What Would Satan Do? (8 page)

“Sounds stupid,” croaked Whitford.

“Yes sir, it was a dumb-sounding name, and it was even a dumb idea – I’ll grant you that.  But what they did – that was not dumb.”  He looked at the Governor and Parker, beaming.

Parker and the Governor waited, but Harris kept smiling his smug grin.  So Parker took a swaggery step in his direction, and cranked up the Texan in his voice.  “You gonna explain what the hell you’re talking about?  Or you just gonna sit there all day with that shit-eatin’ grin on your face?” he asked.

Harris’ smile disappeared.  “It was mind control,” he said, pushing his glasses back up his suddenly sweaty nose.  “The program was set up to figure out a way to get people to do what they didn’t want to do.”  He started to roll up his sleeves, but then stopped.  He wiped sweat from his forehead.

“What does mind control have to do with ... that?”  Whitford pointed a pale, undead finger at the image of a blood stain frozen on the screen.

Harris stood up straight and clasped his hands behind his back.  “Well, we don’t know a lot of details.  Frankly, all we really know for sure is that the project existed, and that it had to do with mind control.” 

“You’re right.  That’s not a lot of details.”

“Well, what you saw in that video – nobody touched that man.”

“So you’re saying they controlled his mind?  Made him hurt himself?”  The governor leaned forward, the glazed-over eyes suddenly piercing.

“Supposedly.”  Harris suppressed a smirk.

Whitford ruminated.  “What happened to the program?”

“They shut it down in the 1980’s, but there are still people alive who participated, people who know about it.  And there are files that ... could be had.” 

“This is the best thing you could find?  Better than the laser?”

“Yes, sir.  Better.”

Whitford looked at Parker, and Parker shrugged.

“What about your source?” asked the Governor.

“Reliable,” said Harris.

“And you think this is worthwhile?”

“It’s the best thing we’ve got.”

Whitford stared at the screen and then looked back over to Parker again.  Parker looked his boss in the eye.  They’d worked together a lot of years.  Nobody knew Dick Whitford better than Clyde Parker, not even Jane Whitford, that inhuman (though very smiley), debutante bitch.  He trusted the man, confided in him.  And Parker knew where all of Whitford’s skeletons were hidden.  In fact, he knew their names, and always made sure to ask after their wives or kids.

Whitford stuck out his lower lip, like he always did when he made big decisions.  “Okay,” he said.  “Get it.”

That was all Clyde Parker needed to hear.

Chapter 9.
                
Liam Has Chick Issues

“Lola?  Dude, that name is
hot
,” said Raju.  “H-O-T, hot!”

Festus joined in the fun.  “Lowwww-lahhhhh,” he said, rolling the sound around in his mouth.

Liam grimaced.  He’d just made the mistake of revealing the name of his latest blind date to the two idiots.  It was bad enough that he’d agreed to spend an evening trying not to look bored, but being harangued by a would-be spiritual guru and a guy who looked like Jesus in a People’s Liberation Army hat was too much.

“You,” he jabbed a finger at Raju, “shut up.  And Festus?”

Festus looked at Liam expectantly.

“You’re not allowed to give me any shit about women.”

“But—”

“No,” said Liam.  “You’re not in any position to say a thing.”

It was true.  Women avoided Festus in much the same way that people in an emergency room waiting area tend to choose seats far away the guy coughing blood into a handkerchief.

Raju snickered.  “He’s got all these dates, but he doesn’t care.  You,” he pointed to Festus, “you got
noooo
dates.”  He kind of sang the word “no.”

“I have an excuse,” said Festus.  “I was in seminary school.”

Liam cast a skeptical look in Festus’ direction.  “How long ago was it that you dropped out?”

“Yeah man, you got like a force field around you or something,” said Raju.  “Or you been sprayed with chick repellant.”

“Shut up.”

“Raju, I’m off.”  Liam leaned over to look at his reflection in the glass countertop and ran a hand through his hair.  He tried to care.

“Dude,” said Raju, “you gotta put more effort into looking good than that.”

Liam glanced up at Raju, a look of disgust on his face.  “Bite me.”  He grabbed his bag and headed for the door.  “Make sure you lock up.  And no toking the Buddha while I’m gone.”

People – other than Festus, of course – were always trying to set him up with women.  And every couple of months or so, Liam relented.  But it never amounted to anything.  There was nothing wrong with the women.  They were always nice, smart, attractive – whatever.  He just never felt anything.  Not even a blip.  In fact, he wasn’t even sure it was possible for him – not any more, at least.  It was as if he were immune. 

Liam’s women problems had started back in college, with Anna. 

Anna was tall and willowy, with long, white-blonde hair that always made her look like she’d just come off the set of a shampoo commercial.  She had a way of making Liam’s serious thoughts seem pointless and boring, and was always coming up with brilliant suggestions like, “You should become an Inuit studies major!” or, “We should kidnap Daniel Day Lewis and demand jobs as caretakers for his shoes!”  And when she said these things, they seemed so logical; so right.  He often found himself wondering,
Why didn’t I think of that?

Liam’s inability to recognize Anna’s insanity was, of course, the result of a chemical imbalance in his cerebral cortex.  Whenever he saw Anna, the deep, lizardy bits of his brain released wave after wave of peptide neurotransmitters and endorphins that supplanted and screwed with the acetylcholine that usually kept the synapses in his parietal lobe on the straight and narrow.  In other words, Liam was in love.

“You should skip your biochem final so you can help us,” said Anna one day.  “The circus is in town and we’re going to go protest!”

“Hmm,” he said.  “Skipping a final seems like kind of a bad idea.  And anyway, I’m not sure I want to go protest the inhumane treatment of animals with someone who’s going to be wearing a fur coat.”  He gestured toward the bed, where she’d set down her politically incorrect, but very hip jacket.

“Animals?” said Anna.  “Who cares about a bunch of stinky animals?”  She put her hand on her hip.  “I mean, an elephant in the circus probably gets better food and is less likely to get shot by a hunter, right?  So … screw the animals.” 

Yeah, screw the animals
, he thought, wondering how Anna was always so convincing.  Maybe it was her intoxicating smile, or her long, well-toned legs.  Or it might have been her sundress, which seemed just a little too short.  He wasn’t sure.

He noticed that Anna was still talking, and blinked his eyes as he tried to focus on whatever it was she was saying.

“We’re going to protest the humiliating and demeaning exploitation of those poor, overworked and under-respected souls.”

“Who?” he asked.  “What are we talking about?”

“The clowns, Liam.  They’re exploited, and we’re going to protest.”

“The clowns?”  He scrunched up his face, mystified, as he attempted to grapple with the absurdity of what Anna had just told him.  He opened and closed his mouth like a fish as he tried and failed repeatedly to find a toe hold from which to build a logical response.  But there was nothing.  You just can’t argue logic with someone who is completely unhinged.  Batshit is immune to logic.

“Come on!”  Anna shut his book and lifted his chin so that their eyes met.  “This is important,” she said.

She stood up tall and smiled a mischievous, radiant smile that washed over him like the first, warm buzz of what was going to be a long night of drinking.  Then the girl who’d spent years in ballet class gracefully lifted her toe into the air, swung it over, and placed it on the other side of his legs so that she was standing over him.  She clasped her hands behind his neck and sat down.  Slowly.  The tiny blue flowers on her sun dress inched up her thighs as she settled onto his lap.  She leaned forward, letting the front of her dress gape as she nibbled his ear. 

“Please,” she said.

Liam experienced a complete cognitive breakdown.  The outer, thinking portions of his brain ceased to function, and those same lizardy bits at the base took over.  They told him to forget studying, get it on with Anna, and go protest the hell out of whatever it was she wanted to protest.

At this point, the narrative will turn its focus elsewhere in the interest of providing Liam and Anna with a bit of privacy.  Should the reader feel disappointment at the lack of description of turgidity, chiseled bits of anatomy, or things that are pulsing or quivering, well, this just isn’t that kind of story.  Sorry.

Even with Anna’s constant stream of fantastical schemes, Liam managed to put together an impressive record in college.  In his third year he applied for and won a Rhodes Scholarship, which he planned to use to study in London.  This, of course, seemed too pragmatic to Anna and was a bit of a source of tension between them.

After three years of struggling to bridge the gulf between his relatively regimented, practical world and Anna’s patchouli-scented, boat-on-a-river-and-looking-glass-eyes lifestyle, Anna announced that she was leaving for a semester in Spain.  She told him that it would give them both time to figure things out.

“I’m leaving for a semester abroad in Spain,” she said.  “That’ll give us both some time to figure things out.”

Over the next couple months, the combination of college-student budget and high long-distance rates, coupled with busy schedules and a seven-hour time difference, meant that he and Anna didn’t talk much.  Liam received the occasional post card from Anna, telling him that she was off with a band of gypsies, or had joined a mime troupe.  In her most recent missive, she’d announced her intention to join a group of neo-revolutionaries led by a charismatic fellow named Alejandro.  She’d signed off with a simple “¡VIVA!”

So Liam hunkered down and came to some decisions in those few months alone.  He decided that although he didn’t particularly care for Inuits, Daniel Day Lewis, or the plight of circus clowns, Anna was probably his soul mate.  He determined that he was going to spend the rest of his life with her, even if it meant he had to live in a yurt.  So he called up the Rhodes Scholarship people, thanked them kindly, and declined their generous offer.  Then he finished up his now seemingly pointless exams and rushed to the airport to pickup Anna.

As he waited outside of customs in the international terminal at Logan airport, he thought about how much nicer the terminal was than the domestic terminals, how much bigger the crowds were, and how awesome this was going to be.  Then he saw Anna stride through the walkway with her easy, carefree grace – she was beautiful.  She seemed to glide up to him. 

“Welcome back!” he said.

“Oh, hey!  Hi!”  Anna seemed surprised to find him waiting there for her.  They hugged, but their embrace was awkward.

“I got these for you,” he said, handing her some flowers he’d picked up on the way to the airport.  He’d never bought her flowers before, and she regarded them with a wary eye, as if there might be zombie rodents hiding between the snapdragons and baby’s breath.

“Thanks,” she said, tucking them into the gaping maw of her fashionable handbag.  After a pause and more awkwardness, she said, “I’ve got big news!”  She held up her hand, displaying a gaudy engagement ring.

“Whoa, a ring!  Holy crap, would you look at that!”

“That’s my news!  I got engaged!”  She clapped a tiny, hyperactive golf clap.

There are very few moments in life where you actually feel like the world is spinning; when the floor seems to forget for a second that it’s supposed to stay down on the bottom and starts dancing around all crazy.  This, for Liam, was one of those moments.  His face felt hot, and it seemed like somebody cranked up the volume of all the conversations and background noise in the terminal.  The carpet pitched and swayed, apparently getting down to some old Motown track.

“Damned floor,” he muttered, lunging for a nearby railing.

“What?” she said.

He looked at the crazy, crazy blonde woman in front of him.  The psychotic bitch.  Where she was once tall and willowy, she now seemed all knees and elbows; almost exo-skeletal even.  She reminded him of a gigantic, stupid, evil praying mantis.  For an instant he imagined her chomping the head of her future husband.  Wasn’t that what praying mantises did?  Have sex and then eat their mates?  He shook his head to erase the image of her post-coital cranial snacking.  There had to be some mistake.  Maybe he’d heard wrong.

“Did you say that you...?”  He trailed off, his attention drawn back to the misbehaving floor and the fact that his breakfast seemed to want to come back up for a visit.

“I got engaged!” she said, as if it were the best news ever.

“Yeah, I guess I heard you right.”  He stared at the floor, and when he couldn’t find any answers there, turned his gaze up at Anna.  “What in the hell...?” 

Anna made a pouty face.  “Are you okay?”

He turned, put his hands behind his head.  “I can’t—”  He leaned over, moving his hands to his knees.

“Liam?  Are you okay?”

Liam stood, pulling the ring he’d brought with him out of his pocket.  “Stupid, stupid.”  He put it right back in.  “Stupid!”  He’d thrown away everything he’d achieved for this?

“Liam?” she said.  “You’re starting to scare—”

The floor started dancing again, only this time it wasn’t just Liam.  The floor was actually dancing – something between a strident Paso Doble and a methamphetamine-fueled Quickstep.  A nearby sign toppled to the ground, and a few panicked screams punctuated the general murmur of alarm that rose up.  There was a loud pop, and the overhead sprinklers came on.  Anna let out a yelp as she toppled over backward onto the floor.

Liam clenched his fists and fumed as he stared at nothing in particular.  All around him, people shuffled and staggered.  A few cried.  The floor continued its dance.  He took a deep breath, rolled his neck, and looked up, calm again.  The shaking subsided a couple of seconds later.