June 5th

Dave walked through a well-tended garden on a hot summer’s day, heading for the back of the Barr’s house. He carried a box of beer under one arm, and a bag containing two bottles of Scotch in the other hand. Even then he wasn’t sure he’d brought enough booze to get him through the day.

He heard the sound of laughter coming from the patio at the side of the house, and almost turned and left. There were days when he wanted company for drinking. Today wasn’t necessarily one of them. Then he thought of Jane.

I can’t let her down. Not again.

He followed the sound of laughter. Jim Barr stood at the big gas cooker wearing a chef’s apron; turning chunks of meat with a pair of tongs. The others, Jane, Frank and Liz, and Maggie, were all seated at a long table.

“We must stop meeting like this.” Maggie said, sneering when she saw Dave walk up the path.

“Maybe it would be better if we just stopped meeting?” Dave replied. He’d had a few beers and a whisky stiffener before even leaving the house and was in no mood to be polite to an obvious nutjob. But as ever, Jane was able to calm him down, at least to a semblance of politeness.

“Dave! Be good. Please?” was all she had to say.

Dave looked over at her, and softened slightly.

“OK. Just this once. But who is this woman, and why does she keep following me?”

“I told you last time…she’s new in town…”

“So is Walmart, but you don’t invite it over to lunch.”

“Please, Dave? I thought she might be somebody you could talk to.”

“I’ll give her a mercy fuck if that’s what she’s after.”

Jane was struck speechless, but Maggie laughed it off.

“I prefer my men to be capable of standing up…if you get my meaning?”

Jane giggled awkwardly, but Dave showed no sign of registering Maggie’s remark.

“Who needs a beer?” he said.

* * *

The meal went the same way as most of Dave’s recent lunches. They all had near-finished plates of food by the end, except for him. He hardly ate, but had a small forest of empty beer bottles in front of him. Once again, he was getting drunk twice as fast as anyone else at the table.

Jim and Jane sat close together, and he saw that Jane kept fondling the back of Jim’s neck. Dave looked pointedly away, taking a long swig of beer. At the same time, Maggie moved her seat closer to Dave and leaned over towards him.

“So what do you do, Dave, out in the real world? When you’re not getting smashed that is?”

Dave took another swig before answering, and when he did it came out too glib, as if it was a line he’d prepared earlier.

“I wheel shitty trolleys around shitty hospital corridors and watch good people die,” he said, and the anger in his voice was evident. “But what’s this about the real world? I thought you didn’t believe in that?”

“What gave you that idea? My personal interface with the Cosmos is the realest thing I know.”

“And what about the rest of us? Are we allowed to play as well, or is it all for you?”

Dave took another swig of beer. He was talking for the sake of it, not really interested. Maggie, however, seemed pleased to have at least got him listening.

“Do you know anything about Zen?” she asked.

It was Dave’s turn to laugh.

“Only from re-runs of Kung Fu.”

“Well, Grasshopper,” Maggie said. “Everything is one, and one is everything.”

“I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together?” Dave said.

“Yes,” Maggie replied. “We are the egg men. All together in one huge womb that is the Universe, the macrocosm. You mentioned quantum theory at dinner the last time. So you know already, all we are, all everything is, is energy and vibration, light and shadow.”

Despite himself, Dave started to enjoy the conversation.

“I’ll give you that one. Random acts among sub-atomic particles at the quantum level. That’s what drives the Universe.”

“And where we differ, is that I believe it’s not so random,” Maggie said. ”In the same way that a magnifying glass can focus light into a spot that burns as bright as a sun, so the human brain can act as a lens, focusing emotion and will to create changes in its environment.”

Dave laughed.

“That’s just wishful thinking.”

“In a way, yes, but it works. I’ve seen it.”

“Like that shit we did last month?” He raised his voice so the rest of the group could hear. “How did that work out? Has the Cosmos been listening?”

No one replied so Dave ploughed on.

“Come on, tell us. Has anybody won the lottery? Has anybody suddenly become handsome?” He turned to Liz. “I can guess what you asked for, Liz. Ready to pop one out yet?”

Jim waved a beer bottle towards Dave.

“Enough already, Dave. You’re being a dick again.”

“He’s not even that interesting,” Maggie said. “A girl could have some fun with a dick.”

They all laughed, except for Dave

“At least I’m still rational,” he said, too loudly, still letting the drink do his talking for him. “What about you lot? It looks like your Cosmos isn’t listening.”

Frank was the one to break the awkward silence.

“Well, that might not be strictly true,” he said.

“And what might that mean?” Dave said sarcastically.

“Our envelopes came back,” Liz said.

* * *

Dave’s booze-addled brain refused to provide a witty comeback. It didn’t look like anything he could say would phase Liz anyway. She was smiling broadly.

The cat that got the cream.

“We got the news this morning, right after we found that the Cosmos had replied.”

Dave was too astonished to speak. He looked around to see if this was maybe all a practical joke they’d agreed to play on him before he turned up. But Frank too had a wide grin on his face.

“You tell them,” he said to Liz.

Liz looked down and rubbed her belly.

“We’re going to have a baby.”

Again the booze made Dave speak without thinking.

“No fucking way.”

Frank smiled.

“What other way is there?”

Jane stood and gave Liz a hug.

“I’m so happy for you both.”

Liz looked across the table.

“We’ve got Maggie to thank. The Cosmos came through for us.”

Dave stopped drinking his beer in mid-gulp.

“Now hold on a minute…”

“What else could it be?” Frank said.

“What else could it be?” Dave answered. “Did your I.Q. just drop sharply? What we have here is a coincidence. It can’t be any more than that.”

“A pretty big fucking coincidence, don’t you think?” Frank said.

Liz put a hand on her husband’s arm.

“God does not play dice with the universe,” she said softly.

“Don’t you dare quote Einstein at me,” Dave said, his voice rising until he was nearly shouting. “Don’t you dare.”

Frank held up two white envelopes

“Then how do you explain these? They were on the kitchen table when we got up this morning.”

“How the fuck should I know?” Dave said. He still had a beer bottle in his hand as he motioned towards Maggie. Beer slopped everywhere. “Why don’t you ask the wicked witch of the west here? Or try asking the fucking Cosmos again.”

Liz looked as if she was about to cry. Jim Barr had seen enough.

“Dave. You’re being an asshole. Again.”

Dave calmed down, but only slightly.

“I’m sorry, Liz. I’m happy for you. I really am. But this is your and Frank’s doing. It’s got nothing to do with a big fairy in the sky, and it’s certainly not the Cosmos arranging your life for you. It’s just good old rhythmic gymnastics and sperm and ovum.”

Now it was Maggie’s turn to get angry.

“How do you know? Come on, Dave, tell me, why are you so sure?”

Dave turned towards her.

“How do I know? I’ve got a fucking brain. That’s how I know.”

“I’ve got a brain too,” Maggie started to say. Dave didn’t give her time to finish.

“No. What you’ve got there is a cabbage. I don’t need a fucking magic crystal to tell me where to find my ass.”

Maggie looked him straight in the eye.

“Jim was right. You are a dick.”

“And who the fuck are you to be saying that? You don’t know me. You’re just some cheap street magician who has conned Frank and Liz into thinking they’re going to live happily ever after.”

He turned to the couple.

“I’d watch out you two. It’s only a matter of time before she asks you for money.”

Maggie stood, knocking over her chair.

“Say that again,” she said, softly.

Dave was too drunk to notice the fire in her eyes.

“Which bit? The bit where you’re full of shit or the bit where you’re a fucking evil bitch?”

Maggie stepped up to Dave and socked him in the jaw, hard. He’d had far too much booze to roll with the punch. He fell off his chair and landed on the grass in a crumpled heap.

Everything suddenly went quiet. Then Liz applauded, and Frank and Jane joined in. That, more than the ignominy of being knocked to the ground, made Dave feel about an inch tall.

Jim, smiling, looked down at Dave and offered him a hand to get up.

“Looks like the Cosmos knows your place in the scheme of things, Dave: flat on your ass and drunk as a skunk.”