The Instructions (150 page)

There wasn’t a glug or whimper. He was about to pass out, face slipping on his fist, his lids nearly shut, but that should have, I thought, had the opposite effect—should have
lessened
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over how he cried. Maybe it did. Scholars might wish to suggest that it did. They might wish to suggest that this orderly, dignified way of weeping—even the tears themselves were subdued, crawling from his eyes just one at a time, waterpark-goers in line for a slide, each waiting to climb from the squeeze of the duct til the one just ahead had safely cleared chin—was, in fact, for a soldier like Nakamook, as close to a demonstration of the chaos inside him as could be expressed without his resorting to the usual violence, of which, sedated, he was not capable. Whatever it was, this Nakamookian weeping, a show of strength or a show of weakness, an act of restraint or a loss of restraint, I didn’t like to see it, and I didn’t think that he’d like me to see it, and so I looked away, looked down at my hands, and let Benji finish berat-ing and threatening me, cursing and hurting til he fell asleep, telling myself we’d patch it up later, outside the school. Safe among brothers. Surrounded and protected. The scholars would arrive and all would be well. I looked down at my hands and waited him out.

“Fucken liar,” he said. “What a fucken even now a fucken miserable dissembling fucken liar you are, man. Treat me like you’re Botha. Manage me like I’m just some dumbfuck SpEd to manage.

Made a mistake… I’ll fucken…
kill
that fucker. I’ll fucken burn your… you fucken lie… liar. Like a… God! Fucking SpEd… I’ll fucken burn down
both
your houses.”

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“…to the right of your screen,” the anchor was saying.

The photo to the right was from the fall before. It was cropped from a two-pager in the Schechter yearbook which showed me leading a discussion in Torah Study. In the original, ten scholars sit around an oval table, all of us using our hands to gesticulate, and we appear to be having the best conversation. Magnified, though, and with the others cropped out, I looked psychotic—my eyebrows straining to meet at my nosebridge, my pointer extending from a fist toward the viewer—a darker, beardless Uncle Sam in a yarmulke.

Both TVs were still tuned to NBC, both pictures snowy, both volume levels cranked. One sat in front of the eastern bleachers, which, except for June and Jelly and Brooklyn and the Five, were occupied by all the Israelites in the gym. The other sat in front of the western bleachers where everybody else was but Vincie and Starla, who each pressed an ear to the pushbar door.

I had entered the gym through the central door, and now I was standing before them all, between the TVs, where the noise was most blurred. Few of the soldiers seemed to notice my entrance.

Some were crying, others shaking their heads, most leaning forward and hugging themselves or stretching their arms, balling their fists, blinking hard, jaw muscles bulging.

June and Jelly and Eliyahu approached to my left, and Berman was descending from the bleachers to my right, the ex-Shover Cory Goldman trailing just behind him. I couldn’t hear anything.

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I sirened the megaphone and held the trigger til the TVs were muted by Googy and Main Man, who held the remotes. June, by my side now, whispered, “Be careful,” and Jelly said, “Where’s—”

I said, Go to Nurse Clyde’s.

Jelly cut out.

“Where’s she going?” said Berman.

“They were saying on the news,” Eliyahu said, “that hundreds of scholars from your former schools got emails from you with directions to Aptakisic, and then they were saying they were spotted on trains, and now they’re saying hundreds more scholars from other Israelite schools in the suburbs and the city are missing as well.”

I strained to keep the relief off my face: I was supposed to have been certain all along that the scholars would show.

So why’s it so somber in here? I said.

“Because they’re also saying,” said Berman, “that cops have blocked the roads off to stop your friends before they get here.”

“But,” said Eliyahu, “that’s not the end of the world. I gave the Five the phone and they called their friend Feingold to warn him that the cops had seen the email with the directions to Aptakisic, and this Feingold said it didn’t matter. He said there were two groups of at least two hundred scholars from the suburbs, each heading south along the lakeshore—Feingold was with one group, and he could see the other one a quarter mile up the beach—and since your directions were for the scholars of Chicago, the cops didn’t know the route that the lakeshore groups were taking, so 1427

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there won’t be any kind of roadblock to stop them, right?”

“Except,” said Berman, “we’re a mile east of the lakeshore, so even if they were
directly
east of us, they’d still have about a mile to go, and they’re
not
directly east of us—they’re still heading south—so we’re talking about at least another twenty minutes til they get here.”

“At
least
,” said Cory. “And that’s a while. And you sound crazy on TV.”

“Enough of that,” said Eliyahu.

“Yeah, enough!” said Pinker. “Cut that shit out!” The Levinson said.

By this point, both sets of bleachers were empty. Much as the last time I’d returned to the gym, the Side and Big Ending and the Five and their Ashley mobbed up to my left behind June and Eliyahu, while the rest of the Israelites were mobbed to my right behind Cory and Berman.

“What Cory means is Philip Roth,” Berman said. “That stuff you said to the camera about talking to Philip Roth… It’s…”

“It’s weird!” an ex-Shover said. “I thought we were waiting for scholars, not an author.” “And what’s this stuff about a holiday that doesn’t have a name?” said another ex-Shover. “I think you should call it Last Day of School Day,” said the Flunky. “That’s completely dumb!” an Israelite yelled. “It’s
completely
dumb and it doesn’t sound Israelite!” “Who cares if it sounds—” “Fuck you who cares!
We
care.” “Who’s Philip Roth?” “How about Shut the Fuck Up You Fucken Coward Day!” “How about you 1428

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fucken idiots don’t even know who Philip Roth is!” “And the way you keep sending Israelites out to guard the doors!” “Yeah!

Why don’t you send any of
them
, you know?” “It’s like you’re trying—” “He’s not trying anything! You just want to watch TV and bitch and moan!” “We have to get out of here. Gurion.

Baby.” “You’re supposed to be the messiah, but you’re sending Israelites into danger!” “What’s the messiah?” “You should send them instead!” “Did that dumbfuck just ask
what’s the messiah
?”

“
Is
he the messiah?” “
Are
you the messiah?” “What’s the messiah?” “And where’s that bully?” “The messiah’s a who!” “Where’d they hide Nakamook?” “Why’s he friends with that kid?!” “He might be the messiah and he might not be the messiah!” “There is no might! He is or he isn’t!” “What the fuck do you know?

You dropped out of Hebrew School!” “He’s our leader!” “Why, though? Why’s he our leader if he isn’t the messiah?” “He
might
be the messiah!” “Why’s he leading
them
if he’s our messiah?”

“He might
not
be the messiah!” “He is or he isn’t! He can’t have his cake and eat it too!” “His
cake
?” “Our cake!” “
Our
cake?”

“Cake?” “Our who?” “He’s our leader!” “Where’s he fucken leading us!?” “He’s protecting us!” “You feel protected?!”

And I stood there, scholars, listening and listening, trying to get a handle on what needed settling first, til finally I judged that none of it did. These
arguers didn’t care about what they were arguing. They were all just afraid. In my absence, as before, they’d all grown afraid, and to combat their fears, they argued with each other. It shouldn’t have surprised me. In war it’s nec-1429

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essary to fill up with enmity—it’s even good—but when under siege, you feel out of control, you become afraid, and you wedge that enmity between yourself and your brothers, who you see before you, who you can reach out and strike: if you can’t attack the one you want to, you attack the one you’re with. It’s a way to forget the siege a little, a way to regain some sense of control.

It’s the wrong way, true, one of the wrongest, but it’s still an act of hope, at least inasmuch as it isn’t surrender, and these soldiers before me—they weren’t surrendering. I saw they had hope yet.

I sirened the megaphone. Their mouths stopped moving.

Brothers, I said, you are wasting your enmity, wasting your strength. You’re all just afraid of what might happen next, not in the school, but outside the school; not between one another, but between now and then; us in here and them out—

“It’s them!” someone shouted from the edge of the mob. “Look!

Come quick! It’s them! It’s them!”

June grabbed my hand as the mob dispersed. I led her to a spot before the eastern bleachers. Ex-Shovers low-voiced some hey’s and what-the’s. I sat us on the floor to unblock their sightlines, not even thinking to address them directly.

Emmanuel Liebman was live on TV.

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The cameraman was shooting from the side of Rand Road, so Emmanuel, in profile, as he pressed forward, was moving from 1430

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the right of our screens toward the left. Behind him, in columns, scholars were emerging from the edge of the frame. Their pennyguns were drawn, but pointed at the ground. Their columns spanned the asphalt between the road’s shoulders.

At the screen’s extreme left were a pair of squadcars, parked nose-to-nose to block both lanes, their blue lights rotating lazily.

Three of four cops who’d been leaning on the doors straightened their postures and crossed their arms. The fourth reached inside of the car he’d been leaning on, grabbed the PA mike and said,

“STAND DOWN.” It sounded fizzy.

Emmanuel stopped moving. The scholars stopped moving.

The soldiers in the gym stifled groans, then didn’t.

Samuel was heading the centermost column. Emmanuel revolved, said something in his ear. Samuel said something back to Emmanuel. Emmanuel nodded, revolved, went forward. The rest of the scholars followed his lead.

When the gap between Emmanuel and the cross-armed cops, which was roughly forty yards at the sound of “STAND DOWN,”

shrunk to thirty-five, another order came.

“HALT,” said the cop on the microphone.

The scholars pressed forward, filling more of the frame. Nine columns eight-deep to the edge of the screen; now nine-, now ten-, now eleven-deep.

“CEASE. HALT. STAND DOWN,” squawked the mike-cop.

The others unholstered batons.

As the scholars closed in, not missing a beat, the PA con-1431

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tinued to fizzily squawk. Fifteen yards from the cops, they were all onscreen; another couple yards and Emmanuel stopped them.

Soldiers in the gym started groaning a little. I tried to count the rows but the camera zoomed in. I’d counted almost halfway and gotten to twenty. Nine columns by forty-odd rows plus flankers (there were flankers picking rocks from the gravel shoulders, handing them in to be passed across the rows) = roughly four hundred scholars in all. Zoomed-in, I was able to make out more faces: the columns switched off between Schechter and Northside, five of the former and four of the latter.

Emmanuel revolved, said something to Samuel. Samuel said something back to Emmanuel.

How far away are they? I said to the soldiers.

“I think those houses are, like, six blocks away.” “More like two.” “They’re nowhere near us.” “There’s that one with the Santa, though. The year-round Santa one.” “The year-round Santa one’s minutes away.” “Minutes exactly.” “Minutes
by bus
, dude.” “
Two
minutes by bus when you catch all the reds.” “Where is it you think you see a Santa, anyway?” “There at the edge.” “That isn’t a Santa.” “It’s the side of a Santa.” “It’s the side of a whatsit—the water thing.” “A hydrant.” “You’re crazy.” “You’re blind. That Santa’s a hydrant.”

“Why don’t you call them?” asked Ally Kravitz.

NoJacks, I said.

Onscreen, Emmanuel was addressing the scholars. He pointed east, then pointed north. Samuel leaned, seeming to protest.

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Emmanuel shrugged. The cops hadn’t moved.

“They’ve
all
got NoJacks?” Josh Berman said.

The ones who I know, I said.

“I fucken hate NoJacks.” “I hate NoJacks, too.” In the gym, we cursed NoJacks til Emmanuel revolved again.

Hands cupped at his mouthsides, he hollered to the cops. The mike on the camera barely picked it up; what it did get got gar-bled into frying sounds.

“STAND DOWN,” said the mike-cop, when Emmanuel finished.

Emmanuel hollered: more hisses and hums. This time the cops, when Emmanuel was finished, started to argue among themselves.

Emmanuel raised his hand, waiting for something.

The cameraman started to speak in a whisper: “The studio’s telling us that our microphone’s failing. The network apologizes…

To catch you up: The boy at the front yelled out to officers that he intended to ‘lead his friends to the two-hill field’ and he asked that the officers please get out of his way so that ‘we won’t have to walk on your cars and dent them.’ Some ten seconds later, he seemed to change his mind, and he told the officers that because they ‘seem like nice men who probably have families and need to keep your jobs, which maybe you’ll lose if you don’t stand your ground, we’ll just walk around you while you stand your ground, and your cars won’t get—’ There they go.”