it will be ready,” Ordé said.
I watched the spinning worms, thinking that this was the first time I could see Ordé’s truth outside of my mind. It wasn’t just Ordé’s words or Claudia’s lovemaking that dazzled me. This was proof.
My stomach began to tighten. The back of my neck trembled, and I wanted to jump up from that table. I wanted to run.
“You see,” Ordé said. “They’re all that milky pink color.”
“Yeah,” I barked.
Ordé went to a drawer in the built-in cabinets around the sink. He pulled out a small whisk and came back. The pink worms were writhing violently by then.
Ordé plunged the whisk in and mixed briskly. The worms turned back to liquid. It was as if the writhing were an illusion, a vision brought on by Ordé’s suggestion.
“This is the lightest color I’ve ever seen,” Ordé said.
“You mean like with Mary?” I asked.
“She was the first,” he said. “That’s what killed her and Janet Wong and Bruce too. They drank a darker fluid and died.”
Ordé looked me in the eye.
I raised the bowl to my lips. The thick fluid was warm on my tongue. In my throat it seemed to change back into worms. Sinuous and twisting they went down. I tried to take the blood from my lips, but Ordé put out his hand to increase the tilt of the bowl. I drank it all down. And then threw the bowl to the floor.
Inside me the worms were on the march. Through my stomach to my intestines. Under my skin and into my heart. I screamed louder than I had for Claudia. When I jumped up Ordé tried to grab me, but I hit him and he went down. I ran to the front door and out into the street; then I took off. Every now and then the parasites in my body brought on a spasm, and I’d fall tumbling across lawns and from sidewalks into the street. A car bumped into me on Telegraph, but I kept on running.
The visions started a few blocks after the accident. Wide bands of light in which images and histories unfolded. Molecules the size of galaxies, strange-looking creatures moving in and out of multicolored lights. A flat plain appeared on one curving screen of blue. The plain, as my mind entered it, spread out in all directions. No path to follow or mountain to set my sights on …
“What’s wrong with him, Martinez?”
“He’s trippin’, Sarge. Trippin’ hard.”
They must have been policemen. They must have arrested me. I know they did because I woke up in the drunk tank of the Berkeley jailhouse. But I was distracted by the visions and the sounds too. I imagined stars singing in a chorus; it was no mistake, no happenstance. There was meaning and the deft motions of a dance among the suns. It was then I realized that the worms had bored their way into my brain.
A pane of light opened before me. It shone like a parchment burning with alien inscriptions, equations, and hieroglyphs. I stared at the burning pages as they moved past. I took in each character but understood very little. Toward the end was the full biography of Ordé. His childhood as a liar and his adult life as a saint. I saw and felt everything he had known and done up until the moment of blue light.
There was a flash and then I was, myself, a page.
A blank sheet.
An unwritten footnote.
Four
“L ESTER?”
I opened my eyes to see a tall white man dressed in a white smock that hung open to reveal a red-and-yellow-plaid shirt and blue jeans.
“Yeah.”
“I’m Dr. Colby. How do you feel?”
“Where am I?”
“At Santa Teresa rest home.”
“I’m tired,” I said.
At some other time (it could have been later that day or another week) I awoke to find Colby standing over my bed again. He was thin. The whites of his eyes were laced with red veins, veins that seemed to be writhing.
“How do you feel?” he asked again.
“I don’t know. Everything looks funny.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Like your skin. If I look at it hard, I can see all kinds of blues and yellows that are like the negative of a
I watched the spinning worms, thinking that this was the first time I could see Ordé’s truth outside of my mind. It wasn’t just Ordé’s words or Claudia’s lovemaking that dazzled me. This was proof.
My stomach began to tighten. The back of my neck trembled, and I wanted to jump up from that table. I wanted to run.
“You see,” Ordé said. “They’re all that milky pink color.”
“Yeah,” I barked.
Ordé went to a drawer in the built-in cabinets around the sink. He pulled out a small whisk and came back. The pink worms were writhing violently by then.
Ordé plunged the whisk in and mixed briskly. The worms turned back to liquid. It was as if the writhing were an illusion, a vision brought on by Ordé’s suggestion.
“This is the lightest color I’ve ever seen,” Ordé said.
“You mean like with Mary?” I asked.
“She was the first,” he said. “That’s what killed her and Janet Wong and Bruce too. They drank a darker fluid and died.”
Ordé looked me in the eye.
I raised the bowl to my lips. The thick fluid was warm on my tongue. In my throat it seemed to change back into worms. Sinuous and twisting they went down. I tried to take the blood from my lips, but Ordé put out his hand to increase the tilt of the bowl. I drank it all down. And then threw the bowl to the floor.
Inside me the worms were on the march. Through my stomach to my intestines. Under my skin and into my heart. I screamed louder than I had for Claudia. When I jumped up Ordé tried to grab me, but I hit him and he went down. I ran to the front door and out into the street; then I took off. Every now and then the parasites in my body brought on a spasm, and I’d fall tumbling across lawns and from sidewalks into the street. A car bumped into me on Telegraph, but I kept on running.
The visions started a few blocks after the accident. Wide bands of light in which images and histories unfolded. Molecules the size of galaxies, strange-looking creatures moving in and out of multicolored lights. A flat plain appeared on one curving screen of blue. The plain, as my mind entered it, spread out in all directions. No path to follow or mountain to set my sights on …
“What’s wrong with him, Martinez?”
“He’s trippin’, Sarge. Trippin’ hard.”
They must have been policemen. They must have arrested me. I know they did because I woke up in the drunk tank of the Berkeley jailhouse. But I was distracted by the visions and the sounds too. I imagined stars singing in a chorus; it was no mistake, no happenstance. There was meaning and the deft motions of a dance among the suns. It was then I realized that the worms had bored their way into my brain.
A pane of light opened before me. It shone like a parchment burning with alien inscriptions, equations, and hieroglyphs. I stared at the burning pages as they moved past. I took in each character but understood very little. Toward the end was the full biography of Ordé. His childhood as a liar and his adult life as a saint. I saw and felt everything he had known and done up until the moment of blue light.
There was a flash and then I was, myself, a page.
A blank sheet.
An unwritten footnote.
Four
“L ESTER?”
I opened my eyes to see a tall white man dressed in a white smock that hung open to reveal a red-and-yellow-plaid shirt and blue jeans.
“Yeah.”
“I’m Dr. Colby. How do you feel?”
“Where am I?”
“At Santa Teresa rest home.”
“I’m tired,” I said.
At some other time (it could have been later that day or another week) I awoke to find Colby standing over my bed again. He was thin. The whites of his eyes were laced with red veins, veins that seemed to be writhing.
“How do you feel?” he asked again.
“I don’t know. Everything looks funny.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Like your skin. If I look at it hard, I can see all kinds of blues and yellows that are like the negative of a
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