Chapter 23
Ron got to school early the next morning. Zoe wasn’t in bed next to him, tempting him to stay just a little longer while she sucked or sketched or massaged some part of him. So, he got there with two containers of coffee over an hour before the official day was to begin. Sitting in his room, staring out the window over the fire escape, Ron drank coffee and watched the street. This part of the city, because of its tumult of large oak trees, was filled with squirrels. They scampered along tree branches and over the sidewalks and between the cracks in stone walls. Ron sipped and watched their movements, almost ballet like, their senses tuned to the heartbeat of the day.
“Good morning, Ron” Sister Bernadette stood in his doorway, filling
it with her large shoulders, her modified habit, her warm dark-eyed smile.
Ron turned towards her, pulled from the reverie of the street, missing the scent of Zoe on him, nervously puffed with the allusions to a future that Robin had suggested and said, “Good Morning Sister Bernadette.”
She waited in his doorway and then Ron invited her with an unopened container of coffee which, to his surprise, she accepted. “Are things better for you now? I mean, since the fire?”
Instantly, Ron saw and felt the flames dancing in back of his eyes. Waking up, feeling their heat, staring into it, pulling away and hollering Fire! “Yes Sister, I seem to be doing better.”
“The girls were all worried about you. You know, they care for you very much.”
“They are quite special aren’t they?”
“Yes, but,” she said smiling. “We are only here to witness how special they are.”
Ron felt genuine warmth emanate from her as she smiled for him. He found himself returning the smile and sharing something with her that cut through everything else. In that instant, he saw the two of them wanting only the best for these young people, willing to make an investment in their success, sadly dedicated to some invisible future of potential.
Driving without a license, and in the teeth-grinding grasp of an epileptic seizure, Alfredo Mora crashed the front of his car into the solid brick corner of their building. His head snapped forward and banged on the hard plastic steering wheel. Blood sprayed from his nose. He was chewing his tongue and drooling. His sister, Gina, was thrown against the passenger side door, screaming.
Alarmed dismay jumped like an electric arc between Bernadette and Ron and then they were on their feet and out the door, just in time to see the now stalled car roll back towards the street. Bernadette ran towards Gina and pulled the door open and gathered the girl into her strong and freshly laundered arms. Ron sprinted to the driver’s side. Alfredo was bent over the wheel but as the car rolled back so did he, mouth open, eyes fluttering, tongue lolling out of the corner of his mouth.
Ron yanked the door open and slid his hands into Alfredo’s armpits, pulling him out of the car. He rested him down against the ground and then someone brought him some kind of cloth and he propped it under Alfredo’s neck. Bernadette ordered, “Put wood between his teeth, and make sure he doesn’t swallow his tongue.”
Ron reached into his mouth and tried to find the tongue. Teeth bit into the back of his hand, wincing fingers probing for the tongue, bringing his head up and bending his shoulders forward. Then Alfredo spit out a stream of bile and Ron saw that his tongue was sticking out as the phlegm slashed against him. The squirrels disappeared with the sound of the siren and as Ron held him up not thinking of what he should do next. People arrived and Ron was moved away.
The North Ward Citizens Group ran a private ambulance service and as soon as they got the call from the school, a detail had been dispatched. They had arrived within five minutes. Although they had the reputation of being a racist group, their ambulance served the neighborhood, irrespective of color. Founded by Anthony Imperiale, a loud- mouthed, ex-marine who extolled the value of all things Italian, the group had gained a sort of national attention during the Newark riots, when Tony’s boys trained in Branch Brook Park and according to lots of rumors, did a lot more than train. All of the members were recruited personally by Imperiale and were, again according to rumor, at least half Italian.
Ron had once met Tony at one of his step-father’s hangouts. He had been appalled when the gavonne had called Martin King “Martin Coon.” His stepfather had grabbed Ron hard by the shoulder when Ron had said, “Now how does talking shit like that do anyone any good?”
Tony did not seem to recognize Ron as he and another man laid out a stretcher and lifted the still twitching Alfredo into the back of the ambulance. Then a patrol car arrived and Ron went back into the school and to the bathroom so that he could try to clean up and get ready for the day.
For the first time since he’d begin teaching, Ron was out the door with the bell. He drove back to the apartment and called Zoe. She was out. He left a message hearing the word Freedom sing in his ears. Then he dialed Robin.
Her mother answered the phone. Her voice was a bit shaky but had a lilt that bore some resemblance to the way that Robin spoke. “Yes, Ron, she is here. She’s been antsy waiting to hear from you all day and now she has thrown herself onto the bed because I didn’t give her the phone right away.”
Ron could not picture this. It was at odds with the cool exterior view with which Robin presented to him these days, but the idea of it still made his heart flutter. Maybe it was true. Maybe his instincts about her had been correct. Maybe having a relationship with Zoe was gonna royally fuck up any chance that he and Robin had of getting back together. Ron said, “Just ask her if she would like to drive down and pick her up now, if you could Mrs. Pavel.”
Then Robin was on the phone and her voice had that cool soft lilt and Ron closed his eyes at the sound of it. “Are you coming down?”
“Where do you need to go?”
“I don’t need to go anywhere. I thought that maybe we could just spend a little time together.”
Ron flew down the parkway. His radio was blasting Deacon Blue. He wanted to be there instantly. He felt fit and a little edgy. He was pleased with his appearance. Maybe that would have an effect on her, but he doubted it. When he got to her mother’s house, she said, “Would you mind taking me food shopping?”
They wandered up and down the aisles of the supermarket, him pushing the cart, she holding a list. She said, “My mother is crazy.”
“That’s not news,” said Ron before he thought about it.
She looked at him strangely and said, “So this teaching thing has really got you, huh?”
“It’s special. I close the door and it’s a different world and nothing except for what I do with them matters.”
“Where are you going to live?”
“I don’t know. Not anywhere expensive based on what they are paying me. But I did get a second job.”
“Doing what?”
“Tutoring.”
“Doesn’t it feel as if it has you trapped a little?”
“Not so much as some other things,” said Ron.
Then they unloaded the groceries and checked out. Working as they always did, without need for the “you do this and I’ll do that” conversation. Anticipating each other, in control of an immediate goal, like a scene on a stage or the making of a meal, but no longer with the in and out intimacy of people who had sex.
In the car, she said, “Have you been going to Rahway?”
“Not so much, it’s not like it used to be there either,” said Ron. “I don’t ever just go there.”
She laughed. “Are you ever invited?”
Ron blushed. “Not so much, no.”
In back of his eyes, he saw her and in his ears he heard her words. “You’re not a real person, you know. You just made yourself up and it’s all fantasy and acting.” Ron winced. He tried to blink the words and image away but he couldn’t move it. He had believed her. Did he still believe her?
He extended his right hand and she took it. Her fingers against his palm, inclining her head and rubbing the backs of his fingers against her cheek, she said, “We’ve made such a mess of this.”
Ron just gazed at her. Was it really possible that they had a future? He wanted to speak out but his voice wouldn’t come. Her cheek was smooth and the touch of her fingers intoxicating. He felt himself slipping away and tried to hold on. He tried to hold on, but an image of her needing to be rid of him overtook his vision. He stared at Robin and thought she had tried so hard to be free of him. Did holding his hand feel like a defeat? Did sliding the backs of his fingers over the intimate smoothness of her face constitute surrender? Ron traced the line of her lips and she parted them ever so slightly. He thought of all the nights that she had slept naked next to him in her bed and not allowed him to touch her. Again, he thought of Zoe. And again he tried to push the image away. Zoe defenseless. Zoe vulnerable. Zoe in need of him. Robin’s lips at the ends of his fingers. Tracing her lips. Entranced by the fire in her eyes. The stubborn fragility of her cheekbone.
Ron said, “I love teaching my students.”
She didn’t answer.