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by Unknown

  Patrick was at the kitchen table with Maria, eating a quick bite before heading over to the high school for the ceremony. One look at me and they both knew what I had planned, though I hadn't breathed a word of it yet.

  Patrick was spit and polish in his crisp new white shirt and silk tie, his hair trimmed and styled. We maybe hadn't been as close the previous few years as we'd been as kids, but we still got along fine, and I couldn't help but think I'd miss seeing him around every now and again. From the pained look on his face that he was trying hard to hide, I got the impression he felt the same way too.

  Maria, for her part, wouldn't make eye contact with me, but chased peas around her china plate with a spoon and muttered to herself under her breath. I think she'd been expecting something like this every day since I got back that summer, years before, and now that the moment had arrived she'd lost faith in all of her rehearsed responses.

  We made with some painfully small talk, each of us taking for granted that this would be the last time we'd see each other for some time to come, but none of us brave enough to say anything of substance. Patrick made some offhand remark about a party planned for the post-graduation festivities and Maria scolded him a bit, reminding him that he wasn't to stay out too late, not to drink and drive, and all of the expected remonstrations due an eighteen year-old boy on graduation night. Patrick didn't bother giving me too many details about the plans, and Maria didn't waste a breath trying to scold me. I was leaving the house, and leaving along with it the right to take part in those sorts of discussions.

  Finally, I said something along the lines of "Well, gotta go," and made the circuit of the table, if a bit reluctantly. Kissing Maria on the cheek, her fingers digging into the flesh of my arms as though she might still keep me from leaving if she could somehow keep me immobile. Shaking hands with Patrick, awkwardly, thinking that it was the adult thing to do, but uncomfortable and not knowing when to stop, feeling that there were things I should have been saying but wasn't.

  I was all set to go, and then grandfather appeared in the doorway. He had a package under one arm, about a foot square, wrapped in black paper with a silver ribbon, and a long thin box wrapped in the same style in his other hand.

  "Where…?" the old man began awkwardly, looking me over, taking in my luggage and then the expressions on the faces of Maria and Patrick. "I had thought…" He broke off and straightened up, composing himself. "I have hired a car, as I thought we would take in a meal on the town after the ceremony this evening."

  "I have some stuff to do," Patrick answered weakly, "but I can put it off a little while."

  "Good," my grandfather answered, not taking his eyes off me. "These are for you," he indicated the packages with a nod of his head, "but I had hoped to present them to you on our return from dinner." He paused, a pregnant silence hanging in the air as he waited for me to answer, and finally added in a voice that sounded almost wounded, "I've had them wrapped."

  I was having trouble meeting the old man's gaze, but he wouldn't stop looking, and wouldn't stop waiting for me to answer. Finally, I couldn't take it any longer.

  "I don't need your stupid shit!" I shouted. "I don't need it, and I don't need you! I've had to put up with it all this time, and now I'm leaving, and there's not a fucking thing you can do about it."

  Patrick blanched; Maria's mouth hung open; but my grandfather just kept looking at me, his face set.

  "I always hoped…" he said softly. "That is… I–"

  "I don't care!" I spat back, my voice shrieking. "I'm leaving."

  I hitched up my suitcase and stomped past the old man towards the door. Without a second glance, my face burning and my eyes watering, I shoved the door open and was out on the street. I was eighteen, and so far as I was concerned I was never coming home again.

  It would be years later before I realized how petulant and small I'd been that night, how little like the adult I'd thought that I was, but I'd learned by then there are some doors that once opened can never be closed, and some bridges you can only cross once. I'd made my choice, and I had to live with it.

  I must have walked for the better part of the day through the streets of El Paso, thinking things over, trying to fit the puzzle pieces together. As the light began to dim and my last cigarette burned down to the filter, I figured I'd had enough of walking for one day and decided to head back to the motel to try to get some sleep. I'd start early the next day, rent another car, and make the drive to San Antonio in time to get my plans in motion.

  My stomach rumbled loudly all the way back to the motel, not having gotten much attention since the burger joint in Sizemore the day before. At the convenience store, along with a few packs of smokes and the requisite Pepsi, I bought a handful of what the owners were optimistically calling "burritos," odd little fried lumps of something brown that dripped orange grease through their wax wrappers and rustled with an unsettling sloshing noise when dumped into a large paper bag. I fished out enough bills to cover the damage and continued on to the motel.

  I should have picked up a roll of antacid along with the burritos, I decided, after the second one had disappeared down my craw, but by that point it was too late. The first two were sitting like bricks in my gut, but I was still hungry, so I sent numbers three and four down to join them, swigging as much of the Pepsi as I could with every bit to mask the taste, and being quick to light up a cigarette when it was all said and done to try to clear the air.

  Managing to get both boots off this time around, I sat on the edge of the bed, just staring at the powered-off television set, trying not to think. On impulse, I called down to the front desk to see if I had any messages, but as near as I could make out from the mumbled squash of syllables they spit back I didn't have any waiting. I was about to hang up when it occurred to me that the desk clerk at a flea bag like this might not be the most reliable avenue of information in the world, and if Cachelle had tried to get a hold of me they might just as well have hung up on her as taken a message. I clicked off the line and then punched in my home number, thinking there might be voice mail waiting on my answering machine there.

  There was a message alright, but not from Cachelle. It was from Michelle Orlin in Austin, out of breath and frantic with excitement, going on and on about something or other. She left her cell phone number on the message and insisted I call her as soon as I got it, day or night, whatever the hour.

  I was tempted to wait, to call sometime after all of this craziness had a chance to go away. I had already had about all the news I could stand, all of it bad, and didn't want to run the risk of getting that last proverbial straw. My camel's back, humped and pained, could never have taken it.

  Michelle had seemed so enthusiastic, so damned happy, that I just couldn't bring myself to wait. With any luck, she'd have some kind of good news, anything to lighten the load.

  "Hello, this is Michelle." Through the light static, she sounded sort of drunk.

  "Hello, This-is-Michelle, this is Spencer." I was wishing I was drunk, too, now that I had the chance to think of it.

  "Spence! Ohmigod, I'm so glad you called!" She was running at 45 rpm here, all of her words run together, a long speedy string of syllables; I was still at 33-and-a-third, but I did my best to keep up.

  "What's going on, Michelle? I'm kind of in the middle of some shit right now–"

  "I was right," she cut in, as though she hadn't heard me. "I was right about it, I can't fucking believe it, this is the biggest thing that's happened to me in my entire fucking life!"

  "What is…?" I started, and then get an idea. "Is this about that paper?" I asked. "The one you're looking at for me?"

  "Of course," came the answer, "what else would I be talking about? It's all real, Spence, it's all fucking real! It's the whole play, well, more or less – the whole goddamned thing."

  "It checked out?" I asked. "It's that guy, that… um…?"

  "Aeschylus," she answered, scolding. "Yes, it's got all kinds of other stuff, too, but it lo
oks to be the full text of Aeschylus's Prometheus Unbound right in the middle of it all, if you can believe it."

  I rubbed my chin. This was nowhere near as exciting news to me as it seemed to be to her.

  "Sure," I said offhanded, "I can believe damn near anything at this point."

  "Oh, me too, Spence, me too!" Michelle gushed. "But I've been doing some checking about a weird reference in the play, something about the 'stainhanded followers of Prometheus.' It sounded familiar, so I copied out some stuff that might tie into it. I've got a whole package of shit for you, man. I finished the translation this morning and I couldn't think straight about anything else, so I've been running around like a crazy person all day putting this stuff together."

  She paused for a breath, and I took one of my own on credit.

  "Are you at home?" she continued. "I'll run it by right now. I can't wait for you to see it."

  "No, I'm still out of town," I answered. "Or out of town again. In El Paso, actually."

  "Erh," she snarled. "I'm sorry." She felt as favorably about El Paso as I did. "Well, is there a fax number there? I really want you to see this stuff; you're not going to believe it."

  "Hang on," I told her, "I'll check."

  I dropped her on hold and picked up another line to call down to the desk. It took a while to get across to the desk clerk what I was after, but after some coaxing I came up with a fax number.

  "Got it, Michelle," I said, clicking back on the line. I gave her the digits and told her to go ahead and send everything on. I wasn't sure how much I was going to get out of it, but there was always a chance it might give me some idea what the book was about, and maybe even why these jokers wanted it so badly.

  I finished things up with Michelle, promising to call her as soon as I'd had a chance to look the thing over, and then made my way downstairs to the front desk. There was some trouble with the fax machine, I was told on my arrival, which seemed to be cleared up quickly enough when I produced a twenty and asked if it might be of assistance. The pages came through, a whole ream of them, and shuffling them into some kind of order I climbed the stairs back up to my room.

  The burritos gone, the Pepsi following close behind and the cigarettes and ash tray my only friends, I propped my feet up on the bed, spread the fax pages out on top of the sheets, and started to read.

  Prometheus Unbound

  by Aeschylus

  What follows is a fragmentary, abridged version of Aeschylus's lost play, Prometheus Unbound. It has been compiled from extant fragments, notably the Arabic manuscript (Codex 1785a-9) discovered by Michelle Orlin, then of the University of Texas-Austin. Though the Orlin Fragment is still under some dispute, the bulk of popular opinion holds it to be genuine, and is presented here as under the verifiable (if not verified) authorship of Aeschylus.

  Characters

  HERACLES

  PROMETHEUS

  CHIRON the Centaur

  CHORUS of the Followers of Prometheus

  PHOSPHORUS, a son of Eos

  HESPERUS, a son of Eos

  A rocky mountain-top, within sight of the sea. PROMETHEUS is manacled to a rock, his head bowed.

  PROMETHEUS

  Here am I, and here have I been. Long suffering the cruel torments of the merciless lord of the gods. Chained here countless years with shackles of iron to this cold spire of unforgiving stone. Of all that live on the earth, and under the seas, and in the skies, only I, Wise-Before-the Fact, know when my torments shall cease. When the man born of that cruel lord will come to free me, and his bitter victim to take on my sorrows.

  Long suffering, for my love of man, for being too good a friend to the creatures of the day. Punished here for my sin, for saving the race of man from sure destruction.

  I gave them knowledge of their own state, and placed into their hands the thing which would save them. But wait, what do I hear? Some footsteps approach. Some new audience for my torments, or the agents of my release come at last?

  Enter HERACLES and the Centaur CHIRON.

  HERACLES

  [To Chiron.] Here we have reached this wilderness, this unmarked desolation, home to one alone.

  That god of old, who in daring to slip the bridle-rope of Zeus was chained here with manacles of iron,

  To be food for that o'er flying eagle by day, and to shiver in his chains by night.

  Prometheus, forethought, who gave to man that prize of the gods, all-fashioning fire.

  CHIRON

  Now the race of man is close on the heels of the gods, pursuing them to the foothills of Olympus itself.

  No longer are men content to be the playpieces in the games of gods, but have themselves grabbed control of play.

  HERACLES

  Still the hard heart of merciless Zeus softens with the course of time.

  Like a stone in a fast running stream, the sharp edges of his ire are now rounded smooth,

  And he finds after long ages forgiveness in his heart for the traitor god, his cousin.

  The Father sends me, upon my labors, to loose Prometheus from his bonds, and to set another in his place.

  CHIRON

  Thus come I, who sore-pained seek for death, though still immortal, pricked by a poisoned arrow from your strong bow.

  I, Chiron, whose suffering is but a shadow of Prometheus's, have come to take up his pains as my own.

  Down into Hades cast, to the River Lethe, I will find forgetfulness there, and lose my pains among the shades.

  HERACLES

  Follow close by, then, Wise One, as I go about my work.

  PROMETHEUS

  Come they closer now, the prophesied agents of my release, the noble archer and the wounded centaur.

  Look now, how Heracles raises his horn bow, and pulls back the string which no man but him can draw.

  He notches to the bow one of his faultless arrows, fletched with the quills of the Stymphalian birds.

  He sights along the arrow, and lets fly into the blue sky, and down comes the loathsome eagle, chief agent of my torments.

  HERACLES

  The deed is done, the still proud traitor's tormentor fallen.

  Now, Chiron, will I lead you into Tartarus, to offer yourself up for Prometheus' sin.

  The Sons of Dawn will be along presently, with the rising of the sun, to relieve Prometheus of his bondage.

  Exeunt HERACLES and CHIRON.

  PROMETHEUS

  Kinder gods than ours bless you, noble Heracles, and you, pitiable Chiron.

  To you, each of you, will be given a home among the stars, that future races of men may look upon you with reverence.

  Now I wait, for those Sons of Dawn, who will release me from my torment.

  Enter the CHORUS up the mountain, bearing a torch.

  CHORUS

  Hail to you, our proud patron, true father of us all.

  As you sculpted the first man and the first woman from dumb clay,

  So too did you bring to us all-fashioning fire, and all bring us up out of savagery.

  We follow you and wait on your pleasure, we the Stained-Handed followers of Prometheus.

  PROMETHEUS

  It lightens my heart to hear it, that I have not suffered here only to be forgotten

  CHORUS

  Never forgotten, Wise-Before-the-Fact. This pith of fennel [indicates torch] we carry always before us, to keep us ever mindful.

  PROMETHEUS

  And to shed light into the dark corners.

  CHORUS

  And thus keep ignorance at bay.

  PROMETHEUS

  So you carry on my work among the race of men, you creatures of a day, carrying the light to your brothers?

  CHORUS

  Just as you instructed our fathers before us.

  PROMETHEUS

  Then never will cruel Zeus, or any new-found lord after him, hold sway over the lives of men.

  CHORUS

  Our lives are our own.

  PROMETHEUS

  Then could I be shack
led here another thousand years and bear the torment, for I know my sacrifice not in vain.

  But listen, others approach.

  Enter Phosphorus and Hesperus.

  PHOSPHORUS

  Come we now, the awaited sons of the Dawn, to relieve you of your burden.

  HESPERUS

  We, the Children of the Dawn, will lead you from this place, and out into a prouder world.

  PROMETHEUS

  Long have I waited and known you would one day come. I welcome you, then, as a father his sons.

  PHOSPHORUS

  Now, Hesperus! I will free his shackled hands, and you see to his bound feet.

  HESPERUS

  There, the bounds broken, the ring pulled loose from stone.

  PHOSPHORUS

  The manacles shattered, the chains are tossed aside.

  CHORUS

  Rise now, father of us all.

  HESPERUS

  Rise and come with us, and we will lead you from your place of torment.

  PHOSPHORUS and HESPERUS help PROMETHEUS to his feet, and lead him from the mountain.

  CHORUS

  We will stay on after, Prometheus FireBringer, and hold the torch high for all to see,

  Every man and beast, every god on the earth, or under the seas, or in the skies, and every passing wind.