Hari Kunzru - Gods Without Men

Joanie gave him a big smile. Good for that man! She wasn’t so interested in all the biblical stuff, and at the end of the day some of those other things just boiled down to numbers, which she found hard to care about, not being mathematically minded herself. In some ways, the book guy seemed kind of muddled, but when it came to love, she was right there with him. The convention was a loving place, put together by people who wanted to heal the dreadful wounds in the world. She’d come a long way to be part of it, and so far she hadn’t been disappointed. It had taken three full days of driving to make it down from Olympia, Washington, staying mindful all the way so her rattly old Buick wouldn’t overheat or get a flat or start leaking oil. She was on a tight budget and greedy mechanics had a way of knowing when a person was desperate, not to mention her being a woman alone. Luckily the car held up, and she managed to find motels that were cheap but not too sleazy, though the one outside Fresno had some rowdy party going on at the end of the block and poor Judy hadn’t gotten much sleep that night.

A little group of Buddhist monks walked past, chanting and banging drums. Most of them were actual Orientals, but a couple were white men, taller than the rest, looking a little self-conscious, she thought, in their orange robes. She hadn’t known you could become a Buddhist monk unless you were brought up to it. Didn’t they choose them as children, just turning up to the parents’ house to take them away? So cruel. On the other hand, she supposed it was probably considered a great blessing by the natives. Halfway along the line of stalls she found Bill Burgess, surrounded as usual by customers browsing his wares and asking him sycophantic questions. Bill was a big cheese in contactee circles. The Guide had invited him to speak from the stage. He’d been on early that morning, which probably wasn’t the best slot, but it was still an honor and Joanie had found him very compelling. His Experience was taken seriously in the movement; there had even been a drawing of it on the cover of Saucerian magazine. Late one night he’d been driving along the New Jersey Turnpike when he’d spotted a fuzzy oval-shaped light. He followed it, and eventually it veered off into the distance, but not before it released two pods, which landed in a nearby field. When Bill got out of his car, he’d suddenly felt light-headed, and his skin became hot and tingly, as if he’d stepped into some kind of radiation field. Voices spoke to him from the landing craft and subsequent correspondence with the Guide confirmed that the visitors were indeed Space Brothers, representatives of the High Command, though from a different sector than the ones who’d visited the Guide when he first started channeling from the Pinnacles.

Bill waved to her and she shouldered her way through the throng of admirers to ask if he’d seen Judy. He said she was with the other kids, playing over by the Mux tower. Relieved, she thanked him and headed back to the tent to change, not without a little tinge of jealousy at all the attention he was getting. Her own Experience wasn’t as dramatic as his, of course. It was more a feeling than an embodied encounter, a beautiful feeling that had descended on her one time when she was out walking in the forest near her home. It was a winter evening and there’d been heavy snow and everything was perfectly still. Suddenly she’d been cloaked in it, enveloped, that was the only word, in the glorious sense that she wasn’t alone in the Universe, that benevolent beings were keeping watch over her and guiding her path. She’d stood still for what might only have been minutes but could easily have been hours. Then she’d made her way home and sat in front of the fire, so overcome she was completely unable to make head or tail of things, until Jake came back from whatever bar he’d been propping up, asking about dinner and wondering aloud how come she still had her boots on and was dripping all over the rug.

It was in a diner, of all places, that she found a clue. Someone had left a dog-eared magazine on the counter and she picked it up and read an article about the Guide and the Space Brothers and the Ashtar Galactic Command. Instinctively, she knew that was the type of consciousness she’d encountered. It seemed like a sign. She wrote off for a subscription to the Guide’s newsletter, and soon enough all the hours she wasn’t typing up invoices in that infernal lumberyard office she was using to find out about the hidden secrets of the Universe. Of course Jake wasn’t happy, but he didn’t have any claim on the moral high ground.

Back at the tent there was no sign of Judy, though her things had been rummaged through, which meant she’d obviously been back. Joanie drank a glass of water and had a little sit-down. When she’d caught her breath, she wet a washcloth and gave herself a quick once-over, face and neck, underarms, between the legs. She changed her underwear and wriggled into her tunic. It was the first time she’d worn her Cohort outfit, and stepping out in it made her self-conscious. It was kind of short. Though she knew she had passable legs, she wasn’t twenty-one anymore, and even in her high-school days she’d never been the sort who liked showing herself off. She shouldn’t have worried; as she made her way to the stage, people smiled and nodded; one or two men even cast admiring looks in her direction. She patted her hair and straightened her spine. Well, when you came to think of it, she was someone special. She’d become a member of the Cohort when it was still known, slightly tongue in cheek, as the Welcoming Committee. You had to send money through the mail and you got back a certificate and a button and a little purple book of rules. Judy was small then, and Jake was still at home. The fights were getting worse, and Joanie was trying to hold the family together, so she missed the first few conventions, despite wanting to go more than anything she could remember since she was a little girl. Finally she’d made it down to San Francisco to hear the Guide speak to a crowded hall about the Mux and the latest messages from the Command. It was the first time she was ever with him in the flesh, and she’d never been near a man with such a strong presence. Afterward she’d chatted to Clark Davis, the First Follower, and he’d invited her to eat dinner with the inner circle, shamelessly squeezing her thigh while the Guide cracked lobster tails and described an electrical computer that Ashtar wanted to incorporate into the Mux. She could barely follow the discussion, but just the same felt so darn happy it lasted her all the way back up to Olympia, kept her going for weeks. Ever since then, she’d considered her life one long preparation for the day the Command considered humanity ready to take up the burdens of full galactic consciousness, the beginning of the post-contact era.

On her way to the stage she passed by the Mux tower and looked around for Judy. A bunch of the other kids were there, including Artie and Karen’s two girls and a little redheaded tyke who surely belonged to Wanda Gilman. They were playing in the capsule, which had been removed from the main structure and opened so people could get a look inside. The kids were lying in the cavity, their little arms and legs not filling out the shape, which of course was made for an adult man. She asked if they’d seen Judy, and they looked solemn.

“She went off with the glow boy,” said a little girl.

“What’s that, honey?”

“She was here and then she went off to play with that boy.”

“I don’t understand. What boy?”

“The glow boy. The little boy from space.”

There was no time to find out what the girl meant. At that moment Manny Vargas came up and hustled her away. The Guide was about to speak; it was time to join the formation. Vargas looked rather wonderful in his sash and tunic. Grecian. Everyone was ready at the foot of the stage, milling around and smoking, all looking thrillingly space-age and exotic.