Fiction / Bryan D. Price

:: Wasting disease ::

*

Can no longer eat. Body rejects every­thing. Uri­nat­ing all the time, etc.

*

Lay­la brings me mag­a­zines. Some gui­tar mag­a­zines and an art one. The art one is glossy with heavy pages. Aston­ish­ing arti­cle in the art mag­a­zine. A pro­file of some­one not known to sit for inter­views. An artist who lives near here. Actu­al­ly only a few miles away.

*

I had known the artist many years ago. We had gone to school togeth­er and were close. When he trans­ferred to art school I dropped out alto­geth­er. We lost touch. I knew he was from here but assumed that the more suc­cess­ful one becomes the fur­ther one wants to be from their point of origin.

*

I fix­ate on a strange detail. The artist has a bor­der col­lie who is aggres­sive around oth­er dogs. Because of this fact, every night he ingests half an edi­ble, waits about a half hour and then, with a sin­gle record loaded onto his portable music device, walks the dog for as long as it takes for the album to end (leaves apart­ment usu­al­ly between 9:30 and midnight).

*

I’m aware of how overused the metaphor of the labyrinth is. The rea­son though that it’s overused is because those of us who are bedrid­den or oth­er­wise delim­it­ed by the four walls of our minds, which is to say our imag­i­na­tions, find the idea of the labyrinth potent—particularly when we close our eyes. In fact, at this point I don’t even have to close my eyes to see what I imag­ine and what I can no longer imagine. 

*

When the inter­view­er asked the artist which records he lis­tened to on his dog walks he pro­vid­ed her with a list of ten (placed in a stand-alone box on the page) three of which I had nev­er heard of—Faust IV, Shot­gun Wed­ding (Lydia Lunch and Row­land S. Howard), and Ask the Ages (Son­ny Shar­rock). I ask Lay­la to go to the store and buy them for me.

*

I keep return­ing to the art mag­a­zine which con­tains the pro­file of the artist. It stays with me in bed. I ask Lay­la to get rid of the gui­tar mag­a­zines. I look at his apart­ment, his stu­dio, his hand­made fur­ni­ture and fix­ate on the cement floors. He has cement floors in both his apart­ment and his stu­dio. I look at his face. He looks young still. He wears a flop­py black hat and a paint-spat­tered leather apron. He sits on a met­al stool. He doesn’t smile. I think how sophis­ti­cat­ed peo­ple don’t smile—to smile is to open one­self up to ridicule. To allow one­self to be pho­tographed is enough vulnerability.

*

Gray and nox­ious out­side the win­dow. Tree trim­mers and then eeri­ly qui­et. The artist began as a min­i­mal­ist. No geo­met­ric shapes or even paint. Every­thing in graphite. Impos­si­bly thin lines. Min­i­mal­ist in its insis­tence on not only mono­chrome and rep­e­ti­tion but restraint. Lines both hard and soft. The inter­view­er sug­gests that min­i­mal­ism is some­thing to be aban­doned or grown out of. The artist gen­tly push­es back. There is a two-page spread of the artist in his stu­dio stand­ing before an immense can­vas, which has an almost Pre-Columbian qual­i­ty. The words used to describe his new work are mythopo­et­ic, reli­gious, and geo­log­ic time.  

*

In her work­ing capac­i­ty (prospect researcher for a bio­med­ical non­prof­it) Lay­la has pro­cured the address of both the artist’s apart­ment build­ing and stu­dio (also his ex-wife’s home in Port­land, Ore­gon and his parent’s home in Carls­bad). She offers to dri­ve me by. I take her up on it. The apart­ment is very mod­ern (con­crete and glass). Very open and light, no frills. The stu­dio is housed in a non­de­script build­ing on the bor­der between down­town and Lit­tle Italy. Accord­ing to some research it used to house a glove fac­to­ry. No sign of the artist walk­ing the streets.

*

Had Lay­la take the tele­vi­sion away. Can no longer defend what it does to my time which is to say my life. Now only music and read­ing. Hear from very few people—an increas­ing­ly dwin­dling num­ber. Lay­la says I am hid­den away like a seed. I need to make the first move. Imag­ine or visu­al­ize some rec­on­cil­i­a­tions and con­clude it’s not worth it. She brings me some pulpy things to read (Friends of Eddie Coyle, etc.) and some cat­a­logues of the artist’s work that she has found some­where. She’s very hush-hush about her methods. 

*

Late after­noon and look­ing over the artist’s ear­ly pieces. One, called 9971 Lines, is real­ly con­cen­tric cir­cles. A use­less den­si­ty to it that makes me want to do some­thing sim­i­lar but I don’t know what. There is noth­ing true or per­fect about it which makes it, in its own way, true.

*

There are sub­tle shifts in the atmos­phere that make me aware of my pain. Maybe the bet­ter way of putting it is my sen­si­tiv­i­ty. I feel things more thor­ough­ly. See things more clear­ly. I smell the past. Not in an eso­teric way but there are odors in the air that bring me back to spe­cif­ic points in the past. They say when death comes it does so with the puz­zle pieces or frag­ments of your life in its hands.

*

Have not worked in six weeks. Am gird­ing myself for the insur­ance night­mares. Begin to feel guilty. Lay­la usu­al­ly deals with such things—paperwork, busi­ness, etc. Mon­ey is get­ting tighter. Will need to tight­en our belts. To have less of some­thing like mon­ey is to become claus­tro­pho­bic. We waste mon­ey but we also waste away. I read about old nos­tal­gia deaths from the eigh­teenth and nine­teenth cen­turies. Wast­ing dis­ease. Lan­guage cre­ates dis­tance between thought and real­i­ty. The artist does col­lages with leaves, the dead­er the bet­ter, he says (like paper). Lay­la shows me a pic­ture of him in Venice from a dif­fer­ent mag­a­zine. He wears the same flop­py black hat. His reclu­sive­ness is not­ed. He doesn’t smile.

*

Lay­la brings me Philip K. Dick (A Scan­ner Dark­ly) and Borges (Fic­tions). Fall asleep try­ing to under­stand what I just read. Wake up and re-read it. Headaches per­sist. Ask Lay­la to get me new lightbulbs.

*

It is easy to get lost in the labyrinth of one’s imag­i­na­tion. Much eas­i­er than in fic­tion (films, books, etc.). It takes a spe­cial kind of mind to get tru­ly lost in fic­tion. One has to be bred that way or at least have it inflict­ed upon them from a very young age. For some it is just a habit of get­ting lost or want­i­ng to get lost—the need to bloody the for­mer puri­ty of silence. Lay­la rais­es the blinds every morn­ing and shuts them at night. Oth­er­wise I am count­ing leaves and shin­gles and rain­drops and air­planes (which I hear rather than see).

*

We are in the habit now (me and Lay­la) of dri­ving by the artist’s apart­ment. I wear a rain­coat and hat. The rain­coat is made by Lon­don Fog and hasn’t fit me since I was in my twen­ties. I bought the hat in Port­land with Lay­la when we took our first trip togeth­er. Lay­la parks across the street and I drink tea laced with a lit­tle whisky. The light in his apart­ment has only been on once.

*

The sun nev­er came out today. Not for a sec­ond. Not for a mil­lisec­ond. All pos­si­bil­i­ties make sense on such days. Or, put dif­fer­ent­ly, noth­ing seems possible.

*

It’s no longer sex­u­al with Lay­la. It was get­ting that way even before all this. I want her to be free—free of me, etc.—but I also want her to stay. It is not easy to square ones self­ish­ness with one’s altruism.

*

Movies—I watch movies in bed with Lay­la on a lap­top. She rarely spends the night. Even on nights like this. It will be 11:45 or 12:00 and she’ll still get in her car and go to her new place. I imag­ine some man is there wait­ing for her but I don’t want to bring it up. Don’t want to upset what seems to be so peace­ful between us. She watch­es what I want to watch—My Life to Live, Annie Hall, Paris, Texas. She likes them too but she’s seen them with me a hun­dred times. It is my life raft, this bed, and every­thing else is the ocean. 

*

This began as some­thing along the lines of a diary of sick­ness and I had a list of things I didn’t want to write about: pol­i­tics (fas­cism), my father, the abor­tion, wars (past and present), dreams, (explic­it) sex.

*

Out-patient surgery. Lying in bed. Lay­la sleeps on the couch. Lis­tens to old records (Richard and Lin­da Thomp­son, Elvis Costel­lo) and cries.

*

Fire today. Not far from here. I smelled it at first and then went out­side. Didn’t have to get far to see the cloud in the dis­tance. Pink on gray (or gray on pink). Neigh­bors came out as well. Peo­ple I hadn’t seen in months (or spo­ken to rather). Hal­loween dec­o­ra­tions everywhere—skeletons, witch­es, ghosts. Inflat­able things that sub­sist on air com­pres­sors click­ing on and off through all hours of the day and night. Strange new world. Must have some­thing to do with how infan­tilized we’ve become (adults fail­ing to grow out of their childhoods).

*

It occurs to me that Lay­la needs a less con­spic­u­ous car (she’s cur­rent­ly dri­ving a sev­en­ties-era Bee­tle con­vert­ible that’s pea soup-green). The artist’s light was on and then we saw him walk­ing his dog. The car stood out, draw­ing his gaze (he saw us). I locked eyes with him for a half-sec­ond. Seem­ing­ly no recognition.

*

With an X‑ACTO knife I take apart the orig­i­nal mag­a­zine with the pro­file of the artist. Very care­ful­ly on one of Layla’s cut­ting mats I run the knife along the pages, sep­a­rat­ing the images from the text. I put each indi­vid­ual piece in clear plas­tic pro­tec­tive sheath­ing so that I could see each side. Lay­la finds a tele­phone num­ber affil­i­at­ed with the artist. I call it and leave a ram­bling mes­sage, or half a ram­bling mes­sage, before hang­ing up.

*

Diet has become very strange. At this point still seems like a guess­ing game. A kind of draw­ing down into noth­ing. I only feel good when there’s noth­ing inside me. Clean, pure, emp­ty, straight, noth­ing. Ener­gy comes from some ter­tiary place—mystical. God speaks crys­tal clear through the empti­ness of the chasm. 

*

The end is here. Lay­la cries, sobs actu­al­ly. Very intense, even uncom­fort­able. Doesn’t come out of nowhere but still sur­pris­es me. A day lat­er she pre­tends it was a mys­tery or out­lier and then we hold onto each oth­er. It is so love­less the way we grasp that it seems as full of love as any­thing I’ve ever expe­ri­enced. I imag­ine turn­ing her away from me and lift­ing up her skirt so that we can fuck one last time. But I can’t bring myself to try such a thing.

*

The artist intro­duces him­self as Vince. I try not to acknowl­edge any­thing strange (know­ing his name’s not Vince). He doesn’t rec­og­nize me or let on that he does. I’m walk­ing Bai­ley who Layla’s sis­ter and broth­er-in-law have left in my care while they’re in Munich for a few months. Bai­ley and the artist’s dog (named Rogue) sniff each oth­er but there is no aggres­sive­ness. It is said that Bai­ley has this kind of calm­ing effect on oth­er dogs.

*

Over time I real­ize the artist, more or less, has a fixed route and it is easy to insin­u­ate myself into his rou­tine. I have Lay­la pick me up an array of edi­bles and try to match the artist’s state of mind (if that’s pos­si­ble). I see things in a clear­er way, lines are sharp­er. I see myself as if through the win­dow of a pass­ing bus. I am gaunt—a tat­tered, emp­ty coat. A ghost.

*

It is not odd for the artist to take his ear­phones off when he sees me. We talk about music some­times. I don’t ever men­tion Faust, et al. When he asks me about music I am tempt­ed to lie—as he has lied about his name. I tell him a few things from a class I took on mod­ern clas­si­cal music. Charles Ives, Edgard Varése, Steve Reich. When I ask him what he does for a liv­ing he says some­thing that I’ve nev­er heard a per­son say in real life: he says he’s inde­pen­dent­ly wealthy. Lat­er, he refers to him­self as an investor. He speaks of mon­ey in terms of “figures”—the high six-fig­ures or low sev­en-fig­ures. I am deeply dis­ap­point­ed that this is the ruse he has chosen.

*

The part of the city where the artist lives exists on the edge between urban and sub­ur­ban or between the ver­ti­cal urban core and its ear­li­est qua­si-sub­urbs, which is to say neigh­bor­hoods of tight­ly packed sin­gle fam­i­ly homes with small two and three-sto­ry apart­ment build­ings inter­spersed. His build­ing is across from a gro­cery store sur­round­ed by a park­ing lot with a small archi­tec­tural­ly inter­est­ing library at the edge. The neigh­bor­hood slight­ly to the north­west is known more for its nightlife. Some­times we encounter strag­gling rev­el­ers and oth­er times peo­ple out steal­ing cat­alyt­ic converters. 

*

It is not clear who I’m talk­ing to and why I’m being so mys­te­ri­ous. Knowl­edge (or expe­ri­ence) is our advan­tage or can be used to our advan­tage. To hold back or make obscure. To keep in my own store­house of mem­o­ries only to be used as cur­ren­cy in case of emergencies.

*

I find mon­ey grotesque and peo­ple who ven­er­ate it, evil. I hide this and feign igno­rance when I ask the artist about mon­ey and what he invests in. I make it so I might want to get involved in invest­ing (even though I have no mon­ey to invest). He says the most sta­ble sec­tor is real estate—rental prop­er­ty. He spe­cial­izes in dis­tressed assets through­out the south and Mid­west. He begins to say a few things about cryp­tocur­ren­cy but I am trans­fixed by Bai­ley shit­ting shame­ful­ly on the side­walk. It is clear that she prefers to do such things clos­er to nature.

*

Lay­la has left me. Every­one has left me. Bai­ley remains. It is true what they say—that dogs are loyal. 

*

I stay up late doing research on the artist. He has been in Spain—Bilbao. There is a pho­to of him in his black flop­py hat and black suit. He wears a red shirt and a braid­ed leather tie with turquoise in it. Again, the word reclu­sive is used. There is a paint­ing of his called The Secret which was made using an image of Wyeth’s Christina’s World torn into 312 pieces, rearranged into an engrid­ded col­lage and then paint­ed onto an enor­mous can­vas that is rough­ly 26 x 12 feet. Peo­ple with lots and lots of mon­ey want it. The les­son: big­ger is better.

*

Is the artist’s devel­op­ment of a fic­tive self a part of his sup­posed reclu­sive­ness? A need to pro­tect the core at the cen­ter of his being? Does he hide it from me alone because I am a par­a­site or like a vam­pire? Recent­ly read an arti­cle about his being rep­re­sent­ed by a world famous art deal­er who bro­kered deals between the artist and a Sau­di Prince, a Russ­ian oli­garch, a tech bil­lion­aire. The lat­ter of whom was also referred to as “reclu­sive.”

*

Since the artist insists on main­tain­ing a fic­tion, I have as well. At first he didn’t seem inter­est­ed in me as a per­son with their own his­to­ry or back­ground. He didn’t even ask my name which is how unin­ter­est­ed he was. To him I was just a fel­low dog walk­er, a fig­ure of no of impor­tance. Now though, I have forced my own fic­tion upon him. I have told him my name is Slavoj Jureček and I’m an oncol­o­gist with a clin­ic near the park. I don’t tell him that it’s world famous but in my mind it is.

*

Pass­ing an emp­ty lot that has been over­tak­en by nature I notice mint grow­ing through the chain link. I touch it and smell my fin­gers. While I do this the artist tells me about a prod­uct he is invest­ing in—a ring that you wear while you sleep that helps you with lucid dream­ing. He says it has some­thing to do with reg­u­lat­ing blood flow, cir­cu­la­tion, Vit­a­min D. He shows one to me. Because it is dark out I can’t tell if it’s black or dark grey. He puts it in my hand and it feels heavy.

*

One night we encounter a third—another dog walk­er. Her name is Mar­ta and she has a Shi­ba Inu named Moth­ra. Moth­ra belongs to Marta’s room­mate who is in Bul­gar­ia record­ing tra­di­tion­al folk music. She refers to this as his “field­work.” The artist, again, intro­duces him­self as Vince. We stand beneath a palm tree talk­ing about Marta’s shirt which has Fer­nan­do Pes­soa on it. She tells us that she made it her­self. She refers to her­self as a graph­ic designer.

*

I’m not tired any­more. Fear has exit­ed my con­scious­ness. I am no longer think­ing about the end, the bib­li­cal end, the apoc­a­lypse, Armaged­don. Like sex, death has a way of clar­i­fy­ing things.

*

Mar­ta is Span­ish. Just being around her makes me almost vio­late my dic­tum on fas­cism. It’s not that she’s fas­cist (quite the oppo­site) but she brings her knowl­edge to bear on new or present things. Things hap­pen­ing out­side our bub­ble that I was try­ing not to dwell on too much any­more. Her grand­fa­ther, she tells us, bare­ly escaped Fran­coist forces only to meet a sim­i­lar bad end else­where. He made his way to Lis­bon and then Mex­i­co City where Marta’s father was born. Her father, she tells us with dead seri­ous­ness, was a poet and her grand­fa­ther mur­dered by death squads in the Domini­can Republic.

*

Mar­ta asks us if we’d like to come back to her apart­ment and watch The Spir­it of the Bee­hive which she owns on laser disc. Her laser disc play­er, she said, is “top of the line.”

*

The artist tells us about invest­ing. Tells us about the bio­hack­ing par­a­digm and how the altru­ism econ­o­my is dead. He tells Mar­ta about the com­pa­ny devel­op­ing the dream ring. Instead of just let­ting her hold the “pro­to­type,” as he did with me, he gives it to her to keep. I com­fort myself know­ing it’s a fraud.

*

I think about our close­ness or for­mer close­ness. How close were we, me and the artist. I don’t know. It seemed sub­stan­tive at the time. What is friend­ship. Or kin­ship or feal­ty. Did we have a real affin­i­ty for one anoth­er. Was it love. For one it can be love and for the oth­er it is col­or­less, odorless—nothing. He lies as easy as breath­ing and yet so do I (but only as a response in accor­dance with my muti­lat­ed ego). The ring—where did he get it? He wears anoth­er one that is iden­ti­cal to the one he gave Mar­ta. He asks her about lucid dream­ing and she says she takes it off when she sleeps. I can tell he is hurt by this.

*

When we get to Marta’s she offers us mush­rooms. Her room­mate has some con­vo­lut­ed con­nec­tion to a mush­room farm in Ore­gon. She strains them into a tea. Nor­mal­ly I’d decline but I feel par­tic­u­lar­ly nihilis­tic, like noth­ing mat­ters any­more. I go through with it. I’m already dead.

*

Marta’s apart­ment is spa­cious. There’s a couch, a cof­fee table, a piece of fur­ni­ture made of wood and glass that holds an enor­mous tele­vi­sion and, to its left is the top of the line laser disc play­er she told us about. She shows us an ad cam­paign she is work­ing on for a local chain of Viet­namese restau­rants. She puts The Spir­it of the Bee­hive on, but with­out the sound. She is play­ing a CD—the Rolling Stones album Some Girls. I bob my head slow­ly to “Beast of Bur­den” and look at the lights of down­town which reveal them­selves unsteadi­ly through a light driz­zle. Mar­ta shows me in a book how dur­ing the Oper­a­tion Con­dor days the Argen­tines used this song (among oth­ers) to mask the cries of the tortured.

*

The con­ver­sa­tion has ceased. Mar­ta had put on some kind of very non­de­script elec­tron­ic music that has the pow­er of suck­ing the ener­gy out of the room. The artist drinks from a cof­fee cup filled near­ly to the top with red wine. Mar­ta lights a Kool. I’d like a smoke but I have to main­tain the fic­tion that I’m an oncol­o­gist even though I’m not quite sure any­one remem­bers or even believes me.

*

Out of nowhere I say some­thing that has been going through my head since ear­li­er in the after­noon. Isn’t it strange, I say, how every­body laughs. The artist is silent, looks annoyed. Mar­ta gig­gles uncom­fort­ably and asks, what do you mean. I say, isn’t it strange that the human reac­tion to some­thing fun­ny or uncom­fort­able is to laugh, no mat­ter what lan­guage you speak. It’s like breath­ing or know­ing not to breathe when you’re under water. Mar­ta con­tin­ues to look at me, like she’s look­ing into my soul, try­ing to fig­ure out if I’m real or a hal­lu­ci­na­tion. All I can think is how human it is to laugh, tran­shu­man or tran­shis­tor­i­cal rather. Some­thing that links me to Jesus or Odysseus (or who­ev­er he was based on) and every­one else who has walked the earth for the last hun­dred or two hun­dred thou­sand years. I turn my mouth into the slight­est bit of a smile and Mar­ta laughs uproar­i­ous­ly. It’s not clear to me if it’s a put on or not.

*

For some rea­son Mar­ta starts cook­ing a whole chick­en. We go out­side with flash­lights to gath­er thyme and rose­mary and she cooks it in a cast iron skil­let with gar­lic and but­ter. I look at my watch and it’s just after eleven o’clock. She pours me a small glass of Béné­dic­tine which I drink in a sin­gle swal­low. I notice that the first three but­tons of her shirt are unbut­toned and she’s not wear­ing a bra. My pulse quickens.

*

When we were in col­lege I would dri­ve the artist into San Fran­cis­co. We would go over the Gold­en Gate Bridge and I felt as if life was open­ing up to me—a real life with sharp edges and car­nal dis­ap­point­ments. He’d tell me about Bill Bur­roughs and Joan Vollmer and Brion Gysin and I wouldn’t have much to tell him because I didn’t yet know any­thing. We’d go to City Lights Book­store and Tosca and Specs and Vesu­vio Café and pre­tend we were things we were not. Things we would hope­ful­ly be one day, but for me: no, nev­er, noth­ing. Now he looks younger than I, like there was nev­er any par­i­ty between us. His pun­ish­ment is to not only with­hold him­self from me, what he has become, but to with­hold my own past as well. When I turn around Mar­ta is hack­ing up a pineap­ple with a meat cleaver. She wants to serve it with the chicken.

*

It’s as if I’ve fall­en asleep and when I awake the artist and Mar­ta are talk­ing about mon­ey or if not mon­ey exact­ly than the future of mon­ey or society’s future. I real­ize the artist has inter­nal­ized con­ver­sa­tions he must have had about what men of elab­o­rate means plan to do with the new world once this one has exhaust­ed itself or they them­selves break it. There is a bot­tle of ouzo in front of them. They are in an embrace and Mar­ta motions me over as if she wants me to join them. I pre­tend not to notice her. All I can think about is Lay­la in bed with anoth­er man who has a penis the size and shape of a banana and my mem­o­ry or ghost only brings to her mind small feel­ings of guilt and sym­pa­thy. Mar­ta says my name, my false one, and I smile game­ly. The artist unbut­tons a few more but­tons and rum­mages around in there. I take the bot­tle of ouzo and what they’re doing rapid­ly becomes more intense. I am both here and not here. They need and don’t need me. 

*

They shut the door and I take one of Marta’s Kools. Exhale, I think, this is almost over. And then with­out think­ing too much about it, I begin to go through her things. Noth­ing too per­son­al. Rifle through some draw­ers, look at her bills, her CDs and laser discs. It’s not often you get to see how a stranger lives, how they eat, what kinds of objects they gath­er around them­selves. Per­son­al objects are the exte­ri­or that reflect the inte­ri­or. She had a framed square of peg board above her draft­ing table where she hung her tools—straight edges, razor­blades, brush­es. For a half-sec­ond I look at the razor­blades and think about cut­ting my wrists on her couch. Then I notice cans filled with pen­cils and pens and try to blot out the image of me bleed­ing to death on the couch.

*

On her draft­ing table was a half-done fly­er for a punk show. I moved the mis­matched let­ters around and real­ized there was some­thing erot­ic about spy­ing on Mar­ta, hav­ing this access to her inner life, which was iron­ic, giv­en what else was going on. But I didn’t want that. I’ve nev­er been inter­est­ed in shar­ing or exhi­bi­tion­ism. In the end it doesn’t mat­ter what I want—I don’t think my pres­ence was tru­ly desired. Mar­ta was just being hospitable.

*

The last thing I do is go through her books. I am on the precipice of leav­ing. It’s not light yet but the dead of night when it’s at its most cold and lone­ly. They are in the mid­dle or throes of it. I take Guy Debord’s Soci­ety of the Spec­ta­cle off the shelf and open it up. It doesn’t take long for me to get frus­trat­ed with my lack of imme­di­ate under­stand­ing. Mar­ta is scream­ing and I can feel the apart­ment trem­ble. I read the same apho­rism twice and make a note to read it lat­er. Then I just slip it into my bag. This will be mine for­ev­er but forever’s not a long time.

From the writer

:: Account ::

I wrote this sto­ry in 2024. It began as a kind of for­mal exper­i­ment. I want­ed to write some­thing in frag­ments that wasn’t just one long text bro­ken into frag­ments after the fact (a thing I some­times lazi­ly do) but writ­ten inten­tion­al­ly that way as the sto­ry pro­gress­es. Like how Susan Son­tag wrote “Against Inter­pre­ta­tion” (in ear­ly drafts, I sim­i­lar­ly used num­bers). I also want­ed to write some­thing about art and ill­ness. I like the idea of gen­tly dip­ping into the mys­tery or detec­tive genre (the stak­ing out of the artist). And I also like the idea of the dop­pel­ganger, in this case the artist appear­ing to with­hold his iden­ti­ty from the nar­ra­tor, and, in turn, the nar­ra­tor pre­tend­ing to be some­one else as well. Bad dogs is anoth­er theme. When I wrote this I had a bad dog that we had to walk late at night to avoid oth­er dogs (RIP Georgie). I also like writ­ing about peo­ple tak­ing drugs, if it’s fun­ny, like how Pyn­chon does it (not that I’m close). And fas­cism. I have an endur­ing fas­ci­na­tion with Latin Amer­i­can or Iber­ian forms of fas­cism, which I feel guilty about, because we have (and had) it just as bad in the Unit­ed States. Final­ly, and no offense to those of you who are filthy rich, but I hate rich peo­ple and I think that is some­what evi­dent in the way I depict the artist’s milieu, how­ev­er sub­tle. Or maybe not, I’m not sure writ­ers are good judges of their own sense of subtlety.

Bryan D. Price is the author of A Plea for Sec­u­lar Gods: Ele­gies (What Books, 2023) His sto­ries and poems have appeared or are forth­com­ing in Noon Annu­al, Epiphany Mag­a­zine, EPOCH, The Glac­i­er, and else­where. He lives in San Diego, California. 

Fiction / Eldridge Thomas III

:: Abducting Jolie ::

Peter twists every­thing she does now into evi­dence she’s unwell. Like how she eats choco­late pop­corn and pick­les inces­sant­ly, appar­ent­ly as hor­ri­fy­ing as kick­ing pup­pies or telling old peo­ple they stink. How was she to know cocoa-dust­ed pop­corn and sweet pick­les made such a per­fect match? Why should she give them up just because she’s no longer pregnant?

                  She didn’t drink Diet Coke. No caf­feine. Now she drinks it by the liter. She’s not try­ing to prove something.

                  Why don’t you get to bed at a decent hour? Why don’t you wake up at a decent hour? Why don’t you clean like you used to?

                  She cleans as she always did, which is to say: not won­der­ful­ly. He knew that when they mar­ried. She was upfront with her plus­es and minus­es. If it both­ers him so much, he could pick up a dang feath­er duster. He could orga­nize his books and mag­a­zines stacked every­where, like she’s asked him a mil­lion times.

                  Watch­ing so much TV isn’t healthy, he says, like he doesn’t know that Oprah’s back. She took the week off at the bank to sit in front of it, slic­ing into her Flori­da sum­mer beach time. That’s how much it means to her.

                  She guess­es it’s his Flori­da beach time, too.

                  He does men­tion the fif­teen hun­dred she down­right blew on the six­ty-five-inch Sam­sung and the five hun­dred she threw away hir­ing two men to hang it above their lit­tle fire­place. She asked him to hang it. He said they didn’t need a new TV.

                  Like he doesn’t know there’s a shelf life on her obses­sion. Oprah said they’ll see the aliens in a week’s time. That’s tonight, but Peter says he’s going to play pok­er. He won’t even watch it with her. Says he won’t enable her.

                  NBC pre­empt­ed Law and Order. That’s how seri­ous it is. It’s Oprah—not Geraldo.

                  Peter uses words like enable now, words Dr. Win­ters gave him to prove she’s loony tunes. Those two got it all fig­ured out.

                  Their house has an open floor plan. Liv­ing room on one side, kitchen and din­ing on the oth­er, a walk­way between. The liv­ing room is sunken. Her mom calls it a con­ver­sa­tion pit.

                  Jodie’s in the over­sized reclin­er, a one hun­dred-twen­ty-eight-ounce jar of pick­les at her feet, pop­corn in her lap, Diet Cokes lined beside her. She hears Peter’s shuf­fle; he always drags his feet. He pops out of the hall­way and looks down at her with the same riled twitch in his eye. Six months running.

                  “Are you sure you won’t go?” he asks.

                  He looks Chi­nese but sounds British. His dad was from Bei­jing but stud­ied physics in Man­ches­ter, where dad met mom. Peter stud­ied physics at Emory, where he met Jodie, sort of. They real­ly met at The Var­si­ty, where she worked the hot­dog counter try­ing to afford Atlanta. She’s from small-town Bain­bridge but always want­ed a city.

                  She glances at the half-grand­fa­ther clock.

                   “It starts in forty-two min­utes,” she says.

                  “I thought you might change your mind. We could use a sixth.” 

                  He wears a red west­ern shirt with pearl snaps, fad­ed jeans, and a brass belt buck­le. His lucky pok­er out­fit. He once asked if he looked like Bill Hickok.

                  “Get out of here, part­ner,” she says.

                  “Should I be leav­ing you alone?”

                  They were in the car togeth­er, com­ing back from Kellie’s East­er din­ner, but he says he doesn’t remem­ber it that way.

                  “Jodie,” he says. “It’d be good if you could walk away. It’d be real progress. We’ll dis­cov­er what­ev­er hap­pens on the Oprah Win­frey pro­gram later.”

                  God for­bid a woman ques­tion what a man says he saw. It’s been Hell since.

*

                  She must see Dr. Win­ters once a week, if she real­ly wants to save their marriage.

                  Dr. Winters’s office is ster­ile and char­ac­ter­less with its pan­eled wood walls and amber light­ing. The books on the shelves have round­ed spines with gold let­ter­ing, and her desk is metic­u­lous­ly bare. Four diplo­mas hang on the wall, one from Mer­cer, two from Geor­gia Tech, one from Emory.

                  Dr. Win­ters always stands by the two hard­back leather chairs to greet her, extend­ing her hand like it’s the one social norm she must and can tol­er­ate. Her hand feels spongy and fever­ish, like cradling a blue jay.

                  “Why have you come to see me, Jodie?” she asks, every time.

                  “Peter says—”

                  “Peter aside, how do you think I might help you?”

                  “I don’t know.”

                  “Jodie, it’s dif­fi­cult to help some­one who doesn’t know they need help.”

                  Every dress Dr. Win­ters wears is apple-col­ored: red, green, or yel­low. They all have the same flat design, mak­ing her look as though she doesn’t have a fig­ure to speak of. She doesn’t even wear a belt, which might prove she has a waist.

                  “Well, I guess every­body could use some­body to talk to.”

                  “What would you like to dis­cuss, then?” she asks.

                  “Peter—”

                  “Let’s not dis­cuss Peter. Let’s dis­cuss you.”

                  “Talk­ing about Peter is sort of dis­cussing me, isn’t it?”

                  Dr. Win­ters purs­es her lips when she thinks.

                  “Did you and Peter have trou­bles before los­ing the baby?” she asks.

                  “Not before the baby was tak­en. Why would we have?”

*

                  Her phone rings.

                  “I have some ques­tions for you, kiddo.”

                  It’s her mom.

                  “Shoot.”

                  “Are you even old enough to remem­ber Oprah’s show?”

                  “I saw it some­times after school, before you got home.”

                  It was just the two of them. Her dad skipped the light fan­tas­tic when she was bare­ly old enough to remem­ber how his mut­ton­chops met his mus­tache. He was a big rig dri­ver. She imag­ines see­ing him on the inter­state some­day and shoot­ing him the bird.

                  Her mom kept the books for a com­pa­ny that makes wood crates. They weren’t well-to-do, but they were com­fort­able. She didn’t feel par­tic­u­lar­ly less than the kids she went to school with.

                  Jodie munch­es on pop­corn and watch­es Laugh, Stu­pid! on mute. Bran­do Joyn­er, the star of the show, makes a per­vy face, and his TV girl­friend slaps him. Jodie grins. She hears her mom say ouch.

                  “What’s his wife’s name?” her mom asks.

                  “On the show?”

                  “What’s her real-life name?”

                  “Kari Shriver.”

                  “She’s got a mean wallop.”

                  It’s a fic­tion­al­ized account of Brando’s real-life jour­ney as a stand-up com­ic. He’s known for his phys­i­cal com­e­dy, what­ev­er that means. He just makes a lot of faces. The Hol­ly­wood gos­sips say he’s gay. She wish­es peo­ple didn’t have to hide who they real­ly are.

                  “How will I know if these aliens are, you know, the ones?”

                  Her mom goes along with every­thing, always has. In high school, the guy in her friend group, Kyle, claimed to have a tenth-degree black belt in jiu jit­su. He was a bar­be­cue pit­mas­ter and a renowned lion tamer. Her mom asked Kyle if he knew any mar­tial arts moves to help her aching back. They did these weird lit­tle dances in the liv­ing room for an hour. Her mom nev­er called Kyle out for clear­ly mak­ing it up as he went.

                  “I don’t know, Mom. Seems like it’ll be pret­ty obvious.”

                  For years, Kyle had talked about how he played piano. One night, they were over at their friend Tonya’s. He sat down at the upright in the base­ment and went to town on some Bil­ly Joel, and every­one sang along. No one could believe it.

                  “I mean, how will I know they’re your aliens?”

                  “I guess I’ll have to tell you.”

                  Jodie doesn’t know if her mom real­ly believes her, but she’s grate­ful for some­body who doesn’t treat her like a wack­adoo­dle. Her mom’s voice is a lit­tle coun­try, all even keel. Jodie miss­es her frizzy gray­ing hair and soft aura. Her mom­ma has always been the best momma.

                  “What if they are? What’ll you do?”

                  “There must be oth­er women like me out there. We’ll band together.”

                  “Jim­my says if the aliens are real, they won’t be friendly.”

                  Jim­my is man­ag­er at the crate com­pa­ny. He’s a beer-bel­lied know-it-all. Her mom’s worked with him twen­ty years.

                  “They’re going on a talk show, Mom. They can’t be all bad.”

                  “Jim­my says they’re using Oprah to announce they plan to enslave earth­lings and take over the world.”

                  “Enslave earth­lings?” She chuckles.

                  “Jodie, they’re tak­ing unborn babies from women’s bellies.”

                  Jodie doesn’t say any­thing. She watch­es the cred­its for Laugh, Stu­pid!, takes a sip of Diet Coke. The phone is warm on her ear.

                  “Right, Jodie?”

                  “I didn’t think about it like that, Mom.”

*

Dr. Win­ters wears her yel­low apple dress, and she’s already a delight.

                  “How is your sleep?”

                  “Much bet­ter,” Jodie lies.

                  Dr. Win­ters pre­scribed mela­tonin when the anti­de­pres­sant and ADHD meds kept her bounc­ing off walls. Jodie doesn’t take the que­ti­ap­ine. She’s not a schizo.

                  “Why have you come to see me, Jodie?”

                  “It’s been months, so we’re old friends at this point.”

                  Dr. Win­ters cocks her head. Jodie laughs ner­vous­ly. Dr. Win­ters scrib­bles some­thing in her notebook.

                  “I’d like for you to tell me when your fas­ci­na­tion with aliens from out­er space began.”

                  “Oh, I don’t have a fas­ci­na­tion,” she says. “I mean, I guess I do now, but I didn’t. Not before, you know.”

                  Dr. Win­ters nods and scrib­bles and asks ques­tions with­out look­ing up.

                  “Has any­one in your fam­i­ly ever claimed to have been abduct­ed, oth­er than yourself?”

                  “Nope, nobody.”

                  “Any of your friends?”

                  “Nope.”

                  “Any­one claim to have seen a space­craft or a lit­tle green man?”

                  “They’re gray.”

                  “Par­don?”

                  “No, I don’t know any­body else who’s seen aliens. Except Peter.”

                  “He denies see­ing them.”

                  “Yes,” Jodie says. She shifts in her chair.

                  “Are you a fan of sci­ence fic­tion movies or tele­vi­sion programs?”

                  “I like Star Trek some. Chris Pine is so handsome.”

                  “Chris Pine?”

                  “He’s the actor. He plays the main guy, the charis­mat­ic, some­what reck­less leader.”

                  “What about the X‑Files?”

                  “I saw an episode when I was lit­tle, and that was enough. There was this kid who could con­trol elec­tric­i­ty, but all he did with his pow­ers was kill peo­ple. Scary stuff.”

                  “What sorts of movies and tele­vi­sion shows do you pre­fer?”
                  “I love a good peri­od dra­ma. Any­thing Jane Austen or Down­ton Abbey.”

                  “Hor­ror?”

                  “I’m a pret­ty aver­age girl.”

                  Dr. Win­ters drops her pen and stares.

Jodie begins to won­der if she’ll stare for­ev­er. She con­sid­ers the long, frost­ed win­dows and won­ders if an awning might break her fall if she jumped out of one. They’re on the third floor.

“Your father left when you were young.”

“I was four.”

“You say that’s your sole child­hood trauma.”

“I wouldn’t say trau­ma. Lots of par­ents skedaddle.”

                  “I don’t under­stand, Jodie.”

                  “You don’t under­stand what, Dr. Winters?”

                  “Is it the news? How do you feel about migrants?”

                  “I mar­ried Peter.”

                  “British immi­grants aren’t what you see on CNN.”

                  “No, I guess not.”

                  “Have you ever felt threat­ened by ille­gals? Have you ever encoun­tered gang activity?”

                  “God no.”

                  Jodie remem­bers the Mex­i­cans who came through her small Geor­gia town, most­ly to help farm­ers plant and har­vest. They were pleas­ant enough. If any­thing, they seemed sus­pi­cious of the locals.

                  “My mom­ma thinks them bub­bas will change their tune once they shut down the Mex­i­can restau­rants,” Jodie says. “They sure do like a mar­gari­ta on a Fri­day night.”

                  Dr. Win­ters sits expressionless.

                  “So, you dis­cuss ille­gal aliens with your mother?”

                  “I mean, I guess, some­times. Isn’t that normal?”

                  “It isn’t nor­mal to claim aliens took a fetus from your uterus.”

                  “I nev­er said it was normal.”

                  Jodie looks at her wrist. They still have thir­ty minutes.

*

Peter dri­ves them in his 1970 dia­mond blue Mus­tang. It’s the one car they own. He bought it and start­ed restor­ing it right after he came over, before they’d even met. He calls it the perk of Amer­i­cana.

                  They wear pas­tels, him in cor­duroy and a pink short-sleeve shirt and her in a yel­low rib-knit dress. An old Willie Nel­son tune about an angel fly­ing too close to the sun plays on the radio.

                  She sits cat­ty-cor­nered in the seat with her hands on her water­mel­on bel­ly and watch­es him dri­ve. They’re tak­ing the long way home from Athens. She watch­es the pow­er lines and Geor­gia pines pass, the fad­ing sun’s yel­low, the indi­go skyline’s slug­gish dark­en­ing. She smells the cher­ry blos­soms in bloom, their pow­dery lush vanil­la, and feels the warmth of a per­fect spring day.

                  They’re happy.

                  Then Peter’s eyes close. She thinks he’s teasing.

                  “Stop, Peter. It’s not fun­ny.” She nudges his shoul­der, but he doesn’t snap to. She pan­ics. “Peter, wake up.” She slugs his shoulder.

                  His head falls to his chest, but his hands con­tin­ue to grip the wheel. The car slows, rolls to a stop.

                  “What’s hap­pen­ing?” she asks and shakes him. She pulls his face into her hands and gen­tly slaps it. He doesn’t respond.

                  The car drifts into a fog, and she can’t see any­thing out the win­dows. The radio turns to sta­t­ic and then a high-pitched buzz. She smells turpentine.

                  She turns to grab her door han­dle, and there, in the open win­dow, she sees its huge gray head, its inky black eyes. It reach­es for her, and she screams before pass­ing out.

*

Oprah sits alone on a couch in a stu­dio some­where. Behind her, a giant screen reads: We are not alone.

Jodie unmutes the TV.

                  “Last Thurs­day,” Oprah says, “I was asleep at my home in Chica­go when I was awak­ened by a bril­liant milky light.”

                  “Peter with you?” her mom asks.

                  “Pok­er,” Jodie says.

                  “I saw the out­lines of three bod­ies stand­ing at the foot of my bed. They were short and thin with stick-fig­ure arms and legs and an elon­gat­ed head.”

“Is that what they look like?”

                  “Mom, I’m try­ing to listen.”

                  “They did not say words, but I heard them inside my head. They said it’s time for human­i­ty to meet oth­er lifeforms.”

                  Oprah push­es her eye­glass­es up the bridge of her nose.

                  “He should be with you.”

                  “Mom, I don’t want to talk about Peter.”

                   “They said I had to make intro­duc­tions,” Oprah says, “and it had to hap­pen in a week’s time.”

                    “They chose her? Why not the president?”

                    “Mom, I’ve got to go.”

                    “Okay, dar­ling. We’ll talk after—”

Jodie ends the call.

*

                   “Is there any­thing in there about it?”

                  She and Peter sit at the din­ing table, hav­ing their break­fast. She pokes her spoon around a fruit and yogurt bowl. He reads the news on his tablet like he does every morn­ing and chomps on an apple, not even acknowl­edg­ing she spoke.

                  “Peter, is there any­thing in there about last night?”

                  “I’m sor­ry, my duck,” he says. “What about last night?”

                  “Some­body must’ve seen some­thing. Look in the Athens paper.”

                  “I’m sor­ry,” he says, again. “What are we discussing?”

“Did any­body see the fog or strange lights or a UFO?”

                  His mouth curves, amused.

                  “Don’t, Peter. You remember.”

                  “Remem­ber what?”

                  “Please, don’t call me crazy.”

                  “Are you unwell?”

                  He gets up, goes to her, kneels beside her.

                  “Tell me what hap­pened last night.”

                  “Peter, you were there.”

                  “Tell me like I wasn’t there, from the beginning.”

                  “You drove us back from Kellie’s—”

                  “My dar­ling, Jodie.” He holds up his hand to hush her.

                  “Why are you pre­tend­ing you don’t know, Peter?”

                  “East­er was a week ago. The still­birth was a week ago.”

                  “Still­birth?”

“You were both excit­ed about the preg­nan­cy?” Dr. Win­ters asks. She wears her red apple dress and seems more human than usual.

                  “So excit­ed,” Jodie says. “Mom came up to help us with the house. His par­ents were going to fly in for the birth. I nev­er felt so happy.”

                  “You were lit­er­al­ly full of life.”

                  “Yes, that’s right.” Jodie gig­gles. “We put plas­tic cov­ers on all the pow­er out­lets. We paint­ed the guest room a bright yel­low. Peter paint­ed flow­ers on the wall. I didn’t even know he had artis­tic tal­ent. We had a bassinet and a crib, a lit­tle chif­forobe. I guess we still do. The room is exact­ly as it was.”

                  “Peter wants to try again?”

                  “Maybe.”

                  “You don’t know if he wants to try again?”

                  “We haven’t talked about it.”

                  “How come?”

                  “We didn’t want to know the gen­der,” she says, still smil­ing, “and we had the names nar­rowed down to two each.”

“Do you want to try again?”

Jodie stiff­ens, not want­i­ng to say how guilty she’d feel hav­ing anoth­er with a baby already up there some­where. Not until they give this one back. She doesn’t want to risk them tak­ing it, too.

“They changed my insides. I might not be able to.”

                  “What were the names?” Dr. Win­ters asks.

                  Jodie smiles.

“Simon or Lewis for a boy,” she says. “Mar­garet Mary or Mary Olivia for a girl.”

                  “You still have no rec­ol­lec­tion of the stillbirth?”

                  Of course not, Jodie thinks.

                  “You were in the hos­pi­tal two days. Peter says you lost a great deal of blood.”

                  Peter’s in on it.

                  “Jodie, your grief is real, even if the aliens are not.”

She doesn’t want to hear Dr. Win­ters talk about false memories.

She’s awake. She’s grog­gy and tries to focus her eyes. The ceil­ing is sap­phire and moves like water. The walls too. The floor too.

                  She’s naked. She real­izes she’s hov­er­ing midair, and this fright­ens her. She kicks, and her body turns upright. She pad­dles her legs and arms, and her feet tap tap tap to land on the floor. She feels a small rhythm in her feet.

                  She kneels and cov­ers her pri­vates. It’s when she real­izes the eight-month swell of her bel­ly is gone.

                  “No,” she says, already defeat­ed. “God, no.”

                  She breaks in sor­row and cra­dles her­self, screams, but her anguish is too much, and her achy, heav­ing yowl leaves her mouth with­out sound.

                  Then his cor­duroy leg is over her. She grabs it and climbs him until her head rests against his chest.

                  “Peter,” she says.

                  “Don’t cry, my bis­cuit,” he says.

                  “The baby,” she says, and he stead­ies her before she col­laps­es again.

                  “There,” he says. He motions for her to see behind her.

                  She turns and sees a cylin­der the size of a large hour­glass hov­er five feet in the air, filled with an amber-glow­ing liq­uid and their baby.

                  She rush­es to it, palms its sur­face. It’s hard like porcelain.

                  “Baby,” she says. “My baby.”

                  Her skin is gos­samer thin. Her tiny organs and bones and veins. Her tum­my push­es in, out. She stretch­es out a yawn.

                  “She’s breathing.”

                  Peter’s hand mas­sages her shoulder.

                  “Isn’t our Mary so lovely?”

                  “Help me get her out of there.”

                  She smells tur­pen­tine. The alien is behind them.

Every­body wants her to go back to work, but she can’t believe how many abductees there are and can’t stop read­ing about them online. She finds the forums, the doc­u­men­taries, the first­hand video and audio accounts, some­times from way back when, some­times from last week.

There are sup­port groups, some­times online, some­times in per­son. One meets week­ly in Atlanta. She googles the address. An Epis­co­pal church. Maybe she’ll go, but some of these peo­ple lie like a no-legged dog. Some act like it’s the best thing that’s ever hap­pened to them.

One girl said she got her baby back. Maybe she did some­thing Jodie didn’t.

                  She’s in bed with her lap­top. Peter doesn’t say good morn­ing when he gets up. He doesn’t kiss her goodbye.

                  She checks her body for mark­ings. They’re there: a small brown dot that could be a freck­le if she didn’t know bet­ter and a pink dot, half an inch above it, three times the brown one’s size. A brown dot and pink dot on both hips. They weren’t there before.

                  So many peo­ple report mul­ti­ple abduc­tions. She can’t suf­fer another.

                  She just can’t.

                  She real­izes she’s spent the day in bed when she hears the door, Peter com­ing home. She con­sid­ers rush­ing to the bath­room to brush her hair, maybe get­ting in the show­er. She wouldn’t be sur­prised if she were cov­ered in a film of dust. How long has it been? This isn’t day one.

                  “We must talk,” she hears him announce before he even steps a foot in their bedroom.

                  She remem­bers how she could lis­ten to him say any­thing for hours at a time, how she want­ed him as her GPS voice. So sexy. Not just the words all Brits pro­nounce dif­fer­ent­ly, like sched­ule and adver­tise­ment. She liked them all. She liked him all.

                  “Jodie, it’s been weeks.”

                  He sits on the bed’s edge, places a hand on her knee.

                  “Enough,” he says.

                  “Peter, I—”

                  “Enough,” he shouts. She hadn’t picked up on his tem­per. “It wasn’t only you.”

                  “You were there, Peter. We talked. We saw Mary in the jar.”

                  “We did not,” he says. “We did not, Jodie, see our baby in a jar. There are no such things as aliens.”

                  “There are. You saw—”

                  “You said you were feel­ing unwell, and you would have a quick kip. I enjoyed the sun and the dri­ve, and, when I looked over to you again, you were a bloody mess. I thought— It was so awful to think I’d lost you both.”

                  “It’s not what hap­pened, Peter.”

                  “You held our baby, Jodie.”

                  “What?”

                  “At the hos­pi­tal. You held her as we said good­bye. She died in your arms.”

                  “That didn’t happen.”

                  “It wasn’t only you, Jodie. It has been extreme­ly dis­tress­ing for me as well.”

                  He stands, brush­es the wrin­kles out of his trousers.

                  “Would you fan­cy a cup­pa? I’ll put on some tea.”

                  He leaves for the kitchen.

                  He’s such a liar.

Oprah says the aliens are immi­nent. Jodie’s pulse races through her neck.

                  Her phone rings. It’s her mom. She hits decline.

                  She hears the front door. She looks over to the foy­er and doesn’t see anybody.

                  “Who’s there?”

                  Peter comes into her line of sight, hands in pockets.

                  Jodie turns from him to the TV, back and forth. Oprah’s in the audi­ence with her micro­phone. Some in the audi­ence look amused, some concerned.

                  “What’re you doing here?” she asks.

                  “Every­one with­drew. They all want to watch that bloody program.”

                  “Come sit.”

She motions to his favorite spot on the couch, beside a side table with a lamp and a stack of magazines.

                  Oprah is talk­ing. Jodie can’t focus. Oprah’s say­ing some­thing about how they breathe air like the rest of us.

                  “I hap­pened upon some right gulls who said they’d play, but we must host the game.”

                  “Peter, no. Not tonight.”

                  “They’ll be here momen­tar­i­ly, my pet.”

                  “My show.” A tear blurs her vision.

                  “Easy mon­ey, my sweet. They’re all plonkers.”

                  “Plonkers?”

                  Oprah asks some­body what he hopes to hear from the aliens.

“That they come in peace,” the man says. They all applaud.

                  “Please, my show.”

                  There’s a knock at the door, and Peter leaves to answer it.

                  The audi­ence looks only afraid now. They’re see­ing some­thing off cam­era. Why won’t they just show the aliens?

                  There’s no sound in the foy­er, no door open­ing or clos­ing, no foot­steps, no voic­es, no anything.

                  “Hel­lo, Jodie.”

                  She turns.

                  “Dr. Win­ters, you shouldn’t be here.”

                  Dr. Win­ters wears her apple green dress. She stands beside Peter. They stare down at her with pity.

                  “Peter invit­ed us,” Dr. Win­ters says. “Won’t you join us in the real world, Jodie?”

                  “Dr. Win­ters, my heart is set on this show.”

                  “We should talk, Jodie. Come, sit with us.”

                  “I don’t want to.”

                  On the tele­vi­sion, the audi­ence stirs. Peo­ple whis­per. Cam­eras wob­ble. Something’s wrong.

                  “Peo­ple of the world,” Oprah says, her voice strained but steady, “I present beings from anoth­er planet.”

                  Jodie swal­lows her breath.

                  Two fig­ures step onto the stage. They’re avo­ca­do-green, big-head­ed, ridicu­lous. They wear glit­ter­ing pur­ple blazers.

                  “Oh no,” Jodie says.

                  Her phone rings. It’s her mom. She hits decline.

                  The broad­cast glitch­es. The sound warps. The image freezes mid-frame: Oprah’s face caught between com­po­sure and con­fu­sion. Then black.

                  Jodie hears cards shuffle.

                  “Jodie.”

                  “Dr. Win­ters, leave me alone.”

                  Jodie bangs the remote, hop­ing the show will return.

Her phone rings. She hits decline.

                  “Jodie, look at the pot. If you want this, you’ll have to win it.”

                  It’s then she smells the turpentine.

                  Jodie stands and turns to them. Peter is at the head of the table. Dr. Win­ters oppo­site him. Sit­ting between them: the aliens, the real aliens. Gray, inky-eyed, ter­ri­ble. The cylin­der rests in the cen­ter, glow­ing amber. Her baby’s peach body turns like a sun­flower tail­ing the sun. Her lit­tle leg kicks.

                  Jodie steps out of the sunken liv­ing room and takes the open seat between an alien and Dr. Win­ters. The alien across from her nods, and she hears it say hel­lo, a rum­bling tenor echo, with­out utter­ing a word.

                  Peter deals five cards to each of them.

                  “Look at that silli­ness on the tele­vi­sion,” Dr. Win­ters says.

                  Jodie turns to see a green alien’s long fin­gers wrapped around some heavy­set guy’s neck. The cam­era zooms in on the man’s face as it turns blue, and the screen goes to black and then to NBC’s logo.

                  “What will you wager?” Dr. Win­ters asks and purs­es her lips.

                  “Every­thing,” Jodie says.

                  “You under­stand what’s at stake, then?”

                  “I’ve always under­stood, Dr. Winters.”

                  “How many cards do you need, my flower?”

Jodie peeks at her hand. Queens full of fours, a full house.

                  She knows what she’ll do next.

                  She’ll find Peter’s ham­mer and a long nail. She’ll tap the glass until it cracks. She’ll wipe her baby clean with their best tow­els, the salmon ones her mom gave them last Christ­mas. She’ll car­ry her to the bed­room, bun­dle her in a soft blan­ket, and curl up beside her on the mat­tress. It’ll be the two of them, warm and snug.

                  No one will try to take or sep­a­rate them ever again, and no one will tell her that she’s only dreaming.

From the writer

:: Account ::

“Abduct­ing Jodie” began with two unre­lat­ed cul­tur­al mem­o­ries that even­tu­al­ly fused togeth­er in my mind: the tabloid sin­cer­i­ty of alien abduc­tion sto­ries from the 1990s and the strange social lone­li­ness sur­round­ing still­birth. Both involve expe­ri­ences that lis­ten­ers often feel pres­sured either to ful­ly accept or ful­ly reject. I became inter­est­ed in what hap­pens when grief cre­ates a real­i­ty more emo­tion­al­ly bear­able than the one every­one else accepts.

I grew up in South Geor­gia, where con­ver­sa­tions about the super­nat­ur­al, reli­gion, con­spir­a­cies, folk wis­dom, and tele­vi­sion often exist­ed side by side with­out much con­tra­dic­tion. Peo­ple might dis­cuss angels, prophet­ic dreams, UFO sight­ings, and pre­scrip­tion med­ica­tion in the same porch con­ver­sa­tion. I want­ed the sto­ry to pre­serve that qual­i­ty rather than treat belief as some­thing clean­ly ratio­nal or irrational.

The story’s struc­ture emerged once I real­ized that what mat­tered most was the real­i­ty of Jodie’s emo­tion­al expe­ri­ence. I wasn’t inter­est­ed in mak­ing the sto­ry a puz­zle about aliens. I want­ed the read­er to expe­ri­ence the exhaust­ing insta­bil­i­ty of a woman try­ing to under­stand an unbear­able loss while psy­chi­a­try, mar­riage, mem­o­ry, media spec­ta­cle, and her own expe­ri­ence offer com­pet­ing explanations.

Oprah became cen­tral because she occu­pies a unique­ly Amer­i­can space between celebri­ty, con­fes­sion, spir­i­tu­al­i­ty, and pub­lic trust. The idea of extrater­res­tri­al rev­e­la­tion occur­ring via a day­time tele­vi­sion host struck me as both absurd and strange­ly inevitable.

As I wrote, I found myself increas­ing­ly inter­est­ed in ten­der­ness rather than satire. Even at its strangest moments, the sto­ry became less about aliens than about a woman refus­ing to sur­ren­der the real­i­ty in which her child still exists somewhere.

Eldridge Thomas III lives and writes in Knoxville, TN, but he’s from a swamp in Deep South Geor­gia. He can be reached at eldridgethomas3@gmail.com.