Dystopia

by Richard Christian Matheson

  "Negative space as vaccine," I suggested, pointing out I hadn't really said anything.

  "No. Just caring," she said, before getting back to her script reading and empty world.

  But here's the twist that made time stop:

  She left an excited message on my machine, last night, well past four a.m. And I mean emotionally excited, not just tactically passionate. It seems her behaviorally devoid boyfriend can't live without her and finally snapped, drove out to her house, in a fit of epiphany, and when she wouldn't let him in, screamed a marriage proposal at the top of his lungs, waking the entire street.

  She'd found herself in moved tears and accepted, as if receiving an Oscar before a world audience. The neighbors applauded and begged them to go to bed.

  After the newly acquired fiancé had fallen asleep, she'd called me wanting to talk the whole situation over, in forensic detail, because she thinks I'm a "good listener." She said she's also starting to think about starting a family; rousting her slumbering fallopia.

  "It's time," she said, in her sleepy voice. "1 don't know what I've been waiting for."

  Miracles.

  I'm starting to think no one's safe.

  Break-Up

  They were in bed, curled together like children.

  That was when he whispered it and her expression quietly tore open. She asked how long he'd felt this way. He gestured without detail, guessed two or three weeks. She stared at him, wanting to know how soon he intended to break things off.

  "Now," he answered, a silhouette.

  She gathered the comforter around herself, like a funeral shroud, and started to cry when he told her the relationship was good, but, that for reasons he couldn't name, he wanted out.

  "I'll change," she offered, sitting higher, ready to negotiate. She grasped a glass of water from her bedside table with pale fingers, and told him she could be more what he wanted. She'd find a way. She watched for his reaction, optimism trapping her.

  He rose and began to dress, telling her it was too late. He needed something different. But even as he said it, in some odd sense he didn't relate to the words. Still, he made no effort to correct the message, though it frightened him.

  She tried to understand and told him if he needed time off to take as much as he required. A weekend. A year. She would wait.

  He began buttoning his shirt, tying his tie. She watched as he laced his wing-tips and asked if he would call.

  ". . . no." He wouldn't say more.

  "You can't do this to us!" Her eyes were wide, angry. He was an executioner, sentencing them.

  He pulled on his suit coat, sat on the bedside, spoke softly.

  "Try to understand. It's not us. It's me. People grow. They want different things. Nothing's forever." He didn't know where the ideas were coming from and felt himself in some grotesque trance.

  Sun struck the brass headboard, as if controlled by a catwalk technician, and lit her bloodless lips. They parted to free a sound of drowning; assassination.

  "It's someone else, isn't it?"

  "No. I'm just feeling different from when we met." He tried to remember when or how they'd met and couldn't. He felt sick.

  "We've known each other six months and you've already fallen out of love? What about all the promises? Our plans? Damn you!" She tried to slap him but thoughtlessly drew her fingers into claws and swiped his skin. Three uneven scratches etched warpaint stripes under one eye, and he wiped his cheek, smearing a cuff red. He tried to say something as she watched the blood glide down his face.

  "I'm sorry, Jill . . . maybe you're right, maybe I don't love you anymore. . . I don't know. If I could explain it. . ." he sounded lost; unable to translate himself. ". . . I just have to move on."

  She looked poisoned. "Get out. Now."

  He grabbed his wallet and keys, looked at her one last time, closed the door behind himself. She caught her reflection in the mirror and threw the bedside clock at her deserted image.

  Outside her apartment, he walked toward his car and stopped to lean against the wall in the underground garage. He was suddenly nauseous and a spasm broke glass in his stomach. He began to vomit and as he arched over the greasy cement, the sensation felt somehow familiar, the pains like dim memories. He became sicker and tried to think about the conversation he'd just had with . . . but he couldn't recall her name.

  Or who she was. Or what they'd been doing.

  He stared down at his right hand, which supported him against the wall, but he no longer recognized it. Where it had been slight of structure, covered with fine, blonde fuzz, it now had black hair on its back and knuckles. The wrists were growing thicker, fingers more powerful, tendons sleek beneath the now tanned skin. He tried to concentrate on where he was and saw an I.D. bracelet on his wrist. It grew gradually tighter and he unclasped it. On one side was an engraving:

  I LOVE YOU, MADLY. JILL.

  He stared at it, thinking, concentrating, unable to place the name. He flipped it and on the other side was another name: David.

  He felt a flicker of recollection but it vanished in seconds and he was quickly distracted by the feeling of growing taller, more sinewed. He felt an aggressive stream of ideas and sensations filling his mind; things deep inside dying, other things replacing them, taking over, taking control. He sensed he'd been through this hundreds of times, somehow even knew it, as the change spread like a perverse warmth, becoming more potent, settling within his cells; becoming them.

  He stopped vomiting. Stood straight.

  He was inches taller, pounds heavier. His face had broadened, the nose more flat now. A heavy stubble had come in and he felt his face, probing at the red wounds on his cheek as they filled in and closed. He ran strong hands through hair that was now long and curly as a woman came up behind him.

  "Excuse me? I'm looking for my boyfriend?"

  He turned and Jill stared at him, hoping he could help.

  But he didn't remember anything about her and, in a deep voice, said he'd seen no one. Then, he walked away, not knowing to take his car.

  As he exited the garage and moved down the street, he felt a wallet against his thigh, withdrew it. He looked at the face on the driver's license and felt nothing as he bellowed the wallet wide, took the cash and tossed it aside.

  Then, feeling the morning sun on his new life, he walked on, good for another six months.

  Whatever

  "You're gonna come around

  To the sad, sad truth.

  The dirty lowdown."

  —Boz Scaggs, "Lowdown"

  Rolling Stone

  Inter-Office MEMO

  To: Michael Blaine, Senior editor

  From: Lisa Frankel, Executive Editor.

  M:

  Bad news. Looked over Matheson's pages. Frankly puzzled. They're indeed a fascination. Yet somehow elusive. Despite the horror of what actually happened, they amount to nothing more than a scrapbook. Evocative. But transient. Not surprised Esquire and The New Yorker decided to pass. My best suggestion: we do the same.

  I know this writer is a friend of yours. But I feel strongly if we get into this, we make a real mistake. Bottom line: the band once mattered, but in my mind is not legend; simply forgotten. And the manuscript, while accomplished, is unpublishable. Wish I had better news.

  Awaiting your thoughts,

  L.

  cc: M. Blaine/L. Frankel/J. Wenner

  FORTRESS OF THE DEAD CITY.

  AIX-EN-PROVENCE, FRANCE

  AUGUST 27, 1969.

  Flies.

  Striking skin; bullets with eyes of dried blood. Clinging to smooth stone. Fortress walls. Sleeping in chunks of shade that creep; shadow icebergs.

  Tourists. Heat.

  Salty half-moons under armpits. Sandals scuffing ancient rock.

  Turkish cigarettes. Lovers hold humid hands.

  A deserted city. Long dead. Before Christ was born. Hated.

  Pounded onto wood with nails; left to bleed, a slaughtered calf.

 
Cries unanswered. Reasons unprovided.

  A couple.

  Young. Nineteen. Seventeen. Him. Her.

  A relationship. Two months. Moods beyond control. Passion and fear.

  Suffering.

  Her Nikon, slicing moments off time; a gently clicking scalpel.

  Memories for a book. An album. A cocktail table mausoleum.

  Always fighting. Driving from Paris to Monte Carlo. Stopping for iced espresso in a town. A charming village.

  Staring in silence; a joint burial.

  He opens his guitar case.

  Metal strings hot under sun; branding fingers. Plays a new ballad.

  Sings softly. Children gather. He smiles, a barefoot saint. It's about her.

  She tries not to hear. Feels her life washed away.

  He isn't hers anymore.

  This trip was an epitaph.

  She begins to cry.

  He's going back to America. To that bastard Tutt.

  To record; to find fame.

  To Whatever.

  FROM A TAPED CONVERSATION.

  MONTSERRAT

  NEW YEAR'S DAY, 1972.

  "I'm fuckin' exhausted. Bad influenza."

  Jagger. Straw to gimlet. Horse teeth shoving out lips; gaudy fenders. "Is that a pun? Christ. . . "

  When he talks it looks like oral sex. He's tanning. A lewd little boy in Spandex; the Groin Gatsby, afloat on a 150 foot bauble. Right now, he has the sniffles and a hundred temperature. His features are a water-retentive Halloween mask; not a face that should host a head cold.

  The other Stones are down there somewhere, in wet slow-mo, with rented air, scoping out the coral and clown-triggers. Scaring the specimens with horned, goateed jewelry. Scarred arms. Albino eels worth too many million to pester the math.

  "Sunken cheeks amid sunken treasure," Mick suggests. "So... what is it? You want my opinion?" He likes the idea, disaffected glee trickling. He lights an antique pipe, tokes. Answers, tucking air in lungs, sounding inside a heavy sack.

  ". . . okay. They're us. If we were good enough to be them."

  I jot it down.

  He dimples Learjet cool. Licks the edge of his perfect little glass, a pink rag sponging. Then, as suddenly, looks off into a place he wants out of, fast. A place of torrential wrongness.

  "But that shit they write is intense. These guys are tormented." He shrugs. "It's not Woodstock anymore. Besides, like Keith says, that was just mud and bad acid."

  He blows Barnum air, yawns like the world's richest kitty.

  "But same time . . . I wouldn't want to be them. The light they use inside those heads . . . too fuckin' bright. You can see everything. You heard "Error of the Opposite" from the first album? The songs are fuckin' brilliant but . . . where you get a light like that?"

  Sunglasses reflect yachts, refrigerator-magnet-sized boats sliding across his lenses. He says nothing. Sneezes. Coughs S&M, Caruso guck from a throat insured by Lloyds. Groans, unhappily.

  "I'd hate to see everything. That's why they invented . . . what did they invent, again, mate?"

  "Shadows?"

  He shakes his head. No, that's not it.

  "Limits?"

  He's losing interest.

  You can tell when that happens to rock stars. They dive into perfect sea and soak you.

  BAM MAGAZINE.

  DECEMBER 9, 1969.

  BLOOD SPA TTERINGS AND FLORAL ARRANGEMENTS

  Petals, a soft-rock group that specialized in emotion-drenched lyrics, has broken up, and its members have left to form other groups.

  Founder, Rikki Tutt, is rumored to be working in an L.A. studio, with ex-Séance member, Greg Magurk, known for his acerbic lyrics and dark wordplay in such well-known songs as 1967's top-ten hit "Miss Take."

  Magurk recently returned from a honeymoon in France, during which his much-publicized marriage, to Bibi Rousse, a former colonic hygienist, was abruptly cancelled.

  Drummer, Stomp McGoo, late of Louisiana funk band Pressure, is manning the sticks. Phil Zapata, of folk duo Zapata and Lake is rumored to be jumping ship, from the latest Z&L European tour, to join. Lake has reportedly filed a lawsuit against his partner. Their Take A Guess album has been top ten for over five weeks.

  Sounds like something plenty interesting getting rolled and lighted here, kids. Keep you posted.

  LYRICS FROM "HERE PUSSY"

  FROM SECOND SEANCE ALBUM.

  WRITTEN BY GREGORYMAGURK.

  COURTESY VOICE RECORDS.

  1968.

  When I met you,

  I wasn't good for much.

  A six-pack of nowhere.

  Wasn't safe to touch.

  You cooked me eggplant,

  Ironed my flaws and clothes.

  Now I'm just a house cat.

  Don’t suffer all those lows.

  ROLLING STONE

  RANDOM NOTES.

  FEBRUARY 1970.

  Newly formed group, Whatever, is currently recording, working with L.A. studio, producing whiz, Purdee Boots. Rumor is various Beatles and Hollies are sitting in, and that the tracks, so far, are monsters. The as-yet-untitled album is due out within the year, on VOICE Records.

  FROM MY NOTES.

  FILLMORE WEST SAN FRANCISCO.

  BILL GRAHAM'S OFFICE.

  JUNE 5, 1970.

  Portion of taped interview with Whatever manager, Lenny Lupo.

  Q. How would you describe the band's sound?

  A. It's the death knell of nitwit rock. Got melody. Got ideas. You know Zappa's a fan? Wants to sit in on the next album. If it was the seventeenth century, these guys would be writing operas. Tell ya, if I was Bob Dylan, man, I'd shoot my rhyming dictionary in the head and open a dry cleaners.

  Q. You represented folk acts and surf bands in the sixties. How did you decide to manage the group?

  A. I listened. I liked.

  Q. The debut album, Know Means Know, is rumored to be amazing.

  A. Tell you something. Whatever is the American Beatles. I defy anyone to listen to their music and not be profoundly blown away.

  Q. Surf is dead. The British invasion is dead. Where are the seventies going?

  A. Ask me in ten years.

  NEW YORK TIMES. MUSIC REVIEW.

  "WHATEVER," BOTTOM LINE.

  FEBRUARY 4, 1972.

  Whatever, a band said to have an I.Q. too big for its own good, escaped imperious repute last night and shook the earth.

  Their first album, the exquisitely produced Know Means Know, has been enjoying the view from the top of nearly every critic's list this year. Its exacting mosaics of song and voice, via producer Purdee Boots, is a radiant marvel. But live, the Los Angeles-based quintet is even better.

  Their compositions, the work of moody, ponytailed guitarist Greg Magurk, and angel-faced bass player/lead vocalist Rikki Tutt, are like small novels, set to highly original scores.

  However, not content with mere literate Beatle-esquery, the wordplay, observation and heartache of Messrs. Magurk and Tutt are only part of the hat trick. Their vocals and tunesmithing are also fed by primal rhythms - a voodoo body blow. Make no mistake, this is not a vinyl meringue, abloom with tender nothings. It is rock and roll that keeps its mouth open while it chews.

  And it is music nearly impossible to resist.

  Last night, playing to a stunned crowd, which packed The Bottom Line, Whatever was a dizzying Houdini. Mr. Tutt's vocals were choirboy-sweet and soared without effort. Mr. Magurk's baleful arias were darker, oozing sly carnality. Wicked lyrics overflowed with estimable ironies, yet never felt like self-indulged puzzles.

  While the rest of rock and roll (with few exceptions, like John Lennon and Paul McCartney, Joni Mitchell or Bob Dylan; perhaps a stray, poignant phrasing from Neil Young, Paul Simon, or Lou Reed) revel in stick drawings, Whatever is doing full-figure studies.

  Mouth-dropping chops, from drummer Stomp McGoo, gouged a groove so deep it's amazing no one fell in and got hurt.

  Keyboardist Phil Zapata, a former ch
ild prodigy, is all grownup now; a honky-tonk Chopin, who smokes Camels while sledging keyboard, and wears shades so dark he takes on the appearance of some Steinway thug.

  Rhythm guitarist G.G. Wall, draped in trademark fringe-jacket and skintight jeans, chugged the songs into a trance state, power-plucking a Fender neck that must've needed a cigarette afterward.

  Apart from the astonishing songs of Messrs. Tutt and Magurk, this band could be hugely successful on its own. Working with Messrs. Tutt and Magurk, a supergroup seems probable.

  Like some fugitive smoke, Whatever has risen quickly from the horizon of poseurs and record company puppets that stultify top 40 rock and roll. They are not kings, yet. But there is royal talent here.

  With its pristine vocals and lyrical savagery, Whatever has ascended to meaning and wonder.

  Something rare touches these young men.

  CRAWDADDY MAGAZINE.

  AUGUST 1976.

  "It's Hubris."

  "Stanley Hubris. One of our finest filmmakers," says Greg Magurk, Rikki Tutt's partner and cofounder of Whatever, grinning.

  He's currently at pool's edge, under a hundred pounds of zinc oxide—a 5'11" can of Crisco.

  "We're forever accused of trying to make the journalists trip up, you know? Like we trade in some quicksand prattle and dare initiates to step closer." Tutt is fed up.

  It's an ultramarine, vaporizer day in Honolulu.

  Tutt, Magurk and the rest of Whatever are taking a few days off from L.A., swatting bugs from freshly written songs for the new album, Philip 's Head, a tribute to band member Phil Zapata, who died last month in Greenwich Village. Tutt, a private pilot, flew the band to the funeral in Sag Harbor, in a retired Avianca 707 the band bought and refurbished—a floating retreat, gutted and filled with warm, fuzzy hedonisms.

  The jet, which Whatever members call SPOT, brought them to the islands and rockets the entourage to all shows.