Still in Love

by Michael Downing

  Richard sidled up to the Professor and whispered, “Do me a favor?” His breath smelled boozy. “Buy the harmonica.”

  The Professor said, “I don’t play.”

  The two guys who’d bought the bike were back, pounding on the unplugged keyboard, as if by sheer force they could bring it back to life.

  Richard slid two twenties under the harmonica and whispered, “Follow me.” As he walked toward the picnic table, he paused and lowered the lid on the banjo.

  By then, the tent was open. Richard’s wife said it was priced at fifty, but the lesbians could have it for forty.

  One of the lesbians found a sleeping bag inside the tent. “It’s warm,” she said. “Sort of creepy.”

  Richard’s wife said, “Twenty-five?” She sounded desperate or irate when she said, “It’s all going for a music scholarship.”

  The lesbians hightailed it to their car.

  The young guys seemed to be eyeing the two twenties, so the Professor followed Richard to the picnic table, handed him the cash and the harmonica. “I don’t want this.”

  Richard closed his eyes, pressed the harmonica to his lips for a few seconds, and then pocketed it. He yelled, “Sold!” and waved the twenties for his wife to see. His eyes were teary. “So awfully quiet around here.”

  The Professor decided Richard was drunk. To mollify him, and to amuse himself, he said, “You drive a hard bargain,” and headed for his car, hoping his young seedlings weren’t dead.

  * * *

  1.

  Mark knew his yard-sale story was not a success, but he’d devoted almost four hours to it on Wednesday morning—well, three hours of real writing and several trips up to the roof to finish off his supply of Black Russians and watch purple snow clouds huff in from the south. Despite his doubts about the quality, doing the work of embracing and trying to love the assigned limits, inventing characters, and writing and rejecting and revising made him mindful of the work all of the students would do after they got this assignment in class today, none of which the Professor would deign to do.

  Mark reread the Professor’s complimentary response to his hit-and-run story one more time, surprised and more than a little embarrassed by how it pleased him. Of course, it was bait, but Mark had swallowed it, and now he was on the hook to devote his time to those op-eds, which would yield more TV time for the Professor, more royalties for that book he’d been milking for almost a decade, and for Mark? More time away from the festering wound of a novel abandoned on his desk in Ipswich. This morning, though, he had just enough time to print out copies of the assignment the Professor would not distribute to the students, shower, and get to campus for office hours before class.

  Mark was ten minutes late. Anton was sitting cross-legged on the floor in Hum Hall, his back against Mark’s office door, next to a pile of something red and puffy.

  “I have a question.” Anton scrambled to his feet, dragging the puffy red mess with him.

  Mark unlocked the door and said, “Tell me that’s a parka.”

  “It’s red,” Anton said, dragging the coat as if it were a screaming child. “My mother claims it’s called a car coat. I’d rather have the car.” He looked around for someplace to dispose of the garment.

  Mark said, “It’s supposed to snow later.”

  Anton said, “It’s red and shiny, and I really don’t want to talk about it.” He tossed the coat onto the floor and sat in the alumni chair. He stared out the windows, as if he might be regretting his decision to come inside. He was wearing his uniform yellow V-neck, but no scarf.

  Mark slipped his little blue parka onto the back of his chair. “What’s your question?”

  “So, I love this class,” Anton said.

  Mark said, “That makes me happy. That’s my aim.”

  Anton smiled so broadly that he strained the muscles in his neck. “I knew you’d say something like that.”

  Mark said, “It’s true.”

  “I know,” Anton said, and then he ducked his head and tugged down one sleeve of his sweater to wipe his eyes. After a few seconds, he whispered, “What I said—that’s true, too.” He wiped his sleeve across his eyes again. “I didn’t expect to start crying like that. Sorry.” He kept his head bowed. “Maybe I just like loving something again.”

  “Versus, say, the coat,” Mark said, hoping to lighten the mood.

  “Exactly.” Anton finally raised his head and smiled. “So, I wanted to say I know sometimes I look tired or like I’m not paying attention, but I’m never tired in class, Mark. That’s the truth. I’m not drawing or doodling or anything like that. I try to write down almost everything you say, and even Rashid, and Max, and Dorothy constantly say stuff I totally understand when I’m in there but I know I won’t remember afterwards, or even if I do, I won’t get it by then, not the way it makes perfect sense in class.” Anton slid forward in the chair and braced his hands on his thighs.

  Mark nodded. Anton seemed to be heading somewhere he wasn’t sure he wanted to go in this conversation, and Mark didn’t want to urge him on or stop him. “It is a really good group.”

  “So, I just wanted to let you know they think it’s temporary,” Anton said, sliding back in the chair and grabbing both armrests, “and after a couple more times this new chemo drug shouldn’t be screwing up my memory like the last one. And since my hair isn’t falling out like they promised, maybe they’re right.”

  “Here’s hoping,” Mark said, narrowing his gaze, tacitly accepting the pretense that he knew about Anton’s illness.

  “This new drug works out for our class because it’s late on Mondays when I go to the clinic, after class,” Anton said. “Infusions, they’re called. That leaves me Tuesday for Netflix and juice, basically, and I feel fine by Wednesday when we have class again, and I just wanted you to know it’s just some kind of leukemia, which sometimes can be cured.”

  The shock of Anton’s revelation was also an illumination. The diagnosis threw new light onto his shaved head, the after-class appointments, and his status as a fifth-year senior—notable but not extraordinary details that suddenly cohered into something much more suggestive. “I hate that you’re sick, Anton.”

  Anton nodded. “I knew you would.”

  Mark waited until he was fairly confident he wouldn’t cry when he spoke. “And I’m happy—really happy to know there are people taking care of you, doing everything that can be done to get you back to—to being yourself.”

  “More people than I need, really.” Right on cue, Anton’s phone buzzed. He slapped his pants pocket and silenced it. “One thing about being Cape Verdean is everybody within a hundred square miles is your aunt or cousin.”

  A knock at the door startled them both. Mark signaled to Anton to stay put and stuck his head out far enough to see Leo kneeling with his backpack between his legs, unzipping it with his only hand. He had something else strapped over one shoulder. A few feet away, Dorothy and the curling-team guy with the Maple Leafs jersey both waved.

  Leo said, “I could come back at two thirty.”

  Mark said, “It’s a date. Knock if the door is closed.”

  From down the hall, the Maple Leaf yelled, “I’m in sort of a rush.”

  Mark said, “I’m not. Give us five minutes,” and closed the door.

  Anton said, “Is it okay to ask why my story was first in the packet this week?”

  New topic; so noted. Mark said, “Alphabetical order by first name.”

  “Okay.” Anton stood up. “I was afraid it was another bomb.” He turned to leave.

  Mark said, “Sit for one more minute, Anton.”

  He did.

  Mark said, “You know I will always be interested in how you’re faring, and you don’t owe me any more in the way of updates or information. Your call. Whatever happens week to week with your health, however, we can make it work for you in the class. That’s my call.”

  Anton said, “Thanks, Mark.”

  Mark said, “You’re welcome, Anton.
And one more thing—and.”

  Anton said, “And?”

  Mark said, “And, and, and, and, and, and, and—”

  Anton groaned. “I knew it. I knew it. The hit-and-run story—I screwed up that 125-word sentence. I should’ve thrown in a but.”

  “Or an or, because, yet, so—anything. The good news is that your long sentence is actually perfect grammatically, but I did sort of feel I was in an echo chamber by the thirteenth or fourteenth and.”

  Anton said, “Could you give me a list of words that are conjunctions?”

  Mark was about to pull a pen and pad from his bag, but stood up instead. “I was just thinking. If someone ever invents Google Search, I bet he’ll make a fortune.”

  “Okay, okay.” Anton stood up. Before he left, he turned. “But the story—not just the sentence, the whole story—that was pretty good?”

  “We’ll find out in workshop when your readers respond.”

  “Perfect grammar, though. Perfect?”

  Mark nodded.

  Anton nodded and slipped out into the hall.

  Dorothy came in, sat down, and glanced disapprovingly at Anton’s shiny red car coat on the floor. “Isaac asked me to tell you he had to leave, but he might stop by later.”

  Isaac? Isaac? Mark could not put a face to the name. More notably, the beads and extensions were gone from Dorothy’s braids, and she was wearing an oddly old-fashioned navy blazer and skirt, and black pumps. Mark was still standing behind Dorothy. He didn’t say anything. He felt momentarily like a kid who’d been called before the principal.

  Dorothy briefly looked back at him, and then turned away. “Hello, Mark,” she said, tucking her skirt underneath her thighs. “How are you today?”

  “Well, I’m fine, Dorothy. How kind of you to ask,” he said, a little too aptly imitating her cheerfully professional tone. He sat at his desk and aimed for a more casual tone. “What’s up?”

  “Well, partly I wanted to just say how much I’m enjoying the class. I especially love the Technical Exercises. They’re sort of infectious. I find myself thinking about them all the time. Then, I read what everyone else wrote and wonder why I didn’t think of that.”

  Mark said, “You’re doing really great work.”

  “It’s not easy, which is hard to explain to anybody not in the class. I mean, 250 words sounds like nothing.”

  “To someone who isn’t a writer.”

  Dorothy nodded. “Like my father.” She kicked off her shoes. “Was that rude?”

  Mark wasn’t sure if she was talking about kicking off her shoes or kicking her father to the curb. “They look painful.”

  “So’s this.” She peeled off the blazer and tossed it onto Anton’s car coat. The office was starting to resemble a rummage sale. “I had an interview at a law firm in Boston this morning. My father’s firm—well, he’s a partner, and he thinks I ought to work for a year before starting law school.”

  “Law school where?”

  “Stanford.”

  Mark said, “What a terrific place to land, Dorothy. Congratulations.”

  “Thanks. And feel free to say so to my father if you run into him at commencement.” She smiled confidentially. “Harvard man.”

  Mark nodded. He didn’t say, So am I, which Paul would say proved he was a Harvard man. Dorothy produced a revision of the first, monosyllabic Technical Exercise, which Mark read aloud and then discussed with her, annotating her new text with a few question marks—four choices for her to reconsider. She looked it over and hummed her approval. After she folded it in half, she looked down at her blazer, as if she were debating its fate. But, as it turned out, she had been debating her own.

  “Here goes,” she said, and after a long pause, she asked if he’d be willing to write a letter recommending her for a summer internship with a publishing house in the Bay Area. “They probably want someone younger, a sophomore or junior who might end up working there at some point,” Dorothy said, “but it would be perfect for me, so I think it’s worth applying. It’s reading unsolicited manuscripts, and that would sort of be like our workshops, I thought, and maybe motivate me to keep writing.”

  “That alone is reason enough for me to write the letter,” Mark said.

  “I think you might know them,” she said. “Plus, I just saw on their website that they publish Wendell Berry. You know who he is, right?”

  Mark nodded. They were also the publishers of that book, on which the Professor had made a minor media career.

  “Last semester, we read a lot of Wendell Berry essays in a course on land rights as civil rights. I didn’t really know it then but I’m starting to think that might be the sort of work I want to do with a law degree.”

  Mark said, “Research and writing?”

  Dorothy nodded and placed her bare feet on top of her pumps. She angled her feet this way and that. She was either debating whether to say something else about her ambitions, or she was wondering how she was going to jam her feet back into those shoes. “You know how in our class, you sometimes suddenly see yourself? Somebody is talking about your story, somebody you sort of know, and she calls you The Writer instead of calling you by name? Or maybe even more when it’s someone you have your doubts about—Max or Leo is explaining some word or sentence you wrote to everyone else, deciding what it means, and you realize it’s his property now? Yours and his?” She kicked her shoes back under the chair.

  Mark heard a conversation outside his office door, but whoever was waiting out there had yet to knock. He said, “Maybe intellectual property law is in your future.”

  “Property, for sure. Something to do with property, which seems so simple but in the law is so—”

  Mark said, “Complicated?”

  “Honestly, I was trying not to say fucked up.”

  Not trying too hard. “Is it a paid internship?”

  “No, but I can live with my mom and stepdad in Oakland for the summer.”

  Doubling her father’s delight, no doubt—no gap year working at his firm, and a summer with the stepfather. “I’ll happily write on your behalf, Dorothy.” He knew the Professor might balk at writing a letter to his publisher on behalf of a student, but that didn’t mean that book couldn’t be flogged to someone else’s advantage for a change.

  Before she left with her shoes dangling from one hand, Dorothy had located her phone in a pocket of her blazer and emailed Mark her CV, a description of the internship, a copy of the application letter she’d written, and the name and email address of the woman to whom his letter had to be addressed—having determined in a matter of minutes her plan for the summer, the following year, and maybe the rest of her life.

  Leo was alone in the hall, with his backpack slung over one shoulder, a camera with a telephoto lens slung over the other, and his phone in his hand. “Am I too late? I apologize. Isaac came by but says he’ll talk to you after class.”

  Isaac? Isaac? Again, nothing.

  Leo said, “I should’ve emailed to let you know I’d be late. I got hung up taking pictures down the hill. Sorry.”

  “We’ve got five minutes anyway,” Mark said. “Sit.” Leo didn’t move, and Mark reflexively worried that Leo wasn’t able to maneuver into the chair with all that equipment and only one hand. “Do you want me to hold something for you, Leo?”

  Leo misunderstood this as a reprimand. “Oh, but I wasn’t texting. I was just shutting it off.” He untied a drawstring on the side of the backpack, slid his phone into a little pocket, and tied the string in a quick square knot. “It’s this camera. It’s borrowed and worth a fortune, so I’m sure I’m gonna do something stupid and regret it. Would it be okay to set it on that white kiddie desk by the window?”

  Mark nodded at Karen Cole’s ridiculous little adjunct office allotment.

  “I’m doing a project. I was wondering—or—” Leo returned from the window and sat down. “Sorry. Did you want to talk first?” In size, shape, and coloring he was a standard-issue American college kid, but h
is eyes were so black they were luminous with reflected light.

  Mark said, “I’ve been talking too much today. You go first.”

  “Thanks. It’s about this project I don’t understand yet. And my girlfriend says it’s too obvious for the class. Not our class. I’m taking a documentary photography class. Anyway, I think she means I’m not being not artistic, not original enough. But I’ve been thinking about what you said, about not wanting to talk to us about our ideas but only about what’s on the page—how when it’s on the page, it starts to have possibilities? You said that, right?”

  “It sounds like something I’d say,” Mark said.

  “So, for now, I’m not thinking too much. I did want to ask permission to stay after class and take pictures of our classroom.”

  “With everyone in the room?”

  “No. Empty. I’ve been taking pictures of every room on campus where I’ve had a class during the last four years. Honestly, I don’t know why.”

  Almost immediately, Mark’s memory rolled out still shots of the many and various rooms on the Hellman campus that had been home to his classes over the years. “I don’t know why this is so,” Mark said, “but that’s really suggestive. Somehow a little haunting.”

  “Right?” Leo stood up and retrieved his camera. He placed it on Mark’s desk. “You want to see the two I just took? I have real film in here for printing, but you can look at the digital images.” He knelt beside Mark’s chair and positioned the tiny viewing window at a perfect angle for Mark. “I mean, they are obvious, but—”

  “But they’re not.” Mark thought he recognized both rooms, but they seemed strangely severe and standardized. “Is this one the new theater?” Up close, Leo smelled like a Marlboro, or at least Mark hoped Leo was the smoky one.

  “I had New Wave Films in that theater when I was a sophomore,” Leo said. “First time I saw Blow Up.”

  Mark didn’t say, Antonioni.