent until the coffee arrived. Then, as Uzi