The Circle

by Dave Eggers

  “I just wanted to take a picture. Look,” she said, and showed him.

  Now her parents had disappeared, no doubt thinking she wanted time alone with Mercer. They were hilarious and insane.

  “It looks good,” he said, staring at the photo a bit longer than Mae had expected. He was not, evidently, above taking pleasure, and pride, in his own work.

  “It looks incredible,” she said. The wine had sent her aloft. “That was very nice of you. And I know it means a lot to them, especially now. It adds something very important here.” Mae was euphoric, and it wasn’t just the wine. It was release. Her family had been released. “This place has been so dark,” she said.

  And for a brief moment, she and Mercer seemed to find their former footing. Mae, who for years had thought about Mercer with a disappointment bordering on pity, remembered now that he was capable of great work. She knew he was compassionate, and very kind, even though his limited horizons had been exasperating. But now, seeing this—could she call it artwork? It was something like art—and the effect it had on the house, her faith in him was rekindled.

  That gave Mae an idea. Under the pretense that she was going to her room to change, she excused herself and hurried upstairs. But instead, sitting on her old bed, in three minutes she’d posted her photo of the chandelier in two dozen design and home design feeds, linking to Mercer’s website—which featured just his phone number and a few pictures; he hadn’t updated it in years—and his email address. If he wasn’t smart enough to get business for himself, she would be happy to do it for him.

  When she was finished, Mercer was sitting with her parents at the kitchen table, which was crowded with salad and stir-fried chicken and vegetables. Their eyes followed her down the stairs. “I called up there,” her father said.

  “We like to eat when it’s hot,” her mother added.

  Mae hadn’t heard them. “Sorry. I was just—Wow, this looks good. Dad, don’t you think Mercer’s chandelier is awesome?”

  “I do. And I told you, and him, as much. We’ve been asking for one of his creations for a year now.”

  “I just needed the right antlers,” Mercer said. “I hadn’t gotten any really great ones in a while.” He went on to explain his sourcing, how he bought antlers only from trusted collaborators, people he knew hadn’t hunted the deer, or if they had, had been instructed to do so by Fish and Game to curb overcrowding.

  “That is fascinating,” her mother said. “Before I forget, I want to raise a toast … What’s that?”

  Mae’s phone had beeped. “Nothing,” she said. “But in a second I think I’ll have some good news to announce. Go on, Mom.”

  “I was just saying that I wanted to toast having us—”

  Now it was Mercer’s phone ringing.

  “Sorry,” he said, and maneuverered his hand outside his pants, finding the off button.

  “Everyone done?” her mother asked.

  “Sorry Mrs. Holland,” Mercer said. “Go on.”

  But at that moment, Mae’s phone buzzed loudly again, and when Mae looked to its screen, she saw that there were thirty-seven new zings and messages.

  “Something you have to attend to?” her father said.

  “No, not yet,” Mae said, though she was almost too excited to wait. She was proud of Mercer, and soon she’d be able to show him something about the audience he might have outside Longfield. If there were thirty-seven messages in the first few minutes, in twenty minutes there would be a hundred.

  Her mother continued. “I was going to thank you, Mae, for all you’ve done to improve your father’s health, and my own sanity. And I wanted to toast Mercer, too, as part of our family, and to thank him for his beautiful work.” She paused, as if expecting a buzz to sound any moment. “Well, I’m just glad I got through that. Let’s eat. The food’s getting cold.”

  And they began to eat, but after a few minutes, Mae had heard so many dings, and she’d seen her phone screen update so many times, that she couldn’t wait.

  “Okay, I can’t stand it anymore. I posted that photo I took of your chandelier, Mercer, and people love it!” She beamed, and raised her glass. “That’s what we should toast.”

  Mercer didn’t look amused. “Wait. You posted them where?”

  “That’s great, Mercer,” her father said, and raised his own glass.

  Mercer’s glass was not raised. “Where’d you post them, Mae?”

  “Everywhere relevant,” she said, “and the comments are amazing.” She searched her screen. “Just let me read the first one. And I quote: Wow, that is gorgeous. That’s from a pretty well-known industrial designer in Stockholm. Here’s another one: Very cool. Reminds me of something I saw in Barcelona last year. That was from a designer in Santa Fe who has her own shop. She gave your thing three out of four stars, and had some suggestions about how you might improve it. I bet you could sell them there if you wanted to. So here’s another—”

  Mercer had his palms on the table. “Stop. Please.”

  “Why? You haven’t even heard the best part. On DesignMind, you already have 122 smiles. That’s an incredible amount to get so quickly. And they have a ranking there, and you’re in the top fifty for today. Actually, I know how you could raise that—” At the same time, it occurred to Mae that this kind of activity would surely get her PartiRank into the 1,800s. And if she could get enough of these people to buy the work, it would mean solid Conversion and Retail Raw numbers—

  “Mae. Stop. Please stop.” Mercer was staring at her, his eyes small and round. “I don’t want to get loud here, in your parents’ home, but either you stop or I have to walk out.”

  “Just hold on a sec,” she said, and scrolled through her messages, looking for one that she was sure would impress him. She’d seen a message come in from Dubai, and if she found it, she knew, his resistance would fall away.

  “Mae,” she heard her mother say. “Mae.”

  But Mae couldn’t locate the message. Where was it? While she scrolled, she heard the scraping of a chair. But she was so close to finding it that she didn’t look up. When she did, she found Mercer gone and her parents staring at her.

  “I think it’s nice you want to support Mercer,” her mother said, “but I just don’t understand why you do this now. We’re trying to enjoy a nice dinner.”

  Mae stared at her mother, absorbing all the disappointment and bewilderment that she could stand, then ran outside and reached Mercer as he was backing out of the driveway.

  She got into the passenger seat. “Stop.”

  His eyes were dull, lifeless. He put the car in park and rested his hands in his lap, exhaling with all the condescension he could muster.

  “What the hell is your problem, Mercer?”

  “Mae, I asked you to stop, and you didn’t.”

  “Did I hurt your feelings?”

  “No. You hurt my brain. You make me think you’re batshit crazy. I asked you to stop and you wouldn’t.”

  “I wouldn’t stop trying to help you.”

  “I didn’t ask for your help. And I didn’t give you permission to post a photo of my work.”

  “Your work.” She heard something barbed in her voice that she knew wasn’t right or productive.

  “You’re snide, Mae, and you’re mean, and you’re callous.”

  “What? I’m the opposite of callous, Mercer. I’m trying to help you because I believe in what you do.”

  “No you don’t. Mae, you’re just unable to allow anything to live inside a room. My work exists in one room. It doesn’t exist anywhere else. And that’s how I intend it.”

  “So you don’t want business?”

  Mercer looked through his windshield, then leaned back. “Mae, I’ve never felt more that there is some cult taking over the world. You know what someone tried to sell me the other day? Actually, I bet it’s somehow affiliated with the Circle. Have you heard of Homie? The thing where your phone scans your house for the bar codes of every product—”

  “R
ight. Then it orders new stuff whenever you’re getting low. It’s brilliant.”

  “You think this is okay?” Mercer said. “You know how they framed it for me? It’s the usual utopian vision. This time they were saying it’ll reduce waste. If stores know what their customers want, then they don’t overproduce, don’t overship, don’t have to throw stuff away when it’s not bought. I mean, like everything else you guys are pushing, it sounds perfect, sounds progressive, but it carries with it more control, more central tracking of everything we do.”

  “Mercer, the Circle is a group of people like me. Are you saying that somehow we’re all in a room somewhere, watching you, planning world domination?”

  “No. First of all, I know it’s all people like you. And that’s what’s so scary. Individually you don’t know what you’re doing collectively. But secondly, don’t presume the benevolence of your leaders. For years there was this happy time when those controlling the major internet conduits were actually decent enough people. Or at least they weren’t predatory and vengeful. But I always worried, what if someone was willing to use this power to punish those who challenged them?”

  “What are you saying?”

  “You think it’s just a coincidence that every time some congresswoman or blogger talks about monopoly, they suddenly become ensnared in some terrible sex-porn-witchcraft controversy? For twenty years, the internet was capable of ruining anyone in minutes, but not until your Three Wise Men, or at least one of them, was anyone willing to do it. You’re saying this is news to you?”

  “You’re so paranoid. Your conspiracy theory brain always depressed me, Mercer. You sound so ignorant. And saying that Homie is some scary new thing, I mean, for a hundred years there were milkmen who brought you milk. They knew when you needed it. There were butchers who sold you meat, bakers who would drop off bread—”

  “But the milkman wasn’t scanning my house! I mean, anything with a UPC code can be scanned. Already, millions of people’s phones are scanning their homes and communicating all that information out to the world.”

  “And so what? You don’t want Charmin to know how much of their toilet paper you’re using? Is Charmin oppressing you in some significant way?”

  “No, Mae, it’s different. That would be easier to understand. Here, though, there are no oppressors. No one’s forcing you to do this. You willingly tie yourself to these leashes. And you willingly become utterly socially autistic. You no longer pick up on basic human communication clues. You’re at a table with three humans, all of whom are looking at you and trying to talk to you, and you’re staring at a screen, searching for strangers in Dubai.”

  “You’re not so pure, Mercer. You have an email account. You have a website.”

  “Here’s the thing, and it’s painful to say this to you. But you’re not very interesting anymore. You sit at a desk twelve hours a day and you have nothing to show for it except for some numbers that won’t exist or be remembered in a week. You’re leaving no evidence that you lived. There’s no proof.”

  “Fuck you, Mercer.”

  “And worse, you’re not doing anything interesting anymore. You’re not seeing anything, saying anything. The weird paradox is that you think you’re at the center of things, and that makes your opinions more valuable, but you yourself are becoming less vibrant. I bet you haven’t done anything offscreen in months. Have you?”

  “You’re such a fucker, Mercer.”

  “Do you go outside anymore?”

  “You’re the interesting one, is that it? The idiot who makes chandeliers out of dead animal parts? You’re the wonderboy of all that’s fascinating?”

  “You know what I think, Mae? I think you think that sitting at your desk, frowning and smiling somehow makes you think you’re actually living some fascinating life. You comment on things, and that substitutes for doing them. You look at pictures of Nepal, push a smile button, and you think that’s the same as going there. I mean, what would happen if you actually went? Your CircleJerk ratings or whatever-the-fuck would drop below an acceptable level! Mae, do you realize how incredibly boring you’ve become?”

  For many years now, Mercer had been the human she’d loathed more than any other. This was not new. He’d always had the unique ability to send her into apoplexy. His professorial smugness. His antiquarian bullshit. And most of all, his baseline assumption—so wrong—that he knew her. He knew the parts of her he liked and agreed with, and he pretended those were her true self, her essence. He knew nothing.

  But with every passing mile, as she drove home, she felt better. Better with every mile between her and that fat fuck. The fact that she’d ever slept with him made her physically sick. Had she been possessed by some weird demon? Her body must have been overtaken, for those three years, by some terrible force that blinded her to his wretchedness. He’d been fat even then, hadn’t he? What kind of guy is fat in high school? He’s talking to me about sitting behind a desk when he’s forty pounds overweight? The man was upside down.

  She would not talk to him again. She knew this, and there was comfort in that. Relief spread over her like warm water. She would never talk to him, write to him. She would insist that her parents sever any connection to him. She planned to destroy the chandelier, too; it would look like an accident. Maybe stage a break-in. Mae laughed to herself, thinking of exorcizing that fat idiot from her life. That ugly, ever-sweating moose-man would never have a say in her world again.

  She saw the sign for Maiden’s Voyages and thought nothing of it. She passed the exit and didn’t feel a thing. Seconds later, though, she was leaving the highway, and doubling back toward the beach. It was almost ten o’clock, so she knew the shop had been closed for hours. So what was she doing? She wasn’t reacting to Mercer’s bullshit questions about what she was or wasn’t doing outside. She was only seeing if the place was open; she knew it wouldn’t be, but maybe Marion was there, and maybe she’d let Mae take one out for half an hour? She lived in the trailer next door, after all. Maybe Mae could catch her walking within the compound, and be able to persuade her to rent her one.

  Mae parked and peered through the chain-link fence, seeing no one, only the shuttered rental kiosk, the rows of kayaks and paddle-boards. She stood, hoping to see a silhouette within the trailer, but there was none. The light within was dim, rose-colored, the trailer empty.

  She walked to the tiny beach and stood, watching the moonlight play on the still surface of the bay. She sat. She didn’t want to go home, though there was no point in staying. Her head was full of Mercer, and his giant infant’s face, and all the bullshit things he said that night and said every night. That would be, she was certain, the last time she tried to help him in any way. He was in her past, in the past, he was an antique, a dull, inanimate object she could leave in an attic.

  She stood up, thinking she should go back to work on her PartiRank, when she saw something odd. Against the far side of the fence, outside the enclosure, she saw a large object, leaning precariously. It was either a kayak or paddleboard, and she quickly made her way to it. It was a kayak, she realized, and it was resting on the free side of the fence, a paddle next to it. The positioning of the kayak made little sense; she’d never seen one standing nearly upright before, and was sure that Marion wouldn’t have approved. Mae could only think that someone had brought a rental back after closing, and tried to get it as close to the enclosure as possible.

  Mae thought at the very least she should bring the kayak to the ground, to reduce the chances that it would fall overnight. She did so, carefully lowering it to the sand, surprised by how light it was.

  Then she had a thought. The water was just thirty yards away, and she knew that she could easily drag it to shore. Would it be theft to borrow a kayak that had already been borrowed? She wasn’t lifting it over the fence, after all; she was only extending the borrowing that someone else had extended. She would return it in an hour or two, and no one would know the difference.

  Mae put the paddle insi
de and dragged the kayak across the sand for a few feet, testing the feeling of this act. Was it theft? Certainly Marion would understand if she knew. Marion was a free spirit, not a rule-bound shrew, and seemed like the type of person who, in Mae’s shoes, would do the same thing. She would not like the liability implications, but then again, were there such implications? How could Marion be held accountable if the kayak was taken without her knowledge?

  Now Mae was at the shore, and the bow of the kayak was wet. And then, feeling the water under the vessel, the way the current seemed to pull the kayak out from her and into the fuller volume of the bay, Mae knew that she would do this. The one complication was that she wouldn’t have a life preserver. It was the one thing the borrower managed to heave over the fence. But the water was so calm that Mae saw no possibility of real danger if she stayed close to the shore.

  Once she was out on the water, though, feeling the heavy glass under her, the quick progress she was making, she thought she might not stay in the shallows. That this would be the night to make it to Blue Island. Angel Island was easy, people went there all the time, but Blue Island was strange, jagged, never visited. Mae smiled, picturing herself there, and smiled wider, thinking of Mercer, his smug face, surprised, upended. Mercer would be too fat to fit into a kayak, she thought, and too lazy to make it out of the marina. A man, fast approaching thirty, making antler chandeliers and lecturing her—who worked at the Circle!—about life paths. This was a joke. But Mae, who was in the T2K and who was moving quickly up through the ranks, was also brave, capable of taking a kayak in the night into the blackwater bay, to explore an island Mercer would only view through a telescope, sitting on his potato-sack ass, painting animal parts with silver paint.

  Hers was not an itinerary rooted in any logic. She had no idea of the currents deeper in the bay, or of the wisdom in getting so close to the tankers that used the nearby shipping lane, especially given she would be in the dark, invisible to them. And by the time she reached, or got close to, the island, the conditions might be too rough for her to go back. But driven by a force within her as strong and reflexive as sleep, she knew she would not stop until she’d made it to Blue Island, or was somehow prevented from doing so. If the wind kept quiet and the water held steady, she would make it there.