Lizard People

by Charlie Price

  “Leaving,” he said, and carried his beer out the door without another word or a backward glance at Mom.

  “What’s he doing here?” I asked Mom.

  “Nothing,” she said. She sounded real tired. Had to make an effort to speak. “Nothing. Came to see me.” She didn’t meet my eyes. “I’m tired.” She made a gesture with her head toward the back of the house. “I’m going to bed.”

  “Are you doing drugs, Mom?” I could feel the shock wave as I said it. I don’t know if she could.

  She looked at me then. Shook her head. “I’m feeling pretty groggy.”

  “Do you remember yesterday?” I asked her.

  “You don’t think people are trying to kill me, but they are,” she said, her eyes growing brighter. “They’re broadcasting. You pretend you don’t hear it, but you know who they are. Doctors think they can knock me out so I’ll forget about it. Well, as soon as you forget, they’ve got you. If it wasn’t for me, you and your dad would already be switched.”

  Mom’s face sharpened and she looked more intense when she talked like this. The doctors said it wouldn’t work to argue with her about these ideas. Strange ideas are a symptom of the illness, they said. The only treatment is regular doses of antipsychotic medication and a stable environment with as few stressors as possible. Right. And then Dad leaves her for another woman.

  “Is that guy giving you drugs?” I asked her.

  Her eyes flared. “Vinnie’s my friend,” she said, getting up. “My friend.” She walked past me to her bedroom and closed the door.

  That night … Why did I wait until dark? Why did I even go? I don’t know. That night, I went back to Marco’s house, got the dining room chair myself this time, and asked for more of the story.

  4000

  Marco knew he needed to get back to the portal. He thought if he could escape the hospital, if that’s what it was, he could just keep going till he reached the park. He needed out of this room.

  “I have to see Dr. Gila!” he yelled, and pounded on the door.

  A little bit of white steam came out of a vent in the ceiling, and the next thing Marco knew, he was on the floor, feeling dizzy. Marco didn’t see the door open but he felt the tube pulling on his arm. He heard some tonal clicking, but he couldn’t understand it. He realized his earpiece had become dislodged when he fell. He found it and put it back in.

  “… me now. Come with me now,” the machine was saying as it led him along the corridors back to Dr. Gila’s office.

  “I’m feeling better,” he told her after the tube had exited.

  “All right,” she said. “Who are you?”

  “I’m … My name is Newt. I’m a nephew of Dr. Monitor. That’s why you don’t have me in your records. He sent me over here to teach me a lesson.” Marco watched Dr. Gila to see if she bought his story.

  “That kind of teaching doesn’t sound like the Dr. Monitor I know,” the woman said, looking for something on her desk.

  “Wait a minute!” he said, thinking this might be his last chance. “Okay, my name’s not Newt. But here’s the problem. When I told you the truth the last time, you didn’t believe me. Give me a minute, and I’ll explain the whole thing.”

  Dr. Gila leaned over and pressed a button on her desk.

  “No!” Marco screamed. “I can explain!”

  “Hold my calls,” Dr. Gila said to a small pad below the button. Then she sat and looked at him. Waiting.

  “Okay. First, I don’t understand how it works, but I really did come through a wormhole or time connector of some sort. It’s located over in a park or a field about a mile or two from here. Second. I’m … on a mission.” Marco was starting to believe it himself. “I really do need to know what the cure for mental illness is. So I can help my Mom.”

  Where was his Mom? Where was his family? Was his Mom in the hospital all this time?

  “I live in a state called California, in the year 2007,” Marco explained. “I’m not crazy. I just wanted help and thought I might find it here in the future.”

  Dr. Gila smoothed wrinkles out of her sleeve. “California. I’ve not heard of that. An ancient state? This planet?”

  Marco nodded. And then he realized he wasn’t sure. This planet? He couldn’t say exactly where he was or what had happened to him.

  “We don’t have anything like mental illness in 4000,” she said. “Genetic engineering, glandular implants, and brain chemistry balancing devices have virtually eliminated it. When the rare case surfaces, the person is offered a variety of treatment options. Which one would you like?”

  Marco was disappointed by the question. “I don’t need one. There is nothing wrong with me!”

  “Why did you tell me your name was Newt a minute ago?”

  “Well, uh, because your name is Gila and the other doctor’s name is Monitor and those are both lizards. And, I saw your face get different and your skin change when you whistled for information earlier and so I thought … uh, if I pretended I was a lizard, too, you might think I was okay.”

  “You think that I’m a lizard?” Dr. Gila leaned back in her chair.

  “I, uh, yes,” Marco said, feeling very off balance. Feeling less certain every second. “I think so. Aren’t you?”

  “Do you think a person can be a human being and a lizard at the same time?” The doctor made a steeple with her fingers.

  “Um, no,” Marco said, “I don’t think so.”

  “So,” Dr. Gila said, “let me ask you again. What kind of treatment would you like?”

  Marco felt like his brain was being tied in knots and rearranged into cornrows. The more he tried to tell the truth and make sense of his situation, the more confused he got. Now he wasn’t sure of anything that had happened to him in this place. Did his window change each day? Or did he move to different locations? Was he in a building or on a ship of some kind? And was he talking to a person or a lizard?

  “I need to talk to Dr. Monitor,” Marco said. “I want to go to his office with you and I’ll show you the entry or exit or whatever it is.”

  “Well, I want to talk with Dr. Monitor, too,” Dr. Gila said. “But he’s missing. No one has seen him since the day you were admitted.”

  “He’s gone through the portal!” Marco practically yelled at Dr. Gila. “I told him about it. About how I got here. That’s why you can’t find him.”

  Dr. Gila was up and out of the room before Marco had even finished speaking.

  She came back with a shot-putter of a woman wearing a yellow uniform that was covered with what Marco first thought were medals, but which turned out to be tools of all kinds.

  “Show us what you call the portal,” Dr. Gila said. It sounded like an order.

  Yes! Marco tried not to let them see how eager he was. Practically free!

  The woman in yellow took two different-sized buttons off her tunic and placed them on Marco’s cheek. “Stabilizer and locator,” his headset translated.

  Marco didn’t like the sound of that but had no time to protest as they briskly led him out to the street. A toboggan-type board slid up to them and both women stepped up on it. Marco joined them and it glided away immediately.

  “The locator traces your spatial memory,” Dr. Gila explained as they sped along in what Marco thought was the direction of the park.

  And the stabilizer? Marco wondered.

  Tonight I wasn’t as uncomfortable as I’d been the night before. With my eyes closed, it was a little like being told a weird bedtime story. I could picture the whole thing as he spoke, like I was watching a movie. But in the back of my mind, I was computing. This can’t be true, so what’s going on here?

  “The entry point is under the biggest branch a few feet from the trunk,” Marco told the two women.

  The big woman in yellow took a lie detector box off her belt and held it above her head. In less than a minute, a silver tube appeared. They sang to each other, but Marco didn’t get a translation. Yellow took a small cylinder out of her pants poc
ket, and it unrolled to form a screen. The silver tube began projecting onto it.

  The field. Gliders. Then a man in a pale blue smock coming in from the side and dismounting his glider. Walking around the field like he was mowing the lawn. Covering every square foot. His motions became jerky as the video fast-forwarded. Then he was gone. Reverse to the man walking. Slow. He’s by the tree. He’s standing under the branch. He walks forward a couple of steps and … disappears!

  “He found it,” Marco told Dr. Gila. The picture moved back, forward, back, forward. The same thing happened each time. Poof, he was gone. Yellow sent the tube away with a flick of her wrist.

  Marco thought the doctor was starting to shift color. He tried to distract her. “Wait a minute,” he said. “I have an idea.” He realized the genius of it. “I’ll go back after him. That makes sense because I know how to get around in 2007, and you all don’t. I’ll bring him back. He’s probably just sightseeing. When I bring him back, you guys tell me how to cure my mom’s mental illness and I go home to Riverton and never bother you again. Everybody gets what they want.” Marco was very pleased with himself as he watched Dr. Gila confer with Yellow. That good feeling was short-lived.

  “Inspector Anole and I agree.” Dr. Gila was removing buttons and stick pins from her smock, taking small gadgets out of her pockets, and handing them to the constable, one by one. She turned around so the woman in yellow could inspect her. Yellow nodded and produced a two-inch capsule from her tunic’s chest pocket. She twisted it open and withdrew two copper BB things and an inch-long needle. Dr. Gila put one BB in her ear and one in Marco’s. It tickled for a second, and then he lost track of it.

  “Translators,” she said. She lifted the earphone and wire mic from his head and pulled the two buttons from his cheek. She took the needle and pushed it into the soft flesh just below his shoulder. That stung, but when he reached for the wound with his other hand, he couldn’t find it.

  “Stabilizer,” she said. Dr. Gila unfastened her smock and took it off. She stepped out of her skirt and stood under the tree in her pale blue swimsuit. “I’m ready,” she said.

  “Ready?” Marco asked.

  “If it is possible to time travel or shift dimensions, it is very dangerous,” Dr. Gila said. “Something from another time or place might seriously alter our future here in 4000. If a person could go back in the past, and somehow affected that world, a killing, or an invention, then the whole future would change from that point on. Novikov’s Paradox. Unless there are completely parallel universes. Our science is still some distance from resolving such questions. Right now, I’m guessing nothing bad has happened, because here we are, getting ready to do this. But you may need help with Monitor and I’m in charge of this sector, so I’m coming with you. It’s my responsibility.”

  Marco could sense it wouldn’t do any good to argue. Plus, if he decided to, once he got home, he could give her the slip. “Okay,” Marco said, “but I wouldn’t wear that.”

  Dr. Gila gave Marco a once-over. “I see what you mean,” she said. “I thought your garb was another manifestation of your illness, but if this is a portal, then your outfit is indicative of the primitives.”

  “I guess you could say that,” Marco said, feeling slightly offended.

  Dr. Gila put her top and skirt back on. “Does this mark me as a medical in your time?” she asked.

  No, Marco thought, it marks you as frumpy, but he didn’t say anything. He heard the constable ask the doctor how they would communicate with each other.

  “I don’t think we’ll be able to,” Gila replied. “I don’t want to take any more of our equipment back into their time, and, besides, I don’t think we have anything that would transmit through a wormhole. Please cordon off the park and post a watch, and I’ll be back as soon as I can.” She touched the middle two fingers of her left hand to the middle of her forehead in what looked like a salute to Yellow and gave Marco a nod, signaling she was ready.

  “Uh, my jacket?” Marco felt embarrassed about asking, especially since he had used it to evade the disk, but heck, it was his best jacket, leather and everything.

  Gila said something to Yellow that Marco didn’t catch. Yellow pulled a cord and whistled into some kind of retractor pin on her lapel. Within a minute, a pale blue tube appeared, escorted by a silver tube. The blue had Marco’s coat attached to its flexible arm. Yellow snatched it and handed it to him. When Yellow turned to further instruct the tubes, Dr. Gila turned to Marco.

  “Ready now?” she asked.

  Marco guessed that he was. They walked into the wavy stuff.

  This time when Marco stopped, I opened my eyes right away. I had my questions. But he was just sitting there. Like the Buddha.

  “Marco.”

  He didn’t move.

  “Marco?”

  Nothing.

  “Marco, dammit!”

  Nothing. His eyes were closed but his posture was straight, chin up, so he wasn’t conked out. I reached out to shake him but stopped. What did they say about disturbing a sleepwalker? What if I touched him and he went ballistic? This was all so … what if he had gone somewhere in his mind and couldn’t come back now?

  Strings and Wormholes

  After school the next day, I drove by Marco’s house to ask him what he thought he was doing, to confront him. Make him tell me the truth about that story. He wasn’t home.

  Back at my place, I was sitting in the living room, planning, while Mom was napping in her bedroom. I would wait for midnight, until she was down for the night, and then I’d go motel hunting again. Bars would be closed, and Dad would have sacked for the night. Dad’s sneaky but he’s lazy. I didn’t think he’d be farther than ten miles from the bar where I found him earlier.

  I called Hubie, who had most of the same classes I did, to see if I could get some back homework.

  “What all have you been doing?” He sounded like he was eating.

  “Uh, some family stuff came up and I’ve been trying to take care of it.”

  “Your mom again? Tough.”

  “Hey, could you tell me any homework I missed early in the week?” I didn’t want to talk about Mom.

  Hubie filled me in.

  “If you want to come over, I’ll copy the stuff.”

  “Thanks, but I can’t tonight.”

  “Okay. They’ll let you hand them in next week. What else do you have? Chem with Sarah, right? You could call her and she’d tell you the work. Anything else?” he asked.

  “History, but we’re just reading Zinn and discussing it.”

  “Cool. Hey, you want to come eat with us?”

  “Hey, Hube, I’d like to. Tomorrow maybe.”

  “Well, if there’s anything else you need, call,” Hubie said. “You want me to call Sarah about the Chemistry assignments?”

  “No thanks. I’ll get it later … but there is one more thing. Uh, what do you know about wormholes?”

  “I thought you only fly-fished.”

  “No, I mean like in physics. Something that connects two places in space-time? Or even one universe to another?”

  “Are you writing a paper of some kind?”

  “No. Uh, a friend mentioned the idea, and I wasn’t sure I understood about them. Can you … could a person go from one time to another, if they found one?”

  “Wow. I don’t think even Stephen Hawking can answer that question. They’re just theoretical, you know. Einstein’s relativity, or maybe Witten’s string theory, suggests it, I think. And there are a zillion unanswered questions about how they would even work. Like, could information pass through and maintain its integrity?”

  “Whoa! Whoa. I just want to know could they jump through time?”

  “Well, jump is probably a misnomer.”

  “Hubie!”

  “Okay. Okay. Theoretically, uh, maybe. I have to get through my post-doc at MIT before I can really answer that question.”

  “Okay,” I said, “that’s good enough for a start.”
>
  “You should be asking Kaitlin about this space stuff,” he said. “I think she went lunar several years ago.”

  Hubie knew I had a thing for his sister. He put up with it. Barely. He never called her Z like she wanted. I bet that made for some fights.

  Drug Dealer?

  I woke up at the kitchen table about midnight, Trig problems and sheets of scratch paper in a mess around me. I checked on Mom. She was snoring. I wasn’t hungry, I wasn’t sleepy. I was ready to find Dad.

  Before I got in the car, I stood on the porch and closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to get a feeling about where Dad might be, like I had before with the bar. Out of plain sight, I thought, so neither Mom nor Charlene would be likely to run into him. Cheap, but somehow a good deal, like maybe it had refrigerators in the rooms. Close enough so he wouldn’t have to drive too far drunk at closing time. He might switch bars since I’d found him, but I didn’t think he’d move to a different motel. What was halfway between here and Lake Vista? There were some chains like Budget Lodge on Market Street, north of downtown. They might cut him a deal, like every seventh night free.

  I tried those first.

  Nothing.

  I remembered some cheesy motels on the old highway between Riverton and Lake Vista. His car was parked outside Room 20 in the second one I found, the Eaz-On Inn. I hesitated when I got to the door. What if he wasn’t alone? As I stood there, I began to have second thoughts. What if he just agreed to everything I said and then took off again as soon as I wasn’t looking? I might not find him next time. I stood outside his door a few seconds longer, thinking, then walked back to my car. Maybe there was a card I hadn’t played.

  I fell asleep again, trying to finish my homework at the kitchen table. The recycling truck’s clanking bottles woke me the next morning. My neck was stiff and I was hungry. I sliced an apple and fixed some cereal. The milk was sour, so I put a couple of spoonfuls of yogurt on the cornflakes. It tasted annoyingly healthy. I added some blackberry jam. I wondered what Hubie was having. And then I wondered about Marco. Had I seen any food in his house?