Mr. Pelligroni

             Mr. Pelligroni was an odd sort, an “eccentric,” as his neighbors liked to call him. He kept to himself. The only time he was ever seen was when he was returning home from the library. Dressed in his long wrinkled gray coat and black wide brimmed hat, he always walked very slowly, hunched over, his face to the ground, his nap sack full of books weighing him down. His house was covered in ivy, and his lawn was overgrown with weeds. It must have been years since it was last cut. It was known to some that he was an Italian immigrant who had been a professor of some sort in his native country. He was thought to have no family, and no friends.

One day, as Mr. Pelligroni was making one of his return trips home from the library, a young boy stopped him on the street. “Old man!” he cried. “What have you got in your bag?”

            “Just some books,” said Mr. Pelligroni.

            “Will you read me one?”
            “Certainly,” said Mr. Pelligroni. He pulled out a blue book and opened to a page in the middle. It was Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human. He read a passage from it and the boy looked up at Mr. Pelligroni with wide eyes and a gaping mouth. Then he ran away. Mr. Pelligroni went home.

            Later that day, as Mr. Pelligroni sat at his desk reading, he heard a knock at his door. It was the mother of the young boy. She looked angry. “Have you been reading inappropriate material to my son?” she asked in an angry voice.

            “I have been reading to your son,” said Mr. Pelligroni, “but it was hardly inappropriate material.”

            The woman looked past Mr. Pelligroni into the foyer, which was filled with books. “What did you read to him?” she asked.

            “Just a passage from Nietzsche,” said Mr. Pelligroni.

            “Nietzsche? You think that is appropriate reading material for a six year old?”

            “Ma’am, he couldn’t possibly have understood a word of it.”
            “On the contrary,” said the woman. “It horrified him. He came to me in tears.”

            “Ma’am,” said Mr. Pelligroni. “It wasn’t Nietzsche that horrified him. It was me.” And with that Mr. Pelligroni slammed the door in the woman’s face.

The Enforcer and the Poet

It was Saturday night and as per usual the members of the Rabid Bulldog biker gang were gathered at Curly’s Bar in the desolate outskirts of Rainer, Indiana. Karl "Killer" Lusk, one of the gang's lead enforcers, was seated at a table with Reggie "Reginald" Thompson, the leader of the gang, and several others. The topic of conversation was "Fat" Willie Connors, an affiliate of the gang who had recently disappeared with over ten thousand dollars of the gang's money. Karl had visited his house earlier that day. It was the memories of this incident that was causing his dour mood. 

            When Reggie turned to Karl and made a joke about some of the awful plans he had in store for Reggie, Karl, brooding, forced himself to smile. It was a crooked, moribund smile. Reggie was really a terribly manipulative man. Everyone feared him, and everyone secretly despised him. They followed him because they themselves had long ago come to the realization that they did not have complete control over their lives, and it was this fear of not knowing that drove them to relinquish what little control they did have over to Reggie, who was, to them, like a God. 
            The alcohol wasn’t helping Karl's mood, either. When Reggie delivered his ill-timed joke, he was just finishing off his eighth beer of the hour—usually light work for a man of his size. (He stood about six feet four, and weighed about two hundred and forty pounds. His torso was like a large boulder, and his arms were long and thick like the pistons of an oil drill.) But tonight, the alcohol was going straight to his spleen.

As he sat there, taking one swig of beer after another, the conversation became muddled in his mind. The music sounded overbearing, and he was beginning to feel uncomfortable. A hot flush ran over his face and down the sides of his neck. He looked over at Reggie, who was laughing and gesticulating at his cohorts, and, after staring at him for a moment, got up. “Where you going?” asked Reggie.

            “I’m not feeling well. I think I need to rest.”

            “Rest?” said Reggie. “Since when did you ever need to fucking rest? Sit your ass down.”

            “I’ll catch you guys later.”
             Karl went outside and got on his brand new Harley Davidson, started the engine, and drove off feeling a little drunk, but certainly not so drunk that he couldn’t ride. Actually, there hardly seemed to him a way that he could ever get so drunk that he couldn’t ride. The night was warm, and dry, with a slight breeze—perfect riding weather. There was a brief moment, as he left the parking lot and started down the highway, when he felt completely free. He revved the engine and listened to it roar, felt the rush of wind blow past his face and the powerful machine rumbling beneath him, and gazed at himself in the side-view mirror. He was a handsome man, in a brooding alcoholic kind of way, with dark, sad eyes set deep in almost purplish sockets, and a high forehead furrowed heavily with worry lines. His goat tee was well trimmed, belying an otherwise restrained pride in his appearance. This all comforted him.  But, when the yellow stripes on the road began to zip hypnotically beneath him, and the darkness surrounded him on all sides, the old thoughts returned. His mind was foggy, but still the images presented themselves, terribly vivid. As his mind flipped through these images like pages in a book, his thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the sound of a police siren. He must have been going past ninety, he thought to himself as he pulled over, cursing himself.

            Karl turned the engine off and waited for the officer to approach. He observed him from his side mirror. He had a big, white, puffy face and a bulging waste line. Oddly, he was wearing dark sunglasses. Maybe that was a pride thing, thought Karl. “License and registration, please,” the officer said. Karl took out his wallet and showed him his license and registration. The officer looked at them and handed them back to Karl. “You know how fast you were going?”

            “Must have been over ninety,” he said.

            “Ninety two, to be exact. You coming from the bar tonight, sir?”

            Karl gripped the handlebars so that his fingers went numb. “What makes you say that?”

            “Call it a hunch,” said the officer.

            “A hunch.”

            The officer didn’t find this joke funny. In fact, his tone became even more serious. “Step off your vehicle, please,” he said.

            Karl did as he was told.

            As he went about following the instructions for the field sobriety test, the thought kept occurring to him that it would be both easy and delightful to crush this police officer’s skull. And he thought that the repercussions for this might not be as bad as the life he was currently living. He had been to jail before, and the idea of spending the rest of his life there, he told himself, did not seem so terrible. Despite this, he kept himself in check, perhaps because he believed deep down that something good was on its way.

            It was apparent very early on that Karl would fail the test, and he was annoyed by the thought that the police officer was only having him continue with it out of sheer sadism. When he was done, the police officer called for backup, and took Karl to the station for a breathalyzer test. Sure enough, he was well over the limit. He cited Karl, impounded his bike, and took him home.

Karl lived in a small, four room apartment just outside of downtown Rainer. It was a medium sized town, completely run down by poverty. A little ways down the street from the apartment, on the corner, was a Texaco, and nearby, an old run-down diner where Karl often got his breakfast. The apartment building itself was an old, shabby looking building, painted dark brown with tiny dust-ridden windows, and a brown slate roof that had been falling apart for years. When he entered his apartment at midnight, he saw the typical sight—empty beer bottles and pizza boxes with half-eaten pizzas on the floor, the carpet covered in stains, and his girlfriend, Sharon, a plump blonde with sleepy eyes and a large upturned nose, slumped into the old, threadbare red leather sofa watching “The Kardashians” and drinking a beer. She barely acknowledged him when he entered. “You’re home early,” she said.

            Karl removed his leather jacket and threw it on the radiator. He sat down next to his girlfriend on the sofa and began to watch the television disinterestedly. “What did you do today?” he asked, almost sarcastically.

            “I cleaned,” was the self-evidently sarcastic reply. Karl reached for the twenty-four pack of Miller High Life on the table, took one, opened it, and took several large gulps.

            “I got pulled over,” he said. “I have a court date next week.”

            “That’s terrific.”

Karl took another swig of beer. On the television one of the Kardashian girls was trying on a skimpy dress for her boyfriend.

            “Yeah,” said Karl, “terrific.”

            “I suppose there will be a fine?” Sharon asked.

            “Most likely,” said Karl. “Unless I can get out of it somehow.”

            “Yeah,” said Sharon, “that’s likely.”

            Karl put his unfinished beer on the table, got up, and went into his room. He lay down on his bed, and stared up at the cracks on the ceiling. He could hear the sound of the mice living above him, scratching at the wooden panels. The sound of the TV could be heard from behind the closed door. I don’t like this one. Too pink. I need something with a little more...character. He closed his eyes. He saw the face of a child, contorted with pain. Blood was flowing from the child’s nose. He opened his eyes, got up, removed his clothes, and hopped in the shower. While washing himself, he suddenly found himself sobbing.

            There was a knock on the door.

            “What?” he cried out.

            “Are you crying?” asked Sharon.

            “No,” he said. “You’re imagining things. Go to bed.”

            As if amused, Sharon pressed him further. “You were crying, weren’t you?”

            “Fuck off!” Karl cried.

            Sharon laughed a snarky laugh. “Have it your way...crybaby.”

            Karl hurried up and finished in the shower. He felt just as tense when he left the bathroom as when he had entered it, thanks to Sharon’s rudeness. He prepared himself for bed. Sharon, no doubt, would be sleeping on the couch tonight, as she did most other nights. He turned the lights off, got into bed and closed his eyes. There was no point. It was useless. He couldn’t sleep. He turned on the light and rolled out of bed. He opened the cabinet in his nightstand and took out the half full bottle of Jack Daniel’s, opened the top and put the bottle to his lips, taking several large gulps. He drank on the edge of his bed, gasping, till he felt utterly sick. Then he lay back down. He closed his eyes. Again, he saw the bloody face of a young boy. He could no longer tell if the boy was him or the one he had seen earlier that day. It no longer mattered. Soon, a distant memory came back to him—the sound of the ocean filled his ears, and he saw the waves crashing onto the beach, and his mother, young and beautiful, pulling him along. A calm came over him, and he fell asleep.

It turned out that Karl was let off very easy. Due to the fact that he was a first time offender, and that his blood alcohol level was just barely over the legal limit, the judge refrained from fining him for a DWI, and instead mandated him to attend a two-day state run educational program at a hotel near Indianapolis. There would be a relatively small charge to attend the program, but he would be allowed to keep his license, and more importantly, his record wouldn’t be tarnished. While Karl was not looking forward to attending this program, he was relieved nonetheless.

Since Karl’s bike was still impounded, Sharon gave him a ride to the hotel in her beat-up, tan station wagon. They drove mostly in silence, Sharon with an air of pensive indignation, Karl thinking to himself how nice it would be to get this time apart from her.

Arriving with ten minutes to spare (programming began at nine in the morning) Karl got himself a cup of coffee in the lobby and followed the sign into the small conference room where the program was being held. About sixty people were crammed around several tables in the room. Large windows lined the back wall, and up front, behind a table, stood several people with nametags. When the conversation in the room began to die down, a tall man with scowling features and large, owl-like eyes began to speak in a deep, sonorous voice. He said his name was Tom, and introduced the other facilitators, a middle aged woman with a bob haircut and pointed sideburns that framed a snooty little face, and an elderly man with silver hair, a wide friendly smile and small, furtive eyes that rested safely behind thick-lensed glasses. Tom explained that everyone who had brought medications were required to put them in a plastic bag and hand them into the staff so that the taking of the drugs could be moderated. The people with meds came up and did as they were told. Then, rooms were assigned, two people per room. As the names were called, the individuals came up to the front of the room and were given their keys.

As Karl waited for his name to be called, he observed the other participants of the program. They seemed to be mostly regular people, like him—white, working class, simply dressed. There were several outliers, however. A black teenager, for example, dressed in baggy jeans and a black tee-shirt, and a strange young man with a mousey appearance. Karl’s name was called, along with the name, David Levy. Karl looked around the room. The strange young man he had noticed earlier had risen. The first thing Karl noticed about him was that he was wearing a green skullcap, the kind of which religious Jews call a yarmulke. As he studied him closer, the more and more peculiar he seemed. He was very thin—Karl noticed that his wrists were so thin that he could most likely break them with one hand—and dressed formally. The legs of his pleated khaki pants did not quite reach his conspicuously old and dilapidated sneakers, and his black button down shirt was tucked in. He walked with short, brisk steps, leaning forward, holding himself stiffly, as if he were trying to disguise the fact that he was paranoid of something, and his dark, sharp little eyes kept darting up and down nervously over and through dirty lenses of his glasses, as if he weren’t sure of his footing or whether what he was approaching was safe. His thin red lips were extraordinarily delicate, and pressed together in such a way that it seemed he was struggling to keep his tongue in check, and his skin was milky white, giving him a sickly, almost ghostly, appearance. A feverish, nervous energy surrounded him, and when Karl looked at him, he felt a surge of disdain and mockery run through him. Karl and David took their keys and headed out into the lobby. David followed Karl at his heel in silence, the way a wounded dog follows his master.

They reached the second floor and found their room, a small, two bedroom suite with a typically low, white plastered ceiling and floral wall-papered walls. After laying his bag on the twin bed, Karl went to the bathroom. When he came out he found David seated in a chair near the window, staring into space, a thick book and a writing pad on his lap. Karl approached him and held out his large hand.

            “I’m Karl,” he said.

David looked up with stern, cautious eyes, took Karl’s hand with his small, moist hand, and shook it meekly. “David,” he said.

His voice was low, quiet, and immature sounding, yet Karl sensed a quality of depth to it, as if it were the voice of a very old man’s pretending to sound like an adolescent’s. It didn’t seem to match his immature face, or his slight build.

“What’s that you’re reading?” asked Karl, turning away to open his suitcase. He began to unpack.

“It’s the Tenach.”

Karl gave him an inquisitive look.

“The Bible. To be exact, The Book of Job.”

“Sounds familiar,” said Karl, taking out a pair of jeans and laying them on the bed. “Job was an innocent man who God punished for nothing, right?”

“It wasn’t for nothing,” said David. “He wanted to test him.”

Karl thought he sensed an air of pride in David’s voice, as if he actually believed himself to be God, and somehow that made Karl the unwitting Job.

“Oh, that’s right,” said Karl, brushing off David’s presumptiveness. “So what are you reading it for, a class?”

A wry smile appeared on David’s face. “No, I don’t go to school. I’m reading it for inspiration. I’m a poet.”

“A poet?” Karl was taken aback. The occupation of poetry, it had always seemed to him, was a needless one. He considered poetry to be silly by nature, and imagined that poets themselves must be silly people. In any event, the idea that he would ever meet a poet seemed completely unlikely, and yet, here one was, and he did not seem at all silly to Karl.

“What kind of poetry do you write?” he asked, surprised at his own curiosity.

“Spiritual poetry. I hope to one day have my work used for prayer services.”

Karl eyed the green skull-cap on his head. It seemed to be made of silk and glistened in the bright fluorescent light. “You’re Jewish?”

“That’s right.”

A poet and a Jew? He wondered what other strange qualities this young man possessed.

“Is there much money in that?” he asked. “Poetry, I mean.”

“Actually, no,” said David. “There is no money in it.” Again, Karl sensed a misplaced pride in David’s pronouncement. He was beginning to sense a real smugness about this young man.

“So how do you make a living, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“I don’t make a living, at the moment.”

Karl looked at him scrupulously. He probably lives with his parents, he thought, which, he thought, was actually rather sad. Then he remembered seeing David in line when the medications were being handed in for later distribution, and wondered if there might not be even more to the story.

 “I see,” he said. “So do you ever share your poems?”

“To anyone who asks,” said David.

“Can I hear one?” he asked, amazed by his own curiosity.

“Absolutely.” David opened his backpack, pulled out a large spiral notebook with a bright green cover, and opened to a page about mid-way through. “It’s untitled,” he said. “All my work is untitled.”

Karl nodded. David cleared his throat, and spoke in a clear, melodious voice:

“To live, and to die,

To breathe, and to give breath to the world,

To first and foremost believe

In that which we cannot see but feel

And to know, and to live,

In peace, love, joy, harmony

Is to know God, to be with God always,

To breathe, to give breath, to love, to know, to see.

That is not the mystery, but the plain truth,

Clear as the sun that rises,

Clear as the moon, and the stars, and the lover’s eyes.”

David closed his notebook and looked up at Karl, waiting for a reply.

“It’s interesting,” said Karl. “I’m not sure what it means, but it’s interesting.”

David smiled, as if satisfied. “It doesn’t matter so much what it means,” he said. “It’s how it makes you feel that counts.”

This take on poetry was new to Karl. His only experience with it had been in high school, and then the teachers had only asked him to analyze its meaning. There was something comforting about what David had said about poetry.

“It made me feel good,” said Karl.

“Good,” David replied.

As Karl continued unpacking, he thought to himself that, although the poem had initially made him feel good, as he had said, it also stirred something in him that caused him great pain. It stirred in him that very thing that for a long time had been rising ever so slowly and which now was coming to a simmer. The poem, in a word, had triggered his conscience.

When Karl finished unpacking (David himself did not unpack his bag), they went back downstairs to the conference room for the beginning of the program. When they entered, the room was half full, and Tom, the facilitator, stood waiting solemnly with his arms crossed in the front of the room. Karl watched as the room filled up with people. He noticed a woman that looked like his girlfriend, only younger and more vibrant, seated at the next table. She looked at him and a slight smile ran across her face. Karl smiled back, and she looked away.

When everyone had come in, and the conversation began to dwindle, Tom, the facilitator, began to speak. “It’s not my job to make you feel guilty,” he said, “but to lead you on a path towards a better life.” After his introduction, he began giving the class a long list of statistics and other facts regarding alcohol and drunk driving. Mostly, Karl tuned this out. Honestly, he did not think he had much of a problem with alcohol, and certainly did not think he was at any risk of developing any serious diseases because of it. However, when Tom began to talk about what even moderate amounts of alcohol could do to one’s body (as well as mind) he began to listen, and when Tom showed images on the projector of an alcoholic’s brain and liver, he actually became disturbed. “Some of you might think just a few beers here and there won’t hurt you,” he said. “But alcoholism comes in many forms. Sometimes, just like any other disease, it can seem small and harmless at first, but if it isn’t kept in check, you might end up with mush for brains.”

After Tom’s presentation, a good-looking middle-aged man in a wheelchair came up. He explained that he had been in a car accident caused by a drunk driver nearly twenty years ago. It had left him a paraplegic and killed his younger brother, who had been sitting next to him in the car. At the end of his talk, he read a poem about his brother. When he began to weep near its end, Karl felt completely humbled, if not touched.

After this, there was a break for lunch.

Karl got his food at the buffet and went out to the outdoor seating area behind the hotel, where it was warm and the sun was shining bright, and they had a view of the forest nearby. He looked for the young lady who he had made eye contact with earlier, but finding her at a table already full of other women deep in conversation, he thought better of it, and looked for David instead. He came over and sat at the round stone table equipped with a wide umbrella where David sat eating alone. “Hey,” said Karl, sitting down. David quickly glanced up from his plate just enough to show that he noticed Karl’s presence. “Hey,” he said quietly, looking back down at his plate. He continued eating. Karl followed suit. After a while, Karl began to feel uncomfortable with the silence. He looked up at David. “They’re really laying it on thick,” he said, trying to lighten things up with his modest wit.

David didn’t look up. “No more than I expected,” he said, his face buried in his plate.

Karl continued eating. Finally, he looked up and turned to look at David. He seemed so modest, so reserved as he sat hunched over his food. He couldn’t resist his curiosity any longer. “You know,” he said, “you don’t really seem like the type to get a DWI. How did you end up here?”

David looked up. “You’re right,” he said, smiling wryly. “I don’t even drink. For me, it was prescription pills that got me into trouble. I had taken my meds for the night, and I decided to go out for a milkshake. In the parking lot I ran into someone’s car. They called the cops, and they cited me.”

“Prescription pills?” said Karl. “Do you mind me asking what you take them for?”

“I am schizophrenic,” said David.

Karl nearly winced. There was a schizophrenic that used to come to the bar Karl frequented. They called him “Crazy Lenny.” He was a grimy, wild-eyed man whose belly often hung out of the front of his dirty tee-shirt. Often, he would sit by himself in the corner and talk to himself, or sleep, drooling. Once, he had accused Karl of having sex with his mother, and had nearly swung at him. The barkeeper along with several members of the gang had to throw him out. But David seemed nothing like this man. Though David certainly wasn’t the most normal person Karl had ever met, he didn’t seem crazy. He seemed sensible, and completely calm. In fact, there was something almost otherworldly about his calm.

They finished their meals in silence and went back in for the second part of the program. The first presenter was a man in his mid-thirties, dressed in a tight, red, Mickey Mouse shirt that clung to his paunchy form, and a Cincinnati Reds baseball cap. He had survived a car crash caused by a drunk driver several years ago, and the damage done to his brain made his speech difficult to understand. However, Karl, and everyone else, had no problem understanding the frustration and pain he felt in regards to what had happened to him. He had been studying psychology at a community college upstate, and was entering his last term when the accident occurred. He finished his presentation with a refrain, which he said several times over with a progressively rising voice each time: “You don’t know what you got,” he said, and snapping his fingers, spoke the prophetic words: “until it’s gone.”

After that, a man affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous gave a presentation. This man was of medium height, shabbily dressed and overweight, with a bushy brown beard. He had a soft voice and looked at the ground as he spoke, seemingly embarrassed by his confession. He looked exhausted, as if on the verge of collapsing. It seemed to Karl that he had given up his pride for the sake of sobriety. But then again, as the man said, he had been on the verge of death, so perhaps the sacrifice was worth it.

After this, for the last hour Tom talked about his own experience with alcoholism. He said at one point he was drinking three cases of beer a day. Karl thought he sensed some pride in Tom’s pronouncement of this fact, based on the way his eyes lit up and he smiled when he said it. Either that, or he was just sheerly amazed that he was able to conquer such a powerful addiction.

“But let me tell you how I quit,” said Tom, tempering his enthusiasm. “I was convinced to go to alcoholics anonymous by a friend. I went, listened to the people speak, and thought, what a bunch of fucking losers. Only, the next day, I went to work and I started talking to people—openly—and I couldn’t stop. I admitted things to my coworkers that I wouldn’t tell a shrink three years earlier. I talked and talked. When I got home, I opened a beer and took a swig, and I spat it out. I couldn’t take the taste of it. It made me sick. I threw out all my beer and haven’t had a drink since.”

Karl grunted to himself. It seemed like an unbelievable story. Could a man change so suddenly? There was something almost miraculous in this story, and Karl did not believe in miracles. Of course, he realized that the change had indeed happened, though it may not have happened the way Tom said it did. And that in itself was amazing, if not miraculous.

“The point is,” said Tom, “some of us in this room are trying to control their lives through the use of alcohol and other drugs. They think it gives them power. But the fact is, none of us are in really in control of our lives. The moment we realize that and run with it, we can truly start living.”

As Karl listened to these words, he asked himself, what is it he’s really talking about? He looked over at David, who seemed to be listening raptly to Tom’s words. Was it God? Was that what he was talking about? Perhaps so. And yet, he did not say the word itself. Maybe he was afraid to, thought Karl— afraid that if he did speak the word, its essence would leave his body and leave him once again at the mercy of the monster in his mind that he called addiction. Tom fielded some questions and then the group was excused for the night. Karl left the meeting feeling rather tired, and looked forward to taking a nap before it was time for dinner.

After Karl’s nap, he went down to dinner, which was already well under way. The room was filled with people and it echoed with the sound of chatter. He went to the buffet, filled his plate, and looked around the room. He located the young woman from before—she was seated alone near the corner. David didn’t seem to be present. He approached the woman and sat down across from her. “Hello,” he said. “I’m Karl.”

She gave him a friendly smile. “Hi, Karl. I’m Theresa.”

“This is some program they’ve got here,” said Karl, feeling instantaneously that it was a lame thing to say.

“Yeah,” said Theresa, sensing his shame. “What do you do, Karl?”

“Me? I’m a bouncer.” (This wasn’t a lie. He often worked security at Curly’s Bar.)

“Oh,” said Theresa. “That makes sense.” Seemingly nervous, she began staring down at the floor. “I noticed your jacket earlier,” she said, suddenly looking up at Karl. “Are you in some kind of gang?”

“I am,” said Karl. “The Rabid Dogs. It’s a biker gang.”

Theresa nervously forced the exaggerated smile of a woman desperately trying to avoid being taken advantage of. “Well, I have to go. It was nice talking to you, Karl.”

Theresa took her plate, which still had a good amount of food on it, and left. Karl felt utterly humiliated. He finished his meal in silence, wondering to himself where David might be.

After dinner, Karl returned to his room to relax. That night, the hotel had come alive like a mad house on a full moon. The young men and women, their hormones raging (and some of whom were only dressed in their underwear), were filling the hallways with the sound of their gossip and flirting. The older men and women mostly stayed in their rooms, except for the smokers, who occupied the courtyard, smoking and talking. Karl lay in bed reading, trying to ignore the commotion out in the hall. Soon he began to wonder where David could be. Was it possible he was out there socializing with the rest of the people? Karl doubted it. More likely, he was somewhere on his own. Just as these thoughts were percolating, he heard a key in the door.

David walked in, looking as he always did—as if he were deep in a trance. He greeted Karl silently and set his pen and notebook on the desk and sat down in the armchair with a quiet grunt.

“Where have you been?” asked Karl.

“The woods,” David replied.

Karl looked at the notebook on the desk. He pictured David out in the woods, reciting poetry euphorically to himself. “Get some good writing done?” he asked.

“I think so,” said David. Karl waited for him to say more. Instead he screwed his mouth up tight and began to stare.

 “I’m sure you got a lot of good material from today,” said Karl, feeling ridiculous at his own ignorance (he had no idea as to how a poet got their material).

“Actually,” said David, “that had no real effect on it. If it was anything, it was the moon. It’s full tonight.”

Karl laughed to himself. “No wonder everyone’s acting so wild,” he said.

Expecting David to be amused by his comment, Karl studied David’s face. A cold, sad smile crept across it as he looked down at the floor.

“Is it hard,” asked Karl, “being schizophrenic?”

David looked up at him, smiling more brightly now. It was the most honest display of joy he had displayed in the whole time Karl had known him. “My life can’t be any harder than yours,” he said.

 “That’s true,” said Karl.

“You’re in a gang?” asked David.

Karl gave him an inquisitive look.

“I could tell from the jacket.” David nodded toward the denim vest jacket next to Karl on the bed that had the gang logo sewn into the back.

Karl nodded.

“What’s that like?” asked David.

“It’s not easy,” said Karl, stretching his arms behind him as he released the tension associated with this truth.

“How so?” asked David, pryingly.

“Well...” Karl set down his magazine and crossed his arms over his chest. (Remembering the details brought the tension back.) “I’m an enforcer,” he said. “It’s a little like being a police officer. Actually, it’s probably the hardest job there is in a gang.”

“I see,” said David. It was evident by the tilt of his head and his forward posture that he wanted to hear more.

“Like recently,” continued Karl, gesturing with his large hand, “I went to go collect some money from this guy who owed the gang, like, over ten thousand dollars. Only he wasn’t at his house. He had skipped town a couple of days earlier. But his family—his wife and two young sons—they were there. So I did what I was told to do in that situation.”

There was a pause. Karl looked down, staring intently. He looked over at the magazine on the bed beside him. On the cover was a beautiful red and black Harley Davidson with gold exhaust pipes. Finally, he spoke. “We beat them up—all of them, then raped the wife and forced the kids to watch.”

Speaking these words, he felt a surge of remorse run up from the pit of his stomach to his heart. This had been the first time he had opened up about it with anyone in a serious manner.

David sat, pondering silently for a moment, as if in a trance. Then, he opened his notebook, and finding a page, began to read. David looked up and listened intently to David speak:

“Blessed are those who know the cause of their pain

For they are on the path to redemption.

Blessed are those who wear their scars for all to see

For their shame is for God’s eyes alone.

Blessed are those who work to repair the world,

For only they can see its perfection.”

Karl sat absorbing these words for a long time. He could not at first identify the meaning of them, but his heart instantaneously knew what David was trying to say. It was like a challenge, without admitting to be so. A challenge for his will—to change his life, to remake himself in David’s image. Or so it seemed to him. How could he respond?

“You have a lot of talent,” he said. “It’s going to take you far.”

“I don’t plan on going very far,” David said, smiling knowingly. “But that’s not important.”

“Don’t you have any dreams of seeing the world?” asked Karl.

“I did once,” said David. “I still long to...” He cut himself off, seemingly embarrassed.

“What?” asked Karl.

“It’s just that, years ago, a voice began to tell me that I must go to Israel. I thought it was the voice of God. I tried to follow that voice, but was unable to. After so many years, the voice has faded, though not completely.” David paused, then tilting his head in consideration, began to speak again. “It’s the Motherland,” he said. “I do long to go, only...I’m somewhat afraid.”

“Why?” asked Karl.

“Well, you see...You know how they say God works in mysterious ways? At the time when I heard the voice of God telling me to go to Israel, I thought of myself as a prophet. Only, what came out of my mouth was not prophecy, but rather, unjustifiable invectives—in other words, madness. I was bitter. I hated my fellow man. If I had had a message that would save them, I wouldn’t have spoken it aloud. But, God was giving me a choice. Either I could abandon my life of privilege and become a pilgrim and try and work my way to Israel without any money, without any resources—in other words, continue to be a madman, only a different kind of madman— or (and this is the understanding that I came to later) I could translate God’s words figuratively. Instead of physically going to Israel, I could bring my soul there through artistic expression. And that is what I chose. Perhaps it was the easier route, but it’s been hard nonetheless. Anyway, the reason I’m afraid to go to Israel is because...I’m afraid of losing touch with the reality that I’ve found...here—in this country.”

Karl narrowed his eyes in thought, his brow deeply furrowed. “But don’t you think,” he said, “that that same reality exists in Israel?”

David smiled. An even more pure smile than before. His eyes showed warmth, and gratefulness. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m almost certain that it does. The fact is, the real reason I can’t go to Israel is because I don’t have the money.”

Karl almost laughed. After all of this mystique, he thought, he’s a regular clown. “That’s a good reason,” he said. “Maybe some day, you’ll get the money you need.”

“I’m not getting my hopes up,” said David, smiling to himself at the idea of it.

That night, Karl slept fitfully, awakening repeatedly from frightening dreams. In one of these dreams, he dreamt that he was walking on a beach as a boy, holding his young mother’s hand. It was morning, and the sun had just risen over the water. His mother’s beautiful red hair flew about in the breeze, and her smiling gaze was fixed on Karl. Then it was suddenly mid-day, and Karl and his mother heard the sound of rumbling behind them. As the rumbling grew nearer, Karl recognized the sound as something familiar, and grew afraid. A group of motorcyclists, perhaps the members of his gang, flew by them, and his mother suddenly disappeared. He then found himself in a desert as a grown man, crawling through the sand. The sun beat down on him; his throat was parched. Ahead of him was Sharon, urging him to get up. Then, she too disappeared, like a mirage, abandoning him as hopeless. Karl felt as if he was going to die of thirst, and then he heard another strange sound. It was the sound of David’s voice, speaking a poem of which he could not make out the words. The poem, it seemed, was calling for him to get up, and just as he felt his whole body was about to dry up and turn to dust, he awoke. In the bed next to him he overheard David talking to himself in his sleep in a strange foreign tongue, and he found himself terribly thirsty. He got up, went to the bathroom, and drank a cup of water. As he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror, he again remembered the woman and children he had violated. He could not get back to sleep.

The next day was difficult for Karl. He was exhausted from lack of sleep, and had a hard time staying awake throughout the morning’s programming. Fortunately, the program ended earlier that day, and the coffee that he drank for breakfast gave him just enough energy. The last major presentation of the program was given by a deputy from the sheriff’s department about the official driving laws of the state, including the laws concerning DWIs. Tediously detail-oriented, the presentation consisted of various graphs and other statistical information, as well as official law documents produced by the state. Karl was relieved, and barely awake, when the presentation was finished. To cap off the program, Tom gave a closing speech, expressing his hopes that everyone had gained something from the program. And then, much to Karl’s chagrin, he handed out certificates of participation to everyone, supposedly to give the program an official air. To Karl it just seemed ridiculous.

When the program was done, Karl and David walked out of the hotel together and stood in front of the yard near the entranceway to wait for their rides. It was another beautiful day, and as he waited, Karl thought about what he and David had spoken of last night. Karl’s impression of the young man had changed since he first saw him a day ago. Karl understood that he had probably suffered a great deal, and he believed this suffering had given him a rare kind of wisdom. He wanted to believe that the world had great things in store for David, and pictured him walking along a beach in Israel, completely at peace.

He turned to his companion. David’s dark eyes were squinting against the sunlight as he stared out at the road. His skin looked paler than ever. “I hope you make it to Israel,” Karl said, breaking a long silence between them.

“Thank you,” said David, without moving his gaze. Karl thought David was on the verge of saying more, but instead his eyes just glazed over, he screwed his mouth up tight, and continued staring.

“You’ve made me think about a lot,” said Karl, again breaking a long silence. David looked up, now with a hint of surprise in his slightly raised brow. “Something’s got to change,” said Karl, as if to himself. “Something’s got to change.”

When David’s mom arrived in her blue Previa mini van, Karl asked him if they could stay in touch.

“Sure,” said David. “Why don’t you write me?” David wrote down his address on a piece of paper and gave it to Karl. Karl thought this somewhat odd, but he was beginning to look past David’s idiosyncracies. They shook hands. He thought David’s grip seemed stronger and more sure of itself than when they originally met. Karl watched David get into his mother’s van, which drove off at what seemed to Karl an abnormally slow pace.

Karl had been told by his girlfriend that she would pick him up at twelve o’clock. She was a half an hour late, and Karl was not surprised. Everyone else had left when her old, beat-up station wagon pulled up to the curb. Karl loaded his bag in the back seat and climbed into the passenger seat of the car. The floor of the car was covered with trash and it smelled like cigarettes. Karl was not a smoker, but Sharon often smoked with her friends in the car.

Karl was eager to talk about his experience, but Sharon showed no interest. She immediately began telling Karl about how Reggie had some important news for him, and began speculating excitedly as to what it could be. “Somebody’s getting their ass handed to them,” she said. “I could feel it by the tone in Reggie’s voice. My guess is that they found Fat Willie. Either that or some bitch broad’s been talking to the cops again. Whatever it is, you’re gonna’ have to forget all that goodie-two-shoes bullshit you absorbed this weekend...fast.” The weight of Sharon’s words kept Karl’s tongue prisoner behind his clenched teeth. They drove the rest of the way in silence, and as Karl sat watching the highway light polls fly past, his mind stewed over the events of the weekend—the confessions of Tom and the other former alcoholic affiliated with AA, and, of course, the conversations he had with David. He tried to reconcile these memories with the cold fact of the duty he would soon be fulfilling for his gang, but found it impossible, and he shoved them both apart in separate corners of his mind. For now, he was just focused on getting home, having a meal, and taking a shower.

That night, after waking up from a long nap, Karl went to the bar, as Sharon had been instructed to tell him to do. There he found Reggie and several of his cohorts drinking in a corner. The table was strewn with empty beer bottles. They were very drunk, though to one who did not know these men they would have appeared completely sober. “Have a seat,” said Reggie.

Karl sat down.

“Somebody go grab Karl a beer.”

“No thanks,” said Karl. “I’m not drinking.”

Reggie gave Karl a disquieted look.  Karl was on the verge of explaining himself, but he held his tongue, realizing that refusing a drink would add no further strain to their already cold relationship.

 “So what do you have for me?” said Karl.

Reggie quickly glanced around at the other men’s faces, which were stretched into wicked little smiles. Reggie himself appeared on the verge of laughter. “We found Willie,” he said.

He stood up, reached into his back pocket and pulled out a square piece of white scrap paper. He sat back down and laid the paper on the table in front of Karl. Written on it was an address. “Get what you can,” he said. “You know the drill.”

Karl took the paper and left. The “drill” which Reggie had spoken of was this: Karl was to get whatever he could out of Willie, then kill him, and whomever he was with. He had done this before. In fact, he was an experienced killer. Only now, he felt unprepared. Why that was he couldn’t say. Perhaps it was the experience with the woman and children. Perhaps it was David. Most likely it was a combination of the two. But whatever it was, when Karl left the bar that night, he found himself both angry and scared. Angry at Reggie—not for his ruthlessness, but for his arrogance and manipulative nature—and angry at himself for allowing himself to lead such a wasted life. He was scared because something told him that he wouldn’t be living that life much longer.

The next night, Karl made the three-hour ride west into Illinois where Fat Willie was hiding out. He took with him his knife and a .22 caliber handgun. At one point on the ride there, Karl thought about a line from one of David’s poems: “Blessed are those who know the cause of their pain, for they are on the path toward redemption.” He had the idea that he was getting closer and closer to the cause of his pain, and that when he reached it, he would be redeemed. But this hopeful feeling quickly faded, replaced the same anger and fear as before.

It was around three in the morning when he entered the small desolate town where Willie was hiding. The town consisted mostly of trailers and moveable houses. There were almost no trees at all, and the sidewalks were made of dried, sand-colored dirt. He stopped in front of a white, dilapidated wooden house with floodlights hanging from the corners of a square roof. He got off his bike, walked up the single step to the door, and knocked. There was no answer. He knocked again, harder. Finally, he heard Willie’s voice. “God damn it! Hold on!”

A short, stocky man in his mid forties, with long, bedraggled, graying black hair, some of which was thinly braided and bound with little red beads, answered the door. He was dressed in blue and white boxer shorts and a wife beater. He looked up at Karl with the sunken, perpetually sullen eyes of an alcoholic, and his bright red lips parted, showing large yellow teeth.

Recognizing Karl, Willie began to slowly back away from the open door. Karl shouldered his way in, and glared menacingly at the petrified man before him. “Karl,” said Willie meekly, under his breath.

Karl looked around the room. The floor was covered with stains and empty beer bottles. The TV was blaring a ridiculous entertainment news program, and the couch was made up with sheets and a pillow. He fixed his gaze on Willie. “Where is it?” he said.

Willie began to stammer, his eyes wide, searching for a safe reply. Karl pulled out his .22. Willie’s eyes shut. “I’ll get it,” he said.

Karl followed Willie to the bedroom at the back of the house. The whole place smelled putrid, like vomit and stale beer. Karl literally couldn’t avoid kicking the mass of beer bottles on the floor. Lying naked under the covers of the bed was a young, somewhat attractive woman bearing on her face the marks of physical and emotional abuse. She wrapped herself in the blanket as the two men entered the room. “What’s this?” she said.

Karl glared at her. “Get up,” he said. The woman did as she was told, not without embarrassment from having to expose her naked body. Karl told her to kneel next to the bed.

“What are you going to do?” she asked fearfully.

Karl hit her over the head with his gun. “Kneel!” he said. She knelt, covering herself with her arms. Karl turned to Willie and glared at him. Willie, understanding that he was nearing his end, nodded. He went to the dresser, opened the bottom drawer, and pulled out a large yellow envelope. This he gave to Karl. Karl threw the envelope on the bed. “Count it,” he said. Willie went and stood by the bed, opened the envelope, and counted the money inside. It was just over eight thousand dollars, nearly two thousand short of what Willie owed the gang.

“I can get you the rest,” said Willie. “You just have to give me more time. Please, I...” Karl put the gun to his head. Willie closed his eyes. The woman, reaching out her arms in terror, cried out, but it was too late. Willie fell forward onto the floor, dead.

 Karl approached the woman and pointed his gun at her head. “Please,” she said, turning around to face Karl. “I’ll do anything.” Willie looked at her face, noticing the bruises and the heavy lines under her eyes. He remembered another line from David’s poem: “Blessed are those who wear their scars for all to see, for their shame is for God’s eyes alone.” He lowered his gun. The woman remained kneeling on the floor. He walked to the bed, replaced the money in the envelope, took it, and left.

He went back outside. None of the houses nearby were stirring. The street was almost completely empty, except for a few cars. He got on his bike, and turned on the engine.

As he rode, the rest of David’s poem came back to him.

“Blessed are those who know the cause of their pain

For they are on the path to redemption.

Blessed are those who wear their scars for all to see

For their shame is for God’s eyes alone.

Blessed are those who work to repair the world,

For only they can see its perfection.”

Karl’s eyes began to well up with tears. Something inside of him had broken.

Karl returned to his home early that morning. Sharon was still asleep on the couch, snoring with a bottle of whiskey cradled in her breast. Karl quietly packed a bag full of clothes, and stuffed the envelope with Willie’s money at the bottom. Searching through his nightstand, he found the piece of paper with David’s address and put it in his pant pocket. He left just as day was breaking.

He got on the highway going west, and did not stop for almost two days. Once in Las Angeles, he found a cheap motel, and went to sleep. When he awoke the next day, he sat down to write a letter. It read as follows:

Dear David,

I never would have thought a poem could change my life. I suppose I needed things spelled out for me. You deserve to go to Israel, and who knows, maybe Israel deserves you. This ought to cover it.

Your friend,

Karl

            Karl went to the post office and purchased a small box. Into this he put the letter he had written, along with five thousand dollars cash. He addressed the box to David, and sent it.

           

It didn’t take long for Karl to settle into his life in Las Angeles. He found a job working as a bouncer at a nightclub, and rented a small apartment in a low rent area of Hollywood. One night, after work, he escorted a beautiful woman back to her apartment. She was drunk, but Karl resisted the urge to sleep with her. She gave Karl her number, and he called her the next day. They fell in love and were soon married.

Not long after this, while searching through a bookstore for a gift for his wife’s birthday, he came across something that grabbed his attention. It was a book. He pulled it from the shelf and read the title: Poems from Israel by David Levy. He turned to the back and saw David’s photograph. Karl smiled. He turned the book over and opened to the first page. There, in the middle of the page, was a dedication: “For my friend, Karl Lusk, who knows the cause of his pain.”