“A countdown to what?"
“To the end of the current cycle. The end of the loop."
He drank from the bottle, his throat working. She liked to watch him now, whatever he did. He finished drinking and screwed the cap back on.
“The loop,” he said, shaking his head.
When he turned to put the bottle back in the refrigerator she saw his other tattoo again: a cross throwing off light. It was inked into the skin on his left shoulder blade.
“You can't even see your own cross,” she said.
He came back to the bed.
“I don't have to see it,” he said. “I just like to know it's there, watching my back."
“Are you Catholic?"
“No."
“My mother is."
“I just like the idea of Jesus,” he said.
“You're spookier than I am,” Kylie said.
“Not by a mile."
She kissed his mouth, but when he tried to caress her she pushed him gently back.
“Take me someplace."
“Where?"
“My grandparents’ house.” She meant “great” grandparents, but didn't feel like explaining to him how so many decades had passed outside the loop of the Preservation.
“Right now?"
“Yes."
It was a white frame house on Queen Anne Hill, sitting comfortably among its prosperous neighbors on a street lined with live oaks. Kylie pressed her nose to the window on the passenger side of the Vee Dub, as Toby called his vehicle.
“Stop,” she said. “That's it."
He tucked the little car into the curb and turned the engine off. Kylie looked from the faded photo in her hand to the house. Her mother's mother had taken the photo just weeks before the world ended. In it, Kylie's great grandparents stood on the front porch of the house, their arms around each other, waving and smiling. There was no one standing on the front porch now.
“It's real,” Kylie said. “I've been looking at this picture my whole life."
“Haven't you ever been here before?"
She shook her head. At the same time her chronometer toned.
“How we doing on the countdown?” Toby asked.
She glanced at the digital display.
“Eight hours."
“So what happens at midnight?"
“It starts up again. The end is the beginning."
He laughed. She didn't.
“So then it's Sunday, right? Then do you countdown to Monday?"
“At the end of the loop it's not Sunday,” she said. “It's the same day over again."
“Two Saturdays. Not a bad deal."
“Not just two. It goes on and on. November ninth a thousand, ten thousand, a million times over."
“Okay."
“You can look at me like that if you want. I don't care if you believe me. You know something, Toby?"
“What?"
“I'm having a really good day."
“That's November ninth for you."
She smiled at him, then kissed him, that feeling, the taste, all of the sensation in its totality.
“I want to see my grandparents now."
She opened the door and got out but he stayed in the car. She crossed the lawn, strewn with big colorful oak leaves, to the front door of the house, stealing backward glances, wanting to know he was still there waiting for her in the yellow car. Her lover. Her boyfriend.
She started to knock on the door but hesitated. From inside the big house she heard muffled music and laughter. She looked around. In the breeze an orange oak leaf detached from the tree and spun down. The sky blew clear and cold. Later it would cloud over and rain. Kylie knew all about this day. She had been told of it since she was a small child. The last day of the world, perfectly preserved for the edification of alien Tourists and anthropologists. Some people said what happened was an accident, a consequence of the aliens opening the rift, disrupting the fabric of reality. What really pissed everybody off, Kylie thought, was the dismissive attitude. There was no occupying army, no invasion. They came, destroyed everything either intentionally or accidentally, then ignored the survivors. The Preservation was the only thing about the former masters of the Earth that interested them.
Kylie didn't care about all that right now. She had been told about the day, but she had never understood what the day meant, the sheer sensorial joy of it, the incredible beauty and rightness of it. A surge of pure delight moved through her being, and for a moment she experienced uncontainable happiness.
She knocked on the door.
“Yes?” A woman in her mid-fifties with vivid green eyes, her face pressed with comfortable laugh lines. Like the house, she was a picture come to life. (Kylie's grandmother showing her the photographs, faded and worn from too much touching.)
“Hi,” Kylie said.
“Can I help you?” the live photograph said.
“No. I mean, I wanted to ask you something."
The waiting expression on her face so familiar. Kylie said, “I just wanted to know, are you having a good day, I mean a really good day?"
Slight turn of the head, lips pursed uncertainly, ready to believe this was a harmless question from a harmless person.
“It's like a survey,” Kylie said. “For school?"
A man of about sixty years wearing a baggy wool sweater and glasses came to the door.
“What's all this?” he asked.
“A happiness survey,” Kylie's great grandmother said, and laughed.
“Happiness survey, huh?” He casually put his arm around his wife and pulled her companionably against him.
“Yes,” Kylie said. “For school."
“Well, I'm happy as a clam,” Kylie's great grandfather said.
“I'm a clam, too,” Kylie's great grandmother said. “A happy one."
“Thank you,” Kylie said.
“You're very welcome. Gosh, but you look familiar."
“So do you. Goodbye."
Back in the car Kylie squeezed Toby's hand. There had been a boy on the Outskirts. He was impotent, but he liked to touch Kylie and be with her, and he didn't mind watching her movies, the ones that made the Old Men sad and angry but that she obsessively hoarded images from in her mind. The boy's hand always felt cold and bony. Which wasn't his fault. The nicest time they ever had was a night they had spent in one of the ruins with a working fireplace and enough furniture to burn for several hours. They'd had a book of poems and took turns reading them to each other. Most of the poems didn't make sense to Kylie but she liked the sounds of the words, the way they were put together. Outside, the perpetual storms crashed and sizzled, violet flashes stuttering into the cozy room with the fire.
In the yellow car, Toby's hand felt warm. Companionable and intimate.
“So how are they doing?” he said.
“They're happy."
“Great. What's next?"
“If you knew this was your last day to live,” Kylie asked him, “what would you do?"
“I'd find a spooky girl and make love to her."
She kissed him. “What else?"
“Ah—"
“I mean without leaving the city. You can't leave the city."
“Why not?"
“Because you'd just get stuck in the Preservation Field until the loop re-started. It looks like people are driving out but they're not."
He looked at her closely, searching for the joke, then grinned. “We wouldn't want that to happen to us."
“No."
“So what would you do on your last day?” he asked.
“I'd find a spooky guy who could fix things and I'd get him to fix me up."
“You don't need fixing. You're not broken."
“I am."
“Yeah?"
“Let's drive around. Then let's have a really great meal, like the best food you can think of."
“That's doable."
“Then we can go back to your apartment."
“What about the big
countdown?"
“Fuck the countdown.” Kylie pushed the timing stud into her chronometer. “There,” she said. “No more countdown."
“You like pizza?” Toby said.
“I don't know. What is it?"
After they made love the second time, Kylie fell into a light doze on Toby's futon bed. She was not used to so much rich stimulation, so much food and drink, so much touching.
She woke with a start from a dream that instantly disappeared from her consciousness. There was the sound of rain, but it wasn't the terrible poisonous rain of her world. Street light through the window cast a flowing shadow across the foot of the bed. It reminded her of the shiny fountain at the waterfront. The room was snug and comforting and safe. There was a clock on the table beside the bed but she didn't look at it. It could end right now.
She sat up. Toby was at his desk under a framed movie poster, bent over something illuminated by a very bright and tightly directed light. He was wearing his jeans but no shirt or socks.
Hello,” she said.
He turned sharply, then smiled. “Oh, hey Kylie. Have a nice rest?"
“I'm thirsty."
He got up and fetched her a half-depleted bottle of water from the refrigerator. While he was doing that she noticed her locator in pieces on the desk.
“We don't need that anymore,” she said, pointing.
“I was just curious. I can put it back together, no problem."
“I don't care about it.” She lay back on the pillows and closed her eyes.
“Kylie?"
“Hmmm?” She kept her eyes closed.
“Who are you? Really."
“I'm your spooky girl."
“Besides that."
She opened her eyes. “Don't spoil it. Please don't."
“Spoil what?"
“This. Us. Now. It's all that matters."
Rain ticked against the window. It would continue all night, a long, cleansing rain. Water that anybody could catch in a cup and drink if they wanted to—water out of the sky.
Toby took his pants down and slipped under the sheet next to her, his body heat like a magnetic field that drew her against him. She pressed her cheek to his chest. His heart beat calmly.
“Everything's perfect,” she said.
“Yeah.” He didn't sound that certain.
“What's the matter?"
“Nothing,” he said. “Only—this is all pretty fast. Don't you think we should know more about each other?"
“Why? Now is what matters."
“Yeah, but I mean, what do you do? Where do you live? Basic stuff. Big stuff, too, like do you believe in God or who'd you vote for for president?"
“I want to go for a long walk in the rain. I want to feel it on my face and not be afraid or sick."
“What do you mean?"
“You're spoiling it. Please, let's make every second happy. Make it a day we'd want to relive a thousand times."
“I don't want to live any day a thousand times."
“Let's walk now."
“What's the hurry?"
She got out of bed and started dressing, her back to him.
“Don't be mad,” he said.
“I'm not mad."
“You are."
She turned to him, buttoning her shirt. “Don't tell me what I am."
“Sorry."
“You practically sleepwalk through the most important day of your life."
“I'm not sleepwalking."
“Don't you even want to fall in love with me?"
He laughed uncertainly. “I don't even know your name."
“You know it. Kylie."
“I mean your last name."
“It doesn't matter."
“It matters to me,” Toby said. “You matter to me."
Finished with her shirt, she sat on the edge of the bed to lace her shoes. “No you don't,” she said. “You only care about me if you can know all about my past and our future. You can't live one day well and be happy."
“Now you sound like Hemingway."
“I don't know what that means and I don't care.” She shrugged into her parka.
“Where are you going?"
“For a walk. I told you what I wanted."
“Yeah, I guess I was too ignorant to absorb it."
She slammed the door on her way out.
She stood under the pumpkin-colored light of the street lamp, confused, face tilted up to be anointed by the rain. Was he watching her from the apartment window, his heart about to break? She waited and waited. This is the part where he would run to her and embrace her and kiss her and tell her that he loved, loved, loved her.
He didn't come out.
She stared at the brick building checkered with light and dark apartment windows, not certain which one was his.
He didn't come out, and it was spoiled.
A bus rumbled between her and the building, pale indifferent faces inside.
Kylie walked in the rain. It was not poison but it was cold and, after a while, unpleasant. She pulled her hood up and walked with her head down. The wet sidewalk was a palette of neon smears. Her fingers touched the shape of the explosive in her pocket. She could find the building with the papered windows. Even if the Tourists tried to stop her she might still get inside and destroy the Eternity Core. It's what her mother wanted, what the Old Men wanted. But what if they caught her? If she remained in the loop through an entire cycle she would become a permanent part of it. She couldn't stand that, not the way she hurt right now. She didn't know what time it was. She didn't know the time. She had to reach her scutter and get out.
A horn went off practically at her elbow. Startled, she looked up. A low and wide vehicle, a boy leaning out the passenger window, smirking.
“Hey, you wanna go for a ride?"
“No."
“Then fuck you, bitch!” He cackled, and the vehicle accelerated away, ripping the air into jagged splinters.
She walked faster. The streets were confusing. She was lost. Her panic intensified. Why couldn't he have come after her and be sorry and love her? But it wasn't like the best parts of the movies. Some of it was good, but a lot of it wasn't. Maybe her mother had been right. But Kylie didn't believe in souls, so wasn't it better to have one day forever than no days? Wasn't it?
Fuck you, bitch.
She turned around and ran back in the direction from which she'd come. At first she didn't think she could find it, but there it was, the apartment building! And Toby was coming out the lobby door, pulling his jacket closed. He saw her, and she ran to him. He didn't mean it and she didn't mean it, and this was the part where they made up, and then all the rest of the loop would be good—the good time after making up. You had to mix the good and bad. The bad made the good better. She ran to him and hugged him, the smell of the wet leather so strong.
“You were coming after me,” she said.
He didn't say anything.
“You were,” she said.
“Yeah."
Something clutched at her heart. “It's the best day ever,” she said.
“I give it a seven point five."
“You don't know anything,” she said. “You got your spooky girl and you had an adventure and you saved the whole world."
“When you put it that way it's a nine. So come on. I'll buy you a hot drink and you can tell me about the tourists from the fifth dimension."
“What time is it?” she asked.
He looked at his watch. “Five of eleven."
“I don't want a hot drink,” she said. “Can you take us some place with a nice view where we can sit in the Vee Dub?"
“You bet."
The city spread out before them. The water of Elliot Bay was black. Rain whispered against the car and the cooling engine ticked down like a slow timer. It was awkward with the separate seats, but they snuggled together, Kylie's head pillowed on his chest. He turned the radio on—not to his loud noise-music but a jazz station, like a complement to the rain. Th
ey talked, intimately. Kylie invented a life and gave it to him, borrowing from stories her mother and grandmother had told her. He called her spooky, his term of endearment, and he talked about what they would do tomorrow. She accepted the gift of the future he was giving her, but she lived in this moment, now, this sweet inhalation of the present, this happy, happy ending. Then the lights of Seattle seemed to haze over. Kylie closed her eyes, her hand on the explosive sphere, and her mind slumbered briefly in a dark spun cocoon.
Kylie punched through, and the sudden light shift dazzled her.
Copyright © 2006 Jack Skillingstead
* * * *
[Back to Table of Contents]
* * *
The Tiger in the Garden
by Scott William Carter
In the last three years, Scott William Carter has sold more than twenty-five short stories to such places as Analog, Realms of Fantasy, Ellery Queen, and Weird Tales, and he has recently begun working on novels. He lives in Oregon with his wife and daughter. You can find out more about his work at www. scottwilliamcarter.com. In his first appearance in Asimov's SF, he takes us to a distant planet and introduces us to...
At precisely noon—not one minute earlier, not one minute later—the ship appeared in Regence's sky. It started as a black dot on a perfect canvas of cobalt, like a drop of ink carelessly spilled from a painter's brush. So small, so seemingly insignificant, and yet José felt his whole body tremble at the sight of it. The punctuality did not surprise him. Unless something had changed, this one was a Bal'ani, and they were said to be obsessive about such things. José had made certain to arrive a half hour early at the landing station. On their home world, the Bal'ani were rumored to eat those who insulted them.
“Constable Valcorez,” the attendant behind him said, “is that truly an Agent's ship?"
“Yes,” José said. Hand raised to block the glare of the sun, he watched through the glass doors as the black dot grew quickly in size, soon filling almost his entire field of vision, until, finally, the ship's thrusters stirred up a fog of dust on the bone-colored ground. Behind the pulsing electric fence that surrounded the landing area, the desolate plains extended flat to the horizon, making the ship that much more stark in appearance. He had seen vids of Agent ships, of course, but seeing one up close was both awful and awe-inspiring. There were three other ships outside, freighters that were not small themselves, and the Agent ship was at least as big as all of them combined.
Asimov's SF, June 2006 Page 6
