deciphered the spidery handwriting: His
name is Nothing. Care for him and he will bring you luck.
All
at once the story fell into place around him. A baby in a basket, abandoned on
two strangers’ doorstep some night. That was what he had been. Surely this note
had been pinned to his blanket. But the strangers had taken him in, changed his
name, tried to make him into one of their kind. If he had brought them any luck
at all, that luck had surely been bad. It was all so clear now. It was all so
right.
He
slept with the note under his pillow that night and dreamed of a place where
the buildings were gay with scrolled ironwork and the river flowed darkly past
and soft laughter went on all night, every night. He roamed the streets and the
alleyways and courtyards, a sweet, rotten, coppery taste on his tongue.
The
next day he put the note back in the drawer in case Mother ever looked there, but
when he was alone in the house he took it out and read it again and again,
holding the paper to his face, pressing it against his mouth, trying to catch
the scent of the place it had come from. For that was where he had been born.
He closed his eyes and tried to imagine the hand that had shaped those
spindling black words, for that hand belonged to someone who knew him, who had
held him. In the veins of that hand, his blood might flow.
And
he ceased to be Jason. He became Nothing, for that was what the note named him.
He
still answered to Jason, but the name was like an echo of a half-forgotten
life.
I
am Nothing his mind whispered. I am Nothing. He liked the name. It did not make
him feel worthless; on the contrary, he began to think of himself as a blank
slate upon which anything could be written. The words he inscribed on his soul
were up to him.
He
grew taller, and some of the flesh of childhood melted from his bones. He was
truly Nothing now; he knew it. When in junior high school he finally made
friends–not friends who could share his soul, but friends who understood a
little better than anyone else ever had, other skinny pale kids, hippie and
punk kids, kids in black Tshirts and leather jackets
and smudgy makeup shoplifted from the drugstore at the mall—he told them to
call him by that name.
The
house was cold tonight. His room was the coldest of all. He shivered again,
then threw off the quilt and pulled on gray sweatpants and an old black sweater
with holes at the elbows. The Tom Waits album had finished playing and turned
itself off. The hiss of the empty speakers filled the room, too loud here in
the dark.
Nothing
rummaged through his backpack and found the cassette Julie had given him.
It
came from far away down south, and only five hundred copies of it had been
printed–it was numbered on the liner, 217 of 500. But somehow one copy had
ended up in a record store in Silver Spring, a nearby town, where Julie had
picked it up.
He
put it on now. The singer’s voice wove in and out of the jangly guitar line,
now losing itself in the music, now as strong and golden-green as some
Appalachian summer mountain stream.
Does
your road go no place?
Does
it go someplace where you can’t see?
If
you follow it anyway
It
just might lead you here to me …
Nothing
sat on the edge of the bed and hummed the words under his breath, his head
tilted back, his eyes searching the stars and planets on the ceiling. He
thought of Julie taking the tape from her purse and handing it to him; he
thought of Laine, sucking him off with innocent abandon.
Somewhere
in the music, perhaps outside the window in the cold night, somewhere
name is Nothing. Care for him and he will bring you luck.
All
at once the story fell into place around him. A baby in a basket, abandoned on
two strangers’ doorstep some night. That was what he had been. Surely this note
had been pinned to his blanket. But the strangers had taken him in, changed his
name, tried to make him into one of their kind. If he had brought them any luck
at all, that luck had surely been bad. It was all so clear now. It was all so
right.
He
slept with the note under his pillow that night and dreamed of a place where
the buildings were gay with scrolled ironwork and the river flowed darkly past
and soft laughter went on all night, every night. He roamed the streets and the
alleyways and courtyards, a sweet, rotten, coppery taste on his tongue.
The
next day he put the note back in the drawer in case Mother ever looked there, but
when he was alone in the house he took it out and read it again and again,
holding the paper to his face, pressing it against his mouth, trying to catch
the scent of the place it had come from. For that was where he had been born.
He closed his eyes and tried to imagine the hand that had shaped those
spindling black words, for that hand belonged to someone who knew him, who had
held him. In the veins of that hand, his blood might flow.
And
he ceased to be Jason. He became Nothing, for that was what the note named him.
He
still answered to Jason, but the name was like an echo of a half-forgotten
life.
I
am Nothing his mind whispered. I am Nothing. He liked the name. It did not make
him feel worthless; on the contrary, he began to think of himself as a blank
slate upon which anything could be written. The words he inscribed on his soul
were up to him.
He
grew taller, and some of the flesh of childhood melted from his bones. He was
truly Nothing now; he knew it. When in junior high school he finally made
friends–not friends who could share his soul, but friends who understood a
little better than anyone else ever had, other skinny pale kids, hippie and
punk kids, kids in black Tshirts and leather jackets
and smudgy makeup shoplifted from the drugstore at the mall—he told them to
call him by that name.
The
house was cold tonight. His room was the coldest of all. He shivered again,
then threw off the quilt and pulled on gray sweatpants and an old black sweater
with holes at the elbows. The Tom Waits album had finished playing and turned
itself off. The hiss of the empty speakers filled the room, too loud here in
the dark.
Nothing
rummaged through his backpack and found the cassette Julie had given him.
It
came from far away down south, and only five hundred copies of it had been
printed–it was numbered on the liner, 217 of 500. But somehow one copy had
ended up in a record store in Silver Spring, a nearby town, where Julie had
picked it up.
He
put it on now. The singer’s voice wove in and out of the jangly guitar line,
now losing itself in the music, now as strong and golden-green as some
Appalachian summer mountain stream.
Does
your road go no place?
Does
it go someplace where you can’t see?
If
you follow it anyway
It
just might lead you here to me …
Nothing
sat on the edge of the bed and hummed the words under his breath, his head
tilted back, his eyes searching the stars and planets on the ceiling. He
thought of Julie taking the tape from her purse and handing it to him; he
thought of Laine, sucking him off with innocent abandon.
Somewhere
in the music, perhaps outside the window in the cold night, somewhere
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