Wait, Who Are You?
The lid of the casket was open, the interior only slightly moist. Vin stirred and faint traces of oily residue and crystalline grit prickled under his arm and on the back of his scalp where his head rested against the device’s supporting armature.
He felt as if he was still returning from the shot, his mind pulling itself back together. He remembered details about himself, the uniform of jeans and shirts that identified him, the smell of his hands, the presence of his daughter. Information was structure and a human being was a kind of information, even arms, heart and bones were structure, information. But each mind was a different world, like a different dimension, both isolated and connected—integrated with the world around it as a unique embodiment of a shared pattern.
Each time he went into the crèche he risked destroying himself, as if becoming aware of a new pattern required a new kind of mind. He could feel it happening, the same emotional entropy that he’d seen in Mona. How long would it take to claim him? How long had Kim been lost before she’d found Trina and destroyed his world? Even now, lying in the dormant casket, he was suppressing a memory of enjoying the taste of roasted human flesh.
He needed to relieve himself and vestigial self-respect set him into hurried motion. As he poked his head out of the hole in the bedroom floor, Sophie stood up, a foot away from the chute, and stared at him. She looked away but stretched her front legs toward him and yawned. Her paws were dark at the ends and she looked like the cat he remembered from the short years they lived together as family, Kim, Trina, Sophie and him. Sophie stepped forward and head-butted his face. He climbed so his arms were out of the chute and petted her as she purred and pushed against him.
In the bathroom, he wondered at her presence. When they’d added the apartment, they’d removed the staircase to the basement.
In this version of the house, the staircase was where it had been before the remodel, and the downstairs wasn’t an apartment yet. The old card table and folding chairs were huddled against the island. He took a breath and sprinted to the third floor, to the master bedroom and the blinking cluster of electronics that were piled around the huge flat screen television, just as they were years ago.
On the second floor, his old inflatable mattress looked worn, covered by faded but familiar green sheets. He dressed in his other self’s clothes, found his phone and wallet and fed Sophie, but he needed to get away from the house. The world outside felt both familiar and fresh. He was walking, moving the same way he always did, speeding his pace over ground that he’d covered endlessly in a city that enclosed most of his life, a life of short sequences repeated through clusters of ragged flourishes any of which might grow into a new variation, a fractal structure of a life spiraling through fading sounds and colors. The air had a distinct taste of salt water skimmed from the mist above Puget Sound, the vanishing scent of ocean.
Near the Pike Place Market, he stepped into a small restaurant with a handwritten sign crowing about zesty calzone. He ate slowly, suppressing memories from the crèche that crowded and tugged, including smells and tastes that simultaneously repelled and comforted him. Food had been the uncomplicated part of his life. Now everything felt alien.
He remembered being in his father’s backyard the summer after Kim died, on a lawn chair of woven plastic bands that stuck to his skin, and feeling almost dizzy with a grief he didn’t understand, his father barely aware that he was present, let alone wounded. Vin kept telling himself to be practical, her death wouldn’t change anything in his life. His feelings were a fantasy, his claim on them false.
Then his teeth bounced on sausage he was chewing in a way that reminded him of the resilience of the flesh that Ban had pulled from the smoking skewer. He flashed on opening the bundle of darkened, fragrant leaves and the hand with two fingers roasted to the bone, the child’s hand beneath. He choked to prevent himself from spewing chewed food. He closed his eyes and lowered his jaw, breathing carefully, deliberately. A person moved away from him.
He put his feet flat on the floor and slowly straightened his legs. Still bent at the waist and shoulders, he staggered to the counter while staring at the floor. “Bathroom,” he managed to mumble. The cashier came swiftly, took his hand firmly and led him to a door that she unlocked. He rushed to the toilet as she shut the door behind him.
By midafternoon, he was walking into a stiff wind that shook the trees on Second Avenue and cut itself on the cracked edges of Belltown’s low brick and plaster buildings. He had wandered in circles, and then watched foot traffic in front of the squat Westlake Center mall, then started north with a vague idea of resting at the Seattle Center.
His phone felt solid. He might not be wearing his own body, but this was his phone. He brushed through contacts, finding Bill’s number. Kim wasn’t listed.
“Halloo,” Bill’s voice. A happy version.
“Bill?”
“Hey, Vin. Hi. What’s happening, man?”
“I need to talk.”
“Well, that sounds serious.”
“It’s not, I just—”
“Yeah?”
“I’m confused and need to talk with someone.”
“Okay.” Bill’s voice was lower, concerned. “Listen, I could get out and come by pretty soon. Meet at Pagliacci, maybe? The one near your house. Would two-thirty work?”
“Not pizza.”
“Now you’re worrying me.”
“Do you know where the Lucky Diner is, in Belltown?”
Blue jeans, a T-shirt, a leather jacket, and sneakers—Bill was wearing his standard uniform but everything had the tailored, slightly glossy look of higher quality materials and extra cost. He looked happy and energetic as he pushed open the glass door. The waiter near the door stopped in surprise when he spotted Bill. Then his hand rose as if to touch him. Bill gave the waiter a half smile while looking about for Vin, who was as far away from the door as possible, nursing a coffee with a milkshake and a cold order of French fries untouched on the flecked Formica tabletop. Bill smiled broadly and Vin was momentarily overcome by the reality of seeing him again.
“Hey man,” Bill said. “What’s this?”
“I’m sorry. It’s just good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you too, but I’m probably not going to cry about it.” Despite his grin, Vin’s eyes had teared up. Bill dropped into one of the red cushioned, chrome-framed chairs.
Vin said, “What year were we born?”
Bill reached for a French fry. “Really, man? You’ve been acting pretty strange recently.”
“I have?”
“Yeah. Crying at the sight of me, for example, is strange. And that question.”
“Okay.” Vin stared at the tabletop. He put a hand on his sweating glass of water and shook it, the bits of ice ringing lightly. “Then, let me ask about”—he took a breath—“do you know someone named Peg?”
“Are you joking?”
“No, but I might be losing my mind.” Vin’s voice cracked and slipped.
The approaching waiter stopped. Bill glanced up and shook his head, asking the waiter not to interrupt.
“So, tell me what’s going on here,” Bill said. “Are you high right now? Do you want to go to a hospital?”
“No. No. I’m not going to hurt anyone, or myself. But I’m just losing track of—it all. Nothing is holding still.” Vin whispered this last, twitching as he said it. “Have I ever been married?”
Bill frowned but said, “No, you never have.”
“Are we still friends?”
“Yeah, sure we are. Of course, man. We always have been.”
“And you bring me drugs.”
“I don’t—well, sometimes. I mean, I have in the past, but I don’t anymore. You know, we’re both a little older. A little wiser.”
“But, I’m not married?”
“I think you’d know.”
“That’s the thing. I might not.” Vin was speaking quickly. “Don’t assume I’d know things. I ask because I am married. Divorced. With Kim.”
“Who?”
“Your sister.”
Bill sat back and bit his upper lip. Outside the window a young man and woman were standing by the curb, staring at Bill. The woman—short, dyed black hair and round cheeks, pale skin—was trying to catch Bill’s eye. She shyly raised a hand and waved at him.
“Do you know them?” he asked.
Bill didn’t even glance. “Fans. You are saying some crazy things. You have a barrel of monkeys in your brain right now, man. You’re scaring me.”
“Do you know someone named Peg?”
“Do you mean my wife?”
“I need to show you something.”
Bill was driving a matte-black Lamborghini Aventador, a sculpture of motion tricked out with shining wheels. “Speed Racer car,” Vin said, walking to the passenger side.
Bill watched him as the doors lifted skyward. “Yeah,” he said, “those old cartoons were the best, weren’t they?”
As Vin flattened himself into the low-slung seat, he had a moment of panic. How could this be Bill? Was this car—with its smell of fresh leather—a different kind of crèche?
“It’s nice,” he said quietly, as the vehicle purred to life and glided away from the curb and onto Second Avenue.
“Yeah. Thank you, again.”
“What do you mean?”
Bill glanced at Vin. “Dividend from Sigmoto. We’ve taken this one out before, haven’t we?”
“Sigmoto did well? For you?”
“Yes, it did well for me.” Bill laughed. “Broke the galactic bank. Is that what this is about? I thought you got past all that.”
“So, do I have a lot of money?” Vin watched the world outside as the car drifted to a stop at a light.
Bill said, “People pitch stuff at me now. You wouldn’t believe how many crazy ideas there are out there. Actually, I kind of like it, but, right now, you sound a little like one of those people, and not to frighten you, but I mean that in the most alarming way. You’re asking questions that I don’t know whether or not I should take you seriously.”
“What I’m going to show you will help.”
“Um, so, I’m still clean. You know that.”
“It’s not drugs. For now, humor me.”
Bill let out his breath, his index finger tapping the steering wheel. “Well, if, by a lot of money, you mean by government standards, then yes, you have quite the fuck-ton of money.”
Vin looked out the side window. People were staring as they passed. “Those people watching you at the diner, you said, fans?”
Bill glanced at him, measuring his disorientation. “Yeah, from the movie. Which I also have you to thank for.”
Vin closed his eyes and sank further into the leather seat.
Bill said, “I’m a little scared right now, but only a little, okay? So, I don’t mean to pry, but is there a medicine, or—I mean, do you have everything you need?”
Vin’s phone rang, the music from Glassworks he’d chosen years ago. He dug it out of his pocket. The screen said, “Alina,” and showed a slim woman with straight dark hair and narrow features, wearing a green halter. Gorgeous.
He asked Bill, “What do you think about Alina?”
“She’s great.” Bill was uncomfortable.
“What do you think about her?”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“This isn’t a test? Because you’re pretty out there right now.”
“I want to know what you think about her.”
Bill made a sour face and shook his head. “Not good for you. Smart, but a party girl. She’s in it for what you can do for her.”
Vin declined the call and rested the phone against his leg. “I have bad judgment.”
“Maybe. Sometimes. We going to that weird house you use as an office?”
When the door of the chute opened, Bill whispered, “Holy shit. What the hell, man? Why did you never tell me about this? Fuck.”
“I can’t. There’s a notebook. It’s complicated.”
“Complicated? That sounds like an understatement. You couldn’t tell me because there’s a notebook?”
Vin went down the chute first, Bill following, showing the same fear that Kim had shown the first time she climbed down. The same fear Vin had felt.