<<< Back Table of Contents Next >>> 9 Fever Dreams The Psychic Rangers' first album, Fever Dreams, was a call for solidarity among the young. Anton was troubled by the way the youth of America divided themselves into clans based on dress code or behavior: skate punks, for example, or club kids or rappers. His strategy was to give each of these groups music they could identify with, while forcing them to consider it as part of a tapestry made up of diverse strands, such as Tibetan chant, Afro-Cuban drumming, Celtic flute. By weaving all these influences together into one pattern, he hoped to blur the divisions among culture ghettos and get people to see each other as part of a common project. Public appetite for the album had been growing for weeks, due to exposure on alternative radio stations and through networks of underground DJs. A few days before they left on tour, their equipment was loaded onto the bus that would serve as their base camp throughout the journey. Cynthia would be joining them in her role as chanteuse, along with Kliff as manager, their sound man Jake Rivers, and three roadies. They intended to make the most of their time on the road, with concerts in thirty cities over six weeks. Advance word from the towns where they would be playing was positive. Several of their shows had already sold out. Despite the excitement of launching his first tour, Anton felt sad. The court-ordered closing of Trashtown, which had come as the result of public pressure by the Clean Kids Initiative, had provoked a wave of sympathy in even the mainstream press. Yet nothing could be done to change the outcome, so that even as he waited for the tour to get under way, he found himself watching the slow dismemberment of the squat. He looked on as people and possessions disappeared bit by bit, and the community that had nurtured him since his arrival in Portland ceased to exist. Cynthia's sculptures, Doreen's paintings and much of Trashtown's other artwork was packed away and moved to a new location for safekeeping. Word was that within a few weeks, it would resurface as a group show in one of the Zombieland galleries, or at the New Jerusalem Chapel, the evangelical church near Club Omaha where some of the best house parties in the city took place. These parties usually began on a Saturday night and spilled over into Sunday morning, ending with donuts and hymn singing at dawn as the first of the regular congregants arrived. A few of the instruments in Cynthia's "infernal orchestra" were rebuilt on portable racks that could be brought along on the tour. The old-fashioned printing press they had used to put out posters and anarchist leaflets found a new home, in a Wiccan commune up the coast. The indoor skate ramps were taken down so that the materials could be reused at another site. In the end, the building that had been their refuge for so long was left empty. The blue footprints in the dining room, the rose trellis in the stairway, the spraypainted walls of the skateboard arena were the only signs that they had been there at all. Even the pirate flag was gone from the front door. Trashtown was what it had been before they colonized it, an abandoned building. As the Psychic Rangers climbed onto their bus and headed out, the squatters who had come to see them off could be forgiven for nursing a certain sense of betrayal. The band was making a convenient getaway in a moment of crisis, starting their new adventure at the very moment that their friends found themselves on the street. Within a day or two, police would arrive to sweep the building, arresting anyone who remained. Entrances would be sealed off and a security guard would be posted around the clock. In time, they imagined, Trashtown would be divided into lofts and offices so it could be rented to telemarketers. Meanwhile, the evicted squatters had to weigh their options. Not all of them would remain in Portland. Those who did would scatter among other squats, become lone scavengers, or return to normal life, taking day jobs and apartments. For the band and their entourage, the ordeal of departure was quickly forgotten in the rush of events. Each new town brought promotional visits to record stores, interviews on local radio, meetings with supporters who could help them later. All of this came on top of the lengthy sound check, the show itself, and the daily business of showers and meals. They had little time to spare, and little privacy. Yet there were intervals when nothing was happening, when they arrived hours early in a town so small there was nothing to do, or when technical complications forced them to wait. On these occasions, Anton liked to slip away by himself and walk around. He would make up lyrics or just sit on a bench somewhere, thinking about what he was doing and why. He could see that in each new place, there was a core of people who knew about the band and had some idea of what to expect. He called them "the committed." The larger group who came to see them based on word of mouth, he called "the curious." Word had spread through people who had been to their shows in Portland, and articles in the underground press. This kind of publicity was voluntary and could not be bought. It was the only kind they had, so he was glad to see it was working. Still, their fame was by no means out of control. They played in bars and small clubs, drawing at most a few hundred people to each show. He figured this was about right for a first tour. Anyway, he was relieved to be out of Portland for a while. He'd become something of a cause celèbre, and could hardly walk the streets of Zombieland any more without someone coming up to him, which usually meant a request for a favor. With all the activity of the tour, one thing stood out. He was bothered by a certain woman he kept seeing. He'd noticed her two or three times already, in different cities. She was distinctive enough to remember clearly. He wouldn't mistake her for someone else. He'd spotted her for the first time in Seattle, where they played for two nights. Her face was strangely white, reflective. Her jet-black hair fell almost to her waist. She was standing in the shadows to the left of the stage, and during the performance, his eyes kept returning to her. Her features looked Asian, but he couldn't be sure. Her mouth was set in a tight, straight line that revealed nothing. She never moved from where she was, but her body seemed poised somehow, ready to spring. That would have been disturbing enough, but he spotted her again in Boise a few days later. He was sitting with Kliff in a downtown diner, looking out a window towards the courthouse. "Who is that woman?" he asked. "Who?" Kliff followed his gaze without seeming to see anything. "That woman over there, on the bench. I think I've seen her before." She stared back at them, holding their gaze for a moment. Before they could blink, she walked away down the street. "Who was that?" he asked after a bit. "How would I know?" Kliff shifted his gaze uneasily. Then he looked right at Anton and grinned. "Spooky, ain't she?" He didn't want to believe that this woman was stalking him, but the sightings continued. At a supermarket in Missoula, she left the store just as he reached the checkout. In Cheyenne, as a college DJ hustled him into the studio for an interview that was running late, she looked up at him from an office along the hall. When they returned later the same way, the office was empty. In Boulder, he could tell that she was once again at their show. This time he couldn't see her, but he was aware of her presence. Maybe she was sitting in a dark corner by the bar, or maybe she was in the wings of the stage itself. Clearly, the woman was resourceful. Without ever putting herself in a situation where he could confront her directly, she'd made her presence known throughout the tour. Her image had become indelible to him: black hair framing a startlingly pale face, mouth set in an expressionless line, an aura of force gracefully contained. She'd even come to him once in a dream. She'd given him a tour of her "torture garden" whose flowers, rocks and charming brook were flecked with the blood of innocents, whose scented air was pierced with tiny screams. And the worst of it was, he found her hopelessly attractive. Who was she? What did she want? He felt that she was watching, that she'd been sent to watch. That could only mean one thing, she worked for Reinhold. Had the Colonel sent her because he believed that Kliff wasn't doing a good enough job? Did he think that Kliff had grown soft, and was withholding information out of friendship for Anton? Or was she acting on her own? He wanted to ask Kliff, but he knew that Kliff would never give him a straight answer. He would have to wait and see how things developed. But as it turned out, she remained out of sight for the rest of the tour. In Albuquerque, Cynthia came down with a cold that wrecked her voice. Her theatrical style of singing, ranging from shrieks to soaring hymns, had taken a lot out of her. Even before getting sick, tapping into those emotions night after night had been wearing her down. In Portland she drew strength from their fans, tripped-out people in spangly stretch tops and outrageously tall shoes, baggy patchwork pants and enormous hats that looked like mushrooms. Now she felt like she was repeating herself endlessly for crowds of yokels, all of them drunk and on the edge, pumping their fists in the air and yelling, "Woo-oo!" Because it no longer felt new to her, she'd grown increasingly critical of the whole adventure. As their bus plunged through the desert on its way to Flagstaff, she lay in her bunk feeling swollen and sore, letting out her frustration. "I hate these dead-end towns, Boise, Grand Junction, Cheyenne. Why do we have to play in every fucking place with a bar and a gas station?" "I'm from one of those towns," Anton reminded her. "In a place like that, if it wasn't for us coming through, nothing would happen. For the kids who are stuck there, we'll be talked about for years to come." "I can see that, but it's hard to pour your heart out every night to strangers and then move on." "What did you expect? Of course, it would be easier to stay in Portland. But I've got news for you, the kids out here are hungry. Why not feed them?" "You've got the energy for it, but I don't. Not any more." He tried to rally her. "For those kids, one taste won't be enough. Later, they'll come to the city. They'll get the life they dreamed of. But they won't do it unless they know it's possible. We've got to show them the way." He felt like an evangelist propelled by his sense of mission. Having tasted liberty, he wanted to liberate others. The Psychic Rangers were bringing light to the dark corners of America. They had to deliver their message in person, because they were the proof it was real. Apparently, Cynthia didn't see it that way. She stared at him from beneath her blankets. "You want to quit?" he challenged her. "We're halfway through our tour." He looked around him for support, but the others had nothing to say. Vince was asleep. Travis and Blake were playing chess. The roadies were along for the ride. Only Kliff's eyes answered him from the dark, telling him it was his call. He decided that if Cynthia wanted to leave the tour, he wouldn't fight it. They would find a way to make it work. They could sample her voice from concerts they'd already taped, and channel through a synthesizer. That would allow them to adjust the pitch and tempo to suggest a live performance. But that wasn't the point. Her real contribution was her spirit, and her spirit had checked out. They saw her off the next morning from the airport in Flagstaff. She would return to Portland, join up with their friends from Trashtown and help them to open a new squat. Once she was gone, Anton rallied his remaining comrades. "We all knew what we were getting into, right? We're a road band now. We'd better get used to this way of life." Kliff told him privately that he wished he were back in Portland with the others. He wanted to help them open the squat, so he could direct their energy in ways that were beneficial to Reinhold. In his absence, there was a danger of things getting out of sync. "They're jumping the gun. There could be unintended consequences." Still, the Psychic Rangers were his first order of business, and the tour demanded his full attention. In a way, Cynthia's departure was to be expected. She'd never officially been part of the band. Her contribution was spontaneous and heartfelt, but touring imposed a special kind of discipline, the art of starting over again each day. In each new town they had to work to reach their audience. Cynthia wasn't able to keep this up this on a daily basis. Vince and Blake could, in fact they prospered from it. Travis kept his cool regardless of the situation. Anton regretted her defection, because he would miss the clash of egos, the exchange of barbs, but the important thing was getting on with the tour. They returned to Portland after three more weeks. Their tour was a success, and an even more ambitious East Coast tour was now on the horizon. For the first time in almost a year, Anton was ready to take a break. He told Kliff, "I want to take a couple of weeks off to kick around. After that, I'll go back in the studio for a bit before we hit the road again. But where will I live?" He'd seen the new squat that Cynthia, Doreen and Sebastian had opened. It looked like Trashtown's painters and sculptors had decided to break off on their own. There didn't seem to be room there for the Psychic Rangers. Kliff told him, "I know a place you can get for cheap. And it's perfect for you." "Then let's go." He was getting used to having an answer for every need. They boarded a bus downtown. As they coasted along in the rain, Anton watched the shoppers and office workers scurry past with their umbrellas and plastic coats. Soon the office towers gave way, and bars, appliance shops, and second-hand stores began drifting past the rain-spotted window. Water hissed from the tires, and the sound of traffic was muted. He lapsed into a dreamy state. At an intersection where two large discount stores faced each other, the turn signal clicked slowly, a melancholy lull. They entered a district where scattered houses sat back from the road in yards overgrown with shrubs. There were lumber yards and enclosures with piles of steel pipes. As they passed a stonecutter's shop with gravestones jutting from the grass like calcified stumps, Kliff touched Anton's arm. "Here." He pulled the cord and stood up. They walked down a street of brick warehouses, most of them deserted. Anton realized they were near the river. "Two more blocks," Kliff told him. "You can bring your stuff here tonight if you want. It's already set up." "You must be pretty sure I'll like it." Kliff shrugged. "I know what you like." They stopped in front of a rusty door with two steps leading to it, that looked like it hadn't been used in twenty years. "Congratulations." Kliff handed him the key. Anton pushed the door open, then stood aside to let Kliff through. They walked up a long flight of stairs, lit by a window at the top. There was a landing halfway up, and another just beneath the window. When they reached the top, Kliff gestured to him to open the door. He stifled a sound of surprise. The room took up the entire floor. Windows on three sides formed a band near the ceiling, through which he could see patches of cloudy sky. At one end was a kitchen and bath, at the other a wide loft. In the space beneath the loft was the recording equipment he'd last seen at Trashtown, before it had been packed away. He pointed to a thick metal door at the far end. "Where does that go?" "Freight elevator." He stepped into the room, trailing his fingers along the plaster. Sniffing the air delicately, like a fox, he walked to the center and spun around, his eye caught by a ladder bolted to the wall. It led to a hatch in the ceiling, fifteen feet up. "Is this the roof?" He tested the ladder and began to climb. Kliff grinned up at him. "See for yourself." He slid the hatch to one side and stepped through, then stuck his head back in, beckoning. "Come on up, it's stopped raining." On the roof, Kliff took out a pretty stone pipe curved like a woman's thighs, and packed it with green bud. He lit it before passing it to Anton, who took a hit and held it for as long as he could. His lips curled into a satisfied grin as the smoke leaked from his nostrils. "Do you like it?" Kliff asked. "The place." Anton wandered off without answering, following the wall along the roof's edge. It varied in height, coming to his waist in places, in others to his knees. He found a dry patch and sat on it, hunched in his baggy longshoreman's sweater. He gestured for Kliff to come join him, and together they peered down into the street. "At night when there's no traffic, you can hear the water," Kliff said. Anton nodded dreamily. Then he realized that Kliff, like him, no longer had a place to stay. "Where will you live, now that the squat's closed?" Kliff gave him a sly grin. "I've got a room in the basement. Have for a long time." "You mean even when we were at Trashtown?" Kliff put a finger to his lips. "A guy needs his privacy." He tapped the ashes from the pipe and repacked it. "There's no one else in the building, by the way. The bottom floors are empty, and it's gonna stay that way. There might be some activity at odd hours, but only once or twice a month." "You mean Reinhold?" "Reinhold isn't part of this. He doesn't even know about this place. Which is good for you, of course. No messy conflicts of interest." "That's hard to believe." If Reinhold had a network of spies that kept him informed about the lives of complete strangers, then surely he would know about Kliff's hideaway, or the living arrangements of a musician in whom he'd taken a special interest. "He knows, but not officially. This is what you might call an off-the-books operation. An associate of his keeps an eye on things, but the owner is a third party with his own agenda. It's called 'deniability.'" Kliff always had an answer ready, but his answers never explained much. Whenever Anton pressed him for more information, he got another layer of evasion. He wished that for once he could get the whole story up front, instead of having to dig it out piece by piece. For his part, Kliff was tired of having to deal with Anton's scruples. Anton wanted explanations for everything, but he always went along in the end. "Everything here is legal and above board. You'll get a written lease like normal people. In fact, it's on the kitchen counter. All you have to do is sign." "Can I afford it? I'm rich now, like you said?" "If you want, I'll show you your bank statements." "Leave them for me. I'll look at them later. But that reminds me. The recording equipment, is it still on indefinite loan? I want to pay for it now, if I've got the money." "It's already taken care of. Reinhold made a profit, and you got a very good deal." "What about noise in the middle of the night?" "Look, if you don't like it here, I'll find you a villa. But I thought you'd like the industrial feel. It suits your lifestyle, and you don't have to worry about neighbors giving you a hard time." "If I'm going to stay here tonight, I'll need a bed." He was running out of objections. "It should be here any minute. I told them to deliver it this afternoon." A buzzer sounded down below. "Maybe that's them." They peered over the edge. A truck had pulled up to the loading dock, and two men were piling things on the platform. "We heard you," Kliff called down. "Be right there." • • • Their East Coast tour was a blur of concert dates and radio appearances, private parties and limousines. Anton felt like he was in an endless mansion whose rooms all resembled one another, but were never quite the same. Sometimes he wanted to walk out of the house to get some air, but as soon as he managed to find a terrace, a balustrade, a set of stairs leading to a moonlit garden, some woman in chiffon and pearls would come up, touching his arm, and lead him back inside. "I'd like you to meet Jack Grady, the most promising young filmmaker of our time." Or, "Come see my Picasso, the latest addition to my collection. It's a special Picasso. Only a few people know it exists." Like the special Picasso, Anton's career was mostly invisible. To those who were aware of him, he was intensely glamorous, while the rest of the world had no clue. No attempt was made to force his album down the throats of an unwilling public. Rather, those who knew his music were passionate and eager to convert others. Fever Dreams was so perfect, so complete, so overdue in terms of what people were looking for, that they absorbed it through their pores in response to a deep, unconscious need. They heard it without even realizing it, out the window of a passing car, on a CD player at the local cafe, or coming from a party down the street. In this way, he achieved a vast if subliminal fame. In each new town he visited, he was hugged to the bosom of Reinhold's invisible empire, surrounded by its oppressive mist. He was astonished to see how deep the roots of the organization really ran. Almost as if they were visiting a Communist country, agents were on hand everywhere to take care of their arrangements: hotel rooms with faded red wallpaper, huge dilapidated concert halls with chipped chandeliers, radio stations whose DJs never bothered to shave because the growth on their faces was so downy and soft. Wherever he went, he saw an air of tarnished elegance, or decadence pure and simple. It was that moment in America when everything was poised for the long, slow fall. In his interviews, Anton spoke about "the army of prodigies I've noticed everywhere I've gone, kids as young as twelve who could silence a Senator, or lead armies. Charming young assassins, too. We live in an era of portents and omens. Kids will be pushing me out of the way as an old man before I'm twenty-five, and I'll thank them for it. I'll say thank you for the bullet in the brain." Between legs of the tour, he holed up alone in a Brooklyn apartment, brooding about martyrdom. He imagined himself as an Arab youth who had come to New York City, the belly of the beast, to be a martyr. Such a youth would have no time for the city's cultural life, preferring to stay in his room learning about explosives and timers. Fastidious, holding himself apart, he would touch neither women nor wine, pray in solitude and receive instructions through headphones in an alien tongue. Anton felt he could identify with such a youth, who aspired to be an angel of death. The Prophet had said something that resonated with him as if he'd said it himself. "Be in this world as a stranger or a traveler passing through." Religious martyrdom, urban terror and his own impatience with reality swirled together in his mind. In time, this would give rise to The Last Assassin, the most notorious and sought-after of his albums, an album so controversial that people attacked it without ever having heard it, and so rare that it might never have been made. He was living the fantasy life of a young rock star, but it made him feel pain. It felt unearned to him, even unreal. Moments of true, piercing actuality were rare. "I can't play the part that's expected of me. I don't fit in here, no more than I ever have, anywhere I've been. I want to go away, get in a car and drive. But I'll end up in the middle of the desert, and then what? Turn around and crawl home to Iowa, tail between my legs? No fuckin' way!" He decided to go on an imaginary trek like he'd made in his youth. Leaving his body behind in Brooklyn, he drove through the manicured wilderness of Pennsylvania. Fingering the steering wheel with ritual precision, he repeated the words to himself, "Highway overpass, highway overpass." His car was a time machine, and the desolation of the future rushed by his windows. Warehouses by the river, rubble-strewn corner rooms, food heated in a tin can, fires made from scraps...teenagers with cropped heads, huddled in blankets, picking out guitar tunes with frozen fingers...this was the backdrop to his journey, but he never got out of his car. He'd been hoping to reach Nevada by dark, but as night fell he was still far from his goal. "I didn't know it took so long." He looked through the windows of his soul, but there was nothing there but fog. Suddenly in the driver's seat he lost control. His car spun off the highway. A tree became visible just before it crashed through the windshield. All over the radio the signals were blocked, voices urgently trying to tell him what he already knew. Floating over the scene of his death, he surveyed the harsh, moonlit landscape. Although he was still young, he now had a depiction of his destiny stored, like a nineteenth-century panorama, on the curved inner surface of his forehead. He saw the banks and lunch counters of an isolated Utah town, and felt the town's presence inside him as a kind of compulsion calling itself forth. He knew that one day he would give birth to this place, be surrounded by it and contained there. Once this town rose up to embrace him, he would be unable to leave until his mission there was finished, and it was a mission that would end in his death. So already at nineteen, he had a clear vision of his martyrdom in the Utah desert. He was left with two choices, to run to meet it, or to draw out the agony of waiting, for decades perhaps, as a kind of game. At a party in a wealthy suburb of Philadelphia, he finally met the mysterious woman who had been shadowing him during his West Coast tour. It was a gathering of successful artists, some of whom he had admired since childhood. Prominent gallery owners and collectors rounded out the picture. Being the new boy, he was the guest of honor. It was a high-powered evening, held in a villa at the end of a forested canyon. Patterns of light shifted along the walls in subtle interplay with the sound of water on rocks. He wandered amid polished wood and cut crystal, sampling hors-d'oeuvres. At one point, a little man in an expensive suit plucked his sleeve, speaking to him about unions and Communism. He wasn't sure if the man was a Hollywood producer or a mob boss, or both. Hearing Kliff's laughter in the next room, he started in that direction. Perhaps they were doing lines of coke. Then he noticed her, the Asian stalker, and he knew that the long-awaited moment had arrived. She sat calmly by the fire, a glass of bourbon at her fingertips, her ivory skin a shocking contrast to her jet-black hair. She smiled at him in a way that revealed nothing, head tilted to one side. He felt like she was scanning him from the inside out. "Come sit by me," she said with a soft accent, extending a hand at his approach. He clasped it and sat in the chair next to hers. She shifted her weight, recrossing her stockinged legs. "Sabrina Lee. I'm a huge fan of yours, Anton Dupree." "I'd be a fan of yours too, if I knew who you were." He kept his voice down. "Why have you been following me?" She smiled at the obvious. "So I can learn more about you. It's important to know who we're dealing with, don't you agree?" "You've got the advantage of me there." "We can fix that. It's why I'm here." "Go ahead, I'm listening." "Let me start by offering you a piece of advice. You should hire a new manager." "What's wrong with the one I have?" His defense of Kliff surprised him. "I mean a road manager. Your friend Kliff is fine for the business angle. He knows the industry, and he knows how people think. Let him make connections, he's good at that. Besides, he's fond of you. Everything he does is for your sake." She paused to let that sink in. "But what you don't have is someone to deal with scrapes. It's ugly out there, and even though you're young, you have enemies. I almost think you want to make them." A vein throbbed at Anton's temple. "Does Reinhold think I'm getting out of line? Is this some kind of threat?" "What makes you think I work for Reinhold? You're revealing more than you should." "Who else would be interested?" "Maybe his competitors?" Anton hadn't thought of that. "Why would they bother? What's so special about me? There must be thousands of guys willing to wound themselves to win glory." "Let's just say we keep tabs on everything Reinhold is up to. We've been watching Trashtown ever since we learned he was using it to groom...that it was a project of his. And sure enough, it soon became the focus for a movement whose ideas look a lot like Reinhold's. So who's the poster boy of this new movement? A young bass player who burst on the scene in a way that looked to us like he got all the right breaks. Wouldn't that get our attention?" Anton felt queasy. Trashtown had been shut down precisely to avoid drawing this kind of attention. Evidently the precautions had come too late. He said carefully, "If you don't work for Reinhold, I don't think we should even be having this conversation." "Are you Reinhold's boy, his creature?" "I'm nobody's creature!" "You're your own man, right? No one tells you what music to play, where to perform, what to say in your songs? You're free to make the choices you like?" Anton glowered at her. She was turning all of Kliff's promises back at him with a mocking edge. She swallowed her bourbon, lowered her glass. "Relax. I don't work for anyone. I'm a volunteer." "Volunteer" was the magic word. Kliff had told him that Reinhold's agents called themselves volunteers because they didn't get any money for their services. Instead, Reinhold removed obstacles from their lives so they could advance more quickly. Anton was relieved to know that Sabrina was on their side, but he was still uneasy. She told him a little about herself. She was born in Taiwan to a gangster turned politician who was killed by a rival when she was still young. At the age of fifteen, she had come to America in an act of rebellion. This cut her off from her family, which had been her only protection until then. At eighteen she joined the Marines to win U.S. citizenship, and was trained as a commando in a covert operations unit. By the age of twenty-five, she was ready to return to civilian life. "I'd learned how things are. People are ruthless and cruel. It's pointless to try and change that, impossible. The best we can do is try to figure out how things work, and use it to our advantage." Anton wondered if she'd met Reinhold in the Marines. He wanted to ask her what Reinhold's goals were, what he was after, but was afraid of provoking her once again. He did his best to stay focused, even though her apricot scent made him dizzy. "What do you want from me?" "I told you, I want you to hire me. I'll be your tactical engineer. That's my profession. I'll arrange things, make sure they get done. I'll keep the gears running smoothly, remove sand and grit. And I'll provide security, of course. In exchange, I have affairs of my own to take care of, the details of which needn't concern you." The last thing Anton wanted was to be mixed up with details that needn't concern him. He'd had enough of that already. Besides, he was happy enough with the job Kliff was doing. But before he could say anything against her offer, Kliff came into the room. Kliff's first reaction on seeing Sabrina was one of shock, but by the time he made his way over to them, he'd recovered his poise. He spoke as if she wasn't there. "C'mon, man, you're missing all the fun! Randall Bright was just showing us his wanger. He's having it removed tomorrow. He says it 'confuses' him, distracts him from his work." Randall Bright was a bad-boy painter in his late twenties. Anton hauled himself out of his chair and grabbed a bottle of vodka from the sideboard. "I can dig it. I've always admired drastic solutions. I'll even do the job if he wants." He followed Kliff out of the room, glancing back at Sabrina with a mixture of relief and regret. He told himself to forget her. He would blind himself to the realities of his new life. How he'd gotten here and what it might cost, he refused to consider. He would treat it as a great adventure from which he must never awake. He returned to Portland dizzy, his ears abuzz. Alone in his new studio by the river, he imagined that he was in a rickety old spaceship hovering just above the earth. From his desk in the loft, he could look out over the treetops, which undulated and respired with a soft hiss. A spiderlike lamp cast an oval of smooth, white light over the thick blotter where he sat writing. It was a letter to Timmins. He didn't need to mail it, because Timmins was standing over his shoulder as he wrote. I'm accustomed now to the altitude, the latitude of this place. I can breathe the air. I could say I've landed safely. But everything is a little cockeyed, a little screwy. Why are revelations so painful to a young man? He'd come to Portland from the plains of the Midwest, thinking he would create a new music. He'd succeeded, but already his success felt hollow and contrived. Once, his ambitions had been pure and beautiful, like a pale, clean fire that could cut through steel. Now he struggled to remember that feeling. He was hoping that Timmins, his childhood soulmate, could help him. Hunched over the paper, he scrawled his plea. Nobody told me that my life would ever get this dangerous. I'm scared of the cold, of course. That's why I'm here, in the middle of it. People lie to each other, that's just the way it is. They learn to lie when they're six years old or earlier. The best way to deal with it is to be creative. The way to get ahead in this world is to rip other people off. There's only so much to go around, and you've got to keep it in circulation. People who hang onto it for too long lose their right to it anyway. We're surrounded by signs, and we need to learn to manipulate them in our favor. I'm proud to be a musician. Musicians know how to turn electricity into sex energy, and sex energy into money. No matter what you do, you've got to learn how to sell yourself. Anyone who wants to survive on his own has got to sell himself. You've got to persuade people to take care of you, to support your lifestyle. Getting somewhere in this world is a process of learning to be hard. No one teaches you to be hard, it's something you learn for yourself. A hard person can be soft when he wants to be, but a soft person can't be hard that easily. You've got to learn to be more dangerous than your environment. The message I like to tell people is, I am exactly what you need. And half of the time, they believe me. When I was a kid, I used to wonder what was going on behind windows that weren't mine. Here, I've been freed from wonder. I either know what's going on, or I don't need to know. I'm scared of the cold, of course. That's why I'm here, in the middle of it. There's nothing here that's dangerous to me. I'm ahead of it. <<< Back Table of Contents Next >>>