Trager watched him. Finally, he laughed softly. “Oh, shit, I can’t take this. Look, Don, you haven’t stabbed me, c’mon, don’t talk like that. I guess, if you love her, this is the way it’s got to be, you know. I just hope everything comes out all right.”
Later that night, in bed with Laurel; “I’m worried about him,” he told her.
HIS FACE, ONCE TANNED, NOW ASHEN. “LAUREL?” HE SAID. NOT BELIEVING.
“I don’t love you anymore. I’m sorry. I don’t. It seemed real at the time, but now it’s almost like a dream. I don’t even know if I ever loved you, really.”
“Don,” he said woodenly.
Laurel flushed. “Don’t say anything bad about Don. I’m tired of hearing you run him down. He never says anything except good about you.”
“Oh, Laurel. Don’t you remember? The things we said, the way we felt? I’m the same person you said those words to.”
“But I’ve grown,” Laurel said, hard and tearless, tossing her red-gold hair. “I remember perfectly well, but I just don’t feel that way anymore.”
“Don’t,” he said. He reached for her.
She stepped back. “Keep your hands off me. I told you, Greg, it’s over. You have to leave now. Don is coming by.”
IT WAS WORSE THAN JOSIE. A THOUSAND TIMES WORSE.
III
WANDERINGS
HE TRIED TO KEEP ON AT THE THEATRE; HE ENJOYED THE WORK, HE had friends there. But it was impossible. Donelly was there every day, smiling and being friendly, and sometimes Laurel came to meet him after the day’s show and they went off together, arm in arm. Trager would stand and watch, try not to notice. While the twisted thing inside him shrieked and clawed.
He quit. He would not see them again. He would keep his pride.
THE SKY WAS BRIGHT WITH THE LIGHTS OF GIDYON AND FULL OF laughter, but it was dark and quiet in the park.
Trager stood stiff against a tree, his eyes on the river, his hands folded tightly against his chest. He was a statue. He hardly seemed to breathe. Not even his eyes moved.
Kneeling near the low wall, the corpse pounded until the stone was slick with blood and its hands were mangled clots of torn meat. The sounds of the blows were dull and wet, but for the infrequent scraping of bone against rock.
THEY MADE HIM PAY FIRST, BEFORE HE COULD EVEN ENTER THE BOOTH. Then he sat there for an hour while they found her and punched through. Finally, though, finally; “Josie.”
“Greg,” she said, grinning her distinctive grin. “I should have known. Who else would call all the way from Vendalia? How are you?”
He told her.
Her grin vanished. “Oh, Greg,” she said. “I’m sorry. But don’t let it get to you. Keep going. The next one will work out better. They always do.”
Her words didn’t satisfy him. “Josie,” he said, “How are things back there? You miss me?”
“Oh, sure. Things are pretty good. It’s still Skrakky, though. Stay where you are, you’re better off.” She looked off screen, then back. “I should go, before your bill gets enormous. Glad you called, love.”
“Josie,” Trager started. But the screen was already dark.
SOMETIMES, AT NIGHT, HE COULDN’T HELP HIMSELF. HE WOULD MOVE to his home screen and ring Laurel. Invariably her eyes would narrow when she saw who it was. Then she would hang up.
And Trager would sit in a dark room and recall how once the sound of his voice made her so very, very happy.
THE STREETS OF GIDYON ARE NOT THE BEST OF PLACES FOR LONELY midnight walks. They are brightly lit, even in the darkest hours, and jammed with men and deadmen. And there are meathouses, all up and down the boulevards and the ironspike boardwalks.
Josie’s words had lost their power. In the meathouses, Trager abandoned dreams and found cheap solace. The sensuous evenings with Laurel and the fumbling sex of his boyhood were things of yesterday; Trager took his meatmates hard and quick, almost brutally, fucked them with a wordless savage power to the inevitable perfect orgasm. Sometimes, remembering the theatre, he would have them act out short erotic playlets to get him in the mood.
IN THE NIGHT. AGONY.
He was in the corridors again, the low dim corridors of the corpsehandlers’ dorm on Skrakky, but now the corridors were twisted and torturous and Trager had long since lost his way. The air was thick with a rotting gray haze, and growing thicker. Soon, he feared, he would be all but blind.
Around and around he walked, up and down, but always there was more corridor, and all of them led nowhere. The doors were grim black rectangles, knobless, locked to him forever; he passed them by without thinking, most of them. Once or twice, though, he paused, before doors where light leaked around the frame. He would listen, and inside there were sounds, and then he would begin to knock wildly. But no one ever answered.
So he would move on, through the haze that got darker and thicker and seemed to burn his skin, past door after door after door, until he was weeping and his feet were tired and bloody. And then, off a ways, down a long, long corridor that loomed straight before him, he would see an open door. From it came light so hot and white it hurt the eyes, and music bright and joyful, and the sounds of people laughing. Then Trager would run, though his feet were raw bundles of pain and his lungs burned with the haze he was breathing. He would run and run until he reached the room with the open door.
Only when he got there, it was his room, and it was empty.
ONCE, IN THE MIDDLE OF THEIR BRIEF TIME TOGETHER, THEY’D GONE out into the wilderness and made love under the stars. Afterwards she had snuggled hard against him, and he stroked her gently. “What are you thinking?” he asked.
“About us,” Laurel said. She shivered. The wind was brisk and cold. “Sometimes I get scared, Greg. I’m so afraid something will happen to us, something that will ruin it. I don’t ever want you to leave me.”
“Don’t worry,” he told her. “I won’t.”
Now, each night before sleep came, he tortured himself with her words. The good memories left him with ashes and tears; the bad ones with a wordless rage.
He slept with a ghost beside him, a supernaturally beautiful ghost, the husk of a dead dream. He woke to her each morning.
HE HATED THEM. HE HATED HIMSELF FOR HATING.
3
DUVALIER’S DREAM
HER NAME DOES NOT MATTER. HER LOOKS ARE NOT IMPORTANT. ALL that counts is that she was, that Trager tried again, that he forced himself on and made himself believe and didn’t give up. He tried.
But something was missing. Magic?
The words were the same.
How many times can you speak them, Trager wondered, speak them and believe them, like you believed them the first time you said them? Once? Twice? Three times, maybe? Or a hundred? And the people who say it a hundred times, are they really so much better at loving? Or only at fooling themselves? Aren’t they really people who long ago abandoned the dream, who use its name for something else?
He said the words, holding her, cradling her, and kissing her. He said the words, with a knowledge that was surer and heavier and more dead than any belief. He said the words and tried, but no longer could he mean them.
And she said the words back, and Trager realized that they meant nothing to him. Over and over again they said the things each wanted to hear, and both of them knew they were pretending.
They tried hard. But when he reached out, like an actor caught in his role, doomed to play out the same part over and over again, when he reached out his hand and touched her cheek—the skin was smooth and soft and lovely. And wet with tears.
IV
ECHOES
“I DON’T WANT TO HURT YOU,” SAID DONELLY, SHUFFLING AND looking guilty, until Trager felt ashamed for having hurt a friend.
He touched her cheek, and she spun away from him.
“I never wanted to hurt you,” Josie said, and Trager was sad. She had given him so much; he’d only made her guilty. Yes, he was hurt, but a stronger man would never have let her know.
&
nbsp; He touched her cheek, and she kissed his hand.
“I’m sorry, I don’t,” Laurel said. And Trager was lost. What had he done, where was his fault, how had he ruined it? She had been so sure. They had had so much.
He touched her cheek, and she wept.
How many times can you speak them, his voice echoed, speak them and believe them, like you believed them the first time you said them?
The wind was dark and dust heavy, the sky throbbed painfully with flickering scarlet flame. In the pit, in the darkness, stood a young woman with goggles and a filtermask and short brown hair and answers. “It breaks down, it breaks down, it breaks down, and they keep sending it out,” she said. “Should realize that something is wrong. After that many failures, it’s sheer self-delusion to think the thing’s going to work right next time out.”
The enemy corpse is huge and black, its torso rippling with muscle, a product of months of exercise, the biggest thing that Trager has ever faced. It advances across the sawdust in a slow, clumsy crouch, holding the gleaming broadsword in one hand. Trager watches it come from his chair atop one end of the fighting arena. The other corpsemaster is careful, cautious.
His own deadman, a wiry blond, stands and waits, a Morningstar trailing down in the blood-soaked arena dust. Trager will move him fast enough and well enough when the time is right. The enemy knows it, and the crowd.
The black corpse suddenly lifts its broadsword and scrambles forward in a run, hoping to use reach and speed to get its kill. But Trager’s corpse is no longer there when the enemy’s measured blow cuts the air where he had been.
Sitting comfortably above the fighting pit/down in the arena, his feet grimy with blood and sawdust—Trager/the corpse—snaps the command/swings the Morningstar—and the great studded ball drifts up and around, almost lazily, almost gracefully. Into the back of the enemy’s head, as he tries to recover and turn. A flower of blood and brain blooms swift and sudden, and the crowd cheers.
Trager walks his corpse from the arena, then stands to receive applause. It is his tenth kill. Soon the championship will be his. He is building such a record that they can no longer deny him a match.
SHE IS BEAUTIFUL, HIS LADY, HIS LOVE. HER HAIR IS SHORT AND BLOND, her body very slim, graceful, almost athletic, with trim legs and small hard breasts. Her eyes are bright green, and they always welcome him. And there is a strange erotic innocence in her smile.
She waits for him in bed, waits for his return from the arena, waits for him eager and playful and loving. When he enters, she is sitting up, smiling for him, the covers bunched around her waist. From the door he admires her nipples.
Aware of his eyes, shy, she covers her breasts and blushes. Trager knows it is all false modesty, all playing. He moves to the bedside, sits, reaches out to stroke her cheek. Her skin is very soft; she nuzzles against his hand as it brushes her. Then Trager draws her hands aside, plants one gentle kiss on each breast, and a not-so-gentle kiss on her mouth. She kisses back, with ardor; their tongues dance.
They make love, he and she, slow and sensuous, locked together in a loving embrace that goes on and on. Two bodies move flawlessly in perfect rhythm, each knowing the other’s needs. Trager thrusts, and his other body meets the thrusts. He reaches, and her hand is there. They come together (always, always, both orgasms triggered by the handler’s brain), and a bright red flush burns on her breasts and earlobes. They kiss.
Afterwards, he talks to her, his love, his lady. You should always talk afterwards; he learned that long ago.
“You’re lucky,” he tells her sometimes, and she snuggles up to him and plants tiny kisses all across his chest. “Very lucky. They lie to you out there, love. They teach you a silly shining dream and they tell you to believe and chase it and they tell you that for you, for everyone, there is someone. But it’s all wrong. The universe isn’t fair, it never has been, so why do they tell you so? You run after the phantom, and lose, and they tell you next time, but it’s all rot, all empty rot. Nobody ever finds the dream at all, they just kid themselves, trick themselves so they can go on believing. It’s just a clutching lie that desperate people tell each other, hoping to convince themselves.”
But then he can’t talk anymore, for her kisses have gone lower and lower, and now she takes him in her mouth. And Trager smiles at his love and gently strokes her hair.
OF ALL THE BRIGHT CRUEL LIES THEY TELL YOU, THE CRUELEST IS THE one called love.
REMEMBERING MELODY
TED WAS SHAVING WHEN THE DOORBELL SOUNDED. IT STARTLED him so badly that he cut himself. His condominium was on the thirty-second floor, and Jack the doorman generally gave him advance warning of any prospective visitors. This had to be someone from the building, then. Except that Ted didn’t know anyone in the building, at least not beyond the trade-smiles-in-the-elevator level.
“Coming,” he shouted. Scowling, he snatched up a towel and wiped the lather from his face, then dabbed at his cut with a tissue. “Shit,” he said loudly to his face in the mirror. He had to be in court this afternoon. If this was another Jehovah’s Witness like the one who’d gotten past Jack last month, they were going to be in for a very rough time indeed.
The buzzer buzzed again. “Coming, dammit,” Ted yelled. He made a final dab at the blood on his neck, then threw the tissue into a wastebasket and strode across the sunken living room to the door. He peered through the eyehole carefully before he opened. “Oh, shit,” he muttered. Before she could buzz again, Ted slid off the chain and threw open the door. “Hello, Melody,” he said.
She smiled wanly. “Hi, Ted,” she replied. She had an old suitcase in her hand, a battered cloth bag with a hideous red-and-black plaid pattern, its broken handle replaced by a length of rope. The last time Ted had seen her, three years before, she’d looked terrible. Now she looked worse. Her clothes—shorts and a tie-dyed T-shirt—were wrinkled and dirty, and emphasized how gaunt she’d become. Her ribs showed through plainly; her legs were pipestems. Her long stringy blond hair hadn’t been washed recently, and her face was red and puffy, as if she’d been crying. That was no surprise. Melody was always crying about one thing or another. “Aren’t you going to ask me in, Ted?”
Ted grimaced. He certainly didn’t want to ask her in. He knew from past experience how difficult it was to get her out again. But he couldn’t just leave her standing in the hall with her suitcase in hand. After all, he thought sourly, she was an old and dear friend. “Oh, sure,” he said. He gestured. “Come on in.”
He took her bag from her and set it by the door, then led her into the kitchen and put on some water to boil. “You look as though you could use a cup of coffee,” he said, trying to keep his voice friendly.
Melody smiled again. “Don’t you remember, Ted? I don’t drink coffee. It’s no good for you, Ted. I used to tell you that. Don’t you remember?” She got up from the kitchen table, and began rummaging through his cupboards. “Do you have any hot chocolate?” she asked. “I like hot chocolate.”
“I don’t drink hot chocolate,” he said. “Just a lot of coffee.”
“You shouldn’t,” she said. “It’s no good for you.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Do you want juice? I’ve got juice.”
Melody nodded. “Fine.”
He poured her a glass of orange juice, and led her back to the table, then spooned some Maxim into a mug while he waited for his kettle to whistle. “So,” he asked, “what brings you to Chicago?”
Melody began to cry. Ted leaned back against the stove and watched her. She was a very noisy crier, and she produced an amazing amount of tears for someone who cried so often. She didn’t look up until the water began to boil. Ted poured some into his cup and stirred in a teaspoon of sugar. Her face was redder and more puffy than ever. Her eyes fixed on him accusingly. “Things have been real bad,” she said. “I need help, Ted. I don’t have any place to live. I thought maybe I could stay with you awhile. Things have been real bad.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, M
elody,” Ted replied, sipping at his coffee thoughtfully. “You can stay here for a few days, if you want. But no longer. I’m not in the market for a roommate.” She always made him feel like such a bastard, but it was better to be firm with her right from the start, he thought.
Melody began to cry again when he mentioned roommates. “You used to say I was a good roommate,” she whined. “We used to have fun, don’t you remember? You were my friend.”
Ted set down his coffee mug and looked at the kitchen clock. “I don’t have time to talk about old times right now,” he said. “I was shaving when you rang. I’ve got to get to the office.” He frowned. “Drink your juice and make yourself at home. I’ve got to get dressed.” He turned abruptly, and left her weeping at the kitchen table.
Back in the bathroom, Ted finished shaving and tended to his cut more properly, his mind full of Melody. Already he could tell that this was going to be difficult. He felt sorry for her—she was messed up and miserably unhappy, with no one to turn to—but he wasn’t going to let her inflict all her troubles on him. Not this time. She’d done it too many times before.
In his bedroom, Ted stared pensively into the closet for a long time before selecting the gray suit. He knotted his tie carefully in the mirror, scowling at his cut. Then he checked his briefcase to make sure all the papers on the Syndio case were in order, nodded, and walked back into the kitchen.
Melody was at the stove, making some pancakes. She turned and smiled at him happily when he entered. “You remember my pancakes, Ted?” she asked. “You used to love it when I made pancakes, especially blueberry pancakes, you remember? You didn’t have any blueberries, though, so I’m just making plain. Is that alright?”
“Jesus,” Ted muttered. “Dammit, Melody, who said you should make anything? I told you I had to get to the office. I don’t have time to eat with you. I’m late already. Anyway, I don’t eat breakfast. I’m trying to lose weight.”