Power

Guest post by Jeremy Gilreath.

Adam reaches into his pocket for the cigarette lighter he knows is there.  The wind is hammering his nose and ears off, and the wool-lined pockets of his overcoat generously give his fingers back their dexterity.  He relaxes for a moment before brandishing the device, making a cave with his hands to cradle his mouth, completing the ritual with a painful scraping of his finger against the wheel of sawblades.  A flame rises, steady and indifferent.  He takes a slow drag of the winter chill as it is filtered through the bent, shitty smoke he found under the overpass.  It’s raining tonight, and the slight dampness of it all makes him wonder if it is even going to catch.

It does.  He takes the last of the long, ceremonial puffs that transfer his life into the stick, and sighs through his nose in relief.  Putting both hands back in his coat pockets and angling his face in the wind just so, the cigarette just hangs there, submissive, while the smoke is carried away from his nostrils.  Adam leans against the abrasive concrete and takes a more relaxed look around with fresh perspective.  Only streetlights and pedestrian subways in the moonlit mix.

You really should stop that smoking.

Shut up, mom.

I didn’t raise you this way.

You raised me only to leave me later.

It wasn’t my fault.

It wasn’t my fault, either.

…

Why do you always talk to me this way?

I don’t.  You’re exaggerating.

…

Well, you are.

[a girl]

Why don’t you go over there to that girl, and make a friend?

She looks busy.

You look nice tonight.  I’m sure she’ll entertain you.

Entertain me?

In a wholesome way, Adam.  Not like your tricks.

Whatever.  Fine.

Do that thing you do.  You know.  People like it.

Until they figure it out, and then hate me for it.

But she might not.

Alright.

Adam doesn’t snap back to reality but rather fades.  He realizes he’s been staring at a muted pub of sorts, flagged by twin streetlights.  He begins to walk towards it, and to the woman, thinking of how to start a conversation.  “My, what lovely piercings you have.  And that’s my favorite shade of black!  Do you drink alone often?”  That probably wouldn’t do.  He can’t muster enough personality for it.  He decides to put on his mask instead, sharpen his smile, and roll his shirt sleeves up just before reaching her.  When he does , their eyes meet and he feels pierced.  The terrible bar music drifting through the open door mingling with the snow; the aching in his left shoulder; the dour mood he was in; his apprehension for human contact; all of these dissipate and are replaced with a tingling sensation.

“I’m Jayna,” she says.

I’m Adam.

She extends her hand to shake his, and the playful yet businesslike manner in which it is done coaxes an instant release of adrenaline in Adam’s gut.

Shit.  Well, here we go.

He reaches out with an open palm, and just as they clasp hands to complete the tradition, he says his name.  The woman takes a sharp breath in.  Her pupils dilate, and her eyelids move apart as if to accommodate them.  A snowflake lands in her right eye.  He knows it must be painful, in this blistering winter wind where most people squint whenever they can, but he also knows she can’t help but keep them open.  He closes his eyes and empties his lungs of air, and imagines himself inside of Jayna’s perspective before summoning up the single happiest moment of his very own childhood, knowing she will be forced to do the same.  He mirrors her, right at that moment, in thought and in feeling.

He sees her running through a playground with a boy.  He watches them on the monkey bars, on the slide, and in the woods with a dingy red ball.  He watches the sky get darker and darker as their parents come to get them both.  He experiences her sadness at seeing him go, and hears her say “I hope I see you again tomorrow.”  She can’t remember his name, so he thinks it to her in a whisper.

Adam.

He engineers himself back in his mind, lets go of her hand, and waits for her to feel recognition in his face, as he slowly grows a hopeful smile of quiet desperation.  He wants it to work.  He wants to make a friend.  Adam has no idea who he is, absent of his ties with other people.  He often doubts that there is anything.

“Adam.”

“Jayna.”

She looks reminiscent, confused, and emotional.  It’s obvious that she isn’t going to bring up the past experience, but she’s steeping herself in it quite well.  Adam steers the conversation elsewhere, towards subjects with multiple words.

“That was quite a handshake, Jayna.  Between you and me, it was the best of both worlds.”  She titters like a teakettle.

“Yeah, thanks.  With the shitty world out here, it’s the best we can do to carry on better ones inside of ourselves.”  She looks away for a moment and fidgets with something.  She’s turned around with a lit cigarette just as Adam figured out what she was attempting.  She pulls away from her mouth with the smoke and shows a sliver of a smile as the glances back his way.  “What brings you here tonight, Adam?”

I don’t know.

That’s horseshit Adam, I told you to go over there and make a friend.

Oh yeah.  Thanks mom.

“Friends.  Misery loves company, I suppose.  But thinking on it, that’s melted away.”

“You’ll be needing to find company without misery then, from the sound of it.”

“I think I already have.”  He smiles back at her, and extends the crook of his arm as he brushes his scarf out of the way.  The space is filled with something warmer, more reassuring, than the frosted cotton weave, as she takes it.  They go inside, neither one fully understanding what happened between them, yet both being certain that the other was still rather miserable on the inside.

They danced the steps up to the double doors of the bar, each pushing one aside with their free arms, pausing in unison to enjoy the intense contrast of the warm air bathing them from inside.  She takes the lead by pulling him over to a pair of stools.  He takes a closer look at what she is wearing as she takes off her coat.  It’s rather low cut for the weather, but in a classy way, skirting the line between strumpet and supervisor.  It impresses him, in part because of the surprise of it.

She’s assertive, clearly an important woman.  Good for you, Adam!

Mom, lay off.

Boy, I love you.  So don’t fuck this up.

You too Dad!  What the hell.

She sits down in the corner stool of the bar and leans into the faux mahogany grain of it like a lover.  Overhead, a lamp that doesn’t work swings slowly by a chain.  Adam sits next to her, lit halfway from behind by a lamp that does.  Glasses are clinking, laughter juxtaposed with forks scratching.  People walking, pool balls clacking, triangles racking and smokers hacking collective lungs with sighs of spent desire.

She catches the eye of the bartender, and he calmly walks over.

“I’ll have whatever’s on tap,” she tells him.  He blinks and lowers his head perceptively, and silently looks Adam’s way.

“I’ll have 3 ounces of Jack, 3 ounces of heavy cream, poured over ice in a glass and stirred,” says Adam.  It gets him an interesting looks from Jayna, but the bartender doesn’t give a shit.

Adam turns to his left and their eyes meet.  They hold it there, together, as they both just relax and warm up to the idea of warming up, of opening up.

Adam starts:  “So, what’s yours?”  It’s cliché and he knows it, but one of them was going to ask sooner or later.  Maybe by skipping straight to it he can keep up with her surefooted navigation of the turbulent social waters.  That’s what he tells himself, anyway.  Jayna looks away to drink from her bottle, and when she looks back he gets hit with that same damn feeling as the first time, and feels another shot of fight or flight being squeezed from his adrenals.  He knows that’s what it is, intellectually, but it feels like coming back to a home you never knew you had, and just as the longing and relief and tension and ecstasy and melancholy of it all stew together and come to a head, it drifts away like smoke through your fingertips leaving only traces of emotion behind, just in time to dovetail with the realization that something amazing is happening.

“Wow.”

That’s going to be addicting.

“How long can you hold that stare, Jayna?”

“Seven minutes and thirteen seconds on a good day.  The last time I was tested, anyway.”

He mulls this over.  “Do you have any friends that can predict when a person is going to die, by any chance?”  She looks up, pausing to give the question legitimate consideration.

“No, why do you ask?”

“I’d like to spend the last seven and change I have left in this world like that with you, is why.”  It gets another smile, but he knows its truth doesn’t keep her from brushing it off.  As well she should.

This is going well.  Maybe I’m even winning her over.  Maybe she likes me.  Just a little bit.

“Why wait?”

Silence.

Neither of them seem to know what to do next, since no obvious move presents itself.  A probable mixture of individual stressors and the cultural trauma of the times.  It’s a comfortable pause, which gets broken by “What about you?  What do you do, Adam?”

He gives a half-smile and looks down sheepishly, knowing he won’t incriminate himself yet rarely being asked.  Who would trust a man that can plant pieces of emotional residue and fragments of thought into their most cherished and private memories, like a desperate fisherman carving out niches in minds and hearts with emotional hooks?  No one, that’s fucking who.

No one.

“I daydream.  Kind of.  It’s like a turbo-charged daydreaming.  I can get lost in my own mind, in a way.”

She gives a slightly approving facial expression, a dubious token of approval that one would expect to be doled out to starving artists and others who willfully but unnecessarily suffer for their trade.  It’s positive overall.

“That’s better than some people I know.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.  My friend Dave?  He can sneeze on command.”  She couples a flourishing of her hand with a wild, unhinged facial expression.  “Allison can draw a perfect circle every time.  And Mary, well… she always seems to find crying babies.  Or rather, they find her, no matter where she goes.  ‘It’s not a very super power at all, if you ask me, thankyouverymuch.’ She always says.”  She does a good impression of her friend Mary.  Adam can tell.

“Some people have it so lucky,” Adam starts.  “This one guy I knew in grade school?  Thomas?   The government found out he had the ability to make people fall in love with him.  A Supra Power they called it, like a power over other people and things.  Not just your average Super Power like being really strong, or even a power like being really good at Carney Games or cooking a mean grilled cheese.  So they took him and groomed him for some foreign relations thing in the military.  An ambassador or something like that.”  Jayna looks on, quite interested, as the barkeep brings Adam the Cowboy he ordered.

I wonder where Thomas is now.  I wonder where they all are.

“He’s quite lucky indeed.  The government usually kills people with Supra Powers they can’t use for National Interests, or measure imperically.  Too much risk letting loose cannons run around and all, you know.”  Adam nods – knowingly – as he begins to feel the spots on his pant legs where the snow is melting and creeping up to grab his calves.  He hates that sensation.

Absolutely fucking hates it.

I want to get out of these clothes now.  Shit.  Maybe I can use the hand dryer in the restroom.

He takes a sip from his drink, puts it down, and says “I’ll be right back.  Don’t go anywhere now!”  to which she reassures him that she won’t be, giving him a smile as the traces the whirling grain of the bar with her fingertips.  She hates to see him go, but watching him walk away isn’t all that bad.

Edging open the door of the men’s restroom, Adam pushes himself inside after pausing to assess the situation.  It’s empty, so he makes his way to the hand dryer and pushes the cold, wet button to start the warm air.  After wiping down the counter next to the sink he hops on up and moves his legs around under the dryer.  It’s a small ordeal.  His wallet is in the way, so he takes it out of his back pocket and moves it to the front.  The drying takes the better part of fifteen minutes, but he gets it done and walks out satisfied and much more relaxed.

Adam turns right towards the bar and notices Jayna watching the television mounted overhead.  He walks past other patrons and takes his seat beside her quietly.  He doesn’t interrupt her concentration, and looks upward to see what’s going on as he sips from his glass.

A steel-jawed woman is giving a report.

“An alliance of burnt out scientists that came together two years ago to form the research corporation Calibrated Genetic Logistics Incorporated have made the merger between them and the Science and Industry division of the United States Armed Forces official today.  While their work is top secret, today’s interview with the Commandant of the Marine Corps confirmed that their recent innovations are on the fast track to being rapidly deployed with our troops in the Arctic Conflict…”

Oh what good news!  Don’t you think, Adam?

I don’t know.  I’m tired of this war.  It’s going nowhere, it benefits no one, and it doesn’t concern me.

You’re wrong, boy.  Listen to your mother.

How can I not listen to her?

Don’t get fresh.

“Nothing new on the news, big surprise there!” laughs Jayna.  “So Adam, where do you work?  That’s what I’m supposed to ask you next to come across as a normal member of polite society, right?”

I like her already.

“I work for Mexican Royal Industrial.  Or rather, I did, before they laid me off.”

Jayna nods.  “Times are hard, even for us at Russian Confectioners.  People aren’t buying like they used to.  But what can you do?”

“Lose yourself in the night, meeting strangers at dive bars” he says.  They raise their drinks with perfunctory nods, a glass in his hand and a bottle in hers.  Adam waits until just before she can touch it to her lips and interrupts her by saying “A toast.”  He says it with confidence, from the belly.

“To hard times.”

Hopefully you’ll have some hard times later tonight. I want some damn grandchildren.

Honey!

Knock it off, both of you!

“I’ll drink to that,” Jayna replies with a smile.  Just then, the warm air circulating in the bar hits her just right, and for the first time Adam catches the fragrance she must be wearing.  He feels outclassed, and suddenly like a thief and a liar.

Lime… cloves… and other things… well whatever it is, it’s really nice.  And she didn’t bathe in it like ninety-nine percent of people seem to.

They drink, and talk, and stumble back to her place two blocks away as the wind claws at the world outside, indifferent to the men and women jerry-rigging one night stands inside the weather-beaten hollows of snow they walked out of.

Jayna fumbles for her keys and, fingering the right one away from the ring, slams it into the cold, sticky lock of her double-doored apartment building.  Once inside they giggle and drift upstairs to apartment 2C.  As soon as she lays her left hand on the doorknob she swiftly spins around, her scarf floating around her like a halo, and puts her slender index finger up to her lips.  She lets out breath, like steam, ushering Adam into silence and solemnity.  “Either my son left the television on, or he’s up past his bedtime and is about to be in trouble, so wait out here until I find out which.”

Didn’t think she’d have a kid.  A mother and businesswoman.  Wow.

Without waiting for Adam to respond she cracks the door open and peers inside.  He stands back while Jayna gets bathed in the artificial glow of the television set, which sternly proclaims the current program’s title in the sort of voice that reminds you of elementary school intercoms and bullhorns that are past their prime.

“Stay tuned for The Adventures of Cerealborg and Combat Groper in… Lizzie Borden and Paul Bunyan Go to Mars, Part 9: The Return!”

…What the hell are kids watching these days?  That sounds more entertaining than what I used to watch.

Jayna creeps in and takes an initial survey before stopping and quietly walking over to a blanketed lump on the floor, shotgunned with electronic snow from the old Magnavox.

I guess that’s her son, then.  Kid must have gotten up then fallen back asleep.  Fortunate.

She bends down and picks him up more tender skill than her hardened punk exterior led Adam to believe she was capable of, at least before he knew she was a mother.  Still, he stays outside and watches her walk down the back hallway before veering left into another room, coming out a few minutes later.  She stops just in front of the television set, silhouetted by its glow, as she beckons Adam forward with a single expressive motion of her hand.

She really does look striking in black, shadows and cloth alike.

He steps forward into her apartment and, closing the door, slides the bolt and chain home.  Warmth finds its way under his charcoal coat as Jayna’s hands slip under the wool and around his hips, her chin finally resting on his shoulder.  Flakes of snow have turned to dew on her hair, and they coat his neck as she draws closer. 

“I’ve been looking for you a long time, Adam Remaster.”

She speaks with more confidence than she should.  He can’t echo the sentiment.  Her shaved temple brushes his stubbled chin as she moves into his neck.

I never told her my last name.