The Whisper (24 page)

“Who else could've?” He pulled another beer from the six-pack at his side and cracked it open. It hissed like the fuse of a bomb. “If Fiona didn't create you, who did?”

The younger Alistair didn't know how to answer that question, so he asked another of his own. “Do you call this place Thessaly?”

“Of course. Don't really know the names of any other places.” The older kept his eyes fixed on the stars. “So are you, like, an alien?”

“In a way,” the younger said. “Does that bother you?”

“Who cares,” the older said. “As long as I'm not being replaced. You look like I did back when she created me. I figured you were my replacement. I thought it was pretty messed up of her, letting me meet my replacement. But then, she's done some messed-up things. She replaced her parents, you know? Multiple times. Who does that? Your parents are your parents, right?”

“Are
your
parents around?” the younger asked.

“Mom passed a few years back,” the older said, and he raised his bottle to the sky. “Dad ran off with Mrs. Loomis number four. Not sure where they ended up.”

“Oh.” The younger sipped his soda. “Your sister?”

“Got a job. Moved away a long time ago,” the older said as he peered over his shoulder at the dark house. “So if you're an alien, what planet are you from?”

“I come from a place very similar to this. It's actually the place that Fiona is from. I'm looking for her. I want to bring her home.”

“Bring her wherever you want. Except back here. I don't want her back here. Not after listening to those tapes.”

“What tapes?”

*   *   *

The neighborhood was almost the same as back home. But this was Fiona's impression of it, her perception of it. She had obviously built it from her memory. A house that Alistair always remembered as green was painted blue. Some trees were shorter, some taller. There was also the issue of age. Fiona had created this version of Thessaly and lived in it for twelve years, and according to the older Alistair, she'd been gone for another thirteen. Things had grown. Things had decayed.

“How old are you?” the younger asked.

“Well, I was already twelve when she created me. I guess that makes me thirty-seven. Jesus, that's old, isn't it?” There were moles on his face that the younger Alistair didn't have, wrinkles in his brow, a chin shaded by stubble. He was taller than the younger Alistair, and yet everything was slightly sunken. His hair was cut short, but that didn't hide the fact that it was thinning.

The two stopped in front of Fiona's house. “Do we knock?” the younger asked.

“I have a key,” the older said. “Her uncle Dorian and I are pals.”

They slipped through the front door and slinked up the stairs that flanked the living room. In the living room, Fiona's uncle Dorian was asleep under a patchwork quilt on the sofa. His body was a round lump. His white hair was tied in a ponytail.

“He waits up every night,” the older whispered. “Always expecting her to come home. It's sad, really. He's a good guy, though. Very sweet. I don't have the heart to let him listen to the tapes.”

“Where's her dad?”

The older sighed. “She gave up after round five, and I haven't seen one of her dads since. I'm not sure what happened to all those different versions.”

Fiona's bedroom was at the top of the stairs. Alistair had been in Fiona's room in Thessaly, but it didn't look like this. The shape was the same, the bones. It had a slanted ceiling and wooden floors, but it had been repainted and redecorated. What were light blue walls back home were dark purple here. White furniture had been supplanted by antique wood.

“I kissed her on her bed once, in the early days,” the older said. He ran his hand over tussled sheets on the bed.

“Were you guys like…?” The younger couldn't find the right word.
Dating? Together? Married?

The older moved over to the window, opening it and letting in a cool breeze. “We weren't like anything,” he said. “There was only that one kiss, but it didn't mean squat. Not to her, at least. Besides, I kept getting older. And she did too, but only on the inside. She looked the same on the outside. A kid. It never would have worked out.”

The younger went over to the bookshelf and starting perusing the volumes. They were all leather-bound. He recognized a few of the titles, some classics about kids sneaking off to magical places, but one had a name that he knew all too well. “
Sixth Grade for the Outer-Spacers
?” he asked, holding up the book. “By Claire Rastaily?”

“Took you all of ten seconds,” the older said. “You must be good with anagrams. I don't think Dorian has ever noticed it, but you knew exactly what it was. Figures.”

“What do you mean?”

“Open it,” the older said.

The younger lifted the cover to reveal that there wasn't any writing inside. The pages had been carved out. Six cassettes rested in the hollowed-out cavity.

“That book is where Fiona used to hide cigarettes and things like that,” the older said. “Kinda funny, actually. Girl was basically a god, but still she'd hide her cigarettes.”

The younger lifted the top cassette. There was no label. “What's on them?” he asked.

“Those tapes were buried next to that big rock along the edge of my backyard,” the older said. “I dug them up not long after Fiona left. Figured she doesn't need her secret smokes anymore, so I tossed those and hid the tapes in the book. I used to come up here and listen. At first, I was happy to hear her voice. I haven't listened in years, though. They make me angry.”

“But what's on them?”

“There's a player hidden under her mattress. She called it Kilgore. Go ahead and take it. Listen if you want. Or chuck it all. Just don't let anyone else know about the tapes. Not the type of things anyone around here should have to think about.”

“Are they really bad?”

The older moved to the doorway, and without looking back, he said, “Not all bad for a guy like you. I'm not stupid, you know. I know you're not an alien. And if you're not my replacement, then there's only one person you could be.”

“Who?”

“The original.”

 

FIONA'S STORY

Today was a good day. Scratch that. It was the best day.

Nana is gone. Kids are disappearing by the minute. The Riverman is … a total prick. But you know what? Today was the best day.

I came to Aquavania this morning and I started over.

I rebuilt Thessaly from the ground up. The neighborhood, the school, the downtown, everything. Even my old tape player, the one I gave to Alistair. Yes, I didn't forget you, Kilgore. Only difference is, this is my Thessaly. With only the people and things I want here.

Funny. It's the first time I've ever created people, but I know my inspiration so well that it wasn't too hard. It's amazing the stuff that's hidden away in the back of your brain and only comes out when you're creating. Voices, smells, the entire skeleton of a friend. I guess we notice more than we realize.

I created Chua, Boaz, Rodrigo, and the rest of the kids from Aquavania I knew stories about. I introduced them to kids from Thessaly, like Fay-Renee, Kendra, and Alistair. They all seem to get along. Aquavania kids and Solid World kids, living in harmony. Pretty cool.

Alistair was being a bit of a downer. “We're like the real thing, but we're not the real thing,” he said. “You created us. You know that this could never really happen?”

Exactly like Alistair in the Solid World. A cynic. He pretends like he's listening really hard and trying to understand, but he's scheming in his head. Trying to find the logic. He means well, but he overthinks things.

Maybe that's the problem. Overthinking. Creating people who are self-aware is a risky kind of magic, isn't it?

*   *   *

I cleared their heads. Yesterday was amazing, but if I'm really starting over, then I should let them start over too. They should have some memories. Good memories, or at least the good ones I'm able to give them. A few bad ones too, so they can recognize the good ones, but I won't overdo it. They should know who their family is and all that stuff. But they won't know who they're supposed to be, where they're supposed to be from. They'll just think they've lived lives like everyone else. They definitely won't know about the Riverman. Beyond that, I won't meddle. I'll let them be whoever they want to be, without fear.

Should it really happen any other way?

I guess I should go to school. Crazy, I know, but that was my life before, so it's my life now. Maybe I'll get rid of Earth Science. And Social Studies. We'll make our own history.

Mom and Dad are … fine so far. Dad made breakfast, which he sometimes did in the Solid World, but not often. Scrambled eggs. I prefer cereal, but I ate the eggs and said that I loved them and he smiled, so that was good.

The sun is shining again. There's no wind. I know it always rains or snows or whatever in the real Thessaly. But today, it's sunny and calm, and I'll let the weather do whatever the weather wants to do.

I'll go for a bike ride and see who's out and about.

*   *   *

A week's gone by and everything is amazing. No one calls Kendra the Wart Woman here, even though she still has her warts. “Love 'em, warts and all” is a saying in the Solid World. It fits here too. I've told everyone that only the smartest people have warts, and everyone believes me. Who knows? Maybe it's true. Kendra
is
smart in the Solid World. Smart here too.

Chua has become the hit of school, which is no surprise. She's friendly and funny and how could you not like her? Of course, Werner is madly in love with her, just like before. And she's madly in love with him, which is the cutest thing. Alistair has been hanging out with Rodrigo and Boaz a little bit, but I'm not sure if they're going to be close friends. That's okay. Not everyone has to be best buddies. They just have to be here.

Nana is dead in the Solid World and I guess I could bring her back, but it seems weird to do that. It's different with Chua, Rodrigo, and Boaz. First off, I'm not sure that they're dead in the Solid World. Though it seems likely. But mostly, it's because they were kids. They didn't get a chance to live a full life. Nana did, so I let her rest. Uncle Dorian is sad, but he's got a good outlook. It's his words that made me decide once and for all not to bring her back.

“She lived a perfect life,” he said when I joined him at the cemetery yesterday.

“How so?” I asked.

“She tried not to hurt people,” he said. “And if she did hurt people, without realizing it at first, then she tried to make up for it.”

“That's not perfect,” I told him. “Perfect is perfect. It's never making a mistake.”

He shrugged and said maybe, and we walked home together and he told me stories about when he and my dad were kids and how they tried to build a human slingshot out of two trees, a hammock, and some inner tubes, and even though it's a story I've heard a million times, I laughed again.

*   *   *

Mom came to my room tonight and I could tell she'd had too much to drink already. She sat on the foot of my bed and said that she was sorry for being … well, not so much a mom.

“I spent all my momness on Maria and Derek,” she explained. “Spent it all up like tickets at a carnival. I didn't mean to. One moment I had lots of tickets … but then my pockets were empty. I wish I hadn't been so … lazy.”

In some ways, it was nice to hear, but mostly it sounded fake. It was like we were in a play.

“You don't have to say that,” I told her.

“But I'm … I'm supposed to say it,” she slurred.

“You're not supposed to say anything,” I replied. “You're supposed to live your life. And say what comes to your mind.”

She looked around my room, and her face twisted like she was sniffing something gross, and she said, “Okay, then I'd like to go downstairs and sit for a while.”

Later, I went downstairs and she was sitting in the kitchen with the lights off and she was doing nothing. Sitting there, hands on her lap. A wine glass was nearby, but she wasn't drinking. Very creepy.

My dad was in the living room watching TV, but when I went in there, the TV was playing rainbow bars. He got up from the sofa and he hugged me, but it was like his arms and chest were made of paper bags, crumpled up inside him like stuffing.

I think I might have to start over with my parents. New versions. Tweaked. Slightly. More for their own good than for mine. I know I said I wasn't going to use my power to interfere with lives, but I'll make this one exception. One do-over. Only for them.

*   *   *

A month now that I've been here, and life is settling into more of a routine. School is as good as school can be. The teachers focus on the things we all enjoy, and it's a lot of reviewing stuff I already know, but that can be fun. Sometimes after school a bunch of kids meet in the park, and they all ask me questions. They have no idea that I created them, but they can sense that I'm different, that I know things they don't.

Alistair comes by every time and he's often quiet, but when he asks questions, it's things like
What lives out in the void beyond town?
I told him that nothing lives out there, that this is the only world there is. Well, except for maybe other planets, far, far away beyond the stars. This seems to calm his nerves. He's nervous a lot.

Compared to the first try, my new parents are … better. They're more lively, more engaged. Dad sings now, in the shower or when he's out mowing the lawn. And Mom dances and plays air guitar when the radio is on. So weird, but that's fine. Better than sitting there like bumps on a log. Like school, my parents are now fun.