Glimmering

by Elizabeth Hand

  Jack’s heart welled as he watched his friend tighten his hold on the steering wheel.

  “She comes. Right there, where you’re sitting. The first couple of times it was at night—I just looked over and there she was. She’d say, ‘Hi, Daddy.’ I almost went off the road.

  “And now she’s here all the time. I mean, no matter what I do, if I drink, if I don’t drink: she’s still there. Afterward, it always seems like maybe I was dreaming; but then she always comes back.”

  Unexpectedly he grabbed Jack’s shoulder. “And she doesn’t forgive me. I thought maybe if I explained things, maybe she’d understand. But it doesn’t work that way. I guess they have their own itinerary. Their own way of doing things.”

  “Who?”

  “The dead. Like people always think they can be summoned, with a Ouija board or a séance or whatever; but really they just do what they want to. Just like us. It’s not even like they have some message. Sometimes they just want to be with us, I think.”

  Jack recalled the sound of his grandfather’s tread upon the stairs at Lazyland, the smell of cigarette smoke and Irish whiskey and his touch upon Jack’s cheek, cold and feathery as snow. Before he could stop himself he blurted, “I know—I know what you mean. A few months ago I had this dream, about my grandfather. Only it wasn’t really a dream. He was really there, and he—he gave me something.”

  Jule nodded. “What did he give you?”

  Jack hesitated. For one moment he considered telling Jule about the Fusax.

  “It was just something I’d lost,” he said at last.

  “Like your mind? ”

  Jack forced a grin. “Something like that.”

  Around them vehicles slowed as though stuck in quicksand. They were in midtown. A few blocks to the south glittered a vast triangular complex of buildings, glass-and-steel walls shining gold and green and red like some monstrous Christmas ornament. From one side bulged a huge glass-domed arena, ovoid, still fluttering with orange construction tape and DANGER: KEEP OUT signs: the site of the millennial ball two days hence. High overhead, an array of solar shields blinked from black to silver, turning this way and that in an urgent search for light. There were bristling antennae like the spines of some huge undersea animal. Satellite dishes and windmills vied for space with hotel and television logos, a neon sign for a restaurant named Pynchon. Across the central pyramid’s surface, rippling letters splashed bright as water.

  Jack gazed awestruck. Jule laughed.

  “Don’t get out much, huh?”

  “It’s been a while.” Jack smiled sheepishly. “I mean, they built that thing so fast… I remember when this was all live sex shows.”

  “Oh yeah. The good old days.” He stared up at the monolith with its swags of Christmas lights. “Fucking Christmas. I hate fucking Christmas. And this place,” he said. “I really hate this place. Because they think it makes up for all that other shit, you know? They think you can walk inside and forget about everything here—”

  He gestured fiercely at the flaming sky that could be glimpsed between the buildings. “They think we’ll just forget. Like with their fucking blimps. They think we can just pick up the pieces and start over again…

  “But I’ll tell you something, Jackie.” Jule’s words were like granite falling. “You can’t ever start over again. Not once you’ve crapped in your own mess kit like we have. You don’t get a fucking second chance. That’s not how the world works, Jackie. That’s not how it works anymore.”

  Jack was silent. Jule said nothing more. The Range Rover inched beneath a marquee whose titles melted into sherbet-colored grids.

  THE DANNY SHOW!

  SUNSHINE SKYE LIVE!

  BONITA & THE WAVETRAMPS

  ION JAMIE

  THE FOUR SEASONS AT

  GLOBAL PYRAMID

  GLOBENET INC.

  Jack pointed at the shimmering edifice, the waves of people flowing in and out of revolving doors at its base. “How is it powered?”

  Jule slid the car into a long line of idling taxis and limousines. He held up one hand, rubbing together the thumb and first two fingers. “Dinero, Jackie-boy.”

  “But do they have their own generators? Or what?”

  “Yes. And or what.’” Jule peered up at the great Pyramid. “Let’s see. Solar panels, some kind of plasma grid. Windmills. A champagne-effect reflexive waterfall. Supposedly they’ve got their own nuclear reactor, too.”

  “So how come I can’t make a fucking phone call?”

  “’Cause you’re not GFI Worldwide. Hey, get over it! I mean, here you are looking at where they make The Danny Show! What else do you want?”

  Before Jack could reply Jule gunned the motor. In front of them a lapis-colored limousine slid away from the sidewalk. The Range Rover roared into its spot. A doorman in Four Seasons livery started for the passenger door, but Jack waved him off.

  “All right, listen,” commanded Jule. He rummaged in the seat behind him until he found a leather portfolio, sat for a minute staring at his friend. He reached out and rested one hand on Jack’s cheek. “You know how to drive a standard, right?”

  “I’m not waiting in the—”

  “Listen. It costs forty dollars to park here for five minutes. This’ll take me thirty seconds. You wait here, anyone asks tell them you’re picking up someone from The Danny Show. Or Sunshine Skye,” he said, glancing up at the marquee. “A cop comes, just drive around the block, okay? Okay.”

  Jack watched as he got out of the car and strode to the sidewalk, carrying the portfolio officiously in front of him. Before he went inside Jule turned. He was swaying slightly, and he looked immeasurably sad.

  “Fuck you!” Jack said under his breath, then waved. Jule nodded and disappeared into the crowd at the entrance. Jack turned his attention back to the scene outside. Well-dressed men and women came and went in a steady stream of overly bright colors. Lime green, candy pink, electric blue. Glittering swathes of Christmas lights hung above the revolving doors. A knot of Japanese businessmen in retro Infoguide sunglasses that made them look like extras from Not of This Earth. Models in silly masks, posturing with smokeless cigarettes. A bizarrely tall, thin man like a giant insect, surrounded by people waving cordless microphones. Jack tried to keep his expression blank as more vehicles pulled up beside him and honked.

  “Shit,” he muttered. At least fifteen minutes had passed, he was sure of that. He could see cars entering and leaving the public parking area with clockwork regularity. He briefly thought of parking—he wouldn’t admit it to Jule, but he was dying to peek inside the world’s most famous corporate complex. But he’d be damned if he’d spend his own money on this idiotic venture.

  He leaned forward and starting playing with the Range Rover’s entertainment system. Lights blinked off and on. When he tried the radio he got only static, then a very long advertisement for the Global Pyramid Four Seasons, recited by a woman with a brisk Pacific Rim accent broadcasting from the hotel. Jack craned his neck to look up at the marquee again.

  THE DANNY SHOW!

  BY INVITATION ONLY: THE PARTY OF THE MILLENNIUM!

  STUDIO TOURS LEAVE EVERY MINUTE!

  He opened the glove compartment to see what was in there, found only papers and a squashed plastic cup. He sighed and glanced out the window. There seemed to be a bottleneck at one of the revolving doors. Several uniformed security guards ran down the sidewalk and began pushing their way through the growing crowd. One held a phone to his mouth and was speaking intently, his face grim.

  Maybe Danny had a heart attack, thought Jack. He decided to take his chances with whatever music Jule had been listening to earlier, punched the music console’s Play button, and closed his eyes. Low hissing came from the speakers.

  Only Jule would spend an extra three thousand dollars for a state-of-the-art music center, and then have nothing to play on it. He was reaching to stab the OFF button when the static cleared. Jule’s voice filled the car.

  “Jackie. I�
��m sorry this isn’t Brian Eno.” A pause; something clinking against the tape recorder. “This is gonna sound really melodramatic. I’m sorry, Jackie. By the time you hear this…”

  “No.”

  The voice went on, the words blurring into each other—

  “… because she’s sick, she thinks I don’t know but I heard her on the phone. She may have—she may have gotten it from me—”

  “Fuck!” Jack shouted, pounding the dashboard; “fuck, fuck!—”

  “… can’t live like this. But I—I don’t want you to think it had anything to do with you, Jackie, Emma either. I know it’s selfish—”

  —and then Jack was out of the car and running, shoving people aside.

  “Hey! Asshole! What—”

  “Julie.” He began to shout above his roaring heart. “Julie! ”

  There were armed guards at the revolving doors, eyes flicking nervously across the excited mob. “Let me in!” Jack yelled. “Goddammit, I know him! Please, let me—”

  One of the guards raised her arms to block him. Her head mic blared, and there was an answering blast from a speaker overhead. When she looked up Jack pushed through the door and into the security checkpoint.

  “—WHITE MALE, ARMED, GATE SEVENTEEN—”

  More guards, dogs straining at leashes, overturned chairs, and papers blown across the floor. Monitors chattered and shrieked, the high-pitched hum of head mics soared off into static. A masked man in a black suit was shouting at several guards. Directly behind them was the glowing arc of the metal detector, and through that Jack glimpsed uniforms and well-dressed women covering their mouths, people being pushed away by city police, all under a blinding sun. He moved through the shadowy booth, pushing aside a fallen chair. The man in the suit turned, his mouth open, but Jack heard nothing. Hands reached for him but he swept them aside, reached the metal detector and passed through it. Then he was in the sun, blinking. A few feet in front of him the crowd had formed a broad half circle, as though watching street musicians. Men and women in uniform knelt on the ground shouting at each other while armed guards waved back the crowd. Someone grabbed Jack and restrained him, he could not pull away so stood there with the rest, staring at the floor.

  Jule lay there on his back. His face was pale save for a circular bruise, red and blackish purple, that radiated from mouth to chin, across his shattered nose to touch the pouched skin beneath his eyes. A corona of blood and what looked like black earth was etched around his head; his eyes were open, staring up into the brilliance. His big hand splayed open and a policeman crouched there with a white cloth and a plastic bag, fingering a gun delicately, as though it were an orchid.

  “Julie,” whispered Jack. He lifted his head. Behind the crowd there were trees, stones, a waterfall; clouds of twinkling red and green lights. A young man comforted a slender woman who was shaking convulsively. A crimson arc was sprayed across the bodice of her dress. Jack shook his head, then froze as he saw the child.

  She stood within the crowd, Emma’s tumbled blond curls and Jule’s hazel eyes, her hands raised before her, clasped. Sun made a glare of her clothes, if she even wore clothes. She was smiling. As he stared she raised her head. Her eyes locked with his, Julie’s eyes. Her lips moved, and Jack strained to hear her voice.

  “—please, go!”

  Someone jarred him, and he stumbled. When he looked up the child was gone. Where she had been a woman with short dark hair stood in dappled sun as though entranced, staring not at Jule’s body but at a point a few feet above it in the bright air. Her features were obscured behind Noh-mask makeup. Her lips moved, and her hands. Amidst the crackle of walkie-talkies and sirens Jack could hear her voice, clear and thin.

  “He has come through.”

  Then someone grabbed him and pulled him backwards, into the security booth.

  “You know this guy? You know him?” a policeman shouted.

  Jack nodded, straining to look back out into the light.

  “HOLD HIM! ” someone screamed, and he was shoved against the wall. They held him for questioning, first by security and then by city police, and finally brought him to another security checkpoint on the main floor, with an adjoining office that was nothing but a holding area for suspicious persons who violated GFI security. He was strip-searched and sprayed with Viconix, made to fill out numerous forms with GFI logos. Jack sat numbly and watched on a monitor as an emergency crew hurried in, after some minutes rushed out again, pushing a long white-draped gurney.

  “His wife works in Mount Kisco,” he said hoarsely, though he had no idea if anyone was even listening. “Northern Westchester Medical Center…”

  “She’s been notified.” The police detective who had been questioning him turned from another monitor. She sighed as a masked officer affixed a magnetic strip around Jack’s wrist. “They’re going to want to see you again, after the autopsy.”

  He nodded.

  “Do you want anything? Something to eat?” On her console a tiny artificial Christmas tree listed to one side. “There’s some kind of fake coffee…”

  “No.”

  He listened as the detective fielded calls from hospitals, police stations, other offices within the Pyramid. The Range Rover had been impounded. Jack sat forgotten in a swivel chair by the wall, wondering if he would have to wait for Emma to appear before he could go home. He drank tepid water from a bottle. It tasted of plastic and something harshly chemical. His stomach recoiled; he clenched his teeth, fighting nausea, a darkness that pulsed before his eyes no matter where he looked.

  “You can leave now.”

  A shadow moved toward him. The police detective.

  “Mr. Finnegan?”

  “Yes?” It hurt to speak.

  “You can go. We located Dr. Isikoff. She—”

  “Oh God.”

  “She’s trying to make arrangements. To get down here. It will probably take her a while. She said something about a brother-in-law or a friend up there?”

  He recognized the effort at kindness in her tone, but could only gaze at her. After a moment she asked, “Do you have a car?”

  He shook his head.

  “Do you have any friends or relatives here you could stay with? Do you want to find a hotel? No. Well. Okay, then.”

  She crossed to the door and remained there. He realized she was waiting for him to leave. “I’ll see what I can do about arranging to get you back home. Rye, is it?”

  “Yonkers.”

  “Right. Yonkers.” She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry. But I’ll have to ask you to leave now, Mr. Finnegan. I have to finish filing my report.”

  He stood. At the doorway he stopped, that darkness rushing in, his head spinning…

  “You can wait in the atrium.” He saw but did not feel her hand upon his arm, propelling him through the door. “I cleared it with security. There’s places to eat under the waterfall, you can sit there and wait. I’ll see about getting you a ride home.”

  He nodded and walked down a blue-lit passage he had no memory of entering. Gradually its dimness gave way to the atrium’s artificial daylight. He left the passage, walked slowly across the atrium’s stone floor, staring at his feet as they crushed a thin layer of moss and lichen, soft grass that had the look of infant hair. Tiny colored lights were strung between stands of birch trees. In front of the revolving doors a small crowd still lingered, people with cameras and vidcams, security guards in GFI red and gold. There was no sign of any medical personnel, no sign that earlier a body had lain crumpled on the grass. Outside, the ambulance had gone, and the police cars. Through the doors he could glimpse the same dark line of limos beaded here and there with a yellow taxi. Another gaudy knot of Bright Young Things burst in, giggling as they left the security station. Jack could smell their perfumes, the vanilla scent of Viconix.

  He took a few steps, stared down at the grass where Jule had fallen. It looked scorched, there was a blurred outline where they had poured disinfectant onto the ground. The heavines
s in his chest became nausea. He turned away and stumbled across the vast room.

  He found a table on the far side of the atrium. The waterfall cascaded from several stories above him, a glittering curtain with rainbows dancing where the sun pierced it. The air smelled of dirt and sun. Birds darted past him and lit upon the branches of a Japanese maple. Jack sat with hands on his knees, concentrating on the warmth spilling across his face.

  It will hit me later, he thought. It will hit me later. A waiter came and he ordered mineral water and pepper-flavored aquavit. The liquor came in a tiny bottle shaped like a fish, prettily arranged on a glass tray with sprigs of watercress and myrtle. It was icily restorative; he ordered a second bottle, and swallowed a dropperful of Fusax as he waited.

  “May I join you?”

  A dark-haired woman stood on the other side of the granite block that served as a table. She wore a black dress interwoven with shreds of Mylar, very ugly, very fashionable. At first he thought she was wearing a mask, but he saw that it was makeup, chalky white foundation, redlined eyes, birdlime mouth. He had a dim sense of recognition, after a moment recalled that she had been in the crowd surrounding Jule’s body. She had been the one who cried He has come over. The odd words rushed at him, his head began to swim again. He moaned and covered his face with his hands.

  “Here—put your head between your knees, take a deep breath—”

  He felt her fingers on his neck—she had gloved hands, warm inside their silken sheathing. “Breathe, breathe—”

  He did as she said, sucking in quick gulps of air.

  “Slowly, slowly…”

  Her voice was low and brusque. Her touch upon his bare neck grew warmer, so much so that after a minute it hurt, as though someone had placed a heating pad there.

  “Okay—I’m—I’m better now.” When he started to sit up she grabbed his shoulder.

  “Slow down! You’ll pass out—”

  He was upright again. She sat beside him, her hand still on his shoulder, and peered at him intently.