Elvissey
Page 18
"What ensued at Montefiore?" he asked. "What's Leverett want?"
"I've been apprised of new situations."
"Involving?"
"I'm informed E needs an overseer he trusts," I said. "Against reason and desire, he trusts me. My arguments inessentialled, and so went unheard. Leverett's drawing my schedule now."
There was too much darkness in our room for me to read his expression. His voice was another's, when he did at last respond. "You're to guide him after what he did to you?"
"He did nothing to me, as told," I said. "His attempt went for naught. He tore my dress, nothing more."
"Leverett's request's unsupportable," John said. "Actionable."
"It's part of my job," I said. "I've never impacted upon yours, whatever you did. Show equal respect."
"What's essentialled in this?"
"To comfort while they train him," I said. "By agreeing, Leverett assures he'll hasten your-"
"Comfort how?"
"Stop!" I feared; when his moods were on him he acted first, considered later. "You'll not suspicion me like this, John. He did nothing to me. I'll do nothing to him. Settle yourself before you go missing. It's unbearable."
As he sighed I heard his air rush from him as if he were attempting to empty his lungs. "His behavior maddened."
"He hurt you, not me," I said. "If that angers, so be it. Understand, John, this difficults overmuch. Leverett'll have me scheduled daylong on this for who knows how long. But I'm with you, John. Even when I'm not, I arm"
"Understood, Iz," he said, intending to silence. "Understood."
"I want to be with you, John," I said. "No one else. But I'm told this essentials. Even Judy's helpless to act."
"Certainly she could," he said. "There's a reason she won't. You'll not know what it is."
"I know her, John," I said. "She's helpless, trust me. She'd act if she could."
"If said, so believed. This'll ongo how long?"
"Unknown," I said. "There's something I've not told you yet, of overriding importance."
"Told me what?"
"We're gifted, John," I said. "You know there're improbabilities and impossibilities. How the unlikely can happen, so long as it's not impossible."
"What's meant?"
"Remember our making love predeparture?"
"Memoryburned," he said. "Forgive me hurting you. For„ give-
"Forgiven then, forgiven now," I said. "It accomplished, all the same. It's Godness's gift. I'm pregnant."
"Pregnant?"
"Perfection's unassured but there's the chance, and I'll chance it for us. Oh, John, if we parent we're forever bound. It's near-miracle, it's our blessing, it's-"
I shushed, feeling his shake begin. `John?" He muted, quivering as if readying to erupt; then slowly settled again, at last so stilling that I imagined he'd been brainstruck. "John, what is it?"
"It's his," he said, rolling away from me, saying no more.
Elvis sang; E listened. "What's thought?" I asked. During the three weeks since I'd first exposed him to his counterpart E had adjusted to the voice's sound, so long as it was musicked; those passages where Elvis tonguespoke still unnerved him enough that he refused to listen to whatever was being said and not sung. I was as glad; Elvis's talk, as preserved, bespoke a public mind so banal that I would go coma before hearing two sentences in sequence.
"He sings good. It's what he's singin' that I can't handle." That afternoon we were listening to the soundtrack of Clambake as we worked chronologically through the recorded bible. "You say a lotta people like this stuff?"
"Your counterpart is very popular, E," I said.
He studied the diskbox's photo, a shot from the midsix- ties; Elvis's features were so heavily airbrushed as any postcard icon's. "They got'm lookin' pretty good here," E said. "Some of 'em he looks like a big of hog ready for market. I'm not gonna have to look like that, am l?"
"It's the preferred look for many," I said. "Not for us."
His bandages were off, revealing his look as we'd made it. Dryco's workmen had so retrofitted E that at certain angles he appeared even less realistic than his dupe did in the treated photos; in daylight his skin and hair looked to have been supplanted by colored polymer and acrylic. "That's crazy. How could anybody like somethin' looked like that?"
"It's love," I said. "Look any way as wished, say whatever's desired. It won't matter. You know how it is when you're in love." He muted; it occurred to me that mayhap he never had been; possibly the occasional rape sufficed.
"I had a girl, once," he said. "She was all right."
"Tell."
"Her name was Dixie," E said. "We met at church. She was a pretty little thing. We'd get together after school."
"What happened?"
"Her family didn't like me," he said. "Her mamma and daddy thought I was white trash. Didn't want her goin' out with me but she snuck out anyhow. We'd go downtown or out on Mud Island. Got along real good." E lay down on his bed again; now that most of the machines had been taken away his hospital room looked to have been doubled in size. "Her brotherJimmy was a sorry bastard even before I started hangin' out with her. He was in my class, one a the guys'd go out nights and kick possums to death for the hell of it. Always called me queerbait. Trip me when I'd be goin' down the hall. I had to ignore him, though. He and Dixie were real close. Couldn't figure out why but they were."
"You finally interacted, I assume-?"
"One afternoon after class I went in the washroom. Jimmy and some a his boys came in and caught me there." E's face darkened; I couldn't tell if anger or embarrassment most responsibled for his purpling. "Not gonna tell you what they did. So next mornin', before school, I took a piece a hose and filled it up with sand. Jimmy was sittin' in home room when I got in. He was laughin' when I walked past 'm. Laughin' up a storm and then I sapped him with that hose. Went down like a bull in the slaughterhouse."
He smiled, telling of his most memorable act of revenge; his features and tone evidenced that this particular anecdot- ing wasn't intended to impress.
"Was he killed?"
"Hell, no. But he was out three days and never was the same after. He and his boys didn't bug me no more but I got that gun after that just in case. I wasn't gonna let nobody do nothin' to me again and I haven't."
"Certainly not," I said.
"That's when I got kicked out a school. Dixie, she wouldn't have nothin' to do with me after that, she'd just be hangin' on her brother makin' sure he always knew where he was goin'. Last time I tried talkin' to her she just called me a name and ran off."
"When was that?"
"Couple months ago," he said. "Well. Lot longer ago than that now, I guess." Picking up a remote he switched on the wall's TVC, across the room. "Let's see what's on the fireplace." With quick motions he zapped through the hundred and forty channels, silencing as we soaked in image. Each channel was commercialling as he called them up; most ads were for Dryco products, though there were a few PR spots, which inferred with metaphysical certitude that the ideal behavior patterns Dryco recommended that all follow would, perhaps, steer the viewers toward a life convincingly semblancing an idealization of contentment.
"You've always felt alone?" I asked.
"You get used to it." E blanked the screen and closed his eyes as we conversed.
"You'll rarely be alone here," I said.
"Can't say much for that either," he said. "None a this seems real, it's all crazy. All of it. You must feel crazy all the time, you've been in it so long."
"It's best if you take none of it seriously. You'll be able to do that in time, to some degree."
He smiled. "I can't ever take Leverett seriously," said E. "He's always goin' on-"
"And always will," I said. "Take him seriously."
"He as crazy as he acts?" E asked. "Level with me."
I hedged, before replying, knowing it a surety that our words would be replayed and noted, later on. "There's little they want of you, after all."
"Stand there and let them love you," I said. "The sole requirement."
"What if they blow me up too?" E said. "Like they did Hitler?"
"Doubtful," I said. "You'll have an easier time of it here than your twin had. You'll better understand what's expected."
"Maybe," he said. "What are they gonna think I am, Isabel?"
"God."
That was the first time I'd so overted what I'd tried, over weeks, to infer. For some moments he was reactionless, as if awaiting followup laughter. Even now I recall his expression when he understood that I truthed, saying that. He paled, and drew away from me as if I'd hurt him more than his girlfriend's brother, or his father, or anyone, even his mother, ever could have. "God of this world?" he asked, whispering as if we'd been caught in illicity.
"What other-?"
"They think I'm like that?" he said. "That's how you want me to be?"
"It's metaphor," I said. "Approximate, all the same. When I say your predecessor is worshiped, I mean what's said."
"No." He began to cry; I'd no idea what so set him off. "I'm bad, but I'm not that bad. I'm not, I'm not-"
"E," I said, rubbing my hand along his shoulder, unwilling to embrace him even as he wept. "What is it? What-?"
"You all think I'm worse'n a murderer," he said. "Worse'n Hitler. My mamma didn't even say I was that bad."
Without warning he threw himself upon me again, as I always feared he might do were I allow him to approach too near; but there was nothing of lust in his clutch, this time. E sobbed, impressing utter bereftness, seeming to have broken as I'd predicted he would. Still, however helpless he was, however pitiable was his presence, I struggled to extricate myself from his grasp, so disgusted by his touch as I had been that night in the woods. I unsuccessed; he clung to me as if to a crumbling mountainside, or a raft in the midst of the sea. Sighing, accepting my lot for the moment, I responded, hoping to calm; hugged him, trying to keep minded that I was dealing with one who, in too many ways, was no more than a child. "You're not bad," I said, searing my tongue with lies.
"Don't call me God, Isabel," he said; he anguished so that I barely heard his words. "Please don't. Please."
Twice weekly Leverett called to his office all involved with the E project save E himself, conferencing with us, assuring that any problems arising might be swiftly solved before he could pretend he'd never known of them. Some were Dryconians, some came as consultants or subcontractors; all appeared to take joy from their labor only in that it served them as license to argue. I was the sole woman; in aggregate the group exuded that oppressive pheromonic air common to such manly lumps, however weedy and asexual they singly appeared. Though I spent so much time with E as any of them, none but Leverett ever inquired me regarding my opinions; they merely noted my observations as I recounted, smiling as if hearing an unreliable, though amiable, passerby. The afternoon before I'd left E calming, if not wholly recovered from his upset; during the following morning's meeting I thought it essential to point my view between their eyes to certify they saw as I saw.
"Any answer he gives is gansered," said one whose name I constantly blanked, a sociopathologist affiliated with Princeton. Several of the others nodded, as if they understood.
"Demetaform," I asked. "What's meant, gansered?"
"Referent to Ganser's Syndrome. Subject consistently replies to questions with approximate answers. A behaviorism common to psychopaths. For example, when asked if he missed his father he responded that they never had stamps in the house."
"Understood," said Leverett. "I asked him if he wasn't glad to be alive and he told me he couldn't say, he hadn't been dead yet." They chuckled. "What's the point, then?"
"Nothing he tells should be entirely trusted," said the Princeton SP. "This must at all times be considered."
"So we'll earplay his words," said Leverett. "Mother him to quiet, father him otherwise. As you did yesterday, Isabel."
"Problem one demands immediate action," said Telford, who taught Comparative Elvisisms at Harvard Divinity. "What Ms. Bonney tells us facts our theories. The matter must be confronted, otherwise project possibilities could be nullified before he's even publicked."
"So describe problem one," Leverett said. "You've been circling around it twenty minutes. Aim and fire, please."
"To best serve as a messiah figure," a bearded man I'd not seen before said, speaking for the first time that day, "requires of the figure a belief in essential messiah concepts."
"Professor Aponte, isn't it?" Leverett asked; the man nodded. "And your field-"
"Neopost Gnosticism," he said. "Doctor Telford contacted me this weekend past, detailing inferences made in direct observation. I've been overseeing deconstruction of the subject's Bible and was developing my own conclusions. Now, the lady tells us of this matter of his not willing to be even a metaphor for God. The subject, I fear, lacks a key essentiality."
"Detail," said Leverett. "No problem overwhelms."
"Professor Mora," said Aponte. "Historicize."
"Awared as we are from these studies that similarity divergence between worlds seems to have intensified, rather than begun, at the 1945/1861 coeval timeframe," said Mora, who appeared no less glad to see me now than he had during our class together, "it evidences that unforeseen complications upset prior predictions regarding the subject's response accordanced to his historical context-"
"Dejargonize," said Leverett, his smile unwavering.
"Prior to the Middle Ages, in our world," said Aponte, "numerous branches of Gnosticism coexisted with Christianity as viable belief-models throughout Eurasia and northern Africa. The Catholic church, over centuries, liquidated all who adhered to Gnosticism, ridding the world of those whom they considered the worst of heretical competitors. Only in the last fifty years have the beliefs remanifested themselves overtly in Western society."
"Macaffreyism, as an example," said Mora. "My wife believes."
"As do many," said Leverett, allowing no hint of his own supposed belief to be revealed. "So our boy's a Gnostic? Make him all the easier to handle, I'd think-"
"Not at all," said Aponte. "Macaffreyism, taking that example, is a neopost variant similar only in the base concept of dual deities, one good, one evil. Extrapolating from the subject's Bible and from interrogation of the subject-"
"Keeping minded of his propensity to ganser," said the Princeton SP.
"-it would appear that in the other world Gnosticism was not erased but thrived, and that the Valentinian sect became in fact the predominant religion of the American South. Correlating his response on the eschatological curve with the texted material, we discerned the potential problem-"
"I'd almost forgotten there was one," said Leverett. "Detail, please-"
"The messianic concept is alien to the subject," said Aponte.
"And? What of it?"
"The core belief of Valentinianism is that knowledge and self-awareness save the soul," said Aponte. "In this particular faith the creator manifests as a female deity, Sophia. She birthed the God of this world, the Demiurge, who created the world and who is unable and unwilling to lead either itself or humanity out of darkness. In our subject's religion old Christian beliefs are topturveyed. To his mind, people redeem their creator in the act of redeeming themselves. Humanity will save God, to be concise."
"He believes that?" Leverett asked.
"Evidently," said Aponte. "So to suggest to the subject that people here want him to contain the God of this world within himself inspires the unfavorable reaction observed." Aponte shrugged. "Heretofore he's believed that, however bad he was, he'd still one day be able to-"
"Regood himself," I said. Leverett nodded.
"So when he finds that others believe he contains God within himself, a God whom they expect to save them, he imagines not only
that those who worship him call evil down upon themselves by doing so, but that by living as their worshipee he'll never have the chance to overcome his own evil."
"Keep the ganser factor minded while assuming," said the Princeton SP.
"Such religious beliefs must be politically quite useful, in their South," said Mora.
"What am I to do with him, then?" I asked.
"He'll mindshift, everyone does," said Leverett. "Reality's most adaptable thing there is. Talk with him about it. It's reasonless why he can't pose as one god while believing in another."
"I'm uncertain, Leverett-"
"He should viz his followers at close hand before we intro him en masse of course, so he'll know what to expect from them. I've a plan for that in any event. The forewarned forearm. We'll roundabout this."
"It may be difficult," said Aponte.
"We'll see. Adjourned for now, gentlemen. See you Thursday, same time. Isabel, remain."
While the others filed out Leverett fixed his stare on mine with such intensity that I believed he might be attempting to hypnotize me, as the late Colonel was said to have done so effectively with the King. "Your hair, Isabel. You didn't tell me of your intention to change."
"I saw no need to tell," I said, twirling relaxed strands of black between my fingers. "I've had enough of blondness. My natural look's called for."
"But what will he think?"
"It's unmattering," I said. "He'll adjust if it troubles, as he's adjusting to so much else. I've missed myself, Leverett. I want to be as I am-"