The Weirdness

by Jeremy P. Bushnell

  “Yes, very good,” says Laurent, rising from his chair, “but, but, wait, wait just a second—”

  But Lucifer does not wait a second. He releases the handshake and there is the flashbulb crackle. Everything goes white.

  For a second Billy fears he’s been tricked, that he’s going back to Hell, on the grounds that Hell Is His True Home or some shit. Or even that he’s being flung back to Ohio, where he’ll have to deal with his dad. But no. When his vision clears he’s happy to see he’s back in his apartment, as he left it, only with one difference: Denver is next to him.

  “Oh, thank God,” Billy says.

  Denver, looking completely drained, drops onto the couch. She shoves open a space on the messy coffee table and drops her camera there.

  “I’m sorry the place is such a mess,” Billy says, exhausted.

  “It’s okay,” she says.

  Billy makes a restless circuit of the room, wonders whether Jørgen will be magically appearing in the next minute or so. In the end, he figures that Jørgen is probably still in the hospital, and Elisa is probably still talking to cops—they may be free of their servitude to the Devil, but there’s still some sorting out to do. He feels an impulse to try right now to call around, figure out what hospital Jørgen might be in, see if he’s all right, but after patting down his jumpsuit for the hundredth time Billy realizes that he still doesn’t have a goddamn phone, and the thought of getting on the Internet right now makes him squirm. Either Jørgen is all right or he isn’t, and nothing Billy does right now either way is going to change that. He puts it in a great file of things that he can worry about in the morning.

  For now, he can assume that he and Denver have the place to themselves.

  “Hey,” he says, pausing in his pacing. “Look, I don’t know if we’re—if we’re still a thing, or what. I kinda hope we are.”

  “You kinda hope we are?” Denver says.

  “I hope we are,” Billy says, groping for definitiveness. “I do. I just—you know, maybe you want to go home, I get it, but I would really love it if you would spend the night here with me tonight. I could go out and get a bottle of wine”—he can’t really, it occurs to him, since he has no cash and no ID—“and we could order Chinese or something and just—hang out? Or something?”

  “You still have to work on your delivery,” Denver says. “But yes, I would like that.”

  Billy breathes an enormous sigh and collapses onto the couch next to her.

  “Wait a second, though,” Denver says. “Do you think it’s safe?”

  “Safe?” Billy says.

  “Well, I’m still missing parts of the story, but if I understand correctly you occasionally turn into some kind of—sex-demon wolf thing?”

  “Hell-wolf,” Billy says.

  “And it was some kind of mystic ward or something that kept you from changing? That your dad put on you? But that ward never got put back on.”

  “Oh, right,” Billy says. “My dad wanted me to go back home; he said he could sort it out there.”

  “Do you want to go?” Denver asks. “We could—get on a bus, or—?”

  Billy frowns at this. “I don’t know what I want,” he says.

  Except he does. He knows that he wants to sit down and have a conversation with his dad, to speak honestly with him for maybe the first time ever. But he also knows that he’s done, at least for a while, with people doing things to his brain, with oaths and wards and whatever else.

  Before he has a chance to really think about that, Denver speaks again. “Let me ask it this way,” she says. “Do you think you’ll try to kill me in the night?”

  “No,” Billy says, with resolve.

  Denver looks into his eyes, inspecting something in his pupils. She gets a penlight off her belt and shines it into each of them in turn. “You seem normal,” Denver says.

  “I’m not,” Billy says.

  “No,” Denver says. “You’re not. But I think that might be okay.”

  They don’t order Chinese. They don’t go out and get wine. They drink a half a bottle of Jørgen’s port that they find in the back of a cabinet above the refrigerator and they go up to the loft.

  For a while they lie in bed and watch the footage that Denver captured. Billy laughs out loud at seeing Anton Cirrus fall down the stairs, but then he remembers the reality of the situation and it sobers him.

  “I think you saved my life,” Billy says, “showing up when you did. He really would have shot me if you weren’t there.” It occurs to him that that means he’s on his third life. Or maybe fourth, if he counts his dad busting him out of Hell. Or fifth, if he counts Anil calling for Krishna’s intercession. Fuck, he thinks, I’m in debt to everyone now.

  And then he realizes that that’s okay. Denver is right: when people love you, they show up. Sometimes that means that they get to bail you out of trouble. It’s not bad when that happens; it just means that you return the obligation when you get the chance. You be a guy who is present instead of a fuck-up.

  He thinks he can do that.

  Billy dreams of Ollard.

  First he dreams of the tower, looming, dank, writhing like a living thing.

  And in this dream Billy enters the tower and finds there not a Starbucks but a room, Billy’s own writing room from long ago, on the third floor of his childhood home. Ollard is there, pecking at the precious Olivetti with stained fingers, and Billy finds one of his mother’s antique blades in his hand. He comes up behind Ollard and slashes his throat. He slashes again and again. Ollard gurgles beneath the blade. Blood sprays onto the page loaded into the typewriter.

  And Billy looks at the page, to see what Ollard has written, and the page is blank, there are no words upon it, even the blood is gone, it is just blankness, the pure blankness of Hell, and Billy can feel himself and Ollard falling into it, forever together.

  And Billy wakes, next to Denver; it is dark and he is safe, surrounded by the comforting things of this world. But the blankness hangs in his mind like a specter. He struggles for a moment to banish it, the only way he knows how. He has an idea.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  FULL DISCLOSURE

  Hello.

  You are listening to the August 17 edition of The Stolon, the Bladed Hyacinth weekly podcast. Fifteen minutes of Q&A about books and the people who make them. I’m your host, Ethel Shira Wise. Today our guest is author W. H. Ridgeway, here to discuss his book-length lyric essay of moral inquiry, On Killing. Thank you for joining us.

  Thank you for having me.

  So. Killing. It’s a heavy topic.

  It is.

  But not a new topic.

  No. It’s one of the oldest topics, in fact. The history of literature is, in some ways, the history of writing about killing. Beowulf, The Iliad—these are works that are intimately attentive to the act of killing.

  And religious literature, as well, is certainly concerned with the topic.

  Indeed. All religious traditions define themselves, partially, by the nature of their ethical values, and all of them therefore end up having to say something about killing. Usually it’s in the form of a proscription of some sort, although in practice religious traditions tend to be fascinatingly inconsistent in exactly how and when they enforce this proscription.

  Inconsistent. Would you say arbitrary?

  Not arbitrary. How would I—? [Pause.] Provisional.

  The provisional ethics of killing is a big subject in this book. Did you approach it from a background in any particular religious tradition?

  No. When I began this book—I’d just turned thirty—I was existing in a very secular place, a sort of nexus of various incoherent nonbeliefs.

  Midway on your life’s journey, you found yourself in a dark wood, the clear path lost?

  Very funny, although the pedant in me insists on pointing out that the Dante of The Divine Comedy is thirty-five, not thirty.

  [Laughter.] I stand corrected.

  But—yeah—you’re not wrong
. I was in kind of a dark wood, spiritually speaking, and part of the impetus behind the book is that I’m attempting, on the page, to develop a usable moral system without the benefit of any specific religious practice to fall back on.

  And yet the centerpiece of the book looks extensively at the concept of “right action” in Hinduism.

  Well, I had some help with that.

  Yes. If I understand correctly, you’ve credited the author Anil Mallick with assisting you on that chapter.

  That’s correct.

  Mallick is known, of course, for his acclaimed collection of short stories King in Exile, published earlier this year. King in Exile features contemporized versions of stories from the Ramayana, is that correct?

  And the Mahabharata, yes. It’s an excellent book; I would recommend it wholeheartedly.

  Your book hints at something like a conversion experience. Do you consider yourself religious now?

  [Pause.] It’s complicated.

  I’m sure.

  [Pause.]

  Let’s shift gears. This book is a work of nonfiction, but prior to its publication you were mostly known as a fiction writer.

  I’m not sure I would say known.

  You’d published some short stories.

  And I was working on a novel. But the novel—it proved to be on a topic I didn’t care about, wasn’t interested in, had nothing to say about.

  And then the idea for this book came along?

  Yes.

  You decided your true topic of interest was killing?

  [Pause.] Yes. [Pause.] The moral appropriateness of killing. Or lack thereof.

  On Killing is published by Naginata Editions, an imprint dedicated to quote-unquote vicious works of fiction and nonfiction.

  Correct.

  And—full disclosure—Naginata Editions is helmed by Anton Cirrus, founder and former editor of Bladed Hyacinth.

  Correct.

  There’s a rumor that the two of you didn’t always get along.

  [Laughter.] I’m not sure we get along now.

  Is it true that he once published a piece on Bladed Hyacinth that panned your work? Only to take it down later?

  If I understand correctly, it’s the only piece he’s ever withdrawn from the site.

  What do you think was behind his change of heart?

  I have no idea. You’d have to ask him. Maybe he’ll talk about it in his memoir.

  Well, we’ll all look forward to that. You’ll forgive me if I ask after one more rumor?

  Certainly.

  You’ve been romantically linked with the emerging filmmaker Denver Norton.

  I have. [Pause.] That’s not a question. [Laughter.]

  There’s quite a buzz around her new film, Love Lives of the Hell-Wolves. It’s a departure from her earlier work.

  That’s fair to say.

  It features explicit scenes of violent animal sex that have raised the eyebrows of both animal rights activists and people in the visual effects community.

  Well, according to the narrative, the hell-wolves aren’t animals, not in a strict sense. But I shouldn’t say more—I don’t want to spoil anything.

  Can you discuss how those scenes were achieved?

  Denver Norton is a very talented filmmaker. And she was fortunate to work with two talented nonprofessional actors: my good friend Jørgen Storløkken, and the poet Elisa Mastic, who also has a new book coming out this fall.

  You appear in the film as well.

  Briefly.

  A nude scene.

  [Laughter.] I’m not going to comment on that. If people want to find out they can go see the film.

  And we’ll have an opportunity to see it when?

  It’s debuting as one of the showcased shorts at Telluride next month. New York audiences will need to wait until April, when it’ll be one of the Shorts in Competition at Tribeca.

  Fantastic.

  We all feel good about it.

  You’ve been listening to The Stolon, fifteen minutes of Q&A about books and the people who make them. I’m your host, Ethel Shira Wise. Our guest today has been W. H. Ridgeway, discussing his new book, On Killing. Thank you for taking the time to talk to us.

  Thank you for having me. It’s been a pleasure.

  JEREMY P. BUSHNELL is the fiction editor for Longform.org, and is also the lead developer of Inevitable, a tabletop game released by Dystopian Holdings. He teaches writing at Northeastern University in Boston, and he lives in Dedham, Massachusetts. This is his first novel.

  Reading Group Guide for The Weirdness

  1. Where do the bananas in bodegas come from? Have you ever thought about something so long that it becomes strange, the way Billy thinks “people have pets”? What started to seem strange to you?

  2. What did you think about the role of religion in The Weirdness? When you heard the line “What about God?” repeated, were you expecting God to make an appearance? Because Lucifer was the Judeo-Christian version of the Devil, were you expecting a Judeo-Christian God to appear?

  3. Why do you think Elisa asks Billy, “What is the worst thing you ever did?” Do you think she wants to share her history with him because she realizes they have a connection? Or do you think she has other motives?

  4. How did your perception of Lucifer change over the course of the story? If he had given you a convincing PowerPoint presentation, do you think you would have signed on to help him?

  5. What do you think Bingxin Ying meant when she told Denver that she admired her “commitment to immanentization of the ephemeral”? How do you think this phrase affects Billy in the moment she says it and when, later in the book, he tries to get closer to Denver?

  6. On this page, were you surprised to find out that Laurent hadn’t read Billy’s work? How did it change your perception of Laurent and his crew?

  7. On this page, do you believe Lucifer when he says Billy doesn’t want to go back to his old life? Did you expect Billy to choose the Devil’s side?

  8. What do you imagine the warlock might do with the Neko of Infinite Equilibrium? Do you trust that Lucifer will do the right thing?

  9. Billy is constantly slowed down by coffee, traffic, and other simple forms of conflict rarely represented in books. Did the story feel more realistic to you, based on these moments?

  10. How did Billy change over the course of this story? Do you think Billy agreed to the right compromise—protecting Elisa and Jørgen by asking Lucifer to train new hell-wolves from the next generation?

  11. Why do you think Anton Cirrus retracted his blog post about Billy’s work? And why do you think Anton Cirrus opted to publish Billy’s book?

  12. The topic of consent recurs throughout the book. Lucifer raises it on this page, and Billy returns to it on this page. In what other ways does this theme occur in this book?

  13. The book ends with Billy musing upon the “moral appropriateness of killing,” or lack thereof. Was it “morally appropriate” for Billy to kill Timothy Ollard? Is it ever morally appropriate to kill in the world of this book, or in real life?