by Alan Osi
It was pretty weird. I wasn’t sure what to make of it. He could have been waiting for someone else, meaning I had nothing to worry about. He definitely didn’t look like the hustler type. Maybe he was in disguise?
I decided to pick a spot down the street from him and stake him out. I wanted to watch him, and I wanted him to see me doing it. I figured if he made a move toward me, I could always run. If Wally came out or in, I’d also be able to observe what happened.
After about an hour, he walked right up to me.
I was unarmed. Still, I decided to let the situation play itself out, because, looking at him, I was sure I could take him. Of course, he could have been armed. But, he just didn’t look the part.
“Who are you?” I said.
“Maxwell Smith. You?”
He smiled, which really didn’t fit the situation. Definitely not a hustler.
“Don’t worry about who I am. Why are you here?”
“Nice day, isn’t it?”
“It’s raining, fool.”
He laughed. “Yeah, it is. Look, I think the question for us right now is: ‘Why are we both here?’”
“I’m about three seconds from kicking your ass. Who are you?”
He held up his hands, in a gesture of peace. Adrenaline made my blood vicious.
“I’m a reporter,” he said.
“Reporter?”
“Reporter. I’m looking for information. Moondust. You heard of it?”
I believed him. I was almost speechless.
32. WINSTON
Doing God’s work tended to bring moments full of His peace and well-being to one. Brief sections of time in which the perfection of His plan, and all He wrought, came clearer and more beautiful than the most uplifting hymn.
Today, before my duties in the confessional, I had such a moment. The church, in all its majesty, seemed surreally calm, in such a way the very spires seemed to whisper His name.
Some of the older priests chalked my vigor up to my youth and would say things like, “Faith is a truth which ages like wine.” They tended to think me erratic. I simply believed things could be better. Often we disagreed.
Then again, a few in the priesthood thought that perhaps I was especially touched. For me, better to put such ideas out of my head—I was what I was, for better or worse, and I lived in the service of Christ.
And so, I set it in my heart to do my duty, solemnly and joyfully. My time at confessional began usual enough: I confessed a woman who had lustful thoughts about a neighbor, then a man who took money from his place of work. I spread the forgiveness, love, and light of our Lord. I confessed a little boy who’d been stealing candy, and a young woman who made love to her boyfriend out of wedlock.
This work, this spiritual work, was beautiful to me. In this small way, I helped ease the burden of humanity, helped save souls, and helped people find their way to our Lord Christ’s restorative forgiveness.
The next woman I confessed, however, was an extremely special case, and one that, afterward, left me quite troubled.
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” she began, and I noticed immediately how small her voice sounded, and how it quivered.
“How long has it been since your last confession, child?”
“It’s been… years, Father. Many years since my last confession.”
“Very well. Tell me your sins.”
“I… I wouldn’t know where to begin. I lived with a man three years ago… I, um, had carnal relations, I…” She trailed off.
“Is this why you have come?”
“I’m ashamed.”
I could barely hear her. “You are loved by our Lord in spite of your sins, child. What is it you wish to tell me? What brought you here? Perhaps we should start there.”
“I… I took a drug.”
“A drug?”
“Yes. It was… blasphemous.”
“All drugs are sins in the eyes of God. Which drug did you take?”
“It was called moondust.”
“Is this something you do regularly?”
“No, Father. I… my boyfriend Max and I were out and… a man gave it to us. He asked us if we wanted to experience God.”
I sat up a little bit in my seat. “Please say that again.”
“He told us that if we took it, we could experience God.”
“But, of course, he was misleading you.”
“Father?”
“Yes?”
“What do you think God looks like? What do you think it would be like to be in His presence?”
“The Holy Bible tells us that one cannot experience His presence without leaving this world. To believe otherwise is blasphemy.”
“I know, but… what if you could? What do… you…?”
“We cannot know. Christ alone could answer that question, child.”
“I’m afraid,” she said, after silence.
“What do you fear?”
“What if—it wasn’t a hallucination?”
I sighed. “This substance will lead you down the path of temptation and damnation. You must recite ten Hail Mary’s, repent in your heart, and never ever again stray onto the path of illicit drug use. Am I clear?”
“Father?”
“Yes?”
“It felt like joy.”
33. PERCIVAL
“Moondust?” I worked out, through my shock. “What, dude?”
Said the preppie journalist, “You know what it is. You take it.”
I just stared at him.
“Oh come on. You and I both know the stuff is unknown and therefore the government hasn’t formed an opinion on whether it’s legal. So I’m not police or FBI. I mean, look at me. Do cops dress this well? You have nothing to worry about.
When I didn’t respond, he continued. “In fact, you have no idea how safe from criminalization moondust is, and by extension, how much you have to gain by being open, and talking to me. To build the cliental, so to speak. I can tell you just how safe you are, and then you can adjust your plans. Would you like to know? If so, we should talk.”
“I don’t know you.”
“Here’s how it’ll go. We’ll dip into a coffee shop, and I’ll tell you what I’ve found out, and then you answer some general questions about moondust. Nothing about yourself. I just want to know who, what, when, where, and why.
“What?” I said, because I needed to keep him talking while I decided.
“Who? Which segment of the population is into this stuff? I don’t need names, I need demographics. What? As much as you can tell me about what it’s like. When? How long it’s been on the scene. Why? How this new drug is hooking whoever it’s hooking. What’s the draw, and how far can we expect the trend to go.”
“Why would I tell you all that?”
“Look, if you knew what I know, no matter what your deal is with this stuff, you’ll want this article to happen. But, you don’t have to believe me yet, just come and listen to what I have to say. As a matter of fact, once you do, you may want to tell me your name. Your face being on the cover of Time Magazine might sound possible, and like the best thing that ever happened to you in your life. I might make you rich. Just listen.”
The man had an argument.
“But you already know who I am,” I said.
He chuckled. “No, how do you figure? I’m not that good of a reporter.”
I stepped closer to him—chest to chest.
“Because you sent three fucking goons to my place to find me, that’s why. Or, you’re a goon yourself, sent by your boss.”
“Whoa,” he said. “You have people following you? That’s a story I want to hear. Off the record, of course.”
I looked into his eyes for a while. He didn’t flinch; he was believable—except for the so-called off-the-record part; that part was bullshit. He planned to scam my story out of me. But, I could deal with that. So I exhaled.
“Alright, fuck it,” I said. “But I pick the place, and you pay.”
&nb
sp; “Done.”
34. MAXWELL
It may have been the best performance of my life-to-date. Of course, a lot was at stake. During my pitch, the sting of rejection was not my biggest concern, which helped. A no would have come with broken legs. So, victory or death.
I really amazed myself when I told him he may even choose to become the face of a movement. It just came to me.
I could do a gritty investigative journalism piece. I could go to the edge and nearly become the people I observed.
I followed him now, a little behind and to the left, out of reach, because he kept looking behind as though he expected me to attack. He was skittish.
I realized I needed a name to call him, for the article.
“Hey,” I called up the street to him. “I need to be able to call you something. A fake name if you prefer.”
“Call me Childe,” he said. “With an E.”
“Childe? Alright.”
We kept going only a little bit farther. We dipped into a neighborhood place, a restaurant and bar, dark, small, and quiet—a good choice, I had to admit. I ordered coffees, sat down at our table, rolled up my sleeves, and got down to business.
“Do you want a muffin?” I said, joshing with him a little. “Corn dog?”
He glanced my way as if bored. “Do you want broken teeth?”
“Not particularly. Biscotti?”
That earned me a chuckle. “Get talking, Fredrick,” he said.
“Fredrick?”
“That’s your name, isn’t it? Or… was it Mandrake? Pennington?”
“You’re mocking me; I get it. Here’s the story. A man calling himself the messenger stopped my girlfriend and me on the Upper West Side, and he offered us moondust. I had a sample from my bag analyzed.”
“Wait,” Childe said. “Some dude’s giving moondust away on the island?”
“Yeah. An odd sort, too,” I said. “He walks around in a business suit, gray, asking people if they want to experience God. I tracked him down. But, he was not open to conversation. I could tell you where he lives, maybe, if it’s worth my while.” I smiled a bit.
“As I was saying, I had moondust analyzed. Testing it turned out to be useless, and that’s what you need to know: Moondust cannot be studied or categorized by conventional methods. When you do routine analytical tests, the results come with a different data sets every time. The stuff appears to be shape-shifting.”
I scanned his face for his reaction as he leaned back in his chair, getting as close to horizontal as possible. His eyes betrayed his affected breeziness.
I continued, “In other words, moondust is immune from governance. Even if the government wanted to, it could only ban the results of one test of one sample; a meaningless, useless gesture. As far as moondust goes, we’re in the wild West.”
I stopped talking; neither of us said anything for a moment. He reclined in his chair, staring off into the distance, most likely trying to gauge how much he believed me.
“And another thing,” I said, “‘Childe’ is a stupid name. I’m going to turn this into an article, and I need a name that could be real. Not something out of a children’s tale about maze gardens.”
“My name’s Wally Beaver,” he said. “I’m a DJ. What do you want to know?”
“Everything. Like I said before. Who. what, where, why, and when?”
And he started telling me his story.
35. PERCIVAL
Things had gotten interesting.
It was looking like moondust could become a whole different vehicle for me altogether. If what the man said was true, I could write my own ticket. We all could: Hailey, Mark, and I, mystic narcotic discoverers.
All we’d have to do is give the reporter what he wanted: the story of moondust, an underground movement taking off in New York, soon to take over the world.
At the same time, we would start throwing parties and arranging nights at clubs, and we would replicate a ton of moondust to give it out for free. I’d create and spin music just for the occasion, psychedelic, deep and throbbing, a shadow of moondust itself.
In short, we’d blow their fucking minds.
Then, as the buzz about us rose to a crescendo—and it would—the article would come out.
Boom. Instant fame. This would make our careers. We might even get rich.
The idea of riches! I gave up that dream a while ago. I liked slugging it out on the front lines—spinning, turning around reality, creating the sounds that later, failed models would become famous for when their fourth-generation recycled and whitewashed ‘indie-doorstep’ bullshit hits the ignorant public’s eardrum. But, we true artists didn’t care; we’d already be on to the next thing.
But this…if there were ever a vehicle worth breaking into the public scene, moondust was it. Moondust could change the world. The implications were staggering. The reporter dude barely even had to say two words about it; the puzzle was so perfect, it fell into place by itself.
Could you imagine me, living in Manhattan? The idea was laughable. I was Brooklyn all the way. If I got posh, then I’d move to Grand Street.
But to keep this going, I needed to feed the reporter some buyable bullshit. I did some quick thinking, while taking a long sip of coffee. I figured my best bet was to keep the story as real as possible, including locations. But, change all names, and include nothing traceable back to the three of us. So I started talking: I threw in this story and that story, mostly idle bullshit I heard from people while out on the town. I used this as a backstory for the drug community, “You have to understand who I, Wally Beaver, am,” I said. (He had a digital-recorder running, I’d given permission.)
And then I went into all this stuff about what I’d done. “But moondust is different,” I said, and about that, I told the truth.
He asked questions, mostly along his who-what-when-where line, and some insightful ones like, “What do you think moondust has cost you?”
My answer, “The illusion of control.”
He asked me to elaborate. But, I declined. Still, I liked these questions the best. They were the most fun. Such as, “What do you think moondust has given you?”
“Perspective.”
“What would you say to someone who wanted to ban moondust or stop you from using it?”
“I’d say, ‘Your whole life, you’ve only been yourself. What do you know?’”
“And what would you say to someone thinking about trying moondust?”
“You’ll never be the same.”
So the interview went.
36. MAXWELL
The kid coughed up beautifully. The worst I could say was that his performance was on the pretentious side. There was even a bit about “the illusion of control,” for goodness’ sake. Hardly what you want to hear from your article’s poster-boy, herald of a terrifying and degenerate new trend.
But it was a start.
To continue, I needed a sample ASAP to give to my chemist, Peter. I figured this DJ could help me with that.
I also needed him to let me shadow him. I needed descriptions of everything. I needed gonzo journalism. I needed to see kids tripping—or whatever—on moondust and to interview them when they came down. In sum, I needed access.
Then, I needed to go into the bleeding heart of the thing, to scrape its arteries and tattoo its blood across the front of America’s newspapers.
“Well, I think that’s all for today,” I said. “How can I get in touch with you?”
“Text me at (718) 555-2315. No phone calls.”
Whatever. “Sure, fine,” I said. “Hey, you know what would be excellent? I want to observe you—or someone—take the stuff. What do you call it, when you take it? Hitting? Scoring?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“Dropping, I guess, if we call it anything.”
“Why’s that? The word dropping, I mean.”
He gave me a smile that clearly called me a moron. “Because it involves the force of gravity.”
“Ah.” Undaunted, I pushed on. “So, how about it? Can I watch sometime?”
“Is that important?”
“It can be the difference between a mediocre article and a great one, I think.”
He gave a long pause, studying me, thinking. “I don’t know. I don’t want to introduce you to my friends, Pennington. You’re not really our type.”
I sighed. “I thought we discussed what was at stake here? How it’d benefit you?”
He sipped his coffee, buying time again. “Alright. But, you watch me. And me alone. If I like your answers; we’ve reached the point where you need to fess up.”
“To what?”
“How did you get to the apartment you were staking out? Why were you there? Your story doesn’t add up, dude.”
“Oh—yeah. Well, I figured happening young people such as yourself would be my best bet at finding moondust, and so I went to a club, asked a DJ about it, and I got lucky. Then I tailed him to the apartment where you saw me. I saw you outside and figured I’d take a shot.”
His eyes lit up. “Skinny kid in skinnier jeans? Dyed-black hair, green eyes, about five-foot, seven-inches?”
“Yeah, that sounds like him. …What’s his name, anyway?”
“Him? Don’t worry about it. Give me your business card.”
I did as he asked. He took the card and scrutinized it. Then he took out his phone and dialed a number.
“New York,” he said. “The New York Globe.” He gestured to me for a pen, and wrote the paper’s number down. I realized he had called information,
On his next phone call, to my paper, he asked for me by name. Satisfied with the result (my voice on a voicemail recording) he hung up. He made another call, to a car service, asking for a pick-up at this address.
When he hung up he said, “We’re going to your place. You’re paying.” He stood up, went outside, and lit a cigarette. I guess that meant I was paying for the coffee, too.