Seven Good Reasons Not to Be Good

by John Gould

  Matt’s in the middle. Nobody holds anybody’s hand, but both Matt’s companions have to root around in his lap for their popcorn. There’s half an hour or so of sense-battering ads and epilepsy-inducing trailers. “In a world where …” The usual voice, that breathy basso. French name, La-something. Thunder Throat, people call him. The Voice of God. Matt did a piece on him once, proposing that he actually is the Prime Mover. “Where else should the Big Guy show up but at the cinema, at the house of worship itself?”

  T3, it soon becomes clear, will not be without its pleasures. From the get-go there’s the trademark camp brutality, and a proliferation of Ah-nold in-jokes—you’re constantly being congratulated for having seen the first two instalments. Schwarzenegger’s new robotic nemesis, back from the future with him, is a T-X, a walking wet dream zipped up in red leather. It’s cool the way she uses her tongue as a data-gathering device (licking the hero’s bloody bandage, getting a palpable thrill from it) and the way she keeps plowing soon-to-be-Governor Schwarzenegger through walls and stuff.

  On the whole though, hm. T3 may be better than Ronald Reagan’s last pre-politics effort—Hellcats of the Navy, that classic—but not by much. The carnage T3 affords is high-priced, but hardly apocalyptic. A lot of it’s just standard-issue car chase, though to be fair one of the “cars” is a massive construction crane on wheels, Arnie doing his wrecking-ball imitation on the end of the boom (Zane giggling groggily here). A couple of the gadgets are kind of neat, including what appears to be a mechanized pterodactyl with machine guns mounted under its wings. In general, though, there’s nothing much to make you run for cover. Worse, there’s precious little pheromone exchange, precious little sex-buzz between the two young stars, the soon-to-be saviour of mankind and his main squeeze.

  Philosophically, too, the film’s a bit of a letdown. The misogyny and homophobia are no shock, but the about-face on free will is a bummer. Where the earlier versions argued for humanity’s control over its own fate, T3 proposes that Judgment Day has always been inevitable. Boooorrrring.

  Critically speaking, then, the movie is crap. It sucks, and it’s Matt’s job to say so. Simple.

  Or at least it should be. There turns out to be a complication though. The complication is that he loves it. He loves T3, just as he loved T2 and T1. He loves them all, loves every movie he sees, every movie he’s ever seen. A world-sized confection of sound and light ladled into his cranium, what’s not to love? Something fathomable is at stake, each loss will be redeemed, why would you ever let go? This love of Matt’s, like many great loves (he tells himself), is unspoken. Would people understand? If they caught him cheering or weeping at this kind of cretinous dreck, would they write him off? What, for instance, would DennyD say? Is there any way he’d credit both parts of Matt, his craving and his kritikal thought? Is there any chance he’d buy the line Matt uses in his own head—that you can love cinema even while you’re loathing it, in the same way you can be both appalled by and enamoured of schlocky old life itself?

  When Matt gets to the “life itself” bit of any of his internal arguments he knows it’s time to move on. He redirects his focus to the screen—no great feat of concentration, given that the world is currently coming to an end up there. E is equalling mc2 in cities all over the ruddy place, LA outwards. Myriad sunrises, myriad mushrooms.

  It’s over. Theme song, credits. And look at this, he’s crying, Matt’s crying—not the full hyuck-hyuck-hyucking yet, but his chest heaves with quasi-hiccups. No worries. By the time the lights come up no one’ll be the wiser.

  “Hey, man, are you crying?” This from Zane, who’s just struggled upright—he’s been sleepily snuffling ever since the machines woke up and started butchering everybody.

  “Fuggoff,” says Matt.

  “You fuggoff,” says Zane.

  “Boys, boys,” says Kate, who appears, this is weird, to be crying too.

  The drive to Zane’s place is bizarrely quiet. Matt’s at the wheel—what with shuttling to and from The Sperm Shack or Mister Semen or what have you, Kate’s had it with big-city traffic. Matt reaches over and kneads her cotton-skirted thigh now and again. His plan is to dump Zane and whip back to the hotel with her. Shift the odds in his direction, why not?

  Here’s a thought though: will he, in the event, be able to manage it? Matt’s organ hasn’t seen this much action since … well, since he and Mariko tried to get pregnant, actually. More recently—and until Sophie began seeing to his wife’s sexual needs—they’ve been down to a respectable (isn’t it?) once a week or so. Is he still in shape for this sort of binge? The image of Lee hovering there in the ether, will that stiffen his resolve or soften it?

  Kate needs to pee, so they agree to pop into Zane’s place for a jiff.

  So that’s where Zane’s lost weight has gone. Mercedes has got it. She’s graduated from big to huge, or maybe from huge to gigantic. Is this some kind of codependence thing, all the calories flowing one way? And she just keeps on getting younger, skin softening, eyes clearing. There’s something so pure about her, joy and fury as absolute as an infant’s.

  “Use the upstairs one,” says Matt once the intros have been accomplished. Why not give Kate an eyeful of the outré leather gear on the landing? Might be fun to get her angle on that.

  Zane excuses himself to use the other loo. Matt and Mercedes—and Siegfried, who’s up on his hind legs, snout buried in Matt’s crotch—are alone.

  This is different. To get into the living room you push through a bead curtain, or what would have been a bead curtain back in the ‘60s but is now a curtain of film, strips of exposed 16 millimetre, a shifting shimmer of celluloid. Pretty cool.

  “Pretty cool,” says Matt.

  “What?” says Mercedes. “Oh. That was Nico. He’s trying to Zanify things, make the place a little more comfortable for the man.”

  “Yeah, good. Dream on, Siegfried.”

  There are new movie posters up too. Peter O’Toole as Lawrence, bleached and burned by the Arabian sun. A tuxed Marlene Dietrich flirting with that dame in Morocco. Newman and Redford as Butch and Sundance, going down together in a blizzard of lead.

  Matt says, “Hey, I meant to ask, how do things turn out in your novel there? Summer …”

  “Late Summer Love.”

  “Right, Zach and Nikki. Tell me they get together.”

  “Like I’d spoil it for you.” Mercedes fusses with a pot of amaryllis on the mantel, twisting it so that its phallic froth of blossoms is more advantageously displayed. Longish pause, and then she turns. “You’ll do something, won’t you?”

  “Do something? About what?”

  “Fuck you, Matt. About Zane.” Her face goes blubbery for an instant, then recomposes itself. “He’s trying to feel good, you know. I mean massage, acupuncture, reiki, he’ll do anything.”

  “I know, yeah, that’s excellent.” Ziggy has redirected his attentions, and is having a hopeful prod at Matt’s hiney.

  “Herbs. Homeopathy.”

  “Wait. Are you saying I should try to stop him?”

  “You’re coming with me!” Kate, on her way back downstairs. Odd woman.

  “Because the thing is—”

  “Come on, move it!”

  “The thing is, what if Zane’s actually … Hey, now.” Siegfried has fastened himself to Matt’s calf, and is humping away like the dickens.

  “Don’t even think about it.” Kate drags herself into the room. She’s got on a studded leather collar and she’s leading herself, maybe a little too roughly, by a length of chain.

  Brief pause, and then Mercedes really starts bawling. No, she’s laughing is what she’s doing. She’s cracking up.

  “Bad boy,” says Matt, prying Ziggy free of his leg.

  “Bad girl,” says Kate, bringing herself to heel.

  Zane wanders in. He lets the scene run for another beat or so and then, “Cut!”

  WEDNESDAY

  Dear Zane,

  REASON NOT TO BE GOOD #6
>
  Virtue is the desire to avoid punishment—humiliation, damnation, bad karma. Virtue is fear, and fear is a vice. Virtue is vice.

  So come on.

  Matt

  The boys are on the highway headed west, Matt at the wheel of Zane’s grungy old Corolla. Their laughter dies down now and then, but not for long. One of them will recall some fresh detail of the morning’s follies and they’ll be off again.

  When Zane’s call came through, early-ish this morning, Matt was on the throne, fondly recalling his evening with the Terminator, marinating in the simple pleasure of his own physical self. He was thinking further back, too, to the trials he’d had on the toilet as a kid. Terrified, is what he was, of that simmering vat beneath his tush. The way it hooked up to all the other toilets in the world through pipes and rivers and lakes and oceans. It was Matt’s first image of the great interlacing of all things. He didn’t like it, not one little bit.

  Third ring, he snatched up the receiver. He was thinking Kate. He was thinking about their long goodnight smooch after the movie, how the elevator door kept bunting him in the backside. How Kate finally shoved him out onto his floor, her attention turning inward, it seemed, alert to new life. How she waved—sadly?—as the doors clunked shut. By now, surely, she’d be reassessing the whole prospect of single motherhood. She’d be wondering if Matt had been at all serious about that comment he laughingly tossed off last night (consisting mostly of Lamaze-type puffing and blowing, kind of like his kapalbhatis). Might he really be willing to give them a try, she’d want to know? Did he like cod, other east coast fare? Was he comfortable with the fact that, statistically speaking, his odds of being the kid’s dad were only whatever? Assuming there actually was a child, would Matt be capable of transcending the biological imperative and extending a father’s yada yada yada if the kid came out another colour?

  On the cod issue the answer would be no. Otherwise, no comment.

  “Matt? Zane.”

  “Oh, hey, hi. I was just going to call a cab, head your way. That suit you?”

  “Actually, slight change in plans. You up for a road trip?”

  “Pardon?”

  “I get these updates. From the CCCRN?”

  “The CCC …?”

  “Canadian Crop Circle Research Network. There’s a brand new one.”

  “Oh.”

  “Just across the border into New York. Little place called Shawnee.”

  “Shawnee. Like the injuns?”

  “Um, yeah, sure. Anyway, I need some sample footage.” The sound went creaky, cavernous—Zane covering the mouthpiece. He directed a few muffled words at somebody in the room with him, then came back on. “So, you in? I’ll drive. We’ll throw your stuff in the car, hit the road.”

  Matt frowned. He wanted to finish up and flush, but that would hardly do. “I should see the Dadinator today.”

  “We’ll drop by on the way back in. Surprise him, see if we can finish him off with a heart attack.”

  “Yeah, okay. But what does Mercedes say?”

  “That old boot? Pester pester pester.”

  Matt gazed down at his toes, which were wiggling. The tile floor seemed to be heated from within—you needed it, what with the refrigerated air. “I don’t know, Zane, she has a point. You looked pretty done in last night.”

  Matt found himself back in the cavern. He traced the tone of the exchange at the other end, but couldn’t make out the words. It was all wha-wha-wha, Peanuts parents.

  Then Zane was back. “Mummy says I can.”

  “Oh, well then.”

  An hour or so later Matt had showered and shaved and chased some French toast down with a flagon of coffee (“Put that on my tab, willya?”). Last chance, he finally punched the bidet button on his potty (Dr. Damphousse with a squirt gun). He put in a call to Kate’s room but found, at the beep, that he had nothing right enough to say to warrant saying it. “Goodbye?” Too abrupt, and it wasn’t really what he meant anyway. So he signed off.

  Then email. Hm, he had a whole slew of messages with subject lines like “kritikal krock” and “kritik as kreative force”—again about fifty-fifty, appalled by and impressed with his shenanigans. Then DennyD, then Mariko.

  still no offer. a few more people have come through, so time will tell.

  i’m manifesting peace and love for zane. i don’t know anybody who’s died for something, do you? imagine having something to die for!!!

  hey by the way i never thanked you for the sweet comment you made about my screenplay. also for all the comments you didn’t make!! but seriously I’d like to hear those sometime. i really care what you think and maybe this is crazy but i’d love you to help me out with it. why not? shanti m

  Why not? Matt started tapping out an answer but found he wasn’t buying it. There were, actually, a couple of things he was inclined to tell her. She-She, for a start, wouldn’t that be better? Why just one She when the tale was about two-ness, about togetherness? Or He-She, let some tension back in? Give the Matt figure a little more heft, even if he stays stupid? Or what about letting him clue in a bit, connect with things again, learn to let them go?

  Before he could get down these half-assed thoughts, though, another message from kuul@materialized.

  i know how you feel, i do. sophie’s been cheating on me. is that even the right word, can you cheat on a cheater? with jessie, the other woman at the café. girl more like!!! sophie’s upset and so am i. there’s no reason for me to be telling you this and maybe i won’t, maybe i’ll delete this before i send it.

  hope you finally get to see zane. i told sophie about him, did i tell you? and he’s her hero. shanti m

  Matt formulated a few responses, trashed them all. He packed up his stuff, pilfered some Starlight paraphernalia and pronounced himself ready to roll.

  The phone rang—Zane from the lobby.

  “Yep,” said Matt. “Be down in two.”

  “This is the front desk calling. Am I speaking to Matt?”

  “Um, yeah.”

  “Room 1209?”

  “No, 807. Hang on, why—”

  “Okay, here’s the thing, you little fairy fuck.”

  Matt extended the receiver to arm’s length, gave it a grimace. He cautiously returned it to his ear. “Hello?”

  “There are two ways we could do this. You could fuck right off and leave my woman alone.”

  Ah, River. Physicist humour, a nerdy prank. “River, buddy, you gave me a start there.”

  “Or I could come up and beat the freaking shit out of you. Your call.”

  Come up? “Okay, River, first of all.” First of all what?

  “I can’t live without her, buddy. Can you?”

  A jolt of something crackled up the back of Matt’s legs, set his torso flickering like a faulty bulb. “River, hey. For one thing, Kate’s pretty much her own woman, wouldn’t you say? River?” But River was gone. Matt stood hearkening to the dead line for a moment, then hung up.

  The phone rang again. He let it ring three times, four, and then snatched it up. Adrenalin. When’s the last time he’d taken this much of it all at one hit? “Look,” he said, “let’s get this straight.”

  “You all set?”

  Zane. “Zane?”

  “You were expecting who?”

  Matt switched hands, then switched back. Tough call, they were both shaking like a jonesing junkie’s. “Jesus. Can you do me a favour, can you look around the lobby, do you see a young guy? Look over by the elevators. About my height but big. Black hair, spiky, with—”

  “I don’t know about black. Dark brown maybe.”

  “Fine. Is he there?”

  “He’s getting into the elevator. You know this guy?”

  “Christ.”

  “How can you possibly know this guy?”

  “I’m bonking … He’s Kate’s boyfriend.”

  “Kate has a boyfriend?”

  “Ex, but he wants her back. I think I better …”

  “What?”


  “Can you go get your car?”

  “Why?”

  “Can you just?”

  “Okay. Bye now.”

  Theme song from Mission: Impossible, that breathy counterpoint of brass and flute. Matt jammed his feet into his sneakers, snatched his wallet and whatnot off the bureau, tucked Erin under his arm and skedaddled out the door.

  He almost made it. He almost made it to the stairwell before River stormed out of the elevator. As it was he earned himself a one-flight head start. They set up quite the racket, he and River, pounding down in complex syncopations. Eight flights, Christ.

  Matt must have gained a little time on the descent—he was most of the way across the lobby before he heard the emergency door straight-armed open behind him. He lost much of that advantage in the revolving door, though, which he shared with a pleasant mauve-haired lady in a shimmering sari. Outside, no sign of the car. Matt charged down the driveway, turned around and charged back.

  River was just emerging. He looked thoroughly befuddled as he took Matt’s shoulder to the chest, heart height. He went down hard. Matt stood over him a moment, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Then he turned and trotted down the driveway. Zane rolled up in his funky wheels, scooched over to the passenger side. He was pointing at Matt out the window. No, he was pointing a gun at Matt out the window.

  “Mind driving?” he called as Matt jogged towards him.

  “Don’t shoot!” Finally. How many years has he been waiting to deliver that line?

  So here they are, a couple of giddy guys going down the road. Goin’ Down the Road only in reverse, heading out of Toronto instead of into it. Departure, arrival, the great engines of story. Death, birth.