Hussein, also pasted on foam core. The UN had passed its resolution against
Iraq at the beginning of November and the inspectors were now over there,
hunting for weapons of mass destruction. It was assumed war had been safely
averted, despite the sword rattling by the White House. The crisis had come
and gone without ever really mussing the hair of college life.
Maureen dropped by Daniel’s office to chat before she went home for
Christmas break. She had no new gossip to report.
“No more babysitting for the Rohanis?”
“Nyaah, I think they’re too embarrassed to invite me back.”
“Do you know if they’re staying in town over Christmas?”
She didn’t think they were. Mr. Rohani had asked their class if anyone
knew the art scene in Toronto. She got the impression that he and his family
were going up there to see relatives over the holidays.
“I didn’t know he had family in Canada.”
“Don’t quote me,” she said. “But that’s the impression I got.”
On the final day of the semester, the school began to clear out at noon. By
five it was like a ghost college, a school of the dead. Daniel took a long walk
around campus to soak up the melancholy. The winter dusk provided a good,
thick, familiar sadness. It was like being back at the George School, a Quaker
prep school in Pennsylvania that Daniel had attended in tenth grade, where
E x i l e s i n A m e r i c a
2 2 7
he was alone and miserable and often in love. He crossed Jamestown Road to
Chandler Court, walked through the gate, turned right, and strolled toward
the duplex rented by the Rohanis. If Abbas or Elena saw him out here, so be
it. Let them think he was a stalker, a prowler, a pervert. But the house under
the tall stand of cedar trees was pitch-black. The car was gone. Daniel went up
on the porch and saw two or three days’ worth of mail jammed into the box.
So Maureen was right. The Rohanis had left town. No wonder the college
felt so empty, not just a ghost college but like a haunted house after the ghosts
had been exorcised. No wonder his sadness felt pleasant, not like real pain
but like the first love of adolescence, when you’re pleased to discover you’re
not heartless after all.
When he got home, he asked Zack if Elena had said anything about visit-
ing Canada.
“No. But we’re not in constant contact. Despite how it might look.” He
hesitated. “If it were a long trip, I would think she’d tell me. It must be a short
visit.” He sounded worried.
“I’m sure they’ll be back. I’m actually glad they’re gone. I’m just surprised
neither of them said anything to anybody.”
Over the next few days Daniel noticed that he and Zack were gentler with
each other. Daniel didn’t do anything deliberately: it just came out differently.
He was on vacation now and used his free time to read in the morning and do
errands in the afternoon. He bought a tree and set it up in the living room
while Zack was at the hospital. Daniel loved the novelty of evergreens in the
house, the fresh, sappy outdoor aroma. The smell only depressed Zack, who
reported that Christmas trees looked especially grim at Eastern State. He
might’ve ruled out having a tree at home except he’d learned that the absence
of decorations in the house made his patients nervous. They didn’t care if
their shrink were an atheist or Jew or Buddhist, so long as he celebrated
Christmas.
One night there was a special screening of Orphans of the Storm on Turner
Classic Movies. Daniel and Zack watched it together, transfixed. A silent
melodrama, as shameless as Dickens, it told the tale of two sisters, one of them
blind, separated by the French Revolution. The climax was the rescue of the
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C h r i s t o p h e r B r a m
sighted sister, played by Lillian Gish, just as she sticks her head under the guil-
lotine. “What a movie!” Zack said afterward. “It plays your emotions like a
harp. When Lillian hears her blind sister crying in the street, you’re so deep in
the scene you hear the voice yourself, even though it’s silent.”
Daniel adored him for responding so strongly to the movie. We still can’t
talk about love, he thought, but we can talk about movies. Which wasn’t a bad
thing, was it?
31
Zack ? Zack ? Wake up, Zack ,” a voice whispered. “Zack, baby. You’re
gonna love this.”
Zack opened his eyes. He was surprised to find Daniel in his room, on his
bed, still wearing his sleep sweater and red plaid boxers. The light on the ceil-
ing was odd, a pale, clear, shadowless glow. Zack sat up in his nightshirt and
looked out the window over his headboard. Everything was blank outside, va-