JPod

by Douglas Coupland

  "No."

  Bree and I swapped maybe-we-went-too-far looks. Bree asked, "So what's going on here?"

  "I can't tell you."

  "Don't sweat it. No problem."

  Bree wagged her head, implying, Best we leave her alone for the time being.

  I agreed, but first I had to extract the Belgian keyboard. "Kaitlin, sorry, but I did something naughty to your keyboard. I swapped it for this freaky unit."

  Kaitlin looked at it. "Cool. A Belgian keyboard."

  'You recognize it?"

  "My sister works for the EU in Antwerp."

  "Oh."

  "That's so sweet of you."

  "I—"

  "No. It's okay."

  I went to my cubicle and got her old board. "Here's the real one. For when you want to switch."

  "Thanks, Ethan."

  I slunk away. Fortunately, Gord-O found me and was able to dump a massive steaming heap of tasks in my lap, relieving me of any time in which to experience remorse. I was considering this steaming pile of tasks when I saw John Doe in the cafeteria, playing Sim City on a wireless. Reprieve! I was able to pre-empt Gord-O's work request with the promise of time well wasted.

  "Sim City? That's pretty vanilla, John."

  "Is it wrong to play a game that's a proven hit? I only play best-selling games, and never allow myself to become too good, lest I deviate from the norm."

  "Okay." I looked at his screen. "Uh . . . John, you're building a city out of body parts." On screen, random body parts glistened alongside traditional buildings. Tunnels passed through feet. Eyeballs formed oil storage tanks.

  "Well, yes. I had to tweak the code at least a little bit. The body part patch is floating around in the in-house system if you want to try it." John attached a donkey tail to a fifty-storey building shaped like a human leg from the foot to the knee. "In about fifty years, real-life genetic traits will be as modular as those you're witnessing on my screen. For now we can only dream. See that oil refinery right there? In a few minutes it's going to get a vagina. By the way, I googled Kaitlin, and you'd be surprised at what I found."

  "You googled her?"

  "Of course I did. Didn't you?"

  I'd somehow forgotten to perform this essential task.

  "Let's have a peek, shall we?"

  A few clicks later, kaitlin anna boyd Joyce went into the Google request box. A predictable landslide of genealogical links filled the screen.

  "Big deal."

  'Yes, but what happens if I go back and enter her name again and click the I FEEL LUCKY button."

  "Nobody ever clicks that button."

  "Maybe they should start." The genealogical mulch came back, but there was a new hit at the top of the page.

  "'Dark Stories from the Subway Diet'?"

  John said, "Exactly."

  He clicked the link, and we were transported to one of hundreds of Subway restaurant fan sites. In it, we saw BEFORE and AFTER photos of Kaitlin—one of her weighing 337 pounds, and the next as the Kaitlin of jPod, weighing at most 105. "Holy crap," I said.

  "That's what I thought. Read on, bro."

  Welcome to . . .

  The Third Rail

  An Unofficial Fan Website for Those Who Enjoy tasty sandwiches from Subway!!!

  07.23.05

  THIS WEEK: What happens when "THE DIET" goes wrong?

  TITLE: "To Kaitlin Boyd, it was just a few pieces of cake, but to Subway, it was a violation of a sacred trust."

  I am not a news reporter, so please excuse my mistakes here. For those of you who visit this site regularly (Thank you for visiting!!! Come back next week to see my new graphic overhaul!!!), you will know that Kaitlin Boyd lost over two hundred pounds on the Diet. She was set for fame and wealth—until a neighbour with a Handicam brought a tape to Subway HQ that rocked her world. This former three-hundred-pounder was caught on the fifth month of her diet eating an entire chocolate mud cake on her back stoop. Her lucrative sponsorship contract was cancelled. All Kaitlin has left are bitter memories and a freezer full of complimentary frozen uncooked Parmesan-oregano 12-inch loaves. A little bird told this reporter that Kaitlin likes to thaw and eat these loaves before bedtime while watching reruns of Who's the Boss? on a satellite feed from the Turks and Caicos Islands.

  THIS WEBSITE ASKS: Was Kaitlin really fired over one lapse with a cake? Surely not!!! A Subway corporate insider (who shall remain nameless!!!) told this reporter, "We're all human, and many of our weight-loss spokes heroes have committed transgressions, but with Ms. Boyd, cake was just the start. That same neighbour also caught Boyd dropping twenty bucks at Popeyes Chicken, and then frittering away an entire afternoon at a Baskin-Robbins. There comes a time when you really have to admit that a line has been drawn in the sand and the line has been crossed. We wish Ms. Boyd the best in her future end eavours."

  Frequent visitors to this site know that the Subway Diet is a sacred pact between you and Subway. To honour this pact, I visited Kaitlin's former next-door neighbour in Sunnyvale, California. There, I spoke with expose creator, Norman Goddard, 31, a nurse. As he told me, "All my friends call me Stormin' Norman!!!" My Sony recorder was acting weird, but here is the general thrust of my conversation with Norman.

  ME: At what point did you realize that you had to take the law into your own hands and report Ms. Boyd to Subway HQ?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: That stuck-up scag wouldn't answer any of my phone calls, and I tried calling her every day for a year.

  ME: What happened then?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: I sent her a Hickory Farms smoked meat platter selection—one of those ironic gifts. I thought if I sent her flowers, it'd look like I was stalking her or something.

  ME: What happened next?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: She came over when I was at work and put the unopened platter on my front stoop. Then the neighbour's labradoodle got into it and then got sick and shat all over the concrete I'd just had power-washed.

  ME: That's really interesting. Go on.

  STORMIN' NORMAN: So I went to Michaels crafts store and got some big coloured cardboards and made some signs, which I taped to the side of my house that faces her place. I thought they were kind of nice.

  ME: What did they say?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: Let's see . . . One said, IT WAS JUST A GIFT WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE so COLD? Another said, i THINK ABOUT YOU ALL THE TIME, IN A GOOD WAY

  ME: Nice enough.

  STORMIN' NORMAN: Totally. But did she respond to me? No. She went to the cops and tried to get a restraining order, which was so insulting, because all I was trying to do was be nice to a neighbour. And she changed her phone number and got all these locks on the doors.

  ME: Did she own the place?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: Rental.

  ME: What next?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: She put up tinfoil on all the windows that faced mine.

  ME: And then?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: She was having a backyard barbecue with all her geek co-workers, and so I came over with a tray of hamburger patties I spiced and formed all by myself—I even put Saran Wrap on them to keep dust and flies off the meat—and when I walked into her yard, all of these people formed a human chain around her, and she ran inside. Jeez, I mean, I was just trying to be neighborly.

  ME: Was there a fight?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: Nah. We all just yelled a bit. Got it out of our system. And then the cops showed up, so I thought to myself, Stormin' Norman, maybe it's time you ate a reality sandwich and faced the fact that Kaitlin doesn't like you. That's when I decided that if I couldn't have her, I'd make sure she noticed me in other ways.

  ME: Really?

  STORMIN' NORMAN: Oh yeah. I went to one of those spy shops and spent a fortune and began chronicling every moment of her life. Every single moment.

  Unfortunately, website visitors, I lost the rest of the interview, but who says that investigative journalism is dead!!!???

  Next week's investigation: What's the top-secret proportion of salt to pepper inside t
he salt-and-pepper can?

  Subway Restaurants is the world's largest submarine sandwich franchise, with more than 24,000 locations in 83countries. In 2002, the Subway chain surpassed McDonald's in the number of restaurants open in the United States and Canada. Headquartered in Milford,Conn., Subway Restaurants was co-founded by Fred DeLuca and Dr. Peter Buck in 1965. That partnership marked the beginning of a remarkable journey—one that made it possible for thousands of individuals to build and succeed in their own business. Subway Restaurants was named the number one franchise opportunity in all categories by Entrepreneur magazine in its Annual Franchise500 ranking for 2005—for the 13th time in 17 years! Formore information about the Subway restaurant chain, visithttp://www.subway.com/. Subway® is a registered trademark of Doctor's Associates Inc. (DAI).

  ATF

  Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms

  AZT

  Azidothymidine

  BLT

  Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato

  BSE

  Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy

  CIA

  Central Intelligence Agency

  CMV

  Cytomegalovirus

  DMZ

  Demilitarized Zone

  DOA

  Dead on Arrival

  EEC

  European Economic Community

  EMP

  Electromagnetic Pulse

  FBI

  Federal Bureau of Investigation

  FTP

  File Transfer Protocol

  GMT

  Greenwich Mean Time

  GTO

  Gran Turismo Omologato

  HIV

  Human Immunodeficiency Virus

  HOV

  High Occupancy Vehicle

  IMF

  International Monetary Fund

  IRA

  Irish Republican Army

  JFK

  John Fitzgerald Kennedy

  KGB

  Komitet Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti

  KKK

  Ku Klux Klan

  LAX

  Los Angeles International Airport

  LSD

  Lysergic Acid Diethylamide

  MIA

  Missing in Action

  MP3

  Moving Pictures Experts Group Audio Layer 3

  NHK

  Nihon Hoso Kyokai TV

  NRA

  National Rifle Association

  NRK

  Anarchy

  OLE

  Object Linking and Embedding

  OPD

  Officially Pronounced Dead

  PFD

  Photoshop File Document

  PIN

  Personal Identification Number

  PSA

  Prostate-Specific Antigen

  PVC

  Polyvinyl Chloride

  QE2

  Queen Elizabeth II

  RGB

  Red-Green-Blue

  RNA

  Ribonucleic Acid

  SLA

  Symbionese Liberation Army

  SPF

  Sun Protection Factor

  SUV

  Sport-Utility Vehicle

  THC

  Tetrahydrocannabinol

  TNT

  Trinitrotoluene

  UPS

  United Parcel Service

  USD

  US Dollar

  VCR

  Videocassette Recorder

  VRE

  Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococci

  WTC

  World Trade Center

  WWW

  World Wide Web

  XML

  Extensible Markup Language

  XXL

  Double Extra Large

  XXX

  Pornography

  YTD

  Year to Date

  Y3K

  The Year 3000

  ZIP

  Zone Improvement Plan

  ZPG

  Zero Population Growth

  . . .

  The next morning I slinked into a BoardX art meeting. Steve, Gord-O and staff from the loftiest links of the corporate food chain were trying to nail the essence of Jeff the Charismatic Turde, albeit without joy or enthusiasm. Prototype turde sketches were pinned onto a massive cork wall, all of them goofy and teensploita-tional: sunglasses, baggy pants and (dear God) a terry cloth sweatband.

  "Does Jeff the Turde follow players around the entire time they manipulate their third person?"

  "Almost. Like Watson is to Sherlock Holmes."

  "Can you imagine how annoying that would be?"

  "Maybe the buddy isn't such a good idea."

  Steve more or less squashed what hope remained: "It's going to be a buddy. Players will love it."

  "Isn't our turde supposed to be a bit more studly?"

  "Turdes aren't studly by nature."

  "What about that turde they used in the 1950s to pimp the atomic weapons program? He was kind of studly."

  "No, he wasn't, and besides, he's dead."

  "What?"

  "Dead. Hung himself from the side of his posh midtown Manhattan terrarium. Left a note saying he couldn't handle the shame of what he'd done. Wrote it on a piece of Bibb lettuce."

  "Can't anyone think of hipper turdes than the Department of Energy's uranium spokesreptile?"

  "Spokesphibian.''

  "No one answered my question. Is our turde studly? Does he have huge pecs?"

  "I don't think it's appropriate that a turde be hot."

  "Have you ever noticed how they never show the Ninja Turtles' shells if they can avoid it? They're always facing forwards."

  "Hey—a thick, rich masculine shell. He could store a tool belt on it."

  "If you look, you'll see that the Ninja Turdes' fleshy undersides are always overexposed, and the musculature is too steroidal. It's a reproductive strategy on their part, maybe."

  "Are they gay?"

  "I told you, Legal said we're not allowed to ask that, and besides, turdes are always straight."

  "Hang on, we agreed to model the turde after Jeff Probst, so maybe we could make our turde wear Banana Republic summer wear. Maybe get a co-licensing deal."

  "That could work."

  "A tan?"

  "I like the tan idea."

  "Everybody, do we all like a suntan for our turde? Let me do a hand count and get it out of the way—okay, suntan it is."

  "Can he have more hair?"

  "I have one word for you: mammal''

  "If Donald Duck can have hands, Jeff can have hair. A litde brush cut—easy to maintain, and it can take him from the boardroom all the way into a palm-fronded yurt populated with dormant tarantulas."

  "No beaches here. Sand gets into skateboard bearings. Game over."

  "Is Jeff middle-class?"

  "By Jeff, you mean the turde?"

  "Yes. Can we all agree to just call him Jeff?"

  "Okay, only so long as the real Jeff Probst never finds out we've been having this discussion."

  "Is Jeff middle-class?"

  "What you're really asking is, What's Jeff's story? What makes Jeff ?"

  "Yes."

  "I think Art did a fine job of depicting Jeff here. Let's look at their ideas and take it from there."

  Silence.

  "Ideas? Thoughts?"

  Silence.

  Everyone suddenly remembered they were supposed to look interested. "Is he an adult turde?"

  "No. He's a teenager. Didn't I say that?"

  "Where does he live?"

  "Players don't need to know that."

  "Is he the only turde in the game?"

  "Yes."

  "Does he have magic powers?"

  "No. He has boarding skill."

  "Does he have a weak spot?"

  "Yes—being flipped onto his back and left to die in the sun, or to have his innards ripped out by rogue weasels."

  "Please," Steve said. "I believe in joshing around as much as the next guy, but let's all be serious. We have to get Jeff loc
ked in by tomorrow."

  "Jeff's not going to sing or do rap songs, is he?"

  "We'll cross that bridge when we get there."

  . . .

  Three hours later Steve walked into jPod while I was procrastinating by downloading car crash images from a gore site in the Czech Republic.

  "Steve. Uh, hi. You must be lost. What part of the building do you need to get to?"

  "Here is fine."

  "Oh."

  'Your mother's a nice woman, Ethan."

  "Well, yes."

  "You're a lucky fellow."

  "Thanks, Steve."

  "She's got a good sense of humour. And when she talks to you, it's like you're the only person in the universe."

  "Steve, I think I left my car in the parking lot." I stood up to go.

  "Don't be in such a hurry. So, uh . . ." Steve began buying time. 'Your brother sells real estate, right?"

  "Sort of." I explained Greg's specialty.

  "You think he'd sell me a place?"

  "It's your money, Steve."

  I gave Greg's information to Steve, and he left. I sat down, turned to look at my screen and then had a blinding headache. It was time to go home—eight o'clock—the earliest I'd left since the last game shipped.

  Upon arriving at my stylish Chinatown shack, I walked in the door to see that all my new furniture was gone, and my original furniture hadn't come back. Fuck. I phoned Greg, but realized he was on Cathay Pacific 889, headed to Hong Kong. I phoned Mom.

  "Ethan, you didn't even like the furniture."

  "That's not the point. There's nothing in my place. Nothing."

  "If you had a girlfriend, there'd be more possessions."

  'You told me to dump my girlfriend."

  "She was a mess. Good riddance. Greg said you really made that generous Chinese businessman angry."

  "Who?"

  "The one whose furniture you made fun of. Kam Fong."

  "I didn't mock it. It's just not me."

  "Me? Someone lavishes you with opulent furniture, and you simply dismiss it as 'Not me'}"

  "Okay, I didn't teject it. I merely grudgingly accepted it."

  "Which in Chinese culture is like piercing the heart with a freshly sharpened oyster shucker."