Archives for July 2013

Chapter 66

 

It wasn’t so much that he dreaded the weekends, as it was that he felt lost during them. Ron sat at his desk, on Friday night, thinking about his life. He felt as if the changes that he was going through were profound. In his mind, he pictured himself walking the halls and grounds of the various college campuses that he had haunted. He had always kept his eyes focused on the girls that he had seen. He had always wanted to meet them. There were never too many girls, even when he had been with Robin or Zoe or anyone else. He felt that was behind him now. He was not going to be looking for a girl, not ever again. He had decided that from now on he would wait to be found rather than look for someone that he wished to find. He had grown tired of the endless desire. It had not served him well. As he thought about it, he realized that anytime something had worked out, it had been by accident, or he had been the one who had been pursued. Hadn’t Robin told him that she had watched him for weeks before she had been able to get his attention? Hadn’t he met Zoe when meeting a girl was the last thing on his mind? Hadn’t his other encounters with women been a series of comical mishaps? It was time for it to stop. What was the saying about staying in one place and letting the world come to you? Ron had gone off looking for the world and each, and every time that he had done that it had worked out badly. Maybe the truth was that he did not like himself well enough to want anyone who wanted him. Maybe what he needed to do was just wait and see what it was that life had in store for him instead of seeing it like a gigantic treasure hunt.

These insights did not make him happy. He saw himself as damaged beyond repair. He was like his knees. Once his speed had been one of his best attributes as an athlete, but it was only when he had learned to accept their damage and stop trying to pretend that he had not been injured that he was able to get himself into the shape that he was in today. He had gone out looking for the perfect job, but it was not until his mother had taken the step that he had resisted and sent out his resume that he had come to Our Lady of the Forlorn. It was not as if he had nothing. He had his teaching and he was sure that it would sustain him for a long time.

It was about 11pm when the phone rang. Ron had been thumbing through his copy of Shakespeare’s plays and lying on his bed. He had no idea who could possibly be calling him.

“Hello.”

A soft, scared voice said, “Mr. Tuck, it is Elena.”

Ron felt a jolt. “Elena, what’s wrong? Can I help you?”

“I need your advice, Mr. Tuck.”

“OK.”

“I am with my boyfriend Junior. He is in the other room and I don’t know what to do.”

“Just tell me what is wrong,” said Ron.

“He wants me to do it and I said that I would and now I’m scared.”

“Why are you scared?”

“I don’t know. I think that I’m just being silly.”

Ron nodded. His mind raced. “If you are scared, then maybe you aren’t ready.”

“What do you mean?”

“There is a lot of pressure on you Elena. You are still very young. There really isn’t a reason to rush.”

“A lot of the girls in class talk about doing it with their boyfriends. I feel like I’m being stupid.”

“Maybe you are being very smart.”

“What do you mean?”

“Doubts are often a good thing, Elena.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I think that you are calling me, because maybe you don’t want to and want me to tell you not to.”

Ron bit his lip. He sounded just like Lashly, telling a student that she didn’t really know what it was that she wanted. One difference a reassuring voice said in his head was that he wasn’t going to have Elena come to his house so that he could show her how to do it.

“You think that is it?”

“I really do, Elena.”

“Then I’m not going to do it.”

“Whether you do or not has to be your decision and it can’t be because Junior will get mad if you don’t, or that the other girls will think that you are strange because you don’t. When you are ready, I promise you that you won’t be calling me or anyone else.”

“Thank you, Mr. Tuck. I think that was really what I needed to hear.”

“Alright Elena. You can call back whenever you need to call.”

“You are wonderful, Mr. Tuck. Why can’t my boyfriend be like you?”

Ron laughed. “Cause he isn’t as old as I am.”

Elena said softly, “He is only three years younger than you are.”

Ron frowned. This was not some eighteen year old guy trying to talk his girlfriend into giving it up. This was a grown man with one of his students. His face hardened. “If there is any problem when you say no, call me and I will come and get you.”

“There won’t be a problem, Mr. Tuck but thank you for looking out for me.”

Then she was gone. Ron hoped that he had said the right things to her. He stared at the ceiling for a long time before he drifted off to sleep.

Chapter 65

Ron waited for the girls to arrive. He was anxious to see them. It occurred to him that he had never had a favorite class before, and he wondered if it was healthy. Although he was active and happy in his other classes, he did not think about them the way that he thought about the Shakespeare class. He worried that he might be short changing his other classes.

His worry vanished when he saw them coming in. Many of them moved straight to the side board and began to write before they even put their books down and before the bell rang that announced the start of the class. They were using their hall time, their free time to talk to each other, to be in his room and write comments about the reading. It made him swell with pride as he watched them.

Samantha wrote, “Portia is cool. I like her.”

Donna wrote, “Jessica is going to be an unhappy girl. This thing with Lorenzo is doomed.”

Elena wrote, “The loan seems to be filled with hatred.”

Elizabeth wrote, “Portia is trapped because if she does not honor her father’s will, she will lose her own honor.”

Helen wrote, “These people give their religions a bad name.”

Ron watched the girls writing and tried hard to not notice the way that their young bottoms jiggled as they wrote so furiously. He looked down into his book. He did not want to look at them that way.

Connie wrote, “I think that Portia and Nerissa are true friends and I hope that nothing bad happens to them.”

Veronica wrote, “I think I know why Antonio is sad.”

Her comment startled Ron. It was a good place to start the class but if would diffuse some of their excitement over Portia. She had spun her spell on them and they were seeing themselves in her place. Shakespeare truly was an incredible genius, thought Ron. How could he conceive of this character? Then he realized that in a world ruled by a queen, it was be easier to think of women as strong.

“Ok,” said Ron. It seems like everyone has gotten through the first two acts. Does anyone have any questions about what is going on?”

Ron waited. No one raised a hand. He turned to Elena. “Summarize for me. What has happened?”

Elena smiled. “Well Bassanio and Portia are going to get to be together.  You can just see that coming. But, Bassanio went to Shylock and they agreed on this weird loan, three thousand ducats for three months. Antonio guarantees the loan and Shylock says that he wants a pound of Antonio’s flesh if he can’t pay in time.”

Donna interrupted. “Is that legal?” I mean, can you make a loan for that kind of repayment?”

It was a good question, almost too good. If he really answered her now, he would blow the ending. “The laws were different back then and remember, people also sold themselves into slavery to gain passage to America. Such a thing would not be legal today, but back then it was a common practice.” He looked at Donna. His answer seemed to satisfy her. He turned his gaze back to Elena and the dark eyed girl continued.

“Shylock’s daughter Jessica and Lorenzo want to be together, but they have to sneak around. Oh, and I finally understand about Portia’s father’s game. If these guys make a wrong answer they have to agree on their honor to go away immediately and never marry. That makes the stakes a bit higher. So they have to really want Portia before they even ask to choose. I wish that they did not keep the answers in caskets though. That is very creepy.”

Ron smiled. “They aren’t caskets in the way that we think of the word. They just are small boxes, like jewelry boxes.”

“Oh, “said Elena. “Is there any reason that they can’t just say jewelry boxes?”

“Caskets does make it seem much more serious, doesn’t it?” said Ron. “Ok, how many of you agree with Donna and think that Jessica is making a mistake?”

Ron directed their eyes over to Donna’s comment on the side board. He made a yes and no divide on the chalkboard and had the strange thought that he did it by drawing a cross. That hadn’t occurred to him before. He polled the room quickly. The class was split. The class was split ten agreeing that Jessica was making a mistake and thirteen not agreeing. Ron turned to Donna, “OK, why do you think that she is making a mistake?”

“Because of the way that he talks to her,” said Donna. “He talks down to her all the time. Wait let me find it.” She looked into the book. Ron almost popped a shirt button with the swell of pride in his chest as she went to the text to back up her assertion. She got it. She was way ahead of the curve.

Donna read, “‘Most beautiful pagan, most sweet Jew! if a Christian did not play the knave and get thee, I am much deceived.’ Donna paused. “That’s not the best example, but I always get the feeling that he is talking down to her and treating her as if he is doing her some kind of great favor.”

Ron nodded, “OK.”

“I think that he really loves her and that he doesn’t care if she is a Jew or a Christian. I think that he really wants to be with her,” said Helen.

“Does anyone think that she should not go with Lorenzo other than for Donna’s reason?” said Ron.

Veronica raised her hand a little bit timidly, almost as if she was apologizing.  “I think that what she does to her father is wrong. I don’t think that Shylock is a nice man but he is her father and she steals from him and she leaves him all alone. She betrays him.” Veronica was gaining strength as she talked. “And I think that it’s bad luck to start a marriage with a betrayal. And she is going to have no family for the rest of her life. These people will always think of her as the Jew’s daughter and if Lorenzo gets tired of her she will have nothing at all.”

Elizabeth shot back. “What does she have now? She’s stuck with a father who treats her like a piece of shit.” Elizabeth’s hand flew up to her mouth and her light skinned face reddened visibly. “I’m sorry, Mr. Tuck,” she said staring up at Ron. “I mean he treats her like crap.”

Ron smiled in a way that let her know that she was not in any trouble. Cursing carried a penalty of five demerits and for a moment Ron was the person in charge of discipline. The class was watching him intently. “I think that we all talk differently when we are not in class. The important thing to do is to understand the difference and Elizabeth corrected herself before anyone had to point it out to her.” He paused and hoped that what he said would sink in. “Now let’s get back to the important stuff. Samantha, why do you think that Portia is cool? And why did you start to like her?”

Samantha grinned. “She’s sarcastic when it comes to guys. She knows what you are like and she can see through your game.”

Ron smiled. “I don’t have any game.”

Like synchronized swimmers, the girls rolled their eyes at the same time. Ron saw it and began to laugh in spite of himself. “Why else do you like her?”

“She knows what’s important to her,” said Samantha.

“Let’s hold that thought,” said Ron. “Samantha, we are going to come back to that comment at the end of the play. If I forget, I want you to remind me.”

Samantha smiled as she basked in the glow of having made a positive contribution. She was thrilled knowing that one of her ideas was an idea that he wanted to save and revisit. It was just then that the bell rang. The class groaned. Ron smiled.

About an hour later, he met Sister Donna Maria in her office to review discipline. After they had settled and gone through a list of girls that were coming before the faculty council, she said, “It isn’t often that I get a complaint about you, Mr. Tuck, but I got one.”

Ron looked up. Her eyes were a watery, placid brown, like wet mold. “What is it, Sister?”

“Are you teaching the children about the Jewish faith?’

Ron laughed, “Not at all, Sister. We are reading The Merchant of Venice in my Shakespeare class.”

“But did you teach them that Christians persecuted Jewish people?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Why would you tell them that?”

“Well,” said Ron. “For one thing it is the truth and for another it is in the play.” Then he thought that this was going in a poor direction. He did not want her prying into the content of the plays. He was instantly and instinctively sure that she was not familiar with Shakespeare. When he had first proposed the idea, her comment had been something to the effect of ‘did he really think that the girls would have any interest in that.’ He decided to take a page out of Shakespeare’s book. “Sister, the Catholic Church is never mentioned. As you know, in England that had The Church of England. I will make sure that the girls understand that.”

Donna Maria smiled placidly. Then her smile turned to a frown. “I have also been informed that you allow the girls to curse in class. Now when I heard that, I didn’t believe it, but I think that since we are talking about it I might as well put all of my cards on the table.”

Ron looked down at the table like he was seeing the Old Maid card with her picture on it. “One time, one girl mistakenly used a crass word. It did not take the name of the Lord in vain or I would have been very upset.”

“What was the word?”

“She said, ‘shit’ and then she immediately apologized and corrected herself.”

Donna Maria sighed. “I guess that we can’t expect too much of these girls considering who they are and when they are from.”

Ron felt his face tighten. He truly did not like this woman and was seeing more and more why Bernadette considered her dangerous. “That’s true, Sister.”

“Who was the girl?” said Donna Maria.

Ron scratched the back of his head. “Gee, I can’t even remember.” Then he paused. “You did put me in charge of these kinds of offenses, Sister.”

“Yes,” said the principal thoughtfully but it is important that I also know who the rabble rousers are.”

Ron squinted as if he was trying to remember what he was really doing was trying to keep himself from saying what he thought, which was that she would consider anyone with a  brain and an original thought a troublemaker.

 

Chapter 64

“Why do you think that Jewish people have been the object of so much prejudice for so long?”

Ron started the class with this question, and as he expected, the question was met with silence. He waited to see what they would say. Lately, he had learned to become comfortable with silence in the classroom. He knew that his questions weren’t easy, and that they needed time to think if he wanted them to give thoughtful answers. It occurred to him that teachers often did not ask questions that had no right answers because they were uncomfortable with the silence that followed them. He looked into their faces. Since this was the first day of the play there were no comments about last night’s reading on the chalkboard.

“Because they are so different,” said Donna, “and they seem to think that they are better than anyone else.”

Ron waited. He knew that there would be more if he could hold out. He gazed at them. He sensed that it was not that they were confused, but that they were unsure about how they should answer. Finally Elena said, “I don’t think that I have known any Jewish people, personally.”

Ron saw a number of the girls bob their heads up and down in assent. He hadn’t considered this. They didn’t know any Jews. Then an idea struck him. “It is quite possible that Shakespeare did not know any Jewish people either. He was working from stories that he had heard. In some cases, he was working with stereotypes that had been passed down for a long time. Jews had been expelled from England a long time before Shakespeare was born, and the depictions of them were usually those of sub-human monsters, which is why, among other reasons, Shakespeare set the play in Venice. There would have been no Jews in England.”

“Where did they go?” asked Donna.

“They wandered in Europe, not being totally accepted. In some places they were forced to wear strange costumes that would mark them as Jews. In other places, such as Venice, they were not allowed to have citizenship or work at jobs. As a result, they turned to money lending, which is referred to as usury in the play.”

Then he turned to the tape player and switched it on. It was the opening scene. He had them. Not like he had them in some of the more romantic plays, but that was coming and he was satisfied. The thoughts in his head as he watched them follow the words of the actors were about how much he would acquaint them with the Jewish culture. How much would he be allowed to say? Would he be allowed to say that it was really the Italians that killed Christ? That in his head it had been one of the great bait and switches of all time to have made the Jews the scapegoats? It didn’t matter. The fact was that they were going to meet their first Jew. Ron wished hard that Shakespeare’s description was not so much of a stereotype, but he wanted to make sure that his audience got it. He wanted them to hate Shylock so that he could, in some ways, redeem him. Shakespeare had really boiled it down to two speeches, two monologues. The one “Hath a Jew not eyes…” and the other, the more famous, “the quality of mercy” It really all came down to those two and one of the strongest women he had ever seen on a stage, Portia.

After the first scene ended, he clicked off the tape. “One question that I want you to try to answer at the end of this play is “Why was Antonio sad?” He turned and wrote the question on the chalkboard. The girls all copied the question into their notebooks. They knew him well enough to know that it was from these questions that he would select their essays. The bell rang before Ron wanted it to ring. He said quickly, “Finish the first act for tomorrow and remember it takes five statements on the side board for us to be able to begin class.” There was a groan and he answered it with a smile and then they left.

The next day, Ron began by looking over at the side board. He read: “Why do parents have nothing better to do than meddle in their kids’ lives?” It was signed by Debbie. The next read, “How can she spend the rest of her life with someone based on the results of a game?” That was signed by Donna. The next read, “I don’t think that it’s fair to force us to read about Jews.” It was unsigned. Ron stared hard at it. It was unsigned for a reason. Of course the girls knew who wrote it and he could force the issue but he decided to let it go. The next read, “What’s the big deal about loaning money for interest?” That was Elena. Veronica had written a quote from the play. “All that glisters is not gold.” Next to it she wrote, “Why did we all learn that it was glitters and what does glisters mean?” It was of course from the second act and it told Ron that Veronica had read ahead. She had probably read the entire play but he would be embarrassing her if he asked. And finally Samantha wrote, “I have no idea why Antonio is sad. He’s rich.”

Ron thought quickly about where to begin and then from seemingly out a nowhere an idea struck him. He turned to the board and quickly drew ten vertical lines. Over each column he placed a number from 1-10. “Now with ten being the highest and one the lowest, tell me how much it matters to you that your parents like the man that you will eventually marry.” He had had some experience with this process and turned to give them a caution. “Now before you lowball the answer, think of this. You are out on a date and the guy you are with tells you that on a scale of 1-10 he would rate your looks a 6.” They laughed. “Would you be offended?”

“I wouldn’t be offended but I would make sure that it was the last time that I went out with him.”

“And why is that?”

“Who wants a guy who does not think that you are beautiful?” she said as if he must be some kind of moron.

“You didn’t do that to your last girlfriend did you Mr. Tuck?” said Donna.

Everyone laughed again. “No, I did not do that. If I thought she was a 6, I wouldn’t be out with her.”

The girls laughed again and Ron laughed with them. As he took the vote, it split the way that he expected that it would. It was based on their mood of the moment. Some said ten and some said one. Samantha asked if there was a category for zero. There were very few in the middle. When he finished the survey, he had 3 tens, 4 nines, 3 eights, 6 twos and 7 ones.

He stared at the results.  He circled the 13 low scores. “So are you saying that your family is not important?”

Elena’s hand shot up. “No, I am saying that my family needs to have trust in my decisions. They need to respect what it is that I want for my life.”

Ron nodded again. Donna, who was a 2, said, “I may not get married but if I did, I wouldn’t want my parents choosing my partner.”

“That’s not the question,” said Ron.

Donna smiled. “No you twisted the question around, the way that you always do.”

Everyone laughed again. Ron feigned being aghast at her response. “I do not twist.” They laughed harder.

Samantha said, “You probably won a twisting contest in the olden days.”

Ron needed to move on. He did not want them dwelling on how he might be manipulating them. It would make it much harder to teach them if they did.

“What about my 10’s and 9’s here? Why is what family thinks of your prospective husband so important?”

Surprisingly Veronica raised her hand and said, “I would be lost without my family. I know it may sound weak, but I need them to like the guy that I want to marry.”

“It is not at all weak,” said Ron. He thought about how he responded to his mother’s judgments of his girlfriends. He thought that life would be easier if she had liked them but he also thought that if there was one that she liked that she would push him to marry her.

Elizabeth said, “I want my mother to be proud of who I choose. It would be great if she were proud of something about me.”

Ron let what she said sink in. He did not want to patronize her. He realized that she wanted to express what she had said, and that in some way it had been cathartic for her to be able to say it.

“For all of you who don’t like, women’s liberation, let me say that back in Shakespeare’s time, women were property. A man could actually beat his daughter to death for disobeying him and it would be within his rights.”

“My dad would have loved living back then,” said Elena.

Now Ron ran through the plot and pointed out some quotes that he suggested that the girls remember and understand. They wrote furiously. These quotes they knew would be the batch from which he would select the ones on their test. When he finished, he clicked on the beginning of Act 2.

His eyes turned to Elizabeth while they were reading and he saw that she was holding her head down and fighting back tears.

In the hall at the change of class he said to Bernadette, “What do you know about Elizabeth’s mother?”

“I never met her,” said Bernadette, “but I know that Elizabeth is frightened of her judgment. And I know that there is no man on the scene.”

“She’s a very determined girl,” said Ron.

“I assume that she gets that from her mother,” said Bernadette. “I think that her mother wants better for her and pushes her to excel. At least that’s what it sounds like.”

Ron wondered if he should find a way to meet Elizabeth’s mom.

 

Chapter 63

When he finished grading the papers, he had a mixed reaction.  The grammar was good. Their knowledge of the play was excellent. Their essay organization was fine. Those were the good points. Their conclusions were lousy. Most of them were using what Ron called summary conclusions, where they just restated their major ideas. In some cases they used the topic sentences from their previous paragraphs. He knew it was the system that Sister Anna Lourdes taught them. It was a system and Ron could not quibble that they needed a system, but now it was time to move beyond that and use the conclusions to actually say something. He thought about how he was going to explain this, and jotted down some quick notes. That was really a pretty easy fix. The ones who understood it would get it, the ones that did not would still have well organized essays. The second problem was harder. A lot of their ideas were his ideas parroted back. What were they going to do when they no longer had his ideas with which to work? He wanted to share his ideas with them, but he didn’t want those ideas to become their thoughts. His nagging voice chided, if you didn’t make them sound like the gospel of truth according to Ron Tuck maybe they would have their own ideas.

It was true and Ron didn’t like it. He looked over his test questions. He had started with five quotes for which they had to supply speaker, literary devices, and an explanation of content. That was fine. He needed that to reward the girls who read the play carefully. He had given them an essay that also began with a quote. He read over his words, “Using the quote ‘We are the stuff that dreams are made on,’ fully explore the themes of the play, using this quote as a basis for exploration.”

His nagging voice said that it was a clumsy sentence. Ron pictured himself walking into the wall that he sometimes viewed language as being. Too many of the girls had just fed him back his ideas. What he wanted was their ideas. Then a thought struck him. He wrote, “Using what you know of Hermia, Helen, Lysander and Demetrius, predict what their lives will be like in five years. Your answer must include references to the play that shows the basis of your predictions.” He liked it. He would have to give the next test in two parts. The first part would be the quotes, and then they could do the second part with open books. They would need more time. He thought again. He could create a two day test. He could create ten quotes for the first day and the essay would be the second day. He glanced at his syllabus to see what was coming up. It was The Merchant of Venice. That would be perfect.

He lay back on his bed thinking that he was ready for tomorrow. Ron laughed at himself when he thought again and realized that it was Friday night. Some life you’ve got, said the nagging voice.

He looked at the clock again. It was almost 10pm, but it wasn’t too late for The French Maid. Ron smiled and got himself dressed and drove down the parkway. When he got to the club, he found that it was locked shut. He was startled and wondered what had happened. He did know of another place up in Paterson. Quimpy had told him about it when he first mentioned that he was going to go-go bars. Quimpy had said, “If you want to see some really wild stuff, try a juice bar.”

The Nest was tucked away on a side street in South Paterson. It was run by Squirrely, a smallish man with a penchant for repeatedly wincing his glasses back up against her eyes. It was that expression and his quick sudden movements that earned him his name.

When he arrived, he was met at the door and a man sitting behind a glass partition. Ron stood in the small vestibule and reached for his money.

“You a member?” asked Squirrely.

“Not yet,” said Ron.

“Twenty buys you six months membership and two glasses of soda.”

Ron slid the money under the Plexiglas partition and the guy said, “I’ll need to see some ID.”

For a moment Ron panicked. He had always come and gone anonymously. The man saw the hesitation on his face. “We don’t put up with no shit here, kid and if we know who you are you are less likely to cause trouble. We are a private club.”

Ron nodded. It made sense. He reached for his driver’s license, careful to not show his school ID. He slipped the license under the partition.

Squirrely took it, looked up at Ron, and then wrote his name onto the list. Ron was feeling queasy. What was going to happen to the list? It was his name! He waited to see if Squirrely took any of his other information, but the guy slid his license back out under the partition, took his $20 and buzzed him through the locked door.

The bar looked like one that served alcohol except that the barmaid was topless. She wore only a G-string and a small beret on her dark hair. Ron handed her his ticket and she brought him a glass of coke that was mostly ice. She stood in front of him waiting. He looked at her and then down at the ticket. He reached into his pocket and brought out the rest of his money. She squeezed her tits together and leaned over as he slid the dollar between them, go-go style.

Ron settled back with his soda and looked at the place. It was dark, they were all dark. The sound system was not as sophisticated as the one at The French Maid and there was an order of perspiration. The girl who was standing on the stage wore nothing. She was a little plump and had dark roots showing at the base of her blonde hair. She did not smile when she met his eyes. Ron felt instantly uncomfortable.

The music was nondescript. There were six other guys in the place. None of them seemed to be looking at the girl. Her set ended and she walked off and disappeared. She was replaced by a thin Latino girl with jet black hair and a resemblance to at least ten of his students. Ron swallowed hard. This was not what he had expected. This girl was young. She looked almost familiar. This isn’t what he wanted at all. Suppose he ever walked into a place like this, and it was one of his former students? What would he do? Money or not, he had to get out of there. He slid the money back into his pocket and literally bolted out of the door. Heads turned at his quick exit. Squirrely laughed quietly.

Ron was shaking by the time that he got to his car. He felt itchy. He wanted a shower. He jumped in quickly and drove him without turning on the radio, trying not to think.

 

Chapter 62

That night Ron got home after his run and made a dish of spinach pasta. Sitting at his writing table, he looked over the end of the play as he ate. He wondered exactly how far he could take them, how much he could push them so that they would realize their potential. He wanted them to stretch without breaking, and he knew that they would try to stretch until they broke in order to please him. The weight of the responsibility caused his shoulders to slump.  Soon it would be time for them to start applying to colleges, and he wanted them to shoot for the stars.

A nagging voice belittled his desire. How would he know what they needed for a good school? Hadn’t he worked himself to illness at the one really good school that he attended? Didn’t he have to drop out of Drew University and take a year off before he finished up at William Paterson? For some of them, William Paterson would be like shooting for the stars, but he wanted better for them. They were going to be better prepared than he had been. Lashly had come from good colleges and Lashly had trained him. Maybe that was enough. They could go further than he had gone because they would start with a better foundation than he had. He needed to push the doubts from his mind. Suppose some of them did fail to make it and some of them did make it? Wouldn’t that be good enough? Sure, for the girls that succeeded it would be enough for them, and he could tell himself that the others would do ok at state schools or at junior colleges. Hadn’t he done ok at a junior college?

He saw their faces in his mind. Elena was a star. She was going further than he could imagine. So was Donna. He had nothing to worry about there. Veronica had a great work ethic and was bright. No need to worry about her. Elizabeth Holland was another story. She needed to make it, or she would break like a porcelain doll that was dropped from a shelf. She might be able to be pasted back together but the tell-tale signs of the breakage would always be there. Should he push her or go easy? Didn’t he owe it to her to push her if she wanted to be pushed? Wasn’t it really her choice? Wasn’t it any of their choices?

There was the voice again. This time it was saying that it was easy for him to say that because it relieved him of any of the responsibility of his influence on them. Samantha Satorini was pretty enough and smart enough so that she had a great chance to be a success, but was it his place to factor her looks into it?

Ron realized that he had stopped eating. The pasta was cold. He stared out his front windows into the September evening. One by one he saw their faces again and the evaluation continued. What did they want? Sure they wanted him to be proud of them, but that wasn’t what they wanted from their lives.

At first he didn’t hear the knock on his door. When it came again, it was louder, less timid. Ron got up and walked through the railroad rooms expecting to find a plate of leftovers at his feet, but opened the door to see Zoe standing there and smiling for him.

Ron stepped back to let her in. “Zoe, I’m surprised to see you. I thought that you’d be at school.”

“Hi Ron,” she said quietly. ‘No, I don’t leave for another ten days.”

He moved to kiss her and at first she stiffened and then she kissed him as gently as he kissed her. They could both feel the stir of passion in back of the kiss.

“Ron, I want to take some of my things back.”

“What things?”

“The writing desk, the bookcase and Nightscape,” she said biting her lip.

Ron felt his face harden. “Zoe, you gave me those things. You said that you had no money and knew that I was paying for everything and that I could have those things instead.”

She sat down on the bed. “I know, but now I want them back.”

Ron said, “I had Nightscape framed. It’s the only piece that I have of yours. You wouldn’t let me keep anything else, even though I was the model for a lot of it.”

“I didn’t want you to have anything else.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s my art, not yours.”

“I know that it’s yours.”

“Then give it to me.”

“It’s a lithograph. I had it framed. You have other copies.”

“I don’t want anyone to have my things.”

Ron felt himself getting angry. For the time that they had lived together he had basically supported her. Her father, who had a lot more than Ron, hadn’t helped at all. But if she wanted it, and it made a difference to her, then maybe he should just give it to her. “I really love the piece, Zoe. Can’t I just have it?”

“Can I stay here with you?”

“Why do you want to do that?”

“I miss sleeping with you. Do you have a girlfriend?

“No.”

“Are you seeing Robin?”

“No.”

“Do you want to sleep with me?”

“Yes. You know that I do.”

“Will you agree to give me what I want?”

Ron stared hard at her. Was she really saying what he thought that she was saying? She started to meet his gaze and then turned away.

“You can do anything that you want to do to me for a week, if you give me my things.”

“Zoe, why are you doing this? I really cared for you.”

“You didn’t love me. You always loved Robin, or the memory of Robin.”

“That’s not true. When I was with you, I was with you, not her.”

“Was it where you wanted to be, Ron? Was I ever the one that you wanted to be with?”

“Yes.”

She looked at him with the flare of her own anger now. “You’re not telling the truth. If I was the one that you wanted, you would have never let me go. You would have come up there after me, the way that you went to Minnesota after her.”

Ron didn’t say anything. He felt dumbstruck. All this time, he had told himself that it was her craziness that drove them apart. Now she was saying something very different.

“When I called you and didn’t say anything,” she continued, “all I wanted to hear was you saying that you loved me. You never said it once.”

“You think that I never loved you?” said Ron.

“No, I know that you never loved me. I even slept with Quimpy to make you jealous. Quimpy of all people! Did you think that I wanted him?”

“I didn’t know what to think.”

“You were angrier at his betrayal than you were at mine, because it was him that you loved.”

Ron was silent.  Zoe’s chin quivered slightly. They sat on the bed staring at each other. Time passed.

Ron said, “Do you want something to drink?”

“What have you got?”

“There’s soda and some old bottles of beer that someone left when they came here.”

“I’ll take a beer,’ she said.

Ron started to get up and go to get it. She stopped him. “No, let me.” She slipped out of her white cut offs and walked into the kitchen in her panties and her top. She came back carrying two of them and handed one to Ron. He took it and set it down without drinking.

“You’re comfortable here. I can feel it. How’s the teaching going?”

“It’s great,” said Ron.

“You’re still at the same school?”

“Yes.”

“And all the girls still think you’re great?”

Ron blushed. “We get along well.”

She took a long swallow on the beer and wiped her mouth with her arm. “If I got up and left, you wouldn’t try to stop me, would you?”

Ron literally hung his head. “Probably not.”

Then she put her shorts back on and left as silently and as magically as she had arrived, and he knew that he would never see her again.