You Deserve Nothing - Alexander Maksik [37]
Not that I wasn’t scared by what had happened. The violence had been sickening. The speed of it, the randomness, all of it scared me. But I was grateful to have been there, for that bond with him. I wouldn’t have traded it. Not even for the guy’s life. It was ours, exceptional, incredible, terrifying, and it connected me to him in a way none of his other students could be. I wouldn’t have given that up. Never.
I remember wondering why he hadn’t moved, why he’d done nothing, why he’d stood there staring, frozen in place.
* * *
When I returned home that afternoon my mom stood up from the couch and wrapped her arms around me. She’d been crying.
“The school called. They said you never showed up today. Jesus Christ, honey.”
We sat on the couch. I told her about the train and about him. She listened and cried, holding my hand while I spoke. The leaves had turned but still it was warm enough to keep the windows open.
“It could have been you.”
“Mom, I’m fine. He wasn’t near me.”
“Still. I’m so sorry you had to see that. Oh sweetie,” she said squeezing my hands with hers. “I’ll send a note to Mr. Silver. It was nice of him. You like him, don’t you?”
“He’s the best teacher I’ve ever had.”
She smiled at me and touched my face. “I’m glad. That’s lucky.”
“Does Dad know?”
“No, not yet. He’ll be home later. You can tell him then.”
I shrugged.
She looked at me for a moment longer, “You know, honey, what you saw . . . ”
“Mom, it’s O.K., I’m not ruined, it’s just something that happened.”
She took my hand. “I’m not talking about today. I mean July.”
I looked at her, anger rising.
“Listen, you know me, I’m not a victim, and I’m not one of those women who sits cowering in the corner.”
I withdrew my hand.
“Gilad, you know very well that I’m not.”
“I don’t.”
“You do know that.”
“And yet you’re still here.”
“I should have left?”
I stood and looked down at her.
“You should’ve left,” I said. “You should leave now. We should leave now.”
WILL
I slept fitfully, finally gave up and got out of bed at five. The sky was that dark morning blue. The moon was up, some fading stars.
There were very few people on the streets. I stopped at Carton to buy a pain aux raisins from the humorless woman who pretended not to know me. I walked up rue de l’Ancienne Comédie past the unconscious homeless men on the grate, crossed Boulevard St. Germain, bought a copy of Libération and descended into the station. I stood alone on the platform. Across the tracks a man slept on the floor with his back turned toward me. There was a bottle on its side, wine in a black pool by his knees.
When I heard the train deep in the tunnel I turned and watched it come sweeping fast out of the dark. It arced toward me and blew into the station. As it passed I felt a chill of vertigo as if I were standing atop a very tall building looking down on the streets below. The car was empty. I took out a photocopied packet I’d put together for seminar and tried to read.
When I arrived at school the English department was locked. First in, I left the fluorescent lights off, turned on the lamp at my desk and made a pot of coffee. Outside the sky was turning pink. There was frost on the field. I sat at my desk with the paper and a cup of coffee and ate my breakfast.
The United States was preparing to invade Iraq. There had been protests throughout Europe and an enormous manifestation was planned for the coming weekend.
Toward the end of the paper was a short article about what had happened at Odéon the day before. A homeless man had shoved thirty-two-year-old Christophe Jolivet, a marketing executive from Nantes, in front of a train. Dead by the time emergency workers arrived. I took a pair of scissors from the ceramic cup on my desk and carefully cut out the article.
The fifteen-minute bell rang. I collected my things and walked down the hall to my classroom. Inside,