The End of FUN (7 page)

“Irish folktales throughout the ages.”

“Ha. I mean, like, what are the tales
themselves
about?”

The woman shrugged. “You know…it's the same story every time. A young man is in love. He goes on a quest. He wanders around the countryside solving impossible riddles—
find me a song that sings itself, an egg that can't be cracked
—that kind of thing. He solves the riddles and returns home to find his love has left, and then he turns into a bird.”

“He turns into a bird?”

“That's right.”

“And then what?”

“That's it,” she said. “He turns into a bird and flies away, the end.”

“Oh.”

The woman looked up, like she was waiting for me to get something. Man, her eyes were blue. Then I got it:

Flies away
.

Oh, OK. Right.

“Well, I should probably get back to my dinner,” I said, and flew away back to my table.

Blake came back.

“Guess what, Arnold? We're out of tacos.”

“I didn't order tacos. I ordered nachos.”

“Yeah,” he said. “We're out of those, too,
Arnold
.”

Awesome. I sipped my soda. It was really turning into a lovely evening.

But then something happened.

Blake went away again, and the woman called over to me.

“Hey,” she said. “Sorry about that. He's just being a dick because of me. We have, you know, kind of a history.”

“Actually, he was being a dick before you got here.”

“Oh, good, then. My conscience is cleared. Thanks—what was your name again? Arnold?”

So I had no choice but to introduce myself as my fake self, Arnold Hamilton, and then I asked her if she was from around here. No, she was from Idaho. She asked me if I was from around here, and I told her no, I was from Uniontown, Pennsylvania. Just in town for my grandfather's funeral.

“Oh,” she said. “I'm sorry to hear about that.”

She was looking at me now. It was the first time we'd really made eye contact, and I know this is going to sound cheesy or whatever, but OK: first of all, she had these really blue eyes. Like
deep
blue. And there was something strange about them. They were just—
different
somehow. Different in a good way. And then it hit me: this woman hadn't been lensed!

“Hey, you aren't having FUN
®
,” I said.

“No way.”

“
No way?
What's that supposed to mean?”

“It
means
,” she said, “that everyone I know who's having FUN
®
acts like a complete
zombie
, and I don't want to be a complete zombie, and therefore I don't want to be having FUN
®
.”

“Hey, I'm having FUN
®
. Am I a complete zombie?”

“Well, I don't know. When I walked in you were mumbling and staring off into space, waving your hands around in front of yourself—like a zombie.”

“I was having FUN
®
.”

“Right,” she said. “Having FUN
®
. Not
actual
fun. Zombie fun.”

“Not zombie fun. FUN
®
fun. It really is fun, too. Most of the time. When you're not a
FAIL
, that is.”

The woman, gave me a look like
?
, because she didn't know what a
FAIL
was. So I started explaining to her about all the rules and consequences and how I was trying to earn my way back, but I could tell I was kind of losing her, so I stopped.

“How about you?” I said. “What do
you
do for actual fun? Read actual books?”

“Yes, as matter of fact—but this book isn't for fun, it's for school.”

“Oh, you're a student?”

“No, I'm a teacher.”

Technically she was a student teacher—at the same elementary school I went to—but the actual teacher got sick and by this point she was basically doing the whole thing herself. She'd moved from Idaho last fall, sight unseen, to fulfill the rural teaching part of her student loan agreement. She'd been debating between Antello and a place in Texas, and in retrospect she should've chosen Texas.

The whole time she talked I was like,
Yay! She's talking to me!
And I tried to keep it going by peppering her with little questions—I asked her what it was like being a first-time teacher and all that, about the tests and whatnot, but I was having a hard time following what she was saying. I was starting to TSD, aka Temporary Sense Death glitch-out, aka a sudden void of sensation leaving a strange silent hole in your brain not unlike the silence of a Vitamix
®
Wishspertech2
™
risk-free blender (YAY!).

Supposedly they've fixed the problem with more recent versions of the chip, but the chip I have is one of the originals, and even with all the updates and patches I still TSD'd from time to time if I was in an agitated state.

It happened to me then. The woman was talking to me, and suddenly I couldn't hear what she was saying. The audio dropped right out. She was a silent movie. I stood there and watched her talk. God, she had a beautiful mouth. I was really getting into it, just loving the way her lip kind of went up all lopsided and beautiful, and then the audio cut back in.

“Which is why I'm reading this,” she was saying, “so I can share it at the assembly tomorrow. It's heritage week at school; we're supposed to present the stories of our ancestors….They told me this was a happening little college town. But the truth is there are approximately ten people here between the ages of eighteen and thirty, and so far let's just say it's not been what you would call stellar….”

“Everyone OK here?” Blake was back. Standing right next to us, actually. “Is he bugging you, Katie?”

“Him?” she said. “No.”

I couldn't help but smile a little. It was like,
Suck on that, Blake.

Blake went away, and I smiled at his receding backside, but then my smile went away because the woman, Katie, was putting her book in her bag and standing up.

“I should go,” she said. “It's late. Nice to meet you, um—what was it again?”

And I was like,
Damn, why'd I lie the first time?
and told her again I was Arnold, and she gave me a wave and was gone. I sat there for maybe three minutes before I was like,
You fool! Go get her contact info!

I got lucky. I found her out in the parking lot. She was leaning against a red truck, smoking a cigarette.

“Hi there.”

She fanned away the smoke. “Don't lecture me. I'm trying to quit.”

“Lecture you?”

“You know, an elementary schoolteacher who smokes…” She took another puff. “I really am trying to quit.”

I reached down into my ballsack for some courage and asked her if she wanted to trade contact info.

“Contact info?” she said.

“Like your username or whatever.”

She cocked her head and eyed me with her blue, blue eyes. “Remember? I'm not having FUN
®
.”

“Right.” I'd totally forgotten. “Well, you should consider having FUN
®
sometime. It's…fun. We could mindtalk
™
or whatever.”

“OK,” she said.

“OK,” I said.

She didn't say anything.

And normally I would've taken the hint and just left her alone. Of course,
normally
I wouldn't even have followed her to the parking lot. I can't even explain it. But something in me was like,
This girl is cool. Don't just let her go
.

“If not a username, how about a phone number? Do you have a phone?”

“Yes, I have a phone.”

“You wanna trade numbers?”

“Just in case I'm ever in Pennsylvania?” she said.

“Right. Or, you never know when I might have to come back for another funeral. People die all the time. Or maybe I'll set out on some kind of quest to turn into a bird or whatever.”

She gave it some thought. “Do you have a piece of paper?”

“Just tell it to me. I'll input it in my address book.”

“No, that's OK.” She took out her notebook, scribbled something on a sheet, ripped it out, folded it up into a tiny square, and handed it to me.

“There. Good night, Arnold. Nice to meet you.”

“Good night, Katie.”

And good night moon, and June, and beautiful tunes, and the bird of romance, aka the loon. Back in my room, I plopped down on the bed and started unfolding the paper. Hell yes, I'd gotten her number! She'd really folded up that paper. Finally I had it all opened and flattened out on the bed, but there wasn't a number. Instead, there was this:

First you must complete three tasks.

You must bring me:

1. A cloud that makes no rain.

2. A needle that needs no thread.

3. A harp that sings without plucking.

—Katie

I woke the next morning with Homie
™
in my face giving me a special message. I'd been selected to have a spin of the Starbucks
®
Grand Epiphany Morning Mocha Wheel (YAY!) and possibly win some free crap, none of which actually included an actual cup of coffee—not that I even
drink
coffee—and while I was listening to this message I missed another one. I mean an actual one. From my sister:

Speaking as a person who's had a lot of experience with running late over the years, it's exactly when you need everything to move smoothly that the most shit goes wrong. I scrambled out of bed and tripped over my bag, the zipper of which I discovered was stuck—and burned five minutes working to get it unstuck, and in the process broke it completely—and when I laid out my funeral outfit on the bed, I discovered that despite the white shirt, brown pants, leather belt, maroon tie, and brown jacket, a critical item was missing: Where were my dress shoes?