Terraplane (34 page)

The Flushing Window-its present monicker, as per Dryco's
word-remains open, though the guard keeps its surroundings
perpetually closed; not so much to keep theirs from entering as ours
from leaving, a matter solely of perspective. Little danger exists
now from viral transmission, at least of the particular virus; in the
initial pandemic DS followed a like pattern in our world, though
since its housebreaking by new-developed vaccines few have been
lost to its purges. As Oktobriana feared, when Alekhine returned
with his prize his gift brought more than was desired. By word of
our informants, Alekhine received definitive treatment for his
efforts. Word passed, too, that the Big Boy himself lived into
elderly's years, safe from all upon a state-supplied dacha-
Skuratov's, I'd like to think. Krasnaya always tried to do the right
thing. Even in Russia it was a matter of greatest humor that only
the Big Boy could have killed millions of his countryfolk during
two different centuries.

Awakened full now, I stood ready to meet and greet; imagined
that as through a windblown drape his hand might reach. Did he,
then, still float there, lost beneath the ice, forever seeking the hole
through which he'd flung himself? When he screams, who hears?
In revenge, does he light the fires of unknown origin; thumb shut
night drivers' eyes; scotch the readings as planes ready to land?
With incubus charm does he lure those whose bodies never after
know grave? Jake never showed; I never knew

It wasn't night's most rational hour. Needing reality's blow after
so long I gazed outward, across Bronx hills and buildings, sighting
distant Manhattan's towers through cloud and falling water. All
looked so normal as it ever did. I shifted my glance, sizing my
holdings. Upon retiring from Dryco after long officebound years
and receiving all gratuities forthcoming, I wished to invest as
desired, and so gathered timekeepers as my budget allowed, scattering them round me: the photo that had fallen, a tin maple-syrup
can in log cabin's guise, a pack of unopened Lucky Strikes, its
Christmas colors fresh; a green shirt of radium silk free of harmful
isotope, a Terraplane's hubcap-

Jake. Jake, Jake, twenty years gone.

I asked Alice once to bring up the city's residential files for the appropriate years so that I might know of our world's Doc. Here,
too, Norman Quarles had been a doctor, undoubtedly one of more
professional background; his wife's name was Wanda and they lived
on Eighth Avenue, just below 133rd, and surely slept as fitfully
through the el's all-night rumble. When they died, in the early
seventies-Doc first, and then Wanda-they left no survivors; for
different reasons, undoubted. I told Wanda of what I found, but
she didn't wish to hear of it. Perhaps she feared that if she were
to more fully acquaint herself with her counterpart, the half
would become whole and she might vanish. Whether this world's
Quarleses knew a happier life, I can't say; I hope they had a
quieter one.

Thoughts rushed to me too rapidly as I stood there, awaiting
word, seeking omens, watching for signs, listening to hear a code
tapped out above the rain's rhythm. As on every night when I
awoke before dawn, the old uncertainty crept up. Switching on
kitchen light, taking up a jar of pennies, I shook them onto a table
and stared at their pile, praying to all unlistening that the kraken
within me hadn't yet awakened as one day, still, it might. No
numbers glowed as neon within my mind as I looked upon them; I
counted, one by one. I counted one hundred and twelve.

Were there any answers? With two worlds in existence, each
following a like trail along a different path, does it follow that an
interactive God drew the map for each? Did having to keep eye on
two instead of one account for such seeming senselessness, that too
much went on for even God to follow? Would this distraction
become madness; provide at last the reason for why the beloved are
snatched away, why the faintest hopes are dashed, why only waste
brings knowledge? If all is predestined, then, does God choose
lesser vessels, through which It delivers Its evil so that It might take
credit for only the good done in Its name? What does God grant Its
killers in return?

One by one, numbering the count again to reassure, I at last let
my fear fall away until the next night's malaise. Rain-wind rattled
windowpanes, drummed its beat without cease, sent its tears into
darkness. Heading bedways I slipped in where, until November
last, Wanda lay. She died of old age; so few do.

Lying down, inserting phones so that with music's graze I might
rub my mind to sleep, I paused to deliberate choice of hands.
Leaving Jake's tape boxed as it lay, in no mood for Ives or Penderecki
or Lalo, I picked Elgar's Sea Pictures; slept away to lost voice's song
singing across long-gone years, carrying comforts penned by one
lost longer. In daylight I awoke, rinsed in memory, washed by
distance, hearing only time's breakers crashing onto a new day's
shore, feeling the beach as it forever slipped from underfoot into
tide. I dressed by Johnson's song. The waves broke; the water rushed
away.

JACK WOMACK was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and currently
lives in New York City. Terraplane is his second novel, following
Ambient.