Just Plain Weird (16 page)

         
“It’s called being realistic, my dear,” he said somberly.

         
She looked at him defiantly, and snorted.

         
“Oh, and what would you do,” she asked, “go round pushing all the buttons? You think that’s the answer? … You saw what trouble that brings, and you know what I’m talking about.”

         
I listened as the argument developed, looking at her and then at him, until my neck ached. At some point, I felt a stabbing pain behind my eye. There was no warning this time, no gradual increase in pain but a sudden swell come out of the blue. I clutched the front of my head, my palm pressed hard against my eye, and a sound, a deep animal sound jumped out of my mouth from the back of my throat.

         
“Travis!” I heard Eliza cry then, and felt her hand on my shoulder. “See what you’ve done with your bickering,” she said to her father.

         
“I don’t think it was just my bickering,” I heard him respond. “And I don’t think that has anything to do with it.”

         
“Travis,” she whispered again, this time very close to my ear. Her other hand was on my back now, and she was tugging me toward her, to lean against her. “Travis, what is it?”

         
The pain was so intense that I couldn’t answer-- I wouldn’t have known what to say, anyway. Then, as abruptly as it had begun, the pain receded and was gone, leaving my entire body feeling flushed with relief. I straighten up, then, and looked at their alarmed expressions. Eliza’s fingers were digging into my shoulders, she held on so tight.

         
“It’s all right,” I announced, “It stopped.”

         
“It was worse this time, though, wasn’t it?” Mr. Laughton asked.

         
“Much,” I said, trying to catch my breath.

         
“Doc, maybe you should check him out,” Eliza suggested.

         
“No, it’s not that,” I said. I wasn’t exactly sure why I said it. I had an idea, so very vague, that I knew what was happening, but it was hidden in some shadowy part of my mind. It was something so simple, so obvious as to be overlooked in favor of some other explanation. “It’s all right,” I assured them, yet they didn’t appear very assured. “I feel just fine now.”

         
“You’re sure?” Mr. Laughton asked.

         
“Yeah.”

         
“Maybe you could use something to drink?” Eliza suggest. “Maybe a lemonade?”

         
“No, but how about an ice tea, with extra sugar.”

         
What happened next seemed nothing short of miraculous, for no sooner had I asked for the ice tea, a glass of ice tea materialized in my right hand.

         
Eliza and her father were dumbfounded. They gawked at the glass, then at me, then at each other.

         
“How…?” Mr. Laughton started, but couldn’t finish.

         
“Travis…uh…how did you do that?” Eliza asked.

         
“I don’t know.”

         
I was staring down at the glass. It had been the strangest sensation-- to have a solid object suddenly appear in my hand. I took a sip out of the glass.

         
“Ice tea?” Eliza asked.

         
“The best I ever tasted,” I said. I took another sip. “Don’t tell me-- nothing like this has ever happened before.”

         
“Uh, no,” Eliza said. “Not exactly. Things materialize within a dispenser, but never outside the dispenser.”

         
I leaned forward and set the glass on the coffee table. Something was still nagging at my mind, like a lost memory, a memory that, once recalled, would make sense of the entire situation.

         
As Eliza and her father watched me-- actually, studied my every move, no matter how small-- I stood and began to pace the tiled floor. There was something here, I was sure, but what? I went up to the front window, parted the curtains and peeked outside, where the sun was beating down on the lonely street-- neighbors holed-up in their air-conditioned houses. Then I wandered back toward the sofa, where Mr. Laughton cast a furtive glance at Eliza, who was sitting attentively forward on the sofa.

         
“In all the years since you’ve found the artifact,” I asked, “have you ever had any regular visitors?”

         
Mr. Laughton considered the question briefly. “No,” he said. “You’ve been here two, three times. That would be the most. Your friend was here once. When we lived in Fort Myers, the mailman came in for a few minutes once. That’s all, as far as I can remember. Why?-- what are you thinking?”

         
“And neither of you have ever had any kind of-- ailment?”

         
“No,” he said. “Actually, I can’t recall the last time I was sick.”

         
“Me, either,” Eliza agreed. “You know, I used to have terrible problems with allergies-- ragweed, mostly, if I remember right-- but that stopped a long time ago. I guess it was at about the time we found the artifact-- it’s so long ago, I can’t quite remember.”

         
Mr. Laughton wagged his head in wonder. “It’s funny I never noticed that, but it’s true; we seem never to get sick. I can’t ever remember the last time I had to see a doctor.”

         
“What does it mean?” Eliza asked me.

         
“I’m not sure,” I said. “I think… Let me try something.”

         
I turned away from them, and took a couple steps toward the front windows. I could almost feel their eyes on my back as I stood there, at about the spot where the console had appeared out of the floor. I tried to visualize the console in my mind, and, sure enough, the console emerged from the floor.

         
I heard a gasp behind me. I wasn’t sure whether it came from Eliza or her father. All I knew was that a moment later, they were standing at my side behind the console.

         
“That never happened before, either,” Mr. Laughton commented, sounding somewhat flustered.

         
“How did you do that, Travis?” Eliza asked. “How is this possible?”

         
I was sure I had the answer now. I knew it would sound crazy, but I figured they had been living with crazy for so long, maybe crazy was normal for them. So I didn’t feel the slightest reluctance to tell them what I believed.

         
“I think this thing is alive.”

5

         
“Well, there has to be some difference,” Mr. Laughton was insisting.

         
“Will you please just leave me alone?” I asked.

         
“There has to be some explanation… Now let me see your head…”

    
    
“Doc, leave him alone,” Eliza chided him.

         
“Maybe it’s in the shape of his skull.”

         
“Please,” I said.

         
“You know, like some people can pick up radio signals if their skull is shaped just right and they have fillings in the right teeth.”

         
“Doc…” Eliza whined, exasperated.

         
“Well, we have to figure out whether this is possible,” Mr Laughton said. “It took me three years to suspect the artifact might be alive, and then another year to communicate with it on a very rudimentary level. Don’t you understand what this means, Eliza, if he is telepathically linked to the artifact? We can learn everything at once-- everything we need to know.” He tilted his head, then, studying me and considering something. “Maybe he has a primitive brain.”
               
“A primitive brain!” Now I was just plain insulted.

         
“My God!” Eliza cried.

         
“Well, whatever you do, Travis, just try to keep your mind blank.”

         
This nightmare of curiosity and conjecture had been going on for a half hour, though it seemed much longer, with Mr. Laughton trying to examine the size and shape of my skull and the location of the fillings in my teeth. He had already formed the belief that the artifact was communicating to me on some sort of telepathic level. He was baffled, though, as to why it was now communicating with me, when, over the years he and Eliza literally lived inside the artifact, it had scarcely made its sentience known. Ergo, there must be some radically different about me. It had begun with him warning me: “Travis, just don’t start thinking about any global catastrophes, like tidal waves or asteroids hitting the planet or the sun exploding,” lest the artifact read these thoughts as wishes for it to realize. Naturally, now, as he chased me around the living room trying to feel my head, the only things I could think of were tidal waves, monsoons, the moon crashing into the earth, and metallic spiders covering the surface of the planet and eating every living thing.

         
“Look,” he said now, catching his breath, “just sit on the sofa and relax-- make your mind go blank. I promise not to touch your head.
 
But promise me, just try to keep your mind clear.”

         
I asked, “Do you realize how hard it is to keep your mind clear when somebody’s telling you to keep your mind clear?”

         
“Just relax, Travis,” he said, trying to make his voice soothing. “Just sit and relax.”

         
So I sat on the sofa, and Eliza stood next to me, nervously chewing her thumbnail. We both watched as Mr. Laughton paced back and forth, his face grim as he thought.

         
“We have to make this like an experiment,” he said. “And for an experiment to be successful, we have to have control. Travis, you have to relax, and try not to think of anything. Eliza, you and I have to be quiet, and careful not to suggest anything that will make Travis think of anything. All right, that sounds reasonable,” he said, as if to himself. “Now, Travis, try breathing in through your nose, and out through your mouth-- that will help you stay relaxed.”

         
I did as he said, and slowly I was calming down.

         
A moment of silence passed.

         
“Fine,” Mr. Laughton said. “Now, Travis, do you feel at ease?”

         
“I guess.”

         
“Don’t guess-- know. Is there anything bothering you-- anything at all?”

         
“Well, Eliza chewing her fingernail is a little annoying,” I said.

         
“Eliza, stop that,” he scolded her.

         
“Oh, sorry,” she said, and stuffed her hand into her pants pocket.

         
“Anything else, Travis?”

         
“She’s standing a little too close, too,” I said, which was true enough; she wasn’t actually touching me, but her leg was close enough to my knee for me to feel her body heat.