NK3

by Michael Tolkin

  Five blocks away the truck stopped. He heard voices outside and a large engine idling. Hopper hopped off the back to see who was talking.

  A gasoline delivery tanker was parked in the intersection, and crews were filling twenty-gallon water bottles with gasoline from the tanker and carrying them into the houses.

  Rome explained it to the group. “We’re in the center of the Burn Zone. The fire crews will set off a big blow here. The fire will spread across the rooftops. To make sure the fire leaps over the streets they’re putting more gas at two-block intervals. The houses in the center will burn hot; flames will cross to the next row. The houses at the intersections will be doused with gas to amplify the fire, those houses will blow, the fire will cross the street on fuses made of flammable ropes soaked in tiki torch paraffin, and burn the next block, and so on, until the last four blocks near the firewall. Those will be kept watered down and if the fire manages to break through, the firewall should stop the rest. That’s how Encino, Van Nuys, Northridge, and South Pasadena were turned into ash moat. When the fire is out, the wreckers will tear the rubble wall down and level what remained. And then it’s on to the next zone until we press the Burn and ash moat from Culver City and Mar Vista to Venice and the beach. That’s two or three months away. Not long.”

  Siouxsie Banshee waved her hand at Rome. “I was the only one listening to you.”

  “He was listening,” said Rome, pointing to Hopper.

  His Silent Voice told him to say, “I wasn’t.”

  They unloaded the truck at a movie studio. Three soundstages were designated for the furniture salvaged from the Burn Zone: kitchen, downstairs, upstairs. The Eames chair and the mission table were taken to one stage and the suitcases with the broken dishes were taken to another, unopened. 18 Tee warned Siouxsie Banshee against complaining anymore.

  Siouxsie wouldn’t give up. “Tee, listen to me and look at what’s in here. Something isn’t right. I’ve done the Inventory runs before the other Burns, and we were selective. The building is crowded and I can help make room by getting rid of the stuff that’s worthless.”

  “That’s not our business,” said 18 Tee. “And you don’t have authority.”

  They carried the table into the soundstage and turned it upside down on another table without a blanket, which was another arrow into her soul. “These tables are just going to get scratched stacking them this way.”

  “If the furniture is bad as you say, what difference does it make if it’s damaged?”

  Siouxsie Banshee put her head on Hopper’s shoulder. “Thank you for saying so. That makes me feel better. I’m a sensitive person. I know that I’m missing my life. The rest of you don’t. Well, not you, maybe. I think you’re different. I know I’m different.”

  She kissed his cheek, then his ear, and licked the back of his neck.

  “I like to do that. I think I must have liked that before. I wonder if I had a lover. I hope so. Do you think you had a lover? Silly question. You have a wedding ring.”

  “Do you know my wife?”

  “I could have. I could have known you. I could have been your wife. Maybe you had a family. You’re old enough to be a father.”

  When they were finished unloading the truck, a van drove them back to Figueroa, where the crowds, finished with inventory, were drunk.

  Chief, Shannon, Erin, Helary, Jobe

  Erin told Shannon: “If you want to live inside the Fence, you have to belong here. You have to want to belong here. You have to commit to the life. Radical inclusion is radical participation. I want to show you who you were. The more you are who you used to be, the more we can trigger. You had a rehab; you just forgot it. You had skills. You were a performer, so you did the same things over and over. You practiced to be Shannon Squier, and you can be Shannon again.”

  Erin brought Shannon into the basement screening room. Shannon sat in the front row, playing with the button that ran the motor that raised and lowered the footrest. Erin showed her the six CDs she recorded. “And here are the two DVDs, the collection of your videos, and your Live in Rio concert video. I have a few songs from iTunes that aren’t on the records. Your biggest success was ‘I (LOVE) YOU.’ It’s on your third album.”

  “Play it,” said Chief. He was in the back of the room; he’d slipped in quietly. He put a hand on Shannon’s shoulder and she jumped up.

  “I’m sorry. I was just saying hello.”

  “We already said hello.”

  “My mistake. I want to make sure you’re comfortable.”

  “This is a good chair, yes.”

  “Isn’t it? Erin, whenever you’re ready.”

  The song came on, a ballad of pain, a declaration of rage at betrayal, a list of strategies for revenge. After half a minute, Shannon raised her hand. Erin stopped the music.

  “That’s really me? I don’t know how to sing.”

  “You’re singing beautifully on the record.”

  “That’s not me anymore.”

  “Give yourself a chance to listen.”

  “Give yourself a chisel in your right eye.”

  Chief turned to Erin. “That was her most popular song. Is that your favorite song too?”

  “I have so many favorites, Chief. All her songs are my favorite.”

  “Erin, pick one, just pick one.”

  Erin conferred with Helary and Jobe. “We all like ‘Take (My) Night, Please.’”

  The song came on, a quiet song, just Shannon and some kind of instrument. Chief couldn’t tell what it was, something electronic, like a violin made out of a can.

  Nothing changed with this song. Shannon didn’t move. Chief stopped it. “Erin, sing along with the song.”

  “Thank you, Chief,” said Erin. It was the worst punishment of her life to sing in front of Shannon, but she recalled the great wisdom of Redwings, “Chief is Chief because there is no other Chief.”

  Erin went to the front of the room and Jobe started the song. Erin sang along with it, as she had a hundred times, as she had with all of Shannon’s songs. Jobe lowered the volume so Chief and Shannon could hear her over the record. Brin had nothing to do, so she did nothing.

  Chief moved to the seat next to Shannon’s. “Why don’t you try that?”

  “That’s not me anymore.”

  “So you know that used to be you,” said Chief.

  She didn’t answer.

  Erin said, “There’s the live concert video. Live in Rio. It’s a city in South America. You gave a concert in the stadium, for a hundred thousand people.”

  The video began with shots of the stage being put together on a platform in the middle of the soccer field.

  There were so many people; the city was so full. Even Shannon sat up to see things more clearly.

  Searchlights mounted on the walls of the arena scanned the sky and found a plane circling. A paraglider dropped out of the plane, with wings like a squadron of trained fireflies in precise formation. The paraglider took a wide turn over the stadium, sailed over the crowd, and landed on the stage. The searchlights now focused on the sky pilot in a flight suit stripping off her harness and jumpsuit. The cameras replayed this image on screens over the stage and mounted on the walls of the stadium, and revealed Shannon Squier wearing nothing but her tattoos.

  Whoever supervised the mix of the DVD had suppressed the presence of the hundred thousand fans in the stadium until the moment Shannon landed on the stage, so that as she stripped, the volume of the audience lifted around the screening room like a flash flood in a narrow canyon.

  Chief got a call from Toby Tyler and walked out of the screening room.

  Erin tried to stop him. “There’s more to see.”

  “Not now,” said Chief.

  He turned his attention to Toby.

  “Have you talked to Vayler?” she asked.

  “About
what?”

  “The inventory isn’t done, he wants another day in the Burn Zone, and I’m already setting the charges. Talk to him. He says he’s only following your orders to collect the treasure.”

  Chief called Vayler.

  “Are you going to have time tomorrow to organize the Drifter buses and trucks and get out of downtown before the Burn?”

  “Touch and go on that, Chief. There was a lot more of value than we expected. Burn it and it’s gone. We’ll be fine. It’s all good.”

  Hopper, Viola, Made In USA

  The food trucks along the street were open, the booze carts were full, and the tired workers left their Inventory transports and Burn Brigade details to join the parade. Hopper walked beside Siouxsie Banshee, while she predicted the future. “When the Burn is over they’ll resettle a lot of people. Did you know that? Back to the desert, you know what I mean. If there’s nothing left to collect, what will they need from Siouxsie Banshee or Nole Hazard? I want to make myself useful. But who do I talk to? You saw how they treat me. Where do you live?”

  He pointed to the Hilton.

  “Not too bad,” said Siouxsie. “I’m in what the sign outside says is a work/loft building. Don’t tell anybody but I have some art I found in a storage room at one of the museums. The artist was named Robert Mapplethorpe and he took pictures of penises. Why did I tell you that? What is wrong with me? Don’t answer.”

  From behind them, the naked Shambler Hopper rescued from the Bottle Bangers put a hand on Hopper’s shoulder.

  “Who is this?” asked Siouxsie.

  “I met her on the street.”

  The naked woman continued to keep pace with Hopper and Siouxsie.

  “So you’re one of them, a Banger?”

  “No,” said Hopper.

  Siouxsie spoke to the Shambler. “He doesn’t want you. Leave us alone.” This had no effect on the Shambler. “Is she ignoring me, or does she not understand my simple words?”

  Hopper couldn’t answer the question.

  “I don’t want to walk this fast,” said Siouxsie. “That’s my polite way of saying I hope I see you tomorrow. You could ask why.”

  “Why what?”

  “Why I hope I see you tomorrow, Nole Hazard.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you listen to me. You don’t talk but I know you’re listening. Good night.”

  Siouxsie Banshee turned down her street. The naked woman held Hopper’s hand.

  “What are you doing?” he asked her. She grabbed his other hand. “What do you want? I can’t help you. I’m sorry. Please leave me alone.”

  He walked away but she ran beside him and grabbed his hands again.

  His Silent Voice came back: “Get rid of her.”

  She walked beside him and grabbed his wrist again, so she wouldn’t be separated from him in the indifferent crowd. Hopper let the woman hang on as he looked down the side streets they passed until he saw an open clothing store on the ground floor of an office building. The sign painted on the window said YOU CAN DECOMMODIFY TODAY. Hopper opened the door enough to talk to the woman who was organizing sweatshirts by size and color. She had abstract tattoos the full length of her left arm.

  The woman stopped what she was doing when she saw the naked Driftette.

  “Let me guess. She’s naked, I run a clothing store, it’s a good idea to put us together, yes? I’m Viola, I’m verified, and this was my store and is my store. Take what you want. It’s a gift. Accept my apologies for the brands but I sort by style, not by logo, like the hooded sweatshirts, in gray, black, red, and yellow. First priority is style. Second priority is size. Third priority is color within the size stack. No priority by brand. The Founders made a free will offering of the clothes and who are we to treat one brand as more like the Founders than another? I ask everyone to please respect my order, which, being who they are, they often don’t. Who are you?”

  “I’m Nole. Nole Hazard. She needs clothes.”

  “Interesting. You’ve got the tan of a Drifter, but you don’t have the attitude of a Drifter. She, on the other hand, she is total full Shamblerina. It doesn’t even understand what I’m saying. Does it have a name?”

  “Maybe. She can’t tell me.”

  “Then why do you want to dress it?”

  “She’s naked.”

  “There’s fifty naked women every night trapped by the Bottle Bangers. What’s so special about this one?”

  “She’s the one I know. And she needs shoes.”

  “Everyone needs shoes. And it doesn’t look right to have shoes but no clothes.”

  Hopper picked up one of the yellow sweatshirts, an S, and held it up against the woman’s chest.

  “Too small,” said Viola. “She’s an M. And don’t touch her with the shirt; she’s just going to get it dirty. I’ll pack it for you.”

  “What shoe will fit?”

  “I don’t think you should bother. It’s not that I’d call it a waste of clothes to dress up the Driftettes, pardon me, Shamblers, like these, but I would call it a waste of time. And time is the one thing we can’t find in the warehouses and department stores. You ever notice and I’d say this to Chief if he walked into the store, which he doesn’t, but he did send Gretel in once. You know Gretel?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Hopper.

  “She’s Heidi now, or was, that’s what they say. But that’s her brand, get it, and therefore Chief’s brand. I see her on the Playa sometimes, but per Chief, we keep our distance. Radical inclusion? Not around Chief. Watches, you can find watches and clocks, but they don’t add any time, you see. They just tell us how much is gone and we have to guess as to how much is left. How much is left for you, Nole Hazard?”

  “No one told me.”

  “It’s a thing you have to find out by yourself.”

  “She needs clothing.”

  “Look, she’s filthy. If I give her the clothes . . . See, this is what I’m saying. Let them put her on the bus, Nole, put her on the bus. Do you understand what I am not trying to be subtle about?”

  “I have a bathroom with a shower in my hotel.”

  “Then let me give you the clothing and shoes. Put them in a bag. I’ll give you this bag. It’s from American Apparel. That’s what this store used to be. You take her back. You clean her up. Then you get her dressed. You see how long before she’s walking the city naked again and as a courtesy to her, they put her on the bus. Am I being kind to her or to you? I don’t see any reconciliation by act of will that lets me be kind to both of you. It’s said of the First Wave that we have heavier traces of old sensitivities, and Chief let me keep the job I had before because I was good at it, but I honestly don’t know what to recommend right now.”

  “I’ll take the clothing and dress her after I wash her,” said Hopper.

  “I don’t remember ever seeing someone dress a girl in her condition is what I’m saying. I’m here to be of service to people who understand this. She doesn’t care about the clothes. Do you see that?” Viola filled two paper shopping bags with clothing. “Sweatshirts, running pants, underwear, and socks. I gave her exercise clothes, clothes to cover her and help keep her warm. I gave her clothes with zippers, not buttons, because zippers are easier to do up. Granted they’re easier to reverse, too. Come here, girl,” said Viola to the naked woman, and she found a pair of slip-on canvas shoes with white rubber soles to fit her. “These’ll come off easier than the lace-ups, but she’ll never learn how to tie a knot and I won’t get old trying to teach her.”

  Hopper’s Silent Voice whispered to him: “Obviously shouting doesn’t make an impression on you, but you are wasting time.”

  “You should give her a name. Even if she doesn’t answer to it, you should give the girl a name. What do you want to call her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “So it
’s my choice? Well then, I have a name for her. She won’t forget it, because it’s in all of her clothing. See?” Viola showed Hopper the label: MadeInUSA. “That’s what you’re going to call her, Madayinoosa, see it? Or maybe it’s pronounced Mayday In Oosa. Mad Day in Oosa? That’s good. But just say it real quick, Madayinoosa. There you go.”

  Hopper said it. “Mod Day En Oosah.”

  “Almost. Mad Day. Mad Day In Oosa. Say it fast. Madayinoosa. Twice more to set it. To be safe.”

  “Madayinoosa. Madayinoosa.”

  “Sounds right to me. Friend, you two are good to go.”

  Hopper took the bag of clothing. He remembered his Teacher and thanked Viola, but it wasn’t clear she needed or expected anything from him, except to take the woman out of the store.

  Madeinusa held his wrist again as he walked her back down Figueroa to the Hilton. He stopped at a food truck for a bowl of rice. She ate it neatly, with more care than he expected from her.

  There was another circle of men banging bottles around another cluster of five hassled women, and Hopper walked faster to get away from them. He didn’t want to talk to anyone. He had let this woman make him noticeable, and nothing good would come of it.

  He walked her through the lobby of the hotel, past the lobby bar, where First and Second Wavers were dancing to a Shannon Squier song, and pressed the button for the elevator. The Cecilia at the desk said, “You get a limit of one Shamblerina at a time. They’re messy, and the cleaners complain.”

  Once inside the room, he threw the bags of clothing on the bed and turned on the shower. He brought Madeinusa into the bathroom and gave her a bar of soap and a washcloth and she held them without understanding. Hopper had to finish what she could not do. It was a long time before the water ran clear at her feet. He patted her dry with a dirty towel.

  Soon she was sitting on the edge of his bed, looking out the window.