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Remembrance of Things I Forgot: A Novel

Page 22

by Bob Smith


  Everyone listening to him appeared to be captivated. From the looks on our faces, I’d say the appearance of concentration is pretty much the same whether you’re enthralled by a speaker’s profundity or appalled by his banality.

  Elena smiled at George before she whispered something in his ear.

  Junior immediately said, “Hey, no secrets.”

  George smirked. “Keeping secrets is the secret of success.” He then announced that he had to get going but offered me his business card. “Call me if you have any questions about Midland. If I don’t have the answer, I know somebody who does.”

  I looked to see if Elena was going with him, but she and Taylor were exchanging phone numbers. They had talked about going to Bandelier National Monument while he lived in Los Alamos. When George got off his bar stool, his cowboy boots met the floor with a slippery shuffle, and he teetered for a moment before steadying himself. He looked embarrassed but joked, “My feet are already in bed.”

  Elena also stood up, and neither of them said good-bye as they headed for the door.

  We waited a short time before leaving. I didn’t want to meet them in the parking lot. In the end, I didn’t stop Elena and talk to her about my misgivings. I regretted it immediately and thought of trying to stop her by calling her on her cell, but then I became infuriated again that no one had cell phones in 1986. (It felt as if my entire civilization were built upon them.) We were all tired and some of us were slightly drunk— Taylor’s eyes were half lidded—and the ride to the motel was quiet, almost as if we were trying not to disturb the couple’s tryst. I felt sick to my stomach and couldn’t decide if my nausea stemmed from the tiny sip of white zinfandel that touched my lips or disgust at embroiling Elena in our scheme. I was the grown-up and should have stopped Junior and Taylor when they first suggested it. But I refused to let die the dream of a world where George W. Bush never became president. It wasn’t a utopian dream of a world without problems; it was a vision of a world with fewer stupid, self-inflicted problems. From the vantage point of 2006, that sounded like paradise.

  George’s car was parked in front of Elena’s room. I tried not to imagine what was happening, but Michael had given Elena the cocaine he’d bought. I said goodnight to the boys in a whisper. Beforehand, we’d agreed that Michael would let us know when the deed was done and confirm that he had the videotape we needed. I was in my room, brushing my teeth, when there was a knock on my door. That was quick, I thought, but it made sense. Bush’s botched invasion of Iraq reeked of premature ejaculation. I opened the door and was surprised to see Elena. “Are you okay?” I asked.

  She entered my room, awkwardly avoiding eye contact before she sat down on the edge of one of the double beds. She petted Ravi without looking up.

  “Where’s George?”

  She made a dismissive face as she batted her hand. “Passed out in my bed.”

  There was another knock on my door. Junior and Taylor whispered loudly, “It’s us!” before I let them enter. Junior explained their appearance. “I left my room curtain half open and saw Elena walk by.”

  Elena appeared to be close to tears.

  “Are you okay?” Taylor asked.

  She shook her head no.

  “I can’t do this. I’m sorry. I’ve spent four hours listening to this guy, and I just don’t believe anyone this mediocre will ever become president. I know you seem to be from the future, but something’s not right here. Either you have to be lying, or the world will become more horrible than I want to imagine. I can’t believe—and I don’t want to believe— our country could ever put him in the White House.”

  I was overcome with relief. We’d tried, but obviously it wasn’t meant to be. Then I was beset by two disemboweling fears. Perhaps it was impossible to change history and thus we would be unable to prevent Carol’s suicide. And in twenty years, would Elena recall this decision and bitterly regret not stopping him? She would castigate herself for allowing six, soon to be eight, years of bad leadership by refusing to have thirty minutes of disagreeable sex. One body sacrificed to stop the thousands of bodies being sacrificed in Iraq. I voiced this new possibility to her.

  “Make up your fucking mind,” Junior said. “An hour ago you were saying fucking him might ruin us, and now you’re saying not fucking him might ruin us. Which is it?”

  “I don’t know. That’s the problem of existence. Everything’s possible.”

  Elena smiled grimly. “Come on. Does he really become president?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m not lying.”

  I voiced a small hope. “Maybe his getting drunk with us tonight is enough of a flutter of the butterfly’s wings to change the future. This didn’t happen in my past so there’s a chance that we’ve changed the future for the better.”

  It sounded like a pipedream, hearing it said aloud.

  “Where’s Michael?” Junior asked.

  “Watching him,” Elena said.

  “Let’s get him home,” I said, thinking that if anyone had ever predicted it was my destiny to try to stop George W. Bush from becoming president, I would have laughed. It wasn’t such an amusing idea right then.

  We all moved toward the door, and when Junior opened it, powerful floodlights blinded us. The room was immediately filled with six men in black uniforms carrying assault rifles, and Ravi began barking. Junior immediately grabbed him by the collar. I could see red laser dots moving over my chest and Junior’s. The soldiers wore black makeup on their faces and ordered us to freeze. We waited silent and motionless until two Dick Cheneys entered. It was the young Dick, the one from 1986, and old Dick. Young Dick stepped into the room first, blocking Old Dick’s path. Old Dick’s face curdled in frustration for a moment, and you could see him physically reining in his anger like a ringmaster cracking a whip at a growling lion. They were excessively courteous to each other, each Dick trying to leave standing room for the other. Old Dick’s altered appearance disproved my theory that he’d made a deal with the devil, since he’d aged horribly in twenty years. It looked as if every artery in his fleshy body was as constricted as his smile. Young Dick skittered about like a newborn scorpion, hankering to sting something. “Not so fast,” he said before closing the door to our room.

  I tried to think of what we could do, but your options are limited when you can see on your body exactly where the first bullet will hit. Young Dick nodded at a soldier, and the soldier opened a briefcase and removed five metal cuffs. He placed one on each of our right wrists. The gay man in me noted the soldier’s muscles bulging through his tight-fitting uniform, but the thought exasperated me as if my brain were incapable of being serious for even a moment.

  “All right, here’s what’s going to happen,” Old Dick declared. “You two and that Michael are going to his room.” He indicated Junior and Taylor with a nod. “You’re going to get your dicks hard and swing them in George’s face. Elena, you’ll go with them, and while they’re waving their things at George, you’ll be petting him, telling him to take a little nibble, making him think you’re offering him one of your very nice tits.” He lop-smiled at her. “George will open wide, and one of you guys will give him a mouthful of dick-titty. Once we get footage of George looking like a cocksucker, we’ll call it a night.”

  “I still think four penises would be optimum,” Young Dick said.

  Old Dick became biblically wrathful for an instant—the word “smite” came to mind—but then resumed his general look of genocidal impatience: will everyone just die. “Look, we made a plan. Let’s follow it.”

  “Four penises will imply that he was attending a gay orgy. It closes the deal.”

  Old Dick snarled, “We can’t use his cock.” There was an almost imperceptible nod in my direction.

  “Why not?”

  Old Dick impatiently pointed to Junior and me.

  “These two share the same cock.”

  “Is anyone going to examine them that closely?”

  Old Dick remained silent for a m
inute before speaking. When he resumed speaking, he sounded like a special education teacher at the end of a very long day.

  “In twenty years, our image-analysis software will be able to count and match the number of pubic hairs in a verification procedure. We used it to prove alleged pornographic photos of Saddam were faked. If we have two penises that match up, we open ourselves to charges of falsification. The Bushes would be looking for that. They’ve always made a policy of having friends in intelligence; they’d figure that out and the tape would be worthless. You do understand that revealing time travel has never been on the table?”

  Young Dick became angry but held it in check.

  “You didn’t tell me about the image-analysis software.”

  “Everything’s revealed on a need-to-know basis.”

  “So you don’t trust me?”

  “You’re inexperienced.”

  Young Dick looked crushed but didn’t respond, making it appear that he agreed with Old Dick’s assessment of him. Old Dick sighed.

  “I expect you to do what you to have to do in 2006. You’ve been briefed. Don’t forget that or we’re fucked.”

  Young Dick nodded and then he ushered Elena, Junior, and Taylor out the door, accompanied by four black ops. “We’ll wait here,” Old Dick said as he took a seat. Two black ops remained with us, their guns aimed at my chest. I also had to sit down. I was in a state of shock from learning that we were the reason Dick Cheney became vice president. It had been his plan from the start. Send me back in time where I’d try to stop George from becoming president, and our videotape would allow Cheney to blackmail him.

  14

  FOR THE FIRST FEW MINUTES, we stared at each other as Ravi growled in the bathroom. I had to lock him up to stop his barking. Looking into Dick Cheney’s blue eyes and trying to figure out what he’s thinking was like looking up and trying to figure out what the sky is thinking. He seemed at ease with long periods of silence, and almost appeared to relish the absence of conversation, as if his idea of nirvana was a world where he could have anyone bound and gagged. I couldn’t stop thinking about what was going on in Elena’s room. It made me sick that they were being forced to help Cheney. I assumed the videotape was the reason Cheney was able to choose himself to be Bush’s vice presidential running mate. I imagined Cheney meeting with George privately. Old Dick would have him by the balls for cocksucking and then dictate his terms on how he’d be running the country after the election, or else the tape would be leaked to Fox News.

  It seemed clear he had never been trying to kill us. He shot at us to get us out of New York and headed toward Midland. Though how had Cheney figured out our plan to stop Bush from becoming president? Did he wiretap our car when he was at my parents’? I was certain he didn’t go near our car, but did he return later? Young Dick was certainly involved. He knew about the time machine. Perhaps we were followed after we left Buffalo. Maybe the car was bugged during the night we spent in St. Louis. After a few minutes of random conjecture, I decided to ask him. “How did you know we were in Midland? How did you know about our plan?” He didn’t immediately respond to my questions, but I hadn’t really expected him to answer me. With most people you observe some facial movement that suggests a decision-making process is occurring, an eyebrow wags or a lip curls, but not with Old Dick. His face remained resolutely stationary, as if a computer were processing my inquiry.

  “You’ve been under constant surveillance since you left the Bronx. Your car was bugged, and I’ve received daily transcripts of your conversations.”

  Cheney gave me a cold, toothy grin—a grin that gave me the disturbing sensation that he got a sick thrill from flashing his skull.

  “I’m curious,” I said. “You’ve sworn to protect the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and yet you torture suspects, jail people without trial, and illegally invade people’s privacy.”

  “So.”

  “You can’t defend the Constitution if you’re undermining it.”

  “We haven’t had a terrorist attack on U.S. soil since 9/11.”

  “So.” I let the word linger for a moment. “But 9/11 happened because you did nothing after you were warned bin Laden was determined to attack. Specifically warned he might hijack airplanes. Maybe you could have given the airlines and airports and every passenger a yoo-hoo about that. It happened on your watch and wouldn’t have if you’d warned the country. You failed to protect us then, but now you have the gall to claim that only you can protect the country.”

  “Intelligence briefings are notoriously speculative.”

  “You and Bush have an alibi. For intelligence briefings to work, the people hearing them need to be intelligent.”

  I wanted to hear him say, “Fuck you!” but he remained dispassionate, aloof as God.

  “I have a master’s in political science.” His voice was unemotional; he sounded like a history teacher grading a student’s paper, correcting an error in the text by writing a comment in the margin.

  “Great. From an administration that doesn’t believe in science.”

  “We believe in science. Science used politically.”

  I think Cheney was making a joke. His lips sidled to the right side of his face.

  “You’ve ignored climate change. What are you going to tell your grandchildren when there are droughts and they can’t grow enough food to feed themselves? ‘I had other priorities’?”

  He ignored my dig at his infamous “I had other priorities” comment, made when he was questioned about taking five draft deferments to avoid serving in Vietnam.

  “We can’t slap together a policy because Chicken Little thinks the earth is running a fever.”

  “Why not? You slapped together the invasion of Iraq.”

  He was preternaturally calm, and even though I kept trying to rile him, he remained placid, almost bored.

  “At least we’re not sitting on our cans bureaucrapping.”

  “No. You guys swing into action and don’t accomplish anything. Instead of sending massive amounts of troops to Afghanistan to get bin Laden, you let him escape. When everyone in the country supported doing whatever it would take to get him.”

  “Oh, please, liberals don’t have the stomach for war.”

  “Well, conservatives don’t either if you two draft-dodgers are any example.”

  In their 2004 reelection campaign, it had nauseated me that Bush and Cheney claimed the mantle of being the indispensable protectors of our country, even though they’d skipped out on risking their own necks in Vietnam. It also made me pissed that conservatives assumed liberals lacked toughness and were irresolute.

  “No, I didn’t fight in Vietnam—only a dummy risks his neck fighting for a nation that no one in his right mind would even want to visit. That’s why Americans eagerly fought in World War II. Every American would like to see Europe and the South Pacific. The reason why we haven’t won any war since then is that we keep fighting for crap-on-themap countries. Americans don’t care about Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, or Iraq. Who wants to die for a place you’d never want to live?”

  Cheney calmly twisted open a bottle of mineral water and took a swig. His voluble ease only goaded me to keep on attacking him.

  “I’m surprised you haven’t lost the support of the fundamentalist Christians,” I said. “Because according to you, Jesus Christ wasn’t crucified. He just underwent ‘enhanced interrogation.’”

  Cheney didn’t respond to my remark. I wasn’t even sure if he was actually listening to me.

  “In Washington you’re either a paper-pusher or a paper-rammer,” Old Dick said. “I’ll shove a report down your throat and out your ass to get things done. Done my way.”

  “How many grandchildren do you have?”

  “Five now, but my daughter Mary’s talking about starting a family.”

  “She’s the lesbian?” I knew the answer to my question but wanted to see if he’d flinch hearing the L word. There wasn’t any change of expre
ssion.

  “You know that. Don’t act as if we’re both stupid.”

  “Aren’t you concerned about their future? The future of their planet?”

  “I’m an environmentalist,” Old Dick said. “I keep saying to the president, ‘What’s wrong with biological warfare? They’re Green Weapons— made from organic ingredients.’”

  His attempt to be humorous was as successful as his invasion of Iraq and attempt to kill bin Laden. He became somber again, as I became angrier.

  “Yeah, and thanks for trying to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. It’s a wildlife refuge, not a wildlife refinery.”

  The Republican-led votes to drill there had triggered a deep sense of hopelessness about our country, despair mixed with disgust that we’d become a savage nation that ate its national parks.

  “I should have guessed you’re a tree-hugger.”

  “A same-sex tree-hugger,” I corrected.

  “Now that’s a fucking liberal,” Cheney said.

  To my lasting shame, his remark didn’t make me laugh, but it did make me smile. The worst trait of Americans is our nation’s faith in our almighty sense of humor, ignoring centuries of evidence that if the devil can cite scripture, he can also crack a joke.

  “The planet isn’t going anywhere. My grandkids will have to figure out their own lives. I won’t be around. And I’ve always believed less government is better.”

  “You must be thrilled. You can’t have any less government than one-man rule.”

  Cheney laughed. “That’s good. I have to remember that.”

  I had meant my comment to be insulting, but he took it as a joke. He visibly relaxed, his perma-grimace softening into a scowl.

  “I’m going fishing as soon as I’m done here,” he said.

  “You love the outdoors but you’re against preserving it,” I said.

 

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