Mr. Spaceman Page 11

  I step across the steel rail and I move into the parking lot and I am full of hope. I know this place teems with the objects that breed in the physical space between these creatures, the objects that beckon and gather and beget words, words that have shaped my understanding of things in so many ways. And though I have collected and preserved a number of these objects in a certain dedicated space on my ship, and though they even clutter together there in some profusion, there is an inevitable air of artificiality about my collection, like a case full of insects stuck with pins. I need to be inside Kroger, no matter what the risk. I squeak on quickly across the asphalt, the bright white glow calling me, a cheery WELCOME and a vast yellow Smiley Face over the double automatic doors.

  I am suddenly struck by this face, which I have seen through my observation machines in many places. But until this moment I have not seen it for what it truly is, the face of a spaceman. No ears. No hair. Large eyes. No lips but a wide, sweet smile. I am a friendly guy, after all. Perhaps this face has prepared a way for me. This word of welcome is for me, Desi the Friendly Spaceman, making a special appearance at the Family Center, Have a nice millennium. I rush toward KROGER.

  A figure is standing there, a large figure in a tan uniform, a security guard, I realize, given the lateness of the hour. And I also realize that I am ready to present myself directly to him: Hi, my name is Desi; I’m the spaceman you have been waiting for, whose image floats cheerily over your head even as we speak. And as soon as I think of saying these words, all that I have imagined for myself crumbles at once. I pull my hat down low and then stuff my hands in my pockets and I turn my face aside. I am not a fool. The more rational part of me does not really expect this world to understand the iconography of their ubiquitous Mr. Smiley Face. I am drawing nearer, trying to navigate with peripheral vision, my face still turned sharply aside, focusing on the metal newspaper box to the right of the doors, allowing the guard a benign interpretation of my refusal to look at him. “Evening,” I say and then, cleverly, I refer to the newspaper headline which I want him to believe has entranced me. “‘Fear and Hope at the End of the Millennium.’ How often those two things go together, do they not?”

  He makes no reply but neither does he try to stop me. I have already stepped onto the rubber pad and the doors swing open with a sound like the one that admits me to the life-giving atmosphere of my home craft from the vacuum of space. I cross the threshold, I am inside one of Earth’s cathedrals of consumerism and the lights dazzle me and I glance quickly about and see no creatures and I duck my head and put on my Groovy Glasses with the dark lenses, affixing my Snappy Sports Strap at the back to hold them on me in the absence of anything quite like earth creatures’ ears on my head. I thrust my hands back into my pockets and head off into an empty space to my right, away from the presence of store clerks and any of my fellow shoppers. But even as I avoid them, I am thrilled with the idea of them: my fellow shoppers.

  Music plays from above. I’m Bluer Than Blue. How ironic. I am whatever is the opposite of that sentiment. I am redder than red. But now there is a metallic clash of shopping carts nearby and I am yellower than yellow, dashing forward, away from the sound, past a great silver case radiating heat, full of whole rotisserie chickens, and past tables Where it Costs Less to Get More, tables spilling over with French bread and cream cakes and angel-food cakes and cinnamon cakes and Special Sale Half Price fruit cakes and past bins of Big Savings on tubes of Christmas wrapping paper and bags of bows, and the sound that frightened me has ceased. It was the late-night work of some bag boy rounding up the evening’s stray carts, I am sure. And now I am in the vast and deserted pharmacy space and I slow down and I am alone and I am happy and I stop and I am standing before rows of mouthwash and they are full of motif and reprise: blue mint and cool mint and peppermint and soft mint and freshmint and my head is spinning with a strange delight and I stagger a bit farther and now there are many ways to hold your false teeth in your head, a matter about which this world is as deeply sympathetic and attentive as the most wonderful and loving father or mother. One can cling, in one’s prosthetic vulnerability, to Dentrol and Sea Bond and Fixodent and Poli-Grip and Dentu-Grip and ORAfix and effergrip and Rigident and Cushion Grip and Klutch. I am quaking now with an irrational hope. For what I do not know.

  I take off my sunglasses to see all these things in their natural light. My eyes throb for a moment with the brightness, but I adjust. I adjust. I am happy to be here. I am awash in a sense of the possibility of things. Another few steps and there are so many ways to clean one’s teeth, one of them Age-Defying. That is all I need from this section. I turn a corner. To stand against the dark stellar wind of mortality, a tube of toothpaste held valiantly before you: perhaps this is the powerful outer edge of yearning.

  And now I am among the lipsticks and foundations and blushes and fingernail polishes and mascaras and powders, women set in cardboard all about me, their heads thrown back in perpetual smiles, defiant smiles, it seems to me, rich in Body Fantasies that Make a Statement with the Color of Vibrant Life that Stays on You and Only You. Yes these women, too, are facing the specter of physical decay that confronts all the creatures on this planet—and on my planet, too—on every inhabited planet in the known universe—and these women throw their heads back and laugh and they smile and they are confident and I am standing in the middle of this place, learning so much, and I turn and a woman’s face—at first I see it as a face from the racks of cosmetics, but I am wrong—a woman’s face, drawn and plain and washed pale as death from the fluorescent lights, turns and sees mine, a tube of Maybelline Great Lash Waterproof mascara in her hand, and her eyes widen at the sight of me and I am suddenly keenly aware of my sunglasses in my hand and she screams.

  “Hi,” I say. “My name is Desi.”

  She screams again. There are voices from the other side of the store. Away from my spaceship, on this planet’s surface, I could alter the consciousness of only one, perhaps two, creatures at once in, at most, a three-pace radius. I take a step toward this woman who raises her tube of mascara before her, as if it were a weapon. “I am a friendly guy,” I say, but she is opening her mouth to scream once more and I quickly wave my hand. She goes glassy-eyed and yawns and smacks her lips, looking about her.

  “Hi,” she says to no one in particular. “I know a little song.”

  The other voices, shouting, are coming nearer. I hear a man cry, “It came from over there.”

  “Three little fishies,” the woman before me begins to sing.

  I put my Groovy Glasses on and I back away, feeling the heat of panic spreading down my arms and into my hands. I realize my visit to Kroger has come to an end. And things could become much worse than that, as well. Much worse. I hear the electric doors whoosh open in the distance. More voices. The guard has rushed in, I know. I move away quickly, away from the door for the moment, back to the turning I made into the cosmetics aisle and then I go up the cross aisle, keeping low, moving deeper into the store, fleeing the gathering of Earthlings but not without the stiff hot fear of trapping myself. I turn again, my Chuck Taylors making a terrible racket beneath me. I can only hope that my pursuers will split up in their search and that they will not have torches and dogs, and I am in the full flowering of panic now, I realize. I am squeaking along among great bundles of disposable baby diapers, Huggies and Pampers, and I wish for that now, very badly, to be in my wife Edna Bradshaw’s arms and she will huggy me and pamper me and we will be safe in the middle of the air and I wish to catch no one up in the clouds ever again. Let this world be.

  I am approaching the western wall of the store. Bins again before me, tree stands and Christmas lights and plug-in nativity scenes, though given my circumstances, I am less enchanted now with the Incredible Holiday Savings available here. Sadly, all that matters at this moment is that I must turn right toward the front of the store or left toward the back or retrace my steps. I go to the left, there are less than a dozen more paces to the far corner
, but up ahead I see a door and I rush. I had a good plan after all. This will take me into a storage room and then perhaps—almost certainly—a delivery door out the back of the building.

  A sign is there: NOT A PUBLIC EXIT. But I am prepared to defy this sign, and I welcome the implication of still another exit—a PRIVATE one—through this way. Private is what I deeply desire. And I arrive and I grasp the handle and I turn it and it will not yield. I turn the handle hard and the door is metal and the lock is heavy-duty and I am ill-equipped for the use of physical force. I am heating up again. I spin around and I am trapped in the farthest corner of this vast place, the rows and rows and rows stacking up before my eyes ablaze in fluorescence, blocking my escape, sealing my doom, the voices are drawing nearer, though they are distinct now, separate.

  I am amidst the monstrous ironies of pet foods. Against the western wall are stacks of bags of seed to feed sweet little beloved pet birds and next to them rows of cans of murdered bird flesh to feed sweet little beloved pet cats. I am at this moment, needless to say, deeply troubled by the contradictions of life on this planet. Especially as I see the top of a head skimming above a row not far down the way. Skimming in my direction.

  Before me, in the space usually assigned to sales bins, are stacks of massive dog-food bags. I step forward and I crouch down low behind them. I wait for a moment and I peek around the bags and my vision is filled with roach killers. Roach Motels, in fact, with a tiny, welcoming facade on each package, and an open door, but it is clear to any objective eye that this is a trap. They Check In But They Do Not Check Out.

  I duck back behind my dog food in a significantly worsened state of mind. I need to stop thinking now, but emblazoned over and over on my bastion of bags is BUTCHER’S CHOICE. And I see my too-many fingers and toes being chopped off and scraped from the cutting block with the steaming blade, not enough meat here even for dog food, and all my loving digits drop into a garbage box, and now the blade lifts to lop off this similarly useless head, its lipless smile still fixed there, even in death.

  Ironically, though the words on these very bags themselves have prompted this final twist of fear in me, in response I scrunch up even harder against them, trying to compact myself into a very small object, half-price and useless to anyone, easily overlooked.

  But there is a quick scuffling sound heading this way and a figure suddenly in my sight, off to my left, trying the door that I tried, finding it, as I did, locked. And now the figure turns, a very young man in a Kroger shirt the color of clotting blood, and he has a name tag, which calms me a little bit, though it is not nearly as friendly a tag as my wife Edna Bradshaw’s. Simply: KROGER Roger. And Roger sees me and I am a strange sight to his eyes, he is struck dumb, but my sunglasses are still on and he is not sure what it is he is seeing, though strange it is. This is fortunate. He takes a step toward me without yet making a sound and I wave my hand and he stops and his eyelids droop and his body does a slow ooze to the floor and he is asleep.

  I wonder how many are in pursuit of me. The staff must be small at this hour. And there would be no need for everyone in the store to join in. After all, there is still commerce to do. And they would have gotten no help in focusing on their target from the woman whose scream began it all. Indeed, they might be on the lookout for three little fishies.

  But now I hear a clear “Oh my God,” a man’s voice, and rushing feet and the voice again: “Over here.” I look toward Roger and at the moment I do, a large white mass descends and hovers over the sleeping young man. And from it, a face turns and the eyes there widen. The body twists my way. Another Kroger name tag. Ken. Ken the assistant manager. I wave my hand at Ken and he is snoring even before he sinks forward, which he does, quickly, ending up pressed on top of Roger, the two men’s faces cheek-to-cheek.

  Someone is calling out “Ken” now. I creep forward, closer to the sleepers. Ken’s torso, clad in his immaculate white shirt, is firmly at rest against Roger, but he is still on his knees and his rear end is stuck in the air. He looks uncomfortable. But I do not help him into a better posture for sleeping. I remain hidden behind the dog food and another scuffling of feet is coming this way, another man’s voice. “Ken,” the voice says. “What the hell are you doing?” More scuffling and then, “Oh shit.”

  I hear the crackle of a two-way radio. This must be the guard. And he is calling for help from the local authorities. “This is Nate,” he says. “We got ourselves a problem. Over.”

  I rise up and peek over the top of the dog food. It is indeed the man in the tan uniform. He is looking down at the two sleepers and he takes a step toward them. I lift my hand and he says into his radio, “I’m not sure …” and then he sees me and adds—not exactly into his radio but generally, for Ken and Roger and Barry Manilow, who is singing overhead about trying to get some unnamed feeling again—“Oh fuck me.” And I realize that my Groovy Glasses are in my hand again and I do not even remember taking them off. Nate is surely about to say more, even though his face seems frozen in its contemplation of mine, but I do not give him the chance. I wave my hand and the radio clatters to the floor, spitting out static and broken cries for someone to come back. But Nate himself is settling down to sleep, ignoring the upthrust of Ken’s backside, drooping down against the delicate balance of the assistant manager so that he topples sideways and I am left with a stack of three loudly snoring members of this planet’s primary species at my feet. I look quickly around and I see no more gliding heads, hear no more rushing feet. But the radio is crackling in the center of the aisle and I must assume that a police car is on its way.

  I wave my hand over each of the three sleepers to ensure they will have no memory of me and I rush off as fast as my sneakers will carry me, back in the direction of the door, the profusion of goods flowing past me on each side in an indistinguishable blur. I think of Ken and Roger and Nate and wonder what they will conclude when they wake and find themselves intertwined on the floor with no memory of how they arrived there. Perhaps love will inadvertently bloom. I wish for that as I rush past the woman who began all this and her voice carries me toward the automatic door: “Swim little fishies, swim if you can …”

  I am released, thankfully, from the fluorescence and into the darkness and already I hear a siren, and I turn toward the open space of ROLLER RINK, which seems to me a very great distance away. I take a step and another and another and I lean forward, into the night, trying to glide the best I can, but as much as I admire my Chuck Taylors, they are not made to facilitate the movement of a member of my species and I press forward, across the asphalt, under the glare of a light and into darkness again and the siren is drawing nearer and I am moving with agonizing slowness and I realize what an obviously suspicious figure I make in my hat and my trench coat and my size-twenty yellow sneakers and I realize I have to remove them, the sneakers, I am no longer concerned about a part of my body giving away my true identity, I am concerned only with running fast from the coppers, who are drawing ever nearer. So I begin pulling at one of my sneakers even as I try to keep my forward momentum and the Chuck Taylor clings to me and I am hopping on one foot with the other in my hands and I hop and wrench at my sneaker and hop and wrench and hop and I am a Bad Boy and I am wondering what I am going to do because the authorities are unquestionably coming for me and I am not sure if I can control the situation.

  And over my shoulder I hear the train whistle once more, quite loud, as if it, too, is in pursuit of me, and there is another sound, a clackity-clack and I look and the train is passing in front of Kroger, slowly, approaching the crossing and there are red lights flashing there and I can see the blue and white flashing of police lights racing this way from the street along the tracks and the engine reaches the crossing and enters it and its cars are following and beneath them I can see the flare of blue and white approach and slow and turn to come to get me. But the police vehicle is blocked there by the train. And I hop on along, still clinging to one determinedly sneakered foot. I hop across t
he street and through the ghost-space of Roller Rink and I bounce along to my invisible craft and I am at last passing inside and I release my foot and I move to the controls and I sit before them, and I pause. I look toward Kroger and I am filled with regret for causing upset in a Family Center. But there is far more upset to come, I fear. Far more. And I move my hand and I rise above Lake Charles, Louisiana, quickly, and I fly toward the huggies of my wife.

  12

  Edna Bradshaw was still sleeping when I returned. Everyone on the ship was sleeping. But when I lay down beside my wife, she stirred without opening her eyes and her arms came around me as if she knew in her very dreams what it was that I needed at that moment. I was grateful.

  I am frightened. Even lying here now with my wife Edna Bradshaw’s arms about me, even with a fetching scent of something coming from her, a good scent that seems to come straight from her knockers, which tower above me in her embrace and which are so unlike anything among my species, even with all of that, I can think only of my imminent public appearance on this planet, how it will be fraught with danger and needs a careful plan, and how even the vague first glimmerings of such a plan are still far from my mind. I continue to believe that whatever I am to do, whatever I am to say, has to be shaped by all the voices of creatures, alive and dead, floating in the vast energy fields of my memory machines and, more to the present point, all the voices now sleeping on my ship and ready to speak. These latter voices are surely as close as I can get to the exact tenor of this particular era, the fin de siècle state of consciousness of the creatures I will face in vast numbers in a very short time.