The Absolved

by Matthew Binder

  “I don’t know,” Karl says, “it’s risky.”

  “Don’t listen to him, Henri,” Lydia says. “I have exactly the vision of how best to use this money!”

  After a long talk, Lydia and Karl decide to take my money, and the next day the deal is concluded. To keep this news from Rachel, I don’t consult with my lawyer. He doesn’t trust my judgment, and I’m certain he’d betray me anyhow. I draw up my own contract on the back of a napkin and ask Lydia and Karl to sign it. From my gram, I transfer the money directly into Karl’s account for a down payment.

  I am jubilant.

  I feared that I’d never again find problems that are as challenging and rewarding as fighting cancer. The realization that there are an infinite number of battles to fight, in every aspect of life, is a gift. Once a man has acquired the taste for tackling difficult things, he no longer has the inclination for matters of ease.

  40

  For the next two weeks, I attend nightly meetings with Lydia and Karl. Nearly every day new faces are joining us. Even Olivia is here, a brand-new baby suckling from her teat. The room is now so tightly packed that it’s standing room only. The nights are still hot, and by thirty minutes into a meeting, we’re all drenched with sweat. The smell is a revolting combination of sour and sweet, something from an Eastern European men’s locker room. The tone of the meetings is overtly political. There is the great sense that these people expect justice, and soon.

  Lydia has emerged as the leader. She’s forceful and frank, and has a handful of proverbs that she deploys so masterfully the crowd is often moved to frenzy. In one of her more impassioned orations, she lectures on “the disease of change.”

  “More technological advancement has occurred since I was born,” she says, “than in the preceding five thousand years. Paradoxically, we remain pitifully ignorant to how the human animal is supposed to cope. I tell you, my brothers and sisters, there is no playbook to this game, so you’re justified in about any action that may alleviate your fears!”

  I see all these men and women, and I so badly want to feel like I’m one of them. Now, more than at any other time, I need other people. To do this, I’ve allowed myself to be deceived and guided by emotions. Despite my inclination to look critically at the world, I am forcing myself to turn inward, to let myself be taken by the hand of an impassioned leader. When I do this, a hope for a better world can, at times, sustain me for up to an hour or more. Yet another part of me can’t help but laugh when I think about the irrationality of a revolution. I’m tempted to shout out, “Why not temper your passions with a modicum of good sense!”

  After each meeting, I always insist on following-up with Lydia and Karl about Anodyne. They assure me that everything is moving along as well as can be.

  “So when do you get the keys?” I ask.

  “Shouldn’t be long now,” Lydia says, “maybe two weeks, three weeks at most.”

  In my spare time, I’ve started perusing the photos of interior design holograms. Over roast beef sandwiches at a late-night diner one evening, I impose on them my ideas about how to incorporate the ancient Chinese philosophical system of Feng Shui into the bar’s decor, in order to better harmonize the environment with its patrons. Lydia takes notes as I speak, which encourages me to continue, which I do for well over an hour’s time. By the end of the meal, I’ve laid out a plan to entirely transform the bar’s aesthetic. Karl assures me that they’ll take everything I say under advisement.

  41

  Tonight at dinner Rachel and I sit in silence for nearly half an hour. She doesn’t even look up from her food. I drink an entire bottle of wine. She does a crossword puzzle.

  Finally, Rachel says, “It’s really very clear, based on the men they choose, how stupid most women are.” I ask Rachel to please pass the peas. She ignores me and continues. “Men are almost never worthy of the women who love them.” When I leave the table to place my dish in the sink, she says, “I envy your indolence. I wish I could take life that way.”

  I do my best to finish loading the dishwasher quickly, but I’m too slow. I make every attempt to pretend she is invisible, but it’s no use. She accuses me of being “lazy” and “useless” and then she calls me “fat.” This is news to me. I’ve never been called any such thing. While I’ve never been rail thin, I’ve always had a fine physique. I take a look at my reflection in the window. It’s true, my face is bloated, almost beyond recognition. Then, as I finish rinsing the last of the pans, she hits me with a final blow.

  “You’ve lost all semblance of self-respect. If your plan is to go on like this, you should tell me now, so that I can leave you. I don’t intend to spend the rest of my life this way.”

  My God, this woman really despises me. There’s not so much as a stiver of love left between us, I realize: a woman with love in her heart would never say such a thing.

  This all fits neatly into my theory of how love affects men and women so differently. History tells us, almost without exception, that men are at their strongest and most noble when they are in love and have full hearts. However, women are just the opposite. Love is too all-consuming for them. It makes them vulnerable and weak. A woman in love can be forced to swallow anything from her beloved, no matter how awful. That said—as soon as a woman’s love vanishes, she becomes hard as steel, pitiless, a true savage!

  I turn on the TV and flip through the channels. There is a baseball game on, the Giants versus the Phillies. I watch half an inning before losing interest and move on. On another channel, I watch five minutes of a cooking show. An Italian chef is teaching a celebrity I recognize from one of Rachel’s charity events how to make rigatoni. The celebrity is extremely flirtatious. She keeps touching the chef’s hands and making sexual innuendos. He seems more than amenable to her advances. The combination of the wonderful sexual tension and the delicious looking food is too much for me in my delicate state, so I flip through three reality dating shows, two reality outdoors adventure shows, and the news, before settling on a documentary on the mating rituals of the endangered East African zebra. I watch a stallion mount a mare, and realize just how unsettled I am. Something about the half-second glimpse of the news I caught has penetrated my psyche, and I feel compelled to go back.

  The doorbell rings. Just as I’m looking through the peephole, I hear the on-site reporter say the words “act of domestic terrorism.” The bell rings again, but I ignore it, transfixed by what I’m seeing. The reporter explains that the central control system that automates the movements of dozens of commercial trucks and trains has been hacked. Footage of eighteen-wheeled vehicles having driven themselves into lakes and off cliffs flash across the screen. The damages are estimated to be over $2 billion. Then we see a man and woman led from a house in cuffs, both with jackets over their heads. The reporter says the two alleged criminals have already confessed, claiming to belong to an organization that supports the Luddite agenda, and that for only $50,000 they were able to orchestrate this entire attack. The reporter then announces that authorities are still searching for one last suspect.

  Julian has run downstairs to answer the door. A team of men with mustaches and blue jackets flash their credentials and introduce themselves as FBI agents. In the background, I hear the reporter mention the name of the victimized company, Sunny Hills Food—Karl’s former employer.

  42

  The FBI has me in the oddest of detainment centers, if that’s what you can call it. The accommodations are fantastic. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve ever been made so comfortable. It’s as if the room was designed specifically to my tastes. Wide spruce beams stretch across a vaulted ceiling, Spanish-tile line the floor. There’s a kiva fireplace, brightly colored woven blankets, and a ranch-style leather sofa. FBI Agent Steekhelm says the theme is “Santa Fe Hacienda.”

  “Is that real adobe?”

  “Do you see those Kachinas dolls over there?” Agent Steekhelm asks, pointing at the mantle over the bar.

  “Authentic?”

&nb
sp; “Made by a real-life Navajo from the Santa Domingo Pueblo.”

  When it comes to furnishing my own home, in my humble opinion, my input has never been adequately appreciated. Rachel once told me I have no eye for design aesthetics. The accusation, at the time, seemed laughable to me. Between the two of us, I’m the only one who has ever demonstrated any artistic aptitude. Determined to change her opinion, I hunted long and hard for a wonderful piece of furniture I could present to her as a birthday gift, finally settling on a gorgeous antique—a mid-century modern teak credenza. The furniture dealer who I purchased it from said it had been designed by a genius architect named Finn Juhl, a true leader in the Danish Modern movement of the 1940s.

  Rachel came home that night from a run with her track club, radiant with an endorphin-induced glow, and glared at the credenza.

  “Why would you ever bring such a thing in from the street?” she said.

  “It’s your birthday present!” I said.

  “You got me a cheap knockoff for my birthday?”

  “This is a Finn Juhl. Do you have any idea what that means?”

  “Of course—Finn Juhl introduced Danish Modern to America.”

  “Then you understand that this is a one-of-a-kind piece.”

  “Henri, this is a repro, made from particle board.”

  I examined the credenza. It was not at all what it seemed just fifteen minutes’ prior. What I thought was a solid block of chiseled wood had somehow transformed itself into cheaply fabricated pieces of chipboard haphazardly glued with epoxy.

  “Next time, ask me before you get conned again, Henri. My God.”

  Agent Steekhelm mixes me a whiskey at the bar and leaves. Next to the highball glasses is a wooden cigar box stocked with both Cubans and a variety of foreign cigarettes.

  The FBI is a first-class operation, I think, firing up a French smoke. Against the wall is a collection of vintage Fender and Gibson guitars. I pick up an old Jazzmaster and begin picking a pleasing minor chord melody. After a time, Agent Steekhelm returns.

  “You’re pretty good on that thing,” he says.

  “I had a band back in high school.”

  “You don’t say.”

  “You want to hear a song?”

  “Why don’t you sit down, Henri. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  “Mind if I refill my drink first?”

  “You go right ahead.”

  Agent Steekhelm and I share the most intimate of conversations. I start from the beginning, with my childhood, telling him about my relationship with my parents—how I felt abandoned by my father’s death, and how I attributed my runt-like size as a boy to poor nutrition, my mother being inept at cooking. By the time I get to talking about my adolescent years, I’m crying hysterically. Agent Steekhelm hands me a box of tissues, assures me I’m in a safe place, then pulls me in close so I can rest my head on his shoulder. After a few minutes, I’ve stained his shirt with my tears and runny nose.

  I tell Agent Steekhelm that he is the kindest man I’ve ever encountered. He confides that he knows I’m not to be blamed for what’s transpired—that I’m simply a “victim of circumstances beyond my control.” This display of compassion inspires me to continue pouring my heart out for many more hours.

  Later, Agent Steekhelm says, “You must be starving. What can we get you for dinner? Anything you want.”

  “Anything?” I ask.

  “We’ll have our chef whip it right up.”

  “You have steak?” I ask. “At home, I’m not allowed any animal products.”

  “We have the very best of steaks, Henri. Rib eye or filet mignon?”

  “Ribeye, medium-rare, please. Also, I don’t want to put you out, but do you have mac-and-cheese? It’s been ages since I’ve had it.”

  “You got it,” Agent Steekhelm says, placing my dinner order into his gram. “Now, Henri, I’d like to talk to you about your relationships with Lydia and Karl.”

  “They swindled me out of my money and let me take a bum rap!”

  “I believe you, Henri,” Agent Steekhelm says, patting my knee. “But I need you to walk me through it. Let’s start with Lydia.”

  I describe my time at the bar with this dear friend who’s betrayed me. I start with how nobody, human nor machine, can mix a better San Martin.

  “That’s very interesting, Henri. But can you tell me a bit about her personal life, who she interacts with, any friends or boyfriends you know of, that sort of thing?”

  I’m well into a story about how I once set Lydia up with a pulmonologist from the hospital when my lawyer, Leonard Horowitz, storms into the room in his wrinkled grey suit and opens up his gram. For the first time, I notice the wiry hairs protruding from his nose.

  “Henri,” he shouts, “don’t say another word to this jackal!”

  Agent Steekhelm must be six inches taller than Horowitz, and outweigh him by forty pounds. I fear that at any moment he will crush Horowitz with one decisive blow to the head. But even as Horowitz is wagging his finger and shouting, Steekhelm never so much as raises his voice. He cites section 2a of the The Protection of Americans from Other Americans Act of 2026, stating that “those arrested and charged with a Class 3 Terrorist offense can be interned without trial for up to six years, if they’re deemed by a federal judge to be an existential threat to the citizenry of the United States.”

  “And I have any number of judges who will issue an injunction to stop it. Now I’m going to need you to leave so I can speak with my client in private. And I’ll have to insist that all cameras and recording equipment be turned off, lest you want me to hit you with an illegal search and seizure suit.”

  “How did you know I was here?” I ask.

  “Rachel, of course.”

  Good old Rachel, how could I ever have doubted her? Everything wrong between us is my fault. I’ve been neglectful, I see it all so clearly now. I’ve ignored the one good piece of advice my father ever gave me.

  “Son,” he said, “women will always need someone to confide in, someone to talk to, someone who takes an interest in their well-being and happiness. Provide a woman with these small favors and she’ll repay you a thousand times over.”

  It’s no wonder Rachel’s been dressing like Snow White. It’s not some new Disney fixation—it’s a plea for attention. What a scoundrel I am!

  “What did you tell that FBI agent about your involvement in this crime?”

  “I didn’t tell him anything.”

  “I don’t believe it. You’ve been here for hours, you must’ve told him something.”

  Through the door, a man hollers, “I have your dinner, sir.”

  “Thank you,” I say.

  A man in a crisp blue suit pushes a cart into the room and from his jacket produces a bottle of steak sauce.

  “Can you believe they gave me steak?”

  “Classic interrogation tactic. Straight from the Nazi playbook.”

  “Come on, Horowitz. I thought you didn’t drink.”

  “This place is everything you’ve ever wanted, am I right? Down even to the guitars and the southwestern décor?”

  “It’s like a dream.”

  “You ever hear of Hanns-Joachim Gottlob Scharr?”

  My mouth is too full of steak, so I shake my head.

  “Scharr was the Nazi’s master interrogator—he could get American soldiers to spill the most confidential of secrets with not so much as a threat of violence. He won them over with kindness and goodwill. No resource was spared to make his prisoners happy, because a happy and content prisoner becomes lulled and complacent, and then he’s only too quick to share his secrets.”

  I throw down my utensils in disgust. “The bastards,” I say.

  “If it worked on hardened American marines and Air Force bombers, I can only imagine how quick you were to sing like a canary!”

  “But I’m innocent, Horowitz. I’m telling you.”

  Horowitz grins, almost lasciviously. Clearly, he thinks he’s ta
lking to a moron. “Please. I have your bank statement, Henri.”

  There it is on his gram, in bright bold font, the amount of $50,000 transferred directly into Karl’s account. I spring from my seat, knocking my plate to the floor.

  “That was a deposit for the Anodyne!”

  “What the hell is the Anodyne?”

  “It’s the bar where Lydia used to work. I gave her the money so she and Karl could buy the joint. I was doing a good deed, helping to secure their future and all.”

  “Don’t you know that one can never do right in this world without also doing something wrong? Why didn’t you have me draw up a contract?”

  “But I had one!”

  “Where is it?”

  “It’s been lost, of course.”

  “But surely you made a copy?”

  “I didn’t think to,” I say. “I was too ecstatic.”

  Standing up, Horowitz runs his hand down the front of his jacket. “I’m afraid this isn’t going to end well for you,” he says as he leaves.

  Overwhelmed by the kind of merriment born only in true disaster, I collapse with howling laughter. Then I think of the past, and then of nothing at all.

  43

  Funny thing how a life can be so besmirched by a seemingly harmless mistake. I could never have imagined I could suffer so much from something I’d thought so good.

  Having spoiled me for a week for nothing they deem of value, the FBI have revoked what Agent Steekhelm called their “hospitality.”

  I knew I was in for it when they made me don this prison attire. The one thing I didn’t bungle was the integrity of my suicide pill. In a feat of quick thinking and nimble fingering, I managed to slip it up my keister. I only had but a few minutes before the pill would send me to an early grave, I knew, but I was brave and squeezed it tightly between my cheeks as I was escorted to my new and exceedingly inferior accommodations.