Who's a Good Boy?

by Joseph Fink

  HIRAM-BLUE: They are shackling and muzzling us for our own trial, Cecil. They think our green head is serious in his threats.

  HIRAM-GREEN: MY THREATS ARE ONLY METAPHORS, YOU SOFT SENTIENT POUCHES OF FUTURE FOOD!

  HIRAM-VIOLET: Cecil. I cannot be separated from myself. I may disagree with myself, but I am all in this together.

  CECIL: Violet, I—

  HIRAM-GOLD: But, listen, Cecil, if Night Vale knew the trouble they were in, they’d let us out so we could help fight these strangers.

  CECIL: Oh, believe me, Hiram. The new sheriff is working double time to get rid of the Desert Bluffs p——

  HIRAM-GOLD: Not Desert Bluffs people, Cecil. They’re harmless, hardworking folks. I’m talking about the strangers. The ones that don’t move. The ones that breathe. You tell your mayor friend I can stop them.

  HIRAM-GRAY: We’re not strong enough.

  HIRAM-BLUE: They would be quite resistant to our fire and even our strength.

  HIRAM-GREEN: WE WILL TEAR THE STRANGERS TO PINK FLESHY SHREDS AND THEN CHEW THEM AND THEN SWALLOW THEM. I AM BEING LITERAL.

  HIRAM-VIOLET: I will fight with you, Green. You too, Gold and Gray and Blue. We could do this. But, Cecil, we need out of this prison.

  CECIL: I don’t know what I can do about that, Hiram.

  HIRAM-GOLD: I’m sure you’ll think of something. We’re gonna make it through this. Thanks, buddy.

  Well then, let’s have a word from our sponsor.

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  Dove. Lungs on a white table.

  Little League coach Lusia Tereshchenko told me the incredible story of her journey to Night Vale. When she was a young woman she left her home to travel west across America. She wanted to find a new life for herself out of the crowded, smoke-choked cities. She walked for miles, picking up work in roadside towns. She rode in carriages when she had money. She eventually found a job, making belts, for an old tanner, who worked Lusia long hours for little pay. The old tanner was otherwise kind and treated Lusia like her very own daughter, because she never had a family. But, the tanner grew ill, and Lusia took care of her, bathing her and fetching herb mixtures from the apothecary.

  One morning the old woman was no more. Lusia ran her business for a while longer but since the tanner had no heirs, and Lusia did not feel she had found her true home, she continued west where there was supposedly golden sunshine along an azure sea.

  Soon, however, she once again was in desperate need of money, so that she could eat, and could sleep in safety. She met some men, silent men. Men who kept their faces in shadows. Who kept their voices in shadows. Who kept their guns in shadows. And she worked for them, never knowing what her work was, just that she was to ride the train with them until the time was right.

  One afternoon, the men stood up simultaneously and moved in different directions. One to the front of the train, one to the rear. One climbed through the ceiling onto the roof of the car. Two more drew pistols on the passengers. They told Lusia to keep everyone calm.

  The train whined to a halt, and the men hurriedly unloaded crates from the rear car onto a horse-drawn cart. The crates were warm, warmer than the air around them. They smelled sharp and earthy, like freshly ground cinnamon.

  The apparent sheriff of the little town they stopped in, the town of Night Vale—a place she’d never heard of—soon arrived. He was wearing a welding mask and a cowboy hat. The sheriff drew his gun on the shadowy men. But being outnumbered, he was unable to do much to stop them.

  So while calming the others on the train, Lusia crept behind one of the men. He had a kerchief drawn across his face. Not an actual kerchief tied in front of his face. But a simulacrum of patterned fabric hand-drawn on his face. Using one of her leather belts, Lusia whipped the gun out of his hand and deftly picked it up from the ground. She fired at the outlaws, felling both. Outside, the sheriff felled two more.

  But as she climbed up to the top of the car, she heard a shot from just below her, and then she was lying on her back. She couldn’t remember why she had laid down. She saw, in the sky just above her, a dark planet of awesome size, lit by no sun. She didn’t know how she had not noticed it before. It was so close. An invisible titan, all thick black forests and jagged mountains and deep, turbulent oceans.

  And then . . . Well, let me take you first, to the weather.

  WEATHER: “The River, The Woods” by Astronautalis

  I asked Lusia if that’s how she died. “Well, one moment I’m in a gunfight,” she said, “and the next moment I’m a ghost.” She asked if I had a cigarette.

  I don’t smoke, so I said no.

  “I couldn’t hold it anyway,” she admitted.

  “Why are you living in a baseball diamond?” I asked her.

  She said this wasn’t always a baseball diamond. It was just a field. A field where train tracks used to run. A field where a train once rolled to a stop. But right around this time, the game of baseball was becoming popular, and kids began coming to the field to play. Lusia watched and learned and grew to love the sport’s simplicity and structured grace.

  “It’s a beautiful game, Cecil. So I started trying to coach the kids, but since I’m translucent and hazy, they got scared and ran away, calling this the haunted baseball diamond. Over time, the kids realized I had some helpful things to say about batting stances and hitting the cutoff man, so they came back.” Lusia turned to one of the kids. “Eye on the ball, Manny!” she shouted.

  I asked Lusia, “So you think those men on the train were related to these strangers in Night Vale now?”

  “You do not see evil like that very often,” she said. “But no. Those men on the train performed their evil because they needed whatever was in those crates more than they needed life or peace,” she said. “These strangers, they don’t need anything. They are evil for evil’s own sake.”

  I looked over and saw Steve and Janice coming my way. They were high-fiving and grinning.

  Lusia said, “She’s a good kid. Good arm. She’s gonna be a great shortstop like her uncle.”

  I told Lusia I hope we have a good baseball season and it was wonderful catching up with her. Steve, Janice, and I turned to walk back to Steve’s van.

  Lusia whispered to me, “We’re past time for hope, Cecil. They’re no longer coming. They’re here, and we cannot stop something that wants nothing.”

  Staring straight at Janice, ignoring Lusia, I said, “You made the team! Congrats. Let’s get ice cream.”

  Behind us I heard a distant bark. It was a sweet, sickening yelp. And in the reflection on the van window I could see a boy in a hoodie holding a beagle puppy and both of them were looking at us. I felt cold sweat, but my face was hot. My tongue was sticky and thick.

  “Steve, can we get a dog?” Janice said, all strapped in.

  “Let’s go get that ice cream, okay?” I interrupted.

  The dog barked again, and I did not look. I did not look at anything as I got in my seat and shut the door. I felt like throwing up.

  “Thanks for driving, Steve,” I said, putting my hand softly on his arm. He looked momentarily amused. No, not amused. Concerned. And we drove away as Janice told us all about her new team.

  Stay tuned next for something lurking just outside your wi
ndow. Don’t worry. It’s not a human.

  And as always, good night, Night Vale. Good Night.

  PROVERB: Dance like the government is watching.

  Episode 85:

  “The April Monologues”

  AUGUST 15, 2016

  GUEST VOICES: MARA WILSON (FACELESS OLD WOMAN), KATE JONES (MICHELLE NGUYEN), HAL LUBLIN (STEVE CARLSBERG)

  THE FIRST SONG I CAN REMEMBER IS “THRILLER” BY MICHAEL JACKSON. I remember watching the music video at my paternal grandparents’ house the night it was released. This song and video had a profound impact on me: It kick-started my lifelong battle with insomnia. Four-year-old me knew then what I know now: No one’s gonna save me from the beast about to strike.

  I don’t want to insinuate that my parents had “poor judgment” or “terrible parenting skills” when they allowed a four-year-old to watch a shorter, musical version of An American Werewolf in London, but I do think they regretted their decision when I insisted that we shouldn’t allow Santa into the house because it’s just Michael Jackson in a costume coming to kidnap me.

  This incident would turn into a distrust of pop music. I preferred the sweet sounds of musicals, like Xanadu, a film with songs about the Greek Muses inspiring a mural artist to build a roller rink so rocking, it would stir Gene Kelly to skate-tap-dance.

  The next stop on my musical journey came when my mom drove me to a birthday party in Brick, New Jersey. It was a mere ten minutes away from our home, but after dropping me off, she took a wrong turn off a traffic circle, drove for an hour without question, and ended up in Camden, New Jersey, which was, at the time, America’s murder capital. After that, a family intervention resulted in me becoming her personal GPS.

  None of this was a big deal until 1988, when my older sister got her driver’s license and my mom bought a Chevy Cavalier that came standard with a tape player. While my sister drove around blasting REM and Belinda Carlisle, I was stuck in the Cavalier making sure Mom arrived home safe and incident-free. With my sister’s abandonment, I lost out on these new one-to-one odds on voting for what we would listen to in Mom’s car. The new tape player inspired my mom to become a teen again, only her idols used bamboo flutes and lute-sounding string instruments to sing Vietnamese ’80s slow jams.

  The next seven years of my life were nonstop Viet-pop.

  I’m not disparaging Vietnamese music, but it’s fair to say listening to the same handful of songs on repeat for six or seven years will make anyone miserable, especially when you don’t speak the language.

  Viet-pop has not really made it out of Vietnam, which makes me think Michelle likes it, but then again, one of her favorite sounds is her hopping (which, to the untrained ear, sounds strikingly similar to silence), so she probably hates it.

  When I turned seventeen and got my license, I was finally free of the oppressive sounds of my mom’s favorite Viet singers, and even now, on long car rides or at home alone, I prefer silence. Maybe I’m just like Michelle. Maybe I should tell people I listen to hop-core.

  In recent years, I’ve branched out since being exposed to so many artists through Welcome to Night Vale. Have you guys heard of Spotify? It’s really neat. And did you know headphones come free with an iPhone?

  My mom’s taste has also evolved. My sister and I gave Mom an iPod for her long walks around town, and she asked me to load the playlist from her 2007 wedding. Not long after, my sister updated Mom’s iPod inadvertently deleting the wedding playlist and replacing it with one of her own. My mom, a Luddite, accidentally pressed “Repeat Song” and went out for her walk. She returned an hour later very concerned that the songs were “All about butts now.” Apparently my sister’s playlist included Sir-Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back,” which Mom listened to for an hour, not realizing she could press stop or pull out her earbuds. I love wondering what was going through her head the fourth time that song started, who she thought Becky was, and why she didn’t just turn it off.

  Then again, it is a great song.

  —Kate Jones

  CECIL: Once again, the turning of the seasons. Nearly imperceptible here, a shading of the desert heat. But we feel the change, in the thrum of our bodies, in the texture of the sand. There is rain, once in a while, if not here, then somewhere else surely. Wild spring has stepped in for her stolid winter sister. It is April, and something is different. It is April, and the days have depth and vibrance. It is April. And so, dear listeners, Night Vale Community Radio is pleased to present . . . the April Monologues.

  FACELESS OLD WOMAN: Chad. Oh, Chad. I’m beginning to understand, and I wish I did not.

  You used to wear nice shirts. You cut your hair regularly. Sometimes while you slept, I would comb it, to keep it orderly and presentable for the next morning. You would shower and shave and dress for your internship. So plain and well-kempt and precious. Unaware of the faceless old woman, secretly living in your home.

  And then one day you did not return home. You love your home. You rarely leave, not even to be with other people. You play video games and watch police dramas and read books by comedians. You have always loved your solitude, and I have always thought you were special in how completely ordinary you seemed. Few young men are exactly what one thinks of when one thinks of a young man. You were it, Chad.

  And I always looked out for you.

  Remember that terrible roach problem you had, and you tried all kinds of traps and poisons, but nothing worked. Only one day you returned home to find thousands of roach corpses scattered across your floor, each one with its legs tied together and its head removed. And there was a hand-scrawled note that read “THEY’LL NOT BOTHER YOU AGAIN.”

  That was me. I did that. Well, I didn’t kill the roaches. That was the exterminator you called. He was very thorough at his job. But I wrote the note, Chad. That note was me.

  We had a good way about us. I lived secretly and facelessly in your home, and you, well, you kind of did too, only metaphorically.

  But then one night you didn’t return home. I saw in your e-mails—I loved reading your e-mails, Chad, so compellingly bland—you had to go check out a used and discount sporting goods store, something for your work. But that store was not what it claimed to be, and you didn’t return home for months.

  The landlord came by in your long absence, but I scared her off with this terrifying noise I can make using only a leather belt and a bird. You loved your home and I protected it for you.

  But when you returned, things were different—oh how different. Your crisp buttoned shirts, all unbuttoned and wrinkled, dangling on hooks like dried pelts from a misguided hunt.

  These days, you rarely notice the little things I do, like when I painted the inside of your bathtub black or glued blurry photos of spiders into the bottoms of your mugs.

  You don’t even play video games anymore. You wear hoods and light candles. You drew a star in the middle of your floor, which actually I can totally get behind.

  Your e-mails, which were once so wonderfully common, full of mailing list detritus and social invitations and social invitation rejections and food delivery receipts, a tale of a stagnant nothing of a man, so perfectly lovable in his comfy inertia. Now they are terse, coded messages to a girl I think you are destroying.

  “Found a door. Come over,” this one says.

  “HE is here, and HE is good,” this one says.

  “Candles are growing again,” this one says.

  I do not like these candles you have that grow when lit, and melt when not. And I certainly do not like . . . HIM.

  You say HIM, but HE is not human. You say HE is good, but HE is awful. He . . . It. It is unwelcome. Unwelcome, Chad.

  What you brought to us here in this little town, my town, the town I secretly live in. What you summoned.

  I stopped secretly living in your house because I was afraid of it, but now I have returned because I feel, unusual for me, some obligation to do something. To prevent this coming disaster.

  [whispering]

 
; Listen to me. It is five in the morning and you are asleep, but I am at your ear quietly asking you . . . telling you . . .

  I’m begging you really, Chad. Did you ever think I would beg you? Beg anyone? I haven’t begged since I was a child, aboard that wicked ship. Those men didn’t listen either, Chad, which is the reason I lived at the bottom of the ocean for so many years before this place, this desert, this town, this apartment.

  Chad, what happened to you in that store that wasn’t a store? What did they turn you into? What have you brought into this reality? Do you even know the destruction that awaits this town? Not just this town, perhaps the world? That is not a door you have opened, Chad.

  When is a door not a door? When it is a chasm.

  I know you cannot see or hear me, for I live secretly. But I beg you, if somehow my voice seeps into your dreams and sticks in your memory. You must undo what you have done before it is too late.

  You must—

  [no longer whispering]

  Chad. That creature, that monster you summoned is here. It is staring at me with eyes that could never be mistaken for human. It’s walking toward me. How does it see me, Chad? No one sees me.

  Chad, it is licking my hand. Stop it!

  It’s bringing me a tennis ball. The puppy is bringing me a ball. I will not play fetch with you, hound. How do you see me, you monster?

  [softly] Chad, we must undo— [off mic; loudly] GET AWAY FROM ME— [on mic softly] you must undo what you have done. It means nothing but ill will to this town, to the world, and most importantly from my perspective, to a faceless old woman that secretly lives in your home.

  [off mic] Stop staring at me, you unholy beast. There, beagle. Go fetch your stupid ball!

  CECIL: Growth turns our thoughts to decline. Each new sprout brings to mind the decay out of which it grows. Each thing leads to its opposite. Every moment contains multitudes. Every second is the history of the universe, if taken at its composite parts. Let us take this moment at its composite parts, break down this day into each person’s thoughts. We return you now to the April Monologues.