Chapter 20

Jack returned home from his first day at the college. He had spent the morning in the personnel office filling out papers and learning more about the job benefits. He had spent the afternoon in the office of the college president replacing carpet. He had finished installing the carpet twenty minutes before quitting time and had spent the rest of his time there learning his way around campus. All in all, it had been a pretty good day.

He parked his car and looked over at the community house. Someone had installed the solar panels on the roof that day. So far that house had been a lot of work and it wasn’t done yet. The roof had been repaired and the damaged interior framing had been replaced. Enough of it was done that they were using the house, but he still needed to put up the sheetrock on the interior walls. Money was very tight on the project, but the need for the house had become obvious to everyone.

Looking at the house reminded him that he had promised Dave that they would get the sheetrock up for the small office in the back of the house that evening after dinner. He was going to have to ease off and only work on the weekends with his new job. He hoped that wouldn’t be a problem for the other members of the commune.

Abby was at home when he came in the front door and asked, “How was it?”

“It was okay,” Jack answered. He was afraid of sounding too enthusiastic. There was a nagging fear that it couldn’t be that good and the bad news was lurking around the corner to catch him unaware.

“That’s good,” Abby said understanding that he didn’t want to tempt fate by being too enthusiastic.

Jack said, “I’ll get my first paycheck next week. They said that it would be for my first week only, but I didn’t expect to get paid for three weeks so I’m pleased about that.”

“That’s great,” Abby said looking over at him. He really looked relaxed and moved around easily.

“I’ve even got a dental plan,” Jack said shaking his head. He was going to have to go to the dentist as soon as he could afford it.

“Wow,” Abby said envious of his benefits. She got to eat a couple of tacos and a soda for lunch as her only job benefit.

Jack said, “Well, let me change out of these clothes and into something I can get dirty. Dave and I are going to put up some more sheetrock in the community house after dinner.”

“I’m shopping tonight,” Abby said holding up her list. It would take her about two hours to get most of what was on the list. She and the other old ladies spent a lot of time searching for bargains at the various stores in the area.

“I take it you’ll be home late,” Jack said knowing that the shopping expeditions could end up lasting hours.

“We’ve got coupons, calculator, shopping list, our price comparison sheets, and money. We’ll be there all night,” Abby said. Monday nights seemed to be the slowest night at the discount warehouse store. Weekends were murder, what with the crowds of people there.

Jack knew that Abby attacked the problem of shopping like a science. She had set up sheets with the prices of everything from five different stores. He had to admit that it was effective. They were eating a lot better than he thought possible for the small amount of money that they were spending individually for food. He said, “It looks like it will be a busy night.”

“Everyone is busy tonight,” Abby said.

“I noticed that they put up the solar panels,” Jack said amazed at how fast things had moved on that front.

“Johnny is in town. He and Dave watched them install the panels,” Abby said. Johnny was in town only one week out of four. He was an auditor and had to go to where the job was.

“That’s good,” Jack said.

Looking over at Jack, Abby said, “Johnny has some papers for you to sign.”

Worried, Jack asked, “What kind of papers?”

“He’s filled some papers declaring the commune to be a non-profit organization so that we can handle taxes a little better. Our contributions to the repair fund become tax deductable. The organization is paying the electricity bill and taxes on the house so that it doesn’t show up on Emily’s taxes as income,” Abby said. She didn’t understand the complexity of tax law and was more than happy to have someone else worry about those issues.

“I didn’t know he was doing that,” Jack said. He wondered if he had missed something in the last breakfast meeting.

“It came up because a number of the members of the commune have to file taxes quarterly because they’ve been pulling money out of their retirement funds,” Abby said. To her, April was tax time and the idea that some people had to deal with it four times a year boggled her mind.

“I had been afraid that we would get slammed with tax problems,” Jack said.

Nodding her head, Abby said, “All of the work that we do in support of the commune are now considered community service hours rather than barter. It doesn’t really matter to me since I don’t make enough to pay taxes, but it will be important to you, Johnny, Rich, and the others who are taking money out of their retirement funds.”

“I was worried about that,” Jack said. He figured that he would probably get audited anyway in the future. That was a kick to the stomach that he knew was coming. He was confident that life wasn’t through with torturing him yet.

“Johnny is an accountant and knows that kind of stuff,” Abby said.

“So what does he need me to sign?” Jack asked curious why he had to sign something.

Smiling at him, Abby said, “You’re on the board.”

“I am?” Jack asked wondering what that meant.

“Yes. You are one of the community leaders,” Abby said. Although Abby contributed a lot of time to the commune she didn’t seem to have the same level of influence as Jack. It had bothered her a little since the idea of the commune was hers, but he did put in more work than everyone else.

“Since when?” Jack asked confused by that charge.

Abby laughed at his reaction and answered, “Since the beginning.”

“I don’t know how to run a commune,” Jack said scratching his head.

Abby said, “According to Johnny, the correct term for what we are doing is ‘Intentional Community.’”

“It is a commune,” Jack said thinking that people were crazy in relabeling a thing just because a past label had a negative context. It reminded him of Orwell’s 1984 where they were changing the names of things because they wanted them to avoid any undesired connotations that a word may have acquired. As Shakespeare said, a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet.

“Apparently not. A commune implies much greater economic interdependency than we have. We are a group of individuals working towards a collective goal that defines our intention. That makes us an intentional community rather than a commune,” Abby said shrugging her shoulders. Johnny had made the distinction sound important and she wasn’t going to argue with him.

“I’ll call it a duck if I want to,” Jack said.

Abby laughed at the petulant attitude in his voice and said, “You and everyone else.”

Frau Shutlz came out of Jack’s bedroom and said, “Guten Abend.”

“Guten Abend, Frau Shultz. Wie geht es Ihnen?” Jack asked going through his normal greeting in German.

“Mir geht es gut. Wie geht es Ihnen?” Frau Shultz replied with a big grin.

“Mir geht es auch gut,” Jack answered.

“Das ist gut,” Frau Shultz said thinking that he wasn’t doing so good. An active young man like him should have a girlfriend. She looked over at Abby thinking that the young woman wasn’t doing right by Jack.

“Was ist fur Abendessen?” Jack asked. He had finally managed to learn how to ask about dinner and to talk a little about food. It wasn’t much, but it made the old woman very happy to have someone with whom she could talk.

Ella gently said, “Was gibt es zum Abendessen?” Jack nodded his thanks.

“Ich weiss es nicht. Laura kocht heute Abend,” Frau Shultz said telling him that Laura was cooking that night. She looked over at Abby and said, “Ich muss mit Abby sprechen.”

Jack looked over at Abby and said, “She says that she needs to talk to you.”

“Not again,” Abby said rolling her eyes.

Frau Shultz took Abby by the arm and led her into her bedroom. Once there, she picked up a bottle of baby oil and box of tissues. Holding them out to Abby, she said, “Sie müssen Sich um ihn kümmern.”

“What?” Abby asked staring at the bottle of baby oil. She had a pretty good idea what Frau Shultz was telling her to do.

“Es ist nicht gesund, wenn ein Mann so lang ohne eine Frau ist,” Frau Shultz said wishing that she knew English.

“I have no idea what you just said.”

“Es ist wichtig, dass junge Männer mit Frauen zusammenkommen,” Frau Shultz said. One of the lessons that she had learned as a young girl during the reconstruction of Berlin was that young men became much more manageable after a little attention from a woman. She had fed her ailing mother by doing that. It hadn’t been easy, but necessity was a harsh mistress. As far as she was concerned, Abby could do that for Jack.

“I still don’t understand what you are saying,” Abby said despite the fact that she knew exactly what she was trying to say.

Frau Shultz put the baby oil and tissues in Abby’s hands and said, “Kümmern Sie Sich um ihm.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Abby said staring at the elderly woman.

Frau Shultz could see that she was not getting through to Abby. She snorted and stomped out of the room. Abby put the baby oil and tissues back on her dresser. She left the bedroom shaking her head.

Having seen the elderly woman stomp out of the house, Jack asked, “What’s the matter with Frau Shultz?”

“I think she basically ordered me to give you a hand job,” Abby said.

“Sorry about that,” Jack said a little embarrassed.

Abby shook her head and said, “It is not your fault. I think she’s senile.”

Jack shook his head and said, “Ella explained it to me the other day. Frau Shultz believes that young men need release on a frequent basis or else they get unmanageable. Apparently she put up with a lot of drunken American soldiers after the war and discovered that young men are lot nicer after they’ve had sex.”

“I know about that,” Abby said admitting that it was the one motive of Frau Shultz that she understood. She didn’t understand why it had to be her to take care of Jack.

“I don’t know how representative her attitude about prostitution is in Germany, but she doesn’t see anything wrong about it. I’m pretty sure that she’d send a prostitute over here for me if she thought any of us could afford it,” Jack said.

“She wants me to prostitute myself,” Abby said.

“I don’t think she sees it that way. I think she sees it as you helping me,” Jack said. He wasn’t going to add that Frau Shultz felt that Abby owed it to him for all of the help he gave Abby.

“How does she know that I’m not taking care of you?”

“She cleans the house every morning. I guess she expects to see signs that something is happening over here,” Jack answered.

“Well, next time you jack off leave something for her to find,” Abby said crossly.

“Hey!”

“I’m sorry. I just get so tired of everyone thinking that we should be doing the wild thing over here regardless of our feelings about the matter,” Abby said.

“It is not my fault,” Jack said defensively.

“I know,” Abby said with a sigh. She looked at Jack and knew that the spark just wasn’t there.

“Sorry,” Jack said. Although by most opinions Abby was an attractive woman, she just didn’t do it for him. He liked her, but didn’t desire her. In a way, she was a comrade-in-arms rather than a sex object.

Abby sighed and said, “The fact of the matter is that I’m horny too. It has been two years since I’ve had a date. It has been even longer than that since I’ve had sex.”