First Contact (5 page)

F
OR THE LIFE OF
her, Maude couldn’t get the coin back. She tried everything—jammed the hovercart closer, jiggled it up and down, even applied some of her lip balm to the key as a lubricant. Nothing worked. After five minutes of grappling, she considered giving up, but if her mother taught her one thing it was that a ditron is a ditron. So she went back inside the store, waited fifteen minutes to get someone’s attention, asked for help, waited fifteen minutes more for someone to actually help her, walked back into the parking lot, then watched in disbelief as a bespectacled, pimply teenage boy released the ditron in less than a second.

“You were putting the key in upside down,” he said, handing Maude the coin.

B
Y THE TIME
M
AUDE
finally headed home, fish fillets and Epsom salts safely in tow, she was a full two hours behind schedule and more than a little upset. Truth was she was upset even before the whole Trader Planet price-check and parking lot fiasco began. That morning, she had received a call from her son’s physics teacher who said Todd, her son, was failing the course. Though she did not say so to the boy who helped her, Maude believed her distress over this telephone call was what had impaired her ability to retrieve her ditron from the shopping wagon.

The teacher said Todd paid little attention in class and would often draw sketches in his notebook during lectures. He had failed each of the first three tests and, without a remarkable turnaround, would have little chance of passing. Furthermore, the teacher said he had spoken with Todd about his situation after class and the boy had shown almost no concern. The teacher thus felt he had no choice but to contact the parents.

This news upset Maude greatly, of course, and her first reaction was to call her husband. She resisted, though, because Ned was away on business in another galaxy and the phone charges would have been substantial. Now she was supremely upset. She had to speak with Ned, roaming charges be damned.

M
AUDE DIALED
. N
ED ANSWERED
after the second ring. His voice sounded concerned. “What is it, Maude?” he asked. “Is everything okay?”

“How did you know it was me?”

“Caller ID, Maude. We’ve been through this before.”

“It’s just so spooky to have someone answer the phone with your name. It was never like that growing up. You always said, ‘Hello,’ and then the person would identify himself or herself or you would ask, ‘Who is this?’ and then they would tell you. There’s no mystery anymore. You can’t surprise anyone.”

“Honey, can you get to the point? You know I’m on a mission.”

She wanted to tell him about how long it took to finish the shopping and about her trouble with the ditron. Ned could be comforting about things like that. But she could tell from his voice she needed to cut to the chase.

“It’s Todd. His teacher called and said he is failing physics. I called the school and it turns out he’s failing three of his courses. They say he’s daydreaming in class and is unconcerned with his performance.”

“Have you spoken with him about it?”

“No, I just found out this morning. In any case, I wanted to speak with you first.”

“Well, I’m glad you called.”

“I really think we should talk to Todd together, face-to-face.”

“That’s going to be difficult. I’m not going to be home for almost a month.”

“Can’t you come home just for a day or two? You work so hard all the time. I don’t see why they can’t give you a few days off.”

“We’re in the middle of a crisis right now, honey. We just made first contact with a species and the dominant power sent back a very confusing message. It is just one word and it isn’t in their native language. We’re trying to discern their intended meaning.”

“And this is more important than your son?”

There was a long silence and, given the rates, an expensive silence at that.

“I’m sorry,” Maude said. “That wasn’t fair of me.”

“It’s okay. I know my being away is hard on you and Todd. It’s just that they really need me here right now.”

“What does the Ambassador say about the message?”

“You know how he is. Everything is fun. Nothing to worry about. He finds the matter amusing.”

“If he’s not worried then you shouldn’t be worried either.”

“I wish I could help myself. I’m just not built that way.”

“Well, I love you just as you are.”

“I love you too, Maude. Listen, how about I give Todd a call later on? It’s not as good as being there in person, but I can set aside an hour and have a good, long chat with him. I’ll try to figure out what’s going on.”

“That sounds fine.”

“And I’ll be home in a few weeks.”

“I know.”

This soothed Maude. Even so, her husband knew it was best to end these conversations with small talk.

“What did you do today?” he asked.

“I did some shopping. I’m on my way home right now.”

“Did you remember to get seltzer?”

“I did.”

“Well, I love you. Drive carefully.”

S
AYING THIS WAS SUPERFLUOUS
,
almost ridiculously so, given Maude Anat-Denarian was perhaps the most careful driver in the universe. She stopped fully at every stop sign, always signaled before turning, and believed speed limits were to be approached only in the event of emergency. As a policy, she drove at least 10,000 feet per second below all posted maximums.

She had developed an impenetrably thick hide to the people who flashed her with their bright lights and cursed as they passed her car. She distracted herself by listening to Intergalactic Public Radio. She particularly enjoyed the afternoon program on good gardening practices. That day’s show was devoted to cultivating broccoli. An avid gardener and fan of broccoli, Maude settled in for a good listen.

Unfortunately for Maude, Nelson Munt-Zoldarian was not so cautious a driver. In fact he was intentionally reckless. Munt-Zoldarian liked to get people, particularly women, to rear-end him. What he would do, and what he did on this occasion, was to drive along a highway in hyperwarp and then brake quite suddenly, leaving the driver behind him very little time to avoid an accident.

This was dangerous behavior to say the least, but Munt-Zoldarian had learned to exploit a loophole in intergalactic traffic law. By any honest assessment, when Maude Anat-Denarian slammed into the back of Nelson Munt-Zoldarian’s car at a speed of approximately 8,000 feet per second, causing all twenty-eight airbags to inflate, it was one hundred percent Nelson’s fault. This was true of each of the thirty-seven prior accidents in which Munt-Zoldarian had been involved. Despite this, Munt-Zoldarian had never been found at fault and would not be found so on this occasion. This was because the law said that when a driver strikes another driver in the rear of the car, the striking driver is adjudged to be at fault.

N
O ONE, NOT EVEN
Lionel Hut-Zanderian, the greatest legal mind in the Orion galaxy, could explain how this rule had come to be adopted. It was one of many, many things in the universe that could be observed, but not explained.

I
T COULD ALSO BE
observed, but not explained, that Nelson Munt-Zoldarian had parlayed his “career” as an accident victim into a fortune amounting to the equivalent of approximately fifty million dollars. This was particularly difficult to accept given the fact that many decent, hardworking people in the universe lived in poverty or near poverty without the benefit of modern amenities such as painless dentistry, no-run panty hose, and levitating luggage. Nevertheless, Munt-Zoldarian had his money. This was why at the time of the accident he was driving a Mercedes Ben-Zantarian, one of the nicest cars in the universe.

Driving an especially nice car helped Munt-Zoldarian in his work because when the police would arrive at the scene to take a report, the officer would never suspect someone driving a Ben-Zantarian of purposely damaging a car costing the equivalent of approximately a hundred thousand dollars. It also helped Munt-Zoldarian to target
women because the police had a preconception that women were inferior drivers. Munt-Zoldarian would speak politely to the police in the presence of the women victims, but would privately roll his eyes to the officers, who always understood. They would draft a report, which would invariably favor Munt-Zoldarian.

In the matter regarding Maude Anat-Denarian, the report simply said this:

This one-sided account of the accident would effectively ensure that Nelson Munt-Zoldarian would receive a settlement of somewhere between $1 million and $5 million, depending on the Party of the Second Part’s resolve and, more relevantly, the coverage limits of the Party of the Second Part’s insurance policy.

It was yet another outrage the police accident report was dispositive of the conflict. Police officers were not experts in accident reconstruction. More often than not, these cases boiled down to one person’s word against another’s, and the police were no better than anyone else at assessing credibility. Lionel Hut-Zanderian called the use of police reports in courtrooms “scandalous,” but by and large the practice went unchallenged.

G
ENERALLY SPEAKING
, M
UNT
-Z
OLDARIAN’S VICTIMS
did not help their own causes. This was particularly true in Maude Anat-Denarian’s case. Maude might have chosen to focus on her well-established, almost comical, caution as a driver to develop the operative hypothesis that she had not been the cause of the accident. This might have led her to realize the Ben-Zantarian in front of her, which appeared to be stopped in the road, was in fact stopped in the road and not just traveling slowly, as its driver contended. It might have emboldened her to challenge the conclusory and one-sided report prepared by the investigating police office. It could also have led her to investigate, or at least have prompted her attorney and insurance carrier to investigate, the rather suspicious intergalactic driving record of Nelson Munt-Zoldarian.

Instead, Maude developed the operative hypothesis that the accident had indeed been her own fault. Honest woman that she was, Maude recognized she had been rather upset over the news regarding her son, her husband’s absence, and the ordeal at the Trader Planet. All of this had led her to focus too intently on the gardening program on the radio and to fantasize about the possibility of good results in her garden. Rather than defend herself, Maude concluded she had caused the accident, in whole or in part, by daydreaming about broccoli.

T
HE EVENING FOLLOW ING THE
day aliens made first contact with humans, Ralph Bailey stood outside the White House anxiously waiting to begin his first date with Jessica Love. It was crowded on the street, but once Ralph spotted Jessica, he could not take his eyes off of her. Pennsylvania Avenue became, in essence, a long runway, which Jessica traversed in a brimmed red beret and overcoat, which she wore to combat the chill of the autumn air. Several men checked out Jessica as she walked, but she did not notice. She had only Ralph on her mind. When she spotted him, she accelerated her pace. He beamed as she drew near.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hi.”

“This was a good place to meet.”

“I’m glad it suits you.”

“So where are we going?” she asked playfully.

“I thought we would just stay here.”

“You mean outside the White House?”

“No,” he said, gesturing toward the presidential home. “I mean inside the White House.”

Jessica’s face lit up. “This is so cool,” she said. “You arranged an after-hours tour?”

“A personal one,” Ralph said. He felt mischievous.

R
ALPH LED
J
ESSICA TO
the West Gate security checkpoint. As they approached, a Secret Service agent said, “Good evening, Mr. Bailey.”

“They know you?” Jessica asked.

“They do.”

“Do I need to show identification?”

“Just a photograph,” Ralph said. “The rest has been taken care of.”

The agent asked, “Are you Jessica Love of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania?”

“I am.”

“May I see a picture identification?” Jessica produced her driver’s license, which the agent ran through a scanner. He watched the results on a computer.

“You’re clear to proceed.” The agent passed Jessica’s bag through a metal detector and handed her a visitor badge. She thanked him.

“A pleasure, ma’am. Have a great evening.”

“Thanks, Tom,” Ralph said.

“You’re welcome, sir.”

“I’m flabbergasted,” Jessica said as they walked across the front lawn. “We just walked in the main gate of the White House. He knew I was from Harrisburg before I even showed him my driver’s license.” Jessica pulled his arm. “Tell me,” she said, “what do you do?”

Ralph stopped and faced Jessica. “Look,” he said, “I expect you don’t like the President very much. The truth is I go back and forth myself. Is it okay, just for tonight, if I am a twenty-four-year-old kid who has access to a really cool place to take a girl he really likes?”

Jessica nodded. “That’s totally fine.”

Ralph said, “Thank you,” and they started walking.

“I bet you don’t like him because he makes you pay for his sandwiches.”

Ralph gently shoved Jessica and they both started to laugh. When they began walking again, Jessica’s arm somehow became entwined with his.

“Now,” Ralph thought, “everything is right in the universe.”

W
HETHER THIS IS TRUE
is a matter of perspective. On the planet Bildungsruinia they have a saying: “Everything is exactly as it should be.” The Bildungsruinians are polyamorous, live for thousands of years, and have conspicuously fertile soil that supports crops of candy corn and jelly beans. The Bildungsruinians have another saying, which was coined after Gilbert Arnot-Friedinian struck his shin against a step stool, which one of his wives left out in the middle of the kitchen. What he said was: “Life stinks.”

This suggests the perspective that the rightness of the universe is really just a question of one’s own lot in life, but even this rule has its exceptions. Case in point: Gottfried Leibniz, the seventeenth-century German mathematician and philosopher. Leibniz profoundly said, “This is the best of all possible worlds.” Yet he was a short, bandy-legged man with a stoop, best known for his ability to sit for days in the same chair. Of Leibniz, the duchess of Orleans graciously said, “It is rare to find learned men who are clean, do not stink, and have a sense of humor.”

A
T THE MASSIVE FRONT
doors, Ralph bowed and said, “After you, my lady.”

Jessica smiled. “Thank you, kind sir,” she said.

Inside the Entrance Hall, the light of the twin eighteenth-century chandeliers made Jessica’s cheeks glow. She stood facing the Grand Staircase and gaped. “It’s magnificent.”

“Best of all, everything you see is made of chocolate,” Ralph said. “It’s all eatable. I mean it’s edible. I mean you can eat everything you see.”

“Seriously?” she asked, playing along.

“Of course. In 1801, the Oompa Loompas, who were terrific at building chocolate structures but quite small in stature, were in great danger from predators. So President Adams said to them, ‘Come and live with me in peace, away from the Whangdoodles and Hornswogglers and Vermicious Knids.’ And they came and constructed the White House out of creamy milk chocolate. Unfor
tunately Chester Arthur ate most of the East Wing, so they had to rebuild. To make the structure sturdier, they mixed in pralines.”

Jessica punched him in the arm. “The Secret Service is going to think you’re crazy.”

“Don’t worry,” Ralph said. “They can’t see us. The pralines block video reception.” He whispered in her ear, “Don’t tell anyone, though. It would be bad for national security if that got out.”

“You mean someone might come and steal the national chocolate.”

Ralph nodded. “Exactly.”

R
ALPH FIRST TOOK
J
ESSICA
downstairs to the creepy corridors of the White House basement and the Mary Todd Lincoln Bedroom.

“The room was furnished in the style of the high-Miltown period,” Ralph explained. “Most of the pieces are attributed to Hoffmann-La Roche.”

“Do you have any idea what the high-Miltown period is?”

“None whatsoever.”

“So why do you know this?”

“You know the saying, ‘Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it.’”

Jessica nodded as she examined the room. “Why are the walls padded?” she asked.

“For the same reason the bedroom is in the basement.”

“Why is the bedroom in the basement?”

“This is where they used to send First Ladies who could not control their behavior.”

“A mini-sanitarium for the wives of presidents. That’s charming.”

“I didn’t make the history,” Ralph said. “I just repeat it.”

At this moment, a raccoon darted out from one of the heat vents and scampered from one end of the bedroom to the other. The creature startled Jessica and she jumped into Ralph’s arms, where she lingered for a moment too long after the danger had passed.

W
HEN
I
WAS SIX
years old, I took a tour of the White House with my parents and when we were in the Mary Todd Lincoln Bedroom, a raccoon made a similar impromptu appearance. It is the kind of
event that makes an indelible impression on a six-year-old and I remember every detail vividly. I remember people were quite startled and my mother nearly jumped out of her skin. I remember people decompressed in a peculiar way by reminiscing about an event that had occurred only moments before. And I remember several jokes being made about Richard Nixon, which I did not get, but laughed at anyway in the spirit of the moment and because I recognized the name of someone my parents disliked.

The repeat appearance of a raccoon so many years later is not as coincidental as it might appear at first blush. Calvin Coolidge’s wife had a pet raccoon named Rebecca who started a family, which for the next century chewed through the wiring in the walls, pilfered unguarded cheese, and generally gave the White House maintenance crew fits.

It does make me question, though, the old saw Ralph repeated about people who don’t know history. The implication is that people who
do
know history will
not
end up repeating it either by not doing the thing of historic moment or doing it better so the consequences are different. But I’m not so sure.

People who say, “Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it” are actually saying, “Don’t fight a two-front war in Europe.” It’s really a veiled shot at Hitler for trying the same thing Napoleon had unsuccessfully tried a century before. But what was Hitler supposed to do? He didn’t choose to be born in Germany with its tenuous strategic position. Once he made the highly questionable decision to conquer the world, he had no choice but to fight in Europe. That’s where he lived.

The principle attributes too little weight to the twists of fate that truly drive the force of history. It wasn’t Hitler’s ignorance that sealed his fate, it was his bad luck (good luck from a more global perspective) of being born on the same plains land as Napoleon, which anyone who has ever played Risk knows is nearly impossible to defend. The thought that knowledge is sufficient to alter the course of destiny is laughable when one thinks about the infinite, arbitrary, and powerful forces at work.

I mean, suppose someone could have gotten to Grace Coolidge and explained to her the problems with keeping raccoons in the White House—both the problems raccoons had caused in important government buildings throughout history and the problems her
own beloved Rebecca would cause in the future. What difference would it have made? Another raccoon still very well might have gotten into the White House ventilation system and made a family, and anyone who owns a home knows once raccoons get in there’s not much that can be done. They are persistent and resilient creatures. My neighbor once had one in his attic. He trapped the critter, released him in a forest thirty miles away, and, believe it or not, the little guy was back in the attic three days later.

R
ALPH TOOK
J
ESSICA UPSTAIRS
,
to the more upbeat parts of the house. He showed her the Library, the Vermeil Room with its collection of Hummel figurines, and then the famous Blue Room.

“This has always been used as a reception room, except during the Truman Administration when J. Edgar Hoover used to keep his corsets here,” Ralph explained. “Interestingly, the blue fabric used on the furniture is EZ Wipe, just like in nursery schools.”

“Cute,” said Jessica.

They walked to the Map Room. “FDR used to use this as a situation room, but now it’s a room where the President and First Lady entertain guests,” Ralph explained. “It is decorated in the Chippendale style, which flourished in the late eighteenth century.”

“Do you have any idea what the Chippendale style is?”

“None at all,” said Ralph.

Finally, he escorted her to the West Wing. The executive offices mesmerized her.

“Now this impresses me,” she said. “This is where it really happens.”

It was quiet in the West Wing, and Jessica quickly noticed.

“Where is everybody?”

“The President is at his place on the Chesapeake for the evening,” Ralph explained. “When he leaves the White House, some of the staff go with him.”

“What about you?”

“I didn’t go this time. The others can take care of him okay.”

“How often do you get time off?”

“This is the first time since the President took office.”

“You mean in three years this is your first night off.”

“Sounds like a great job, doesn’t it?”

“How’s the pay?”

“Not too good.”

“Where do I sign up?” Jessica asked.

“I bet we could use another lawyer.”

“I bet you could too. Show me around.”

R
ALPH SHOWED
J
ESSICA THE
press briefing room, and the chief of staff’s office, and the little kitchen area where staff members microwaved their soup and snack-sized Beefaroni. He showed her the Roosevelt Room and explained how it used to be called the Fish Room because that was where FDR used to mount his fish, and how Nixon named the room in FDR’s honor, but got rid of his fish, and that the biggest of the formerly mounted fish, a mackerel, was in storage in the basement. Then he revealed the pièce de résistance.

“Oh my god,” she said. “This is the Oval Office.” Tentatively, she asked, “Can we go in?”

“Of course.”

Jessica walked to the center of the room on the rug with the presidential seal, and took a full, Marlo Thomas turnaround.

“It’s magnificent,” she said.

“In the morning, when the sunlight streams in from the east, it’s almost mystical.”

“I can imagine,” she said.

Jessica pointed toward a cubby. “Is that where Clinton and Lewinsky did it?”

“Yes,” Ralph said, leading her over.

“Who cares where the executive orders are signed,” Jessica said. “I want to see where Clinton took his dates.”

“It isn’t so exciting anymore,” Ralph said. “The President doesn’t even allow real sugar in the West Wing.” He rifled through the coffee station. “Sometimes the President’s secretary smuggles home packets of Equal by stuffing them into her brassiere. Would you like some?”

“That’s okay,” Jessica said.

Together, they walked to the President’s desk. Jessica caressed the top. “This is from the HMS
Resolute
,” she said. “The
Resolute
was an abandoned British ship the Americans discovered and returned to England as a gesture of goodwill. Queen Victoria commissioned the desk and gave it to Rutherford Hayes.”

“I’m impressed,” Ralph said, smiling.

“When I was a kid I wanted to be president,” she said.

“Me too,” Ralph said. He pointed to the desk. “Why don’t you try it out?”

“Really?”

“Sure.”

Solemnly, Jessica sat down. She wiped her palms across the top of the desk and arched her back against the chair to feel the full power of the furniture. Ralph sat down on one of the sofas and watched.

“How do you like it?” he asked.

“It suits me just fine,” she said.

“And you suit it,” he said. “I don’t think that desk has ever looked better.”

Jessica blushed. When the color faded from her cheeks, she turned more serious. “What would you do if you were president?” she asked.