John Adams - Wastelands 2

But Keith had an option; Keith could go back. Keith still had his Sandi, so he didn’t have to start over again.

That, I thought, explained a lot. Maybe I should have mentioned it to Winters. Maybe.

Winters skipped the singing that night. He and Crazy Harry were set to leave the next morning, to go searching to the west. They were off somewhere stocking their jeep and making plans.

Keith didn’t miss them any. He sat on his rock, warmed by a pile of burning autumn leaves, and out-sung the bitter wind that had started to blow. He played hard and loud, and sang sad. And after the fire went out, and the audience drifted off, he took his guitar and his cigar box and went off toward the creek.

I followed him. This time the night was black and cloudy, with the smell of rain in the air. And the wind was strong and cold. No, it didn’t sound like people dying. But it moved through the trees and shook the branches and whipped away the leaves. And it sounded… restless.

When I reached the creek, Keith was already rolling up his sleeve.

I stopped him before he took his needle out. “Hey, Keith,” I said, laying a hand on his arm. “Easy. Talk first, okay?”

He looked at my hand and his needle, and returned a reluctant nod. “Okay, Gary,” he said. “But short. I’m in a rush. I haven’t seen Sandi for a week.”

I let go his arm and sat down. “I know.”

“I was trying to make it last, Gary. I only had a month’s worth, but I figured I could make it last longer if I only timetripped once a week.” He smiled. “But that’s hard.”

“I know,” I repeated. “But it would be easier if you didn’t think about her so much.”

He nodded, put down the box, and pulled his denim jacket a little tighter to shut out the wind. “I think too much,” he agreed. Then, smiling, he added, “Such men are dangerous.”

“Ummm, yeah. To themselves, mostly.” I looked at him, cold and huddled in the darkness. “Keith, what will you do when you run out?”

“I wish I knew.”

“I know,” I said. “Then you’ll forget. Your time machine will be broken, and you’ll have to live today. Find somebody else and start again. Only it might be easier if you’d start now. Put away the chronine for a while. Fight it.”

“Sing cheerful songs?” he asked sarcastically.

“Maybe not. I don’t ask you to wipe out the past, or pretend it didn’t happen. But try to find something in the present. You know it can’t be as empty as you pretend. Things aren’t black and white like that. Winters was part right, you know—there are still good things. You forget that.”

“Do I? What do I forget?”

I hesitated. He was making it hard for me. “Well… you still enjoy your singing. You know that. And there could be other things. You used to enjoy writing your own stuff. Why don’t you work on some new songs? You haven’t written anything to speak of since the Blast.”

Keith had picked up a handful of leaves and was offering them to the wind, one by one. “I’ve thought of that. You don’t know how much I’ve thought of that, Gary. And I’ve tried. But nothing comes.” His voice went soft right then. “In the old days, it was different. And you know why. Sandi would sit out in the audience every time I sang. And when I did something new, something of mine, I could see her brighten. If it was good, I’d know it, just from the way she smiled. She was proud of me, and my songs.”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t work now, Gary. I write a song now, and sing it, and… so what? Who cares? You? Yeah, maybe you and a few of the others come up after and say, ‘Hey, Keith, I liked that.’ But that’s not the same. My songs were important to Sandi, the same way her acting was important to me. And now my songs aren’t important to anyone. I tell myself that shouldn’t matter. I should get my own satisfaction from composing, even if no one else does. I tell myself that a lot. But saying it doesn’t make it so.”

Sometimes I think, right then, I should have told Keith that his songs were the most important thing in the world to me. But hell, they weren’t. And Keith was a friend, and I couldn’t feed him lies, even if he needed them.

Besides, he wouldn’t have believed me. Keith had a way of recognizing truth.

Instead, I floundered. “Keith, you could find someone like that again, if you tried. There are girls in the commune, girls as good as Sandi, if you’d open yourself up to them. You could find someone else.”

Keith gave me a calm stare, more chilling than the wind. “I don’t need someone else, Gary,” he said. He picked up the cigar box, opened it, and showed me the needle. “I’ve got Sandi.”

Twice more that week Keith timetripped. And both times he rushed off with a feverish urgency. Usually he’d wait an hour or so after the singing, and discreetly drift off to his creek. But now he brought the cigar box with him, and left even before the last notes of “Me and Bobby McGee” had faded from the air.

Nobody mentioned anything, of course. We all knew Keith was timetripping, and we all knew he was running out. So we forgave him, and understood. Everybody understood, that is, except Pete, Winters’ former corporal. He, like Winters and Crazy Harry, hadn’t been filled in yet. But one evening at the singing, I noticed him looking curiously at the cigar box that lay by Keith’s feet. He said something to Jan, the girl he’d been sleeping with. And she said something back. So I figured he’d been briefed.

I was too right.

Winters and Crazy Harry returned a week, to the day, after their departure. They were not alone. They brought three young teen-agers, a guy and two girls, whom they’d found down west, in company with a group of rats. “In company,” is a euphemism, of course. The kids had been slaves. Winters and Crazy had freed them.

I didn’t ask what had happened to the rats. I could guess.

There was a lot of excitement that night and the night after. The kids were a little frightened of us, and it took a lot of attention to convince them that things would be different here. Winters decided that they should have their own place, and he and Pete began planning a second new cabin. The first one was nearing its crude completion.

As it turned out, Winters and Pete were talking about more than a cabin. I should have realized that, since I caught Winters looking at Keith very curiously and thoughtfully on at least two occasions.

But I didn’t realize it. Like everyone else, I was busy getting to know the newcomers and trying to make them feel at ease. It wasn’t simple, that.

So I didn’t know what was going on until the fourth evening after Winters’ return. I was outside, listening to Keith sing. He’d just barely finished “They Call the Wind Maria,” and was about to swing into a second song, when a group of people suddenly walked into the circle. Winters led them, and Crazy Harry was just behind him with the three kids. And Pete was there, with his arm around Jan. Plus a few others who hadn’t been at the concert when it started but had followed Winters from the common house.

Keith figured they wanted to listen, I guess. He began to play. But Winters stopped him.

“No, Keith,” he said. “Not right now. We’ve got business to take care of now, while everybody’s together. We’re going to talk tonight.”

Keith’s fingers stopped, and the music faded. The only sounds were the wind and the crackle of the nearby burning leaves. Everyone was looking at Winters.

“I want to talk about timetripping,” Winters said.

Keith put down his guitar and glanced at the cigar box at the base of concert rock. “Talk,” he said.