25
21 Jan. 92
Betty
and Daniel are back at college. For Betty of course its the winter semester of
her first year at the cégep. For Daniel its the spring semester (its what
they call it in the US) of his junior year (its what they call the 3rd year,
like U2 at McGill) at Columbia University, but in the US they call it going to
college as long as one is an undergraduate. In fact, as he explained to me, he
is a student at Columbia College, which is a division of Columbia University.
Another division, for women only, is called Barnard College, but there are also
women at Columbia College, though that is a recent change. Except that Barnard
is not actually a division of the university but an independent institution
that is affiliated with it.
And why am I
telling you all these trivial details, my journal? Because Daniel, during his
just-ended winter vacation, told me about them. Yes, he actually talked to me.
No deep confidences or grand revelations, but free, easy talk about his life,
both academic and personal.
Academically,
he told me that in his history minor he will have enough credits to turn it
into a second major, but he is not sure if he will do that.
Personally,
that since Cici he has not had a real girlfriend but he has been casually
seeing two girls, one Jewish and one Chinese. He made a point of saying it in
French, une Juive et une Chinoise, just as he had switched to French when he
told me about his loss of interest in Amy. I cant quite figure out his
language policy, sa politique linguistique as Betty calls it.
La Juive,
by the way, is not Rachel like in the opera but the same Audrey from two years
ago, back after a year in Israel.
He also told
me that his friend Roger is gay but in the closet. He asked me if être dans
le placard is used to describe the situation in French, and I told him that
I had heard it but it was not common. Of course I thought of Jean-Marc, and I
felt myself shudder. I dont know if D noticed.
I flirted with
the idea of having Bob over to the house, but it still doesnt feel right.
After a year and a half! But Bob doesnt seem to mind. Perhaps, if he saw that
I am the mother of a 20-year-old, it would destroy his idea that we are of the
same age. No, my journal, I am being too self-conscious. He remembers Betty
from the flight from London and knows that she is almost an adult. He has
occasionally remarked on how beautiful she is, saying ta belle (pause) fille,
with a laugh, to make sure that it doesnt sound like my daughter-in-law or my
stepdaughter. The only reference he has ever made to Daniel, as far as I
remember, was an oblique one, when he once said that some day I would probably
have une belle-fille,
Daniel spent a
good deal of time with his friends while he was here, and this time he told me
matter-of-factly whom he was seeing: Harvey of course, but also Roxane, Leslie
(Harveys ex-girlfriend), Alex and Megan. I asked him if Megan was Megan Kenner
and he blushed when he said yes. He didnt ask me how I knew about her.
He also
decided that he would no longer take the bus to go to New York. In August he
got sick after getting back, and he thought that it might have been something
he picked up on the bus. So, he said, from now on he is going to fly. It was
Harvey who drove him to Mirabel, and Paul and Betty went along for the ride.
Paul and
Betty. It has become quite natural to say the two names together, just like
Greg and Marcia, or Mark and Julie. They are 18 and 17, but they give the
impression of a mature couple. Of course they have known each other all their
lives. But they became friends only when Betty started Sec. III at NAA.
Bob and
Mireille? No, that does not sound the same. Why, my journal?
Freak,
spook and geek
It was only in mid-January, after the Soviet Union had
ceased to exist and when Daniel was back from Montreal, that he heard from
Karen Litov. She suggested a meeting at her office on the twenty-first floor of
a nondescript Midtown building, near Grand Central. She did not ask what his
business with her might be; it seemed that she already knew about him from
Audrey, most probably and was expecting him.
By then the photograph of the Mossads Ora was
in his possession, and some vague intuition told him that there might be a
connection between the two women. He would bring the photograph with him to the
appointment, he decided, though not sure of how he would use it.
Having
read through his mail, he checked his e-mail and found that that, aside from
official communications from Columbia, there was a message from Claire. Of
course it was something that the Chinese geek, as she called herself, would
use. But he decided to hold off opening it. There was something else that he
wanted to do.
When
Harvey who was no longer living with Leslie, though they were still friends
dropped him off at Mirabel, he gave him a videocassette in a blank box.
Watch it when youre home alone, Harvey said, declining to make any further
comment about it. And now he was home alone. His finances looked good. All his
bills were paid. All his classes were set. Time to relax with Harveys
mysterious videotape.
It was a movie, titled Trouble
at QCI. The title sequence consisted of the title, seen as a headline on a
nameless newspaper, with the credits names that Daniel did not recognize
appearing as the pages of the newspaper were turned. Daniel surmised that the
setting would be a high school in Toronto, since most of the high schools there
were named [Something] Collegiate Institute, abbreviated CI, and he was
proved right with the first shot: a school-like building, with a sign in front
of it reading Queenstown Collegiate Institute. The camera then zoomed in
on a window, showing the inside of a classroom. Next, a male teacher was seen
from the back, writing a poetry quotation Have ever you heard of the Land
of Beyond, / That dreams at the gates of the day? on the blackboard. He
then turned around he was young and very good-looking and scanned the faces
of the students until he focused on one girl, and his gaze, as embodied by the
camera, quickly went down to her partly unbuttoned blouse, showing the better
part of a full, ripe bosom, and then back to her face. At this point Daniel
felt his heart stop. The girl was Megan Kenner.
After
taking a deep breath he pushed the rewind button to return to the credits.
Among the first acting credits shown was May Green. He guessed that this was
Megans screen name. He fast-forwarded back to Megans cleavage shot and paused
for a few second before pushing the play button..
Do
you recognize this poem, Miss Flowers? the teacher asked.
Uh,
no, sir, Megan, or May Green, or Miss Flowers, answered. Snickers were heard
from the rest of the class, but the nerdy-looking boy sitting behind her kept a
straight, serious face.
It
was assigned, you know. The camera now panned to the teachers lasciviously
smiling face.
I
know, sir. Its just that Ive been having trouble studying. I need some help.
All
right, Miss Flowers. See me after class. Turning his face slightly in
direction of the boy behind Megan. Mister Anderson? The teacher said.
Its
The Land of Beyond, from Rhymes of a Rolling Stone by Robert W.
Service, sir.
Perhaps
you can help Miss Flowers. The boy blushed, and the class snickered again.
Yeah, Tommy, you can help Katie, someone exclaimed, and the class laughed.
Katie
Flowers now gave a saucy smile and looked straight at the teacher. Id rather
get help from you, Mister Taylor.
Well
talk about that, Mr. Taylor said. He turned to another girl, a slim
bespectacled redhead who reminded Daniel of Audrey, and said, Miss Howard, can
you continue the poem?
Miss
Howard recited with a self-satisfied look on her face and exaggerated emotion
in her voice:
Alluring
it lies at the skirts of the skies,
And
ever so far away;
Alluring
it calls: O ye the yoke galls,
And ye
of the trail overfond,
With
saddle and pack, by paddle and track,
Let's
go to the Land of Beyond!
Very good, Miss
Howard, Mr. Taylor said. Now lets discuss some of the language here. The
skirts of the skies, anyone?
Dissolve to Mr. Taylors
office. Katie Flowers smooths her skirt as she enters.
Daniel pushed pause
again. He needed to think.
The Megan that he saw in
the film was the large-bosomed one that he had come to know in the preceding
August. Making the movie was evidently the summer job that had kept him from
seeing her in June. The boob job must have happened shortly before.
She had never said
anything to him about any ambition for acting. Nor had she told him anything,
either in August or in December, about the movie she had made. What was going
on?
He pushed play and then
fast forward. And it shortly became evident what was going on. The movie was a
porno.
Soon enough, Katie
Flowers was in bed with the teacher. Daniel pushed play again, and what he saw
and heard was hard-core, unsimulated sex. In fact, Megan could hardly be said
to be acting: what she did with her fellow actor, in front of the camera, was
just what she had done with Daniel, as recently as a week before.
He remembered thinking,
when he first saw the new Megan at Harvey and Leslies party, that with her
adolescents face and her ripe womans body she would appeal to the sexual
fantasies of middle-aged men. Apparently she had been noticed by just such a
man, one who happened to be a porn producer.
As he was watching the
sex scene, Daniel found himself able to predict Megans moves. The actor
playing Mr. Taylor Dick Somers was his screen name was a relatively passive
participant, and the director seemed to have let Megan control the action. What
about the undressing? Daniel rewound to the beginning of the sequence, as Katie
entered Mr. Taylors studio apartment, a large book under her arm. Ooh, its
warm in here, she said cooingly. Can I help you get comfortable? the teacher
asked. Sure, she said, sitting down on the sofa as she put first the book and
then her feet on the coffee table. Mr. Taylor turned on a floor fan, which blew
Katies skirt above her knees and exposed her thighs. That feels nice, she
said and pulled her skirt up a little more, enough to show her bare hips; she
was not wearing panties. Mr. Taylor sat down beside her and began to unbutton
her blouse. After removing it, he undid her bra and buried his head in her
bosom, causing her to moan while his right hand sought the zipper in the back
of her skirt.
It was Megan all right,
Daniel thought.
In the plot, the nerdy
Tommy Anderson, who had the hots for Katie, and the redheaded Lucy Howard, who
had designs on Mr. Taylor, independently discover the illicit affair and team
up to expose it. In the process they discover each other, and Lucy gives Tommy
a lesson in sex. Mr. Taylor is fired and Katie is expelled. Lucy now becomes
the schools queen bee; she drops Tommy and takes up with the schools football
players. Tommy seeks out Katie, who now works as a waitress, and expresses his
remorse by saying, Im sorry I was such a freak. Youre sweet, Katie says
and kisses him. I was the freak, she adds. Soon they are on a bed, with the
no longer inexperienced Tommy ripping Katies clothes off her. As soon as she
is naked, Katie climbs on Tommy and a furious bout of copulation ensues. THE
END.
The movie affected
Daniel as it was meant to: it made him horny. He thought of Audrey. Their
pre-Thanksgiving date had been followed by two more in December and another two
since his return to New York, the last one just two nights since. In fact there
had been no other woman in his life since reconnecting with her, aside from an
after-dinner quickie on Thanksgiving with Monica Lehmann she lured him into her
room, in French, on the pretext of having something to show him and the usual
holiday encounters with Megan. And so, in a sense, he could now think of
Audrey, once again, as his girlfriend.
But he preferred not to,
for it was Claire Chen that he now desired. Perhaps because her full,
curvaceous body was with no surgical help, as far as he knew more like
Megans, while Audreys was more like that of the girl who played Lucy, and in
the movie it was the scenes with Katie that excited him more than those with
Lucy. He wondered if Claire was back from California.
He called Claires
number, and got her answering machine. Her outgoing message, unlike Cicis, did
not specify whether she was out of town. He left a message saying that he
missed her and hoped that she had a nice vacation, and asking her to call him
back.
The sign on the door read MS. K. LITOV / YOUTH OUTREACH
COORDINATOR. He knocked and heard Come in! in the same accent as on the
answering machine.
Hello,
he said as he entered. Karen was standing behind her desk, extending her hand
to him. She was a plain-featured woman, her face unlined, probably in her
mid-thirties, tall and muscular with short light-brown hair and large glasses,
dressed in jeans and a loose-fitting white sweater. Shalom, she said, sit
down please. He removed his parka and hung it on the back of the chair before
sitting down. She then sat down too.
He
didnt quite know how to begin, but she opened the conversation. I know two
things about you. One is that you are Audrey Seligmans boyfriend.
He
was unsure of whether to confirm or deny it. In a sense it was true, as he had
reflected the other night. But the implication of being known as Audreys
boyfriend were too strong, given his interest in Claire.
Sort
of, he said. Weve been dating, but theres no, like, commitment, you know.
He felt awkward, but Karen Litov did not react.
And
the other, she went on, is that you are Michael Wilners son. I am too young
to know about your father, but older people that I talked with remembered him.
He was a little controversial, I hear, Karen concluded with a smile.
Thats
what Ive heard too. I didnt know him, and I havent thought about him until
recently, when I got interested in my Jewish side. He felt himself exaggerating,
if not lying, but it didnt bother him. And in Israel, he added emphatically.
Then
your mother isnt Jewish.
No,
shes French Canadian, and thats what Ive always thought of myself as. But I
happened to get in touch with my fathers first wife
Really?
The German movie star?
Yes,
Brigitte Wilner. From her I found out that I might have a sister in Israel. He
was now lying outright. He was not going to mention Ora Rozen or Nili Rosen. He
was having fun.
Really?
Karen sounded truly surprised.
Well,
maybe. It seems that back in nineteen-seventy a girl came to visit him in
Hamburg and said that she was his daughter by a girlfriend that he had in the
kibbutz. She would now be, oh, thirty-eight. I have a picture of her at
seventeen. Here it is. He pulled the photograph from the inside pocket of his
parka and placed it on the desk.
He
was quite sure of seeing a flicker of recognition in Karens eyes, followed by
a deliberate blanking of her face. She smiled. I can think of several women
who looked like this at seventeen, she said. Are you asking the Jewish Agency
to help you find her?
No,
of course not. I would like to go to Israel, to learn more about my Jewish
identity, and while Im there Ill make some attempts to find this woman who
might be my sister. But I wonder if you have any programs for people like me.
People
like you? Karen laughed good-naturedly. You mean half-Jewish, that didnt
have any Jewish upbringing?
He
laughed too. Youve got it, he said.
The
Jewish Agency doesnt have any program like that directly, but I know about
other organizations that have them. Give me your address and Ill send you a
list. She put a blank sheet of paper in front of him, and he wrote his name
and address. He added his phone number for good measure.
Very
good, she said, reaching her hand out to him. It was a pleasure to meet you.
Likewise,
he said as he shook her hand. Shalom, he added, standing up to leave.
Shalom
u-lhitraot, Karen Litov said with another laugh. That means to see you
again.
Lhitraot,
he said.
It was a cold, cloudy, windy day. The wind was blowing
from the west. While it had been in Daniels back when he walked from Times
Square to Third Avenue, it would be in his face on the way back and so he
walked to Grand Central, from where he would take the 42nd Street shuttle, one
of the few things about New York that he didnt like.
Just
before entering the station he stopped at a little coffee shop for a coffee and
croissant. The place was surprisingly pleasant and quiet, its small tables
occupied by groups of two or three people who were chatting softly. It almost
didnt feel like New York.
While
sipping his coffee he thought about Karen Litov. On the basis of her demeanor
he felt pretty sure, without quite knowing why, that she was some sort of
spook. Most likely a Mossad agent. The feeling of certainty kept increasing
after he left the coffee shop and walked through Grand Central to the subway,
almost reaching the point of elation when, finally feeling warm, he reached the
platform. Later he would sift through his feelings and impressions to determine
what it was about her that seemed to be giving her away.
And
he would have to find a way to make her give herself away so that he could
somehow penetrate the mystery of that organization
Stand
back from the closing doors
He
would befriend her. Try to get close to her.
Penetrate!
Of course!
It
was just as well that he had refuted Karen Litovs characterization of him as
Audreys boyfriend.
It was about four in the afternoon. He was back in his
warm, almost overheated, apartment, sipping a cup of tea and reading an article
about Mario Cuomo would he or would he not run for President? in one of the
issues of The New Yorker that were in his accumulated mail. But thoughts
of Megan or her alter ego May Green and images from the movie were
intruding on his mind. Between paragraphs of the article he found himself
composing the letter that he would write to Megan, telling her what he had seen
and asking her to tell him more about it.
The
telephone rang. It was Claire.
Hi
Daniel, I just got in from the airport and I found your message. Whats the
problem? She giggled.
What
do you mean?
I
mean like with your computer.
He
laughed. No problem. I just wanted to see you. He had thought of saying to
have with sex you or to fuck you but refrained.
Oh,
sure. You mean like right now?
Not
necessarily
Because
right now would be great. Im like freezing. In LA it was like seventy-five
degrees, and in my dorm theres no heat yet.
Sure,
come on over. Its nice and warm here, and Ill make you some tea.
Thats
great! See you soon!
It
seemed to Daniel that Claires California vacation,
where she had visited relatives
and old friends (she had lived there till she was twelve), had left her with a
distinct Valley Girl accent. He wondered if his own speech, on his returns to
New York from Montreal, would sound like Montreal English.
He
imagined that Claire, once she was enveloped in the warm air of his apartment,
would rush to undress. He would stop her, he decided. He would help her off
with her parka or overcoat, playing the gentleman, and then he would begin to
caress her through her clothing, which he would slowly remove.
But
his fantasy was not realized. When Claire came through his door, a small duffel
bag in her hand, she said, Do you mind if I take a shower? I had to get up
like at five to catch my flight and didnt shower because I thought Id do it
in my room, but theres no hot water. I wouldve gone to my folks place, but
youre closer. She giggled as she moved closer to him and put her bag down on
the floor. He took her in his arms and kissed her just as she removed her
glasses and placed them on the telephone stand. Her cheeks were cold, but her
lips felt warm and moist.
They
held the kiss for a long time. Sure, he said as he released her, go ahead
and shower.
Thanks,
she said. Without removing her overcoat she picked up her bag and took it with
her to the bathroom. While she was showering he made another pot of tea.
She
came out wearing a terry-cloth bathrobe and flip-flops, with her now much
bulkier duffel bag in one hand and her overcoat draped over the other arm. The
robe was open at the neck and showed parts of her breasts. She put her load on
the arm of the sofa and sat down, crossing her legs and revealing her shapely
legs. Daniel wondered if she would put her feet on the coffee table, like Megan
in the movie, but she didnt. Would you like some tea? he asked her.
Youre,
like, asking a Chinese girl? she answered with a giggle. As he poured her tea,
he noticed that she was leafing through the travel section of the preceding
Sundays New York Times that was still on the coffee table. Look at this! she
exclaimed when he set the cup in front of her, and showed him an article titled
Booking With a Computer. Next time you go traveling you can, like, be
your own travel agent. I can show you how to do it.
Not
now, he said as he sat down beside her, teacup in hand. She took a sip of her
tea and kissed him. He did the same in turn. They each drank about half of
their tea, exchanging kisses between sips, and simultaneously set their cups
down and embraced. Clumsily, they got up from the sofa with their arms around
each other and, without letting go, made their way to the bedroom, stumbling
and laughing along the way.
By the time classes were well underway, at the end of
January, Daniel Wilner knew that he was dating two girls at the same time, with
everything that dating might entail. He already knew that Audrey regarded him
as her boyfriend. Claire, for her part, no longer waited for him to call her
for a date but called him whenever she wanted to get together. (Roger had been
right about her aggressiveness.) Up to this time there had been no conflict
between such requests and dates he had already made with Audrey, but there was
no doubt that one would come up sooner or later. What would he do then?
That
shouldnt be too hard, he thought. He could simply say that he is busy.
Did
Audrey and Claire, by any chance, know each other? They were classmates at
Barnard, after all. But they lived in different dorms, and their majors were
far enough apart that, as juniors, they were unlikely to have any classes
together.
But
of course, the real problem would arise if one girl should see him out with the
other. There was no point in deciding in advance how he would deal with that.
What
was most clear in his mind was that he liked both of them, but each one had
some annoying qualities. And, of course, he was not in love with either one.
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