Traipsing around the parking lot I am pleased with my new coat. I like the way it flares out like a luxurious cape when I spin.
I picture Eddie smiling and telling me that spinning clears his overcrowded head. I extend my arms and close my eyes and give it a shot.
I spin and I spin and I spin and after a few revolutions I just let go. I let my head swirl. And fuck the sickness, fuck the rising nausea and the throat-constricting spin-quease, fuck the stares that I am surely drawing, fuck the balance that I am slowly losing. I am not going to stop for two hours. I’m going to spin in memoriam. I’m going to spin in reception. I’m going to spin until Eddie, wherever he may be, is at long last freed from his child shell, freed from the constraints of youth, freed from the constraints of the flesh.
After a few minutes I lose it and drop to the pavement. My body has stopped spinning but the world continues. In my vision, swimmy with motion and lights and blurry monolithic casinos, I think I see the fuzzy outline of a black minivan. I press my hand to my forehead and try to shake it off. Focus, focus. Shapes align and the gyroscope inside my head is beginning to slow. Squinting, I search and sure enough, beyond the Excalibur’s parking lot, at the stoplight adjacent to the MGM Grand, a black minivan idles, waiting.
Is it the same one that snatched Eddie?
I don’t know, but that doesn’t stop me from breaking into a run. By the time I hit the street the light changes. The traffic, including the black minivan, surges into motion. I run into the middle of the street and flail my arms. Cars honk and screech and swerve, clipping one another, causing a mega ruckus. Somehow everything falls into perfect place and the black minivan screams to halt mere feet in front of me. I walk around to the driver’s side and peer into the window. A woman in her midforties stares back. She has one of those mom haircuts, short and frosted or streaked or whatever. I try to pull open the door, but it’s locked.
“Open it!” I scream.
It would have been infinitely better for her if she didn’t listen to me, but fear and nervousness and backward logic compel her into action. The automatic door lock clicks resoundingly and I pull open the door.
“Don’t hurt me,” ran together like donthurtme, all whimpery and scared. I ignore her and poke my head into the van. Empty. The lady begins sobbing and her lower lip quivers like a bowlful of jelly. I pull my head out of the van and am about to walk away when I think: just because Eddie’s not in there doesn’t mean he hasn’t been in there and just because this stupid bitch is crying doesn’t mean she didn’t kidnap and kill Eddie. Chances are she didn’t, but there is always the possibility.
My neck goes wobbly and the death flower blooms in my brain. I raise my left hand and lock it onto the sobbing woman’s forehead. Her body goes stiff and foamy shit begins to creep from the corners of her mouth. I feel my soul receding, preparing for the fall, but I don’t want to get caught in that deathly neverspace, I don’t want to waste time death-tripping, so I push my brain and will my palm to release. After a few seconds it complies and I am glad to learn that with the right pressure, with the right reason, the palm will relent and relinquish control.
The woman falls out of her seat into the street and flops about on the ground like a gasping fish. Her forehead glistens smooth and white, all features and lines burned away, a mirror image of my killing palm, and her eyes blink empty, nearly drained, absolved of awareness by the ultimate cure of my touch.
I hop in the minivan, shut the door and speed away.
The lights of Vegas disappear behind me like a dimming bulb and my thoughts run crazy, spun this way and that way like a heaping pile of disemboweled intestines. My brain is a pit, deep and black and all-encompassing. I drive on autopilot, taking a second to note the gas tank is full and allotting a minimal amount of cerebral activity to handle two necessary menial tasks: pointing the minivan in the direction of Arizona and stepping on the gas. The rest of my attention dances with the dead, with the thousands upon thousands of staring eyeballs, with dreams turned to dust. And this dwelling, this constant internalizing, is a weird thing, because when I really think about it, I don’t think I should feel like a murderer.
I don’t think of myself as a man who has crossed the line and taken a life.
The ever-rising body count is simply an indirect consequence of an indirect, natural action. It’s not really my fault. All I do is touch people. I don’t break them to fucking pieces or chop them up with an axe. I touch them. That’s it. No big deal. So then, fuck it, I shouldn’t care. According to Annabelle I am designed not to. But something weird has welled up inside and I do care, I care more than anything and the eyes, the fucking eyes are everywhere, staring, accusing, questioning, clogging my inner vision like glistening mulch.
I have only killed six people directly—that’s twelve eyes, three pairs of human ones and one pair of canine peepers—and I suppose if I have to live with their glaring presence, their haunting reminder, I can. And if killing means being haunted, then so be it—shit, I deserve it for Lumpy and Paunch and Eddie and the religious lady at the gas station and Mr. Beer Spiller and the Minivan Lady. I intimately drained them away and a little guilt is warranted. But thousands? But every person inadvertently infected? No way. I don’t deserve that. No way, but here they are, a wall of sad, angry, evil, shame-on-you eyes, and here they persist, raising the hairs on the back of my neck and filling my head with dreadful menace. Murderer, they blink, Murderer, Murderer, Murderer and I shout at the top of my lungs for them to shut the fuck up. Surprisingly they do, and with a little more heated suppression they scatter and slowly fade, sinking into the cavernous folds of my brain. But for how long? They will be back and as the dead grow, their numbers and power increasing, I fear they will eventually be strong enough to drive me out of my own head.
Not that it would be a bad thing. I could use a little nothingness, driving and driving and trying to think about anything but death. And for a short while I succeed as red-tinged thoughts of my Annabelle (where are you?) creep in. For a short while I am able to smile. For a short while warmth spreads throughout my insides filling in all of the cold, dead-trained spaces. For a short while it’s just me, the tranquil road, the beautiful rising sun, and lovely, lovely fantasy. For a short while, as the land radiates gold and awakens, I am able to let it go. Then I happen to notice the LCD clock beset into the dashboard of the minivan. It reads 6:37 a.m.
Eddie Lee Wiggins, rest in peace.
Whatever Eddie’s fate, death has surely caught up with him by now. It would be easy to blame his abductor(s) and factor myself right out of the equation, but he is dead because of me. I killed him and again, as with the guilt-milking wall of eyes, I shouldn’t take it so personally. He was dead whether I touched him or not. You’re all dead whether I touch you or not because eventually somebody is going touch you.
Half of me is happy, my destiny in full effect, but the other half is sad and kind of pissed. I wasn’t really given much choice in the matter. With Lumpy or Paunch or Eddie I didn’t know what I was doing. If I was given the opportunity to go back, knowing what I know, I don’t know if I would do it again. I wouldn’t kill Paunch and I sure as hell wouldn’t harm Eddie—maybe Lumpy, but maybe not because he was just doing his job. The more I think about it, the less I like what I’ve become.
At first, my brain going five million miles an hour, the plausibility of purpose and the idea of making a difference, lit me up inside: Fuck yes, I am the man, the destroyer, and all that bravado bullshit. Now, I don’t know. This change has forced away my insular little world. I am able to see that life is more than Mr. Shithead and the shit-talking kitchen spics (take that) and my crappy apartment and my God complex. And now with this strange desire for Annabelle, my sex complex is fading, and I am interacting with all kinds of different people and developing a twisted appreciation for humanity. For the past I don’t know how many years I have locked myself away and built up an impenetrable wall and let myself forget that not all people are bad.
Not all people are good. But there is a balance. Like Logan, a deviant, thief, drug-using homosexual, would-be murderer who would drop everything to help a man find his would-be son. For every repulsive character flaw there are a number of redeeming qualities.
The wall of eyes, the thousands dead, every one of them is a dichotomy of goodness and unpleasantness and I am not as sure as I was before about them deserving to die.
“Don’t be going soft on me.” Annabelle smiles at me from the passenger’s seat. She looks as fabulous as ever, wearing the usual getup but with darker hair. The red has gone so deep it looks almost black.
My heart does a somersault in my chest and I swallow back a lump. “Hi,” I stammer.
“Hi yourself. Where the fuck are we?”
“Close.”
“Close?” She sounds irritated and my idiot heart takes a dip. Something worrisome and debilitating thumps my brain.
Annabelle folds her pretty little arms over her bountiful bosom (snap out of it, dumbass) and continues on, “What were you doing in Vegas?”
“Vegas?” How does she know?
“Yes. Vegas, Charles. What were you doing tearing apart Vegas?”
“I was—”
“It’s all over the fucking news, Charlie!”
“I was trying to touch people, you know…spread the disease.” Given her anger I decide to omit the Eddie stuff.
“Right and you did a fantastic job,” she says evenly and then with some volume, “Compromising our fucking mission! You are all over the news! You! They’re showing your picture and some footage an asshole tourist shot and although they still don’t know what to make of things, they are after you!”
“But—”
“But nothing, Charles! You royally fucked up. So much for keeping it cool, so much for brushing up against people and allowing the world to die in confusion. Walnut Creek was our get-out-of-jail-free card. We had it made, nice and easy. Now you are public enemy number one. Now things are going to be hard.”
“I’m sorry—”
She cuts me off again, “Sorry? What the hell were you thinking? You pulled a lady from this van, which we have to ditch as soon as possible, and drained her right there in the middle of a busy intersection! They are showing the surveillance tape every five minutes!”
“How do you know?” Time to fight back.
“What?”
“How do you know? I thought you were blind.”
“I am, but I can still hear.” She gives me an extremely agitated expression and rolls her eyes and then growls in anger. “Fuck it. This isn’t going to work.”
“I’m sorry.” Idiot.
“Yeah, me too. I thought you were the one.”
“I am the one, I just went a little crazy.”
“Good luck then.” She waves and closes her eyes.
“Wait, I said I just went a little crazy, I’m okay now.”
Annabelle makes a funny little smirk with her lips and closes her eyes harder as if concentrating superhard.
“Annabelle?”
“Good-bye, Charles.”
The concentration continues. She is trying to wake herself up.
“Wait, Annabelle. Don’t go. We can still make this happen. I’ll be in Mesa in a few hours.”
She opens her eyes. “Don’t bother.” She closes them again.
How can she abandon me? Me, the most important man in the world? So what if I fucked up a little? What am I supposed to do? And why does it feel like my insides are being pureed?
“Please wait. I didn’t know what I was doing. This is all so new and I couldn’t control myself. My body just reacted. All of those people-lined streets. I couldn’t stop it. And now inside. I, I, I love you and it hurts.”
She opens her eyes. “The change,” she sighs. Her demeanor softens. “I’m sorry for yelling, I know you didn’t mean any harm, it’s just that there is so much riding on keeping things low-key. When I heard the news, I flipped. I’m still flipping.” She takes a long pause, stares out the window and then looks at me with huge, lovely, happy eyes. “But don’t worry. I won’t give up on you. We’ll get through this somehow.”
“I won’t let you down again.” I beam and just like that everything feels right as rain and my insides pulse strong, healthy, light, airy, happy.
“Good.” Annabelle’s smile lights up the van. “Good,” she repeats. “Now before we play nice, what is all of this human sympathy crap?”
I play dumb. “What?”
“Come on, I can feel it. You have to squash those thoughts. You have to get your mind right, Charles, or this will never work. Vegas for all its probable disastrous consequences proved your capability; you took out a lot of people, but you can’t wimp out in the end because some random human shows you kindness or courage or some another amiable characteristic.”
“It’s just hard because they’re not all bad. They don’t all deserve to die.”
“No, they’re not all bad, a lot of them are even wonderful, but make no mistake, they all have to die. It’s not even a matter of deserving to or not deserving to. You are not touching someone because they are despicable or deserving of death, nor are you touching them because they are great and deserve to live. There’s no distinction for you or me to make—you are touching them because someone just has to. Someone has to save the world before it’s too late.”
And that’s me, whoopee! “But why me?”
“Why not you? Why me? Who knows?” Annabelle shrugs her shoulders.
I sigh, “It sucks because there’s nothing at the end, you know? I keep thinking about it and when this is all over, then what? No promise of heaven or a thousand virgins or my own kingdom or anything?”
Annabelle snaps her fingers as if to say Bingo and then she really says, “That’s exactly why humanity has to die. Everything doesn’t, everything shouldn’t, warrant a reward or a benefit. Some things are done just because they need to be done.”
“What if I just say to hell with it?”
“Then another would come along and finish it. It might even be too late. You may have done enough already. Besides, you wouldn’t leave me, would you?” She flutters her eyes at me coyly, playful.
I blush and go giddy like a love-struck schoolgirl. “No,” I giggle back.
Annabelle frowns. “I have my doubts about this love tactic. I understand the purpose, but this expanding of your emotional range is allowing dangerous tendencies to seep in. Enjoy it or whatever, but don’t let sensitivity take you over.”
“Me, sensitive? Never.” I make a severe face for effect.
“Cute. So how much longer?”
Did she just call me cute? Spider legs, tingly footfalls, multiply across the underside of my skin. I smile and squeeze the wheel.
Annabelle repeats, “How much longer?”
“Soon.”
“Just hurry, I have to get out of here sooner than soon.”
I step on the gas.
“Be careful, you’re a wanted man. We have to get rid of this van.”
“A wanted man. I like the sound of that.”
A wanted man. How about that? A wanted man.
“You would,” Annabelle snickers.
Feisty. “What’s it like being blind?” I ask.
“It sucks.”
“What do you see?”
“I don’t.”
“You know what I mean,” I retort.
She looks out the window and stares off. I didn’t mean to offend her or hit upon a touchy subject and I tell her so. She waves me off and shakes her head. “No, it’s okay, I don’t really like to talk about it is all.”
“That’s cool. Tell me something about yourself. What do you like to do?” Stupid, I know, but I’m not really good at interpersonal communication.
“I wasn’t born blind. It happened when I was twelve. One day I was fine, the next I couldn’t see. The doctors couldn’t explain it—it was just one of those freak-of-nature occurrences. We tried different
surgeries and techniques and optical therapeutics, but to no avail. Anyway, like I said, it sucks. It’s limiting. I can pretty much remember what everything looks like so it’s easy for me to conceptualize.” Annabelle air-traces a box and then waves her hand and air-erases it. “Not like a natural-born who only understands what’s in their head, I’ve seen the outside world, colors, shapes, objects. If you tell me about something you saw, chances are I can visualize it. But sometimes it’s a scary feeling because it’s been such a long time since I’ve actually seen, and I can’t always remember what something looks like. Sometimes it takes a minute or two, but my brain eventually retrieves the proper image. Sometimes it doesn’t, my brain having somehow erased or forgotten the visualization. I hate that. I hate having to rely on my imagination to build a replacement. Overall, everything is fuzzy and weird, like I’m always dreaming. I hate it. I just want to wake up and see things as I used to see them, but then again at forty-five years old things probably look a whole lot differently than they did at twelve.”
“I prefer the way the world looks in dreams,” I interject, trying to make her feel better.
Annabelle nods. “Yeah. At times I see some incredible stuff, but it still sucks because I can’t contrast it with the world beyond my eyelids. This whole thing”—she motions with her hand in a giant circle—“is the closest I’ve come to actual vision since I went blind. You are the only person I’ve actually seen since I went blind.” She goes silent for a second and then says, “Also, forget what I see, it’s all about what I can’t see. I can’t drive or wave at somebody or watch a movie or look in the mirror.” She sits up in her seat and cranes her neck and looks at herself in the rearview mirror. “Damn, I’m hot.”
I Will Rise Page 17
