Sensation Machines

by Adam Wilson

  “Your brother is correct,” says Lydia. “And if you think about it, we can read the exodus in light of the Holocaust. We may not have been slaves, but we were the victims of genocide. Are the victims of genocide. And that wasn’t in ancient Egypt, darling, that was in this very century in civilized Europe.”

  “It’s a metaphor for black life in America,” says Michael. He got this idea from a book of essays, all by white academics, on the legacy of NWA.

  “Last century, Mom,” says Rachel. “We’re in a whole new century now. Have been for a while. And, Michael, I’m sorry, but how is the Holocaust a metaphor for black life in America?”

  Stuart interrupts by banging the table.

  He says, “My life is fucked.”

  “Your life’s not fucked,” says Lydia.

  Stuart repeats, “My life is fucked.”

  “Everything’s okay Dad,” Michael reassures.

  “Your life?” says Lydia, standing. She points to herself and the others. “We’re your life. We’re your family. And we’re all here. Isn’t that nice? You should be happy to have us all here.”

  “Fuck,” Stuart says. He stands, tips over his chair, kicks the table, and exits the room.

  “What was that about?” says Rachel.

  “It’s unfair,” says Lydia. “His making a scene while you’re here for your friend’s funeral. Very unfair.”

  “Ricky,” says Michael.

  “It’s unfair of him to bring you into this. Not now anyway.”

  “Into what?” says Rachel. “What are you talking about?”

  “Divorce,” says Lydia.

  “You and Dad are getting divorced?”

  “Your father and I aren’t planning anything that radical as of yet. He’s getting divorced from Sharon.”

  “Who’s Sharon?” says Michael.

  “His girlfriend from the game,” says Rachel.

  “Wife,” says Lydia. “His wife from the game.”

  “They’ve never even met!” says Rachel.

  “That’s not how he sees it.”

  “Why’s she dumping him?” Michael asks.

  “She’d prefer someone younger.”

  “What?” says Rachel.

  “Your father,” says Lydia. “Sharon thinks his looks are starting to fade.”

  “She’s never even seen him in person!”

  “It’s a very shallow culture,” says Lydia.

  29.

  The detectives have left Donnell with his lawyer, a young man in an off-the-rack suit who looks more like someone playing Atticus Finch in a school production of To Kill a Mockingbird than the genuine article. His face is nearly cubist: one ear the size and texture of a wine cork, the other Dumbo-esque; eyes distorted through the thick lenses of horn-rimmed glasses; nostrils misaligned; a swollen tongue that hangs like a dog’s during moments of intense concentration. The lawyer’s office is also his bedroom, possibly a university dorm. In the background sits an unmade bed. Its blond wood matches the lawyer’s desk chair. The lawyer bends forward, revealing a poster of Van Gogh’s Starry Night.

  Donnell keeps reaching for a nonexistent remote that might change the channel and provide him with a more experienced litigator. Instead he scoots forward, closer to the webcam, so the lawyer gets a tighter view of his face. He wants the lawyer to see its creases and shaving bumps, his hazelnut eyes, the things that mark him as frail and human. He needs the lawyer to know that Donnell’s missing paychecks and incurring late fees, that Jackie’s scared and home alone. He needs the lawyer to know what’s at stake.

  Despite his skepticism, Donnell is lucky to have a Canadian. Public defenders come from all over the world, and especially the Caribbean, ever since its largest law school—University of the West Indies—super-sized its applicant pool by only training and certifying in US Law. Not that there’s anything wrong with Caribbeans per se—many, Donnell’s sure, are excellent lawyers—but certain older, white judges have trouble with accents. Donnell’s friend Kwame was once arrested for an open container and he ended up doing thirty days because the judge misunderstood the lawyer and became convinced that Kwame had hit a cop while resisting arrest.

  By contrast, a Canadian lawyer is theoretically good news, or would be if Donnell’s looked older than twelve. There’s no question that this is the lawyer’s first murder. Donnell could see the fear in his eyes every time the detectives unveiled another piece of quote unquote evidence, all of which was circumstantial, hearsay, or otherwise inadmissible. The cops have nothing and Donnell knows it.

  Well, not nothing exactly. A witness, the lawyer explained, claims to have seen Donnell in the lobby of the Zone. The witness was shown a six-man lineup of possible suspects, and she picked Donnell. This, despite the fact that she couldn’t have actually seen Donnell, because he’s never stepped foot in the hotel in his life.

  No matter. In her initial report, the witness described the suspect as a dark-skinned black man between the ages of thirty and forty, and the five other guys in the lineup were light-skinned twentysomethings.

  “The whole thing is a setup,” he tells his lawyer.

  The lawyer nods, neither affirming nor denying Donnell’s statement. Perhaps the computer mic’s not working. The unit, a boxy desktop chained to the table with a bicycle lock, looks like a relic. He says, again, louder this time, “The whole thing is a setup.”

  “I heard you,” says the lawyer. He clicks his teeth, tugs on his tie, and says, “She picked you out of the lineup.”

  “Of course she picked me. I was twelve shades darker than the others. Who’d they think she was going to pick?”

  Again, the lawyer says nothing, as if the context is too charged, and he’s afraid that whatever comes out of his mouth might be read as racially insensitive. Or maybe he’s distracted. For all Donnell knows, the kid’s concurrently scrolling Twitter.

  Donnell called Jackie last night from the prison payphone, reversing the charges. As they spoke—awkwardly, avoidantly—he found himself thinking back on the days following Jackie’s birth, when she wouldn’t sleep anywhere but her mom’s or dad’s chest, screaming every time they tried to ever-so-gently place her in the bassinet. Donnell and Dani traded two-hour sleep shifts, while the other stayed up in the living room: rocking Jackie, staring at Jackie, trying to find echoes of their own facial features. Jackie slept in Donnell’s arms, lulled by the white noise of the turned-down TV, or else lulled by the sound of her father’s voice, which sang “You Are My Sunshine” over and over, and whispered key facts about her dry, new world: the names of her relatives, and things to look forward to like coffee, ocean swimming, and Beanpot hockey. He recited a poem he remembered from college—Galway Kinnell, “I would scrape the rust off your ivory bones”—and Donnell found himself crying for this fragile human whom it was now his mission to protect.

  Which might be how he got into this mess. Because Donnell’s a good father, and good fathers provide, even when they can’t afford to provide. And so good fathers sometimes do stupid things, like emptying their bank accounts to make down payments, and signing off on mortgages without really knowing what floating-rate means. They do stupid things like paying for a gut renovation on credit, because a girl should grow up in a light, airy space, with high bedroom windows that catch the pink dawn, and a modern kitchen with a Viking stove so they can eat Sunday pancakes in style, and a spacious, private bathroom for the long years of puberty distantly ahead.

  And when debt begins to weigh them down, one stupid thing that good dads do is take sports betting tips from their coworker Steve, who claims his friend’s sister dates the Jets’ QB, and Steve knows for a fact that the dude tweaked his wrist playing Fortnite and will sit out next week. When that bet goes bust, then really dumb good dads continue taking tips from Steve, and taking tips from paid tip lines, siphoning money. So they start buying scratch cards, and M
ega Millions tickets, and keep betting on horses, and football, and the Academy Awards, even after their wives have put them on warning, and even after their wives have moved to Los Angeles and left them alone.

  If Donnell had been better with money, he would have never ended up with the doorman job. He would never have met Ricky Cortes. When Jackie asked, last night, when Donnell was coming home, he told her, tomorrow. He tried to sound like he believed it.

  “You have to do something,” says Donnell. “You have to get that lineup thrown out on the grounds that none of those people in the lineup looked anything like me. And then you have to get that security tape thrown out on the grounds that it’s impossible to even see the guy’s face in the video, and the only reason they’re assuming it’s me is because they think all black people look alike. And you’ve got to get them to admit they have no murder weapon and they have no evidence, and I’ve never heard of this gold watch or bracelet or whatever it is they keep asking about. You getting this, Atticus? Maybe you should write it down.”

  The lawyer says, “I think I can get you a deal.”

  “I don’t want a deal. I want to get out of here.”

  “They have motive,” says the lawyer, enunciating the M-word, as if Donnell is deaf or too dumbstruck to process this piece of information.

  “I want to go home,” says Donnell.

  “I’m trying,” says the lawyer. “We’ll talk again soon.” He removes a container of dental floss from a desk drawer and begins to unspool it.

  “Really?” says Donnell.

  “Sorry,” says his lawyer, floss stretched between two fingers like a tightrope for a tiny acrobat. “I thought the camera was off.”

  30.

  She answers despite being underground. A woman shouts nearby, an argument with God over compound interest (“Free will!” she imagines God’s reply), so Wendy sticks a finger in her ear and hustles toward the far end of the tunnel, slaloming around trash bins and a man with a feather earring playing slide guitar.

  “When’s your train?” says Michael.

  Wendy looks up at the electronic display.

  “One minute.”

  “Tonight?” Michael says. “I thought you weren’t leaving until early tomorrow morning. I didn’t know they ran a train this late. Oh, I’m so glad. You’re taking it to Hudson, right? Let me know what time you get in and I’ll pick you up. Doesn’t matter how late.”

  It takes Wendy a second to figure out that he’s not talking about the subway train but an Amtrak that would, in theory, be bringing her to the Berkshires.

  “Michael, I’m not,” she says, and stares at the track. A foot-sized rat dawdles by the third rail. It sniffs a Cheetos bag, then crawls inside.

  “Not what?”

  “Not coming to Hudson.”

  “You’re taking the bus into Pittsfield then?”

  “Let’s talk about it later,” she says.

  The rat emerges, dusted orange. A little girl points and says, “Kitty cat.”

  “So what time does the bus come?” Michael says.

  “I’m not coming,” Wendy says.

  “What?”

  “I’m not coming to Ricky’s memorial.”

  “I don’t understand,” says Michael. Neither does Wendy. All she knows is she can’t leave right now, with Devor’s conspiracy gaining traction, and the billboard campaign launching, and the supposed unveiling of the product on Sunday. She can’t go to the funeral because of work, and because work is an excuse for avoiding what she doesn’t wish to confront.

  She can picture Ricky’s wake, his lips wired into a smile, still smug, even in death. Michael standing over the casket and reaching inside, maybe fixing Ricky’s tie. Lydia asking when they’ll try for another baby. The inevitable moment when Stuart stares at her breasts.

  The last funeral she went to was Nina’s. Not a funeral, a burial. No friends or Mixners, just Wendy, Michael, a rabbi, and Wendy’s dad. The tiny casket, which they lowered by hand. No one spoke. The rabbi breathlessly recited the kaddish, intuiting their need to move quickly. And it was too warm. She wanted thunder and wind, no light on that horrible day. Michael said something about the cemetery being a place where flowers grow. How one day their children would come here and play among these daisies, and that Nina would like that, seeing her sisters.

  “Look,” says Michael, near tears, she can tell, “I need you right now. Things are so fucked up, and I’m alone, and I just saw on TV that they arrested Donnell, and I keep seeing stuff on Reddit about your company’s campaign, and I just need to know what’s . . .”

  Wendy loses service as she steps onto the train.

  31.

  They were married the following September on the sand. Broder wore linen pants and a band-collared shirt, buttoned, as instructed, to the top. She said he looked hip, but he felt like a priest. He sipped virgin mojitos and shook everyone’s hands. He sanitized his hands when no one was looking. Their friends from Recovery said: too soon.

  And there were too many bridesmaids. High school best friends, Emma C. and Emma H., who both “lived” for Burning Man. A best friend from summer camp, Corrinne, in visible bra straps and cat-eye makeup; she was gay and played bass in a disco-punk band. And Aliana’s cousin, Alix, who’d had two lines in a Tom Cruise film and found a way to work it into every conversation. The bridesmaids primped, gossiped, posted to Facebook. They treated the wedding like a magazine shoot. And they smoked a joint in the club’s bridal suite, sort of half-apologetic—oh ha-ha, right, you guys are, like, sober—Recovery dismissed as passing fad.

  Aliana wore white and a wildflower crown. Her dress was backless, with a lacy bodice and a gauzy skirt that caught the breeze. She’d had her teeth bleached for the affair, and her smile seemed inhumanly bright as she walked down the aisle. It was hard to believe she was Broder’s bride. And yet here she was, moving toward him, meeting his eyes. He’d spent years in Recovery struggling to get past its second step, faith in a Power beyond himself. Where others found God in the coastline, Broder saw only a nihilistic ocean, a long, empty sky. But in her, he’d discovered the elusive divine.

  Broder stood barefoot, back to the surf. The barefoot thing was the bride’s idea. The groom had been pedicured in preparation. He’d never had one before and he liked it: the touch and attention, and the smooth result, heels planed like stones beneath a century of tides. It had drizzled that morning, and the beach was still wet. There was sand between his toes and caked to his ankles and the cuffs of his pants. He smelled sea salt and sunscreen. He felt himself sinking ever so slightly.

  Broder’s dad and Patty, who was now Broder’s stepmom, sat up front. They were obvious outliers in their East Coast attire: navy and charcoal, worsted wool. Broder kept waiting for his father to smile. The bride’s parents beamed. This was their party and they presided, hands clasped, legs stretched into the aisle. Broder’s mom sat alone, sweating, fanning herself with a program. She was the largest person here, and Broder felt embarrassed, and then he felt badly about being embarrassed. He’d bought the small diamond with his own meager savings. He hadn’t asked his family for money in months.

  The officiant was another of Aliana’s friends—a guy she’d once dated, or had maybe just slept with. He welcomed the guests and said some words about the bride: her beauty, her intelligence, her singular spirit. He made a joke about her being off the market. He laughed and said Broder was a lucky guy.

  Broder trembled while reciting his vows. He’d composed them himself, in the privacy and silence of his bedroom, and now he felt shy about sharing aloud. The vows seemed too sober for the tone of the occasion, too earnest and raw for the jovial vibe. He steadied himself in Aliana’s gaze. He got through it, then broke down when she spoke hers, sobbing into his sleeve. They kissed. Her dad serenaded the couple with a song written, years ago, for Aliana’s mom. Her parents’ friends clapped. Th
ey comprised most of the crowd, aging rockers in open collars, suits paired with Converse or cowboy boots. Broder had wanted something smaller—maybe the courthouse—but he had no say. He wanted the dignity of footwear.

  Michael was absent, no RSVP. Broder recognized few of the guests. They’d stopped going to meetings a couple months back. They told themselves it was because they were busy, between work and wedding prep they had no free time, but that was fine, they kept in touch with their sponsors, had each other’s support. In truth, Broder was only at the florist’s twenty hours a week, and Aliana’s mom had handled much of the planning: finding the venue, choosing place settings, vetoing Broder’s proposed floral arrangements. The real reason they skipped meetings was the judgment of others who held the party line that one should stay free of romantic distraction for that first sober year. They’d invited their sponsors, but no one else from Recovery. All of which accounted for Ricky Cortes at table eight. The bride had insisted on the presence of at least a few friends of Broder’s, and he’d long lost touch with the high school guys.

  Of course Ricky befriended the bridesmaids, lining up shots, leading the dance-floor charge. He was the same showman Broder remembered from college: bow-tied and suspendered, hands and mouth in perpetual motion—laughing, performing—part impresario, part shifty-eyed card shark.

  The Emmas gave a giggly, rhyming toast and the bride was handed a champagne flute. Broder scanned the room for her sponsor, who appeared, at that moment, to be immersed in her phone. And the bride clinked flutes with her high school friends, and she took, or pretended to take, a tiny sip. Broder couldn’t tell which. She danced with her dad to one of his own songs, and people clapped and sang along. Broder was supposed to dance with his mom, but she couldn’t be found, so they skipped it. His mom, it turned out, was blasting the AC in her rental car. When Broder found her, she said she was hot, she was sorry, she wasn’t used to this weather. He tried to pat her shoulder and she kept saying sorry.

  People kept whisking Aliana away—for photos, for dances, for passionate hugs—and there were so many people for Broder to talk to, all the bride’s relatives and family friends. These people had known her since childhood—they knew her, in one sense, better than he did—and Broder wasn’t sure what, exactly, to say: Hi, my name is Broder, I’m a heroin addict, and I work as a florist—an assistant florist—and yes, I signed a prenup, thanks for your concern. But that was okay. These strangers didn’t really have questions, they just wanted to perform old stories for a receptive new target, telling Broder about shrooming with Jim Morrison on this very beach, or Dennis Wilson getting seasick on somebody’s yacht. Out by the ashtray he encountered the Emmas, who bummed him a Spirit and then made him suffer through a lengthy discourse on the difficulty—no, no, the impossibility—of monogamy in this day and age. They were into the whole polyamory thing, the whole pseudo-Buddhist Bay Area pansexual thing. The Emmas spoke rapidly and rubbed at their noses. Ricky must have been to blame.