by Dave Housley
“Nobody ever got sick. Ever?” Jenkins said. He had heard stories, like a lot of young cops who were paired at the time, government experiments in the sixties, strains of sickness from the old country that were still around and could lead to aberrant behavior. They had been briefed, secretly, although he never had much faith in the government in that way, its ability to keep its collective mouth shut about anything. They had given him warnings about spotting signs of…what did they call it…“existential exhaustion in your partner.”
“Why don’t you come out with it?” Tibor said.
“I heard some stories.”
Tibor met his eyes. This was a trick, Jenkins knew, from dog training. The dominant dog will maintain eye contact. The submissive dog blinks. A hell of a lot easier to be the alpha, he thought, when you don’t have to physically blink, when you’re not technically alive. “Oh, Jesus Christ, Tibby,” he said, “I know you’re not going to blink. Why don’t you just…”
“There were stories. You’re right,” Tibor said, his voice just above a whisper, his old-world accent peeking through. It was his natural speaking voice, Jenkins knew, and he almost never let anybody else hear it. Too much like those movie vampires. “An experiment. In the sixties when, well, you know. There were experiments. Not such an unusual thing.”
“Experiments with what?” Jenkins said. He had only heard this much. That something had been done in some lab in California, that it had roots in the rest of the counterculture, best intentions, yadda, yadda, yadda.
“Acid.”
“Acid? LSD?”
“It was a different time,” Tibor said.
“But I thought,” Jenkins said, “drugs didn’t affect you people?” Jenkins’ mind was reeling. This was the piece of the puzzle. It was starting to make sense.
“I’ve been upgraded to person. Thank you so much,” Tibor said. He got up and walked slowly to the bedroom.
“I know you don’t need to use the john,” Jenkins said. “All four years together I never seen you so much as spit.” He watched the man’s back move through the door, heard a closet slide open, things being moved around. He walked to the window and looked out.
The parking lot was dark, fluorescent lights turned as low as they could get. A few loose residents wandered toward the fences. An old habit, he guessed, a phantom limb. They stared out at the highway or up toward the moon, meandered this way and that, like drugged rats in some test maze. A car came in through security and he watched each of them slink into a separate shadow, disappearing for all intents and purposes. He didn’t know if this was some remnant of a different time—a hunter’s instinct toward camouflage—or a kind of embarrassment about their current situation. Most of them, he knew, were too drugged to comprehend much beyond the minute by minute circumstances of their situation: pills, walls, Plasmatrol Extra, daylight retreat and nighttime wandering.
More rustling in the bedroom. Boxes falling, items being placed on the floor. “You okay?” Jenkins shouted. “I’m not going to have to come in there and use my superhuman strength, am I?” An old joke, never very funny. For some reason, Jenkins always slipped right back into the old patterns when he saw Tibor.
“Here’s what I was looking for,” Tibor said. He handed Jenkins a folder. Jenkins opened and a clutch of old black and white photos fell out. They were grainy, yellowed. He picked up the first one and smelled it—libraries, attics, industrial solvent.
“Sometimes you people…” Tibor said. He shook his head and sat back down in his chair.
Jenkins thumbed through the photos. They showed some kind of research facility—men in lab coats moving among a group of patients who sat in hospital beds behind a kind of chain link fence. Each of them was strapped to the bed, an IV coming out of their arms. Above the beds were additional fluorescent lights, single banks like a football stadium. It looked like the maximum-security ward at a hospital for criminals.
“The fuck?” he said.
Tibor mumbled and walked to the window.
Jenkins looked at another photograph, a close-up of a patient clawing at his cage. The photo was washed out with the fluorescent lights. The patient’s fangs were drawn and he was chewing on the metal bars, a look of pure anguish on his face. His hands were shaking so fast they made two blurry mitts on the photo.
Jenkins turned to Tibor.
“What the fuck is this?” he said.
“Look closer,” said Tibor.
Jenkins regarded the photograph. There was something about the patient. Something familiar. “This isn’t…” he said.
“My origin story,” Tibor said. “As I understand it, every superhero must have one.”
“Jesus Christ,” Jenkins said. The person in the photograph was in so much pain. The hunger on his face so plain that he wasn’t a person anymore, had crossed over into something else, the centuries of civilization and culture tossed aside like a winter coat in the summertime. He looked closer. It was clear that this was a picture of Tibor.
“You said this thing was sick,” Tibor said. “A sick animal.”
Jenkins nodded. Words were not available.
“So am I,” Tibor said.
Chapter 22
July 5, 1995. Maryland Heights, MO. Riverport Amphitheatre.
Something was gnawing at Pete the entire ride. He had only been on the job a week and still he had a feeling like he was doing something wrong. But his job was, as they had said, to become part of the scene. To hang out and learn who is who on tour, who might have information about the dead junkies. He wasn’t supposed to arrest anybody, and when he’d asked about badges or guns or whether it was okay to get high on the job, to have a few beers, sleep in, generally live the life of a touring Deadhead, all Nutter had done was laugh.
“I said become part of the scene,” he said. “No way you can do that without doing all of the above.” Pete had just stared. This was the United States government? “You won’t be drug tested, that’s for damn sure,” Nutter had said. “Least not in the way you’re thinking.” Pete picked at his cuticles, pretended to be examining his notes. “Not by us is what I mean,” Nutter said. “You sure as shooting won’t be drug tested by us.”
Pete tried to put his worries at ease. He was becoming part of the scene. Just a few days and he’d made these contacts—Sunny and Rainey and Easy—had slept in a van and gotten high in the morning, smoked cigarettes for the first time, drank beer most of the time in between. He felt tired and worn out and couldn’t have been happier. They had made a drug deal—two tickets for Pittsburgh for a baggie full of something that looked like dried worms. “Mushrooms,” Sunny had explained. How much more a part of the scene could you get than that? Surely they would be happy with his progress so far.
He kept on forgetting to ask the questions—did you hear anything about these junkies dying? You ever meet anybody on tour who didn’t, you know, seem to really fit in very well? He realized now, just two days in, how awkward those questions were, how the only way to actually stand out would be to start asking questions just like these. The whole deal seemed to be accepting people on face value. The only thing you didn’t do was ask follow-up questions, pry into people’s lives, the people and things they’d left behind to be standing out in a dusty parking lot, smoking a bowl and drinking beer and waiting until the gates opened.
In the forty-eight hours they’d spent together, he’d never heard Sunny mutter a bad word about anybody, with the slight exception of Rainey, her sister, and even then, nothing but jokey remarks about how big Rainey’s feet were, or the “random” nature of Rainey’s hair. In any case, he hadn’t heard anybody worry over any dead junkies or notice anything that seemed out of place in any way, other than the calls of “five up!” that followed undercover police throughout the parking lot, or the occasional bad trip or low-level drug rip-off.
Right now, Sunny was making some necklaces while Rainey went out to meet somebody named “James Brown” who Pete assumed was not the Godfather of Soul, but he had also seen enoug
h that at this point, he wasn’t ruling anything out. Pete leaned back in his chair and took a drink of his orange juice. The parking lot was filling up. The sickness crawled back into his stomach. Diarrhea. This was not the best place for this to happen. He wasn’t sure whether it was the beer or the way he’d been eating or the doubt that edged around the back of his mind whenever he thought about what he’d actually been doing for the past few days. He’d slipped into this world effortlessly, traded a few tickets for access to something he’d never before even considered. It had been as easy as Alice slipping down the rabbit hole. Too easy. And he liked it too much. The reason he’d been hired in the first place, he assumed, was because he was so unlikely to go all Heart of Darkness and really start living the life.
Or maybe it was something else. They certainly knew everything there was to know about him, more than anybody he’d ever met. More, in some areas—like his parents, their college lives, how they’d met and married and what they’d done until the day of the accident—than Pete knew himself. It was more than a little unsettling, but he wrote it off as Big Brother and government surveillance and tried to put it out of his mind, be happy that he had new information to add to the little stockpile of narrative he’d been able to cobble out of newspapers and what the social services people had told him.
Still, they had selected him. And now here he was, two days into it, and if he wasn’t careful, he could wind up slipping into the current of this thing and never coming out. His stomach turned again. There were certain things, certain parts of this life that he knew were not well suited for him. The sleeping. The dirt. He craved a shower, some quiet, order in general. He thought about his apartment, a mere three hours away—so quiet and neat. The town would be deserted—one of his favorite times of the year.
He felt the tightening in his bowels. Need to get to a porta-potty. He’d avoided them his entire life, and now it felt like he was spending half his day waiting in line, trying to get the idea of exactly what was happening out of his head.
“Be right back,” he said.
Sunny nodded. “Bring back a Dr. Pepper if you see one?” she said. “None of that Mr. Pibb bullshit.”
Had he gotten himself into a domestic situation already, he wondered. They hadn’t even kissed, but he felt a kinship toward her. And she was pretty, even here, without showers or makeup or whatever else it was that women did to make themselves attractive. “One Dr. Pepper, coming up,” he said.
He knew by now to head away from the stadium, to the row of porta-potties furthest from the crowd. “The tourists,” as Sunny called them. He walked past the now-familiar sights—T-shirt vendors, nitrous oxide tanks, vans that looked like they’d been on tour since Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters first hired the Dead to play the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests. He passed a kid who couldn’t have been more than twelve selling soda for a dollar a can, made a mental note to get Sunny’s Dr. Pepper on the way back.
Finally, he could see the row of blue porta-potties. No lines. He’d forgotten to bring along tissues, though, so he had to hope for some toilet paper. Stupid.
“Hey!” A middle-aged hippie with a baseball cap on backwards and a Jerry Garcia shirt was nodding at him.
“No thanks, man. I’m good,” he said.
“Pete,” the guy said. Pete stopped in his tracks. The guy nodded, something in his eyes changed. “Come on over here,” he said. “Let’s talk.”
He stopped in his tracks. “How did you…”
The guy just held his hands up, his mouth pulled into a sarcastic smile. On second glance, there were a few things about the guy that didn’t quite hold up. He was chubby, a typical middle-aged beer gut pushing the T-shirt up to expose a few inches of pink-white skin. He was wearing tennis sneakers—too new, unscuffed, the kind that might be appropriate on a boat or a country club patio, but not here, where sandals and Chuck Taylors were the clear footwear of choice.
Of course, Pete thought, he was one of them. Or, one of us. He looked back to where he’d come, but there was nobody looking for him, nobody he knew. Just the steady line of people selling things, others walking around, little clumps of people forming to smoke whatever it was they had to smoke. It seemed normal. It had been a long two days.
Behind the guy, Pete could see a woven blanket with a half-hearted assortment of bracelets and necklaces. “Come on,” the guy said. “Take a look at my wares. Let’s us have a talk.” There was a trace of a New York accent. He turned around and walked over to a few folding chairs set up on either side of the blanket. He picked up a necklace and held it up as if he was showing it off, patted the chair next to him, and sat down.
Pete followed, but remained standing. “So, who are you?” he whispered. He looked toward the parking lot again.
“You’ve had a hell of a few days, huh?” the guy said. He was smiling, but there was no mirth in his voice. “Enjoying yourself, I see.”
Pete felt the familiar déjà vu settle in. It was as if he was shrinking, like he was three years old again and hearing that terrible news for the first time. His breath shortened. Air cut off. He heard the sounds of gulping, wheezing, before he realized he was even doing it. He felt himself sit down on the ground. The feeling of dirt on his arms, rocks under his ass, his glasses steaming up.
“Hey,” the guy whispered. “Hey! You’re gonna blow both of us out of the water here, we have to call a fucking ambulance.”
All Pete could hear was the heavy suck of his own breath. His lungs burned. Only that feeling—the burning, the wheezing. Not enough air. He imagined himself back on the steps of Glatfelter Hall. Fall day. Just a nip of winter in the air. He watched students walking back and forth, felt the slippery marble on his hands.
“Okay,” the guy said, his voice faraway but insistent. “Okay, Peter. Calm down. Breathe.” His tone had changed to the overly calm, mannered tones of a pilot making a routine announcement. In the back of his mind, Pete registered the word “professional.”
The burning was dissipating, his lungs filling with air. He opened his eyes and the man reached out a hand. “Get in the fucking chair and let’s work this out,” he said.
Pete grasped his hand and was moving. The guy was surprisingly strong, guided him expertly into the folding chair. He reached into a cooler and held out a can of orange juice.
“No,” Pete said, his voice scratchy and raw. “I’m good.”
“You are not good,” the guy said.
“I don’t like,” Pete said. His voice was coming back. “The can.”
The guy dropped the can in Pete’s lap. “Drink the fucking juice,” he said. He put the necklace he’d been holding back onto the ragged blanket, picked up two bracelets.
Pete opened the juice and took a sip, then a gulp. He hadn’t realized how thirsty he was.
“That was a hell of a way to make a first impression,” the guy whispered.
Pete finished the orange juice and set the can down on the ground.
“I can’t let these go for that!” the guy shouted suddenly, waving the bracelets around. He smiled at somebody behind Pete. “Guy wants two for one. I tell him, you find anything nicer than these around here and they’re free. Best bracelets on the lot.” Pete turned around to see two girls about his age, both with flowing patterned dresses and bare feet. “You guys want some bracelets?” the guy shouted. His tone was all off—more used car salesman than hippie craft maker. The taller girl gave him the peace sign and moved along.
“So they didn’t tell you about me, brother, but here I am,” the guy said. He let the bracelets drop and reached in his pocket. “You can call me Spot.” He nodded his head with finality.
“Spot?” Pete said.
“That’s my tour name. That’s the only name you need to know. Now here’s your first performance review,” he said. “It’s good you been doing what you’re doing, but those girls aren’t the people you’re looking for.” He reached into his cooler and opened up a beer, held one out to Pete.
�
�No thanks,” Pete said.
“It’s different here on tour, huh?” Spot said. He opened the beer and took a long drink. “Ahhh, but you don’t even know. Pretty plum fucking first assignment, you ask me.”
“So the girls?” Pete said.
“I got a wife. Two kids. A mortgage and a lawn to mow.” He took another pull from his bottle. “I could get used to this shit.”
“So I need to look for this…this person.” Pete realized he wasn’t sure what this guy knew. Nutter had been very clear about keeping his mouth shut about exactly what he was doing, even with local law enforcement, even with other federal agencies. Only Invasive Species could know exactly who he was, why he was out here. “I need to get out there more?”
“The girls you’re with?” Spot said. “A good start. Important to have a tribe, as they say,” he waved his hand around to indicate the parking lot. “A home base. Somebody to show you around, introduce you to somebody else.” He took another deep drink from the can. “So what you need to do, my friend,” he said. “Is start getting introduced.”
“To who?” Pete said.
“Well that’s the magic fucking question, isn’t it?” Spot said. “Hey! I got those bracelets you been looking for!” he shouted at a group of guys walking by.
“Looking for the bathroom, man,” somebody said, and they passed by.
“Well,” Spot said, waving at the parking lot and the sad collection of jewelry in front of him, “we got work to do, so you best be getting along, little partner.”
“Wait,” Pete said. “How will I find you again?”
“Oh, don’t worry about that, partner,” Spot said. He pointed to the row of porta-potties. “I’m a forty-five-year-old man drinking beer all day long. You find the pissers, I won’t be far away.”
Pete turned toward the bathrooms. A long line now snaked along the porta-potties.
“One second, brother,” Spot said. He held out a bracelet and Pete waved him off. “No, man. Don’t think you understand,” he said. “This one isn’t optional.” Pete accepted the bracelet—thick, black, woven leather, an off-white stone with a yin-yang etched into it at the center.