Dead Lines

by Greg Bear

  “We must be brave,” Weinstein proclaimed.

  “Right,” Peter said.

  “Trans is just like walking on the moon. That’s what Arpad says.” Weinstein shook his head in almost frenetic admiration. “You should write that down. Sheer genius.”

  CHAPTER 17

  WITH MONEY IN his pocket and the Porsche full of gas, he sped south on 5, intent on getting to Los Angeles as fast as he could. The bland straight miles on the freeway and the steady controlled rasp of the Porsche’s air-cooled engine worked like solitude and music, or should have, but Peter was certain he was losing his mind. The more he racked up the miles, the less he knew whether he was coming or going, seeking or fleeing.

  He talked the situation over with himself, glancing at his eyes in the rearview mirror, before he grew tired of rehashing the facts or his perception of the facts.

  It had all begun with Sandaji in Pasadena—or earlier, at Salammbo.

  It had all begun with Phil.

  The truck-rutted asphalt of the freeway played rhythmic hell with his tires. Sandaji, Salammbo. Sandaji, Salammbo.

  Lydia’s cast-off emotions, as if even living people could manufacture ghosts.

  The eel shadows so eager to get into Phil’s bedroom.

  The eroded figure and the phantom children at the beach.

  Peter tried to hum a tune. Suddenly, he needed music. The radio had been broken for years, but only now did he miss the chatter and noise of the busy outside world, talk shows, pop music, religious sermons. The air was full of information, and all you needed was a receiver, but his radio was broken.

  Until now.

  “I do not know what the hell I am trying to think, here,” he shouted, and rolled down the window just to feel the Central Valley air blow past. The interior of the Porsche became a resonant, pulsing bellows. “I am not a radio. I am not tuning in to another world.”

  He took a break at a rest stop and got out of the car, stretched his legs, watching people walk their dogs on the designated grassy field. He restlessly tried to avoid staring at anything for very long.

  What if some of the things you see every day aren’t really there? What if they just look normal? You seldom compare notes with anybody, do you? You don’t bring along a video camera and record every minute of your daily life to see what you might have seen that wasn’t there after all.

  He dipped his head. He was doing it again. “Oh, crap,” he murmured under his breath. “None of it makes sense. I’m losing it. I’m afraid to get back into the saddle.”

  An elderly woman came into hearing distance and he clamped his teeth. White-haired, wearing a flower-print dress and antique white nurse pumps, she had pink hearing aids tucked up in both ears like little plastic mushrooms. A Pomeranian on a short, taut leash tugged her forward.

  “Nice day,” she said, nodding pleasantly. The dog’s tongue hung out as it pop-eyed frantically at the bushes, eager to move on. The old woman awarded Peter a grandmotherly expression, mouth shaping a pleased simper, head nodding slightly as she looked at a point just beyond his left arm. The Pomeranian husked and strained. The old woman lifted her gaze back to Peter, expression full of matronly congratulations. “Lovely,” she said, and then, with a jerk on the leash that made the dog gag, moved on.

  Peter stopped and made a one-eighty. The woman was solid, real. The Pomeranian was fluffy and orange and ridiculous. He stood for a moment, and the despair burst. A chuckle came out gentle, not harsh, from deep in his chest. Life was too weird. A way with the ladies. Phil would have seen it immediately. He could almost hear Phil in his head, You remind her of someone. An old beau, maybe. The best orgasm she ever had, sixty years ago, you bastard you.

  And as for the rest of the morning:

  Nothing unusual; just concrete walkways, lawn, small trees, brick buildings, a volunteer coffee booth manned by two fit-looking gents about his age but looking older and happier, people walking, dogs walking, kids running.

  A rest stop. Real and solid. Nothing more.

  He felt like squaring his shoulders but instead just took a deep, easy breath. He had a job. He had work, finally—decent work that could put him back on top.

  Maybe it had been self-sabotage, maybe not. But whatever, maybe it was over.

  CHAPTER 18

  THE PORSCHE STOWED in the garage—it had made the long trip in high old style, he was proud of it, would have liked to stuff its noble nose into a big old bag of oats—the house in good shape, no burglaries, everything quiet, calm; Phil scattered to the ocean, back to the carbon cycle, the best anyone could do for him now; Peter’s mind sleepily going over schemes for how to promote a new kind of telecom product—and wasn’t that rich, he was so out of it he could be trendy again, like string-bean ties—and the porch smelling of late-summer jasmine; the blackboard by the Soleri bell empty of new messages, his answering machine silent and empty of calls; nothing to stop him after the long long drive from simply peeling off his clothes and climbing into bed, no shower on the way, he did not stink so bad—still smelled of Jessie’s soap, in fact—so tired. A warm spot in his heart for good old Phil, dammit, he had done his duty to his friend, there would be missing him and maybe more tears later but that part of his life had to be over. Shirt off, pants halfway down, he stopped by the full-length mirror. His chest-hairs were gray and he wore loose boxers now rather than BVDs because BVDs made his balls ache, he had a tight little paunch that wouldn’t go away, but life was not over, far from it. He was tired. He had done well, dammit. He had a job.

  He crawled into the unmade bed, then reached down to peel off his socks. Still flexible. He could reach his ankles. He could still please a woman in bed four or five different ways—more if they were inclined to be creative—and that was good.

  It would come. All that was good would return, a second summer for Peter Russell.

  He pulled up the sheet, all he needed on this warm night. A breeze blew outside, fresh and welcome; the wind chimes in back tinkled. Bed felt so good. He was well into a dream about set construction and actors when someone knocked on the front door, then donged the Soleri bell. He was a light sleeper. He had to be, the house was old and easy to break into. He hated thieves.

  He pulled on a robe and went to answer, feet slapping bare against the parquet and then the tile. He stared through the glass at Carla Wyss, rubbed his eyes, and opened the door.

  Carla returned his stare and then looked down at her feet, her knees, like a little lost girl. “The bastard,” she said. “It’s over.”

  “What’s over?”

  “I’m an idiot. I’m too old.”

  “You’re not too old,” Peter assured her, yawning. He opened the door wider. “What happened?”

  “What always happens. This time, even stupid old me knew it was coming, and I was ready. I clobbered him. I scratched his cheek. I screamed. I became such a bitch, Peter.” The tears began, dampening her cheeks as she stood pigeon-toed on the tile floor in her leather miniskirt and white blouse and lace net nylons and high-heel black pumps. “Am I a bitch?”

  “Only when you need to be,” Peter said, still standing there, waiting. He would not send her away. She had been a lover, she was still a friend, and he did not know what she needed, much less what she wanted.

  “You are the only man who was ever decent to me,” Carla said, her lip quivering. “I treated you so badly.”

  “That’s not how I remember it,” Peter said.

  She faced him. “It doesn’t matter. It just doesn’t matter anymore, but am I, like, a complete hag?”

  “You’re gorgeous. You know it,” Peter said.

  “I feel like a bag of trash left out by the curb,” she said. “I try not to be a down chick,” she added after a swallowed sob, “and the world just hammers and hammers.” Spoken softly and reasonably. Hands by her sides. Color gone from her face.

  That made him jump. He did not like colorless faces.

  “Tea,” Peter announced.

  “What
?”

  “You need some hot tea.”

  Her sad, stern look melted and she wiped her cheeks with her finger. No mascara streaks, thank you, Lord. “Oh, yes,” she said. “And chocolate. Do you have chocolate?”

  “Godivas good enough?”

  She looked up, delighted, more like a little girl than ever. “Really? You have Godivas?”

  “Tea, the best chocolate, and sympathy.”

  “Oh, Peter.” She tried to grin wickedly. “I am a chocolate vampire, and you are my victim. You are the one.” Then the tears started all over again. Peter put his arm around her shoulders and led her into the kitchen.

  “I keep them locked up,” he said. “The maid sneaks them.”

  IT WAS OBVIOUS Carla did not want sex, and Peter quickly discovered that despite initial yearnings, he was far too tired to care. He was just glad for company. She took a BlackBerry from her purse—essential equipment for actors hoping for agent calls or e-mails—and turned off the phone part, removed her clothes in the bathroom, put on one of his old shirts—something that he usually found extremely stimulating in a woman—and lay down beside him with an expression that drew the last of the blood from his erection. She looked utterly and fatally lost.

  Peter snuggled against her.

  “No sex,” she reminded him.

  “Of course.”

  “But hug me,” she said. He did.

  “I never learn,” she said a few minutes later, just as he was starting to nod off. The red letters of the clock said it was four in the morning. He could tell even with her back to him that she had her eyes wide open.

  “Can we talk later?” Peter asked. “I’ve had a very long day.”

  “Uh-huh,” she said.

  HE CAME WIDE-AWAKE at nine and lay beside Carla’s dark, snoring form. She had rolled herself up like a sheet sausage, stealing most of the covers. In boxers and T-shirt, Peter slipped out of bed and strolled into the kitchen, bending and straining one arm to scratch between his shoulder blades. He put a kettle on the stove and inspected the refrigerator. There were five eggs. He smelled the open package of bacon, plastic streaked white with cold grease; still good. Milk not fresh but drinkable. The cream in its smaller carton had become a cheesy mass. Two apples, jam, some bread that would toast up nicely once he scraped off a little mold. Good enough for a surprise breakfast, he thought.

  He stared at the stove, bits of carbon sintered into the stainless steel but otherwise clean. A clean bachelor stove. Something chimed lightly and far away, not the Soleri bell. He puzzled over what it could be, then remembered the Trans in his coat pocket.

  What with finding the coat—draped over the purple chair—and fumbling out the unit, he flipped the case open by the seventh ring. “Peter here.” He was half-expecting Michelle or perhaps Weinstein.

  “Hey, Peter, it’s Hank! Thought I’d give you a call, or whatever. This Trans thing sounds great. You’re as clear as a bell.”

  “Yeah, you, too,” Peter said, glad to hear another male voice. “How’s Prague?”

  “Wet. Whole city is up to its ass in filthy water. Six productions have been flooded out, including ours. But we’re back to work tomorrow. I strung big lights in the hotel dining room and hooked them to the company generator. We sang songs and drank coffee and beer all night. It was like the Sahara in there, the lights were so hot. Hotel porters came in to dry out. Everyone cheered right up.”

  “Sounds great,” Peter said. He added some gray to his tone. “Phil’s wake went okay. Lydia was there.”

  “Ah,” Hank said.

  “I spread Phil’s ashes on the beach at Point Reyes.”

  “He would have liked that.”

  “Yeah. Still might have some under my fingernails. Want me to save you a speck?”

  Hank laughed nervously. “I’d prefer Phil as a diamond, you know, all squeezed down. They do that.”

  “Yeah, well, he was a gem, all right.”

  “When I was a kid,” Hank said, “I heard the word cremation and thought it meant they turned you into cream.”

  Peter groaned. “That’s awful,” he said. “Carla is here now. She ran into another one of her agents.”

  “Did you give her Godivas?”

  “And tea. She’s asleep. I’m fixing her breakfast. It’s good to hear your voice. Good to know someone’s working.”

  “When the water level drops, I’ll be working. Right now, I’m sitting in a hotel room reading a stack of Asterix I borrowed from an Italian stand-in.”

  Phil had once owned every single issue of Asterix, in French and in English. They might still be in boxes in the house, Peter thought. “I might have a job myself,” he said. “Doing commercials and promos for Trans.”

  “That’s great! Money or credit?”

  “Money, they say. I’m so out, I’m back in.”

  “Hey, when you’re not hot, you’re cool. Everyone here has a Trans,” Hank said. “They must have saturated LA, because I swear, the entire crew is carrying them around. I fit right in. Even Bishop has one. He calls his wife every day, tells her to send him dry socks.”

  “Sounds like an adventure. I envy you.”

  “Yeah, well, envy me after I run my cables through a puddle and fry the DP. He’s a right bastard, a real chiaroscuro type. He’s running all of us hard around corners. I won’t have any tread left in a week.”

  Peter could pick up the expressions a crew invented during a shoot. Films were little wars and every crew had its catch-phrases and scars and campaign medals.

  “But hey, Prague’s great. No ghosts, though. We’re all very disappointed.”

  “Give it time,” Peter said, not so lightly.

  “Right—”

  Then, abruptly, a burst of harsh cricket chirps ended the call.

  “Hank?”

  No answer. The connection was gone.

  Peter heard the deeper silence and pulled the unit back from his head. “Nothing’s perfect,” he muttered, and listened to Carla moving around in the bedroom. He folded the unit and placed it on the dining table.

  “Breakfast for sleeping beauty,” he shouted to her. “Coffee with no cream, bacon, and scrambled eggs.”

  Carla came out still wearing his old Pendleton. “Man, did I dream,” she said.

  “Sit, eat,” Peter invited. She surveyed the table with sad, wise eyes.

  “You are the best,” she said.

  “Tell me something I don’t know,” Peter said.

  SHE MOVED AND sat slowly, as if walking through mud. Peter recognized the symptoms well enough.

  “Why so low?” he asked, sitting across the table to give her room to make her own decisions, in her own time.

  “I am such a fuckup,” she said, placing both hands on the table. She was still astonishingly beautiful, though not in a credit-card commercial way.

  “Shh,” Peter said. “You’re taking the sacred name of sex in vain.”

  She shook her head like a toy whose action was winding down. “I am forty-two years old. Never married. No career. I sleep around sometimes and from what I’ve learned, there isn’t a man in town who won’t fuck me, and not one willing to stick around for more than a week.”

  “I did.”

  “I was younger then, and I was working for you,” Carla said, facing him with a soft frown. Her eyebrows swept gently but with determination over dark blue eyes to a high but not too assertive forehead. Those brows still feathered at their ends like a girl’s, untouched by makeup. Peter watched her face with professional appreciation, automatically checking how he would light it, where he would set up diffusers and umbrella, where he would place the baby spots to accent. Beneath the Pendleton, she wore no underwear; that was good. No red lines and dimples from bra hooks to smooth. And it was morning; her tummy would still be flat from lying vertically for so many hours. By mid-afternoon, one had to change the lighting and adjust angles carefully to minimize the sagging effects of gravity.

  “It’s so awful, Peter,” Carl
a said, and abruptly lifted her hands to cover her face, not to cry, but to hide. “I don’t want to have ever been in this business.”

  “It was good for a time,” Peter said.

  “It’s a dead end.”

  “Not for some.”

  “For you and for me, it is.”

  “Oh,” Peter said. “Well.”

  “I wasn’t good enough, long enough,” Carla said.

  “You just need to find a better class of fellow. Play hard to get. You’re a knockout.”

  This brought her hands down. “I’m honest,” she said. “I trust men and I like them. Is there something wrong with that? I had a wonderful father, and that spoiled me.”

  Peter had not heard this angle before. He smiled.

  “I just never know what to expect from men,” Carla finished.

  “I never treated you badly,” Peter said. Before she could disagree, he added, “Eggs are getting cold.”

  Carla took a bite. Some of the sadness and anger went away with the taste of food. She sipped from her cup and made a face. “Mr. Coffee,” she said. “Maxwell House.”

  “Folgers. I’m not a rich guy, Carla.”

  “I prefer Kona coffee or espresso.”

  “So do I.”

  They sat in silence for a moment while she finished her eggs and started on the bacon strips. The thing about Carla, Peter knew, was that her sadness, even when it was deep, never lasted for more than a few hours. She was naturally sunny.

  “I had some weird dreams last night,” Carla said, raising her eyes to the kitchen window, mouth full.

  “Oh?”

  She finished chewing. “I dreamed somebody like you was horny and had been dreaming about girls and sex and when you woke up, they just hung off of you, like old, naked balloons.”

  Peter made a disgusted face. “That is truly . . .” He could not find the word.

  “That isn’t all. The books in your shelves were shedding limp white sacks. I looked around and there were like these sacks hanging off them, like condoms, or you know, like when a spoon pulls up the skin on hot milk.”