A Town of Empty Rooms (20 page)

As he drove home, Zeb asked him, “Why didn't you say the — ”

“I said what they told me,” said Dan, quickly.

“Who?”

“I said the Boy Scout prayer. That's all I said.” He had not known what to do; he wanted his son to nod. Zeb fiddled with his seatbelt.

“Oh,” said Zeb. He was silent. The evening was warm, and Dan rolled down the windows. Zeb stretched his arm out the window and opened his hand to the air.

“You want to win this thing?” asked Dan.

“Yes,” said Zeb.

 

 

ZEB HAD BECOME HESITANT AGAIN, walking into school; he did not scream when Serena dropped him off, but he stood, watchful, quietly gripping the straps of his backpack while the other children ran across the cool, damp grass into the classroom trailer. She did not know what he was watching for, what made him hesitate; he did not tell her, and she did not want to share any of her own fears with him. “Have a good day,” she said, touching his shoulder, her voice swerving into a hopeful brightness; he nodded at her solemnly. Neither wanted to move. She backed up, lifting her hand in a wave.

She headed to the Temple as soon as Zeb was at school and Rachel was at her playgroup; Georgia needed her there extra hours now. There was the usual business of scheduling and paper clips and adjusting who was behind in their dues paying. There was the odor of copy paper and the thud of staplers. She sat at her makeshift desk and wrote memos, took calls; there was the sense that they were preparing for a kind of war.

The rabbi kept himself in his office, engaged in loud discussion on his cell phone, but sometimes he ventured out. She wanted to ask him about the complaints, what had happened, and she wanted to ask him about the pennies, what the next move should be, and when he emerged from his office, she looked up at him. He had the alert expression he wore when he wanted to offer advice.

“How are you?” she asked.

He stopped. “Been better,” he said. “And how are you doing?”

He was the only person who seemed to ever ask her this. She took a deep breath and released it. “My son had some trouble at school.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“A boy threw pennies at him and told him to pick them up.”

“Oh,
no,
” he said, with his beautiful, intent voice; he seemed to fully inhabit her outrage, as though it were a coat he could put on. She invited him outside to pick up the mail. They pushed the doors open and walked into the bright sunshine.

“I don't know what to do,” she said. “I want to go and push the bully who did that. Really. Just go in there and rough him up.”

He laughed. “The Torah has interesting things to say about this,” he said. “‘Turn from evil and pursue good, seek peace and pursue it.' Psalm 34:15,” he said. “But. The Torah also believes in self-defense. God's quest is in ‘the interest of the hunted.' Ecclesiastes,” he said. “What does this mean? If you don't help the victim, then you are supporting the aggressor.”

It sounded as though he had been reading up on this topic in particular. He walked beside her with brisk, deft steps, his rayon jacket falling liquid around his body.

“I think of him sitting in his class and I worry.” She stopped. He was walking more quickly into the alley beside the Temple, his eyes on something; she struggled to catch up.

“Is that car parked in my spot?” he asked.

He was staring at the small space marked “Rabbi Golden,” bordered by two gold lines. There was, indeed, a car parked in his space.

“I think so, yes,” she said.

“Whose car is that?” he asked. He walked up to it and looked at the license. “Florida.” His voice was anguished. “Who is it?
Who
?”

“There's an open spot here,” she said. There was a space next to it.

“I have no car today!” he said. “My brakes went out. I'm okay, thanks for asking. It's in the shop. I took the bus here. Have you ridden the public bus? It smells like a keg party. It's full of DUIs. But look at this. Who would think it was okay to park in the rabbi's spot? Do they not have eyes?” He stepped forward and suddenly kicked the tires of the car. He kicked them once, twice, three times; the tip of his tan shoe paled with dust. He stepped back and rubbed his foot. “What in god's name are these tires made of — ”

“Rabbi!” she said, stepping forward, alarmed. “I'm sure they didn't mean to . . . ”

His forehead was bright with sweat. He stopped, took a deep breath, and turned away from the parking spot.

“I'm sure they'd move,” she said, “if you asked — ”

“Ask? Why should
I
— Why should — I'm not asking anyone.” He stepped back, rubbed his face with his hand, and looked at her. His eyes resembled Zeb's for a moment, the same softness around the eyelids.

“I heard that you had quite a meeting,” he said.

The meeting.

“This is what I think,” said the rabbi, talking more quickly. He lifted his sunglasses out of his pocket and set them on his face so his eyes were invisible. “I think that some people perceive me to be angry. I can under
stand
that.” He enunciated this last sentence slowly, as though he had been coached on it. “But I am not . . . a bully.”

“All right,” she said.

“I hear people. I tell them what I think.”

He was biting his lip. She wanted this to be true, for it to be this simple. But she had to ask. “But is it sometimes true that some congregants have — ”

“It depends on your perception,” he said. “Maybe they don't like my sermons. Maybe I use too many big
words,
” he said, crossing his arms across his chest.

“Maybe they're a little intimidated,” she said. “You're the rabbi — they look up to you.”

He shrugged. “I think the people behind this are afraid of something else,” he said. “They're afraid of victory! They're Southerners.
Suspicious.” He leaned toward her. “Can you believe some of them?
You
understand.”

His voice became sweet, almost hushed. His face was so clean-shaven it looked raw.

“What do I understand?” she asked. She wanted to understand.

“I have done a lot,” he said. “Membership. Through the roof. Friday nights. People want to come! I did this. My first pulpit, mind you. The troops loved me. You should have seen them. We prayed together. I fortified them. They were battling evil. Those SCUDs in Israel. They knew the stakes. Push the army out of Kuwait.
I made them strong.
I told them they were Maccabees. They put down
Halo
to listen to me. None of the other chaplains had that effect.”

“But — ” she said, softly, “what about Carmella? Or Mrs. Schwartz? They count, too.”

He stepped back, lightly, and took off his sunglasses. His eyes looked bare, vulnerable as a baby's in the sun. She felt a swooping pity for him.

“Maybe — maybe you need to count to ten,” she said, and flinched; had she really said this to him? The rabbi?

His eyelids flickered, then he assumed a pert, childish expression. “Well,” she said, “at least I don't stamp my feet.”

 

 

 

THAT NIGHT, AROUND MIDNIGHT, THERE was the turning wail of a siren. It was distant, and then it was approaching, and then there was a click and whoosh and it was parked at Forrest Sanders's door. The street was glowing red. The EMTs hauled in a stretcher.

She waited for ten, fifteen minutes until she saw Evelyn brought out on the stretcher. Forrest was not the emergency; it was as though Serena's murderous thoughts had missed Forrest and hit his wife. Forrest walked beside the stretcher, his hand gripping one side as though trying to hold it up. He climbed into the ambulance, and it flew into the night.

DAN HEARD THE NEWS FROM a neighbor across the street: Evelyn had had a heart attack; she spent two nights in the hospital, and then she was home.

He wanted to bring them something. A pie. That 's what people did here, brought over pies after disastrous events. He headed to Food Lion, intent on this most blameless of actions: purchasing a pie for the infirm. He stood in front of the prebaked pies — apple, cherry, blueberry — and then chose the most expensive: pecan. That evening, he stood in the cool, blue air at Forrest's front door, his fingers gripping the silver tin. He knocked. Forrest opened the door, slowly.

“Forrest, brought you something,” said Dan. “All of us hope Evelyn is feeling better.”

Dan was startled by Forrest's eyes, which looked as though they had faded the last few days, as if he had gazed intently at something too hot and bright. Forrest regarded the pie.

“She can't eat that,” Forrest said.

“Oh,” said Dan, feeling foolish.

“But I can,” said Forrest, taking it from him. “Thank you.”

Dan heard a cough from inside the house.

“You want to come in?” Forrest asked.

He had never been inside of Forrest's house. It held a shadowy, plastic odor; the rooms were small and dim, the wallpaper brown and covered in pink roses. There was the brisk and artificially sweet odor of strawberry room freshener. The room appeared smaller from the extensive collections of knickknacks: There were porcelain figurines of Jesus as a baby, child, adult, Mary looking beatific; these were set against dozens of metal Civil War soldiers in various postures of combat. The different worldviews in the objects lent the room the sense of an unfinished argument. Forrest switched on a light that cast a yellow glow. Dan saw Evelyn sitting in the corner, perfectly still; for a moment, he almost thought she was a lamp. Her white hair was uncombed and had the stiff consistency of seaweed, and, abruptly, she looked at them, her face blank. Dan walked over to her.

“Evelyn. How are you feeling?” he asked.

“I don't know,” said Evelyn.

“She was healthy as a horse, and now this,” said Forrest. “I came home and found her on the floor — I thought she was just tired as usual — ”

“I worked a double,” said Evelyn.

“But she was sweating and then she fainted and I called 9-1-1 — ”

“You're looking good, ah, young lady,” said Dan to Evelyn. Evelyn did not respond to this. Forrest stood, holding the pie. He did not appear to want to offer any to Dan. Dan felt an urge to keep talking.

“Let me know how I can help,” said Dan. “You know, I can take over the Pinewood Derby . . . if you want — ”

Forrest reddened. He put down the pie and stared at Dan. “You're not taking over the derby,” he said.

“I mean I can help out,” said Dan.

“You think I need help?” asked Forrest.

“No,” said Dan, alarmed. “Certainly not.”

Forrest crossed his arms. “I've run those derbies for almost seventy years. I'm the only one in that room who knows how to run it.”

Dan nodded, a little violently. “You sure are,” he said. Evelyn coughed. Dan nodded toward Evelyn and Forrest. “Let us know if you need anything.” His face ached from smiling. He pushed open the vinyl screen door and walked outside.

 

 

THE NEXT DAY, WHEN SERENA saw Forrest, he stood, holding the garden hose, watering his impatiens. “Forrest,” she called — to ask about Evelyn, perhaps, though she still resented him. He glanced at her and then away. What he was doing was examining the side of her house. She followed his gaze to see if she could figure out what he was seeing — a crack, or mold — but there was only a house. His face looked blanched. There was a draining of light beneath his pink skin. She thought she saw something flicker in his expression: a calculation.