Outside, the afternoons had become legendary and warm. I rescued my tired and neglected leather datebook from its place on the dusty window ledge. Traversing its many barren pages, its vast white field of empty days and weeks, I penned in this single appointment, Arrive Paris April 15, punctuated with a swift underline.
“I’m only doing this to rescue you from the scandal you’re courting here in town.”
“Courting? I’m not courting anyone.”
“You can’t go inviting twelve-year-old ex-students to sleep with you and expect nothing to come of it.”
“Oh, everything came of it. He’s fifteen, by the way.”
“Exactly my point. You could be arrested.”
“I’ve already been punished for it by the school. It’s the least I can do, you know, to make the charges valid.”
“That’s certainly selfless—and stupid.”
“I wish Dogan could go with me.”
“It’s out of the question. I’m the one who’s going to Paris.”
“I’m sure I’ll keep to myself.”
“Maybe you’ll get this Turk out of your system, or at least develop the good sense not to sleep with him anymore.”
“Hmm.”
The bright blue days became crowded. I hadn’t packed bags like this since my second trip with Louise (France at age sixteen), and it was relaxing to lift them in two hands and feel anchored by their weight. The neglected datebook got filled with errands and addresses, lists, phone numbers, and the pleasing finality of sharp check marks stabbed beside those tasks I managed to complete. Herbert was disappearing to a vast ranch near Petaluma to take pharmaceuticals, drink chilled fumé blanc, and lie in the sun with an architect friend of ours who had everything one could ever want in life except company. The “rest cure,” Herbert called it.
“Jimmy asked if you were free too.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That you were in jail.”
“No.”
“I told him you were taking some school group on a trip. I didn’t say where. I doubt he’ll press me for details.”
“Maybe I’ll join you. I mean, after Paris.”
“Mmm, you should. I don’t see any reason not to stay on at Jimmy’s.”
“I could bring you the drawings.”
“Yes, you could; that’s very good. I’ll tell them I’m flying back via San Francisco. A week in Paris and then a week in San Francisco. I’ve got to get back by the twenty-ninth.”
“The museum won’t collapse in your absence?”
“Not so anyone would notice.”
The prospect of vacation at Jimmy’s was already giving Herbert a blush of health and vigor I hadn’t seen on him in several months. He still looked gaunt and drunk, but his mouth was more relaxed and his eyes sparkled. The arrangement promised to be as good for him as it was for me, and this equanimity was pleasing. It assuaged the guilt I felt for the one truly wrong and completely unconscionable thing I did to my dearest friend before going to Paris. I don’t know why it was important to me. I can’t say how the compulsion became so irresistible and the act so plausible, but I took his passport. I stole it from his apartment while he was at work, rifling through the desk to find it, together with his birth certificate—and then I mutilated the passport, so it would have to be replaced. I wanted a new one with my picture and his name, to make the masquerade of my Paris trip complete.
Our last drink was at Shackles. An air of melancholy settled with the balding assistant manager’s news that Tristan was gone for two weeks. “The kids are all off for spring break,” he told us. “How glum,” Herbert said, and indeed the whole place was glum. The assistant didn’t bother to wear the croupier’s disguise. He wiped our clean table with a filthy cloth and stood waiting for an order. We split a bottle of heavy Bordeaux and then a Napa Valley red zinfandel that was like drinking a brick wall. A little bon voyage.
“Is that a new watch? You never wore a watch before.” I’d bought a watch and Herbert was right, I had never had one before.
“I know. I thought I might need one.” I fiddled with the mechanism and ran my fingers along the soft leather band. I had been doing that all evening.
“What time is your flight?”
“Afternoon. One o’clock, I think.” The bar was crowded but it seemed empty, the drinkers subdued by the fact it was Monday evening, stunned by the recent weekend’s end and the terrible recurring surprise of work again.
“It takes forever.”
“Eleven hours. I change planes in Copenhagen.”
“Oh, SAS?”
“Mmm.” I’d bought the ticket with Herbert’s credit card, as per instructions; I also had it issued in his name, with his passport, but he didn’t know that.
“I love SAS. All those little sandwiches, and you know they’ll give you aquavit, chilled to absolute zero.”
“Delicious.” We drank wine without speaking for some time.
“Thank God I’m leaving for California. I couldn’t stand another evening like this, here without Tristan.”
“Thank you very much. I’ll miss you too.”
“I mean without Tristan or you, obviously. That kind of thing goes without saying.”
“Tristan’s probably waiting for you at Jimmy’s.”
“Don’t tease me. I would die to spend a few weeks with him at Jimmy’s.”
“He looks Californian, maybe he’s back home for break, just over the ridge at the next ranch. Jimmy probably hires him every spring to, you know, mow the range. The neighbor boy, out mowing the range, all shirtless and sweaty.” I smiled weakly, happy to give my friend at least this small token.
“Maybe he does live down there. I wonder if he’d visit, I mean if I invited him?”
“He’d have to stay overnight. Can’t drive drunk.”
“The bursar would certainly have his family’s address.”
“A scented note in the letter box.”
“I should probably just phone. Though maybe a note is best, so he doesn’t feel pressured in any way.”
“A simple note: Jimmy’s phone number and a condom.”
“You’re so crude.”
“What’s so crude about a condom? It’s a very normal thing. You’re so anachronistic.”
“It isn’t normal to send one in the mail as a dinner invitation.”
“Mmm, just dinner?”
“Obviously just dinner.” Herbert tried the zinfandel and made a face. “Or maybe a day trip, a hike in the hills and lunch somewhere, like that fabulous place near Point Reyes. Jimmy could get us reservations, I mean if anyone could.”
“Just send the condom.”
“Oh, shut up.”
I would miss Herbert, but that went without saying. My well-kept secret lent the evening some of the poignancy and glamour of the Last Supper, but only for me. Herbert was a Christ without a clue, unaware