The Ghost in Love (31 page)

“I am.” A big fat annoying fly had been buzzing around them for some time. Stanley pointed a finger at it and the insect instantly dropped out of the air as though it had been shot. He smiled and said, “Special effects.”

Ben repeated the words slowly because he wanted to try them out on his tongue. “The Angel of Death.”

“That's me.”

“You were with a woman that night in the pizza place.”

“Ling. I was there with Ling.”

“Why are you here now?”

“I don't know, Ben. Why
am
I here?”

“Who sent you?”

“I'm here because you just summoned me.”

“I did?”

“Yes. And them too.” Stanley pointed over to his car. Inside, it was full of people. Ben and German gawked because they were certain no one else had been in there before.

“We're all here because you called for us, Ben.” Stanley nodded toward the car as the doors opened.

The passengers got out. Ben did not recognize any of them. They stayed together on the other side of the street, watching and waiting.

“Who are they?” he asked.

German answered, “I know who they are,” and went down the
stairs to the street. She was smiling. Ben tried to catch her eye but she only looked toward the blue car.

Puzzled, he watched her go. She crossed the street and walked over to Stanley's car. Five people greeted her enthusiastically and with great affection. German hugged one woman and then a thin man in a green shirt. Someone said something and they all laughed. German kept reaching over and touching arms and elbows: sign after sign that she knew each one of these people well and was delighted to see them. Ben caught snatches of lively conversations but not enough to discern what was going on. Frustrated, he turned to Stanley and asked again, “Who
are
they?” But he wasn't really asking the other man so much as the universe at large.

“Figure it out for yourself,” the Angel of Death said and poured more wine into both their glasses.

“How does German know those people? How come I don't?”

“Figure it out for yourself.”

Someone bent down into the car and a moment later music started playing. A piano began slowly, a few lonesome notes that little by little opened up into a waltz. Ben immediately recognized the tune because it was one of his favorite pieces of music: Scott Joplin's melancholic waltz “Bethena.”

The man in the green shirt opened his arms and German moved into them. The two of them began waltzing right there in the middle of the street. The other passengers stepped back and watched, smiling. A little while later the woman German had embraced earlier cut in and the two women waltzed together.

Ben looked at Stanley. The angel shook his head no: I am not going to tell you anything.

What else was there to do but go over and find out who these
people were? Maybe they were all minor angels of death—Stanley's assistants. Or Angel of Death roadies who set up the equipment for Stanley's different productions. But how could German know them? These thoughts churned around in Ben's head as he walked in the direction of the crowd. Before he had a chance to reach them, another woman from the group stepped forward and asked him to dance. He looked at her but saw only a stranger.

“Do I know you?”

“Come dance with me.”

“But do I
know
you?”

Saying nothing, she took his hand and led him over to the others. Looking at Ben, German waved and grinned. It was the first time she had smiled at him in so long. The two couples glided in the waltz's formal circles around and around that tree-lined street. It was such an odd but amusing thing to do in this wrong place. German had taught Ben to waltz when they lived together, so he had no problem doing it. His partner was a nimble dancer but remained silent and only smiled with her eyes closed as they whirled in and out of light and shadow. Halfway through the piece Ben began to smile too. Weird as it was, waltzing on a city street with this stranger in the middle of the day was a memory he knew would live in him a long time.

When the tune ended Ben thought, Okay
now
. But immediately another song came on—something entirely different. Zouk music: “Bay Chabon” by Kassav'. The festive Caribbean music Dominique Bertaux loved so much and introduced him to when they were together. Its mood was the exact opposite of the solemn “Bethena.” Zouk music made anyone jump up and dance all out. You had to—it was that infectious. Caribbean, African, and South American beats swirled together in one frantic jumping sound. The first time Dominique
played it for him, Ben was so impressed that he listened to her Kassav' tape three times in a row. German had the same reaction: She loved zouk music from the first.

Now every one of the passengers from Stanley's car started dancing, whether they had partners or not. They walked out into the street and started moving, gyrating, twisting, dipping. It didn't matter what you did: hearing zouk filled you with the best kind of life energy and a need to dance it out however your body felt like moving. Some people waved their arms or hopped from one foot to the other. A man high-stepped in a big circle as if he were in a marching band. Another did the twist too fast and lost his balance. Everyone dropped their guards, opened their doors, and danced as though no one else were there—danced like it was the last thing they'd ever do. They danced their joy.

Ben's partner threw both arms straight up in the air, tipped her head back and whooped at the top of her lungs. The whole moving scene was nuts and loonier by the moment, but it was happy-nuts, so let's just dance and forget the rest for the moment.

Stretching both arms out to his sides, Ben began spinning around like a Sufi dervish doing a Sema. The spin was too slow for the music but that's what his body felt like doing, so he went with it.

Before closing his eyes to drop deeper into the music and the whirl, Ben glimpsed Stanley at the top of the stairs watching everything with a big grin on his face. He held the wine bottle in one hand and a glass in the other, and both were empty. He was sort of penduluming from side to side in time to the music. The Stanley dance. The Angel of Death dancing, ladies and gentlemen.

Ben shut his eyes and spun. And quickly bumped into someone. The breath. Before he had a chance to open his eyes, Ben smelled this other person's breath and it was so intimately familiar, so reminiscent
of something memorable but illusive, that he kept his eyes closed to concentrate on the smell to work out what it was.

When the recognition struck, spontaneously he said, “It's
ful
!”
Ful medames
, the fava bean dish people eat for breakfast in the Middle East because it's tasty, filling, and very cheap: fava beans, garlic, olive oil, parsley, and onion. Simple to prepare and often delicious. Whoever was standing near him now, their breath smelled exactly like
ful
. Before opening his eyes to see who it was, Ben remembered the last time he had prepared the dish.

It was his first date with German Landis. He had invited her over to his apartment so he could cook dinner for her. They had met several nights before in a public library. She was sitting by herself on a couch in the reading room surrounded by books on Egypt. Among them was a large cookbook of Middle Eastern cuisine. She was preparing a unit on Egyptian art and culture for her seventh-grade students. Watching from afar, Ben was attracted both by her looks and the fact that this handsome woman read Middle Eastern cookbooks.

Mustering his courage, he walked over and asked if she liked
ful
. She looked him straight in the eye and asked, “Do I like
full
? What are you talking about?” He pointed to the cookbook and said no,
ful
, assuming she'd understand the connection. Anyone interested in Middle Eastern cuisine would have to know about
ful
. It was one of the most ubiquitous national dishes in that region, like hot dogs in America or Wiener schnitzel in Austria.

When German's facial expression moved from I'm listening to guarded, Ben managed to keep the conversation alive by describing exactly what
ful
was and the first time he ever tasted it, on a back-street in Alexandria, Egypt. She asked why he'd gone there. Ben said because he loved
The Alexandria Quartet
by Lawrence Durrell. After finishing it in a reading frenzy, he knew he had to go see the city and
experience it for himself. Particularly the famous new library there that looked like a giant flying saucer. By coincidence, German had just been reading about that library and poring over pictures of it. In due course she invited him to sit down on the couch.

So the first time he cooked for her, Ben decided to prepare
ful
as an hors d'oeuvre. He taste tested it three times before she arrived just to make sure it was perfect.

Touched by his thoughtfulness, German took a taste of the stuff. Revulsion flashed across her face. Seeing this, Ben panicked and told her to spit it out, spit it out. But there was nowhere to spit except into her hand. German had good manners and managed to swallow the warmish library paste without regurgitating it as she had done on occasion in the past when she accidentally ate something awful.

Ben was so shaken and embarrassed by her reaction that he ruined the rest of the meal. He'd planned everything so carefully, but in the end it would have been better if he had called out for a pizza because everything he served after the
ful
was overcooked or under-cooked or simply tasted
off
. The meal was a total disaster and both of them knew it. When it was over and neither had taken more than a few bites of the chocolate
Palatschinken
, which tasted of far too much espresso (his secret ingredient in the recipe), they put their spoons down, careful to avoid looking at each other. Since he had begun cooking seriously years before, Ben had never made such a thoroughly rotten meal.

German stood up. He thought she was going to the toilet. Then for a worrying few seconds he thought, No, she's leaving! How can I stop her? What can I do?

Instead, the tall woman walked around the table until she was standing directly behind him. She put both of her hands on top of his head. Leaning down, she kissed one of them loudly. She did it that
way because she didn't have enough nerve to kiss him directly. She said, “Thank you for making all this,” and walked out of the room.

Ben picked up the dessert spoon and wiggled it upanddownandupanddown between his now galvanized fingers. That from-out-of-nowhere kiss and then her thank-you knocked him flat. How was he going to keep her here? What could he do after this fiasco to make her stay and see that he wasn't a total loser?

He needn't have worried. In his bathroom German stood in front of the mirror, hands pressed tightly to her sides, staring at her reflection while on the verge of tears. That's why she had walked away from the table after the kiss. She was overcome and didn't want him to see her cry if it came to that. No man had ever made this kind of effort for her before. And even better, on a first date, when they didn't know each other. How beautiful just the salad alone was. Or the unmistakable care he'd taken in arranging everything from the flowers to the way each course looked on the plate.

Who
was
this guy? A man who went to Egypt because he read a description of a city in a novel and was captivated enough to actually go there? German didn't know anyone who did such gutsy, impulsive things, male or female. He'd made that bad-tasting
ful
just because he wanted her to see and taste it. The tender hesitant look on his face when he brought it out and told her what it was. How could you top that on a first date? His actions were as kind as his eyes. What was she going to do now? How could she tell him that he'd already won her heart three times before they'd even tasted that bitter dessert?

She managed. Later that night, after they went to bed for the first time, a strange but pleasant thing happened to her. After they were both exhausted and in that idyllic state of drifting in and out of sleep together, German remembered Mr. Spilke. It made her smile because
she hadn't thought about the man in years. Why did he come to mind
now
?

Her seventh-grade earth science teacher, Mr. Spilke with his never-ending array of green shirts and passion for inspiring young people. He loved science, teaching, and his students. Eventually most of them grew to love him, too, because he was such a good guy and his gusto for his subject was contagious.

In bed, German turned to her brand-new lover. Touching her fingertips to his warm cheek, she mumbled, “You remind me of Mr. Spilke.” Ben smiled but was too tired to ask who she was talking about. How peculiar that here in bed—sated, raw, and content—she would think about her seventh-grade science teacher, but that's what happened. Before falling asleep on Ben's outstretched arm, German realized why: although she didn't know this Benjamin Gould very well yet, he exuded the same kind of bigheartedness and generous enthusiasm as Mr. Spilke. Which was a very good sign, because that teacher was one of the few who had genuinely affected German Landis's life and helped to make her the woman she was. Part of the reason she became a teacher was because of the way Spilke had made learning an exhilarating adventure, even when his subject did not interest her at all.

In life there are only a small number of people whom we choose to keep in our hearts. Over the years a lot come in and go out: lovers, family, and friends. Some hang around for a while, and some want to stay even after we have ordered them to leave. But only a handful, no more than two handfuls if you're very lucky, are welcome forever. Mr. Spilke was one of these people for German.

And that's exactly who Ben saw when he opened his eyes on the street in front of Danielle Voyles's apartment building: Mr. Spilke, the man in the green shirt, whose breath now smelled like
ful
.