by Chris Vola
“I’d think that digging up enough dirt to make the entire military-industrial complex shit itself is a big enough achievement,” Ryan said, no longer apprehensive, annoyed that James had outed him to a crackpot whistle-blower whose months of isolation had clearly sent him far out into the deep end. A place deeper than time? Younger factions?
Ryan had had his fill of nonsense. He needed to get out of Wonderland.
“If you really want to know what I was,” he said, “I hear there are plenty of message boards for you to check out, other stuff on the deep web, if you haven’t found that already. But I can’t help you anymore. Good luck.”
Derrick croaked out a chuckle that was as rough as his hands. “I only deal in the truth,” he said, “and the truth is far bigger than anything you or I can fathom, bigger than anyone’s psyche can reasonably handle. It goes beyond governments, beyond manufactured immortality. It’s why I’ve released the information I have. I needed to sacrifice myself to establish credibility, send out the more easily digestible tidbits first. I hope it’s enough for when I start dropping the real mind-bending knowledge, but the masses will believe what they want to believe. It’s how we’ve been programmed.”
Ryan just hoped that whatever synapses were still firing in Derrick’s brain would be enough to figure out how to manipulate his phone. He felt a coughing fit rise in his chest, tried to clear his throat before it got too much worse, tried not to think about the migraine that was seeping into the space behind his temples.
“I can see you’re tired,” Derrick continued, zipping up the section of his pack where he’d stashed the phone. “You crave simpler things, you want to be a normal guy chasing girls. Or a girl. The girl, whatever. That’s okay. I get it. You don’t need to worry, you’ve already rejoined the flock. When I let the world know what’s really going on, you’ll have a choice, like everyone else, about whether to take a step forward on the path to the truth. Or you can stay in the dark. In the meantime, I’ll find your pretty sheep.”
Ryan waited out the silence that followed. It seemed like Derrick was finally done. He stood up to leave. “Ten o’clock tomorrow, Morningside Park?”
Derrick nodded. “You should probably head through the North Woods on your way back. Switch it up. It’s a little less conspicuous than the meadow.”
Ryan walked briskly in the direction of the wrought-iron gate that separated the garden from the rest of the park, his head exploding in pain, not turning to ask Derrick how he’d known about the route he’d taken to get to the meeting. He’d heard and seen more than enough for one day.
18
He could hear the electronic dance music pulsing and vibrating off the asphalt before he turned onto 87th Street. It was just past dusk, but the ceiling’s track lights were already blazing beyond the flung-open second-story French windows. A shadow-wreathed woman was perched near the ledge, smoking. Ash from her cigarette landed on Ryan’s shoulder as he stepped to the building’s front entrance and fumbled for James’s spare key. He groaned.
As he exited the elevator and walked down the hallway, the ever-present odor of marijuana grew stronger and the bass thumps got wall-shaking loud. James’s door was ajar. Ryan pushed through it and was greeted by a pair of butch girls who couldn’t have been older than nineteen or twenty—one with a shaved head and a pierced septum, the other wearing a tank top stained by armpits that sprouted a robust amount of black fuzz—making out roughly in the entranceway to James’s bedroom. They noticed him gawking, giggled, and entered the room, slamming the door behind them.
There were other people flitting around in the hallway and the living room, a few more youngish girls, a couple of sweat-gleaming guys in wrinkle-free shirts that were unbuttoned to their sternums. They looked like they could have been James’s interns.
Ryan stopped in front of the entrance to the kitchen, where James was bent over a black granite countertop next to the stove, separating orange, pink, and white pills from a large Ziploc bag into three ceramic bowls, apparently based on which color they were. He seemed giddy, agitated, humming along to the repetitive drone of the song that was blasting from invisible speakers that were seemingly everywhere in the apartment. His thick, darting fingers were covered in a sherbet rainbow of dust.
He looked up, grinned, twisted off the cap of a bottle of Budweiser that had been perspiring nearby on the stove, and handed it to Ryan. “GHB, ketamine, and of course, some Molly that I think is actually Molly,” he said, pointing at the pharmaceutical salad in front of him. “Never been a fan of the club stuff, get sweaty enough after a couple brews and a handful of key bumps. But you know me, can’t help but be a gracious host.”
Ryan slammed the beer down on the counter. “What the fuck were you thinking?” he hissed.
“About what?” James replied, wiping his hands on an off-white V-neck that accentuated his paleness and his love handles. “Did he not show up? Did he not want to help you? I made it more than clear that he wouldn’t be able to cash out with me if he didn’t. Do you need me to call him?”
“I needed you to not tell him anything about me, biologically. I’ve spent most of my life trying to avoid becoming a science project. It also would have helped if you had given me at least a minimal warning about Derrick’s current choice of wardrobe and hairstyle. Also his tendency to ramble like a delusional cult groupie. Jesus, man.”
James grinned, opened the fridge, pulled out another beer, and twisted the cap off. “Thought I told you he was weird,” he said before taking a long swig. “But the skin stuff is fucking crazy, right? He used a chick’s curling iron on his fingers. Feet look the same way, apparently. I guess it’s one way to avoid getting caught. Hiding in plain sight. You know a thing or two about that. You guys might be more similar than you think.”
James had always been an idiot and a scumbag, but at least he hadn’t been reckless. The man Ryan knew might have had a little too much fun most nights of the week, but when it came to business, to his side gig as Ryan’s donor, he had kept his shit together. And above all else, he had kept his mouth shut. But that part of the man seemed to no longer exist. Ryan had been a fool for thinking James could help him.
“You know what, this whole thing was a bad idea. I’m going to grab my bag—unless one of your friends has decided to sell it for a quick fix—and I’m going to ask you where Derrick is staying in case he doesn’t show up tomorrow. And that’s it. You won’t hear from me in person again. Thanks for everything.”
Ryan turned to walk out of the kitchen. A moist hand latched on to his shoulder, bullet-quick.
“That’s not going to happen,” James said, lowering his voice.
“Why?” Ryan whispered. His body tensed up, ready to spring in whatever direction he needed it to.
“Well, for one thing,” James continued, relaxing his grip, “he isn’t staying anywhere. He’s been living in the park, sleeps there. Where, I can’t say. He thinks it’s safer that way. And for Derrick, it probably is. He’s got the lay of the land down cold. Like some kind of urban ninja savant. You’d never find him, and if you somehow got close, he’d see you before you made contact and disappear again. If you haven’t been paying attention to the news, he’s pretty good at that. But you need to chill out because he can’t leave, not until I deliver the funds he’s invested with my company. His little hiking trip across the border and his insane plot to upset the fabric of society or whatever he’s trying to do won’t work without them. And guess what? He’s not cashing out until he gets you what you want. It’s what I told him. It’s as simple as that.”
“You’re sure about that?”
Ryan turned back around to face James, who chugged from the Budweiser bottle until it was empty, wiped the backwash from his chin, and smiled. He picked up the beer Ryan had put down and handed it to him a second time. “I’m positive,” he said. “So just relax tonight, enjoy my humble festivities, and tomorrow you’ll be on your way. When’s the last time you got wasted? You remember what b
eer tastes like?”
“Not really, but I’m sure this is better than the rotgut we used to swill at the shipyards.” He put the bottle to his lips and took a long pull. It tasted bitter and slightly grating as it went down his throat, but the longer he drank, the more refreshed he felt. A forgotten fuzziness began to work its way into his stomach and radiate outward.
Maybe it was smarter for him to stay at the apartment overnight. He needed to rest before meeting with Derrick and obtaining whatever information the bleached oddball could find, wherever that might lead him. He couldn’t get wasted, but he could afford to relax for a couple of hours. And he owed James as much. He took another pull, emptying the bottle.
“That’s more like it!” James boomed. He took another beer out of the fridge and held the bowl of orange pills in front of Ryan.
“No way, man,” Ryan said, holding up his arms, palms out. “I’m not even sure I can handle the booze.”
James pressed the bowl into his hand. “Calm down, I know you’re a pussy,” he said. “They’re for my other, slightly more hip guests. And by ‘slightly’ I mean ‘significantly.’ Be a pal and help me bring these into the living room. Oh, and I told everyone you were like, some kind of New Age monk just back from a five-year pilgrimage to Nepal or Bangladesh or somewhere, totally ignorant of the ways of modern civilization. It’s actually pretty accurate when you think about it. Don’t worry about getting the story straight. Most of them probably won’t even remember it.”
“You what?”
“Just shut up and follow me!”
James scooped up the other two bowls, grabbed his beer, and plunged out of sight into the murky hallway.
Ryan looked down at the clothes James had lent him. An XXL gray T-shirt, baggy sweatpants that were almost the same color, and a white pair of gender-neutral tennis shoes that had belonged to a recent hookup (he hadn’t asked James why they were still in his possession) and were the only footwear in the apartment that came close to fitting correctly. If he was going to have to play the role of a world-denying hermit, he at least looked the part.
He walked into the living room, where the couch, the window ledge, and two folding chairs he hadn’t noticed the previous morning were occupied by the finance bros he’d seen earlier, a young Hispanic guy with a ponytail rolling a joint on his lap, the lesbians from the hallway, and a pot-bellied burnout wearing a tie-dyed bandana who was dozing and drooling onto the lap of his corduroy overalls.
“I come bearing gifts!” James shouted over the music as he set the bowls on the coffee table, which was already occupied by various drink containers, a small rectangular mirror, two dusty credit cards, and several sections of a cut-up plastic straw. “Oh, and this is my good buddy Ryan I was telling you about.”
Ryan did a wave-and-nod routine as he placed the bowl he’d been carrying next to the others and settled with his beer on the window ledge next to the semicomatose old-timer. Most of the group only gave him brief grunts of acknowledgment, as they were already fixated on the fresh batch of goodies.
One of the women scooped out pills from the bowls and placed them on the mirror, separating them by color. She began crushing and chopping them with a credit card until she’d formed multiple rows of neat, nail-sized lines. Buoyed by the prospect of killing more brain cells, the other party guests slurred along with a newish song by an Australian rapper that had just come on the stereo, with varying degrees of success.
James flitted back and forth from the kitchen, replacing empty bottles and glasses, distributing cigarettes, his forehead glistening, his perma-grin unbreakable.
When Ryan finished his beer, another appeared in front of him, then another. The woman who had taken on the role of drug dispenser wiped her hands on the slinky black dress that was riding up her orange-tinted thighs, revealing craters of cellulite and veins that would have once made Ryan salivate but now only caused him to shudder. Her drooping eyes found his and she motioned for him to come over to the mirror, to take his place in the giddy line that had formed, behind the guy with the ponytail. He smiled back, weakly, and shook his head. She shrugged and bent over, took a long snort.
Though a pleasant, hoppy numbness had begun to seep through him, allowing him to reach a level of relaxation he hadn’t felt in weeks, he knew he shouldn’t take it to the next level; he had to remain focused on the next day, to not lose the sense of urgency that gnawed at him, the image of Jennifer that had been grafted onto his brain.
At one point he noticed that James had been absent from the room for a few minutes. Ryan decided he would wait until his host returned, thank him for the beers, and crash in the room where he’d left his backpack, if it wasn’t already being used as a fuck pad by more of James’s esteemed colleagues. But his game plan was interrupted by the sudden coldness of metal against his forearm—a stainless-steel flask that was being offered to him by the grizzled hippie on the ledge next to him who had apparently just woken up.
“Don’t bother with that stuff,” the man rasped, his wet, cracked lips sputtering like a dying lawn mower as he motioned at the human vacuum cleaner convention across the room. “This is the real deal. All you’ll ever need. Take off the edge you’ve got going there, son.”
Ryan nodded, took the flask, and twisted off the cap. A small nightcap wouldn’t be the worst idea; it might make him drowsy enough to block out the earsplitting racket that would probably be going strong for the next few hours. He’d done it plenty of times in the creaky, boisterous boardinghouse where he’d lived for the two years before he was turned, cradling quart bottles in the oil-lit gloom.
He tilted his head back and lifted the flask to his lips. The liquor came out much faster than he’d anticipated, a skull-bruising gush of fire that burned through his throat and sent his vestibular system into a spasm of vertigo. He coughed, drooled, tried not to gag, lowered his head between his knees as the laughter and music swirled and drowned him in a suddenly deafening sea of noise. When he finally lifted his head, tears streaming down his face, the hippie was massaging his shoulders and saying something he couldn’t hear and everyone else was smirking, their expressions warped and ghoulish, applauding, but at a strange distance—he was outside himself.
The creatures on the couch beckoned to him, made a space for him, and he watched his body get up and join them, watched someone pass him an unmarked bottle of amber liquid, then a joint, then a burst of sour air and he was fully transported to a place beyond caring, beyond meaning and sound, that only existed as a series of increasingly disjointed snapshots—James materializing and holding him in a long bear hug, whispering something under his hot and spit-infused breath, another beer in his hand, one of the women passing out next to him, foam exiting her mouth, the other two taking pictures of her with their phones, snorting more lines, the beer falling out of his hand and shattering on the carpet, the finance bros dragging the passed-out woman somewhere else, another beer, the hippie straddling the ledge, cackling and flinging the flask and jumping out of the window and into the darkness, the girls who had been making out in the hallway earlier suddenly pressed against him on either side, flushed and sweaty, hands creeping up his thighs, laughing, licking, pleading, bending over the mirror while someone held a straw in his nostril, staring at a face he no longer recognized, a face that didn’t want to be recognized, then no face at all.
* * *
He tried to scrunch the sun from his eyes, to return to the soothing blackness where nothing mattered, but it was impossible.
He was lying on the folded-out sofa in James’s extra room. Of that much he could be certain, unlike the location of his shirt and backpack, and the last three or four or five hours of the previous night. He tried covering his face with his arm, and when that didn’t work he flailed blindly at the curtain of the window that he hoped was an arm’s length away, but all he came up with was a fistful of pillow-soft breast and a goose-pimpled areola.
Ryan pulled his hand back, opened his eyes, and was greeted by the sm
irking, squinting face of the girl with the shaved head and nose ring. “All night Isabel and I basically throw ourselves at you,” she murmured, turning onto her back and rolling her eyes, “and now you want to play. Go figure.” She reached for a crumpled bedsheet that was wrapped around her stomach, just below her pale, freckled chest, and began to pull it down over her slender waist, revealing a bellybutton piercing and several small tattoos depicting geometric shapes—pyramids, disks, spheres in chain formations.
“Oh shit,” Ryan muttered as he jumped off the couch, head spinning, stomach twisted, trying to reconstruct the sequence of events that had led him to the situation he was currently in—naked except for the oversized Batman boxers James had lent him—and coming up with nothing. “Shit, shit, shit,” he kept repeating while the girl rolled her eyes and pulled the sheet over herself, up to her neck.
“What time is it?” Ryan mumbled, half to himself. He scanned the room, past the dozens of half-empty beer bottles perched on a wooden desk, dresser, and bookshelf, many with cigarettes swimming in the leftover swill, a torn-open bag of Cheetos on the carpet, an old macroeconomics textbook on a bed stand, covered with powdery residue and several rolled-up dollar bills. The clothes he’d been wearing were lying in a heap in the corner of the room nearest the couch, accompanied by a red silk bra that he assumed was the girl’s.
“Can you toss me that?” she asked. She had rolled onto her stomach and was watching Ryan intently. “We’ve probably got an hour or so to kill before you have to go and make things right with your girlfriend or whoever it was you kept gushing so, um, eloquently about last night. I promise I won’t tell. It’ll be our little secret.”
