The Compass (2 page)

During the day, Jacob found respite in his garden and in the companionship of his dear neighbors. Not many had seen the Eden that lay hidden behind their homes, but those who had could not dispute the results whatever the motivation, even if it was senility. And, despite whatever madness invaded Frederick’s and Yoshito’s senses, they were his friends. Through some great miracle the three of them had been placed next door to each other on this earth, only to find after years of gaining trust that they shared similar histories; dark histories they did not share with many. They understood each other. And so their relationships evolved over the years from neighbors to friends and then to family, as if they were brothers sharing one history instead of three similar histories. Jacob knew how lucky he was to have them in his life. They were good men—even if they were going mad. “The geriatric musketeers,” Jacob would say whenever the three of them had worked together on some project, like when they first built their raised beds for their vegetable garden behind Frederick’s house.

In their garden, the seasons passed easily, each changing the complexion and colors of the garden. The work never seemed to end. The more they planted and weeded and hoed, the more they found to plant, weed, and hoe. But their labors filled their days, and they were rewarded with the opening of a rose, the bloom of a daffodil, the drape of purple wisteria, the smell of fresh cilantro and lavender, and the sweetness and juiciness of a homegrown tomato. Simply, they had come to love their garden, their Eden, as they called it. They recalled that God had created the Garden of Eden from nothing, much as they had done with the dead earth that once was their backyards. At the end of a fine day, like today, after the watering and cleaning up was done, the singing faded, the plants satiated, and the birds retired, they would sit in their garden and enjoy its coolness and beauty and wonder, until the darkness enfolded them reminding them of their pillows and the feathery dreams that awaited them.

While the others welcomed sleep, Jacob resisted it, knowing his nightmares would come if not tonight then tomorrow. However reconciled to them he had become, he could only hope that they would strike as close to dawn as possible so as not to ruin an entire night of sleep.

Jacob’s garden was as beautiful as the other’s, but he had not yet torn down the fence between his garden and the rest of Eden.
He needed help; he couldn’t do it alone. An old man like himself, or even two old men, could not wrestle that wire fence down; it seemed to have the strength of Hercules. Frederick said he would get help from someone at his church. Jacob had to remember to ask him about it—but then again, he was in no hurry.

Squinting, and then cupping his hand over his eyes, Jacob looked up at the bright sky rather than at his watch and decided from the angle of the sun that it was close to three o’clock in the afternoon. He confirmed his suspicion by measuring the size of the all too familiar and still-bent shadow that sprouted from his feet and stretched across the blistering hot driveway, noting that his image slightly wavered like a mirage in the sweltering heat. The air screamed its stillness and summer oppression, and it was only the end of June. In that still air, he noted the absence of the whistling and chattering birds that normally filled his ears when the day was young and realized they had been silent several hours—further evidence that the day was well situated somewhere around the mid-afternoon hour.

Even after all these years, Jacob still wondered where his feathery friends went when the sun was too high and the afternoons too long. They would not reappear until the sun fell lower in the sky, the brightness became muted, and the air cooled. Then they would keep him company again for a few hours more until sunset bid them home. He sometimes wondered if they retired to a place over the rainbow like the song said. His good-humored friends joked with him about this theory, but since none of them had seen a bird sleep, he knew a place like that must exist.

As the sun scorched his back through his sweat-soaked cotton undershirt, Jacob thought,
It’s
too
hot
for
them;
they’re
off
sleeping.
I
should
take
a
lesson
from
them.
But instead of feeling branded and burned from the sun, the heat seemed more to him like the luxury of a hot bath surrounding him and settling in around his bones and joints, easing the exertions of the day. Each morning, his movements were slow and heavy, his muscles stiff. Then, as the sun gathered strength and intensity, warming the dirt in which he crawled from sunup to sundown, he found his body loosening and ridding itself of the chill that accompanied his dreams as he slept. His old body relished the comfort that heat brought to his movements, the years it took away, and the cold memories it suppressed. It was not the raised mercury that made him feel branded, but the black number tattooed on the inside of his forearm that neither soap nor time could take away and that a summer tan could not hide.
I
should
have
had
that
removed
a
long
time
ago,
he thought again as he had so many times over the decades, but he never did.

Jacob drew his attention back to the patch of planters along the driveway where he had been working all day to critique his own handiwork.
Ah
, he corrected himself,
God’s
handiwork
. He had merely arranged God’s colorful and leafy creations, rejuvenated the soil with some mulch, and seized the evil weeds from their strangling tendencies. He gave a nod of approval to no one but himself.

Next door, Frederick had gone indoors to prepare iced tea for all of them. “The nectar of the gods,” Frederick called it. Jacob would routinely shake his head and say, “It’s only a tea bag and some water, my dramatic friend.”

Yoshito had gone to the nursery hours earlier for more bags of peat moss and manure for the project he was going to start the next day.
Must
have
gotten
caught
up
talking
to
the
hydrangeas
at
the
nursery
, Jacob mused to himself. He took some small delight in teasing his old friends, and they let him enjoy himself at their expense.

Jacob looked at the next planter over and thought that he must amend that soil and pull any weeds tomorrow. From behind him, he heard Frederick’s voice at the fence, and it startled him.

“Here’s your tea, Jacob,” Frederick said, as he reached over the chain link fence that separated his part of Eden from the whole. Jacob took a cool, long draught from the glass. Satisfied, he and Frederick sought shade nearby, each on their own side of the fence.

“You did a fine job on that planter. Just a little water and those new flowers will take off in no time. What is that yellow one, yarrow?” Frederick asked.

Jacob just nodded, still inspecting his work.

Frederick continued. “Oh, I’ve got a teenage boy coming to help take down this fence. His mother is anxious to fill his summer with something other than the crowd he’s started to hang with, so I offered him a little cash for some honest hard work. His mother is grateful.”

“You may be asking for trouble, my friend. Teenager? Bad crowd? I don’t like the sound of it.”

Jacob found himself thinking back to the boys on the bikes; how the taunting and the hostile eyes of those neighborhood boys that gawked at him had reminded him of the young men in Germany so long ago, after it was no longer safe to be Jewish. It didn’t matter that he was ten thousand miles and fifty-five years removed from it. Jew, “Jude,” the way they spit out the word, was the same. Jacob wondered how such young boys then and now could have so much anger and hatred inside them.
Too
young,
too
young
, Jacob thought shaking his head.

Jacob knew that this was not Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. It was not that he was old, or a Jew. He could have been anything—Mexican, Puerto Rican, Asian, Black, white, short, tall, fat, skinny, blond, what did they call it… gay?—it didn’t matter. It was that he was not whatever they thought they were. But this wasn’t much consolation. He’d seen too much, knew what could happen, to shrug it off easily.
But
what
could
he
do?
Jacob wondered, feeling as helpless now as he had then. Now he was going to have some troubled teenager working in his Eden? He didn’t like the idea.

“It’ll be fine, Jacob. His mother is a good woman. The boy’s father left them when he was just three. He just hasn’t had much direction, that’s all. Needs to see what some hard work can get you—a little spending money, the feeling of accomplishment, being part of something. You know.”

Jacob waved him off. “I think we’ll never get this fence down. But what do I know? Let us try Mr. Teenage Big Shot. When does he start?”

“This Saturday, bright and early. I’ll be here to help; Yoshito, too, if we need him.”

“All right, Frederick. I don’t like the idea, but we’ll see if we can give Mr. Know-It-All Teenager something to do, see if he sticks with it.” Jacob handed back his now empty glass to his friend and headed for the hose to wash away the dirt that clung to his hands and spewed out onto the drive from the planter.

Chapter 2
 

Saturday morning came early and Rudy arrived late and begrudgingly. He didn’t want to be there and had told his mother so, but when they’d fought, she’d cried. That was still one thing he couldn’t do, was make his mama cry. He was already thirteen, and the time was coming when he would become a man; and he couldn’t be taking no orders from his mama. What would his friends say if they knew he was doing work for the old Jew man? He’d had to make up a story of how he was spending his time; otherwise he’d have a hard time hanging with the group, being one of them. More than anything else, he wanted to belong to something. He was tired of being a nothing; tired of living in a small box that was too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter, of being in the world of the have-nots—tired of having bars on the windows at home, of feeling like he was a victim. The group he was with now taught him what it was like to have power over things and people. They told him to take what he wanted, because no one was going to hand it to him—he deserved it. That seemed a whole lot smarter than praying for things in church on Sunday. His mama seemed to think that the answers to her prayers would fall into her hands like manna from heaven. His mother let millions of rosary beads slide through her fingers, each with a prayer up to heaven, and for what? To have nothing, to be nothing? There’d been no answers to any prayers as far as he could tell. All those hours his mother had spent on her knees amounted to nothing. Even now, he was going to have to work like a dog in the heat of the day over how many weeks, and for what, a few measly bucks?

Just the other day, he shoplifted a pocketknife. It wasn’t the one he wanted, but it was his first time and good practice. The guys told him that he seemed to have a talent—real slick—and that he was better than that stupid store owner who had trouble speaking English. Well, he had lost this battle with his mama, but he would win the war.
So
help
me
God
, he thought.

Rudy was just getting ready to knock at the Jew man’s door when a tall, slim, black man waved out to him, calling out his name from next door like they were old friends.

“Hey, Rudy! Wait up.” The boy looked at the old black man approaching with dislike knowing he was the one who had gotten him this stupid job. It was all his fault that he was there instead of having fun with his friends.
Well,
he
may
have
picked
cotton
in
the
fields
, Rudy thought,
but
no
one
is
going
to
push
me
down.
No
one
. Rudy said nothing.

Extending his hand, Frederick said, “Hi, Rudy. I’m Frederick. I know your mother. I want to thank you for helping Jacob with his fence. I’m afraid we’re just too old to tackle a big job like this. A big strong boy like you shouldn’t have much trouble though. You’ll have it out in no time.”

Rudy reluctantly shook Frederick’s hand, but he didn’t like it, especially when Frederick slapped him lightly on the shoulder, like they were old friends who had just shared the punch line to a joke that amused them both. He didn’t say anything in return, just stared through narrow, black shark eyes. Frederick appeared to ignore, accept, or be oblivious to Rudy’s coldness. Rudy couldn’t figure out which.

“Let’s see if we can get Jacob out here,” Frederick said as he banged on the front screen door.

Slowly, the heavy wood door on the other side of the security screen opened. The house was dark inside, and Rudy couldn’t make out anything except the dark bulky figures of heavy furniture until the shape of a stocky man blocked his view.
The
Jew
man,
Rudy thought.

“Ah, here is our helper. I am Jacob. And what is your name?” a voice inquired as the heavy metal screen door swung open and Jacob stepped out onto the porch.