The Great Glowing Coils of the Universe

by Joseph Fink

  [Loud crunch]

  The door’s come off its hinges. It’s gotten in. I’m ducking into this stall.

  [Whispering]

  I’m peering now under the walls and see nothing. I’m standing now on the commode and looking over the walls and see nothing. Listeners, the only thing more terrifying than seeing the devil is no longer being able to see the devil.

  Perhaps, I should be quiet. Intern Jeremy, can you, one, call animal control, and, two, take us now to the weath—

  [Roar and crash sound]

  What was that?? Oh no. No. Khoshekh. What have you done with my cat you monst—

  [Loud shriek]

  Jeremy. Take us to the weather! Come here you son of a—

  WEATHER: “Cover Me Up” by Jason Isbell

  Listeners . . . oh god, listeners, Khoshekh has been hurt very badly. Animal control came and took him to a hospital. They think he will live. They think he will live differently. They think there will be significantly less of him physically and mentally. But he will live.

  He is my boy. He is my buddy. I love him so much. And this thing. This thing comes here and—

  Yes. Yes. Let me tell you about this thing, this awful beast. After I saw it tear Khoshekh from his fixed point, and bite into his side, I kicked it. I kicked it again. Jeremy helped me pin it down, and animal control tried to sedate it. I wanted to beat it to death with a hammer. But I had no hammer, only self-control.

  Animal control tried to inject it with their delicious poisons, but they stopped. They said we can’t. We can’t inject. It is a machine. And they flipped its switch and it died. I have never been so relieved to be safe and so disappointed to be shorted my vengeance.

  Our new program director, Lauren, came in and wanted to know why we destroyed my gift. My gift? I asked. It’s your birthday, she replied. Daniel and I and the whole Strexcorp management team got you that StrexPet, because we know you love animals so much. And I replied, but it’s a machine. A biomachine, she retorted. And it’s not my birthday, I mumbled as animal control took Khoshekh away.

  I’m going to go now. Go see my Khoshekh. He should be out of surgery in half an hour or so. I’m sure he will live. I’m sure he will float again at a fixed point exactly four feet up in the men’s bathroom of our community radio station.

  I’m sure there is vengeance to be found. I’m sure I will find it. I’m sure I just have to find the right recipient.

  Stay tuned next for the sound of your own thoughts, broadcast live on the radio for all to hear.

  And as always, good night, Night Vale. Good night.

  PROVERB: You won’t sleep when you’re dead, either.

  EPISODE 44:

  “COOKIES”

  APRIL 1, 2014

  GUEST VOICE: LAUREN SHARPE

  I WAS NEVER A GIRL SCOUT.

  I was in 4-H though, and I spent one summer completely satisfied with my place in the world.

  I’ll try to explain that feeling later.

  Instead of cookies, we sold geraniums to raise money. I remember going to my 4-H leader’s house to have a planning meeting. The air was warm; it had just rained. I liked the way the rain looked on the sidewalk as we came up to the front door. I learned to make a thing called Puppy Chow that day.

  My two areas of study in 4-H were geology and cooking. I knew a decent amount about rocks and stuff. My sister and I used to hunt for arrowheads and geodes in the cornfield behind our house. For the state fair I made a poster with all kinds of geological specimens. And some brownies.

  I want to try to explain that feeling I mentioned. This is a feeling that I’ve felt only a handful of times in my life and it’s a fleeting moment and it’s so quiet and simple. It’s connected to creating, creation, place, and time. It’s a feeling of being just right, just where you are in the world. It’s 78 degrees under a shady tree and knowing that everything is really okay. It’s just a moment. It’s over. But it was there and you know that it’s real and maybe it’s because you were in that weird and wonderful place between being a little kid and a teenager and it was the summer and all you had to do was think about rocks and brownies and selling some flowers and it’s nice to have a purpose and doesn’t it feel just great to be alive sometimes?!

  Here’s how to make Puppy Chow:

  Get a big bowl.

  Put a bunch of peanut butter, regular butter, and chocolate chips in it.

  Put it in the microwave and zap it until it’s melted.

  Double up two brown paper shopping bags and fill the bag with two boxes of Chex or Crispix-like, neutral-tasting cereal.

  Dump the bowl of melty goodness into the bag of cereal and close it up tight.

  Shake it well.

  Open it up again.

  Toss a bunch of powdered sugar in and close it up tight again.

  Shake it until it covers all of the cereal, then open it and taste a bit. It’s delicious. You’re welcome.

  —Lauren Sharpe, Voice of Strexcorp’s Lauren Mallard

  All that glitters is not gold. Particularly that thing over there. That’s maybe a giant insect of some sort. It’s really too dark to tell.

  WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE.

  I am not a good salesman. This is why I am a radio host, listeners, because while I like to talk to people—“a real people person” it says in Russian at the bottom of my college degree—I don’t like to shape a conversation toward buying and selling. I like to tell people stories, stories that affect them, allowing my listeners to process the stories in their own unique ways. I don’t want to directly tell them how to think. I am not a good salesman.

  That being said, I have Girl Scout cookies. Please, if you want some, come on up to the station.

  My niece Janice joined the Girl Scouts last year and I have box upon box of Caramel deLites, Thin Mints, and those lemon ones. There are also quite a few of these new cookies in very heavy, unmarked black boxes that I think are made entirely of metal. And there’s one box that’s a five-foot-by-five-foot wooden crate with airholes cut into the top and “Peanut Butter Patties” scrawled on it in permanent marker. I can hear breathing inside.

  I know people normally order the cookies first and then get them delivered weeks later, but sometimes a mother goes out of town, and the stepfather isn’t on top of his stepdaughter’s extracurricular activities, and then the child doesn’t know how to sell cookies on her own, so the kindly uncle with a busy radio job has to step in and buy up a bunch of boxes so she can go camping with her friends while you continue to disappoint everyone with your inattention to detail, and sports gambling, and idiotic taste in shoes, Steve Carlsberg. Yes, Steve, this is how things sometimes happen.

  Anyway, listeners, these cookies are delicious. And I had to buy a lot of them. There is barely any room here in the studio or in my producer, Daniel’s, booth. So buy some cookies. Please help us. It is difficult to move actually.

  Sorry. I am not a good salesman.

  Many of you have written in asking about our station cat, Khoshekh. He was attacked by an animal that our stup— that our evi— that our Station Management let in the building for some careless reason.

  Khoshekh’s on the mend. He lost his right eye. His legs are healing, but he’s missing part of his front left paw and will walk with a limp. He’s at the vet today to have the feeding tube removed. It’s fine. He is fine.

  Here’s something nice, though. Khoshekh spent his whole life floating four feet off the ground at a fixed point in the men’s bathroom here at our station. He never moved from there until he was attacked. I hate to think much about the pain he’s been in while healing from broken bones and severe lacerations, but . . . listeners, I got to hold Khoshekh for the first time last week. I got to pick him up, hug him, carry him around my home.

  Carlos is allergic to cats, but I bought him some Claritin, so he’ll be fine while Khoshekh heals. Thanks for all your concerns, dear listeners. It’s wonderful to have him back.

  Oh, hey, Janice’s Girl Scout cookies h
ave really been moving. The guys in Sales just came by and bought some classic shortbread cookies. The guys were all wearing matching suits and wool hats. And they threw the boxes of cookies back and forth to each other while shouting “hup!” and “catch!” and “look alive, Shawn!” as they jogged back to their cubicles.

  All of the guys in Sales are named Shawn.

  So if you like delicious cookies, come on up to the station. I already bought all these cookies with my own money, but I told Janice I would donate back all the proceeds from selling these boxes, so it’s kind of an extra gift to the Girl Scouts of Night Vale.

  Several listeners and co-workers have bought cookies, but no one from Station Management yet.

  It’s really nice when you have the support of your management. I mean, let’s be honest. No job is perfect. And relationships between bosses and employees aren’t always friendly. You’re going to have disagreements, of course—little disputes. Sometimes big disputes. Enormous ones. But you get over those things. You forgive and forget, only to retract both and be filled with vindictive rage and unrelenting memories of the pain brought upon you.

  Such are the difficulties of professional life. Sure do hope Station Management steps it up here. We’re all friends after all. Looking at you in the booth there, Daniel.

  Listeners, Daniel is blushing. He is very very red. You have a lot of blood Daniel. (Listeners, I really mean that. Daniel looks to have a lot of blood.)

  Let’s have a look now at traff—

  DANA: Cecil.

  CECIL: Hello? Listeners, I just saw a glimmer, a flicker of something here in the studio. One moment there was simply a wall and a floor and air, and then in another moment there was a shape of a person, of a woman, a—

  DANA: Cecil, it’s your former intern. It’s me, Dana.

  CECIL: Dana, where are you? When are you?

  DANA: For right now I’m here in the studio. But I’m also still trapped in the desert, near the mountain, near the lighthouse. But I’m learning more about how this works. If I turn my head just right I can not only see places, but I can be places. I can’t do it for long, but it’s amazing where I can go, when I can go. I’ve been visiting with John Peters, you know, the farmer?, who appears here from time to time. I met briefly one of your other former interns, Maureen, who flicks in and out of existence here. I’ve even made friends with some of the men and women of this nationless army that wanders about the desert.

  CECIL: Dana, I’m so glad you’re here now. I haven’t heard from you in months. I told your mother and brother I saw you and you were safe and that you loved them very much.

  DANA: Yes. I know. Thank you, Cecil. And do you know what? Today is my brother’s birthday. He’s twenty-six today, and I used the lighthouse and my new abilities to go visit him. I finally got to see my family again. Very briefly.

  CECIL: That’s great news, Dana.

  DANA: But here’s what happened. And this is . . . Well, when I appeared in my mother’s home, I saw my mother. I saw my brother. I saw their friends. I saw a cake. And the cake said “Happy 33rd Birthday.” And I was confused, because he is only twenty-six. And I saw a woman standing near my brother. She wore a suit. She had short, natural hair. She stood up straight. She glowed. She looked important. I recognized her. And then my brother saw me standing there. And my mother saw me standing there. And others saw me standing there. And they began to cry. But they were fearful tears, turning into shouts and screams. Some people ran from the room. My mother couldn’t come near me. I said, “Mom. It’s me. Dana.” And I held out my arms and tried to step toward her. And no one could control their fear, their cries. No one could move.

  But the woman next to my brother. She was smiling. She knew. She stepped toward me, and in that moment I saw who it was. I knew who it was.

  It was me, Cecil. She . . . I . . . must have been twenty-nine, if my math is good. And she (I) turned to my (our) mother and said, “It’s okay. It’s okay.” And she held her hands up, and people went silent. People listened. And she told the room who I was, who she was, who we were and what had happened (or for me, what will happen). And the tears turned from fear to relief to joy. And we embraced.

  CECIL: You saw yourself. You saw your older self?

  DANA: You should have seen the way everyone looked at the older me, Cecil. They . . . admired me. They saw me for someone else. I must be important in my future life. I must have a good job or be a significant part of society. I must have become something. I tried to ask what I was to become, but I began to blink out of that time and place. And I was back in the desert, more alone, less important.

  CECIL: You have always been important. You have always been something. Age just reveals the facts that always were, Dana. Experience uncovers the you that always was. I am glad to know you will be safe. That you will come home. That— Dana. You just flickered. I can’t see you.

  DANA: I can’t stay any longer. I am always going somewhere. Someday I won’t have to go. I will just be in the place that I am. Our time and space will match again someday, Cecil.

  CECIL: I’m glad to know that. Tell Maureen hi!

  DANA: Good-bye, Cecil.

  CECIL: The Night Vale Highway Department is asking all motorists to please turn on your headlights when driving through construction zones. If you see workers, please turn on your headlights.

  If you see workers in orange vests and black balaclavas holding large metal devices that look like miniature satellite dishes and whispering coded instructions into walkie-talkies while low-hovering, disk-shaped aircraft of the likes you have never seen before zip quickly about overhead, please turn on your headlights. Please, for the safety of our workers, slow your vehicle. Please turn on your headlights and slow your vehicle. Slow your vehicle (with your headlights clearly in the ON setting) to a crawl. Come to a complete stop.

  For the safety of our highway workers and their vast interplanetary secrets, please get out of your vehicle and walk toward the hum. You will hear a loud humming from above. Please follow the humming until you are completely lifted from this earth, from this world, never to return. Well, to return eventually, but not to this time. To a completely different time. Maybe millennia from now. Maybe millennia ago. Who knows? You will. Eventually.

  This public service announcement has been brought to you by the Night Vale Highway Department.

  Good news, listeners. Daniel is telling me that Strexcorp, and the whole management of the station, is very excited about my support of the Girls Scouts of Night Vale, and they want to buy every box of Janice’s cookies.

  In fact, Lauren Mallard, our program director and Strexcorp executive, is back again here in my studio with an announcement to make.

  LAUREN: Thank you, Cecil. Strexcorp has long been a supporter of community organizations, and the Girl Scouts—with their commitment to teaching young girls about nature, surviving in nature, controlling nature with their minds, radiation immunity, and advanced knife-fighting skills—are an important institution here in Night Vale. Not just for our women leaders in the future but also for Strexcorp right now, here in the present.

  The Girl Scouts not only have a great reputation for youth leadership training but a pretty extensive database of nearly every girl in Night Vale. Their names, addresses, phone numbers, e-mails, and skill levels at various talents, like oil painting, or parasailing, or library science, or slingshots, or helicopter piloting. It sure would be nice to know where the young ladies are who are good at helicopter piloting.

  Very few young girls are trained to fly helicopters. We’d like to hunt down, or ooh weird phrasing . . . scratch that . . . We’d like to find and meet these talented girls.

  So Strexcorp is proud to announce that they have purchased the Girl Scouts of Night Vale and will also be taking over management of the organization immediately. Thank you, Night Vale. We look forward to leading your children.

  Daniel, can you help me carry these cookies out of here?

  CECIL: Um, Thank you, Laur
en, for that.

  LAUREN: You know, Cecil, I was never a Girl Scout myself, but I can say I am thrilled to support your endeavor to help bring your niece . . .

  I’m sorry. What was her name again?

  CECIL: I don’t want to um—

  LAUREN: Janice. It was Janice. I love the way you are taking part in Janice’s life. You must really care for her.

  CECIL: Yes. With all my heart. But—

  LAUREN: [Giddy] Oh! I know what you were about to say. It’s my favorite part of your show. Can I do it? Just this once? I’ve always wanted—

  CECIL: Can you wha—

  LAUREN: Oh, how exciting! Thank you, Cecil! [In the style of Cecil] Listeners, I take you now, to the weather!

  WEATHER: “Haunted” by Maya Kern

  I just talked to Janice, listeners, to tell her we sold all the cookies, and she is very happy about the upcoming camping trip. She is a sweet child who loves the outdoors. Thank you, listeners, and station co-workers. No, thank you to Steve Carlsberg, who couldn’t be bothered.

  Thank you, um . . . I guess to Strexcorp for contributing to a great cause. Please continue the great work of the Girl Scouts. Please. They are a good organization, and they deserve so much bett— They deserve so many good things.

  I hope all of the girls out there are safe on their upcoming camping trip. There are not many places to hide in the desert, girls. But you’re very innovative. I mean for playing tag of course. I mean for simple games of course. Not for self-preservation or well-thought-out strategic attacks on a highly organized enemy. You would never need to hide for those reasons. Why would I even say that? Why would I say anything? Words. No. These are just strange noises I’m making with my face. Strange noises.

  And for the rest of you, what do you need? Did you get your cookies yet? Are you nourished by a couple of dollars given to a good cause in exchange for some sugary treats? Do you feel you have done enough to help young women—a specific young woman with helicopter skills—to achieve great things in a town that needs, now more than ever, great things achieved?