Mitzvah Man

15

At music camp Lisa is getting looks. The kids are talking. All the time, the kids are talking. When she gets to the computer late in the evening, her inbox is stuffed with emails. Her friends from school, even Annie, are all flurried up, gossiping, sympathizing, pretending to sympathize. Her so-called friends at camp love it, this story; they talk about it over lunch or waiting for Ms. Panzica to come in for the lesson in music theory. They’re so thoughtful, so concerned— the rats. She’s dying to talk to someone who really, really understands. At camp she has Maisie and her pianist friend Anthony, who’s so sweet to her—nobody else. One Sunday evening, after the once-a-week special dinner the camp takes pride in—each table gets a small roast turkey, and she feels nauseated looking at the dead birds and can’t eat a thing—she calls Talia Rosenthal to ask about Dad; it’s good to hear her voice. Talia says, “Your dad seems okay to us.” “Really, really okay, Talia?” “I mean it, dear. He’s busy with his foundation. His friend in New York—Ben somebody?—” “Ben Licht. He’s real nice.” “He’s a lawyer? He’s helping set up the foundation. Along with a local lawyer. It turns out to be a long process, applying for tax-exempt status. You know what that means?” “So people can give money and take it off their taxes as charity.”|15| “Right. Your dad came over for dinner earlier this week, and Lisa, dear, truly, he didn’t sound so peculiar. He’s working hard. Oh . . . he talked a bit too much about God’s grace—nothing else unusual. There’ve been stories on the news and in The Herald, they blow it up—you know? Your dad has become . . . an icon of magical power. Lisa? Are you okay?” “Okay, I guess. . . . You know.” “No. That’s the point, dear. I don’t know.” “Sometimes everything feels so weird. Here. To be here away from things.” “You need to come home?” “Maybe. No. No. Talia? I wish he’d just shut up around those news guys. You don’t know what it’s like. You know what they’ve been saying at camp? According to a bunch of my so-called friends, he fought off four or five men with guns and said God gave him the power. I called Dad—he says he never, never said that. I know he never said that. But I keep hearing this stuff. All I want is to play music and be at camp the way I used to.” It gets so when she’s not playing music, she hides out with a book or a sketch pad. She’s begun being furious at everybody in advance. If they talk about it, she hates it; if they don’t, they’re pretending. Suppose she’s making too much of it and they really aren’t pretending. But she’s playing well. She’s sure it’s because of her mother’s instrument . But when Miss Cole puts her in First Trio for the concert, is it because she’s good, or is it a way to comfort her? That Friday night the trio plays awesomely. Next morning in the big, sunny dining room made out of a parlor and a library when it was a summer estate for a rich Boston family, she gets lots of nice comments; then one of the girls at the cool table, a blonde wearing a tee shirt with “Smart Blonde” across the front comes over and puts down a print-out from a Herald article she found on-line. The girl puts a hand on her shoulder and reads as Lisa reads: Mitzvah Man Beats Lottery John J. Clayton 174 | The story tells about an unemployed hi-tech manager, down and out, who got a ten-dollar bill and a lucky number from Adam Friedman and won thousands of dollars. “‘Man’s got the magic. I knew it. God tells him. I bought a suit and kept some cash, but I gave the Mitzvah Foundation its share,’ Mr. Wright said.” “I can’t believe what a cool guy your father is,” the smart blonde says. But her voice is telling this to the whole camp, and Lisa can smell the hostility. “God! A real, live...