The Golden Globe

by John Varley

  I could have. I could have afforded it. But I was never very good at spending my money. I left that up to my father. There was nothing much I really wanted except to do good work. I'm not saying I shopped at thrift stores. I just never bought the kind of baubles many rich folks buy.

  But I could get used to the Halley.

  I spent many days doing little more than lolling in the hammock stretched between the wood struts supporting my porch roof, dangling a line in the still water. To call me an angler would have been an insult to fishermen since the beginning of time. A bite on the hook was a minor annoyance; I'd pull in the little perch or bass or catfish, cut off the barb, and set the fish free. Catch and release, a phrase I recall from Old Earth. Then I'd get settled in the hammock again. It got where I was sure I recognized some of the finny critters. They'd look at me accusingly with their wall eyes just before I dumped them in the drink, but I didn't care. I was ruthless. It's your own fault for being so trusting, I'd tell them. Didn't you learn anything when you hit the bait yesterday?

  Nothing happened, as I said. But while I idled, things were going on.

  Each day was an improvement for Poly. She spent six, seven hours a day practicing. At first she was sure it was annoying me. She offered to move to one of the rim staterooms. I begged her not to. Usually it was scales, arpeggios; finger exercises. Studies for the student. But notes flew into the air and I drank them in, even the simplest, most monotonous run. I seldom saw her when she practiced. The sound came through the open window of her tree house, and each sweet tone soothed me.

  At the end of a session, when we would usually share a sumptuous picnic prepared by the ship's gourmet-chef program, she would come alive describing her day's progress. Her skills were returning faster than she had been led to believe, faster than she had dared hope. She was starting to think she might even be ready to play professionally by the time we got to Luna. Most of the time I had no idea what she was talking about. To tell the truth, she had sounded just fine to me on the first day of practice. I have what I consider a good ear. I can carry a tune; Lord knows, I've sung in enough musical theater. But you don't need a perfect voice to sing what have become known as "Broadway" musicals. In fact, you don't even have to have a "good" voice, as long as you can belt it out and not hit sour notes. The genre is famous for its scratchy altos and "singers" who do more speaking than singing. But I know the difference between the sort of music I can make and that made by a real professional musician. I know most ears are not tuned to the fineness needed to distinguish a good performance from a work of genius. Poly has that sort of ear. You have to have it if you expect to move in the circles she aspires to, which, for now, would be concertmaster with a middling philharmonic orchestra. First chair with the King City Symphony, solo work... that would have to await more experience and maturity.

  So things are well with Poly. A little sex would brighten my day, but so far she hasn't responded to my hints. I don't intend to push her.

  The other thing going on involves Toby, and I blush to bring it up. Toby has lost his mind.

  From the moment the two tigers, Shere Khan and Hobbes, padded into the galley Toby had been absolutely gaga over Shere Khan. It was love at first sight.

  When humans have sex with animals they call it bestiality. What is it when one species have sex with another species? Hybridization, I think. Didn't I hear that a donkey and a mule can have sex and produce... a horse? Somehow I don't think I got that right. Maybe it's a donkey and an ass. Maybe I don't know what the heck I'm talking about.

  Not that sex was involved here. You could call it puppy love, I guess. Toby began following Shere (which is what we called her, though Kipling's Shere Khan was a male tiger, I believe) with his tongue hanging out. When she would sit down somewhere, take a nap—which tigers can do up to about twenty hours a day—Toby would be there, climbing up on her striped flank, licking her behind the ears, on the muzzle, around the jaw; anywhere he could reach. For a few days Shere kept casting dubious glances at him. When she looked at me I swear she seemed embarrassed. But eventually she settled into it. Soon she began to purr, and to drift off to sleep with an extremely satisfied look on her savage face. Then Toby would walk in a tight circle for a while, like dogs do, and nestle himself into the curve of her neck, tuck his head down around his belly, and doze. If she stirred he was instantly up, ready to follow her anywhere.

  Hobbes was a different story. There's no other way to describe him than a great big pussycat. Shere Khan bullied him mercilessly, and he didn't seem to mind. She stole his food; he just went to get more for himself. If he tried a romantic approach she would roar a warning, and he would put his ears back and slink away while Toby yapped at him, as indecently pleased as any dog in the history of the world, I think. The big sissy would never assert himself. It's true she outweighed him by about a hundred pounds, but really!

  "Pussy-whipped," Poly would observe, then go over and scratch him behind the ears. What that said about the human condition, or about our situation in particular, I don't even want to guess.

  So the days pass, Poly fiddles, Toby moons, I fish, and we're coming up on Jupiter. Why we have to go by way of Jupiter I don't know, but it promises to be quite an event.

  * * *

  LAST STAND IN NEVERLAND

  Part One of a Series

  by Hildy Johnson

  * * *

  It's the biggest party I've ever been to, and I've been to some big ones.

  The guest of honor arrives on the back of a live brontosaurus.

  What shall we call him now? For years we've all called him Sparky. Just Sparky, and that was enough. Like Elvis. All that time his real name has been Kenneth Valentine, but who knew? The fact was seldom mentioned in the billions of pages written about him, in the thousands of hours of tape, of paparazzi shots stolen through very long lenses. Little Kenny Valentine has been as thoroughly immersed in the part of good ol' wire-haired, zigzag-headed Sparky as any actor in history. There were times when, if you'd asked him his real name, he would have stared blankly at you, and then thought it over for a moment, like somebody trying to recall someone met many years ago, and only briefly. And Sparky was always a child of action, not reflection. He would give you his wonderful grin, then move along.

  But Sparky has decided to grow up.

  Now there's a phrase. Maybe you've heard it before, but it wasn't meant literally. How do you "decide to grow up"? What is it about your thirtieth year that makes you decide "Well, that's enough of childhood. Time to do that old adult thing."? The Sparky show is doing as well as it ever has, consistently in the top five. Generation after generation seems to find the little moppet irresistible. There's no real reason why the show can't go on for another twenty years. Forty years. Hell, who knows? Not only that, but the Valentine family and corporation have parlayed the bucketloads of money into an entertainment empire far beyond the dreams of the modest production company, Thimble Theater, that gave it birth. So why quit? Could it be that little Kenneth Valentine wants to... learn to act?

  Well, sure, he acted as Sparky. Won some awards. But though you earn a trillion dollars and the admiration of your peers in the children's entertainment industry, though you stand at the pinnacle of your profession and do what you do better than anyone has ever done it before, there is respect, and there is respect. Nobody with wiry hair and no pants has ever earned respect in the realm of "legitimate theater." No one ever will. And Sparky... sorry, Kenneth Valentine comes from a distinguished theatrical family. His father, John, is a thespian to the soles of his feet, which were planted on the boards while still in his swaddling clothes. (Some say this was shortly after he was laid in a manger... at least according to John Valentine.) Kenneth's upbringing was no less classical. It is said he knows the Shakespearean oeuvre by heart. Every line from every play. Can it be that such an education will forever produce nothing more than the best children's series ever made?

  Not if John Valentine has anything to say about it
. And John Valentine has plenty to say, take my word for it.

  More about that later.

  The dinosaur's name is Nessie. Over her back is a glorious brocaded drape in gold and purple. Strapped around her middle is a structure you'd have to call howdah, after the platforms usually borne on the backs of elephants, but this one is five stories high, with two levels depending on each side of the beast. On Nessie's back are three more stories, including a pointed gazebo on the very top. Maybe two dozen actors cling to the railings and scamper up and down the ladders and staircases, all in festive costume. Nessie lumbers on, oblivious, her red-rimmed eyes indicating to anyone knowledgeable about these creatures that she's high as a kite on a double dose of reptile tranquilizer. I know for a fact that a cherry bomb exploding two feet into her anal canal wouldn't even make her blink. (Your humble narrator had a rather wayward childhood on her mother's bronto ranch.)

  Perched on a saddle high on the endless neck is Sparky, having a great old time waving to the crowd.

  Only moments ago some actual work was going on here. Studio 4 was and is dressed as an ancient Thai temple overrun with vines. A huge golden Buddha looks serenely down on the shoot. Blessing the enterprise? One wonders as to his reaction when the director yelled "Cut!" on the last take of the last scene of Sparky and His Gang, and one wall of the studio rolled up to reveal the equally cavernous Studio 3, decked out for the biggest wrap party of all time. Wasn't Sparky in this last shot? Hasn't he just been here a moment ago? Then how the heck did he get onto the back of that bronto... oh, never mind. It must be movie magic, because here he comes, here comes the bronto, here comes the party!

  Nessie lumbers through the wide lane cleared for her, stops for a moment, looks as thoughtful as a brontosaurus can look, which is not much, lifts her gargantuan tail, and drops three turds the size of hay bales but not nearly so sweet smelling. Some people start to laugh. Sparky looks back. The tail comes down on a table laden with five thousand dollars' worth of ice sculpture, six thousand dollars' worth of peeled shrimp, and untold barrels of strawberries and whipped cream. Instant strawberry-shrimp spumoni.

  Sparky is delighted. He stands up and runs down the neck, surefooted as a squirrel. He leaps to the floor and starts wading into the mess. Others follow him. Heck, there are ten thousand cream pies on racks against the back wall; everybody knew this was going to be a mess, with the biggest pie fight in history as the climax. The hijinks are just starting a little early.

  Near the Buddha, a few are hanging back. Guys in morph suits seem to be ignoring it all. Morphing a part is just a damn job, they seem to think. The suit, festooned with hundreds of computer reference sensors held together by wire mesh, is uncomfortable, but they are well paid. Who knows who the people are under those suits? Nobody. By the time the computer is finished morphing them, they've become creatures that couldn't be played by guys on their knees or people with lots of latex glued to their faces.

  A few people have that look on their face that you might see on a guy who has just set foot over a deep hole he thought was solid ground. Take Walter Burgess, the guy who has played Windy Cheesecutter for twenty years now. Pondering your future career, are you, Walter? Trying to figure out what you'll put on your resume? It would be good to recall the immortal words of Bert Lahr: "After The Wizard of Oz, I was typecast as a lion, and there aren't that many parts for lions." Not a whole lot of parts for fat guys who can fart their way into the air, either. He can see himself now, a few years down the line, stepping up onto a platform in front of a new hardware store as some schmuck shouts, "And now folks, teevee's Windy Cheesecutter... Walter Burgess!" As the kids make delighted noises with their lips and bored girls pass out whoopee cushions to the crowd. Sometimes, in this business, success can be your worst enemy. John Valentine is here, too, working the crowd. He is very good at it. Here is the man most agree is responsible for shutting down production on the studio's most successful series. He has shaken everything up. People are getting pink slips, being sent home. And most of them seem to like him. They act like he's doing them a favor.

  If you're looking for a description of the rest of the party, you've come to the wrong reference. You want to see it, you can buy the tape. You want to read about it, who was there, who did what, who made a fool of herself, who had to be mailed home, just head right over to the gossip column.

  This series isn't about parties, and it isn't about celebrities. It is about growing up.

  It's about Sparky... and where is that little devil? Can it be that the guest of honor has slipped away early, before the pies start to fly?

  John Valentine's looking for him, too. A few people have noticed, and a few have remarked on how close the man is to his son. Twenty years presiding over a financial disaster on Neptune, and suddenly he doesn't seem to want Sparky to get out of his sight. Well, you know what they say about absence, the heart, and fondness.

  No, I was wrong. There's Sparky over by the punch bowl. John Valentine spots him, starts toward him... and his eyes slide away. He ignores Sparky, and keeps looking around the room. Because... why, that's not Sparky at all. It surely looks like Sparky. Everyone is treating him like Sparky, but it's not.

  Can you say stand-in? You've heard about it, the rumors, that sometimes celebrities will use doubles to give themselves a little breathing space. A little vacation from the... suffocating demands of fame. From the millions who would like a little chunk of you, and would take it if they could, tearing you to pieces. So they use stand-ins, and they find private places to go.

  If I was John Valentine, I'd look for Sparky in a pinstripe uniform, playing baseball in a rather unusual place. You didn't hear it from me.

  * * *

  "Easy out, easy out!" Sparky shouted. "Burn it in there, Bob! He couldn't hit it if you rolled it on the ground! Easy out!" Sparky pounded his fist into the glove, then set his feet apart and crouched slightly, glove held up a few inches from his mouth and nose. He could smell the soft leather and the oil he'd rubbed into it a few hours ago. He dug his spikes into the green grass, into the soil. He felt a primal connection to the field of dreams. For a moment nothing existed for him but the pitcher's windup and the slowly circling tip of the bat, away in the distance.

  The batter took the pitch and the umpire turned away, unimpressed.

  Ball three.

  "Whadda ya, blind?" somebody yelled off to his right.

  So it was the bottom of the sixth. No score. There was a man on second trying to look in all directions at once, ready for the shortstop to sneak in behind him for a pickoff, ready to fly at the crack of the bat. Two outs, three balls, two strikes. Nothing to lose.

  The guy at the plate wasn't known for fly balls, or long balls. He had no home runs on the season. But he could dribble it into the hole between first and second, and that's where Sparky was playing it. If it got to him there was no way he'd get the man at first. The throw would have to be to the plate. The catcher was good, and the runner at second didn't have a lot of speed. So throw it a few feet down the third-base line and the catcher would be there, blocking the plate.

  But was Sparky's arm good enough? Should he throw to the pitcher, hope he could cut it off and still get it to the catcher in time? No, wait, wouldn't the pitcher be running in, backing up the catcher? Sure, sure he would, and the third baseman would head toward the mound, ready to snag a short throw.

  Damn, but baseball had a lot of things to remember.

  He loved every minute of it.

  The pitcher wound up, the runner led off at second, the batter swung, and the ball went high in the air... over the backstop and foul, out of play.

  Everybody relaxed. The runner loped back to the second sack and the hitter found his bat. Sparky took off his cap and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand, like he'd seen the players in the majors do. At least half of baseball was not so much what you did, but the style with which you did it.

  For years this had been the only place Sparky could relax, could totally
let down his guard, be himself, do something he loved to do, but didn't have to do. He wasn't the best baseball player in the Little League. He wasn't even in the top one hundred. In fact, he was strictly mediocre. For some reason, this was a great comfort to Sparky.

  Here on the sweet green grass of the outfield, or digging his spikes into the red dirt of the batter's box, or circling the bases, or even sitting at ease in the dugout with his friends—his friends, not fans of Sparky, the television boy—he felt a magical calm that existed nowhere else in his life. It was the uncomplicated happiness that generations of boys before him had felt on the diamond. It was his own private thing.

  If fact, life would be darned near perfect at that moment but for two things: he was hungry and his toes hurt.

  The hunger was a familiar thing by now, and he could deal with it. He pulled a candy bar out of his pocket, bit off a hasty chunk, and stuck it in his cheek, conscious of how much he now resembled those black-and-white heroes of the game back on Old Earth. Only there it had not been a wad of chocolate and nuts in their cheeks, but a chaw of tobacco.

  So here he was, Jackie Robinson in the outfield, crouching slightly, ready to explode in a blur of motion, the moment stretching, eternal....

  Sparky could no more play ball at a regular King City park than he could walk into a Pizza Palace franchise and order a slice and a Coke. But this field was different. This was the recreation dome of the Plain People of Luna: the Outer Amish.

  That's what they were called when they first moved to Luna, anyway. Later, groups relocated to Mars and even more distant points. Some now called the original settlers Old-Order Outer Amish, but it was cumbersome, and names stick long after they've lost their original meaning.

  When Sparky first started visiting here, he had been told the saga of the Amish and Mennonite communities on Luna. They had come from Germany and Switzerland, settled in the lush farmland of Pennsylvania, and did what sects always do: they split into other sects. The plainest of the Plain People avoided things like cars, electricity, and telephones. Basically, if it wasn't mentioned in the Bible, the Amish felt they could do without it. Some felt cars were okay, but chrome was vain, so they painted it black: the Black Bumper Mennonites. Most didn't wear buttons, and the men never grew mustaches because that reminded them of the Prussian military, which they were fleeing. They were the original conscientious objectors.