Archives for July 2013

Chapter 71

Over the next week, they practiced each day for an hour. Veronica had a car and picked Elena up each morning. Ron was always there waiting for them. He measured out a stage area on the floor and marked it off with strips of packing tape. They worked on the number of props that they would need and what props they would pantomime.

The scenes of the play consisted of a scene between Ferdinand and Miranda from The Tempest. Ferdinand had been given the job of moving wood by Miranda’s father, a wizard named Prospero and she had come to watch him work. Next was a scene from Henry the Fifth where Henry attempts to tell the French princess Catherine that he wants her. This scene was complicated by the fact that she did not understand English. Luckily, Elena had taken French and could read the lines very well. Ron marveled at her fluidity, thinking that she now spoke three languages as well as he spoke one. Then there was a scene between Petruchio and Kate from The Taming of the Shrew. The next scene was from Richard the Third when Richard tells the widow of a man that he has killed that he is going to marry her while she is on the way to bury her husband. Finally there was the scene between Othello and Desdemona, where he strangles her.

They would need chairs. They would need a couch. They would pantomime the wood. Each morning they read through the scenes and Ron timed them. There were also five connecting scenes where the two actors would tell the audience what it was that they were going to see.

Elena said, “Mr. Tuck, what are we going to do about costumes?”

Ron was silent and thoughtful.

Veronica said, “I was thinking that I would tape my chest with an ace bandage. You know so that I don’t show.”

Ron smiled and said, “That’s a good idea, Veronica. He didn’t say that she was flat-chested enough so that it would not be necessary. Ron noticed that Grace Scarpelli began arriving and watching some of their rehearsals as she drank her morning coffee.

“Well,” said Ron. “I think that black tights for all the scenes with the actors between the Shakespearian scenes and then we can just add some things to that foundation for the scenes. Do you think that we should give you a moustache or a beard, Veronica?”

She nodded. “I think it would help me to feel less like myself, Mr. Tuck.”

At the end of the week, Ron said, “Ok, we have a feel for this but we can’t really start to act until we memorize the lines. So, let’s try to have the first scene ready to recite on Monday.”

Ron watched as both girls’ mouths fell open. He said, “You didn’t think we were going to use the books on stage, did you?”

The girls couldn’t seem to close their mouths as they shook their heads no. As they were leaving to go to classes, Grace said, “Ron, I need a favor from you now.”

Ron stopped. The girls left the gym. Ron stood there holding is over the shoulder army field pouch that he used as a book bag. “Sure,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

“My older brother is a fund raiser for the Georgetown School of International Law,” she said. “He needs me to go with him tonight to something at the Metropolitan Opera House.” Ron listened. He was baffled. Did she need him to cover some kind of game or dance for her? She watched his confusion and took a breath and said, “Would you go with me?”

 

The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny was an Opera in English by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill. Ron had never been to an Opera before. As he got dressed he felt, for one of the first times that he could remember, like a pauper. His suit was a hand-me-down from George.  It was too big on him. He shoes were scuffed and he owned no shoe polish. He searched for socks that were not  threatening to produce holes from their next wearing. He needed a haircut. None of his ties seemed to match the suit.

He tried to avoid the mirror as he tied his default light green tie around his neck. At least it didn’t completely clash with the brown suit and a white shirt always worked. He avoided looking down at his scuffed black shoes that shabbily projected like loaves of bread sticking out of his pockets. He told himself that it was not like this was his idea. He tried to get his hair to stay behind his ears, but the bulk of it only caused his ears to project out more and to his thinking completed his image as Howdy Doody getting ready for church.

The directions to Grace Scarpelli house were easy enough. She lived in Maplewood. It was a huge brick place that must have had fifteen rooms. Grace met him at the door and said she really appreciated him doing this for her. She looked very different than the way that she did in her track suit at school. She wore a low cut blue evening dress and pearls around her neck and at her ears. Without thinking, he slid his arm around her waist as they walked to his car and she turned to him and smiled a freshly scrubbed and warm grin.

Located in Lincoln Center, The Opera House sparkled like a jewel in the early spring evening.  Water gushed up in elegant torrents from a round fountain that was set in the middle of an immaculate square. The glass of the Opera House behind the fountain and the soft lights caught caused the water to also appear as if it were a flowing of jewels that was being puddled at the feet of some thirsty, other worldly creature. Ron felt like a dung beetle as he crossed the square.

Harrison Scarpelli and the six contributors to the University’s School of International Law seemed to arrive in the limo as perfectly timed as if it had been arranged by some punctual concierge. Stupidly Ron tried to polish the tops of his shoes on the backs of his calves as they stood waiting.

The entourage met Grace and Ron like a wave of fur and diamonds. Harrison kissed his sister and shook Ron’s hand. Ron was relieved that he had at least remembered to clean his fingernails. Grace seemed relaxed and oblivious to his fidgeting discomfort as they all made their way up low flat stairs that to their table for ten on the Vilar Grand Tier. They were seated in front of an incredibly large painting by Marc Chagall. Ron wondered if they would have time for dinner before the thing started. He turned to Grace and whispered, “Do you think that we’ll be late if we eat?”

She moved her mouth to his ear and whispered back. “They time the meal to the Opera.”

Ron felt like a blackhead. Harrison began the introductions, “This is my sister Grace Scarpelli and her date Ron Tuck. With a slow sweep of his arm he said, Mrs. Witherspoon and her cousin Mrs. Ravel.” The two ladies nodded and smiled. “Mr. and Mrs. Sithe.” Mrs. Sithe smiled but Mr. Sithe seemed to ignore the introduction and was moving his head above theirs as if searching for a waiter. He magically appeared at his side dressed in a white serving jacket and carrying a leather bound wine list. “And now, Mrs. Oglethorpe”

“Everyone please call me Bunny,” said the large silver streaked woman with a diamond clutch bag that she laid casually on the table. Ron glanced at it and wondered how much it would bring in at a pawn shop.

“Last and most certainly not least are two of the University’s oldest and dearest friends, Mrs. Singletary and her mother, Mrs. Gregory Winterhintz.

There were two waiters dressed in white jackets, and they moved around the table taking dinner orders. Other waiters served dinner rolls, using silver tongs and placing one roll on each person’s side dish. Small pats of butter were also placed next to the rolls and then salad dishes with spring greens were given to each person. Ron and Grace each ordered the prime rib entrée.

The early talk was about the weather and what a mild winter it had been. Ron was quiet and tried to listen attentively and smile. Grace was making smooth conversation and Ron noticed that she seemed as at home in this setting as she did in the gym.

Harrison Scarpelli was leading the conversation and warming the table with the confident expertise of a professional who knew how to put everyone at ease, and at the same time make everything seem completely casual. Ron watched him with admiration. He was wearing a gray suit with a light pinstripe and a darker gray tie that was tied in a perfect Windsor knot. His dress shirt sported square silver cuff links that projected at his wrists in perfect length. His hair was razor cut and seemed also perfectly in place. Ron wondered if a man like this ever had feelings that were similar to his. He doubted it. The man was at least twenty years younger than any of the others with the exception of Ron and Grace and it seemed to not matter at all to him or to them.

Finally someone asked, “Where is your family from, Ron?”

In the past, he had always made a point of saying that they were all from Newark, but this time he felt himself saying, “Glen Ridge.”

“Oh yes,” said Mrs. Gregory Winterhintz. “I have friends from Glen Ridge. It’s very small isn’t it?”

“Yes,” said Ron. “I think that adds to its charm actually.”

“Well, of course it does,” said Bunny Oglethorpe.

Then there was a soft chiming of bells and a flickering of lights. It seemed to come on cue, just as they were finishing their salads.

The interior of the Opera house seemed to stretch up into the sky where a large, round, lighted globe of a chandelier looked down on the proceedings like a friendly sun. They were led to their seats, which were located in the President’s box at the center of the Golden Horseshoe. As they sat, Ron noticed that there was more than ample room for their legs. In small pockets in front of each seat were opera glasses. Grace showed him how to open them. The lights dimmed and the opera began.

Ron was immediately struck by the richness of costume and the way that his eyes could not leave the stage. The Opera was one of the few that was in English, but he still could not really make out the words. The singers were incredible and the orchestra was impeccable. Sitting back, he wondered if he could have had this life if he had made different choices. A voice in his head told him that he would not have been able to appreciate it if he had not made the choices that he had made.

The story was easy to follow. Criminals set up this city based on lust and greed and invite others who want to partake in these pleasures to join them. Ron listened to the voice of Jenny Smith, enraptured by the angelic quality that the whore had as she sang about whiskey and pretty boys. As their fortunes rose and fell Ron realized that he had forgotten all about his dinner. At the conclusion of the first act, as the characters waited for an approaching storm that threatened to destroy the city, the house light came up and Ron realized that he was very hungry.

Again, Ron was dazzled by the soft lights on gold and the glittering glass that was everywhere as they moved. It was a very short walk back to their table, but he kept waiting for Julian T. Willy to pop out from behind a white marble column and explain to Ron that the service entrance was in the rear.

They sat at their table and simultaneously waiters lifted stainless steel covers from off of their plates and there was their dinner, hot, perfectly timed to be eaten right now. It surprised Ron that his prime rib was quite ordinary. He had expected something of a heavenly quality that matched the surroundings.

Bunny Oglethorpe was explaining that her niece was going to boarding school in France and that she had gone “hither and yon” searching for the proper attire that was required to fill the girl’s trunk.

“Isn’t it ridiculous that they have lists of what is required?” said Mrs. Singletary. “They treat you as if you are going to send the girl away with plaid shirts and blue jeans.”

Mrs. Winterhintz turned to Ron. “You are in education, aren’t you Ron?”

“Yes, I’m a teacher at a small Catholic school in Newark.”

“Do they enforce a rigid dress code as well?” said Mrs. Oglethorpe.

Ron finished chewing and swallowed. “Our girls wear uniforms.”

“I do expect that would be best for them wouldn’t it?”

“I hadn’t thought about it,” said Ron.

Mrs. Oglethorpe said, “Well, someone has to teach them as well, I suppose.”

“We try our best,” said Grace, coming to his rescue.

Ron had the distinct impression after that that these people, far from being admirable, were cartoon characters. He began picturing Mrs. Oglethorpe is large floppy pink ears, and when he looked at Mrs. Singletary and Winterhintz the Bob Dylan line “Jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule” repeated in his head. He began to wonder if she brayed when she had orgasms.

Harrison Scarpelli said, “I would like to recommend that each of us have the chocolate sulfate for dessert. It really is quite good.”

“I’m all for chocolate,” said Mrs. Sithe.

Mr. Sithe looked at his watch. Finally he said, “They do have this well-organized.”

It was his only comment of the evening.

Back in their seats Act 2 began. Again Ron found his eyes drawn to the stage, and again the voices of the singers so astounded him that he wondered why he had never heard opera before. He realized that it just would not sound the same on a record. Then he was struck by the idea that his students needed to actually see one of the plays that they were doing. They didn’t sound the same on the recordings as they would appear in a theater.

In the second scene, a man ate himself to death and he was lauded as a man without fear. Ron wondered if the people in the theater found the message about excess to be quaint. He began to watch their faces with his opera glasses. They looked universally glum and bored. He wondered if this was not a very good performance or if that was their default posture.

As was expected, one of the characters, Jimmy, was in love with the whore Jenny. He sang of his love for her while men waited on line to pay to fuck her. At a boxing match, one man beats another to death. Ron wondered if these people would enjoy the show more if someone was actually beaten to death. The answer came back to him like the thud of a fist. No, they did not like things to be real. They preferred them bloodless and appreciated from a distance with a good view and opera glasses.

As the second act ended, Jim is arrested for not being able to pay his bar bill. He appeals to Jenny for help and she turns him down in a song called “Make your own bed.” More and more, Jenny reminded Ron of Robin. Jim ends the second act chained to a lamppost singing a ballad that pleads for the sun not to rise for the day of his trial. He saw himself as the stupid sap who got in over his head and now had no way out.

As they forked into the waiting sulfates, chocolate scented whooshes of steam came out of them. The fork fills melted in their mouths and Ron watched as the diners smiled to each other and then secretly smacked their lips.

During the third act, Jimmy is convicted and sentenced to death for the crime of being broke. The line, “In the whole human race there is no greater criminal than a man without money,” reverberated in Ron’s head.

Ron turned his glasses on the crowd as they watched. It was the one line that drew smiling nods from the men. Ron was surprised that they had actually been listening closely enough to make it out. He found himself smiling when Jenny testified against Jimmy.

The opera ended, quite simply with Jimmy being hanged. Then there was a postscript about how the city finally tore itself to pieces because of its greed and corruption. Ron thought that was gratuitous.

As the crowd filed out that sat at their table and had coffee. These people would never be caught leaving with the herd. Ron remembered the line, “all that glitters is not gold” but it sure was here.

In his car, Grace took his hand and said, “Thank you so much for doing this. You were fabulous.”

“Did you like those people?” said Ron.

“Oh god no, but that table gave Harrison about $50,000 tonight.”

“Why did he want you there?”

“There was a cancellation and it is not considered good form to have an empty seat at the table.” said Grace.

Ron wondered if that was why no one had bothered to say good night to them. After all, they were just props.

He kissed Grace good night and she pressed herself to him. Ron did not harden but knew that he would if she worked at it hard enough. Was it access to this kind of life that we wanted for his students and for himself? He didn’t want it but some of them would, and they should have the right to choose.

 

As Ron drove home thinking about the evening that had passed, Robin sat curled in her reading chair with a pad on her lap. It was to be her last night in this apartment that had taught her how to be alone and she wanted closure. She had not lived with anyone except for Ron, and the assorted people that he had run in and out of their lives, for eight years.

“Dear Ron,” she looked at the page crumpled it and threw it away and began again. “Ron, you wanted to know why I wouldn’t marry you and I did not want the argument of trying to explain it to you, but it stays on my mind and I want to be free of it. So, here goes. I don’t trust you. I don’t believe that you would have ever been faithful to me. I do believe that there is a good chance that you will become an addict. I never really cared about your teaching or the joy that it gave you and that just showed me that I really was not in love with you anymore. I don’t think that you are a bad person, but I do believe that you are lost and damaged and will never be whole. I believe that you will spend the rest of your life in New Jersey, and that is not what I wanted. It never used to be what you wanted either. I knew that after you asked me to marry you that we could never be friends, but the idea of being your wife made me cringe. I know that you think that you love me, but what you loved isn’t there for you anymore. I tried every way that I knew to tell you that, but as usual you would not listen.”

Robin reread the page. It made her smile that she didn’t feel anything. She started to put it into an envelope and then a thought struck her. Why should she? She crumpled the page and through it into the waste basket next to the blank page that showed at the top, “Dear Ron.”

 

 

Chapter 70

Elena and Veronica sat in Ron’s classroom. The building was emptying out. Each of them was holding a red library book that Ron had gotten for them.

“It’s a lot of work,” he said. “And you both know already that you are getting great grades from me. This isn’t about that.”

“I think it would be fun,” said Veronica.

“You have the harder decision to make,” said Ron. “It’s not going to be easy to play all of these male roles.”

Veronica grinned. “I know I’m a girl, Mr. Tuck. It’s not like you have two guys in front of you and you are asking one of them to play all the female roles.”

Ron smiled. “Two guys would never have the guts to do what I am asking the two of you to try to accomplish.”

“Do you really think that we can do it?” said Elena.

“I’m gonna be honest with you. I’m not sure. I directed one play in college and I acted some back then, but I never tried anything like this before.”

Elena grinned. “We have no scenery, no budget, no stage and most of the teachers in the school thinking that we can’t do it. What’s the problem?”

The three of them shared a conspiratorial grin. But what Elena was saying was true. For the first time, Ron was really out of favor with both the nuns and the other teachers. When the college admissions letters started arriving, the school was at first shocked and then pleased and then distrustful and now resolutely convinced that Ron had somehow conspired to have these girls apply to colleges that were way over their heads. Bernadette and Ron had their most heated argument ever, and now they were barely speaking to each other. It had started because of Elena. Two months earlier she had burst into Ron’s classroom before the day began waving a letter from Princeton. It said that she had been accepted and that the school wanted her to visit and meet with a financial aid counselor to help her to work out a financial package. Bernadette and Ron had been having coffee in his class. Ron was thrilled when he heard the news. He hugged Elena and she said, “I could never have had the guts to do this without your help.”

Ron said, “You have brains and talent and you can do whatever it is that you decide that you want to do.” They were the same words that his mother had always said to him when he was facing a challenge.

Elena turned to Bernadette. “Isn’t it great, Sister?”

“It’s a lovely honor,” said Bernadette with a tight lipped smile.

“They said that I can bring two guests with me. Will you come, Mr. Tuck? My father said that he would come with me.”

Before Ron could answer, Bernadette said, “What about your mother?”

“She doesn’t mind and I really want you to meet my father, Mr. Tuck. My mother will visit lots after I start going there.”

“Elena, I would be really honored to go, but I think Sister is right. It should be someone else from your family.”

“I already told them that I wanted you,” blurted Elena.

“Then it’s me you get,” said Ron smiling. She hugged him and ran off.

Bernadette was very quiet after she left. Then she stood and said, “Are you really sure that you know what you are doing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Rutgers, yes. Montclair State would be better, but I could understand Rutgers. She has a full scholarship to St. Josephs. But you’ve convinced that girl that she can go to Princeton.”

“She can go to Princeton.”

“And how is her family supposed to manage that?”

“I’m thinking that she is going get a full ride.”

“She’s not that bright, Ron. She’s clever and she works hard and she has overcome the cultural disadvantages, but you had to have her shoot for the moon.”

Ron’s face hardened. “Not only her. Wait until the rest of the acceptances come in. Wait until you see the colleges that these girls are going to get into.”

Bernadette made a fist and pounded it down in the air like she was striking an imaginary table. “Getting in is not the point!” She raised her voice. “This is more about you than it is about them. You just refuse to see the realities.”

“You’re right,” Ron shot back, “because their realities suck. They need dreams, and they can make some of those dreams come true.”

“What you really mean to say is that you can make their dreams come true.”

“I can help,” said Ron.

“You did help! But that wasn’t enough for you. You have to think of them as extraordinary because you want to be extraordinary.”

Ron stood with some amount of defiance in his posture. “Maybe we all are, Bernadette.”

That was really the last meaningful conversation that they had. When Veronica got into Rutgers and Elizabeth got into NYU and Donna decided that she would attend Brandeis, Bernadette avoided Ron more and more. They no longer had coffee and even the girls noticed that their two favorite teachers were not as friendly as they had once been. They speculated that Ron and Bernadette had been lovers and that now they had broken up. Bernadette used to speak glowingly of the guy across the hall, but now she never mentioned him. And Ron seemed to never be with her in the mornings anymore.

“Take the play home and read it over. We need to make a decision by the end of the week and then I have to get permission for us to do it.”

The next morning Ron met with Sister Donna Maria and explained his plan. She looked at him with startled eyes. “You want to do a Shakespeare play?”

“Not exactly,” said Ron.  “It’s a collection of Shakespeare scenes that have been put together on a theme. It’s called Shakespeare’s World of Love.”

Sister Cheesy got up from behind her desk and began to pace. She tugged at her waistband and then at her headpiece. “I don’t understand your need to do these things, Mr. Tuck.”

“What do you mean, Sister?”

“Your creative writing class is doing a literary magazine is that not right?”

“Yes, but we are doing that as part of the class and I am paying for the paper. It is only costing the school the price of the ink.”

“And now you want to do this?”

“I’m not sure that I see what one thing has got to do with another,” said Ron.

She threw up her hands in exasperation. “Where are we supposed to put this play on? We have no stage.”

“I think that we can do it in the gym.”

She looked at him with disbelieving eyes. “And just who would we put this play on for, Mr. Tuck?”

“I was thinking that we could do it for the other students and maybe the eighth grade kids. It could be good public relations for next year’s incoming class.”

“It could also be a disaster that humiliates everyone involved.”

“Ok, tell you what. We’ll put it together and show it to you and some of the other teachers. If you don’t think it’s good enough, we won’t do it.”

“No, no, that’s not a good idea. Word will get out about what you are doing and then if the students don’t get to see it, we will look like the bad guys.”

“Have you spoken to Miss Scarpelli about using her gym for this activity?”

“No Sister. That would be presumptuous. I came to you first.”

“She looked at him with exasperation. And you would never be presumptuous would you, Ron?”

“Look, I’m trying to do a good thing here. I’m trying to get the kids excited about learning and to show them that it can be fun too.”

“And you aren’t forcing these girls into this?”

“Not at all,” he said. “They are both top students. They don’t need the grades. They are both accepted into colleges.”

“Well I can’t fault your enthusiasm.  But why Shakespeare?”

Ron looked at her evenly and said, “Because no one else thinks that they can do it.”

“Have you ever contemplated the sin of Pride, Mr. Tuck?”

“Being proud of these kids is no sin Sister.”

“We have no money to give you for this.”

“I know that.”

“Well,” she threw up her hands in an expression of exhausted defeat. “Get started and let’s see how it goes, if Miss Scarpelli agrees. I’m not commandeering her classroom for this effort.”

Grace Scarpelli was a short woman in her late 20’s with reddish brown closely cropped hair, freckles and a slight twist to her nose that gave her face an unusual contour. Ron didn’t know her at all but was fairly certain that she was gay. They had said hello over the years and once shared a cafeteria duty. She kept to herself and had been there longer than Ron.

Ron made his way over to the gym with some sense of trepidation. She was sitting in her office with the school nurse when he arrived.

“Hi, Grace.”

“Hello, Ron. You don’t often make it down to this part of the school.”

“I know,” said Ron, feeling a blush heat his face. “They keep me pretty busy up on the other end.”

Grace laughed. “I’m sure that they do.”

The nurse stood up. “Well, I’ve got to get back to my office. We can finish this up tomorrow Grace.”

“Hello Mrs. Babio.”

“Hello and goodbye, Mr. Tuck,” said the nurse without smiling.

Ron felt slapped and he was not sure why. He explained to Grace what he wanted to do and watched with delight as she said that she thought that it was a cool idea, and also that she thought that he was crazy for doing it.

“Well that seems to be the popular opinion,” said Ron.

“You know that they all will be watching and waiting for you to fall on your ass so that they can say that they told you so?”

“Yeah, I know,” said Ron. He was a bit startled by her language. But what the hell, it won’t be the first time that I’ve fallen on my ass.”

“When do you want to rehearse?”

“We’re going to come in an hour before school starts.”

Grace Scarpelli chuckled. “You are a glutton for punishment, huh?”

“I guess,” said Ron. He would have agreed with anything that she said right about now.

“You won’t be in my way,” Grace shrugged. “Good luck with it.”

Ron reached out to shake her hand. It was warm and soft and she stood closer to him when he slid his palm into hers. “I appreciate it,” he said.

 

Part 4

Chapter 69

Sitting in Quimpy’s living room where there was little heat, Ron watched the NCAA Basketball Championship game with Quimpy and two of his friends, Roger and Eli. He had hung out with Roger before. They were both English teachers, but Roger had grown so depressed at the idea of grading papers that he was developing a nervous condition that caused him to break out into hives whenever he gave his class an assignment. As their football Sundays went on, Ron would see the red splotches begin to gather on Roger’s neck and he would dig at them with his fingernails and grow more sullen. Silently, Ron had hoped that he would never become like this and wondered how Roger could possibly be doing his best for his students when they very thought of reading their words made him sick.  Once he had brought a stack of papers with him to read as they watched and Roger had lost the color in his face as he saw Ron begin to shuffle through the pages and read and smile and share a comment that one of his students had written. When he could not take it anymore, Roger said to Quimpy, “If he’s gonna keep doing that, I’m going to go home.”

Quimpy had responded by breaking out one of his special, saved jar of Thai sticks and after a few puffs Ron was too stoned to read anymore and had put the papers away. After that, Ron had little respect for Roger and never mentioned his teaching or his students again. Secretly, he told himself that Roger was just one of those public school teachers who was in for the money and should have been doing something else.

Quimpy had tried to soothe Roger’s disturbed equilibrium. “You know Ron, he’s still just an idealistic fuck up who thinks that someday we are going to have a cultural revolution.” They had both laughed at Ron’s naiveté, and Ron had responded by smoking more of the Thai stick that Quimpy would have thought imaginable.

However, this was the first time that he had met Eli, who was Quimpy’s mentor and hero.  Like Warren, Eli was from North Carolina, but unlike Warren, he spoke very slowly and utilized long pauses in his patterns of speech that caused most people to want to interrupt and finish sentences for him. Eli had retired from teaching and had a house on top of a mountain. He was married to one of his former students, who was thirty-five years his junior. He had been a legendary tennis coach. Quimpy had explained to Ron that Eli was a true genius and that it was impossible to understand the way that he truly looked at the world. Ron felt that he had seen this act before.

The game pitted two legendary coaches against each other, Dean Smith from North Carolina and Bobby Knight from Indiana. Smith was a gentleman and Knight was a raving lunatic. Ron was the only one in the room who thought that Indiana was going to win. Eli had been shocked by Ron’s opinion and asked him to explain.

“Smith is a pussy,” said Ron in way that was sure not to endear him to Eli. “He has no killer instinct. Knight will just put his foot on your throat and stomp the life out of you without thinking that it should be any other way. Smith wants to be elegant. He wants to be well thought of. Knight just wants to beat the shit out of his opponents.”

Eli sat back. “That is a rather vivid,” he paused, “interpretation, another pause, “of how to…” he changed his position on the chair “…play a game.”

Ron smiled. Quimpy shook his head with silent grinning laughter.

Roger said, “Dean Smith is a brilliant tactician.”

“For a pussy,” said Ron.

“Quimpy tells me… that you… are a teacher, Ron?”

Roger stiffened. Quimpy said, “Ron teaches in a Catholic School.”

Eli smiled. “Well, that explains a lot, doesn’t it?”

Quimpy and Roger laughed. Eli puffed on his pipe. Ron lit a joint.

It was a Monday night and he was making an exception. He never went out during the week, but since this was pretty much the extent of his social life and the championship game was a big deal, he had decided to come. He was already regretting it. It was late and he wanted to be home and settling in with his papers and thoughts of his next day. But he knew that he had to start going out some of the time.

At the half, Indiana scored on a long shot that put them up 27-26 for their first lead of the game. The halftime show was dedicated to an update on the condition of Ronald Reagan who had been shot the day before. Surgeons had successfully removed a bullet and the President was said to be doing very well.

Quimpy, who actually was an acknowledged intellect on JFK in Dallas, was explaining that he thought that Reagan had been set up by the secret service to teach him a lesson. Quimpy believed that Reagan had somehow pissed the wrong people off and that a bullet in him was scheduled to get his attention and to put him back on track. Eli contended that it was in this case just an ill-mannered lunatic who thought that he knew what was best for the country. Looking over at Ron, he added, “Not unlike…in spirit… the essence of the way that you describe …Bob Knight.”

Ron just said that he didn’t like Reagan but hoped that he would live. “I just don’t want to ever see another American President killed.”

Roger said, “They’re all no good fucks anyway.”

In the second half, Indiana got off to a slow start but then routed North Carolina. Ron felt vindicated. As soon as the game ended, he slipped out and drove home and went to bed as quickly as he could so that he would be ready for his real life in the morning.

Before he left, Eli congratulated him on his analysis and said that it had been a pleasure to meet him. Ron was a little taken aback. He knew that perhaps he hadn’t been fair to Eli. He had been too guarded to take anything that the guy said at face value. He had shaken his hand and said that he had enjoyed meeting him very much. As he lay in bed, trying to go to sleep, he wondered if Rahway had damaged him with respect to meeting new people. They had been so sure that what they were doing was new and exploratory, but now it seemed that they made each other unhappy more than they did anything positive for each other.

 

Chapter 68

Looking straight at Veronica Ron said, “Ok, why is Antonio sad?”

Veronica grinned and opened her notebook. She turned back a few pages. “I think that he is sad because he does not love his life and he knows that it is the only one that he has and he is dissatisfied with it.”

Ron was struck first by the simplicity of her insight. He nodded slowly and made a cross on the board, labeling it with a Y and an N.

“How many of you agree with Veronica?”

As he took the poll, he realized that he had made a mistake to do it this way. By identifying the statement as belonging to Veronica, the poll became a referendum on her and it wasn’t going to get him anywhere. It was unanimous in favor of agreement. He stopped. There was no place to go with a vote like this unless he took the opposing point of view. He didn’t want to do that. “What is missing in his life?” he said.

Donna grinned as she raised her hand. “I personally think that he is a little bit too sweet on Bassanio.”

There was a scattering of “Ewws” in the classroom. Ron looked at Donna and said, “Why do you think that?”

Donna answered with a strong and confident voice. “Bassanio is the only one that he wants to see before he thinks that he is going to die, for one thing.”

“That is true,” said Ron. “Anyone else have an idea?”

Veronica’s hand went back up into the air. She began speaking as soon as Ron made eye contact with her. “I think that he has taken his life for granted and that it’s only when he is faced with losing it that he realizes that he has another chance. I think that Shakespeare put him through this so that he could learn that his life was important.”

“Why do you believe that he didn’t understand that his life was important?”

Elena chimed in. “The bond. Who makes that kind of deal about a debt? It had to be that he just didn’t care.”

Ron was stunned. He had read this play at least six times and he had never come to these conclusions, but now they looked real and true and he believed them to be accurate insights. “I think that you may all be correct. And I think that I have never had these thoughts about the play before.” He grinned at them proudly and they grinned back at him just as proud of themselves as he was of them.

“OK,” he said. “Let’s move on to the rings and what Portia does back at Belmont.”

Samantha said, “She’s just having fun with him.”

He exaggerated a face of being aghast and in pain. “That was your idea of fun?”

The girls giggled. Elizabeth said, “Mr. Tuck, do you remember back in freshman year when we read The Odyssey?

Ron smiled. “Yes.”

Elizabeth continued, “Didn’t Penelope do the same thing to Ody?”

They laughed remembering the name that he had given them to use because they had trouble saying Odysseus. “What do you mean?

“At the end of the story, when she tests him and tells her maid to bring their bed so that she can sleep with him,” said Elizabeth.

“Both events are very much related. Except of course that Odysseus was gone for 20 years and she wanted to make sure that it was him.”

Elizabeth blushed but held her ground. “She knew it was him. She wanted to make sure that he hadn’t taken her for granted and Portia is doing the same thing here.”

“Wow,” said Ron. “I should just sit down and let you guys teach the class to yourselves.”

Paula looked at him as if he was serious. “We couldn’t do this without you,” she complained.

Ron smiled. “Yes, you can and you’re gonna.”

He spent the rest of the class reviewing and giving them a pool of quotes from which he would choose his questions. He made the pool huge, including at least thirty quotes from which he would choose ten. Even if they just studied those quotes, they would be ready.  Then he told them about the new testing formula that he was going to use and he saw them get nervous again. He explained that he did it so that they would have more time to express themselves and feel less pressure. They were not convinced.

Standing with Bernadette, in the hall between classes, he said, “I just had the best class that I have ever had with these kids. They are something special.”

Bernadette’s dark eyes looked into his face. Her expression was worried. “Do you think that you might be putting too much pressure on them?”

“No,” said Ron quickly.

“Are you raising their expectations too high, Ron?”

“Why are you asking that?”

“Because I think that some of these kids are going to fail to live up to your expectations of them and what happens to them then? You get a new batch of kids to teach. What do they get?”

Ron felt slapped. He actually took a step back. “Is that what you think that I’m doing?”

“I’m worried that you might be getting carried away,” she said.

“Have you spoken to them about colleges?”

“A little bit.”

“Did you tell Elena that an Ivy League school would not be out of the question?”

“I didn’t have to tell her. She already knew. But I certainly didn’t discourage her.”

Bernadette rolled her eyes. “Come on, Ron, an Ivy League school?  And even with affirmative action, if she did get in, do you think that there would be any way that she could possibly make it in that kind of an environment?”

“Yes, I do.”

Bernadette’s face was hard. “Whose dream is that Ron, yours or hers?” Saying that she turned and went back into her classroom. Ron stood and watched her go feeling very confused. A moment ago he had been riding along on the wave of their learning. He was feeling like he was finally doing some real good and now he felt incredibly insecure. Bernadette had never said anything like that to him before.

At lunch, he walked the streets around the school and smoked cigarettes. The leaves were the spectacular variety of colors that he remembered from his childhood. The light was soft as if filtered through them. He wanted to do what was right. He believed in them. They believed in him. Did they believe in him too much? Did he have unrealistic expectations for them? Was he setting them up for failure? Did he just want to think that he was some kind of magical person who could come back to Newark and change the way that things were? Was he a fool? He thought of the Blake proverb about the fool persisting in his folly and becoming wise. Did the fool become wise by learning that he had been a fool? He did not want his wisdom to come at their expense. He was quite sure that he could never forgive himself that.

At the end of the day, Bernadette appeared in his doorway. He had sleepwalked through his afternoon classes. He could not stop thinking about it. “I was cruel to you,” she said.

He looked up and said, “No, you were telling what you believed. That’s not being cruel.”

“What do you think I was telling you?”

“I think that you were saying that I might be doing this for myself more than I am doing it for them.”

“That’s how I thought it sounded too. I was just upset.”

“About what?”

Bernadette came into the room and closed the door. “I got a letter from Irene Emanuel.”

“How is she doing?”

Bernadette moved deeper into his room.  “She was worried about the way that she left and she was worried about you.”

“Me?”

“She said that I should look after you and help you to not burn yourself out.”

“I miss her,” said Ron. “I really wish that I understood why she just had to go like that.”

“If I tell you something you have to promise me that you will never tell anyone under any circumstances.” Ron looked at her quizzically. She paused and waited for him. He nodded. “Do you remember that man whose body they found in the basement just before she left?” Ron nodded again. “Did you know Father Joyce?”

“He baptized me when I converted back when I was 14. I studied with him.”

“Did you like him?”

“No, he was cold and never smiled.”

“You were too old for his taste. Lucky you!”

“What do you mean?”

“Irene Emanuel was poking around in the basement trying to figure out what had happened. She couldn’t stop wondering what this man was doing down there and why he went there to die. She found a bunch of pictures of Father Joyce and the boys from the second grade Indians Club. Some of the boys had no clothes on. It wasn’t a hobo Ron. It was a former student. He went down there to kill himself”

“What?”

Bernadette nodded. “She took the pictures to the Rectory and shortly after that both she and Father Joyce were transferred.”

Ron sat with his mouth hanging open.

“Some things here are never what you think that they are, Ron.”

 

End of Part 3

 

Chapter 67

On Monday morning, Ron began class by drawing a cross on the board and dividing it, not by yes and no as was his normal way, but with the words ‘love and justice. He did not look at the side board although he knew that there were many comments there. While some students took the weekends off, Ron had learned that his were very diligent at accomplishing their lessons over the weekend. They had confided to him that in many instances that they were not allowed to go out and that they could get out of doing housework by claiming that they had school work which needed to be finished.

“Would you prefer to live in a world that is governed by love or a world that was governed by justice?” he asked.

Ron almost fully expected that the girls would almost unanimously vote for a world where love was in charge and was at a loss to explain when the vote came back evenly split between the two choices. He looked at them very thoughtfully. He circled the group that had voted for justice. “Then you believe that Shylock was treated fairly?”

Donna’s hand shot up like a bolt. Before he could even acknowledge her, she said, “That wasn’t justice! That was prejudice!”

Ron smiled. “What do you mean?”

“Well the judge does not even try to hide the fact that he hates Shylock.”

“That’s true,” said Ron. “But is he impartial?”

“He claims to be but that is a joke. He was looking for any way to overturn the bond.”

“Doesn’t Shylock demand the ‘letter of the law’ and isn’t that what he gets?”

“Yes, but isn’t the purpose of the law to help everyone to be treated fairly?”

“Is it?” said Ron.

“It should be!” countered Donna.

Ron nodded. “You are correct. It should be. I want you to think about your history classes for a moment.” The girls groaned and Ron was shocked at the reaction. “What?”

Elena said, “History is no fun, Mr. Tuck.” She looked at him with her eyes twinkling in the secret that the two of them now shared.

“Haven’t our laws always been a reflection of our prejudices?”

The girls were silent. Elizabeth who had also voted for justice said, “Then there is nothing to trust except love. Is that what you are saying?”

“No,” answered Ron. “Love does not even attempt to be fair. We treat those that we love much differently than we treat anyone else.”

“So what’s the right answer?”

“You tell me,” said Ron. “It’s there. It’s right in the pages.”

Veronica smiled broadly and put her hand up. “The mercy speech by Portia.”

Ron smiled and said, “Let’s look at it together.” Ron read the speech as the girls followed along. He read it slowly. He reread the words, “… in the course of justice, none of us shall see salvation…”

Ron paused to let the words sink in. Then he said, “Why doesn’t Shylock take three times the amount of money that is due him?”

Paula Sandal said, “Because he hates them and he wants to get back at them.”

Ron nodded.  “Why else?”

Judith said, “Because of his daughter.”

Ron nodded again. “Why else?” He felt uneasy about saying this because those were the two reasons that he wanted. Sometimes he would push beyond what he expected them or him to know and had this kind of blind faith in the power of the classroom to provide an answer. Victoria didn’t make him wait long.

“He is sticking up for all the Jews.”

Ron smiled. He had not thought of Shylock as seeing himself as a standard bearer but there it was and it seemed to ring true.

Elena said, “Do you think that Shakespeare secretly liked Jews, Mr. Tuck?”

“What I think is that Shakespeare, in his writing, wanted us all to treat each other better. But let me ask you this. How would Shylock know what mercy looked like or felt like? Had anyone shown him mercy? If you were trying to leave this room and every time that you almost got out, I swung down and kicked you in the teeth and knocked you back into the room, wouldn’t you want to beat the hell out of me if you finally did get out?”

Elena said, “So, Portia is asking Shylock to give something that he has never been given.”

“So why does she do that?” said Ron.

Paula said, “Because she wants him to be better.”

Paula had just started volunteering answers and the last thing that Ron wanted to do was to shut her down.

“That is partially true. Why else?”

Donna’s face lit up. She pointed to the love side of the vote. “Because she is in love with Bassanio and wants to get Antonio off.”

Ron was having trouble containing his smile. “Do you think that she really cares about Shylock at all?”

There was a soft chorus of “no” in the room.

Ron returned to the board and looked out at them. In this space he felt that somehow he was inside of the play, moving in it like an observer, almost like a director. He drew another cross. “Does Shylock get what he deserves?”

The vote was swift. There were fifteen who said yes and seven who said no.  Ron circled the minority and walked away from the board without saying anything. They knew what it meant.

Veronica said, “He should be punished for what he has done, but they don’t leave him with anything, not even his friends or his religion.”

“That’s true,” said Ron. “If he becomes a Christian, his fellow Jews will think of him as dead.”

“I want to change my vote,” said Judith.

“Ok,” said Ron. “Why?”

“Cause if I don’t, I won’t be any better than they are.”

Other girls said, “I want to change my vote too.”

Ron grinned at Judith. “See you are a real trendsetter.”

She beamed.

“But that doesn’t make Shylock any better of a person, does it? And Shakespeare leaves him this way. In some ways what Shakespeare is saying in his own Christianity is that Shylock had a shot at redemption and turned it down, which is why a lot of critics have said that Antonio is like a Christ figure in the play. You may want to write that down.” Dutifully the girls wrote.

Ron went back to the chalkboard and said, “OK, let’s switch gears here.” He circled those who had voted for the world governed by love. “What happens in the courtroom between Bassanio and Portia?”

Samantha said, “He digs himself into a really deep hole.”

“Why?”

Samantha gave him that look that again displayed disbelief at his inability to understand. “He gives away his ring!”

Ron grinned. “So?”

“Has a girl that you loved ever given you a ring?” said Samantha.

Ron looked down at his finger. There was silver ring with Minnesota jasper in it on the third finger of his left hand. Robin had given it to him when he first moved to Minneapolis, before he knew that she was sleeping with her cousin, before things had gotten really crazy. He dutifully wore the ring every day. He thought of her each time that he slipped it on his finger. “This one,” he said holding up the finger.

“How would she feel if you gave it away to another woman?” said Samantha.

Ron felt his eyes fill up instantly. He fought the reaction. Not here! Not in front of his students. The girls saw his face and the room became very quiet. Ron tried to smile and he shrugged. “I doubt that she would care very much anymore,” he said. The room was very quiet. The floor creaked as Ron moved across it. “But she also would probably not try to trick me into giving it away.” He was trying to get it back, trying to will his mind away from that place and back to his students. He felt himself close a door. For a moment, he heard laughter across the hall. It made him flinch. “OK,” he said. “Now the first thing that Bassanio does is to tell Portia, who he does not know is Portia, that he would give her up if that would help to get Antonio off the hook for the pound of flesh.” Ron read the passage. “The next thing that he does, and Portia has already said that she was going to leave at this point, is to keep asking her if there is anything that he can give her. And that puts it in her head to ask for the ring.”

“Yup,” said Donna. “He’s a dope.”

“Well,” said Ron, “he is not as smart as she is.”

“That’s an understatement,” said Donna. “But I have a question. How could he not know who she was?”

“Because the court was a man’s world and he would never have guessed that a woman could conduct herself in there the way that Portia did.”

“Yup ,” said Elena. “A real dope.”

The bell rang. The class groaned. Ron smiled. “Act 5 is very short so it’s almost like you have a free night, but remember as soon as we finish the play, we have the test.”