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

Leonard felt then as if he’d been dropped from the earth. Milione spoke of a desert. Leonard could well imagine this — shaded by nothing, light always shining in your eyes, an accusatory light reminding you that you’d acted badly, your grandfather had died because of you, and now you’re alone, you’ll always be alone. Fifteen-year-old Leonard stopped speaking, he spent long hours on his grandfather’s settee staring at the wall, trying without success to understand the script his grandfather had scrawled there.

I could have asked him what it meant, he told himself, as Medusa, a kitten then, purred on his lap. I could have asked him and I didn’t; now I’ll never know. I could have laughed at his jokes about herring — would it have killed me to laugh at his jokes?

Carol seemed to understand. She stopped making him do things he didn’t want to do, like go to school, like go anywhere, really.

For five years, Leonard did little or nothing but follow the doings of Sue & Susheela, let Medusa in and out of the garage apartment, and care for Felix. Till Carol told him he had to get a job.

Like all of his grandfather’s stories, the one that went with the clapping song didn’t make much sense — his grandfather had learned it from his grandfather, who’d learned it from his grandfather (and so on), so maybe that was to be expected. But it was about demons (who cause havoc only on Mondays), so Felix pronounced it truly grand. His favorite was Kafkaphony, the demon with two wives: with one wife, he had leper babies; with the other, two-headed babies who fought each other and had open sores on their faces. He also liked Kafsephony, whose babies leapt from one end of the ether to the other, sometimes appearing as men and telling the future. Also, he liked the fact that dogs were formed in the ether out of bad deeds; they barked and howled, and bit people; they could find no cure for their condition till they died and were reborn as something else. He couldn’t wait to draw the goats who look like people. And so on.

Can I really not tell Mom? Felix asked. His cheeks were still pink from the exertion of hopping skipping jumping west south north east around the invisible circle.

Grandpa made me promise, Leonard said. No one can know, just you and me.

Felix considered this a moment, twirling a lock of his red afro.

What if I add the demons to my opus?

They have to stay between us. You can show your grandson. He’s the only person who can see it.

Will I have a grandson? he asked.

Of course, Leonard said.

You don’t, Felix said.

You’re better than I am.

I am?

Of course you are! Look at you! Leonard said. You’re strong! You do awesome karate kicks. You have an opus!

I do, don’t I?

And you’ve got red hair, Leonard said. Girls love red hair.

They don’t seem to, Felix said. He was thinking of Celeste, whose idea it had been most recently to dump him on the municipal compost heap.

Trust me, Leonard said, and Felix did.

A pleasing style

Good news! Milione said one night, his voice again bright. A gentleman has arrived who wishes to transcribe my adventures. He remembers me from Acre, he has a pleasing style. A certain Rustichello of Pisa — perhaps he lives near you?

I don’t think so, Leonard said.

Have you encountered his romances?

Not my cuppa tea.

He writes in French, Mill said. I gather this is the language for romance.

I wouldn’t know, Leonard said.

I neither, Mill said. But he proposes to make me famous beyond the walls of this shit-piss town. They will have to release me then, don’t you think? Really, I believe I shall go mad here.

Leonard couldn’t argue with that. But he didn’t think Mill’s “memoirs” would help him out of his loony bin; they might occupy him, however, and stave off what seemed a deepening depression.

What will you write about? Leonard asked. I’d say no to the dates and silks, yes to the starving caliph and marauding khan.

I shall talk of the Tibetans! Mill said triumphantly, and the line, predictably, went dead.

The Desert of Lop

Do you ever feel you are the only person in the universe? Mill asked the next night. When the moon disappears, and the sky is black and the sea is still and there is nothing around you but the void, then, dear Leonard, do you sometimes feel alone?

I guess I felt like that when my grandfather died. Carol was glad. She was tired of taking care of him. I was fifteen. I felt alone then.

An orphan is always alone. I was an orphan for fifteen years.

So you said, Leonard said, thinking, You were never an orphan, you know nothing about being an orphan.

There is a desert of which I have oft tried to speak, Mill said.

The Desert of Lop, Leonard said, surprised that their connection wasn’t severed.

Yes, that place. I was lost there, did I tell you?

No.

That is because I have told no one. No one knows of this. I became separated from my fellows there. The desert was full of apparitions, sounds that beckon — one hears voices there, the sounds of waterfalls, of livestock and bandits. You follow those sounds, or you run from them, it does not matter, you only ever find yourself alone. Within hours your brain empties, the inside of your head feels hot, as if filled with desert sand, your eyes become parched, your throat closes, you feel certain you will never speak again, and how could you, for you have lost all words. And there is no one there with whom to speak, nor will there ever be. Everywhere is light, but this light, it illuminates nothing! You are your inside, your outside is in, and you are as empty as can be. You are sere. Do you know whereof I speak, dear Leonard?

Maybe, Leonard whispered.

Nothing is more terrifying. It was like this for hours, days perhaps — it is hard to know because there was no night or day there, or maybe I was unable to discern the difference. A minute felt like hours, an hour passed like a drop of rain. The sunshine felt like mud, I could barely lift my feet. I walked, or maybe I sat, I dreamed, maybe I was covered with sand, or maybe the wind uncovered me, I do not know. I may even have died: this is not impossible. It is possible to die, then live again.

Leonard didn’t know what to say.

I opened my eyes, and there they were. The people whose name I dare not mention, of whom I have not spoken.

Even Leonard dared not say the Tibetans.

Yes, Mill said, as if reading Leonard’s mind. They were many. They wore silks, they wore garlands, they were like angels, riding on steeds with hooves adapted to the desert, steeds that flew across the sands. They took me to their tents, their huts, oh I’m too tired to properly describe them, but maybe you can see them, dear Leonard.

I can!

They administered potions and unguents, they put drops in my eyes. I saw things, dear friend, too horrible to mention, too beautiful to describe. My waking hours were as sleep, my sleep more vivid than any life. It was then that they taught me, or rather it was through their example that I learned, for they assumed I already knew. They saw how strange I was, how I had come from far away, they assumed I was like them. They are separated from their kind by vast distances, you see. But I think that is all I will say for today. Leonard?

Yes, Milione?

I have been in battle, I have crossed the raging seas, I have relied on my fellows and with them I have survived every hardship known to man, sorrows such as I hope you never experience. But you alone have become my friend.

Really? Leonard said.

You have an ability …, Mill said.

To listen? Leonard asked.

Yes, Mill said. To listen.

Rusty’s manner

Mill had all but abandoned his nighttime tales. These days he spoke only of Rusty, the poncy blowhard who’d undertaken to write his history.