by Mick Brady
“Howdy, Mister!” the big Texan shouted as he reached the curb, well into his monologue before he even climbed into the backseat. “Must be a salesman,” Will thought, sitting quietly, waiting for the punch line before asking where he wanted to go, smiling all the while at his new sidekick. The cowboy rambled on.
“Hey, Mister—” Will said to no avail.
“Pretty much a done deal that the first thing you’re gonna see in this city is a pretty lady,” the big Texan said, winking at Juliette.
“Yeah, well…” Will said with a twang conjured up from his days down San Angelo way. “This must be your lucky day, mister, ‘cause we’ve got the prettiest one of all riding shotgun.” The cowboy let out a Texas-sized laugh as Will smiled at Juliette.
He was about to wrestle a destination from the Texan when he spotted a head bobbing and weaving its way through the midday crowd on the other side of the street. Not far behind, a cop was in hot pursuit. As the two bobbing heads reached a spot directly opposite Will’s cab, the first head burst from the crowd, morphing into a big, seedy-looking guy in a threadbare suit with a revolver in his hand, headed directly toward the line of cabs.
“Looks like we got ourselves some real trouble here, folks,” Will said, still speaking Texan.
“Hell, man, that fella’s got a gun—” the cowboy said.
But before he could finish, the cop stepped out from between two parked cars. “Gimme back the gun, and no one’ll get hurt,” he pleaded with the gunman. The world ground to a halt for a frozen moment as the guy turned and fired a single shot, hitting the cop in the forehead and knocking him backward into the screaming crowd. He was dead before he hit the ground.
Will and his passengers sat in stunned silence as the killer started running in their direction. Waving the gun in the air, he cursed the two passengers who had beaten him to his cab, lunged toward the next one in line and climbed into the rear seat, shouting, “Get the fuck outta here! Now!” As the driver began to pull away from the curb, he opened his door, dropped to the pavement, and rolled under Will’s cab. The getaway car continued to roll out into the street, coming to a stop less than a dozen feet away. At that moment, all hell broke loose. Police cars were streaming in from all directions, cops lining up behind parked cars.
As sirens wailed, people screamed, and guns blazed, Juliette calmly lifted her feet to make room for Will, who dove for the illusory safety of the floor. She then sat, serenely unmoved, her arms wrapped around her legs like a kid in front of a TV set, as the scene unfolded around them. When he tried to pull her down, she took his hand and pulled him up, scrunching over so he could sit beside her on the front seat, then rested her head on his shoulder.
“Don’t worry, Will. You’re perfectly safe with me,” she said, radiant. The magnetic power of her body and the soft touch of her lips upon his cheek erased all sense of danger. Wrapping her arms around his neck and sliding onto his lap, she drove him back into the seat with a deep soul kiss as bullets whizzed and thudded all around them. His heart burst into flames.
“Please, dear God, let us live to see another day,” he said softly into the warmth of her neck, the smell of her hair. Filled anew with courage at the very closeness of her, he looked around just long enough to see a cop leap onto the trunk of the getaway cab and fire a half-dozen rounds into the shattered rear window. Unbelievably, return fire knocked him to the street.
Riveted by reality and wrapped in the halo of her love, he began to sense through all the sound and fury that she might be a shaman, a goddess, maybe even his guardian angel come to save him with the kiss of life. “I don’t even know your name,” he said in her ear.
“Juliette,” she said. A bullet tore through the trunk as she nestled in, burying her head in his shoulder. The plaintive sounds of the Carter Family singing “Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone?” drifted up from his transistor radio on the floor, intermingled with the prayers and curses coming from the backseat. High on adrenaline and stoked with love, Will and Juliette laughed; it was a beatific moment of transcendent absurdity.
At long last, there was a pause in the hellfire. Outside, an army of cops advanced toward the bullet-riddled cab. With a flourish reminiscent of Bonnie and Clyde, they shredded what remained of the getaway car with a staccato burst of gunfire. Once the silence seemed to hold, Will struggled to reach the door handle, and they emerged to survey the bloody scene.
They wandered about the street, dazed, shell-shocked, with the sound of guns still ringing in their ears. They were like soldiers, fresh from a foxhole, exulting in the simple fact of being alive. Juliette stood apart, transfixed, soaking up the aftermath; blood, tears, laughter, and even the screams of the wounded. In her brief life, she had never witnessed the brutality and finality of death; she had only known the hard, cold data. Will couldn’t take his eyes off her.
The street slowly came back to life. The smoke cleared, and survivors emerged from their hiding places, as a growing crowd of onlookers gathered in clusters around the windowless, bullet-riddled cab. The cops finally opened the door with guns drawn, reached in, and jerked the guy unceremoniously out onto the street by his feet. Justice had been swift; blood was pouring from every part of his body. Juliette approached and stood nearby until they hauled him away. Returning to Will, she asked, “Will…the people who died…can they be rebooted?” He had no idea what she was talking about.
After dropping the Texan off at his destination, Will and Juliette drove back to the taxi garage, docked the Mothership deep in its cavernous depths, and walked up to the dispatcher’s office, where Will slid the key under the bulletproof glass for the very last time.
“That’s it for me, Lou. I’m outta here. Cash me out.”
“What the fuck you talkin’ about, Powers? It’s the middle of the goddamn day!” Lou said.
“Listen, Lou. I’m done. It’s a fucking war zone out there, man, and I’m too young to die. Gimme my road money; I’m headin’ west.”
8
THE PARADOX
Will was still counting his cash when they stepped from the chilly shadows of the taxi garage into the brittle sunlight of midday Manhattan. Memories of the morning’s rampage were already being jackhammered by the everyday madness of the big-city streets. Juliette stood beside him, absorbing the heat of his presence. She could see the injured boy within—wrapped in layers of emotional scar tissue and cultural debris, still longing for love and perfection—all hidden beneath a slick veneer of cool toughness that enabled him to hide in plain sight.
“My ticket to ride,” he said, holding up the roll of bills before stuffing it into his pocket.
“Like a rolling stone,” she said, parrying with a tune from the database. He shot her a quick smile. She accepted.
“There’s a great little café a few blocks from here. Might be nice to unwind, get to know one another,” he said, his head tilted, hands in his pockets. She beamed with joy.
“You’re reading my mind, Will Powers. I’d love to.” With great excitement, they headed south, arm in arm, just as the noonday crowd began to thicken; a rich parade of characters was already jamming the streets. Uptown girls—bleached, bronzed, and bulletproof in their haute couture; sleek Nuyorican punks—teased out in their rolled-up tees and colorful bandanas; beat poets slouching toward oblivion; rainbow-hued hippies—beaded, bangled, and barefooted. They were all tossed together with a steady stream of Mad Men, rushing to another three-martini lunch.
“Behold…The Miserati! All breathing the same poisoned air, all careening toward the same tragic fate,” Will said, with a dramatic sweep of his hand, as they stood together on the corner of 24th and Broadway.
“The smell of death and perfume fills the air, and no one seems to care,” she said, taking his hand as they made their way through the frozen traffic, giving it one last squeeze when they reached the other side. He squeezed back.
As they stood together in the bustling crowd, Juliette suddenly felt an ominous, rhythmic pounding beneat
h her feet. After scanning the past and future of the immediate area, she realized that, not far from where they stood, pile drivers were pounding girders into the bedrock, laying down the foundation for two gleaming towers of glass and steel that would soon soar above the city, shining in the morning sun.
She also knew that Will was completely unaware of these things. To him, the nearby project was no more than a vast pit of mud and steel and lumbering cranes, loosely hidden by a mile or two of graffiti-tattooed plywood. He had no idea that their monolithic profiles would dominate the skyline for the rest of the century, or that rockets full of innocents would one day pierce their skin like bullets from another planet, and they would crumple to the ground like every other shooting victim in this town. For the moment, at least, Will’s mind was filled with ordinary bullets, everyday bodies. And, of course, the body of the goddess standing next to him.
There were only a half-dozen outdoor tables at the Paradox, so it was their good fortune to arrive as another couple was getting up to leave. They were greeted and seated by a waitress who, Will whispered, could easily have been Yoko Ono’s twin.
“Who knows, this might be one of her art projects,” Juliette said as they settled into a corner under a faded gray umbrella and the lush green tendrils of hanging bougainvillea. Will ordered two double espressos, neat, and they both settled back to relax.
“Talk to me,” Juliette said, suddenly leaning forward, the touch of her hand triggering a shower of invisible sparks.
“OK, riddle me this: a beautiful woman on the back of a Hells Angel’s chopper pulls up to a cab near Times Square and hops in, just in time to prevent a deranged killer from using it as a getaway car. Then she shields the driver from harm in the ensuing gun battle with a soul kiss. What planet is she from?”
“Easy. She’s from a parallel world; she’s the girl next door.”
“Very clever. What superpowers does she have?”
“She doesn’t have superpowers; she’s in sync with the universe and has full access to the powers of nature.”
“Hmm‘…‘supernatural’…interesting,” Will added.
“True. But I wonder…maybe this driver you mention is underestimating his own powers, Mr. Powers. Most likely, he’d have done just fine without her,” she said, smiling.
“Not so sure about that, darlin’. Dodging bullets is a lonely business.”
“Truth is, Will, you were never really alone; you just couldn’t see in the dark. You should let your heart shine more often.” He smiled with all the boyish charm of a young James Dean. She recognized the scene. “Lost boys in blue jeans, direct from the silver screen,” she mused, touched by his hidden vulnerability. When he finally spoke, he looked her straight in the eye.
“Truth is, Juliette, I was lost in that darkness until an angel appeared before me and wrapped me in her charms.” This was said with such sweet longing that her autoblush kicked in, setting her cheeks aglow with a slight hint of spring rose. Then, with the exquisite timing and dramatic flourish of a performance artist, Yoko placed two espressos before them, giving them each a chance to catch their breath. Juliette, for her part, was silently groping for a way forward, struggling under the weight of two worlds, searching for the center of gravity in their orbiting souls. She had to begin the delicate process of beaming light into his troubled mind without causing his head to explode. This was no time to reveal, for instance, that she was a manifestation of his own soul—an intrinsic part of the larger artwork he himself would one day initiate—or that she had arrived here by riding the fine line between space and time—a line that now felt like a tightrope.
Now, normally, when a muse interacts with an artist, she weaves her magic with laser-like precision, relying on instinct, imagination, insight and complete candor. In the throes of the creative struggle, the right balance of truth and possibility can mean the difference between a masterpiece and a refrigerator magnet. But this was no ordinary collaboration. She was a voice from another world, another dimension, and had the power to access living data in the space/time continuum, possibly even alter the course of events in the subject’s life.
Will, meanwhile, adrift in hormonal bliss, had only a vague sense of the extraordinary mind that was focused on him, and even that faint impression was filtered through his own drug-fueled, magical-mystical thinking. He was merely in love again, this time with his own intergalactic Emma Peel, and was fumbling around for a way to break through the tantalizing aura of mystery surrounding her, utterly unaware that she was already inside his head.
“An avatar,” he said suddenly. “You’re an avatar. You’ve come to enlighten me.”
She leaned in close, wrapping his curls around her finger. “An avatar? A Hindu god in human form, like Vishnu? Blue, lots of arms?”
“In the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna tells Arjuna that when the world is in deep trouble, he appears in the form of an avatar to rescue the righteous. Well, the world is in deep trouble, and who better to save the world than an angel who arrives on a silver chariot?”
“Are you waiting to be rescued, Will?”
“Well, yes…I mean, no. Just looking for some light down here, Juliette; thought maybe you had some. Forget I even mentioned it.”
“Will, enlightenment isn’t complicated. It’s the sun-kissed state you lived in as a child; a time when marbles were as big as planets and fireflies seemed like a gleam in God’s eye. It can still be found, but it comes at a great price. You must break free of your world and become like a newborn babe.”
“Right. Lift myself up by my own bootstraps?”
“Aren’t there any heroes left in this world? Visionaries who can guide you through this maze?”
She knew that Will was still clinging to a rapidly vanishing ethos—the last gasp of romantic idealism—and that he had molded himself in the shape of his heroes: beat writers, jazz musicians, ab-ex painters, and so on—mythic figures who were no more real than the comic book heroes of his childhood. He knew nothing of their personal lives, their compromises, betrayals and humiliations, their own inner struggles in the face of growing darkness. He only knew their carefully curated public image, the myths that had grown up around them to feed the far-off dreams of those who, like Will, lived in the contrail of their made-up magic. His answer reflected a budding awareness of his dilemma.
“Heroes of a darker sort, maybe. Brave souls like Monk, digging for truth between the keys; Caravaggio punching holes in the darkness; soul painters like Turner or Blake; and, of course, the mad saints—Kerouac, Ginsberg, Genet. For a long time, I was sure they were on the path to truth, beauty and perfection, but now I’m not even sure those things ever existed. These days I feel like a kid picking flowers on a battlefield.”
“But such beautiful flowers…”
“Yeah, but no match for such deadly powers…” By now he was all fired up, sparks of anger shooting from his eyes. “Truth is, Juliette, I came here to become a giant myself, and I knew I had the talent to pull it off. But once I got here, I found out that art is just a fool’s game, rigged from the inside. Galleries are nothing but temples full of money changers, art no more than a colorful form of currency. Real art can’t survive in a place like this. Look around; we’re surrounded by dull people with sharp objects. The rest are all packing heat.”
“That may all be true…But aren’t you painting yourself into a corner?”
“Hilarious. What the hell are you talking about?”
“Well, it seems to me you’re looking for perfection in an imperfect world.”
“Where else is there to go?”
Juliette smiled mysteriously. “To the worlds within your paintings, perhaps; a journey you’ve been looking forward to for years. But you haven’t painted in months, and now you’re walking away from it all. You’re giving up.”
“When you’re hanging by a thread, darlin’, art is the last thing on your mind. What I’m really looking for is a miracle—”
As if on cue, a ruby-throated
hummingbird appeared above them, dancing from flower to flower with a great kinetic blur of wings, sipping ambrosia in turn from each of the dangling red trumpets. They held their breath as it descended and hovered directly in front of Juliette, weightless in the air, still, shimmering, translucent. She was leaning forward as if to whisper in its ear when the tiny creature, no bigger than a ripe strawberry, met her halfway and gently kissed the flower of her ruby-red lips, pivoted and vanished as quickly as it had appeared. A long silence followed, broken only by a slow-rolling wave of chatter from the surrounding tables. Will was spellbound.
“If I hadn’t seen that with my…own…” Will began, his voice trailing off as he saw the light dancing in her eyes. When the spell was finally broken, she turned and looked at him with such openhearted love he melted like a candle in the noonday sun.
“What…was…that…? he asked.
“The spirit of life in all its unfettered glory, Will—a gentle kiss to nudge us out of the nest, a green light for our coming flight.” His face lit up, then darkened with confusion. He leaned forward and spoke in the low, urgent tones of a man hanging from the edge of an invisible cliff.
“Listen, Juliette; my mind is running on fumes. I could crash and burn any minute. Please tell me where all this is going and what it all means. I don’t have a lot of trips left in me.”
“I know that, Will, but there’s nothing to be afraid of. There’s an underlying pattern to all of life. If you’re in sync with it, you’ll be filled with light. If you resist it, well…let’s not talk about that. At any rate, I’m here to help you align with that pattern, no strings attached.” The smile returned.
“So you are an avatar—my avatar—here to lead me to enlightenment,” he said.
“For now, dear Will, that will have to do,” Juliette said, surprising him once again by leaning close and sealing the deal with a kiss. She then stood up, took his hand, and led him out to the sidewalk, leaving just enough time to pass some cash to Yoko. The deep chugga-chugga of the Angel’s chopper pounded insistently in the background as they stood together in a cloud of uncertainty. With only a few seconds left in his world, she took off her pendant and placed it around his neck, adjusting the silver bar to rest directly over his heart.
