The Best American Mystery Stories 2019

by Jonathan Lethem

  And now you are in my homeroom. “Vio-let Rue.”

  No alternative. Mr. Sandman was the ninth-grade math teacher.

  At last, I was his. On his homeroom class list and in his fifth-period math class.

  For both homeroom and math class Mr. Sandman seated me at his right hand where he could keep a much-needed eye on you.

  He’d helped me to my feet. Before he’d been my teacher. Discovered me sleeping in a corner of the school library where I’d curled up beneath a vinyl chair as a dog might curl up to sleep, nose to tail, a shabby little terrier, hoping to be invisible and not to be kicked.

  No one else seemed to see me. Might’ve been somebody’s sheepskin jacket tossed beneath a chair at the back of the room.

  Standing over me breathing hoarsely for so long, I wouldn’t know.

  Time to wake up, dear! Take my hand.

  But it was his hand that took my hand. Gripped hard, and hauled me to my feet.

  Why did you let him touch you, Violet! That terrible man.

  Why, when you would not let others touch you, who’d hoped to love you as a daughter?

  2.

  “I am the captain. You are the crew. If you don’t shape up, you go overboard.”

  Mr. Sandman, ninth-grade math. His skin was flushed with perpetual indignation at our stupidity. His eyes leapt at us like small shiny toads. When he stretched his lips it was like meat grinning, we cringed and shuddered and yet we laughed, for Mr. Sandman was funny.

  He was one of only three male teachers at Port Oriskany Middle School. He was advisor to the Chess Club and the Math Club. He led his homeroom class each morning in the Pledge of Allegiance.

  (In a severe voice Mr. Sandman recited the pledge facing us as we stood obediently with our hands over our hearts, heads bowed. There was no joking now. You would have thought that the Pledge of Allegiance was a prayer. A shiny American flag, said to be a personal flag, a flag that Mr. Sandman had purchased himself, hung unfurled from the top, left-hand corner of the blackboard, and when Mr. Sandman finished the pledge in his loud righteous voice he lifted his right hand with a flourish, in a kind of salute, fingers pointing straight upward and at the flag.)

  (Was this the Nazi salute?) (We were uncertain.)

  Mr. Sandman ruled math classes like a sea captain. He liked to shake what he called his iron fist. If one of us, usually a boy, was hopelessly stupid that day he’d have to walk the plank—rise from his desk and walk to the rear of the room, stand there with his back to the class and wait for the bell.

  On a day of rough waters there’d be three, could be four, boys at the rear of the room, resigned to standing until the bell rang, forbidden to turn around, no smirking, no wisecracks, if you have to pee just pee your pants—a Sandman pronouncement shocking each time we heard, provoking gales of nervous laughter through the room.

  Of course, this was ninth-grade algebra. We were fourteen, fifteen years old. Nobody in this class was likely to pee his pants.

  (Yet we were not so old that the possibility didn’t evoke terror in us. Our faces flushed, we squirmed in our seats hoping not to be singled out for torment by Mr. Sandman.)

  It was rare that Mr. Sandman commanded a girl to march to walk the plank. Though Mr. Sandman teased girls, and provoked some (of us) to tears, yet he was not cruel to girls, not usually.

  Boys were another story. Boys were Schmutz.

  Bobbie Sandusky was Boobie Schmutz. Mike Farrolino was Muck Schmutz. Rick Latour was Ruck Schmutz. Don Farquhar was Dumbo Schmutz.

  Was any of this funny? But why did we laugh?

  Hiding our faces in our hands. Nothing so hilarious as the misery of someone not-you.

  You’d have thought that Mr. Sandman would be detested but in fact Mr. Sandman had many admirers. Graduates of the middle school spoke fondly of him as a character, mean old sonuvabitch who really made us learn algebra. Even boys he ridiculed laughed at his jokes. Like a standup TV comic scowling and growling and the most shocking things erupting from his mouth, impossible not to laugh. Hilarity was a gas seeping into the room that made you laugh even as it choked you.

  Mr. Sandman was a firm believer in running a tight ship. “In an asylum you can’t let the inmates get control.”

  A scattering of boys in Mr. Sandman’s class seemed to escape his ridicule. Not the smartest boys but likely to be the tallest, best-looking, often athletes, sons of well-to-do families in Port Oriskany. These boys who laughed loudest at jokes of Mr. Sandman’s directed at other, less fortunate boys. My goon squad.

  He’d get them uniforms, he said. Helmets, boots. Revolvers to fit into holsters. Rifles.

  They could learn to goose-step. March in a parade along Main Street past the school. Atten-tion! Ready, aim. He’d lead them.

  (Would Mr. Sandman be in uniform, himself? What sort of captain’s uniform? A pistol in a holster, not a rifle. Polished boots to the thigh.)

  Boys were goons at best but girls didn’t matter at all. When Mr. Sandman spoke with a rough sort of tenderness of his goon squad it seemed that we (girls) were invisible in his eyes.

  “Girls have no ‘natural aptitude’ for math. There is no reason for girls to know math at all. Especially algebra—of no earthly use for a female. I have made my opinion known to the illustrious school board of our fair city but my (informed, objective) opinions often fall upon deaf ears and into empty heads. Therefore, I do not expect anything from females—but I am hoping for at least mediocre, passable work from you. And you, and you.” Winking at the girls nearest him.

  Was this funny? Why did girls laugh?

  It did not seem like a radical idea to us, any of us, that girls had no natural aptitude for math. It seemed like a very reasonable idea. And a relief, to some (of us), that our math teacher did not hold us to standards higher than mediocrity—(a word we’d never heard before, but instinctively understood).

  In fact Mr. Sandman didn’t wink at me at such times. When he made his pronouncements which were meant to make us laugh, and yet instruct us in the ways of the world, he didn’t look at me at all. He’d arranged the classroom seating so that “Violet Kerrigan” was seated at a desk in the first row of desks, farthest to the right and near the outer wall of windows, a few inches from the teacher’s desk. In this way as Mr. Sandman preened at the front of the classroom addressing the class I was at his right hand, sidelined as if backstage in a theater.

  Keeping my eye on you. “Vio-let Rue.”

  Each math class was a drill. Up and down the rows, Mr. Sandman as captain and drillmaster calling upon hapless students. Even if you’d done the homework and knew the answer you were likely to be intimidated, to stammer and misspeak. Even Mr. Sandman’s praise might sting—“Well! A correct answer.” And he’d clap, with deadpan ironic intent.

  As Mr. Sandman paced about the front of the room preaching, scolding, teasing, and tormenting us an oily sheen would appear on his forehead. His stiff, thinning, dust-colored hair became dislodged showing slivers of scalp shiny as cellophane.

  It made me shiver, to anticipate Mr. Sandman glancing sidelong at me.

  Keeping an eye on you. “Vio-let Rue.”

  Ever since you came to us. You.

  These were quick, intimate glances. No one saw.

  Staying after school, in Mr. Sandman’s homeroom.

  This was a special privilege: “tutorial.” (Only girls were invited.)

  Told to bring our homework that had been graded. If we needed “extra” instruction.

  Mr. Sandman stooped over our desks, breathing against our necks. He was not sarcastic at such times. His hand on my shoulder—“Here’s your error, Violet.” With his red ballpoint pen he would tap at the error and sometimes he would take my hand, his hand closed over mine, and redo the problem.

  I sat very still. A kind of peace moved through me. If you do not antagonize them, if you behave exactly as they wish you to behave, they will not be cruel to you.

  If you are very good, they will speak approvi
ngly of you.

  “‘Vio-let Rue’—you are a quick study, aren’t you?”

  With the other girls Mr. Sandman behaved in a similar way but you could tell (I could tell: I was acutely aware) that he did not like them the way he liked me.

  Though he called them dear he did not enunciate their names in the melodic way in which he enunciated Vio-let Rue. This was a crucial sign.

  Edgy and excited we bent over our desks. We did not glance up as Mr. Sandman approached, for Mr. Sandman did not seem to like any sort of flirtatious or over-eager behavior.

  Leaning over, his hand resting on a shoulder. His breath at the nape of a neck. A warm hand. A comforting hand. Lightly on a shoulder, or at the small of a back.

  “Very good, dear! Now turn the paper over, and see if you can replicate the problem from memory.”

  Sometimes, Mr. Sandman swore us to secrecy: we were given “rehearsal tutorials” during which we worked out problems that would appear on the next day’s quiz or test in Mr. Sandman’s class.

  Of course, we were eager to swear not to tell.

  We were privileged, and we were grateful. Maybe, we were afraid of our math teacher.

  Eventually, the other girls disappeared from the tutorials. Only Violet Rue remained.

  3.

  Instinctively Mr. Sandman knew: I did not live with my family but with relatives.

  Though each day came the hope—Daddy will come get me today.

  Or, more possibly—Daddy will call. Today.

  Running home expecting to see my aunt awaiting me just inside the door, a wounded expression on her face—“There’s been a call for you, Violet. From home.”

  At once, I would know what this meant.

  Even Irma understood that home, for me, did not mean the tidy beige-brick house on Erie Street.

  And so, each day hurrying home. But even as I approached Erie Street a wave of apprehension swept over me, my mouth went dry with anxiety . . .

  For there would be no Daddy waiting for me. There’d been no telephone call.

  In the meantime reciting multiplication tables to myself. Multiplying three-digit numbers. Long division in my head. Puzzling over algebra problems that uncurled themselves in my brain like miniature dreams.

  Such happiness in the Pythagorean Theorem! Always and forever it is a fact, clutched-at like a life-jacket in churning water—the sum of the areas of two small squares equals the area of the large one.

  No need to ask why. When something just is.

  Math had become strange to me. “Pre-algebra”—this was our ninth-grade curriculum. Like a foreign language, fearful and yet fascinating.

  “Equations”—numerals, letters—a, b, c. Sometimes my hand trembled, gripping a pencil. Hours I would work on algebra problems, in my room with the door shut. It seemed to me that each problem solved brought me a step closer to being summoned back home to South Niagara and so I worked tirelessly until my eyes misted over and my head swam.

  Downstairs Aunt Irma watched TV. Festive voices and laughter lifted through the floorboards. My aunt often invited me to watch with her, when I was finished with my homework for the night. But I was never finished with my homework.

  On her way to bed Aunt Irma would pause at my door to call out in her sweet, sad voice, “Goodnight, Violet!” Then, “Turn off your light now, dear, and go to sleep.”

  Obediently I turned off my desk light. Beneath my door, the rim of light would vanish. And then a few minutes later when I calculated that my aunt and uncle were safely in bed I turned it on again.

  During the day (most days) I was afflicted with sleepiness in waves like ether but at night when I was alone my eyes were wonderfully wide-open and my brain ran on and on like a rattling machine that would have to be smashed to be stopped.

  On my homework papers Mr. Sandman wrote, in bright red ink—Good work!

  My grades on classroom quizzes and tests were high—93%, 97%, 99%. Because I prepared for these so methodically, hours at a stretch. And because of the secret tutorials.

  It was true, I had no natural aptitude for math. Nothing came easily to me. But much that passed into my memory, being hard-won, did not fade as it seemed to fade from the memories of my classmates like water sifting through outspread fingers.

  My secret was, I had no natural aptitude for any subject—for life itself.

  Keeping myself alive. Keeping myself from drowning. That was the challenge.

  They would ask Why. But lifting my eyes I can see the synthetic-shiny American flag hanging from the corner of Mr. Sandman’s blackboard, red and white stripes like snakes quivering with life.

  Listening very carefully I can hear the chanting. Each morning pledging allegiance. (But what was “allegiance”? We had no idea.) The entire class standing, palms of hands pressed against our young hearts. Reciting, syllables of sound without meaning, emptied of all meaning, eyes half-shut in reverence, a pretense of reverence, heads bowed. Five days a week.

  Our teacher Mr. Sandman was not ironic now but sincere, vehement.

  Pledge allegiance. To my flag. And to the Republic for which it stands. One Nation, indivisible. With Liberty and Justice for all.

  Under his breath Mr. Sandman might mutter as we settled back into our seats—Amen.

  4.

  Each time was a rescue. No one would understand.

  Boys had been trailing me, calling after me in low, lewd voices—Hey baby! Baby-girl! Hey cunt!

  Not touching me. Not usually.

  Well, sometimes—colliding with me in a corridor when classes changed. Brushing an arm, the back of a hand across my chest—“Hey! Sor-ry.” At my locker, jostling and grinning.

  Because I was a transfer student. Because I was alone. Because, like Mr. Sandman, they could see something forlorn and lost in my face, that excited them.

  In a restroom where I’d been hiding waiting for them to go away after the final bell had rung I’d asked a girl, are they gone yet, she’d laughed at my pleading eyes and told me yeah sure, those assholes had gone away a long time ago. But when I went out they were waiting just outside the door to the faculty parking lot.

  Shouts, laughter. Grabbing at the sleeves of my jacket, at my hair—run cunt run!

  Crouching behind a car, panting. Hands and knees on the icy pavement. Desperate for a place to hide trying car doors one after another until I found one that was unlocked. Climbed inside, into the backseat, on the floor making myself small as a wounded animal might. On the rear seat was a man’s jacket, I pulled over myself. Meant to hide for only a few minutes until the braying boys were gone but so tired!—fell asleep instead. Wakened by someone tugging at my ankle.

  Mr. Sandman’s dark face. Steel-wool eyebrows above his creased eyes. “Vi-o-let Rue! Is that you?”

  His voice was almost a song. Surprise, delight.

  “What are you doing here, Vio-let? Has someone been hounding you?”

  Of course, Mr. Sandman knew. All of the teachers knew. Though I had not ever told.

  How much worse it would be for me, if I told.

  I was not sure of the names of my tormenters. It was a matter of shame to me, there were so many.

  “Well! You don’t have to tell me who the vermin are just yet, dear. You have already been upset enough.” A pause. A stained-teeth smile. “I will drive you home.”

  Invited me to sit in the passenger’s seat beside him. Astonishing to me, the math teacher famous for his sarcasm was behaving in a kindly manner. Smiling!

  Though glancing about, to see if anyone was watching.

  It was late afternoon, early winter. Already the sky was dim, fading.

  In my confusion, waking from sleep, I seemed not to know exactly where I was, or why.

  Mr. Sandman advised me, I might just “hunch down” in the seat. In case some “nosy individual” happened to be watching.

  “One of my teacher-colleagues. Eager for gossip, you bet.”

  Quickly I hunched down in the seat. Shut my eyes and hu
gged my knees. I did not want to be seen by anyone in Mr. Sandman’s car.

  Mr. Sandman’s car was a large heavy pewter-colored four-door sedan. Not a compact vehicle like most vehicles in the faculty parking lot. Its interior was very cold and smelled of something slightly rancid like spilled milk.

  “You live on the east side, I believe? Is it—Ontario Street?”

  This was astonishing to me: how did Mr. Sandman have any idea where I lived?

  “Not Ontario? But nearby?”

  “Erie . . .”

  “You are wondering how I know where you live, Violet? And how I know with whom you live? Well!”

  Mr. Sandman chuckled. It was part of his comic style to pose a question but not answer it.

  When I was allowed to sit up a few minutes later and peer out the car window it did not appear that Mr. Sandman was driving in the direction of Erie Street. The thought came to me—He is taking another route. He knows another, better route.

  And when it became evident that Mr. Sandman was not driving me home at all I sat silently, staring out the window. I did not know what to say for I feared offending Mr. Sandman.

  In homeroom and in math class Mr. Sandman was easily “offended”—“deeply offended”—by a foolish answer to a question, or a foolish question. Often he simply glared, wriggling his dense eyebrows in a way comical to behold, unless you were the object of his ire.

  However, Mr. Sandman was in a very good mood now. Almost, Mr. Sandman was humming under his breath.

  “You know, Violet, it has been a pleasant and unexpected surprise—to discover that you are an impressively good student. Quite a surprise!”

  Mr. Sandman mused aloud as he drove. There was no expectation that I should answer him.

  “And also, a pleasant and unexpected surprise, to discover such an impressively good student in my automobile, hiding under a garment like Sleeping Beauty.”

  We were ascending hilly Craigmont Avenue. Still we were moving in a direction opposite to my aunt’s and uncle’s house on Erie Street and still I could not bring myself to protest.