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Derek
Derek lifted the large plastic tub, which he had just filled with ice,
level with the counter, dumped the ice into the stainless steel container,
and sighed. He looked at his watch: 10:25, it said; almost mid-morning,
and five eternal minutes left until his fifteen minute coffee break. Fuck
it, he thought, I'll take it now. He bent down low with a much-practiced
'bowling' motion and sent the plastic tub whizzing down the tiled corridor
into the dish room where it hit the surly dishwasher on the ankles.
"'Bowling For Busboys'!" he yelled (out of habit, mostly, since it had
been a while since he had found the consequences of that action really
amusing), and paced off to the staff room.
"I'll bowl ya!" he heard the irate dishwasher yell, but the dishwasher
always yelled that, and Derek had long since ceased to notice: he was
already reaching for his cigarette pack. With quick, practiced movements
he withdrew one of the long tubes from the cardboard package. With one
hand he placed it in a precise position in his lips while the other hand
was occupied with first replacing the package to his shirt pocket, then
digging out a half used pack of matches from his too tight jeans. He was
extremely conscious of the fluidity of his movements; lighting the
cigarette with the match was the hard part, and he wanted to look as cool
as possible, smooth and flowing, for all the eyes he perceived to be on him.
He managed to execute the task to his satisfaction as he entered the staff
room above the restaurant, but only Karen was there, finishing a butt of
her own. He didn't give a shit about Karen and there was no one else
around.
He felt a frustration welling up inside that seemed incomprehensible.
He thrust himself into one of the tattered chairs which his employers had
so graciously donated to facilitate his comfort, and blew out a long stream
of smoke from his lips, like a visible sigh. Karen eyed him with wary
curiousity, but Derek was busy inspecting the floor. He could hear the
clank and clatter of dishes from the dishroom, and the slamming of doors
and calling of orders as the waiters and waitresses bounced off of and
around each other like atoms in a solution. He realized he had to go back
out there and face that frantic pace again in only fifteen minutes.
Unconsciously he looked at his watch and saw that five of those minutes had
already passed. "Fuck," he said, without thinking about it.
"Whatsa matter?" asked Karen as she cracked her gum. She could stand
the silence no longer; it made her uncomfortable.
"Nuthin'," Derek lied, but it wasn't anything he could have spoken to
her about. It was a subject which seemed to be most on his mind but least
on his lips, and when he tried to articulate these things he simply stopped
talking: there were too many things he wanted to say, all of them at once,
and he couldn't decide where to start. That seemed important: deciding
where to start. He feared that if he started in the wrong place his
listener might get the wrong idea, or make the wrong conclusions about
himself. It seemed like everything he wanted to say needed to be qualified.
So he said nothing, or very little. "I dunno, just restless, I quess.
Don't really want to be here either." He chuckled, but there was no humor
in it.
"Yeah, I know what ya mean. There's a good movie on T.V. I'm
missing," said Karen, cracking her gum again, and chewing enthusiastically.
That's not what I meant, bitch, he thought. Derek hated the tube. To
him the T.V. was an insidious invention: it was far too powerful a tool in
the wrong hands, and too easy an excuse for not doing anything yourself.
Derek thought that "The Glass Teat" was a perfect name for it. Still,
there was a good side to it: it helped tie together the world in a network
of communication, which was valuable, provided the communicators were
trustworthy. But Derek felt that most of them weren't. Most of T.V. was
blatant propaganda, and people like Karen just lapped it all up, like
kittens to milk, or junkies to junk. But he didn't feel like explaining
all that to Karen just now. Most of those thoughts were coded as symbols
in his brain, and drumming up sentences to clothe those symbols with
meaningful dress was too much like work. So he said, "No, I mean I'd
rather be somewhere else entirely, like another country, or something. I'm
tired of this..." he waved his hand around in an "all-encompassing"
gesture.
"Yeah, I like to travel, too. We went to California once, saw
Disneyland. 'Course, I was just twelve. But I'd go back tomorrow, if I
could. I remember..."
Derek tuned out Karen's voice as she droned on and on about all the
things she saw at Disneyland, how her brother was such a pest and got
chocolate ice cream all over his new white shirt with a picture of Goofy on
the front, and how the Matterhorn was such a scary ride, why, she almost
fainted, and on and on, and Derek felt that Karen didn't have a clue what
he was talking about. He didn't see how anyone could consider going to
Disneyland "travelling", or the United States as a different country. It
still had a familiar atmosphere: the language was the same, the religion
was the same, the cars were the same. Even the T.V. was the same. The
goals were the same, the same ethics, the same books, same records, same,
same, same. Derek felt that Karen would be horrified by the thought of
going anywhere unfamiliar, like Mexico, or the island of Celebes.
"I don't know about the States," said Derek carefully, for he believed
in being diplomatic unless he held a person in complete contempt and there
were others around who felt the same to back him up. "I was thinking of,
like, maybe, Mexico." He said Mexico as if it was some improbable place
that he had just dreamt up out of his head.
"Oouu!" her face crinkled up, "I hear it's dirty, and there's all
these beggars, and they'll rob you blind."
"How do you know that?"
"Well, that's what I heard," she said, indignant that he would
question her. "I don't know. But they always look dirty on TV."
Derek leaned back in the ratty chair and folded his arms over his
chest, the dim clatter of dishes downstairs echoing the random and hazy
pattern of his thoughts. Abruptly he looked at his watch and his shoulders
slumped in disappointment: he was five minutes overdue for his return to
work. He muttered an obscenity and, without so much as a look at Karen he
went back downstairs.
II
Derek walked out ten minutes early into the fine, warm and breezy
afternoon day. He felt bad leaving all his co-workers behind in the hot
and stuffy restaurant, but not bad enough. Outside he finally felt like he
had enough room. He took a deep breath and smiled as he exhaled. The rush
hour was swiftly approaching, but as yet there was only a faint cloying
smell of exhaust fumes so he took in another lungful and savored it. In a
little while he would be on the bus, and by habit his breathing would
become shallow and rapid; he hated some smells, especially chemicals.
Other people's rancid sweat also topped the list, along with musty attics,
restaurant kitchens, paint, powerful perfumes, stale beer, and old, full
ashtrays. But machine exhaust was the worst, and had been ever since his
Dad had caught him, long ago in his childhood, squatting behind the car
while it was running, sniffing the wondrous sweet vapors.
"Hey!" Dad had yelled. "What the hell are you doing!? You want to
get brain damage?!" Derek hadn't been old enough to know precisely what
brain damage was, but he understood that it was BAD; it wasn't often that
his Dad yelled like that. From then on he tried to make sure that whenever
he smelled car exhaust he held his breath, even if it meant having no
breath to hold.
A truck went by, and Derek breathed cautiously, but the breezes washed
the fumes away. He continued to his bus stop, smiling. I could walk home
and enjoy this fully, he realized. He knew of a couple of long-cuts that
would take him through some nice residential streets, past a well kept park
by the river with lush grass and tall, fat trees. If he stopped in the
park for a sprawl in the grass it might take about an hour to get home to
his apartment. Besides, he needed the exercise: his shape was gaining
even more than his usual paunchiness. Even though he despised the food he
worked with, he could not seem to help nibbling throughout the day.
But he felt tired. He'd been on his feet all day, and maybe that was
enough exercise. No need to abuse oneself, is there? He got to his bus
stop next to the oversized department store, perched himself on the steel
tube railing which divided the parking lot from the sidewalk, lit a
cigarette, and waited for his bus.
III
Derek got off the bus two stops early and walked the rest of the way
home down the busy street which ran past his house. He did it as a sort of
penance for not walking all the way home, and ended up not enjoying it a
bit. The street was a major artery for traffic bound for home across the
river, and was bottlenecked by the small width of the old steel bridge. It
was jammed, as usual, with a variety of traffic: executives on their way
home in their air conditioned self-contained personal transport units,
isolated from the very world they controlled, and looking as though their
thoughts were unfathomable; toughs in hotrods playing the latest Heavy
Metal bands, or classic Led Zeppelin; prim librarians with nouveau-
hornrimmed glasses (faint strands of Bach and Mozart), followed by a
nondescript fellow in a battered Datsun from which Mahler's Symphony #2
blared forth. Some old red-faced guy driving a matching old red pickup
fitted with racks for carrying plate glass tried to go around a stalled car
before he looked, and the successful saleswoman in the expensive Oldsmobile
would have had to slam on her brakes, but she hit the gas instead and her
heavy iron beast (roaring) leapt into the side of the old red glass-truck.
Shattered glass misted the air, rainbow colors which swiftly fell to the
pavement and became dangerous garbage. The toughs in the hotrod jeered,
"AwwwRIGHT!! Didjew see that, man?! Haha!" The old guy in the old red
pickup hit the horn getting out of the cab and it stuck on, braying like an
injured mule. Been meanin' to git that fixed, thought the old guy. He
went around his truck to where the big powder blue Olds tiger had taken a
bite out of his rusty red mule to survey the damage. This wasn't his first
accident, no sense in getting too worked up. He knew it was his fault, too.
The saleswoman's shriek surprized him. She couldn't get her door open,
and she was trying hard to roll down the window. As a result, her first
few words were muffled:
"...dam son-of-a-bitch, waddaya tryin' ta do, huh?! Y'wanna get
everybody killed?! I'll sue you you bastard!..."
Derek tuned out the rest as best he could and wished fervently that he
had walked all the way home. I will, he thought fiercely. I promise I
will walk home everyday, he swore, as if standing up to himself and putting
his foot down. Unless it is bad weather, his brain quickly added. Derek
cursed. It seemed that everytime he made a vow to himself a host of imps,
and even some more powerful devils, crowded into his headspace trying to
make exceptions and prove him wrong. There were even times when, in
disbelief, his conscious mind sat back and watched while the imps, like
perverse puppeteers, twisted his tongue into saying things he had no right
to say (such as criticizing others and judging the depths of their
spiritual depravity), or forced his feet towards the drugstore where he
could buy another pack of smokes, even though he kept telling himself that
he really wanted to quit. His conscience could implore and beg, but it was
only a quiet, still voice, easily ignored.
Derek clenched his fists in frustration; he ground his teeth in
desperation. He longed for an answer: how do you make yourself do the
things you really want to do? or make yourself be the way you really want
to be? Is there an answer? Derek didn't know. It seemed like everytime
he thought about stuff like that it made his head whirl. He didn't even
feel like he could talk properly, communicate at all. There were so many
words crowding his brain, and words needed to be let out one at a time, in
a certain order.
He didn't even notice that he had already automatically turned across
the front lawn (he never used the cracked and heaving sidewalk) and was
making his way up the creaking stairs at the side of the old leaning house
where he was renting an apartment on the third floor. He reached into his
pocket to pull out his key ring and froze: it wasn't there. His eyes
widened. Shit, he thought. He patted himself absently and dug his fingers
into other pockets while he mentally retraced his steps home. Then he
remembered leaving them on the table in the staff room as he had gotten
changed to leave. He'd been in a hurry: skipping out early wasn't
something you did when your fellow employees were around. He'd almost made
it unobserved, but Andrea had come bursting in the back way, almost taking
his head off with the door. Andrea was a waitress he got along with quite
well, but today he had been curt with her:
"Hey Derek! How'r ya? Looks like you're leaving a little early," she
said, far too loudly. He rolled his eyes and said, "Yeah, so?"
"'Yeah, so' nothing," she shot back, refusing to be daunted.
"See you later." It was a statement of fact.
That's what he'd always liked about Andrea: she was straight-forward
and honest, and full of energy. She was one of those persons who exuded
energy and managed to animate everyone else around her. She was one of
those neat independent girls who somehow latch onto and keep interesting,
handsome and artistic guys, while being the object of every other guy's
not-necessarily-sexual desire. She wasn't someone who you had to groan
about while they went around with some goofball who managed (by what means,
no one knows) to impress her with his car. You couldn't help liking Scott,
Andrea's boyfriend.
Thinking about talking to Andrea made it that much easier for Derek to
get up his resolve to head back to work. Suddenly he chuckled, thinking
that Fate was going to make him walk, no matter how hard his natural apathy
tried to assert itself. He clambered back down the stairs and headed for
the back lane, instead of going up the busy front street. It was much more
peaceful; the delapidated houses and the accumulated garbage even looked
like Art. He suddenly felt good, so good that he decided to reward himself.
He promptly lit a cigarette.
IV
It took more than an hour to get back to work, longer than Derek had
anticipated, and he was tired by the time he arrived. Man, I am out of
shape, he thought, and he felt vaguely guilty about it, but pushed the
thoughts aside with the conviction that he was doing something about it--he
was actively pursuing a goal. Action was very important. Action could
change your very mind; like washing a car, with action, force and energy
you could remove all the dirt and corrosive salt to reveal the gleaming,
solid entity beneath. Sometimes Derek felt that his mind--maybe
consciousness was a better word--was somehow smothered, and, had there been
some sort of "other-word" entity there to assess it, would have appeared
indistinct and amorphous. He spent most of his conscious thought-time
wondering where to start cleaning. But at times like this he felt much
better, like as if he had been aimlessly scrubbing, and suddenly saw,
beneath the crust and ooze, a wonderful stray gleam. He dared not question.
With a smile on his face he jerked the door of the restaurant open and
swung inside.
It was always dark in the restaurant, but the kitchen was well lit,
and he nodded greetings to the two busy night-shift cooks. The head cook,
with the unlikely name of Ipzwaldt, was a tall, lanky guy with a pleasantly
twisted face. "Hey Derek!" he yelled, "since you abandoned ship too soon
before, why doncha bail us out for a bit?"
"Sure thing, Captain Waldo," said Derek with a grin. He was in too
good a mood to feel bad about his earlier actions.
"That's 'aye aye' to you, sailor."
"'Arrr, like bloody 'ell," snarled Derek, reaching to butter some
bread.
"Watch yerself, mate. That's close to mutiny. Hey Bob!" said Waldo,
calling to the other cook. "Hold this bugger down while I pour our Special
Sauce down his pants."
Bob, who was new, got into the spirit of the banter. "I'll not do it,
Cap'n. Not 'til I get a bloomin' raise," he said in a parody of Irish.
"What?! Insurrection on my ship? Fine, I'll do it meself. But you'd
best look to your own britches later."
They carried on for a while, until the waiters and waitresses stopped
plying them with orders. Andrea noticed Derek working. "What are you
doing here?" she asked.
"Bailing," he said, and flashed her a smile of "I'm OK, you're OK too".
"You're weird," she said, and wondered how he could be so moody.
Derek just chuckled.
V
Derek liked working with Waldo. Waldo rarely lost his cool, and was
almost always in a good mood, but the thing Derek liked most was that Waldo
and he never bumped into each other. That might seem like a small thing,
but in a crowded kitchen full of objects both sharp and hot it became
important. Somehow he and Waldo knew where each other were going, which
way the other would move, even whether or not the other guy was coming
around a blind corner. Derek could remember many times when he had avoided
a collision by slowing down for no other reason than he felt he had to.
And he knew that Waldo had done the same. It was sort of like dancing
(once the restaurant got going you did get into a rhythm), and he and Waldo
were great partners.
Of course, Derek didn't know why this was so, but he knew it was true.
When he worked with other guys, half the time he was running into them,
saying things like "'scuse me" and "oops! Sorry" all night. It got
frustrating, and usually destroyed Derek's good mood. Derek had a passion
for harmony and flow; it got right to his gut when he was working with some
klutz who couldn't seem to understand what dancing was all about.
So Derek, enjoying himself, stayed in the kitchen and worked for a
couple of extra hours for free until the manager, a short, squat, young guy
named C.D. (the cooks all called him Compact Dip--behind his back of
course) told Derek that he had better leave the kitchen since he didn't
have on his uniform. Derek remembered his keys, and then remembered that
he had wanted to talk to Andrea.
"Sure thing, C.D.," he said, agreeably. "We'll see you mates later,"
he left Waldo and Bob in the now calm kitchen. Waldo threw a chunk of
pineapple his way, but Derek dodged around the corner and was gone.
Having gathered his keys, he headed towards the staff table which was
set into an unobtrusive corner of the restaurant, and sat down on the bench
seat next to Tracy who was chattering animatedly (as she always was) with
Andrea. Andrea nodded a greeting; Tracy said "hi", absently, because she
was engrossed in her story (as she always was). Derek tried to pick up the
flow of the conversation while he surreptitiously checked Andrea's pack of
cigarettes. She had only one, so he left it there. She caught him as he
put the pack back down and slapped his hand, giving him an exaggerated
dirty look. Tracy, feeling interrupted, hit Derek too, and said, "Leave
her stuff alone", then continued with her story as if nothing had happened.
Derek envied her that. If someone interrupted him in the middle of a
sentence he usually forgot what he was talking about. And sometimes he even
managed to interrupt himself, new thoughts intruding upon the current ones.
That was embarrasing.
Derek was wondering how she did it when he realized that she was
talking to him, trying to get out of the bench seat.
"Will you move? Or do I have to cause some pain?" she wielded a
burning cigarette threateningly. He grabbed a knife from the table and
took an "en guarde" position. They fenced for a bit, laughing, then he got
up to let her out of the bench seat.
"You look preoccupied," said Andrea as Derek sat back down.
"Ah so, so very perceptive, missy. Derek Chan seek profound wisdom
from you'self. He is at great loss."
"Yeah, what did you lose?"
Derek got serious. "My sanity," he said. She laughed.
"So you finally realized. Well, join the club, sonny. If you think
you're the only one just take a..."
"No!" he said with some heat. "I know I'm not the only one, but I
want to do something about it." He looked around, but no one else was near.
"Look, I'm starting to realize some things and it isn't pleasant. I'm not
going anywhere, I'm just drifting. I'm just floating along in this not-so-
pleasant world. I want to go somewhere else, do something different! I'm
tired of this crapping lifestyle..." he trailed off, groping for words.
"So do something, then."
Derek's whole body slumped. "I guess I just don't know how to start."
He fiddled with a book of matches, sighed, and tossed them on the table.
Derek felt disappointed. It was as if, having seen the first stray gleam
from the body of his mind he had left it, partially satisfied, and when he
had come back the shiny patch was gone.
"Why don't you go travelling?"
"What?" Derek broke out of his musings.
"Go travelling. You know, hop on a bus and head south with the birds.
Hey! Then you could avoid the winter. You go far enough south and you just
find a nice beach and stay there. Smell new smells, taste new tastes, hell,
see new seas. Ha!" Andrea was getting excited, "I know a place in Mexico
where you could have a hut on the Pacific for about ten bucks a month. And
you meet all these great people!"
Her enthusiasm infected him. He had heard a lot of Andrea's stories
before, and he had listened with a kind of wistfulness, as if he knew that
those things would never happen to him, though he would like them to. But
this time he didn't feel like listening to any more stories. He
interrupted her again.
"So how much would it cost me to get there and back by the cheapest
way?"
She blinked. "Really? You wanna go?"
He nodded. "I have managed to put some money away. It was going to
be for a car, but who needs a car?"
"Well that's great! But maybe we shouldn't talk about it here. Why
don't you come over, let me see," she counted on her fingers, "how about
Friday night? That way you can think up some good questions, and Scott and
I can figure some stuff out."
He beamed at her, and privately decided to bring a bottle of scotch.
CHAPTER TWO
I
The great rythmic beat swelled up around him, massaged his body,
pushing it gently to and fro. His eyes were closed, but he had just rubbed
them and the brilliant waves of magenta and blue made his heart pound with
a familiar but enigmatic ecstacy. Derek opened his eyes and stared again
into the warm flame of the candle, the only light in the room. There was
nothing else; just this creamy white candle which fed the tiny sprite
dancing on its tapered tip. The moment lasted forever; Derek felt as if he
was on the verge of Truth. Just a little higher, he thought.
He brought what was left of the joint to his lips and drew in
professionally, with just the right smooth mix of air and smoke. He held
it there in his lungs feeling the smoke swirl inside his body, his huge
body the size of the Earth with its currents and pulsings; he could feel
the marrow growing inside his bones, sensed the slow secretion of the stuff
that made up his fingernails and hair. He felt a dust mote land on his arm
and poke a nerve; it began to itch. His inner ear warned him that his
gentle rocking had gone too far. He fell over and realized that he had
held his breath too long and was passing out. That struck him as absurd;
he snorted and began to laugh, the thin smoke escaping his lips in small
puffs.
Abruptly he began to cough, violently. He groped for his glass of
orange juice and soda, almost knocked it over, and brought it to his lips
too fast. He banged his teeth on the glass and some of the orange juice
spilt onto his T-shirt. He hardly noticed as he finally gulped down the
cooling, bubbly liquid. He coughed a couple of times more; the burning
sensation in his chest lessened. He sat there, feeling it with the whole
of his being while staring into the dark to the left of the burning candle.
The moment of Truth was gone, and Derek jolted out of his timeless revery
feeling a profound cold silence all about him and within his very soul.
His eyes widened and he looked around. The thin yellow light of the candle
glimmered from the white walls which now seemed much too close. A pang of
fear chilled Derek's heart. He swung his head and looked across the room
and the immensity of the space before him, yawning like the vortex which
preceeds the black hole, hit his brain like a shock.
"What is happening?" his lips moved, but no sound came out. It was
like when he was a kid and was having a nightmare. He would come into a
semi-wakeful state, terrified and wanting to scream, but the most he could
do was whisper "mom...mom...", and that was the most terrifying of all.
But Derek was a little older now, and he had some faith in his own reality.
He was suddenly aware of the muffled warbling sound of the TV of the people
who lived below him, and he realized that the record he had been playing
was over, had been for a while. A relieved chuckle escaped him. He was
glad that the silence he had felt had not been in his soul, but rather in
his environment.
"Well," he said outloud to himself, "I think I'll just turn the damn
thing over." He wondered vaguely if it was true that only crazy people
talked to themselves, but before he had a chance to dwell on it there was a
knock on the door.
Who could that be? he wondered. Derek always felt terribly vulnerable
when he was stoned. He felt like people could see right through him, right
to the spot in his heart where his deepest fears lay. Anything he said or
did only made those fears more obvious, so Derek usually clammed up. He
hated going to parties unless he knew everybody, and he felt most
uncomfortable in the presence of people who were not stoned. Most likely
the person at the door wasn't. Derek began to feel pangs of guilt, and did
not even realize that he was standing motionless in the room, his head down
and his arms keeping the record in his hands away from his body, like a
mannequin poised to groove.
There was a second series of knocks, harder this time, and a familiar
voice called out, "Hey Derek! Hey tortiose, you in your shell?" Derek
didn't say anything, but he smiled widely, put the record on and turned the
volume way up. As he opened the door, giggling mischeviously, the music
burst out, flooding the room with noise.
It was Arthur, of course, and right now Derek felt like he needed a
dose of Arthur's unquenchable energy. Arthur took one look at Derek and
shrieked with raucous laughter, which Derek could barely hear.
"You crazy guy! Look at you, just look! Your eyeballs are flaming
scarlet. Your nose is dripping, you're drooling like a retard, you look
terrible, ha ha!" Arthur poked at Derek's ribs exhibiting a license for
physical abuse which only good friends display. Derek tried in vain to
fend him off. His silly grin spread across his face and became choking
laughter. "Hey, do you have any more?" Arthur shouted over the music and
continued to ply his abuse.
"Not for you, you...you..." Derek forgot what he was going to say.
But he realized that the door was still open and here they were shouting
about illegal substances and playing music far too loudly. Derek's beaming
face suddenly clouded over. He pushed Arthur aside impatiently and
unceremoniously, closed the door and locked it.
"Aww, man, don't be so paranoid. Your neighbors are cool."
Derek shrugged. A swirl of feelings engulfed him. He felt stupid for
not having noticed the door, and he wished that Arthur had more sense.
Whether his neighbors were cool or not was not really the point; Derek was
a private person and did not like to feel that his comings, goings, and
doings were known to just anyone. Oddly enough, Derek could justify the
volume of his music because it served to mask his personal actions. He
looked at Arthur who was eyeing him, fists on hips, with a sardonic grin.
Derek ignored it. "You want some?" he said. It was more of a statement
than a question; Arthur was an avid smoker of "the Herb".
"Sure, if you haven't already smoked it all." Arthur was trying to
joke, but Derek suddenly did not feel like responding. He was vaguely aware
that he was not being very friendly, but Arthur's exhuberance was suddenly
bothering him. Only a couple of minutes ago Derek felt excited about
Arthur. But now Arthur's energy, as much of it as there was, seemed stale.
Derek disappeared into his darkened bedroom and pretended to root
around, trying to clear his head. I'm just being moody, he thought. I
can't relate to him 'cause he's not stoned...yet! Derek soon emerged
carrying a bag of green powder and a packet of rolling papers. He did not
look at Arthur, but went into the livingroom and turned on the lamp in the
corner. He left the candle burning and turned down the music a touch.
Then he set about rolling a joint.
Arthur surveyed Derek's livingroom with his permanently curious eye.
It was rather bare: there were only a few prints hanging up to take away
the starkness of the white walls, and the furniture was limited to a coffee
table, a few chairs and a beanbag scattered over the cheap indoor/outdoor
carpeting on the floor. Hasn't changed since the last time I was here, he
thought. Arthur liked to spend a lot of time making his place as homey as
possible. When he saw the lighted candle, Arthur raised an eyebrow, and he
began to wonder.
To Arthur, the use of marijuana was a social thing, an experience to
be shared with others. He did not understand how Derek could sit all by
himself in the dark, alone with his swirling and scattered thoughts. That
was because, though he would never have admitted it, Arthur was afraid of
his thoughts. Despite his boisterous, energetic and positive front, deep
down Arthur did not trust himself, and his thoughts and desires often
haunted him. He tried to drown them out with constant movement and action,
and the idea that Derek was doing what he dared not do made him worried.
He did not realize that Derek was even more uncomfortable among his peers,
when stoned, than when he was alone.
Arthur crossed the room and turned down the music so he could talk to
his friend. He was trying to think of what to say to get Derek to leave
with him, to get out of these oppressive surroundings.
"So what's new, Bud?" he asked. Derek did not look up from the floor
where he was carefully rolling the joint.
"Not much," he said in an uncommunicative tone. Derek held the joint
up to the light and eyed his handiwork critically. Satisfied, he set about
rolling another. He was preparing to be in a better mood, but he wanted a
few moments to think about something else entirely. Arthur, knowing his
friend well, recognized this and kept silent. Scanning the room he noticed
a pencil and notepad on the coffee table in front of him. Curious as
always, Arthur reached for it and saw that it was covered with wandering
doodles and almost illegible scrawls.
Derek was aware of Arthur's movements. He said nothing, but wondered
what Arthur would say, and waited in anticipation. Often when high Derek
would try to write down some of the random thoughts which occured to him,
thoughts which at the time seemed like indisputable Truth. He took his
time rolling the joint and cleaned up thoroughly afterwords. Then he
carefully re-rolled his bag of pot and sat back watching Arthur's
expressions as he read.
Unfortunately for Derek, Arthur's face remained impassive and he
finally threw the notepad down without a comment. Derek was disappointed
and stared at his friend, feeling lost. He had thought that the few lines
he had scrawled were quite good, and he wondered that Arthur could remain
unmoved by them.
Not that this was anything new. Derek often felt frustrated by what
he saw as the insensitivity of others to what he considered Truth.
Statements like "The Oneness of All", were too easily seen as being corny,
or even meaningless. But Derek thought he felt the full meaning of such a
statement. Consider: your entire body replaces all the molecules in it
about once every three months, then they become part of something else; the
air you breathe today was breathed in Hong Kong a month ago; even the
electrons around the atomic nucleus had only a given probability of being
where they should be--they could be as far away as Pluto at any given
moment. And there was more to it than that, something that Derek could not
quite put his finger on, but felt in the depths of his soul. So he was
disappointed by Arthur's response.
Arthur could sense Derek's frustration but he had no inclination to
say anything and so avoided looking Derek in the eye. To Arthur it was all
hogwash. Well, it might be true, but so what? To Arthur, philosophy
(which is what he termed any intellectual speculation with which he was
confronted) was for people who had too much time on their hands and could
not face living in the real world. Although he would not have expressed
his conception of his existence in this way, as far as he was concerned, he,
Arthur, was a distinct entity coexisting, cooperating, and competing with
other distinct entities. This he took for granted because his eyes and
ears told him so. How this was so, or why, did not concern him at all,
although if pressed he might have conceeded that the responsibility
probably rested with "God". Seeing Derek's feeble attempts at capturing
something intangible made Arthur more worried. When he finally did look at
Derek, his eyes and a twist of his mouth seemed to be making an apology.
Derek stared at the wall, tapping his foot to the beat of the music,
seemingly oblivious and content. He was wondering, however, why he
continued to hang around with a guy like Arthur. It was so obvious that
they were on completely different "wavelengths". While they enjoyed doing
similar things on a physical level, Derek and Arthur rarely communicated at
a deep one. Derek supposed that it was because he had known Arthur for six
or seven years that he continued to see Arthur at all.
Arthur could not abide the silence any longer and he conquered it in
his usual fashion.
"So are you going to light that thing, or what?" he asked jovially, as
if there was no tension between them. Derek had to laugh. Arthur was just
unquenchable, and suddenly the realization that Arthur was Arthur and Derek
was Derek and neither had to change for the other made Derek feel warm
inside.
"Yes, I am," he said, smiling. "But be careful. This stuff will
knock your socks off."
"Right on."
They smoked in silence, and Arthur, his lungs full and his cheeks
puffed out, nodded his appreciation for the quality of the herb.
Derek felt the familiar rush of sensation through his torso and down
his legs, but it was not the same as before when he had been clear headed
to begin with. It was muddier, less intense and paralyzing, and he knew
that the euphoria would be short-lived.
The joint was finished and Derek popped the tar-blackened end into an
old film canister--his "rainy day toke dump". They began an animated
conversation, now and then bursting into hysterical laughter, sometimes for
just any reason at all. After a while Arthur managed to convince Derek to
get outside. "For some fresh air," he said. They cruised around for a
while in Arthur's big blue battered Plymouth, smoked the second joint, and
eventually ended up at the local pool hall/video arcade. Arthur parked in
the lane behind it, but Derek did not want to go in.
"I don't feel like it," he said, not explaining why.
"Fuck," said Arthur mentally rolling his eyes. Did this always have
to be so hard? He continued, "Why not? There's a new high score on KILLER
ROBOT SERENADE and I want to try to break it."
"So try tomorrow. Why now?"
"Because we're stoned, man. We have the advantage of 'heightened
awarenesses', so let's make the best of it."
"Well, that's exactly why I don't want to go in. I'm stoned. What
if..." Derek trailed off, not wishing to admit that he was petrified at
the thought of going inside and facing the cold perusal of the pool hall
crowd. Everybody in there was "cool". They knew their places and they fit
in. Derek, on the other hand, knew he wasn't "cool", did not have a place
and knew that he did not fit in. They'll see through me like Saran Wrap,
he thought.
If he had not been so high, Derek would probably have had the
confidence to appear quite comfortable, or even to mildly imitate the role
which he felt was required here. But his natural feelings of transparency
(which in everyday life he managed to cover with an act), along with the
disorientation caused by the drug, loomed so large that Derek could not
understand where to begin acting.
Arthur thought he understood. "Look, man, everybody in there is
stoned," he said gently. "Just act natural. And besides, nobody cares,
anyway."
Arthur continued pushing and prodding, and slowly Derek let himself be
convinced (although he did not know what Arthur meant by "act natural").
He got out of the car, trying to relax. He felt disoriented, uncomfortable
and depressed (like he usually did after being stoned for a few hours) and
would rather have gone home and gone to bed. Arthur, on the other hand,
was quite cheery feeling that he had done his duty in getting Derek into a
more sociable setting. Together, Arthur slightly in the lead, they walked
around to the front of the arcade.
II
Arthur honked once and drove off into the night, the big engine of the
Plymouth chugging roughly. Derek watched as the car floated under the dim
streetlights and changed colors: now a blue blacker than black, shimmering
at the edges; now reflecting the yellow streetlight glare like whole
galaxies passing across the empty face of space; now a murky grey-green,
but shiny like a shellacked mushroom. The left taillight was brighter than
the other. Derek watched until they seemed to rise into the air, then
disappeared over the bridge.
He looked up. The sky was almost clear, the half-Moon falling towards
the hidden Sun. Derek stared at it a while letting his eyes adjust to the
brightness. Amazing how bright the Moon is, he mused. He could almost
feel its pulsing rays, the rays of a creature nearly living, nearly
stirring and warm. Either that, or powerful and quiescent. If I was a Celt,
I'd make the Moon my God, he thought. Goddess, he corrected. A slow
contented grin appeared on his face with the first peaceful feeling he had
had all evening. He turned and went in to bed.
* * * * *
Going into the pool hall had not been as bad as Derek had feared (it
never was, but the FEAR was always so dibilitating), and Derek was
privately grateful to Arthur for having shown him that. At first Derek
felt intimidated by his sense of having violated the "pool-hall clique",
having introduced his not-so-cool presence into the murky, smoky depths of
the arcade. To Derek's meandering mind, these people had "the Knowledge",
that priceless sense of who they were and where they fit. It was something
that Derek had been striving and straining for for so long now that he was
beginning to get desperate. But he realized quite soon that none, none of
these goofballs had the slightest clue what they were doing there either.
Sure, they were having fun, maybe, but were they completely comfortable?
Definitely not, thought Derek. All of them were so concerned with
posturing and posing in their jeans and leather jackets, black tee-shirts
with the promise of DEATH displayed so starkly that they were confined to
this one place on Earth, this one place where they could feel that they
were a part of the scene, that they were a part of what was happening...
It gave Derek a sense of unwarrented superiority that he, uncool as he
was, could barge in on this scene, even though he did not belong, and feel
somewhat at ease. And that was the secret wasn't it? To be a genuine
Human Being, able to move freely among all manner of men and women? For
that was what it was all about, wasn't it?
Derek found himself on the verge of Truth for the second time that
night, only to become aware that he was the subject of laughter and jests,
led by Arthur who was saying:
"...kind of spaced out. Look at him! Where are you, man?" he taunted,
snapping his fingers under Derek's nose. Derek's reverie and rapture fled.
He grinned a good-natured grin at Arthur and the others, but his eyes
glared at his friend saying, "How could you dare to subject me, your friend,
to such awful humiliation, you shit?!"
And Arthur's mischevious eyes twinkled back, "Get your spine up, you
wimp. Life's no piece of pie ala mode, and if you want to be cool you have
to be on your guard. If you slip up, you have to cover your ass all by
yourself."
To cover his embarrassment Derek mumbled something about being "ripped
just right out of my mind", but nobody understood him, and nobody asked him
what it was he said.
Feeling ignored, Derek went to inspect the various video games to see
if there were any new ones. There weren't, and he knew all the old ones
well. He felt bored. He felt like leaving and he wished Arthur would
hurry up. Finally Arthur came over. They played KILLER ROBOT SERENADE, but
Arthur could not beat the high score. Arthur cursed and shook the machine
until he was reprimanded by the owner.
Derek let himself be carried away by a fantasy where he was almost
convinced that the game itself was sentient and had an evil will. It
cleverly led them on, let them think that they had it figured out and that
the illusory glory of getting "High Score" would soon be theirs. Then they
would reach the dreaded "Panel 9". "Panel 9" was more than the sum of all
the screens before; "Panel 9" had cunning beyond a mere machine, and it
showed a true mastery of psychological manipulation; "Panel 9" lived! And
to get high score you had to defeat "Panel 9".
Several times they came close, fighting furiously down to the last man
the "Beasts of Panel 9". But each time they were repulsed. Hot and
sweating in the dim, overheated hall, they removed their jackets and
plugged more coins into the greedy, gaping maw of KILLER ROBOT SERENADE.
Finally they were disgusted.
"Last game?" asked a sweaty Arthur, holding a quarter poised to feed
the demon to whom they were selling their...selling what?
Derek frowned.
"C'mon, last game."
"...sure..." and they plunged into the battle again. This time they
almost made it. Almost, but Derek's hands slipped on the controls and his
last man was ripped apart. Derek was sure that the controls had jumped in
his hands, and so far gone was he in his fantasy that he felt an irrational,
cold rage, and a determination to defeat this evil creation, to show it its
place like an avenging paladin. He went and got more quarters.
They played a few more games, but it was pointless. They finally left
in disgust, donned their jackets and stepped out into the cool of the night.
They breathed deeply, trying to rid their lungs of the smoke and filth
from inside. Derek blinked, and his eyelids displayed scenes from the game.
That perturbed him since he was trying hard not to think about it anymore.
He felt manipulated and cheated, led on by some foggy promise of glory.
And how would you have felt if you had gotten High Score? asked an
unbidden voice in his head. Derek blinked, surprised. He realized that,
while he might have felt some sensation of pride, it would not have lasted
very long, and he might very well have poked fun at himself for feeling
that way.
So it was a waste, not only of time, but money and your own energy as
well. What was gained? Nothing but an illusion, and a masturbation of
your imagination. Derek digested this and thought it over. Then he
realized that he was making thinking noises--like "hmm"--and that Arthur
was looking at him funny.
Derek cleared his throat and gave Arthur a sidelong glance that said
"Go ahead, say it, I dare ya".
Arthur laughed. "C'mon," he said. "I'll drive you home."
III
Asleep Derek lay in the darkest part of the room where the patterns
cast by the streetlamp did not fall. His breathing, once slow and deep,
came more swiftly and shallower. He turned on his side, opened his eyes
briefly without seeing, sighed, and was quiet once again.
* * * * *
...It should have been obvious to him at the time, but it's hard to
tell in a crowd. She was no longer visible, but that wouldn't stop him
from trying. He pushed deeper into the swirling chasm, sometimes helped
along, but most times, it seemed to him, hindered. He began to despair,
and, on waking, sobbed. I need to go for a walk, he decided. He wiped a
tear away, blew his nose, and pulled on his faded jeans. He didn't put on
a shirt; it was too cold, and a shirt wouldn't help. He shuddered as he
stepped out into the snowy night. The huge flakes hissed and steamed as
they touched his vibrant skin, and soon his back was running with cool,
clear water which pooled in the waistline of his jeans; it collected there,
inexorably soaking downward, loosening their inherent tightness, until they
began to sag. This is stupid, he thought.
A passerby sneered and muttered, "Disgusting!" That brought him to an
abrupt halt, and he stared at the receding back of his slanderer, wishing
to look fierce, so fierce tha
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