Asimov's SF, February 2007

by Dell Magazine Authors

  "It might have been nothing,” Yvonne concluded. “I wonder whether we're all—all of us who've experienced this—whether we're linked. Events in each of our lives might be connected. Or maybe not."

  Utterly lost by this exchange, Ed watched Kendra's reaction; she seemed merely attentive.

  Thomas told the group, “My wife and I were invited to visit some people in the Adirondacks next weekend.” He had only the local accent, no trace of something foreign. This fascinated Ed, when people looked a certain way, but you couldn't conclude anything from it. “They have a lodge up there. We decided not to go. It's too risky."

  "You'd feel too exposed,” said Pat.

  Yvonne agreed firmly. “Anything could happen."

  In the silence that followed, Pat picked up his cake and took a tremendous bite, his face staying engaged with the piece for some seconds as he managed it. Terrance and Yvonne took the opportunity to get themselves coffee.

  "Maybe it would be helpful,” said Father Mike, “especially for our new folks, if we each talked a little about our first or even long-term experiences. Then maybe the two of you,” he said to Kendra and Ed, “can find some common ground. If you feel comfortable, you could share some of your own, um, accounts."

  Glances ran around the group, Ed alone keeping his head down, and though Yvonne and Thomas both opened their mouths to speak, Kendra broke the moment. “The others won't stop coming.” Ed's thinking seized as he waited for something more, words that would make sense of everything he'd heard tonight. She finally said, “Not coming like ... visiting. That's stopped, or I guess it's stopped. But it's like I'm never alone now.” Marshall pressed his hands together and brought them to his lips, thumbs tucked below his chin.

  "Implants?” Pat quietly asked.

  Breathing loudly through her nose, Kendra inhaled and exhaled twice. “It's the loss of privacy, you know? You set up barriers—who you let into your life, how close you let them get, what you tell people about yourself.... Instead, they just ... intrude."

  Ed chose this moment to rise in the direction of the snack table; rather, some impulse drove him upward, though no conscious thought about food and coffee had come to mind. He saw the look Father Mike gave him; he was used to such looks, which was another reason he avoided social gatherings. Rules for when to speak, when to leave, how to serve himself, perplexed. Clearly, this time was wrong for rising. Once at the table, a panicked slowness overtook him; he watched his hands detach one paper cup from its nested fellows, a task that seemed surprisingly complicated.

  "The first time was five years ago,” said Kendra. “I live alone. My son stayed with his father when we split up, and they live in Colorado now. I'd gone to bed.” Ed had a cup, but couldn't listen and choose among the three dispensers at the same time.

  "My house is on an old farm property that nobody farms, so there aren't any other houses right there. It's maybe half a mile to the closest one.

  "Anyway, at some point, I woke up. I thought at the time that I'd heard my son call me. For a minute I just lay there with my eyes open, and then I realized I couldn't move.” To remember, she faced the ceiling. “I had the impression someone was in the room, standing by the bed, but the way I was lying there, I couldn't see him. So it was like that for a while, and I was terrified, terrified, and then there was a voice, kind of a voice in my head, but I wasn't sure I heard it. You know?” The hot water and coffee dispensers—one marked by a Post-It reading “DECAF"—were of a sort with a central disk that you depressed to expel the coffee. Splashing in the cup, the coffee sounded to Ed like a man urinating; he felt that he, at that moment, was that man.

  "The voice was reassuring, even though I felt like it was maybe lying, that it didn't have any right to reassure me. I couldn't move, I suddenly wanted to see my son..."

  Ed started back, but he noticed a bookmark-sized handout by the cake. The angle at which the handout was placed forced him to twist his neck, and the violet paper made the print difficult to make out. AVE? SAVE? Bold letters in four lines at the top spelled out Survivors of Abductions and Visitations by Extraterrestrials. Numbered items, ten in all, seemed to provide tips for handling such experiences. An odd humming began in his head, like the time he'd blacked out while donating blood. Standing awkwardly, tugged by Kendra's voice and the need to get back to his seat, Ed couldn't force the words on the handout into coherent sentences. Back hunched to make himself smaller, he returned to the sofa.

  "I think I fell asleep again. I even dreamed. Dreamed of animals, rabbits, running in a field in the daylight. Then somehow, I was outside. I don't know if I was floating, or if I was being held up by someone, maybe just one person, but I could see the stars and the tops of some trees. I couldn't turn my head. I knew I was in my yard. I hadn't gone very far."

  Facing the carpet, Ed heard the air whistling in his nose, and he tried to stop it by slowing his breaths. He bowed his head to sip coffee.

  "It's okay,” said the priest.

  "I'll be all right,” said Kendra, but her voice was thick, muted. Ed looked up and saw her swallow with difficulty. “The voice told me I wasn't going to be hurt and I didn't need to feel afraid. I had this sense, or maybe I thought this later, that whatever was behind the voice was looking for ... a connection, just ... time with me."

  Ed noticed an approaching voice and soft steps in the corridor. Two men passed, one talking and the other listening; both looked into the room on their way, and then they slipped by. Ed recalled now the dozen or more cars in the parking lot. He saw a sentence in his mind's eye, and he read the sentence: I am in the wrong room.

  "I don't remember after that. Either the stars kind of went out, or I blacked out, or something black went over me. I do remember eyes, eyes like Terrance mentioned."

  "You won't forget those,” said Pat.

  "I remember turning around a lot with my arms out, like in a weird, formal dance. I don't know. When I realized where I was again, I was sitting downstairs. It's funny.” She smiled at each person in turn. Ed managed to return the look. “It's funny,” she said again. “I thought I'd come downstairs for something. So I got myself some orange juice from the fridge and walked back upstairs. I thought, ‘That's not it. That's not why I came downstairs.’ And I went to bed.

  "The next morning, I got up, I did the usual things. I was in the bathroom, and I remember looking at myself in the mirror and suddenly remembering what had happened, that someone had been there and that I'd been outside, but not anything after that. Still. The other times ... I remember even less of those."

  A moment passed, and then Father Mike said, softly, “Okay."

  "I find the visits reassuring,” said Yvonne. “They remind me that they're real. If they didn't keep happening, I wouldn't believe them."

  "But you never know when they'll come,” said Thomas. “Sometimes it's several in a short period. And my wife and I are wrecks for weeks afterward."

  After a glance at the slice of dark window between the curtains, Ed kept his eyes elsewhere; he felt his mind working, against his will, to conjure the faces of insect-headed aliens half-veiled in the outer darkness. Even looking at his hand picking a piece of lint from his knee, he imagined a face forming and receding, forming and receding. He couldn't imagine why such a being would watch him. Certainly he wasn't worth pursuing. In the hall, the two men from the other group passed, returning. He wished they could hear what he was hearing.

  "It's not like that for me,” said Pat. “I mean, it's true, I get sort of jangly, my nerves are jangly for days. I get what you're saying, but I also like that they have a focus on me. I don't feel it's malign. I'm being watched, but, I have to say, it's not like being watched by a stalker or something."

  "People feel very different ways about this,” said Father Mike. “I think you need to integrate the experiences with your workaday lives. Talking can help you do that. This is something that you can't undo, and you should find a way to accept it. It's a mystery the universe is giving to all of
you.” Ed wondered why a priest would say “the universe” instead of “God.” Except at church, Ed didn't often think of God, and when he did, he thought of a night that didn't answer back, the way Jesus’ prayer in the dark garden was met by silence.

  "My theory,” said Terrance, smiling, which felt terribly wrong to Ed, “is that all visitations are linked. People see the Virgin Mary, ghosts, we see these things that come for us.... They're all manifestations of some reality we're not fully aware of. They break through into our world. We think that all there is is what we can see; we're so closed off, when you think about it. There are realities just the other side of ours, like through a paper wall.” He shrugged. “Things break through, and we see them a certain way. Maybe they aren't anything like what we picture or what we remember. You, uh—"

  "Kendra,” Ed surprised himself by saying.

  "—Kendra, right—you remember some kind of assault, but maybe because you were assaulted once as a teenager. Everything goes through this prism of our perspective, do you see what I'm saying?"

  Even Ed could read Kendra's face, and he felt how the people in this room weren't helping her. He sensed, pressing from outside the building, even gathering at their backs, the presence of mysterious forces.

  "Others scare me,” he said abruptly. The line often ran through his head like a lyric he couldn't shake; now he said it.

  "The others?” asked Father Mike, mostly turned toward Kendra. Yvonne had leaned forward to place her head close to Terrance's; she made her eyes wide until he looked back, and then she mouthed something.

  "Others,” Ed repeated, and the priest nodded with his whole upper body. “I hear how afraid Kendra is. I get afraid too. I don't think it's wrong to feel that way. I mean, you're being watched. We're all being watched, all of us. Maybe right now. And I think that's frightening. I don't think that I have to ... integrate that."

  "See—” began the priest, but Ed couldn't stop yet.

  "I would like some things to be more normal in my life. But just talking about my life doesn't change it. Something has to happen. Maybe I have to do something. And that's been a problem. I'm thirty-four, and I'm not any closer to being comfortable in the world than I was at fourteen. There are too many frightening things. The world should be a lot easier to figure out. Things shouldn't be this difficult, should they?” He listened to the whistling in his nose again and realized he'd run out of sentences. He also realized that he wanted the priest to answer his question.

  "Ed,” said Father Mike, a stillness entering his features, “you're a very good person to feel that way."

  Ed shook his head slightly, but said nothing. Good wasn't how he felt at all.

  Most members of the group adjusted themselves in their seats. Father Mike tugged back his left sleeve to check his watch.

  Then Yok stood, made sure everyone was listening, and spoke. “I think: Where they come from, nothing happens anymore.” She made sharp gestures with her hands as a form of punctuation. “Their lives are completely regulated. There's no color or music. There aren't any surprises. They come here and take us, and then they have something to tell each other. They have stories. Our lives are interesting because we're complicated, so they take us and tell the stories."

  Marshall leaned out over his knees. “That's an interesting theory.” He fixed Yok with a look, then shot his gaze at Ed, who jerked.

  "It's something I feel very strongly,” said Yok.

  "Sure,” said Marshall, settling back. He opened one hand to demonstrate his understanding. “Sure."

  "My son's stopping in next weekend,” said Pat, but Ed didn't listen much after that. Personal matters involving children and work surfaced. While several people discussed a route to work to avoid some recent construction, Terrance crossed to Kendra and said something Ed couldn't hear. He saw her pat his hand.

  When Father Mike stood, Ed thought he might lead them in prayer. “If anyone wants the leftovers, go ahead,” said the priest; then he and Pat carried out the coffee and hot water. They paused in the doorway as members of the other group passed in the hallway. “I'll lock up,” Ed heard the priest say to someone.

  Kendra had already gathered her coat. In the company of Yvonne, she tossed a cup in the trash can, and, chatting, headed out. Eyes unfocused, Ed stood between his seat and the coat rack. He felt the evening tearing away into unrecoverable pieces. The Asian couple picked up a piece of cake, said goodbye, and left. One coat remained on the rack; somehow he couldn't entirely recognize it. When he finally reached for it, Marshall, who'd been tidying the snack area and straightening the chairs, stepped in too close.

  "You're a walk-in, too, aren't you,” he said, squinting slightly.

  "It's my first time here...."

  "No. No. That isn't what I meant. I meant,” and his voice both softened and deepened, “an old soul. A walk-in."

  "Heh,” Ed half-laughed, thinking that might be appropriate. He pulled his coat from the hanger without removing the hanger from the rack; when the second shoulder came free, the hanger bent, then sprang upward, tinged the pole, and fell off. Marshall collected it. “Oh, thanks."

  Even before rising again, Marshall was talking. “I recognize you. I know you.” Again, he gave Ed the narrowed look. “You're like me."

  "I ... I...

  "There are quite a few of us around. I see them in the grocery story, at the mall, and we nod to each other.” He gave a knowing nod to one side of Ed, as if someone stood there. “I didn't know until one of them came up to me one day out at the park. I was watching some boys play basketball. A gentleman in a long coat came from all the way across the field, and the whole time I watched him coming, I knew he had something important to tell me. He finally got up to me and said, ‘You have a message for the world,’ and then he left. His eyes were totally black, like they were all pupil. Just like that, he was gone.

  "A few days after that, I realized that I wasn't Marshall Price anymore. I hadn't been for a long time, maybe since I was a child. His soul had gone. Now I'm the soul of Uniac, from a planet in the Arcturus system. My message is peace and enlightenment."

  "Peace,” Ed repeated.

  "I've taken many journeys. I can point out the stars I've visited."

  "Guys,” said Father Mike. Standing in the doorway, he flipped the lights off and on. “Time to go. Oh, the cake."

  "I know I'll see you again,” Marshall said.

  "Marshall,” said the priest. With one hand he held the cake plate; with the other, he pressed plastic wrap over a single fat piece. “Are you freaking out our new friend?"

  Marshall bent his head slightly. “Father Mike doesn't like me to talk."

  "I never said that. Come on."

  Ed left first, relieved when the priest started talking to Marshall; Ed didn't like the thought of talking to him in the parking lot.

  Outside, the temperature had dipped sharply; Ed felt it in his hands. He'd left his gloves atop his dresser. Only a few cars remained, his own buried in shadow at the far end. The door of one opened and Kendra stepped out.

  Wrapping her arms around herself against the cold, Kendra came straight up to him. Her car rattled with uncertain life, and exhaust eased upward from the rear. Father Mike and Marshall passed him where he stood and said their goodbyes.

  "I'm glad I caught you. I wanted to thank you.” Ed watched amazed as her hand patted his coat's forearm, conveying the slightest pressure. “What you said meant a lot to me."

  "I didn't say anything."

  "You did. You tried to reach out. I think that was great."

  "Oh...” He shook his head.

  "So. I hope things get better for you.” Her car coughed. Her hand went out again, only brushing his arm. “Anyway.” She walked backwards two steps. “See you next time?” He worked to produce some answer, but she had turned away.

  He watched Kendra leave: shutting the door, putting on her seatbelt, waving at him by twiddling her fingers—he returned the gesture—and then driving off. Mar
shall and Father Mike pulled away as well, leaving him alone with the commentary of crows.

  At his car, he paused and surveyed the lot. Next time. Buried in his coat pocket, his fingers touched the keys, two for the house, one for the car. He slid one finger into the ring that bound them. He thought of seeing Kendra again.

  A problem presented itself. How could he come to the next meeting? He hadn't belonged. Arguably, he had lied. He wanted to see Kendra at least one more time, he knew they could be friends, but he would have to tell her the truth.

  He drew in a ragged breath and his lower lip twitched as if a current were passing through it. He didn't know the correct words, and then he did; he would say I've never been abducted. I was in the wrong room. That's what life is like for me.

  He faced into the trees to think. Perhaps he could speak to Kendra in the parking lot before the meeting. Nothing in his life to this point had prepared him to think through what her reaction might be. He imagined speaking, but couldn't see or hear what might come from her. She seemed so nice; she might find it all amusing. Or she might feel, in some way, betrayed. Linked solely by a misunderstanding, he might never see her again. He breathed the icy air and couldn't move, his situation, as far as he could judge, unresolvable.

  His breath whistled rapidly through his nose, the only sound. The trees were still stuffed with crows; he could see their upright, nervous shapes, but they had gone silent. His chest tightened. The school floodlights and the high lamp in the parking lot blacked out, plunging him into a lake of darkness.

  Then we opened the night, gathered him close, and hauled him upward into the deeps.

  Copyright (c) 2006 William Preston

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  RECOVERING APOLLO 8 by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  The author's latest Retrieval Artist novel, Paloma, was published late last year by Roc and she had stories in Analog and the North American Review around the same time. In her latest tale for Asimov's, a man's lifelong obsession becomes both his life story and the story of...