May We Be Forgiven

them take off their coats. “Better range of motion,” one fellow says. The men and women take positions along the rope, five men up front and then male, female, male, female, until the end, which is again all male. There are some who sheepishly stand off to the side and repeat their excuses—knee replacement, two hips, a shoulder eight weeks ago, quadruple bypass. There are a few boys in casts, on crutches, one in a wheelchair, and I wonder, was he in the chair before he came to the school or did it happen here?
    I am watching and suddenly remember George and me playing tug-of-war, me pulling with all my might and then George suddenly letting go and me flying backwards, crashing through a window—ending up essentially sitting in the broken glass. “I’m still a mess from yesterday,” I say to Nate. “So I’m going to pass on this one.”
    “No worries,” Nate says, hurrying off to secure his spot on the line.

    A shot is fired—I glance up and see the Headmaster holding an ancient pistol. The air stinks of gunpowder, and his hand is singed black and appears to be smoking.
    The contest has begun. I become fixated on a woman in a boiled-wool jacket, her hair band pulling dyed blond locks out of her face, her lips rolled back, teeth clenched, pulling on the rope like her life depends on it.
    “I notice you keep staring at my wife. Do you know her?” the man sidelined with an amputated half-leg asks.
    “She looks familiar,” I say, not because it’s true but because I have nothing else to say.
    “She’s a Middlebranch,” he says. “The family goes back a very long way—one of them was Ben Franklin’s roommate in France in 1753—kept one hell of a journal.”
    “How did you meet?” I ask.
    “I was a student here, and she and two gals from Emma Willard came over to visit her brother. Odd that you marry someone that you meet at fourteen, don’t ya think?” he says.
    “Might be the best thing, there’s great clarity in youth,” I say.
    “Why aren’t you pulling?” he asks.
    “Stroke,” I say. “You?”
    “Goddamned colostomy,” he says, patting his stomach through his coat. “Had cancer the size of a grapefruit and they rerouted everything. They swear they’re going to reconnect the pipes, but I’m not so sure how.”
    A groaning sound from the line distracts us. Someone splits his pants, a woman grinding down breaks a tooth. The adults pull and pull and pull, digging in as intractably as toddlers. Each side is so determined, so sure not only that they will win, but that in winning, in defeating the other, there is some greater gain.
    “Pull,” the man on the parent side calls.
    “Pull,” the boy on the student side calls.
    “Pant,” one of the women calls, “remember your Lamaze.”
    The seams of the Middlebranch boiled wool are pulling, stretching—white fibers, threads, are showing. It is truly a power struggle, and I get the feeling the parents are the ones desperate to prove something, what or why I’m not sure. And then, suddenly, as it all seems about to explode, the boys have the rope and are doing a strange improvisational victory dance across the lawn—Martha Graham gone wrong.
    The parents gather themselves up and dust themselves off, and the weekend is suddenly over. Within minutes, the fathers and mothers are hugging their sons, bidding them adieu.
    Nate gives me a powerful squeeze and thanks me for coming. “Let me know you get home safe,” he says.
    “Will do,” I say.
    As I’m walking to the car, the man married to the Middlebranch tells me this is the way it goes—the adults rarely win. And the academy likes to keep the parting short and sweet: the boys will finish the weekend with study hall and a suckling pig for dinner, that’s the tradition. Tomorrow is Monday, a school day, and these future captains of industry, titans of banking, orthopedic surgeons, and accountants to the stars all have homework to do.

    I quickly settle back into the routine at George’s house, and on Thursday evening, as I’m relaxing, rereading John Ehrlichman’s Witness to Power, George’s psychiatrist telephones.
    “We’ve reached a second stage. The team thinks it would be useful for you to come and spend some time with us.”
    “In what capacity?” I ask, fearing that I’ll have to somehow “enroll.”
    “Think of it as a supervised playdate,” he says.
    “Can I leave if I’m not having a good time?”
    “In theory, yes,” he says.
    “In