The King of Infinite Space

by Lyndsay Faye

  “Cheers. All’s well.” Horatio is genuinely touched.

  “Won’t happen again, swear to god.” Benjamin pushes thumb and forefinger against his nose. “It was a three-ring shit show.”

  “Considering your views, God is an odd one to swear to,” Horatio teases, aiming for the fondness to return.

  “What are my views?” Benjamin asks dryly, recovering himself.

  “Oh, um . . . that God is dead and we murdered Him, something along Nietzsche lines?”

  His friend blows on his burnt coffee. “Well, not exactly. God is our explanation for entropy.”

  “You’ve mentioned this, I think. And that means?”

  Benjamin squares his lecturing shoulders, sits up straight.

  Good, thank you, that’s better. Horatio wills himself not to see Benjamin as he was a few hours ago. Unconscious whimpers, unconscious twitches as he rocked on the sofa. Horatio begging to know what the matter was. Benjamin begging him back I can’t I can’t, you’ll drag me to the sixth floor and lock me in, it could only have been a dream, or the drugs, please let it have been only a nightmare.

  I will be your straitjacket, Horatio thought frantically. Put your limbs in me and anchor yourself. I can do this for both our sakes.

  “OK. Presenting my ‘God Is Entropy’ lecture, one-oh-one. Carefully place a distinct layer of oil over a layer of water and you’re looking at a very simple system,” Benjamin declaims. “Black sand on white sand in two segments, an ice sheet floating on water. All of these configurations are pretty uniform.”

  Horatio manfully battles the urge to sigh. “Benjamin—”

  “Wait, look, exactly like cream and coffee—you can layer cream on top of coffee if you’re careful enough.” Holding an open plastic creamer over his mug, Ben struggles to look distantly ironic. “But after this very careful layering process I’m not attempting, if you stirred it, you’d get a completely brown liquid. That’s another fairly featureless substance. Everything mixed evenly, also quite basic. Like, pumpkin-lattes-and-pottery-with-cheerful-words-on-it basic.”

  “Is this leading anywhere? Because—”

  “This,” Ben persists, “the creamer outside of the coffee, is before the Big Bang, if you can even say there was a before the Big Bang, which we can’t, because did time itself exist? Probably not. This,” he continues, adding the creamer and stirring it with still-trembling hands, “is the cold eventual death of the universe when everything is motionless freezing nothingness.”

  “I thought we were talking about God.”

  “We are. I started with the idea of two distinct layers and I ended with a homogenous liquid. Both are nail-gun-to-the-head boring. But suppose we’d just done that creamer pour in a clear glass, with a slo-mo camera.”

  He rests his chin on his palm. Horatio might be impatient tonight, but he is also helpless to resist when Benjamin paints these surrealist dreamscapes that somehow seem more tangible than everyday life.

  “Picture the plunge of white into brown, the initial swirling, the impossible labor required to accurately track, like, every atom as it shifts and eddies and fucks and permeates and penetrates this frankly maaaaaaybe eight-hours-old substance they call coffee. Vector after vector, unimaginable complexity. Sublime chaos along the way to being featureless. That’s God, my friend.”

  Horatio nods, beginning to understand. And as ever, the way Benjamin sees the universe isn’t quite scientific, and it isn’t quite spiritual. It’s an unholy marriage of the two that must reverberate through his head like a cathedral organ.

  “The universe began and will inevitably end,” Ben says, staring at his mug. “Cream outside of coffee becoming cream stirred into coffee. But for a flash, right at the outset? Unfathomable intricacy. Michelangelo. Isaac Newton. The Beatles. We’re in the swirl, Horatio, and it’s so complex that we invented God to explain its purpose. It doesn’t have one. God is chaos before it reaches uniformity. God is Beyoncé and Richard Pryor. And we get to see it.”

  “I think I’m looking at it right now,” Horatio says before he can stop himself.

  The words float in the air between them. If Horatio could breathe, which he can’t at present, he would breathe them back in. His pulse starts hammering. He’s usually more careful, and he can’t un-say it, Benjamin would remind him that time doesn’t work that way.

  You utter shite, now you’ve gone and done for us both, haven’t you?

  Benjamin stares very hard at the tabletop. There’s a brushstroke of warm blood over his cheekbones. When his lips move, the smile is sweet and sad and something else, and Horatio’s feelings are everywhere at once, in his brain, in his fingertips, his groin, the left side of his chest.

  “People think it’s defeatist or lazy to say que será, será,” Benjamin tells him softly. “But it’s a scientific fact. These lives we lead, we were always going to lead them that way. It’s just how the cream was poured.”

  If there weren’t a table covered in cold diner food between them, Horatio would be kissing his friend with one fist in the back of his shirt and one cradling his head already, propriety be damned.

  “You’re saying that no matter how hard we try, divinity shapes our ends, and that divinity is random chance?”

  It’s terrifying, and beautiful in the way most terrifying things are.

  “Entropy,” Benjamin corrects with a smile that could raze city blocks. His lifts his coffee. “This particular entropy tastes like ass, by the way.”

  “What the . . . no way. Oh, Christ guys, it is so crazy to see you both here!” comes a new voice.

  “Benny, what is up, it has been too long!” another chimes in.

  Horatio’s and Benjamin’s eyes raise as their mouths drop.

  “Er, hullo,” Horatio manages. “What on earth are the pair of you doing here?”

  “Rory!” Benjamin exclaims. “Garrett, what the hell?”

  “Right, dude, it’s so random!” Rory Marlowe exclaims.

  “What are the odds?” his twin brother, Garrett Marlowe, crows.

  Or perhaps it’s the other way round?

  “Seriously. A divinely instigated accident.” Benjamin grins, edging over in the seat. “Well shit, sit down, you bastards! How are you?”

  Horatio mirrors his friend as the new pair slide into place, both leaning and clapping Benjamin’s back. He isn’t upset by seeing the Marlowe twins, exactly. He’s had copious laughs in their company, and copious alcohol to boot. But they were finally fucking getting somewhere, he and Benjamin, finally, so Rory and Garrett’s appearance is as enraging as it is mystifying.

  Where Benjamin is chiseled and blond, the twins are slab-jawed and what Horatio imagines when he pictures the descriptor “raven-haired.” And where Benjamin is astronomically rich, Rory and Garrett are merely flamboyantly rich. They are already finishing each other’s sentences and egging Benjamin on. The Dane heir has always liked them because they’re genuinely funny and clever. But Horatio has always been ambivalent about them because he and his parents are in debt to Columbia and Eton for a stupefying figure, and he doesn’t wear three-hundred-quid shoes, so they ignore him.

  As they’re doing now.

  Horatio feels his hands curling into what resemble fists. He relaxes them, shocked at himself.

  “And then that time in Professor Bob Cordell’s class, oh my god—”

  “When we had to present the theoretical physics proof we’d been trying to write based on a philosophical text—”

  “Such a bullshit assignment. ‘Search for a core of provable mathematical truth in the wildly romantic or speculative.’ ”

  “Professor Cordell was so far up his own ass, he could check for strep throat.”

  “And here you are in front of the class,” one of them says to his brother, “talking about quantum physics and their curled-up minuscule dimensions—”

/>   “One dimension in particular, right, and finding a way of accessing it—”

  Horatio doesn’t know which twin sits next to him, Rory or Garrett. He supposes it doesn’t matter, as there won’t be a quiz, and he yearns to throttle them both equally. To his extreme alarm.

  I shall have humility and amity for all.

  Recalling that one of them uses right as a verbal tic, he decides that’s Rory from now on.

  “Then you get to the part about using an as-yet undiscovered particle to access this quantum dimension.” Garrett hunches forward in glee.

  “Right, with plenty of Einstein shit about light speed and bending space thrown in.” Rory giggles helplessly.

  “And preserving the mass and energy profile of an object, and Benny here raises his hand and says . . .” Garrett concludes with an invitational flourish.

  Benjamin is smirking when he supplies, “ ‘Even supposing you could build a hyperdrive, how are you going to navigate hyperspace without a map? It ain’t like dusting crops, boy.’ ”

  The twins are the definition of mirth, faces contorted and arms flung. Horatio smiles faintly, reflecting that while he never would have survived switching his master’s over to philosophy of physics, he really ought to have given it a go.

  Think of all you missed whilst fretting over the triangular slave trade.

  “ ‘Without precise calculations you could fly right through a star or bounce too close to a supernova,’ ” Benjamin continues quoting as the Marlowe twins howl, “ ‘and that’d end your trip real quick, wouldn’t it?’ ”

  “He did it just like that too, totally deadpan.” Garrett’s face flushes, which resembles a distressingly handsome sunburn.

  “Right, no Harrison Ford impression, just straight called us out on trying to build the Millennium Falcon.” Rory wipes wet lashes with a napkin. “Professor Cordell was too confused to even be pissed, never having seen Star Wars. I swear to God that man was born in a bunker.”

  Twisting, Benjamin calls out, “Hey, man, not to interrupt your break, but could we get two bottles of wine for the table? Like, the very finest of your red flavor? Thank you. You’re in for a treat, guys. This will be the best wine within eight to ten yards of us. So.” Benjamin straightens as the rail-thin waiter drops four wineglasses on the table with one hand. “I thought you both took tech gigs at Google’s main Silicon Valley campus?”

  The twins are going a mile a minute again. Horatio wonders whether they remember his name. When he and Benjamin used to throw parties, they’d never interact much. Horatio would be chatting up less stunning but less straight men, or skiving off with Lia to sip from a bottle of gin on the fire escape, talking of art history, or each other, or Benjamin.

  Lia. It’s coming back in a great pounding rush, the way they all used to be together. Because he loved Lia, before, deeply loved her. It was impossible not to love her, with her pale freckles and regal profile and that hair like fireworks on New Year’s Eve. She was funny and kind and utterly brilliant at the oddest things, and she never laughed when she didn’t mean it. Ever. That alone was worth loving. He can see why Benjamin did, he always could do.

  A stone forms in Horatio’s stomach.

  “A toast,” Benjamin proposes, raising his glass. “To old friends in unexpected places.”

  “Hear, hear,” Rory proclaims as the four of them clink.

  Garrett flips through menu pages. “Their coffee is listed as ‘our legendary coffee.’ ”

  “That’s totally accurate, and they should be congratulated for managing to brew coffee in a vat of dead fry oil,” Benjamin comments. “Guys, though, seriously—what are you doing here?”

  A strange neutrality infuses Benjamin’s tone.

  Garrett goes back to the menu while Rory examines the wine bottle’s label. “We’re spending a week in the city, man. Old stomping grounds! We were going to look you up but running into you like this is more fun.”

  “Way more fun,” Benjamin concurs, blue eyes squinting. “I mean, I didn’t see you at Dad’s funeral, that would not have been the slightest bit fun, but I assume you’re maybe coming to the gala, so at least you won’t miss Mom’s wedding reception, which will be suuuuuper fun.”

  “We didn’t really know how to bring that up.” Garrett rubs the back of his head, abashed.

  “Oh, so you’re not surprised, then.” Ben’s lips are closed as he smirks, but Horatio can sense the sharpness of his teeth. “Interesting. Seeing as the marriage is not, like, public knowledge. Not that I’m gobsmacked the Marlowe family knows about the blessed event, since Mom always considered you folks primo inner circle. Kinda shocks me she didn’t ask you to be Dad’s pallbearers. Oh, wait, I planned the entire memorial. That’s right. Slipped my mind.”

  “It sucks, Benny,” Rory offers quietly. “It all sucks. But yeah, our whole family is still on her invite list as donors to the theatre, and she does still keep in touch, and our folks are stuck out in Cali, so here we are.”

  “We weren’t sure if you wanted to discuss it—”

  “But we’re so sorry.”

  “It’s cool, at least I won’t have to, like, struggle to remember my new stepdad’s name,” Benjamin purrs. “OK, so. I am a ready worshipper of the gods of chance, I was just talking with Horatio here about that, but this is really all an accident?”

  “Of course.” Garrett frowns.

  “Right, why wouldn’t it be?” Rory adds, topping up their glasses unnecessarily.

  Benjamin links his hands on the tabletop, shrugging. “I dunno, you remember that time toward the end of grad school when Mom wanted to make sure I wasn’t popping too many pills for finals and she bribed you to go through all of my shit?”

  “Jesus Christ,” Horatio marvels aloud.

  He knew that Trudy was invasive, and occasionally obsessive, but this is beyond what he’d pictured. The twins exchange moderately mortified glances. As if they had been caught copying each other’s exam answers, or pissing in a pool.

  “Man, that was beyond unfortunate.” Rory spreads his fingers on the table.

  “Absolutely ridiculously invading your space,” Garrett agrees.

  “But Trudy was worried about you. Finals at Columbia are no joke.”

  “It sort of felt more like an intervention than it did an invasion?”

  “But we’re sorry. We didn’t realize that you’d caught us.”

  “Noooooo.” Benjamin bats his eyelashes. “You didn’t. I made sure Mom did, though, and she was out of my fucking hair for a solid three months, which were among the sanest of my life.”

  The Danes are beyond dysfunctional; Benjamin loves his mother. Horatio can hold two thoughts in his head at the same time. But there’s a sharply plucked bass note of rage here, and it sends ripples through the grotty house wine. Benjamin himself looks surprised.

  “Hey, Benny, we apologize,” Rory offers. “As much as we might have intended well—”

  “And been too out of our own minds with finals to really think it through—” Garrett continues.

  “And walked away with season box seats to the Yankees,” Benjamin notes.

  “Right, we regret it now.” Rory nods.

  “Not cool, bro. Not at all,” Garrett agrees.

  Horatio watches Benjamin deliberately calm himself, softening. Lia always said she loved Benjamin Dane because he wanted to plunder the world’s secrets to the last molecule and abandon it entirely, all at once. In more intimate moods, she’d talk about his giving nature too, about how far he’d go for either of them, which was probably somewhere in the Andromeda Galaxy. But it’s this for Horatio, the devastating sincerity, that ends him. No matter how many times Benjamin’s been spit on, nearly drowned in a school loo, taken to hospital for fractured ribs, he can still be shocked that anyone would betray him. And then he can forgive them. Benjamin fundamentall
y doesn’t understand greed or disloyalty, even when he’s being mildly vicious himself.

  “Yeah, I get it,” Benjamin sighs. “I worry me, too. Anyway. Enough of this shit, so you’re going to the benefit gala?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it, man.”

  “Those swag bags alone.”

  “What was in there last time? Bottle of Pappy Van Winkle, limited edition Swatch, a spa weekend?”

  “Yep, those three items in particular do sound like my mother,” Benjamin agrees, but his tone is calmer.

  “She kills it every year, right? It’ll be an amazing event. Horatio, my man, you’re down too, right? It’s like the gang is back together.”

  Rory swings his eyes lazily. Now that Benjamin has relented, Rory’s arm is thrown back over the booth, and Garrett has melted forward over his wineglass, a matched set of Roman princes poised to be fed grapes.

  “Um,” Horatio replies. He doesn’t know whether he’s more shocked that Rory wants him to be there, or that Rory addressed him.

  “Yep, he’s absolutely coming.” Benjamin finishes his wine, studying the dregs. “Just working out the, like, salient details.”

  “Outstanding,” Garrett crows.

  “Epic,” Rory concurs.

  “Agreed,” trills Benjamin, and he leans over to grip his friend by the wrist.

  Horatio flinches inwardly. Benjamin’s hand on his frozen limb is delicate and guitar-calloused and encased in a leather cuff. An inner storm is brewing, and he doesn’t know whether the maelstrom will turn out to be a blizzard, a monsoon, or a tornado. Horatio only knows that if one more bloody butterfly flaps its wings in Taipei, a category five event will erupt in his aorta.

  Benjamin lets go. The moment lasted how long, a second? Two seconds?

  Ten or twelve lifetimes, give or take a few millennia.

  The twins are making plans with Benjamin for a proper mutton lunch at Keens the next day. It’s intended for the four of them, but far from feeling glad of gaining the twins’ attention, instead Horatio feels as if he’s fast losing something. Benjamin isn’t going to blink at him in that gentle way with the Marlowes around or smile like he means to say something. Horatio wants to lash out at them like an angry animal battling for a mate, with teeth honed and claws curling.