The Imperfectionists: A Novel

by Tom Rachman

  Jimmy frowns, but can't remember. He says he can't retain anything anymore.

  "I'm the same," Herman says. "I used to have perfect recall, but my memory's shot now. I have this new technique: I write everything down. Lists. That's the answer." He's lying. His memory remains impeccable. "Long lists for everything. Consider it. It works.

  Any idea I have--not that what I do amounts to ideas--but any gripe I have with the paper, I jot down. Thank God I'm not attempting anything as complex as what you do. I admire that. I could never write a book." He flaps the napkin out on his lap. "Do you mind if I ask about the book? I'm wondering--and I don't want to intrude here--but I'm curious to know if you brought the manuscript. My bigger question, I guess, is when do I get to read it? And you should feel free to work on it out here, if you want. You don't have to feel obliged to meet up with me for lunch. I can leave you in the study, bring you bowls of soup, whatever. I spent years in New York bringing food and drink to writers--I know what I'm doing in this field! Seriously, though, I'd be delighted if you made some progress while you're here. And if I could be of use in looking over the thing, I'd be honored. Again, not that there's any obligation. Sorry, I'll shut up."

  When Herman was offered a position at the paper in the 1970s, he hesitated: going off to Europe before Jimmy had established himself was all wrong. Then again, Jimmy wasn't even in New York anymore. His affair in Mexico had ended badly and, rather than returning to Manhattan, he had accepted a job taking publicity photographs for the equestrian circuit, traveling the United States in trucks with event technicians. He wrote infrequent memos to Herman about his wanderings. The letters were captivating, the events bizarre. Herman kept the correspondence in a cherrywood box--they'd be useful one day in the biography. He imagined Jimmy's existence: moving on a whim, walking out when jobs annoyed him, staying up all night and waking with unknown women. Herman resented it slightly, as if he were somehow footing the bill for Jimmy's freedom. Miriam encouraged Herman to take the job in Italy, especially while their daughter was young enough to make the transition. It was tempting: the paper held a cosmopolitan allure for Herman. To his mind, it was the publication that a weathered novelist or a spy might fold under his arm. And the 1970s were thrilling times at the paper, with an inventive new editor, Milton Berber, a vibrant young staff, and buoyant spirits all around. So he took the position and urged Jimmy to take advantage of the free lodgings in Rome--he could come and write his book there, full-time and for as long as he liked. (Within limits set by Miriam, naturally.)

  Instead, Jimmy settled in Arizona with Deb, who weaved artisanal rugs and had an infant daughter. He married Deb, adopted the girl, and, to bring in money, qualified as a paralegal. Herman was disappointed when he finally met Deb--he'd expected a marvel, and she wasn't that. It rankled that Jimmy should be detained by mediocrity in Arizona when he could have been sparkling in Rome. Herman could easily have got Jimmy hired at the paper, and he'd repeatedly offered to do so.

  When the bill comes for their lunch at Casa Bleve, Jimmy pulls out his credit card.

  "No, no," Herman says. "This is mine. I'm the one with the job."

  But Jimmy insists.

  "Okay, how about this then," Herman says. "I'll let you pay on one condition: that you write something for me--an article, any kind you like--and I get to print it in the paper. What do you say? Obviously, we'll pay you, though I'm afraid we have a lousy freelance rate these days after all the budget cuts. But you can write about anything. An opinion piece, something funny--anything. It'd be a real feather in my cap to publish you.

  How's that sound?"

  That night, Jimmy sits before the computer, leaning his gaunt face into the screen, slender fingers hovering above the keyboard. Herman leaves him there, closes the door, and shakes his fist triumphantly. As the hours pass, Herman paces back and forth in the kitchen, nervously eating slices of homemade lemon-pistachio polenta and browsing cookbooks. He approaches the computer room, places his ear to the door, hears the slow tapping of fingers on the keyboard. It is almost 2 A.M. when Jimmy emerges. The article is there on the screen, but he can't figure out how to work the printer. He's tired, says good night, goes to bed.

  By the end of the 1980s, Deb had divorced Jimmy. A few years later, they remarried. But soon she left him a second painful time, and he moved to Los Angeles to get away from the situation. He freelanced as a paralegal, which kept him afloat. But he had no health coverage, so when a molar went rotten he yanked it himself with needle-nose pliers. He was drunk at the time and bungled it, splintering the tooth and leaving chunks in the bloody gum. Herman happened to call a few days later and heard about the tooth and the fever that had followed. He demanded that Jimmy go to the hospital. At the emergency room, they told him the wound had gone septic. While waiting for the on-call dentist, he suffered a heart attack. Jimmy was fifty-six, but by the time he was discharged he had become an old man. In the following months, he aged further, grew forgetful and anxious, suspected that people were walking up behind him. He checked endlessly that his doors and windows were locked, that the gas was off. He often called in sick at the law firm where he freelanced, then eventually retired--it was foisted on him, really. At the time, Herman welcomed the news: finally, Jimmy could focus on his writing. He'd always said he'd finish his book once he retired.

  And now he's here, in the spare room, asleep. Still no sign of the full manuscript, but at least here is a taste of Jimmy's writing. Herman prints a copy of the article and two pages emerge. He snatches them from the printer tray, rushes to the sofa, plops down to read.

  It takes a moment before he can focus on the text, so excited is he. How many years has he waited for this! Sure, it's just a few hundred words, but it's a start. Might Jimmy have a full manuscript in that bag over there in the corner? Herman would never snoop, but how he longs to.

  He focuses on the pages before him.

  He reads through them.

  Herman has worked as an editor for forty years. It doesn't take him long to realize.

  This article is no good.

  It's a sort of editorial, but without any clear argument, touching on life in L.A., on the proliferation of guns in America, on declining civility. The article is full of grammar mistakes and platitudes. It's amateurish. Is this the right document? Maybe this is a rough draft? He goes to check the computer. By the mouse pad, he finds a scrap of scrunched paper and pulls it apart. It bears Jimmy's handwriting and contains a long list of notes, written, rewritten, crossed out, full of scribbles and question marks and lines and dashes and variations. Hours of effort have gone into this, a worthless piece of writing.

  Herman can't sleep that night. He keeps sitting up in bed, turning on the lamp, stuffing himself with hard candies, then brushing his teeth all over again. At 6 A.M., he rises for good--he intends to escape the apartment before Jimmy wakes up. That way, Herman can study the article at the office and work out what to do.

  But Jimmy appears from the spare room, saying he wanted to catch Herman before he left: there's a spelling mistake in the article.

  "Don't worry. I'll fix it," Herman says.

  Jimmy insists on doing it himself. He disappears into the computer room, makes his correction, and hands Herman a memory stick containing the article.

  At the office, Herman shoots off an email to Kathleen, saying he may have a late addition to the editorial page. He isn't bound by this, but it leaves him the option. Does he have to run the piece? He could tell Jimmy it was good but that it needed more focus.

  Then again, honestly, can anything be salvaged from it? And the paper isn't his to fill as he pleases. It's not disloyal if he spikes the piece, is it? What about credibility?

  "Credibility," he mutters, and it is a sodden, fraudulent word on this day.

  He resolves to publish the article. He has the power to. And he will. It'll appear in a single edition, down two half-columns, with a bloated headline and a pull quote to fill out the space, deep in the inside pages. He
'll show the clipping to Jimmy tomorrow morning, he'll thank him, he'll throw a thick arm around his narrow friend and say, "After all these years, we got to work together."

  He plugs the memory stick into his computer and opens Jimmy's document. But the text of the night before is gone. All that appears is a note: "Don't worry, kid. I deleted the thing. Did you know tonight is my last night in town? I'm taking you for dinner, and I pay. No arguments. Jimmy."

  Kathleen asks about the editorial, and Herman tells her it was a false alarm. She points out a headline--"Global Warming Good for Ice Creams"--and proposes it for his next edition of Why? She adds, "I find it idiotic on so many levels."

  "No, yes, you're right," he says, though he's not listening.

  Jimmy chooses a touristy restaurant near the Vatican for their last dinner. Herman wishes he himself had picked--he can see from the curled menu outside that this place isn't serious. Food is not the point, of course, but he's on edge: his friend leaves tomorrow and nothing has been achieved. During dinner, Jimmy drinks three glasses of wine, which is the most he's had since the heart attack. As alcohol seeps into him, he rambles charmingly, like in the old days, when he was legendary for tipsy philosophizing, reciting Yeats or Yevtushenko from memory, blathering on about Joyce, and proclaiming the funniest word in the English language to be "rump." Herman associates Jimmy's drunken chatter with their happiest times.

  They don't mention his article at first. But the evening is going so well that Herman says, "This whole thing could be an impetus, don't you think? A little reminder, you know. To really write something now."

  Jimmy sits up straighter, clears his throat. "Herman," he says calmly, "I'm not writing anything. I haven't yet, and I'm not going to now. I never was going to. I knew that from, maybe, age twenty. You're the one who kept going on about it."

  "I didn't go on about it," Herman says, taken aback. "It's just that I thought--I think--that you are capable of something great. Something outstanding. You always had such talent."

  Jimmy taps his friend's earlobe affectionately. "There's no such thing as talent, kid."

  Herman pulls away. "I'm serious."

  "So am I. I should have made it clear forty years ago that you had the wrong idea about me. But I'm vain. I guess I was trying to make a good impression. Only I'm too old to keep trying. So please stop talking about what I'll do. It only emphasizes what I didn't.

  I've had a good enough life, an average life. And that's fine."

  "It's hardly been average."

  "No? If not, then what proof is there to the contrary? I have the proof of sixty-five years."

  Herman begins to dispute this, but Jimmy talks over him.

  "You know what I liked about that article you had me do?" he says. "I liked working with you, Herman--that I enjoyed. Hearing how you'd get it into print. You really know the world of journalism, boy. See --you do useful work. Hard work. Not the hooey I've done. Standards. That's what you have. And I liked getting a sense of how you do it. That's a real pleasure for me. To see how far you've come."

  "Don't be crazy. You're the one who wrote that article. Think how quickly you rolled it out. Professional writers sometimes take days over a piece, weeks even, months.

  Imagine if you really put some time into it? Doesn't that inspire you? To go back and work on something a bit more permanent?"

  "I haven't got it in me," Jimmy says. "And I don't like leaning on you anymore. I take advantage of you too much. Always have. Your generosity. Me sleeping on the floor at Riverside Drive? I never paid a dime of rent in how many years?"

  "You weren't my tenant. You were my friend. You didn't owe me anything."

  Jimmy smiles. "You got a nutso perspective on certain things, Mr. Herman Cohen."

  When they leave, Herman takes a handful of business cards from the restaurant and rests his hand on Jimmy's shoulder. As they emerge onto the street, Herman makes a show of looking around for a taxi to hide the fact that he's choked up.

  At Fiumicino Airport the next day, Jimmy mentions that he may move back to Arizona. His adopted daughter, now in her thirties, has a place in Tempe. She works in real estate and lives alone. She'd enjoy the company.

  As Herman listens, he envisions this life for his fading friend. He and Jimmy are not, as Herman has always believed, gradations of the same man--he the middling version and Jimmy the superlative one. They are utterly different: Herman would never move in with his daughter, would never let himself fall insolvent at age sixty-five, and never need a place to stay. Even now, the notion of retirement is preposterous to him--his fingers still jab far too well, poking that paper to credibility.

  They part at airport security and Herman walks toward the exit, but he pauses at the sliding doors. Perhaps Jimmy still needs him for something. What if there's a problem?

  He turns back and spots his old friend in the security line. Jimmy hauls his carry-on luggage, jacket slung over his forearm. He yawns--he never did get over the jet lag.

  He is jostled from behind and scratches his forehead testily, muttering. He has little hair left, a dusting of snow above each ear. His eyelids hang heavy, his ears are long. How Herman has adored provoking laughter from that face over the years! And how thin it has become. A spindly neck knocking around inside a collar, an abdomen retreating into a spine. The security line inches forward until it is Jimmy's turn. With difficulty, he heaves his bag onto the conveyor belt and Herman's shoulders strain involuntarily as if to help the bag up there. Jimmy raises his arms to be scanned, collects his bag, walks out of sight.

  Herman drives the blue Mazda slowly home to Monteverde. He finds himself considering it all: Miriam (he smiles), their daughter (what a fine young woman), their grandchildren (each has such a different personality), these extraordinary years in Rome (Miriam was right about us moving here), his satisfaction at the paper (I've been useful).

  All this has been the most extraordinary surprise; he had expected an unhappy life, yet ended up with the opposite. It's barely credible.

  When Miriam arrives home, she raves about the trip to Philadelphia and shows off all the photos on her digital camera. They are so wrapped up in talking about the grandkids that they hardly discuss Jimmy's stay. She turns to Herman on the sofa--they are sitting side by side.

  "What?" he asks suspiciously. "What is it?"

  "I was just thinking how handsome you are."

  "How fat, you mean."

  "No," she says. "Handsome." She kisses his cheek, then his lips. "You are. And I'm not the only one who thinks so, either."

  "So I've got admirers now?"

  "I'm not about to tell you, am I. You might run off."

  "I made soup, by the way."

  "Yes," she says, amused. "I know."

  A couple of months later, Herman receives an email from Jimmy. It is long and rambling, full of philosophizing and poetic citations. Which is another way of saying he's in splendid spirits with his daughter in Tempe, Arizona.

  The email, for no reason Herman can articulate, upsets him. He sees no reason to write back, and perhaps that is why.

  1960. AVENTINE HILL, ROME

  Ott opened his copy of the paper across the dining-room table and touched a finger to his tongue, which was dry from all the medication the doctors had him on. He flipped the pages: Eichmann caught in Argentina, African colonies declaring independence, Kennedy running for president.

  He was proud of what the paper had become but sorry to read it here in his mansion and not in the office, among his staff. He had not visited Corso Vittorio in weeks. He'd told Betty and Leo that he was traveling in the United States; he'd told his family in Atlanta that he was on the road in Italy. The only travel he did, however, was to clinics in London and Geneva.

  His symptoms had been worsening for months: blood, pain, exhaustion. He came to despise his bathroom in the mansion, all the intimate revulsions awaiting him there.

  He had the cooks prepare steak, eggs, liver pate, but still he grew thinner.

>   A surgeon in London cut out half of Ott's cancerous insides, but the procedure did no good. On his return to the mansion, he ordered the servants away. A delivery boy dropped each day's paper outside the gate; a maid left him food. Otherwise, he was on his own.

  He washed in the bathtub, soap bar bruising his skin, bumping bones beneath. He climbed out, arms straining on the rim of the tub. In the fogged mirror, he caught sight of himself, thick white towel around jagged hips. He was dying.

  He walked across the mansion, bathwater dripping off him, over the floorboards, up the stairs to the second floor. Cautiously, he lowered himself into the chair at his desk-

  -no buttock flesh to cushion him anymore--and opened his letter pad.

  The first note he addressed to his wife and son, whom he had left in Atlanta years earlier. "Dear Jeanne and Boyd," he wrote. "The important thing to realize, and I need to make this clear."

  His pen hung above the line.

  He glanced at the wall, at one of the paintings Betty had chosen, theTurner. He approached it and reached behind himself, as if to take her wrist, to lead her closer. "Tell me about this one. I don't understand it. Explain it to me."