The Bend of the World: A Novel (24 page)

Perennials, I said.

Pringle either didn’t get or didn’t care that I was making fun. Yes, he said. Very astute. They are actually associated with the harvest, particularly in ancient Egypt. We presume they are also associated with the dog-headed god Anubis.

Mandy’s dog raised his head and gave an approving woof.

Distant relative? Helen said.

That’s his name, actually, said Mandy. She pulled off a rib and tossed it to the beast. Stinky, she said. Yummy-yums.

So straight through the stargate, huh? I said.

Of course, we have no idea what they were doing that far back, Pringle replied. Interestingly, we’ve discovered that FTL and transtemporal navigation is closer in form and fact to the Guild Navigators from Frank Herbert’s
Dune
series. Among other sources of inspiration, it was the early recovery and medical examination of pilots from UFO crashes that first sent us down the path of pharmaco-temporal manipulation. The Russians got to it at Tunguska. We suspect, but cannot prove, that Rasputin was able to isolate certain compounds from the alien’s body that became the principal source of his power and apparent imperviousness to ordinary physical harm, but the chaos of the Revolution significantly impeded their progress in such research. The Germans of course believed otherwise, which ultimately led to Hitler’s ill-conceived invasion of Russia. We—the Americans, I mean—were never especially concerned; not until we figured out that the Germans and the Russians had been after it. Then of course came Roswell, and we quickly moved into similar lines of research. As with the Manhattan Project, the core of our team consisted of former Germans with a few Russians and Poles.

I thought they were extradimensional, I said. But now you say they’re aliens.

A term of art, really, said Pringle. Recall they emanate from the distant future. We have no idea what sort of physiological evolution they may have undergone. They may have even directed their own evolution. An intriguing possibility that we are investigating. After all, how likely is it that actual extraterrestrials, evolving in an entirely alien biosphere under completely different planetary conditions, would end up looking like little gray men? Whereas, if human evolution were to continue. Well, you can imagine.

So let me ask you this, I said. If this whole shebang is such a goddamn secret, how come you can write a bunch of books about it?

Ah, said Pringle. Fortunately, in a parallel time track, I have been able to convince my compatriots on the Project that the Winston Pringle self-modality who is writing the books is engaging in a necessary kind of disinformation. By telling a truth so strange it appears to be fiction, the true truth is obscured.

The true truth, Helen said.

The best kind, said Johnny.

That’s what I was thinking, Helen said.

I like this new girlfriend of yours, Johnny told me.

She’s not my girlfriend, I said.

I’m his boss’s girlfriend, she said.

No shit, said Mandy. I thought you were a fag. No offense.

None taken.

That’s what I’ve been telling him for years, said Johnny. He positively reeks of sexual deviancy.

You haven’t been telling me that for years. You once accused me of an aggressive heterosexuality that resembles American imperialism.

Did I say that? said Johnny. I’m very quotable, aren’t I?

The point being, haha, said Pringle, that if you view higher dimensionality from a calculitic perspective, the difference between time travel and space travel becomes extremely vague.

So, I said, what’s their deal? The UFOs. What are they doing in Pittsburgh, uh, out of season?

Presumably, Pringle said, still ignoring my tone, they are drawn by the psycho-temporal distortions in the local time field caused by the Project as it nears its completion.

Is it near completion? Helen asked. She pressed her knee against mine. Our eyes met. She grinned privately, just for me.

Oh, very. December, or thereabouts. They don’t know that I plan to preempt them.

They? I said.

The Project, he said.

Including you? I mean, aren’t you part of the Project?

Possibly including me. Possibly including
you
. He turned to Helen. Very possibly including you, my dear.

Me? she said. I just moved here.

Time tracks can be tricky, Pringle said. And, of course, none of us can be sure if we are or are not involved. But I have a strong feeling about you. I’ve seen you, you know.

Oh yeah? she said.

Yes, Pringle said. In dreamtime. I very clearly recall seeing you enter the main Time Chamber with a reptiloid humanoid.

Haha, I said. Maybe it was Mark.

Maybe it was, she said. She didn’t laugh.

I’m kidding, I said.

Me, too, she said.

So where’s the Time Chamber?

Directly under the fountain at Point State Park, Johnny said.

For real? I gave him a look that held the promise of mutual understanding if he’d just give me some sign that he found this whole deal as much a trip as I did, but he only raised an eyebrow at me, and I admit that, despite all my efforts to the contrary, I began to wonder what was really going on.

Of course, Pringle said, it’s on a separate time track.

Of course, I said.

You’re very dismissive, Mandy said.

What’s
your
deal? I said.

Merchandising, she replied.

You know, Pringle said, we’re not so different, you and I. He fixed me in his unblinking Murine gaze.

I’d probably beg to differ, I said.

Children of privilege he said. Scions of a powerful family.

I’m not sure I’d call my family powerful, I said.

Bearing the burdens of a past fascism, seeking amends.

No, I said. I don’t think I’d agree with that characterization, precisely.

Your grandfather, you know, was involved heavily in the Westinghouse empire.

Did Johnny tell you that? I asked. Johnny shrugged. In fact, my grandfather wasn’t much of a businessman after all.

Regardless, Pringle said, I can see you have yet to cut the cord.

Oh no? I said.

Verily, Pringle said.

Amen, I said.

Well, ahem, Pringle said. Dessert?

I could use another drink, said Helen.

I’m sure you could, Johnny said.

She glared at him.

I was thinking, Pringle said, more along the lines of a pick-me-up.

I’ve got a little coke, said Helen. I tilted my head. A girl’s gotta be prepared, she said.

Thank you, no, dear. I propose we instead imbibe in something altogether more potent.

No, thanks, I said.

Live a little, Johnny told me.

I intend to, I said.

Fear of death is an animal emotion, Johnny responded.

Well, then me and Anubis over there will be dancing partners for the evening.

The dog, hearing his name, gave a pleased, throaty little bark and slapped his tail a few times against the floor.

10

But I was steadfast in my refusal to take any of Pringle’s weird concoction, and after a bit of cajoling and the offer of a complimentary hand scan, the dinner party broke up. Some young, smoother, more attractive boys than Johnny or me required his product and his attention; Mandy and the dog went off to continue the distribution of the sacraments; a band was playing out by the bonfire. A crowd was smoking and drinking and dancing under the crooked wooden horse. Helen had had one too many and told me she was going to go do a few bumps to sober up. It seemed like an offer of sex, but when I looked at her, her hair falling across her face, a slight redness to her eyes, that brittle, careful timbre returning to her voice, I got depressed; I thought, Lauren Sara never looked like that; I said, No, thanks, and maybe Helen understood something else in it, because she frowned furiously before she walked away. I was at last alone with Johnny on the balcony looking out over the field. You’ve got a real way with women, Morrison. Maybe you
are
a fag.

I wish, I said.

You look like shit, he told me.

It’s been a weird couple of days.

You know, your new employer is implicated in the Pittsburgh Project.

I’m not surprised.

I’m thinking of doing a significant exposé, Johnny said. On my blog.

Come on, I said. I thought you’d quit blogging.

It is possible, Johnny said, that I may still blog a bit here and there.

You ought to watch it, I said. Everyone’s still pissed off about that Alieyinz shit.

I have no idea what you’re talking about

Whatever. Derek told me that Jonah Kantsky is looking for the perp.

Kantsky? Did you know he’s ex-Mossad?

That’s the rumor, I said.

How is Derek? Still doing the dirty work of the corporate surveillance state global gulag?

He’s fine, I said. Except that he fucked Lauren Sara.

So? Johnny said. Didn’t they used to date?

Recently, I said.

Oh. He shrugged. Want me to kill him? Mandy can dispose of the body.

I hope you’re joking.

We’ll lure him up here, sacrifice him to that buffalo, and dump him in the river.

What buffalo? The horse?

It’s supposed to be an owl. Like—

The Bohemian Grove, I said.

I’ve missed you, Johnny said.

What the fuck are you doing out here? I said.

It’ll all be finished soon.

Johnny, I said.

Seriously. Trust me. This is nothing permanent. It’s just something I’m working on for the time being.

For the time being? I said.

Just for the time being, he said.

I hope so, I said.

Helen returned, looking both more awake and more miserable. What’s wrong? I said.

I want to go, she said.

I’m too drunk, I said. We’re stuck.

Fuck that, she said. The cocaine, or something, had made her angry. This is fucking boring. I want to go. She was tired, suddenly, with that ironic, exhausted look that comes after too many visits with stimulants in too short a span, and for the first time I considered her age and realized that she must actually be nearly forty, a discomfiting thought, because while thirty seems the far rim of a yawning canyon all through your twenties, right up to the very last second of your twenty-ninth-year, the moment you cross into that fourth decade of your life, forty rushes at you as inevitably as the ground when you’ve leapt from a cliff. There was a suggestive dampness around her nostrils. I thought back to that first night we’d met. I thought of Mark saying, She gets a little crazy, and then felt badly for thinking it.

You said you liked it.

I don’t anymore. I’ll drive.

Oh no, I said. You’re not driving.

Fuck you, Mark, she said. I can drive.

Who? I said.

Whatever, she said. Give me the keys.

No, no, no, I said. I tried to laugh, as if we were all having a good time. She stuck out her lip and turned to Johnny.

Fine. Then I want to do the time drug.

He winked at me. I think it’s counterindicated with your other little what-have-you, he said.

I dropped the rest in the toilet, she said. Let’s do the other thing.

Helen, I said.

Who the fuck are you? she said. Fuck off.

Johnny, I said.

Sorry, buddy, he told me. It’s the libertarian thing to do. Don’t tread on me. Do what thou wilt and that shall be the whole of the law. Who is John Galt?

Huh? said Helen.

Follow me, beautiful, Johnny said.

And I, reluctantly, but less reluctantly than I made it appear, followed as well.

11

What’s her fucking problem?

We were waiting for the drugs to come up. They were not coming up. Dissociatives were the most infuriating of all psychopharmacological playthings. They messed with your sense of time even before they messed with your sense of time. The ductile moment of anticipation elongated and thinned and became a gossamer thread that caught the breeze and carried your excitement away like a baby spider on its own silk. It was replaced by anxiety and annoyance. It wasn’t going to work. The drugs were bogus. Your mind had adapted. Your metabolism had changed. An hour had passed. Fuck it. You got another beer. We were drinking some beers.

I shrugged. Beats me, I said. She dropped the coke in the can.

We were sitting on the edge of the woods. The bands were still playing up by the lodge. The fire was still going strong. It was bright, but not as bright as the city, and you could see the stars overhead.

You can see Canis Major, said Johnny.

Yeah, thanks, Edwin Hubble.

Copernicus.

Tycho Brahe.

Oh, good one. Georges-Henri Lemaître.

Jan Hendrik Oort, motherfucker.

Kip Thorne.

I concede, I said.

Helen was sitting apart from us in the grass and playing with her phone. Thorne, Johnny said, was instrumental in the development of black hole cosmology. Pringle thinks he was involved in the Project back in the seventies.

Was anyone not involved?

Shit goes deep, Johnny said.

Do you really believe this shit? I asked him. I meant, Should I believe it?

I believe everything, he said. A man who believes in everything is surprised by nothing. All eventualities ultimately obtain. The best of all possible worlds is the possibility of all possible worlds.

I think it’s starting to work.

No, Johnny said. I’m not feeling it.

She’s probably texting Mark, I said. I get the feeling she got a nastygram.

A what?

Oh, God, sorry. Something a coworker used to say. Fortunately, we fired her. Well, she quit.

Fortunately? Johnny turned enough to look at me. How is that fortunate? Fortunate for whom?

She didn’t do anything, I said.

Do
anything? he said. Jesus fucking Christ. And you think I’m the dangerous one.

I never said that.

No, he said, you didn’t.

Helen, I called, are you okay?

I’m getting a drink, she said. She sighed. Want anything?

I’m good, I said.

I’ve got to make a call, she said. I’ll be back.

To who?

She bit her lip with displeasure, seemed about to answer, and then walked away toward the house.