The Xactilias Project

by RJ Lawrence

  Chapter 3

  Claire wept as she hadn't in years, her mother trying to understand the muddled, furious words pouring from her mouth. The old woman stared at the dining room floor, sipping her tea, eyebrows pinched together, head nodding, judgments. When her daughter had finished, she stood and walked to the kitchen. Seconds later, she returned with two small plates of muffins that looked as if they'd been freshly made for the occasion.

  "You need a lawyer," she said, as she centered a plate beneath Claire's chin.

  Claire shook her head and leaned back.

  "It won't do any good. These people, whoever they are, whatever they are, they seem too capable."

  A garbage truck strained and gurgled out front, and they waited for the calamity of crunching glass and plastic to quiet.

  Her mother frowned.

  "This is why you should always put some cash aside."

  Claire shook her head and looked down the hall.

  "Where's dad?"

  Her mother's mouth firmed, the corners descending.

  "Just resting."

  Claire turned and studied her mother’s face, so weary and weathered by life.

  "How is it?"

  The old woman looked down the hall.

  "Sometimes it's o.k.," she said, and that was all.

  Claire tapped her fingernails against the table.

  "Should I see him?"

  For a moment, her mother's eyes grew pale as his, and Claire found her answer within them. Through the years, a cloud had grown over her father's mind, an unforgiving dementia at root within. At first, its subtleties inspired endearing little teases. He'd forget things, coin odd remarks, like who made ketchup so red and how do you look at the stars long enough to count them? After a while, though, it became how is a shoe buttoned, why didn't the dog vote and when will we eat anymore?

  At first, her mother sought to best the doctors and all their certain words. But soon more and more memories went like bits of pepper in the wind, and her resolve ultimately fell away from the fight and settled on the caring instead.

  "Maybe wait for a better day," she said, as she cleared the table.

  Outside, on the stoop, her mother fiddled with her pocket book under the shamed gaze of her genius daughter.

  "This is all I have on me, but there'll be more. I just have to cash my social security check."

  Claire took the money with a swift motion, abbreviating the moment.

  "I won't need more." She held both her mother’s hands, the skin like tissue paper. "I will return this with more upon more."

  Her mother smiled.

  "What will you do?"

  Claire let go the hands and straightened herself.

  "Practical things."

  The old woman put her palms on her daughter's shoulders.

  "Long ago, I gave up telling you the ways of the world, my dear, but it wasn't because I didn't think they applied."

  She leaned in and kissed the girl's forehead.

  "Be careful. Life doesn't care about your abilities, will use them against you if it can."

  Claire's eyes shot forth.

  "Don't worry. The decision is made for me. I can see no way to resist."

  They embraced as awkward friends, the bare tree tops clattering above them in all the rushing wind. After a quick goodbye, she left in a taxi, the old woman outside, waving even after there was no one left to receive the gesture.

  Claire sat back and watched the city flash outside the backseat glass. The driver tried to make conversation without success, so he pinned the radio to something foreign and off-putting. When they finally arrived at her apartment, she paid the man with money unearned, a miserly hand at the end of her wrist. He grunted and forced the gas pedal down, the tires spinning without much noise, despite his best efforts toward the otherwise.

  She climbed the steps with a heavy heart and even heavier legs. She opened the door and let her keys splash against the kitchen Formica. She filled her lungs with the familiar scent of home, and for a moment, she was overcome by peace. But within seconds, the telephone broke the spell and brought the outside within.

  She lifted the receiver and said hello.

  "Ms. Foley?"

  She breathed deeply, her stomach lurching at the sound of his voice.

  "Hello, Mr. Harris," she said. "How are you?"

  "Just fine, ma'am. Do you have a second?"

  "Yes."

  "Good."

  She heard the rustling of papers.

  "I'm going to read a statement to you given to me by my employer regarding the opportunity I spoke of the other day. Is that clear?"

  "Of course," she said.

  "Alright, begin quote:” He cleared his throat. "We'd like to offer you a lucrative position. We value your expertise and believe you can prosper with our organization."

  She waited.

  "End quote," he said.

  "That's it?"

  "I'm afraid so.'

  She dropped the phone to her waist and rubbed her left eye.

  "Are you still there, Ms. Foley?"

  She put the phone to her ear.

  "Yes. I'm still here."

  "I'm sorry I don't have more to offer, but that was the only thing given to me."

  She said nothing.

  "Are you interested, ma'am?"

  Her mind worked over all opposing eventualities: risks, rewards and the forever lack thereof.

  "I suppose so."

  "Good," Mr. Harris said. "Very good."

  That night, she laid in her bed with her eyes closed, mind frenetically turning stones at search for sleep. But it would not be found in its usual places. And each time she drew close, it skipped away, her eyes rolling upwards and then snapping back, body flinching, palms bleeding sweat.

  After a while, the light from the windows grew soft and purple; so she quit the enterprise entirely and moved to the kitchen, where she drank black coffee and drew sound, practical plans.

  Chapter 4

  Mr. Harris had said noon with an impactful tone, so she left at nine for anxiety's sake. The park wasn't within walking distance, but she didn't care. The journey provided room for thought and chances to reconsider. Cornered and sleep deprived, she moved over the pavement, each step forced, yet terrifyingly productive. Something waited at the end, but its mystery was absolute. They wanted her; she did not want them, the former everything, the latter, a wrinkle under an iron.

  She navigated the sidewalks, people rushing past, scarves whipping airborne, a mob of expressionless faces paled by the dim autumn light. Each made way toward his or her next thing, heads pointed straight with intent, as if its measure trumped all others, and as theirs, rightly so.

  She bought a cup of coffee at the place with the smallest line, the cashier palming her mother's social security money like any other, no judgment opposite her shame. Outside, she drank as quickly as possible, wisps of steam curling up, wetting the tip of her nose. The caffeine ran its route, and she used it for its worth, but halfway to the park, the muscles in her legs caught fire, so she flagged a cab and rode too quickly the rest of the way.

  At the park, on a bench, Mr. Harris sat against all reason, two hours too early, with the posture of someone anticipating an immediate arrival. She stood behind a big tree, watching him as if he mattered more than he did. But his decisions couldn't save her from this imposed destiny, and after a while she stepped from her hiding and approached him from behind.

  As she neared, he did not turn to face her, and for some reason, this brought relief. Despite his all-knowing, he could not predict the moment of her coming, and as she entered his field of vision from the side, he seemed to flinch.

  He stood and outstretched his hand, and when she refused it, he did not seem offended. They sat quietly with good space between them, an obvious awkwardness at root. The weather so, few used the park for its designed purpose, but it made an ideal timesaver for working lunch-goers, and mobs of white-collared people passed along the path before
them in regular flashes with middling breaks between.

  Mr. Harris started to speak but shut his mouth at the break of her voice.

  "Why the hell are you doing this?" She asked.

  He pursed his lips and shook his head.

  "I understand your frustration, but I am not doing anything."

  She slapped her palms against her knees.

  "Bullshit. You are ruining my life."

  He shook his head again.

  "I understand why it seems that way, but your life is not ruined, and I am not responsible for any of this either way."

  A fat, whiskered man sold hotdogs from a wheeled stand nearby, the smell of flavored roasting meats travelling all the cold, surrounding air.

  Claire pulled a tissue from her purse and wiped her nose.

  "Do you have any idea how freaked out I am?"

  Mr. Harris nodded.

  "I can imagine."

  She waited for something more, but he only sat, his face made no less handsome by its unsympathetic mold. She looked off somewhere and then back to his ardent stare.

  "Well, what now?"

  "Now, I give you the information you need, and you use it however you like."

  She leaned back and rubbed her forehead.

  "However I like?"

  He nodded.

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "What I'd like is to have things as they were."

  He frowned.

  "The job you would've had?"

  She opened her hands to the air.

  "At least that, yes."

  He squared his shoulders to face her.

  "Ask yourself what you would have been there." He slid about an inch closer to her on the bench. "Just a background figure cooking up stuff for others to take credit for. That's all. And these places like Viox, they're corrupt. They bribe politicians to get drugs rushed through trials. Next thing you know, you've got thousands sick or dead and you're responsible for it."

  She shook her head and sighed.

  "None of it matters, anyway," he said. "What choice have you got?"

  She passed a glance at a blue-eyed girl wandering over the dead grass. The mother sat immediately across them on the opposite bench, her interest tied to some publication documenting the activities of the famous and those balanced along the fringe.

  "At times, you seem like a nice man, Mr. Harris."

  Nodded his head slightly.

  "I thank you for the compliment."

  She squared her shoulders to face him.

  "Are you doing a nice thing now?"

  He shook his head.

  "I honestly have no way of knowing."

  She rubbed her eyes and sat back on the bench.

  "Tell me this," she said. "Why do you work for these people?"

  He sighed.

  "I would have thought you'd know that by now."

  She looked off toward nothing in particular.

  "Because you don't have any choice," she whispered.

  He put his hand on her shoulder.

  "If you want to continue what you've started in this life, want to be anything at all, you will have to do this." He took his hand away and moved it flat across the air in front of them. "You will have no consideration, elsewhere. They'll have you cut out until you're like a woodpecker in a petrified forest. No doors will open; nobody's going to want to touch you."

  He frowned and scratched with his fingers the corners of his mouth.

  “It is what it is."

  From the opposing bench across the path, the mother attracted her child and gave her blueberries from a Ziploc bag. The girl winced from the sourness and then smiled with delight.

  "Why did this have to happen?" Claire asked the wind.

  Harris said nothing.

  "Can't you tell me anything about these people?"

  He shook his head.

  "I'm sorry. All I can do is tell you where to be and when to be there."

  He handed her a very small yellow envelope the size of a business card.

  "Inside that, you'll find an address and a time." He firmed his position upon the bench. "Now, I need to give you some important information, and I want you to listen to me very closely. Are you listening?"

  She nodded.

  "Good. Now, I've warned you of the passive fallout that will occur if you refuse this offer, correct?"

  She nodded.

  "Okay, now I'm going to give you some important instructions, and you need to follow them, or desert this whole thing before you get started."

  He waited a moment and then went on.

  "If you decide to come to the specified location inside that envelope, you need to be on time, and you need to go alone. Don't bring someone else, or they will be in danger. Don’t call the authorities, or you will be in danger. Do you understand?"

  She took a breath and nodded.

  "Do not disregard my warning, okay?"

  "I understand."

  He shook his head.

  "No, I mean it. Violence to these people is like you or me having orange juice in the morning."

  The two from across got up to leave, and Claire watched them go forward, the child at a stumble, mother at a considerate pace, until they were smalled by the distance and lost in the flowing human mass.

  "What's your first name, Mr. Harris?"

  "I'm not allowed to say."

  "Say it anyway."

  He scratched hard the skin above his eyes.

  "Henry."

  She tipped her head back and closed her eyes.

  "Henry Harris," she whispered.

  He looked off for a moment, the wind kicking up, desiccated leaves rushing between the benches, some whirling, some atomized under boots and heels.

  She wiped her eyes, but they were dry.

  "What's all this for?"

  He slapped his hands against his knees.

  "I don't even have a guess." He stood and smoothed the wrinkles on his shirt. "Something important."

  She looked at him, his face suddenly grim and imposing.

  "Just go along with it," he said, pulling firmly the bill of his fedora. "That is my advice to you, and it is sound."

  With that, he stood and walked away, his figure square and smallish, and quickly lost in the hoard of passers.

  She looked down at the tiny envelope in her gloved hand to make sure it was still there. She held it up to the light. She started to tear it open, but stopped to make sure no one was watching. Someone was. It was a man on the other side of the path. Amid the grass, he stood alone, his hands in his pockets, dark sunglasses shielding his eyes. She lowered the envelope and watched him, her heart throbbing wildly within her chest. He kept watching, his face disappearing behind the people that passed and then reappearing exactly as before.

  She pushed the envelope into her pocket and toyed with it nervously. She glanced to the left and to the right, but there wasn't much to see. Her eyes drifted back toward the man, and she saw he was approaching. Her pulse raced as he closed the distance, her head growing faint, white flecks infesting her vision. Soon he reached the path and began sifting through the passing pedestrians, his face looking eager, mouth open and breathing.

  After some difficulty, the man finally slipped through the human congestion and continued toward her. As he neared, Claire's body stiffened. She looked around. She started to call for help. But just as she opened her mouth, a young woman appeared from behind her and rushed into the man's arms. She buckled forward and breathed, her chest tight, hands trembling. She sat back and watched as the two entangled in what must have been a long-awaited embrace. At last, they separated and the man rubbed tears from beneath the girl's eyes. They smiled at one another and walked away, their hands interlaced as they disappeared from her sight and into their lives.

  She sat a while longer, until her heart settled and her hands stilled. Then she stood up, took the path a ways and caught a quiet cab ride home.

  That night, she sat in her bed, the lights dim and considerate, h
er legs Indian-fashioned beneath the weight of her body and soul. The television ran live in one far corner of the room, but its offerings competed poorly for her attention.

  She held the enveloped message in her hand, its secret at wait inside the cheap manila shell. Weightless and sharply rectangular, it was a part of something. Fractional to some greater purpose, but key to its actualization.

  Inside this thing was the answer, and loath as she was, a terrible curiosity festered within. She was pursued by the influential and powerful. Forcible as it was, this entity considered her important, and a horrible, unfamiliar satisfaction with that seemed rightly fixed to support the countering weight of her natural anxiety.

  In time, it would all make sense; and she would cope and evolve and grow from whatever came with it. This was her destiny, and bound by it, she seemed definitively so.

  But when she opened the envelope, she found it empty, and no action could make things any other way. And she cried to her core for a long time. For more time than she ever thought she could. And she did not, could not sleep the night, her crisp, brilliant mind growing wild and frayed and spoiled with dark thoughts.

  Chapter 5

  The spring dusted the city in gold, the warmth eroding all the browning snow drifts and opening lush pastures for children to play. Almost at once, the parks turned lavish with flowers and green-smelling things, the sunlight opening rich veins of pleasure for those who knew how to take it.

  For others, the season came without notice, their lives ensnared by schedules, deadlines and obligations. Like oddly-uniformed soldiers, they marched toward their zombie enterprises, some fixated on rings of brass, others driven by the patter of wolf feet.

  Claire's spring was spent at her parents’ home, supporting her mother's efforts to care for her father as they safely guided him toward his end. Intent on mindlessness, she cleaned dishes and dust and physical waste, pacified his delusions, and thoughtfully exterminated her mother's notions of perceived improvement. Bonded together, they forced food into his mouth, and his body into bed, restrained his panicked aggression with smoothed voices, and when that didn't work, combined to forcefully hold his arms and legs together to keep him from stumbling outright into the open, uncaring world.