The Abstinence Teacher

by Tom Perrotta

  What she said made a certain amount of sense, but Tim found himself reluctant to admit it.

  “This thing we agreed to is totally biblical. A husband shouldn’t have sex with his wife if his heart isn’t pure. It’s in Corinthians. Ask Pastor Dennis if you don’t believe me.”

  “I’m not married to Pastor Dennis,” she said.

  “I didn’t say you were.”

  “So who’s he to say what goes on in our bed?”

  “It’s not just him, honey. It’s in the Scriptures.”

  “Jerk!”

  She snatched the lube off the table and threw it at him, harder than he expected. He barely managed to get his hand up in time to deflect it. “Hey,” he said. “Take it easy.”

  “Go to hell, Tim.”

  “I really don’t see why you’re so upset.”

  She glared at him, her eyes full of pain.

  “I can’t believe you’re such a baby. You think I don’t fantasize about other men?”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah. Sometimes. But I don’t go crying to Pastor Dennis about it. You know why?”

  Tim shook his head.

  “Because I love my husband,” she told him. “And all I ever wanted was for him to love me back. But he couldn’t do it.”

  Tim didn’t dispute this.

  “You never did, did you?” For some mysterious reason, she was smiling, as if this knowledge brought her some kind of sad pleasure. “You never loved me one bit.”

  “I—” Tim began, but he faltered. “I’m trying, Carrie. I’m trying to be a good husband.”

  “Trying to do your Christian duty?” she taunted.

  “That’s not fair,” he told her. “I’m really working at this.”

  She shook her head, slowly and for a long time. Tim felt as though some terrible judgment were being passed, and understood that there probably wouldn’t be an appeal.

  “If you loved me,” she said, “it wouldn’t seem like such a chore.”

  Faith Keepers

  ARRIVING AT SCHOOL ON FRIDAY MORNING, RUTH FOUND AN OFFICIAL- looking envelope tucked into her mail slot, buried beneath the usual blizzard of memos and announcements. The message it contained—a couple of lines scrawled on a piece of stationery “From the Desk of Principal Venuti”—was ominously terse.

  Ruth, it said. Please report to my office at the beginning of first period—J.V.

  She showed the note to Randall when she brought him his latte. He made a sympathetic noise as he mulled it over, then lapsed into a childish singsong.

  “Someone’s in trouble, someone’s in trouble.”

  “Thanks for the support.”

  “Sorry. Just trying to inject a little levity into the proceedings.”

  She looked at him a little more closely. His mood seemed to have improved considerably since the previous evening, when he’d accused her of being a bad friend. Randall had cried himself to sleep on her couch for two nights in a row at that point, and hadn’t taken it well when she informed him that a third night was out of the question. She hated taking a hard line when he was in such a fragile emotional state, but she felt like she needed some time alone with Maggie and Eliza, a chance for the three of them to be a family without a weepy guest underfoot. Watching the girls head off to church on Sunday with the Parks had been a wake-up call, a reminder of how easy it was for the people you love to slip away from you. It had happened with her sister, and with Frank, and with more friends than she cared to remember. She wasn’t going to let it happen with her daughters, not if she could help it.

  “You seem awfully cheerful this morning,” she observed. “Did you get a good night’s rest?”

  “I wouldn’t say that. Actually I was up pretty late. Greg and I had a long talk.”

  “And?”

  Randall smiled coyly. “Are you free for dinner tonight?”

  “Why?”

  “There’s something we want to tell you.”

  “We? Does that mean what I think it means?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough.”

  “Come on,” she coaxed. “Are you back together?”

  Randall’s expression grew stern.

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss this right now. Greg made me promise we’d break the news together.”

  “The suspense is killing me.”

  “Seven o’clock at the Indian place,” he told her, handing back the summons. “Don’t be late.”

  THIS TIME around Ruth wasn’t surprised to find the Superintendent and JoAnn Marlow waiting for her in the Principal’s office—they were sitting on either side of the big desk, looking professionally somber—along with sour-faced Joe Venuti, who was anxiously caressing his abdomen, as if he’d already begun to regret his breakfast.

  “Hey,” she said, “it’s the old gang!”

  Only the Superintendent felt the need to respond. He rose and offered his hand.

  “Good to see you, Ruth.” He jerked her arm up and down, as if congratulating her on a job well-done. “Thanks for stopping by.”

  JoAnn and the Principal remained seated, watching coolly as she made her way to the bronze folding chair that had been placed in front of the desk. It had the words BAND ROOM stenciled on the backrest in faded black letters.

  “What’s up?” Ruth asked. “Did I get Teacher of the Year?”

  “Very funny,” muttered Venuti.

  “Now, now,” cautioned Dr. Farmer, somewhat ambiguously. “No need for that.”

  The conversation stalled for a moment. JoAnn looked expectantly at the Principal, who did the same to the Superintendent, who pretended to be engrossed in a thorough examination of a completely ordinary ballpoint pen he’d removed from a mug on Venuti’s desk.

  “They want to tell you something,” JoAnn explained.

  Venuti nodded in confirmation. He cleared his throat and drummed a few nervous beats on the edge of his desk.

  “After some, ah, administrative soul-searching, we’ve, ahhh, come to a decision. Dr. Farmer, would you like to have the honors?”

  The Superintendent didn’t look too happy to find the ball in his court.

  “Right,” he said, smiling sadly at Ruth. “You know we hate to do this sort of thing, but we couldn’t see any alternative.”

  “We’ve received numerous complaints,” Venuti added. “I can show you the file if you want.”

  Dr. Farmer nodded. “It seems fair to say that you’re not really in synch with the new curriculum. I don’t think anyone would disagree with that.”

  “We need team players,” JoAnn chimed in. “Otherwise, we’re at cross-purposes. And this pilot program is just too important for me to allow that to happen.”

  “I’m sorry,” Ruth said. “I’m not really sure what you guys are talking about.”

  “You’re being reassigned,” Dr. Farmer informed her. “You can finish up this semester, but starting in January you’re not going to be teaching Health anymore.”

  “We were hoping that refresher course might straighten things out,” Venuti went on, “but according to the report we received, it seems like you were uncooperative at best and possibly even a bit disruptive.”

  “We thought about sending you to a two-week training program in Philadelphia over the summer,” Dr. Farmer said, “but JoAnn sincerely feels like that would be a waste of everyone’s time and the school district’s resources. And in this era of across-the-board belt-tightening … well, I’m sure you understand.”

  “You can’t teach something if you don’t believe in it,” JoAnn declared. “And clearly, you don’t believe in the mission you’ve been entrusted with.”

  Ruth was stunned. She’d come here expecting a scolding, but not a three-way ambush.

  “I’m being fired?” she asked meekly.

  JoAnn nodded, but the Principal and Superintendent immediately took issue with this formulation.

  “That’s ridiculous,” said Venuti. “No one’s talking about firing anyone.”

 
; “You have tenure,” Dr. Farmer pointed out. “We couldn’t fire you if we wanted to.”

  “Not unless you killed someone,” Venuti said, glaring at Ruth as if he wasn’t ruling out this possibility.

  “Even then it’s dicey.” Dr. Farmer allowed himself a soft bureaucratic chuckle. “You’re just being reassigned, Ruth. It’s nothing personal.”

  The fog in Ruth’s head began to dissipate.

  “This is outrageous,” she said. “I’m going to the union.”

  “That’s your right,” Dr. Farmer assured her. “But our lawyer tells us we’re on solid ground here. You’re not being disciplined. You’re just being redeployed in accordance with our staffing needs. We have wide latitude over that sort of thing.”

  “Okay,” Ruth said. “Maybe you do. But who’s gonna teach my classes?”

  “The school board meeting’s next Tuesday,” Venuti said. “They’re going to vote on a waiver that would allow a qualified expert to teach within her subject area without going through the onerous process of state certification.”

  “A qualified expert?” Ruth repeated, turning to JoAnn.

  The Virginity Consultant smiled sweetly, and gave a little shrug, as if to say, You win some, you lose some.

  “JoAnn’s ABD in Public Health,” Venuti pointed out. “You just have a Master’s in Education.”

  “They’ve never approved one of those waivers before,” Ruth said. “Didn’t they turn down that retired newspaper editor who wanted to teach journalism?”

  “That was four years ago,” Venuti reminded her. “The board’s changed a lot in the meantime. I seriously doubt that JoAnn’s going to run into any problems.”

  “I’m sure she won’t,” Ruth agreed.

  “Thank you for being such a good sport,” Dr. Farmer said with obvious relief. “Do you have any questions about all this?”

  Ruth shook her head and stood up, eager to get the hell out of there. She was almost through the door when she realized she’d forgotten something.

  “Oh, wait,” she said. “You didn’t tell me about my reassignment.”

  “We’re not a hundred percent sure right now,” Venuti replied. “But it’s starting to look like we might have an opening in the Math Department.”

  “Math?” She couldn’t help laughing. “I don’t know anything about math.”

  “This is remedial,” Dr. Farmer assured her. “We’re just talking about the basics here.”

  “Believe me,” Venuti said. “These kids aren’t rocket scientists. If you know how to put two and two together, you’ll be way ahead of the curve.”

  THE FAITH Keepers’ contingent from the Tabernacle was nine guys in all, too many to fit in John Roper’s van. Tim had volunteered as the second driver and had been assigned Marty Materia and Jonathan Kim as passengers. The new guy, Jay, was originally supposed to make it four, but Pastor Dennis decided at the last minute that Jay should join him in the van.

  True to form—he was an electrician who worked crazy hours to support his wife and five kids, and was renowned for his ability to nap whenever and wherever an opportunity presented itself, including at Sunday meeting—Marty started snoring in the backseat the moment Tim pulled onto the highway. Jonathan rode shotgun, staring dead ahead and plucking nervously at the sharp creases on his khakis. For the first half hour of the trip, he made the occasional random stab at conversation, asking Tim how many siblings he had and whether he intended to buy a wide-screen TV in the near future, but then he gave up, falling into a meditative silence punctuated every couple of minutes by a soft grunt of approval, as if he were agreeing with his own thoughts.

  From a purely social standpoint, there was no denying that John’s Odyssey was the more desirable vehicle. Trailing it from a respectful distance, Tim could see the silhouettes of the men inside; there seemed to be a lot of activity in there—heads turning, snacks getting passed around, even the odd high five. There must have been praise music on the sound system—Pastor Dennis would have insisted—and a fair amount of laughter as well, given that Steve Zelchuk appeared to be holding forth from the back row. A gifted mimic with a huge repertoire of reasonably amusing, non-dirty jokes, Steve was widely considered to be the funniest guy at the Tabernacle, not that there was a whole lot of competition for the title.

  Normally, Tim would have been disappointed to find himself relegated to the dull car, but tonight he didn’t mind. It was a relief to get a little time to himself, a chance to listen to his new Mavis Staples CD and let his mind wander. Things would have been a lot more problematic if he’d been stuck inside the van with Pastor Dennis and John Roper, neither of whom could contain his excitement about tomorrow’s soccer game.

  From what Tim could figure, the whole thing was shaping up to be a circus. The Pastor had devoted a fair amount of time over the past few days to alerting the media—not just the local and regional papers, but TV and radio stations as well—to what he said was going to be “a historic battle in the ongoing war for the hearts and minds of our children.” He’d also enlisted a dozen or so volunteers from the Tabernacle to stand on the sidelines holding signs with Bible verses printed on them, which he figured would be a terrific visual if any TV reporters really did show up. These volunteers could also join the prayer circle at the end of the game, which sounded like an awesome idea to John.

  It didn’t sound quite so awesome to Tim, but his attempt to explain his reservations at the end of Wednesday Night Bible Study hadn’t gone over too well. Pastor Dennis couldn’t have cared less that Bill Derzarian and the Soccer Association would be pissed off, or that a lot of girls and their parents would be made uncomfortable, or that Tim and John would probably never be allowed to coach again.

  “If it upsets people to hear the truth,” he said, “so be it. Jesus told us to go into the world and preach the good news to all creation, not just the people who feel comfortable about it.”

  To their credit, both men were more sympathetic to Tim’s fears that, by participating in another postgame prayer, he’d be violating his custody agreement and jeopardizing his relationship with his daughter.

  “This is for real,” he told them. “I’ve been put on notice.”

  “That’s tough,” John agreed. “I really don’t know what I’d do in your shoes.”

  Pastor Dennis placed his hands on Tim’s shoulders and stared directly into his eyes for several seconds, as if he were trying to give him a transfusion of courage.

  “Be strong,” he said. “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord.”

  John nodded in solemn agreement.

  “You started this,” he reminded Tim. “Let’s finish it together.”

  THEY PARKED in a ten-dollar lot several blocks from the Civic Center and joined the parade of Christian men heading toward the arena. This was Tim’s second Faith Keepers’ conference, so he wasn’t caught off guard the way he’d been last year, but he was still deeply impressed by the spectacle. It was disorienting, but also strangely moving, to find yourself in a demographic fun house, to look around and see nothing but kindred spirits converging from all directions, streaming out of tour buses and school buses and church vans and taxicabs, shaking hands and hugging and calling out to one another in happy voices.

  Most of the Faith Keepers were white and most were on the youngish side of middle age, but there were lots of exceptions—clean-cut Asian guys, hip college dudes with soul patches and long sideburns, imposing black men with shaved heads, father-and-son duos, packs of bikers, and even a few old codgers getting around with canes and walkers. You couldn’t assemble a crowd this size without attracting a handful of out-and-out weirdos—Tim saw a dreadlocked hippie in a floor-length dashiki, and a burly guy in a flannel shirt who stood by the main entrance, blowing repeatedly into a ram’s horn; he was also accosted by a hollow-eyed street preacher who pressed a vile, badly photocopied pamphlet into his hand, the cover of which read, Ten Reasons Why God Hates Fags (And We Should Too)—but what struck him was just how
few of them there were. The overwhelming majority of the conference goers were just regular guys in khakis or jeans, sweaters or leather jackets, white sneakers or brown loafers, solid citizens with steady jobs and wedding rings and maybe a little less hair and a little more belly than they’d started out with, guys who looked like they’d fit right in at the Tabernacle with Marty and Jonathan and Eddie and Jay and John and Tim and Bill and Steve and Dennis.

  They picked up their official bracelets at the registration table—purple Livestrong-style rubber loops with the conference motto (UNDAUNTED) stamped onto the side—then browsed the merchandise displays, wandering past trade-show booths selling CDs, books, T-shirts (JESUS IS AWESOME), and souvenir mugs (“got God?”), and then checking out the folding tables stacked with promotional literature for Christian colleges, charities, political causes, and businesses. Examining a brochure for a company called Calvary Homebuilders, Tim winced at the memory of the bridges he’d burned at the poker game the other night, and wondered if it would be possible to set things right with George Dykstra. On the bright side, no one seemed to have connected him with the vandalism to Billy’s Hummer; in any case, no one had accused him of anything. He understood all too clearly that a better man would have picked up the phone and owned up to the stupid thing he’d done, but Tim had enough problems on his plate and no stomach for kowtowing to a jerk like Billy.

  The concession stands were open in the main corridor, and Tim got in line along with several other members of the Tabernacle group who hadn’t had time to eat dinner. The new guy, Jay, turned to him while they waited.

  “You ever been to one of these?”

  “Last year,” Tim told him. “I enjoyed it.”

  Jay looked skeptical.

  “Too many guys,” he said. “Feels like a gay bar.”

  Tim laughed in spite of himself. He’d never spoken to Jay one-on-one before, but he’d been curious about him since the day he appeared at Sunday meeting after punching Pastor Dennis in the face. He’d heard through the grapevine that the Pastor was beginning to question the strength of Jay’s commitment to the Lord and expending a lot of energy trying to keep him in the fold.