Strange Animals (16 page)

She moved the picture from the dresser to her nightstand and looked at it as she lay in bed, resting on her side in an effort to ease the cramps she was starting to feel in her legs. Her mother had always described it as a picture of the last day the world was “Karenless.” She knew that eventually the world would be without her again, but before she left it, she was determined to change it.

James had been
driving for much longer than he ever had before in a single trip. It was starting to take its toll on him physically. His shoulders and legs were sore, his eyes were getting heavy, and the landscape was less and less stimulating as he moved through the Oklahoma Panhandle and into the Texas Panhandle along Highway 54. Everything was flat, and there were few buildings in the small towns he passed through. James thought that this was God's way of preparing him for whatever he would need to do once he got to California, of removing any distractions so that he could mentally strengthen himself. James knew that once he arrived in California he would have to remain vigilant against Satan's efforts to distract him from whatever the subsequent steps of God's plan would be. Worse yet, he knew that Satan might try to trick him into believing in a false goal. God hadn't yet revealed his entire plan, and James suspected that Satan might see this as
an opportunity to make him fail. After all, James was carrying out God's will, which would necessarily be counter to Satan's own plans for humanity. He would encounter distractions of all kinds. There would be confusion. There would be temptation. And once he got to his ultimate goal in Los Angeles, once he was close enough to be a serious threat to Satan's own plans, there would likely be hopelessness and despair. James knew he would have to overcome all of this in order to succeed for God. He thanked God for giving him this time in the beginning of his journey to focus, to clear his mind and purify his spirit.

James felt his stomach churn and realized he hadn't eaten since he got in his car and started driving. The pain in his stomach reminded him of what he'd felt at the end of the first day of his fast. He remembered the pain fondly, but he was glad he wouldn't have to continue feeling it for two more days. He had brought no food with him on his trip, because he knew that God would provide for him. James began thinking about finding a grocery store, but then he saw what he took to be a sign from God. It was a Dairy Queen sign just off the highway in Dalhart, Texas.

No other fast-food restaurant would have had the same personal meaning to James as the Dairy Queen, and he knew that God knew this. When James was young, his first foster family had been devoutly Christian. His foster father was strict and physically abusive, though he always justified the abuse with the Bible. James couldn't understand this rationale as a child, but as an adult he reflected on the times his first foster father would whip him and his foster brothers and sisters with a car antenna, and understood that pain can sometimes be a better teacher, a better expression of love, than anything else. But as a child he had found this impossible to understand.

While he was with that foster family, Dairy Queen was his favorite place. James had a Sunday School teacher who was kind to him, and she would take all the children from her Sunday
School class to Dairy Queen every Sunday. She'd buy them ice cream and encourage them to get to know one another, and it seemed that she chose to express her love and obedience to God through compassion and understanding. It was a brief reprieve from his foster father, and the caring his Sunday School teacher showed him was unique in his life at the time. As a result, Dairy Queen was the place he most closely associated with happiness as a child. It was the place where he felt closest to God.

His foster father's temper was not confined to his wards, however, and eventually the man beat his wife so badly that he was sentenced to some time in jail and their foster children were all removed and dispersed to other foster homes. He wasn't very close with any of his foster siblings, but he sometimes wondered where they ended up and if they felt the same way about Dairy Queen as he did.

As he walked through the front doors, the familiar smell of the soft-serve machine and the grease from the fryers transported him right back to those Sundays. He ordered the same thing he always ordered as a child: a double cheeseburger, fries, and a Heath Blizzard. Every bite was justification that what he was doing was what God wanted, and it filled him with excitement at what God might have in store for him on the rest of his journey.

He looked around and noticed that he was the only person in the place besides the staff, which included a young cook who was very likely a local high school student and the older lady who had taken his order. It was late, and glancing at the store's hours posted on the door, James saw that they were about to close. He looked at the older lady who was wiping down a table near him and apologized for keeping them in the store later than they had to be.

The older woman said, “Nonsense, young man. You eat your dinner and stay here as long as you like. We have to clean up anyway, and I don't mind having some extra company.”

God was innately good, and individual happiness was his
greatest gift to any person. Science and the study of space and planets were fine, but those things weren't for most people. Most people couldn't have a true understanding of science, so those endeavors were best left to those who could grasp them. Being kind to one another and making life pleasant were what most people should focus on. Sex and love were for the young. After a certain age, after having enough experiences, life eventually became about finding something to pass your time while you remembered the things that made you truly happy. Having children was essential, because it was easier to remember your own youth if you surround yourself with young people. These were things that the old woman understood to be true.

James thanked her and wondered if she was an angel. He knew it was certainly possible that God would send angels to help him along in his journey. If she wasn't an angel, he hoped he would encounter one or two on his journey, and he looked forward to recognizing them.

After finishing his meal, he said goodbye to the older woman and told her that he appreciated everything she had done for him, to which she responded, “I just gave you dinner, son. You needed it and I gave it to you. Anyone else would have done the same.” James took this overtly humble response to be further evidence of her possible divine origin. As he walked out into the parking lot and started wondering where he would sleep, he gave a brief thought to going back inside and asking the angel if she knew of anyplace to stay for the night, but he thought better of it. He didn't want to insult God's generosity by asking for more. God would provide him what he needed as he needed it. So he got in his car and got back on the freeway, looking for a divine sign. No more than a minute farther down the road, he saw a sign for the Corral RV park and pulled off at the next exit.

Once he got to the RV park, certain that this was where God intended him to spend his first night on the road, James found that they were closed. There was a small building in front of the
park labeled
“
Office
,”
but it was dark and the door was locked. James was silently asking God if he had misinterpreted anything, if he was meant to have gone somewhere else, when a man emerged from a nearby RV and lit a cigarette. James asked him if he knew where the supervisor was, or if there was some way to contact him.

The man said, “I think they're closed for the night. I doubt you can make a reservation or anything for tonight, if that's what you're looking for.”

If there was a God, then humanity was better off without him. Any creature that had absolute power over everything on planet Earth clearly only wanted to cause us all pain and misery in some of the most sadistic ways possible. The universe was vast and mysterious and beautiful, but no human being would ever get to experience it. The knowledge of such things was only the taunting insult of a paradise we could never experience. Instead most people would spend their lives performing a job they didn't care about and wondering if anything in their life would ever have real meaning for them. Ultimately they would conclude that there was no meaning. Sex was the only thing worth living for, but the trappings of a regular relationship were too high a price to pay for it. Taking small vacations with a prostitute in an RV was the only thing that could keep a man sane. Children were not only disgusting and inconsiderate, but they were also evidence of the futility of life, of the disposable nature of everything, the inherent obsolescence in each and every person's excuse for a life. These were things that the smoking man understood to be true.

James told the man that he was trying to find a place to stay for the night. He explained that he'd been on the road for a long time, and he had no problem sleeping in his car, but he wanted to find a safe place, not just the side of the highway. The smoking man said, “Well, you can see my RV here. It's an Airstream Incognito, on the smaller side, but I accidentally booked a full-size
spot here for tonight. Your car could probably fit right behind me if you wanted to pull in for the night.”

The stranger's generosity surprised James, but it solidified his understanding of just how invested God was in him and his journey. Clearly God had sent two angels from heaven to help him on his first night of the journey. James kindly accepted the offer and pulled his car behind the RV as the stranger finished his cigarette.

James asked the stranger how long he'd been on the road and what his final destination was. He hoped the answer would reveal some hint from God about what the next day of his own journey would hold. The stranger said, “Today's the first day of a little road trip I've been planning for a month or so. I try to get out in the RV at least three or four times a year. Clear my head. And I don't really have a final destination. Back home I guess. I just drive around for a few days, see the sights, meet some people like yourself along the way, and then head back home.”

James understood the stranger's home to be heaven. He didn't want to pry too much further, as he felt that God would have instructed the angel to be secretive where details were concerned. He knew that God wouldn't want to give him every piece of information he needed, but rather to allow James to learn some things for himself. He silently thanked God for sending him two angels in a single night, and then he thanked the stranger again.

The stranger said, “You're more than welcome. It's really no trouble. We might be out of here tomorrow pretty early, so if I don't see you in the morning, good luck on your own trip, wherever it takes you.”

The stranger threw his cigarette butt on the ground, stomped it out, and headed back into his RV. James couldn't help smiling about the small bit of information that the angel had let slip. He referred to himself as “we.” For James there was only one way to interpret that. Not only was this stranger an angel, but God was
present as well. God wasn't just up in heaven looking down on James. God was also there with him.

James got into his car, reclined the seat, and breathed deeply. He rolled down his window and let the night air into his car. He could feel God in the way the air felt heavier than normal for that time of year. He could smell God in the faint lingering smoke from the angel's cigarette. He could hear God in the cars passing by on the highway. He could sense that all this was part of God's plan, in a way that he never could before.

He opened his sunroof and looked up at the stars. The night sky had always fascinated James. It seemed so vast and so endless. He didn't understand how anyone could look up at the heavens and not know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that a great and awesome God had made it all. He didn't dwell on how every star was just a ball of hydrogen floating in space like our sun. He didn't wonder what other planets might be locked in their own orbits around those stars. He never thought about what forces might be at work holding it all together. He only took in the immensity of it, and imagined the greatness of the God who created it all.

He closed his sunroof, got as comfortable as he could in his driver's seat, and fell asleep wondering what other angels he would meet on his trip to California.

Karen's mother, Lynn,
agreed to accompany Karen to her next doctor's visit, which would include an ultrasound that would be capable of revealing the gender of the fetus. Assuming Karen probably wanted to know as little about her unborn child as possible, Lynn had not asked her daughter if she planned to find out, but as they drove, her curiosity got the best of her. She said, “I don't really know how you're feeling, or what you're thinking about all this right now, and I don't really even know if you want to talk to me about it, but I'm going to ask you anyway. Do you want to know if your baby is a boy or a girl?”

Karen said, “It's not a baby. It's a fetus. And, no, I don't want to know.”

Lynn was silent for several seconds before saying, “Okay. You know the doctor is going to know when she does the ultrasound, right?”

Karen said, “I know, but I don't want to know.”

Lynn said, “Okay. Okay,” and remained quiet for several more seconds before asking her daughter, “Would you care if the doctor told me?”

Karen said, “Why would you want to know? It's really likely that I won't be having this baby. The money is really slowing down, and unless it picks up there's no way it's going to hit the goal. That's the reason I don't want to know. Are you sure you do?”

Lynn said, “I'm not sure. I'm not at all. But . . . Look, I'm about to open a whole can of worms here. Do you want to have this conversation now?”

Karen knew her mother was anxious to have a real talk about the whole thing, which she had been denied since this all began. Karen had been feeling somewhat guilty about this, and now she finally gave in. She said, “Yeah, it's fine. Let's do it. We have to at some point.”

Lynn said, “Okay. I'm not going to get mad or chastise you. I would have in the beginning, when your father and I first found out this was you, but I'm past that. I guess I just don't understand why you couldn't refund the money after you prove your point, either way, and then have the baby anyway and raise it yourself.”

Karen said, “Because I don't want to have a baby.”

Lynn said, “I know. You've always said that. But let me tell you something, and this is not me trying to coax you into having grandbabies for me. When you're forty, and you look back on this moment in your life, you're going to have regrets if you don't have this baby. It's that simple.”

Karen said, “You know what? I might. You could be completely correct. But I'm not having the baby, Mom. I can't. I just can't. There's so much other shit wrapped up in this, I wouldn't even know where to start.”

Lynn said, “Yeah, this is complicated, no doubt about that. But it will be far more complicated for you later in life if you don't have it.”

Karen said, “Okay, just for argument's sake, let's say I have this baby, no matter how everything turns out. That kid would be at least as much of a public figure as I am right now. I don't think that's fair, you know, to bring a kid into the world with that burden right off the bat.”

Lynn said, “And you think aborting the baby is fair?”

Karen said, “For me, this fetus is just a means to an end. Obviously, if the site hits its mark, then I'll have the baby, and it will get to live. And maybe it will even get to live in anonymity, if whoever ends up adopting the kid wants it that way. That's about as fair as this kid could hope for, I guess. But let's get back to your original premise here, where I have the kid and raise it myself. At what point do I tell him or her why people are always taking its picture and why it's always being talked about and why so many people in the world hate its mom? Is that a tenth-birthday conversation?
Listen, little Johnny or Jenny, I accidentally got pregnant, and then I decided to use you, when you were a fetus, to prove that the religious right in this country is filled with a bunch of misogynist assholes who want to take away women's rights at every turn. I was fully prepared to abort you, but once I proved my point, I didn't. Instead I had you, kept you, and now your entire life will be a sideshow attraction.
”

Lynn said, “It doesn't have to be like that, and you know it.”

Karen said, “I think it has to be pretty close to that. In a best-case scenario.”

Lynn said, “I just find it very hard to accept that you could actually have this baby, my grandchild, and give it to someone else to raise.”

Karen said, “I really don't think that's going to happen, Mom.”

Lynn said, “Really? Then why are we going to a doctor right now to get an ultrasound?”

Karen said, “Because I'm fucking pregnant. Jesus Christ. You know I need to have a doctor take a look at me to make sure
everything's okay with me, with my body. This isn't just to take pictures of the baby.”

Lynn said, “So you do think of it as a baby, then?”

Karen said, “Jesus fucking Christ.”

Lynn said, “Sorry. This is just hard for me and your father, too, you know?”

Karen said, “I know, and I'm sorry you guys got dragged into this. I never wanted anyone to know it was me.”

Lynn said, “How were you going to keep your dad and me from finding out that you were pregnant? We were going to see you sooner or later, weren't we?”

Karen said, “I was just going to be really busy with my dissertation for a while.”

Lynn said, “So you were going to lie to us?”

Karen said, “Yes, Mom, I was going to lie to you to avoid conversations just like this one. I was trying to focus on the bigger picture.”

Lynn said, “The bigger picture is your family, Karen. That's always what the bigger picture is. I know you think what you're doing is important, and it's going to change people, but it might not. Even if you get the money, or don't get the money, or whatever you think you want to happen actually happens, do you think the world will really be that different? And even if it is different, will it be different in the way you intended? The world moves at a slow pace. If you try to change it too much, it will reject you.”

Karen said, “Jesus, Mom, thanks for the pep talk.”

Lynn said, “Honey, I'm just saying that when you look back on all of this, years from now, you might realize it was all a lot of pain and suffering for not much of a result. Once it ends, people will go back to their lives, and eventually they'll all forget about it. But if you have a son or a daughter, you'll get to watch them grow into a person. And I just can't tell you”—and now she was starting to cry a bit—“I just can't tell you how rewarding that is.”

Karen said, “Mom, don't cry.”

Lynn said, “I can't help it. I remember the day we brought you home and your dad and I had a conversation about who we thought you'd be when you grew up.”

Karen said, “I know. You've told me this a hundred times.”

Lynn said, “I thought you'd be a ballerina because you were born with long legs, and your dad thought—”

Karen said, “He thought I'd be a race car driver, because I'd squeeze his fingers until my knuckles were white. I know. You were both wrong.”

Lynn said, “Yes, we were wrong, but that's not what matters. What matters is that you grew into this incredible person, and we got to see that happen. For both of us, there's not one thing we did that's more important than raising you. And I just want you to have that experience, too.”

Karen said, “I get it. I really do. But try and see it from my perspective. For me, doing this, doing something that forces people to think and maybe even change their minds about something, is just as important to me as having a kid was to you and Dad. I understand what you're saying, Mom. I always have when baby shit comes up. But I just don't feel the same way, and I'm asking you to respect that.”

Lynn said, “You know we respect you, honey, but this is something that's beyond respect.”

Karen said, “I know. It's my life, and I'm trying to do what I think is best.”

Lynn said, “It's not just your life, though. That's the thing I think you're not really taking the time to see. You're living with us. You're affecting our lives, too.”

Karen said, “If it's an inconvenience, I can get another place. I just don't want to be somewhere where my name's on a lease so that weirdos can find me.”

Lynn said, “That's not what I meant. You're not inconveniencing us. We're happy to have you back. I meant that this isn't just
about you, because what if those weirdos show up at our front door or the cameras or whatever? We're part of this, too, now. And what about Paul? I know he can't be doing too good. You guys broke up, or whatever happened, but I know you still love each other, and no matter what happens with the baby, that will still be true. I guess I'm just asking you to think about all this, because when you're old, whether you have a child or not, you're going to have lived with whatever the fallout is from this. That could be bad.”

Karen said, “I know, Mom. I know. But it's worth what I'm doing.”

Lynn said, “Okay, honey. If you really think that, then okay.”

As they turned onto the street where Dr. Prasad's office was, they saw the crowd immediately. It was a smaller crowd, but it was similar to what Karen experienced the last time she was on UCLA's campus. There were two groups outside of Dr. Prasad's building—one supporting Karen and one protesting. And there were more signs, many of them directed at Dr. Prasad, with phrases like “Prasad is a Baby Killer,” and “You Don't Have to Perform the Abortion to Kill a Baby.”

Karen noticed one sign that showed her own face next to Hitler's and read, “God Kills All Antichrists.” Although Karen found the sign amusing, she also began to understand for the first time that these people had a visceral hatred for her. They saw what she was doing as the equivalent of murdering millions of people. They truly believed that she was working with, or for, the Christian Satan. She wondered what people of other religions might think of what she was doing. There had been very little commentary about it online from other religious groups, and nothing as vitriolic as what the Christian groups were writing about her.

The two groups had positioned themselves on either side of the driveway leading to the building's underground parking garage. Three police officers were keeping the groups separate and corralling them onto the sidewalk so they wouldn't spill out into
the street. They were also prohibiting them from going into the building.

Lynn said, “This is what I was talking about. This is nuts.”

Karen said, “It's what I was talking about, too, Mom. When's the last time you've seen anyone this invested in an idea?”

As they drove into the parking garage, someone spit on the car's driver's-side window. Lynn said, “I'm not real sure they're invested in anything but hating you at the moment, honey.”

Karen and her mother made their way through the building and into Dr. Prasad's waiting room, where two other women gave them less-than-welcoming stares. Before Karen could even sign in, Dr. Prasad herself came out and asked Karen if they could speak privately. Once in Dr. Prasad's office, Dr. Prasad said, “Karen, I'm really sorry to have to do this, but I don't think I can continue being your doctor.”

Karen said, “What? You've been my doctor for almost my entire life. Are you serious?”

Dr. Prasad said, “Unfortunately, I am. I want you to know that I have nothing against you and I don't even mind what you're doing. Even if I did, I'd still be your doctor. I don't pass any kind of moral judgment on any of my patients.”

Karen said, “Okay. Then why are you turning me away?”

Dr. Prasad said, “I'm sure you saw the crowd outside. They've been there for three days. I don't know how they knew I was your doctor, but they found out somehow, and now they're scaring my other patients—and everyone who works in this building, for that matter—and those people are starting to complain to me. I just can't put all of these people through this. I hope you understand that I don't want to be doing this, but I just can't, in good conscience, continue being your doctor.”

Karen said, “Wow. What happened to the Hippocratic oath?”

Dr. Prasad said, “Come on. I don't want to argue about this. I've found another doctor for you. She's a great prenatal doctor and a pediatrician, just like me. I've known her since medical
school, and she said she'd be happy to help you. No one knows we talked about it, so you should be able to remain anonymous with her. It will be easier for everyone involved, including you. I know you can't enjoy driving through that mob outside to come in here. Do you enjoy it?”

Karen said, “No. Of course not.”

Dr. Prasad handed Karen a business card with the information for her new doctor and said, “Karen, I am truly sorry to have to do this. I've never turned a patient away before. But I think we both know this is best for us all.”

As Karen walked out of her office Dr. Prasad said, “Good luck, Karen. I really mean that.”