Across
By Howard Smead
Chapter 1
Shunpiking
Do not take
the back roads. If you do, be ready for a bumpy ride.
In Davy
Crockett's case, the ride was so bumpy he got bounced right off the road. And
this particular road was taking him towards his life’s goal — a seat in
Congress. Something he'd dreamed of and worked toward since college.
Perhaps
Davy's detour —and it was major detour — was his own fault. Perhaps
not. Your conclusion depends upon your political persuasion. That's the
way politics works, isn't it? Your side is right; their side is wrong. And the
devil takes the hind most. Davy most definitely was the hind most.
His
campaign wasn’t exactly a headline-grabber. It one of those obscure House races
no one knows or cares about, including most people living in the district. In
addition, the local Democratic Party was a shambles. Not news to anyone east of
the Mariana Trench, except for poor Davy. That discovery came as a shock to
him. Still, against all odds, he was running ahead, if you could believe the
polls, right up to the end when the race became national news — and the bubble
burst. He was all set to become the second Davy Crockett to serve in the
He truly did give it his best, glad‑handing more bleary-eyed workers in
front of more chain link fences and issuing more hardy guffaws than he thought
ever possible. He attended more functions at more out of the way places and
smooched more women, and a few men, than was wise for his health. In doing so,
he also came to know the location of rest rooms in every shopping mall,
department store and Saturday morning discount house in every precinct in my
district.
Hard work but something he'd wanted to do for years. Davy discovered had a
natural affinity for people. As they did for him. Not
once did he meet a stranger, even among the grease-guts slopping coffee and
hash browns along the two-lane blacktops that lace his district together like
an old woolen glove. People liked him and were willing to hear him.
Anyone would have found that gratifying. He certainly did.
The
primary run proved a breeze, and more important inexpensive. Beyond the filing
fee he didn't have to put forth much money or effort. His victory in that race,
the first time he'd run for anything since he was elected Assistant Tool
Foreman in Mr. Poffenberger's seventh grade shop
class, indicated that he actually had a shot. His primary opponent was a for‑gosh‑sakes
rummy who listed a bar in
He passed out while waiting to file for the campaign at the Elections
Commission and barely made the deadline. Davy had to step over his urine soaked
body to affix him name to the proper papers. He ran the race with confidence,
trying out things he intended to use in the general election. A weak primary
challenge proved a safe and painless way to bloody his sword. Before he managed to fall on it.
Like
most every freshman politico, he really wanted to make a difference. To do
that, of course, one has first to get elected. To figure a way to beat the
system, that is, so stacked against challengers they seldom won.
Wherever
he went the crickets chirped Crockett for
Congress, Crockett for Congress.
He’d
stuffed a good bit in the cookie jar. Unfortunately, enthusiasm gave birth to
seriously flawed estimates. He counted
on spending just under 60K, including maxed-out Visa, Discovery and Mastercards. (American Express called for its card halfway
through the campaign after they got a load of the bills he was running up.)
Still, in all, not an unreasonable amount. But his opponent had lots of money
and called up limitless reserves.
So,
Davy’s wallet got thin early, and he found himself relying on the generosity of
people in cafes and diners for meals and hit his parents’ up for gas money. He campaigned
out of the trunk of his car and slept in his old bedroom surrounded by my dusty
SF novels and boxes of baseball cards, now worth considerably more than his future.
Don't laugh. A Congressman on the
Davy
was a Democrat. In
During
the 2000 campaign he’d stopped by the Democratic headquarters in his hometown
to pick up a Gore poster for his parents’ front lawn. They didn’t have any and
couldn’t say when they would. It was that bad for the Dimmicrats
in the Western reaches of the state. Had it not been for Baltimore and the
suburban counties around DC,
The
only reason Spiro T. Agnew got elected governor way back in 1966 was the
Democrats managed to nominate a racist whose campaign slogan was “Your Home is
Your Castle. Protect it.” Agnew could run as the liberal and collect all those
swing votes. The state has the sixth largest black population in the country,
and this was in the middle of the Civil Rights era.
Black
voters put him in office, whereupon he turned on them with every bit as much venom
as his Democratic opponent had. But then could you expect virtue from a small
time Republican politician from an all-white suburb who’d been taking small
time cash in unmarked envelopes? Please.
Davy
was trying to unseat GOP Radical Conservative named Venerable Barnhart, one of
the GOP’s “citizen politicians.” He’d come in with the freshman class of ’94
and was one of the handful of congressmen who’d voted against condemning Newt
Gingrich for his unethical conduct as Speaker of the House. Temporary Speaker
of the House, as it turned out. (Newt’s excuse: But what my predecessor did was
illegal. I didn’t break the law.” How Clintonesque!)
When
Davy read of Barnhart’s nay vote, he wrote him a plaintive letter. His
response: “Our mission is too important to let such petty matters stand in the
way of saving the nation.”
Venerable
Barnhart had to go to save the nation. He had ties to the militia movements,
the League of the South, and the Council of Conservative Citizens. Not to
mention the defunct Moral Majority and the floundering Christian Coalition. He
was the right-winger’s right-winger. Everything was YES or NO
with him. Mostly NO. On the other hand, he rarely
showed up for votes or committee hearings. And no one in his party seemed to
care. The people in his district knew him by name only. He was never around.
But
voters were frightened. Dark times were abroad in the land — all Bill and
Hillary’s fault, right down to Enron, September 11 and
No
one knew what exactly Barnhart did with his time. When Davy confronted him with
this at the one candidate forum Barnhart consented to attend, he looked at his
watch, the moderator and the door and changed the subject. He’d agreed to come
to that particular event only if it was limited to half an hour. Half an hour!
There were four candidates and an auditorium full of people, for Heaven’s sake.
One of his aides actually jostled Davy out in the parking lot.
As
the weeks wore on and Davy developed a solid lead in the polls, the attack ads
started. You have to hand it to Barnhart’s staff. They were solid gold: polished
and brutally unfair. They tagged Davy a Big Government “liberalist” (presumably
because it sounds more like “communist”). Davy responded with a smart quote
from
Then
they tried “cultural Marxist” and trotted out the “acid, abortion, amnesty”
slogan used against McGovern in the 1972.
Davy returned the compliment, branding Venerable Barnhart a “Lennist-Reaganite” and wondered aloud at various church
services if anyone could recall ever meeting Venerable’s
wife, or, á la Reagan, seeing him in church. Davy threw
in another little gem from Old Abe: “What is conservatism? Is it not adherence
to the old and tried, against the new and untried?”
His
lead held.
By
then the national party stepped in. Control of the House and therefore the
nation was at stake. When they took off the gloves, his foolish ass was grass.
He
thought he was on my way to Capital Hill and told his friends as much. His
buddy Jitz Harlow, a columnist for DC’s fattest newspaper, warned him to keep his
guard up and his pants on. Politics was quirky. Davy didn’t listen and paid the
price. He was high flyin’.
Chapter 2
Bare-Naked, Out the Window
He
was returning from the Hancock Apple Blossom Festival where he’d hoped to
corral Mr. Barnhart and put some questions to him. He was there all right
—until he spotted Davy. Barnhart’s aides shuttled him off to his waiting limo,
claiming pressing matters of state.
As
he was sliding into his dark
Davy
used the opportunity to point out that his opponent was camera shy. He drew a
crowd and the incident made the local news. Times like those that made it hard
for him not to get cocky.
Waving
all the way, Davy got into my sensible, Tennessee-built Saturn and headed back
to Billingsgate to spend the night at his boyhood home.
He
ate dinner with my parents and tried to calm their fears. His father was
devoted to concern for his son. The day Davy called home collect with the news
he'd gotten his Ph.D., the very first thing he'd said — without even pausing
for congratulations — had been, “I think you should go back and get a
bachelor's degree in business administration.”
His
father was a traditional, hard-working businessman, and like his hero, Ronald
Reagan, he had the ingrained notion that academics cheat the time clock and
therefore the taxpayers. Davy tried to convince him to consider Congress a
career move. But he thought all politicians except St. Reagan were bounders and
poltroons. And he wasn't so sure about Reagan anymore either. Convincing him
the House of Representatives was a good career move had been Davy’s first
attempt at campaigning.
After
helping with the dishes, it was out to a meet-and-greet at the Little League in
Boonsboro, a few miles down
A
few hours watching Kwanis lose to Rotary and Davy
left for home, planning to stop off at one or two small places along the way to
say Howdy. He stopped for gas at French’s Gas n’ Eat and went inside to pay. As
he came out munching on a corn dog, which was their specialty they insisted he
try, he spotted an unlikely blond leaning against his car, casting her
appraisal his way.
“I
wouldn’t suggest doing that,” he said, referring to her reclined position. Her
expression — one raised eyebrow — asked, Oh, and why not? “It hasn’t been
washed lately. Wouldn’t want you to get you skirt dirty.”
Her response was to
remove the gas cap and begin pumping gas. Davy stood by trying to keep his eyes
on the gauge. She gave his a glow of recognition, a look of such familiarity he
glanced over his shoulder to make sure it was really him getting the glow job.
He
concluded she knew him from the campaign, smiled and tried not to look self-conscious.
“Stop at ten dollars,” he said. “Please.”
“Dollars or gallons?”
But
she’d already gone over. She topped it off, and, holding up an admonishing
hand, went in to make up the difference. She returned, fixing her gamine eyes
on him, a sleek mane of nearly baby-white hair framing them, lank-limbed,
shapely, well endowed, and a tad less forbidding in her beauty than the young
Grace Kelly. But only a tad.
“How
'bout a ride, handsome?” nodding in the wrong direction.
“I'm
afraid I’m not going that way.”
“I
have to meet someone.”
“I’d
like to, but I'm headed the opposite direction.” Davy indicated the road
towards Billingsgate. “I’m sorry.”
“Can
I come along?”
Davy
looked so startled she added quickly, “Relax, we got our signals crossed,
that's all.”
“We?”
She
tossed the hair from her eyes. “Well, how about it?”
He
shrugged. “Sure.”
She climbed in mumbling, “I'd thought
I'd missed you.”
“Beg
pardon?” When she gave him an attractive rendition of Come Hither, he blurted,
“Where'd you say you were heading?”
“Straight,” she responded. “Or the first
decent motel you come to.”
“How’s
that again?” He wasn’t certain what she’d said because of the blood roaring in
his ears. Nobody gets this lucky, he was thinking. He was right, but it didn’t
dawn on him until it was way too late. At that point, all he could hear was the
hopeful thunder of his throbbing heart.
She
repeated the magic words. “Motel. Okay, it doesn't
have to be a decent one. The closest one would be best. How
about the Dew Drop Inn over the next hill?”
Caution
flags were waving all over the place. This was too good to be true, and for
once in his life, Davy had other things of greater import. Still, this was also
once in a lifetime. “Where are you from?” he asked, as nonchalant as a six year
old channeling the Croc Hunter.
“Delta Charlie.”
“Delta Charlie?
Is that in this solar system?”
“It’s
in D.C.”
Davy
giggled. “I've never heard it called that before.”
“My
sister made it up.” She explained.
“You
mean there are two of you?”
She
thought for a moment before she said, “We’re not twins, if that’s what you
mean. “
They
rounded the hill and sure enough off to the left, half a football field from
the road was a Been-there, Done-that, No-Tell Motel called, Rose’s Dew Drop
Inn. In rural
He
located the office facing away from the road behind a redoubt of spent kitchen
appliances, pulled up and started to get out.
“Don't
bother getting a room,” his hitchhiker said. “It's been taken care of. We're in
number 9.”
Of
course, no one else would have gotten suspicious at this point either. Not a
bit.
You
could describe Davy Crockett as a testosterone-blinded fool who reconstructed
red herrings like this only in retrospect. But the fact as he’d been alone in
life for a good while and, despite the real friendliness of the crowds, was
thirty-four years old and quite lonely.
The
sad and daunting fact of the matter was as follows: the utter bogosity of this situation was merely a gnat in his beet-red
ears.
No
excuses, please. But the poor guy never knew what hit him. They strolled in. He
fled to the broken down chair, thinking, Now what? She kicked off her shoes. Her
toes were painted gun-metal. She had elegant arches. This latter, he almost
blurted out, God help him.
She
sat down on the edge of the bed and said, “So, how’s the campaign going,
Congressman?”
“I’m
not a congressman yet.”
“You’re
well on the way, wouldn’t you say?”
“I
would.”
“I
would, too.”
“Let
me ask you a question. Do you think I’m forward?”
“Me?
No. Why would you ask?”
She
laughed and disrobed, daintily turning away while she slipped off her under
garments.
This
he found re-assuring. Catching his thought, she said. “I don’t usually do
things like this, you know. Consider yourself lucky.”
“Oh,
believe me, I do.” He was gapping.
“Are
you gonna leave me all alone with my
Chapter
3
Davy
Gets His Fifteen
Standing on the balcony at the Justice Department gazing down on
Pennsylvania Avenue flooded with anti-war demonstrators, Richard Nixon’s
Attorney General John N. Mitchell pointed to a particularly unruly group,
heavily infiltrated by his own agents provocateur, and remarked, “There goes
the hard core.” Mitchell added, “This country is going to go so far right you
won’t recognize it.” He was right.
— Jitz Harlow
A
short time later her cell phone sounded. She drove straight for her purse, which
took her directly over him, elegant arches and all. “Where are you?” She
snapped and hung up.
“Who
was that?”
“Wrong number.” But Davy knew it wasn't.
The
door flew open and someone jumped into the room. The blond sat up as though to
say, Well?
The
three of them squinted through the gloom at one another for a long second until
this person, a woman, tangled brunette beneath the ball cap and bomber jacket thrust
a video camera up to her nose and a little red light winked ‘Gotcha.’
Any
reverie Davy may have been entertaining ended forthwith as stage direction was
hurtled in his direction, semi-coherent orders to we sit up, look startled — as
if he had to be told — blink at the camera lens, etc., etc.
The
brunette reached down and yanked the sheets away from the hitchiker
bedmate, exposing her breasts, in addition to, well, her favorite state, tattoo and pierced navel included.
Davy
leapt out of bed. Snatching up his clothes one item at a
time, trying to hold them against him. “What the hell is this?” he spit at the blond.
The hurt in his voice distinct and discernable in the confusion only increased
his humiliation.
She
pretended she didn’t hear. He got down on his hands and knees and fumbled under
the bed for his wallet. He retrieved it, gathered his belongings and jumped
through the open window, unleashing a string of epithets that would soon be
aired on Imus in the Morning. Stills from this scene,
with modesty boxes across his dangling evidence and his unadorned butt as he
was feeling for his wallet showed up in just about every supermarket tabloid
and high gloss magazine out there.
Davy
got his fifteen minutes, whether he wanted them or not. Videos were soon
available for download at the cost of an e-mail address courtesy of any number
of websites offering the best in amateur porn and underage girls gone wild. Lovely, just lovely.
“I’m single,” he shouted. Not that it would
matter. At that point in the ever-changing perception of good versus bad, his
sin wasn’t having a fling with
Five
miles later, he thought maybe he’d better go back and confront these two. He returned
to the Dew Drop Inn. The blond, the brunette and her camera were gone.
He
was tempted to put it aside and continue with the campaign. That little delusion
lasted all of six hours. That’s how long it took him to learn a valuable lesson.
In
politics, as in governance, things happen slowly — until the roof caves in.
Then they happen so rapidly there’s nothing you can do about them. To survive
you have to stay one step ahead. Playing catch-up means you’ve already lost.
Once
the scandal broke neither Davy’s popularity with the voters nor
Barnhart’s nearly nonexistent record helped. And Tom Brokaw mispronounced his
name the one time he mentioned it. Victory was Venerable Barnhart’s to savor.
Davy was left trying to link him to the two women. He failed there as well.
On
election night he sat at home with his parents, the three of them watching the
returns in the undisguised gloom of a darkened house, as though Ma and Pa
Crockett were hoping no one knew they were home. “Well, son, there's always the
School Board,” said dear old dad with enormous sympathy.
The
one fortunate aspect of his cheapo-cheapo campaign was that he didn't have to
show up at a hotel ballroom to make a hail and hearty concession speech to
misty-eyed followers. Davy ended his noble dream with a telegram to Venerable
Barnhart, saying, “Congratulations on a fortunate campaign and victory. You
have inspired me to try again in two years. Until then, I wish you much success
working on behalf of the good citizens of the Sixth District.”
Not
the most gracious of concessions. He already knew there wouldn’t be a next
time. Short of a Born Again conversion, those images from
the motel would be impossible to slough off. He wasn’t about to pretend to
embrace the 1baby Jesus for political gain. He had
one or two values left, believe it or not. Oh
well, sigh one sigh and get on with it. The trick was not surrendering his
beliefs to a fit of post-election cynicism. He wished his folks pleasant dreams
and repaired to his bedroom, where he spent a fitful hour trying not to think
about his monumental stupidity by going through a box of childhood memorabilia
that his mom left out for him. A laminated newspaper photo of
kids donating “a grand total of $8.17” to the Red Cross for flood relief, the
proceeds from a neighborhood variety show. The photo of Davy and his
friends their upturned faces devoid of all pretense and guile proudly
presenting their tiny wad of cash brought him the closest he ever came to
tears.
Clutching
that picture, he fell into burdenless sleep — until
several hours later his mother crept in cloaking her robe and gently disturbed
the covers around his shoulders. “You have a phone call,” she whispered.
“At this hour? It must be the media,” He felt for my watch,
mumbling, “Why on earth would they want me now?”
“It's
after
Mom
was right, of course. She must have had strong intuition about that. “Give me a
break, Ma,” he'd said to her. “I'm only thirty-four-years-old.”
“You're
closer to forty than I am.” Her problem was she wanted grandchildren and no
daughter-in-law. “I wish you wouldn't have your women calling you here. Your
father needs his rest.”
“Did
she give a name?”
“Don't
stay on long. It's late.” She handed him the phone and went back to bed.
Chapter
4
Register
Columnists, not Firearms
… “Upon what meat
doth this our Caesar feed?” From
‘The fault, dear
Brutus, lies not in our stars, but in ourselves’ Mitchell went to jail and then
on to Hell. But he was right. The hard core right took over the country. Et, tu, Brute?
—Jitz Harlow
Thinking
better of disturbing his father more than he already had, Davy made his way
down the steps and onto the back porch despite the chilly air.
“Hello,”
he shivered.
“Is
this Crockett for Congress headquarters?” a woman’s voice tittered. Sounded vague familiar. But before he could match the
throaty, ironic, smart-mouth with a face, it handed off the phone —whiskey gave
way to cigarettes. Too many cigarettes. “You asshole.”
This
voice Davy knew. “Calling to rub it in, huh?”
“Feeling
sorry for ourselves, are we?”
“Only for getting out of a comfortable bed to take your call.”
“Don’t
say I didn’t warn you.”
“You
warned me.”
“That’s
what I get paid for.”
“Warning
people? I doubt it.”
“Dispensing unwanted advice.”
“You
seem to be taking particular joy in it.”
“What
are you going to do next?”
“I
haven’t thought about it.”
“You sorry
piece of shit. You didn’t think about a lot of things, did you?”
“Who’s
the one with the barroom voice lying beside you?”
“Sitting,
I’m at work still. A friend.”
“You
mean another groupie you’ve brought into the newsroom on election night hoping
you’ll get lucky?”
“You’ll
meet her soon enough. Look, I didn’t call to rub it in. I called because I
wanted to make sure you know, personally and not through e-mail, that if you
need anything, if there’s anything I can do for you, give me a call.”
Davy
felt a lump forming. “Thanks, Jitz. I really appreciate it.”
“Your
friends will help you, Davy. By the way, check out my column tomorrow.”
“You’re
not gonna do a number on me, are you? You’re the
whoremonger, not me.”
“That
may be, but I’m not the one who got caught with my pants down.”
That
throaty laugh played in the background again. Jitz hung up and Davy went back
to bed. Enough of late night phone calls.
His
friend Jitz Harlow was widely read and celebrated in journalistic circles and
among suburban professionals who didn’t know him the way Davy knew him.
Classic: small town lad makes good, his star rising straight out of college and
shot ever upward. There seemed no limits to the dimensions of his fame and
influence. He went from news aide to the Metro Desk in a year. A front page
series on gang warfare in the suburbs won him a Neiman Fellowship and a book
contract. The book flirted with the bestseller list and became a TV series. He
returned to work on the national desk and had himself a column at the end of
his second year.
After
his on-air fistfight with Sean Hannity, he became the
darling of the chattering classes — and perhaps, so the gossip went, CBS’s long
sought replacement for Eric Sevaride. He featured
himself as the next Walter Lippman. What a coup for a
fatherless boy whose mother spent much of his teenage years “dating”.
Jitz,
Davy and several other townies left Billingsgate for the state university and
from there embarked on various careers in the DC area, all of them seeking
fame, fortune and the love of women. They’d stayed friends over the years via
monthly Friday night dinners. Jitz, a Secret Service agent, and others
scattered in and out of mid-level government and private industry jobs. Davy
had stayed in college until there were no more degrees to be had and defaulted
into teaching. Now he was headed back to academia, licking his wounds.
The
following January he returned to his previous future, a future he’d hoped to
leave behind, a future where he’d spent the previous half dozen years teaching
American history.
Because
Davy’s student evaluations ranked him at the top of his department, he was able
to get the same two courses he’d taught prior taking leave for the election.
These student ratings had maybe beguiled him into running for Congress in the
first place. His chair brought him in to sign his contract, shook his hand and
exclaimed, “God, I hate adjuncts.”
“Me,
too,” Davy replied.
His
school hired to teach most of their courses, at one eighth the pay and no benefits.
That meant limited office space, no parking, telephone calls
or free photocopying. Forget about travel and research grants. If they
were able somehow to take a semester off to do research — or run for office —
they risked loosing their job to another desperate adjunct.
This
is one half of academia’s dirty secret: Adjuncts such
as Davy Crockett are the people parents go into hock to pay to teach their
kids. Adjuncts earned less than the graduate students that assisted them.
That’s the other half.
Davy
shared a converted storage closet with two other adjuncts. He had the
afternoons. They split mornings. Several professors balked at removing their
filing cabinets and spare journals so there was no place to put his course
materials other than in cardboard boxes on the desk. His three graduate
teaching assistants assigned to his 240 student survey course sat on the floor
when they met with him. Working for Davy had a funky sort of caché.
Davy
also resumed living in the same apartment he’d been in since grad school, a
mildewed, one-bedroom basement apartment in
That
made it all the more surprising when he returned home from class late one
afternoon to find a box of cookies wedged between the doors. They were of the
homemade chocolate chip variety with M & M’s pressed into their scorched
upper surface. Judging from the black scoring beneath, these babies were the
work of an undergraduate. No note was attached, but the box was a used large
Pizza-U-Go complete with a disc-shaped grease stain. The cookies rattled around
like marbles.
Davy
ate them for dinner. Hard as marble, too.
Chapter 5
Twice
Bitten
Neo-conservatives, paleo-conservatives,
cultural conservatives, Christian conservatives, compassionate conservatives —
what’s going on here? Paleos are isolationist.
Neo-cons are Imperialists. Cultural cons are disgruntled frumps. Christian cons
are zealots. Compassionate cons are liars. They are all ‘Leninist
Conservatives’, which makes them ruthless relativists.
Theirs is a
radical vision at odds with both the Declaration of
—Jitz
Harlow
Monday
of the second week of the semester a student showed up during office hours to
get help with the course work, claiming she had fallen behind. Her first words
once seated were, “Dr. Crockett?”
The
simple fact she wasn’t sure she was who he was should have sounded all the
tocsins.
“Do
I know you?” He made a throwaway gesture with his hand, adding when shook her
head too quickly, “I guess it’s from class.”
“Did
you get the cookies?”
“Those
were yours?
She
nodded.
“Thank
you. Very thoughtful. I was surprised you were able to
find my place. It’s sort of hidden.”
She
said nothing. Continued watching him, as though waiting for
something to happen. In the cramped space, their knees were all but
touching. Davy got up and slid past her to make sure the door to his closet
space was open. He didn’t want to risk any accusations.
By
this point he was gun shy. Besides, she was so bewitching he didn’t trust
himself.
Bewitching and then some. Beneath the inspiring nest of
raven-hair that reminded him of crumpled bed sheets, was the pouty face of God’s teenage daughter and a leggy body
straight off the catwalk. He cleared away what clutter he could and rested his
elbow on the clean spot. “What’s your name?” he asked.
“Miss
“No,
no,” Davy laughed. “I mean your name, not your title. Although I’m surprised
it’s not Miss
“Miss
“Which
class are you in?” he asked her.
“History.” It sounded like a question.
“I
teach two.”
“Oh….”
She wasn’t carrying a book bag or notebook, or even the school newspaper. Nothing more than her car keys, to which she clung with white
knuckles.
“Are
you parked at a meter?” Davy asked.
To
her uncertain nod he mimicked the turning of a meter key. She nodded somewhat
more vigorously.
“How
much time to you have on it?” he asked, “Those fines are excruciating.”
She
shrugged. “Enough.” This comely student was winging it, exhibiting the sort of
emotions students don’t develop until they flunk an exam or two — or want a
letter of recommendation based upon shoddy work. This wasn’t about any of that.
It was far too early in the semester. And even then, most women students, even
those as beautiful as this one, blush. Male students play St.Vitus
and look out the window. This one maintained a steady gaze.
“Do
you have the syllabus?”
“Actually
...” Ms. God was probably in her mid-20s, which made her all the more
appealing.
He
handed her one from each class. She glanced at the packet of papers in her
hand, holding them as she had received them. “Which course are you in?”
“This one.” She said without hesitation — and without
indicating which syllabus. She’d chosen the survey course, 240 students knee to
back in a large lecture hall, sufficient to explain why he wouldn’t recognize
her even if she had been to class. Which she hadn’t.
There seemed to be some question about her attendance in this or any class on
campus or off.
Leaning
forward in his battered folding chair, which squeaked like the bleating of a
rusty alarm bell, he pointed to the readings for the first two weeks. As he did
she raised a finger ever so slightly so that it brushed mine.
Davy
sat back in his chair, watching her apprehensively That
little move had been too well calculated. When he spoke, his voice was weak and
unconvincing. “You should also talk to your TA about what’s expected of you in
discussion. It’s thirty percent of your grade … but you haven’t been to discussion
class, have you?”
A
shake of the head, a toss of the curls. Christ, why bother with college, why not
go straight to Maxim or the Hot Issue of Rolling
Stone?
“You don’t know who
your TA is, do you?”
Toss of the mane.
“Why
are you here?” But he thought he already knew. His head swirled with inchoate
stages of paranoia. What have I done to deserve this, he wondered?
He
stood up and motioned to the door. “Lecture is this afternoon. Do you know
where the classroom is? Or the building?”
She
didn’t bother with an answer. Instead, she ran a nervous hand through her hair.
It had the effect of sweeping tangles from her face on one side.
“It’s
right downstairs.” By now, he had abandoned all pretense
and was staring. He was sure he knew her from another place. Somewhere
other than a crowded lecture hall. With half her face exposed, her
appearance changed enough that it became still more familiar to him.
Brushing past him on
her way out, slowing only, it seemed to him, to release the death grip on her
car keys. Her knuckles were bled-white.
Then
it struck it with such fury he lurched against the door. “You’re the one with
the camera!” he shouted.
“Come
back here, goddamnit. You’re not getting off this
easy. You owe me an explanation!”
Other
professors sitting in their offices, male and female alike, looked up at her
from their laptops — and yes, startled at Davy’s craven outburst, as they would
report when asked. They would also report on the tears sluicing along the young
student’s face and across her neck.
She
filed sexual harassment charges the very next day on grounds of verbal abuse
and creating a hostile educational environment. Charges corroborated by his
colleagues. To seal the indictment, Miss Virginia Dick was, or had been until
that day, a student in his survey course. Whether she’d ever attended was moot.
The
day after his hearing was announced his Chair removed him from his classes for
the protection of the students. He might just as well kept the door closed and
groped her. Too late, though he would always remember the
mane.
No
one. No one at all paid much attention to his complaints that he was
being set up. Davy’s accusations she’d been involved somehow in a nefarious
plot to discredit him and ruin his congressional campaign and teaching career,
were scoffed at and dismissed. He’d used
foul language against a female student. She was traumatized. He was fucked,
again. Like totally.