Mean Boy (35 page)

The result being that it doesn’t take as much courage as I had expected to ask if he would mind advising me on a personal matter.

His office door is open a crack, the way he always likes to keep it—Jim doesn’t leave it gaping like Dekker or some of the other profs. It’s sort of a begrudging crack:
Enter if You Must
. I push the door open farther, gently, moving it aside like a curtain. I don’t think about it, I just do it.

Toc-toc-toc
, I knock. Deliberately unthinking, deliberately unreflecting. Dermot’s words have got me operating on pure impulse. Jim glances up with only his eyes. His head stays bowed.

Arsenault is a genius, nobody’s denying that. I suppose the problem is he knows it. I’m not saying he’s an egomaniac, I’m saying when a man with that much talent knows he has that much talent, it’s got to be difficult to reconcile the—the mundane obligations of day-to-day life. The fact that people of equal or even less
ability are—you know—frolicking on Greek islands, drinking red wine on Patmos. That so many are being exalted for so much less. And there he is, sitting in an office, marking essays …

He’s got the place dark, the blinds closed. Only his desk lamp is on, pointed at a low, harsh angle. The light pools over a pile of papers stacked so haphazardly, it’s as if they’ve been shoved together into the centre of the desk in preparation for a mini bonfire. There’s also a smaller pile of Kleenex in one corner. Jim is sniffling. Fighting off another cold.

But you’re just as talented as Jim, and you don’t …

Okay, Larry. Listen. What’s wonderful about Arsenault—what’s difficult about Arsenault … he’s a dreamer. That’s the quality of his poetry that makes it so gorgeous, so compelling. That’s the quality of his personality as well. I’m … I guess I’m a congenital pragmatist. I’ve never been told I was special. I’ve never felt I had any sort of destiny to fulfill. If I’ve managed to achieve the kind of life where, every once in a while, I get to write a poem … you know … I’m happy. That’s enough for me. But Jim—

“Larry.”

“Hi, Jim.”

He reaches for what looks like a random wad of tissue, unwads it slightly in order to enfold his nose. There’s a brief, musical honk. I’ve never seen his hair so carefully combed, the ruts still in it, shining wetly.

The used tissue gets replaced in its pile. Jim sniffs long and wet, as if blowing his nose has made things worse in there, opened the floodgates all the more. He blinks up at me through the rheum. “So how you doing, kiddo?”

“I’m good,” I tell him, nodding hard.

He makes a limp attempt to straighten the haystack of papers in front of him before shoving them to the opposite side of his desk from the balls of Kleenex. He knocks a coffee cup to the floor in the process. We both look at it.

“Well,” he says. “Shit.”

Nothing’s spilled. Jim leans back and sighs without bothering to retrieve the mug. “You wanna sit down?”

I perch on the frame of the toilet-chair.

“How are you, Jim?”

He nods and doesn’t look at me, rifling through a drawer. “Sick. Sick, again. This time of year always kills me.”

“Me too,” I say. It doesn’t feel like the time to tell him what a good, dread-free day I’ve been having. Besides, the jury’s still out. I may already have pushed my luck too far. It feels as if the raisin could recover its rosy plumpness and come bouncing back to life at any minute.

Jim pulls a folder out of his desk, glances up at me again with eyes dark and teary as a bloodhound’s.

“I suppose you’re here to talk about your grade.”

He glances away again, opens the folder, and all at once I know what I’m supposed to say.

The thing to remember about Arsenault, when he’s mad, is that he doesn’t want to
stay
mad. He wants to
get
mad, yes. And he wants to
be
mad. And he wants to be able to get mad whenever he wants, and he wants you to put up with it. But he doesn’t want to
stay
mad. It’s your job to help him not be mad anymore. He slams the door, and he wants you to be the one to come knocking afterward. He can’t open it up again himself
.

“I’m here,” I say, “To see how you’re doing, Jim. I’m just here to say hello and get caught up.”

Jim looks up again—it’s an awful glance, like a kicked dog expecting more of the same. I can’t believe he’d look at me like that. He exhales a breath and sinks a little in his chair.

“Oh well, you know how it can be after the holidays around here. A bit—a bit deathly.”

“Stark,” I say. “I always find this time of year so stark.”

Jim runs his hands along the edge of his desk—away from each other, and then together again. It is a shy sort of gesture, which startles me.

“Stark,” he whispers to the desk. “Jesus, you got that right, kiddo.”

My next question is a gamble—but better to get it over with than let the topic fester in the air between us.

“How
was
your holiday, by the way, Jim?”

He’s in the middle of running his hands along the desk’s edge some more. Halfway through, when his hands are as far apart as they can get without falling off the ends, his eyes slide up to meet mine.

“Not bad, Larry. Thanks for asking. Not too-too bad.”

“Did you and Moira go anywhere, or—?”

“No, no,” says Jim. “Stayed put. Neither of us is all that close with our families. Moira’s youngest brother stopped in.” Jim shakes his head. “Drunk. Made a fool of himself as usual.”

Another quick glance from Jim. Did I say shy? Perhaps I meant sly. He smiles. I smile bigger.

“You know my cousin?” I say, seizing on the topic of family. “You know how I told you my cousin was pregnant and my family was freaking out?”

Jim frowns. “I believe you mentioned that, yes.”

I hesitate, remembering that when I mentioned this, it was of course the night of Dekker’s party, walking home from the bootleggers’. I remember I introduced the topic as
a way of changing the subject—a last-ditch means of distracting Jim from all the betrayals, all the lies, all the rocks to be pushed up all the hills.

It’s possible, because of how drunk he was, that Jim has no memory of any of this and doesn’t know what I’m talking about—that he is pretending to. Either way, I launch into the story of Janet. I do my jowl-quivering impression of Grandma Lydia for him. I talk movingly of Uncle Stan shaking his head back and forth. Then Janet in Little Billy’s, confessing to me all her stunning lies, her Machiavellian manoeuvres. I wave my hands until Jim’s leaning forward, smiling. I don’t stop until the two of us are laughing, until Jim is shaking his own head in amazement and disbelief. Until I’m certain he has shaken off his mistrust and reserve. Until I find myself feeling tired, maybe even a little resentful of the effort, trying to remember what it is I did wrong, what exactly I’m trying to atone for.

Not five minutes after leaving Jim’s office, the magic sheen of my day is forcibly, physically explained to me by a wave of nausea that descends like a black bird. There’s a moment where I can almost see it approaching in the distance. The potato chips I grabbed for lunch rumble emptily in my gut. Acid gurgles up around them and saliva spurts beneath my tongue. I remember as a kid in springtime, walking down the path from Grandma Lydia’s to the beach, being cawed at by nesting crows. The whole way there, I’d be terrified as they swooped directly at my head, veering off only at the last possible minute. That’s what it’s like, this thing coming at me, this thing I know has no intention of veering off at the last minute. This thing is my hangover, delayed. I’ve been having such a good day because I’ve been residually drunk all morning.

I bolt into a washroom and retch nothing but bile and chips. A couple of guys at the urinals laugh and provide
uninspired commentary—“Whoa! Rough night, buddy?”—until they get bored and maybe start to feel guilty.

I close my eyes and hold some tissue to my nose to act as a smell-filter. I try to think about this morning’s snowflakes, clean and white. I think of Dermot Schofield’s reedy poet’s voice, so comfortable and far away across the whirring wires.

But what I see is Jim’s face—transformed and animated thanks to me, all my painstaking effort. Him opening his blinds, stretching with sudden, startling vigour as the winter sun poured in. I thought he might perform a couple of jumping jacks for a minute there. Instead, he turned to me with a startled look.

By God, Larry, I don’t think we even had a chance to discuss your portfolio, now, have we?

The phlegm had gone completely from his voice.

Well
—I realized what I was supposed to do. I was supposed to wave my hand, act unconcerned, and so I did.

No, no, no, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about some of the pieces. Great work, kid. Really
.

And going over to one of his shelves, and rifling through his stack of copies.

When we were both in Toronto
, said Schofield,
we spent a lot of time together. I can’t tell you how much I admired him. The confidence he had even then, in his talent. It was inspiring to me
.

And throwing himself back into his chair, tossing his long legs up onto the desk, sending the balls of Kleenex flying on the updraft.

The sequence
, he said, flipping pages.
The short poems with
the similar titles. Some really smart stuff here. “Showdogs”—that was a great one, Larry
.

I mentioned “The Ass of the Head.” I said I understood why he hadn’t cared for that one as much.

No, no, it wasn’t that, Larry, I just didn’t feel it had the precision and coherence of the others. It kind of stuck out. Plus, to be honest, it was the more suitable piece for discussing in class. More meat on it. But I liked it, I really did
. He raised his head, cocked it at me. I knew that cock. I knew that look. Throw the ball, it said. I’m waiting.

Why would you think I didn’t like it, Larry?

We’d go out
, said Schofield,
and he could be so crazy. He could—it never occurred to him he should have to hold himself back, and at first that was wonderful, in a way. Exhilarating to behold when you’re a young man. It’s precisely the way you think a genius should be
.

Well
, I said, and I knew what I was supposed to say.
My grade
.

Blank look.
But you got an A
.

Then I was supposed to act a little shy and shamefaced. I was supposed to shrug apologetically. I was supposed to explain to Jim I hadn’t, in fact, gotten an A.

At that point, Jim was supposed to look appalled, yank open a drawer, and withdraw the folder he kept his marks in. Flip it open. Run his finger down the page. And finally smile with relief—shooting me a mock-scolding look: Naughty-naughty. Playing games are we?

It’s an A, Larry
. Broad grin.
Right here in black and white, kid
.

I ad libbed at this point. I argued a bit with Jim. I insisted my mark had been a B—it was written on my portfolio.

It was? Were there any other comments?

No, there hadn’t been any other comments.

It was a mistake, kiddo. I mistook your portfolio for someone else’s. Sorry about that—it’s a crazy time of year with all the marking. Must have given you a scare, though!

Yes, it had given me a scare.

It’s a good thing you came in. I bet some poor kid thinks he got your A. I should double-check with everyone
. I watched Jim scribble himself a note and stick it in the folder before shoving the whole thing back into his top drawer.

What I wasn’t supposed to do was jump to my feet and yell,
What the hell is going on?
I wasn’t supposed to kick the toilet-chair over to one side, or reach over and topple Jim’s haystack of papers. I wasn’t supposed to grab him by the shirt, or shout in his face, or yank the top drawer from his desk to see my original grade for myself. Of course, I wasn’t supposed to do any of those things. And of course, I didn’t.

I was feeling a little queasy at that point anyway; there was a heaviness settling itself inside my head. All the toppled raisins were ballooning to full strength at once.

After a while
, said Dermot Schofield.
After a while, though—I don’t know. I was tired. Just take care of yourself, Larry, okay? It’s as important as anything else
.

I stood and smiled, went to shake Jim’s hand, but got pulled into his musty chest for a moment instead. He bashed a hand between my shoulder blades a few times then set me loose with a light, companionable shove toward the door. The raisins swelled and strained—a million frog’s eggs popping open deep in the marsh’s awakening depths. In the distance, a black-winged shadow getting ready to dive.

JIM SHOWS UP
in class every week, comb ruts dug across his scalp. He introduces us to a new form called the ghazal, which is basically a series of unrhyming couplets, and shows us some very old Persian translations as well as a couple of modern examples by a poet named Jim Harrison, who is wonderful. I try to keep from getting too excited. It’s one of the loveliest forms I’ve seen. It’s muscular and vague all at once—
Potent yet airy
, says Jim. I like it so much I want it to be just mine. I don’t ever want to write anything else. I have this childish urge to stand up in the middle of the class and insist that no one else be allowed to experiment with this form. Where does it come from, I wonder, that mean human desire to keep all the most beautiful things to yourself?