Blind Sight (23 page)

“Mine,” thinks Luke, looking at his father on the television. “Mine, mine, mine.”

I
seem to have a lot more stuff now than when I started out the summer. I have more to think about, yes, but I actually mean physical possessions. I may need another suitcase to get everything back. I think I saw one in the garage. I have only eighteen more days here in Los Angeles, and time, along with everything else, is getting crowded.

Earlier in the week, Kati showed up at the house with this team of people, and they carried three racks of clothes into the living room, some in my dad’s size and some in mine. I don’t even know how Kati got my size. I wonder if she went into my room and looked at the labels of my clothes, or if that’s one of her assistant superpowers. Kati told me to make a pile of things I liked and so I did, thinking that it would lead to some sort of selection process, but everything I liked they let me keep. I don’t even know if my dad had to pay for it, or what. Now I have all this new stuff. My suit got tailored for me
by a guy named Diamond. It’s pretty sharp. Even I can tell that it’s significantly nicer than the suit I came with. I’ve got it on right now because in another hour a limousine is coming to pick up me and my dad and Kati and take us all to the premiere of a movie. After that, we are going to the after-party. All of this seems to be the kind of stuff that people at home who are wondering about me imagine that I am doing and that is, in fact, what I seem to be doing.

Today Sara called me. She’s back in Delaware from her retreat. Talking to her made me think about what I’ve been doing here a little differently. Sara has that effect. The conversation was good when we were talking about her retreat, and what she experienced, and what was going on with Aurora and Pearl, and how Nana is doing and all that, but when we started talking about me, things got a little awkward.

“So,” Sara said. “It sounds like you are in a good place with your father.”

“Oh yeah,” I said. “He’s been great.”

“You didn’t say if Mark has anyone special in his life right now.”

Here we entered into that weird infinitely regressive territory of: does she know/that I know/that she knows, etc.

“Um … no,” I said. “He’s pretty busy with the show and everything. We did go to dinner with a girl he’s been seeing.”

For all Sara knows, I thought, Mark has changed. Sara believes that people can change.

“Oh?” is what Sara said.

“You got my emails about going to Illinois and everything, right?” I said. “I knew you wouldn’t be reading them until after, but Dad wanted to keep you in the loop.”

“Oh yes, of course I did,” Sara said. “I appreciate Mark keeping me in the loop. Nana and I are wondering if you’d like us to invite Mark’s mother here?”

I tried to imagine a meeting between Bubbles and Nana. Bubbles and Sara. Bubbles and my sisters.

“No, that’s okay,” I said. “Maybe at some point we’ll all meet, but you know, actually I was thinking that Dad might want to come to Delaware sometime next year. If that’s okay with you and Nana. Or maybe I’ll come out and see him again?”

“Of course, Luke. He’s always welcome here. So tell me more. Give me a typical day in the Life of Luke.”

“We’re busy right now,” I told her. “Because Dad got nominated for an Emmy for his show and so he has to do publicity stuff for that. So I go with him and kind of keep him company at these different events.”

There was a little bit of silence on the other end, and then Sara said, “Yes, that certainly is a different world.”

“It’s fun,” I said, firmly, because I wanted Sara to enter into the spirit of it more, even though she sounded like she was still in ashram-induced detachment mode. “Like, we’re going to this movie premiere today, and then to an after-party at a big restaurant.”

“Pearl told me there are pictures of you on the Internet with Anthony,” Sara said. “Mark, I mean.”

“Yeah,” I said. “There was something in a magazine too, I guess. Some kids at school saw it.”

“Yes, I’ve heard all about that. I haven’t seen it.”

“People take pictures of him all the time,” I explained. “You get that he’s kind of famous, right?”

“I’m not entirely out of it,” she said. “I understand that.”

“Well, I’m just saying,” I said. “I know it’s not like they have
People
magazine at the ashram. And it’s not like any of the New Brethren are surfing the web. I wasn’t sure what you and Nana know.”

“What I’m interested in is finding out how you are,” Sara said. “I think it’s wonderful that Anthony feels he’s in a place now that he can welcome you into his life, and that you are having a good time. I’m a little … I’m a little concerned, honestly.”

“About what?” I asked. “Exactly?”

“Yes, well,” she said, after a moment. “You know I trust your
judgment. I’m sure you won’t let Mark put you in a situation you’re not comfortable with.”

“He wouldn’t do that,” I told her. “He’s always checking to make sure everything is okay with me.”

“And what,” she asked, “is okay with Luke?”

I could picture Sara’s face very clearly when she said that, because the voice she was using comes with a particular look: a stare, really, only she doesn’t seem to be staring at you but at some invisible midpoint between her and you that she’s substituted for you. It’s to this third person—who, coincidentally, shares your exact biology, history, and circumstances—that Sara will express a very measured disappointment or dissatisfaction. It’s to this person that Sara has said things like, “I’m wondering how you feel about letting others clean up after you?” or “I’m sure that you are sorry to be causing anyone worry with your lateness.” This third person, invisible though he may be, always gets the picture, so I made some noncommittal sound and waited for Sara to tell me whatever she needed to tell me.

“What I’ve been hearing so far,” she said, “is a lot about Mark. What he thinks and what he does and what he wants, and it’s wonderful that you are sensitive to that, but I’m not hearing a lot of Luke. I’m not hearing about what Luke thinks or Luke feels. I’m just wondering where Luke is in this picture that you are creating.”

“Maybe I’m not expressing myself well?” I said, because you can sometimes cut Sara’s “let’s try to go to a deeper level” gambits off at the pass with a little speak-for-speak deflection.

“I know that you are not someone who easily falls under the influence of other people or other ways of life,” Sara said, getting to the point. “We all have people in our lives who are different from us, and we can participate in their lives without changing who we are.”

“Why is everyone treating this like it’s all some kind of ordeal?” I asked, because now I was really annoyed.

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” she said.

“I called Nana when we were in Hawaii,” I said. “And I was like, ‘Nana, I’m in Hawaii, it’s so awesome,’ and she was like, ‘Luke, I will
pray for a safe return journey for you.’ It was like I told her I was in Baghdad.”

Sara laughed a little at that, but I wasn’t finished.

“Listen,” I said, “I really appreciate that you trust I can get through this difficult time of having … you know … a really great time. If everything suddenly reveals itself to not be as totally cool and simple as it seems, and I’ve been corrupted and blinded without even knowing it, then I’ll figure it out somehow and you can be sure, at that point, that I will treat it with total love and compassion just like always.”

There is a way of saying things where you can still get away with saying, “Oh, I was just joking,” if what you said upsets someone. Both my sisters have it mastered, but I think I might have erred on the side of being irretrievably sarcastic.

“Okay, Luke, my only concern,” Sara started to say, and then stopped. I knew that we had probably reached the point now where Sara was going to let her point go. And that is what happened.

“You know how Mother is,” Sara said at last. “She can’t hear of anyone getting on a plane without thinking it’s going to lead to disaster. I’m sorry, honey. You were wanting to tell me all this fun stuff. Pearl said you took surfing lessons and I could just picture you on a surfboard doing great and having the time of your life. I was smiling all day thinking about that.”

We talked a little more and then we hung up and of course now I can’t help thinking, okay, where am I in this picture I’m creating?

Luke goes into his bathroom and looks at himself in the mirror. Luke goes back into his bedroom, retrieves his phone, and returns to the bathroom. He holds the phone up next to his face, and takes a picture of his reflection in the mirror. Luke looks at the image he has captured of himself, which looks different in a number of ways from how Luke looked to himself while he was looking at himself.

It is difficult to know what level of consciousness nonhuman
animals experience. One test for this is to show an animal a mirror and see if it recognizes that the reflection is itself, and not some other animal. Nine animals consistently pass this test: bonobos, chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, bottlenose dolphins, orcas, elephants, the European magpie, and humans. Animals that fail include chimpanzees, dogs and cats, and humans before the age of eighteen months.

Luke leaves his bathroom and presents himself in the living room, where Mark is waiting.

“You look like a movie star,” Mark says to Luke.

“Spawn of Movie Star,” Luke corrects.

“Spawn of TV Star,” Mark amends. “There will be real movie stars out tonight. You’ll see what small potatoes I really am.”

The limousine, with Kati in it, arrives, and twenty minutes later Luke is standing on a red carpet next to his father and he knows that what this experience looks like to him, Luke, is actually significantly different in a number of ways from what it will look like later to other people when they look at pictures of it. Luke sees several famous people he recognizes, even though they too look different than their well-known images. Mostly this has to do with proportions: either their bodies are smaller, or they have much larger heads. Kati, in a black dress with a much smaller purse than usual, moves Mark and Luke to different positions, organizing where they should stand and who Mark should talk to. Mark waves at the crowds of people lined up behind a portable barricade. Luke does not see that his father is small potatoes at all. Once inside the movie theater, before they take their seats, several very famous people approach Mark and tell him how much they love
The Last
and congratulate him on his Emmy nomination. “Really great work,” people say, and “I’m such a fan.” Mark introduces famous people to Luke and famous people tell Luke their names. They say their own names as if they were not names that Luke already knew.

Luke knows that his father gets edgy and nervous at public events like this, although Mark always appears relaxed. Mark has
already told Luke that Luke is hugely helpful to him in these situations because Luke is very calming.

Chimera
is a summer blockbuster movie in the science fiction/fantasy vein. Scientists studying soil samples brought back from Mars find and are able to extract an actual zygote from the soil. A Top Secret experiment is started to fuse the alien embryonic cell with a human one and create a genetic chimera. The experiment is successful and the Chimera grows up in the laboratory with extraordinary abilities and a blue and partially transparent skin. The plot gets more complicated when it is revealed that a second Chimera was started at an even more Top Secret lab (this Chimera is called C-2) and the first Chimera and C-2 eventually battle each other. Additionally there is a romantic subplot, involving the Chimera and a sympathetic woman scientist who loves the Chimera and does not mind the partial sight of his circulatory system. The world is saved from destruction, and the Chimera discovers he possesses a soul (although it’s not clear whether this was a biological inheritance or something he developed through love).

Luke enjoys the film. Later, in the limousine en route to the after-party, Mark is extremely critical of a particular actor’s performance. Luke is interested to learn how his father would have played the role. Kati reminds Luke that if anyone asks him, he should say that he thought the movie was great.

“Say that you thought it was entertaining but it also made you think,” Mark suggests.

The after-party is being held at a restaurant, redecorated for the evening to look like the laboratory in the film, with servers dressed in white lab coats, and an enormous glass beaker in the middle of the main room with blue liquid bubbling in it. There is a buffet, and tables, but Kati keeps Mark and Luke circulating through the crowd in order to “say hello” to people, some of whom were also being circulated by their own assistants to “say hello” to other people, a situation that Luke judges to be highly inefficient. More photographs
are taken. No one lingers very long in one spot and everyone is very friendly and nice to everyone else, in short bursts: an artillery fire of friendliness and niceness. Mark finds a friend in the crowd, an actor he’s known for a long time, and when Luke sees his father safely settled into a conversation, he excuses himself to investigate the buffet.

There is a crush of people near the food, and Luke finds himself momentarily blocked in. Treading water, he attempts to sidle into an outside lane. Luke feels his elbow being tugged. He turns and finds himself nearly nose to nose with a girl.

“Are you going to the buffet?” the girl asks, half shouting because they are underneath a speaker playing the
Chimera
soundtrack.

Luke nods. The girl has thick bangs that hang in her eyes, and the rest of her hair is pulled back into a ponytail. She is wearing large and elaborately ornamental earrings that pull the lobes of her ears slightly downwards. Luke cannot see the rest of her due to the jamming situation of the crowd.

“Can you get me something?” the girl shouts. Someone behind Luke jostles him and Luke steps forward and onto someone else’s foot. The girl still has her hand on Luke’s elbow, and her grip tightens reflexively.

“I’m sorry,” Luke shouts. “Was that your foot? Sorry.”