"Of course you do," says Holly, who has been looked at and talked about plenty in her own time; her high school nickname was Jibba-Jibba.
"The teachers talk about gender equality, and racial equality. They have a zero tolerance policy, and they mean it--at least most of them do, I guess--but anyone can walk through the halls when the classes are changing and pick out the black kids and the Chinese transfer students and the Muslim girl, because there's only two dozen of us and we're like a few grains of pepper that somehow got into the salt shaker."
She's picking up steam now, her voice outraged and indignant but also weary.
"I get invited to parties, but there are a lot of parties I don't get invited to, and I've only been asked out on dates twice. One of the boys who asked me was white, and everyone looked at us when we went into the movies, and someone threw popcorn at the back of our heads. I guess at the AMC 12, racial equality stops when the lights go down. And one time when I was playing soccer? Here I go, dribbling the ball up the sideline, got a clear shot, and this white dad in a golf shirt tells his daughter, 'Guard that jig!' I pretended I didn't hear it. The girl kind of smirked. I wanted to knock her over, right there where he could see it, but I didn't. I swallowed it. And once, when I was a freshman, I left my English book on the bleachers at lunch, and when I went back to get it, someone had put a note in it that said BUCKWHEAT'S GIRLFRIEND. I swallowed that, too. For days it can be good, weeks, even, and then there's something to swallow. It's the same with Mom and Dad, I know it is. Maybe it's different for Jerome at Harvard, but I bet sometimes even he has to swallow it."
Holly squeezes her hand, but says nothing.
"I'm not blackish, but the voice said I was, just because I didn't grow up in a tenement with an abusive dad and a drug addict mom. Because I never ate a collard green, or even knew exactly what it was. Because I say pork chop instead of poke chop. Because they're poor down there in the Low and we're doing just fine on Teaberry Lane. I have my cash card, and my nice school, and Jere goes to Harvard, but . . . but, don't you see . . . Holly, don't you see that I never--"
"You never had a choice about those things," Holly says. "You were born where you were and what you were, the same as me. The same as all of us, really. And at sixteen, you've never been asked to change anything but your clothes."
"Yes! And I know I shouldn't be ashamed, but the voice made me ashamed, it made me feel like a useless parasite, and it's still not all gone. It's like it left a trail of slime inside my head. Because I never had been in Lowtown before, and it's horrible down there, and compared to them I really am blackish, and I'm afraid that voice may never go away and my life will be spoiled."
"You have to strangle it." Holly speaks with dry, detached certainty.
Barbara looks at her in surprise.
Holly nods. "Yes. You have to choke that voice until it's dead. It's the first job. If you don't take care of yourself, you can't get better. And if you can't get better, you can't make anything else better."
Barbara says, "I can't just go back to school and pretend Lowtown doesn't exist. If I'm going to live, I have to do something. Young or not, I have to do something."
"Are you thinking about some kind of volunteer work?"
"I don't know what I'm thinking about. I don't know what there is for a kid like me. But I'm going to find out. If it means going back down there, my parents won't like it. You have to help me with them, Holly. I know it's hard for you, but please. You have to tell them that I need to shut that voice up. Even if I can't choke it to death right away, maybe I can at least quiet it down."
"All right," Holly says, although she dreads it. "I will." An idea occurs to her and she brightens. "You should talk to the boy who pushed you out of the way of the truck."
"I don't know how to find him."
"Bill will help you," Holly says. "Now tell me about the game."
"It broke. The truck ran over it, I saw the pieces, and I'm glad. Every time I close my eyes I can see those fish, especially the pink number-fish, and hear the little song." She hums it, but it rings no bells with Holly.
A nurse comes in wheeling a meds cart. She asks Barbara what her pain level is. Holly is ashamed she didn't think to ask herself, and first thing. In some ways she is a very bad and thoughtless person.
"I don't know," Barbara says. "A five, maybe?"
The nurse opens a plastic pill tray and hands Barbara a little paper cup. There are two white pills in it. "These are custom-tailored Five pills. You'll sleep like a baby. At least until I come in to check your pupils."
Barbara swallows the pills with a sip of water. The nurse tells Holly she should leave soon and let "our girl" get some rest.
"Very soon," Holly says, and when the nurse is gone, she leans forward, face intent, eyes bright. "The game. How did you get it, Barb?"
"A man gave it to me. I was at the Birch Street Mall with Hilda Carver."
"When was this?"
"Before Christmas, but not much before. I remember, because I still hadn't found anything for Jerome, and I was starting to get worried. I saw a nice sport coat in Banana Republic, but it was way expensive, and besides, he's going to be building houses until May. You don't have much reason to wear a sport coat when you're doing that, do you?"
"I guess not."
"Anyway, this man came up to us while Hilda and I were having lunch. We're not supposed to talk to strangers, but it's not like we're little kids anymore, and besides, it was in the food court with people all around. Also, he looked nice."
The worst ones usually do, Holly thinks.
"He was wearing a terrific suit that must have cost mucho megabucks and carrying a briefcase. He said his name was Myron Zakim and he worked for a company called Sunrise Solutions. He gave us his card. He showed us a couple of Zappits--his briefcase was full of them--and said we could each have one free if we'd fill out a questionnaire and send it back. The address was on the questionnaire. It was on the card, too."
"Do you happen to remember the address?"
"No, and I threw his card away. Besides, it was only a box number."
"In New York?"
Barbara thinks it over. "No. Here in the city."
"So you took the Zappits."
"Yes. I didn't tell Mom, because she would have given me a big lecture about talking to that guy. I filled out the questionnaire, too, and sent it in. Hilda didn't, because her Zappit didn't work. It just gave out a single blue flash and went dead. So she threw it away. I remember her saying that's all you could expect when someone said something was free." Barbara giggles. "She sounded just like her mother."
"But yours did work."
"Yes. It was old-fashioned but kind of . . . you know, kind of fun, in a silly way. At first. I wish mine had been broken, then I wouldn't have the voice." Her eyes slip closed, then slowly reopen. She smiles. "Whoa! Feel like I might be floating away."
"Don't float away yet. Can you describe the man?"
"A white guy with white hair. He was old."
"Old-old, or just a little bit old?"
Barbara's eyes are growing glassy. "Older than Dad, not as old as Grampa."
"Sixtyish? Sixty-fiveish?"
"Yeah, I guess. Bill's age, more or less." Her eyes suddenly spring wide open. "Oh, guess what? I remember something. I thought it was a little weird, and so did Hilda."
"What was that?"
"He said his name was Myron Zakim, and his card said Myron Zakim, but there were initials on his briefcase that were different."
"Can you remember what they were?"
"No . . . sorry . . ." She's floating away, all right.
"Will you think about that first thing when you wake up, Barb? Your mind will be fresh then, and it might be important."
"Okay . . ."
"I wish Hilda hadn't thrown hers away," Holly says. She gets no reply, nor expects one; she often talks to herself. Barbara's breathing has grown deep and slow. Holly begins buttoning her coat.
"Dinah ha
s one," Barbara says in a faraway dreaming voice. "Hers works. She plays Crossy Road on it . . . and Plants Vs. Zombies . . . also, she downloaded the whole Divergent trilogy, but she said it came in all jumbled up."
Holly stops buttoning. She knows Dinah Scott, has seen her at the Robinson house many times, playing board games or watching TV, often staying for supper. And drooling over Jerome, as all of Barbara's friends do.
"Did the same man give it to her?"
Barbara doesn't answer. Biting her lip, not wanting to press her but needing to, Holly shakes Barbara by the shoulder and asks again.
"No," Barbara says in the same faraway voice. "She got it from the website."
"What website was that, Barbara?"
Her only answer is a snore. Barbara is gone.
25
Holly knows that the Robinsons will be waiting for her in the lobby, so she hurries into the gift shop, lurks behind a display of teddy bears (Holly is an accomplished lurker), and calls Bill. She asks if he knows Barbara's friend Dinah Scott.
"Sure," he says. "I know most of her friends. The ones that come to the house, anyway. So do you."
"I think you should go to see her."
"You mean tonight?"
"I mean right away. She's got a Zappit." Holly takes a deep breath. "They're dangerous." She can't quite bring herself to say what she is coming to believe: that they are suicide machines.
26
In Room 217, orderlies Norm Richard and Kelly Pelham lift Brady back into bed while Mavis Rainier supervises. Norm picks up the Zappit console from the floor and stares at the swimming fish on the screen.
"Why doesn't he just catch pneumonia and die, like the rest of the gorks?" Kelly asks.
"This one's too ornery to die," Mavis says, then notices Norm staring down at the swimming fish. His eyes are wide and his mouth is hung ajar.
"Wake up, splendor in the grass," she says, and snatches the gadget away. She pushes the power button and tosses it into the top drawer of Brady's nightstand. "We've got miles to go before we sleep."
"Huh?" Norm looks down at his hands, as if expecting to see the Zappit still in them.
Kelly asks Nurse Rainier if maybe she wants to take Hartsfield's blood pressure. "O2 looks a little low," he says.
Mavis considers this, then says, "Fuck him."
They leave.
27
In Sugar Heights, the city's poshest neighborhood, an old Chevy Malibu spotted with primer paint creeps up to a closed gate on Lilac Drive. Artfully scrolled into the wrought iron are the initials Barbara Robinson failed to remember: FB. Z-Boy gets out from behind the wheel, his old parka (a rip in the back and another in the left sleeve thriftily mended with masking tape) flapping around him. He taps the correct code into the keypad, and the gates begin to swing open. He gets back into the car, reaches under the seat, and brings out two items. One is a plastic soda bottle with the neck cut off. The interior has been packed with steel wool. The other is a .32-caliber revolver. Z-Boy slips the muzzle of the .32 into this homemade silencer--another Brady Hartsfield invention--and holds it on his lap. With his free hand he pilots the Malibu up the smooth, curving driveway.
Ahead, the porch-mounted motion lights come on.
Behind, the wrought iron gates swing silently shut.
LIBRARY AL
It didn't take Brady long to realize he was pretty much finished as a physical being. He was born stupid but didn't stay that way, as the saying goes.
Yes, there was physical therapy--Dr. Babineau decreed it, and Brady was hardly in a position to protest--but there was only so much therapy could accomplish. He was eventually able to shamble thirty feet or so along the corridor some patients called the Torture Highway, but only with the help of Rehab Care Coordinator Ursula Haber, the bull dyke Nazi who ran the place.
"One more step, Mr. Hartsfield," Haber would exhort, and when he managed one more step the bitch would ask for one more and one more after that. When Brady was finally allowed to collapse into his wheelchair, trembling and soaked with sweat, he liked to imagine stuffing oil-soaked rags up Haber's snatch and setting them on fire.
"Good job!" she'd cry. "Good job, Mr. Hartsfield!"
And if he managed to gargle something that bore a passing resemblance to thank you, she would look around at whoever happened to be near, smiling proudly. Look! My pet monkey can talk!
He could talk (more and better than they knew), and he could shamble ten yards up the Torture Highway. On his best days he could eat custard without spilling too much down his front. But he couldn't dress himself, couldn't tie his shoes, couldn't wipe himself after taking a shit, couldn't even use the remote control (so reminiscent of Thing One and Thing Two back in the good old days) to watch television. He could grasp it, but his motor control wasn't even close to good enough for him to manipulate the small buttons. If he did manage to hit the power button, he usually ended up staring at nothing but a blank screen and the SEARCHING FOR SIGNAL message. This infuriated him--in the early days of 2012, everything infuriated him--but he was careful not to show it. Angry people were angry for a reason, and gorks weren't supposed to have reasons for anything.
Sometimes lawyers from the District Attorney's office dropped by. Babineau protested these visits, telling the lawyers they were setting him back and therefore working against their own long-term interests, but it did no good.
Sometimes cops came with the lawyers from the DA's office, and once a cop came on his own. He was a fat cocksucker with a crewcut and a cheerful demeanor. Brady was in his chair, so the fat cocksucker sat on Brady's bed. The fat cocksucker told Brady that his niece had been at the 'Round Here concert. "Just thirteen years old and crazy about that band," he said, chuckling. Still chuckling, he leaned forward over his big stomach and punched Brady in the balls.
"A little something from my niece," the fat cocksucker said. "Did you feel it? Man, I hope so."
Brady did feel it, but not as much as the fat cocksucker probably hoped, because everything had gone kind of vague between his waist and knees. Some circuit in his brain that was supposed to be controlling that area had burned out, he supposed. That would ordinarily be bad news, but it was good news when you had to cope with a right hook to the family jewels. He sat there, his face blank. A little drool on his chin. But he filed away the fat cocksucker's name. Moretti. It went on his list.
Brady had a long list.
*
He retained a thin hold over Sadie MacDonald by virtue of that first, wholly accidental safari into her brain. (He retained an even greater hold over the idiot orderly's brain, but visiting there was like taking a vacation in Lowtown.) On several occasions Brady was able to nudge her toward the window, the site of her first seizure. Usually she only glanced out and then went about her work, which was frustrating, but one day in June of 2012, she had another of those mini-seizures. Brady found himself looking out through her eyes once more, but this time he was not content to stay on the passenger side, just watching the scenery. This time he wanted to drive.
Sadie reached up and caressed her breasts. Squeezed them. Brady felt a low tingle begin between Sadie's legs. He was getting her a little hot. Interesting, but hardly useful.
He thought of turning her around and walking her out of the room. Going down the corridor. Getting a drink of water from the fountain. His very own organic wheelchair. Only what if someone talked to him? What would he say? Or what if Sadie took over again once she was away from the sunflashes, and started screaming that Hartsfield was inside of her? They'd think she was crazy. They might put her on leave. If they did that, Brady would lose his access to her.
He burrowed deeper into her mind instead, watching the thoughtfish go flashing back and forth. They were clearer now, but mostly uninteresting.
One, though . . . the red one . . .
It came into view as soon as he thought about it, because he was making her think of it.
Big red fish.
A fatherfish.
Br
ady snatched at it and caught it. It was easy. His body was next to useless, but inside Sadie's mind he was as agile as a ballet dancer. The fatherfish had molested her regularly between the ages of six and eleven. Finally he had gone all the way and fucked her. Sadie told a teacher at school, and her father was arrested. He had killed himself while out on bail.
Mostly to amuse himself, Brady began to release his own fish into the aquarium of Sadie MacDonald's mind: tiny poisonous blowfish that were little more than exaggerations of thoughts she herself harbored in the twilight area that exists between the conscious mind and the subconscious.
That she had led him on.
That she had actually enjoyed his attentions.
That she was responsible for his death.
That when you looked at it that way, it hadn't been suicide at all. When you looked at it that way, she had murdered him.
Sadie jerked violently, hands flying up to the sides of her head, and turned away from the window. Brady felt that moment of nauseating, tumbling vertigo as he was ejected from her mind. She looked at him, her face pale and dismayed.
"I think I passed out for a second or two," she said, then laughed shakily. "But you won't tell, will you, Brady?"
Of course not, and after that he found it easier and easier to get into her head. She no longer had to look at the sunlight on the windshields across the way; all she had to do was come into the room. She was losing weight. Her vague prettiness was disappearing. Sometimes her uniform was dirty and sometimes her stockings were torn. Brady continued to plant his depth charges: you led him on, you enjoyed it, you were responsible, you don't deserve to live.
Hell, it was something to do.
*
Sometimes the hospital got freebies, and in September of 2012 it received a dozen Zappit game consoles, either from the company that made them or from some charity organization. Admin shipped them to the tiny library next to the hospital's nondenominational chapel. There an orderly unpacked them, looked them over, decided they were stupid and outdated, and stuck them on a back shelf. It was there that Library Al Brooks found them in November, and took one for himself.