Rachel Cantor - A Highly Unlikely Scenario, or a Neetsa Pizza Employee's Guide to Saving the World

This also is true, Mill said.

Forgive me for saying so, but you don’t seem very good at this just yet. Maybe you need more practice? So no one gets hurt?

Mill didn’t reply.

You could write about this in your next book, perhaps? Leonard said, knowing somehow that there would be no next book.

Still no reply.

Mill? Are you there?

Leonard, you are a most trusted friend, and you speak wisely. I shall consider your words; possibly I shall do as you say.

When they parted that night, Leonard had no way of knowing he would never speak to Milione again.

The complaints returned the next night. The phone didn’t bleat — instead, the usual clients-in-pain called complaining that they’d ordered Neoplatonist , not Neapolitan . Leonard listened, used approved nicknames and the Lateral Sales Strategy to good advantage, demonstrated largesse with Neetsa Pizza coupons, and gained a more or less average number of converts, but his heart wasn’t in it. Where was Milione? Was he okay? Leonard was sure now that Mill had rerouted Leonard’s calls — how had he managed to do that? Now that the complaints had returned, did this mean Mill had gone away? Was he in trouble? Was his invisible circle dance the one Leonard knew? Would he hear from him again?

He felt uncomfortably bereft. He had enjoyed their conversations, he had looked forward to them, he had found in Mill not just a client-in-pain but a friend.

Yes, Milione had been his friend.

He was surprised to realize this, because really, he didn’t have friends. He sometimes screen-yakked with fans of Sue & Susheela, or other Listeners, using an alias or avatar. To none of these had he ever confided the emptiness he’d felt when his grandfather died, or his lack of skill with women, or the mystery of his grandfather’s changing eyes, or his occasional sadness. With none of these had he exchanged fears, or experiences of orphanhood; certainly, none had urged him to be more than he was. Yes, Mill was a friend. But still he didn’t call.

When the phone bleated a few nights later, Leonard grabbed it with unprofessional enthusiasm and shouted, Milione? Mill? And was deathly surprised to hear another voice, a voice he thought he’d never hear again.

Listen, boychik, the voice said. I need you to listen good.

Boychik

Grandpa? Is it you?

It sounds like me, the caller said, but it isn’t.

I don’t understand, Leonard said, tears already streaming down his cheeks. He’d spent ten years on his grandfather’s settee, listening to his grandfather’s stories: he knew his grandfather’s voice!

Who is it? he sobbed. Why are you calling me?

Boychik, I need you to listen good, the man repeated, causing Leonard to sob even more. You saved the world, just like I ask. You did very very good. I always knew you were a good egg.

Grandpa! You’re dead! Why are you calling me?

I tell you, it’s not me, the man said, but I need you to listen good.

Who is it, then? Leonard said. Why are you doing this?

You did very very good, said his grandfather’s voice. I am so proud of you.

You are? I started telling Felix the stories, I couldn’t help it. He’s so lonely! I’m never going to have grandsons!

You know nothing about the future, the voice said. Trust me on this one thing. On this one thing there can be no question. You will have grandsons, and more grandsons, on this there can be no question. That Felix, he is a good egg, he is a good egg and so are you, you are very very good to him. This is very important. Don’t you worry about Felix, we talk about Felix later. For the moment I need you to listen.

Grandpa, I was so bad to you before you died. I’m sorry! I am so very sorry!

It’s not me like you think, the man said, but your grandpa he know this, he know you are a good egg. Not to worry, boychik.

I was just a kid, I didn’t mean it when I said you were stupid and horrible and smelled like herring and I hated your stories. It wasn’t true!

Boychik, I need you to listen.

I am listening, Leonard said, wiping his face with his flared cambric sleeve.

You are not listening, said the voice, and he was right. You have the possibility to be the world’s great listener, but you don’t listen!

Oh, Leonard said. Sorry. I’m listening now.

You saved the world, the voice said. I don’t expect you to understand, someday I explain.

I don’t understand.

Your advice to Marco save the world, for the time being, this is what I mean.

I was his friend. I called him Mill. I was allowed to call him Mill because I was his friend.

Forget about Marco. He did what we need. He publish his book and he don’t speak about the Tibetans. These things he know die with him. I need you to do another thing.

Mill’s dead? Leonard’s tears started streaming again.

Boychik, you understand nothing. Sometimes you gotta read a book, really, you gotta get your tuchas offa that swirly chair.

I don’t understand. How do you know Mill’s dead?

He live another twenty-five years after he get out of prison …

He really was in prison?

This is what he say, right?

Yes.

You listen to what he say?

I thought he was an NP test, or a crazy man.

Marco Polo, he die in 1324, live a very happy life. Three children, a sweet wifey, he is one of the famous men in the world: this is what he want, to be a famous guy, he get this because of you. You are very very good to him.

He died in 1324? What are you talking about? I was just on the phone with him last week.

This is the mystery, the man said. This is the mystery and it is safe because of you. He publish these things how he do this and someday, someone use them for evil, this is for sure. You save the world, see? We are very grateful.

Marco Polo, like the pool game?

You are not listening.

Who is this talking if it’s not my grandfather, and how do you know Milione?

I thought you understand this, boychik.

I don’t understand, Leonard said. This is what I’ve been saying.

Boychik, this is Isaac. Isaac the Blind.

Lenny

You’re making me crazy! Leonard said. I don’t believe anything you say! I’m not friends with a man who’s been dead eight hundred years. I am Leonard, of Neetsa Pizza, I live in the twenty-first century, I work in a White Room. Why are you using my grandfather’s voice? Who are you?

You will read this book and we will talk. Make special note of the suggestion you make. You find Marco’s false governorship on page 206, his false claim to breaking the siege of Siang-yang-fu on the pages falling after.

The line was dead and the doorbell rang.

Leonard didn’t know he had a doorbell.

Package, a man said. He was wearing a striped green delivery uniform Leonard had never seen before. Leonard put his finger in the fingerprint flasher and took the package. It was a book: The Travels , by Marco Polo.

No one called the rest of that night, so Leonard read. He read about the lands Milione had described. He read critical commentary about Rustichello, the stylistic and possibly substantive contributions that chronicler had made to the book. He read that many didn’t think Marco had been to China, which he called Cathay (he had! he had!). He read about the apparitions that beset men in the Desert of Lop — but not about the Tibetans, there was no word about the Tibetans, or a circle.

Any crazy person could read this book and pretend to be Marco, or think he was Marco, but there were the lies that he, Leonard, had suggested, on page 206 and following, just as Isaac had said.