A Child across the Sky

by Jonathan Carroll

  "Do you remember where in New Jersey?"

  "No, but Phil said he'd spent a summer there when he was a kid."

  "Not Browns Mills?"

  "Yes, Browns Mills. That was the name."

  "What was he like when you saw him?"

  "Very up, like he was on dexedrine. He kept telling jokes so the little girl would laugh. Almost as if he were babysitting and felt compelled to entertain her the whole time. It was odd. I felt uncomfortable."

  "Why didn't you bring Cullen?"

  "Because he specifically asked me not to. No Cullen and no Mae. Which was strange too, because you know how much he liked both of them.

  "We spent a few hours together and then I had an appointment. As we were saying goodbye, he told me to tell you he'd be sending you some very important videotapes soon."

  "How come you didn't tell me?"

  "Because he was dead a few days later."

  If you've seen Midnight Too you know about Browns Mills, New Jersey. Only in the film Phil called the town Levrett, after the dormitory we lived in at Harvard.

  Why would he want to go back there with the child? There are singular events in life that shift or determine our direction forever. I'm not only talking about marriage or the loss of loved ones. In Strayhorn's case, it was the death of two strangers that did it. Both happened the summer he was ten in Browns Mills.

  His family rented a cabin by the lake there. Because the town was near an army base, lots of military families lived nearby. Phil became friendly with the children of one and they all hung around together.

  Their father was a military policeman. One day when all the kids were sitting around listening to the radio, a news bulletin came on and said two M.P.s had been shot to death by an unknown assailant. When they gave the names and the father of his friends was one of them, Phil snapped. For some reason, he started screaming 'Rock and Roll! Rock and Roll!' They took him to the hospital and put him under observation.

  That would have been enough for one summer, but a few weeks later he was down at the lake with another friend throwing rocks into the water, and one of them hit something. It turned out to be a girl's body. Strayhorn stood on the shore and watched his friend drag her in. Then he ran away, screaming 'Rock and Roll did it!'

  For years afterward, he was haunted by this "Rock and Roll" monster. Whenever anything bad happened he was sure who did it. If he woke in the night gasping and sweaty from some lunar struggle, he knew who must have caused it. We all have our demons, but Phil's was linked to real death and one real body.

  Even when we were at Harvard he sometimes had screaming Rock and Roll dreams. He told me their origin and how over the years the thing had taken on a face and body that he later used as the basis for Bloodstone.

  When I got off the phone with Danny my head felt like it was going to spout steam: Sasha, Pinsleepe, Strayhorn (alive or dead), angels, devils, Browns Mills. . . .

  What the fuck was he doing with Pinsleepe in Browns Mills, New Jersey?

  He'd been seen at El Coyote, so we went there and asked questions: nothing. He'd been seen in the valley at a gay bar called Jack's, so we went there: nothing. He was seen on Rodeo Drive. . . . We asked for – days before turning up anything. I had repeatedly gone back to the videotapes to see if anything new would appear, but it didn't. Both Wyatt and I called people we knew and then people they knew until our ears were red and bored. There are so many stories and counter stories in Los Angeles that we were constantly comparing notes to see if we already had certain information or if it ran counter to what we'd learned.

  What emerged was this: A man who looked and sounded like Philip Strayhorn was going around town in Porsche sunglasses, a black silk suit and shirt, and alligator shoes saying Ha-ha, it was all a big publicity joke: Here I am, and rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

  The problem with this description was Strayhorn was one of the most unfashionable men I knew, unlike Mr. Alligator Shoes.

  Phil bought clothes the way some people buy whatever's nearest when they're hungry. When his underwear got holey, he went down to Thrifty Drugs on La Brea (a favorite Strayhorn hangout) and bought – six-packs of plain BVD white underpants. While there, he might go on a shopping spree, which meant including some white T-shirts and cotton basketball socks. Top that off with sneakers and jeans, and you had the well-dressed Strayhorn.

  Besides that, he almost never went out. Chic restaurants and "in" places made him nervous and uncomfortable. His idea of a good time was to stay at home and talk to Sasha or play with the dog. His house was one of the coziest I knew.

  I called my friend Dominic Scanlan in the Los Angeles Police Department and described what was going on. He said he'd look into it. Two hours later he called back and said to meet him at an address downtown. When Wyatt and I got there, a small yellow house was partially roped off by Police Investigation tapes. Dominic pulled up a few minutes later.

  "The kids in these neighborhoods tear down our tapes so fast. We got a call a couple of days ago from the next-door neighbor saying something fishy was going on in there. Strange loud noises, crashes and bangs, that sort of thing. There are a lot of crack houses around here, so we thought maybe some dealers were having a party.

  "Fuck us and our premonitions. Nothin' is ever simple, huh? The first cop goes inside, takes one look, and calls back to his partner, 'Hey, come here! We got 'Ripley's Believe It or Not.'" Dominic took a manila envelope from under his arm and opened it. Sliding out some pictures, he handed them over.

  "Holy God!"

  "James Penn, ex-out-of-work actor, ex-waiter at Jack's –"

  "Ex-human being!"

  "You got it, Finky. The guys in pathology are still trying to figure out what happened to him."

  "What was the cause of death?"

  "Electrocution, blood loss . . . shit, I don't know. Everything. Ha! That's one for you – guy died of everything!"

  "And this is the same man who went around pretending to be Strayhorn?"

  "Look at the other pictures."

  There were some of Penn alive and smiling. He did look like Phil, and it was easy to see how some might have mistaken him for the other.

  Something ball-shriveling came to me. I looked at Dominic.

  "It's a scene from Midnight Always Comes!"

  He nodded. "You got it. The ultimate Hollywood crime: Guy goes around impersonating Philip Strayhorn, then ends up getting killed the way Bloodstone did a guy in one of his movies. Cinematic justice. Other places you got poetic justice, out here we got cinematic justice!"

  "Can we go inside?"

  "Speak for yourself, Weber, I'm not going in there."

  "Yeah, you can go in, but don't touch anything, huh? They're still checking the place out. I'll stay here with Finky. I want to ask him a couple of questions about the old show. I got this great Finky Linky T-shirt at home. Wish I'd brought it with me so you could sign it. Here's the key, Weber."

  There was a brick path up to the front porch. The lawn smelled fresh-cut. Two of the steps creaked when I put pressure on them. I thought about walking up to Rainer Artus's house a few days before. Inside his place had been a vague madness; inside this one was the bitterest kind of death.

  I unlocked the door and stepped in.

  Eerily, everything was in perfect order. Clean wooden floors, a smell in the air of some kind of pine disinfectant. Spotless, ordered. When he was technical adviser on one of my films, Dominic had taken me to other murder scenes. They'd reflected the chaos of the act – blood, scatter, curtains torn from windows in the desperation of the soon-dead. Not here. James Penn's house appeared ready for a party to arrive any moment.

  I walked into the living room and saw Pinsleepe sitting on a blue couch eating a red ice-cream cone.

  "Hi, Weber."

  "How long have you been here?"

  "I don't know. I've been waiting for you. I just finished cleaning up."

  "Did you know this man?"

  "James Penn? No
. But it's another part of the Phil thing."

  "Penn was killed the same way Bloodstone killed someone."

  "That's right. It's what I told you: When Phil did that scene, everything bad got loose."

  "You mean Bloodstone's alive?"

  She smiled and licked a corner of her cone. "No. Phil thought up that scene, not Bloodstone. All the Midnights are Phil."

  "He's alive?"

  "No. He's dead. But what he was is still alive. Do you get it? If we could put all the children we have been across the sky, we'd understand ourselves a lot better.

  "No matter how many times Phil killed himself, by making that scene in the movie after I told him not to, he was only killing himself then. All the other thirty years of Strayhorn were around and alive: the little boy Phil who ran away from the bogeyman Rock and Roll, the Phil who thought up Bloodstone, all of them. Who you are now controls all the people you were. If this now-you dies for the wrong reason, the other ones get to do what they want. And if they don't have any guide, they go crazy."

  "They killed Penn?"

  "Sure. Maybe it was the eight-year-old Phil with the bad temper who was angry at the man for impersonating him. Or the twenty-six-year-old Phil who was stoned all the time and did strange things. . . . I couldn't tell you which one. Maybe it was a combination. Maybe they ganged up on Penn.

  "Did Sasha ever tell you why they really broke up? Ask her. Ask her about 'A Quarter Past You.' She still has it. Don't let her tell you she doesn't. That'll show you some of the different Phils you didn't know.

  "You're the only one now who can do anything about it, Weber. If you don't film that scene, everything's over. Other things too, besides Sasha dying."

  "Like what?"

  She shook her head.

  "If I film it . . . right, then Sasha lives, and her baby – you – die. Right?"

  "Right. I go away. I don't have to be here anymore."

  A QUARTER PAST YOU

  It began innocently enough, sort of. They loved each other. They wanted to grow old together, and that is the only real proof of great love. But recently there had been one thing, one large speck of dust on their otherwise clear lens: sex. It had always been fine with them, and there were times when they reveled in each other. But sleep with another person a thousand nights, and some of sex's phosphorescence rubs off under the touch of familiar fingers.

  One time, as they worked to catch each other's rhythms, she'd uttered something inadvertently that made him smile and want to talk about later, during those fading soft moments before sleep.

  "You shouldn't!" was what she'd suddenly said.

  He hadn't been doing anything new or special, so he had to assume she was fantasizing a naughty scene with someone else. The thought excited him, particularly because he himself had often done the same thing.

  Afterward, in the blue dark, he touched her hand and asked if he was right.

  "I'm embarrassed." But then she giggled – her sign she was willing to talk.

  "Come on, don't be embarrassed. I've done it too, I promise! It's just another way."

  "You promise you won't misunderstand?"

  "I promise."

  "Okay, but I'm really embarrassed."

  He squeezed her hand and knew not to say anything or else she would shut right up.

  "Well, it's not anyone in particular, just this man. It's a fantasy. I see him on a subway and can't stop looking at him."

  "How's he dressed?"

  "The way I like – jacket and tie, maybe a nice suit. But he's also wearing fresh white tennis sneakers, which throws the whole thing off in a great way. It's a touch of humor that says he wears what he wants and doesn't give a damn what others think."

  "Okay. So what happens then?"

  She took a deep breath and let it all out slowly before continuing. "I see him and can't stop looking, as I said. He's sexy and that's part of it, sure, but there are other things that make him more special than just that.

  "He has these great Frenchman's eyes and is carrying a book I've been meaning to read for a long time. Finally he looks at me and I'm hooked completely. The best part is, he doesn't check out my body or anything. Just looks at me and I know he's interested. I love that. He doesn't go over me like I'm a new car in the showroom."

  Her story was much more detailed than he'd have thought. In his own fantasies, he'd make eyes at waitresses in high heels or shopgirls with thick lips. Things were arranged. They'd go back to her apartment. Once there, they'd leap to it with instant heat and curiosity.

  Moments pass before he realizes she's begun speaking again.

  ". . . follows me when I get off the subway. Knowing he's there behind makes me incredibly excited. I know what's going to happen and I know I'll do it, no matter what."

  She talked on, giving the most minute, loving details. She and Mr. White Sneakers never speak, not once. As things get more intense, they slow down until it's all movement under water.

  The single sentence ever said aloud is the line "You shouldn't!" This is something she says each time, but only once it's actually happening and she feels a momentary pang of guilt. But that passes quickly because the experience is simply too rare and extreme for guilt to enter into it.

  When she was finished, there was a silence thick as fur between them. Under her breath, she mumbled something about its not being a very original fantasy.

  "Don't say that! Don't degrade it! What do you care, so long as it excites you? What difference does it make how original it is? I bet – quarters of most people's sexual fantasies are either about taking or being taken.

  "What's his name?"

  "Who, the man? I have no idea. We don't talk. He never tells me."

  "What do you want his name to be?"

  "I never thought about it. What a funny question."

  He went into the kitchen for some wine. When he returned, the light on her side of the bed was on and she was sitting with her arms wrapped around her knees.

  "Peter Copeland." She smiled at him and shrugged as if a little embarrassed.

  "Peter Copeland? Sounds like a Yalie."

  She shrugged. "I don't know. It's just the kind of name he would have."

  "Okay. Is it always the same fantasy? Do you ever make up others about him?"

  She took a sip of wine and thought about it. She no longer seemed uncomfortable talking about Peter Copeland now that the fact of him was out in the open and he had a name.

  "Usually the same – the subway, what he wears, how he follows me. It's enough."

  That last phrase hit him hard. He'd had so many different fantasies with so many different predictable faces and settings. "It's enough." He knew then he was jealous of her and her Peter Copeland, content with each other and their silent mutual fever.

  The next day, walking to work, he stopped in the middle of the street and started to smirk. At a florist, he bought ten tulips, her favorite flower, and arranged to have them sent over to their apartment. On the enclosed card he wrote, I hope you like tulips. They're my favorite. Thanks for putting the comet over last night's sky. Peter.

  And in bed that night, he changed everything. He became an entirely different person in the dark. She couldn't see him so he could have been anyone. He wanted to be Peter Copeland but didn't know how.

  Usually they spoke, but in this half hour when they owned each other, he said nothing. From the beginning she understood and responded eagerly. Whenever they sailed toward something familiar, their own from their years together, he steered them away. Then she took over and was strong or passive when he least expected it.

  It was all better than he had imagined, and once again he grew so jealous of Peter Copeland. No stranger, however wonderful, deserved what she offered now. The only things he had ever given his dream lovers were both anonymous and forgettable.

  At the end, when she again said, "You shouldn't!" he was thrilled she was saying it both to him and to someone else. A moment later he wished it were only him.

&nb
sp; The next day he bought the book he knew she had been wanting to read. Inside he wrote, I think you'll like this. Peter. She discovered it under her pillow. Sitting down on the bed, she held it on her lap, both hands on top of it and very still. What was he doing? Did she like it?

  Their electricity and willingness to go in so many new directions both awed and scared them a little. Both wondered who they were doing this for – themselves or the other?

  That week their nights were long exhausting experiments. He couldn't ask her what she liked because it all had to remain silent, spoken only through touch and movement. By eight every night they were excited and looking at the clock. Whatever they'd been used to doing before was unimportant and forgotten. Now they would slip into their new second skins, and whatever was left of the day would hide because it did not know them.

  On Thursday she was out walking and decided to buy him a present. In a store, a salesman spread beautiful cashmere sweaters over a glass counter: lilac, taupe, black. She couldn't decide. Only after leaving the store did she realize she'd chosen one that would look better on Peter Copeland than her husband. That startled her, but she made no move to return it. She simply wouldn't tell him.

  At work he realized he'd written the name Peter Copeland – times on a pad of paper in front of him. He didn't even know he was doing it. Each time the script was completely different, as if he were trying to forge rather than invent the other man's signature.

  "What's for dinner?"

  "Your favorite – chili."

  He didn't like chili.

  There was no chili – her little joke – but the tulips he sent were in a new black and yellow vase on the dining table between them. They were like a third person in the room. He wanted to tell her about writing Copeland's name, but the vivid flowers were enough of the other's presence for the moment.