PALINDROME by Lawrence Kelter Page A

all
costs. There were billions of people in the world, yet Ax and I
were truly alone. No other two people possessed what we possessed,
and although we could look like anyone, we were like no one else. I
didn’t have to say thank you. My emotion was there for him to see
in my eyes. “Face forward and pretend you’re interested in the
lecture. He’ll never know that you don’t belong in the class.”
    “Okay.” Ax turned and faced the lecturer and
spoke without looking at me. “I still don’t know what to do about
the money, but the fact that you deposited the check into our bank
account kind of takes the decision out of our hands. Everything
comes at a cost, and I’m worried that the cost of this money will
be great.”
    “We’ll have to deal with it, whatever it
is.”
    “We always have.”
    “So what now? What do we do?”
    “There’s nothing to do but wait for the fight
to come to us. Either it will or it won’t. Maybe we’ll get lucky
and nothing will come of it. Let’s just live our lives cautiously
and take one step at a time.”
    “We’re survivors.”
    We fist bumped. “Survivors,” we said
together.
    I started to giggle and had to cover my mouth
to conceal the noise from the lecturer. I was thinking about the
spastic events of the day, tripping at work and taking a syringe in
the head. I mean c’mon, it’s funny when you think about it.
    “What’s so funny?” Ax asked as he turned his
gaze back to me.
    I shrugged and kept my mouth shut, but Ax
understood from my expression that I had another bomb to drop on
him. He rolled his eyes. I could see that he was preparing himself
for another emotional blow.
    “What already?” he said.
    “It’s nothing, just something funny that
happened at work. I’ll tell you later.”
    “Your expression betrays you. It doesn’t look
like nothing .”
    “I slipped at work and accidentally stuck
myself in the head with a syringe of lidocaine. I’m fine.”
    “You call that nothing? Your life forces are
out of balance. That’s why these things continue to happen. Don’t
you understand? The altercation at the bar, slipping and injecting
yourself with poison; it’s caused by a spiritual imbalance.”
    “It’s a fluke, nothing more than a random
series of events.”
    “And maybe it’s God, acting incognito.”
    “God acting incognito? Whoa, reaching deep,
aren’t we?” We were drawing attention from nearby students, who
heard us quarreling. “Let’s get out of here.” I stood and left the
lecture hall. Ax followed.
    “Maybe we should think about leaving town
again,” he said.
    “No way, I’m so close to my degree I can
taste it.”
    “You can always transfer your credits. We’ve
done that before.”
    “No!” I said loudly. A student passing in the
corridor turned to look at us. “No,” I whispered, adjusting the
level of my voice. “Let’s just stick to our plan and take one day
at a time. I like living here.”
    “I like it too, so don’t create a reason for
us to have to move again. Long Island’s not the first place we’ve
liked, and it’s not the first place we were forced to leave.”
    “How can we leave? We have an actual home
here. It’s not the same as before.”
    “Aunt Sue’s condo? It’s a material thing. It
means nothing.”
    “How can you say that? It’s our home and the
first decent place we’ve had in a long time. I don’t know about
you, but I’m getting too old to sleep in a car at the Home Depot
parking lot. You would have to leave the dojo!”
    “I can practice my art anywhere, in a dojo or
in a dumpster, my surroundings are immaterial.”
    “Well, I’m not as Zen as you are.”
    “No,” Ax said, “you are not Zen, but you can
benefit from Zen wisdom.”
    “Meaning?”
    “Try the Chinese medicine. Be the change,
Lexa. Can you do that? Can you be the change? It’s a basic Zen
principal: don’t wait for things to change. Do it yourself. Be the
change.”
    “I’ll try.”
    Ax gave me an