by S. G. Browne
It’s like having my life on tape delay.
Because I’m struggling with my focus and concentration, and because I suffered a head injury on the job, I’ve been given a medical leave of absence from work for the entire month of December. Actually it’s more like I’ve been forced to take some personal time. Company policy, according to HR. Standard procedure. But I know the real reason they’ve sent me home.
They don’t want me to learn the truth about what they’re doing. About what’s going on and what they’re covering up.
I don’t know what the company told Neil’s family about what happened to him, but I know it wasn’t related to his OCD—just like I know Angela’s anti-anxiety medication had nothing to do with her breakdown and Chloe wasn’t using black market Egos.
This is what the company is claiming, the stories that have been leaked to the other departments. And that’s exactly what they are. Stories. Fabrications.
I know the truth. The FDA was right. Egos are dangerous. And not just the ones being sold on the black market.
Truth is, the company is trying to cover up the truth.
Not only regarding the safety of Big Egos and what happened to Chloe and Angela and Neil, but the company’s role in the deaths of dozens of black market Ego users.
I don’t have any documentation of my meeting with Bill Summers, and the bonus and stock shares and penthouse suite he promised never materialized, but that only confirms my belief that the company is trying to hide the truth about what I was asked to do. At first I thought that would be impossible, considering there were other EGOS employees like me out testing the antidote. But since I wasn’t told the truth about what I was doing, I have no reason to believe that there was anyone else going to Ego parties and giving the antidote to unsuspecting black market Ego users. I was the only one.
Truth is, I’m pretty sure I was set up.
I haven’t shared this with anyone because I don’t know who I can trust. I’m not even sure I can trust Emily, Kurt, or Vincent, who are all going through mandatory counseling while continuing their work, apparently under the supervision of Bill Summers—which only raises my suspicions further.
For all I know, Emily, Kurt, and Vincent are part of the cover-up. All three of them were already working here when I started, so maybe they’ve been involved all along. Maybe they’re spies.
Even if they aren’t, I can’t take the chance that they might talk to someone else or tell the wrong person. This isn’t something they can help me with. This is something I’m going to have to handle on my own.
I know I’m taking a risk continuing to inject Egos, but this is the only way I can think of to do what needs to be done, to make things right. Besides, I’ve spent so much time over the past three years pretending to be someone else that I’ve grown accustomed to not being me. It’s my comfort zone. It’s when I feel the most in control. It’s when I feel the most myself.
I pick up the smooth silver case and run my fingers along the engraved letters, then I undo the latch and remove the small Plexiglas bottle from its bed of blue velvet and insert the syringe into the bottle. Once the syringe is filled with two milliliters of amber fluid, I reach around to the back of my neck, inject the needle into the base of my brain stem, and depress the plunger. Almost immediately my appearance starts to shift and my conscience starts to drift, the part that is me retreating into a corner as the DNA-laced cocktail calibrates my brain and readjusts my face, turning me into someone new.
Truth is, reality is overrated.
CHAPTER 39
Romeo stands behind the DJ table, spinning “I’m Your Boogie Man” by KC and the Sunshine Band, while Juliet and Holly Golightly dirty dance with Harry Potter—rubbing up against him from the front and the back, making a wizard sandwich. They motion for me to come join them but I don’t know what to do with women. The trouble with me is, once we get started, I never know if they want me to stop or keep going. Most guys don’t stop. I can’t help it. I keep stopping. Either that or I fall in love with them. Women can drive you crazy. They really can.
Instead I just wave and pretend like I don’t know what they want and I stroll through the party and look around. I don’t see any crooks yet but you ask me, every place has them. Someone is always being a goddamn crook. That’s why I wore my favorite hat. My red hunting hat. My people-hunting hat. And I’m hunting for a specific person.
Over in the corner, Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe are drinking and laughing, their mouths open as big as goddamn manholes. The way they’re laughing you’d think one of them was a regular comedian. I mean, no one can be that happy. I bet they’re just a couple of phonies. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s phonies. They make me sick.
More laughter comes from the couch, where Tyler Durden is chatting up Madame Bovary and Jane Eyre, charming as hell, trying to get them to buy some of his homemade soap. I don’t know if they believe any of his crap but if you ask me, he just wants to take them both into a room and give them the time. That’s all most of these phonies want to do with women. Give them the time. They don’t have any respect. He probably doesn’t even know their first names.
That’s what’s wrong with the world. It’s full of goddamn phonies.
Nearby, Hester Prynne sits on a chair, wearing this red dress that’s sexy as hell as she flirts with Patrick Bateman, Atticus Finch, and Jake Barnes. I don’t know what the hell Barnes is thinking. Even if he does get Prynne alone, he won’t be able to give her the time. What a lousy moron.
Over by the bar, Elizabeth Bennet and Elinor Dashwood are both hitting on Sherlock Holmes, who’s wearing this corny deerstalker hat, while Dr. Henry Jekyll mixes up drinks for everyone. I walk over and order a scotch-and-soda and Holmes looks at my own hat and tells me it’s grand. If there’s one word I hate, it’s grand. It’s so phony.
As I’m waiting for my drink, I notice Willy Wonka handing out candy to Lolita and Alice. Humbert Humbert sits a few feet away, checking them out, sipping his cocktail, nervous as hell and sweating. When he catches me looking at him, he gives me a phony smile.
Jekyll finally gets me my drink and as I’m walking away, Captain Ahab limps past, bumping into me and knocking my drink out of my hand and muttering “To hell with the white whale” as he heads over to join the growing suitors gathered around Hester Prynne. Behind me, Holmes and Jekyll are laughing at me, the bastards, while Ebenezer Scrooge plunders the dessert table, shoving cookies and cupcakes into his pockets. Blanche DuBois and Stanley Kowalski stand a few feet away, arguing.
“To be or not to be, that is the question . . .”
Hamlet stands on a chair, a cocktail glass in one hand, and spouts out the rest of his famous goddamn soliloquy. He’s always doing things like that, boring as hell. I can’t stand bores. I’m not kidding.
I look over at Romeo and motion for him to turn up the music. He looks at me and nods, cranking up “Play That Funky Music” by Wild Cherry and drowning out the rest of Hamlet’s speech.
While I’m looking around and thinking about ordering another scotch-and-soda from that bastard Jekyll, Kilgore Trout walks up and starts talking to me, acting like he’s some terrific friend of mine, clapping me on the back and shaking my hand, telling me his life story like we haven’t seen each other in years.
People like that annoy the hell out of me.
I tell him I have to go to the bathroom, which I don’t, then I grab a bottle of Patrón Silver tequila from the bar and walk down the hallway toward the kitchen. On my way, I pass a room filled with books, some kind of library, and I see Guy Montag standing in the middle of the room, turning slowly around in circles.
When I ask him what he’s doing, he gets this corny expression on his face and says, “Just thinking.”
I shrug and head into the kitchen, one of those big custom-design jobs with an island and a breakfast nook and about half a million cabinets. It’s the kind of kitchen that’s so goddamn big you could just about live in it.
Tarzan a
nd Jane Porter are in the kitchen, half naked in front of the refrigerator with the doors open. I mean, Tarzan and Jane are always half naked, but Jane isn’t usually hanging on to the top of the refrigerator doors with her legs wrapped around Tarzan’s hips. They don’t seem to mind me, so I sit down at the breakfast nook and wait for them to finish. Peter Pan comes into the kitchen, stands next to me, and watches with his goddamn mouth and eyes wide open.
“I’ve changed my mind,” he says. “I want to grow up.”
What really knocks me out is that they know we’re watching them but they don’t stop until they’re finished.
When they’re done, Jane smooths out her leopard skin skirt, gives us a smile and a wink, then grabs a tray of puff cheese pastries and walks out of the kitchen with Peter Pan following close behind.
I smile at Tarzan and say, “You’re just who I’ve been looking for.”
Tarzan looks at me like he’s trying to figure out who the hell I am. Then he points to himself. “Me Tarzan.”
“No kidding,” I say. “And that was Jane.”
He smiles. “Tarzan like Jane.”
Who wouldn’t like Jane? I’d give her the time, but like I said, I’d probably end up stopping on account of the type of guy I am. Which makes me feel lousy as hell.
Tarzan follows up his declaration of love for Jane with a rapid beating of his chest.
What a goddamned phony. I mean, anyone who read their Edgar Rice Burroughs knows that the Tarzan in the novels is educated and intelligent, not the syllable-challenged film version. It just goes to show that this phony has no appreciation for literature.
I set the bottle of tequila on the table. Tarzan’s eyebrows raise and he gets this big, goofy smile on his face. “Tarzan like tequila. Tarzan get shot glasses.”
He grabs a couple of tall shot glasses out of one of his half a million cabinets and sits down at the table with me.
I pour each of us a shot, then I raise my glass to him and drink mine. He does the same, then wipes his mouth with a grimace and a grunt. I pour us each another shot and we drink those down fast as hell. The thing is, I can’t stand tequila, but I knew Tarzan wouldn’t be able to resist. The goddamn phony.
Before I’m halfway done with my second shot, Tarzan slams his shot glass down on the table and pounds his chest and lets out one of his goddamn yells.
That’s something else that gives me a royal pain. Show-offs. I can’t stand show-offs. They’re even worse than bores and phonies.
I pour us each another shot but before we drink them, I ask Tarzan if he has any limes. Tarzan beats once on his chest, then gets up and moves like an ape over to the refrigerator. When he does, I reach into my shirt pocket, pull out a capsule, and crack it open, dumping the powdered contents into Tarzan’s shot glass.
“And some salt,” I say. “We need some salt for Christ’s sake.”
When Tarzan returns with the shaker of salt and slices of lime, the contents of the capsule have dissolved in his tequila.
“Limes,” says Tarzan. “And salt.”
He’s a regular goddamn genius.
I lick my hand between my thumb and index finger and pour some salt on it, then I grab my shot glass. After two shots of tequila I’m feeling pretty lousy, but I don’t have much of a choice. Tarzan dumps salt all over his hand, then licks it up, makes a face, and slams down his shot as I choke down mine.
Tarzan pounds his chest again, then jumps up on top of the table and lets out another one of his head-splitting yells. I don’t wait around to watch what happens to him but get up and walk out of the kitchen and stagger down the hall and end up outside throwing up in the bushes while Rhett Butler and Jay Gatsby laugh at me over their martinis.
The lousy goddamn bastards.
CHAPTER 40
I wake up on my side on a couch facing a giant plasma television, half hearing the news playing on CNN, wondering where I am and what day it is. Spittle has pooled on the pillow beneath my mouth, which feels like it could use some disinfecting.
On the television, the news anchor is telling a familiar story.
“This is another of the growing number of deaths over the past several months linked to the illegally manufactured products.”
My head is pounding. When I sit up, I feel like I might vomit. But from the taste in my mouth, I’m guessing that wouldn’t be anything new.
On the floor next to a pair of brown dress loafers is a red hunting hat with earflaps.
I pick up the hat and look around and realize I’m in my living room. I still don’t know what day it is, but from the soft, filtered light coming in through the windows I’m guessing it’s pushing sunset. I glance at the clock and see that it’s 4:33 in the afternoon. I hate December. It’s dark before five o’clock.
I toss the hat on the couch, then get up and go into the kitchen and fill a glass with cold water as the news anchor continues to talk about the deaths related to the use of black market Egos. When the anchor says the victim is someone with ties to Engineering Genetics Organization and Systems, I nearly drop my glass of water.
“We go to reporter Rachel Harrison for details on the latest victim.”
I sit back down on the couch next to the hat and put on the 3-D glasses as the video feed switches to an attractive woman standing out in front of a black iron gate between two brick walls, behind which sits a rather large and expensive-looking home.
I turn up the volume.
“Over the past several months here in Los Angeles, California, there has been a startling rise in the fatalities of people who have purchased Egos on the black market, but none more startling than the death that occurred at this Bel Air residence last night.”
The house looks familiar. But then, when you’ve seen one Bel Air mansion, you’ve seen them all.
“Bill Summers, an executive with Engineering Genetics Organization and Systems, the developer and manufacturer of Big Egos based here in Los Angeles, collapsed and died early this morning at a party he was hosting, apparently after injecting a black market Ego.”
Rachel Harrison continues to talk, but I’m just staring at the television, watching her lips move and not really hearing what she’s saying.
Bill Summers? Did she say Bill Summers? That might explain why the house looks familiar. And I’m suddenly wondering where I was last night.
I hear the sound of a key rattling in a lock. Moments later, the front door opens and Delilah walks in carrying a Prada shopping bag. When she sees me, she stands there wearing red leather pants, a black leather jacket, and a look of disappointment.
“Well, look who finally woke up,” she says.
I have this vague recollection of a dream where I was at a party with a bunch of famous literary characters. At least I think it was a dream. Some of the details are so vivid that I have the feeling it wasn’t a dream at all. And I remember something about tequila shots, which would explain the headache and the taste of vomit in my mouth.
For some reason, the thought occurs to me that Bill Summers was a tequila drinker.
“While no official word has been released by the company, the death of one of their own has come as a shock to EGOS,” says Rachel Harrison. “Further complicating matters is the question as to why a company executive who has led the charge against illegally manufactured Egos would risk using a product he publicly decried as dangerous.”
“What are you wearing?” asks Delilah as she sets her Prada shopping bag on the dining room table. “I’ve never seen that outfit before.”
I look down at my clothes and notice that I’m wearing a blue V-neck sweater, a white collared shirt, and gray sharkskin slim-fit pants. When I look at the red hunting hat with earflaps lying on the floor, a thought goes through my head.
This is my people-hunting hat. I hunt people in this hat.
Delilah walks over and stands next to the couch, looking down at me. “So where were you last night?”
I look up at the TV. Bill Summers’s house sits dark and quiet
in the approaching twilight behind Rachel Harrison as she wraps up her story.
“When asked about the possibility that Bill Summers’s death was caused by one of the company’s own Egos and not one of those available at a discount on the black market, a spokesman for EGOS refused to comment.”
“Hello?” says Delilah. “Are you listening to me?”
CHAPTER 41
“Are you listening to me?” says Martin Scorsese. “Did you hear what I said?”
Scorsese is standing in the middle of my parents’ kitchen, which is more like a Hollywood movie set. I see boom mics and stage lights and a film crew standing off in the shadows behind him. Although I can’t make out all of their faces, I recognize Chloe and Vincent and the rest of my team. I even see Delilah standing near the camera, looking annoyed.
Big surprise.
Where we are is . . . I don’t know when.
It takes me a moment to realize Scorsese is my father. And that he’s talking to me.
“Yes,” I say from my seat at the kitchen table. “I’m listening.”
“Good, because I’d really like to get this scene wrapped before lunch.” Scorsese goes to sit back down in his chair. “Let’s take it from the top, only this time, with a little more feeling. Let’s show some emotion.”
My mother stands over by the sink, leaning against the counter, smoking a cigarette, which is weird because my mother never smoked. And she’s my mother now, not from twenty years ago, or at least what she probably looks like now. I haven’t seen her since I graduated from high school so I have no idea if she’s taken up smoking or skydiving or has a hundred cats.
We never exactly stayed in touch.
I’m sitting at the kitchen table. I’m me as an adult but I feel like I’m a little kid. Eight years old and trying to please my father, but knowing that’s not likely to happen. Not unless someone has written a new script.
“You all set?” Scorsese says to me.
My mother lets out a laugh, then takes another drag on her cigarette while I remain seated at the table, wondering why she’s laughing, and I realize I have no idea what my lines are.