Hari Kunzru - Gods Without Men

“Who is it?” he asked.

Francisco Lobo looked at him strangely. “No one I ever saw before.”

“Where’s the boy?”

“There weren’t no boy.”

Around them, tired deputies were slapping one another on the back, passing round a bottle. No one seemed to care they’d chased a man for days across the desert, then murdered him without cause. They were victorious hunters. Once the photographs were done, they started to cut brush and pile it over the corpse. Deighton tried to pull it away. He wasn’t sure who was beneath it, but he knew they ought to carry him down, give him a decent funeral. Two of Craw’s hands dragged him off and laid him on the ground. It’s just an Indian, sneered one. He don’t care.

They stepped back and lit the pyre. Deighton watched the circle of unshaven haggard faces staring avidly into the flames.

Covering the grid. The makeup girl was professional, and moved around her without speaking. Neither personal nor impersonal. Just some powder. Mirror-Lisa, framed in bulbs. Make you look like a person who sleeps .

Q. Why did you do it? Why would a person behave like that?

Because she wanted to. Not long enough as an answer. People want more. They want explanations that feel like explanations.

On the first day they’d flown vectors over the park. Flown tracklines, expanding squares. Walking, they’d swept the area. Go on, said Dawn, out of the shadows. Ask her a question. Judy, sitting in that rocking chair under the bighorn-sheep skull on the wall. Back and forth, back and forth, Navajo blanket on her lap like an old woman. Ask her anything you like.

Impossible to cover all that territory.

Just some powder.

Ma’am, we stopped vehicles, questioned hikers. Everything by the book. At a certain time you have to conclude. At a certain time you have to. At a certain time.

You conclude that this was an abduction and it’s possible the child has been taken across state lines.

There you are. All done.

The land and aerial searches.

The host came in and said hello. She looked older in real life. She looked like a real person. I am so sorry, she said. Jaz was getting made up in the next chair, a white napkin tucked into his collar. Awkwardly, he craned around. Lisa looked at the two women in the mirror, the one leaning over the other. My heart, said the presenter. My personal anger. The mirror made it easier to see her. It made it easier when she said why don’t we all join hands.

She liked to do that before a special show. A show where we are dealing with life in its rawest form.

Judy rocking in her chair. Had Lisa ever really been in that room, with its triangular windows, its animal-skin rugs and polished floors? Under the dome of the stars. Only the stone hearth and the rocking woman had substance. Everything else dissolved into the shadows.

Side effects may include drowsiness, skin irritation, severe allergic reaction. Stop taking the medication and immediately seek medical help if you have any of the following:

The people in the hallway were her people. She had people. Victim support, Park Service media relations. Her parents had hired a lawyer or maybe an agent. He acted like an agent. His name was Price and he wore western boots under his double-breasted silk suits. He wore monogrammed shirts and talked to her like they were both in a Lifetime movie of the week. When they interviewed him on television, he was described as the “family spokesperson.” Her mother took her aside and started acting strangely and eventually she worked out that she was trying to explain why they’d hired a goy. You don’t know how it is out here, she said. They need to deal with one of their own.

There was a ribbon campaign, briefly. There was a website with a counter and a PayPal button.

In a moment she’d have to speak. The headset girl said they were almost ready for their segment. The girl leaned in very close. Her breath smelled of strawberry-flavored gum. It was strange how they all came in so close. It was like being pregnant, everyone wanting to rub your belly for luck. The little squeezes, the hugs. The holding of the wrists. When you’re making up each step through force of will, creating ground on which to walk, it takes faith. Faith and an atmosphere of silence. People touching or talking to you can throw you off.

Her people. Really they were just there to wheel her about, like a patient on a gurney. She never said a word if she could help it.

Perhaps she could blame the pictures. There’d been a collage of photos behind the bar, groups of smiling young Marines, arms thrown over one another’s shoulders or fiercely squeezing girls. Over the bar were more photographs, framed black-and-white portraits of heavy-jawed men on plain backgrounds. Down below, everyone had a world — a fragment of counter, stark and shiny in the flash, a car hood, a beer poster, a table and chair. Up there, the heroes floated in the milky-white amniotic fluid of their heroism, safe from harm. The bottles against the smeared mirror, the tangled string of Christmas lights; the place reminded her of a roadside shrine she’d once seen in Mexico. She’d taken pictures while Jaz read out the names on the votive candles. Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe. Contra el Mal de Ojo y Para Atrear La Fortuna . How many of these red-eyed bottle wavers were dead? Or had no legs? That was the difference now. Wonders of modern medicine. All coming home with chunks blown out of their brains or PTSD or missing limbs, as if by failing to die they’d also failed to complete a mandatory process, hadn’t followed the correct procedure for their transformation into black-and-white floating heads.

And that was when he came up and asked if she’d like to play a game of pool. It wasn’t complicated. She could already see him as he would be in the future, wheeling himself around. The sideways glances at the mall. The screaming-eagle decal on the chair. It was strange. She’d never had a premonition, but she saw this very clearly.

Maria Dolorosa .

She thought about the sand in her hair, her sweaty clothes. She took a gulp of her vodka soda.

He repeated his question.

Swelling of the lips, face, throat and tongue. May impair your ability to drive or operate heavy machinery. Some people taking this medication have engaged in activities such as driving or making telephone calls and later have no memory of these activities .

It was time. She gave herself up to the strawberry-gum girl, floating along with an arm to rest on, a guiding hand in the small of the back. Her own hand was placed in Jaz’s. It lay there, a damp fish on his papery palm. He was talking to her, using a warm tone, his trying-to-reach-you tone. Go toward the light, said the strawberry-gum girl, and launched them on set.

There was applause. The host hugged, patted, performed the holding of the wrists. She smelled of some powerful lilac deodorant. She smelled like an office bathroom. They sat down on the couch.

We’re so glad. Our hearts. Such a difficult. Tell me.

Well Sally he reminded me of my cousin Nate made me feel beautiful like a woman you know how important that is for a mom well Sally I’m glad you asked because it was a cry for help you have to appreciate autism affects everyone parents carers we all live with my levels of stress were through the roof Sally I know your viewers understand how hard understand how very hard understand it’s hard for me to come here today and admit alcohol drugs obesity gambling abuse has been a problem in my life but now with the grace of God and my husband by my side. My husband. My

Jaz shifted in his seat. The host said something. He said something. The host said something else. All eyes were on her: the witch Lisa Matharu, the woman who didn’t cry for her son.