by Mike Ashley
“By ginger, Oberon,” said Wilbraham, “you are right! I have rather put it on to you people and I’m sorry. I wouldn’t embarrass you good fairies for anything in the world.”
“Good!” cried Oberon, overjoyed. “I thought you would feel that way. Just think for one moment what it would mean for us if the Great Wish Syndicate were started as a going concern, with a board of directors made up of men like John W. Midas, Rockernegie, and old Bondifeller running things. Why, there aren’t fairies enough in the world to keep up with those men, and the whole business world would come down with a crash. Their wish would elect a whole Congress. If they wished the Senate out of Washington and located on Wall Street, you’d soon find it so, and by thunder, Wilbraham, every four years they’d wish somebody in the White House with a great capacity for taking orders and not enough spine to fill an umbrella cover, and the public would be powerless.”
Wilbraham gazed thoughtfully out of the window. A dazzling prospect of imperial proportions loomed up before his vision, and the temptation was terrible, but in the end common sense came to the rescue.
“It would be a terrible nuisance,” he muttered to himself, and then turning to Oberon he asked: “What is your proposition?”
“A compromise,” said the fairy. “If you’ll give up your right to further wishes on our account we will place you in a position where, for the rest of your natural life, you will always have four dollars more than you need, and in addition to that, as a compliment to Mrs Wilbraham, she can have everything she wants.”
“Ha!” said Wilbraham, dubiously. “I – I don’t think I’d like that exactly. She might want something I didn’t want her to have.”
“Very well, then,” said the fairy, with a broad smile. “We’ll make you the flat proposition – you give us a quitclaim deed to all your future right, title, and interest in our wishes, and we will guarantee that as long as you live you will, upon every occasion, find in your pocket five dollars more than you need.”
“Make it seven and I’ll go you!” cried Wilbraham, really enthusiastic over the suggestion.
“Sure!” returned Oberon with a deep sigh of relief.
“Well, dearest,” said Wilbraham that night as he sat down at his onyx dinner-table, “I’ve gone out of the wish business.”
His wife’s eyes lit up with a glow of happiness.
“You have?” she cried delightedly.
“Yes,” said Wilbraham; and then he told her of Oberon’s call, and the new arrangement, and was rejoiced beyond measure to receive her approval of it.
“I am so glad, Richard,” she murmured, with a sigh of content. “I have been kept so busy for two years trying to think of new things to wish for that I have had no time to enjoy all the beautiful things we have.”
“And it isn’t bad to have seven dollars more than you need whenever you need it, is it, dearest?”
“Bad, Richard?” she returned. “Bad? I should say not, my beloved. To have seven dollars more than you need at all times is, to my mind, the height of an ideal prosperity. I need five thousand dollars at this very minute to pay my milliner’s bill.”
“And here it is,” said her husband, taking five crisp one-thousand-dollar bills from his vest pocket and handing them to her. “And here are seven brand-new ones besides. The fairies are true to their bargain.”
And they lived affluently forever afterward, although Midas and his confréres did sue Wilbraham for breach of contract, securing judgment for twenty-nine million dollars, the which Wilbraham paid before leaving the court-room, departing therefrom with a balance of one five and two one dollar bills to the good.
And that is why, my dear children, when you see the Wilbraham motor chugging along the highway, if you look closely you will see painted on the door of the car a simple crest, a poached egg dormant upon a piece of toast couchant, and underneath it, in golden letters on a scroll, the family motto, Hic semper septimus.
FRACTAL PAISLEYS
Paul Di Filippo
That night the Li’l Bear Inn was as crowded as the last ’copter out of Saigon. But the atmosphere was a little more frenzied.
All three pool tables were hidden by tight packs of players and spectators, protruding cues making the whole mass resemble a patchwork porcupine. The dartboards looked like Custer’s troops. Harley Fitts was rocking the pinball machine towards a high score: a sizable task, given that two sisters who called themselves Frick and Frack were perched on it. Rollo Dexadreen was monopolizing the single videogame as usual. Archie Opterix, on kazoo, was accompanying Gig von Beaver – who was making farting noises with a hand under his armpit – in a rendition of “Born to Run”. Kitty Koerner was dancing atop the jukebox, which was playing Hank Williams Junior, though Kitty was doing something that looked like the Watusi.
Above the sounds of clicking pool balls, thwocking darts, ringing bells, exploding aliens, kazoo, farts, Hank Junior, and the bug-zapper hung outside the screen-door that gave onto the gravel parking lot, the calls for drinks were continuous.
“Tracey, two shots!”
“Tracey, another pitcher!”
“Tracey, six rum ’n’ cokes!”
The woman behind the bar – Tracey Thorne-Smith – was on the tall side, and skinny as a book of poems by a sixteen-year-old virgin. She had long straight brown hair and a sociable smile, though her features were overlaid with signs of worry. She wore a white shirt knotted above her navel, and a pair of cheap jeans. Moving like an assembly-line worker with the belt cranked up, the piece-work rate cut in half and the next mortgage payment due, she paused only long enough to wipe the sweat from her forehead now and then.
A weary waitress appeared at one end of the crowded bar, where she set down her tray. She was short and round-faced, and her wavy hair – dyed a color not found in nature – was pinched in a banana-clip, one tendril escaping to hang damply against her cheek.
The bartender moved down to take her order.
“What’ll it be, Catalina?”
“It’s ‘lick it, slam it ’n’ suck it’ time again, Trace. Larry and his city-friends, in the corner there.”
“Four margaritas coming up.”
Catalina leaned gratefully on the bar. “Lord, it’s hot! You think that cheap bastard would get some air-con in here.”
Her back to Catalina, Tracey said, “You best not hold your breath waiting for the Westinghouse van to arrive, Cat. You know well as I do that Larry’s been pinching every penny, so’s he can buy into the syndicate those boys he’s with represent. And something tells me he’s pinched himself a considerable sum, what with the way those lizards are crawling all over him. No, I wouldn’t count on no air-conditioning anytime soon.” Tracey set the salt-rimmed glasses two at a time on Catalina’s tray. “How they tipping tonight?”
The waitress tucked the loose hair behind her ear. “Not bad. But I aim to get a little more out of Larry later, after closing.”
Tracey made a sour face. “I don’t see how you can bring yourself to be nice to him like that.”
“Oh, he’s not that bad. He’s been real lonely since Janice died. It’s downright pathetic sometimes. He keeps telling me, ‘She was my Honeypot, and I was her Li’l Bear.’”
“Eee-yew!”
Primping her hair, Catalina said, “That remark don’t show much sympathy, Tracey, nor much common sense. You should try being nice to Larry, like I do. Might get yourself a little bonus. You sure could use it, I bet, what with Jay Dee being outa work.”
“Forget it! Not only would I never let that man touch me in a million years, but if I did and Jay Dee found out, he’d kill him. Why, he can just about stand me working here as it is.”
Catalina shrugged. “Your call. It’s not like you’re married or nothing.”
After Catalina had sashayed away, Tracey went back to filling the non-stop orders.
She was bending over for a fresh bottle of Scotch when she felt a hand on her rear-end.
“You shore got a nice ass for su
ch a skinny – gack!”
Tracey straightened up and turned around. “Jay Dee,” she said, “turn that poor sucker loose.”
Jay Dee McGhee removed his chokehold from beneath the impulsive patron’s jaw and released the burly man’s wrist, which he had been holding at about jaw-level, only behind the man’s back. Shoving the gagging man away from the bar, he dropped down onto the vacant stool.
“Draw me a Bud, Trace. I had a long hot walk.”
Jay Dee was shaggy and unshaven, with the looks of a mischievous five-year-old, perhaps one just caught affixing a string of firecrackers to a cat’s tail. He wore a green workshirt with the sleeves ripped off and the same K-Mart-brand jeans as his girlfriend. In fact, they were a pair of hers, since the two were much of a size. He had a tattoo on each wiry bicep: on the left was a dagger-pierced, blood-dripping heart with the admonition TAKE IT EASY; on the right was a grinning horned and tailed pitchfork-bearing devil above the legend CLEAN AND SERENE.
Tracey pulled the tap. “You walked all the way from the trailer park?”
After a deep sip, Jay Dee answered, “How else was I supposed to get here? You got the car – not that it’d do me much good anyway – and ain’t nobody we know gonna give me a ride.”
Slopping a dirty rag onto the bar in front of her lover of six months and scrubbing violently, Tracey said, “Only thing is, you weren’t supposed to come here at all.”
“Jesus, Trace, gimme a break! How long can a man sit and watch television? Day and night, night and day! Zap, zap, zap with the damned remote! I’m going outa my head! I hadda get out.”
“But why here? I told you, I get nervous with you around when I’m trying to wait on people. I can’t do my job.”
“It’s a damn good thing I did come, or the next thing you know, that asshole would’ve had your pants off.”
“Don’t make me laugh. I can take care of jerks like that without your help. I got along just fine all those years before I met you.”
“Well, maybe. Though the two black eyes and the busted ribs I seen them tape up at the clinic don’t sound to me like you could take care of anything except getting knocked around.”
Tracey glared. “I told you, Gene was a little too much for me. But you don’t run into someone like him twice in your life. And what do you mean, you watched the doctor fix me up?”
“Well, it’s true.”
“The janitor at the Lakewood Walk-in Emergency Clinic was allowed to spy on patients?”
“It wasn’t a case of being allowed.”
“Oh, I get it. How many women did you size up, before you settled on me?”
“Well, lessee – Christ, Trace, we’re getting off the track! The plain fact is, I missed you tonight! This routine sucks. With you working till two and sleeping till noon, I hardly get to see you no more. And then I got to rattle around in that tin can like a lone pea . . . I’m sick of it!”
Tracey stopped polishing the counter. “I know, I know, Jay Dee. We’re going through a rough time now. But it won’t last forever. I don’t like it anymore than you, but right now we need this job. And if Larry sees you here, after what happened the last time –”
“That fight wasn’t my fault.”
“It don’t matter. He’s still pissed at you. If I didn’t work so good and so cheap, I woulda been fired right then.”
“Well, there’s no law says a man can’t visit his girlfriend at work. Long as I don’t cause no trouble, there’s nothing he can do.”
“This is his joint, Jay Dee, he can do whatever he – look out!”
Holding onto the bar, Jay Dee shoved his stool backward into the crotch of the man he had choked, who grunted and dropped the beer bottle he had been aiming at Jay Dee’s head. While he was still recovering, Jay Dee laid him low with two succinct punches.
“It’s plumb foolish to hold a grudge –” Jay Dee began.
“What in the hell is going on here?”
Larry Livermore was shaped roughly like a traffic-cone, and only marginally taller. Balding, he wore enough cheap gold around his neck to outfit a pawn shop window. He was accoutred in a checked shirt and lime-green trousers. Spotting Jay Dee, he turned to Tracey.
“I warned you about letting this trouble-maker in here again, Thorne-Smith. And now he’s made me look bad in front of some important friends, like I can’t even manage my own joint. I don’t need headaches like this.”
Tracey had stepped out from behind the bar. “It won’t happen again, Larry – I promise.”
“I’m sure of it, ’cause I’m canning you now.” Larry reached into his pocket, took out a roll of cash secured with a rubber band, and peeled off a hundred. “Here’s half a week’s pay. Take off.”
Jay Dee moved menacingly toward the squat man. Larry’s mouth opened in shock. “Hey, wait a minute –”
Tracey laid a hand on his shoulder. “No, Jay Dee, it’s not worth it. Let’s go.”
Out in the parking lot, gravel crunched beneath their shoes. They walked silently to their car, a 1972 Plymouth Valiant, more rust than steel, its flaking chrome bumper bearing a sticker that advised ONE DAY AT A TIME. Tracey opened the passenger-side door and slid across the seat to take the wheel. Jay Dee got in after her. When the engine finally caught, they drove off.
Halfway back to the trailer camp, one of them finally spoke.
“You should a let me hit him, Trace.”
Tracey swivelled her head angrily, taking her eyes off the dark road. “Hit him! Is that all you know how –”
There was a noise like a hundred-pound sack of flour being dropped on the hood of their car, and the sensation of an impact. Tracey slammed on the brakes.
“Could be a deer,” said Jay Dee without much hope or conviction. “Though life has shown me that bad luck usually comes like an elephant. Namely, in buckets.”
“I – I’ll turn the car around so we can see what we hit . . .”
Moving forward slowly, cutting the wheel, Tracey made a three-point turn.
There was a man lying in the middle of the road.
“Oh my God –”
Jay Dee got out.
The victim was a white guy in a business suit that appeared to be made out of rubber, with all the tailoring, including the shirt-front, stamped on. The suit continued onto his feet, forming shoes. He did, however, wear a separate tie patterned with paisleys. Something about the tie drew Jay Dee’s fascinated gaze. Why, the borders of each paisley were formed of little paisleys. And the little paisleys were made of littler paisleys. And those were made up of even littler paisleys! And on, and on, and –
“What’s the matter, Jay Dee?”
Jay Dee shook his head. “Nothing, I guess . . . I just felt dizzy, like I was hanging over the edge of a skyscraper . . . Hey, look – He’s holding something –”
Prying open the dead man’s hand, Jay Dee removed the object.
The thing squirmed for a moment in Jay Dee’s grip, then settled down to solidity.
At that moment, a wave of shimmering disintegration passed down the man from head to toe. Then the corpse was gone.
“Mo-ther-fuck . . .”
Tracey was squeezing his devil with both hands. “This is too spooky for me, Jay Dee. Let’s split.”
A minute later and a mile onward, Tracey asked, “What was in his hand, Jay Dee?”
“’pears to be nothing but a goddamn television remote.”
Jay Dee made to throw out the window, then stopped. “It’s awfully big, though . . .”
Tracey made it back to the trailer camp in record time, without encountering any further obstacles. She pulled up alongside their home, an aqua-trimmed sag-roofed aluminum box with the former tenant’s flower garden run to weeds that half hid the two creaky wooden steps braced against the side of the structure.
From the weeds emerged Mister Boots, a large tomcat the colour of wholewheat bread, and with white stockings. He carried a dead mouse proudly in his mouth. Spotting the car, he leaped inside throug
h the open window to devour his feast in the privacy he required.
“Got to learn that cat some manners one of these days . . .”
Inside, Tracey went straight for the bottle of vodka above the tiny sink full of dirty dishes. “Lord, I need a drink! I never knew that killing someone would feel like this – even if it was an accident.”
Jay Dee flopped down into a beat-up chair. “Least when you kill someone you do a thorough job of it, Trace. No stiff left behind to clutter up things. Now look, calm down! Who knows what that was we hit? Chances are it wasn’t even human, the way it vanished.”
“I know, I know, that’s what I’ve been telling myself since it happened. But it stills leaves a person kinda shaky, you know?”
“Just take a pull and sit down. You’ll feel better in a minute.”
Jay Dee fell to examining the remote control he had taken from the corpse.
The black plastic device was about twice as big as a standard control, with more than the usual number of buttons. It had the usual smoky translucent cap on one end, where the signal would emerge. It bore no brand-name, nor were the buttons labeled.
But as Jay Dee studied it, this changed.
Gold letters appeared on the face of the device, seeming to float up from deep inside the case.
MASTER DIGITAL REMOTE ran the wording across the top of the case. Beneath each button smaller letters spelled out various odd functions.
