Seeing Crows

by Matthew Miles

  Things were different now, though. I cowered in a city gripped with paranoia and terror, eyeing every stranger, in a city full of strangers, with suspicion bordering on vehement distrust.

  Try meeting women in a world like that.

  “Yeah, Dr. Rivers invited me to come,” Winewright announced, though no one had asked him about it in any way. “I’ve been a TA at the college, working with her,” he said, eager to somehow get this information out.

  “I’ve got to head up to the lodge to find Dr. Phillips,” I announced. “I’ll catch you later, Winewright,” I promised, starting past him. “Nice seeing you both again,” I said to Dalia and Marianne. “I’m sure I’ll see you all around later.”

  I headed past them, smiling slightly and waving before heading off to the Lodge, feeling a small elation, a sensation I had all but forgotten, at being back in my element, back in a virtual Garden of Eden again, no matter how oppressive the heat.

  *3*

  Dr. Phillips had an office in the main lodge. It was rustic and over-decorated with a moose head on a plaque, simply gigantic and looming ridiculously over the room. Phillips was at his desk, typing away at his computer, not taking any credit for the décor.

  “Why’d you guys invite Winewright?” I asked, plopping down in a chair opposite his desk.

  Phillips glanced upward at me as he kept typing, not responding right away. “I guess Dr. Rivers was jealous my once prize pupil was coming and wanted to bring her own little pet, too.”

  “Such is the life of academic competition,” I observed, perhaps more wryly than intended. “If you can’t outdo each other, get someone who can and take them under your wing.”

  “I think I can outdo any one of you,” Phillips said, still not giving me his full attention, typing away.

  Phillips hair had whitened since I graduated and he wore it closely cropped to his head, almost Caesar-like, with a trim, later period Sean Connery beard. Since my first class with him in my freshman year, his hair had faded from a light brown to an even gray to the dove white that now crowned him. He had put on a few pounds as well, probably inevitable, but his face was still smooth of any wrinkles. His eyes betrayed a youth that other parts of him no longer did.

  “I don’t know,” I said, “Winewright’s pretty talented, for an asshole.”

  “I know,” Phillips countered, pausing long enough to look up at me. “That’s why I brought a back-up,” he said, raising his eyebrows and grinning. “I got Dalia a job here.”

  “Ahh,” I said. “Now it all makes sense.”

  “She’s pretty talented,” Phillips insisted.

  “I read a good story by her.,” I conceded.

  “You didn’t publish it,” he challenged.

  “It was too long.”

  “Could have helped her take something off.”

  “Heh,” I grunted, acknowledging the joke.

  “It’s what writers do,” he quipped.

  I nodded, flashing a sardonic smile.

  “But a good editor would help with her story,” he added, trying maybe too late to play the professional.

  Always the professor. “Wasn’t appropriate for the magazine,” I explained, remembering the graphic violence and vivid sex scenes. I had pictured tuition dollars evaporating if parents had gotten a look at that. Not a cross I had wanted on my shoulders.

  “Maybe you were afraid of getting shown up.”

  “It was a great story,” I agreed, again, “but it wasn’t right for The Broadside. Editors have to make calls – you taught me that.”

  “Someone ought to get those clothes off her,” Phillips finally muttered, shaking his head, losing the point of the conversation, showing what was really on his mind.

  “Now that I agree with,” I laughed. “But I’m the one that rejected her story. So I’m not exactly her favorite person in the world, I’m afraid. This one is going to have to be you, wise one.”

  “I’m an old, married man,” he said. “I wouldn’t even know what to do with a body like that anymore. It would probably put me in my grave. You better make amends - you’re only here for a little while - could be your last chance.”

  “Coming down to the bonfire tonight?” I asked.

  “I can’t condone employee debauchery,” Phillips declined. “I’ve got to stay up here and pretend I’m above that sort of thing, that I don’t know what’s happening.”

  “We’re in the middle of nowhere,” I offered. “There’s not exactly an ethics committee on staff here.”

  “I’ll come down and make sure you’re all behaving,” he agreed at last.

  “Well, hey, Dr. Phillips,” I said slowly, moving the conversation forward, “I really want to thank you for getting me this job. I really need it.”

  “Things have been tough since you left college, hah?” he asked, though he knew.

  “I thought I could move to the city, find a job being an editor and doing some writing on a magazine, or anything really. I would have done anything, but it doesn’t really work out that easily, does it?”

  “No,” he assured me. “And then 9/11 –the city’s still reeling – it isn’t exactly the place to have your dreams fulfilled.”

  “More like my nightmares,” I conceded, hanging my head.

  “Maybe you should write about some of your experiences,” he suggested. “It might be cathartic, to get some of it off of your chest. And maybe you’ll find some outlets for your writing.” He kept typing, barely glancing at me, but his tone sharpened some, and I picked up on the change in his attitude. “I mean, you were there, after all.”

  I knew where this was coming from. “Dr. Phillips, I wasn’t there,” I admitted, wanting to come clean, since it seemed he had figured that out already somehow anyway. “I mean, I was in New York, but I wasn’t near the World Trade Center or the attack or anything. I could have been in another city, really.”

  After the attack on New York, on 9/11, when everyone was still trying to figure out what the hell happened, people close to me, people who knew I was in New York, started emailing me, to see if I was OK, to try to get some perspective on what was going on in the city from someone who was there on the ground.

  Moving to New York after college was a trial for me. College had made me feel good about myself – I worked hard, I got good grades, recognition, a chance to stand out amongst other students, and everyone believed, convinced me, I was a great writer. Professors showered accolades, girls in poetry classes swooned. What more could some brainy young kid want?

  New York City was an impenetrable sea of apathy and facelessness; gone were the pats on the back from the established elite, the parties where everyone knew me, the girls jumping into the sack. I was nobody amongst millions of nobodies when I hit the city, and even if I was the most talented writer in the world, it wouldn’t have mattered. I don’t think anything would have made me stand out. I was alone, and lonely, and oddly, in a city full of everything the world has to offer, bored.

  When people, including Dr. Phillips, started emailing me to see if I was OK, to see what was going on, I appreciated the attention.

  I told them stories about fleeing while the Towers crumbled only blocks away from me. I told them about the smoke, the noise – the terrible sound of buildings collapsing, drowning out screams, of the mobs in the street, the hysteria of pawing past people on the sidewalks, of leaving others behind you, not knowing if they would make it or not. I didn’t make myself out to be a hero or anything.

  More - or worse - I wanted to be a victim.

  A near casualty, at least.

  Now I just felt ashamed.

  And relieved to tell someone – a mentor to me – the truth.

  “I knew you were lying,” Dr. Phillips said.

  “It was stupid of me,” I apologized.

  “I thought you were just flexing your creative wings a little,” he said, leaning back and pausing his typing finally. He fixed a stern gazed on me, but I thought I detected a hint of amusement beh
ind it as well.

  “I did pay for my poetic license,” I reminded him, mustering a slight grin. “Bonafide charges most people a lot of money for that.”

  He laughed. “It’s true. Hopefully you’ll put that license to greater use in the future,” he suggested, before adding, “So, you want to know how I knew you weren’t really there?”

  “Was it some detail in my account that gave it away?” I asked. “Something that contradicted the news?”

  “No – your story was just like what I was seeing on the news,” he said. “But you had actually been emailing me at the time the attacks happened. I remember we were exchanging emails at that very time, and I saw everything going on in the news and realized that you had no idea what was happening. So, later, when you started talking about it, I knew you were stretching. It’s actually kind of ironic in retrospect.”

  “I feel like an asshole,” I grumbled. “I’m sorry.”

  “Come on, man,” he said. “No harm done. It’s not the most fucked up thing that happened, or even the biggest lie, that’s going to be told, when it comes to what happened that day. You’re not even going to earn a historical footnote for fabricating a story that you were closer to it than you really were. I mean, everyone wants a piece of the story. So you wrote yourself one. You are a fiction writer, after all.”

  “I wish I could take it back,” I told him.

  He tried to smile with some reassurance. “Come on, kid. It got you published.”

  “Like that’s gotten me far,” I sneered. “And if it did, it would probably only come out that I’d made it up and then I’d really be ruined.”

  “Hell, people get even more famous for that these days,” he reminded me. “No one cares or remembers what someone did, only that they remember your name.”

  “You’re almost condoning what I did,” I pointed out to him.

  “That I can’t do. But I’m not going to waste much time lingering on it. And neither should you,” he suggested, waving his hand dismissively. And just like that, the issue vanished, and with it, even, some of my guilt. I felt better already.

  “So, what are you writing?” I asked, trying to change the topic, as he returned to pecking steadily away on his computer.

  “I’m adding in one little paragraph to my novel,” he said, pounding on the keys. “And then it’s back to perfect.”

  “Then you’re sending it back out?” I asked.

  “I’ve got to keep trying,” he said. “It’s not as easy to get published when you’re writing literature. Little easier when you just stick to genres and formulas.”

  I chuckled, a forced laugh. Phillips - academic, author, professor of literature - had always looked down his nose at horror writing, at genre fiction in general. He said it was a waste of my writing talent to pursue entertainment over literature.

  “I wasn’t trying to write another horror story,” I told him. “I was trying to write something horrifying. I was ahead of my time. Terror’s big these days. Haven’t you been out of the sticks lately?”

  “The whole first half of your story could have come out of any generic Friday the 13th rip-off,” he insisted, ignoring my other point, ignoring my bait. Phillips was a product of the 1950’s, a love-it-or-leave-it, Leave-it-to-Beaver social conservative, purely us against them. He didn’t care to indulge my belief that the government might exploit public fear for political gain, or that we should criticize our government in a time of crisis.

  “It’s an artifice,” I told him, trying once again see it from my angle. “Pop culture is the literary reference of my generation. Using genre trappings to create expectations you can later subvert.”

  “Only to still fulfill them by the end,” Dr. Phillips challenged, pausing his typing to pull his reading glasses off and look at me, always the teacher.

  “To redefine them,” I said. “Everything we write has a precedent, genre or no genre, and comes with a set of expectations for the reader. We can manipulate and exploit those to nail down something else that is – maybe - unexpected or original. Subverting a genre is no different than subverting literature if it achieves something meaningful in the end.”

  “You might have a point,” he smiled.

  “Horrifying, isn’t it?” I asked.

  “Fills me with fear,” he conceded.

  “Fear’s a big commodity these days.”

  “I’ll show you fear, smartass,” he growled.

  With that I took my cue and left him to his work, heading out of his cabin and back into the sweltering heat, walking slowly in the dense humidity, wiping my brow. Not because of the sweat – but because I had faced Dr. Phillips, and some of my disappointment in myself.

  *4*

  When I got back to my cabin, the door was mostly open. Late afternoon shadows had replaced the sunlight streaming through the windows. I poked my head in. My roommate had arrived. Space at the camp was, of course, limited, so it was the privilege of only faculty and guest writers to have their own cabins.

  A short, darkly tanned dude was standing with his back to the door, fixing his hair in the mirror. He had to have heard me enter, but he kept his gaze locked on his reflection, still fussing with his hair.

  “Hey, what’s up?” I said, knocking and opening the door the rest of the way at the same time. It had been a long time since I had shared a room with anyone - well, except for maybe one night - so I wasn’t sure of the best etiquette when walking in on someone anymore.

  “Just getting ready for the bonfire,” the guy said, turning around and smiling, his hair apparently set to his liking. The room smelled of recently applied cologne. Suddenly I didn’t miss living alone so much. “Not that we need a fire in this heat.”

  “No joke,” I said, “So I guess we’re roommates.”

  “Cool,” he said. “I’m Lester.” He wiped his hand on a towel, drying it of hair gel, and extended it toward me. His hand was smooth and soft, but his grip was strong and purposeful.

  “I’m Jones,” I said, introducing myself.

  “I know,” he said. “Dude, I heard you were there on 9/11 when the shit went down.” His eyes were wide and his face split into a huge grin, like he was congratulating me for having done something really cool.

  “Uh, yeah,” I said slowly, wondering how long this legacy would last. I had only been at the camp for a few hours, and this was my third conversation about it. Of course, it was only karma coming back to bite me in the ass, and I deserved it.

  “Man, I’m glad you took the side closest to the door,” Lester said, changing the topic totally, to my relief. “I brought some iPod speakers. Feel free to hook up some tunes if you brought anything. I got a little weed too. Help yourself. You’re an American hero,” he jibed with a friendly grin.

  “Thanks,” I said. Though I preferred the whole 9/11 thing didn’t come up, I couldn’t pretend either that I didn’t enjoy a little special treatment, even if it was only because people thought I was a greater part of our national tragedy than they were. “Did you go to Bonafide or something?” I asked. “I don’t remember you.”

  “Ah, no,” he said. “You know what, I just kind of know Dr. Rayburn. He sort of dragged me out to this thing.”

  There were three main professors in the writing department at St. Bonafide – Dr. Phillips, Dr. Rivers, and Dr. Rayburn. Phillips taught fiction there, and was my advisor and mentor and worked with me throughout my four years there.

  Dr. Rivers was the legendary teacher of poetry at the University, a silver-tongued goddess with a Zen soul, easily spotted about the campus by her brown hair flowing nearly to her waist, often tangled in layers of colorful, patterned scarves collected from around the world.

  Rayburn – non-fiction professor and my greatest professorial antagonist – was the only one who shot me down for honors before my graduation. Late in my junior year, I’d had a fling with a darling writing major on her way out of the school, a manic depressive named Emma with a gift for iambic pentameter. It turned out that
Rayburn had a hard-on for Emma since she was a freshman, so when thinly veiled stories of me benefiting from her more manic moments surfaced during my non-fiction class, Rayburn held it against me. This easily wounded pride bore witness to a rare insecurity in a professor, carefully hidden behind the pretentious Beatnik goatee and occasional beret that Rayburn sported.

  “You don’t sound psyched to be here,” I commented, picking up on his language, but not sure if I was attaching too much significance or not. No one had forced him to come, after all. “You a writer?”

  “Yeah, sure, kind of,” Lester said. “I do film. You know, reality stuff. Collages. Though I try to assemble them into some kind of story. Narrative. I do a little script-writing, but a lot of the real creating is done in editing, on computer. ” He nodded his head toward his Mac sitting on the bead.

  “Writers Gone Wild?” I asked, joking.

  “Yeah,” he laughed, “Real wild bunch here.”

  “So are you working on something, then?”

  “Rayburn and the others want to make a promotional video about the Writing Camp,” he explained. “They want all handheld stuff, so it looks real. They told me to just hang out and shoot footage and talk to people and whatever. And they’re paying me.”

  “Cool. Were you thinking about heading down to that bonfire soon?” I asked.

  “Without a doubt,” Lester said. “Let’s go hang out with the geeks.”

  Just then Charlie poked her head into the window again. “Hey Jones,” she said, her voice ringing through the room. “I heard there’s some party going on or something.”

  “Yeah, down by the lake,” I said, turning away from Lester and heading toward the window.

  “I don’t know anybody here,” she said, whipping out her best fake pout. “Can I go with you?”