by Bruce Bauman
Many in the audience applauded passionately.
Alchemy, measuring the temperature of the crowd, began to sing: “Oneness though many / in this land o’ plenty …” The audience joined in: “we are the ones who are proud to share / open your arms if you dare.”
“C’mon, Louise, join the rest of us. Don’t be so stodgy,” Alchemy teased, fully aware that Vulter would not appreciate being called “stodgy.”
She joined in: “Let’s have some fun / all hail E Pluribus Unum Wampum.”
When the auditorium quieted, he began again, “Now, don’t we feel better? Seriously, Louise, I don’t disagree that this is a major problem for now and the future. A song won’t stop a real or cybermissile, but it can make us stop and think about what we share, so that the missile isn’t fired. Taking an eye for an eye, or four eyes of theirs for one of ours, isn’t a solution. Better to change cyberswords into cyberplowshares.”
Back in the hotel, eating a room service dinner, Alchemy listened to the Cherry-supplied recording with his usual insouciance:
A woman’s voice: “Oh, my God … Oh, my, my … Oh, baby, let me …”
Alchemy: “No wonder … they call you gums.”
“Jesus fucking Christ. Yeah, that’s me and Absurda. I forgot all about that. Goes back to when we were at Juilliard. All of
us were taking turns faking sex with each of the others in the room. Somebody edited out their voices.”
“You want to talk to Borden? Maybe give Cherry the names of the other people there?”
“I’ll try to remember who they were.”
“How is Mindswallow going to respond if this gets out?”
“He, Carlotta, this new woman he’s been seeing, Laluna, and I had dinner not long ago. I think he’s over being pissed at me. I’ll talk to him.” One of his three cells rang. “Hi, Louise, yes it was a good night. What’s up?”
Moses motioned asking if he should leave. Alchemy shook his head. “Yeah, saw it. What can we do? Can’t promise no more songs.” Vulter was vexed by the local TV news station playing only a sound bite of the audience singing. “I’ll call the station and ask them to add something. Okay? And yeah, I say take it.”
When he hung up, he explained to Moses the real reason for her call. “The bigwigs in her party offered her a spot on the new Committee on Anti-American Activities. She’s ambivalent. Her libertarian and ‘security’ instincts clash.”
The repeal of the laws that allowed the CAA to investigate and legally incarcerate American citizens by a star-chamber-like process, along with rewording and perverting the original intention of the Cyber Safety Acts, were central to the Nightingale Party’s mission.
“You kind of like her, don’t you?”
“She’s more thoughtful, and funnier, than those on our side think. Sometimes she panders too much, and I wish she were a little less—”
“Intolerant? Anti-Islamic?”
“Rigid. Mose, she and I could be a formidable team. Don’t go apoplectic. Never going to happen. We’d never agree on who should be on top”—a wisp of a smile crossed his lips—“of the ticket …” Moses laughed. “Mose, I got a more serious question. What do you think of shifting tactics, so I go for California governor next year? I can win. Then we go presidential in ’24.”
“I’m thinking it’s an idea to consider for not very long. Unless it’s a total disaster, the ’20 election sets the stage for ’24. If you run for president and don’t win, that’s expected—we go again in ’24. Run for governor and don’t win—you’re branded a ‘loser.’ If anything, having no record is better than a blemished one. What brought this up?”
“I got a feeler from the Independence for California peeps. They already have a half million signatures for the ballot initiative. They’ll file when they reach a million. They’re in search of a standard-bearer with name recognition and clout.”
“If that’s the case, then this is the worst idea since the initiative to make California six states. IFC wants California, Washington, and Oregon to secede and get Vancouver to join in a union to form a loose association with the U.S. and Canada.”
“I know what they want.”
“Then how can you?… It’s akin to the Articles of Confederation, which failed. It’s nuts. Impossible.”
“Really?!”
Moses always marveled that in Alchemy’s world “impossible” did not exist. He also saw that instead of getting tired, he was getting juiced and ready to riff deep into the night.
“Okay, Mose.” He was standing now and circling around the room. “I’ll talk to Winslow about the tape and IFC when I’m back in L.A. Get me more info on IFC and who’s giving them money.”
“Sure. I’ll do some other research, too.”
“But Mose, follow my reasoning here. You’re the one who told me America is fracturing. That the three West Coast states have more common interests and beliefs than their neighbors in Arizona, Nevada, and Idaho. You’re the one who said the three coastal states are among the best options for ringing up good numbers. That’s fifty, sixty million people, and they have an economy that would rank among the largest in the world. Didn’t you say that somehow these rifts need to be repaired or it could lead to permanent fractures? If I’m gov when it cracks …”
“I said maybe in fifty or a hundred years, because all empires run their courses. Not in five or ten years. I believe you can begin the repair we need now.”
“Revolutionary change starts in the head, but it’s the feet that make it happen. One can look back a thousand years easier than forward fifty. Be futurific and march forward.”
Alchemy closed his eyes and seemed suddenly far away.
“Alchemy, what? Where are you? Say what you’re thinking.”
“That shit with Louise and the Muslims. Makes me crazy, too. But all this religious posturing has made the line separating church and state all but disappear. I’m going to make it reappear. Whether it’s for governor or prez, you know it’s going to come up again and again. I want to get out in front of it. And ‘spiritual but not religious’ is liberal bogusocity.”
Moses was beyond wanting to argue with his brother. He wanted to go to bed, but Alchemy was in the zone.
“Mose, you’re a progressive politically. But a true progressive has to make leaps in every direction. You still can’t extinguish that niggling belief. I said belief, not doubt. Ninety, ninety-five percent of the time you don’t believe in God, but a secret little piece of you still isn’t sure.”
“I doubt, therefore I am.” A slight deprecating smile crossed Moses’s face.
“I doubt, but still act, therefore I am. We’re forty, fifty years into the new world of the digital age, and with the right vision we are on the cusp of a new political and social order. It took Christianity two hundred and fifty, three hundred and fifty years to become the historical force that dominated the last seventeen hundred years. Within seventy-five years of Gutenberg’s invention, Luther and the Protestant Reformation took hold and undid the monolithic power of Catholicism in a timeframe that seemed, to them, unimaginably fast. The quantum revolution is not the future—it’s the present. We’re not in the Industrial Age anymore. It’s the Cyber Age, and ‘cyberplowshares’ can take us to a new era where religion and nationalism are as archaic as idol worship and the steam engine. A man or a woman working with a binary device, not some papyrus or Gutenberg Bible—a believer in humankind’s power and intelligence, will lead us to a Promised Land without God. Or to extinction.”
75
MEMOIRS OF A USELESS GOOD-FOR-NUTHIN’
Ringolevio One Two Three, 2016 – 2017
I send Salome flowers and a note that I am truly sorry about Nathaniel. I also thank her for being Salome, ’cause Carlotta Solano ain’t like most of the women I dated. She likes people and people like her, and she is as sweet as I am not sweet. She’s thirty-one and never been married. Not a rock ’n’ roll chick. Not even a fan of the Insatiables. We click in and out of bed, and
she ain’t no honey trap counting my bankrolls.
Her parents are still married and live in the same house in Cucamonga they bought when she was born. Her father works in a local air conditioning/heating repair business and her mom worked part time at the local school so she could be home with the kids. Carlotta moved to Eagle Rock after goin’ to U.C. Riverside. Brother works in the AC business. They don’t treat me either special or like a scumbag who is boffin’ their daughter.
I feel like I swallowed a redbrick sandwich the day I propose. She jumps like ten feet in the air, which is the fucking answer I been waiting for. Carlotta don’t want some Entertainment Weekly–style shindig with a fire-eating mariachi band and parachuting mermaids as bridesmaids. We get hitched over the Memorial Day weekend in her folks’ backyard. Her dad won’t let me pay for zip. I nix a church ceremony but I find a priest who agrees to perform the service for a donation. I invite my sister and my mom. Carlotta talks me into inviting my dad. I do not invite my brother. I warn them all to behave, which is like asking a monkey not to shit in the jungle. Ricky Jr., Lux, and Alchy is my best men and witnesses.
After dinner, Carlotta’s pop makes a real nice toast. He asks if anyone else wants to make one, and Salome stands up. That gets me Nadling at super speed.
“I believe that the institution of marriage should be abolished, yet, as the matchmaker of this union, I accept the blame.”
My mother blurts out, “I’ll remind ya a that when Ricky fucks up.” Carlotta is sitting between me and her mom and I see her squeeze her mom’s hand.
“He won’t, but if he does, they met at my son’s house.”
Alchy raises his glass toward Salome. “I’m always the beast of your burden of blame.”
Salome sticks her tongue out at Alchy. “Many years ago I told a snarky little boy that he needed to grow some balls to become the Sancho Panza my son needed.”
“Of evil,” I yell. “Sancho Panzer of evil. I had to ask Alchemy who he was.”
“Yes, yes, I did say that. I was wrong. You were not evil, just splenetic and misguided. And you became a great Sancho. Alas, you have been replaced by another …” She gives a sideways twitch at Laluna and we’re all waiting for Salome to compliment her. Uh-uh. Alchemy looks like someone just barfed in his soup. “Ricky, you’re not society’s stereotypical ideal of a husband, but hell, I’m not society’s ideal of a mother, so … Carlotta, you are blessed with the good fortune to have found a courageous and loyal partner who will always watch over you.”
After the toasts and before dessert, my slobbering and soused dad starts poking Alchemy about Vulter. “She’s one smart lady. Make a damn good president.” He thinks this proves he ain’t no sexist even though he says, “I’d sure like to give her ‘a Real McFinn’ night.” Alchemy’s so slick at playing drunks, he treats their moronic postulations like no one ever uttered them before. “You’re right about her. Louise loves a good party, and she’s smart and warm underneath.”
Salome’s antennae goes berserk and it’s uh-oh time. She gets right in Alchemy’s face.
“Underneath what? You can’t trust her. She talks out of both sides of her mouth and she’s lying from each side.”
“How the hell would you know?” My dad is gearing up his nasty. Salome can match him nasty-for-nasty no problem.
“Nathaniel scouted behind enemy lines and listened to her radio program. I watched her on TV with Alchemy. Complex ideas confound her and her supporters.”
“We all can’t be a gen-ie-us and a crazy bitch like you. Or a millionaire commie like your son.”
“Your simple-minded insults prove my point. You’re a parasite who lives off your son, who Alchemy rescued from his misbegotten life, which, in effect, means you live off Alchemy the commie.”
Alchemy slings his arm over Salome’s shoulder and edges her away, which don’t stop Mr. Must Have the Last Word. “Ya gotta be dumber than a Flushing cockroach to spend a dollar on that crap you call art!” Me and Alchy exchange frustrated sighs. I say, “Dad, shut the fuck up or you’ll be on a plane in two hours.”
Just as they’re serving the cake, Laluna tells me that Persephone isn’t feeling well so she is leaving early. Alchemy is sticking around. I got an idea that ain’t the only reason she’s gotta hop. Laluna gets that Salome was jabbing her as much as complimenting me, and she’s PO’d ’cause Alchemy don’t back her up that she is a great Sancho, which is the trap Salome set. No matter what he says, he can’t win.
Carlotta walks Laluna out to the driveway. Alchemy is off in the corner of the yard with Salome, who says real loud, “She’s now the leader of the Salome defamation league.” I start to go toward them. For once, I’ll play peacemaker.
Lux cuts me off. “Don’t, bad move.”
“Yeah,” I says.
Then he teases me, “Who would’ve thought a once skinny little shit like you, with two bucks and a torn T-shirt to his name, would one day land such a great woman as Carlotta?”
“Who you callin’ ‘once’ skinny?”
He pinches my belly through my shirt. “Okay, okay.” I say, “but I know the real reason you shaved your head, and it ain’t just for the look.”
He says real stern, “What’re you implying?” Then he cracks up. But he got me thinking, since I left home, I do got one wonderful fuckin’ life.
76
THE SONGS OF SALOME
Say the Secret Word
My ancestors deserted me when I most needed them. To complete or abandon my Margarita mission was my question. Why? Why must I be the one? Yet, although I could not reach him through my DNA, I had sensated that night in the office that he was my son—and Margarita was right, his reappearance boded ill for Alchemy. I forced myself to drop by a few political or foundation events at the house. He was never there. I made an effort to be more solicitous of the entity known as “LAlunamy,” hoping to glean more insight. When they rehearsed and recorded their album Chansons, often with Persephone by my side in the studio, I offered only kudos. I never criticized or asked if I could contribute. Or admitted my hurt when Alchemy allowed Laluna to choose another artist to do the art accompanying the text after I offered to help. I began to think that never seeing him again was no coincidence, and the completion of the mission might be unnecessary.
That changed after Mindswallow’s wedding. Before we dressed for the festivities, I went to fetch Perse for a morning constitutional. Laluna was in the kitchen talking on the phone. I got a cup of coffee and sat across from her at the butcher block counter. She pulled at her lip piercing, her anxiety tell. “Okay, Got to go, Jack. Send me the download.”
Sometime back, Laluna had come to my studio with Crouse and Godfrey Barker. Barker was a bloated-cheeked, potbellied blowhard whose uniform of silver-gray silk kurta and white pajama pants gave him the look of an irony-free ’60s TV sitcom hippie, an unctuous purveyor of airy-but-not-airy-enough “science.” I faked serenity as I showed them around. He paused in front of a Baddist Boy collage of the Pretender and Malcolm. “Ah, yes, I remember seeing them at your Hammer retrospective. I don’t remember this particular one. Is it for sale?”
“I didn’t exhibit it. And no, not to you.”
He bared his teeth and smiled haughtily. “It’s not for me.”
“Who?”
“Someone I think you would approve of. Can I take a cell phone picture?”
He did. I never heard from him and never gave him another thought—not until that morning in the kitchen on the day of the wedding. Sounding a bit defensive, Laluna told me that Crouse wanted her to try scoring his new film.
“That’s nice.” I said. “Where’s my granddaughter?”
“Alchemy is driving her to Mose and Jay’s for the night. She loves being with them.” She sounded far too self-satisfied. “Alchemy will drive us to the wedding.”
I let it drop.
Except for the petulant Laluna, who left early to pick up Persephone, and maybe Ambitious’s Neanderthal father, everyone had a
swell old time. Alchemy beamed, elated for his true brother. In the car ride home, I broached the necessary topic. “I’ve been considering, maybe, that night in the Nightingale office—I may have let my myopia overtake my empathic impulses, with, you know”—his name choked in my throat—“him.”
“You mean my brother, your son, Mose?”
“Yes.”
Instead of compassion at my suffering over the turmoil of my lost child, my attempt at making peace elicited an accusatory question. “And now, years later, how do you intend to correct that myopia?”
“You and he are close. His wife seems to be friendly with Laluna. He spends time with Persephone. Maybe a family get-to-know-you session.” My tactic was clumsy—I hate clumsy—my words sounded like someone else was speaking them. I backtracked. “I’m sorry. Maybe this is the wrong time. We can talk again and I’ll explain how, from the moment of his conception, his life affected mine in only the most excruciating ways.”
No sympathy. Only a lifeless, “I’ll talk to him.”
Alchemy never spoke his name again in my presence.
77
MEMOIRS OF A USELESS GOOD-FOR-NUTHIN’
Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Wright, 2017
I forget about Elizabeth Borden ’til she e-mails me about a meet. I double-check with Alchemy. For a guy who spent so much energy fogging his personal life, this told me how much he wanted to do this shit. And wanted it from day one.
I meet Borden at the Kasbah offices. Right away she sticks a confidentiality agreement in my face that “prohibits” me from “disclosing to any individual” what we talk about. I sign it Ricky McFinn, which ain’t been my legal name for years.
She starts with Nova’s death and shows me phone records that I called Alchy before I called the cops. “Fuck, this was like a hundred years ago. He told me to call the cops and I did.”
“What were Alchemy’s relations to Ana Perez, who you knew as Falstaffa, and Martin O’Malley and their drug business?”