My Own Devices

by Dessa

  Maxie, who’s a big sports guy, said his most recent philosophical dilemma involved hockey. He’d recently fallen in love with the sport, but the more he learned about it, the less justified he felt in enjoying it. I am not a big sports guy, so I settled in to listen. He explained that in sports like football, high-scoring contests with highly specialized positions, after a “long tide of scoring and offense, the better team will rise above and win,” whereas baseball and hockey were low scoring, had small margins of error, and were therefore innately prone to chaos. The difference between an out and a grand slam might be, say, the position of the stitching of the ball at the moment of contact. He said that something like 23 percent of hockey games go into overtime. The team considered the underdog wins roughly a third of the time. If the better teams weren’t winning reliably, if pivotal moments were determined by chance, if an inherent chaos prevailed, Maxie asked, “Well then, does any of it matter?” And if not, then it’s sort of a stupid thing to love.

  In the sixteen games of a regular NFL season, he said, we know who the good teams are. After sixteen games of hockey, who the hell knows who the best teams might be?

  “What about dates?” I interjected. I meant to ask if he thought there might be a romantic corollary—like a certain number of dates to determine a good match or something.

  “How many dates to find out if she’s a better hockey player than me?”

  We decided to break for dinner and a run to Target. Maxie has become such a thoughtful, clever conversationalist, I thought. I had to up my game.

  I navigated while Maxie piloted his little Smart car. A disproportionate number of my most significant memories have happened in cars—maybe because I spend an unusual amount of time in transit or maybe because inescapable quarters provide a natural setting for dramatic action.

  As I remember it, Maxie’s first independent opinion was formulated in the back seat of a parked car. We were alone, probably waiting for Mom to come out of Walgreens or the bank or the grocery store. He could talk, but was small, still in a car seat. Following some fiendish kid impulse, I opened a catalog and pointed to a scantily clad woman in an advertisement. That’s a Sexy Lady, I said. Can you say Sexy Lady? He could, and I was satisfied by the corruption. We waited some more, making whatever sort of conversation is made by an eight-year-old girl and a three-year-old boy. Then a song came on the radio and I said I liked it. Maxie said he did not. I turned to him, confused. I just told him it was a good song. Where could he have learned not to like it?

  Numbers flashed on the dash of Maxie’s Smart car. “Holy shit, does this thing get a hundred miles to the gallon?” I asked. “Only on the highway,” Maxie said. We missed our exit—a shared failure—and traded romantic updates while rerouting. He was in the trenches of a passing crush but had no long-term prospects. I was still wading through the same emotional porridge with X.

  I’d have guessed Maxie would have had a kid by now, even if accidentally. He’s handsome, chatty, generally well received by women. I’m not especially eager to suit up as an aunt, but the prospect of him never having a family makes me uneasy—the astronaut thing again: I just don’t like imagining him out there all on his own. On the frontage road to Target, he might have been thinking the same thing about me. But I doubted it. Between the two of us, I’m the worrier; Maxie tends to experience his anxiety in the present tense and leave the future to itself.

  Since I was the one who’d be sleeping on it, I insisted on picking up the tab for the air mattress. He bought a towel, because he didn’t have any extras at home.

  We ate sushi at a spot in his neighborhood then drank too much at the cocktail bar next door. Maxie, when he is drunk, repeats himself. I, when I am drunk, forget parts of the evening. A conveniently matched pair.

  For the next three days, Maxie let me tag along everywhere he went. We Ubered to one of his work events downtown: an invite-only industry party with an open bar, an impressive dessert table, and some pretty unimpressive dancing to the music of Ginuwine. We toured the Botanica facilities, which felt like a Willy Wonka adaptation rendered more adult by the addition of intoxicants and nondisclosure agreements. Early one evening, I took half of a CBD mint and fell asleep twenty minutes later, presumably enjoying a neck-down high while fast asleep on my air mattress.

  It was over a couple of afternoon beers that we’d sat down to begin comparing genomes. We set up on a sunny table at a place called Whisky Bar. I was outrageously excited. Maxie was sporting. As we logged on to the site, I asked, “Have you already run the scenario in your head where Mom has to tell us we’re from dif—”

  “Oh, absolutely.”

  We entered our respective log-in information and waited on the Wi-Fi.

  “Who has the Y chromosome again?”

  “You do.”

  A menu of reports appeared at the top of the page. Even the ancestry stuff turned out to be fascinating. There were color-coded maps and interactive chromosome diagrams and I wanted to nominate the website designer for whatever sort of award website designers get. The top line of my screen said that I was 12.9 percent Iberian; Maxie’s top line, however, was 14.9 percent French and German. In fact, everything seemed a little different; he had Ashkenazic blood, I was a teensy bit Sardinian. In unison, we navigated to the FAQ page.

  “Huh.”

  “Huh.”

  Turns out siblings share only about 50 percent of their DNA, because each inherits different portions of the parents’ genes. My allotment from Mom might feature more of her mother’s DNA than what Maxie got. In that way, our ancestry diverged. I had more sub-Saharan genes, which I’m pretty sure we both thought made me the winner.

  I was ready to move on to our next report, but his screen displayed something mine didn’t. I hadn’t noticed as much when we signed on, but Maxie had elected to receive information about his genetic health risks. I’d passed on mine—genetic health risks do not a dinner party hero make. But I’d watched over his shoulder as he clicked through.

  Alzheimer’s disease is characterized by memory loss, cognitive decline, and personality changes. Late-onset Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of Alzheimer’s disease, developing after age 65.

  Maxwell, you have one copy of the ε4 variant we tested.

  * * *

  —

  With one variant in the APOE gene, the site said Maxie’s chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease by age seventy-five was 4–7 percent. By eighty-five, his chances were 20–23 percent.

  “I feel better actually,” he said. Two of our grandparents had shown symptoms of the disease, and given that fact, his numbers did seem fairly low.

  Catalyzed by Maxie’s results, I navigated through my own profile, back to the health risks section. He looked over my shoulder as I unclicked the button beside I do not want to see my health results, and clicked I do.

  When I know I’m making a bad choice, I do it as fast as I can—I eat all of the ice cream before my better judgment can intervene to take away my spoon. I clicked Continue.

  Dessa, you have two copies of the ε4 variant we tested.

  If I lived long enough, my chances of developing the disease were more like 60 percent.

  I felt immediately sobered, though I hadn’t felt tipsy before. It was a new, soberer sober, a previously undiscovered sub-basement. I didn’t want Maxie to pick up on my fear or surprise—both now easier to detect after my bang trim. But if there was one nonmusical skill I’ve honed during the last decade of touring with X, it is an ability to tamp down strong feelings until the schedule permitted an escape to the women’s room for a private, quiet freak-out.

  I put this news in a cardboard box in my head, sealed it with an entire roll of packing tape, and pushed it against the back wall. Then I put on a bit of manufactured cheer and forged ahead to the next report.

  Maxie and I learned how much genetic material we’d inherited
from Neanderthals. Before going extinct forty thousand years ago, they’d interbred with modern humans. I wondered how the people of each subspecies felt about the other—if parents yelled about getting mixed up with the wrong crowd, if there were runaway pairs of Romeos and Juliets, if there were ugly words then, as there are now, for mixed children.

  We learned blue eyes were only ten thousand years old. I tried to imagine what it would have been like to see the first pair, like meeting someone who glowed in the dark, or bled seawater.

  Maxie could smell the asparagus metabolite in his pee—I didn’t even know that was a thing. The site said some people don’t produce the chemical and some people just can’t detect it, so I wasn’t sure which group I fell into.

  “What does it smell like?”

  “It smells like asparagus.”

  It is commonly thought that cleft chins result from an incomplete fusion of the bones of the jaw during fetal development.

  I leaned back, surprised. “Whoa, it’s a bone thing?”

  “I just thought it was a meat thing.”

  “Me too.”

  Dessa, based on your genetics, you’re likely to move more than average during sleep. Thirteen movements per hour was the norm; I was probably batting sixteen. I thought of X—a veritable athlete in his sleep. If there were a nighty with shin guards, I would have bought it.

  Based on the way our bodies were likely to process a chemical called adenosine, neither Maxie nor I were likely to be particularly deep sleepers. Adenosine, we read, builds up in the brain the longer we stay awake, increasing sleep pressure. “Huh,” I said. “I always thought of alertness spending down, not drowsiness building up.” On a click, a pop-up data table revealed that people with Asian ancestry were more likely to sleep deeply and less likely to move while doing so. I wondered if Asian art features less sleepwalking: no Lady Macbeth.

  Unibrows are genetically inherited and were considered signs of intelligence by the ancient Greeks and Romans. Women in modern Tajikistan still paint them on using a crushed herb called usma.

  The same gene that determines whether or not a person has wet or dry earwax determines the strength of their body odor.

  Dimples are likely associated with a doubling of a facial muscle. Which, in my independent analysis, made them sort of gross.

  Maxie and I ordered a second pair of beers. I had enough material for a year of dinner parties—the stuff was fascinating. But the quarantined box was rattling itself for some attention. I excused myself to the women’s room.

  I locked myself in a stall to think. My mind has always been my most treasured thing. Even when I am in great pain, I’m often comforted by watching it at work—as it flags the copyediting error on the cough syrup label, or tries to calculate the number of weeks I could survive on the canned food I’ve got on hand, or notes the fact that passing sirens seem to be in key with every song. (Hypothesis: as the Doppler effect sends the sound sliding through the scales, our pattern-hungry brains highlight the fleeting moments of consonance.) I would choose to part with almost anything before surrendering my mind.

  Of course, late-stage is very far away. Maybe I wouldn’t live long enough to encounter the problem at all. This piece of genetic news felt like a positive pregnancy test for sex I hadn’t had yet.

  But then there was the issue of Maxie. Neither of us was married, neither had kids. For each of us, the most likely primary caretaker was the other. He could’ve been thinking the same thing back at our table. But I doubted it.

  When we were kids, the worst thing I ever did to Maxie was play dead. I’d lie down on the carpet and close my eyes and wait for him to come and find me. Remembering the last time I pulled the trick, he would say, “I know you can hear me.” And then his little voice would rise and tighten and even though he knew I was faking, he’d repeat my name, threaten to tell, and, overcome with panic, begin to yell, “Get up!” I’ve done a few things in my life of which I am more ashamed, but not many. It was just so mean, and I had nothing to gain. Except maybe reveling in how much he’d miss me. Adult Maxie laughs it off—which means there’s no one left who could forgive me; the wronged boy is gone.

  I collected myself to return to our table. I don’t believe in fate, or destiny, or that everything turns out for the best. I’ll concede that everything happens for a reason—but only as a very general statement of causation. Some lousy things happen for really lousy reasons. Sometimes you hit the stitch, sometimes you don’t. There’s an inherent chaos at work and you just have to decide what’s worth loving as it floats past in the cyclone. I had no choices or changes to make, nothing to do or decide. The only sensible thing to do was finish my beer.

  The next day, we went for breakfast at a greasy spoon a couple of blocks from his apartment. We’d made plans with several of his friends from the weed business and I asked Maxie if there was a drug he hadn’t tried but would like to. Ayahuasca, he answered. I’m curious about ayahuasca too, but probably too scared to do it. I’d heard that it could have long-term effects on brain function. Maxie acknowledged that the whole meet-your-dealer-in-the-jungle thing was a pretty intense starting point too.

  I’ve read that a propensity for risk-taking and novelty-seeking is determined, at least in part, by genetics. DRD4, a gene on chromosome 11, governs the way the brain consumes dopamine; the faster we burn through the stuff, the more likely we are to go adventuring to get another dose of it. Seems like the desire to try a new drug might be informed by the drugs already on tap.

  I asked if using marijuana regularly had changed his sober life. Not really, he said. But he’d taken LSD once, and that might have.

  “When I was on acid . . . there’s something epiphanic about the experience—”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Like, of an epiphany.”

  “Okay.”

  Maxie conceded that psychedelic insights are tough to communicate. It’s easy to sound like a burnout even trying to talk about the experience afterward. But his recalled sensation of understanding was powerful, and had remained important to him.

  I thought of Sims, who’d had a deeply moving trip on mushrooms. He’d written down his revelations, so as not to forget what he’d learned. In the morning, he had a piece of paper that said only, Water is the key to life. When somebody in Doomtree has an uncomfortably earnest moment, one of us will sometimes softly declare, Water is the key to life, man.

  I took up a position opposite Maxie’s to see what might shake out. Throwing a kid an extravagant party for her first birthday—which she’d forget the next damn day—seems pretty pointless. If you couldn’t really remember something later, then what’s the value of doing it?

  “You got to experience it once,” Maxie said. “What’s the value of taking a trip somewhere if you’re not going to live there?”

  At least you can recall the vacation, I said.

  You can recall the epiphany, he maintained, just not communicate it.

  No, you can only recall that you had it, I argued. “That’s like, ‘I know I spent the holiday in Mexico, I just can’t remember anything about it, but I saw on my calendar that I went there and I am told it was fun.’”

  “I don’t think that proxy is valid.”

  “So differentiate it.”

  Maxie looked down and shrugged. Dammit, I’d done it again—found myself playing a game of verbal chess with someone who was trying to have a genuine conversation.

  I rushed in to say that I’d had similar experiences—also high on mushrooms, feeling like I’d just cracked the code of my relationship with our father, or made peace with my own aging. “I’m just investigating: How much of that do we get to drag back to the sober world?”

  “I don’t know the answer to that.” Even mid-trip, he said, he remembered thinking, “I can’t bring this, in full detail, back with me to the other side.” But the experience still co
unted, even if it was brief, and even if he only had it once.

  We both agreed that our default mode of consciousness was itself the product of a neurochemical cocktail—it just happened to be the house drink. Maxie suggested that the way the world is perceived sober and the way it is perceived intoxicated—well, probably some degree of that variability exists between people, or even between moods, between days. He had no idea whether the sound of traffic was overwhelming to other people, whether social attention was welcome or harrowing, or what it all might seem to mean. “In your daily life, you have to be critical of people,” he said, “but underneath it all, I try to remember I have no idea how these people perceive the world, maybe in a way that would make their actions and behavior a lot more understandable. If they have a radically different perception of things, maybe I’m the asshole.” Sometimes Maxie is just so easy to love.

  * * *

  —

  That night, my last in Seattle, Maxie and I had a late dinner with his friends. I drank two sweet cocktails and reveled in the fact that so many of his coworkers wanted to say nice things about him to me. In the morning, Maxie drove me to the airport in his Smart car. Idling on the tarmac, waiting to take off, I texted him, What is your earliest memory? I held my phone in my lap, hoping he’d reply before I got busted by a flight attendant for digital noncompliance.

  Maxie sent back a video, shot in the car. He was at the wheel, but the trees in the background weren’t moving—probably filmed at a red light. The seat belt crossed his chest like a bandolier. He was looking into the camera on his phone, but I couldn’t see his eyes through his aviators. His first memory, he said, was an attempted escape from his crib: “my little hands on the bars.”

  I wanted to know precisely when that would have been—I made a note to ask my mom exactly how old Maxie was when he transitioned from crib to bed.

  I asked if he remembered his Cheerios inspections. When he was tiny, Maxie would sit in the throne of his high chair, examining the Cheerios my mother had poured onto the chair’s little built-in tray. He’d lift them up one by one and if they were perfectly round, he would eat them. If they were broken or sickle shaped, he would extend his pudgy arm, and without looking, drop them into whatever abyss might lie beyond the kingdom of his attention.