and the platters of cafeteria food before us, he smiled. There he was, my little brother, a sleepy-looking kid with a spray of freckles up and over his nose like the crab nebula, and two enthusiastic front teeth that would be keeping his mouth open for decades. “Reed,” he said.
“How’s it going?
I love that. I’ve always liked your acute sense of narrative. So linear and right for you.” His smile, which took a moment and some force to assemble, was ancient, beneficent, as if he both envied and pitied me for something, and he shook his head softly. “But things here aren’t going, kid.” He poked a finger into the white bread of his tuna sandwich and studied the indentation like a man finding a footprint on the moon. “Things here
are
. This is it. Things…” He started again. “Things aren’t bad, really. It’s kind of a floating circle. That’s close. Things aren’t going; they float in the circle. Right?”
We were both staring at the sandwich; I think I might have been waiting for it to float, but only for a second. I understood what he was saying. Things existed. I’m not that dumb. Things, whatever they might be, and that was a topic I didn’t even want to open, had essence, not process. That’s simple; that doesn’t take a genius to decipher. “Great,” I said. Andthen I said what you say to your little brother when he sits there pale and distracted and four years ahead of you in school, “Why don’t you eat some of that, and I’ll take you out and show you my car.”
It wasn’t as bad a visit as I’m making it sound. We were brothers; we loved each other. We didn’t have to say it. The dining room got me a little until I realized I should stop worrying about these children and whether or not they were happy. Happiness wasn’t an issue. The place was clean; the food was fresh. Happiness, in that cafeteria, was simply beside the point.
On the way out, Garrett introduced me to his friend Donna Li, a ten-year-old from New Orleans, whom he said was into programming. She was a tall girl with shiny hair and a ready smile, eating alone by the window. This was 1966 and I was certain she was involved somehow in television. You didn’t hear the word
computer
every other sentence back then. When she stood to shake my hand, I had no idea of what to say to her and it came out, “I hope your programming is floating in the circle.”
“It is,” she said.
“She’s written her own language,” Garrett assured me, “and now she’s on the applications.”
It was my turn to speak again and already I couldn’t touch bottom, so I said, “We’re going out to see my car. Do you want to see my car?”
Imagine me in the parking lot then with these two little kids. On the way out I’d told Garrett about my job at the motel and that Jeff Shreckenbah and I had been hanging out and fishing on the weekends and that Jeff’s dad raced stock cars, and for the first time all day Garrett’s face filled with a kind of wonder, as if this were news from another world, which I guess it was. There was a misty rain with a faintpetrochemical smell in it, and we approached my car as if it were a sleeping Brontosaurus. They were both entranced and moved toward it carefully, finally putting their little hands on the wet fender in unison. “This is your car,” Garrett said, and I wasn’t sure if it was the
your
or the
car
that had him in awe.
I couldn’t figure out what floats in the circle or even where the circle was, but I could rattle my keys and start that Plymouth Fury III and listen to the steady sound of the engine, which I did for them now. They both backed away appreciatively.
“It’s a large car,” Donna Li said.
“Reed,” Garrett said to me. “This is really something. And what’s that smell?”
I cocked my head, smelling it, too, a big smell, budging the petrocarbons away, a live, salty smell, and then I remembered: I’d left half a bucket of bait shrimp in the trunk, where they’d
“How’s it going?
I love that. I’ve always liked your acute sense of narrative. So linear and right for you.” His smile, which took a moment and some force to assemble, was ancient, beneficent, as if he both envied and pitied me for something, and he shook his head softly. “But things here aren’t going, kid.” He poked a finger into the white bread of his tuna sandwich and studied the indentation like a man finding a footprint on the moon. “Things here
are
. This is it. Things…” He started again. “Things aren’t bad, really. It’s kind of a floating circle. That’s close. Things aren’t going; they float in the circle. Right?”
We were both staring at the sandwich; I think I might have been waiting for it to float, but only for a second. I understood what he was saying. Things existed. I’m not that dumb. Things, whatever they might be, and that was a topic I didn’t even want to open, had essence, not process. That’s simple; that doesn’t take a genius to decipher. “Great,” I said. Andthen I said what you say to your little brother when he sits there pale and distracted and four years ahead of you in school, “Why don’t you eat some of that, and I’ll take you out and show you my car.”
It wasn’t as bad a visit as I’m making it sound. We were brothers; we loved each other. We didn’t have to say it. The dining room got me a little until I realized I should stop worrying about these children and whether or not they were happy. Happiness wasn’t an issue. The place was clean; the food was fresh. Happiness, in that cafeteria, was simply beside the point.
On the way out, Garrett introduced me to his friend Donna Li, a ten-year-old from New Orleans, whom he said was into programming. She was a tall girl with shiny hair and a ready smile, eating alone by the window. This was 1966 and I was certain she was involved somehow in television. You didn’t hear the word
computer
every other sentence back then. When she stood to shake my hand, I had no idea of what to say to her and it came out, “I hope your programming is floating in the circle.”
“It is,” she said.
“She’s written her own language,” Garrett assured me, “and now she’s on the applications.”
It was my turn to speak again and already I couldn’t touch bottom, so I said, “We’re going out to see my car. Do you want to see my car?”
Imagine me in the parking lot then with these two little kids. On the way out I’d told Garrett about my job at the motel and that Jeff Shreckenbah and I had been hanging out and fishing on the weekends and that Jeff’s dad raced stock cars, and for the first time all day Garrett’s face filled with a kind of wonder, as if this were news from another world, which I guess it was. There was a misty rain with a faintpetrochemical smell in it, and we approached my car as if it were a sleeping Brontosaurus. They were both entranced and moved toward it carefully, finally putting their little hands on the wet fender in unison. “This is your car,” Garrett said, and I wasn’t sure if it was the
your
or the
car
that had him in awe.
I couldn’t figure out what floats in the circle or even where the circle was, but I could rattle my keys and start that Plymouth Fury III and listen to the steady sound of the engine, which I did for them now. They both backed away appreciatively.
“It’s a large car,” Donna Li said.
“Reed,” Garrett said to me. “This is really something. And what’s that smell?”
I cocked my head, smelling it, too, a big smell, budging the petrocarbons away, a live, salty smell, and then I remembered: I’d left half a bucket of bait shrimp in the trunk, where they’d
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