A Robin Redbreast in a Cage

by R.P. Burnham

On a pleasant day in late June with nesting robins hopping across the lawn and a soft breeze filling the air with the fragrance of nearby flowers in full bloom, Jeremy Lawrence found himself outside of Luther Bonney Hall on the campus of USM discussing French adjectives with three classmates from the summer-session course. They were all good guys who, when they learned Jeremy planned on a career teaching college history, began calling him “Professor” in a good-humored way. One of them, Chuck Farley, had gone to the Red Sox game in Boston last night and had not gotten home until 1:20 A.M. The late evening had the unfortunate result of causing him to fall asleep in class. It was that catnap and its results they were discussing.

  With a sheepish grin Chuck said, “It was the Red Sox that caused me to be the class dunce.”

  “You got that nailed already,” one of the other guys said. “You don’t need any help from those guys.” He imitated the French professor’s voice with its slight hint of a French accent: “Are we disturbing your rest, Monsieur Farley?”

  That’s when Chuck was asked to translate a passage from English to French that was filled with adjectives, the lesson of the day. Chuck translated “a great man” as un homme grand.

  The French professor had corrected him, but apparently Chuck was too sleepy to understand the grammatical principle because he turned to Jeremy and said, “Perhaps our professor will have the goodness to explain what I did wrong.”

  They all turned to Jeremy, making him feel embarrassed. “It’s like Professor Sonet said. Most French adjectives, with the exception of a few like petit and mauvais that go before the noun, go after it. Then there are some that depending on the sense, the meaning, go either before or after the noun. “Un grand homme means ‘a great man.’ Un homme grand means ‘a tall man.’ That’s what you got wrong.”

  “I see. So you could say David Ortez is both un grand homme and un homme grand.”

  “You’re thinking of Big Papi’s homerun that won the game, aren’t you? I saw it on TV.”

  “Yeah. The crowd went wild. Me and my buddy yelled until we were hoarse.”

  “Where were your seats? Last time I went we were ten rows behind the visitors’ dugout. Great view.”

  “Right field, near the foul line and about twenty rows up. My friend brought his glove.”

  Jeremy, sitting on the low concrete wall and listening to the guys with but slight interest, looked around and saw a pretty and shapely woman coming out of the door and turning left towards downtown. She wore a long skirt and white blouse which was tight across the chest because of her large breasts. At first he was merely regarding her as a fine specimen of female flesh, but with a shock that actually jolted him to his feet he recognized Charlie Harris. He couldn’t believe how good she looked at the same time her face had changed little. She was not beautiful in any conventional sense, but her face was attractive and appealing with the qualities of shyness, earnestness and sincerity mixed in equal part with a dollop of sweet naiveté. Now that face was connected to a magnificent body.

  “Hey, you guys. I see an old friend I haven’t seen since high school. See you next class.”

  Without even listening to their responses, he hurried to catch up with Charlie. “Hey, Charlie! Wait up!”

  She turned, looking fearful momentarily until her face lit up in recognition. “Jeremy! Jeremy Lawrence. What are you doing here?”

  “I’m taking French. I need it for my major, European history. What about you? Have you left the bible college?”

  She colored. “No. I’m taking a course in journalism here. It’s not offered at my college.”

  He hid his disappointment. “You’re looking great. How have you been?”

  The question elicited a strange look and a cryptic “Okay” that told him that something was wrong. Not wanting to pry and make her even more uncomfortable, he changed the subject. “Are you driving now? Is that how you got here?”

  “No. I took the bus. A few times my uncle drove me in and once my…my brother-in-law gave me a ride. But mostly I’ve been taking the bus.”

  That was the answer he hoped for. Trying not to sound too eager, he said, “I’m going home to Waska right now. Can I give you a ride?”

  She had to think about that question too, but not long. She smiled warmly. “That would be wonderful. Thank you.”

  His car was parked on the street on the other side of the campus, which necessitated retracing their steps. He was glad the guys were already gone. Introductions would have been awkward. He was already so nervous he could feel the sweat pouring out of armpits and his mouth was dry. He had the impression Charlie was glad to see him and nervous in a maidenly-shy way, but over and beyond that something else was bothering her. He knew he had to be careful. But walking in silence was worse than saying the wrong thing, so thinking that it would be safe he asked her about the journalism course.

  His instincts were correct. It was a topic she could discuss unguardedly. She told him the class was learning how to conduct interviews and ask pertinent questions. Their homework from last class was to read material on half a dozen fictitious government officials; then in class students assumed either the role of the reporter or the interviewee. She was the reporter when it was her turn. When he asked her how she did, she smiled broadly and said that the professor said she was a natural.

  They were off campus now. “There’s my car,” he said, pointing to a late-model Japanese hatchback, his mother’s old car. Last summer when she bought a new German car she had given it to him. Now he was confronted with another moment of indecision. The women he knew at Wisconsin would be horrified and insulted to be patronized to have a man open the door and close it after they were seated. He rather thought Charlie would not think this way, but still his hand shook as he unlocked the door and opened it. Then he went around to the driver’s side as she got in and closed the door without any sign of either feeling patronized on the one hand or neglected as a lady on the other. The crisis having passed, he relaxed a little, but not so much that as they started driving through the streets of Portland he stupidly forgot himself and asked her the first thing that popped into his mind. “How are things at the bible college going?”

  In a tone that that showed she really didn’t want to talk about it, she said, “Oh, it’s a small place and everyone is pretty much the same. I bet it’s a lot different at the University of Wisconsin. Tell me about it.”

  Her request led to a burst of verbiage fueled by his nervousness and by the fact he could talk about the University of Wisconsin for hours. He started speaking generally, but finding her to be genuinely interested in life at a big university, soon he was talking enthusiastically. It was a world-class university with a majority of its academic departments ranked in the top ten in the country. Its football, basketball and hockey teams were likewise nationally ranked and had the most enthusiastic fans in all of college sports. Students came from all over the world drawn by its academic reputation and famous scholars and scientists. In research it produced more books, monographs and scholarly articles than any other university. Its campus on the shores of Lake Mendota was the most beautiful in the country, and the architecture of its building was likewise world-class. It was founded by New England Yankees who came to the Midwest and who modeled their university after Harvard, Yale and other ivy league colleges. The city of Madison had a vibrancy you could feel. It had great restaurants of every imaginable cuisine in the world.

  By the time he was talking about the city of Madison they had long left the streets of Portland and were driving on the interstate. He hardly remembered the stops and turns of the city driving, and having Easy Pass so that he didn’t have to stop to pay a toll, he barely remembered getting on the turnpike.

  By now he was perfectly calm. Charlie, who occasionally interrupted him to ask a question, had also relaxed.

  “I’m surprised I’ve never run across you in Waska. You have been there this and last summer, haven’t you?”

  She laughed. “I was and am, b
ut I lead a very quiet, a very sheltered life. Home, church and visiting my mother pretty much describes my life.”

  “Your mother?” He knew she had been taken from her mother and had heard rumors that her mother was an alcoholic, but he knew nothing for sure.

  “She’s stopped drinking. She’s a completely different person now and is married to a wonderful man, also a former alcoholic.”

  “That’s wonderful news. I bet you’re very happy to have her back in your life.”

  “I am,” she said emphatically. “She’s become a fanatical decorator now. She refinishes furniture and makes them beautiful—almost like works of art. I help her sometimes. Their apartment is filled with beautiful furniture and is bright and cheerful, a lot different from the place we had when I was growing up.”

  Suddenly she was quiet. He looked over to see a dark thought pass across her face. It distressed him. But when he said, “No kidding. You’ve helped refinish furniture?” the dark moment had already passed.

  She became aware she was being observed. “I’m just an assistant, of course. And anything really tricky is done by Ted, her husband. He’s a skilled carpenter.”

  “You say he’s a nice guy?”

  “Oh, yes.” Then she became serious. “Jeremy, you told me all about the University of Wisconsin, but you didn’t tell me anything about your personal life.”

  He had purposely avoided that subject since it inevitably would lead to his anti-war activities, but now that she had asked he was glad. Far from wanting to keep it from her, he wanted her to know.

  He told her about his roommates, Drew Jensen and Chad Kubek. In giving their backgrounds he even told her about Chad’s father being a union man in Detroit and his grandfather and great grandfather union activists as well, though he did slide over the fact one was a communist and the other a Wobblie. Then remembering his mother telling him that honesty was the most important part of a relationship, he took a deep breath and told her about his anti-war activities and how he had participated in numerous demonstrations on campus.

  He was pleasantly surprised by her reaction. “Iraq is such a mess there,” she said. “I wish we’d just get out. Just leave.”

  “So you agree the war is evil and stupid?”

  She seemed to understand what he meant. “Yes, I do. I have to keep my opinion to myself at the college. Everybody there thinks Bush is wonderful, but I hate war.” She was silent for a moment. He saw her dreamily looking at the trees lining the highway. The she turned to him. “Tell me why you do it. And how too. How do these demonstrations work?”

  “First the whys. Because the war is wrong. Because it’s based on lies. Because the government is doing evil in our name. I think most of us, or even all of us, who protest feel it’s our moral duty to oppose evil.”

  He looked at her. Her nod said “go on.”

  “Remember Thoreau protested the Mexican War in ‘On the Duty of Civil Disobedience’?”

  “Yes, I agree. I think you’re doing the right thing.”

  He smiled, feeling a rush of contentment and pleasure. “I’m glad you think so.”

  She smiled back. “I’ve seen protests on TV. Are yours like that? Lots of chanting, signs and stuff?”

  “Yeah, we have all that. We have discipline too. We’re nonviolent. We follow Gandhi’s and Dr. Martin Luther King’s principles of passive resistance and nonviolence.”

  “Good. Violence is what you’re protesting, right?”

  He nodded.

  She giggled, her face looking beautiful and happy and… but he stifled the sexual thought. “What’s so funny?”

  “It was Bush I interviewed in class. He was supposed to be an unnamed president, but everybody knew it was Bush. I asked him why he couldn’t admit the Iraq war was a mistake.”

  “Really? What did the guy say?”

  Again she giggled. “You mean President Bush? Well, the guy was against the war too and had a hard time pretending to be Bush at that moment.”

  “That’s funny—and true too. Just about everyone I know is turning against the war. Our demonstrations at Wisconsin and other colleges have been doing the job.”

  Their exit was coming out. He slowed down and put his blinker on. Now that they were about to enter Waska, the pleasant feeling of closeness dissipated and he grew nervous again. He wondered what her uncle would think about her riding with a non-Christian. “We have our classes at the same time,” he said after they passed through the toll booth. “Do you think your uncle would mind if you rode with me to every class? I’ll be glad to pick you up.”

  “He might not like it, but he’s aware that I’m going to have to be on my own if I’m to do the job for the church.”

  “What job’s that?”

  She became guarded again. “It’s a long story. I’ll tell you some other time. What I mean, though, is that he’s already aware that he can’t, ah…what is the word? protect me from the world.”

  That was a strange thing for a twenty-year-old young woman to say and she knew it. Its unspoken message was the paranoia of fundamentalism. Maybe she was telling him indirectly that she knew what her uncle did not: that looking at anything too closely would reveal the absurdity of their beliefs. And yet if there was perspective and balance, there was also a tinge of fear in her voice. She was afraid of her uncle. It wasn’t love that bound her to the church; it was fear. The flash of insight had an immediate impact on him. He became more and more nervous and fearful the closer they came to her house.

  “It’s the third house on the left,” she said as they turned onto her street. “The one with black shutters.”

  He nodded, too nervous and dry-mouthed to speak.

  He pulled over next to the curb and stopped the car.

  Opening the door and reaching down to gather up her backpack, she looked over at him. “It was great to see you, Jeremy. Thanks for the ride. Bye!”

  “I was great to see you too, Charlie. Take care.”

  As she started walking around the front of the car he realized the return of his nervousness had made him forget to ask her how they could communicate. He opened the window to feel a hot blast of air. “Oh, Charlie, how shall I know if I can pick you up on Thursday?”

  A strange look passed over her face. More than embarrassment, it revealed a feeling of being frustrated and stymied that she wanted to hide but could not. In a low voice, she said, “I’m not sure. I guess I’ll try to call you.”

  As she spoke, behind her he saw the front door open and Rev. Harris, wearing a scowl, issue forth. Jeremy had seen his picture in the newspaper. He looked even more intimidating in person. He was a heavyset bull of a man, with a severe crewcut, small dark eyes, jowls and a hooked nose. Even on a hot summer day he wore a suit and tie. Right now he was glaring at Charlie, waiting for an explanation. Jeremy saw Charlie cringe reflexively before standing straight and addressing her uncle in a steady voice.

  “This is Jeremy Lawrence, the nice boy who protected me from attacks on our church by mean boys at Courtney Academy. He’s taking a course in French at USM and offered me a ride home when we ran into each other.”

  Jeremy, seeing Rev. Harris’s frown darken and feeling the primordial mammalian fright or flight impulse, was actually putting the car in gear and preparing to drive off before he came to his senses. Here was the perfect opportunity to settle the matter. Bravely he opened the door and got out of the car. Braver still, he walked up to the minister. “Pleased to meet you, sir.” He put his hand out, but when the minister made no offer to reciprocate, he awkwardly pulled it down. “I’ve offered to give Charlie a ride each class day, Rev. Harris. It would be much easier for her than taking the bus. We found out our classes are at the exact same time.”

  The minister frowned darkly when he said “Charlie.” Pointedly he said to her, “Charlene, go into the house while I talk to this young man.”

  They watched her obediently and wordlessly go directly inside. When the door closed behind her, Rev. Harris turn
ed and regarded Jeremy with a looked of undisguised distaste. “Tell me about yourself, young man.”

  Jeremy, still so nervous he could feel his hand shaking, somehow had the wherewithal to come up with an inspired answer that he thought would please the minister. “We belong to the Congregationalist Church of our puritan ancestors. I’m a history major at the University of Wisconsin where I’m attending with a full scholarship. I hope to be a professor of history some day. I’m taking French because I need it for course work and it’s most convenient to take it in the summer. I’m also working at the library here in Waska on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays helping Mr. Seavey organize the history collection. I find it interesting work because I’ve run across references to my puritan ancestors, some of whom were on the Mayflower.”

  His instincts were spot on! He could see the minister’s face relax a little and become less severe as he talked about the puritans.

  “They were holy men, those puritans. Righteous men. You seem to be proud of them?”

  “I am.”

  “Are you righteous?”

  That was a loaded word. For a moment he felt another stab of panic, but there was an easy answer that would be sincere, though not in the way Rev. Harris intended. “Yes, sir. I try to be.”

  The minister thought for a moment. His pudgy, well manicured hand felt for and found his tie clasp, a small gold cross in a silver setting. Jeremy hoped he wasn’t going to ask him if he was a believing Christian. He didn’t think he could pull that lie off.

  The silence was becoming oppressive until Jeremy realized it was Rev. Harris’s attempt to assert dominance. Instantly some of the fear he had been feeling turned to secret contempt.

  “You can give Charlene a ride only on one condition. You go directly to class and you come directly home. Is that understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He turned towards the front door before another thought occurred to him. “Her name is Charlene. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, sir,” he said very earnestly, though already he could see Charlie and him laughing about that when he told her on Thursday.

  His sense of triumph as he drove home was short-lived. Even as he was vowing to himself never to be afraid in that man’s presence again, he remembered Charlie literally cringing when her uncle spoke sharply to her and knew that words were cheap. He could see through the tricks the man used to dominate others. He knew that the reverend was a bully and a cretin and that he was stupid. But the man’s self-confident belief that he was always right put him at an advantage and gave him the ability to crush the merely human that recognized doubt and complexity and knew truth had to be pulled out of a deep, swirling pool of contradictory lights and shadows. No, he shouldn’t try to kid himself. Reverend Harris was a formidable foe.

  Even with his mind filled with Charlie and her uncle, he had chores that had to be attended to when he got home. He brought the trash receptacle back into the garage and lined it with a new plastic bag. Looking at various boxes stacked haphazardly on both sides of the garage, rakes leaning against the wall instead of on their hooks, a pile of debris on the old workbench, blown-in leaves lining the back floor of the garage like a discarded rug, he recalled promising his mother he would clean up the mess. He had planned on doing it today, but meeting Charlie changed his mind. Inside the house, he looked through the mail and, finding nothing for himself, put the letters and catalogs on the small table by the door. Catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror above the table, he was surprised to see a worried, haggard look on his face. Had Rev. Harris that much power to destroy his tranquility? Or was it his newly awakened feelings for Charlie herself?

  In the kitchen, he remembered that his mother asked him to make a salad and get a rice dish going for their supper of chicken barbecued on the grill. He got the material out of the refrigerator to make a salad. He found the lettuce, cucumber, carrots, olives, onions and half of a green pepper but no radishes. That was a disappointment. The crunchy and pungent radishes were his favorite part. While he washed the produce, made the salad and put the pan and the box of rice mix out on the counter to remind him to put it on the stove at five o’clock, he thought about Charlie and the chances for a relationship. The scowl on Rev. Harris’s face looming over his thoughts like a billowing thunderhead before the storm broke too clearly told him the source of the worried, haggard face he’d seen in the mirror. The frustration he felt came from the same source. Trying to connect with Charlie was like seeing a lushly green oasis in the desert guarded by a pride of lions.

  With a sigh he went up to his room where he first checked his email. There was a message from Chad telling him he and his girlfriend were going to an antiwar rally in downtown Detroit on the weekend and attaching the gist of a speech he hoped to give. Jeremy decided to read it later. The thought Chad’s email gave rise to was a jealous one: how wonderful it must be to go to an antiwar rally with a girlfriend. Instead of checking his favorite website, Counterpunch, as he had planned, he lay on his bed and daydreamed of him and Charlie sharing their lives.

  The reality was that in the summer he had a very limited social life and was often bored and lonely. He was even considering next summer staying in Madison. If it wasn’t for the French class and his library job he would be completely stir-crazy. The job was serendipitous. Early in the spring his mother was returning some books to the library on a slow Saturday morning when Mr. Seavey, the librarian, happened to be on duty. They chatted for a while and the librarian told his mother of the grant money he had gotten to organize and upgrade the local history collection. When she told him that Jeremy was a straight A history major at the University of Wisconsin, everything fell into place. He worked six hours on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and studied French and attended classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Weekends were the lonely time. Last Saturday he and Ray Martineau had watched Ray’s brother Pete play Babe Ruth baseball. He was still not much of a player, but his enthusiasm made up for his athletic deficiencies. Once the game was over, however, Ray had to leave to get ready for a date that night. Jeremy saw Tony occasionally, always with Gina. Tony was working for a trucking company and Gina worked as a clerk at a local department store. They were going to marry next summer. Keith Hadley wasn’t around this summer. Last summer he saw Josh Gilbert a few times, but their political differences had widened into an ocean, and implicitly and mutually they ceased being friends. Then there was Joan. He had gone to a few movies with her this summer, still with the understanding that they were “just friends,” though he got the impression she would like it to be more.

  But he didn’t think of her that way and knew he never could. He was no longer a virgin. After finals at Wisconsin and before he went home for the summer, his friend Carol Abercrombie had in fact initiated him into the mysteries of sex. It was wonderful, but it caused an awkward problem. Never having been that close to another human being, he began to act as if it would lead to something more, only to find out that Carol regarded it as merely hooking up. She wasn’t interested in a relationship, not with her career goals her immediate concern. Gently and kindly she had explained her position, which he pretended to understand and accept.

  He had worried that seeing her in the fall was going to be awkward, but meeting Charlie changed that. Now his worry was that his tryst with Carol was a sort of infidelity to Charlie, though he was aware his scruples were absurd. On the one hand they had never shared a trust that could be violated, and on the other a future relationship was unlikely since the barriers separating them seemed insurmountable. All he could do was what he did until he heard his mother’s car pull into the garage: he daydreamed.

  At supper he told his mother about his accidental meeting with Charlie. When she asked him if Charlie had changed much from high school, he told her that she wore more normal clothes and looked striking. As for her character, he thought she was still naive and sweet, but she had matured and had a stronger sense of self than in high school.

  “You t
hink or you hope?” his mother asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  His mother smiled and her eyes sparkled. “You like her, don’t you?”

  “Yes, we’ve been friends for years.”

  “You know what I mean, Jeremy.” She sipped at her glass of wine, then held it before her lips and peered at him from above the rim. “In that way, as a girlfriend, I mean.”

  She was right, of course. In fact, he thought about Charlie constantly through the rest of the evening and all day Wednesday. To his disgust, he even had to re-catalog some historical papers at the library because he had become so moonstruck he lost his concentration. He was only able to study his French lesson on Thursday morning by forcing himself to focus his mind, but then became so nervous that he hardly touched his early lunch of a tuna salad sandwich. He paced from the living room to the kitchen until it was time to go.

  At her house he refrained from tooting the horn, knowing that Rev. Harris would not like it. It was a moot point, however, for she was waiting for him and came out directly as soon as she saw his car. It was cooler today, and she wore a light sweater that still showed her full figure and a dark skirt that went below her knees. Her uncle had been working on her spirits too, it seemed, for telling her the story of her uncle reminding him that her name was “Charlene” didn’t get the laugh he expected. Instead she looked like she wanted to cry.

  “He’s a difficult man to live with, isn’t he?”

  She nodded grimly, then changed the subject by asking him what he was studying in French.

  The result was that the ride was awkward and uncomfortable for both of them. Long periods of silence were interrupted by some dull remark where they both could perceive the desperation behind the commonplace observation.

  “Look at that car with all the bumper stickers. Green earth this, save the earth that.”

  “What kind of exams do they have in journalism courses?”

  “I hope it doesn’t rain. Those clouds look threatening.”

  “Traffic is very thick today. It looks like a lot of out-of-state people are getting an early start on the weekend.”

  Those and similar topics got them to the campus. Their parting words, “See you after class” and “I’ll meet you in front of Luther Bonney” were similarly forced and lifeless.

  He was depressed all through his French class and had to force himself to pay attention so that he could avoid being this day’s class dunce. Going home, both made an effort to talk spontaneously, but yoking together effort and spontaneity was like trying to dance with a wooden leg, and the awkwardness continued. Every time he thought of her name he heard Rev. Harris saying “Her name is Charlene? Do you understand?” He did understand—perfectly. She belonged to a different world from which he was barred. Charlie felt some form of estrangement too, for their good-byes at the Harris house were heavy with despair.

  On Tuesday they both were in better spirits but as if by implicit agreement confined their conversation to the safe topic of class work. Charlie had studied Spanish and was aware that both French and Spanish were Romance languages. That led them to a comparison between such French and Spanish words for heaven, country, man and nose that was actually fun and animated—ciel and cielo; pays and pais; homme and hombre; nez and nariz—and only lost steam when Jeremy brought up the German words for these things ( Himmel, Land, Mann and Mensch, Nase). When he explained that Himmel was both the word for sky and heaven and that while English “country” was latinate, “fatherland,” “homeland” and the like showed the same connotation as in the related German word, the look on Charlie’s face told him he was becoming too professorial. Making a joke about it set things right. “If that’s your eyes glazing over, just remember I was just practicing to be a college professor.”

  “No, no,” she laughed. “It was interesting. I just didn’t know German and English were closely related.”

  “The Anglo-Saxons were Germanic tribes, so English is definitely a Germanic language. But there I go again,” he said, and they both laughed.

  He felt better. That he could laugh at himself and that they could laugh together was a good sign. French class went well, and that after class Charlie greeted him with a warm smile showed she too had shaken off the incubus of her uncle’s ghost.

  They met at the back door of Luther Bonney because not being able to find a parking spot on the street, he’d gone into the parking lot below the campus. As they made their way in the direction of Forest Avenue and approached a small shed used by the ground crew to store lawn mowers and the like, they saw a tiny kitten, a yellow tiger with fluffy kittenish fur, pink nose, green eyes and white belly, probably a month to six-weeks old. She was sitting on her haunches warming herself in the sun, but when she caught sight of them she hastily ran under the steps of the shed.

  “It’s a kitten,” Charlie gasped in surprise. She started walking fast and then running towards the shed, and Jeremy followed. Before the steps, Charlie turned to him, her face etched with a deep concern for the little creature. Her eyes were wide, her mouth open. “She’s afraid of us.”

  “Poor little kitten,” he said. “Do you think she’s abandoned?”

  “Don’t you? “I don’t know why she would be here if she wasn’t. I bet someone dumped her from a car to get rid of her.”

  “Maybe. But what if she belongs to someone? What if she’s lost?” He leaned down and peered under the steps. The kitten, her head cocked at an angle, stared at him with eyes wide with fear and yet the desire for attention. Charlie got on her knees beside him and reached under the steps trying to touch her, but withdrew her hand when she saw the kitten backing up fearfully. Undeterred, she tried to coax it out. Speaking in a soft, singsong voice one used with babies, she said, “Don’t worry, little kitty, we won’t hurt you.”

  Jeremy joined the effort by making sucking sounds he’s seen work with cats before. It definitely had an effect, for the kitten took a step forward. The space under the stairs was not very large. He reckoned he could easily reach in a grab her, but he didn’t want to frighten her. He put his hand just under the steps and held it still.

  With Charlie whispering babytalk and Jeremy making the sucking sound and rubbing his fingers together, a minute or so went by. The kitten stared indecisively, her eyes wide, still afraid, still wanting comfort. Again, Charlie leaned forward and said in a soft, soothing voice, “Come on, little kitty, we won’t hurt you.” She was so close he could feel her breath against his cheek.

  Then after one final moment of hesitation, the kitty moved forward. Jeremy’s hand was still partly under the stairs. He didn’t dare move it for fear of frightening the kitten. Then he felt the kitten put her snout under his hand and press up with surprising force. The invitation to pat was understood, however, and no sooner did he start stroking her little head than he heard purring.

  When Charlie adjusted her legs to a squatting position so that she could face the kitten, he saw her inner thighs momentarily—a dazzling sight he knew he would long remember.

  “She looks skinny,” Charlie said, reaching out and patting the kitten’s side while Jeremy continued working on her head. “I think she is abandoned.”

  He heard the appeal in her voice. She wanted to take the cat with them. “She does feel a bit boney. Yeah, maybe she is abandoned, but…”

  He stopped patting and watched the kitten. Trusting them now, she came out from under the steps. When Charlie took her into her hands and onto her lap, she offered no resistance.

  “My uncle doesn’t like cats. Do you think your mother would like her?”

  Jeremy, thinking it wasn’t surprising that her uncle didn’t like cats—tyrants couldn’t abide their air of superiority and independence—was momentarily inattentive. “What? Oh, my mother? I think she probably would. But I’m still not certain we should take her. I read somewhere that most pets are just lost. What if someone in the neighborhood is looking for her? It wouldn’t be right to take her.”

 
Charlie was looking down at the kitten, her face wearing a happy, even blissful expression. In a voice laden with maternal instinct, she said, “It wouldn’t be right to leave her unprotected either. A dog might kill her or she might get run over.” She looked up at him, now cajoling, “You’ve seen students roar out of the parking lot like race drivers.”

  Instead of responding to her objection, he asked, “Did you have cats when you were a kid?”

  Still patting the kitten, she shook her head. “No, but a nice neighbor, Mrs. Fecteau, did. I loved her two cats. How about you?”

  “We had a dog, but when I was ten he got run over. It was very sad. Then not too long after that my dad was killed in a car accident. Somehow after that we never got another pet.”

  She looked up, her brown eyes widened in sympathy. “Oh, I didn’t know about your dad. I’m very sorry.”

  He nodded, feeling the pang of a memory that even after ten years was still throbbingly alive. “But here’s what I think we should do. I’ll talk to my mother. I’m sure she’ll say yes if I were to bring the kitty home. Right now I just don’t think we should take her in case she just wandered away from a loving home an hour or so ago. But if she’s here Thursday, then we’ll know she’s abandoned. Then we’ll take her. How’s that sound?”

  “I guess you’re right,” she said. “I think I’ll worry about the poor little thing until then, though. Then after one more pat, she stood. “You be careful, Tiger.”

  Jeremy smiled. “You just named her. Tiger is perfect.”

  On the way home the conversation was animated. They talked about the kitten endlessly and shared their memories of the pets they’d known. He told her he had seen his dog die. “I can still see Stringer looking at me, his eyes confused and scared and making an appeal to me. He was just a puppy. He waited for me in at the front door every day after school. For weeks afterwards I couldn’t come home without crying.”

  “It must have been awful. I’m so sorry, Jeremy.”

  Her sympathy made him open even more. “It was just the opposite when my dad died. At the funeral my grandmother’s second husband made one of those ridiculous stock remarks that now I was the man of the family. I took him seriously and tried for weeks not to cry. But my mother heard me crying one night and came into my room. We had a long talk. You know what she told me?”

  “What?”

  “That strong men cry. She told me my dad cried when I was born and when his dad died. She said at really sad movies he would cry sometimes. It was okay to cry.”

  “I think a lot of boys don’t think so. I’m glad you do.”

  “Strangely enough, after that it brought my dad back to me. He was a good man. He taught me to respect people who were different than I was. Whether they were black or white or gay or straight, Christian or some other religion, he told me all people want the same things, a loving family, a job so that they can contribute to the family, self-respect, and the respect of their fellows. He had sympathy for birds and animals too. He taught me the golden rule and made it real to me. So like when I saw someone bullying some kid, I would remember my dad’s advice and know that I wouldn’t want to be treated that way because it wasn’t right.”

  “Was that why you defended me against those boys who teased me.”

  “Partly. Don’t forget I already knew you when that happened. I was also helping a friend. That was the way I looked at it. But even if I hadn’t known you, I still probably would have tried to help. Bob Parole and those other boys were evil little creeps. Bullies and spoiled brats. I didn’t like them. My dad always impressed upon me the importance of doing the right thing, which means of course not only not doing evil but opposing evil.”

  “So he’s also the reason you’ve become an anti-war demonstrator, isn’t he?”

  He was pleased, very pleased, with her question. It demonstrated that not only could she connect the dots but—more excitingly—that she had been thinking of him. “Yeah, I think so. What he taught me about being a decent human being is very probably the main reason why I got involved with anti-war demonstrations at Wisconsin.”

  “I think he would be very proud of you. You’ve learned his lessons well.”

  “How about your dad, Charlie. Does he ever come around to see you or your mom.

  “I never knew my dad. I don’t even know who he is. My mother when she drank led an irregular life, so…” She shrugged to finish the thought.

  He slowed down and waited for a chance to get into the right lane for the Waska exit. Even though she displayed great delicacy in conveying the information that her mother was promiscuous without explicitly stating it, this was the first time Charlie had ever talked so frankly about her background. It was a good sign, he thought, a sign that she trusted him. He moved into the right lane behind a big tractor-trailer. “You must have felt different as a kid.”

  “I did. But it wasn’t all bad. When my mom was sober she could be nice. We had fun times together. And even when she started drinking more and being a bad mom, I still wanted her to be my mother. And Mrs. Fecteau was like a grandmother to me. Her cats helped too. I remember how soothing it was to pat Sly and Tubby.”

  But now on the streets of Waska and too close to her uncle to continue to share intimacies of their lives, they reverted to talking about Tiger, with both of them expressing the wish that she would still be there on Thursday.

  She was. Before they saw her hiding under the shed stairs they already knew she would be there because a girl in Charlie’s class told her another student had been feeding her milk and pieces of tuna from her lunch on Wednesday and as recently as half an hour before class started today. A cat lover, this female student lived in a dorm room and couldn’t take the kitten. She had been trying to find someone who would for the past two days. Her friend told Charlie she would be much relieved to know the kitten had found a home.

  With Charlie calling to her in the same singsong voice she’d used on Tuesday, Tiger remembered them and came out from her hiding place as soon as they approached her. She offered no resistance to being picked up and carried away and sat quietly and contently on Charlie’s lap during the drive home, which took longer because they heard on the radio that there was a massive backup on the turnpike due to a three-car accident and had taken Route 1 to avoid it.

  It was a lucky thing for them, Charlie observed when and only when she heard no one was killed or seriously injured in the accident, for it could be used as the excuse for any delay bringing the kitten to Jeremy’s house.

  She talked to the kitten for a while, softly cooing to her and occasionally holding her high enough so that she could look out the window. Many cats hated being in a moving vehicle, but Tiger was a curious little beast and took in the moving world with wide, innocent eyes.

  Traffic was heavy on Route 1, and for some time while progress was stop and go he concentrated on his driving. Only slowly did he become aware that Charlie had stopped cooing to the kitten and had grown quiet. He stole a glance and saw that she looked pensive, even troubled.

  He was about to ask her if something was bothering her, but the car in front of him, which had Massachusetts plates with the “Spirit of America” slogan, was slowing down and obviously going to turn into a gas station on the left even though the driver didn’t have his directional signal blinking. When the car came to a dead stop, Jeremy had to follow suit. This section of Route 1 did not have double lanes.

  “Wish the interstate wasn’t backed up. These stops and goes drive me crazy.”

  His remark startled her out of a reverie. She looked at him, her hand still unconsciously patting Tiger, and said, “Sorry, I was thinking of my cousin, the one who just got married last month. It was a arranged marriage, you see. Martha has been teaching the kids at the home school, but her husband Tom has just forbidden it. I think it’s unfair.”

  “Arranged marriage!? Who did the arranging?”

  She smiled wryly. “I see you have the same reaction my mom had when I tol
d her. It was my uncle and Brother Johnson. He’s one of the church elders and the father of Tom.”

  “Do they love each other?”

  She shook her head. He noticed her hand never stopped stroking Tiger, who promptly had gone to sleep the moment the car came to a standstill. “I doubt it. In fact I know they don’t. I think Martha is going to be very unhappy. She loved teaching. Her husband thinks a woman’s place is in the home.”

  Finally a gap in the oncoming traffic allowed the Massachusetts driver to take his left. Jeremy started moving again. “That’s old-fashioned,” he said, then had a disturbing thought. “They don’t plan something like that with you, do they?” He spoke too earnestly, betraying his deep interest in the answer.

  She noticed it, but a slight, momentary frown also indicated she was displeased he was only thinking of himself and not Martha. “Again that’s what my mom wanted to know. I hope not.”

  “Charlie, that wouldn’t be right. That poor girl doesn’t deserve such bondage. Neither do you. This is the twenty-first century.”

  “I know. It gets worse.” Then she told him all about her humiliation at the hands of Rev. Hamlin and how it undercut her projected career as spokesman for her church.

  He was stunned, though upon reflection he decided he shouldn’t be surprised. “You must have felt really insulted.”

  “I did. It was the most humiliating thing that ever happened to me, even worse than the Intelligent Design business at C.A.”

  “I know fundamentalists tend to be conservative people, but really. That minister must be a world-class boorish egomaniac. On a human level, what he did was unspeakable.”

  Again she said, “I know,” this time in a tone that openly conveyed her disillusionment with her church. But they were in Waska now, and she grew quiet. She was nervous about anyone seeing them going in the opposite direction from her uncle’s house.

  At home he drove into the driveway and shut off the ignition. “You’ll have to carry Tiger. The front door is double locked, and I would have a hard time holding him while getting it.”

  She looked around nervously. He knew the family who lived in the house at the corner were members of The Church of Salvation Through Jesus. “It’s okay. Nobody’s around.”

  Even so she quickly got out of the car and walked hurriedly to the front door, scanning the street as she did so. Tiger, feeling her nervousness, started squirming for the first time since they rescued him from the shed. A small meow grew insistent as it was repeated. “Meow. MEOW. MEOW!”

  Inside everyone, feline and human, returned to calmness. While Jeremy got a bowl from the cupboard and poured some whole milk into it, which Tiger began lapping up instantly, Charlie was looking at the portrait gallery by the door.

  “I’ll have to get some catfood after I drive you home.”

  “And kitty litter stuff too. “Is that your dad?” she asked, pointing to the photo on the upper right. Beside it was a picture of his mother and below it a family portrait and then an eight by ten picture of him from the senior yearbook at C.A.

  The kitchen in the small house had only a counter dividing it from the dining room. Jeremy walked over and leaned across it. “Yes, that’s him. My mother is next to him.”

  “She’s pretty.” She looked at the photos and then back at Jeremy. “Mostly you resemble your father.”

  “That’s what everyone says. I’ve got my mom’s blue eyes, but everyone says my nose, chin, brown hair and height all come from him.”

  “He was a handsome man, and you can tell from his eyes that he was a gentle and good man. It’s funny how you can see a person’s decency in his face. Was he a religious man?”

  “Not very. He did go to church when I was going to Sunday school as a kid—he thought that was important for me and he wasn’t one of those people who say ‘do as I say, not as I do,’ so he went to church too, but really I don’t think he was too religious.”

  When she seemed disappointed, he added, “But he was Christian in the way the Sermon on the Mount describes a Christian.”

  She nodded. “My stepfather, Ted McNaughton is like that. He thinks the most important thing is to have a good heart. God wants us to be good people. I’m guessing you’d agree with that?”

  “Yes, I think I do.” He got the impression she wanted to talk about religion and explain herself. By way of offering an invitation to do so he added, “But your uncle doesn’t, does he?”

  “No, he doesn’t.”

  He felt certain enough of her answer to ask, “You’re not happy with a lot of things in your church, are you?”

  “No, I’m not. And not just the way it treats women. You realize, don’t you, that I know my uncle is wrong in all kinds of ways. When I first came to his house he had me study the Bible so that I could become a good Christian. The trouble was right from the start I saw the Bible is filled with inconsistencies. My uncle sees God’s hand in everything, like if someone is killed it’s because God wanted it.”

  “I know about that way of thinking and don’t buy it. My father was killed, but it was an accident. He was at the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “Yes, that’s a perfect example. And plagues are caused by germs, not God’s wrath. The Old Testament chronicles ancient days when war could be as savage as it is today. Slaughtering innocents was supposed to be God’s work, not human savagery. Supposedly God tells the Israelites when they were coming from Egypt to kill all the people in the land of milk and honey, but God would never want such a thing. It was the people rationalizing their cruelty speaking in that passage. The story of Adam and Eve has inconsistencies. I came to see the Bible was an attempt by human beings to explain the ways of God in terms people could understand. Really, what I’m trying to say is that right from the beginning I saw that my uncle’s beliefs could only be believed if you ignored all sorts of evidence. Even the Intelligent Design business that everyone at C. A. thought I believed I knew was wrong. Mr. Adamson convinced me evolution fit the facts. You see what I’m saying? I know the Bible isn’t literally true, but spiritually it has a great deal of truth. It’s in that way you could say it’s inspired by God.”

  Tiger, having finished a goodly amount of milk and explored the kitchen for a while, came over looking for companionship. Charlie picked her up and held her between her breasts. Instantly she started patting her.

  “I think she’s going to be happy here,” Jeremy said. I hope you’ll be able to see her some times.”

  “Me too,” she said. They both were aware of what his hope implied.

  “Back to your point about the Bible. I would agree it is filled with wisdom.”

  “Jeremy, do you believe in God?” she asked and then quickly looked down at Tiger. The question was important to her, he could tell. She was nervous.

  “I’ll have to give you a long answer. Chad, my friend and roommate at Wisconsin is an aggressive atheist. We used to argue all the time. I would defend the religious point-of-view. Nobody knows why the universe started. It’s a big mystery, one that will never be answered. Maybe science can answer the how, but it will never explain why. If there was a beginning, doesn’t that mean there was, or could be, a beginner? How can there be an unbegun? It’s so strange, so puzzling. That’s why I don’t disbelieve in God. I don’t think we can ever know. I do know that I have no problem seeing why people attribute the world to God. They are recognizing the mystery. I think the great religious leaders like Jesus and Buddha have connected to something eternal. Maybe they’re really even inspired prophets, which would be the word religious people would use. Even if you think that wasn’t literally true, it’s spiritually true. Suppose Jesus was just a man—a great man, a special man, a genius, a man of insight—but just a man? I don’t think that invalidates his teachings. The things he taught in the Sermon on the Mount are the things my father taught me.”

  “Agnostic,” she said when he finished his long explanation. “You’re an agnostic.”

  “Yeah, the word f
its, but I’m an agnostic who understands and is friendly to the religious attitude. In my intellectual history course last year we talked about an idea Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the English poet and thinker, had. He said that any idea that has engaged the great minds of the past deserves to be treated with the utmost respect. I agree with him. The idea of God and the desire to know God is one of the dominant ideas of mankind. That’s one reason I’m open-minded about it. My friend Chad isn’t. You realize when I was defending the religious attitude against Chad, it was you I was especially thinking of.”

  She blushed, understanding what he was implicitly saying.

  “But, Charlie, you’re open-minded and intelligent, unlike your uncle who’s so close-minded he’s blind. Why don’t you just leave? Go home to your mother. Then you’d be free to be yourself.”

  She looked down at Tiger, then back at him. She started to speak, hesitated, then with a look of resolve, said, “Well, I’m actually thinking about it. My mom definitely wants me to live at home. She says I could live there and go to USM. But it’s a big step.”

  “I know. It would mean you’d be leaving your uncle’s church. But I think they aren’t worthy of you. They don’t deserve you.”

  When she didn’t answer, he pushed the point. “A lot of people change their church, you know.”

  “I know. You can’t say anything I haven’t thought. I’m leaning towards leaving, but not yet. That’s all I can say.”

  He remembered her cringing at her uncle’s sharp words a few weeks ago and knew she was afraid of him. He could understand how difficult it would be to extricate herself from the life she had known for the past six years. There was no use in trying to push her. She had to be the one who jumped.

  He looked at his watch. “Well, come on. It’s time I took you to your uncle’s house.”

  They both understood why he did not use the word “home.”

  The Opened Door