Tag: “Ah Mikhail

  

                     
              At the library desk, as Radix walked in, Dr. Balleret and Judy Wiener
              looked up and smiled, as if happy at that moment to see him. "There he is,
              the man's everyone's been asking for,"  Dr. Balleret announced. There was a
              brightness in her eyes he'd come to interpret as danger signals. He nodded
              and looked at Judy Wiener, wondering what the excitement was about.

              "Did you hear?" she said. Heard what? "Xavier died over the weekend." The 
              shock and disbelief must have showed on his face. They watched him
              closely and, since it was apparent he hadn't heard, they seemed to be
              measuring the impact the news had on him. He simply repeated the word
              Died? and waited to be be told what happened.

              Dr. Balleret tried to relieve the shock by saying next: "I knew him by his full
              name, Malcolm Xavier Haltaufauderhude. He didn't come here often, but
              when he did I'd say to him, Malcolm Xavier Haltaufauderhude, to what do
              we owe the pleasure of your company? And he'd say…" (she stiffened her
              back and raised her bony arms in an effort to dramatize Xavier's manner)
              "…all puffed up with pride, or maybe he was upset about something, I
              don't owe you no book, Miss Balleret. Just a little game we played
              whenever he showed up, which wasn't too regular. He was such a pleasant
              young man when you got to know him. He gave me no trouble." And Judy
              Wiener said, "We knew him only as Xavier. He was a hard worker."

              By then Radix had sufficiently recovered from the first news impact. His 
              eyes fastened on Judy Wiener's face. 

              He couldn't understand her apparent nonchalance. This after all was
              shattering news. This was Xavier they were talking about. Her Xavier.
              They'd been to the hospital to visit him, Judy Wiener and Radix. Not Dr.
              Balleret. Surely there was more to be said between them, some expression
              of sorrow; not this idle chatter in the library. 

              Dr. Balleret now wondered if there was sufficient time to make a public
              announcement, during the homeroom class break. She found a ballpoint in
              a drawer and began taking down particulars from Judy Wiener; and Radix
              drifted off to find a work desk. He half-expected Judy Wiener to come over
              when she was done, but she didn't.

              Dr. Balleret made the brief announcement about Xavier, but to many it
              sounded like old news. Those who knew him had heard already about his 
              death. Most students and teachers didn't know who he was; his name
              sounded foreign, and in any event he was from Special Education. 

              Later in the teacher's cafeteria he saw Judy Wiener again, eating heartily,
              and deep in conversation with a plump teacher who moved food to her
              mouth with practiced speed and pleasure. He stopped at the table, still
              thinking they needed to say something more to each other about what had
              happened. 

              She looked up, her face cheerful and serene; she gave him a bright "Hi". 
              He shook his head and by way of broaching the subject said, "So, what a
              shame this had to happen." She shook her head, catching his meaning: "Yes,
              isn't it terrible? Isn't it terrible?" 

              She put down her fork and turned in her chair to him, as if to pass on
              information of a confidential nature. Still poised to moved on and sit
              elsewhere, he leaned forward. 

              And in a voice just above a whisper she said, "I only found out about it this
              morning, from the kids in class." Radix opened his eyes, amazed. "That's
              how I heard he'd died. One of the kids told me."  She seemed unhappy
              about that. "But didn't his mother contact you?" he asked. Judy Wiener
              shook her head, as if very disappointed.

             It became clearer to Radix. Xavier's mother had not called Xavier's teacher
             at John Wayne Cotter to let her know her student had died. 

             She dabbed her lips with a paper napkin, and looked hard at Radix as if to  
             say, How could she do something like that?  I should have been the first in 
             the building to hear about this. And Radix shrugged his shoulders,
             suggesting, Yes, that's strange. There must be some explanation. 

             "Anyway, the funeral is set for tomorrow morning, so I was told. Are you
              going?' 

             "I don't know. Tomorrow morning? While we're in classrooms?" 

              "You can arrange for someone to cover your class…it shouldn't be a
              problem…talk to you later."

              Radix moved away. He'd seen the first twitches of sadness on her face. He
              heard a little crack in her voice, like something lurking in her throat,
              working to subvert her. It sounded like the Judy Wiener he knew.

                      (from "Ah Mikhail, O Fidel!", a novel by N.D.Williams, 2001)

 

 

 

   One morning Bilicki and Radix were joined by Mahmood Sharif; his teaching schedule had changed abruptly, assigning him a new ‘lunch period’.
   Mahmood was in his forties. A quiet scholarly-looking man, he had travelled from Iran – via London, the Virgin Islands and California, at each stop a classroom teacher – to John Wayne Cotter H.S. in the Bronx.
    He, too, was skeptical of the cafeteria food, but he ate it anyway. He brought a folded copy of the New York Times, and he divided his attention between conversation at the table and issues on the front page. Sometimes, disturbed by a headline or an article, he’d make disapproving sounds with his tongue.
    “Trouble back home?” Bilicki would ask.
    Mahmood would shake his head.
    “There’s always trouble back home,” he said once. “Whether your home is the Middle East or the Caribbean.” He looked at Radix for confirmation. “The news reported in the Times is always about trouble.”
    “That’s right,” Radix said. “For the Times, the world is full of trouble spots. You can sit here and read all about trouble spots. And you’re free to feel troubled, or not troubled at all.”
    Mahmood seemed easily disturbed by articles reporting the behavior of a world leader or a world agency. He’d tsk tsk and say, “I can’t believe what the State Department is doing now.” Or, “Listen to what Bush is saying.” Or, “This Margaret Thatcher is an evil woman.”
    He had a keen sense of the world as a violent playground. The players, the elected leaders, made moves or statements that set things in violent motion. His abiding concern was for ordinary working people all over the globe, “the rock breakers of the world”, who only wished to get on with their humble lives; who invariably got caught up in the machinations of world leaders.
    Once Radix heard him sigh, “O Fidel, Fidel!” He looked up and wondered aloud what had happened, had the Cuban leader died? No, he hadn’t, Mahmood assured him, smiling.
    He drove a Volkswagen to the school. He’d bought the car when he lived in California, and he’d driven it all the way to New York when he moved. His wife, he said, was urging him to trade it in, purchase a fancy new vehicle, a Japanese import. His wife, he sighed, did not understand how someone could remain as faithful to a car as a man to a horse.
    These revelations about the car and his wife, spoken with humor and an open-eyed plea for understanding, impressed Radix. The man’s gentle manner, his seeming lack of affectation, as well as the fire of concern inside him for the working people, “the rock breakers of the world”, struck him as genuine.
    Mahmood, it turned out, had a doctorate degree. So, shouldn’t he be lecturing somewhere, inspiring college freshmen with his passion? What was he doing in New York, a high school teacher? worlds away from his true audience? wearing his jacket with the elbow patch, and perusing the Times?
    For thirty minutes each day, over lunch, their table was the place for intense exchange. Tightly knit, almost conspiratorial in manner, they seemed so unlike other teachers on lunch break, most of whom were just relieved to be out of a classroom for a spell, enjoying a cigarette, or some foil-wrapped bone of gossip.
    People stopped by, ostensibly to speak to Bilicki, but curious about his friends, about what could possibly bind them together each day. They rested a hand on Bilicki’s shoulder. When they sensed conversation had paused or frozen as a result of their apparent intrusion, they drifted away.
    Quickenbush would join them on occasion. He hovered and smiled, half-listening to the talk; sometimes he sat and acted as if he wasn’t really there. 
    One day he wondered aloud about the accuracy of reports published in the Times.
    What did he mean?  Mahmood asked.
    Well, take for instance, a recent article about Japan where he, Quickenbush, had lived for several years. What the writer was saying about the Japanese seemed to him “way off base”. The Times, he felt certain, preferred to publish sugar-coated, anecdotal stuff, easy to digest with your morning coffee. If anyone really wanted to learn about the forces shaping events in Japan and around the world, the best place to turn to was The Wall Street Journal.  
    And with that Quickenbush got up abruptly and left the table.
     (from "Ah Mikhail, O Fidel!", a novel by N.D.Williams, 2001)