The Ministry of Special Cases (13 page)

“It feels so different,” she said, getting up. “Come, Kaddish, let’s go see.” She took his hand and pulled him down the hall. Pato, shaking his head, went along. Kaddish started into the bedroom. “The bathroom mirror has the best light,” she said, continuing on.

Lillian flicked the switch as if she were at a surprise party and the guest of honor had arrived.

She saw her husband’s face in the mirror alongside her own. She couldn’t understand. She didn’t—
give it a minute
—understand.

“I’m sorry,” Kaddish said.

“Roman ruin,” Pato said.

“Oh my God,” Lillian said, and was struck dumb. When she could speak it was to spit out the name of the young doctor like a curse. “Bracchi,” she said. Lillian turned her head this way and that. “Kaddish?” she said, despairing.

Lillian started her survey again. She began from the front where her nose, so thin, was nearly invisible. The prominent bump on the bridge seemed to have been lowered to the tip, where it floated, mottled and clownlike. It looked as if a gumdrop had been affixed to the end of her face. From the side, she was surprised to discover, the profile was even worse. That sharp bone came out from between her eyes and then
dropped straight down, a crag that jutted out where the gumdrop began. What she settled on was the image of a carcass—it most reminded Lillian of a chicken’s breastbone when the bird is picked clean.

And then it hit her. Lillian reached up. She touched it. She looked at her handsome husband. She looked at herself.

“Worse off,” she said. “Always worse off.”

KADDISH WAS AT THE BOOKSHELVES
trying to set things right. Lillian wouldn’t speak to him, which he didn’t think fair. She was the one who wanted him to go first.

If anything, things had been better with Pato since he’d come back from Rafa’s. Now that Kaddish was getting normal airflow through his nose, now that he could eat with his mouth closed and nod off on the couch in silence, it seemed a great relief for Pato not to have to hear the sound of his father breathing. Kaddish, who didn’t consider himself very sensitive, had always pretended not to notice the pained look on his son’s face with each exhalation, with every reminder that Kaddish was alive.

He pulled a Marcuse off the shelf. He was embarrassed and quickly turned as if Pato was right there behind him. Only Pato could make him feel inadequate in this way. When Pato shook his head at the holes in his father’s knowledge, Kaddish felt sorry for himself and felt stupid before his son. He didn’t have the slightest doubt about what he was doing now. It was only his ignorance that unnerved him. This wasn’t the cemetery. Running his fingers along a name pressed into the spine of a book, Kaddish had no idea about the man behind it.

For Kaddish, the shelves were a sign of what he’d done right with his son. And this is where Pato misunderstood him. The books made
Kaddish proud. He loved that Pato was educated. It was Pato’s educated attitude that made Kaddish want to wring his neck. He could dump them all if he wanted, every last book. Simpler. But he wasn’t an animal, he wasn’t being cruel. As always, as forever, Kaddish was trying his best.

That’s why Pato should have been there doing it. Not solely because he could pull the right titles with ease, but because, if he really loved those books so much, they should be disposed of with proper respect. Kaddish remembered when there was a fire at Talmud Harry’s house and his library damaged. Talmud Harry left the unsalvageable books boxed up at the rabbi’s door. As proud a man as he was, he wanted his
shemos
buried with everyone else’s.

Kaddish took down anything that mentioned Che Guevara in the title and then he added a Lenin and a Lermontov to the stack. The Lermontov was a thin little novel but there was a portrait of the writer on the cover and Kaddish thought he had the face of a rabble-rouser. The only book he opened for pleasure was a survey of Argentine poetry. He read “Martín Fierro.” He could still pretty much recite the first page by heart.

Kaddish pulled out a psychology textbook. Hidden underneath it was a mimeographed pamphlet with sentences crossed out and additions made by hand. Kaddish flipped through it. There were jokes and political cartoons, a couple of reviews, and some left-wing nonsense. The last page was a nest of famous quotes that sounded more or less the same. This just the sort of thing they’d kill you over, some student’s after-school project.

Kaddish went down the hall and checked Pato’s nightstand and the books strewn on his bedroom floor. Then he went back to the living room to give the shelves a once-over, to see if his selections held up.

A Hebrew Bible Kaddish left. He took down a Spanish copy of
The Art of Loving
and
Reflections on the Jewish Question
and a
Mein Kampf he’d
never seen. He’d wondered how his son had come to read it. If Kaddish had asked him, Pato could have led him the whole way: how
Ward Six
had gotten him to
The Cherry Orchard
and that to
Onegin
and on to
A Hero of Our Time
, which led him by fluke to Voltaire. Each book begat another. For a boy whose entire family history dead-ended on his
father’s side, this is how Pato traced his line. It was Pato’s proof of how he came to be. If there was any conspiracy to follow, this one left a trail.

Such a big ruckus over thirteen books. Two trips, two piles on the bathroom floor, and then Kaddish fetched the kerosene from the service balcony and brought it inside. The bathtub had seemed the most sensible place to make a fire indoors when the intent wasn’t to burn the house down. There was water at the ready and nothing flammable in reach. Kaddish unhooked the shower head from its clamp and let it hang outside the tub. He cranked open the slats to the small bathroom window, and peered out with the lights off to see if anyone was in his courtyard or if he could spot any neighbors hanging laundry who might see the smoke, might call the fire department and the police, and, as with so many of his plans (even he understood after Lillian’s nose), bring about the exact opposite of what he’d intended. Kaddish had waited until dark. Every passing hour made it safer with the neighbors, but he had to beat Pato and Lillian’s return. Lillian was working late these days and his son, likely off causing trouble, rarely got home before his mother.

One book at a time, and Kaddish figured the smoke would be no worse than a dinner gone awry. Kaddish knew there’d be aftermath. He also knew he was protecting the family, securing them better this way than Lillian ever could with a door. She might not show it while Pato was still seething, but Kaddish knew it would redeem him; at night she’d roll over to his side of the bed, put an arm around him, and kiss him on the back of his neck.

Kaddish used the Lermontov as kindling. He poured the kerosene. He pulled a cigarette from a pack with his teeth, lit it, and tossed the match onto the book in the tub. Flames rose up.

The match made a small stain on the book’s cover, a cradle for the match head, and then, around it, all this benign yellow flame. In the dark of the bathroom Kaddish found it calming. He enjoyed this window of time when he’d done what needed doing and there wasn’t yet any harm. He’d never expected a happy life, only moments of joy to
carry him through. This he would cherish. For one perfect moment the book was on fire and did not burn.

The cover caught first. Then the pages inside began to curl. Kaddish knew Pato would be furious but, watching the book burn, he realized he’d maybe underestimated to what degree. There’s something about the singular, Kaddish thought, that is always more distressing. He believed this about all things. Kaddish tossed the pamphlet on top as a remedy. It is why war and disaster were always spread across the front of his newspaper. It’s not just magnitude. It’s the ease of calamity on the conscience. A single death is too much to look at for long. Better the way Pato wanted it, like a bonfire, a mountain of books blazing in the town square.

Kaddish took another book, fanned its pages, and balanced it as if on display. The smoke turned acrid with the addition. Kaddish cranked open the window the rest of the way and the smoke was drawn out, its path almost geometric as it rose up, then funneled into the air shaft before rising again. Bits of burning page flew over his head and circled around the bathroom like fireflies. The smoke became heavier; recognizing the ridiculousness of his cigarette, Kaddish tossed it into the tub. He used the biggest book to break up the embers of the last. He poured on more kerosene, hoping for that gentle flame. It didn’t work that way a second time. The pages turned wet and then burned faster, so he added another book, hoping it would somehow exhaust the fire. Kaddish got down on the floor. It was hot and he began to worry about real damage to the bathroom as the tub and the wall tiles blackened. He’d planned to scrub it clean after, to wipe the ash away. He got into a rhythm and burned the books at a steady pace. As if saving best for last, the final volume turned out to be his son’s favorite. Kaddish didn’t intend for this, but it showed good instincts just the same.

He was pushing at that last book with the handle of the plunger, as if tending to a hearth, when a gust of clean air nearly bowled him over. This was precipitated by the swinging open of the door. Looking up,
trying to get his bearings, Kaddish turned his eye to the mirror, which held in it a reflection from the hall. The air was still hazy and the mirror glass smoky, and Kaddish’s eyes were adjusting while the remains of the fire flickered in the tub; all of this together made for a face hard to read. If one stared carefully, though, looked hard into that mirror—if one used a bit of imagination and applied it to those ghostlike features—a face could be made out. From the nose alone. From their lone nose.

The last book wasn’t done yet. It would need some attention. But Pato was already at his father’s side, a hand on the edge of the tub to steady himself, the other grabbing the book. He pulled it out and dropped it to the floor. It made a puffing noise and there was a flurry of sparks. Pato rushed his burnt fingers into his mouth.

“No,” Kaddish said. He reached into the tub and turned on the water. “Here,” he said, pointing through smoke and, with the water, steam. “To the kitchen,” Kaddish said, “you can still get at the ice.”

Pato already had his hand out and was looking at his fingertips, waiting for the blisters to form. He lowered that hand to stare at his father. How many times had Pato raced down the hall trying to beat his father to the bathroom, the only room in the apartment with a lock. How many times had Pato feared that Kaddish—as Pato himself just had—would burst through the door? And Kaddish had tried. There were the cracks to prove it from Kaddish throwing his shoulder against it in a rage. Though the roles were reversed, they’d never been in there with all that fury before. Kaddish may have banged until the wood cracked, but he’d never gotten in.

Recognizing this reversal, Pato understood why his father never made it all the way. He’d been chasing without enough chase, breaking without enough break. Kaddish hadn’t ever really wanted to follow through.

Pato lamented this as his burnt hand became his swinging hand, as he made a fist and hit his father right in his brand-new nose. It didn’t fracture—solid work from Mazursky the foundation of that strong bone left as it was.

Kaddish also had a good thick neck to keep a skull from rocking and a brain from bobbing. He had a sturdy jaw and a tough nose and a cannonball
head. Kaddish wasn’t knocked out, only knocked down. He stood up slowly, dizzily, and he went to the mirror and looked in, though with the soot and smoke, and Kaddish a bit bleary from the hit, there was nothing but shadow to see. As Pato waited for the blisters, Kaddish, who had scarcely finished healing from his nose job, waited for his eyes to turn back to black.

“I’d rather it had been someone else,” Kaddish said. “A scuffle in the playground or a brawl with your gang. Still, I’m glad to take a punch off you and see that you’re not such a pussy after all. It’s a hard world we live in.”

“We don’t fit together and never have. It’s time that I free you up officially,” Pato said. “Let’s pretend this never happened—that I never happened. We can go our separate ways. I’ll have no father, and you’ll have no son.”

“You can’t make me dead to you, if that’s what you’re proposing. That’s not how it works.” Kaddish patted Pato gently on the cheek. “You’re not the first son in such a predicament. So I tell you, some things aren’t so easily achieved.”

“What would you know about having a father?” Pato said. “You have no clue.”

“That’s what makes me expert on the matter,” Kaddish said. “Without ever having met, without knowing a thing about him, I tell you it’s work to see a father undone.”

“Always you know better,” Pato said. “If there’s enough hatred, I bet it can be managed. The one thing you taught me is to give it my best.”

Kaddish said, “Fine,” as if accepting the terms.

Pato considered taking his book from where it smoldered on the floor. He opened and closed his burnt hand. Then he looked his father in the eye, full of disappointment.

He did not, in his anger, take keys or wallet, left up on the scalloped shelf. He did not take the jacket, inside out, that he’d pulled off on his way down the hall. He had nothing to protect him against the wind and the rain that hit him outside. Pato held up his hand and sighed, his feet already wet. He pushed on toward Rafa’s. It was his intent never to come home.

THEY SAT TOGETHER IN CLASS
at the university. They were in the tiered lecture hall used for social psychology getting their exam grades.

Names were being called in alphabetical order. Pato was caught in the middle of the alphabet but he was the first of his trio to be summoned to the front. Rafa moved his legs so his friend could slide by.

Pato felt ridiculous for worrying over his grade. He already knew that only one person in that lecture hall would be given a pass. Insane as it seemed, these were apparently the rules handed down from above. It was another way to intimidate them and an attempt to split their ranks. A whole class full of failures and Pato couldn’t help it. He wanted the decent mark.