Jonathan Lethem - The Wall of the Sky, the Wall of the Eye

Soon enough the little knot of attention that had gathered around us was dissolved back into the park. The Sufferer wandered away too.

When the trembling passed I got up and staggered out of the park, half blind with hunger and exhaustion. The Village swirled around me, oblivious. I thought about Don weighing ninety pounds, reaching the end of his run, thanking the cops for taking him off the street, for noticing him at all.

I don’t know how long I walked before I passed out on the bench on Sixth Avenue, in front of the basketball courts, but when I woke again, the sun was low. People were going home from work. I was freezing. The Sufferer was staring at me, its face inches from mine.

I reached out, weak, wanting to hit it or twist its ears and to take its warmth at the same time.

It pulled away, and turned and trotted down Sixth. “You fucker,” I said. “It would have been better if you’d never come at all.”

I could have been talking to myself. Maybe I was.

I watched the Sufferer turn the comer, and I never saw it again after that.

The Brooklyn Bridge has a walkway. The Manhattan used to, but doesn’t anymore. I crossed the bridge under an orange sky. I walked through downtown Brooklyn to Flatbush Avenue, and took the Long Island Railroad to Plainview, to tell Jimmy and Marilla that I knew what had happened to Don, to Donovan, to Light.

Pearl O’Hennies was in the corner talking to Notable Johnson. “Can you believe her gall, calling everyone up like this.”

“But my dear, that’s exactly what he did,” said Notable. “They’re the only two really here. We’re all samples.”

They were talking about their hosts, who were in another of the blank, featureless rooms.

“What is it, a contest?”

“A contest, you mean to see who had more lovers? I think they’re above that. They’ve known each other all these years—”

“Why don’t they just call each other up, then? Why all this?”

“Well they could be with each other, of course. In the real world, instead of a dull, poorly furnished virtual space like this one. But then we wouldn’t all be here. It is about us, you see. Even if they won’t talk to anyone but each other.”

“I heard they’ve got games planned, for later.”

“What, Spin the Bottle?”

Cambert Moid stepped over to where they stood. “Have you ever seen anything like it?” he asked.

“Hello, Cambert,” said Pearl crisply.

“Hello, Pearl. I suppose I should say, long time no see. But”—he mimicked a Southern accent—“I don’t rightly know if that’s true. I suppose our real selves could have warmed up to each other by now. Besides, this is hardly ‘see,’ now is it?”

“You talk too much, Cambert,” said Pearl.

“I’ll let you two catch up,” mumbled Notable Johnson, and he slipped away. He was en route to the monitors where guests were punching up drink simulations when he ran into Caitlice Frisman.

“Caitlice!”

“Oh, Johnny.” She put her arms around him. “Nice, nice, nice. But what, excuse me, what the hell are you doing here?” She leaned in close. “You sleep with that remorseless pussycat?”

“I take it you refer to our host.”

“Yours, not mine,” she corrected.

He nodded his shameful assent to her question.

“Well, a party like this is what you get, what you deserve, for a glitch like that — but enough. You’re in charge of your own regrets. Just tell me when it happened.”

“You’re humiliating me, Cait,” he said affectionately. “Two years — how should I count it? — two years after us, after you and I—”

“Then you know how we’ve been, and you must tell me. Because I — this copy here is from right after we broke — you weren’t even talking to me, Johnny. But you’re from later, and so you know how we’ve been, out there, in our real selves.”

“Oh, fine, Cait. Nothing could keep us from — coffee every Monday.”

“Ah.”

They both fell to a moment of sadness. Then Caitlice said flippantly, “So am I magnificently fat now?”

“Oh, no, you look terrific. But that reminds me, Cait, listen: Gavin Urnst is here, a very early sample, and last I knew he was in the hospital, quite sick—”

“We mustn’t tell him here,” she said quickly. “Ruin his time, when he can’t do anything. Any more than you would tell me if I was fat. Do you think he—”

“Died? I can’t know. Anyone, I mean, you or I—”

“Shh.”

They were quiet again for a minute.

“Cait, if this thing goes long, let’s find each other. I mean, it could get unbearable. I’ve heard they’re hoping we’ll all pair—”

“Shhh. Say no more. It’s a date. Save the last dance for me. And now I must mingle, darling.”

Notable nodded. Caitlice turned and attached herself immediately to a group containing Millard Heron, O.K. Tinkers, and Wendy Airhole.

“This is such an indignity,” Wendy said. “I was only with him as a favor, just stayed long enough to qualify for the copying. I wanted him to have me to access , but not for this fucking party. I remember thinking that I shouldn’t, just out of pity for my poor copy — that is, me, now, here. God.”

“Hmmm,” said Millard Heron. “He told me it was the other way. That he only slept with you—”

“Oh Millard, what do you know?” Wendy breathed out in a weary rush. “The things women have to tell men just to keep them from imploding with insecurity, just to keep their dicks hard long enough to be entertaining —and then to think they go around repeating it to each other —”

“Hey, we’re at a party,” said Caitlice, singingly. “Make the best of it, there’s no harm done here. You, the real you, doesn’t care about this, doesn’t object, won’t recall it. You and I, the real you and I, might be having our very-own version of this same party right now —”

“I would never,” said O.K. Tinkers. He shuddered. “Oh, I would never want to see them all, all in the same place—”

The four laughed, resentment suddenly abolished.

“This could be a sort of nightmare for them,” Wendy speculated merrily. “If we somehow joined forces—”

Caitlice took her by the elbow, tsk-tsking. “Excuse us, boys. Come for a drink simulation, Wendy.”

“You think I should lighten up, Cait, don’t you?”

“I think you could be having fun.” Caitlice steered her away from O.K. and Millard.

“My kind of fun is darker than yours, Cait. Doesn’t the, the smugness of it just creep you out? But I’ll have a drink if you like. It’ll just get me bitchier. They made a mistake calling this particular lady out of storage.”

“Stop vamping,” said Caitlice, delighted. “I know your act too well.”

“I’m just warming up. I’m going straight to the source tonight, Cait. And you’re right, I should have a drink.”

“Straight to the source?”

“They think they’re here together,” Wendy said, lowering her voice.

“Who?” But Caitlice knew.

“Our hosts, the ‘real’ ones. But I’m going to get between them. Take him ‘home’ at the end of the party.”

At the console they each tapped up a drink’s worth of process distortion.

“Here, stand still, let me check something.” Caitlice reached over and dug in Wendy’s pocket, and pulled out a green ticket.

“What’s that?” said Wendy.

“All the guests at this party have a ticket in their pockets, green or red. A little extra our hosts wrote into tonight’s program. Red means you’re his guest, green hers .”