Untitled (41 page)

  "Not at all. But the grapevine – "

  "Do my goddamn peers ever stop gossiping long enough to collect their awards."

  "Let's put aside the all-too-human deficiencies of our comrades for the moment Corso and consider my diagnosis. Think a minute. If I were the one suffering the blockage, would all my money and possessions make me feel one whit happier. Of course not. Same thing with one's physical health. Psychological or somatic, an easy and natural functioning is the one essential to your peace of mind. Clear up your creative logjam, and you'll be back on top of the world."

  "An easy prescription. But hard to administer to oneself."

  "Let's work on it together a little longer. It's not that late in the evening. We can still have dinner. But first we need to get you discharged."

  Doctor summoned. Corso reluctantly given a clean bill of health. Possibly a small case of food poisoning adduced. From Papoon Skloot's. Spoiled coelacanth in the prehistoric kitchen. Which would serve all the egregiously wealthy diners right. Bidden by a surly yet attractive red-haired nurse to dress oneself. Nurse not lingering to peek at Corso's neglected manhood. As half-fantasized. By a lonely and too-little-of-late-fondled profes sional daydreamer. And soon out on the twilit streets.

  Stiltjack swinging a cane with a golden grip. Casting a radiant appreciative gaze at the whole wide world. Scurrying business drones. Sweaty delivery persons. Idling teenagers. A cherry for his picking. Or kicking. Should any viciously magisterial whim overtake him.
Droit du seigneur.
My mundane subjects. Corso striding silently alongside. Certain that if any pigeon shits. The excrement will hit the one who presents the most abject target.

  "Now then tell me about your problems lad."

  Corso complies. Recounts his disenchantment with the work. Displacement of tropes into real life. And the fugue states. And even as he describes his disease. He nervously awaits another strike. But nothing. Yet Corso's sigh of relief is undone. By Stiltjack's next words.

  "So you've got the dicky fits. I thought they wouldn't have hit you for another few years yet. But they do occur in direct proportion to one's talents. So I shouldn't be surprised."

  Corso simultaneously flattered and alarmed. "The dicky fits."

  "Named after you-know-who of course. Our patron saint."

  "But you mean to say – "

  "That I've had them too. But of course! Every cold-stone writer of science fiction goes through them at one point or another. Most come out the other side. But of course a few don't. With luck you won't be numbered among the latter."

  "It's an occupational disease then."

  "Oh it's not a disease. It's a privileged glimpse of reality."

  Corso stops. "What are you saying Malachi."

  "Aren't you listening to me. You've been vouchsafed a vision. Of the plastic, unstable nature of reality. The illusory character of the entire cosmos. It's the god's-eye perspective. Conceptual breakthrough time."

  Corso's tone sneering. "And I suppose then that you've benefited immensely from these visions. Maybe even learned how to become a deity yourself. Maybe I'm just a character in one of your fictions."

  "Well, yes, I have become rather a demigod. As to who created whom, or whether we're both figments of some larger entity – well, the jury is still out."

  "I would appreciate some disproof of your insanity."

  "Naturally. How's this."

  The surging pedestrian crowd freezes in place. And the traffic too. On the sidewalk appear Sharon Walpole, Clive Multrum, and Roger Wankel. In their standard configurations. But then each morphs to his or her abnormal state. Walpole's prosthetic lobster claw. Multrum's reptilian guise. Wankel's android fixity. Corso approaches the marmoreal figures. Pokes them. Turns to Stiltjack.

  "Satisfied now. Or shall I trot out Jenny and her new beau. I believe they're attending a car show in Duluth at the moment. I could bring onstage that derelict from Penn Station as well. His name by the way is Arthur Pearty. A fascinating fellow once you really get to know him."

  "No. Not necessary. Just send these – these specters away."

  The editors and agent vanish. Life resumes. Stiltjack moves blithely onward. Corso numbly following. The world's deceptive insubstantiality now confirmed. A thin shambles. A picture painted on rice paper. Corso sick to his stomach.

  "It's best not to cause such large-scale disruptions. The universe, whatever it is, is not our toy. We did not create it. We do not run the hourly shadow show. We are unaware of the ultimate rationale for its existence. But a small tweak here and there. Aimed a personal betterment. Such little perquisites are permitted those of us who have come out the other side of the dicky fits."

  "But, but – but even if you decide to go on living, how can you continue to write science fiction! In the face of such knowledge."

  Malachi pausing. To signal importance of his words. "Well, as to motivation now Corso it's all a question of whose imagination is superior, isn't it. Weird as the universe is when you finally comprehend it, a trained mind such as yours or mine demands that our own imagination be even more potent in its conceptions. If you're a real science-fiction writer, that is. Now why don't we go enjoy a fine meal. I can guarantee that we won't be interrupted."

Milt appeared at breakfast, about as unsavory a sight as you could ever see at 7:30 on a summer morning: long stringy hair threatening to dip into the bowl of cereal, old faded sweatshirt with the sleeves hacked off, showing wiry arms with a river of tattoos flowing up and down them, even older jeans faded to baby blue overlaid with a sheen of brown.

  "Say hi to Milt, Lynn," my mother told me, planting a quart of milk on the table next to his technicolor elbow. "I bailed him out of jail last night instead of your father."

  "Hi, Milt," I said.

  His head moved slightly; I saw one watery hazel eye peering at me between the strands of hair and I could tell he was amused by the wary tone in my voice. I might have been amused, too, if I'd been in his position, but I wasn't. I looked at my mother. As usual, the creases in her crisp, white coverall seemed sharp enough to cut flesh. My mother never failed to do mornings extremely well, even if she'd been up very late the night before.

  "Drunk driving," she said. Sitting down at Milt's left with her own bowl of cereal. "We can't go on like that."

  "Drunk driving isn't funny, Ma," I said. Milt sat up straight. He looked like a knife-murderer.

  "I meant your father," she said, "not Milt. Milt was in on a shoplifting charge."

  "I know who you meant."

  Milt glanced at my mother. She patted his arm. "
Don't worry.
I said you could stay, so you can stay. If you want to."

  "And if I don't," he said, turning that psycho face to me, "ain't you afraid of forfeiting the bail?"

  "My mother isn't afraid of anything," I said. "Haven't you figured that out yet?"

Before my mother left for work at Busy Hands, she presented Milt with a complete list of his chores for the day, reading it aloud to him just in case he was, in her words, literate-embarrassed. "Do the dishes, tidy the living room, vacuum all the rugs, dust all the downstairs furniture, change the linens on the beds upstairs – there are three bedrooms, including the one you're staying in – and clean both bathrooms. Do a good job and I'll give you a treat when I get home from Busy Hands."

  He took the list from her in what I thought of as Standard Dumb Amazement, blinking when she stood on tiptoe to pat him on the head, and then stared after her as she bustled out the door leading to the garage. Bustled was the only word for the way my mother moved; once you'd seen her do it, you understood exactly what it looked like. He went to the window over the sink and watched her drive away.

  Finally, he turned back to me, holding the list the way I'd seen people hold bills from auto repair shops. "Is she kidding?" he asked me.

  I spread a thin layer of cream cheese on the other half of my pumpernickel bagel. "Are you in jail?"

  He laughed, crumpled the list, and tossed it over his shoulder into the sink. "What I am is outta here."

  I got up, went to the junk drawer, and pulled out the gun. "I don't think so."

  Those watery hazel eyes got very large. "Holy shit, girl! What are you doing?"

  "Come on,
Milt
, what do
you
think?"

  His gaze went from the gun to me, back to the gun and back to me.

  "Give up?" I said. He started to raise his hands, just the way people did on TV. "The dishes. I'm helping you do the dishes."

  He took at step toward me and I aimed at his crotch. Most people make the mistake of aiming a gun at a man's head or chest, but believe me, setting your sights lower will get their attention much better.

  "Do I have to persuade you that I can and will use this on you? Do you think this is the first time I've had breakfast with a convicted felon on my mother's sufferance?"

  He squinted at me. "Who
are
you people?
What
are you?"

  "Conscientious citizens," I said.

  "Listen, I don't want you here any more than you want to be here. But here we are." I jerked my head at the table. "Stack 'em and rack 'em. I'll plead self-defense."

  "Are you gonna keep that gun on me all day? That's what you'll have to do."

  "We all gotta do what we gotta do, Milt," I said. "And you gotta get busy."

  "How old are you?" he said suspiciously.

  "Sixteen."

  "My God." He didn't believe me, of course; I'm built like a linebacker, hostage to genetics.

  "The house is a mess, Milt," I said. "Okay?"

  He folded those skinny arms. "What if I just refuse to move?"

  "Then it's going to be a boring day for both of us," I said. "And you'll go back to jail at the end of it."

  That finally reached him. "I can't do that. And I can't stay here," he said. "Please, honey – Lynn – give a guy a break, will ya?"

  "You got a break. You're out of jail."

  He was staring at the gun again.

  "Well, sort of," I added. "Look, my mother's eccentric even by your standards – "

  "I heard
that."

  " – but don't get the idea she isn't serious. My mother doesn't kid around. She doesn't know how." I gestured at the dishes waiting on the table. "Come on, Milt. Is it going to kill you to do a dish?"

  He got the point, but I could tell even he was surprised to find himself gathering up bowls and silverware and plates and taking them to the sink. The whole time he was rinsing things off and putting them in the dishwasher, I could practically hear the wheels turning in his head: when he could get a good opening to try to overpower this big, crazy bruiser of a girl, how far could he run and how fast, and what the hell was he doing, why had he accepted his release to a total stranger in the first place? My mother always chose well, though. Old Milt had obviously spent more than a few nights sleeping rough and the prospect of spending at least one night indoors before he made off with anything that wasn't nailed down with a value of over five dollars had been too tempting to resist. Going along with the crazy little grayhaired lady who had chosen to foot bail for him over her husband had been a pretty good idea in the middle of the night.

  The phone rang just after he'd gotten the vacuum cleaner out of the hall closet. My mother, of course; she was pleased to hear that Milt was on schedule, but dismayed that I still had to hold the gun on him. As if that were unusual. Anyone would think she'd have learned by now – they spend at least one whole day working under the gun. My mother, the eternal optimist, always hoping that she'd get a quick study.