Superposition

by David Walton

  The anger receded into the background, like a pit bull chained in the shadows. I still worked out with the bags in the gym, but I didn’t talk much about my background. I wanted to leave it behind. I was a scientist now, someone who believed in the inherent order of the universe. The chaos was behind me.

  The gun went off with a deafening blast. The coffee mug Elena was holding exploded into shards. I didn’t think; I just reacted. I leaned toward Brian, pivoting my hips and throwing my weight into a right cross as hard as I knew how. The punch knocked him backward, sending him sprawling in a jumble on the floor. I looked at Elena.

  She still sat at the table, eyes wide and mouth slightly parted, her face ashen. Her mug lay shattered in front of her in a pool of coffee.

  “Are you hurt? Elena!” My ears were ringing; I could hardly hear the sound of my own voice. I rushed to her side. She was still sitting in the chair, breathing, stunned but apparently unharmed. I couldn’t believe it. I thought at first the bullet must have deflected off of her coffee mug, but no—in the wall behind her, following a direct line through the middle of her chest, there was a hole punched into the drywall. The bullet had gone straight through her.

  “Call 911,” I said.

  She didn’t move.

  “Elena!”

  She jolted, as if startled awake, and fished the phone out of her pocket to make the call. Brian hadn’t moved from the floor. He was still breathing, but the punch had dazed him.

  “Yes,” Elena said into the phone. “Someone . . . a . . . a man just fired a gun at me in my house.”

  Brian stirred and looked at Elena. His eyes focused suddenly, and he shook his head. “What are you doing? Are you calling the police? Don’t do that.” He looked at me. A trickle of blood was running out of his left nostril. “Please!” he said. “Look at her—she’s not hurt! The bullet diffracted around her, just like I told you! I was just showing you.” He stood shakily to his feet.

  “Right here in the kitchen,” Elena said. “Please hurry.”

  “Please, put the phone down,” Brian said.

  I stepped between them. “Get out of my house.”

  “Jacob,” he said, his voice pleading. “I need your help.”

  I advanced on him, fists raised, heedless of the gun he still held in one hand. He turned and started yanking on the door that led to the backyard. It didn’t budge. He fumbled at the lock. I didn’t help him. It was all I could do not to hit him again. Finally, he managed to turn it and yanked the door open. With one last backward look of reproach, he ran out barefoot into the snow.

  The stairs thundered with descending feet, and Claire, Alessandra, and Sean burst into the room, all talking at once.

  “What was that sound?” Claire asked.

  “Did he shoot a gun at you?” Sean asked, eyes wide.

  “It’s all right,” I said. “He’s gone now. Go and get dressed. The police are coming, and I’m sure they’ll want to talk to you, too.”

  Elena was shaking. I put my arms around her, and she clung to me. I felt her slim neck and delicate bones and stroked her hair and thought about what might have happened. About what my life would be like if she were dead. I felt the pit bull in the shadows, tugging at its chain, wanting to get free. I wanted to hurt someone. I had it under control, for the moment, but I knew that if Brian came to my house again, that control wouldn’t last.

  Elena didn’t let go, and neither did I, and we stood that way until the police arrived.

  CHAPTER 4

  DOWN-SPIN

  The prosecution’s first witness was Officer Richard Peyton, a big guy with a thick neck, red blotches on his face, and blond hair cropped so close to his scalp that you almost couldn’t see his receding hairline. He climbed the short stairs to the witness box, stiff in a freshly cleaned and pressed uniform and holding his cap, which he set on the rail next to him.

  The court officer held out a Bible, and Peyton placed his hand on it. “Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” The officer rattled it off like it was one multisyllable word.

  “I do,” Peyton said.

  Haviland advanced. “Officer Peyton, what is your profession?”

  “I’m an officer for the Media Police Department.”

  “How many years have you been a police officer?”

  “Eight years, give or take.”

  Next to me, Terry Sheppard slouched, apparently bored with the witness, and played with the end of his mustache. I figured it was a pose, meant to communicate to the jury a contempt for the witness, but I wasn’t sure. He did this all the time. He might actually be bored.

  “Do you remember where you were the evening of December second?” Haviland asked.

  “Yes, I do. I was cruising the downtown Media area when I got a call from the dispatcher to Woodview Lane, possible armed assault,” Peyton said.

  “And you went to the scene as ordered?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Were you the only one there?”

  “No, my partner, Officer Jimenez, was in the car with me, also Officers Esposito and Ashford arrived on the scene in their car approximately five minutes after we did.”

  “And what did you find when you got there?”

  “We found Mr. and Mrs. Kelley, the owners of the house, along with their three children. Mr. Kelley claimed Brian Vanderhall had discharged a firearm at his wife.”

  “Was there evidence of that?”

  “Yes, sir. There was a bullet hole in the kitchen wall, and a shattered coffee mug with gunshot residue consistent with a firearm discharge about five feet away.”

  “And can you identify Mr. Kelley? Is he in the courtroom today?”

  “Sure.” Peyton pointed at me. A lot of people were doing that today. “That’s him, right there.”

  “Let the court records show that the witness identified the defendant, Jacob Kelley,” Haviland said. “Thank you, Officer. How did Mr. Kelley seem to you?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “How did he seem to be feeling?” Haviland asked. “Was he happy, sad, angry, annoyed, amused?”

  “Objection!” Terry called out. He stressed the first syllable, as if this were the twentieth objection he’d made, and he was growing weary of the prosecutor’s games. “What is the relevance of this line of questioning to the murder?”

  “I’m trying to establish motive,” Haviland said. This incident occurred the day before, and is crucial for demonstrating the defendant’s state of mind.”

  “Overruled,” Judge Roswell said. “You may answer the question, Officer Peyton.”

  “He was angry,” Peyton said. “Blazing mad. Some guy just took a shot at his wife. I’d be angry, too.”

  “Angry enough to kill?” Haviland asked.

  “Objection!” Terry said.

  But Haviland waved it away. “I withdraw the question,” he said.

  I was having trouble staying in my seat and listening to all this. My muscles kept clenching and unclenching, just like they used to do when I had to sit and listen to a scientist lie through his teeth about the worthlessness of some competing experiment in an attempt to raise the value of his own research. I felt so powerless: unable to explain, unable to speak up or do anything at all. All my life, I had hated that feeling of helplessness and vulnerability. I wasn’t sure how I was going to stand it for several days of trial.

  “What time did you come to the house?” Haviland asked.

  “At 8:25 in the evening.”

  “How can you be certain?”

  “The time was recorded in my report of the incident, which I reviewed before coming here today.”

  Haviland reached under the prosecution table and pulled out a giant interactive whiteboard that showed a line with dates and times marked. A rectangle marked “Next” appeared on the bottom right corner of the board, and when Haviland touched it, a box appeared over 8:25 PM on December 2, which read “Police arrive at Kelley home.”


  “Is this time correct?” Haviland asked.

  “Yes, it is,” Peyton said.

  Haviland spun briefly to give the jury and the audience a good look, then leaned it against the table. “So you came to the house and found evidence of firearm violence and a very angry Jacob Kelley,” he said. “What did you do next?”

  “I called it in, and they started a manhunt for Brian Vanderhall. We put an APB out on his car and searched the neighborhood, but we didn’t find him,” Peyton said.

  “You didn’t find him? Was this a halfhearted search?”

  “No, sir. We went house to house for blocks in every direction, knocking on doors and searching yards. We alerted the departments in surrounding towns, as well as the New Jersey State Police. Nobody saw him.”

  “How long did the search continue?”

  “Until his dead body was found.”

  “And in all that searching, did Mr. Kelley mention to you that there was a secret bunker, hidden underground, in which he and Mr. Vanderhall used to perform scientific experiments?”

  “No, he did not.”

  “He didn’t suggest to you that Vanderhall might be hiding down there, evading capture?”

  “No, sir,” Peyton said.

  “Why do you think that is?”

  “Objection,” Terry said. “He’s asking the witness to speculate.”

  “Sustained,” Roswell said.

  Haviland shrugged. “One final question. What time did the police leave the Kelley home that night?”

  “At 10:55,” Peyton said.

  Haviland picked up his whiteboard and pressed the “Next” square again, causing a new box to appear over 10:55, which read “Police leave Kelley home.”

  “Is this correct?” he asked.

  “Yes, it is.”

  “No further questions, Your Honor.”

  Haviland sat down. Terry leaped to his feet and practically ran to the lectern, where he threw down his notes. The pose of yawning indifference had disappeared in a moment. He glanced at me briefly, and his eyes were ablaze.

  “Mr. Peyton,” he said in the same strident tone I used to use to call one of my children to task when they misbehaved.

  “Officer,” Peyton corrected.

  “Ah yes. An officer of the law. Keeper of the truth. Mr. Peyton, in your eight years as a police officer, how many times have you been called to a scene of violence in someone’s home?”

  Peyton made a huffing noise. “I don’t know. Hundreds.”

  Terry held up a sheaf of papers. “According to police records, over five hundred times?”

  “I would believe that, though I don’t keep track,” Peyton said.

  “And how many of those incidents have involved one or more angry persons?”

  Peyton gave him a strange look. “I’m sorry?”

  “Come on, Mr. Peyton. In how many of those incidents of violence in the home did you encounter someone who was, if I may quote you, ‘blazing mad’?”

  “Most of them, I guess,” Peyton said.

  “And how many of them resulted in someone’s death?”

  “Not many.”

  Terry held up the papers. “Fifteen?”

  Peyton was getting a bit irritated. “It could be. I don’t remember the exact number.”

  “So is it safe to say,” Terry said, “in your expert opinion as a police officer, that when someone is angry, it doesn’t necessarily mean he will kill someone?”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  “Mr. Peyton, when you encounter a man who you believe is a danger to himself or other people, what do you do?”

  “We take him into custody.”

  “Would you include in your report your belief that you feared that person would do violence to others?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you take Jacob Kelley into custody that night?”

  “No.”

  “Did you include in your report that you feared he would do violence to others?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I didn’t believe him to be a threat, sir.”

  “So in your professional opinion, as a police officer on the scene at the time, Mr. Kelley gave no indication of being angry enough to murder someone.”

  “That’s not something you can tell just by looking at someone,” Peyton said.

  “But at the time, you did not think he was angry enough to commit murder.”

  He didn’t want to answer the question. Peyton knew his main purpose on the stand was to introduce a motive for murder. “I wasn’t certain one way or another,” he said. “At that time, he had not committed a crime.”

  Terry wasn’t going to let him off the hook. “According to your report, however, you had no reason, at the time, to believe that he would commit a crime, correct?”

  Peyton took a deep breath and let it out. “That’s correct.”

  Terry smiled. “Thank you. No more questions, Your Honor.”

  CHAPTER 5

  UP-SPIN

  The police interviewed me, Elena, and each of the kids individually, although the kids had seen nothing and had little to say. The questions were polite, though repetitive, and I told them the truth about everything, except that I left out the spinning gyroscope and the apparent diffraction of the bullet. When the police finally left, it was nearly eleven o’clock, and we were all exhausted.

  Sean was practically asleep on his feet, so I picked him up and carried him to his room. His bed was set on a loft over a desk and play area, both of which were scattered with Legos, action figures, and plastic dinosaurs. On the desk, a set of green plastic army men that had been mine when I was young lay in various fallen poses in a field littered with spent rubber band ammunition. Because of his short arm, he had learned to fire by holding one end of the rubber band in his teeth while stretching it forward with a finger on his right hand.

  “Did you really punch that guy in the face?” Sean mumbled.

  “Yes, I did,” I said.

  “Awesome,” he said.

  I thought more of an explanation was probably required—about when it was and was not appropriate to hit other people—but it wasn’t the time. I gave him a quick kiss and turned out the light.

  “The nightlight!” he said.

  I flipped it on and slipped out of the room.

  “Daddy! My music!”

  Sighing, I went back in and turned on the soft music he always fell asleep to.

  “My drink,” he said.

  “Not tonight,” I told him. “It’s late. Go to sleep.” I kissed him once more and stroked his hair, thinking of Brian and the gun and the police. Someday, Sean would be strong enough to take care of himself, but as a child, he was so helpless. He relied on me, trusted me implicitly to take care of him. He was asleep by the time I left the room.

  Elena was in the shower, and Claire’s room was dark, but the lights were still on in Alessandra’s room. I peeked in and saw her lying on her bed.

  “Lights out,” I said.

  No response.

  “Sweetheart, it’s late. Time to go to sleep.”

  Still no response. Her eyes gave a telltale twitch, and I realized that she was eyejacked, her vision overlaid by the icons and images of a shared network. Sometimes I think the technology was invented as a means to ignore parents and teachers while appearing to pay perfect attention. She could trade video clips or stills of what her eyes were seeing with similar viewfeeds from other people. At this moment, she might be looking at a school friend’s new shoes or following the drama of a family argument in China, while half a dozen strangers were looking at me. It was disconcerting to think that I might be parenting to an audience, but it was the culture of my children’s generation, and I didn’t feel I could keep them out of it entirely, much as I might wish to.

  I spotted her phone in its cradle on her dresser and leaned over to punch the disconnect button. Alessandra’s eyelids closed, fluttered, and then sprang open again. She sprang to her feet, her f
ace a mask of fury. “Dad! You could kill me doing that!”

  “It won’t kill you.”

  “You’re supposed to bring me out gradually. Do you want to leave me brain-dead and drooling?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “At least when I’m dead, you’ll still have Claire.”

  I didn’t want to get dragged down that rabbit hole. “Time for bed, Alessandra.”

  She crossed her arms and gave me a belligerent look.

  “Good night,” I said, and turned off the lights.

  Elena had finished her shower. I brushed my teeth in the bathroom, thinking about Brian’s endlessly spinning gyroscope and the bullet that had apparently passed through—or diffracted around—Elena. In the quantum world—among particles smaller than an atom—such oddities were commonplace. Spinning particles had a ground state energy, a rate of spin that couldn’t go any slower. And all particles, whether they had mass or not, had a wavelength and could diffract like light. But such things only worked on the subatomic scale, not with gyroscopes and bullets.

  The subatomic world was a weird and wonderful one, a world where common sense broke down. It took me until my second year at MIT to really come to terms with it, to realize that the beautiful world of cause and effect I had fallen in love with in my high school physics class was a sham. Lurking deep inside the stable laws of Newtonian physics was the ambiguous world of the subatomic, where probability reigned. Not the probability of ignorance, like a coin flip, where if you knew enough about the force of the flip and the rotation and the wind and the air pressure and the scars on the referee’s finger, you could predict the outcome. No, at the bottom of everything was a fundamental probability, an unknowable, unpredictable creation and an annihilation of particles with no rhyme or reason to it. The real world, the quantum world, was dark and terrifying and didn’t make any sense at all.

  Here’s the problem: Every particle in the universe is also a wave. It’s not like a marble or a stone, with a clearly defined position, diameter, and velocity. It might be either here or there. It might be moving slow or fast. It might have a lot of energy or a little. It isn’t just that you don’t know. The particle itself hasn’t decided. It’s in an indeterminate state, smeared out over a region of space. Since even the smallest everyday objects are composed of billions of particles, the uncertainty usually averages itself out in the larger world. But it’s there.