“Eleven is nothing special. Ten was a big deal. And twelve is a big deal, you know, ’cause then you’re almost a teenager. I’ll have a party next year.”
“OK, then. Whatever you say.” She turned back to the kitchen. “I’m making homemade pizza, just the way you like it.”
“That sounds great, Mom.” Chase sat on the floor and turned on the TV. The big old tube popped when it lit up, and he turned to the station that showed old reruns from when his parents were kids. Chase’s dad was a real TV buff—he knew all about hit shows from the ’70s. He knew when they aired, who starred in them. He even knew a lot of the episode titles. That afternoon Chase watched one of his father’s favorites. Chase couldn’t wait until supper so he could tell him about it.
Mom started singing again. Chase closed my eyes for a minute and wished he would never grow up. He wanted to stay eleven forever.
****
Dinner with his mom and dad made it the best birthday ever. By the time they got around to blowing out the candles and cutting the cake, Chase was telling his dad about that day’s episode of The Six Million Dollar Man.
“Oh, I love that one.” Dad shoveled in a forkful of the chocolate cake. “Guy puts a bomb in the Liberty Bell. It was when the country was getting ready for the bicentennial. Lots of celebrating.”
“It all seems kind of hokey, you know? Compared to what’s on TV now,” Chase said.
“Sure it does. We’ve come a long way,” Dad said.
And then Mom started singing something about coming a long way.
Chase raised his eyebrows.
“Old jingle from a commercial.” She took a bite of cake.
Chase nodded.
Dad hummed the tune for a moment. “Steve Austin was something. So fast and he could see better than anybody alive. I used to think it would happen, you know, in the real world. But now I doubt it.”
“Why?” Chase asked.
“Well, for one thing, it’s too much money. Besides, who would allow themselves to have all that stuff put in their body?”
“But, Dad, Steve Austin didn’t know it was happening until it was all over.”
“Yeah,” Mom said. “Same with Jaime Sommers on The Bionic Woman. Then they wiped out her memory or something.”
“Well, it was more complicated than that,” Dad said. “But I guess if some secret branch of the government wanted to turn people into cyborgs—”
“Yeah, and look how far we’ve come since The Six Million Dollar Man. Look what happened in The Terminator,” Chase said.
“I love that movie. Best cyborg story ever. Still, it’s just fiction,” Dad said. “Nothing like that is ever going to happen.”
“Not to my sweet boy,” Mom said. “You’re getting so big.” She reached over and tousled his hair. “Happy birthday.”
Chase opened his presents—a collector’s edition of the Star Wars movies and a new pair of high tops. Then he watched TV while Dad helped Mom clear the dishes and clean up the kitchen. He could hear them talking, so he turned down the sound a little.
“He spends too much time watching TV, Kim. He needs to get out more.”
“He gets out plenty. He was outside playing for two or three hours today—came inside all covered with sand,” Mom said.
“Does he have any friends?”
“Sure he does. He doesn’t see a lot of his friends during the summer. Some of them live on the other side of the county. But he plays with that Dawson kid. And he’s always been buddy-buddy with Kenny Larson down the road. And have you noticed the way the girls coo over him? He’s really getting to be very handsome.”
“Now, don’t push him into that, Kim.”
“I’m not pushing, I’m just saying his social life is nothing for you to worry about, Chuck.”
“You ought to take him down to the church on Main. They’re having some kind of summer thing for kids.”
“You know, you were the one who got him watching all those old shows. Let him enjoy his summer. They’d probably try to save his soul, or whatever they do, down at that church. You really want him to give up TV for God, Chuck?”
Dad came out of the kitchen and turned off the TV. “Come outside with me,” he said.
Chase got up and followed him, and they looked at the stars. “What do you want to do with your life, son?”
“I don’t know, Dad. What do you want me to do?”
“I want you to be someone who makes a difference in the world.”
“How do I do that?”
He didn’t tell Chase. He didn’t say much else at all. Chase got the feeling he had something else to say, but he never said it. After a while, they went inside.
Chase turned off the TV in his room at eleven thirty. A yellow beam from the street light out front sneaked in through the split in the curtain and fell across his bedspread. He grabbed the edge of the curtain and pulled it closed. Then he slept the good summer sleep of an eleven-year-old boy. Until the voice woke him.
12
“Did you like it there?”
Chase opened his eyes but couldn’t see anything. He was blind again. “Yes. It was a good game. I liked being a kid again. After I was there awhile, I forgot it was a game. I thought it was real. How did you do that?”
“Go back to sleep. You need your rest.”
“Are you going to get somebody to come and check my vision? I think I was injured on the set last night.”
“Do you want Dr. Fiender to take a look at you?”
Chase sat up. “Am I at SynVue Estate?”
The voice didn’t answer.
“Don’t let them do anything without my permission.”
“The doctor could restore your vision. If fact, he could make your vision much, much better than it was before.”
“Don’t do this.”
“Relax, Charles. Go back to sleep.”
Chase laid his head on the pillow and blinked his useless eyes. Fear kept him awake for a while, but sleep finally took him. The next time he awoke, he could see. No super vision, just 20/20. He was in his room at the old house again. Only it was different. The walls were no longer blue, but beige. The furniture was the same, but the movie posters were gone. So was his TV. An early model GV hung on the wall. Chase jumped out of the bed and looked in the mirror over the chest of drawers. He remembered the stupid haircut. He was twenty-one.
“Mom?” he yelled.
“In the kitchen, Chase. What’s the matter?”
“Let the game continue.”
“What?”
“Nothing, Mom. I’ll be in the shower.”
“Hurry up, dear. If we’re going to do this on the way to the airport, we need to get going.”
OK, he could figure this out. When did she say that? Where were they going?
“I can’t believe it’s been a year since your father died.”
Chase closed his eyes. His father was gone. They were going to the beach to scatter his ashes. Mom had kept the urn in their bedroom for a year. Then she said she couldn’t keep him trapped in there—she had to set him free.
Chase wondered if it were really herself she wanted to set free.
He had a new job waiting in Nashville. That’s why they were going to the airport. The job was with a production company. He had full realization of all this, and he knew he was a thirty-four-year-old playing some kind of regression game. Maybe the game didn’t work as well when you were re-living an adult experience. He took his shower, threw on the only clothes he hadn’t packed, and walked to the kitchen to eat breakfast with the figment of his mother.
That’s when the game became real life for him.
“Mom.” Chase bent to kiss her cheek. “You look so pretty.”
“Well, thank you, Chase. I wanted to look nice for this little ceremony. Your dad always liked this dress.”
“Are you sure you’re OK with me leaving today?”
“Absolutely. You spent a year with your widowed mother. That’s enough. But are you sure
about this job? You’re really ready to leave grad school and go to work?”
“Mom, I told you, the virtual classes are all I need. I’ll be done quicker than if I was still on campus. And yes, I’m sure about the job. It’s what I want.”
“Your dad was always worried about your spending too much time alone. You can’t meet a girl in a virtual classroom.”
“You’d be surprised what you can do in a virtual classroom.” Chase smiled, and his mother raised her eyebrows. She had nothing else to say about that.
Chase drove Mom’s new electric car that morning. They took the long way through town. He wanted one more look. He’d miss this place.
They went down Main. A sign stood in front of what used to be a church. Chase read it aloud. “Now they won’t even miss us when we’re gone.”
“Do you remember your eleventh birthday?” Mom asked.
“Like it was yesterday.”
“Your dad thought you spent too much time watching GV. Well, I mean, TV. He wanted you to go to some kind of summer program at that church.”
“I wonder what the sign means.”
“Maybe it means what it says. Nobody misses them.”
“Yeah. I guess so.” Chase turned onto the highway. “That was the night, on my eleventh birthday, that Dad told me he wanted me to make a difference in the world. I didn’t know what he meant then, but I think I do now. That’s why I took this job. Making a difference is all about communication. People need to know what’s going on in the world. They need information, education. Working for this company, with the media, will allow me to give people what they need.”
“Your dad would be so proud, Chase. I think you really will make a difference.”
Chase drove over Clearwater Pass to Sand Key. His dad always loved it there. He stood on the shore and opened the urn. The wind was with them—with Dad—and the ashes floated like a gull over the gentle waves and out to sea.
Chase missed him. He was a good man.
They went on to the airport, and Chase handed Mom the keys to her car. “Don’t forget to have it serviced in three months. I already made the appointment for you. It’s programmed into your computer. You’ll get a reminder prompt.”
“Then why are you telling me not to forget? If the computer remembers, I don’t have to.”
“OK, Mom.” He smiled.
“Call me when you get there,” she said. She grabbed him around the neck and held him tight. Chase put his arms around her.
“Are you sure you’ll be all right?” he asked.
“Of course. Now go on.” She pulled away and smiled. “I love you, Chase.”
“Love you, too, Mom. I’ll call you.”
Chase would miss her, but he was glad to be getting on with his life. For the first time, boarding that plane, he felt like a man. Like he was in control.
Once he got settled on the hydro jet, he buckled himself in, turned on his reader, and ignored the instructions given by the robotic flight attendant whose digital nametag read Haley. The little mechanical “girl” dropped from an overhead compartment, then retreated when she was done.
“Look at that, they’re naming the robots,” the guy next to him said. “I like to see a real person when I get on a jet. You know? But they’re a rare find. The cheaper airlines are still using them. And the private flights. But us middle-classers get the robots.”
“You don’t like robots?”
“Oh, sure, I like them just fine. They make great lamps.”
The guy was probably sixty. Old farts like him kept things real. Real backward.
“Can’t stop progress.”
“I can try,” he said. “Unless that idiot gets elected.”
“You don’t like Cosimo?”
“He’ll throw out the Constitution for good.”
“The Constitution’s been on its way out for a while now.”
The man turned in his seat to look Chase in the eye. “It’ll be the end of us if Cosimo gets elected. We’ll be living in a new country.”
“You sound like my father.”
“Then you’ve got a smart man for a father.” He smiled, and there was a twinkle in his eye.
“I just scattered his ashes over the gulf at Sand Key.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, son.”
“He’s been dead a year now. My mom wanted to set him free.”
“Well, you’re a good son to be there with her.”
They didn’t talk politics after that. After a while, Chase acted sleepy, and the man quit talking altogether. Chase really did start to doze.
But then the nosedive began.
His head jerked forward, and his shoulders followed. He dug his nails into the padded armrests. A body rolled down the aisle. He didn’t know if it was a man or a woman. The political commentator at Chase’s side wasn’t wearing his seatbelt, and he fell away into the spiraling tunnel, screaming as he went spinning.
He forced his head back against the seat and gritted his teeth. Then he opened his mouth and screamed. He couldn’t help himself. The sound from his throat met the discord of a terrified choir. After what seemed an eternity, though it was only half a minute, the front of the tunnel and the end of it came level. The bodies stopped rolling. His body stopped its strain to stay in the seat. And then the crying started. Chase cried along with them.
He vowed to never fly again.
After a look-over by med-techs in the airport triage center, Chase signed documents and stared at the free meal he’d been offered. He picked up his rental and escaped that compound of winged vessels bound for hell. He knew he would fly again—he’d have to. But it’d be a long, long time.
He took the Briley Parkway to the complex that housed the company that would be writing his paycheck.
“Good to have you here at last.” His new boss met him in the reception area. “Pleasant flight?” He was middle-aged and pudgy.
“Not at all.”
“Well, no matter. You’re here now and we have a lot to do.”
He familiarized himself with the company’s upcoming projects for about three hours until the boss came back. He’d heard about the flight. Chase was on the phone with Mom, trying to convince her he was fine, when the boss told him to take the rest of the day off. “I’ve got to go,” Chase told his mother.
The boss chided Chase for not telling him he’d almost died that morning. Then he sent Chase home.
Home was a company apartment he’d been given to use during his probationary period. Chase didn’t look at it—the colors or the furniture or the view. He found the bed and plunged headfirst into it.
****
The voice woke Chase, who didn’t understand what he asked at first. The voice obliged in repeating himself.
“Did you pray when you faced death?”
The room was black. “I don’t know. I don’t remember what was going on in my mind.” Chase hoisted himself up on his elbows. “Look, I don’t like this game. Just get me a doctor. And my assistant—I want to talk to Mel.”
“What about Kerstin? Don’t you want to talk to her?”
“Sure. Get her in here.” Chase felt the nightstand for a VPad, or a lamp, or a glass of water. Nothing but a metal bowl. “Why can’t I see anything?” His voice grew loud. “I want a doctor.”
“In good time, Charles Redding. We’re not finished.”
“Well, it’s a sick game. I won’t allow it on my show.”
“This is my show.”
“Get me out of here.”
“Soon, Charles. Look up. Kerstin is waiting.”
The screen came to life. The studio in Chicago filled his vision. Only it wasn’t the way it looked the day before, or whenever he’d last seen it. Before him was the modest lobby of an organization not yet born. Change Your Life was only a dream at this point.
Kerstin came from the hallway at the far end of the lobby. Her silky ponytail bounced and swayed as she walked his way. She was young, beautiful, and almost sweet with her innocent smile.
Chase hadn’t seen that hopeful expression on her face in years. He felt pity for her. And love, he thought. She held out her hand as she approached. He wanted to embrace her. This game just got much better. When she took his hand, the game became reality once again. This was his life.
“Kerstin Bennett,” she said. “So glad to meet you, Mr. Sterling.”
“That’s sounds strange—‘Mr. Sterling.’”
“No one else knows about the name change. Well, no one here at the studio, I mean. It suits you.” She looked him over and then cupped her hand under his elbow and led him toward the hallway. “Chase Sterling. I like it.”
She was right. It did suit him.
13
Somewhere in that hallway, a couple of years went by. The next thing he knew, he and Kerstin were standing in the newly built auditorium.
“You are going to do great things, Chase,” Kerstin said.
Workers surrounded them. They were installing seats and unrolling carpets. Dust covered Chase’s designer suit. Kerstin’s VPad chirped interminably, but she ignored it. She wrapped both hands around his arm and stood on her toes to kiss him.
“We are going to do great things.” Chase looked over the vast theater. “This is our show. I can’t do it without you.”
“True,” she said, and she laughed.
In Chase’s time with the studio, SynVue had become the only government-funded communications company in the world. They supplied all news, all information, and all entertainment. A few renegade broadcast signals remained, but involvement in that activity could lead to years in prison. This new show, Change Your Life, was not just about entertainment. It would literally change lives. The WR had chosen Chase as the face of the show, and he was ready to start handing out fortunes and health and hope. What a marvelous opportunity. He never dreamed this would happen to him.
“Chase, darling, pay attention.”
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“Really, this is no time for daydreaming. We’ve got two days to get this auditorium ready. Now listen, when you hear my voice, you’ll look up at the booth hidden there among the balconies.” She lifted her pale hand and pointed to the area. “You’ll look up as though an angel has called your name. Do you understand?”
Wake the Dead Page 6