Again I saw the startled expression on her face, but I willed her to accept my gesture as one of kindness and genuine concern. I could feel the tension in her arm and body slowly subside. I decided it was time to take the next step.
“Tell me about yourself, Neda,” I asked. “I want to know all about you.” I felt her wondering why I should want to know about her. “Because I like you,” I responded to this unspoken thought. “And I think I can help solve some problems that are bothering you.”
“How do you know I have problems that you can help me with?” she whispered.
“Well,” I replied, “everyone has some problems, and one of my goals in life is to help as many people as possible solve their problems.”
She thought about this for a moment, then said, “I want to thank you for being so kind to me. I’ve never met anyone like you before. I don’t know how or why, but I’m convinced that somehow you do like me and you do want to help me. I . . . I’m very grateful.”
“Their you’ll let me have the pleasure of getting you dessert,” I said. “How about a chocolate sundae, or maybe strawberry?”
She smiled shyly and didn’t respond, but I caught her thought of how good a strawberry sundae would taste.
“Okay,” I said, “I’ll surprise you. All you have to do is save my seat for me.”
As I left our table I sent as powerful a thought as I could to the girl at the ice cream counter, and by the time I got to her she was already busily preparing two sundaes, one chocolate and one strawberry. I waited until she finished, thanked her for reading my mind, and paid her for them. All the way back to our table I could see her startled expression and feel her wonderment at the kooky possibility that she really had somehow read my mind.
The strawberry sundae proved to be the final step in overcoming Neda’s shyness with me. She began talking about herself. She was a twenty‑year‑old liberal arts junior who lived off campus with her mother and stepfather. While she didn’t say so, I picked up from her mind that she desperately wanted to escape from her tyrannical mother, who hated her for being ugly, and a coarse sneering stepfather who enjoyed tormenting her about her looks.
She didn’t know what she wanted to do after college and, while her grades were excellent, going to classes was a torture because of her shyness. She was majoring in English composition and literature, and her one escape was in reading and writing.
As I listened intently to her talking about her happiness in writing short stories, I noticed that the more she talked about this area in her life the more animated her face became. The dark eyes came alive and the voice rose from a whisper to an easily understandable level. I learned from her mind that I was the second person in her life that she had ever talked to about her writing. The first person had been her high school English teacher, an elderly lady who had died shortly after Neda graduated. Since this old woman had been the only friend in her life, her loss had been almost too much for Neda to endure.
I realized that Neda had completely accepted her mother’s view of her as being an ugly blight on her parent’s lives. Consequently she was filled with self-loathing and massive feelings of worthlessness and inadequacy. It was no wonder that she tried desperately to avoid contact with others, since she believed her appearance was completely revolting to all who saw her.
Now, how could I help Neda? Every night I had access to all the knowledge of the Macro society’s Central Information. How could my Macro powers change Neda’s life? What did I want to do?
‘Well, I thought, I want to help her find a new life in which she can learn to like herself and the world about her. But wouldn’t I need all the power and wisdom of a Rana to accomplish such a miracle? As I carefully, but surreptitiously, examined the face and figure of Neda, I wondered if even tenth‑level awareness would be sufficient to change Neda’s self‑concept. But I decided I was going to try.
After questioning Neda about her typing ability and learning that she was a very good typist, I offered her a job typing up notes from the dissertation research that Karl and I had been doing and which he was still working on. When I finally convinced her that I really needed her help and that she would be doing me a great favor by accepting the job, I took the big plunge.
“Neda,” I said, “I want you to move out of your mother’s home and into an apartment at the building where I live. Yes,” I said, forestalling her objection, “I know you don’t have much money, but since Karl and I own the building we live in, your rent can be part of your monthly salary. Karl and I will be conveniently located near you so you’ll actually be able to function not only as a typist, but also as a sort of research assistant.”
I had been talking fast and off the top of my head, but now I paused to check Neda’s reaction. She was so overwhelmed by me that resistance seemed impossible. I felt that somewhere in the past hour she had capitulated totally to the loving accepting thoughts I had been sending her. But then, how could a person languishing in hell turn down an invitation to heaven? I told her that I would help her move into her new quarters immediately.
Fifteen minutes later we arrived at her home in a taxi. The house was a run‑down two‑story stucco located in a fast‑decaying neighborhood. I told our taxi driver to wait for us and then accompanied Neda to her door. There she hesitated until I calmly, but firmly, opened the door for her and ushered her inside: I immediately realized why she had hesitated, since charging toward us out of the kitchen was the most formidable‑looking old harridan I had ever seen. This was Neda’s mother, who was roaring at Neda about being late and eyeing me suspiciously.
After Neda tried to respond to her mother and got shouted down, I decided to lend a hand. I told Neda to go to her room and pack her belongings, then, with a gentle nudge, sent her on her way. I stopped her mother in mid‑roar with a mighty PK shove that sent her reeling backwards to land with a thud on the couch.
“Be quiet, Mrs. Cricksley,” I said. “I want you to hear what I’ve got to say.”
Her mouth was open but no sound came out, and her eyes were enormous as she finally managed to gasp, “You pushed me!”
“Really, Mrs. Cricksley,” I replied, “you know that I didn’t touch you. Now pay attention to me. I’ve offered your daughter a job as typist and research assistant to myself and my partner. We’re doing psychological research at the university. I’ve asked her to take an apartment near the university so she’ll be closer to her work. I’ll advance her enough on her salary so that she can pay the rent and live quite comfortably. Now do you have any questions?”
Mrs. Cricksley was obviously not used to being dominated and treated in such a confidently imperious manner. She opened and closed her mouth, for all the world like an ugly flounder that has just found itself beached. I decided to keep the pressure on before she could jump back into the water.
“Of course,” I continued, “this will relieve you of the considerable financial burden of caring for your daughter and providing her with an education. Naturally her salary will be sufficient , to comfortably cover the tuition for her remaining years of college.”
I had decided to go all the way. Since Karl and I had invested our inheritance in the apartment building we lived in, we had more than sufficient funds for our rather modest needs and could afford my project with Neda without too much difficulty.
Mrs. Cricksley was shaking her head in a bewildered manner. Things were happening just too fast for her to comprehend. Was she really going to be able to unload that ugly blight of a daughter? she was thinking. I easily picked up her thoughts. However, it was painful for me to tune into the old woman’s mind. There was no physical ugliness that could match the mental ugliness of her mind. It was a seething caldron of spite, greed, jealousy, and crawling hatreds. I withdrew my mind contact with a violent shudder of revulsion.
At that moment Neda entered the room with all her worldly possessions in a small battered suitcase. When her mother protested the ownership of the suitcase I swiftly hande
d her a twenty‑dollar bill saying that I was sure that this would amply repay her. She was still looking greedily at the bill in her hand when I took the suitcase from Neda and hurried her out of the house to the waiting taxi.
Shortly over an hour later, having stopped off at a supermarket (a different one!) and purchased some forty dollars’ worth of food, I was busily stocking the refrigerator of Neda’s new apartment. It was a large three room apartment with bedroom, living room, and kitchen, and was nicely furnished. Neda walked about it in a happy daze. She kept saying, “I don’t know what to say, and I don’t know how to thank you, Mr. Lake.”
“Please call me Jon,” I kept saying as I put away her groceries. “And remember, I live just one floor above you in apartment 303
in case you need anything. I’ll have the phone connected tomorrow so you can call me any time.
Neda came partially out of her daze and asked, “But when do I start to work and where?”
“Tomorrow,” I said, “you can start to work right here in your apartment. I’ll come back this evening with my typewriter, which I’ll leave with you. It’s a little portable electric. Easy to use.”
Then I persuaded her to sit down with me in her comfortable new living room. For the next half‑hour I encouraged her to talk about her writing and reassured her that she could continue, taking all the courses she wanted at the university, although I felt she looked upon her new job as an opportunity to drop her courses. All the while I was there, I kept up a steady flow of the most positive and confident telepathic messages. By the time I left her she was almost glowing with happiness and her face didn’t look anywhere near as ugly as when I had first seen it.
By the time I got back to my apartment, I was ready for a rest. All this practice of my new powers had taken its toll, and it felt good to sit down. After resting a few minutes I brought this journal up to date.
When Karl came in I handed him my journal and headed for the kitchen to cook up a couple of steaks.
I caught myself wishing for the mealtime conveniences of 2150.
Since I had left Neda I had tuned in to her every fifteen or twenty minutes to give her another mental shot of loving acceptance and confidence. It seemed to be working well.
Over dinner Karl, and I discussed my project with Neda and I solicited his help. He was perfectly agreeable to my wanting us to help her and said that he would be glad not to have to depend on the university typing pool any longer. I didn’t reveal my long‑range plans for Neda, which involved shaping an entirely new self‑concept for her. I decided I would let Karl meet her and then we could talk further about my plans.
About eight that evening Karl and I went, typewriter in hand, down to Neda’s apartment. She welcomed us with a little shyness but talked rather easily with Karl about the typing requirements of our research. I let him do almost all the talking, and when we left, almost an hour later, I was congratulating myself on my progress with Neda. However, Karl brought me back to reality.
“Really, Jon,” he said when we were back in our apartment, “you weren’t kidding when you said she was homely.”
“You weren’t very impressed,” I commented.
Karl laughed and said, “I was impressed all right! Come on, Jon. She’s probably a very nice person, but did you look at her? My God, she’s a walking disaster area!”
“Hmm,” I responded. “You really think it’s that bad, huh?”
Karl shook his head. “You know, it seems to me that if you were going to buy her groceries and provide her with an apartment, you could have at least provided her with some decent clothes, too.”
“Yeah, I know, Karl,” I agreed, “they’re pretty bad. I wanted to fix her up with something better, but I don’t know anything about women’s clothes. I thought one of your girlfriends could help you pick out some nice things for you to give her.”
“You want me to do this?” Karl asked with a startled expression.
“Of course,” I explained, “the more positive male attention we can give her, the sooner we’ll be able to change her self‑concept from one of self‑loathing to one of self‑confidence.”
“But-but, Jon,” Karl sputtered, “you can’t give her a new face and figure, so it certainly isn’t fair to kid her along.”
“I’m not kidding her,” I answered. “She’s a valuable and worthwhile person no matter how she looks, and I’m going to let her know that at least you and I think so.”
“Yeah, but what about other people?” Karl objected. “How are you going to help her adjust to the fact that everyone else will continue to view her as her old homely self? That’s got to keep her self‑concept a shambles for as long as she lives.”
“I think she can become physically attractive,” I said. “After all, she wouldn’t look so scrawny with another twenty pounds on her!”
“Fifty would be more like it!” Karl replied “Why, she must be five feet eight but she looks like she might weigh 90 pounds if we got her good and wet. Even if she put on enough weight to curve her out, how are you going to hide that nose of hers?”
“Hmm,” I pondered, “you’re right about her nose. But I’m sure a little plastic surgery would fix that up. We can afford it, can’t we?”
Karl gave me a startled look, and said, “Boy, you’ve really gone overboard! Sure, I guess we can afford it, Jon, but do you know what you’re talking about? Do you have any idea how much this little project of yours is going to cost? Well, let me tell you . . . it’s going to cost a pile!”
“I couldn’t find a better use for it, Karl,” I said. “Besides, if I’m successful I won’t need any money three months from now.”
“But if you’re not successful,” Karl grunted, “you’ll have sure cleaned out your account.”
I laughed at Karl’s gloomy expression. “Cheer up,” I said. “If micro man can earn a million selfishly I’m sure that with the aid of my Macro powers I can earn a million unselfishly.”
“What other projects have you got in mind?” Karl asked a bit sarcastically.
“I don’t know for sure,” I said. “Maybe I’d better see how this one comes out before I start another one.”
“That’s a damned sound idea,” Karl said with relief.
We talked for a while more about 2150; then I said that I was eager to get back to C.I. and ask some more questions, especially about how I could work this miracle I had embarked upon’, and retired early.
CHAPTER 12: The Fifty‑Foot Leap
I awakened to the gentle pressure of warm lips on mine and the sounds of our soul notes beginning to resonate in my mind. I responded eagerly and soon joined Carol in the ecstasy of physical and emental contact. These delights grew in awareness and intensity until the unifying joy of Macro immersion was ours.
As we lay quietly, still happily entwined, I thought once again of how different my sexual experiences with Carol had been from those of my micro past. Before Carol and my Macro immersions, I had always felt either guilty or fearful, or simply unfulfilled by my sexual experiences. I wondered if anyone had ever attained Macro immersion before the Macro society.
“It was very rare,” Carol answered my thought, “and most of them took place between twin souls.”
“Since twin souls rarely incarnate together,” I said, “that goes a long way toward explaining the sexual frustrations of micro man.”
“Sexual relationships which do not attain Macro immersion are only of fleeting satisfaction,” Carol explained.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “That means that the vast majority of sexual relationships, prior to the Macro society, have not been fulfilling.”
“That’s right,” Carol nodded. “They usually left the participants with a strong underlying desire to start over again, since their true longing was unfulfilled.”
“Then you’re saying that any sexual relationship between you and me that does not reach Macro immersion would be unfulfilling.”
“That’s right,” Carol replied. �
�Now you can appreciate how unselfish the other girls of our Alpha were being when they agreed to have a sexual relationship with you if you so desired.”
“They knew,” I said, “that their soul notes were too dissimilar from mine to attain Macro immersion, yet to help me learn this they were willing to experience an unsatisfying union.”
“However,” Carol added, “to the extent that you give unselfishly of yourself to another it cannot be an unpleasant experience.”
I shook my head. “That explains it... that’s why micro man experiences so much guilt, anxiety, and frustration associated with sex,” I said. “He almost always uses sex for his own selfish purposes, so the result is bound to be something less than complete fulfillment.”
“That’s right,” Carol responded, “and even the micro view that sex is sanctified if it is used only for the purpose of creating children is false, because micro man views his children as possessions, thus, uses them for selfish purposes.”
2150 AD Page 19