“I don’t know. We have the names of her husbands. Maybe I can try to look them up. Find their numbers and addresses.”
Not a bad idea, Andy thought. “Don’t you have some school work to do?”
“In my spare time.”
“What about attending school in your spare time?”
“I’ll think about that. I promise. But I think I should get on this ASAP, don’t you, Andy?”
Another touch of esprit de corps. Why did he keep talking as if they had some kind of working relationship? She was considering how to nip this little notion in the bud, when her computer rang.
Sam. Skyping. Andy had completely forgotten. She pressed the green phone icon, and the living room of a three-bedroom flat in the heart of Edinburgh popped onto the screen, accompanied by the lilting screech of a two-year-old.
“Put the club down, Jake,” Sam was yelling, as the image on Andy’s screen bobbed up and down.
“Sam?”
“Just a minute, Mom. Jake’s got a 9-iron.”
Andy watched from 5,000 miles away as Sam dashed into the center of the room and grabbed the weapon, then put it back into a golf bag that was propped up in a window alcove. Next, she hoisted the toddler under her arm and returned to sit down at the computer.
“I don’t know why I can’t convince Graham to keep his clubs in the closet. He insists on leaving at least one set on public display. It’s insane,” Sam said, nearly out of breath. “Anyway, how are you?”
“I’m fine, honey,” Andy smiled. “The question is, how are you?”
“Frazzled.”
“Hi, Samantha!” Harley’s voice wormed its way in from behind Andy.
“Harley?” asked Sam.
His visage dipped into the picture like a loosely tethered balloon. “Just wanted to say ‘hi,’” he chirped.
“And then ‘good-bye,’” Andy prompted.
“Good-bye,” Harley said, waving and floating away as commanded.
Andy watched him pick up the papers from Larry O’Dowd’s report, giving the distinct impression that they now belonged to him, and walk purposefully toward his bedroom, as if his lolling Converse had suddenly morphed into wingtips.
“Why isn’t he in school?” Sam asked.
“Don’t ask. Don’t tell,” Andy replied. “I truly do not want to know.”
Jake managed to wriggle out of his mother’s clutch and jet across the room onto the sofa.
“Just a sec,” Sam sighed. “Let me put on a video.” She searched for and found a remote, then played with the keys until an episode of In the Night Garden appeared on the television screen.
“Igglepiggle?” Andy said, derisively. “Is that really the best you can do?”
“I know you think it’s insipid. But Jake and Ella love it.”
“It is insipid. The British should be ashamed of themselves.”
“The English should be ashamed of themselves,” Sam corrected. “I refuse to believe any full-blooded Scot had anything to do with either the writing or development of this show.”
“Well, I don’t want my grandchildren exposed to it.”
“I don’t want your grandchildren exposed to it either. But there are things in this life that we didn’t cause, can’t control, and will never cure. And this is one of them. Now what’s the temperature there?”
“A sunny 78.”
“It’s 55 and raining here. Which means I am suffering enough. So let’s move on, shall we?”
“Absolutely. Where’s Graham?”
“He’s teaching a putting clinic at Glen Eagles this week.”
“Cool. That should be lucrative.”
“It is. But it makes the childcare arrangements a nightmare. He’s supposed to be home in an hour so that I can teach my night class.”
“And how’s school?”
“Good. That’s actually why I wanted to chat. I’ve been in touch with Lil’s neighbor—Mike Anderson.”
“The recovering Mormon?”
“Right. We’ve been working on the Bader genealogy. It’s very interesting.”
“Have you found anything so far?”
“Quite a bit, actually. But nothing definitive. However, as luck would have it, I’m going to Kiev next week for a lecture, and Mike helped me set up a meeting with a researcher there who specializes in Bessarabia, where your mom’s family came from.”
“Bessarabia,” Andy repeated, as she recalled the ringing of the same bell in the conversation with Mike Anderson.
“The area around Odessa, on the Black Sea. That’s where the Baders sailed from.”
“Right. I think I knew that. But that’s about all I know,” Andy said, treading the waters of her own ignorance. She had been remarkably incurious about her family’s background, she realized. “I hope this isn’t eating up too much of your time.”
“Not at all. I’d really like to find out. Some Baders from that area were German Protestants. Others were Jews. And this researcher should be able to tell us which tribe we belonged to. I’ve always been a little suspicious we might be Jewish. Haven’t you?”
“Not really,” Andy answered, truthfully. “It never occurred to me.”
“That’s because you’re a reactionary,” Samantha said, knowing it might be a mistake.
“I am not!” erupted Mount Andy.
“You see? It’s so easy to pull your chain, Mom. You always react before you think things through.”
Andy had been called many things in her life; reactionary had never been one of them.
When her mother didn’t say anything more, Sam recanted her word choice. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t mean to sound so accusatory. I meant to say that you’ve been so busy running away from your family’s religion all your life that you never considered that they might have been running away from their family’s religion, too.”
Andy blinked. Then blinked again. She sat up and stared intensely into Sam’s rather obvious observation. “Oh,” she said. “I never thought about that.” She put the possibility in perspective, trying to reimagine her family history. “You think they weren’t just coming to Nebraska to homestead? You think they might have been trying to escape persecution?”
“Well, there were definitely pogroms in that part of the country around the time the family emigrated.”
“Pogroms?”
“Bessarabia has a nasty history in that respect.”
“Right,” Andy said. “I guess I didn’t know that, either.” The waters of what she didn’t know were getting deeper and deeper. “You’re saying they were some kind of religious refugees?”
“I don’t know. But it could be,” Sam offered, allowing Andy a little silence in which to struggle with the idea. It went on for nearly a minute. “Mom?” she finally asked.
“I’m thinking,” Andy said. “I’m thinking that if what you say is true, that they fled the Ukraine because they were Jewish, then it might explain why they became so non-Jewish when they got here.”
“And why they always seemed to be making up their own religious ideas,” Sam added. “Because they had to make them up.”
Was this the change in perspective that Alice had experienced when stepping through the looking glass, Andy wondered. “Well, it certainly explains some of their holier-than-thou behavior!” she announced.
“And maybe some of your unholier-than-thou behavior, Mom,” Sam suggested.
It was a barb well placed, and it stung like hell.
“Mom?”
“Hmm?”
“Would it really make a difference, if all this turns out to be true?”
“You’re damned right it would!”
“Why?” Sam wondered.
“Because I’d have to be a helluva lot more forgiving, that’s why. And where’s the fun in that?”
Where ignorance is bliss, ‘tis folly to be wise, Andy wanted to remind her daughter, but Sam hated ignorance. Still, Andy thought, having to learn to understand her relatives at this stage in her life seemed
grossly unfair.
“Well, at least it would help explain why everyone in our family seems to enjoy arguing all the time,” said Sam. “About absolutely nothing. It could be that old Talmudic tradition.”
“You think we argue all the time because we’re descended from Rabbis?”
“I certainly hope so,” Sam laughed. “Otherwise, we’re just unbearably annoying people.”
To the rear of the computer screen, Andy caught a momentary glint of light bouncing off titanium as it collided with the goldfish bowl on the bookshelf behind Sam’s head. Andy actually saw the impact before Sam heard the sound of shattering glass. As her daughter whirled around, Andy yelled, “Go! Save your Shel Silverstein collection. And don’t be mad at my grandson. I’m the one who keeps telling him to take a full backswing.”
Sam turned momentarily back to the screen and snarled. “I hope to hell this is the only thing we have hiding in our family background. Because I’m also beginning to suspect my son may be descended from Vlad the Impaler.” She dashed across the room and again snatched up her ginger-haired boy.
“Bye, Sam,” Andy called.
“Bye, Mom. Love you.”
“You, too.”
Andy sighed, pressed the button, and life in Scotland faded to black.
“What’s hiding in our family background?”
The voice she had dismissed earlier was back behind her chair.
“What?”
“What does Sam think is hiding in our family background?” Harley repeated.
“Oh. Sam’s doing some research on the Baders,” Andy said, thinking if she didn’t turn around he might go away. Engaging with him on this particular subject would not end well.
“Grandma’s family?”
“Right.”
“What’s wrong with them?”
“Nothing’s wrong with them, Harley. We just want to know more about them.”
“Like what?”
Andy had avoided mentioning that Sam was rummaging around in their family closet because she was afraid it might upset Harley’s theological equilibrium. He’d begin to worry all over again about which team she would be supporting when it came time for Armageddon. Now she considered her options: tell the truth, equivocate, or outright lie.
“Come on, Andy. I’m a big boy. I can take it.”
Again with the just plain ‘Andy,’ she noted, as if he’d launched himself onto a new, loftier plane. It grated, like Edward Scissorhands’s nails on a chalkboard. In the end, Andy decided to turn around, give him her best smile, and opt for spite.
“Okay,” Andy said, pleasantly. “How do you feel about being Jewish?”
God, she thought, enjoying the contorted look on the boy’s face, I’m worse than a reactionary. I’m actually a sadist.
Chapter 16
Animal House Remake
Harley took the news of his possible Semite roots with surprising calm and in ominous silence. In fact, in the ensuing days he avoided the topic like a Biblical plague. Andy sensed he was searching for some way to inoculate himself against his potential Jewishness. The behavior that resulted confirmed her favorite dictum: what does not destroy us often makes us more obnoxious.
Without further provocation, he pulled himself together and returned to school. He attended classes. He read textbooks. He wrote papers. Well, at least one paper. And he prayed, before and after every meal. He was the very model of a modern major general in the Army of the Lord. To the faculty at Tabernacle U, the rededicated Harley Davidson must have been something of a revelation; he certainly was to Andy. For the first time, he demonstrated laser-like focus, hard work, and a hint of humility. More importantly, her born-again-born-again nephew stopped speaking to his aunt entirely; he merely shared the same house. It was all a little weird.
For her part, Andy was certain there was some kind of emotional eruption coming, and she didn’t want to be around when his primal pain hit the fan. Her strategy was to spend as much time away from home as possible. She did a lot of grocery shopping. Had the car washed. Returned a miter board and saw she’d borrowed from a neighbor. Made three trips to her credit union. And considered feeding the poor and visiting a few shut-ins.
Mostly, she played golf with Ted. She’d talked him into three games in one week. They played the first two at Balboa, a Los Angeles city course just off the 101 in Encino. Today they were back at Hansen Dam, pushing their carts down the meandering fairways below an artificial lake that helped feed and water the surrounding population. LA was pocked with these gigantic reservoir preserves that included fake lakes, miles of walking trails, and more nature than most Angelinos expected or cared about. Andy’s favorite edifice was only a few miles from her condo at Castaic Lake. The Castaic dam and surrounding trails were spectacular, and she walked there nearly every week. The recreation area’s only failing was that no one had bothered to build a golf course for her convenience. Hence, she was routinely forced to drive to the San Fernando Valley for her good-walk-spoiled. Since Harley’s recent transformation, however, she didn’t mind killing time, even on the freeway.
“So did Larry call you last night?” Ted asked, as they approached the 13th tee.
“No,” Andy said. “Was he trying to?”
“We went out for a burger at Barney’s. He said he might.”
“Why?”
“I think he got a bead on your Lady of the Ashes.”
“Tilda?”
“I guess she’s been on the move.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know. He’s still trying to track her credit card receipts or something. He just said he owed you a call.”
“Did he find any evidence of Mark?”
Ted shrugged. “Beats me.”
“I’m gonna call him,” she said, pulling out her cell phone.
“He won’t answer. He’s on a stakeout.”
“A stakeout?” she said.
“For one of the studios. They’ve got a flasher on the lot who keeps popping up in the women’s bathrooms.” Ted stuck his tee in the grass and set up to swing. “Larry thinks it’s one of the gaffers on the Animal House remake they’re shooting.”
He whipped his club back, then brought it down like a pendulum, impacting the ball at the base of the arc. His Pro V1 took off like a shot, traveling about three feet off the ground for several yards, then launching high into the air.
“I don’t think I can hit a ball better than that,” he announced.
Andy nodded her admiration, as the ball drew slightly to the left and landed just over 300 yards out.
“They’re shooting a remake of Animal House?” she tut-tutted, making her way to the tee. “That’s ridiculous!”
“Exactly what I said! How can you remake a classic?”
She bent over, put the tee in the ground, and looked up at him in not-so-mock horror. “A classic? Are you joking, Ted?”
“No. Why would I? Some things are just perfect the way they are. Like the Wizard of Oz. Would you remake the Wizard of Oz?”
Feeling his comparison of the two movies did not merit a response, she swung, slamming the ball 225 yards down the middle. Credible. But not incredible. A little surge of jealousy invaded her endocrine system. The unruly hormones made her long to be a man and hit the ball exactly like Ted did. And then just as quickly, the surge subsided, and reason returned. Every man Andy had ever golfed with believed Animal House was a classic, she realized; this kind of stupidity was biological, and men just couldn’t help it. Estrogen had its physical drawbacks, no doubt about it. But testosterone exacted its own terrible price, particularly in the arts.
“Nice hit,” Ted said, as he always did, even though her ball was 75 yards short of his.
“I’ll take it,” she replied, smiling contentedly. “Because I am a woman, Ted. And therefore free to hate Animal House.”
On the way home from the course, Andy tried calling Larry O’Dowd. The call went immediately to voice mail, as Ted predicted, so she left a message say
ing he could call her any time. As she drove into the garage, it occurred to her that Harley had never returned the P.I.’s report to her desk and that it must still be in his room. She decided she needed to look through it again before the call, just in case she had any questions she wanted to ask. She got out of the car, hampered by a humiliating stiffness that screamed ‘old person,’ and opened the door into the family room. Blessed silence. Harley was still at school. Now all she had to do was nip upstairs.
By the fifth step, she was acutely aware that ‘nipping’ was no longer an option and was forced to slow down. She reached his door and, without thinking to knock, pushed it open. She stopped dead in her tracks. Harley, or some other very marshmallow-like being in a fetal position, lay on the bed, covers pulled over his head. Either the fuel that had been feeding his current fervor had run out, or he’d crashed headlong into another psychological obstacle tantamount to the naked coupling he had witnessed in her closet. Whatever had traumatized him this time, she didn’t want to hear about it.
Andy spotted the envelope from Larry on the dresser, tiptoed into the curtained room, and grabbed it. Mute and stealthy, she turned to make her escape. She was near the door when she caught sight of something shimmering at the foot of his bed, along with her first inkling of his latest identity crisis. There on the bed bench, draped over the silver-toed cowboy boots that were his pride and joy, was a long, silky scarf with elegant tassels. Her nephew was either cross-dressing, or he had managed to find himself a prayer shawl.
She closed her eyes and tried like hell not to conjecture. She pressed on toward the door, determined to escape the room without saying anything that could be mistaken as the least bit sympathetic. But as she reached the threshold, guilt got the best of her. “I’ll be downstairs making dinner if you want to talk,” she whispered very, very softly. Does an act of kindness still count if the person can’t quite hear it?
In the kitchen Andy assembled her store of ingredients for making chili. One of her skinny friends once said that chili was the perfect combination of carbs and proteins. Andy preferred to think of chili as the perfect combination of tin cans and frozen hamburger. Mindlessly, she went through the ritual that was her version of cooking, greatly relieved that Harley remained quiet and upstairs. After half an hour, she sat down at the dining room table with her bowl full of perfection and once again opened the file Larry had sent. Between spoonfuls, she fingered through the papers hoping something new would jump out at her, but nothing did. She remembered that her nephew had promised to Google the names of Tilda’s other three husbands, but there was nothing to indicate he had. So Andy returned to the stove for a second helping, and on the way back to the table, she grabbed her laptop off the counter.
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