by Ryder Stacy
Rockson picked up the newspaper again. He glanced at the date: Thursday, September 7, 1989. Something seemed odd about that.
He put the paper down, “Kim? Could you come in here?”
Kim came out of the kitchen. “What did you say, dear?”
“What date is it?” Rockson asked. “Is this right? Look at this newspaper.”
She took the paper from his hand and read, “Thursday, September seventh. That’s right, dear. Why? Did you think it was Wednesday?”
Rockson smiled, “Yeah. I guess I did . . . Funny, isn’t it?”
“Really, dear, the Herald never makes a mistake. It’s been Thursday all day!”
Rockson closed his eyes, “Of course. Guess I should rest . . . Thanks, dear.”
“Mistakes happen.” She smiled, and winked.
Five
“There’s the bell on the microwave; the synthosteak is ready, dear! You sit still; I’ll roll in the TV table, and you can eat and watch Twenty Questions with me snuggled against your knee. Oh, Rock, I’ve been so happy these past few years—since our marriage.”
TV? Rock looked up at the make-believe Spanish-oak cabinet with the big greenish screen. TV. That was a good idea. He went over and turned on the switch. He sat back in his chair and watched the screen brighten. A commercial came on. “Ruffy dog food is good for your pet.”
“Ruffy, Ruffy,” said the black-and-white pooch. Rockson smiled. How the hell do they do that? “This is KREK in Salt Lake City, Channel Two. Stay tuned for TWENTY QUESTIONS.”
The logo of a spinning word that blew apart to form the words “Twenty Questions” came upon the screen in a dazzle of color.
“And now your host, Jeri Jet!” The smiling emcee, a twentyish thin man with gold hair, in a pink suit, came on the screen. “Good day to you all out there in TV Land . . . Are you ready to play Twenty Questions?”
“Yes!” came the roar of approval from an unseen audience.
“Well, let’s go! Now, for our first contestant!” said Jeri Jet, stepping aside. The vermilion curtain parted, and a naked man trussed to a chair appeared. He looked a lot like the derelict who had led Rockson to the fountain the other day—a coincidence, no doubt. The man had electrical wires taped to his ankles.
Jeri Jet walked over, leaned down at the man in the chair, and said, “Contestant, are you ready for Twenty Questions?”
The man cried out “No!” but was overwhelmed by the roar of “Yes!” from the audience.
Rockson leaned forward, intensely interested. Kim came into the room rolling the synthosteak and broccoli out on the TV tray. She sat down beside him on the floor, “Oooh, has it started?” she asked.
Rock said nothing. His knuckles were white; his hands gripped the plush arms of the chair. What the hell was this?
“First question,” said Jeri Jet, jabbing a finger at the man. “What are you for?”
“I’m for freedom!”
“WRONG!” Jeri Jet yelled, and his hand dropped down. The contestant suddenly convulsed as if electricity had shot along the wires leading to his body. For an instant, his tangled, black hair stood on end.
“Is that a jolt of electricity?” Rock asked.
Kim laughed. “Don’t be silly—it’s just special effects. Nothing is real on TV.”
“The correct answer is . . ." Jet smiled. The audience yelled “SOCIAL ORDER.”
“SECOND QUESTION,” Jeri Jet yelled. “What are you for?”
The man in the chair looked around wildly, said nothing. Jeri Jet repeated the question. Kim squeezed Rockson’s knee, “The answer is social order, everyone knows that,” she said. “Come on, come on!”
Another convulsion swept through the naked bound man. He struggled to free himself.
“We’re waiting,” laughed Jeri Jet. “What’s your answer?”
The man on the chair spat and said, “Rock ’n roll.”
“WRONG!” yelled the audience—and Kim.
The contestant’s hair stood on end and again he started convulsing. He slumped, his body limp.
Jeri Jet turned solemnly to the camera. “And now, the voice of our beloved leader, with a message for today!”
The screen faded, and replacing the gruesome quiz program was a drawing of a red chess piece—the king. A strong male voice bellowed out, “Don’t give to the beggars and street people. Citizens, you work hard for your money. Let the loafers and deviants starve if they don’t want to work. I, the chessman respect you . . . Respect you.”
The voice-over was repeated twice. The logo of the chess king with the superimposed words social order was spinning, faster and faster, until it was a spiral. Then it faded.
Kim sighed. “He’s so wonderful.”
Rockson wasn’t listening to her. Where? Where had he heard that voice before? Not in this city, not on television. Where?
Then the quiz program was back. Rockson watched tensely as “THIRD QUESTION!” was yelled by the audience. “No!” begged the man on the chair. “No, please don’t ask.”
“YES,” yelled the audience. Kim squeezed Rockson’s left calf. “Isn’t it exciting? Can we make love after the program, dear?”
Rockson mumbled, “Yes, of course,” and continued to watch the glaring screen. “THIRD QUESTION,” shouted Jeri Jet. “What are you for?”
The man on the chair cried out, “Social order, goddamn it.”
Jeri Jet exclaimed, “Correct! Martha, the man has given the correct answer. Let’s see what he’s won!” A slender woman in a white-sequined see-through gown came out and another curtain opened. The audience oooed and aahed as “Fabulous kitchen appliances” passed in front of them. “A washer/dryer, a blender, a new microwave. Total value twelve thousand dollars and one cent,” Jeri Jet concluded.
The contestant was cut loose and led away weeping, by slinky Martha.
“MORE,” Jeri Jet shouted, “after this message.”
While the dog food commercial barked on, Rockson asked Kim, “What happens if they don’t answer correctly?”
“They have twenty tries at the question. If they don’t answer correctly by their twentieth try, they don’t win the kitchen.”
“How are they selected to be on the program?”
“Why, I don’t know, dear. Does it matter?”
“No, I guess not . . .”
Jeri Jet’s “More” turned out to be a wiggle from Martha, a wave good bye from Jeri, and another station logo.
“Finish your meal, dear—it’s time to turn it off and go to bed,” said Kim. “I want to show you my new negligee outfit—it’s super.”
In a few minutes he had cleaned the plate off. She cooked well.
Rockson followed her into the bedroom, which consisted almost entirely of a double-sized bed and wall and ceiling mirrors. The only other furniture besides the immense bed was a small dresser and some of those big-eyed-children paintings. Rockson wondered why the bedroom didn’t seem familiar at all.
“Did you redecorate, Kim?”
“No, silly. Now you wait here a second, while I go in the bathroom and put on my new outfit . . .”
Rock sat down on the red velour bedspread. The bed jiggled, it felt cool. He pulled the sheets off one end—rubber. It was a water bed. He lay down. It rocked back and forth, like he was in a rowboat.
“Take a look, dear. What do you think?”
Kim sure looked good—she was nearly naked, and the sepia-colored almost-transparent clingy bikini panties and push-up bra accentuated her curves. Her alabaster-complected skin seemed to glow softly in the lamplight. All the more so when Kim undulated her body over to the light switch and made an adjustment. The room’s lighting turned a dim pink. “Maybe now you’re ready for a little fooling around.”
“Maybe so,” Rock said. He felt his manhood solidifying. Kim had climbed up on the bed and undid his shirt buttons and unbuckled his pants. Then she unzipped him. He started to fondle her breasts but she said, “No!” slapping his hands and frowning. “No. First I d
o this,” she said softly. She got down on her elbows and her cool white hands extracted his erect manhood from his pants. She engulfed it with her wet lips, bringing an immediate groan of pleasure from Rockson. “Just lie back, dear. Remember what the Chessman says about sex. It’s the woman’s job. After a hard day, the best thing is a blow job.”
Rockson didn’t protest; still, he wanted to hold her, run his fingers through her silky blond tresses. But every time he made a move to touch her, she objected. He lay back resigned to a passive role.
Kim’s marshmallow-soft, pink lips continued to slide moistly up and down his manly staff, tightening ever so slightly now and then, bringing paroxysms of response from her bedmate.
Rockson could no longer remain idle. He pulled her face to his, stared at her. His eyes melted into her. “Kim, lie down. I’ll do some of the moving—”
“But Chessman says—”
It was too late. Rockson had rolled over onto her, tearing the flimsy panties off with one snap of his fingers. He felt her yielding, her legs opening, her burning-hot sex wet and ready for him. “Yes . . .yes. Please, please put it in!”
Rockson needed no encouragement. It was a bit distracting to see endless rows of naked Rockson-Kim images—the damned mirrors—all around them, but soon he was lost in the task at hand. She undulated the wet tip of her blond triangle forward to meet his manhood, and he plunged.
He thought the shout that Kim uttered at that instant might arouse the neighbors: “Oh, yes, yes—Aaahhhh!”
But soon she settled back to simple gasps and groans, punctuated by love-words. The probing staff slid in and out between the opened petals of flesh. She rolled her eyes, rocked her head back and forth on the pillow. The bed set up some sort of obscene rhythm underneath them. She moved up and down, meeting the Doomsday Warrior’s every thrust, locking herself against him, being a full participant in the age-old ritual of coming together.
“Oh, it’s so good. Oh, Rock, it’s—been so long. I’ve—I’ve never—experienced you like this before . . .”
“Don’t talk—not now,” he whispered. For he was reaching the point of explosive completion. Like a gathering tidal wave, he moved faster and faster, the mattress nearly bursting a seam from the impacts. At the same time, Kim was reaching her own peak. Then suddenly, together, they shuddered in surrender to the heaving ecstacy.
“Always, always I will love you,” she said. She lay limp on the tousled satin sheets, exhausted as she had never been before. And happier.
Rockson was exhausted too. But when Kim turned off the love-light’s pink rays, no matter how he tried, he couldn’t sleep. He turned to look at Kim, his wife. She was beautiful.
She lay there asleep, a smile a mile wide on her face.
He sat up. Something still seemed wrong. He had to think, had to think.
He went to sit near the bedroom window. He stared out over the humming city and the winking stars above.
Why? Why do I feel like a stranger in this city?
When Rock finally returned to bed it was four A.M. He dozed off; a dream began. It was a vivid, frightening thing, a nightmare of twisting images and symbols . . .
He was walking alone, walking across a long flat plain. Where was he going? Something about the mountains to the south . . . A vehicle appeared—a jeep. And in the jeep were red-clad men who laughed and pointed at him. They threw ropes, and though he fought with all his might the ropes ensnared him, like huge winding snakes; they coiled about his body, tightening. Then he was thrown down a hole, and as he screamed out “Let me go, let me go,” the snakes whirled him so that he spun on his heels like a top, around and around, and he couldn’t stop.
Then a red-clad man came in, his face leered at Rockson every time he spun past the man. Then the spinning stopped and Rockson was on a big chessboard, and the red-clad man with the leer was wearing a crown, and Rockson felt on top of his head and he had a crown on also. And Rockson noticed that he was now dressed in a white outfit.
The man at the far end of the chessboard—it was a half-mile square, at least—was approaching. He came rapidly, without moving his feet. Rockson turned and tried to run, for he knew that something awful was about to happen. But he was blocked. Two men with flamethrowers, also dressed in red, were coming at him from the opposite direction, leering, spurts of fire coming from their weapons.
Rockson tried to run another way, but a beautiful blond woman with long wavy hair and blue eyes stopped him. She had no weapon, but her blue eyes flashed at him, and somehow they paralyzed him. Her mouth moved, her luscious lips undulated up and down, but he couldn’t make out the words. What was she saying? Her body was all curves and she was dancing as she walked, swaying in her clinging white gown, which sparkled like starfields afire. The sexual rhythm of her movement was all-powerful, all-desirable. And Rockson couldn’t break away from her spell, couldn’t leave the square he stood upon, even though the two men with flamethrowers approached closer, even though the king in red was rapidly closing on him.
“Stop,” Rockson shouted. “Stop! Let me go, Kim, let me go!”
Gasping for air that would not come, Rockson sat bolt-upright in bed and looked wildly around. The nightmare vision faded like an old sepia photograph in sunlight, until it was replaced by the room. And Kim was looking in his eyes, her mouth moving. “What’s wrong, dear? Have you been having a nightmare? Do you want me to turn on the lamp?”
Rockson nodded; he could breath now, he could move. But he wanted to see the room better, wanted to know this wasn’t also part of the nightmare. She turned the light on, and Rockson, taking long oxygen-sucking breaths, looked around. There were the large-eyed-children pictures, the door to the bathroom, the bureau and mirrors. He was home, he was safe. His shoulders relaxed. He slid back down and put his hands, which had been in front of him in a defensive position, back down.
“I’m all right,” he said. “Turn off the light. Let’s go back to sleep. It was just a nightmare.”
Six
Rockson awoke to the buzz of the alarm, the whistle of the kettle, and the sound of music. Moments before, he had been dreaming of something about being trapped by snakes, trudging endlessly in the desert. The combined sounds drove the rest of the dream from his head. He stared quietly at the ceiling. It’d seemed so real. He yawned. What day was it? Who was he? Where was he? Slowly it all came back to him. He was Ted Rockman, C.P.A. His eyes scanned the room. He was at home. Today was Friday, September eighth. He glanced at the clock—if he didn’t hurry, he’d be late for work.
He swung himself out of bed, afraid it would collapse from the movement. His back ached. What a nightmare he’d had!
Kim’s side of the bed was empty. He could hear her elsewhere in the apartment, humming along with the synthesized music that seemed to come from everywhere and couldn’t be shut off.
Groggy, he shuffled into the bathroom and relieved himself, only to find the toilet didn’t flush. The handle came off in his hand. For some reason he felt very dissatisfied, almost angry—at everything.
“Kim!” Rockson shouted. “Come look at this!”
Kim came to the doorway of the bathroom. She was wearing a pink chenille robe with a frilly green apron over it. She carried a fork, which she brandished like a weapon. “Yes, dear?” Before he could speak, she clucked, “The stove keeps going out. I’ll have to run down to Worthington’s and order a new one. I hope they’re on sale.”
He looked at her. She looked so stupid—what she wore was so silly too. It was some sort of tunic outfit that was a washed-out pink.
“What is it, dear?” Kim prodded him. “The Pop-tarts will burn if I don’t get back to the kitchen.”
“Pop-tarts?”
“Why, yes, your tummy’s favorite breakfast. Really, Teddy, you act like you never heard of Pop-tarts before.”
Remembering his original point, Rockson indicated the toilet. “It’s broken.”
She sighed. “You’ll have to call the repairman again. Speedfi
x takes care of all the maintenance.” She pursed her lips in thought. “Except, I don’t know if we have any money for plumbers, Teddy. Honestly, if you’d only go to Mr. Cooper and ask for a raise, like you promised. I’d like to buy some new furniture, too . . . You think I enjoy looking at this third-rate stuff all day when we could have first-rate plastic on a better salary?”
“But—”
Just then the music swelled, snapping his patience. “Turn off that blasted music! I can’t take it anymore!” Kim looked as though he had slapped her in the face. “Teddy, that’s blasphemous! It’s a crime! I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that! Oh, thank goodness the children already left for school—what a bad example you set!”
Rockson charged out of the bathroom, looking for a speaker or amplifier to punch out of commission. “I guess I’m just in a bad mood.”
Kim burst into tears. Rockson halted, chagrined. He could not bear to see women cry. He went to her and said, “What’s the matter?”
“You,” bawled his wife. “You’re not normal anymore. You say illegal things and you have such a temper! I’ll have to turn you back over to the police. Then the kids and I will starve. We won’t be able to pay our rent, and we’ll get thrown out— We’ll have to sleep on the streets—”
He shushed her. “All right.” He would not mention the music again—he had no desire to have another run-in with the police. He only wanted to get out of the house. It was the nightmare; it had made him uneasy.
“I’m sorry,” Rockson said, brushing away her tears.
She sniffed. “You’d better hurry and eat your breakfast, so you can get to work on time.”
Work? He knew he was a C.P.A.—but what was a C.P.A.? Odd thoughts, disjointed memories, were sweeping over him like a tide going out to sea, and it was all he could do to not drown in them.
“I’m not going to work today,” he said. “I have . . . other things to do.”
