Entropy in Bloom

by Jeremy Robert Johnson

  A League of Zeroes poster stapled to a telephone pole advertises an upcoming appearance by S. O. Faygus and his amazing translucent throat.

  An ad beneath the poster promises a two-for-one deal on mail-order brides.

  Another asks me if I really trust my gas mask.

  It all leaves me with the impression that I’m living in some kind of ravaged nuclear wasteland. The problem with that diagnosis lies in the absence of any level of apocalypse. No one dropped any bombs; no great fire scorched the Earth.

  We just ended up like this. We followed a natural progression from past to present. We’re not Post-Apocalyptic, we’re Post-Yesterday.

  One look around, though, and I realize that we must have had some brutal kind of Yesterday.

  Ray’s voice is still in my head, echoing doubt, stirring up stomach acid.

  “Jamie, that’s impossible!”

  It can’t be.

  This plan is all I have. It’s my only chance of getting off these streets.

  It’s the only way I’ll ever be special.

  DR. TIKOSHI WOULDN’T TAKE me as a patient.

  Dr. Komatsu had me ejected from his building.

  I had to go to my old standby, Dr. Shinori. He’s the only one who likes to experiment. He’s the only one willing to push boundaries. He’s the only one who would take a credit card.

  I’m moments from anesthesia and Dr. Shinori is sharpening his diamond bone saw. He has emphasized several times how difficult this will be. He hasn’t said anything, and I wouldn’t understand a single word he’d say, but we’ve been communicating with drawings.

  I showed him a picture of my design, the new me, the guaranteed League of Zeroes member.

  He sketched for a moment and showed me a picture. On the left there was a big, bright smiley face, and on the right there was a little stick figure drawing of my body resting in a casket.

  I hope this means my chances are fifty/fifty.

  I suspect this might mean he’d be happy to kill me. He gets my money either way. I signed the Goddamn waiver. I’m taking the dive.

  I go over the reasons in my head, even though it’s too late to turn back. People would assume I take the risks and bear the public scrutiny because there’s money in it. They wouldn’t be totally wrong. The freak show industry pulls millions every year, and gets more lucrative as time passes. More fame, more attention. Those things don’t hurt. Before I started this, before I split my tongue into three prongs and had my irises removed and my toes extended, I was dirt poor and always felt like I was ugly anyway. Now I’m so ugly that people can’t look away, and I can pull advertising dollars.

  The number one reason I do this? People jump to assumptions and whisper asides to each other about parental neglect or abuse or acid in my baby formula. They’re wrong.

  I do this because when I was little my mom told me I was going to be someone special.

  I asked her what special meant. She pointed to the TV screen. I thought “special” was Burt Reynolds, until she spoke up.

  “Special means that people pay attention to you. Special means you have something that other people don’t. Special is having people love you without even knowing you. I know, and have known since the day you were born, that you are going to be special. That’s why I love you so much, Jamie.”

  So, I waited to become special.

  By the time I hit twenty, I was just like everyone else.

  I still am.

  Which is not to say that I’m Mr. Free Spirit Railing Against Conformity, because everyone else does that too. I just know that I’m not special, and I have to force the change.

  Mom calls me less and less these days.

  The hugs are shorter than they used to be.

  So here I am, a product of forcible evolution trying to stay one step ahead of the other mutants, hoping my mommy pays attention.

  Dr. Shinori puts the gas mask over my mouth and nose and doesn’t ask me to start counting backwards from a hundred. I know the routine. By ninety-five I’m floating in a soft yellow ocean made from rose petals. Somewhere further away I’m shaking as the bone saw hits meat.

  THE STAGE LIGHTS ARE especially bright tonight, but I can still make out the audience. The women with no lips always look pleased, grinning wide as the valley.

  Ray is in the front row tonight. I flew him out here, even though he’s Body Modification Royalty now and could afford it himself. He’s not wearing a shirt and the baby tomatoes sewn into his chest spell out SaladMan, which is pretty sound promotion.

  As the leader of the League of Zeroes I get to make a closing address to our national audience each Thursday.

  My mom is in the crowd, like always, and I’m planning a great address tonight, something about how Love Evolves Us All.

  They’ll eat it up, but they won’t understand the costs that come with being truly special. They won’t know about the white-fire headaches. They won’t know about the pressure that shoots down my spine when I change the oxygenated cerebrospinal fluid. They won’t know what it’s like when your brain signals get backed up and a dream hits you while your eyes are wide open. I keep these things to myself. I don’t even tell my mom. She thinks I’m perfect now.

  The audience always likes to hear about how I’m doing, first thing in the show. I tell them my brain is getting a little hot under these stage lights and that gets a good, hearty laugh. I’m laughing with them, but inside I’m genuinely concerned and I shift my hands to the left and try to move the clear, titanium-laced plastic box I keep my brain in toward the shadows. It tugs on the fiber optic lines running into my neck at the top of my spinal cord, but I manage.

  I adapt. We all do.

  Persistence Hunting

  Don’t act surprised, or shake your bloody fists at the night sky.

  You chased this down.

  Help is coming—maybe a reality check can keep you seething until it gets here. Better than slipping into shock.

  Face it—you’re lying there in the evening chill, broken and breathless on the dewy suburban grass because of a basic truth:

  You’ve always been a sucker for love.

  And being smart enough to know that isn’t the same as being able to do a goddamn thing about it.

  YOU WERE A MARK from the get-go.

  Age seven: All Mary Ashford had to do was smile. You kicked over your licorice. She skipped away, shared it with that red-headed oaf Mikey Vinson.

  Rube.

  Age fourteen: Sarah Miller asked you to the last dance of the year.

  Why wouldn’t you help her with her algebra homework? An easy down-payment on a guaranteed post-dance make-out session.

  You even gave Sarah your final exam answers.

  She passed algebra.

  She passed on attending the dance.

  Stomach flu—very sad. She cried on the phone.

  Two weeks later she went to the final dance at the school across town. With Mikey Fucking Vinson. The rumor mill had them crossing fourth base. In a hot tub.

  You cursed Mikey Vinson, prayed to God for wolves to snuff the bastard, to disembowel him in a hot tub, a steaming red bowl of Vinson soup.

  Revenge fantasies waned. You knew the truth. This was on you. You cried yourself to sleep, thinking Sarah Miller would be the last girl you’d ever truly fall for.

  Chump.

  Age fifteen: Love got blown off the radar.

  Was it world-weary resolve? No, you were a mess of hormones and zero savvy charging headlong into the bayonets of the beauties walking your school halls.

  Love caught the boot because your parents burned to death on their eighteenth anniversary. Bad electrical blanket wiring and spilled champagne caused a flash-fire.

  As with every anniversary weekend since you were born, you were staying at Uncle Joshua’s house—a bungalow off Powell on 58th—in Southeast Portland. The crucial difference that weekend was that at the end of it you had no home to return to.

  Uncle Joshua took you in. You didn’t
speak for three months. You dreamed—your parents screaming with smoke-filled lungs.

  Your Uncle did his best. Let you know you were loved. Gave you great pulp novels about druggy detectives and man-eating slugs. Taught you how to swear properly. Let you stay up till any hour, so long as you promised to run with him every morning at seven sharp.

  “The morning run blows the morning prayer out of the water,” he told you. “Gets you thinking. Breathing deep. It clears out the worry, the garbage, everything.”

  You ran the city with him—sidewalks, tracks, trails. Portland seemed huge and electric in a way your hometown Salem never did.

  He showed you how to run through “the wall”—the utter vacuum of energy that forced you to walk. Soon the wall was pushed further and further out.

  You ran to exhaustion—morning jogs with your Uncle and epic evening jaunts that allowed you to collapse far from the reality of your loneliness, from dreams of burning hands reaching for your face.

  FIVE YEARS AFTER THE fire, love finally tracked you down.

  You were twenty-one. Still a virgin. You’d chased nobility, never exploiting your semi-orphan status for a cheap lay. Besides, that would have meant talking to someone, knowing someone.

  You were confident chasing the cat was for suckers anyway. You’d transcended that status because you had a new kick, something you’d guessed was better than pussy:

  THEFT.

  It wasn’t for the cash—your parents’ trust kept you sound.

  You stole because you’d recognized a loophole.

  Portland was a runner’s city. During daylight it was impossible to hit the waterfront without seeing a jogger, but the nights had their own crews. Doctors or bartenders forced into the late shift. Other running zealots like you.

  And Portland’s runner omni-presence rendered you a non-threat to the cops. Another fitness freak in fancy gear. You rocked sheer shirts, a Garmin GPS watch, a CamelBak water backpack, a flashy yellow vest, and shorts designed to hug your junk.

  You liked to wave at the cops, give them a nod that said, “Here we are, upstanding citizens keeping things safe and healthy.”

  Sometimes they waved back. Some of those times you ran right by them with a thousand dollars worth of pinched jewelry in your CamelBak.

  They never turned around. What self-respecting thief would run by a cop car while rocking reflective gear meant to call attention?

  You were just another night runner fading in the rearview.

  In fairness to them, you started minor, like some jockey-boxing meth-head.

  Your LifeHammer tool was designed for drivers trapped in a submerged vehicle. One side had a hammer specially designed to crack tempered auto glass.

  Ostensibly designed for exits, it worked great for entrances.

  You trolled the NW hills near the Leif Erikson trail, pulling smash-and-grabs on Suburbans, Jaguars, a smattering of Portland’s ubiquitous Subarus and Priuses. You copped cell phones, cameras, MP3 players. You copped hard-ons from the gigs, tracked record runs off the buzz.

  You kept the swag in a box in your closet, obsessed over it, deciphering what you could about the people you’d jacked. You fell asleep to stolen playlists. You studied the smiles of strangers in digital photos.

  You soon realized that any tweaker could crack car windows.

  The buzz dwindled.

  You escalated—houses were the logical progression.

  Your first pick was a sharp art-deco joint. You’d done your sidewalk surveying—they had a habit of leaving the sliding glass door on the side of their house open.

  You almost bailed. Nerves. Visions of the owners polishing rifles inside.

  You decided to hit their car instead—a desperation move.

  You got lucky, opened the glove compartment, found a receipt. Franzetti Jewelers—$6,000. Dated that day. Scrambled the car, found zilch.

  Was it in the home? A necklace, a ring—they’d fit into your backpack so easily. Something like that was much more intimate than an iPod—it represented history between two people.

  The gravity of it pulled you to the side entrance of the house.

  You knocked on the door frame. “Hello?”

  If anyone answered, you’d feign injury: You’d crunched your ankle coming down from Forest Park. Needed a cab, a hospital.

  After your third “Hello” echoed dead, you crossed the threshold.

  It took five exhilarating minutes to find the jewelry box. Bedroom dresser, third drawer, under a pile of gold-toe socks. A serious square-cut rock mounted on a platinum setting. An engagement in the cards?

  You thought about leaving the stone. But then you remembered Mary Ashford and Sarah Miller, decided to save the guy from becoming another sucker.

  You hit the streets, the ring secure in your CamelBak.

  Back home, the jewelry went into the swag box. You couldn’t sleep, reviewing your plunder, tiny pieces of other lives.

  B & E’s became everything.

  One a week at first. Monday through Thursday was casual jog recon. Weekends were break-ins.

  Jewels reigned supreme. They spent time close to other people, had sentimental value.

  You’d take cash when discovered, but never credit cards.

  Once a week quickly became “whenever the coast looked clear.” Your record was three break-ins in one night.

  You wore thin white runner’s gloves, hoping they’d prevent prints.

  You carried steak-flavored dog treats but never had the guts to break into a house after you’d heard a dog bark. You petted cats when they’d allow it.

  If a whole pack of cigarettes was left out you’d take one smoke, save it for the morning, puff on it at sunrise.

  Sometimes you went to hip hop shows before your evening run. It was easy to stay chill, enjoy a show solo, hood up, feeling like an anonymous gangster amidst all the fronting. They could talk up the criminal life; you lived it.

  You tried to maintain the morning runs with Uncle Joshua. He noticed your owl eyes and lagging pace.

  He expressed concern.

  You dropped the routine. The nights were just too long.

  It was in this state—harried, junkie-hungry for break-ins—that you let love back into your life.

  SLOW IT DOWN. PAY attention. This is where everything fell apart.

  You were coming home via Burnside that night, maneuvering around the bum-clusters near the bridge. An alky with a piece of corn in his beard gave you a wave.

  You were astronaut high from a twenty minute break-in session. The entire house had smelled like summer lilac. You’d wondered if the owners paid to have that piped in at all hours.

  That sweet smell is what you were thinking about at the moment the little black car took a no-look right turn at 10th and Burnside past Union Jack’s. You saw a bright flash out of your peripheral, heard a thump that you ID’d as your body hitting the hood of the ride. Then you were rolling on pavement.

  Brake lights made the scene run red. You caught the model of the car . . . couldn’t focus on the license plate.

  Last-call closeout-boozers were a night run liability. You’d accepted that, but you couldn’t accept the fact that you might have been slaughtered by a fucking Jetta with a butterfly sticker on the bumper.

  Gorgeous legs in camouflage stockings emerged from the driver’s side. The girl stood, giraffe-tall. Five inch heels. Soon she was crouched by your side. You couldn’t focus on her face aside from wide hazel eyes, tiny flecks of gold floating in the green.

  You sap—you might have been in love before you even lost consciousness.

  SHE DANCED UNDER THE name Avarice. When she told a guy he could call her Ava it guaranteed extra tips. When boys pointed out the fitting nature of her name she called them clever. That pulled more tips, too.

  She was insanely irresponsible, taking you to her apartment instead of a hospital, but her license was already suspended for another offense. Ava had bugged at the idea of real jail time and was strong eno
ugh to get you into her back seat, then her first floor apartment. She watched you sleep on her couch. You kept breathing. She gave you an ice compress for your head. You asked for Advil; she came back with two Valium and a Xanax, delivered by slender hands, chipped black polish on the fingernails.

  She asked why you were out running so late. You told her you worked a day job and preferred to run when it was cooler out. She asked what you did. You said roofing. Seemed tough.

  She asked you running questions, caught your excitement about the topic, used it. You could see her game—ingratiate until she knew charges would be dropped—but you didn’t want to stop playing. You liked the way she was tending to you. It stirred something you hadn’t felt in years.

  Plus, she was easy on the eyes. Heart-shaped pale face framed with short black hair. Decent lips made more charming by a crooked smile. Legs that seemed to be two thirds of her frame. She wore grey shorts with pink trim piping, a thin green cotton T-shirt that showed off the curves on each side of her small breasts.

  You knew most men didn’t get to see her like this—casual, relaxed and gracious. She knew you knew and rode the vibe. She showed you her tattoos—two thin stripes, one running up the back of each leg, meant to mimic the back seam of a pair of pin-up stockings. As she got closer you saw that each seam was actually composed of delicate cursive words.

  She bent forward, touched her toes so you could see the entirety of each line.

  The right leg said: . . . I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him

  The left leg continued: yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.

  “It’s from Ulysses,” she said.

  She admitted that every time she read that last chapter she felt like “rubbing one out.” She made a circling motion in the sky with her index finger and closed her eyes. Then she smiled, full blaze.