Dreambox Junkies Page 5

  “Are you now?"

  The woman sounded countrified. And she was woefully Incongruent, psychotrichologically, her close-cropped, perversely unquasiplatonic all-but-ginger hair block-capitalizing her potato-peasant features, failing to distract from the puppyfat that had outstayed its charm and left her overvolup by any fashionable standard. No more than twenty-five, she was hefty and thick-limbed and barefoot, and wore a Diana t-shirt—please!—under the sort of shapeless great pals-with-the-planet woollen cardigan that had come and gone a full three seasons ago. Altogether, Sesha was appalled. Surely this was not the partner?

  “I've a message for him,” Sesha explained to the woman. “For Paul Rayle."

  “What is it?"

  “I need to see him in person, if possible."

  “You can tell me, and I can pass it on. Waking my fucking baby up."

  Fruck you too, Sesha thought. She knew the type. Feckless, technophobic, hopelessly naive. They would go ahead and have unplanned, undesigned children totally without reference to the foetal genestory, leaving everything to pot luck, embracing primitivism as natural. How could anyone be so selfish?

  A waft of vanilla incense set the seal on her deductions, and Sesha wondered how Paul Rayle could possibly have left Frances for such an uncouth anachronism.

  Someone else appeared, behind the woman's shoulder.

  “What's going on?” A male voice, groggy-sounding.

  “This one here says she's got a message for you."

  “Me?"

  “Paul Rayle?” Sesha asked.

  None too happily, the woman stood aside, and Sesha received another shock.

  He looked terrible. Haggard, unshaven, baggy-eyed. His lips, even, seemed to have shed weight. And his hair had lost its Congruence, tied back like this, which really didn't suit him. He should have left it hanging loose and cool and christjesusy.

  Sesha said, “I've a message from Frances."

  The partner and Paul Rayle exchanged glances, and only now, as she stepped closer, into the light, did Sesha notice that the woman's eyes were gorg. Large and striking, with very pale irises, they alone redeemed a face otherwise unremarkable.

  “Well, what is it?” Paul Rayle demanded, giving Sesha the distinct impression that he was putting on a gruff front for the partner's sake, that his manner might have been different had he been alone.

  “Could I come in?” she asked.

  The woman kissed the baby. “Long as she don't tread shit everywhere."

  * * * *

  To Paulie's eyes she cut a sorry figure, Frances's lackey, with her poshname pinstripe jacket and her company poise, and he lost no time in taking a dislike. What was she, early thirties? The full complement of voguish face-piercings, some inset with solar-powered shimmerjewels of light-emitting polymer, all took pains to say, ‘I may be a desko but I'm still Rock ‘n’ Roll.’ And her chopped-off dyed-black hairstyle she doubtless thought Congruent, when in truth it did sod all for her.

  She introduced herself; Paulie didn't properly catch the name. To Ruth, who was closest, she extended a small, graceful hand. Ruth ignored it. Kali had finally stopped crying, and now she stared, frowning and drooling, at the visitor.

  “How old is ... he? She?"

  “She's three months.” Ruth might have been giving name, rank and number to an enemy officer.

  “She's beautiful."

  The compliment's breathy sincerity cut no ice with Ruth, yet for some reason caused Paulie to do an abrupt about-turn and start to feel a little sorry for this officedog, so out of place here with her painted nails and vivid lips and tailored jacket and pelmet microskirt, all in cerise and taupe, and too-thin thighs encased in charcoal tights. “Sit down,” he invited, indicating the rocking chair in the corner.

  “Thanks.” The woman sat.

  “So what's all this about?” he asked her.

  “It's ... Frances.” The reply was tentative, the woman obviously uncertain as to where his ex-wife featured these days in his scheme of things.

  “Would you like a cup of tea?” Ruth said suddenly, as though in grudging, belated compliance with custom.

  “I'd love one, thanks. No sugar. Thanks a lot. That's if it's no trouble?"

  “Here.” Paulie held out his arms for the baby. Ruth handed Kali over and went out to the kitchen.

  The woman said, “You've heard of ... Angel Syndrome?"

  My God, Paulie thought. Poor Frances. Taking that telothine crap and going loopy. Learning that there are calamities against which Congruent hair is no shield.

  He asked, “How long has she had it? How far has it gone?"

  The woman sighed. “I'm not sure. I think it's still in the early stages."

  “How long has she been on telothine?"

  “I really don't know."

  “There must be something the doctors can do?” But he had heard that the condition seldom responded well to treatment. Worse than seldom. Never.

  The woman shrugged. “We're all of us hoping for the best."

  “Yeah.” Paulie couldn't think of anything else to say. Frances suffering from AS? It was unreal. He couldn't quite believe it, couldn't take it in. Either that or, truth be told, he didn't, at the end of the day, care an awful lot.

  “Frances would like you to come and see her."

  “Me?” He was taken aback, even though he might have known the woman would hardly have descended out of the sky just to bring him up to date with his ex-wife's vicissitudes. She'd been sent to fetch him. He was, plainly, supposed to drop everything and rush to Frances's bedside.

  “If possible."

  “And what if it isn't possible?” He hadn't seen Frances in years.

  “Well ... so be it, I suppose.” The woman had matched the hard edge in his voice, but promptly dropped it again as she added, “You know, I think it might really do so much for Frances's morale.” This was, she clearly implied, no time for pettiness, immaturity. “If you could just manage to pop over and see her?"

  “Pop over to where?"

  “Seville."

  He had heard about her place in Spain. And her places in Ireland and Cornwall. And her place in California. He said, “I thought you might have brought one of those telepresence rigs?"

  “Frances hates telepresence."

  Yeah, Paulie thought. That rings true.

  From her bag, the woman took out an old-fashioned pink plastic powder compact and flipped it open. “Sevilla, please,” she said to it, and Paulie realized it was a mobe.

  “Sorry, Sesha, you can't call from here ... you're in an airjam zone."

  The mobe's voice was young and male, on the stoned side, and vaguely familiar.

  “You mean I can't make any calls out?"

  “Or receive them. Bitch, huh?"

  The woman—Sesha, was it?—turned pissed-off eyes on Paulie. “I was going to see whether Frances would like to speak with you directly."

  “They keep it jammed round here,” Paulie explained. “They want the tourists’ money but not the radiation thrown out by their mobes. And this is meant to be a media shelter."

  “Emission levels nowadays are quite safe.” The woman's tone was that of a teacher with explanation fatigue. “In fact if anything, the jamming is far more likely to generate an addictive field or cause brain tumours or explode people's heads."

  “It only comes into operation when someone tries making an aircall. They're not stupid enough to keep it switched on all the time."

  “Who?"

  “The village elders."

  The woman's eyes flickered, just as Paulie had anticipated; she was scanning the room for crucifixes. Well, she could think what she liked.

  “I could jack into the fibropt,” she suggested.

  Paulie shook his head. “We're not connected."

  I know, he thought. You can't believe it. Not in this day and age. How do we manage to live like this?

  He asked her, “How long have you been working for Frances?"

  “Nearly sev
en months.” She put away her mobe.

  “Enjoy your job?"

  “Yes, I do."

  “You believe in Psychotrichological Congruence as the key to human happiness?"

  “It's proved itself to be amongst the more successful therapeutic aids."

  “Personally, though, job aside ... are you a believer?"

  “I've an open mind. I've seen it help people.” The woman stifled a yawn. “Excuse me. Only I'm not really here to debate the efficacy of..."

  “So it doesn't bother you, knowing the whole thing started out as a piss-take?"

  “I'm sorry?"

  But Paulie could see that she knew. Of course she knew Frances's deep dark secret.

  He said, “The Happy Hair Book."

  Frances had written it as a satire, a sly send-up of the fad industry. The Cool Cut as the Answer to Everything. And with a sound scientific basis. Those who got the joke were like voices in the wilderness. A whole new market had been opened up, and Frances had been unable to resist going a stage further, coming up with the PsyTri Institute. She had thought it hilarious, incredible, depressing, grotesque, that people would pay good money to get a Psychotrichological Profile and be advised to sport a fringe, avoid tight perms, or go ash-blonde or auburn in their quest for psychic salubrity.

  By this time he and Frances had parted. It had been exceptionally amicable, a simple agreement that the union was over. Decree absolute notwithstanding, his memory told him of a mutual reluctance to close every door, burn every bridge—at any rate, before he met Ruth.

  He had gone on to wonder how far his ex-wife, the stage actress come over all Swiftian, would decide to take her little lampoon. Time had passed, and more time, and the next thing he had heard, Frances Rayle was seriously moneyed. The Institute was thriving. He could remember, a couple of years ago, seeing a NeTV interview with the High Priestess of PsyTri. Either she was laughing behind the poker-face, or...

  Had Frances found herself growing into the role simply by wearing the crown, developed a case of True Belief in spite of herself through a kind of osmosis? Or had she made herself believe? For there must have come a moment when stopping, coming clean, blowing the gaff, was no longer a viable move. A matter of momentum, of critical mass.

  Or, Paulie thought, would it really have mattered if she'd come out and told the world, ‘Hey, suckers, I had you fooled?’ Maybe people would have laughed along with her, even as they continued to sign up for PsyTri consultations. For, if what Miss Whatsername here said were true, and he saw no reason to doubt it, PsyTri could claim as good a record as any other commercialized superstition. And if it did people good and raked in the lucre and enabled Frances to branch out into pharmaceutical research and find cures for greyness and baldness and, by the merest chance, give you a way of dethanatizing your boxlife, then more power to her Institute, and never mind your sound scientific basis.

  At least, that was how it now appeared from the perspective of Paulie Rayle; it went without saying that allowances had to be made for his mental condition—his worldview, as he was willing to admit, might well be somewhat skewed.

  He said to the woman, “Take no notice of me. I've probably got it all wrong."

  She was frowning, ever so slightly, and also smiling, in an equally small way, as though not quite sure whether he was joking, making a candid confession, or what. It was a very nice, polite, sympathetic form of response, but also a touch customer-servicey.

  “Listen, how can I put this?” Taking out his cigarettes, Paulie offered one to the woman.

  “The baby?” she reminded him.

  “Oh, shit, yeah. I'm sorry.” He kissed Kali's cheek. “Musn't smokies near my little Funsize, mustn't do that, must we? No!” His words brought from the woman a spontaneous smile. He felt foolish, spouting infantese in front of a stranger.

  “You see, the thing is,” Paulie told the woman, “my memory's a little bit, not to put too fine a point on it, fucked. My long-term memory. I have problems getting things straight in my head. Probably I'm no longer the person Frances expects."

  The woman's sharp little face had assumed an expression of unplastic, authentic sympathy. In fact she wasn't that bad-looking at all, if you went for Little Miss Efficiencies. Which Paulie didn't, as a rule. He began to take back his antipathy. It wasn't like he couldn't understand how a person could be in thrall to Frances.

  Pondering, the woman said, “I'm sure it would still be of benefit for Frances were you to pay her a visit."

  “You mean visit her alone? Or does the invitation include Ruth? That's"—he indicated the kitchen door—"Ruth, by the way. She's very tired. She's been really busy lately, with the baby and everything."

  “Certainly Ruth can come along. And the baby ... I'm sorry, what's her name?"

  “Kali."

  “You're all invited."

  “Well, we'd better see what Ruth has to say. It's not so easy to just up and..."

  “Of course not."

  In a silence broken only by the windchimes, they waited for Ruth to return.

  “You've a lovely place here.” The woman surveyed the living-room. “Cosy."

  He said, “I'm sorry, I've forgotten your name?"

  “Processia Roffey."

  “Processia? Unusual."

  “People normally end up calling me Sesha."

  Paulie held out his hand. They shook. “It's just that verticars aren't exactly the quietest form of transport. Ruth had only just got Kali to sleep."

  “I should have thought. I'm really sorry."

  Ruth reappeared with the tea.

  “Thanks.” The woman took the offered mug. “Ruth, I'm so sorry I woke Kali. All that noise—it was thoughtless of me."

  Ruth shot Paulie a suspicious glance that asked, ‘Did you tell her the baby's name or did she already know?’ To the woman, Processia Roffey, she said, “Look what's all this in aid of? I s'pose when you go you'll be starting up that racket and scaring the shit out of my kid again?"

  Paulie felt guilty. Should he not have been equally indignant? What was wrong with him? Ruth's hostility toward the PsyTri woman embarrassed him.

  “Frances isn't well,” he informed Ruth. “She has Angel Syndrome. She'd like us to pay a visit, if we could manage to."

  “You mean,” Ruth said sourly, “she wants you to pay her a visit."

  “The three of us. You, me, and Kali."

  “Oh yeah, I'm sure she's desperate to see me."

  “The three of us,” Paulie repeated, catching the woman's eye and feeling a shameful little complicit twinge. “She'd like to see us all."

  “Would she now?"

  To Ruth, the woman said earnestly, “If possible, yes."

  Ruth considered. “That's serious, isn't it, Angel Syndrome? Isn't it to do with some therapy that's meant to stop people ageing?"

  The woman nodded. “Telotherapy."

  “I'm not always this stroppy.” Ruth rubbed at her eyes. “Bet you got me down as a right old cow?"

  Processia Roffey shook her head. “Not at all. I know I shouldn't be too happy if a verticar came waking my baby."

  “Makes you think, though, doesn't it? Frances. I mean what good's anything else if you don't have your health?"

  “Absolutely."

  Paulie wondered what the woman must make of Ruth, blowing hot and cold like this. It was Ruth's trademark; she had always been that way, as long as he had known her. Which was how long? He couldn't remember. He could recall being married to Frances, but he didn't know how long ago it was, or precisely when they had divorced, or ... He didn't know a lot of things he should have known. It was an awkward existential state of affairs.

  “So, I suppose,” said Ruth, “the doctors are doing everything they can for her?"

  “It's not the easiest condition to treat, apparently.” Processia Roffey sipped at her tea. “But Frances does have some of the very best medical...” She halted, as though conscious of a faux pas.

  Ruth sniffed. “Frances must
be worth ... what? ... millions and millions?"

  “I expect so. I don't really know."

  Paulie said. “I wish I could remember more.” To Ruth, he added, “I was trying to explain about my memory."

  “His memory's not good,” Ruth told the woman.

  Processia Roffey looked at him and said, “It would mean so much to Frances."

  “You'd better go and see her.” Ruth took back Kali. “We'll be fine."

  “You mean go on my own?"

  Ruth nodded. “Don't you think you ought to? I think you should."

  Paulie felt numbed, deprived of momentum. Now that it came to it, he wasn't at all sure that he wanted anything to do with this. He wished simply to be left alone, to live his tiny life in peace.

  “You'd better go.” Ruth was firm. “I really think you should go."

  He said to them both, “It's not that I don't care."

  They both nodded; they both understood.

  But did he really care? did he find Frances's condition a cause of any special anguish? Or was it just another news item from the distant wider world? This awful, ugly Groundworld. Here, his ex-wife was ailing. Up in boxworld, she would very soon be cured, along with everyone else, courtesy of the miracle of ontotechnology.

  Ontodogturds, Paulie thought savagely

  All that effort down the toilet. He had expected so much more of himself, the creation of a new, improved world whose rational elegance inspired him with confidence. Not some slapdash technotopia with its sketchy, hazy pseudoscience. He had been hopelessly naive, not to mention hubristic. He had reverted to a schoolboy worldview, with his Heaven recast in secular terms by and for a mind that found magic more palatable dressed in today's rather than yesterday's mumbo-jumbo. No wonder he could never give that world fundamental realitude. Was it really so surprising that he was unable, when it came to it, to establish it as the new Grundwelt, to will it into ontological pre-eminence over this world? It was all he could do to hold it together as a dream. He was burnt out, dredging up shoddy ideas from the bottom of the barrel. Why not do it the easy way, dream up a nice gentle God to take care of everything? Or, even better, a Goddess; he had never been that much of a man's man.