The Merchants of Zion

by William Stamp

  “No James, I do understand. Everyone is out to get you.” I rinsed my plate in the sink and headed to my bedroom to prepare for work. Today Elly and I were making our own neo-barbaric, a-retinal short film.

  At the bottom of the stairs, I turned back to him and said, “If you're really so worried, why don't you run away to Canada. Or hide out in Mexico, if it's serious.”

  “It's too late,” he wailed as I shut the door to my room. “I'm a dead man.”

  Neo-barbaric, a-retinal videography is an avant garde film technique of the early and mid-21st century. Its first practitioners, working in loose collaboration on a variety of social media platforms, used custom-modified film equipment to create a filter or effect unique to each camera. Over time, this mish-mash of individual styles took on a distinctive aesthetic form.

  The term was popularized by an artist operating under the name “La Corse,” or “The Corsican.” Inspired by scientific experiments exploring the perceptual adaptation of the human retina, she created a series of abstract viral videos that appeared to be rotated one-hundred and eighty degrees. The viewers' retinas eventually adjust to the images, reversing the artificial rotation. The rate varies with the individual creating, she claimed, “A unique visual experience for each person. You can never guess when someone is going to have that, 'a-ha' moment where their mind flips the video without their conscious awareness.”

  La Corse discovered misshapen, asymmetrical images and figures worked best to consistently achieve this affect. “Originally I wanted to call it neo-Gothic, because really I got the ideas from the Notre Dame Cathedral and other Gothic architecture, but the connotation of the fin-de-siecle sub-culture was too strong. People would say, 'that doesn't look Gothic to me. There's barely any black and all, and where're the chains and the spikes?' so I settled on neo-barbaric instead.”

  Neo-barbaric, a-retinal videography has been the focus of a perspective at the Liberty Bell Museum of Modern Art, as well as in Common Sense: The Twelve Art Movements to Watch in the Coming Decade. Further discussion has taken place on dozens of blogs, forums, and social media websites across the United States and France, and in Australia, Austria, Ireland, Italy, Great Britain, and Mozambique.

  15. New Horizons

  A week passed without hooded assassins breaking down the door and slaying James as he slept. Of course, that didn't make any difference to him. He developed deep circles under his eyes and kept asking me to roll him cigarettes. When I told him to go buy his own, he said he was too afraid to leave the house. Since I was a good roommate I went and bought him a carton, which he complained about, as they were Storebrand and not the organic brand I preferred, though that didn't prevent him from sitting on the stoop, chain-smoking and warily watching cars and pedestrians that passed by without giving him more than the New York “is that crazy man going to attack me?” glance. He canceled all his appointments, and told me he was “done with that business in Rockford.”

  Mr. Felkins worked to set me up with his niece, Stacy. He invited her over for dinner several times, always while I was working. She was enrolled in Hudson University's political science graduate program, and had moved a few weeks early from Berkeley to get a feel for the city. I asked if she'd been involved with the student-Hispanic alliance and she wrinkled her nose at the idea. There was no way the city could be run by uneducated immigrants and over-privileged undergrads. I said I didn't know the details and dropped the subject.

  On her third visit, Mr. Felkins suggested I show her around the city. A wonderful idea, Helen agreed. Did Stacy know I was part of Brooklyn's vibrant artistic community? I demurred, but they insisted and Stacy seemed receptive, if not exactly thrilled. We agreed to meet at the Felkins' house after Elly's parents relieved me of my duties, then head out to Brooklyn and hang out with those starving artists who, I'd forgotten to mention, had all moved to Buffalo and St. Louis years ago.

  Elly suspected this might be more than “just friends” and expressed her disapproval.

  “I've got to stick to my principles, Cliff. I don't think Stacy is right for you,” she said, in a decent imitation of her mother's eat-your-vegetables voice.

  “Why not, Ells Bells?”

  “What about Ruth? You'll hurt her feelings!”

  “You don't even like her.” Since their lunch encounter, Elly never passed up an opportunity to criticize her. She was mean; she was sneaky; she was ugly. All in all she was most certainly and definitely not at all the right girl for me. Her criticisms amused me, even post-fallout, and I'd seen no reason to tell her that Ruth and I no longer spoke.

  “I do too,” she insisted, pounding her feet for emphasis. “Plus you two are in love.”

  “Not anymore.”

  “Really?” The gears turned in her head. Deep-thought. “Then it's okay. But I still don't like Stacy.”

  “You don't like anybody.”

  Mr. Felkins came home early. Elly saw him, screamed “Daddy!” and charged him. He swept her up in his arms, then placed her on his shoulders. She squealed as he bounced around the room, belting out low, monkey howls. Skittles joined the fun, yapping and circling around Elly's father's feet, with the occasional body-twisting leap in the air.

  I watched from the kitchen's archway—embarrassed at the naked sincerity, but also amused. He approached being a good father with the same gusto as I imagined he did hiding rich people's money. Robert Felkins was a born winner, and so long as he had a clear goal he would triumph. His son's death had muddled his senses and he'd wandered, disoriented and scotch in hand, through the foggy grief, but his GPS had found its signal. It was good for Elly—which made me happy—but the pleasure was melancholy. No matter how much time I spent with her, regardless of how much he attended or neglected her, she'd always run to him first. I was not and could not be a surrogate child for Helen or brother for Elly.

  Mr. Felkins put her down and Elly grabbed Skittles, cradling him in her arms and traipsing around, imitating her dad. Her monkey noises were squeakier. The dog took it all in stride, enduring discomfort and humiliation as childhood pets are wont to do.

  “Cliff-my-boy,” Robert said, advancing on me. He gave me a hearty slap on the back. His treatment of me had turned one-hundred and eighty degrees, from gruff and aloof to attempted male camaraderie. He didn't do it well—he came off as either condescending or all business—but I appreciated the effort. Dropping the alcohol had improved his mood. As had the shocking discovery that I was not, in fact, sleeping with his wife.

  The three of us played Storebrand Words, retrieved from the top shelf of the cupboard above the kitchen and covered with dust. Elly had never played before, but quickly learned. We let slide the misspelled words she laid down if they were close. When she cobbled together “prinsipul” I felt an inordinate amount of pride.

  Mr. Felkins was an old hand at the game—telling me he used to play it with his friends in college while pre-gaming. For him, games were about competition, not fun, and he showed us how serious he was as he wiped the floor with both Elly and myself. Not only did he play words I hadn't heard since university lectures, but he would play them to close off as many other possibilities as he could. I would put down big words to show-off, but also to open up the board and make the game more interesting, and he took advantage of my generosity to rack up a score larger than Elly's and mine combined. She protested and he began to hold back, but only when it was clear he would win.

  Afterwards, he pulled me into the kitchen. I expected a lecture about how his niece was off limits, that I really was supposed to be her tour guide, no more, blah blah blah, but instead he told me tonight's dinner was on him, and he'd transfer a few hundred bucks my way in the morning.

  “It'd better be nice. You can take her to a dive bar or filthy club or whatever's cool, but eat somewhere classy first. I don't care what you two do, just make sure she has a good time. And I don't want to hear about it. I'm going to assume you dropped her off at her apartment and she kissed you on the cheek.”
>
  “Gosh, Mr. Felkins. It's only a first date.”

  “I know how you young people are. But are you really going to take her out dressed like that?”

  I had to look down to remember what I was wearing. My brown loafers, their soles worn down to the leather; blue and yellow striped socks with holes in both heels; a pair of old jeans I'd cut into shorts; and a threadbare “Blue Supernova” t-shirt. On top of that I hadn't shaved in one week, or two, I couldn't remember. I'd meant to today, but it must've slipped my mind.

  “It's what's in style.” He couldn't tell if I was joking, mocking him, or being serious, so he changed the subject.

  “Do you know where you're going to take her?”

  “Gimme a sec. My options have expanded with my swollen budget. Do you know what kind of food she likes?” I asked. “Is she picky? She's not a vegetarian, right?”

  “No, she ate the duck Helen prepared last night. Beyond that I don't know.”

  “I'll talk to her. I've got a few places in mind.”

  Stacy showed up at half past seven. I hugged Elly goodbye and shook Mr. Felkin's hand. Once we were out the door I stuck out my arm—as a joke—and was surprised when she linked hers with mine.

  “You look good,” I said. “Too cool for me.” Indeed, she did, with fishnet stockings creeping up her legs and disappearing beneath a dark green tunic and gold belt. Her long black hair—striped electric blue—had been pulled into a nonchalant ponytail.

  She said, “Thanks,” and nothing else. I asked what kind of food she liked and if she'd prefer to eat in Manhattan or Brooklyn. She liked everything, and didn't care in what borough we ate.

  I was fortunate to live in a city where single, straight men were rarer than millionaires. I had no business scooping such gorgeous women.

  We took a car to my neighborhood and got out on a street filled with empty stores whose drawn-down shutters were covered in graffiti. I glanced to see her reaction; her face was expressionless. She looked like a senile grandmother stuck out on the porch by her family.

  I led her by the hand to a door unmarked except for its street number—33. We walked side-by-side down a short corridor to a set of glass doors. A man in a black dress shirt let us in, bowing his head as we passed by. Another waiter escorted us to a small patio table out in a garden paved with cobblestone. This hidden gem failed to register the least bit of emotion on her catatonic face.

  “What do you think?” I asked as we sat down.

  “It's nice.”

  “Let's get a bottle of wine.” I pored over the wine list, picking names at random and making a big deal about them, pretending like I could taste the difference between anything narrower than white and red.

  “I won't be drinking.”

  “Sure. That's fine. Totally up to you,” I said, trying my best to not sound disappointed.

  “I'm sorry, I must seem really out of it to you. I started new meds this week. They're having some pretty strong side effects.”

  I laughed, then apologized. “I was worried you were steeling yourself for the worst date of your life.” She smiled faintly. “What're you taking?”

  “Anti-anxiety pills. New York stresses me out.”

  I ordered a Negroni and she ordered a glass of cranberry juice.

  The meal was relaxing and uneventful. Together, we discovered the medication had caused Stacy to lose all interest in abstract concepts—“What am I going to do in grad school?”... “I'm sure the side effects will wear off.”—but she could recount the minutiae of her life, and assured me she enjoyed listening to my stories, though you couldn't tell it from her face.

  She was the daughter of Mr. Felkins sister, once Patty Felkins, now Patty Shan. Her father was a Chinese-American venture capitalist in California whose relationship with Mr. Felkin's she described as a giant pissing contest between East and West. Her father had taken it as a slight against him when she decided to move to New York, the city of her favorite uncle. The information helped explain his enthusiasm—if we dated Mr. Felkins could jab it in the eye of his brother-in-law.

  I tried talking about politics, about Robespierre's death, but she didn't have strong opinions and I didn't have James's enthusiastic lack of self-awareness about when I was being boring, so I brought up literature. No interest. Ditto for film and music: the meds had killed any and all interest in those. She didn't have much to say about anything, really, so the discussion inevitably returned to my two favorite topics: Ruth and James. I monologued about the insanity of my life these past few months, telling her first about Ruth, then backtracking to explain who James was and why he was sleeping in my living room. I forgot Mary at first, and added her into the story retroactively, although I did get Dimitri's small part in the drama exactly right the first time around. Then about Elly and Chicago, and the drama in Rockford. I finished with the night I learned about James and Ruth, editing out my extreme drunkenness and the immature note I left in the morning. At the end I was biting back tears, amazed at how raw the emotions still were.

  “And now I'm here, with no real friends or future.” I said.

  “That's quite the story,” she said, waving down the waiter for another cranberry juice.

  I had laid it all bare, and awaited judgment, comment, something.

  “The salmon is good. Very flaky.”

  I paid for the meal over her mild objection. I'd been emphasizing all evening how poor I was, and she didn't want me to suffer for some vainglorious display of masculinity.

  “Don't worry, I'm not destitute. I was exaggerating to heighten the drama.”

  Outside the restaurant I offered her a cigarette, which she accepted.

  “I don't usually smoke, but this goddamned medicine is mind killing. I think—” An ambulance blared past us, followed by two police cars. Mild annoyance spread across her face.

  “Part of living in New York.”

  Bars were obviously out of the question, and I didn't feel up for a bout of one-side chatting at a late-night diner. She suggested we go to my place—her internet didn't work in her new apartment and could she use my computer? I laughed, thinking of James's tablet annexation.

  “What's so funny?”

  “It's nothing. Yeah, let's get going.”

  Normally if I bring a girl back to my house, and especially if she offers up the idea first, and with absolute certainty if said events occur after a date at “33,” I assume I'm getting laid. It's not always true, but the rule is if those conditions are met, I will make a move. And it usually works.

  The meds changed things. They probably made her less aware of how her actions fit in with perceived social norms, and had quite possibly destroyed her sex drive. Unless they somehow made her hornier, in which case, would it be unethical to take advantage of that fact? I judged it as the equivalent of two cocktails; if the opportunity presented itself I was game.

  We walked in silence, me concocting an implausible fantasy and her staring at the buildings as if her head were stuffed with cotton balls.

  As we turned to corner to my street we were greeted with a cavalcade of emergency vehicles. The ambulance we'd seen earlier was parked halfway down the block, lights flashing. It was flanked by police cars and unmarked, black SUVs. When we were closer I realized they were in front of my house.

  “What the—” I ran down the street and was stopped by a middle-aged, black police officer, who blocked me with his body and then grabbed both my shoulders when I tried to rush past him.

  “I live there. What the hell's going on?” Another officer was cordoning off my stoop with yellow police tape: DO NOT CROSS.

  A brief struggle to get past him ended with my face pressed against the sidewalk and with his knee pressed against the small of my back. My luck with the law was the worst.

  “Young man, listen to me,” he said. “If I release you, will you calm down?”

  “Scout's honor.”

  He did so, and I stood up and dusted myself off. Stacy was reclining against my chestn
ut, watching with detached interest.

  “Officer,” I said, refraining from bum-rushing him only because I knew it would be futile. “I live there. Will you tell me what's going on or allow me to speak with someone who can? Please.”

  Two EMTs emerged from the house wheeling a gurney. On it lay a human-sized lump covered with a black canvas tarp. As they navigated down the stairs a metallic taste flooded my mouth and my head spun. I began to sway. The officer grabbed my forearm to steady me, then guided me as I plunked to the ground. I rolled my head off the sidewalk and vomited my expensive, three course meal. I stared at the chunks of salmon and chewed-up noodles as if hoping they'd offer answers to the questions I was too frightened to ask.

  “Is that... is that...” I stammered.

  The officer said to Stacy, not unkindly, “Can you take care of your boyfriend here for a second?” He stepped away from us and—just out of earshot—murmured into his walkie-talkie. Stacy knelt beside me and placed one cold, clammy hand in mine.

  “You think it's James?” she asked.

  “I don't know who else it could be.”

  “You hated him anyway, didn't you?” I gaped at her. “Sorry. The pills.”

  There had to be a mistake. I took out my phone to call Ruth—with whom I suddenly, quite badly, wanted to speak—then put it away. Better to wait until I was certain. Various possibilities cycled through my mind; robber, deranged drug addict, girl he'd had over. Best case scenario: he'd managed to buy a gun and had shot and killed someone, but was still alive.

  Moments later a man wearing a black suit and an ear piece approached me. “You own this house,” he phrased the words in a question but spoke them as a statement. His voice had the flat cadence of poor computer speech.

  “Who died? Why are there cops here? Who are you?” I asked.

  “I'll repeat myself. Do you own this house.” I wanted to tell him to fuck off, but doubted doing so would help me learn what had happened. “No. It's my cousin's and I'm house-sitting while he's out of the country.”