"OK, buddy. I"m gonna go now. You call anytime, OK OK?"

"OK."

"Goodbye."

Grant pulls his hair back and stands up from the couch. He spins two invisible pistols off his hips and says, "f.u.c.k the dog."

By the time he makes his way across the carpet to the refrigerator a charge of electricity has built up and it snaps between his finger and the handle. He jerks his hand up and blows on the finger, then shakes it out and returns it to the invisible holster.

Behind him the phone rings. An angelfish in a clear bowl sitting beside the couch turns away to face the dark hallway. It raises its hind end slightly and fans its tail, catching the pink glow of choral in the transparent ray of its a.n.a.l fin. A thin beige spiral swings in the water and the angelfish shudders it free. Grant trips against the coffee table as he grabs the phone. He picks up the receiver and places the phone on the table, careful not to touch anything metal.

"h.e.l.lo, you"ve reached the Parkdale Crisis Hotline. Who am I speaking to?"

"h.e.l.lo. My name is Greg."

"Hi Greg. My name is Grant. What"s on your mind, buddy?"

[image]

The Future Bakery at the corner of Tec.u.mseth and Queen is the beehive, the recovering addict"s caffeine s.p.u.n.k house. Men who have spread their knuckles up to their elbows. .h.i.tting women sip Turkish coffee and design their Higher Powers, informing each other about how to surrender, sharing affirmations in their collective exile. None of them will ever be what is commonly called a good person, but now that they have stopped being so actively bad, they chart together a course to the hereafter. Chosen and marked for this, they hug each other l.u.s.tily.

When women venture near, sit at an adjacent table or a.s.sess them from the line-up, the New Men close off distrustfully. They welcome the amend-making process. They would love to say "I"m sorry" and stand in that unforgiving flak, in the pain of being wrong. But those days are gone. Feeling useless to either gender makes them merely pray. And prayer has made them different, gentler, sure. They really don"t beat women any longer. In each of their imaginations a new place has evolved, a place that loops off the side of their personalities.

Here they picture G.o.d.

In between Greg"s pierced ears, and under his pretty curls, lurks a Higher Power. The Higher Power stands near Greg while he jerks off, waiting patiently. He"s a Higher Power who doesn"t look away, but furrows his brow, knowing that s.e.x is when you"re waiting for better behaviour, not guilty, not shameful, just not quite holy. As Greg wipes his s.e.m.e.n from his palm, the Higher Power points at the cuff of his pants: you missed some, there, no right there on your pants. you missed some, there, no right there on your pants. And then he smiles slightly as Greg says, "Fuh-huck!" and flips the white dollop into a Kleenex. When he"s shaken out his hair, Greg makes room for his Higher Power on the couch. He sits with his elbows on his knees and says, "Greg, I"m going to let you live forever." And then he smiles slightly as Greg says, "Fuh-huck!" and flips the white dollop into a Kleenex. When he"s shaken out his hair, Greg makes room for his Higher Power on the couch. He sits with his elbows on his knees and says, "Greg, I"m going to let you live forever."

Greg already knows this, and his Higher Power never seems to tire of saying it; however, it"s supposed to mean something slightly different each time. Greg pinches his moist pant cuff and wonders what exactly it means this time.

Finally Greg says, "Are you saying I should accept that Jojo never liked Hogg?" Hogg is Greg"s recently deceased rat, and Jojo is his recently estranged girlfriend. In truth, the Higher Power thinks it"s a bit amusing that a dead rat and a relationship well-lost are persisting as "issues" in Greg"s recovery. The Higher Power is very aware that his own sense of humour is always inappropriate. He looks across at Greg, straining to keep his poker face, while he nods in a way that looks important. Greg suspects for a second that his Higher Power is mocking him. But he also knows how inappropriate his suspicions are, so he pretends they are not true.

Greg"s Higher Power cannot look him in the eye right now, so he lowers his gaze and spots another dollop of s.e.m.e.n on the young man"s socks.

10.

Original People When Jimmy was very young - not that he isn"t now, but a few years ago, when he was seven - an event occurred that would predispose him to silence.

In the backyard of his parents" house, hanging on a cliff over-looking the high-way, lived Jimmy and his family. This house was peculiar for several reasons. One was its dramatic placement on a cliff at the end of a street in an old suburb of Toronto. At the base of this cliff was a sc.r.a.ppy bit of wilderness that was screwed up tight as a jar, between the house"s backyard and Highway 401.

In this little patch of land, a sort of old smudge at the edge of a new drawing, a doomed population of wildlife was living out its final generation in manic friendlessness. Snakes copulated on the drying scalp of the terrain. A fox scrambled back and forth along an unearthed concrete conduit. A million mites lived on the rust from a single barb of wire. At night their eyes shone and their microscopic faces vibrated with insanity. Migrating birds that had made this a rest spot for hundreds of years now sensed something was terribly wrong. They lit on the backs of barrels in the fat brown river, and when their young looked hungrily at a suicided worm or a grinning minnow, they clicked their beaks, sadly, "No." At night a faint popping sound could be heard up and down the river, as weak heart valves in the young owl population strained to sustain life until morning.

Jimmy spent a great deal of time here as a naturalist, learning to observe, to read into what animals wrote. And he read very well. When he climbed the hill in the late afternoon he always looked back over his shoulder, because he knew that this little patch of land was teeming with sick, unpredictable minds.

The vivid certainty that b.u.t.ton-eyed rats were throwing themselves at his heels as he made his final scramble over the top of the hill made him scream. He ran through the yard to a back door that seemed to be held at an impossible distance. A family photo of the door dangled at the edge of the lawn, without enough dimension to escape through. The snapshot"s border of chemicals, the loss of his mother"s face into the glare of the sun or the flash of a distant bulb, sucked the oxygen from his lungs. He was lucky to complete the dash through his own backyard.Jimmy heard people reading aloud from magazines as he kicked at the ground between himself and this door, reading aloud about the boy who died legless and insane in his own backyard. His screams, these daily screams, were never heard because of another peculiarity about this property.

This house lay directly under the last leg of an airplane highway. Every five minutes, in the late afternoon, a commercial airplane tore up the air, drowning out Jimmy"s screams, dropping its landing gear just this side of the chimney so as to miss it and fall from the sky into Jimmy"s tortured ravine. While these planes landed somewhere else safely, they had also crashed moments before - eating up the ground with their noise; eating up Jimmy"s wailing, and ending the world over and over and over again.

As he lay there, for he always fell down to clutch the ground before he died, Jimmy saw the tiny red-b.u.t.ton eyes of ravine rats look up and shatter. These tiny plastic shards flew across him as the belly of the plane lay on the earth to finally, after so many threats, end this. Needless to say, Jimmy was never able to finish his dinner, and when asked what he had been doing, Jimmy felt his young pathology squeezing his brain.

The more conventional fear, that his parents were aliens, was becoming a comfort.

Today is Jimmy"s seventh birthday, and his mother, or rather the alien who looks like her, is baking a cake shaped like a rocketship with a blue Commander Tom profile at the base. Like his mother, the artistic Jimmy is busy creating, and the tiny explosions he makes with his mouth attract her attention. He senses her alien eyes on him, and he looks up in time to catch her wiping the tell-tale green of the icing from her extraterrestrial nose.

"Jimmy, are you drawing those nasty drawings again?"

She slams her powdered hand down on the drawing before Jimmy has a chance to pull it away, and she turns it toward her. The drawing depicts a giant rat covered with b.u.t.tons that are being sewn onto it by an airplane captain who is stretching from his c.o.c.kpit to stab a needle into the rat"s eye. a.s.sorted cowboys and Indians and dinosaurs are scattered in pieces around the plane.

"Jimmy, why don"t you ever draw nice things? And whatever you do, don"t let Missus see these. Hide them with the others in your room. Now go out and play in the pool with your sister."

Missus was the woman who came in and cleaned once a week. She was a Jehovah"s Witness who became confused and angry at even the thought of dinosaurs. Upon seeing one of Jimmy"s drawings she asked to leave immediately; clutching her old heart, she limped home in a state of abjection. Jimmy"s mother watched helplessly from behind the curtains in the kitchen. Missus returned the following week, but she has never entered, nor has she since been asked to enter, the boy"s room.

"Careful out there, your father"s tools are lying all over the place. Take a towel."

Now there"s the hill, that lost wall, and the weasels are wiping their gums against it. At a distance, somewhere above Jane and Finch, two airplanes are waiting at an intersection. And in the lawn below and to the west is a small rectangle punched into the ground coated with concrete and filled with water.

In this wading pool stands an eight-year-old girl. Beside the pool stands a seven-year-old boy. The boy strolls over to a saw that hangs at an angle in a plank that is stretched between two sawhorses. He rocks the saw until it squawks out of the wood.

There are thoughts going through this child"s head, which is normal. As normal as it is to place thoughts in a head. And they are arriving and departing in the usual custom. That is, as far as it is usual for thoughts to arrive and depart. These thoughts, idle and wandering, are picking up speed, acc.u.mulating a motive from the way they are arranged. There is a dangerous belief in the corners they turn.

These thoughts: The saw can enter wood and my father can leave it there. Can it enter my sister and can I leave it there? To the saw, my ruler, my king, my sister is wet inside like wood, and her grain is looser and nearly separated anyway. So where is the difference if I draw the separation out? Make her wood. The same. She The saw can enter wood and my father can leave it there. Can it enter my sister and can I leave it there? To the saw, my ruler, my king, my sister is wet inside like wood, and her grain is looser and nearly separated anyway. So where is the difference if I draw the separation out? Make her wood. The same. She is is wood. Peaceful and heavy. The little teeth marching across her shoulder. That"s it. wood. Peaceful and heavy. The little teeth marching across her shoulder. That"s it.

The grim little mouth the saw has made in the plank blows blonde fibres from its lips and gives the word. Jimmy slips into the pool clumsily, dragging the saw behind him.

Behind Julie"s head is the deep blue of the sky. A blue most like that colour is at her shoulders, whitening as it leaves her, travelling upward. On the surface of the sky, microscopic bacteria living in Jimmy"s eyes flow from the sun into Julie, who is smiling. They"re glancing down at her shoulder, inviting the saw there. Jimmy lays it on her shoulder and draws it towards himself. Then he pushes it along a groove that starts easily in the skin. A bright strip of blood highlights the course - down through her body - the saw will take. Julie"s face is calm, at least as calm as Jimmy"s, and she smiles with a full understanding of what is happening.

When their father runs around the pool, as if up a ramp, his mouth is open and through it an airplane comes out of the sky. Julie and Jimmy lean towards each other and kiss in the silence of this moment. Now husband and wife, they kiss each other goodbye forever. When the airplane advances past the sky and their father"s voice starts up in his mouth again, Julie and Jimmy pull apart sheepishly and Julie begins to howl in pain, holding her shoulder. Jimmy sees, for the first time, all the blood in the water.

In every home movie and photograph that their father will take this summer, the girl"s shoulder will have a large pad of gauze taped to it. And Julie and Jimmy will grow apart like brother and sister.

This event also marks Jimmy"s first deliberate silence, a silence that will last three months and will return every three months. Like now, as they make their way up the path in the dark, four cottages away from where people are eating each other alive in a now brightly lit bedroom.

11.

More Mazzy At his desk, Grant Mazzy sits across from the only person at Big Town TV TV who is willing to spend time with him. who is willing to spend time with him.

Steve is a student volunteer, which means he is something of a slave. He"s young, eighteen or so, with an anachronistic blond pompadour, tight rockabilly pants, and pointy boots. Grant has asked himself whether this look, the way the kid features it, the way it precedes everything else about him, is trendy or disdainful of trends, or trendily disdainful of trends. Is he ultra-hip and ironically retro-quoting another ultra-hip that had hotly retro-quoted another ultra-hip that once, long ago, railed against, what? What? Uh, squares? Grant has decided, in order to get through the day, that the kid is just a bit silly looking. And that is that. Besides, because of the way Steve has followed him around and b.u.mped against him and bobbed his head like a good dog, Grant figures those old squares, as referentially obscure as they have become, have nothing to worry about anymore, anyway.

Steve picks up the second phone on Grant"s desk and gives the "Girlfriend" signal, followed by the "Sorry dude" signal. Grant stares at the kid for a second, watching as his face crumples towards the "No, I"m really sorry, dude" signal. Grant smiles and pulls a Romeo Y Julieta Tubo Romeo Y Julieta Tubo out of his shirt pocket. He swings it in his fingers and taps it onto his phone to get the orchestra"s attention. out of his shirt pocket. He swings it in his fingers and taps it onto his phone to get the orchestra"s attention.

"I"m getting phone calls you wouldn"t believe. Calls from, like, look at this. Here"s an anthropologist. Here"s a linguist."

Steve"s eyes dart quickly to the side, toward the East Indian weather person who sits quietly surrounded by unused phones.

"Semioticians, doctors, and a feminist lawyer, and, oh, this one"s rich, an art critic, an art critic who now fancies himself a virologist... now what was that about..."

Steve sits nodding at Grant.

"Here it is. Yeah, art critic, thinks the virus became contagious when Marcel Duchamp got a guy called Steiglits to photograph a urinal in 1919."

Steve has heard the name before.

"Who?"

"Marcel Duchamp. You know, the urinal. Uh, the bride descended on the bachelor, something. Readymades, that sort of thing. A dadaist."

Steve remembers him.

"Right. The Nude Descending a Staircase. The Nude Descending a Staircase. I know. Yeah, so what does that have to do with the virus?" I know. Yeah, so what does that have to do with the virus?"

"Well, this critic seems to think that Duchamp"s experiments with the fourth dimension, sending a urinal into it, somehow caused a breach of some kind. And when the p.i.s.s-pot returned, some kind of illuminating gas got in through the nth door type of twilight zone s.h.i.t. Anyway, in here somewhere pops a virus you catch through conversation. Crazy, eh?"

Steve smiles, "So, like, I guess this is one disease that you can can catch off a toilet seat." catch off a toilet seat."

"That"s right, kid, very good. Very good. Now, what am I gonna do here? The only virologist I don"t have is a virologist."

12.

The Volunteer Is Fatal Greg is not sure what it is that people should know. He thinks that there is certainly something. He sits in Grant"s small office drumming his fingertips against his thighs. Three weeks ago I get a fatal illness, and today I start a new career. Three weeks ago I get a fatal illness, and today I start a new career. Greg is anxious that these two clauses keep a safe distance from each other. Even though he suspects they are dependent on each other, he avoids acknowledging them at the same time. Greg is anxious that these two clauses keep a safe distance from each other. Even though he suspects they are dependent on each other, he avoids acknowledging them at the same time.

When Greg thinks of the illness, he does so with a consciousness that is dim and oval, capable of spreading outward, yes, but with borders that he keeps visible at all times. If he thinks of the new career, he does so less in a s.p.a.ce than in a direction. His thoughts brush towards something, incapable of wandering or examining or dissolving. He fears these thoughts are actually directionless, so he caps the furthest ones in arrowheads. When he thinks of his illness, his career is simply that unthinkable; that unthinkable; and when he thinks of his career, his illness is also and when he thinks of his career, his illness is also that unthinkable. that unthinkable.

Now that he is sitting in the office where he"ll be interviewed, Greg has the sinking sensation that his arrows have abandoned him. He sits calmly at the doorway to this softly lit oval: the disease that has never manifested itself. The disease that includes him while the arrows cut him off.

The office is lit only by a long desk lamp that sheds light across surfaces, dropping two hard crescents onto the floor. Greg slides his foot out from under his chair and pushes the toe of his running shoe cozily into the sharp edge of one of the crescents.

Grant enters the office. He looks at everything, the chair, a framed photograph of man at a sink, the fax machine, the ceiling, everything except Greg.

"h.e.l.lo there. Grant Mazzy."

A hand goes out, eyes drop to a hand brushing an imagined crumb from his thigh.

"You"re Greg?"

Greg suddenly wishes he was home, sleeping in. "Uh, yes, I"m here for the volunteer."

"Well, no, you"re here for me. Hah! You are are the volunteer, right?" the volunteer, right?"

Greg feels the crescent of light cut open the top of his foot.

"Yeah, that"s right."

"Right?"

"Yeah."

"OK then." then."

Grant lifts and drops the tip of a pen in front of his face, following it with his eyebrows, not his eyes, which he widens to introduce Greg to new perspectives.

"I gotta tell ya, Greg. You"re gonna look back one day on this meeting and I guarantee that you"ll say to yourself one of two things: I should have got the f.u.c.k out of there as soon as I saw that guy; or, you might say, that was the day that I started livin" for myself."

Grant coughs up in the air, like an animal, a seal tossing a ring, a lion throwing its mane.

"And you"re gonna get all that by living for me."

Greg can"t look straight ahead. He focuses on a silver bullet on a key-chain that lies on the desk.

"Now I"m gonna say something that offends most people. I"m gonna say this for two reasons. One, to see whether you are like most people - an unfortunate shape to find yourself in. And two, if you are like most people, I can at least have the pleasure of watching you puff up before I spin you outta here. Ready?"

Greg lowers his head slightly, scooping his jaw out in small acceptance. He pushes a scale of dried s.e.m.e.n off his knee with the back of his thumb.

"OK. If you work out here it"s gonna be because you let two things happen. You"ll let me own you; and you"re gonna fall head over f.u.c.kin" heels in love with me."

Grant jabs a finger off his chin at Greg. The other hand gives a disgusted shake in the darkness above the lamp. I"m not a p.u.s.s.y. The world is full of p.u.s.s.ies. I dismiss them. I"m not a p.u.s.s.y. The world is full of p.u.s.s.ies. I dismiss them.

"I"m gonna tell you something now. Later, if you do a few things for me, I"ll show you what I"m talking about, OK OK?"

Greg feels a little roll of exhilaration. Grant detects it.

"OK. This is it. You know the world you live in? You know the one. Little things going on, urgent things, terrible true tales of human struggle, reasons to go on, reasons not to go on, blah, blah. The world you live in. Well, it"s only one of, say, about fifteen or so. And each one has a serious claim on you, a vested interest in your stupidity. In fact, your world is maintained in a very deliberate way by the fourteen that you"ll never encounter."

Greg notices that his Higher Power is standing in the corner of the room. He looks frightened.

"You watch the news, right? OK OK, picture this now. There"s me on the screen saying, oh, I don"t know, "a home invasion last night" - blah, blah. But I"m not not saying something, too. I haven"t said: "A prost.i.tute was found in a dumpster with her arms severed." And I haven"t pointed out that this woman is the twenty-third this year! I"m not going to say that the murders are committed by a serial killer. Why am I not saying this? Can you guess? Because they weren"t. They were killed by an organization. Organized. And if it comes out, a connection is made, maybe somebody says three murders or seven in a row or whatever, then, through me, a very sophisticated solution comes along and dissolves the cell walls of this story. You may read it somewhere, but it won"t live. And it gives rise to a home invasion story - which is just a tiny version of how the other story died. Hmmm. I"m gonna take you to where things are infinitely amusing." saying something, too. I haven"t said: "A prost.i.tute was found in a dumpster with her arms severed." And I haven"t pointed out that this woman is the twenty-third this year! I"m not going to say that the murders are committed by a serial killer. Why am I not saying this? Can you guess? Because they weren"t. They were killed by an organization. Organized. And if it comes out, a connection is made, maybe somebody says three murders or seven in a row or whatever, then, through me, a very sophisticated solution comes along and dissolves the cell walls of this story. You may read it somewhere, but it won"t live. And it gives rise to a home invasion story - which is just a tiny version of how the other story died. Hmmm. I"m gonna take you to where things are infinitely amusing."

Greg"s Higher Power looks over, impressed. Grant spreads his hands flat across the desk under the lamp.

"Now we"re going to go downstairs, into the bas.e.m.e.nt. I want you to stand guard for me for a while. We"re going to do something criminal, uh? A little bit. Enough to make the tiny world gag. Ready?"

Greg looks over to his Higher Power, who shrugs and places his hand over his heart.