by Ulf Wolf
Melissa finally sat down, and began peeling her own orange. “Not unlike getting the toothpaste back into the tube,” she said. “Not easily done.”
“If it can be done,” said Ananda. “It would be the prudent, and most merciful, way to go.”
Ruth now nodded, “I agree.”
“What does Cal Tech have to say about all this?” Ananda wondered.
Julian looked not a little uncomfortable at this. “To be honest,” he said. “I don’t know. But I’m guessing they don’t like the spectacle—sorry, Ruth—the spectacle of all this detracting from the bona fide findings of the experiment, which seems to be lost in all this. They don’t have a well-tended sense of humor.”
Ruth pushed her chair back and rose, “Let’s do it.” Then turned to leave.
“Do what?” Melissa said. Ruth stopped and turned again.
“Let’s tell them it was a carefully planned hoax,” said Ruth.
“Sit down, please,” said Ananda. “We have to prepare a little. If we tell them that, they will have questions we need to answer believably.” He paused and considered. “I can think of several, the most obvious one being, why on earth would we pull a hoax like this? What possible reason would we have? And why would KCAA employees lie about it?”
Ruth returned to her seat. “Okay,” she said after a moment’s reflection. “This was not our idea; this was Alvarez’s stunt.”
“Why would he pull a stunt like this?” said Melissa.
“Ratings,” suggested Julian.
“Ratings,” confirmed Ruth, looking from Julian to Melissa.
“Why would you, the Awake One, go along with this, making a mockery out of your experiment findings?” asked Ananda.
That question settled around the table like a heavy mist. It had no immediate or good answer.
Finally, Ruth suggested, “I didn’t know about it.”
“He set this up without you knowing?” said Julian.
“Yes. I was as surprised as anybody,” said Ruth.
“If you didn’t know anything about it. How do you know it was Alvarez’s stunt?”
“He told me,” Ruth answered.
“When?”
“Just before we left, he pulled me aside and apologized.”
“You know that’s an out and out lie,” said Ananda.
“I know that.”
“What if he denies this?”
“I doubt that he will.”
“On what grounds?”
“He’s been dead quiet so far,” said Ruth. “I think he is too embarrassed or frightened or both.”
“You’re the one who should apologize to him,” said Melissa.
“I know,” said Ruth.
“I’m not sure this will fly,” said Ananda.
“I’m open to suggestions,” said Ruth.
“Don’t forget,” began Ananda.
“I know, I know,” said Ruth, raising her hands in apology.
Ananda straightened in his chair and frowned. “Do not forget to apologize to him,” completing what he meant to say.
“If you admit to rising the chair,” said Julian. “Hell will continue to break loose. If you admit to knowing about the hoax, one and all with question both your motive and your sanity, Cal Tech probably first among them. If you wash your hands of the whole deal—what I would term a lie of both convenience and necessity—no one can blame you, or discredit you.”
“I think Federico Alvarez will still dispute this,” said Melissa.
“Or he may not,” said Ananda, having considered further. “The man is nothing if not concerned about his reputation, and as it stands right now, if this really did happen, he looks nothing but the outplayed, and taught-a-lesson fool. I don’t think he likes that. I think he’d much rather be the author of this spectacle,” looking over at Julian to acknowledge where that word had originated. “Much rather the author of it than its victim.”
“Good point,” said Melissa.
“Good point,” said Ruth.
Julian nodded in agreement. The way to go.
“So,” said Ruth. “It’s a hoax. I had nothing to do with it. I was as surprised as any of you. In fact, I’m still quite upset about it, since this spectacle,” also looking over at Julian, “has made very little of the experiment and my paper that I came on the program to discuss.”
They all looked at each other, waiting for objections, elaborations, anything else. No one spoke.
“Let’s do it then,” said Ruth.
:
They decided that only Ruth and Melissa would face the reporters.
Melissa took a long look at the throng of people with cameras and microphones that seemed to huddle against the gloomy May air and actually felt a little sorry for them. At least she and the others were warm inside.
She looked up briefly at the overcast sky and confirmed another misty, dripping day that was good for the lawn—which quite a few feet were treading on right now—but not so good for the mood.
When they stepped out onto the porch the police sprang to life and prevented the media crowd from approaching too closely—also stepping on the lawn, Melissa noticed. Oh, well.
Unlike the movie version of the agitated media posse, each yelling their questions and demands for comments that none really could hear, this crowd was dead silent, and wholly focused on Ruth, who must have emanated the appearance of about to make a statement—which, of course, was precisely what she was about to do.
Ruth surveyed the gathering, frowned at the one or two spotlights that had sprung up in the gloomy dawn, then drew breath and said, “You can all go home.”
She paused to study the silent reporters again, each holding up a microphone tilted in her direction. Then smiled and shook her head in what appeared to be amazement. “You look cold. You shouldn’t be out here freezing. It might even start to rain soon.”
When no one responded, Ruth changed gears and in a stronger voice more or less proclaimed, “I want to confirm what some of you already suspect, that the rising was a hoax. Let me repeat that, the rising was a hoax.
“I am not happy to have been part of it, but Mr. Alvarez saw it fit to play me as much of a fool as he played all of you and everybody else.
“I don’t know how he did it, for—from where I was sitting, and I had a good view—it certainly looked convincing, but I assume that this was his idea of a practical joke. Maybe this was his way of mocking the last line of my paper, to somewhat playfully express his disbelief of my allusion to the Buddha. Perhaps this was an attempt to throw attention off the subject we were supposed to discuss, the verified and validated result of the Cal Tech EPROM experiment—which, sadly, seems to have fallen by the wayside in the ruckus of all this.
“The person whose house you should camp outside is not ours, but Federico Alvarez’s. So, if you wouldn’t mind, would you please pack up all of your stuff—the neighbors would like that, too—and head on over to wherever he lives. We would all appreciate that very much.
“Any questions?”
Oh, yes, there were questions. The first, or loudest:
“How do you know this?”
“Alvarez told me. He apologized, then told me.”
The next loudest: “Several of the crew on the show swear, on camera, that it was not a hoax.”
“They must have been paid handsomely by Mr. Alvarez to say precisely that,” said Melissa.
The same reporter: “We have examined the footage, Ms. Marten. Thoroughly. There is no sign whatever of a hoax, no traces of lines or thread. Do you have any suggestions how Alvarez did this, if indeed he did?”
“I’m as clueless as you are,” said Ruth. But then added, “Magnets, perhaps. Iron in the chair, a strong, finely directed electrical magnet above. Have you examined that possibility?”
The reporters looked at each other, this had apparently not crossed media minds yet.
“Can you prove his?” From the middle of the pack.
“Of course not. As I said, I
haven’t a clue. I don’t know how Alvarez pulled this off. That was just a suggestion.”
“You did not look very surprised on camera, Ms. Marten.” Someone else.
“I rarely look very surprised,” answered Ruth.
“If the chair next to me rose in the air of its own free will, I would be very surprised,” the same someone. “Shocked, in fact.”
“I didn’t say I wasn’t surprised, I said I rarely look surprised.”
“Why, if this was Alvarez’s stunt, would he do this?”
“My guess is for the ratings,” said Melissa.
“Ratings,” confirmed Ruth, nodding. “What else does Mr. Alvarez live for?”
Melissa didn’t catch the next question (from someone in the back) for her attention was caught by a waving hand, closer and to her left, and realized that the hand belonged to Clare Downes, her favorite television personality. She was surprised to see her there, among the pack, but on second thought, why should she not be there, this was a story she would be interested in, surely.
“I have no idea,” answered Ruth to the question Melissa hadn’t heard.
“Yes,” Melissa said, pointing to Clare Downes, acknowledging the waving hand and inviting the question.
“Are you truly the Maitreya, Ruth?”
The question struck Melissa as free of any trace of sarcasm or cynicism. Clare Downes meant this as a question; she was truly curious.
“Why do you ask?” said Ruth.
“I don’t know, but I always pictured the Maitreya as a man.” Again, this was said in all earnestness, as far as Melissa could tell.
“I would have thought the true Maitreya would be neither man nor woman,” said Ruth.
“Yes,” said Clare Downes. “You have a point. But back to the question, though, if you don’t mind. You say in your paper—in fact, you end your paper with a statement that really cannot be taken any other way. Is that what you mean? How you intended it to be taken?”
Melissa was unsure whether this was indeed the right forum for this and looking over at Ruth, who met her look straight on, she saw that she was of the same mind.
Ruth looked back at Clare Downes and said, “I’m getting cold, and you guys are not getting any warmer. You’re far too many to invite in, or I would. But,” and here she turned to Melissa and said under her breath, “I recognize her, what’s her name?”
“Clare Downes,” Melissa whispered back.
“But you, Clare, if you want, are invited in.”
This brought an almost threatening protest groan from the crowd, something that pulled the police officers to stricter attention and alert. One of them looked back at Melissa. “Yes,” she said. “Miss Downes can come through.”
The officer pointed, nodded, then waved her through. Her cameraman made to follow.
“Not him,” said Ruth, meaning the cameraman.
“Really?” said Clare Downes.
“Really,” said Ruth.
Clare turned to her cameraman and said something. He nodded, and turned while Clare continued to make her way for the porch. Again, the mutter of protest spoke of the unfairness of it all, but with the police line holding firm nothing more came of that, and once Clare Downes had entered the house, and Melissa closed the door behind them, the rest of the reporters and their cameramen seemed to decide that nothing would be gained by lingering, so they began to pack up and head back to the studio with whatever footage they had, or perhaps heading over to Federico Alvarez’s house.
Just as the sun decided to break through the gloomy overhead.
:: 94 :: (Pasadena)
Clare Downes could easily qualify as poster child for the all-American girl. Sincere to a fault—some would go so far (actually, many did) as to call her naïve, but they would be wrong—and stunningly good looking, she quickly became the viewer darling in Minnesota, where she began her career, as well as in Los Angeles, once KCRI managed to lure her out there.
With a sister who had just taken first steps, and with a brother yet to come, she was born during a Minneapolis snow storm to Craig and Ellen Downes.
Craig Downes was—and still is—a well-known, and much respected, architect, at least as far as Minnesota goes. Ellen Downes still owns and runs a prestigious Minneapolis art gallery—The Canvas, a local gem that she inherited from her mother Berit, and made it her life’s mission to run and expand; that and raising three great kids.
Clare probably got her voracious reading habit from her mom, who never seemed to tire of informing one and all that television numbed you into a zombie state more effectively than anything she could name. It killed any sense of participation and creativity, she’d add. Then she’d turn around, holding her book high, like a banner or a flag, and disappear into what she insisted on calling the library to read.
Still, the last word to come to mind if you’d run into her as a teenager would be “brainy.” She was so vivacious that she literally sparkled. And so beautiful that her main complaint at the time was that “there were boys everywhere, could someone please do something.”
She finally settled on a boyfriend who spelled his name Marq, and who could probably bench-press a horse—more for protection than anything else, she once confided to her sister—and so was safely escorted through high school by this very nice man who’d agreed that there was no question about sex until they were married, if that were to happen. Indeed, he was happy enough just to be seen with her. A good arrangement. And he also enjoyed the kissing.
Her life took a major turn during the summer of her twentieth year. She and her sister were on a two-week hike in the Canadian Rockies when it happened.
To be perfectly honest, she had smoked pot a couple of days before, and she had not slept for about 48 hours (as an experiment), when it happened. But in her view, neither of these circumstances had any bearing on the realness, or the significance, of her experience—neither detracted one iota from the genuine event.
Three days earlier they had set up camp just above the tree line, that was the evening that she also smoked pot. Not too much, but enough to enable her to put her finger on precisely how come she decided not to sleep.
Either she had read about it, or she’d heard it said (she could not decide which), but apparently, if you can stay up for forty-eight hours or more, and still stay alert, your thoughts slow down to where you can trace them like lasers through darkness.
Perhaps it was leaning back against her backpack and looking up at the stars at this altitude, into a sky that even treated her to a meteor or two slicing across the dusty dark in quick arcs; perhaps it was this that made her curious as to whether there was some truth to that staying awake thing.
Britt, her sister, was rolling another joint when Clare asked her, “Do you think it’s true that you can see and trace your thoughts like streaks of lasers through blackness if you don’t sleep for a few days?”
Britt licked the paper and finalized her creation before she looked over at Clare, searchingly, and said, “Lasers?”
“Yes, like strands of light through dark space.”
“Thoughts?”
“Yes. Like lasers.”
“Who said that?”
“I don’t remember. I may have read it somewhere.”
“I bet you did.”
“Seriously.”
Britt lit the joint and filled her lungs with the sweet smoke. Still holding it in she offered the joint to Clare. “No, I’m fine,” she said. “Fine for now.”
Britt finally exhaled. “Okay, more for me.”
“So, do you think that’ll work?”
“What?”
“Staying up to turn thoughts into lasers.”
“I don’t know. Why don’t you try it and find out?”
“I may just do that.”
And that is precisely what she did. Although partly floating on the pot she’d already smoked, the curiosity (there’s no other word for it) of what would happen if she didn’t fall asleep kept her up not only through that
star-filled night, and the following rather warm day, but the next (overcast) night and the following windy day as well.
Towards the end of that second day, the clouds—that she was now studying quite intently—amazingly cleared the sky in several directions, not unlike a huge, multifaceted curtain opening to reveal the stage of clear sky beyond, now admitting first one star, then two, then many.
Britt was toking it again, and again offering Clare her fair share, but she declined, no, not for her, not now, perhaps not ever. As darkness fell further and deeper Britt eventually crawled into their tent and slumbered off. In the new stillness Clare could hear her sister’s breathing: in, out, in, out, then in again.
Clare, to her surprise wide awake still, leaned back into the soft undergrowth, giving herself to mossy, motherly arms. So cradled by the Earth she felt safe and secure in letting go, in relaxing and simply looking. And looking she could see a thought enter the heavens and travel, slowly, almost stately, through that huge silence above.
This was her thought: “They were right.” It spawned and sailed loftily between constellations, though whether the constellations themselves were out there or in here, she could not tell, just that the thought made its way between them, like a slow—or on a universal scale, very fast—laser between them.
Eventually the thought evaporated—a wave breaking into a trillion little pieces upon the welcoming shore—now gone, and in its place: nothing. No new thought. And she was aware of this: I am not thinking. Aware of not thinking, and this awareness did not consist of thought, it was pure awareness being aware of doing nothing but being aware of doing nothing.
She grew.
Again, whether inward our outward she could not tell, she either absorbed the skies she saw or they absorbed her (these were thoughts she had on reflection, at the time she thought nothing).
Then she thought, actually and consciously thought, “I am controlling my own thoughts.” She sent this thought on its way toward the deep darkness above and then thought nothing—again aware of thinking nothing.