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The UnAmerican2 I knew better than to mention Claw to my parents. I kept them happy by depositing most of my paycheck in a savings account and swimming in the pool at the Club on weekends. I had no spare time during the week, since going to work took over an hour in two buses and again coming home. I had to get up at a quarter to six o’clock, prepare my breakfast and lunch, eat, clean up and catch a bus at a quarter to seven. When I came home, a quarter after six, I showered, had supper, read or watched TV for an hour, went to bed and fell asleep right away. I felt lucky not having such a schedule the rest of my working life. The only relief from weekday drudgery in the heat was lunch with Claw, which I yearned for even more than swimming on weekends. Grateful for his friendship, I was wondering why he cared about me, until, after three weeks, we got around to the subject as if by chance, although he left nothing to that. No one knew better how to nudge a conversation along in the direction he wanted it to go. What a teacher! And I was his unique student.
Claw: “You like to swim?”
“ I used to feel like that.”
“ I splash a lot now.”
“ The Great Lakes, the Gulf, the ocean... ”
“ No, you get to the other end and you have to turn around and come back. I want to keep on going. Some idiot is always trying to save me.” “ How far out do you go?”
“ ... You could get in trouble.”
“ And nobody around you?”
“ And you feel free.”
“ I have a lot more figuring to do.”
“ ... ”
“ I bet you swim better with one leg than I do with two.”
I told him the story.
“ Every chance I had.”
“ She said she would never forget my sacrifice. Do you think it was a sacrifice?”
Every time I removed my partial to clean it, I heard Claw telling me that. Maybe I wasn’t such a coward after all.
Although my tooth wasn’t much in comparison to his eye and leg, we did have a little in common. When I bit into an apple one day, my false tooth poked my gum and I winced. Claw warned me to expect such reminders the rest of my life. Getting up at night, he sometimes fell trying to walk to the bathroom. While hunting, which he loved, he sometimes raised his rifle to his right shoulder and shut his left eye, the only one he still had. Once he had opened it and shifted his rifle to the other shoulder, the game had fled. This mistake so enraged him that he shouted “shit!” at the top of his lungs, scaring everything within a hundred yards. I believed him, his lungs could cause an echo. He didn’t like resorting to words like that because they were symptoms of indiscipline. Dreams aggravated his frustration because he dreamt of running on both legs or aiming with his right eye to shoot from his right shoulder. At times, he could have sworn he had caught something in that eye, at others, he tried to scratch an itch in his right foot. Whenever he thought he would blow his top, he said a prayer to the Great Spirit.
“ Yeah, the Great Spirit.”
“ Me, I’m an Indian.”
“ You don’t know what you are saying! All my parents could give me was pride and folklore. My father was drinking and drugging himself to death when he wasn’t beating my mother. She was prostituting herself to feed us. She died of AIDS. Some of the other kids got worse than I did. If you are born an Indian, everything is against you. If you are born a cowboy, make the best of it. Wishing you were somebody else is an excuse.”
“ Naw. He don’t give a damn about me. I’m just a piece of dust in his creation. He ain’t going to change nothing for me. Prayer’s just folklore, but it puts my troubles in context.”
“ Yeah, Eagle Claw.” Another time, he explained why he had enlisted in the Marine Corps. Unemployed at seventeen, he had no skills and little education, so he had to choose between drifting and enlisting. Following in his father’s footsteps would have dishonored his ancestors even further, while war would honor them. The Marines fought like Indians, you joined them because you wanted to fight, your unit was your tribe and you fought together. You welcomed armor, artillery and air power, but you craved firefights. The rattle of the rounds you were firing at the enemy and the whine of those he was firing at you were music to your ears. Men were killing men, pride and honor mattered, better to die than live with shame. Your brothers were all around you, encouraging you and you were encouraging them. You knew that, if you were hit, they would do everything they could to save you and, if they couldn’t, they would never forget you. Wouldn’t you do the same for them? They all expected to be wounded or killed sooner or later, a conviction that inflamed their ardor and incited them to outdo themselves. It didn’t come as a surprise when an explosion from a mortar round cost Claw an eye, a leg and other wounds, but rather as a disappointment. He felt cheated because it hadn’t happened in a firefight with enemies as brave, cunning and determined as he was. The trajectory of a mortar exposed the crew who fired it less to retaliation than direct fire would have. Yet he took pride in living up to the honor he had inherited from his ancestors. Nor did he credit the administration’s claim that American troops were defending democracy from communism in Vietnam. None of the successive governments supported by the US had made a serious attempt to involve the people. Praise for the Marines’ patriotism fell on deaf ears. Did they love their country as much as the girlfriend or wife of whom they showed you pictures? They even forgot them when they found Vietnamese women willing to fuck for dollars. This testimony subjected me to conflicting reactions. What I wanted most to know and dared least to ask was why Claw had told me.
“ Yes, but I’m glad you did.”
29 © “ Why?”
“ Are you sure I did?”
“ No music like bullets whistling around your ears?”
“ I wouldn’t like dropping a round in a mortar.”
“ You respect the Viet Cong for doing that?”
“ I know. The history textbooks don’t say much about that. I learned it in the library reading a book Thelma showed me.”
“ I read that in another book she showed me.”
“ A jealous boyfriend!”
“ They won’t have me.”
This advice reminded me of a girl I had recognized a few times coming home on the bus. The year before St. Bernard’s, I had noticed her at Spencer Middle School. Her brown eyes looked so serious that they captivated me when I passed her in the hall. I realized that I had been staring only when I saw that she had noticed it. Although she must have recognized the school creep, she didn’t seem to mind. Except for her eyes, she was neither pretty nor sexy and I wondered if she cared. Since she had a flat chest, for instance, she could have worn falsies. Although she looked intelligent, how could I tell? She hadn’t been in any of my classes. Nice? Maybe she was sly or mean. I got on the bus sooner than she did when she got on, so I was always in back and she, in front. After Claw told me I needed a girlfriend, I began to watch the passengers waiting to get on at her stop. Since I didn’t see her a few times, I got off at her stop and waited for the next bus, but she didn’t come. The next evening, 30 © however, I saw her waiting and, excited, I got off, got in line and got back on in front. I started to pay my fare again, but the driver recognized me:
The standees in the front of the bus, including the girl with the eyes, turned and looked to see who was so eager to pay his fare twice. I could feel her eyes on me. My face was on fire. Convinced I had made a mess of things, I was staring through the windshield when I heard a girl’s voice in my ear:
Those eyes! Emotions were whirling in my chest. I had to say “yes” twice before I could hear it myself. She smiled, but it wasn’t the kind girls practice in front of their mirror. It showed me that she had discovered my secret. “I thought I recognized you!” she said, but it sounded like: ‘I thought you recognized me!’ How could I say: ‘I thought I recognized you too?’ What could I say? The adults around us, who pretended not to be listening, didn’t help. Finally I blurted out: “I take this bus home from work.” Damn if she didn’t want to know all about my job, so I told her. I had never been that talkative because I couldn’t imagine anyone being interested. She did seem interested and so did the others, judging by their efforts to hide it, so I talked my head off. Where was it all coming from? As we approached the stop where she got off, I began to stammer.
Dumbfounded, I tried twice to accept the proposal and finally managed a faint “OK.” After talking so much on the bus where people were listening, I didn’t know what to say when we were alone.
“ ... Swim.”
“ ... The Club.” Did she belong?
I was in the water when I saw her coming. She was as flat in her swimsuit as in her polo shirt and jeans, but I forgot that as soon as she saw me. Those eyes! Her name was Sheila Kepp. She didn’t swim well, so I taught her the crawl. Although I had never taught anyone anything, she learned quickly and I felt proud. Was I fooling myself? Everything between us seemed to be happening as 31 © she intended. We were sitting on our towels beside the pool, where she was combing the water out of her hair.
She had dark, thick hair cut short and, as soon as it escaped the comb, it sprang back in a wave. Fascinated, I gave it an extra stroke and started to give it another one when she turned her eyes and smile on me as if to say:
Wasn’t that what I had been tempted to say myself? She was making all the decisions. Was I already her slave? Claw wouldn’t have approved.
Not only did she made all the decisions herself, but also she made them seem like mine. We were going to do what I liked next! “Well, I used to dance.”
“ I guess it would come back to me.”
What a carefree laugh! My heart was beating so hard I was afraid she would hear it. I couldn’t have had the same effect on her that she had on me. Our house nestled in the architectural mediocrity of Sheffield, an old residential section of Mapleton. The difference between ours and the others merely demonstrated the variety of the mediocrity. The Kepp’s house in Westpark, a new section, stopped me in my tracks. Built of yellow-brown stone in irregular shapes, it consisted of a one-floor rectangular parallelepiped in front on the right and a three-floor cube in back on the left. Wall windows covered most of the façade in the lower section.
Claw had told me I should let her know: “Of course! The frame suits the painting.”
“ The painter hasn’t finished it yet.” She burst out laughing, grabbed my arm and took me to the front door. The space inside surprized and invited me. The decor and the furniture harmonizied with it instead of filling it as it did in our house. The lines and surfaces formed a pure geometry uncluttered by idle ornementation. Behind the entrance, the living room had another wall window in back opening on a patio and lawn. Enlivened by daylight, the colors welcomed me instead of beckoning to me. A big fireplace of the same yellow-brown stone stood against the wall opposite the window. I could imagine how pleasant a fire would be with snow on the ground outside. I looked at Sheila who was holding my arm: “You live in a dream.” 32 © We had lunch at a round table in the breakfast room with another view of the lawn. The lunch she took from the refrigerator could have fed three adolescents as hungry as we were. Violet tinged lettuce, sliced tomatos and cucumbers, and black olives filled a salad bowl. Sheila mixed oil, vinegar and brown mustard, poured the dressing over the salad and tossed it. I admired her arms and saw that she appreciated it.
“ I have to get my breakfast and lunch every morning before I leave for work. It’s a good thing I’m not doing it for anybody else.” When we had enough salad, she took from the refrigerator a baguette crammed with cheese and ham. It was cut in three pieces, two of which she put in a counter oven. She cut it on and turned around to face me.
“ It’s the first time a friend has had me to lunch. Thanks!”
She turned back, bent over to check the oven, straightened up and turned back to face me again. I enjoyed watching her.
I laughed, and you probably remember that I don’t laugh often.
I didn’t know how to answer and her eyes embarrassed me, so I looked out of the window. “I guess it’s more complicated than that.” She turned, checked the oven, turned it off, took the sandwiches out, put them on plates, brought them to the table and sat down beside me.
“ No, you didn’t. We are friends, aren’t we?”
“ Your parents trust you, don’t they?”
“ Well, mine don’t trust me.”
Phew! “How do you know I’m not a seducer or something?”
33 © I was hungry too, but not that hungry! “Are you a femme fatale?”
I laughed again and this time I really enjoyed it. That made twice as often as that whole week.
I burst out laughing and so did she. I wanted to hug her, but we had those sandwiches in our hands. Unused to happiness, I was so happy I felt uneasy. Where was the trap? Did Sheila really like me? No other girl had except Thelma, whose friendship hardly resembled hers. But hadn’t Sheila also gotten me to do what she wanted by asking me what I wanted? Twice! Was I already her slave? Afterwards, we rolled up the rug in the living room, chose some CDs and put them on. No Nat King Cole, but a Louis Armstrong and the Beatles.
Her’s were the latest thing and that’s why I have forgotten them. We put a few of them on too. What a magnificent sound system! She taught me to back away, wiggle and twitch to the new pop, then I taught her to move up close, hold each other and walk around together to the old-fashioned stuff. How lithe she was! I realized she was moving even closer when her hair tickled my cheek. Then our bellies bumped and I had an erection. Mortified, I hesitated to excuse myself and take refuge in the bathroom for fear she would see the bulge. Yet she pressed up against it and I realized once again that she was still deciding for both of us.
“ Neither have I,” which she already knew. She turned her face up to me, focused her eyes on mine and her lips were so close that I closed the gap. How could I have refrained? Her tongue darted into my mouth, so we kissed like movie stars. I was wondering how far she was going to take me when she nudged me in the groin with her knee, which made me gasp. Yet I was soon nudging her and we stopped dancing. Now she was leading and I was following. We were breathing so hard we could hear and feel each other. Running our hands up and down each other’s back, we pulled our shirts loose, slipped our hands up under them and caressed each other’s back, then each other’s chest. Suddenly she reached behind her back and unhooked her bra. Her breasts felt small, but soft and full in my hands. We were only fifteen years old! Our shirts came off, then our shoes, then my slacks and her shorts, then our underpants. She backed away, holding my hands at arms’ length and exploring me with her eyes. Her body resembled a little boy’s except for her breasts and her dark triangle. 34 © I was about to move up close to her again when she dropped my hands.
Although I was still standing there, panting and trembling, she was getting dressed.
but she merely smiled. “Better get dressed, Rob.” What else could I do? As frustration churned in my chest, I sputtered silly words in a whiny voice. I felt betrayed, humiliated.
“ I thought we were more than that by now.” Dressed, she was arranging her hair in a mirror on the wall. “All right: you are my boyfriend and I’m your girlfriend.” “ So it’s OK to tease, tempt, excite, betray, frustrate your boyfriend for... for fun!”
After a sigh, which seems ridiculous to me now, I knelt at the other end and we rolled it back. Then she came over to me, threw her arms around my neck, looked me in the eyes and I knew I was going to agree with everything she said.
She took my hand and led me to the front door, where we had another long hug and kiss. Then she let me go and started to open the front door, but I felt I had to make the last decision myself. I grasped her hand on the handle and kept it from turning: “When are we going to see each other again?”
“ Give me your phone number, your e-mail address.”
I nodded. “My parents would try to discourage us... ”
It sounded so possessive that it echoed in my ears. Although Claw saw that something had happened to me, he didn’t ask me. I liked his company even when we didn’t have much to say. Sheila didn’t get on at her stop Monday or Tuesday, so I was worried Wednesday. Since it was raining at lunchtime, Claw and I sat on some crates just inside the 35 © vehicle entrance. Suddenly words came pouring out of my mouth and all I could do was to slow them down for self-respect. Although Claw listened, he asked no questions and made no comments. My story told, I felt ashamed. After a little silence, I said: “Maybe I should follow your advice and look for another one.”
“ Like a hunt?”
“ Should I go after her?”
“ How do I know she will ever get on the bus again?”
“ How many should I give her?”
“ What if she gets dressed again?”
“ You think she’s one of those?”
“ My parents would disown me.”
“ No. How could he have intended for me to go through anything like that?”
"Maybe I should do some hunting. I could learn something.”
“ I guess the Great Spirit wanted it that way.” I saw Sheila waiting to get on at her stop on Thursday and I was so excited I was afraid the people standing around me would notice. Once she had paid her fare, she looked for me, saw me and smiled. We worked our way through the standees to the space opposite the exit doors in the middle. Damned if she didn’t kiss me on the cheek! so I kissed her back. Again, people were pretending not to notice. She apologized for missing my bus until then, explaining that her father liked to give her a ride home after work. A surgeon, he had gotten her a job as a secretary in the office he shared with colleagues. She took the bus when he left from somewhere else, such as the hospital. “I was tempted to tell him I wanted to take the bus anyway, [whispering in my ear] because I would see this guy who takes it.”
“ He would have asked [whispering] if you are a cute guy.”
36 © “‘ Dad: I wouldn’t take a crowded bus for [whispering] some guy who isn’t cute.’”
“ Yes, he would have laughed. Dad’s all right.” She liked entertaining everybody all around us like that. Though embarrassed, I enjoyed it too. I let her talk and whisper until we reached her stop, where I got off with her. As soon as the bus pulled away, she threw her arms around me laughing. We hugged and kissed as if we were invisible to the rest of the world, but how could the people who lived in the houses all around us ignore the spectacle? Only when I saw the next bus coming did I realize that we hadn’t made any plans yet.
She made a delightful face. “Oh, I can’t, Rob. I’m sorry! I have to fly to Colorado with Mom and Dad for the weekend. We have a condominium in Aspen... If only you and I could go!” It didn’t sound as if we would dress as soon as we had undressed. The bus was stopping.
“ On the bus, next week. I promise.” It must have taken me two hours to go to sleep that night. Was she going to see another cute guy in Aspen? She could do with him what she had done with me, now that she had tried it out. If she hadn’t already tried it out on him or someone else! Besides, was I all that cute a guy? The next week, Claw surprised me by talking a lot and talking about politics. As usual, he seemed to hit on the subject by chance and only afterwards did I recognize the steps he had taken to introduce it. I had two more surprises. In the first place, he had read an awful lot, not only about current events, but also history and political science. In the second place, his ideas tended to confirm my notions. Freedom in our country faced no greater threat, he told me, than enormous corporations, whose managers were concentrating wealth and power in their hands. They were collaborating with each other to usurp control of the national economy from the federal and state governments, which they played off against each other. Hiring the most effective lobbyists, lawyers and advertisers, these states within the state were cheating and deceiving the public as arrogantly as any dictatorship. They enslaved their employees, monopolized markets, abused their customers, squandered absurd sums on compensation of top management, ignored the will of stockholders without a controlling interest, connived with powerful competitors and bullied less powerful ones, attacked rivals in court on pretexts defendable only by clever shysters, declared bankruptcy to get rid of pensions and contracts, relocated overseas to exploit cheaper labor and less enlightened legislation leaving unemployment and 37 © ruin behind them, influenced legislation to their advantage and the disadvantage of the public, bought elections by campaign contributions, placed their representatives at the head of agences regulating their industry, obtained contracts from corrupt officials without competitive bidding, avoided taxes by financial manipulations and spreading operations among various countries which they pitted against each other, bribed corrupt regimes and collaborated with repressive ones... The list was hardly complete, Claw admitted. Unaware of Dr. Kepp’s profession, he picked healthcare as the worst example, because the industry trampled on individual freedom by exploiting the most vital necessity of our society. Greed had formed a predatory alliance between business and medicine to sell the most advanced care at the highest price allowed by the market. The many patients who couldn’t afford it had to resort to the inferior medicine of public healthcare. More than healthcare businessmen, malpractice lawyers and drug manufacturers, Claw blamed physicians for the commercialization of their profession. How could it have happened without their cooperation? Surgeons were even performing unnecessary operations to make money. The remark startled me even though I had read a recent article on the subject myself. I saw Sheila waiting for the bus on Wednesday. Standing on tiptoes to see if I was inside, she jumped up and down when she saw me. After another joyful conversation with much whispering in my ear, we had another hug and kiss when we got off. How she would have enjoyed that weekend if I had been with her! When her Mom and Dad saw she was a little bored, she hinted that she missed her friends at home. Why not throw a party for them? they suggested. “So you and some other kids are invited to our house Saturday at six for pizza and ice cream.”
“ Oh friends... Maybe you know some of them from school.” Kiss.
“ Of course! On the patio if it’s nice, in the living room if it’s not.” Kiss.
Giggle: “Who do you think this party is for?” Kiss.
Pout: “Come on, Rob! Once Mom and Dad meet you, they won’t mind us doing things together.” No Kiss.
“ Who needs company?” Kiss. 38 © What a gift she had for inciting both desire and fear in me at the same time! I wanted desperately to finish what she had started in her living room. Fat chance with the others watching and her parents around! Why would her friends change their mind about the school creep? Her parents obviously thought she was Aphrodite; me: Apollo? Not only would they frown on us doing things together, but she would drop me like a hot potato. She cared what they thought. I had kept her such a secret that Mom was getting suspicious. She wouldn’t have let me leave Saturday evening without knowing where I was going and what I was going to do.
Pleased: “Who invited you?”
“ You never said anything about her then.”
“ Well, you must have met her now.”
“ That’s all she needed to invite you?”
“ Was it her you had lunch with?”
“ What’s their name?”
“ One of the most prominent families in Mapleton.” Sheila opened the door for me, put her finger over her lips, grabbed me by the hand, yanked me inside and, after a glance over her shoulder, gave me a hug and kiss. Then she took me by the hand and led me to the kitchen where her mother was making pizzas. Neither had wrinkles spoiled Mrs. Kepp’s dignified smile nor had fat ruined the charm of her plump figure. She wore a beige apron decorated on one side by a slice of pizza with a whisp of vapor rising from it and, on the other, by a woman with a yellow dress down to her feet and a billowy white cap on her head making pizza. If I had dared, I would have enjoyed the similarity between this decorative figure and the wearer of the apron. Introduced by Sheila, I tried to resemble the ideal boyfriend I imagined a surgeon’s wife would expect of her daughter. As I expected, she asked me about my parents, so I replied as vaguely as modesty allowed. Once the usual curtesy had run its course, Sheila, who hadn’t let go of my hand, took me 39 © outdoors on the end of the patio next to the kitchen. A tall, thin man with a white mustache and little hair was baking pizzas in an oven built into the corner of the house. Turning to face us, he focused Sheila’s eyes on me and, despite his narrow smile, they were inspecting me severely. His apron displayed the same hot slice of pizza on the same side, but a tall, slender man with a toque and whites was baking pizzas on the other side. It resembled him too and it was narrow enough to keep the images in front of him, while his wife’s spread them across her breadth.
My face heated up, my mouth dropped open and my tongue stuck: father and daughter burst out laughing. I never managed to say anything coherent before she took me over to meet her friends. Some were sitting in a semicircle in the middle of the patio, while others were playing badminton on the lawn. As Sheila introduced me, I only recognized two I had seen at Spencer. Neither they nor the others seemed contemptuous, but rather curious. The boy at the back of the semicircle looked like a better candidate for cute guy than I did. He resembled a young movie star with his smooth complexion, harmonious features, ironical smile, abundent hair, suave voice and contagious chuckle. When Keith stood up to shake hands with me, I saw that, while short and unathletic, he already had a mature build. Only when Sheila took me over to meet the badminton players did I realize that girls were sitting on either side of him, leaving boys on the flanks of the formation. One of these had looked bored. As soon as we left, Keith continued his jokes and the girls, their laughter. The couples playing badminton ran and swung like tennis players and, in fact, I had seen one of them playing at the Club. Here as ardently as there, he wanted to win, not just by a few points, but an overwhelming number. When his partner, who played as well as a girl could, lost one, Richie scowled at her or even slighted her by sarcasm. Tall, blond and graceful, Laura tried to try harder but never got a compliment from him. An abstractionist might have drawn him with a cube for a head, embedded spheres for eyes, a rectangular hole for a mouth, a little wedge for a nose, a big wedge for a body and articulated tubes for limbs. His voice reminded me of a saw biting into wood. I liked Richie even less than Keith. Once Sheila had introduced me, his opponents invited us to replace them. They might have asked me to strangle myself, but how could I oppose Sheila’s spontaneous enthusiasm. I had never witnessed such wild delight. No matter how fast the cock flew over the net, no matter how far it was from her and no matter how steeply it fell, she ran, lunged and swung with reckless ardor. In contrast with the blond on the other side, she was doing everything wrong and I 40 © loved it. Her movements must have escaped the repertories of gymnastics and dance. Whether she missed the cock or struck it over the fence mattered little to her. Hit or miss, she uttered a joyful yelp that gave me a thrill I have never forgotten. My dread of humiliation by Richie diminished as my amusement over his frustration with winning too easily increased. The acrobat was attracting the guests on the patio, who came over one by one and, abandoned by his audience, Keith followed them. Sheila’s mother and father were admiring her near the outdoor oven. Then panic gripped me: did this exuberance announce a change that would take her away from me? As soon as the score reached 21 - 1, however, she ran over to me laughing, jumped on me staggering me backwards and hugged me so hard she took my breath away. Dr. Kepp had set a folding table up on the patio, placed five chairs on either side of it and one at each end, while Mrs. Kepp had set the table. When they invited us to sit down, we had the usual confusion over who would sit where. Holding my hand, Sheila was taking me to the near end of the table where the hostess would customarily sit. Keith, who was standing behind the first chair on the left, moved over behind the chair at the end to help her sit down.
The two girls who had been laughing at his jokes laughed at this one too, but it annoyed me. Sheila turned her eyes on Keith: “I’m not a Mom, Keith, and Rob isn’t a Dad. He’s going to sit here.” She pointed at the chair on the right.
I wasn’t looking forward to entertainment by him, as Sheila saw in my face. “Keith, we can’t have two girls sitting together, why don’t you sit between Tess and Pat?” Although Keith’s smile had tensed slightly, he asked Tess to move so he could sit between her and Pat.
Covering it with her hand, she whispered in my ear: “I love you.” Fifteen years old!
Smiling, Keith whispered in Tess’s and Pat’s ears starting messages whispered from mouth to ear in opposite directions around the table. Before the one on my side reached me, the one on Sheila’s reached her and she frowned. “Keith, when are you going to grow up?” His smile indicated that he had anticipated just that reaction. When the message on my side reached me:
I blushed 105° Fahrenheit, everyone except me roared with laughter and Richie louder than the others. Sheila, who was laughing too, jumped up, ran around behind me and hugged me from behind. I felt like a Teddy bear. After supper, we all pitched in to help the Kepps remove the dishes, the chairs and the table. After much discussion, the CD player was loaded, the patio loudspeakers were on and we began to dance. Standoff wiggling and wriggling invited the flexibility of Sheila’s shapeless figure driven by the energy of her enthusiasm. The movement of her body contrasted with the stability of her eyes which kept mine captivated. Yet I only enjoyed her company until the third track of the first CD, when the other boys began to do their duty dancing with the hostess. Doing mine with the other girls, I could only admire her from three to five yards away and I had to be careful not to neglect my partner. How curious they were about me! Laura hinted that Sheila had never cared about boys until I had awakened emotions no one expected. I hadn’t realized, I admitted, that I had any such gift. It was harder to satisfy the other girls’ curiosity, which seemed both less discreet and less profound. “Mr. Mystery!” Pat teased me. When she had asked Sheila about “her crush”, she had admitted that “she didn’t know all that much about [me].” Everyone else there had known each other since they were little kids. I tried to divert Pat by ironical exaggeration of trivia. Admiring my shave, for instance, she ran the back of her hand down my jaw. I told her I used a Gillette and shaving cream every time I discovered a whisker. Although she laughed, I had only teased her curiosity. Tess had heard that Sheila and I were meeting on the bus coming home from work. I told her about my job, which pleasantly appalled her, so I told her about Claw and her reaction amused me. Wasn’t it dangerous to hang around with an Amerindian Marine? By the time I had danced with all the other girls, Louis Armstrong came on, I returned to Sheila and everyone moved closer together. Smiling impishly, she riveted me with her eyes: “You never told me about Claw.”
“You shocked everybody else.”
Skeptical: “You were saving that for me, hunh?”
42 © Indulgent smile. “OK, how about Claw’s politics?” She snuggled her ear up to my lips.
No response.
She smiled, though not very convincingly, and snuggled her ear back up to my lips. After a few minutes of silence, she asked: “What does he say about healthcare?” This question gave me a little scare. A dialogue began, in which I was trying to keep Claw’s opinion vague, while she was demanding details. Soon we came to a crucial issue: what was causing the inflation in the cost of healthcare? Malpractice litigation or physicians’ greed? She insisted on knowing Claw’s opinion, so I had to tell her. While he acknowledged both, he found that concentration of the industry had resulted in emphasis on profit. “Greed!” concluded Sheila in a voice that iced my blood.
She gave me a skeptical look.
“ If I were a coal miner’s daughter... ?”
Her eyes were searching my mind. “That’s sweet of you Rob, but it isn’t true. I’m sorry you don’t like your Dad, but I do like mine.”
“ You think he’s greedy.” We stopped dancing, dropped our arms and stared at each other.
The others were looking at us and Keith was smiling. I wanted to punch him in the mouth, but she grabbed my arm and pulled me around the corner of the house where we faced each other.
“ I forgot when you said my father’s a coal miner.”
We were staring at each other. I took a deep breath and tried to think. She was waiting for me to say something. Apologize? What had I done wrong? Hadn’t she done it herself?
“ Now you are accusing me of fooling you!” She turned, left and disappeared around the corner. Louis Armstrong was singing “Pennys From Heaven.” It was a beautiful night with a crescent moon, constellations and the milky way. Surprised to see me come home so early, my parents wanted to know why. As usual, Mom acted as if she were a prosecutor and I, a suspect. She interpreted everything I said as harmful, blamed it on me and used it to extract further admissions from me. Every detail I gave her only incited her suspicion that I was holding another, more compromizing one back. She not only condemned this Indian, whom I had never told her about, but also my advocacy of his opinions. I should have realized that you don’t repeat criticism of healthcare while dancing with a doctor’s daughter. Here a nice girl had invited me to her party and I had insulted her. Anxious to separate me from Claw, Mom wanted me to quit my job at once, but Dad objected that I had been hired to replace employees going on vacation. Once again, I had disappointed Dad and angered Mom. How could my own parents have compounded the absurd injustice suddenly inflicted on me by a girl who had been lavishing her affection on me? Neither she nor they had distinguished between my attitude towards her father who had treated me cordially and my agreement with my friend’s opinion. I yearned for lunchtime on Monday, but how could I tell Claw without implying that his opinion had alienated Sheila? Well, telling him was easier than I had thought because he burst out laughing before I could finish. I had never heard him laugh that hard or long before.
This enlightenment about man’s best friend and worst enemy consoled me until my second bus home that evening. As it approached Sheila’s stop, I couldn’t help hoping. Nope, no Sheila, neither that day nor any of the others. Was it a dream or a nightmare? It woke me up at one thirty in the morning and I couldn’t go back to sleep for over an hour. Sheila and I were facing each other naked and I had an erection. Leaning towards me, she whispered in my ear, “I love you,” and it echoed throughout the Mapleton Auditorium. We were standing in the middle of the stage and the house was full of spectators. I got a surprise Saturday morning at the Club where I had gone swimming as usual. After dressing, I was hungry and thirsty, so I went to the café on the terrace overlooking the golf course. I bought a cup filled with more ice than coke and a package of cheese crackers, then I sat at a table near the 44 © tee to the first hole. Although I knew little about golf and cared even less, I noticed that some players had a smooth and powerful swing, while others jerked the club around themselves. I admired the long arc of drives by the former and enjoyed the erratic curving or bouncing of those by the latter.
I turned and saw Laura with a tennis racket wearing white tennis clothes in handsome contrast with her suntan. She had tied her ponytail with a blue ribbon. I jumped up: “Laura!”
“ No, of course not!” Our conversation began with no small talk, which reminded me that she deserved better than Richie.
I was the first boy Sheila had ever cared for and yet she had shocked her friends by the way she had treated me. They and especially Keith had always teased her because she took herself so seriously.
“ I did?”
“ ... Like me?”
“ I didn’t either... So I was her guinea pig.”
Richie was standing behind us with two tennis rackets, his clothes soaked and his skin dripping with sweat. Although Laura scolded him for eavesdropping, I could tell by her voice that she was afraid to irritate him. I shook hands and left on the excuse of lunch at home. When I told Claw about Laura, he regretted that she had enslaved herself to sports. Wasn’t Richie a part of that slavery? Sports tempted most adolescents, who mistook them for a quick and easy way to fame and fortune. The warrior tradition of Claw’s ancestors had inspired a different ambition in him. He had never regretted the Marines, because they allowed him to earn his freedom. Honorable 45 © Honorable discharge hadn’t drowned him in despair like so many severely wounded veterans; on the contrary, he had felt exhilerated. Paying the debt he owed his ancestors had liberated him from the slavery of the past that was debilitating his fellow Indians. He left the hospital with a patch over his eye socket and, limping on a prosthetic leg, he turned his remaining eye up.
“ But you haven’t forgotten what my ancestors did to yours, have you?”
“ Millions of thieves coming over from Europe and stealing the whole continent from the rightful owners, who had been living here for centuries! They said they wanted to convert the Indians to Christianity. Bullshit! They wanted their lands, they wanted the occupants out of the way.”
During my last week on the job, Claw and I were lunching under his tree when a white truck with a big, wavy American flag painted on the side came down the driveway. It was another opportunity to discuss something with him that I dared not mention to anyone else: “You know, Claw, the American flag seems flashy to me.”
“ So do I. You see the stars and stripes in advertisements as if they guaranteed the product on sale.”
“How about that enormous flag over the Chevrolet-Cadillac dealer at the top of the hill where Gotchtalopee Boulevard takes a turn? Buy an American vehicle even if a German or Japanese one is better!”
“ How many of them are claiming the US for themselves?”
“ The stars and stripes look a little vulgar to me.”
“ You would think we had something to brag about.”
46 © He was thinking of the US government, which, according to all of my teachers and textbooks, was already perfect and maybe a little sacred too. To my astonishment, he preposed a thorough reform. One legislative body instead of two; representatives limited to two five-year terms; districts drawn according to geographical and economic criteria, and inhabited by roughly the some number of citizens; campaigns limited to one month and funded uniquely by the treasury; mandatory annual disclosure of personal finances; mandatory transfer of all investments to an independent trust; prohibition of all gifts, contributions and invitations involving free transportation, entertainment or recreation; repeal of congressional immunity and jurisdiction of the supreme court over unlawful conduct by representatives... “Wouldn’t that require revision of the Constitution?”
An assembly elected for that purpose scared congressmen and senators because they couldn’t control the proceedings and that’s precisely why we needed it. Congress was incapable of reforming itself. Such an assembly would be an opportunity to rewrite congressional rules and eliminate abuses such as pork barrel. “How about the president?” Two five-year terms also, but his election would precede the legislative one by three months, time for five regional primaries and a runoff by the two candidates who received the most votes. To hell with New Hampshire! Why should a trivial number of eccentric citizens in a small eccentric state be allowed to choose the two presidential candidates that the rest of us have to choose between? The government would fund the presidential campaigns too. Contributions to presidential and congressional campaigns would be prosecuted as bribes with sentencing upon conviction of both recipients and contributors. Reduce the number of government positions that a president can fill and reinforce the protection of the civil service from presidential and congressional retaliation. Every presidential appointee would have to qualify for his position by his training and experience. No more ambassadors who have never served as diplomats, no more cabinet officers or agency heads who have no experience with the activities they oversee. Outlaw the appointment of polluters to enforce laws against pollution, pharmaceutical executives to decide on the safety and effectiveness of drugs, investment bankers to regulate financial markets, vehicle manufacturers to evaluate the safety of vehicles, media magnates to oversee the media, businessmen to prevent excessive industrial concentration... 47 © The judicial branch should have the power to block the appointment of wolves to herd sheep. Broaden the jurisdiction of the courts over abuses by the other two branches and transfer impeachment to the Supreme Court. Take the power to nominate and appoint judges away from the president and Congress, and give it to the judicial branch. No more Supreme Court justices who have never served as a judge! Raise the standards of education, experience and integrity for service in the judicial branch. Establish a corps of barristers on government salary with the exclusive power to argue all cases brought before federal courts. Establish a government academy in parallel with the service academies to train jurists with statutory guarantees that poor and minority candidates for admission receive fair consideration. Render more explicit and complete the constitutional separation of church and state. Suspend the pensions of all retired government officials such as former presidents, members of congress, cabinet officers, agency heads, judges, generals, etc. who accept employment by companies and institutions. “Phew!”
I drew my last paycheck that Friday. Claw invited me to have lunch with him whenever I wished and I promised to come at least once a week. Since I was going to high school, I wouldn’t be able to get away every day. He didn’t give me a telephone number, a mail or e-mail address, so I didn’t mention mine. The company provided him with a two-way radio at work, but he apparently had no cellphone or telephone. He evidently preferred to meet under his oak or on the loading dock if the weather was bad. I gathered that he lived by himself in a small prefab in Stringly with enough of a yard for vegetables. He devoted most of his leisure to reading, which he had learned to love already as a child, hence irony:
His nostrils spread as if to relish the cowless cow pasture where his oak stood. He was born with the rare ability to read fast, remember what he had learned and develop it in his mind. That, he said, was the only luck he had ever had. A glutton for books, he borrowed them from the local branch library, loaded the shelves that covered his meager walls with secondhand paperbacks, had to give or throw many away to make room for more, came to work with one crammed in his hip pocket, which he often gave me. I have never seen such dog-eared, crumpled, torn paperbacks. The best luck I have 48 © ever had was knowing him and, when I lost him, it was as of half of me died. I still have one of the paperbacks he gave me: Orwell’s Animal Farm: “If liberty means anything at all it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”
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