Two or Three Things I Forgot to Tell You (21 page)

“Nadia Stillinger. Maybe I should have
guessed. . . .”

“Why do you say that,
Adrian?”

“Because Nadia is—has
been—talking to me quite a bit after class lately. She's a bright girl, but very
insecure. Physically she's mature, but in other ways she's very
young.”

“Is this girl attractive?”

“Attractive? I—really can't
say.”

Adrian didn't want to say yes. And he
didn't want to say no.

“How would you characterize your relationship
with her?”

“Relationship? Why—nothing out of the
ordinary.”

“Just the sort of relationship a teacher would
have with any student?”

“Y-yes.” Strictly speaking, this was
probably not true. But Adrian swallowed hard and resisted the impulse to explain further.

“Then why did the girl give you a birthday
present, Adrian—worth three million dollars?”

Three million dollars! Adrian was
astonished.

Thinking what a story this would be, related to his
friends. And on his twenty-seventh birthday, which would have been, otherwise, a not very
exceptional birthday.

“I—don't know, Mr. Nichols. I
think that Nadia is a little excitable—impressionable.”

“In what way excitable,
impressionable?”

“She tends to be a little more emotional than
most students. She seems always”—he hesitated, not wanting to say
breathless
,
yearning
. Not wanting to say
pleading
,
adoring
—“very intense about whatever
she's talking about, as if it had a personal meaning to her. Scientific ideas, for
instance. . . .”

Mr. Nichols spoke in a neutral voice, as if he were
making no judgment, only just stating facts: “Personally, I don't know Nadia. I
certainly know of Roger Stillinger, her father, but I've never had the pleasure of meeting
him. I seem to remember a quite glamorous young woman—the girl's
stepmother?—bringing her to school for an interview, before her application was accepted; and
this young woman, Mrs. Stillinger, has come to a few PTA meetings, I think. Nadia's father is
CFO at Univers Pharmaceutical. I make it a point to know such things. And he's very upset, as
you can imagine. He demanded that I call you at once and tell you to bring his painting back to him,
and the bag it came in, immediately—or he has threatened to call the Quaker Heights
police.”

Adrian Kessler, who'd been standing in a
doorway, felt his knees grow weak. He fumbled for a chair and sat.

“Call the
police
?
Did you say—
police
? Mr. Nichols, I didn't steal the
painting—the girl left it in my car—she didn't even give it to me, certainly I
wouldn't have accepted it. And I didn't even know who'd given it to me until a
minute ago, when you called—how could this possibly be my fault?”

“No one is saying it's your fault,
Adrian, in any way. But people can file complaints with the police without evidence. Mr. Stillinger
is angry and suspicious. He spoke very aggressively—he may have been drinking. He claims that
you must have exerted ‘undue influence' on his daughter, and that you've been
seeing her after school in your office, to discuss ‘personal'
matters.”

“No. This all wrong. Give me Mr.
Stillinger's address, please, Mr. Nichols, and I'll return the painting right
now.”

“And the bag. The gold bag it came in.
Don't forget that.”

 

Shame! Nadia hid away in her room, wanting
to die.

Her face was still smarting from Amelie's slap.
Her eyes welled with tears of hurt and indignation.

Her father had called Headmaster Nichols. In a
sniggering voice outside her shut door, Amelie had told her that her teacher was
“returning” the painting—as if Mr. Kessler had been the one to have taken
it.

Oh! Oh God. Poor Mr. Kessler, humiliated.

Because of her, humiliated.

He would hate her now. He would never feel kindly
toward her again.

Anxiously Nadia waited. Every few minutes she checked
her iPhone to see if there might be a message from Mr. Kessler, but of course there was
not.

Then, at 9:12 p.m., she saw headlights turn into the
driveway outside. On the lighted front walk there was a man hurrying—Mr.
Kessler?—Nadia wouldn't have recognized her teacher wearing sweatpants and a nylon
parka, carrying the gaudy gilt tote bag with an object inside.

How unfairly Mr. Kessler was being treated. Nadia
could imagine what harsh, insulting, unjust things her father had said to Mr. Nichols about
him.

Nadia hoped that Mr. Kessler wouldn't bring the
silly little birthday card to show her father, too.

What a reckless thing she'd done! Yet at the
time it hadn't seemed reckless at all but a sweet, intimate, playful gesture—if only
Mr. Kessler had known who “Dani A.” was.

Nadia heard voices downstairs. Her father's
voice, and another voice she had to suppose was Mr. Kessler's, not so loud. She stood in the
doorway of her room, listening without daring to breathe, but she couldn't hear distinct
words.

She wondered—would Mr. Kessler ask to speak
with her? Her father would never allow it.

Amelie hadn't apologized for slapping Nadia.
She'd seemed to have forgotten immediately.

No one had ever struck Nadia before. Not even her
father on those occasions when he'd been in a rage at her.
Only a brute
will strike a child—
Nadia had heard this somewhere.

Nadia remembered how Tink's mother had slapped
her
.

You'd have expected, from Tink's brash
manner, that she'd have reacted more assertively against her mother, but she hadn't.
Poor Tink had pressed her hand against her stinging cheek in silence, just as Nadia had
done.

Nadia wondered if, after Tink had
gone away
, her mother even remembered having slapped her in front of her friends.

Nadia ventured into the corridor, to the top of the
stairs. Her father had commanded her to “stay in your room,” but she had to hear what
was being said downstairs.

. . .
claims you touched her. Talked of “personal things” in your
office.

. . . claims you
“comforted” her, after you made her cry. In your office, after school. When no one
else was around.

. . . claims you drew
her into talking about her mother. Which is none of your goddamned business. Taking advantage of a
naive, immature, impressionable girl.

Mr. Stillinger's deep, angry voice. And there
came Mr. Kessler's less forceful voice protesting,
No . . . no . . . not like that.

Nadia listened anxiously. She hadn't been able
to eat much that day—she was light-headed, dizzy. Biting at her thumbnail and seeing the
bloody cuticle.

. . . misunderstanding,
Mr. Stillinger. Believe me. Nothing like that.

Cautiously Nadia descended the stairs. The adults were
standing in a room that opened off the foyer, that Amelie called a “drawing room”; no
one was seated. Mr. Kessler hadn't even been invited to remove his nylon parka. On a table
was the Kandinsky painting, which had been unwrapped and no doubt carefully inspected by Mr.
Stillinger. Also on the table was the gilt bag, which looked cheaply glamorous now, like something
you might purchase in an airport store, though it had originally cost seven hundred
dollars.

How strange it was to Nadia to see Mr. Kessler in her
house—in gray sweatpants, parka, and running shoes. His hair was disheveled, and he seemed so
young
—many years younger than her dominating father, and younger
than Amelie. Though Mr. Kessler was the tallest person in the room, Mr. Stillinger outweighed him by
many pounds.

As Nadia moved to the doorway, her father's
eyes shifted to her with a look of pained surprise and disgust.

“Nadia! Haven't you caused enough
trouble? I've told you—
stay out of this
. The painting has
been returned—the situation is under control. Mr. Kressle is about to leave, but this
isn't the last he will hear from me. I intend to file a formal complaint with the headmaster,
and if Nichols doesn't cooperate, by which I mean a disciplinary hearing, I will file a
report with the police. Touching a distraught girl—provoking her to tears, and to personal
disclosures—will not go unnoticed.”

Mr. Kessler protested, “Mr. Stillinger, I
explained to you—
I did not
—”

“My daughter doesn't lie, sir. It will
be her word against yours.”

Mr. Stillinger's eyes glared in his flushed
face. Even his ears were reddened. In calmer circumstances Nadia would have sensed that, though her
father spoke threateningly, it was possible that he wasn't entirely serious—he liked
to intimidate, and to frighten, but it wasn't like him to pursue an issue once he'd
won and had forced others to capitulate to him. His intention was to assert his dominance over his
daughter's much-admired science teacher, and humiliate the man. He enjoyed, too, playing the
bully in the presence of his young wife.

But Nadia was too upset to register this. She pleaded,
“Daddy, no! Mr. Kessler did not touch me—not my hand and not
anywhere
. He
did not
. He
did not
cause me to cry—I was crying before I went to see him. None of it was his fault—it was
my own crazy idea to give him a birthday present. It won't be my word against his—and
you can't make me testify against him.”

Adrian Kessler turned to stare at Nadia. He was trying
to smile but looking agitated as Nadia had never seen him.

“Why,
Nadia . . .”

“I'm so sorry, Mr. Kessler! I n-never
meant to—I wasn't thinking . . .”

Nadia's father turned to her angrily.
“Turn around and go back upstairs, Nadia. Immediately.”

Mr. Kessler objected, “Don't speak to
Nadia like that, please, Mr. Stillinger. She's upset, she's been under a good deal of
strain—this isn't the way to handle the situation.”

“And who are you? What business is this of
yours? You can leave our house now, Mr. Tressle. Just—leave.”

“Mr. Stillinger—”

“You've caused enough disturbance in
this household for the time being—taking advantage of an unstable adolescent girl.
Please—just leave the premises.”

“I don't think you should frighten your
daughter as you are doing, Mr. Stillinger. You don't need to raise your voice to her. Nadia
may have acted impulsively and immaturely, but she didn't do anything really serious, and
your precious painting is back with you unharmed.”

“If you don't leave immediately, Mr.
Tressle, I will call the police. Or I will eject you bodily. Which do you prefer?”

“Are you threatening me? Are you threatening
Nadia? If—”

“Get the hell out of my house, you
pathetic—prep school teacher!”

Mr. Stillinger pushed at Mr. Kessler's chest,
forcing him backward. Both men were panting, and for a moment it looked as if Mr. Kessler might push
back at Mr. Stillinger—then the younger man thought better of what he was doing, and backed
away.

“If they hurt you, Nadia—tell me. They
have no right to terrify you or harm you—”

“Out! Get the hell out! You—child
molester!
Pervert!
”

Mr. Kessler left. Nadia ran to the front door of the
house to follow him, but Mr. Stillinger gripped her arm to pull her back.

“Mr. Kessler—take me with you!
Please—take me with you! I don't want to stay here with them. Mr. Kessler!
Please . . .”

Mr. Stillinger yanked Nadia back, as if she were a
limp cloth doll. And Amelie, cursing under her breath, slammed the front door.

Through the buzzing in her head Nadia could hear Mr.
Kessler's station wagon kick into life and depart.

Red taillights diminishing into the darkness, beyond
Wheatsheaf Lane.

Nadia was unresisting now. She was not even crying
now. Her furious father and her furious stepmother were saying terrible things to her, spitting
terrible words at her. Nadia scarcely heard, and scarcely cared. She was suffused with shame; they
could not hurt her further. In a few minutes they would banish her upstairs to bed—as if she
were a small child. As if she were six years old, defenseless. They would deprive her of her cell
phone and of her laptop. They would punish her, for they were ashamed of her, and hated her. And
Nadia had not the spirit to resist. She had not the strength to tell them,
I
don't love you—you can't hurt me. I wish I was with Mommy. I wish that Mommy
had taken me with her—that's where I belong.