May We Be Forgiven: A Novel

by Homes, A. M.

  “No,” I say. “I’m not really from around here.”

  “It’s really good,” she says. “They make wonderful meatball pizza. I’ve been known to eat it in my car. I’ll meet you there,” she says. “And I’ll give Julie your number.”

  “I’ll look forward to it,” I say.

  She pauses. “If Julie asks how we know each other, say we met at a barbecue. No, wait, say kids and sports and don’t go further.”

  “Got it.”

  “Okay, then,” she says, “I’m glad we talked. Like I said, you’ve been on my mind.”

  “Friday at noon,” I say.

  “Friday at noon,” she repeats.

  “See you then,” I say, coming down, crashing. I’m all at once up and down, both extremes simultaneously, and, well, it’s hard to keep talking.

  Is it possible that a woman I don’t remember holds the key to my future?

  I’m giddy, light-headed—actually, my head is pounding. I tell myself not to get too excited, not to buy into my own enthusiasm; it could all be for naught.

  I hold myself in check, and then I am laughing out loud. Check! Checkers, the Nixons’ famous cocker spaniel. I play with my mental footnotes—like catalogue cards. Checkers died in 1964 and is buried at the Bide-a-Wee Pet Cemetery, not far from where Aunt Lillian lives. Perhaps next time I’m out I’ll visit.

  Maybe this is the moment, the big break, the swift kick-start that I’ve been waiting for. Julie Nixon Eisenhower and me!

  Tessie is in the bathroom licking the floor, cleaning up my mess.

  “Good dog,” I say, aware that my mood is all too subject to the winds of change. I go upstairs to shower and get ready for class. My eye looks bad, red, bulging. I put in some kind of drops from the medicine cabinet which burn like crazy—makes sense, they are ear drops—and rinse the eye again. I shower, dress, and leave for school, proud of myself for remembering to bring some empty boxes. Today is packing day; years of class plans, student evaluations, examples of good and bad papers will be edited—the highlights crammed into well-worn liquor boxes. Anticipating the end, I want to be out long before it is officially over. On my final day I simply want to be done—teach and go.

  As I’m walking into the department, the secretary stops me. “The Chair would like a word,” she says.

  As nonchalantly as possible, I stick my head into the Chair’s office, hovering at the edge of the doorway. “You looking for me?”

  The Chair, my former friend Ben Schwartz, looks up. “How are you doing?”

  “On what level?”

  The Chair doesn’t answer right away; then he says, “I’ve known you for years, we’re old friends.”

  “That’s right,” I say. “And not so long ago you took me out to lunch, ordered a cup of soup and half a sandwich, and told me my career was over. You said, ‘We’ve got this fellow who has a new way of teaching history, it’s future-forward. Instead of studying the past, the students will explore the future—it’s all about possibility. We think it will be less depressing than watching reruns of the Zapruder films.’”

  “I didn’t have the sandwich,” the Chair says. “Just the soup. And the decision wasn’t entirely mine. I like to think I’m your friend. I’m the one who hired you.”

  “You didn’t hire me. We were colleagues, you told me there was a job opening, but you didn’t hire me. Frankly, I think if you could have ordered the soup by the spoon, you’d have had two spoons and left it at that.”

  He says nothing.

  “What is it you want?” I ask, wondering if he wants my pardon, my forgiveness.

  “Take a walk with me,” the Chair says, putting on his jacket.

  We exit the building and walk to his car.

  The parking lot is filled with compact cars of various ages. The reflection of the sun off the endless sea of chrome is blinding. Ours is a commuter school. We used to think we were special because faculty got numbered parking places, hot until a graduate engineering student intentionally blew up the car in Spot 454 and the administration decided that it was better for parking to be random, democratic, with the exception of those with handicapped plates.

  The boss unlocks the doors of his Toyota. The song of the automatic lock echoes off the other cars in the outdoor lot. I imagine someday cars will actually answer each other’s chirps in a postmodern reenactment of call and response. Hybrids, where are you? Chirp-chirp, we’re everywhere. He pulls out an envelope from under the seat, a standard white #10, and he hands it to me.

  “Take it,” he says.

  My hands remain in my pockets.

  “Take it,” he repeats more urgently.

  “What is it?”

  “What does it look like?”

  “One might assume it’s money,” I say.

  He pushes the envelope towards me. “You idiot,” he says. “I’m trying to help you. I feel bad, I should have handled things differently, and you,” he says, “you should have finished your book.”

  “Blame the victim,” I say, hands still in my pockets.

  “I couldn’t protect you—I had nothing to use to support my argument.” Again he pushes the envelope towards me.

  “No thanks,” I say.

  “On what grounds?” he asks.

  “On the grounds that I don’t take envelopes of money from anyone. For all I know, you’re setting me up, having your secretary witness, call me in, making me walk out to your car, where you have the envelope hidden; for all I know, there are cameras everywhere, recording this—the car is miked.”

  “You are a paranoid motherfucker,” he says.

  “I am a Nixon scholar,” I shout. “I know whereof I speak,” I say, as I turn on my heel to march across the parking lot and back to the building.

  “Where are you going?” he calls.

  “Office hours,” I say.

  I hear the chirp-chirp sound of him relocking his car, and his hot breath as he jogs to catch up with me. “Look, it’s not about the money,” he says.

  “But you are offering me money, hush money to go gently into the night.”

  “It’s my own money,” he says. “Not the department’s.”

  “That makes it even more perverted.”

  “I hope you’ll reconsider,” he says when we get back to the department. “Think of it as a research grant.”

  I pick up the boxes that I left outside his office door, one of which someone has inexplicably filled with balled-up sheets of paper—all I can think of is target practice.

  There is someone in my office, sitting in the guest chair. His back is to the door, a yarmulke bobby-pinned to the back of his head.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Are you Professor Silver?”

  “I am.” Does he know what just happened in the parking lot? Is he sitting here ready to receive my confession of temptation—is it like some Scared Straight program, or is he part of the setup? “Are you interested in Richard Nixon?” I ask, taking my seat.

  “Not so much,” he says. “I am a rabbinical student.”

  “You get to dress like that even though you’re still a student?” I ask.

  “Dress like what?” he says, looking down at himself. “This is the way I dress.”

  “Are you working for the Chair?” I ask.

  “Pardon?”

  “Schwartz, the Chair of the department, just tried to get me to take an envelope of money from him.”

  “And what did you do?”

  “What do you think I did?” I ask. “I told him to go fuck himself.”

  “I’m interested in your brother,” he says.

  “Drumming up business?”

  “Exploring the Jewish relationship to crime. With the exception of gambling, Jews aren’t much engaged in criminal activity.” He gives me an amused look, like he’s stumbled on a treasure chest of goodies and is trying desperately not to show how excited he is.

  “How did you decide to become a rabbi?”

  “I didn’t decide
,” he says. “In my family we are all rabbis. My father is a rabbi, my uncle is a rabbi. My sister is a car mechanic; she felt to be a woman rabbi had too many restrictions.”

  “My brother, George, had a bar mitzvah because he wanted the savings bonds, the clock radio from my aunt, the Cross pen from the temple Sisterhood, and a free trip to Florida from my grandparents. He got lucky down there, met some girl who gave him his first, um, oral experience. His affinity has nothing to do with God and everything to do with sex.”

  “I want to study him,” the rabbinical student says, and then corrects himself. “I am studying him, but I want to study up closer.”

  “What is your premise?” I ask. “Jews gone bad?”

  “May I sit in on your class?” he asks, not even acknowledging my question.

  “No,” I say quickly.

  There is silence.

  “Jews don’t kill their wives,” he says.

  “Are you talking with anyone else?” I ask.

  “Lefkowitz,” he says.

  “The Ponzi who stuffed Rolexes and his wife’s jewelry up his dog’s ass and then took the pup for a walk while under house arrest? The dog would crap, and then some shmo would come along and pick up the poop. He cleaned the watches, sold them, kept fifty percent of the profits. The feds used to call him Shitty Fingers.”

  “That’s the guy,” the student says.

  “Who else?”

  “Hernandez and Kwon.”

  “They’re both converts,” I say. The rabbinical student is surprised that I’ve heard of them, but why wouldn’t I? I am after all in the business of knowing about things.

  He pauses. “Can I ask you, what is your relationship to God?”

  “Limited,” I say. “Limited with the exception of spontaneous prayer in times of acute distress.”

  “I’d like to learn more about your family.”

  “I’m a very private person,” I say. “My brother and I, we’re not the same person. Different sides of the coin.”

  “But you have much in common. What do you do when you get angry?”

  “I don’t get angry,” I say. “Mostly I don’t have any feelings.” I check my watch. “We’re going to have to stop for now,” I say. “I have to prepare for class.”

  “I’d like to see you again,” he says.

  “During office hours, my door is open.”

  “Next week?” he says.

  “Sure,” I say. “If you feel compelled. May I ask your name?”

  “Ryan,” he says.

  “Interesting,” I say. “I never met a Jew named Ryan.”

  “We are few and far between,” he says, leaving. “See you next week.”

  My office shelves are filled with Nixonalia; I purposely packed the place with fat historical volumes, wanting the students to see my office as a historical repository. I also have some rare political posters—McGovern/Eagleton, Humphrey, Geraldine Ferraro. I carefully take things down and roll them up. Apart from Nixon, my second favorite is LBJ. I think it has to do with when I came to political consciousness, when I realized there was a world outside my parents’ living room.

  En route to class, I take the boxes to the car; the envelope is on the front seat. The door is locked but I see it right there, on the seat. Did Schwartz plant it? Am I being set up? I take the envelope and try to put it back in Schwartz’s car; the doors are locked. I try stuffing it through the top of the window; I get the edge of the envelope in, but the fatter part (the bills) won’t go in. I hurry back up to the office. Schwartz’s door is closed; the department secretary is gone. Shit! I put the envelope back on the seat of my car, relock the door, and hurry to class. I don’t want it with me. I don’t want a confrontation in the classroom.

  “Good afternoon,” I say as I enter. The room is only a third full. I give them a few minutes’ grace period and then begin with a series of announcements about exams, last dates to make changes with the registrar. “As you know, your assignment was to write a paper, which is due today. Would you please pass those forward?” I wait as twelve papers are passed forward. “I’m wondering when I might hear from the rest of you?” No one says a word. I glance down; the paper on top is titled “Richard Nixon as Villain: A Story in Pictures.” I flip through. The student has made a comic book in lieu of writing a paper; I should be annoyed but I find the idea promising. His drawings are distortions of Nixon, Haldeman, and Kissinger with exaggerated features, an elaboration on “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.” There is intentional blurring, such as “Let me be perfectly clear.”

  My eye is throbbing. I feel it starting to close, and the other narrowing to a thin slit as though in sympathy. “Okay, so where are we?”

  “Watergate,” someone says.

  “Very good. And what do we know about Watergate?”

  “It was the first of the ‘gates,’” one of the students says. And a few others laugh.

  A student’s phone rings. It rings and rings while she digs through her bag—everyone watches. She answers: “Hello.” I stare, amazed that she actually answered her phone during class.

  “Who is it?” I ask.

  “My mother,” she whispers loudly.

  “Pass the phone forward,” I instruct, and the phone comes to the front of the room. “Hello,” I say.

  “Who is this?” the mother asks.

  “This is Professor Silver. And who am I speaking with?”

  “Malina Garcia.”

  “How many children do you have, Mrs. Garcia?”

  “Four.”

  “That’s lovely,” I say. “You must be so proud; but right now we’re in the middle of class.”

  “Oh,” she says. “Is it yoga? My daughters love yoga.”

  “No, Mrs. Garcia, it’s not yoga. Does the name Richard Nixon ring a bell?”

  “Yes,” she says, “the president who died of the forgetting disease. Such a shame, a beautiful man.”

  In the classroom, her daughter blushes.

  “Yes, Mrs. Garcia, he was a beautiful man. It was a pleasure talking with you. Your daughter’s paper was due today. Did she mention that to you?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Any idea what she might be writing about?”

  “Not really.”

  “Does she typically discuss her schoolwork with you?”

  “Not so much; mostly we talk about the family and her friends and things like that.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Garcia,” I say, hanging up and passing the phone back to the girl. “Anyone else have a call they’d like me to make?” There is no response. “Isn’t it interesting that during Nixon’s time there were no cell phones, no texting, no BlackBerrys. Imagine how things might have unfolded differently if Nixon had been more of a future-forward president, instead of running an old-fashioned tape recorder with big bulky buttons that could get confusing—so that his secretary could accidentally push the wrong one and then, while answering the phone, put her foot on the remote pedal and erase all the good stuff.”

  The class stares at me, blankly.

  “Okay, well, let’s get back to it. Where were we…? Can one of you refresh us about what Watergate was?”

  A single hand goes up. “‘Gate’ is a suffix applied to a word to modify that word into a scandal, as in ‘Watergate,’ which was also named as such because it took place at a complex in Washington known as the Watergate. But in the years since then, any big blowup is called Whatevergate. So in fact it was the first of the ‘gates.’”

  “Interesting, and thank you. Do I have your paper?”

  “Yes, you do,” he says. “I am here from far away, and I must have very good grade in order to stay in this country. My family will cut my head off if I do not do well.”

  The class laughs. “You mean your family will cut you off if you do not do well.”

  “I mean what I say,” the student says.

  “I will take you at your word,” I say, and carry on, quoting from Nixon’s memoirs:

>   The factual truth [about Watergate] could probably never be completely reconstructed, because each of us had become involved in different ways and no one’s knowledge at any given time exactly duplicated anyone else’s.

  I explain that at the time the scandal unfolded it was the most public example of political dirty tricks in American history and prompted the only resignation of a United States president and the indictment of the Watergate Seven (with Nixon named as co-conspirator—again a historical first). John Mitchell, H. R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman, and Charles Colson all served time; Gordon C. Strachan, Robert Mardian, and Kenneth Parkinson were never jailed. Among the others who served time related to Watergate were John Dean, E. Howard Hunt, G. Gordon Liddy, James McCord, Fred LaRue.…As is my habit, I digress, laying out the evolution of Nixon’s Special Investigations Unit, dubbed “the Plumbers.” Their first job was to break into the office of Daniel Ellsberg’s psychiatrist and get the scoop on the former RAND employee who felt it his civic duty to leak the Pentagon Papers. Nixon felt this leak was a “conspiracy” against his administration and wanted to discredit Ellsberg. He ordered his Plumbers to get everything they could find out to the media and “try him in the press…leak it out.” The attempted burglary is a comedy of errors: the burglers wait until the cleaning lady leaves, then find the door locked and have to break through a window. There are three burglars, Bernard Baker, Felipe de Diego, and Eugenio Martinez, and two lookouts, E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy. Oddly enough, several of these “Plumbers” are CIA and ex-CIA and can be traced back to the Bay of Pigs and forward to Watergate.…

  My eye is killing me; after class I go to the Student Health Center. They have an actual eyewash station built right into the sink. The “nurse” on duty, who turns on the faucets, makes a point of saying, “Just so you know, I’m not really a nurse, I’m a health aide; they cut the nurse a couple of years ago, during a budget crunch; there is no nurse…” and then asks, “Are you sure you didn’t get some kind of chemical in there that might have burned your cornea?”

  “It was just dirt,” I say, thinking, for all I know, I could have gotten a chemical in there; maybe there was one of those toilet fresheners in the bathroom, maybe I waterboarded myself with fucking Ty-D-Bowl.