Miss Buddha

by Ulf Wolf

  Before the beginning there was life. It tasted of Bible. Not that he was particularly religious, but he didn’t like it. Pretentious, is what he thought.

  He put the paper down on the small desk beside him, then leaned back into his leather armchair, his head swirling a little with the magnitude of what the girl was proposing.

  Or appeared to propose.

  For he could see it no other way: It was fake. It had to be. A huge and elaborately disguised hoax, for no matter how scientifically proven and ostensibly verified, it reeked of the utterly impossible. And then to end things up by claiming, which was what the girl was doing—wasn’t it?, that she is the Buddha, or a Buddha, whichever.

  The general media reaction was split just about fifty-fifty.

  Some papers reported the paper and its subject as the “miracle experiment,” which was the phrase used by quite a few stations as well. Others reported it as one of the world’s most elaborate (and expensive) hoaxes, sharing his view that this, this mystical mumbo jumbo, well, it simply could not be true. Nor could the girl be anything like a Buddha. Of course not. Preposterous. The audacity.

  Some of the smaller, and more radical mid-west and southern stations saw the Buddha inference as quite apt. The Buddha, after all, was nothing but an idol worshipped by a bunch of heathens, and since the paper was nothing but lies, the liar herself—they claimed—only confirmed it by this wild Buddha innuendo.

  He thought briefly of getting up and fixing himself a drink, then thought better of it. It was too late, and he needed to rise early, with a clear head. There remained many strings to pull and he only had two more days to prepare. The interview—which was to be live, the girl had insisted on that (and this was just fine with him, thank you very much)—was scheduled for eight o’clock Saturday night. KCAA had scrambled to rearrange the programming to accommodate him and were now, even as he sat there, he’d venture to guess, promoting the upcoming interview (exclusively on KCAA here in Los Angeles, of course) every commercial break.

  He had two days to prove the hoax, and all he had to go on was his guts, though they were not entirely well-mustered behind him. Faint stirrings of what ifs refused to toe the line.

  Well, damn it. He reached for the paper and continued to read, pen at the ready.

  :

  Apparently, one of Federico’s debtors knew someone who knew someone who knew someone whose friend knew Melissa’s mother Sylvia quite well, and that friend had convinced Sylvia that Ruth Marten would benefit both financially and PR-wise if she granted KCAA the first (exclusive) interview, and did not give any other interviews before then.

  Sylvia, not quite sure what to make of Ruth’s paper—she had known the girl since she was a baby for heaven’s sake, and to write such things—was nevertheless happy to be of help by bringing such good tidings (the amount offered Ruth for the interview was considerable), convincing Melissa that Ruth simply must do this.

  Melissa in turn convinced Ruth (if not Ananda, but he felt he had to go along), then called her mother back: “Yes, she’ll do it.”

  And that is how Federico landed his interview.

  “I’m not entirely comfortable with this,” said Ananda.

  “For one,” said Melissa, setting out to count on her fingers. “We need the money.”

  Ruth looked from one to the other. She could see it both ways. Ananda had a point, Federico Alvarez was neither scientifically nor religiously oriented, but he had a fantastic following and he had promised a wholly unbiased, informative interview. And a handy sum to go along with that. And yes, they did need the money.

  “For two,” Melissa continued. “The man’s the best-known television reporter in the country. Mom tells me they will broadcast the interview not only in Los Angeles, but KCAA will also provide a feed to every interested station in the country—except local competitors, of course.”

  “He’s a sensationalist, and I don’t trust him,” said Ananda. “He’ll do anything for ratings, and I don’t think he’ll give us an unbiased interview.”

  “He said he would,” said Melissa.

  “I know he did.”

  “What can he do?” she said. “It’s not like he can challenge the results of the experiment.”

  “Oh, I’m sure he can. Others do.” Then added, “I’m sure he will.”

  “Well, I’m sure he won’t,” said Melissa.

  They did not always see eye to eye on matters, Ananda and Melissa, but they were always civil about that, and their at times disparate views had never caused any bad blood between them. They each acknowledged the other’s right to an opinion and viewpoint, and were quite comfortable with that. This held true now as well.

  “I’ve done a quick survey of his career,” said Ananda. “And lately, he’s made a living out of exposés, and some of them quite brutal, in my opinion.”

  “Ananda has a point,” said Ruth.

  “What would you suggest, daughter of mine?” Melissa asked her.

  “You have a point, too,” she attempted, diplomatically.

  “I know I do.”

  “What if he tries to ‘expose’ you?” said Ananda, surrounding the word expose with fingered quotes.

  “I’d like to see him try,” said Ruth.

  “He promised an unbiased interview,” repeated Melissa.

  “Well,” said Ananda, “I still don’t trust him. I think you need to be on your guard,” addressing Ruth.

  “Always,” said Ruth.

  :

  To squeeze as large an audience as possible into Studio C—the largest one on the lot—KCAA had removed ten back-rows of seating to make standing room, which could accommodate about four times as many as the number of seats. The remaining seats were not as easily removable and were left in place. Even so, they had to turn away what one reporter estimated to be at least four thousand people. To say that the the producer was ecstatic would be an understatement. Chances were they would break viewer records with this. Virtually every independent station in the country had subscribed to the feed, and even quite a few networks affiliates (which they no doubt would catch hell for when discovered by their respective mother ships).

  Federico, still being worked on by make-up, was silently rehearsing his line of questioning while watching Lela put the final touches to his appearance. She was truly an artist: he looked if not half his age, perhaps at least part-way there. Lela could shave ten years with her magic. He nodded in approval at his mirror-image—which nodded right back, but with a bit of a frown.

  “You okay?” said Lela.

  “Fine. Yes. Fine.”

  And he was. Just fine. He knew where to go with this. The only cloudiness was the strange what if that did not want to leave (and that seemed to frown at him): what if the experiment and the paper were not fakes? But of course they were, the whole deal: a setup. And he knew just how to get this young lady to spill those very valuable beans on his show, prime time, live and, for all intents and purposes, nationwide. It was to be quite a night. His crowning achievement? Well, he didn’t even want to think that, so as not to jinx it, but perhaps.

  Someone just outside the make-up door was shouting “Ten minutes” and louder than she had to. Lela stepped back and took a final look at him in the mirror, pleased with herself. “You’re done,” she said.

  “Thanks,” he said. “Good job. As always.”

  Two chairs. A small steel and glass-top table between them. A crystal water carafe and two nice crystal glasses on bamboo coasters. Nice touch.

  As always, he sat down in the chair to the right from the audience’s perspective. One of the sound guys appeared behind him, and began to gear him up with the microphone and earpiece.

  He heard “Five minutes” from somewhere, and here—guided by the producer—she came: the Ruth Marten.

  A stunning Ruth Marten.

  He hadn’t noticed this from her photos, but those were some of the bluest eyes he’d ever seen, framed by some of the blackest hair he’d ever seen. Incong
ruous was the word. Or contradictory.

  A stunning combination, three others.

  He rose and extended his hand, which she took and shook. Nice dry hand, firm shake. She should be nervous, but apparently was not.

  “Mr. Alvarez,” she said.

  “Oh, please. Federico.”

  “Federico,” she said. She let go of his hand and turned toward the audience, shielding her eyes against the glare with her hand. You could hear the audience well enough, a murmur, a rustle, a forest in the wind—picking up now that Ruth was on stage—but it was hard to make out, except for the first few rows.

  He wanted to say something else, something to give the impression of wanting to put her at ease, something like, just pretend that we’re having a conversation in your living room, but there seemed no need, or more correctly: no space, for that. Instead he sat down again and let the soundman complete his task. Another sound guy was adjusting Ruth’s microphone (which had been fitted backstage) and tested for sound. Then he looked over to the producer and gave a thumbs-up.

  Someone said “Three minutes,” and the murmur of audience-forest gathered even more. So much, in fact, that one of the producer’s assistants, crowd-control was the nickname, ran up and started to flash “Silence Please” on the overhead electronic banner, which almost instantly had the desired (and somewhat frightening) effect: the place grew dead-quiet.

  “Two minutes,” this over the monitors, and was the producer’s voice.

  “You ready?” he asked Ruth Marten.

  “Of course,” she said.

  “They’ve explained to you about the commercial breaks?”

  “Yes.”

  “Comfortable?”

  “Sure.”

  “This is live, you know that?” There had to be some way of rattling her, at least a little.

  “Yes. That was the deal.”

  Granted, the makeup would hide any sweat, but after twenty some years he could tell when someone was flushing under the makeup, and Ruth Marten was not.

  The audience as forest was very much there, you could tell—that many warm bodies and eager attentions could not help forming a tangible presence—but made no sound.

  “One minute,” said the producer. Federico looked over at Ruth again, who in turn looked back at him, still as anything. Ready indeed.

  Here came the production assistant holding up five fingers: “Five.” Four fingers: “Four.” Then just the fingers: three, two, one, and that one now firing at him with the meaning: Go.

  Which he did.

  “Unless you’ve just returned from a long trip to the South Pole, or Mars, you will have heard, or seen, or read about the recent Cal Tech EPROM experiment,” he said, addressing both the camera and the audience, which laughed obligingly, and just the right amount.

  “And,” he continued, “at the center of this storm, this divine revelation, is a young—and let me add, beautiful—girl, Ruth Marten.”

  Applause.

  He now turned toward her. “Seventeen, and by all accounts a genius. Have I got that right?”

  “By what accounts?” said Ruth. Right away, and without a shiver. She seemed genuinely curious, though.

  “By what accounts?” He was surprised into repeating.

  “Yes.”

  “Well,” Federico glanced down at his notes. “You transferred from Pasadena Polytechnic to Cal Tech at fourteen. That’s a bit precocious, don’t you think? Or don’t you agree?”

  “I have a knack for physics,” said Ruth.

  “So they say.”

  “Who’s they?” As right away, and as commanding of an answer.

  For the briefest of moments Federico looked like he had been bitten. Then said, again consulting his notes, “Kristina Medina, for one.”

  “Is she here?” asked Ruth, again shielding her eyes from the lights with her hand and peeking into the audience, which laughed at the gesture.

  “I don’t know,” said Federico.

  But Ruth had spotted her in the front row, and now waved. Kristina waved back. The audience laughed again, enjoying the exchange.

  Federico smiled, he had to. Then asked, “You asked that the particle physics department at MIT replicate the test, is that right?”

  “That is right.”

  “But isn’t it true that MIT had to do the experiment twice, why was that?”

  Before Ruth could answer, Federico added, “Was it because the first set of tests were a complete failure?”

  “Yes,” said Ruth.

  “Yes, what?”

  “Yes, it was because their first set of tests was a complete failure.”

  “Because it did not verify your findings?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “So you told them to do it again?”

  “That’s what we did.”

  “Asking MIT to do the test again just because it didn’t verify your findings isn’t very scientific, is it?”

  “Do you know the difference between EPROM and Flash Memory?”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  Her question, again, demanded an answer, and he virtually heard himself say, “Flash Memory is the newer of the two technologies.”

  “True. What else?”

  “Flash has a much higher density?” He was guessing here.

  “True. What else?”

  “That’s about it.”

  “No, that’s not about it. The singular—and, as far as our experiment is concerned, crucial—difference between EPROM and Flash is that EPROM requires ultraviolet light for erasure, while Flash only requires additional electricity.”

  Federico again consulted his notes. “Right you are.”

  “Right I am.”

  This got another cheerful laugh from the audience, and Ruth again looked in Kristin Medina’s direction, and also spotted some other people she knew, her mom among them. She waved at them, too. Then she turned back to Federico, and continued, before he could ask the next question:

  “MIT were using Flash memory in their first set of tests. There was some mix-up with their EPROM supply. Our EPROM experiment was called an ‘EPROM experience’ for a fairly obvious reason.”

  Another brief audience giggle cut her off, but she soon picked up the thread, “We did the experiment using EPROMs, that’s the only kind of memory that nature cannot revise after the fact. That is why we asked MIT to do their tests again, using EPROMs this time. They did, and as soon as they actually ran our experiment as done—as we had described it and requested it be run—they verified our findings.”

  “Or so you say.”

  “Or so MIT says.”

  Federico took a long look at this seemingly unflappable girl. He had underestimated her, gravely. Those incredibly blue eyes met his, and did not waver. A challenge. No, more like curiosity. And laughing. Or, if not laughing, at least mocking. She smiled and shifted in the chair, waiting for the next question, which he had to come up with fast.

  Looking first at Ruth, and then into the camera, he said, “Several renowned physicists have gone on record calling your experiment a spoof, a stunt.”

  Ruth did not rise to the bait of the insinuated question, and was obviously waiting for more to come—so he had to state it.

  “Why on earth would you pull a stunt like this? What’s in it for you, or your mother?”

  Federico noted that she flinched ever so slightly on the mention of her mother. A chink in the armor?

  “Is that the question?” She said.

  “Yes, that’s the question.”

  “Why on earth would I pull a stunt like this? And what’s in it for me, or my mother?”

  “Yes, that’s it.”

  Ruth shifted again, then swept back her hair with her hand. “You are right, Mr. Alvarez, several renowned physicists and institutions have expressed disbelief. Among them research teams at Fermilab in Illinois and at CERN in Switzerland—primarily, I guess, for political rather than scientific reasons. Some qu
estions have been raised by those who have not had the chance to fully familiarize themselves with the facts and details. Others still, I’d venture to assume, have been paid very well to fuel controversy, which I assume is good for ratings. Isn’t it?”

  And before Federico could respond, Ruth went on, “And as to what’s in it for me, or for my mom: The truth. That’s all. The goal of all science, and the goal of both philosophy and religion as well. The truth.”

  Federico’s strategy had been to first cast his famous doubt upon the experiment itself, and upon the quote verifications unquote, which he would frame by index and long fingers slashing the air, enlisting the many articles and reports that questioned—some politely, some mockingly, some outrageously—the veracity of the EPROM experiment findings.

  Then, with the young girl reeling from this onslaught, he would move in for the kill and expose the ludicrous claim that she was the Buddha, for that is what she claimed wrapping up her paper: “Those who have woken up to this fact are called Buddhas.” And, “Those who have notions of this fact are called artists. Those who see none of these facts are called humans. I am awake.”

  And “I am awake,” meaning precisely that: I am the Buddha. Ridiculous, of course, and an invitation to exposure.

  But the girl wasn’t reeling. Not in the least. Calm as anything, and those too-blue, mocking eyes, as if asking whether that was the best he could do. Well, it wasn’t. Far from it. He had done his homework, lots of it.

  And so the fighter in him stirred more fully awake, smiled, and said, “It’s a big word that: the truth.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “About once a year,” he said. “Sometimes more often, we hear the clamor from some part or other of the country—or the world, for that matter—that Jesus has returned. We hear that the end is near, and that the savior has come back in the flesh to lead his flock back home. And every time this happens we pull the string only find some lunatic at the end of it, fit for the spin bin.”