John Shirley - Wetbones (3 page)

He first had to unlock her brain. He reached out mentally and undid the partial paralysis. She spasmed like a sick dog and defecated thinly and wetly on herself, then flopped onto her back. Ephram wrinkled his nose at the smell and switched on the bathroom's ventilator fan; he took a little can of air freshener from the glass shelf over the sink and sprayed it around a bit. Honeysuckle.

He put the can away and inspected her. The marks he'd made were scabbing over, but rather badly. Some of them were purulent. This definitely did have to be the last time with Megan.

She tried to speak, managed to croak, ''Listen . . . just once . . . listen I can't believe you don't . . . you can't . . ."

"You should believe it," he said, sending a probe into her cerebral punishment receiver. She gave out a cawing sound that was all the scream she could manage anymore and arched her back. Ephram felt his penis harden. It hardened a bit, anyway.

He moved to stand beside the bathtub and said, "Come over here and get in the tub. Facing me."

The look on her face. Her eyes going dully to the door. Thinking about pushing past him, running. Not having the strength - and knowing he'd never let her get a step toward the door, anyway.

He savoured the completeness of his triumph over her. She had fought him all the way. She was better than some, who'd capitulate in some kind of role reversal madness, beginning to identify with him, losing their grasp on identity. That was a bore. But Megan fought to the last breath, bless her.

All she could do was say, emptily, "No.".

Psychically, he speared her again. She writhed and tried to weep, but the tears were long since dried up. Her lips were cracked from dehydration.

She struggled to her feet. She swayed.

Ephram reached over and turned on the water, started the shower going, lukewarm. He didn't want any steam to obscure his view. Then he said, again, "Get in the tub."

She took a wobbly step toward it. She might not make it . . .

His mental probe encircled her reward receiver; grasped it, almost squeezed it like a sponge. His use of her this past week made the extra exertion necessary.

She struggled, but the pleasure rippled through her, prompted by Ephram's control of the master switch in her brain, the nexus of all biological switchboards . . .

Raspily sobbing, she struggled across the floor to the tub and, with great effort, climbed over its rim, stood miserably in the shushing water. He waited till her fouled thigh was rinsed, then bent to the portable cassette stereo he kept on the floor - what people called a "ghetto blaster", ha ha - and Mozart unreeled sweetly from its speakers, the music bouncing tinnily from the tiles in the little room.

Ephram closed his eyes and listened. He took a deep breath, refining his senses, and opened his eyes.

He grabbed Megan by the hair, turned her about in the shower to lubricate her. He unzipped his pants. His psychic probe found the last pleasure receivers that could still be stimulated in her . . . She wailed and commenced involuntary humping motions with her hips. He put a hand around her throat and forced her to her knees, directed his semi-erect penis into her crusted mouth . . .

His hand closed slowly around her neck; as the crispy tissues of her throat collapsed under his strong, practiced fingers, his penis briefly hardened to something like complete tumescence.

A minute after the Mozart cassette ended, he withdrew from her, mentally. Withdrawing with excellent timing: just as she died. He dared not experience her death more closely, with the psychic probe. That would set up etheric repercussions and the Akishra would hear. They would find him again. The soulworms would find him. His freedom from them must be scrupulously guarded.

He wasn't sure if he'd killed her with the choking, or if she'd simply died from being used up, from exhaustion.

She was rather emaciated. It didn't matter.

Now he had to clean up the mess.

There was always a downside, in life.

"Did Constance come back there, Mr. Garner?"

"What? Isn't she with you, Terry?" Garner told the cold, clutching hand of his imagination to let go of his guts. Constance's friend Terry phoning from the mall - he could hear the video arcade going bing, bam, bong in the background. The girl was looking for Constance. Who, dammit, was supposed to be with this girl Terry. But there could be a lot of explanations. "Terry . . ?"

"No, uh, she was with me, but, it's like, she goes, 'I'm gonna go to the restroom', you know? And I'm like, 'Okay but hurry up because you have to drive me home before eleven or my dad'll get really gross on me, you know?' And she's all, 'I'll be right back'. But then she doesn't come back and doesn't come back and -"

"She hasn't shown up here, either. Did you check for her car?"

"No. You think she'd, you know, actually
ditch
me at the mall like that?"

"No. I just want to make sure she's still in the mall somewhere. Can you check and call me back?"

"Um . . . Sure. Bye."

They hung up and Garner went back to the group. Nothing he could do till Terry called back. Just get on with the group and try not to think about it. If you freaked out every time your kid misplaced herself for a few minutes, you'd get some kind of chronic stress syndrome.

Group was in the living room. It smelled of stale coffee and cigarettes. It went on for ten minutes more, with Mrs. Wineblatt wallowing in self pity about her

shambling marriage; the others struggling bravely to keep their interest in Mrs. Wineblatt's share, though they'd heard it all a half-dozen times and generally felt she was playing out some heavy denial about a necessary divorce . . .

Garner shook his head, thinking that his attitude toward Mrs. Wineblatt was slanted by his anxiety about Constance. He'd had a bad feeling about Constance all day and it made Constance's losing touch with Terry at the mall seem more important than it probably was.

The minutes dragged by. Mrs. Wineblatt was snivelling, Harry Dugan seemed an irritating old cynic, James seemed a pouty, self-indulgent college sophomore. Damn Constance. This kind of thing was just not on. She had to be responsible, because
he
had to be responsible . . .

Or maybe she . . .

The doorbell rang. Garner jumped up, announcing the end of group though James wasn't quite done with his share yet. Garner could see the boy's pout deepen, the kid taking it as a personal rejection.

Tough. Garner nearly sprinted to the front door, expecting to find a cop with a long face on his doorstep.

But on his doorstep was a twenty-five-year-old white woman, six months pregnant. Aleutia Berenson. He'd been counselling her for three months, on and off. She was a crack addict.

"Come on in, Aleutia," he forced himself to say. Looking up and down the street, before he closed the front door.

He escorted Aleutia into his study. She smiled at him, her eyes wet, the skin under them looking bruised. She was working up some kind of manipulative addict trip to pull on him. She sat on the sofa.

This wasn't her appointed counselling day, but he

made time for pregnant women with drug problems. You help a pregnant drug addict get clean, you've scored a twofer.

His face may have been a little wooden, though. Waiting for the phone to ring. Terry to call back. What was taking so long?

From the Journal of Ephram Pixie, "for 5 January 1987".

. . . Number Seven is responding more readily than Six did and I am convinced that the difference is in me. Getting free of the Akishra is no doubt part of it. Without their sucking, sucking, sucking at me all the time, my talent flourishes. And Number Six responded more readily than Number Five did.

The Divine Vision is quickening in me. It is emerging and strengthening. Whatever spirit put this Talent in me (I do feel that it is Spiritual Power of some kind, intended to elevate me to the Transcendence I have always known is fated to me, known even when I was bowing and scraping to get tenure as a Professor trying to teach Nietzsche to the television-stunned cattle of this generation). I feel the Spirit is beginning to merge with me, to take part in my celebrations. Without the Akishra to interfere with our communing, I feel the Spirit's enjoyment the way a great solo violinist senses the rapt attention of the audience at a recital. Indeed, I can feel The Spirit participating, sharing with me all that I experience when I employ this Celestial Gift. Although I have never seen this Presence with my physical eyes, I felt it

sharply last night as I used Seven on the deserted pebble beach and, in the course of things, I looked up at the stars and saw the unseen stars between the bright ones, the Negative constellation, the secret Zodiac that guides the lives of the world's secret masters . . . Zodiac signs no one but me and, perhaps, a few others, have seen . . . The Sign of the Lamprey. The Sign of the Cobra. The Sign of the Judge. The Sign of the Spider. The Sign of Kali. The Sign of the Sow. The Sign of the Hangman . . .

"I mean, if you really wanted to help me," Aleutia was saying, with elaborate innocence, you'd give me maybe fifty or a hundred in cash so I can get a room for a couple days -"

"So that's it. I can arrange shelter," Garner said wearily. "I can arrange a hotel room. I can arrange food. But no way do I give crack poofers a dime. I know better."

"You're a minister. Liberal Methodist or whatever, it don't matter, you're just another Minister, Rev Garner, and I should know you can't trust ministers anymore than cops!"

"So don't trust me. I don't give a fuck. Trust God, and that's enough."

"I just don't see how you can expect me to believe in God, with all this shit coming down on me in the world," Aleutia said. She was thinner, except for the pooch of her swollen stomach - and there were bruised hollows under her eyes. The backs of her hands were flecked with small, crusted sores; more of them scored her cheeks.

"You've been using again," Garner said.

She said, "Uh . . ." as she tried to decide whether it was worth the effort to deny it.

He went on, "You've got tweakin sores on your arms and face. You've been picking at cocaine bugs."

She started to cry, with a ratchety sound in her throat, and a bubble of phlegm appeared at a nostril. He gave her a tissue from the box on his desk, and she wiped her nose awkwardly, her fingernails getting in the way. They were six-inches long, painted gold, curling like the nails of a tree-sloth. Her brown hair was razor cut into wave patterns along the sides. She was a white girl, but these were the emblems of ghetto culture, Garner knew, which probably meant that she was living with Donald again. He decided to ask her point blank. Theological issues were for later. (Why didn't Terry call?)

"You're back with Donald, aren't you?"

"And you think that's bad, right, because he's a black man."

"Hell no, not because he's a black man, because he's a fucking crack addict, Aleutia, and he's got you back on the shit."

She broke down, then, and he put his arm around her and patted her. She said she was sorry, she knew it was hurting the baby, but she just found herself at the rock-house at five in morning, looking for Donald.

"You were looking for the cocaine, girl, you know? At least as much as Donald."

"So I'm a fucking addict. I didn't ask to be no addict."

I hear you. I was - I'm an addict too." He hadn't done dope of any kind in years but you were supposed to never talk about being an addict in the past tense, because that led to complacency, and somewhere inside, the addict was waiting for complacency. "I've been

there. People who say, 'It's your fault because you started and you should have known better', those people are full of shit. We all had a direction in our life, a momentum, see, that carried us into addiction. Your stepdad raping you, your Mom beating you up
because
your stepdad raped you - the shit you went through goes on and on. You felt like you had to hit the streets. I can see that. But once we know what's happening, we can take responsibility and get the fuck off the streets, Aleutia. You know?"

She shook her head. Shivering. She was having a strong craving now, he knew. A spooncall. Or, in her case, a pipecall. She put her hand to her mouth and he could imagine a crack stem, the glass coke-smoking pipe, in her fingers.

Looking at her, he saw a little girl. Not much older than his own kid. It made him ache with worry about Constance. He thought: I'd better call the cops, tell them Constance is missing . . .

No. He knew what they'd say: It hadn't been long enough. Give her time. And if they picked her up when nothing was wrong she'd be so mad at him . . .

He forced himself to concentrate on Aleutia. "Look, Aleutia - you had a cocaine relapse, that's all. It's easy to do. We haven't had a chance to talk much and there's some stuff - Listen, Crack gets you two ways. One, getting off is a way of escaping from all the shit, right? Addictive personalities. We've talked about that. Second - and this is important, Aleutia - it gets to you neurologically. Meaning it messes with your brain chemistry. It pushes your brain-buttons, so to speak. You ever see that film of the white rat that's got a wire running into its brain? The rat pushes a button to stimulate the pleasure centre of the brain and it becomes this little

furry button pushin' machine. That's all it can do, it doesn't eat or sleep, it just pushes that fucking button till it
dies
, girl. It reprogrammed itself that way."

"Oh God, that's fucked up." Her face crumpling. "What're you saying, we're like robots? Programming and shit?" Tears streaking her makeup.

"Only up to a point. You get trapped. Neurologically trapped."

"It's like a fucking roach motel," she said miserably, reaching for a clean tissue.

He nodded, thinking about the baby in her belly: trapped in the trapped. He took a deep breath. "But if you get off the shit, and give yourself a whole new system of rewards, well, eventually, you can get free. It takes time for the brain to get normal. And holding on till then takes help from outside the trap. What you need to do, maybe, is think about going to a halfway house. Inpatient recovery home. For six months, say . . ."