Asimov's SF, February 2007

by Dell Magazine Authors

  "That's true,” he says. “But where do you sleep? You're not over here every night."

  "I don't sleep every night,” she says. “Maybe about one in four."

  Chris looks concerned. “You need to get off those stims,” he says. “They're messing you up."

  "I know,” she says. “I didn't take any today."

  "Then let's get some sleep,” he says.

  * * * *

  Before Chris even opens his eyes the next morning, he notices the smell. It is unmistakable, and his first thought is, why? Why, after his generous gift of two jars, did they enter his apartment to steal more? But then, as his eyes adjust to the morning light and focus on the propped up canvas in the middle of the room, he understands.

  "Lanna,” he says, jostling her a little. “Lanna, you've gotta wake up. I need to shellac this thing right now."

  "What?” she asks. “What are you talking about?"

  "Take a look at this,” he says, pointing to the canvas in the middle of the room.

  "My god,” she says. “It's gorgeous.” She goes over to examine the canvas. “The texture and detail are amazing.” She sniffs at the air suddenly. “But I guess I don't get your choice of medium."

  "It wasn't me,” he says.

  Lanna's eyes get big. “No shit?"

  "No shit,” says Chris. “Come on, we have to get this shellacked so it'll keep."

  The next day, at Rico's art opening, the intelligentsia are milling around. They are mildly interested in the various condiment creations. It is a novel medium, but surely, they agree, not one to come into widespread use. However, their tune changes when they get to the centerpiece of the exhibit, a comparison piece of sorts. One woman, a local art critic, says, “it really showcases the power of condiments to convey texture and shape, and contrasts them with the power of traditional paint to portray color."

  The exhibit consists of two pieces side by side. Their subject is the same—a strange squirrel with bony thumbs on its paws. One is done in the style of pixelism, the other, in peanut butter. A wealthy philanthropist at the event observes that “while the pixelism piece does an excellent job at showing the light of intelligence in the creature's eyes, the peanut butter piece is incredible at portraying the grain of its fur, and depth of facial features."

  A famous collector, before purchasing the set, explained his motivations by saying that “while the squirrel in peanut butter seems to be holding a sword of some kind, the squirrel in paint has been defaced with an overly large mustache and beard. There is little doubt in my mind that these differences have as much or more import than the similarities. These contrasts have, more than any other characteristics, convinced me to buy the set, if for no other reason than that they might be set side by side as long as I live, their intersections and dissimilarities more ripe for the viewer's consumption."

  The set sells for more money than all the other condiment pieces combined. Rico looks for Chris to tell him the good news, but he has already left with Lanna. They wanted to hit the art supply store before it closed. Chris intends to leave some oil paints on the roof overnight.

  Copyright (c) 2006 Charles Midwinter

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  CLOSE by William Preston

  Just because you're feeling ill at ease and terrified doesn't mean something isn't out to get you...

  That night, a turtlish car crept into the parking lot of the former St. Jude's School fifteen minutes after every other, passed more than a dozen vehicles huddled in regions of brightness, then backed into the dimmest corner, against the narrow band of woods. Crows riotously packing the high branches briefly lifted off and raised even more argument, then settled back to their ordinary din.

  Elbow on the open window, Ed Lukens breathed clouds as he surveyed the other cars. Some had gathered under the tall, helmeted lamp in the lot's middle; the rest, in the first row of slots by the one-story brick building, faced the few bright, curtained windows and the regularly spaced floods.

  He'd kept the ignition key partly turned; the dashboard clock read 7:20. Choosing what to wear had taken too long, what with his mother out for the evening with his married sister. The part in his flat brown hair hadn't fallen correctly, so he'd simply combed his hair forward, where it troubled his brow. Then there'd been that wrong turn, his brain's autopilot taking him initially toward work rather than here. He twisted his face into an imitation of disappointment, though once the expression was in place, he felt himself sinking into despair.

  During mass two weeks ago, in the middle of the sermon, his sister had dropped the church bulletin into his lap and, with one red-nailed finger, tapped twice, sharply, at a notice.

  Does meeting new people make you uncomfortable? Does small talk make you anxious? Afraid to get out of the house for new experiences?

  Through the rest of the service, he'd imagined everyone in the congregation reading those sentences and thinking only of him, thirty-four, tall, and strange. At night he'd lie in bed, the window open in any season, listening. Not attending to the night's sounds exactly, but to the gaps between the sounds, he ached, the aggregate emptiness confirming his sense that everyone was truly alone.

  Two weeks his sister had kept after him, mentioning the bulletin notice over dinner every other day when she and her husband visited. Coming tonight was meant to stop her wearying assaults. The evening had been difficult enough to this point; walking in late seemed impossible. He pictured people turning toward him, holding drinks, going silent. He couldn't face such attention. Just to be here was quite an achievement. Maybe another night, he'd manage to go inside.

  He considered sitting a while longer, then driving a meandering route home. Probably his mother wouldn't be back until later, and he could lie that he'd attended, answering with shrugs when pressed for details.

  Then he heard a failing muffler, and headlights swept his eyes. A four-door car, streaked with old mud, appeared, and in the light from the center pole Ed could see, as the car paused, the female driver, pale and blonde, leaning over her hands, which clutched the steering wheel. She scanned the lot, moved forward hesitantly, then at last selected a spot one row from the building. The engine cut out, the sound of crows returned, but she didn't step out.

  Ed waited, an unfamiliar certainty expanding in him like a dense bubble. She didn't leave her car when the dashboard clock read 7:21, then 7:22. All the while, the chorus of crows rose and fell, or shifted about, restless. Ed's breathing quickened. She couldn't take that first step from the car. She nearly hadn't come at all. What held her back? His own fears seemed to him so inexpressible, yet here was someone who surely shared them, a normal-looking woman of around his own age, from what he could see—and gathered inside the old school, even more people who would know what it meant to be paralyzed, stuck at what Ed's sister called “an inability to move to the next level."

  The longer she waited, the more watching her from the darkness troubled him, but driving off would, he reasoned, draw attention to how he'd sat there all this time. He didn't want to be the kind of person who would watch someone this way. After setting a determined look on his face, he took out the key, opened his door, and unfolded his lanky frame into the cold night. His hand resting where his window should have been, he realized he hadn't raised the window. As he bent back into the car to insert the key, he heard the other car's door open. He willed the electronic window to hurry.

  He emerged from his task to see the woman, wearing a white, fur-fringed coat, still standing by her car. He shut the door, knowing it would startle her, but she didn't budge. Something in his expression had shifted, he knew, but he couldn't quite reorganize his face and walk at the same time, so his pace across the lot became irregular. When she looked back at him and said “Hi,” a bit loudly, he initially and instinctively turned away. Raised to be polite, he managed a “Hello” back in her general direction. She was already on the move for the doors; he followed. He entered the brightness under the tall lamp, then faced the firs
t set of double doors into the high, open lobby; she held the door, her other hand hooked by a thumb between her purse strap and shoulder. She leaned inside, and he stepped quickly so she wasn't delayed by his approach.

  "Thank you,” he said faintly.

  "You're very welcome,” she said, passing him the door's weight. She passed him the next door as well, and they both muttered another exchange.

  He considered her short-heeled shoes on the thin gray rug at the entrance. From the lobby, the single, half-lit hall ran directly to their left. Two distinct voices laughed, and then her shoes proceeded, snapping onto the tile. Her right foot slid noticeably out of the heel with each step. When, two rooms down, she turned left, Ed turned as well and entered a room that seemed too bright.

  Entrances daunted him. Usually the tallest person in any gathering, at six foot three, even his slouch could not make him less conspicuous. Wincing slightly, he was met by the hellos of several people rising from their seats. One, a black man, surprised him by being taller. He shook hands all around. The only person whose eyes he briefly met was a priest, identifiable by the Roman shirt collar. He heard the woman from the lot apologize for being late, and he somehow picked up that she, too, was new to the group.

  Ed didn't catch any names, as simply pushing a smile outward and grasping hands had required so much attention. “You can hang your coat over there,” the priest told him, indicating a wheeled rack. Ed did as he was told, and with his back to the others he became aware of his actions as if they were a choreographed performance he'd failed to practice. Before him hung floor to ceiling curtains; in a gap, he saw himself reflected. The metal hanger slid strangely from the pole, then plunged too shallowly into the first sleeve. The woman from the parking lot stepped in beside him to hang up her own coat.

  She leaned slightly toward him. “I'm Kendra."

  Stalled with the coat and hanger, he faced her. “Ed. Lukens.” She gave him a quick smile and turned away.

  Leaving the coat hanging jauntily, he looked for the nearest seat and took it, on a beige sofa whose front edge was threadbare, foam showing from beneath. He shook hands—for the second time, though he didn't realize that—with his neighbor. Dark hair streaked the back of the man's hands; his jacket bore a local union number over the left breast. Over a peach-colored shirt, Ed wore an earthily brown sweater his mother had given him two Christmases past. He'd considered, but rejected, a sports coat. A second glance showed his sofa-mate to be nearly bald, the hair far back on his head shaved close.

  The priest raised a hand to attract Ed's attention. “I didn't catch your name.” Ed hadn't said, in fact, and looked from the priest's pink, pocked face to the table behind his plastic chair, a potential harbor of coffee dispensers and some assortment of snacks. The table stood just under a wall-length blackboard. Instantly Ed wanted something in his hands and something to do with his mouth besides talk.

  "I'm Ed Lukens."

  The priest's eyes rolled upward to consult a memory. “We didn't speak before, did we?"

  "Um..."

  "On the phone. You didn't call me...?"

  "No. No. I should have called.” There had been a number in the bulletin.

  "Oh, that's fine. It's just so I know how much food to bring."

  "I eat too much of it,” said the man at Ed's side, leaning forward on the sofa. Everyone laughed pleasantly. A piece of cake lay on a paper plate between his neighbor's boot-clad feet.

  "You spoke to me, Father,” said the other new arrival.

  "Kendra,” he said, pointing with satisfaction, though Ed supposed she'd told him her name only moments ago. “I remember our talk. I'm really glad you could come. We've just been chatting so far tonight, so you haven't missed anything. Let's just run through the names, and then I'll give the two of you my standard speech for newcomers,” he said, making Ed twitch. Ed studied the cake on the floor but heard how the priest's voice kept shifting direction as he angled his talk back and forth between Kendra, seated to the priest's left, and himself.

  The tall black man, Marshall, sat closest to the door in a chair that diminished his size by forcing him low and so far back that his knees were higher than the armrests. Kendra was next, on a chair of detached cushions. The priest sat beside her in what appeared to be a classroom chair of metal and stone. On the sofa perpendicular to Ed's, Yvonne, upright and thin as a corn-stalk, with sparse brown hair that stuck to her skull and hung below her shoulders, sat beside Terrance, Ed's age but silver-haired. Ed thought Terrance looked pleased somehow; it had to do with the way he sat forward, the leather elbow patches on his sport coat resting on his knees, and his faint smile; Ed thought he wouldn't mind getting to know him. Pat shared the sofa with Ed. Somewhat out of sight behind Pat, so Ed had to shift about to see them, an Asian couple, Yok and Thomas, clutched each other's hands atop the woman's lap, their classroom chairs shoved together.

  That they were Asian made Ed remember that there were important cultural differences between, for example, Koreans, Japanese, and Chinese, and his mind momentarily busied itself worrying that he might say the wrong thing. Then he switched to considering something more obvious: They'd come together. Could a couple feel mutually anxious about meeting others? Perhaps they were brother and sister.

  "And you can call me ‘Father’ or ‘Father Mike’ or just ‘Mike,’ okay? First, anything we say here stays here."

  "Well,” said Yvonne, raising her brows.

  Father Mike gave her a serious look. “You know what I mean. This is a safe place. What I mean is, we don't have to worry about saying something that might sound foolish, and no one here is looking to make you uncomfortable.” Yvonne nodded to one side noncommittally. “Our aim is to get our experiences out in the open, as much as we're comfortable talking about them, and see what we can learn from each other."

  The priest opened his hands to indicate everyone seated. “So: Anyone have any visitors in the last two weeks?"

  A disjointed chorus of no's followed. Much to his surprise, Ed pictured Kendra coming to see him at his house. He'd arranged for his mother to be out. They'd sit together on the sofa ... no, that didn't look comfortable. He'd scoot forward and back on the cushion, as he did now, unable to find the right spot. Better if they sat at the small table in the kitchen together. They'd cut fat slices from one of those store-bought poundcakes his mother kept in the freezer. Kendra loved them too. Then he'd hear the key rattle in the front door as his mother returned.

  Ed's fingers clutched the cushion under him. Pat had said something he'd missed, concluding with, “I figure this dry spell can't go on forever."

  "It could,” said Father Mike. “There aren't rigid rules here. All relationships have elements of the unknown, the unexpected, right? Why should this be any different?"

  "That earthquake in India last week,” said Yvonne, and the others made sympathetic sounds. “It made me think. My life is difficult, but so is everyone else's, just in different ways. People died in that. People are without homes. Okay, this is stranger than what a lot of other people go through, but it's not like I'm the only person, which is what I thought ten years ago."

  "What makes anything bearable is other people,” said the priest. Ed studied the carpet's fibers in displaced concentration, because really it was other people who made life hard. “You think about all the terrible and amazing things we go through as individuals, all the events and catastrophes and what-have-you down through the ages, and what do people do afterwards? We tell our stories to each other. Somehow we make sense of things when we do that. We realize we have something in common, and we try, though it's not some perfect process, to come to some common understanding of what we've been through."

  Ed caught a glimpse of the Asian couple hugging sideways, their close-cropped heads leaning together.

  Terrance tightened his lips together in a grin and scooted forward a bit on the sofa, preparing to speak. Beside him, Yvonne blinked a few times and looked at the floor.

  "Last time,
I was talking about how hard it is in a new place.” To Ed, Terry seemed outgoing, trying to catch the eyes of each person in the room. “I have to assume, because I've moved before, I can expect the same kinds of things. And it's funny, well, not funny, but I've developed a kind of paranoia, where I think people already know things about me. Or like they're in on some secret I'm not in on."

  "So which is it?” asked Pat as he rose in the direction of the snack table.

  "You know, sometimes I feel there's a conspiracy and it's all about keeping me in the dark. And sometimes I think when people look at me they see somebody who's not fitting in, somebody ... marked in a way."

  Yvonne cleared her throat and straightened more. Ed consciously tried to force his own back into a more erect position; he'd sunk too low into the cushion. “Stages,” she said. “Those were stages I went through. The conspiracy and then the feeling different."

  "They're really interrelated,” said the priest, showing his hands laced together.

  Ed remembered feeling those ways in grade school. Kids gathered by their lockers engaged in conversations to which he would never be privy. What did people talk about? At times he believed, probably rightly, that kids were talking about him, or about every other untouchable at school. He'd imagine the school empty, himself simply circling the hallways in a day of bright floors and silence.

  Involved in his own thoughts, he'd missed some of what Terrance said, tuning back in on “...incident since I moved here.” Pay attention, Ed told himself. He knew the importance of taking an interest in people, listening to them so you could ask good questions that showed you wanted to know them better.

  "Anyone else have anything strange happen Saturday night?” asked Yvonne. Everyone considered this.

  "A visit?” asked Terrance.

  "No ... A dream?"

  "I might have had a dream. Nothing new. Eyes. Big eyes.” His hands opened like opposing C's.

  "I get that a lot,” said Pat, returning with another piece of cake and a cup.