JPod

by Douglas Coupland

  Cowboy said, "I miss the greed of the 1990s bubble."

  John Doe said, "I miss the possibility of unearned wealth."

  Bree said, "I miss the possibility of doing something Apple, something one-point-oh."

  Evil Mark said, "I miss people having Hot Wheels tracks set up in their cubicles." (Evil Mark is nostalgic for a stint he did at ILM in the Bay Area two years ago.)

  Gord-O walked into the pod. 'You can't miss the nineties, because you weren't there. They were great. Too bad you screwed-up twits missed out on the party."

  I asked, "What was it like—all that money out there just waiting to rain down on you?"

  "It wasn't merely all that money, Ethan. It was a Fort-Knox-is-hemorrhaging cash geyser. But forget that. This is the Wretched Decade, and here in the Wretched Decade, you drive to Costco to buy Honey Nut Cheerios for my team and me. Oh, and while you're at it, I need six Stouffer's breaded white-meat chicken filet dinners with mashed potatoes. They put a microwave in our coffee station, and I want to try it out." Welcome to my life.

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  . . .

  Three days ago I had to drive John Doe to his house in South Van so he could pick up some car keys, and in his kitchen I was looking around, and there was a jumbo four-slice toaster.

  "Jesus, John—four slices—are you on breakfast duty at Rikers?"

  "Is it so wrong to like toast?"

  "I guess not."

  His living room looked like a Radisson Suites hotel room in somewhere blank like Des Plaines, Illinois. "John, have you considered maybe taping up a poster or something?"

  "Yes, but I decided not to. I like the room's air of calculated neutrality. And poster colours might fade in the sunlight."

  "That's possibly the most depressing thing I've ever heard."

  "Nonsense. Hey, look at these—" From beneath the kitchen counter he pulled out a yellow plastic dairy crate filled with arcade game motherboards from the late 1980s, all of them wrapped in bubble-pack. He'd converted some crap Ikea furniture into a full-scale, economically correct arcade game simulator. We ended up spending the entire afternoon playing Konami's The Simpsons Power Test, which was primitive but cool. We both agreed we couldn't watch the super-early Simpsons episodes where the voices are wrong—especially Homer's—and the line quality is thin and slighdy scary.

  . . .

  The day after I visited John's house, I dropped Bree off at her place because her car was in the shop. Right outside her window was this huge exhaust vent from a fried chicken restaurant, spewing oily participates at her apartment.

  "Bree—what the hell is that thing? How can you live with it?"

  "Oh, that."

  "Yes, that."

  "I call it the trans-fatty acid vapour funnel."

  "It doesn't scare the crap out of you? The smell doesn't keep you up at night?"

  "I grew up with frying-chicken smell. My father the urologist also ran an illicit gambling parlour, and my mom made snacks until five a.m. every night. I find it comforting."

  Who am I to argue?

  . . .

  I just sat through possibly the longest meeting I've ever been in, and possibly the dullest. Let me go through the four hours point by point. Okay, I'm kidding—I wouldn't have sent my worst enemy to today's meeting. The upshot is that, now that Steve is gone, a political batde has given rise to Steve's replacement: Alistair. Today Alistair told us our new mandate for BoardX: "Its new title is SpriteQuest. SpriteQuest is a warm, heartfelt journey into magical and fantastic lands, where our hero, Prince Amulon, allows children to rediscover life's joys as he teaches us all to laugh and dream again."

  Something died inside us as we heard this proclamation. Senior management, though, interpreted the ensuing silence as tacit agreement.

  Alistair carried on. "We decided that a skateboard was too constraining a vehicle for storytelling. If we convert the skateboard into Prince Amulon's magic carpet, on which kids can ride along, we can create more options for learning and growth for the players."

  Learning? Growth?

  Kaitlin raised her hand.

  Alistair short-circuited her query. "I can read your mind, and let me answer your question. We all felt that Jeff the Turde might ultimately be interpreted as too derivative of the TMNT franchise. We want to be industry leaders, and SpriteQuest will take us all to a new place—a place of excitement and challenge. While Jeff the Turde is, unfortunately, no longer with us, his mesh, utilities and properties will live on as we repurpose him into Prince Amulon—a bold twist that will create many more opportunities to explore him as a character. How does Prince Amulon think} What are his motivations} What drives him through the game? With just a few extra polygons, we ought to be able to convert BoardX's inner-city environment frameworks into dungeons. Ditto the rest of the game. Think magic. Think challenge. Think possibilities] And now I think it would be appropriate to have a minute of silence in memory of Steve, wherever he may be."

  After the meeting ended, we shuffled, zombie-like, back to jPod. Fortunately, I had to make Gord-O's Cheerios run, which allowed me to space out for a few hours in traffic.

  . . .

  I've come to the conclusion that documents are thirty-four percent more boring when presented in the Courier font. Please see the following examples:

  I showed the above list to Kaitlin, and she berated me. "In order for something to become boring, it has to be interesting to begin with," she said. Thus, I present Kaitlin's list:

  . . .

  I went to get some skin tone at Tanfastic, and was lying in the sunbed, enjoying its dull lavender hum, when somebody in the bed one room over put on Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart" at full volume. My six minutes instandy began to feel like three hundred.

  . . .

  We just invented a cubicle game called Baffle. It's a hot potato clone. Everyone sits in his or her cubicle as we toss a loaded stapler over the fabric wall baffles between us. You never know who's going to throw it to whom, and you'd be surprised at how much fun it is. For technical reasons, the game made us assign a code name to each dis-assemblable fabric-covered wall baffle in the pod. We decided to assign them non-specific food flavours:

  Regular

  Original

  Classic

  Alpine

  Ranch

  Frost

  Extreme

  Fresh

  Arctic

  Blast

  . . .

  Okay, I'm procrastinating about the meeting's fallout.

  . . .

  Okay . . .

  When I got back to the pod after Gord-O's Cheerios run, Kaitlin was gone. Bree said she had gone to my parents' place. "Your mom needed help harvesting."

  "Oh jeez, I forgot."

  "Ethan, you did not forget. I can tell because you just used your fake voice. How come you're not there helping her?"

  "Because my mother makes a huge pot of curry every time she harvests—it's to cover up the pot smell—and the curry smells even worse."

  "Oh."

  "What did you mean, my 'fake' voice?"

  "The voice you use when you're not telling the truth. We talk about it all the time. Cowboy does a really good impression of it. You're a terrible liar."

  "Where is everybody?"

  "We're al
l in denial. Cowboy went to sniff magic markers and watch planes land at the airport, and John Doe's out having his weekly mouse-brown hair tinting."

  "Evil Mark?"

  "Some bug tester downstairs has some NFL cards he wants to buy for his collection."

  "So why are you still here?"

  "I played Freecell for two hours. Now I'm off to a downtown wine-tasting seminar. Zinfandels."

  "You're still determined to be chic for Mr. French Guy?"

  "Absolutely."

  "Do you feel like discussing SpriteQuest?"

  "Not yet."

  "I know what you mean."

  Bree left. I was considering the sixty-seven unopened emails at the end of the Chute when the phone rang: Kaitlin. "Ethan, can you come over here?"

  "Kaitlin, you know how I feel about that curry smell—"

  "Your mom isn't making a curry this time, and besides, this is about something else. I found something."

  "What?"

  "I can't say. Come over."

  When I got to my parents' place, Mom was dithering about in the front hallway, wearing a safari suit. "Hi, dear. Glad you could find the time to help out."

  "Mom, what's with the outfit? You look like the host of a faltering Japanese game show."

  "Well, dear, I suppose one might say the same about your ragamuffin outfits, but some people have manners. Kaitlin's downstairs separating and sorting buds for me. Could you go help her?"

  "Sure."

  "I'm making spaghetti tonight, not curry."

  "Praise the Lord."

  Downstairs, Kaitlin whispered, "Can she hear us?"

  "What's going on?"

  I sat down and started to pluck seeds from the buds and trim out the stalky bits.

  "An hour ago I cut myself, so I went upstairs to get a Band-Aid from the guest bathroom drawer."

  "And?"

  "I found Steve's tie in the drawer, along with some guest soaps."

  "His tie?"

  "You know the one—the Tm kooky' tie with litde penguins wearing sunglasses on it."

  "Uh-oh."

  "Ethan, I'm looking at your face, and I know there's something you're not telling me. Spill."

  I looked across the room to make sure I'd have enough time to shut up if Mom came down. "I think Steve and my mom were having a fling," I whispered.

  "What!" Kaitlin shrieked.

  "Shhhh!"

  "No way. Your mother's at least fifteen years older than him."

  'Your point being? My mother's always been a major guy magnet. Oh God, it feels so weird talking about her like this."

  "Like she has sex? Grow up. But with Steve}"

  "Imagine how I feel. A few months ago, I came by the house to drop off some magazines at four in the morning, and he was at the bottom of the driveway, shaving with an electric razor."

  "Yughh."

  During the awkward silence that fell, we shucked seeds into a steel salad bowl.

  Kaitlin said, "Do you think there's a connection between your mom and Steve's, you know, Steve's disappearance?"

  "I doubt it," I said, trying hard not to use my easily detected fake/lying voice.

  "What should we do?"

  "No idea."

  Mom was chopping mushrooms when I walked into the kitchen. She seemed cheerful. "Mushrooms have come a long way from those beige buttons I ate growing up. Shiitake, inoki and morels—such flavour."

  "Mom, I was in the guest bathroom looking for a Band-Aid and found Steve's penguin tie in the drawer."

  Mom put down her knife. "Did you?"

  "Yes, I did."

  Mom picked up the knife and began chopping mushrooms again. "Well, he's not dead, if that's what you're wondering."

  "If he's not dead, where is he?"

  "Keep your voice down. Kaitlin might hear."

  "Do you know where he is?"

  "No, Ethan, I don't know where he is, but Kam Fong did say he wouldn't kill him."

  "Kam Fong?"

  "Shush! Yes, Kam Fong. Such a nice man."

  "How does Steve connect to Kam Fong?"

  "Pour me a vodka tonic and I'll tell you. Make it a double. Slice of lime—a circular slice, not a wedge."

  "I think I'll pour one for myself, too."

  "No you don't. You and Kaitlin will be using the scales tonight, and I want to make sure you get the numbers right."

  So I mixed Mom a drink and pulled up a bar stool while she sliced and diced.

  "You have to understand that I liked young Steven, but I was never in love with him."

  "Gee. I feel much better already."

  "Hand me my drink." She took a big gulp. "I know that gulp didn't look too good, but truth be told, I do feel a bit bad about what happened."

  "What happened?"

  "I'm getting to that. You have to realize that Steven was in love with me."

  "That doesn't surprise me."

  "Are you being facetious?" Mom stared at me. "A girl can't control who will and who won't fall in love with her, Ethan. And sometimes, when a nuisance person falls in love with you, it can be awfully . . . awkward."

  "How?"

  "In the case of young Steven, he was always phoning and waiting for your father to leave so he could come around. It was awful."

  That still didn't explain Steve's tie in the soap drawer in the guest bathroom. "And?"

  "I just wanted Steven to leave me alone. So I called Kam Fong." Mom stared at me uneasily. "Why do you care about young Steven, by the way? I thought he was making your life miserable."

  "He was, but now that he's gone, we've ended up with something much worse than him."

  "I thought you might be happy to have him out of your hair."

  "What did Kam Fong do with him?"

  "I made him promise that he wouldn't kill him."

  "How humane."

  "Shush. You'll just have to ask Kam yourself. I can't ask him because it'll look as if I don't trust him—and if you do ask him, make sure he knows that it's you who wants to find Steven, not me."

  "Done."

  "Dinner will be ready in ninety minutes," said Mom. "Oh, I forgot—your father may have landed a speaking role in an SUV commercial. He's so excited."

  I went downstairs again. Kaitlin asked, "Well?"

  "I'm not sure."

  "You think there's a connection?"

  "I just don't know."

  "How did the tie end up here?"

  "She didn't say."

  "Ethan, you're using your fake voice."

  Shit.

  "No, I'm not."

  "And you're even lying about using your fake voice."

  Crap.

  "Ethan, I'm going to let this one go because it's family, and family stuff is always weird, but don't think I'm going to forget any of this."

  "Kaitlin—" I looked at her. I love every molecule of her body. "That is really nice of you." I looked down at the task at hand. "I really just want to turn off my brain. Let's groom this pot and veg for a litde bit."

  Kaitlin sighed. "I wish my parents took such good care of their grow-op. My mom's lazy about tracking genetics. Her plants are the foliage equivalents of Cletus the Slack-jawed Yokel. And my dad's electrical wiring is like that scene in Poltergeist where the evil bedroom is trying to suck the litde girl into another dimension. When you turn on the light, you clench your toes, tighten your sphincter and wait for a different universe to suck you up."

  . . .

  Dinner went off without a hitch, although when I had to use the guest bathroom, Steve's tie was gone. Dad was stoked about his potential speaking part. "For once I get to be the asshole driving the shiny silver climate-killer down a mountain road that's been sprayed with a firehose by set-dec."

  "What's your line in the commercial?"

  "'Smooth, smooth, smooth.' Do you want me to demonstrate my various possible readings?"

  "Go for it, Dad."

  "Here's the one I think is best, but you listen and you tell me.

  Smooth, smoot
h, smoooooooth. What do you think?"

  "Do a few more."

  "Of course. Smooooooth, smooooooooth, smooooooooooooth."

  Kaitlin said, "I like that one."

  "Really? Did you like the way I lengthened the oooooooooooo sound?"

  "It was good."

  Imagine an hour more of this and you have dinner. Afterwards, we weighed Mom's crop and bagged it. Back at my place, around midnight, Kaitlin and I found Kam Fong leaving with a suitcase. He was moving out.

  "Kam—no—we'll miss you." We really would.

  "I'm not going far. Your brother just found me this great house in West Van—up on the hill. A bargain, too—the owner got nailed for shipping sugar pills to American seniors who thought they were buying Gleevec and OxyContin. Got it for peanuts. It's got a commanding city view, two karaoke rooms and it's been feng-shuied by a Grand Master." This was about as excited as Kam gets.

  Kaitlin asked if Kam would have bought it if it hadn't been feng-shuied.

  "Of course. Feng shui's one of those mumbo-jumbo Chinese things people expect Chinese people to get all serious about. It's total crap, but I use it all the time to haggle for lower prices. In any event, come to my housewarming the night after tomorrow. And Ethan, be prepared to sing along to Madonna's "Vogue."'

  "Mother of God, no."

  "Host chooses the tunes. Bye, kids."

  . . .

  Kaitlin's first meeting in the morning was about the repurposing of BoardX's characters. "I suppose I don't mind doing yet one more anime-style project, but Jesus, anime's like the gaming equivalent of those $8.95 white plastic stacking chairs from Wal-Mart. Sure, they work, but they've also slaughtered every other chair on the market. It's a category killer."