Slipstream

by Leslie Larson

She squinted at the type, trying to make out the message. PROGRAM INTERRUPTED…she read with rising alarm. EMERGENCY BROADCAST SYSTEM…PLEASE STAND BY.

  6

  Rudy stumbled on a grate in the airport’s employee parking lot. He paused a minute, resting his hand on the fender of a yellow Jeep as he looked out over the sea of cars. He rubbed his eyes. Where the hell had he parked? It seemed like he’d been wandering here forever, up and down the rows, the black asphalt and the yellow lines pulsing up in his face. Jets roared overhead, landing gear dangling and wing flaps down. Rudy cursed Waller. That fucking son of a bitch. The asshole motherfucker. What a pathetic loser, hanging out in his flunky job so long he’d managed to get a little power over other people. And look how he used it! Brown-nosing the higher-ups by firing Rudy. Sucking ass to the Latashas and the Pilars and the Trinhs. The cocksucker. The fat, butt-licking deadbeat. The thought of Waller’s hairy knuckles and livery lips turned Rudy’s stomach.

  Was that his car down at the end of the row, sticking out behind the pickup with the camper shell? Rudy dragged himself forward. God, he was tired. His legs felt like concrete. All these damn cars. Employees’ cars. They still had jobs. Jobs, cars, houses, families. All of them would come out at the end of the day, just like always, take out their keys, start their engines, drive home. Eat their fancy dinners. Watch their big TVs. Go up to their master suites at night and brush their rotten teeth in marble-topped sinks.

  It was his car! Thank God. He didn’t feel like he could go another step. But it was still half a row away. How innocent he’d been when he’d gotten out of the car that morning! He’d had no idea, no inkling at all, that anything like this was going to happen. That any such thing was even possible! That ignoramus Waller! That pig of a dog shit! Jesus Christ, how much farther? How could it take so long to go so short a distance? Each bumper was the length of a football field. An airstrip! And the planes just kept coming over, clogging the air with jet fuel. Rudy’s stomach bubbled with rage. His neck and arms were rigid with fury. Just get to the car, he told himself. A few more steps and he could sit down. He needed to get out from under the sky, away from the noise of the jets and the eyes of whoever might see him wandering around the parking lot.

  Finally, there it was. The Buick that had once been a deep lacquered red but now had faded to the cheap orange of canned tomato soup. Specks of rust spangled the metal around the grille and windshield. A missing hubcap gave it a derelict look, like it had lost a tooth. Still, Rudy sighed with relief as he slipped the key into the lock, lugged open the door, and fell into the driver’s seat.

  It was hot inside, even though the sky was cloudy. Rudy turned on the motor and fiddled with the air conditioner. The radio came on to his favorite station. Light rock, less talk, ninety-four-point-nine. The Beatles were singing “Yesterday.”

  He closed his eyes and lowered his head. The moment his forehead touched the steering wheel, the music stopped. The usual programming was being interrupted, an announcer said. The clouds moved quickly, as if invisible hands were pushing them aside. This is a test, the voice went on, of the emergency broadcast system.

  Jewell walked fast, her long legs eating up the distance between the cafeteria, where she’d just finished her shift, and her car. She weaved in and out of the clumps of students who strolled slowly or paused to talk. Walking was good because it was harder to think while your legs and arms were moving, while the pavement disappeared under your feet. At least it was harder to think about the same thing. To obsess, to brood.

  Still, as she mounted the steps near Royce Hall two at a time, she thought again of how Celeste had pulled away impatiently that morning. She had been in the bathroom, her makeup spread out all over the sink, when Jewell had squeezed in behind her and watched her apply mascara with rapid flips of the wrist.

  “It’s weird that you buy Avon,” Jewell said. “That you don’t wear some fancier brand. You know, like Clinique or Lancôme or Shiseido or something.”

  “Family tradition,” Celeste shrugged. “My aunt sold Avon and everybody bought it. Probably got a family discount, you know? Anyway, I’m into quantity, not quality. You know how much all this crap would cost if I bought it at Nordstrom? Besides, I like the Avon Lady.”

  “You’re kidding! Why?”

  Jewell couldn’t remember the last time Celeste had smiled, but as she met Jewell’s eyes in the mirror, a corner of her mouth drew up in the half-grin that Jewell found irresistible.

  “I don’t know what it is about her,” Celeste said. “She has some secret quality. Or maybe it’s just her name. Inez.”

  The exchange seemed so friendly that Jewell, who was standing behind Celeste, took a step closer. She leaned forward so that she rested against Celeste’s back and nestled her face in Celeste’s hair.

  “Don’t,” Celeste had said peevishly, shaking her off. “I’m late already.”

  The bells started chiming. It was twelve o’clock, that lost time between morning and afternoon. A crush of people crowded the walkway, a river of bobbing heads. The noon tide. Jewell counted the chimes. The moment the last one faded away, her cell phone rang. She fished it out of her overalls. It would be Celeste, calling to say that she was sorry, that she’d come to her senses.

  It wasn’t, though. It was Jewell’s uncle. She hadn’t spoken to him in several years, but she recognized the characteristic tinge of hoarseness in his voice that her father had, too, as if talking were a strain. Sometimes she even heard it in her own voice.

  “How’re you doing, Jewell?” Wylie asked. “How’s it going?”

  He sounded nervous, as though he hadn’t called just to chat. Jewell stepped out of the stream of people and leaned against a stone wall that divided the walkway from a group of trees. The clouds moved quickly across the sun, making bright patches glow and dim on the walkways and faces of buildings.

  “What’s up, Uncle Tommy?” she asked, trying to mask her disappointment that he wasn’t Celeste. “Is something wrong?’

  “No, no. Nothing like that.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Oh, I’m out at LAX. Working, you know. This is my break. I mean, I got half an hour.”

  He hesitated, and Jewell sensed him struggling. A strange guy, her uncle. “Your dogs okay?” she asked to break the ice.

  “Yeah, they’re great.” Wylie laughed. “Listen, I just wanted to tell you. To say that I talked to your dad today. He’s out, you know.”

  “Oh?” Jewell felt herself go still, like an animal that relies on camouflage for protection. The last thing she needed right now was to get sucked into one of her father’s dramas.

  “I thought you might want to give him a call,” Wylie suggested. “No big deal, you know. Just say hi or something. Just to check in, kinda.”

  Jewell pursed her lips. How many times had she been through this? Why couldn’t her uncle call someone else?

  “You there?” Wylie said.

  “Yeah, I’m here. Okay,” she said with resignation. “You got his number?”

  “He’s staying in a place downtown,” Wylie answered. He sounded relieved that he was passing on the responsibility for Logan to someone else. “It’s called the Morningstar, or something like that. Just a room, until he can find a better place. Okay, you got a pencil?”

  “Just a minute. Hold on.”

  Jewell set the phone down so she could get a pen and paper from her backpack. The parade of students in front of her continued, passing to their classes or going to lunch. A lot of them had fathers who gave them career advice and paid for their educations, Jewell mused as she ripped a corner of lined paper from her notebook. Imagine that. She was still bent over her backpack when there was an electronic pop like the magic moment at a concert when the sound system comes on and the lights go down. The moment when the crowd comes to attention and the star steps on stage.

  Jewell stood up and looked around. Another pop came from high above, from the sky and trees and roofs of the buildings. As if someone
were tapping a celestial microphone, about to say test, test.

  This is a test of our emergency broadcast system, a disembodied voice announced. This is only a test.

  The words bounced off the buildings and plazas, the stairs and parking lots and hills. Jewell heard lagging versions of it echoing in the distance. Jesus Christ, what did they do, string up microphones in the trees? Mount speakers on the roofs? It was eerie, like the birds and trees were speaking in a human voice to warn people that the end of the world had come. And, most freaky of all, no one reacted. The students kept walking, chatting, sipping their Cokes on the lawn, reading beneath the trees. Where was Celeste? Where would she be if bombs rained down or missiles filled the air like swarms of insects? If L.A. became a charred-out hole on the edge of the continent?

  The voice was counting backwards now, the echoes lagging as they boomed back toward where Jewell was standing. She looked down and spied her phone resting on the wall where she’d set it down.

  “Sorry, Uncle Tommy,” she said. “But this weird thing is happening. Can you hear it? It’s like an air raid or something.”

  “An air raid?” Wylie said.

  “Not a real air raid,” Jewell said quickly, surprised at the alarm in his voice. “A test, you know. I remember now that they were going to install a new warning system, but this is the first time I’ve heard it. Anyway, it’s just ending.”

  “Oh, it’s noon,” Wylie said, sounding relieved. “That’s why.”

  “Yeah, that’s it,” Jewell agreed. As the last echoes died away, she realized her heart was pounding. “Okay, I’ve got the pen. What’s his number?”

  Wylie recited the number. “Thanks,” he said. “I’m a little worried about him. I thought it might be good if you just said hi. You know, let him know you’re thinking about him.”

  Jewell folded the paper with the number on it and stuffed it back in her bag. Whatever, she thought. She suddenly wanted to be off the phone.

  “And maybe sometime, maybe we could—” Wylie began, stumbling over his words like a geek about to ask her out on a date. “Maybe we could get together sometime. Catch up, you know. Have a look at each other.”

  “That would be nice,” Jewell said politely, though she knew that there was a good chance she wouldn’t see Tommy or her father at all, maybe for years. Life would go on, theirs and hers, with no intersection.

  “Okay, well, it was nice talking to you,” Wylie said. “I better get back to the rockpile.”

  “’Bye, Uncle Tommy. Thanks for calling.”

  She dropped her phone in her pocket and shouldered her backpack. The PA system gave one last pop, like an electronic cough, before the trees and sky went silent.

  Air raid? Wylie thought as he hung up and turned toward the pile of newspapers that littered the table in the break room. A vending machine hummed in the corner. He checked his watch. Less than ten minutes left of his break. He was a little hungry, and he had to pee. The can, then, he thought as he left the break room. He wouldn’t get another chance before his shift was over.

  As he walked down the corridor where the administrative offices were, he remembered the drills from elementary school. Air raid. Duck and cover. The clatter of chairs scraping the brown linoleum and the squeals and laughter from his classmates as they dove under their desks. The floor smelled of polish and pencil shavings. With his nose to the linoleum, his eyes squeezed shut, and his hands laced over the back of his head, he wondered—not if bombs were going to come crashing through the tall windows on one side of the class—but whether his teacher, bulky Mrs. Jackson whose ankles were the same thickness as her calves, was under her desk, too. Thinking of her squeezed into the cubbyhole of her wooden desk back near the bean plants that struggled in milk cartons, her big butt in the air and her face against her nubby plaid skirt, he had to smother his laughter.

  In one of the offices along the corridor, the big guy with the walrus mustache and the Indian guy with the suit—the walrus’s boss, Wylie presumed—were talking to a security guard. Wylie knew the first two by sight. The security guard was writing things down. As he pushed open the door and stepped out into the terminal near the cart where the kids from the alternative high school sold espresso, he suddenly remembered Jim Dunnigan, the kid who always emerged from under the desk with a wet spot that spread from his waistband to his knees. Front and back. Jesus, Wylie couldn’t believe he still remembered the name. What was it, second grade? Every damn time. Fire drill or earthquake drill or air raid, it didn’t matter. No wonder kids from his class were drugging themselves to the gills by the time they were in high school. The Cold War. The words still gave Wylie the jitters.

  He hesitated near Baja Burritos. He could get one to eat later in the afternoon, when he knew he’d be hungry. The line was short, but it still took them awhile to make the burrito, and the guy who was relieving him back at the bar got pissy if he was late. No, better not. Instead he decided to grab one of the ready-made sandwiches at the cafeteria near the bathrooms.

  The line there was miraculously short. He wondered about the alarm Jewell had heard and pictured the students at UCLA diving to their knees or scrambling for cover as he waited. Tuna, BLT, egg salad. Some kind of vegetarian thing with eggplant and cheese. It was too bad Jewell had grown up just like he had, scared shitless that some lunatic was going to push the button. He picked up a BLT, reminded himself how it was getting harder and harder to button his pants, set it down, and took a tuna instead.

  It was a straight shot down to the pavilion where his bar was, and the bathroom was on the way. He’d be a little late, but Tony, the assistant manager who was spelling him, would just have to wait. Ambitious little fuck, always bustling around. Wylie glanced at the tuna sandwich. He should have chosen more carefully; this one was smashed on one side. How in the world had Logan managed to come up with a girl like Jewell? She hadn’t been overjoyed to hear about Logan, and she hadn’t exactly jumped at the offer to meet Wylie. But, really, who could blame her? With all the shit that had come down from the family, it made sense that she’d want to stay as far away as possible.

  He was thinking so hard and he’d gone this route so many times that he almost walked straight into the tape. What the hell was this? He stopped, clutching the tuna sandwich. Yellow caution tape draped across the entrance to the men’s restroom. Wylie’s pulse ratcheted up, spun, whirred. A crime scene? He flashed on the barstool clattering over earlier that morning. The way his armpits had prickled when Logan had called. And then the air raid, the alarm in Jewell’s voice. For a moment they all seemed connected. Wylie’s mind did a dizzy spin as he had the disturbing sensation that he was remembering something that hadn’t happened yet. It was just yellow tape, he reassured himself. A stool had fallen over. Big deal. They could be fixing a faucet or mopping the floor. Yet he sensed something lurking nearby. As the fear whistled through his nostrils, he turned and looked out at the terminal, where people still wheeled their bags toward the security check, still browsed at the newsstand, still bent to wipe a toddler’s face.

  Logan almost gunned it and jammed through the yellow, but at the last minute he decided to play it safe. The very last minute. Man, it almost put him through the windshield. Still, he felt good about it, especially since some granny came hobbling into the crosswalk with her little dog. He even put it in reverse, backed it up so the nose of his truck was behind the line. The law-abiding citizen. Mr. Clean. So it was no wonder he whipped around in shock when the siren sounded behind him.

  What the fuck was going on? His first thought was to floor it. Take a right, get the hell out of there. But a stream of cars was moving through the intersection. Someone had pulled up behind him, too. Fuck! There was no way out. He checked the sideview, the rearview, swiveled his head around like an owl. No black-and-whites in sight. No unmarked, either, as far as he could tell. The shitheads! Where the hell were they?

  Calm down, he told himself. Be cool, keep your head. He did a quick inventory. Wait, man, wai
t! Wonder of wonders.

  Logan chuckled to himself, shook his head.

  He was clean, man. Clean!

  Okay, there was no insurance on his truck and his license was expired, but that was no big deal. So what was with the sirens? He stuck his head out the window and looked around. That’s when he realized it was the noon whistle. The air-raid siren! The emergency notification system! Logan laughed. Christ, he was paranoid. It wasn’t personal, man. It wasn’t him they were after. Get a grip! It was noon, a Tuesday, the time they always tested these things. City-wide, man. No need to worry.

  But why was the light taking so fucking long? The sound of the sirens filled the air, like a fucking buzz saw. He could hear other ones going off farther away, in the distance. A cloud of pigeons lifted off and whirled over the parking lot of the Safeway on the corner. They didn’t like it either. They circled, soared, arched. A ball of birds. Logan tapped a nervous rhythm on the steering wheel. Hurry the fuck up. It’s a siren, he told himself. No great shakes. Still, it bugged him. Jesus, was the light broken? Why did the damn thing keep blaring away? What if it was the real thing?

  Come on, come on, come on, Logan chanted, tapping the steering wheel. Let’s get moving. The sound was spooky, man. Annoying. It reminded him of fire drills. Gunshots, explosions, thunderstorms. Ask not for whom the siren screams; it screams for you. A million ways to die, some worse than others. Burning: he wouldn’t like that. Or suffocating. It wouldn’t be bad to freeze to death, from what he’d heard, or to go out in an OD haze, just drifting off to sleep. He glanced anxiously in the rearview. The siren made him feel like someone was tailing him, chasing him down. That it was only a matter of time.

  Thank God! he told himself when it finally stopped. The light changed. The silence was such a relief, he felt like curling up and going to sleep in it. He began to hear the motors of the other cars again. The flapping of the pigeons’ wings, the wind moving through the trees, the radio playing in the car to his left. The sky felt empty again, normal. The blood stopped pounding in his ears. Still, he was cautious as he pressed the gas, as he eased into the intersection.