Burning Down the House

by Lev Raphael

  The bell dinged behind me as I stumbled out into the

  parking lot.

  9

  LUCKILY, I had classes to teach that day. I threw myself into them, all the while feeling like an impostor. I wasn’t a teacher anymore, a decent citizen. Despite all the blather about a right to bear arms, I felt grubby and criminal for having

  contemplated buying a gun, for having had the urge burst out of me and force me to hide where I was going and what I was doing.

  Wasn’t I panicking, turning myself inside out,

  abandoning lifetime values just because I’d been the victim of violence again? Wasn’t this all an overreaction to my shame?

  These recriminations were obviously the result of having grown up in New York with European-born parents who

  derided the American love of guns. Yet they hadn’t kept cowboy outfits and pistols and holsters away from me, or banned any violent movies. So of course the gun I’d held at Mrs. Fennnebresque’s shop had felt somewhat natural to me.

  I’d probably held a toy one in my hands when I was four or five, if not younger, chasing other little boys with it, shouting, “Bang-bang-bang!”

  Maybe that’s why Americans were gun-crazy. We

  worshiped youth, and hadn’t outgrown our own as

  individuals, and as a country. Is that what being attacked had done to me—first sent me to bed, then turned me into a simulacrum of a cowboy seeking revenge on cattle rustlers?

  Questions like that roiled at the back of my mind while I was teaching. Hell, they were at the front of my mind, too, and even in the middle. It’s a wonder my head didn’t implode with all the mental pressure. But despite having a cramped, peeling classroom in nasty Uplegger Hall, one of the least prestigious venues for EAR professors, I taught energetic, exciting classes, and the glowing eyes and active participation in each room proved it, plus the instant explosion of conversation when I let the classes go. People were actually excited about putting the finishing touches on their research papers, due at semester’s end in a few weeks.

  It was a fun topic to deal with that day, as always when I was helping them explode myths about writing. Even after almost a full semester with me, my freshmen were still under the spell of bad high school teaching that turned writing mechanical, so that almost every one of them thought

  conclusions had to “wrap up the paper” (and of course, you could never write without an outline).

  “In other words,” I said in each class, “you’ve told your readers what you had to say, then you tell the readers again in case they weren’t paying attention. Is that right?”

  There were the inevitable snickers.

  “Sounds really exciting, doesn’t it?”

  More laughter, and then questions about what I thought could provide a good conclusion, which I always tried to turn back to the class: What did they think might make a good conclusion, one that wasn’t boring and dull? They always came up with ideas, which was heartening, but sometimes it seemed that half of my work in freshman composition was deprogramming. Like dealing with students who wondered how they could write a personal narrative, since they weren’t “allowed” to use “I.”

  As each class ended, a couple of the guys sidled past me in their best gang-banger imitations, checking out my bruise and nodding what I suppose they thought was homeboy-style approval, or saying things like, “Rockin’ class, Dr. Hoffman.”

  I felt like I was in a sitcom, and I felt like a fraud, but I basked in the attention anyway. Who said I had to explain what had really happened? Tell them that it wasn’t even the first time I’d been beaten up at SUM? I was no hero, but given the fictions that had sprouted up about my SUM career as a crime solver, in a year’s time students would be swearing I’d come into class with a cast on my leg after a kick-boxing finale with some “perp” I’d chased across town in a stolen Jag.

  My enrollments would quadruple.

  But Juno wanted to know the truth. She found me in my office that afternoon as I was getting ready to leave.

  Looking devastating as usual in a very Dynasty black leather pantsuit and a leopard-print headband, she shuddered with distaste as she sat at my desk. “Your office—it’s chilling.”

  “It used to be a meat locker.”

  “No, seriously, you could open up a wax museum here.”

  “The wax museum’s upstairs. It’s where we work.”

  “Too true. Nick, when I’m chair, I’ll get you a better office, I promise.”

  “Where? There’s no room in Parker—you’d have to

  pitch a tent on the lawn outside, or build a shack on the roof.”

  “We can put you in with someone else.” She made it

  sound like bunking with a buddy at summer camp.

  “Who? They all hate me or think I’m cursed—or both.”

  She clapped her hands together sternly. “Please don’t act like a victim—it’s very tiresome.”

  “You think I’m acting like a victim? I went to a gun shop this morning!”

  Juno’s face was as bright as a sunflower, though I

  realized my second statement would for some people have proved an affirmative answer to my rhetorical question.

  “Did you really? How marvelous—which one? Aux

  Armes?”

  “Is that where you got your Glock?”

  She shook her head very firmly, and I took it as a

  warning not to probe further. “Are you buying a gun, then?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Nick—what are you afraid of? You’re an American, for Christ’s sake—guns should be like Rice Krispies to you!”

  “A breakfast cereal?”

  “Don’t be obtuse. I meant ordinary. ”

  “Well, they’re not, but I can see it happening.”

  “Not ten years from now, I hope.”

  “Are you kidding? I’m getting one as soon as I decide what I want.” I couldn’t believe how banal the words were to describe buying a weapon. Maybe I should have tried Sears.

  “What’s wrong with a Glock?”

  I fumbled for an answer. What was really wrong was

  that Juno had one, and I couldn’t see myself with the same gun. It would have felt like I was a tagalong or something. A member of the Glock Gang.

  “I have to sense it’s the right gun for me.” Was that even it? Was I actually going through with this? Is that what five years at SUM had done to me? My parents would be appalled, and I could never tell them or Sharon.

  Juno nodded. “I understand. It’s like a woman finding the right scent.”

  “I’m not planning on wearing it.”

  “You never know. This time last year, did you think

  you’d want to own a gun? Of course not. Things change, people change. Now fill me in on what happened to you Saturday night. In detail.”

  I did, and she seemed puzzled, stroking one cheek as if it were a crystal ball that would reveal the true nature of what was threatening us, or as if she wanted to comfort me by stroking my bruised cheek.

  “I was shot at, you were beaten up,” she said. “It

  doesn’t make sense. Why such different methods of

  intimidation?”

  “Different people?”

  “Do you mean you and I—or them?”

  I shrugged. “Both, maybe.” Despite the uncertainty

  hovering over us, and the threat of further violence, I was enjoying myself with Juno. The sight and smell of her, the intimacy, real or imagined. There was an old-fashioned phrase that described our present situation: we were closeted together. I liked the coziness of that image, even though the setting was more dismal than inviting.

  She crossed her legs decisively and tightly, as if that could help her think. It didn’t do the trick for me, but sent my thoughts lurching in the wrong direction. I looked away.

  “Why us, though?” she asked ruminatively. “What’s the connection?”

  I’d been so dazed Sunday, so
sleepy, I hadn’t considered that, and neither had Stefan.

  “Someone’s clearly trying to scare us, but why? What do we know, what have we seen, what did we say or do?”

  “We both think the Diversity Tree is a terrible idea,” I offered. “There’s no other connection.”

  “Could that be enough?” She looked around. “Jesus,

  Nick, don’t you have anything to drink?” I’m not sure what she expected in my dismal hideaway—a fully stocked wet bar?

  “There’s a pop machine down the hall, or I could make some coffee.…”

  “When I say drink, I mean a drink, not a beverage.”

  “Sorry.”

  She sighed.

  “You could always send me a case of your favorite,” I suggested. “For when you drop by.”

  She grinned, and I had a flash of many such

  companionable times ahead of us, but it didn’t last; someone pounded on the half-open door, and we whirled around in our chairs.

  “So you’re here, too!” Avis Kinderhoek said, glaring at Juno and looming in the doorway as ominously as someone five feet tall could. Imagine the Seven Dwarves’ mother annoyed at finding all their little beds unmade.

  “I heard about your so-called attack,” she went on to me, not moving into the room as if afraid some maleficent influence might cloud her judgment. “I don’t believe a word!

  You made it up to get attention, to get sympathy, and so that EAR would look bad.”

  As if our department needed my help. “You’re nuts,” I said, wanting to jump up and slam the door in her face, but Juno restrained me as confidently as Stefan would have done.

  “Am I? You came to your office Saturday night? Oh,

  aren’t you the dedicated teacher! Well, your office is in the basement—what were you doing in the bathroom on the

  second floor?”

  I felt cornered in the witness box by a hostile prosecutor.

  I shot back, “I stopped there after getting my mail.”

  She nodded cynically. “Great excuse, but I’ll bet you were there to sabotage that tree—and somebody stopped you.”

  Juno waded in. “What is it you’re trying to say, Mavis?”

  “Avis. I changed my name! It’s Avis, not Mavis. You

  don’t respect anything. You people don’t respect anything.”

  “Canadians?” Juno asked demurely.

  “You perverts, that’s who I mean, and don’t pretend you didn’t understand me the first time. But I’ll tell you something.

  This university may have let people like you in, but it’s going to vomit you forth one day. There’s a change coming.”

  I thought a moment and recalled a wonderful line from Topsy-Turvy, which I delivered with quiet joy: “I’m sure that we shall reap the benefit of your remonstrations in the fullness of time.”

  Avis scowled as if I’d spoken gibberish, but Juno

  laughed hard. Avis beetled off down the hall, and Juno and I looked at each other as if checking our eyes—had we really witnessed this buffoonish incursion? I was too embarrassed by and for Avis to laugh.

  Juno grimaced. “People like that make me admire

  countries where they have purges.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “Probably not. But I would like to use her for target practice. How can she be a writer? She seems impervious to irony and human feeling. What does she write about?”

  “She’s a memoirist.”

  “That explains it. I’m so sick of your American

  confessions. Nobody is interested—can’t you get the

  message? You meet someone at a party, and within five minutes you hear about his gruesome divorce or her child’s birth defect or some other equally intimate horror. I suppose Avis writes about being overweight and underloved?”

  “Sometimes. But she’s never gotten the attention she

  thinks she deserves.”

  “She deserves to be bitch-slapped, is what she deserves.

  What a little commissar!”

  “You were the one who was talking about purges.”

  “After being around her, I need a purgative. She’s disgusting. What makes her such a termagant?”

  “Her first book was published by Knopf, all the others by smaller and smaller presses. She’s gone nowhere big.”

  Juno was musing now as if we’d actually had a civil

  exchange with Avis and not been the target of raving. “What do you think she meant about us being vomited forth? It’s from the Bible, I know, but what’s she getting at? She couldn’t be the one who’s after us, could she? It seems too obvious. And while I could picture her shooting at me, she’s a bit small to take you down, unless she’s the kind of woman who breeds giants and she had her son run some errands and then beat you up on his way to the bars.”

  “‘Leave her alone.’ ‘Leave it alone.’ Either way, it could be about Avis. She’s the one who defended the tree at the meeting.”

  “So we’re being threatened because someone thinks

  we’re picking on that muskrat?”

  Right then, it all seemed so confusing that I did need a drink—whether to clarify my thoughts or to drown them didn’t matter. Juno had a better idea.

  “How about a swim?” she said. “I’ve got my gym bag.

  How about you?”

  “It’s in the car. Let me call home.”

  “I’ll meet you over at The Club, in the pool.” Juno patted my hand and left. I sat back in my chair, closing my eyes and enjoying her perfume.

  “Nick. You are called!” Byron Summerscale boomed at

  me, stomping into my office like a bounty hunter about to drag me off to jail. I definitely needed a doorman.

  “What’s going on?”

  “A crusade! Cleaning out the Augean stables! The

  cleansing fire!” If he got any louder, he would unsettle Parker’s foundation. I didn’t bother pointing out that Hercules used water to clean those stables, not flame.

  “Byron, I’m not following you.”

  “But you must! You must follow me—join my campaign

  —help me become chair of EAR. It’s time to end the

  gynocracy. Only a man can do this job.”

  “Juno’s pretty tough,” I said provocatively.

  His voice dropped a few decibels, but his generally

  mobile face looked very Mount Rushmore. “She’s dangerous.

  She’s malicious. You should stay away from her. She’s trouble.”

  Suddenly he was sounding like a father warning his

  teenage son about a date. Could he tell I was attracted to Juno? I wasn’t sure what to say, but Summerscale didn’t seem to need a reply and surged back out into the hall and down to his office. The door slammed, then opened again, and he bellowed, “Think about it hard, Nicholas!”

  French farce meets Scream.

  Of course part of my problem with Juno was thinking

  about it hard, but now wasn’t the time to mention that. I called Stefan to say I was swimming with Juno, that I needed a quick swim to relax. I felt a twinge when I hung up but shifted gear as I was getting ready to close up my office. I thought about Summerscale. He was big enough and broad enough to have been the one to hold me down on the men’sroom floor, and the kind of guy who might use an Old Spice or Yardley-style aftershave. How could I get to smell his hands?

  I headed up to check my mailbox in the EAR office,

  feeling as giddy about having a rendezvous with Juno as if there were much more involved than sharing a lane at the pool. Rusty Dominguez-St.John was striding down the stairs as if he owned them—in a sensitive, life-affirming-we’re-allin-this-together kind of way, of course—and he stopped. The Ego Has Landed, I thought.

  “That was pretty courageous what you said at the

  meeting. You took a lot of risks.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Oh, I’m not complimenting you,” he said, voice warm

 
; and broad and helpful. “I think you made a big mistake. And you’re going to have to pay for it.”

  “Can I put that on my VISA card?”

  He gave me a Jack Nicholson grin. “Remember, you did

  it to yourself, dude.” And he strutted down the stairs, as cocky as Brad Pitt in Fight Club mocking Ed Norton on the plane. “Nasty-looking bruise,” he said from down below, and I touched it as if to shield myself from his quiet contempt.

  Jeez, he was two unpleasant people, nasty one-on-one, smarmy in public.

  I made it to the office without being accosted by anyone else, but along with the other usual mail found a bizarre memo in my box from Les Peterman, Martin Wardell, and Larry Rich, declaring their intention to vote for and lobby for Byron Summerscale as the savior of EAR because he was the only person disinterested enough to be a good chair. Great—were we going to be seeing commercials and campaign buttons, too?

  As I read it, I felt an unpleasant sensation and turned to see if I was being stared at. I was. Dulcie Halligan had come to the front counter from her desk as if to defend the miserable little Diversity Tree from my depredations—or just plain scorn. Her watchful, hostile attitude told me that she must have been informed of my stand at the meeting. That was great—I could expect her from now on to be even less helpful to me, and even obstructive. She seemed to be staring at my bruise, and I couldn’t tell if she were offended somehow, or if she was glad.

  “Have a nice day,” I said, departing, noting the thickening of objects on the tree since I’d seen it Saturday night. I saw a little white-and-gold teddy bear that definitely looked new— what faith tradition did that represent? Disney?

  Dulcie Halligan made some sort of dismissive noise

  through her nose.

  It was late afternoon, and the parking lot at The Club was starting to fill up when I got there a few minutes later, but as always, I looked for a space close to the door, as if the walk from my car was particularly enervating. I tried to think of a Seinfeld-like witticism to explain it but drew a big blank.

  Between the eastern edge of campus and exclusive (and flat) Michigan Hills, The Club was Michiganapolis’s premier place to work out, or pretend to. It was a lavish, gigantic concrete-and-glass multiwinged structure that looked more like a biotech research center than a health club. Spreading across many acres and built on different levels connected by wide staircases, it teemed with possibilities for physical self-improvement or torment, depending on your perspective: an indoor and outdoor track, dozens of tennis and racquetball courts, three basketball courts, indoor and outdoor pools, and so many aerobic studios and cardiovascular equipment rooms that it was easy to get lost. The weight rooms were so big they looked like warehouses for storing the equipment.