Unfiction

by Gene Doucette

Palace

  Chapter Seven

  The Best-Laid Schemes o’ Mice and Men

  Oliver was never going to be the kind of person who liked going to clubs, but he thought he could probably figure out how to become that kind of person for at least one day. It was the sort of transformation he was just coming to appreciate, as an adult, in general.

  When he was younger, he imagined he would grow into who he wanted to be, but that didn’t really happen. Writing was a perfect example of this. He wanted to be a writer, but he didn’t grow up and just become one, and that was disappointing. But it turned out nobody did. What appeared to work was acting as if he was a writer, until it was true.

  This didn’t seem like it could possibly be accurate, because the sole obvious defining characteristic of a writer would appear to be the writing itself, but more than one member of TAWU called themselves a writer, but failed to produce writing—until recently, Oliver included. He was pretty sure the only reason he began to actually write was that he managed to convince himself he was already a writer.

  He had a suspicion that this was all being an adult was actually about: everyone pretending they were adults until they believed it themselves.

  This translated into other aspects of his life as well. He was something akin to a shift supervisor at The Jittery Canary, which only meant that he had a key to the front door and was the person people spoke to when they asked to speak to the manager about something. (This never happened, but it could, and if it did, they would talk to him.) Everyone knew how to do things so he didn’t have to tell people what to do, which was good since he had no barista training. Yet, sometimes he had to pretend he did have that training in order for things to go smoothly, and sometimes he had to speak firmly to customers or staff members for one reason or another. And he was able to do that because one day he decided supervisors had straight backs.

  There was really no other way to describe it. He lowered his shoulders, which kept the tension from collecting in his neck, and he straightened his back. He made sure his voice stuck to a lower natural register, because he knew it tended to go up when he was nervous. It gave off the illusion of confidence when he was in no way confident, and people reacted to him as if he actually was. Soon, he had convinced himself. He had become the kind of person he thought he needed to be, by pretending he already was that person.

  Now he needed to understand how to become a person who goes to a club, through some combination of posture, clothing, and… something else.

  “Social engagement,” he said to himself, in the bathroom mirror. “This is where you always fail.”

  The man in the mirror thought he was being a little harsh, but accurate. He was not one of those people, who naturally engaged with other people on an accepted relational level, and he was worried that if he pretended to be, the artifice would be self-evident.

  It never worked before, basically. Those early attempts were when he was still in school, and trying to pass as, well, one of the cool kids, as cliché as that was. There were times back then when he felt like an alien sociologist attempting to understand human mating rituals, and everyone around him knew it.

  The first problem was going to be clothing. He had a dress shirt, decent slacks, and a pair of loafers. Was he supposed to wear a tie? He didn’t know. He thought maybe probably not, but he didn’t know, and that was an early blow to the confidence he was trying to pretend to have. In the end, he chose two ties that went with the shirt—it was a white shirt, so all ties went with it—and shoved both of them in his pocket. He would determine whether or not to wear one based on how everyone else dressed.

  Then he left the apartment. It was only two in the afternoon, so he was giving himself two hours to get to Minerva’s condo. Since the trip took only forty minutes, he was going to end up being unfashionably early.

  But not all that early. The train ride was eventful in the way that the subway could be on occasion, especially when it came to sharing the experience with other humans. Some people were just odd, basically, and there was no way around it.

  Oliver ended up on a mostly-empty car. It was a Saturday. The worst commuter traffic for the rail system was always going to be clustered around weekdays, early morning and early evening, but the weekends had moments of high congestion too. It was only that the congestion was a lot harder to predict. The mostly-empty car, then, was a tiny surprise.

  He spent half of the ride sitting at one end and examining an M Pallas poster for clues as to how his evening should be expected to go, and which tie would be best. The poster was unhelpful.

  Three stops in, a man sat down in the chair opposite, and unlike Oliver elected to stare somewhere other than at a poster. He also didn’t bother with a handheld electronic device, as 90% of the train’s riders did. He stared at Oliver.

  He was an older man, with salt-and-pepper hair and a square face. It looked like that face had experienced its share of scarring over his lifetime.

  He looked angry, and that anger seemed to be directed at Oliver, for no good reason.

  It was annoying enough that after two stops Ollie decided he’d better speak to the guy.

  “I’m supposed to be going there,” he said, pointing to the poster. “Never been. I’m pretty excited.”

  The man glared. Oliver wondered if maybe he didn’t speak English.

  “You? Ever been?”

  “I bet you thought you’d never see me again,” the man said. He did have a bit of an accent, but nothing that wouldn’t go away if he concentrated on hiding it.

  “I’m pretty sure that isn’t true. I don’t know you at all.”

  He lurched to his feet and grabbed the handrail nearest Oliver. Ollie was glad the car was only mostly empty.

  “Next time, old friend, you will remember to make sure old Koestler is dead before you walk away, no?”

  “I’m… look, I’m sorry, I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.”

  He nodded.

  “You do. And you will. We have much to learn, you and I.”

  Oliver was running the man’s face through every memory he had, but didn’t think there was a match. Clearly, the guy wasn’t all there. The name Koestler sounded familiar, but he couldn’t even tell if this man thought that was his name or if he was talking about someone else.

  The train reached the next stop and the doors opened.

  “Until next we meet,” the old man said, and he stepped off the train and faded into the crowd on the subway landing.

  “Well,” Oliver said to himself, “let’s not do that any time soon.”

  “Thank God you’re here,” Wilson said, on greeting Oliver. “She’s beside herself.”

  “Why?”

  “She was sure you weren’t going to come. I had to talk her out of calling you five times, and in another half an hour I was going to send someone over to knock on your door.”

  Oliver laughed, but this was apparently not a joke.

  “You don’t even know where I live,” he said.

  “All right, in another forty minutes. I would have needed the ten to find out your address.”

  “I don’t understand the big deal.”

  “I don’t either,” Wilson said. “But I’ve learned not to get in her way when she’s like this. She’s a killer.”

  “Ollie!” Minerva said, racing into the living room. She was in sweats, and Wilson was wearing pajama bottoms and a sleeveless tee. Oliver was clearly the only one ready to go, but then he wasn’t even supposed to be there yet.

  Minnie hugged him, and then stepped back.

  “Is this how you’re going?” she asked, rather neutrally.

  “I have a tie. Two.”

  He pulled them out and held them up against his shirt for some feedback.

  “No, no, no. Pallas isn’t a bank. You look like you’re going to work at a bank.”

  “It’s a club, this is what I have for clubs.”

  She laughed.

  “It’s not a club, not re
ally. I told you, it’s something different. It’s an experience.”

  “You know, when you say that, it doesn’t mean anything. I don’t know how to dress correctly for an experience.”

  “I would think there’s no way to dress incorrectly for one,” Wilson said.

  “Right, see? What he said.”

  “You two are going to team up on me all night, aren’t you?” Minnie said. “Don’t worry, I expected this, and Wilson owns two of everything. You boys go get dressed.”

  “This can’t be right,” Oliver said, a half an hour later. He was staring at a version of himself in the mirror that didn’t correspond to clubbing or dancing in any way with which he was familiar. It was something closer to weekend warrior if that weekend was in the mid-1980’s.

  “She told you it was themed, didn’t she?” Wilson asked. “This is the theme right now. Don’t forget the gloves.”

  The gloves were of the fingerless variety. They were army green, and matched the jacket. Underneath, he had a collarless black shirt that looked like it was raided from the closet of an emo kid. The pants were loose-fitting denim in the same green as the jacket and the gloves. On his feet: black combat boots.

  “I don’t know what this theme actually is,” Oliver said. “I look like a military priest.”

  “Yeah, I don’t know. Like I said, I’m just going along with whatever she says. Minerva’s the social animal, not me.”

  Wilson’s outfit was similar, in that it also appeared army-issued. The boots were the same, but the rest of him was in camo. He had no gloves, but he did have a canvas hat with a brim. It didn’t appear to offer any protection unless they happened upon rain or a particularly harsh sun.

  “Don’t know how she expected me to know I was supposed to be dressing this way,” Oliver said.

  “Oh, she completely did not. She was curious to see what you did end up wearing, though.”

  They stepped back into the living room, and waited for Minerva to emerge, which took another twenty minutes. It was worth the wait, but not for the expected reasons.

  If Oliver were being completely honest, one of the only reasons he decided to actually show for this was because he thought there was a decent chance he’d get to see Minnie in a short dress and heels. That was how women who went to clubs dressed, after all. He’s seen it often enough, just going around town on Friday nights.

  She wasn’t in heels, or in a dress. She also wasn’t in anything army-issued, or, not issued by the modern American military version of an army.

  “What is that?” Wilson asked. He could form words, which was nice. Oliver couldn’t seem to.

  “Do you like it?” she asked, doing a little turn.

  “I do. What are you supposed to be?”

  It was a costume dominated by brown leather and cloth, with some elasticity in the joints. It covered her whole body up to the neck, except for a peekaboo spot for cleavage that didn’t serve any obvious utilitarian purpose, unless showing off cleavage could be argued to have a utility. It was pretty much form-fitting, with allowances for a tunic-like flap that covered her groin and backside. The material even extended to the wrists, and down two fingers. Only her thumb, ring finger and pinkie were showing.

  She also had her hair up in a ponytail, which was a different look altogether.

  “I was going for archer,” she said. “One from those Japanese films you make me watch.”

  “Those costumes show more skin.”

  “I have a boob window, what more do you want?”

  “I’m not answering that,” Wilson said, wisely.

  “I wanted it to be practical. Ollie, what do you think?”

  “It’s, ah… practical. Very practical.”

  She laughed.

  “I can already tell that wasn’t the first word to come to mind.”

  “It actually is. I hadn’t been able to string any words together before that.”

  “Aww.”

  Minnie smacked Wilson on the arm.

  “See?” she said. “That’s how you give a girl a compliment. Thank you, Oliver.”

  “You’re welcome. So, um, before we head off to see the wizard, or whatever, can you tell me why we’re dressed like this? Wilson hasn’t been helpful. He said it’s your plan.”

  “It’s kind of my plan. I had to do some research, follow a few leads, piece some things together. I’m pretty sure once this gets going it’ll pick up its own momentum. We just have to start in the right place.”

  “That didn’t at all answer my question.”

  “The clothing will make sense later, Ollie. I promise.”

  It wasn’t even four in the afternoon when they got outside, and Oliver felt wildly out of place. Generally speaking, this part of town had a healthy combination of joggers, people in suits, shoppers and tourists. No army people. Not that he thought he looked anything like an army person, not really. He was too gangly.

  Wilson was equally out of place in his full camouflage, but he looked entirely comfortable about it. Likewise, Minerva looked like embarrassment was a concept she’d never been introduced to, much in the same way she saw no issue with taking off her shirt and running around in her bra a couple of days earlier.

  Due to some sort of civic miracle, the helicopter was completely gone. The spot where it landed was profoundly messed up—the grass was missing, the trees looked like they were on the verge of an early death, and the whole area still smelled of the fire-retardant foam the emergency crew used—but there was no trace of the wreckage itself.

  Oliver ended up staring at the crash site. He did this on the way into the building too, for a lot longer. He was trying to line up his memory of the scene with the current view, but he couldn’t get it right. It was as if the helicopter accident was a little less real for existing now only in his memory.

  “Hey, let’s go,” Minnie said. “We got a lot to do.”

  “How long did it take to clear all that up?”

  “Not long.” She looked to Wilson for agreement. “Just overnight, pretty much.”

  “Pretty much,” Wilson agreed.

  “You guys act like stuff falls out of the sky all the time around here,” Oliver said.

  Minnie, who was several feet up the sidewalk at this point, circled back around and took Oliver by the elbow.

  “Stuff doesn’t fall out of the sky all the time,” she said, leading him off the stoop as a way to convey, politely, that she would like him to please start walking now. “But that’s not as interesting as the fact that we haven’t seen anything in the sky since.”

  Oliver looked up and around so as to verify the absence of any flying somethings. Not even the birds on the cornice were around, although he got the impression that wasn’t what she meant.

  “I didn’t notice,” he said. “That’s weird, huh?”

  “It just means we have to get going,” she said, cryptically.

  “Why does it mean that?”

  She didn’t answer, but he had started walking so maybe she didn’t feel like an answer was necessary.

  Oliver looked at Wilson, who shrugged. He was not going to be providing translation services for his girlfriend on this particular outing.

  “All right, well are we walking far? The train station’s that way.”

  “Not taking the train,” Minnie said. “Not right now. Come on, it’s a beautiful day for a walk.”

  “Just go along with it,” Wilson said.

  It was hard to tell where they were actually going. Oliver had a decent idea of which direction they should be heading if the plan was to walk all the way to Pallas. He couldn’t imagine it made any sense at all to actually do this, given the various modes of transportation available to them at more or less every corner, but so far he was just a passenger on this little trip, and not the driver.

  The driver was Minerva. That was never really a question, although it probably should have been given the number of times he’d seen her act as a satellite in the orbit of planet Wilson. Ma
ybe they took turns being in charge of things. Ollie never really had a long-term relationship that included cohabitation, so he couldn’t say if this was normal or abnormal. He had parents, certainly, but they didn’t agree on much of anything, so they were probably not a template he could use.

  Minerva was the one, anyway, who took point on this bizarre expedition, with Ollie behind her and Wilson behind him. And so they went, single file, cosplaying soldiers (or something) in broad daylight on a sunny Saturday afternoon.

  Interestingly, nobody much cared. The pedestrian foot traffic in the city was dense, and just got worse the closer one was to the hub, which was the direction in which they were heading, so they passed by, through and around a lot of people. Given their unspecified military cosplay costumes, then, Ollie expected more staring. But while there were double takes here and there, they mostly involved Minnie’s boob window, not the group’s fashion sense as a whole.

  Another interesting thing was that given the pace Minerva chose, they were in a hurry. Oliver couldn’t imagine why that was.

  He decided to take up this point with her at one of the crosswalks.

  “Hey, are we late for something?” he asked.

  Minnie looked over her shoulder at Wilson, and then to Ollie, as if she wasn’t sure she should answer.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Well we’re practically running, and like you said, it’s a nice day and I gotta think nothing’s going to be starting at a nightclub before ten or eleven. So what’s the rush?”

  “It’s going to start raining soon,” she said. “We have things to do before that happens.”

  Oliver looked up at a cloudless sky.

  “What kind of weather forecast are you working off of?” he asked.

  “I told you, I studied a lot.”

  “And that’s still not an answer. What were you studying?”

  “Trust me.”

  “Well all right, so it’s going to rain soon. But like I said, it’s going to be hours before we can even get into the club and we could always take the subway if it starts raining. Or a bus, or a cab. Maybe a horse, if you have a thing about transportation that comes with a roof.”