Now the Flake was married, raising his children as he was raised— and he would soon suffer the consequence
“A sheer impossibility.”
Efraim winced. He always felt that Rabbi Bindman, his sgan menahel, was better suited to a bowtie and tuxedo, given his formal way of speaking. That’s why Efraim called the meeting in the staff room rather than his cramped office. If Rabbi Bindman was going to be there, Efraim needed a few feet’s distance.
The subject of the meeting was the Gorpin kid, who had been a huge headache almost from day one. The Kid (he had a first name — Shimmy — but to Efraim, he would always be “The Kid”) barely skimmed average during his farher. That would have put him into questionable status had he been anyone else. But he was a Gorpin, and that meant full salaries’ worth of yearly donations, or so they were promised, and therefore averages counted for home runs in his world. So insisted the mighty Board of Directors. Efraim had no choice.
The Kid was in.
Starting from the very first day of yeshivah, Efraim kept a wary eye on The Kid. He couldn’t help himself. He watched as The Kid’s Shacharis arrival inched from a few minutes late until much more than that, and soon, he was missing davening entirely.
A week after Succos, The Kid was pulling up some time mid-first seder.
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