“What, smelling Jessker’s horrible odor mixture?”
“No. Watching you. Realizing that you have a completely split personality. That you live in two irreconcilable worlds at the same time. Hiding it from me.”
Hieronymus stared into her face on the small screen. Two people with goggles. Having a bitter discussion that only people who were meant to but never became lovers could have.
“What you are saying is true, Slue. I have tried to separate my two existences at school. I knew that nobody would understand. I knew you wouldn’t. But those are the cards I’ve been dealt. At least the kids in the remedial section don’t judge me. If they had the chance, they might rob me and beat me up—but they wouldn’t judge me if they knew I took classes with the honors section.”
“I’m not judging you, Hieronymus. I’m hurt that you’ve kept this from me.”
“Look. I’m sorry. I know you’re mad. That’s understandable. But something came up that I really have to talk to you about.”
“What? You found another book that has been drastically changed and reedited through the centuries?”
“No. Listen. How secure is your phone line?”
There was a pause in their inane conversation that was drastically deeper than everything that had transpired, and in that long, silent gap, Slue understood immediately what must have happened.
“I…don’t know…how secure my…phone line is…”
“Listen. Last night. Something happened that I should not have let happen.”
“Go on.”
“There was this girl.”
Slue’s face became utterly grim. Her head tilted down. She breathed through her nose. She looked so sad and at the same time so much like an animal who was caught with no chance of rescue, a mouse in a glue trap, a starving dog in a cage.
“I met this girl last night. She was very curious about the thing you and I have in common, but we never talk about. She…did not have a good reaction when we crossed a certain line.”
Slue could not believe what she was hearing.
“Have you any idea what you’ve done?” she whispered.
“I do now. But at the time, I was crazy. She really wanted to see my eye color. And I really wanted to look at her—without the goggles…”
“What was it like?” she whispered.
“I can’t talk about it. Not here.”
“You said she reacted badly.”
“It was terrible.”
“How was she when you saw her last?”
“When I dropped her off, she was fine. But I have to see her again. And you should see her, too. She told me something unbelievable. A rumor. One that involves you, and me, and anyone else who has to wear these goggles.”
Slue said nothing. Her face remained blank, but a terrible fear seemed to radiate from every muscle in her face. Last time, it was she who brought the subject up. And he did not want to talk about it.
Ninety-four years ago there were camps on the far side of the Moon…
But that was not what Hieronymus was about to tell her. His concern was over certain hidden current events—which were, naturally, intertwined with certain hidden historical events.
“There is a rumor going round on Earth. The Earth girl I had this misadventure with—”
“Wait,” interrupted Slue. “She was from Earth?”
“Yes. Listen. She told me this rumor that she claims to have sub-stantiated.”
Heironymous told Slue what he had heard about the Mega Cruisers. He stopped speaking as Slue’s face switched from fear to panic. Out of sight of the screen, she appeared to have grabbed something, and furiously wrote the following sentence on her tablet with her stylo-point and held it up to the screen for Hieronymus to see:
stop talking aBout this now.
i Don’t know iF this line is saFe.
we’ll speak aBout it in school.
change the suBject.
Hieronymus paused. Where were we? Oh, yes. Tonight. The Ferris wheel. The girl from Earth. The Ginger Kang Kangs playing at the Dog Shelter. Bruegel. I have to convince Slue to come along. She won’t want to. But she must. She has to…
“So. Slue. Like I said, I met this really cool girl from Earth, and I’m supposed to meet her tonight at eight. You would like her. And how often do you get a chance to hang with a girl from Earth? It would be so excellent! After we pick her up, the four of us can head over to the Dog Shelter and check out the Ginger Kang Kangs. It will be so much fun. Please come. Bruegel won’t drive me unless you come with us.”
“Wait. Who is this Bruegel guy?”
“You must have seen him. He’s big. He has a really loud voice. He’s not ugly.”
“He’s not ugly. That’s good to know. Almost as good as knowing that he’s a Loopie. And he won’t drive you unless I come along, which is a little creepy. Anyway, I have other plans tonight, so I can’t go.”
“Really? What can possibly be more important than this?”
“More important than traveling two hundred kilometers in a car with you and your Loopie friend to see an obscure band play at the Dog Shelter? I can think of a lot of things.”
“Well, what are you doing tonight?”
Slue sighed, as she always did whenever she was slightly embarrassed.
“I’m going out with Pete tonight. You remember Pete from the rotunda? I told him that I’d go see Trapezoids Crunchdown with him.”
“I don’t think Pete will be seeing you tonight.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Believe me, Slue, my very accurate sources that tell me Pete will be doing something else entirely different tonight.”
“Hieronymus, what are you talking about? You don’t even know Pete! You just met him once, and you almost got into a fight with him.”
“On the contrary, Pete and I hung out on the transporter yesterday morning on the way to LEM Zone One. I misjudged him entirely. He is a truly excellent fellow. He and I are great pals now. In fact, if he was not committed to do this thing tonight, I would invite him along with us. But you’ll see. He has other plans, probably in the vicinity of Telstar Towers, and he will cancel on you.”
“Telstar Towers? Are you kidding me? No way would Pete even dream of going over there. You are not talking about the same Pete I am, Hieronymus.”
“I’ll make you a deal. If Pete cancels, as I predict he will, you will come out with me and Bruegel tonight on a double date. You and Bruegel. Me and the Earth girl.”
For a split second, Slue’s face curled up in total disgust.
“Double date? Are you out of your mind? What are in Jesus Pixie are you talking about?”
“I am talking about trying to get myself back to LEM Zone One so I can meet this girl. I can’t take the subway because it’s totally messed up—I got in last night at five in the morning because of that. The only one I know who has a car is Bruegel. He will drive me out there on one condition—that I set us all up on a double date. Him and you, me and the girl I met last night.”
“This is so nauseating, Hieronymus.”
“Why do you care? You just told me that you are supposed to meet Pete, right?”
“I am meeting Peter tonight. Yes. This is true.”
“But I know for a fact that he will cancel.”
“He will not cancel. Peter is a very upstanding young man, unlike all of your Loopie friends. He does not cancel dates.”
“So you admit that you are going out on a date with him?”
“Stop it, Hieronymus. Yes. I have a date with Pete.”
“You are dating him?”
“I hate that word dating. It is so embarrassing, I get chills of nausea.”
“Answer the question.”
“Okay. Yes, Hieronymus, I am dating Pete. Happy? Satisfied?”
“Almost. Now answer this next question. Is he your boyfriend?”
“I don’t know. What does that mean, anyway? Boyfriend, girlfriend, it’s so stupid.”
“S
o you would not get upset if Pete called you up and canceled because he said that he was sick or something like that, then you found out that he was actually having a wild sexy love afair with an unbelievably hot girl who just so happens to be in the Loopie class?”
“You are…insane. I’m not even going to answer that.”
“So I can safely assume that you are not willing to bet that Pete might cancel his date with you?”
“Okay, I’ll bet. If it shuts you up, I’ll bet.”
“Excellent. So, if Pete does not cancel his date, I am wrong. I will be humiliated and I will tell everyone in class what an insane kazzer-bat I really am. And that I take classes with the Loopies. Because I’m stupid. But, if Pete does indeed cancel, like I know he will, then you will have to come out on a harmless double date with me and Bruegel and the girl I met last night. We will pick her up from the Ferris wheel at LEM Zone One, and then we will all go to the Dog Shelter to see the Ginger Kang Kangs, which Bruegel informs me is a really happening band.”
Slue sighed. “Okay, Hieronymus. Whatever you say.”
“It’s a deal?”
“Sure.”
“We’ll be by to pick you up in about two hours.”
“It will never happen.”
“Five thirty. Be ready.”
“Wait. Five thirty? That’s a bit early, isn’t it?”
“It’s a long drive. But don’t worry, you get to sit up front with the driver—your date, that is.”
“It’s all set, big guy,” Hieronymus smiled as he approached his friend and slapped him on the shoulder.
“What’s all set?” Bruegel asked with a glassy-eyed stare of profound momentary confusion. He shifted his mind from the cookies’ ingredients list to whatever Hieronymus must have been talking about.
“Tonight. It’s all set. Slue is coming with us.”
“Slue?”
“Yes. Slue. The girl with the blue hair.”
Bruegel stared up from his comfortable place on the linoleum floor among the piles of cookie boxes all around him. “Slue…” he said, repeating the word silently several times before making an obvious mental connection, and his eye shifted out of whatever trance he had happened to find himself in. “Slue, yes, of course. Oh, that’s wonderful! Wonderful! I knew you’d do it! That foxentrotter with the blue hair! You are a true friend, Hieronymus, a true friend! Wow! I have a date tonight with the girl with the blue hair whom every guy in school thinks is really hot! Let’s see, what jacket should I wear…maybe my purple suede tuxedo? Hieronymus, do you think I should wear my spats on my shoes? Girls dig those. Also, I was wondering, I have this wonderful top hat, a real stovetop that my mother’s last boyfriend left behind before he split on us. It’s really cool. Should I wear that? It’s made of alligator skin—very rare, from Earth! What do you think?”
Hieronymus did not think anything at all. He just started picking up the boxes of cookies that his friend had been studying and proceeded to put them back in their proper places on the shelves.
They purchased a case of Peterray’s Extra Special Beer for Bruegel’s mother. They split the cost and handed the wrinkled cash to Mr. O’Looney. An elderly homeless couple lay sleeping and snoring on a large ripped antique sofa that was propped up against the Plexiglas window. Even as they slept, this man and woman had odd expressions on their faces, as if their dreams returned them to their youth, but a youth of such apprehension and uncertainty, and one that would lead them to the unpleasant reality they found themselves in.
The two boys left through the front door of O’Looney’s, the neon streets before them glowing in the constant twilight, the focks of large white hummingbirds forming clouds and ascending to the tops of the highest towers that surrounded them.
Hieronymus was back in his room. He sneaked in through the living room hoping to avoid his father, who was still furious at him for coming in at five in the morning. He did not have a Hell of a lot of time, so he sorted through the piles of clothes he had never bothered to put away. Everything was a mess. Why am I always leaving my crap all over the floor? he wondered. I always tell myself that I’m going to hang things up, and yet, here I am, rummaging through all my shirts and my trousers, my socks, ugh. What’s wrong with me? I was going to wear that shirt tonight, but I left those socks on it and now it smells like someone’s feet… He was in a bit of a quandary—everything was either wrinkled, or was filthy, or stank because he didn’t bother to put it into the laundry hamper. And it was always the same cycle. The only time he ever gave a damn about tidiness were those moments he suffered from his lack of it.
Suddenly, he realized there was a figure at the doorway, observing him. His father.
Ringo was not in a good mood. He had huge bags under his dark brown eyes. He had been under a lot of pressure at his job the whole week, and last night’s disaster was an over-the-top episode of extreme stress. Pacing all night. Sometimes, the worry got to him so much he had to curl up in a fetal position on the couch and scream into a pillow to deal with the anxiety of where the Hell is my Pixiedamned son, it’s three thirty in the Pixiedamned morning but that didn’t improve matters—not one bit.
When Hieronymus finally got in, Ringo was too exhausted to press him for details. It was difficult for Hieronymus to lie to him because he never had anything to hide, except for the fact that he hung out a lot at O’Looney’s, and that was not exactly something worth lying about, it just never came up. So any lie told to his father, even the smallest one, took on an extreme weight for him. He felt sorry for his father, but he was not sure exactly why. The man was not that old—but the lines of disappointment he carried on his forehead betrayed a life where something, somewhere long ago passed him by. It was hard to be dishonest to a guy like that. Especially when he’s your own father.
“So where in Hades were you last night.”
“I told you, Da. I was at LEM Zone One on a class field trip. I wandered of with a couple of friends, which I know I shouldn’t have done. I got lost, and I missed the transporter ride back. The subway took forever. You know that. Look it up, they always list the previous night’s subway problems on the transport channel. I can even show you the tickets of the rides I went on at the amusement park there.”
“Amusement park?”
“Yes, Da, there’s an amusement park at LEM Zone One.”
“So you wandered of to go on some childish rides and that caused you to miss your transport ride back? What’s wrong with you? Have you any idea how far away LEM Zone One is?”
“I do now.”
“Don’t be a wise guy.”
“I’m not. Sorry. I just agree with you that now, after this experience, I understand how far away that place is.”
“That’s not really the point, Hieronymus. What I’m angry about is the fact that you put yourself at risk over something so utterly stupid. The subway at three in the morning, getting in at five—”
“I got on at about midnight. Normally, it should have taken only an hour and a half, tops. It’s not my fault the train broke down, or whatever it did.”
Ringo’s voice grew slightly louder.
“No. It is completely your fault. What kind of a jackass waits till midnight to take a train that has to cross the entire Sea of Tranquility? You’ve got to be kidding me! That train is a notorious, undependable wreck! You wait till midnight? You don’t even call me and let me know where you are?”
“Sorry…”
“Have you any idea how dangerous the train is? You know about what happened two nights ago? That couple that was murdered? The man was killed because he was a One Hundred Percent…”
“Yes, I know, Da.”
“You want to know what else, Hieronymus? The school did not even have you listed as even being on that field trip. I called them at six.”
“You called the school at six?”
“Yes. Remember? Your uncle Reno was coming over. We were going
to have dinner with him. You never showed up. So I called
the school, and they said that your class canceled out on the field trip. There is no trace of you being anywhere.”
“I’m sorry, Da. I don’t know why they listed my class as being canceled. Most of the kids cut, so I guess that’s why the teacher—actually, we had a sub again—listed the class as being cancelled from the trip because everyone just cut. But I was there. I was with Bruegel and Clellen. They didn’t cut.”
“Clellen. Doesn’t that girl live over in Telstar?”
“Yeah.”
Ringo seemed to drift for a fleeting moment as soon as Clellen’s name came up. He thought she was one of the wackiest, most eccentric human beings he had ever met. And, of course, so badly beautiful, so blindingly gorgeous, he felt like a horrible old lecher just thinking of her. He dutifully pushed her image from his mind. He was both appalled and delighted his son associated with her…
The bubblephone rang. Ringo went into the living room to answer it. Hieronymus followed at a distance, wary of who might call. And the fact that his class was canceled turned out to be a stroke of luck for Hieronymus, as the caller himself turned out to be none other than Lieutenant Dogumanhed Schmet, Detective, Sea of Tranquility Police Department.
His screen image, that inhuman, waxen face, sent horrible shivers up the spines of both father and son. Hieronymus remembered him.
“Hello? Hello,” he said. “Excuse me, I am looking for a Mr. Ringo Rexaphin. Is that you, sir?”
“Yes,” replied Ringo with as neutral voice as he could muster. “Can I help you?”
“Good afternoon, sir. I am Lieutenant Dogumanhed Schmet of the STPD. We’re just making a routine check of all LOS-bearing males between the ages of fifteen and twenty. This is just a routine check, but we have to ask you a couple of questions, if that’s all right with you.”
“Of course,” replied Ringo. “I have nothing to hide.”
“Thank you, sir. Your cooperation in this matter is much appreciated. Now, before we go any further, I would like to ask you, as a parent of a child who bears lunarcroptic ocular symbolanosis, you are familiar with Quarantine Directive Number Sixty-Seven, are you not?
One Hundred Percent Lunar Boy Page 18