Sketches for Stories of Tea Service
So, one story would be about obedience actually, and the tea will only be a device, a metaphor, the vehicle through which the lesson about obedience is learned. The story is one in which a young Zimzim is taught the order of things, the ways of the world, by a wise and compassionate (if firm, and uncompromising) master. A bildungsroman. His. This will be the first of my Tea Boy stories.
Another story could be about the actual experience of drinking the tea itself, about enjoying tea, its sensual aspects, its tannic texture on the tongue, its earthy tang rising off the palate and imbuing the nasal passages with a kind of smoke; the feeling of the heated porcelain in the hand, the sweet warmth creeping down into the belly, suchlike.
Maybe another story would tell about my adverse reactions to not receiving tea? About (I want to say: frustration?)
Maybe another story would be someone else’s story of tea. I’ve heard a few. Maybe I’ll pass some of these off as my own.
Nm. I can work out the details later.
* * *
—
“I’ve made real progress today,” I tell the duty officer, admin18, at day’s end, and I’m fairly sure that even the Director and his other cohorts would agree. Miss Fairfax will be so pleased. Though I won’t tell her yet—I’ll make her wait. She’ll have to tease it out of me.
But no: I’ve accomplished tangible results. It is coming to life. I am creating. Really making things.
To wit, I now have, aside from my paper uniform and paper Tea Boy, made a paper Dennis Royal to keep me company and amuse me with his wry asides. Paper-Dennis is the very picture of the louche and disaffected lounger, and I’ve perfected, after many attempts, the exact sardonic slant of his mouth. There he is, slumped up against a structural column off by the window. (There is nothing that the meatspace Dennis won’t lean up against.) This Dennis looks as if he will be saying something to me any moment. A quip of some sort, or putdown. I haven’t yet determined what it is he will be saying. Perhaps it will be something like “Oh, well done, Percy.” (Sarcasm.) Or just “What an effing mockery.” (Derision.) But I feel like, at this stage, even mute, the new Dennis is providing decent companionship.
Also, I have constructed a map of my rooms, in a 1:1 scale, made out of hundreds of sheets of paper all hot-glued to the floors and walls of the space. The flat is now a map of the flat. (Listen: it had to happen.) I’ve even papered over the windows and have drawn a serene scene upon each of them, a tableau of the Institute at rest, fellows out in huddles and conferences, swaying palms (you can tell they are swaying from the movement lines I’ve drawn around them), various rectilinear buildings in the distance, lake, Pleasure Center, Mountain House, a tiny desert-viewing bench, and that clear, clear sky, which I’ve almost finished indicating.
It should all be over soon, I think.
43
(HIGHLY QUESTIONABLE)
A break in the weather, unexpected, blessed. A boon. Though who knows how long it will last, as it all, everything that is, feels as though it is building to something. Is this the proverbial calm then? It must be. And so, it is out to the souks with us, right away, while we can, all of us, practically the entire Institute, to get away from the goddam paper.
We visit the Gold Souk, and the Spice Souk, the Rug and Tapestry Souk, and, just past the Digital Services Roundabout, the Perfume Souk. Enthusiasm about shopping has, for the fellows who have been bused out to the bazaars, reached an all-time high. Enthusiasm, or competitiveness. Fellows run the souks like obstacle courses; alone and in small groups. Baskets fill with trinkets. It’s a spectacle. Everyone eager, trying out their skill with the local language. In the Souk D’Adidas I speak to a man who sells shoelaces. He is drinking surreptitiously from a small flask, and he nods as I speak to him, but never speaks back. All the streets in the various bazaars are crooked. Some by design. But the place is alive, just thronged with vendors and shoppers. And children, who beg insistently for coins, and who offer up wide and genuine smiles for us. Some are shoeshine boys. Some are musicians, or acrobats. Some are selling small items, foodstuffs. They paw, lightly, at our arms and legs like seaweed around a swimmer.
We have a traditional sweet mint tea, in a tent inside one of the stalls. The famous mint tea at last. The vendor pores the hot liquid from a virtuosic height. Then we sample it. Then eat our energy bars, and drink our juice boxes, the ones which were handed out to each of us by our admins. We eat and drink in silence.
Then there’s a brief moment out in the glare, in the car park. Wind from the north, dry irritants. Nothing to look at but the desert’s rim: a faint waving line. Just a line. Merely. Wavy lines are everywhere, frankly—a dime a dozen. To prove the point, I draw a snaky line with the toe of my shoe in the sand of the lot’s divider. And I draw another. Three. I could make twenty. A thousand. Who cares.
Then the admins call us back.
We are organized for a group photo. Many, many rows of us. Institute support-staffers as well. We stand in designated spots. Takes a while. It’s hot but we persevere. The admin who whispers up the shot takes a long while to get the settings right. The brightness is through the bloody roof. Everyone is sweating; squinting. But we get there—the photograph is taken. And now, of course, other devices are passed forward. Everyone needs a pic on their own device. (Though of course the original could just be pinged out to everyone. Sure, but it’s the principle of the thing. Everyone wants ownership. Even if it is merely ownership over whatever filter they’ve scrupulously elected to use.) Later, I might look at this photo on my own device and notice that we—all of us; the Cryptographer and the Sculptor and the Philosopher, the Psychologist, the Actor, the Translator, the Set Theorist, the Miniaturist, the Critic, the Sociologist and the Composer, the Developer and the Astronomer, then the Humorist, the Philologist, the Theologian, the Urban Planner, the Percussionist, etc., etc.—each of us has been arranged so as to form a meta-picture, a picture of a head; a giant head, that is. Perhaps it is the head of a single fellow, an everyman fellow, or perhaps the perfect, idealized fellow, whose very existence is predicated upon the presence of all of us; whose project depends upon leveraging the skills of all of the others; a fellow who doesn’t exist except in aggregate. If only I were high enough to see!
Everyone is here; everyone but, again, no Mysterious Woman. No “Miss Chatterton.” I’ve lost track of her, I realize. And wonder how she avoids having to come on these group outings. She is always apart. Always keeps apart. And why deny her the pleasure of solitude, Percy? Idk. Because it is denied me? W/e.
Me: I’m assimilated now, a piece of the large head. I can’t ever manage to be alone. Or, rather, unobserved. I’m always watched. So no more Same Same sneakaways.
I shuffle off with the rest of the brigade, obeying the loud but cheery exhortations of the admins, and now it is off to “Aladdin’s Cave.”
“Aladdin’s Cave” is a souk which sells I-don’t-know-what-exactly, but once I part the diaphanous curtain and enter, I can see that there are oil lamps which contain lightbulbs in lieu of ancient and bonded spirits. Brocaded red vests, and fezzes too. Necklaces of bright turquoise, scimitars (plastic scimitars), key chains with a wide-eyed cartoon monkey on them spelling out names from Aaron to Zinedine, as well as signs from Aries to Virgo, and there is jasmine but not the plant but rather the T-shirts bearing the word “Jasmine,” in a faux-Arabic script, and baseball hats upon which are emblazoned the word, in gold thread, “Aladdin,” plus rows of Blu-rays and DVDs, water bottles, snow globes, plush dolls, USB drives, figurine play-sets, flying carpets, stacked like pancakes, hookahs which are actually coffeemakers, and an animatronic purple genie who takes smart chips, credit cards, or Apple Pay, and who grants wishes. A song is currently emanating from a perforated speaker where his mouth should be and I just catch the words “…where it’s flat and immense and the heat is intense…”
this followed by a tinny rendition of “The Old Bazaar in Cairo,” followed in turn by the title track from Follow That Camel! (There’s a touchscreen playlist.)
The Brand Analyst is here, but she’s done with me. She hangs, proprietarily, on the arm of 鼎福 the Architect as they travel from stall to stall, picking up wares, turning them this way and that, looking for prices underneath ceramic bowls, and smiling at one another like they are standing at the glass looking into a nursery. I am tiring and hot so I sit down on a stack of velour rugs.
“Intending to fly your way to safety?” It’s Mr. Al’Hatif.
His previously smart beard has gone wild and untrimmed, and his skin now seems yellow and hard. He remains more or less affectless since his presentation, though there is, now, a tiny glimmer in his eye, a light on the far shore, and I wonder what this encounter of all things has catalyzed in him. But as soon as it flashes, the lantern is snuffed.
“They don’t have any ‘Ousman’ key chains,” he reports, glumly.
“Not surprising, really.”
“There’s probably a Mr. ‘Percy,’ if you want me to find you one.”
“No, thank you. I’m fine.”
“I’ve brought you something,” he says, digging into the pocket of his uniform, and coming up with a balled-up handkerchief which he extends to me. I reach out, cautiously.
“Go ahead,” he says.
I unwrap the bundle, and a series of small, worn red plastic disks spill out onto the floor of the bazaar, which he hastens to sweep up and put back into my cupped hands.
“What is this, Ousman.”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“Aren’t these—”
“Yes.”
“Checkers?”
“Fragments.” He raises one brow as is his manner, and leans way in.
“True fragments. Of the Great Buddha. Authentic. The last of them. I saved a few. Just for you.”
“What an honor, Ousman, thank you.”
I cascade the synthetic rounds into my uniform’s pocket, and clasp his hands in mine. He looks at me, his face devoid of strain or effort. Permanently off-Ladder.
But admins are beginning to hustle us toward the vehicles. There’s a barely discernible uptick in their urgency. Faintly now, I hear sirens again. Sliding up and down like soprano trombones.
The storms are back again.
44
THE FUNDAMENTS OF MY PROJECT
Fundament 16. In the beginning, a character arrives in a strange, new environment—on the page that is—devoid of characteristics. But he should, eventually, come into focus (as should his new milieu). In order for this to occur, the character must be placed amid other agents. Interactions are vital. Through such interactions, a character will find himself in opposition to something; he will overcome that something; and finally, through this very overcoming, he will learn something crucial about himself, so on. In other words, he cannot remain static, the environment cannot remain static, and the project itself cannot remain withholding throughout its entire duration.
Fundament 17. Psa: meteorological symbolism is to be avoided.
45
Catastrophe is binary; it either mounts, or is averted. In this case, the former, and the Institute now resembles a disorganized archive, the confettied aftermath of a parade; the floor of a stock exchange when trading closes; a beaten piñata; a leaflet-strewn battleground; an unflustered snow globe; an ashy fireplace…images, analogies, metaphors curdling on my tongue before I can commit to them, piling up like so much paper trash. And now I only recall my reluctance to think along such lines with a kind of wistfulness. I am resigned to softly yielding to whatever is undeniably transpiring around me.
(THE PAPER CONTINUED)
Meanwhile, four pages fly low over the lawns where one or two fellows mill about. They fly past broken park benches, over cracked pavement, mud patches, grass (sparse), half-empties, stubs, wrappers, albino dogshit, whatnot—over the yuck of it, i/o/w—and, understandably, the papers hasten off. Straight on through Gate 22 and through the double doors to the Mountain House.
They now follow the airstreams about the building, swirling around hallways and dipping in and out of doorways. Now breezing past and over the sad, mostly melted, once-iceberg, they enter the cantina, where two women yell incoherently at one another. A lot of hot invective and spittle—a mess of intimidation and fronting—charges, bellows, dominance displays. The women come together. Claw at one another. Hair grabbed, thumbs digging for purchase, eyes scratched at. Punches landing. Elbows, knees too. It is raucous, shrieking, fugal. That acceleration of time that violence provokes. Chairs flipped, Dixie cups and cutlery clatter to the floor.
One of the sheets of paper peels off, gets in close for a better view. Its approach is low, via the ground, but it comes in much too close. Pull up! The smaller of the two women backs up onto it, and trips—the paper is wrecked; crumpled and torn—and the woman falls loudly to the floor. The standing woman gets right to it now, straddling and subduing her adversary, and just pounding on the fallen woman, whose uniform is tangled, riding up—no dignity in these things. There are ugly, damp sounds. Admins running. The straddler is pulled off the straddled by her armpits, the prone woman lifted by her feet and hands and hauled away. The papers leave now as well, though not of their own accord; they go where the gusts take them.
Another set of papers (about a short story’s worth) is shooting down a different corridor, the walls of which glint with laminated schedules, invites, cheer-me-ups; a rainbow alphabet: “Don’t backtrack!” “Strive for a new life!” “Journaling can help!” (If the papers could laugh at this last one, they might now.) Instead they sail past the shiny and cigarette-blistered couch and follow the scuffed lines running centrally down the tiled floors like runway markings. Beneath, more fellows mill, and fragments of conversation can be made out. Taken together, these fragments coalesce to form news: the news that “5B is freaking out,” and that there is going to be a “six-person lockup.” The papers, sensitive already to the smallest vibration, feel alert; exhilarated.
And here’s 5B, in front of which the night staff has duly assembled.
Meanwhile, a fellow—whose scrawny, pale arms are being held behind his back by two admins, one admin per arm—dances violently in place.
One of the admins says to the others: “He needs to be sectioned, I keep saying.”
Another fellow, a bystander, walks by, holding a single folded bedsheet under his arm, and a single thin pillow in that same hand, like a commuter, managing briefcase and newspaper. The fellow rubbernecks the scene. Other fellows shuffle over to watch as well—it’s exciting. The commuter and the other onlookers are encouraged by the staff to back away.
The already restrained fellow is now grabbed by two more admins, though the man continues to judder in their grip. He’s slight, but putting up an impressive amount of resistance.
“We’re bringing you back to your room now.”
“It’s not time.”
“Time’s up.”
“Actually, fuck right off.”
“Now.”
“Who appointed you, sir?” he asks, sardonic, even (especially) in his bondage.
“Easy does it.”
“Unfh.”
“Easy, there.”
“Bastards.”
“Easy, love.”
“Imbeciles.”
“Take it slow.”
“Nobody appointed you, asshole.”
“Nope. Nobody appointed me. Ha, ha, ha.”
“Don’t laugh at me.”
“Easy.”
“Shit.”
“Get his ankles.”
“What did I do?”
“Be calm.”
“I can piss where I damn well like, it’s a free
country.”
“File a grievance.”
He writhes again, in their grip, massively now, manages to free one of his hands, and grabs the tie of the laughing admin.
A clip-on. Still holding the tie, the fellow slips to the floor.
“Ha, ha, ha.”
“Stop fucking laughing.”
“Turn him over.”
“Get off.”
“Going to remove the shoes now.”
“Get off.”
“Facedown. Easy. Elbows, we’ve got knees.”
“Frrrrk.”
“Relax.”
Facedown on the linoleum.
Six admins holding him, one brandishing the hypo.
“Ahngg.”
“There you go. Calm.”
Time passes.
Now carrying the fellow between them like a bag of water they don’t want to spill.
Through the door, lights on.
He’s in.
Turn him around. Lying on his back now, feet away from the door, crown of his head pointing toward it. Rocking gently in the narrow bed, restrained by twelve blue hands. They form a symmetrical figure; lines, restraints, relays, sephirot. A Vitruvian prisoner.
Admins release their grips serially; one hand at a time. The last admin to leave the room is the admin who is holding the head. The head is freed at the very last instant by this admin who is also the admin closest to the door.
Same Same Page 28