Erich Segal - The Class

He had spent his last few days with Eva agonizing over what to do about them, and had reached no satisfactory conclusion. She felt he should drive out to Long Island and see them. So much more could be accomplished in a face-to-face confrontation. They could look into his eyes and perceive his commitment. That could change everything.

But it was easier for her to say than for him to do. He knew he had caused his parents heartache. And whatever the rights or wrongs of his actions, he still felt guilty.

Yet, one thing Eva told him gnawed at his consciousness: “You’ll never make peace with yourself until you make peace with them. One way or another, you have to free yourself or you’ll never grow up.”

“But I’m nearly forty years old,” he had protested.

“All the more reason for you to become a full-fledged adult,” she had replied.

Still, Jason sat in his hotel room that afternoon unable to pick up the phone. Instead, he put on his newly acquired summer-weight suit and went out for a walk. He told himself that he was ambling up Fifth Avenue merely to stare in shop windows at all the luxuries no Israeli could afford. Yet, when he reached Forty-fourth Street, he knew that what had drawn him there was the Harvard Club.

He hadn’t paid his dues for years, but he talked his way in by fabricating the excuse that he would be meeting Andrew Eliot upstairs in the gym.

He took the elevator to the fifth floor and checked the squash-reservations book for that afternoon. Sure enough, at 5:00 P.M. there was a court assigned to “A. Eliot ’58.” He glanced at his watch — only twenty minutes to wait.

Andrew could not believe his eyes. He was ecstatic.

“My God, Gilbert. You haven’t changed at all. I mean, the rest of us are losing hair and growing paunches and you look like a goddamn freshman. What’s your secret?”

“Try active duty in the army for ten years, Eliot.”

“No, thanks. I’d rather be safe and fat. Want to play a little squash? You can have my court and my opponent, who’s just an overweight stockbroker.”

“Thanks. I’d love to — if you can get me some gear.”

“No sweat, old buddy,” Andrew replied jauntily. “Then can we have dinner afterward?”

“Doesn’t your wife expect you home?” Jason inquired.

“Not exactly. But that’s another story.”

It was really great to see Jason Gilbert again after all these years. And also a bit disconcerting.

On the one hand, the guy has barely changed physically. He still looks like a twenty-year-old athlete, making me feel more like a middle-aged slob than I already do.

And yet there was something strangely different about him. I search for the appropriate adjective, but the only thing I can come up with is “somber.” While he’s obviously happily married and adores his kids, he seems to have lost something of his old joie de vivre. I mean, he smiles a lot when we talk about the escapades of the past. But he never laughs. Nothing seems to amuse him now .

Of course, I’m aware that he’s been through a great deal these past few years — most of which he avoided talking about. I mean, when your fiancée is murdered and you’ve been in the thick of a real shooting war, that’s certainly reason enough to be somber. But I sensed there was something more bothering him, and I tried my best to dig it out. At one point he said, “I’m really lost, Andy.”

That kind of shook me. Because if there was anyone in The Class who I thought knew what he was doing and why, it was Jason. I mean, he’d dedicated himself to a cause and sacrificed a lot of the glittering prizes that would have come his way if he had stayed in the American rat race. After all, he was the best rat in our whole damn pack.

I got a glimpse of what was weighing heavy on him when I told him how the press — and even the man in the street — admired the exploits of the Israeli Army in the Six Day War. It was kind of a David and Goliath that really captured the American imagination.

To which he replied that the media must have glorified it. Because no matter how much you believe in what you’re fighting for, it’s a terrible thing to take another person’s life. He was having trouble living with the awareness that there were probably kids in the world he himself had orphaned.

I replied that it must be pretty hard to be a soldier if you have thoughts like that.

He looked at me with a sadness in his eyes that I’d never seen before and said softly, “It’s impossible to be a soldier and a complete human being.”

Up till then, I was convinced that I and our other classmates were feeling the weight of the world-stalled careers, mortgages, divorces, custody fights, rebelling kids — and all the stuff of which middle-age crises are made.

But, unlike the rest of us, still in hot pursuit of fame and fortune, all Jason wants to do in life is be a human being.

And he’s far from certain he can do it.

During his first week in New York, Jason had to face twelve different audiences, ranging from a few political leaders to more than a thousand Friends of Israel at a luncheon in the Biltmore Hotel.

There were more than just “Friends” at the gathering. During the question period, several New Left sympathizers attacked him vehemently for representing an “imperialist nation.” He calmly replied that, far from aspiring to empire, Israel wanted only to be a democratic country just like any other. And — in his personal opinion — would surely relinquish territory in exchange for the Arabs’ acknowledgment of her right to exist.

For a long while afterward, crowds clustered around the podium. Talking to him. Shaking his hand. Wishing him well. Finally, there was only one couple left.

He was standing face to face with his father and mother.

Each of them was afraid to say the first words. But the glances they exchanged spoke eloquently. Of admiration and affection on their part. Of relief and love on his. Of the passionate desire for a reconciliation on both sides.

“Hello, Mom, Dad. It’s… good to see you.”

“You look wonderful, Jason,” his mother said softly.

“Yeah,” he replied. “I guess danger agrees with me. You guys look pretty good yourselves. How’s Julie?”

“She’s fine,” his father answered. “She’s in California. Married a lawyer from Santa Barbara.”

“Is she happy?”

“Actually, she and Samantha will be moving back this summer. When the divorce is final.”

“Again?”

His father nodded. “Julie hasn’t changed.” He then added hoarsely, “We… we’ve missed you very much, son.”

Jason hopped off the platform and put his arms around his parents. For a long moment they held this triangular embrace.

“Do you have time to come out to the house?” his mother asked.

“Sure, I’d really like to.”

The next evening at dinner he showed his parents pictures of Eva and their two grandsons. They were very moved just to see them and delighted that his marriage was so successful.

“Can we keep any of these?” his mother asked.

“Keep them all,” Jason offered. And then confessed, “Actually, I brought them for you.”

Just after eleven, his mother pleaded tiredness and excused herself, leaving Jason and his father alone for the first time in ten years.

Jason was the first to speak. “Dad, I know how much I must have hurt you and Mom —”

“No,” his father interrupted. “If there are going to be any apologies, let me go first. I was wrong not to respect your convictions.”

“Please, Dad.”

“No, let me finish. You’ve taught me a lesson about our heritage. I realize that it’s possible to be one-hundred-percent American and at the same time still be a Jew. The Six Day War was a catalyst for a lot of people like me. There was such a sudden outburst of pride.…” He paused.