Couch

by Benjamin Parzybok

  Erik and Tree watched Thom move his lips and stare at the sky for a bit.

  “It was more like having 2,666,667 monkeys typing for five hours. Or, if you flipped the monkeys and time, that’d be fourteen hundred and sixty-seven days of a thousand monkeys with their thousand typewriters pounding out one to two characters per second around the clock—or the equivalent of ten novels per hour. I racked up just over four years of monkeys and amassed three hundred and fifty-two thousand novel-length works. Somewhat shy of eternity, but it was really cool. I got caught, and they claimed I’d cost them a fortune. . . . Sixteen hundred people unable to work for a day, plus their network was shut down and the time it took them to fix the computers and undo any supposed damages. A million in damages.” Thom grinned.

  “So what happened?” said Erik. “Did you go to jail?”

  “No. Almost. The computer world is a funny place. In the settlement, I had to give them the rights to the source code for the program, and I was on probation. They sell pieces of it now, and believe me have more than made up for the money that they said I cost them.”

  “Holy shit, you mean you could have sold it in the first place?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “You’re crazy, man.”

  “Yeah, I guess. I wouldn’t be here with you ducks if I’d sold it.”

  “Did it write any books?” Tree said.

  “Good question. Possibly. There are some grave problems with the original question. Is the monkey required to write a complete novel, sans nonsense? Or could they contribute only a single line? All we need to do is read back through a hundred and ninety billion characters for some plot structure. As soon as we can make computers that recognize plot . . . Well, we’ll be making us, we’ll be making humans, we’ll be God. Which was my original point anyway.”

  “How did they let you do that? Don’t they have something that’d catch viruses?”

  “Well, a lot less than you think but . . . ah . . . I was working there at the time. The message was generated internally from the human-resources department—I sent them a Christmas card in the form of a script. People trusted it. And when they double clicked on it, they got a real Christmas card. It was a silent virus. They didn’t even know they were infected until a month later when I ran the monkeys.” Thom shrugged. “I think someone could do it from the outside as well. And even though a lot of people were outraged, some key people thought what I’d done was very funny, interesting, I hope, and I suspect they let me off a bit easy. I was fired, of course.”

  “That’s cool,” said Erik and patted him on the shoulder. “You’re a nerd, it’s obvious, but that’s a cool thing to do if you’re a nerd.”

  “Thanks, Erik. I’m glad I have your approval.”

  They used Sheilene’s map to try to spot a good campsite. They found a secluded, deeply treed area along the bank of the Columbia. It was a dark campsite, enshrouded in shadows, but after a day of wary looks from townspeople, the privacy appealed. The tracks wandered inland away from them, and they weren’t eager to begin the inland trek away from the river in the morning.

  They set the couch up on the side of the campsite closest to the river and cleared areas to sleep. Tree made a fire, and after numerous tries with wet wood finally got the flame to stick. With an hour of light left in the day, Tree boiled water on a rickety setup over the fire and began making a potato and onion soup, expertly cutting an onion with no surface to cut on. Thom set up a makeshift shelter using the back of the couch as one end, and Erik busied himself with finding an obscene amount of firewood until, bored of that, Thom saw, he did some sort of silly looking martial-arts thing facing the river.

  Thom wrapped his laptop in layers of plastic, fearing another rain, and stayed as packed as possible. Erik had done his best to spread his meager possessions evenly over the campsite, as if he were planting seeds for a later harvest of better gear.

  With the soup cooking, they took up perches on the bank, dangling their legs over the three-foot ledge, the river running fast below them. Erik handed out sunflower seeds. The sun pierced through a cloud-covered sky at the very edge of the horizon. They spit shells into the river, watched the water take them, Lilliputian craft spinning helplessly in the current, then talked idly and quietly. There were bird sounds and the unsettlingly lonely hoot of an owl. The deep throat of a giant diesel engine as a ship passed. Night fell, and the fire emphasized the darkness, the rest of the world a painting that had been blotted by a sea of ink.

  Thom fought a paranoia that something was just beyond the feeble arm of firelight, something watching them. They transferred the sunflower seed shell-spitting into the fire and waited for the soup to finish. The shells twisted and cracked in the heat.

  “People used to be able to just go places,” Erik said. “We’re along railroad tracks, and that’s why we can more or less walk in a straight line. But all this is owned by people. Fences everywhere. You can’t walk anywhere anymore.”

  “Been that way for quite a while.”

  “A couple hundred years ago you could get on your horse and see the country,” said Erik. “The Indians had such a more intelligent idea of ownership.”

  “Well, the people settling were farmers,” Thom said. “They had reason for fences.”

  “Some had, others were just greedy. I think.”

  “Yeah, I suppose so. It’s true that the world is colonized—there’s nothing left to make you feel free, like you could head off into the unknown.”

  “Exactly, exactly! That’s what I’m talking about. What if you don’t want to earn money. Be stuck in this. There’s no way out. If you try to do something different, then you’re unpatriotic. I’d love to be a hunter-gatherer.”

  “That soup smells so good I can’t believe it.” Thom’s stomach ached hollowly. “When’s it going to be ready?”

  “Another ten minutes.”

  “You’ve got these people that get off the grid,” Erik spit a slough of shells into the fire.

  “Watch the soup,” Tree said.

  “Sorry. And that takes a lot of money. I mean I guess you could live in a cabin in the woods without electricity and water and whatnot.”

  “Some communes emulate tribal systems,” Tree said.

  “Yeah,” said Erik. “I guess what I’m saying is I would have loved to live sometime in the past when the struggle for survival had something to do with how you were able to find food, firewood, build a place, ride a horse, fend off the wild . . . and not how well you could bag groceries at Safeway or,” he gestured toward Tree, “make sure somebody’s lawn had the right level of grass”—he nodded at Thom—“or type numbers into a screen.”

  “What I do . . . It’s, uh, a little more complicated than that.”

  “Yeah, but we’re just slaves in somebody else’s system. There’s no place left anymore to make your own system or live differently. If you don’t pay taxes, you’re an outlaw.”

  Thom nodded. “Could you really give it all up though? I think we’re addicted to our own adrenaline. The hypercapitalist world is a dreary struggle, but it’s also fraught with danger and excitement and crime and stimuli, and we’re addicted to its rush.”

  “If I could be anyone, I’d be Robin Hood, robbing rich fuckers and then giving to the people. That’d be plenty of rush.”

  “I didn’t know you had such a thing for the people.”

  Erik shrugged, and Thom thought he heard him mumble something about his parents.

  Tree turned sharply, looking out into the blackness. “Something’s out there.”

  “Eh?” said Thom.

  Erik leapt to his feet. “Who’s there?”

  There was silence outside their haven of light, the crackling of the fire the only sound, and Thom smiled at the paranoia of his roommates. He felt something on his neck, and he reached his hand back to brush it off and connected with metal. He turned and saw a man holding a gun on him, and his gut dropped out from under him. Another man was aiming a shotgu
n at Erik. They were dressed in long overcoats, one with a cowboy hat, the other a ski hat, and for a moment Thom thought he’d conjured them out of the past with their conversation. He’d never had a gun held on him before and thought it possible—his teeth starting to chatter—that he was one of those who gets on his knees and begs.

  “Hi,” Erik said. “You gentlemen are just in time for supper.”

  “We’re here for the couch.”

  “You can’t have it,” said Tree.

  “I don’t see you have much of a choice.”

  “He’s definitely got a point there, Tree.” Erik calmly fed the fire another stick. “But of course, if you guys think holding guns on people is the best way to outfit your living room, that’s your own choice. To me it seems downright silly. But hurry on up, take your furniture and get out of here.”

  “Pick it up,” said cowboy hat and gestured to Erik with his chin.

  “Ah, you want furniture movers too. Now that’s another story. I don’t move furniture for no one. I guess you’ll have to kill me.”

  Cowboy hat looked at his partner, then nodded toward Tree and Thom. “You pick it up.”

  Thom scrambled to his feet and stationed himself at one end of the couch. Tree and he picked it up. Thom was grateful that the weight seemed unchanged. He didn’t want to have to explain that under the barrel of a shotgun.

  “Throw it in the river, boys,” yelled Erik. “Let them fetch it from there.”

  “You bring it over here,” said cowboy hat.

  Thom started to walk to where the man had gestured and realized Tree was pulling the other way with a surprising strength. Tree’s eyes were wild, and firelight flickered across his face.

  “In the river,” Tree said through his teeth.

  “Tree,” Thom appealed, nodding his head toward the men with guns. Thom had a slippery foothold on mud, and Tree managed to pull him a step toward the bank.

  “Sorry, fellers,” said Erik, “we’ve got this all worked out. It’s going in the river.” Tree pulled Thom another step toward the river, and then he managed a foothold on a rock.

  Both men with shotguns took a step toward the couch, and Erik stood up, his fist straight-armed, and caught cowboy hat in the throat.

  The man in the cowboy hat dropped the gun and held his throat, unable to breathe.

  “Sorry about that, mate,” Erik said. He picked up the shotgun as ski hat turned on him. He walked slowly toward him, both of them pointing at each other. “Ever been in a standoff?” Erik asked the man. The man held the rifle to his shoulder and began to sweat.

  “I’ll shoot you right now,” said ski-hat. “I’ll kill you right now.”

  “You’re not holding your gun right. You’ve never killed anybody, have you? First time you’ve held a gun, I bet. You’re not going to do it like that. Look, you don’t need to aim. You need to concentrate on me. Aiming isn’t going to get you anywhere. I’m right in front of you. You’re not going to miss. We’re no longer at the gun-skills part of the evening.”

  “You’re full of shit,” ski hat said, and if Thom could have found his voice he would have backed him up. “This wasn’t my idea anyway. We were just paid to pick up a couch.”

  “I’ve killed for furniture before.” Erik shrugged. “It’s not such a big deal. I used to work for Castro.” Erik took the shotgun in one hand and pushed it against the man’s crotch. “Now that would suck, wouldn’t it?” He smiled. “I knew a man who had his crotch blown out once. Terrible thing, just terrible.”

  Ski hat pushed the gun against Erik’s chest. “That’s enough. I’m going to kill you, you sonofabitch.”

  “Sure, sure, sure you are, it’s your job, and then you’ve got to do that to my two friends too. Imagine trying to do that with your crotch blown out.” Erik laughed heartily. “That would not be fun.”

  Thom came to his senses finally, realized he was still stupidly holding the couch, set it down, grabbed the big rock under his foot, and knocked it over the man’s head. The man fell to the ground unconscious.

  “Jesus Christ, what the hell is wrong with you! I thought you were good at this sort of thing,” Erik yelled at Thom. “I almost shit my pants.”

  “Sorry, I . . . you sounded like you knew what you were doing.”

  “I did! I was waiting for you to knock him out, goddamnit!”

  There was a giant splash behind them, and Thom turned around to find that the couch and Tree were gone.

  “Holy crap, Tree!” Thom yelled.

  “In the water,” said Tree. “Come on, hurry, I can’t hold against the current much longer.”

  Thom and Erik ran to the bank and held their hands out into the blackness. They couldn’t see Tree. The vicinity of the fire created a veil of darkness on its edge. “Can you see us?” said Thom.

  “Yes, I can see you. I don’t want back up; I want you to come down. I’ve got a hold of a branch, and it’s breaking.”

  “The hell are you talking about,” said Erik. “There’s no way in hell I’m getting in there.”

  “Yes, you are,” Tree said. “Don’t worry, the couch floats.”

  Erik looked at Thom to see if it was just him, or had Tree gone mad. Thom reassured him that Tree had gone mad.

  “He dreamed this,” Thom said. The boom of a shotgun blast sounded behind them, and Thom looked at Erik to make sure he was still alive and then without thinking dove into the icy Columbia water, surfaced shivering, his teeth clattering from shock. A hand reached out of the darkness and grabbed him, guided him shaking onto the couch, which miraculously continued not to sink. A moment later another hand reached up and they pulled Erik onboard, and the couch still did not sink. The branch broke and they spun off into the current, watching flashlight beams strobe around the water behind them.

  “I am no longer speaking to you,” Erik whispered.

  Tree nodded solemnly. “Okay.”

  “We were doing just fine. There’s no freaking reason to have thrown the f-f-f-f-f-f—agh!—fucking couch in the water,” Erik said as a convulsive shiver ran through him. They could just barely see each other in the dim light. Erik wiped his hand over his head, and water poured from his hair. “We’re going to die out here. And it’s your effking fault, Tree.”

  “Hypothermia,” Thom said. “You’re right.”

  Tree handed him a hard shape that emanated heat. “Soup,” he said.

  “How in the hell did you manage to get the soup down here?” Erik said.

  “My laptop!” Thom said. “Shit!”

  “I got it,” Tree said and handed Thom a spoon.

  Tree handed Erik a bowl and spoon. “I didn’t get much of your stuff. It was sort of spread out.”

  “Hey, listen, asshole, I’m not talking to you,” Erik said.

  “Here’s a towel,” Tree said.

  “Where did you get a towel?”

  “Sheilene gave it to me.”

  Erik shook his head in wonder, then wrapped it about himself. “My fake beard,” he said.

  “What?”

  “And my straw hat. What if I need a disguise?”

  The couch spun on. What they could see of the shore moved, changed. They were in the gyroscope of the river, movement, wetness, the force of the current on every side.

  “Don’t worry, I dreamed this.”

  “Listen,” said Thom, “your dreaming it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. Your doing it because you dreamed it does. Don’t you think you might not be dreaming about what we should do, but what stupid things you are going to do?”

  Tree didn’t answer.

  “That’s right. You’re the asshole that threw us into the water, not your dreams.”

  “I never thought of it that way.”

  Erik huffed and scratched fiercely at his face. He was growing hair at an alarming rate. “Arrrrghh!” he yelled into the night, and the yell echoed across the water.

  “Well, it’s easier on the feet,” Thom said.

  “Yeah,” Tree s
aid, “easier on the feet.”

  “You shut up,” Erik said. Erik attempted to take his shoes off without touching the water, rocking the couch, elbowing roommates. “Someone tried to steal the couch, for fuck sake. What is this madness? They had shotguns!”

  “Nice job back there. I take that back about your losing fights all the time,” Thom said.

  “See?”

  “But—” Thom watched the moon appear and disappear again, wondered at these strange creatures he traveled with—“you didn’t really work for Castro, right?”

  “No, but I met him. Nice guy, loves to eat.”

  “How in the hell did you meet Fidel Castro?”

  “Friend of my dad’s. Forget about it.”

  Thom saw the giant form of a freighter behind them and then realized they didn’t have any way to steer. “Ship,” he said. “A ship is coming.”

  They sat cross-legged to keep their feet out of the water, but the couch floated surprisingly high with the three of them sitting on it. The water was black and roiled about the couch burbling and murmuring to itself, and the couch did constant slow circles. Thom saw the ship gaining on them, heard it pushing a wall of water in front of it. Giant engines churned the water. Clouds covered the moon so that the shore was invisible. Black water melted into black shoreline, into black trees and a black sky. It was only them, a black dot on a blanket of black, and the looming, illuminated ship, now only a hundred yards away. Thom, Erik, and Tree had their hands in the water trying to paddle to one side, pawing frantically. At thirty yards away they could see the crew on the edge of the ship, oblivious of the tiny couch far below them. They yelled and screamed but could scarcely hear themselves over the roar of the ship. A wall of metal rose before them. Thom imagined himself again the character in movies who gets on his knees and pleads. What about the life-flash-before-my-eyes thing? His mind calculated the probabilities of death. Multitasking. Hello? How about a little help here, brain. Dive! brain said, Dive off! Of course. Thom eyed the tar-water at his feet and chose the couch-death probability scenario. The ship a mere couch-length or two away, pushing them up, sucking them in.