I do this because today there are three of them on the porch.
Three freaks.
They’re on the porch for me. Each of them wants to hear a story. A story about how their life improves dramatically. About how in the future, they will find their lost loves or lost cats or missing charms or even their faith in the Lord Jesus. These people, I tend to find them in front of my house the way some people find strays.
Thing is, with the Internet, most anyone can find my mom’s accounts, other church members’ accounts, of my abilities. They type in stuff like “I need to know what will happen with my baby when she’s a grandmother” and “Oh God, will they evict me next month?” and somehow, by some weird quirk of electronic routing, they wind up here.
Mom’s at All Souls Chapel the whole night, so I eat leftover casserole in my bedroom.
The freaks, they leave around nine. Heads hung low, kicking at the lawn.
I settle in on my bed and replay the day’s events.
So far, so brilliant.
There’s a mirror on the back of my bedroom door and I prop myself up in bed and stare hard at myself. I see my mom. Only my hair isn’t thinning out. If anything it’s gotten bushier. But the perfect triangle nose is the same. The thin arched eyebrows. The full bottom lip. With Vauxhall’s sudden appearance, I’m tripped up a little thinking about how I must look, all battered and broken.
I don’t normally fix my hair or worry over zits, but I find myself looking in the mirror more and more often these days. Looking more and more closely at the scars. At the bruises. In mom’s makeup mirror, I find myself trying to find the sunken spots from the dents. Tracing the scar tissue. The healed-over gashes and fractures. My nose, it’s been busted more times than I can remember, and yet it’s still straight. Went right a year ago but then busted left a few months later. All the damage works itself out in the end.
My face comes back together no matter how I break it.
Looking through myself, back at myself on the bed, my mind drifts to my ex-girlfriend, Belle. This is probably because I’m tired and the last time Belle and I talked, really really talked, we were sitting on my bed looking into this same mirror and saying ridiculous things to each other. She was drunk or high. With her it’s always one or the other. I fall asleep hanging on that memory but I’m only under seconds before the phone rings.
“Hello, Ade.”
It’s a voice I don’t recognize. A voice filled with phlegm. A voice like a third-generation dupe of a badly recorded rock show. I yell to Mom that I’ve got the phone.
“Who is this?” I ask.
The voice rattles. “You’re in trouble.”
“Who the hell is this?”
“Doesn’t matter. I’m calling to help you.”
I snicker. Loudly. Push my ear down on the receiver hard. “Who the fuck is this?”
Just ratty breathing.
“Okay. I’m going to hang up now, freak.”
The voice on the other end, it laughs. The sound is nauseating. The voice ignores me, says, “So I had this woman come in to see me this afternoon. An old friend, but she’s never had much in terms of work. Trifles usually. Or truffles, as the case may be. Stuff like that, pedestrian courses, I maybe can give her a week at the most. But today she comes in with a big surprise: thousand-year eggs.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Getting angry, I say, “Is there a point to this phone call? You that creep across the street that the cops have been bugging-”
The voice interrupts, “Actually, they’re only a hundred days old. The eggs. They’re preserved in ash and salt and have a gray yolk. Very bitter, salty, but exquisite nonetheless. But only one hundred days.”
“This is really educational and all, but I think-”
The gargled voice, it gets louder. “Why I’m calling you, Ade, is because eating those eggs I had an superb vision. My client got what she wanted, and we’re talking months in advance, but I also saw you.”
“Me?” I laugh uncomfortably and know immediately that I shouldn’t. This freak on the phone could be sitting outside in a car. He could be watching me from a rooftop right now. He wants this. He wants me spooked.
“Odd, isn’t it.”
“That’s enough, I’m gone.”
But I don’t hang up. I can’t.
Ten seconds pass. They’re as long as visits with my brain-dead dad. And then the voice comes back in, swimming in through the static. “Here’s the deal: You’re at a reservoir. Maybe Cherry Creek. A few weeks from now. And something just terrible goes down. This is at night. This is really dangerous. You look frantic. Seriously, I’m worried-”
“Worried about what?”
“Just I wouldn’t plan on going to the park anytime soon.”
“Who is this? Tell me. Is this a joke?”
The sewer voice says, “This thing I saw, it’s just the setup for an adventure, Ade. What I saw today? Well, that’s the third act. Like a play, my friend. You know, first act introduces our hero, his or her situation, the usual background stuff. Second act is the longest, usually it’s like second act part one and part two where all the action happens, where our hero is put in a weird situation, or has a conflict to resolve. And third act is where the shit hits the proverbial fan.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“You’re the lone cowboy, Ade. I like that you’re a fighter. You’re scrappy.”
I say nothing. Just breathe back slowly. Every heartbeat is cautious.
“I’ll be seeing you,” the voice says. And the line goes dead.
SIX
My mom is the reason that these nuts call me.
Why they appear on the porch.
What’s interesting is that this one, this old guy, seems a bit more confident. The way he talked it’s almost like he had abilities like mine. What makes me say almost is the fact that he’s surely a nut. I’m convinced of this because of his voice. His phlegmy rattle pretty much insures that he’s a freak.
I’m guessing he’s a freak from The Fairlight Hospital.
It’s this place my mom used to volunteer and they had a burn unit where she’d crouch down low with the third-degree guys, most of them bums who fell asleep downtown while drenched in alcohol and smoking and pretty much combusted themselves. These burned-up guys had the very same voice as the guy on the phone. My mom, sometimes she’d drag me along on her Fairlight Rounds (that’s what she called it), had me hold the hand of some still sizzling hobo while she told him about the joys of Christ and the promise of eternal life. The way those crispy guys said “Amen” sounded exactly the same as the way the dude who just called said my name.
I have no idea what he’s on about now, what this phone call meant, but I don’t really want to worry over it. My time for worrying about the here and now is over. Long gone. If it doesn’t have anything to do with Vauxhall and our future, than it’s just chatter in the wind.
Me, I’m over the nut jobs.
Me, I’m done with the bozos.
What I need is to seriously kiss Vauxhall and then knock myself out.
CHAPTER THREE
ONE
Professor David Gore, MD, PhD
Department of Medical Physics
University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA
Dear Dr. Gore,
Thank you for your short note. I appreciate your taking a few minutes to reply to my letter and I can understand your doubting me. Comes with the territory.
Fact is, Dr. Gore: When I get knocked out, I can see the future.
Maybe my last letter wasn’t clear but, really, the seeing the future thing is simple. Just a matter of complicated physics. It’s changing what I see that’s the tough one. I’m wondering (again) if you have any ideas on how I can change the future after I’ve seen it.
Like I mentioned in my last letter, I’ve tried it before. Maybe it’s better if I get specific: Last year I saw a guy I knew get killed in a car accident. I did everything I co
uld to stop it from happening. I knew the rules, but this was life and death and I wasn’t just going to sit there and let it happen. I told this dude, told him everything I saw. He didn’t believe me. For like three days I hounded him, practically begging him. I mapped it out for him, gave him a description of the car, of the people at the scene. Still, he wouldn’t listen. Eventually, he showed up at my house, said he was going to get a restraining order if I didn’t leave him alone, told me he had some friends who would kick my ass. Still, I begged him. He ran out of my house, flicking me off. I heard the bang three and a half minutes later. Ran out to find him in the middle of the road a block away, run down by a red car. Vision came true and I made it happen.
See, me trying to stop it made it happen.
I’m haunted by it. And if I ever see something like that again, someone being hurt or worse, I’m not sure what I can do. But I want to do something. I need to do something.
Dr. Gore, you’re a medical physicist, an expert. I read your paper on “temporal disturbances” and chronic migraines and even though I didn’t really get anything beyond the first page (just being honest), I figure if anyone can give me some good advice it’ll be you. Here’s to hoping!
Sincerely,
Ade (not Abe) Patience
TWO
Vauxhall’s sitting a few rows over.
She is stunning in the dry fluorescence of McKellar’s Art Room. I’m staring at her so hard that I’m worried I’m drooling on my shirt. I’m worried that if she turns around and sees me, she’ll just freak out. God, she is so incredibly beautiful!
Mr. McKellar is going on about the history of perspective.
It’s the driest stuff I’ve heard in years and already half the class is nodding off. I can’t imagine why Vauxhall would want to transfer to this class, this teacher.
Vauxhall does not appear bored by the perspective talk.
Head on her hands, she looks enraptured.
I decide to give it a go and actually pay attention. Mostly this is an act for Vauxhall. But I can feel my brain rotting away and only five minutes in I’m eyeing the edges of a stool in the corner of the room.
I’m thinking: If I take a running leap from here, I can nail my forehead on that stool and be out in seconds.
Buzz.
I’m actually tensing up, getting ready to leap, when something spins onto my desk. White cray paper, folded over four times.
It’s from Vauxhall.
Try not to fall asleep, the note says.
I look at her and smile. I write back, Gonna be hard.
My heart is exploding. Her handwriting is exquisite.
Vauxhall writes back, her head close to the paper, hands tight on her pen. She writes, He’s actually pretty famous.
The way she writes her a’s-this dollop of ink-is so freaking sexy.
I respond, For boring students to death? Where’s the art?
She writes, Ha Ha.
Have I seen anything he’s done?
Vauxhall writes, Probably not. His stuff is pretty arty.
I write her that I dig arty. I’m really into arty.
Like what?
I list the films Paige and I have seen at the Esquire. Mostly they’re midnight movies. Stuff like El Topo and The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Showgirls. I write Vauxhall that I realize it might not be as arty as I thought at the time.
In her note back she laughs. No, really. It’s a drawing of her, a little kind of thumbnail sketch of her face with her hair and eyes, and she’s laughing her head off. That’s her response. The drawing, it’s honestly pretty good. Actually, I want to frame it on my wall.
Mr. McKellar decides its time for questions and he looks over at me, so I fold the note up and put it in my pocket.
McKellar asks, “What would art without perspective look like? Would it be primitive or would it be abstract? Has art improved with its invention?”
I stare back blank, my mind not even turning.
Vauxhall answers for me. She tells McKellar, this apparently brilliant instructor worth transferring for, that the answer depends on where you’re coming from and what you’re looking for. She tells him it’s all in the eye of the beholder. She says, “Perspective is just another tool. If you’re making something realistic or that’s supposed to seem realistic, then it’s a great tool. If not, then you can freely leave it behind. It’s a relatively new thing, perspective. Medieval times it wasn’t distance that was important but weight. The bigger something was, the more central it was, the bigger it was on canvas. They say it revolutionized art when perspective appeared, sometime in Italy, but really, I don’t think it was such a great thing. Art might look more realistic, it’s certainly easier to get, but it’s lost that imaginative view. That childlike view of things that just opens everything all up. There’s real beauty in seeing something the way it isn’t meant to be seen.”
The way Vauxhall speaks is jaw-dropping.
When we’re packing up before the bell, and Mr. McKellar has drifted off to his desk, I turn to the brilliant and beautiful mind next to me and I say, “That was amazing.”
My veins are drumming overtime as I’m speaking.
Vauxhall stands and bows. She says, “That was bullshit.”
Before she leaves she asks me if I’m going to Oscar’s party tonight.
“Sure,” I say. I’m hoping it’s not apparent I wasn’t invited. Oscar’s this really loud almost-frat guy who seems to have a party every other weekend. Both his parents travel, he drinks Red Bull and Jägermeister, and his liver is probably the size of Montana.
“Great.” And she smiles.
That smile has me floating all the way to Paige’s locker. And Paige can read it on me the way a dog can read the cheeseburger off your lips. She says, “You know, I’ve been meaning to mention that I don’t think… Look, call it woman’s intuition, but I think she’s got something going on with Jimi.”
“What? That’s ridiculous. Since when do you have woman’s intuition?”
“Eat a dick, Ade. I’m being serious.”
“Nah, I’ve seen this.”
I don’t let on that I’ve got stress about Jimi.
I say, “We, you and me, are going to Oscar’s party tonight. Vauxhall’s hoping I’ll be there.”
Paige crosses herself. She says, “You been on airplane mode this whole time?”
“What the hell are you talking about, Paige?”
Hands on her hips, Paige says, “Just think it’s funny how much you miss. It’s like you’re only half awake most of the time.”
“No idea what you’re talking about.”
“I think they’re together.”
“Well, if they are,” I say, winking, “it won’t be for long, buzz kill.”
Paige kisses me on the cheek. The peck, it isn’t sweet. She smiles, says, “Not as though you’d remember anyhow.”
THREE
The song has been sung in the lunchroom.
We’ve talked. We’ve laughed together. Flirted even, maybe.
This party is surely where we kiss.
Tonight, this party is the moment I have waited so many seasons for.
The frost is over and the summer has come. I spend an hour in the bathroom and I look over every inch of my face. This is prom and my wedding and my first real job all wrapped up in one. I make myself look and smell and feel as good as I can. I use the gel, I use the lotions, I use the aftershave, I iron my clothes, and shine my shoes. My stomach is an impossible knot.
First thing Paige and I notice when we hit Oscar’s is that it’s a costume party.
We decide to hang around outside Oscar’s place and wait for more partygoers.
Maybe find some other idiots without costumes.
* * *
Everyone who walks in I scan like I’m an MRI. Trying to make out the shapes of the beneath the costumes. ’Course I’m not looking for tumors.
I’m looking for Vauxhall.
Paige has smuggled a half bottle of wh
iskey from her dad’s liquor cabinet and we sip that while we wait, out throats getting chapped. Paige is chatty, but I’m too nervous to speak. When I do, it’s just me saying stupid things and stuttering about how anxious I am. Paige finds me ridiculous.
When this guy named Jethro that Paige’s friends with shows up, we walk in with him and his date. Jethro’s a Mormon and is dressed like a nun and his date is some Filipino girl with braces dressed like a witch. Walking in, the two of them describe their newfound love of chicken tinola. We have no idea what that is but imagine it’s something like what Oscar’s place smells like. It must be pot and coconut milk.
Inside, I see Vauxhall first.
Of course I do.
This is exactly how fate and destiny and providence works.
She’s wearing dark slacks. Innocuous footwear. A blue button-up shirt. Electric blue, no less. She’s also wearing gloves. Black leather. And her face is entirely swathed in bandages. Bowler hat on. Shades on. Vaux’s speaking damaged French to someone I think is named Bethany.
Vaux has a name tag that says, VAUXHALL, NEW GIRL.
A little light on the top of the tag, like an Xmas tree light, flashes on and off and on and off. This is Vauxhall as the cool mummy.
She’s so relaxed. And it makes me feel uptight.
I can’t keep my eyes off where her face should be.
So I push my way into the kitchen for a drink. I need something to loosen up before I talk to Vauxhall. Unfortunately, Heather Albine, Chris Lavoire, Liz Chin, and Gina Foley are standing around the cooler. These are bitches I hate being trapped in kitchens with.
I push in between them, reach into the cooler, and pull out a cider. Not my favorite, but I want something sweet because I’m sure I’ll be swilling bitter wine later. I look around for a bottle opener.
“What do you think of her?” Heather asks me.
“Who?” I play it dumb.
Future Imperfect Page 4
