Man of the Hour

by Peter Blauner

He looked up at her, scratching his chin. She was transmitting, but he wasn’t set up to receive her yet. Something was happening here. He forced himself to focus. “Why don’t you sit down?” He patted the seat next to him.

  She glanced around, as if she was thinking of bolting, and then gradually, reluctantly, lowered herself to his side, not daring to look at him directly. “It’s hard, what I have to tell you. I feel like I’m coming apart.”

  “Then just say it already,” he said, feeling pressure moving around inside of him. “Come on, we’ve known each other a long time, Elizabeth. If you don’t trust me by now, then you’re never going to.”

  “All right. Okay.” She tried out three different expressions, before settling on a tight-mouthed determination. “You were asking me before about the day of the bombing,” she said finally. “Right?”

  “Right.” He swatted a fly away. “And you reminded me you weren’t there.” Another in the classic series of frustrating dead-end conversations.

  She took a deep breath as an out-of-service train pulled into the station. “There’s a little more to it.”

  “Okay.” He felt like he was cautiously peering around a half-opened door.

  “My brother asked me to stay home that day. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.” She turned her feet at the ankles and contemplated them, avoiding his eyes. “He said he was going to take me shopping. And then he showed up late.”

  “And this is significant why exactly?” He noticed her eyes were sunken and her cheeks were drawn, like she hadn’t gotten much sleep lately. “Come on, Elizabeth. Just tell me what you want to tell me. I’m no good at reading between the lines anymore.”

  The out-of-service train pulled out of the station and she squinted, making little asterisks appear near the corners of her eyes. “He showed up right after the bomb went off,” she said. “Because he was the one who put it there.”

  The train was gone, but the station was still reverberating. “How do you know that?” said David.

  “He told me.”

  David sat very still. Wide awake now. Not wanting to disturb the moment.

  “Your brother planted the bomb.” David coughed and replayed the last five seconds of conversation in his mind, trying to make sure he hadn’t imagined it.

  She turned away, pressing the heels of her hands against her eyes to keep from crying. “You see? That’s what I mean. It’s like the things we’ve talked about. Do you stay or run away when you’re in trouble? All this time, I’ve wanted to tell you, but I’ve been afraid. I’ve gone back and forth on it a hundred times. It’s like a hand over my heart.”

  David held himself in check, trying not to overreact. But in his mind, he heard a crowd starting to cheer. It sounded like long-dead fans at Ebbets Field, rising in the stands again.

  He looked at Elizabeth. She was a beautiful doorway between one part of his life and another.

  “Have you told anyone else about this?” he asked cautiously.

  “I haven’t said anything to anyone.”

  David closed his eyes and pictured the after-image of a train disappearing down the tracks on his inner lids. No, no, he wouldn’t believe this. He wouldn’t let his guard down so easily. There had to be a catch.

  “So what are we going to do about this?” he said.

  He had to go slowly and carefully here. It was like walking on thin ice in baseball cleats.

  “I don’t know,” Elizabeth murmured. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

  “Have you thought about going to the police?”

  She looked up, hurt, worried that he was about to betray her. “A detective already came to our house. He said my brother would get the death penalty if it turned out he had anything to do with what happened. So I lied to him too.”

  “Okay.”

  David glanced down the platform at a pay phone, wanting to call his lawyers immediately. But then he stopped himself, realizing she was still like a bird on a railing. If he moved too quickly to grab her, she’d fly away.

  “It’s not just him, you know,” she said in a choked voice. “It’s what he’s been through and the people he’s with. The political situation. The terrible choices.”

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, thought David. And if pigs had wings and your aunt had a mustache and all the other Hall of Fame rationalizations. To understand isn’t always to forgive. Sometimes, to understand is just to understand.

  “Do you think he’s capable of doing it again?”

  She sniffed and wiped her face with the side of her arm. “I don’t know. He asked me to rent him a storage space in the city. He told me he was going to put some material there. Compressors. So I don’t know.”

  David sucked on his teeth and thought of Nasser. Their fight in the parking lot, their conversation in the office yesterday, his flickering, edgy presence in class. It’s always the quiet ones.

  “We gotta deal with this, Elizabeth,” he said. “If your brother killed somebody in another bombing and you hadn’t told the FBI about this, you could go to jail. Okay?”

  “I know, I know.” She doubled over on the bench, arms against her stomach. “But if I tell anyone, he could have me killed. You don’t know what they’re like, the people I think he’s hooked up with. My father’s told me about them, the fanatics from back home. Their whole lives are about killing.”

  David listened for a minute, to the sound of car alarms and seagulls crying in the distance. What could he tell her? What possible relevant experience could he offer to advise her? Come on. You’re supposed to be a teacher. Teach.

  “So which way are you leaning?” he asked, taking off his glasses and trying to give her some space.

  “I don’t know, I don’t know.” She moved against him and rested her head lightly against his shoulder. “It’s going to kill my father to find out about this. It’s against everything he ever wanted for us.”

  The weight of her head on his shoulder stirred him a little, even though he knew it shouldn’t.

  “You have to make a choice, Elizabeth.” He tried to move and subtly shift his weight. “You know, it’s like what we’ve talked about in class. Sometimes, you gotta step to it and see what you can live with.”

  “No. I don’t want you to give me choices.” She began crying and burrowing into the folds of his jacket. “I want you to tell me what to do.”

  He thought about putting an arm around her, but stopped himself. What if one of her classmates or another teacher saw them? The train they’d both been waiting for finally pulled in, but he ignored it.

  “You know, I know what you’ve been going through. I’m not just this stupid girl.” She pulled away suddenly, so she could see him whole. “I know you have a wife and a child and they’re blaming you for something you didn’t do.”

  “There is that,” he said.

  “Well, I can’t live with that. I just can’t.” She started to touch his knee and then took her hand away. “It’s not the right thing. It’s haram.”

  He looked over, surprised to hear her using her brother’s word. But she’d moved on.

  “Maybe it’d be different if you were somebody I didn’t know or care about.” She took out a Kleenex and blew her nose. “Then I could just side with my family and hope no one would find out. But this is you. Right? This is you.”

  For a few seconds, he couldn’t respond. He felt like she’d dropped her raw, bleeding heart into his lap.

  “We gotta work this out,” he said.

  “Oh God, I am not ready for this. I am not.” She balled up the Kleenex and kicked at her book bag, threatening to send it tumbling over the edge of the platform. “Okay,” she said, sighing and straightening up. “Just help me with this. Help me think it through. What will happen if I do tell the police about Nasser? Would he get the death penalty?”

  “I don’t know. You could probably plead mercy on his behalf.”

  “And what about his friends? They’d kill me if they found out about this. How would you
protect me from them?”

  “How would I protect you?” A good practical question that had never occurred to him. David put his glasses back on. “Um, well, you know, they have witness protection programs they could put you in, the FBI. They can change your name, give you a new place to live, a new school …”

  The more he talked, the farther Elizabeth leaned away from him. She looked seasick and pale.

  “You mean, I could never see my family again?”

  “Well, I don’t know, maybe you could all go in …”

  “Then I can’t do it,” she said. “My father couldn’t handle this. To take away everything he’s worked for and make him live like a criminal and ruin my sisters’ lives … It would kill him.”

  The train closed its doors and pulled away with a jolt. David watched the last car disappear down the tracks and knew he shouldn’t miss the next one.

  “Well, maybe they won’t have to play it that way,” he said. “Maybe they could use your information without making you testify in court. That’s something you could talk to my lawyers about. Making sure you’re protected.”

  That’s right. Fob it off on the experts. Don’t take any responsibility yourself. Manipulate this poor girl against her brother. Maybe you’re not such a big man after all. She’s the one taking the real risk here. Self-preservation wrestled with self-disgust. Self-preservation had the natural weight advantage, but self-disgust was pretty good in the clinches, David remembered.

  “You sure this is the right thing to do?” Elizabeth asked. “I need you to tell me.”

  All of a sudden, she wasn’t just a doorway anymore. He could see what was going on inside of her, and it made him unhappy. The vulnerable brown eyes, the mouth trying to be strong, the delicate shoulders. Why couldn’t she be harder, more self-centered, like an American girl? Yes, he’d jarred a little information out of her by his questioning, but she’d come all the way across on her own, looking to do the right thing and help him. So could he let her just go ahead and risk her life for him? Self-disgust said: Think about it. Self-preservation said: Go for it, dude!

  “Yeah, I think it’s the right thing,” said David.

  Besides, said self-preservation, other people’s lives are at stake here. This wasn’t just selfish thinking. Yeah, sure, said self-disgust. And here’s a little stomach acid for your trouble.

  David grimaced. “So do you want me to pass on the information to my lawyers and see what they can work out?”

  “I don’t know, maybe. I’m not sure.” Elizabeth raised her chin. “Yes. I guess that’s what I need to do.”

  Another train pulled in. A hero one day a week and a bum the other six, said David’s self-disgust. You never were worth anything anyway. Kiss my ass, said self-preservation. I’m going to Disneyland.

  58

  EVER SINCE THE DECISION had been made about the suicide bombing, Youssef and Dr. Ahmed had put Nasser under almost constant watch. They mixed chemicals for both dynamite and the fuel bombs with him at the garage, with nitric acid scorching his hands and burning his clothes as he tried to funnel it into little cardboard boxes. They took him to various mosques and prayed with him five times a day, making sure he did at least three full rakas on each occasion. They ate all his meals with him, they went with him to move the car, slept in the same room with him and, most important, they forbade him to have any further contact with his family.

  Of course, this was to be expected. He’d always heard that the leaders cut the suicide bombers off from their friends and family in the days just before they were “activated.” This was as it should be, he’d thought. Isolation was the best way to maintain the purity of purpose, especially so close to the end, when one’s faith could wobble. But now he felt overwhelmed by terrifying loneliness and uncertainty. He longed to reach out to someone, anyone. About once every two minutes, he found himself wavering in his decision. It complicated everything. At meals, he couldn’t choose between meat and vegetables; when walking into rooms, he couldn’t make up his mind whether to go left or right.

  Finally, he couldn’t take it anymore. He waited until Dr. Ahmed collapsed from exhaustion and fell asleep early on Tuesday night and then sneaked out of their little behind-the-cab-stand hovel, seeking solace.

  The time had come to see his old cell mate Professor Bin-Khaled. He’d carefully checked the City University class schedules again, and at ten o’clock, just as a gray drizzle began to fall on the city, he pulled up outside the building on West 42nd Street again and waited in his Lincoln Town Car. After a few minutes, the professor came out, talking to several students. Again, it struck Nasser how much Ibrahim had aged since the last time they’d talked.

  “Asalam allakem, brother,” Nasser called out the window. “You need a ride?”

  Ibrahim approached cautiously, but his face broke into a hard-earned smile as he recognized Nasser. “Many years, little brother.” He climbed into the car and they briefly embraced. “Many years.”

  The professor smelled of old tobacco and Turkish coffee. Nothing of the old prison stink remained with him. It was funny. When they shared a cell, they’d only been allowed one shower a week, and for years after his release, Nasser made a point of bathing twice a day. He sometimes thought he saw people wrinkling their noses as if they could still smell the jail on him.

  “So can I take you somewhere?”

  The professor used the moment to look at Nasser. His deep brown eyes refracted the light, as if he were measuring some distance between them. “Yes,” he said finally. “Yes, that would be good. I am staying with a professor from Columbia.”

  He gave Nasser an address on the Upper West Side.

  “Do you like to sit in the back, like a real passenger?” Nasser turned to make sure he hadn’t left any newspapers or rags lying in the backseat.

  “No, my friend. I am fine being in front with you.”

  Nasser studied the side of the older man’s face as he got into the car. Seven years had brought new lines and crags and for a moment, Nasser felt a surge of gladness that he would never have a son of his own to lose, and therefore would never know such deep sorrow.

  “So, my little brother,” said the professor as they started up Sixth Avenue. “You have been in the city all this time, and you’ve never come to see me. Why is this?”

  “I’m sorry, sheik. I’ve been busy, very, very busy.”

  “Sheik?” The professor looked bemused as they approached the diamond district. “I am not a sheik. I’m just a teacher. What have you been up to, my friend?”

  “I am studying more the religion these days. I’m trying to understand God.”

  “Oh yes?” The professor looked through the briefcase on his lap, making sure he had all the papers he needed. “This is good, to study the Koran. This can be a great comfort in life. And what else have you been doing?”

  “Politics.” This was the euphemism Nasser had settled on when he tried to imagine this conversation several hours before. “I’ve been getting more involved in the politics.”

  “Oh, yes, the politics.” The professor sighed, as they passed Radio City Music Hall. “I am afraid I don’t have much time for politics anymore.”

  “Yes, there have been so many lies and disappointments.” Nasser gripped the wheel, noticing once again it seemed loose since his conversation with his sister the other night. “Sometimes I think maybe the time for talking with the Jews is over. There is no point to this anymore. Now is the time for action.”

  “Actually, I don’t have time for any of the politicians anymore.” The professor wearily pulled on his seat belt and buckled it. “Not the Jews or the Arabs. Not since Abu died.”

  “Yes, I was sad to hear about this.” The hum and pitch of traffic noise rose in Nasser’s ears as he made a left on Central Park South. “I should have written to you.”

  Abu was the professor’s firstborn son. Nasser remembered him coming to visit at the jail once or twice. A big-eyed boy with a haystack of black hair and an in
fectious laugh. Even the Israeli guards were nice to him, letting him wear their hats and not getting too upset when he asked to hold their guns. The circumstances of his death were still vague to Nasser. There’d been a stone-throwing incident between some local children and the Jewish settlers in Hebron, and then a confrontation in a schoolyard, and in the gunfire that followed, Abu was killed protecting a friend. He was sixteen years old. The age Nasser was when he first met the professor in prison.

  “They should all die, the ones that did this,” said Nasser, stopping at a red light near Columbus Circle. “When I think about the way these things happen, I think a bomb should come and blow all of them up. And there should be no remorse about this.”

  The professor grimaced. “I don’t think this is the answer, the violence,” he said quietly.

  “But how can you say this?” Nasser was indignant “After they put you in prison and killed your son? How can you not want them all dead?”

  The professor raised a wry eyebrow. “Nasser, did I ever tell you the story of how they first tortured me?”

  “No. I’m not sure. I don’t know.”

  After all these years, the torture stories had begun to flow together and meld in his mind, mixed in with lies and exaggerations from the younger prisoners.

  “Well,” said the professor. “You know they jailed me for this ridiculous reason, for ‘resisting the occupation’ and suspicion of being a terrorist. There was nothing to it, but anyway, they were trying to get me to confess before I went to trial. So every day for a month, they would take me to see this same man, Avi, to answer the same questions over and over in his office, until one day, he said, ‘I’m sorry, you’re not giving us what we want. And now we’re going to have to get physical with you.’ So they handcuffed me behind my back, laid me down on the floor face-up, put a chair between my legs, and then this man, this Avi, reached down and squeezed my balls as hard as he could.”

  “Oh.” Nasser stepped too hard on the gas and the car shot out into the busy intersection, near that monstrous Trump hotel, a black-and-gold whore of a building. He had to swerve to avoid getting hit by a truck. “This must have been agony.”