“Catch me up.”
“Right. I’ve been working on this real cooker of a case, one for the papuz, but something’s up higher than helium underwater. A plot that’d put a New York novelist to shame. You know me, what I do, who doesn’t? Naturally I follow it up. Now I’m up two dead bodies and no leads. One body was the cook in question; bloated gasbag genius Robotnik, the other was Tails, a nickname of course. One of them I didn’t kill. Ya know, all of this is hardly the point. Strange occurrences I hardly recall, shadow cops, women who function to distract, conversations in white space, so on, you get it. I’m caught in an odd state of awareness that is triggered by something obvious and inane. Nothing can be explained. No subjects/starts. Improper grammar. Errors.” Kids come here after movies to eat and be obnoxious, the usual. Constant beeping from the kitchen mixes with MP3s of sprites, smell programs, and the slick-clean of the old and new.
“Okay… I can’t help.”
“Sure you can, you can give me a job. Employment. Slow deterioration, just like I like it.” I smile to close the deal. I hope he notices the one-two punch of the word “like.”
“You… want a job… here?”
“Oh don’t pause mid-sentence. I see you stress certain words. Is that part of the test?”
“Test? By God, man, we’ve only just met.”
“And we feel like old friends, yes?”
“No, you daft-”
A tough nut to crack, this one. I’ll need pliers and the front wheels of a diesel truck. Ten minutes of constant pressure. Pull out the big guns. At least this is comforting, trying to leave a lifestyle continually stranded in another state, hopefully denial. The Cop keeps following me and asking how I knew Tails and what I’m eating and if I’m going to stop Robotnik’s robots and what do I mean I don’t know what he’s talking about and stop punching him in the face. I lost him round an alley when a herd of pigeons begged for spare change. The irony too much for him, he backed down like an ashamed clown.
“-look for more like students.” I like the uniforms the workers wear. I’ll be sure to mention it.
“That’s great and all, Bob. Listen, you know your name’s the same backwards? We have something in common. I shudder to think of the future, but I can make exceptions. Truth be told to you and you only, I need a job. A change of clothes, yes, something in rugged wear. I’m not suited properly for my environment, see what I say? The look on your face suggests otherwise. Okay. I’m a quilt that someone used only one color to make. Photo analogue. Ink flesh, pixels. It’s a usual nightmare, day to day. Cut off by hyphens, too many commas. Forgive the structure, not my fault. GODDAMMIT. Please, please, mister. How’s the insurance coverage?”
My words assaulting his head like the ocean on a house with stilts, he eyes turn bloodshot red. “I-”
“It’s hard starting over. That’s what it feels like, anyway. I promise you my shoes will always be honest. No one can find my origins, doesn’t that weird you out? I’m supposed to be doing something. See the guy staring at us outside, emitting fog from his teeth? The cop? He’s back, making sure I don’t take more down with me. Robotnik was the trump, the person who gets me to rebel, and I killed him so no one else would… I think. That guy wants me to solve both cases, two of them, 2, see? How many times can I say it?”
“I can’t help you, sir! I work here!”
“Both sentences contradict each other, you realize?”
“No-wha? No no! You ever been function outside your own fantasy world? You’re dumb if you haven’t! Christ, we don’t hire people on the spot, no matter how famous, sorry, sorry, and you’d hate it here. Way more stressful; it’s like fighting for your life with no adrenaline. The music artists are right: a machine that works against your advantage.”
“Like the X-Files episode?”
“Shut up! Shut the fuck up, Mr. Hedgehog!!”
“Now now, let’s not get racial, and you needn’t use more than one exclamation-”
“You’d quit within the week! You already have the deck stacked against you! I be polite, of course. Useless shit! Selfish motherfuck! Penis! How DARE YOU!” The rest of the restaurant patrons ignore, food falling into their throats, stuffing, stuffing. The guy Bob pauses. “What is that? A coat?”
“I… sincerely hope it isn’t another plot device… or a moment of weakness.”
“Stab an orifice and stuff comes out. You deny this?”
“Okay, so I might have gone a little nuts.” Bob has calmed down considerably, suddenly, suspiciously. A clue? A clue? Someone help me out here.
“Let’s talk about this: your sex.”
“Eh?”
“When you fucked Amy not long ago you made it sound like you didn’t want to be there, and yet you stayed and fucked her anyway.”
“That’s not really… er, I mean…”
“Is it possible you really wanted to stay?”
I don’t like this Bob guy. “I don’t really remember. Memory thing.”
“You remember what you want? It’s okay. So let’s say you did and you didn’t want to admit that she had control over you. What do you do? First you try your hardest to hurt her, and that doesn’t work so you lie about it. You distort the facts, purposefully misinterpret her emotions, and when telling the story later, you say that it was really you that was controlling her. Makes you feel great and since people hear it from you first, they assume it’s the truth. No harm done, after all. Just make sure if you leave reality, you never come back.”
“So do we eat free on our breaks or do we pay it at discount price?”
“Free if you can sneak it by me. You know what you did was a shit thing to do?”
“Of course, down in the sewers, but it had to be done.”
“Not that. You lied, and you lied like a man. Just accept the fact that you can’t destroy things with your penis, not even relationships. What happened was you tried to fuck her nicely and you were very bad at it and she laughed at you. That’s why you left. But she wasn’t trying to be cruel, she thought the situation was funny, but you, you took it too seriously. It’s just sex, and you’re not even trying to have kids.”
“… What does the job entail exactly?”
“You job will be to get excited for a week, hate your life when you sink into it, do drugs to get through the day, be blamed for everything that goes wrong, be expected to betray coworkers, never ever get mad, act like a robot, adhere to impossible demands, and above all, keep quiet when your paycheck is suspiciously low. Want the test now?”
Call me Susan, but I don’t think I want this job anymore. Although that first week thing sounds kinda nice. “Yeah, I postulate.”
“You’re not clever.”
“True!”
“No, that- never mind. What’s a hoot owl?”
“A blast.”
“Mop the floors when?”
“I feel guilty about it.”
“Breaks are?”
“Nothing but trouble.”
“Wear your uniform at all times?”
“Uh… false.”
“Get mad at customers?”
“Behind their backs.”
“You’re always wrong?”
“Never used to think so.”
“What time is it?”
“Also false.”
“Destruction is great but it hurts bystanders.”
“That’s the point.”
“Okay you’re hired!”
As fast as I can, I run out of the restaurant, knocking down Tommy the Cop and starting the chase all over again. I guess the working class just isn’t cut out for me.
**********
Back at Amy’s place, she acts like nothing happened at all, that we’re still friends and she wants me to fuck her and/or date her. I try everything I can to get her away from me, gradually sliding away from subtlety, until I’m just screaming at her and saying I don’t think of her in that way and that she has to move on. She thinks I’m kidding no matter what and just smiles and laughs. Nothing I can do will push her away, but… but… what the hell am I supposed to do? I can continue with this craziness, trying not to vomit or kill her. Did I murder Tails? I have memories of it but they aren’t of me doing it. Some freak in a business suit. Vendetta skin. Plot and circumstance. I tell Amy that I want to spend the night at her place.
And then we have sex.