Zerostrata Read online

  “Oh, you’re very welcome.”

  The man started bouncing along. For having only one leg, he was surprisingly fast. Eventually, I saw Grayson before us. I wondered if anything had happened there. I was kind of excited to get home.

  The man wasn’t much of a conversationalist. I tried to ask him questions and talk to him about the most banal things imaginable but he only responded with grunts. Maybe this was due to the strain of carrying me on his back or maybe he just wasn’t much of a talker.

  We reached Grayson and he continued to hop, taking me back to the gates of the sad house. He bent down and began helping me to unfasten the harness.

  “Wow, I didn’t even tell you where I live.”

  “Oh, we all know where everybody else lives, if you think about it.”

  I thought about it for a second but still didn’t really get what he meant. This new world that Dr. Blast proposed was absolutely rife with crypticness.

  “Well, thank you,” I said and felt compelled to hug the man so I did. He hugged me until I stepped away and looked at him, making eye contact before preparing to turn back to the house. Then he dipped down and jumped, continuing straight up into the air. I watched until he became a dot, getting lost in the gloom over the house.

  I wondered why he had hopped all that way when he could have just flown.

  Chapter Nine

  How Do You Wait When There Is No Such Thing As Time?

  When I returned home, things were certainly not as I left them. The only thing I could think about was going through the house and out into the backyard where I could take the elevator up to Zerostrata and wait for the running girl. But the happenings inside the house temporarily distracted me.

  I heard noise coming from the living room so I walked past the staircase, going deeper into the house. All of the lights were on in the living room. Mother was on a pogo stick, unsteadily hopping around the room. Tricky was on her head, completely affright, his back arched, his claws digging into Mother’s wig. Mr. Donovan was there. He stood in the corner, his shirt off, a bucket of eggs sitting on the floor beside his leg. He was throwing them at Mother as she hopped crazily around the room. Every egg I saw him throw missed, splattering on the floor or the wall. Francis frantically ran around with a bucket full of soapy water and a sponge. An egg would explode on the wall and she would be right there to clean it up.

  I wondered what pills had caused Mother to start acting like this. This energy was definitely out of character for her.

  She noticed me standing there in the opening and temporarily paused her pogoing.

  “Hello, Hansel!” she called. She had color in her cheeks I only remembered being there as a small child.

  “Hello, Mother.”

  “How did your appointment go?”

  “Well... I guess. I think it went well. I feel better now.”

  “I feel pretty good too.”

  “So what pills are you taking to give you this much energy?”

  “Pills? Oh, I decided not to take my pills today. I think this was the first original thought I’ve had in years. The pills tend to make me want to go to sleep but, this morning, when I decided not to take them, I asked myself, ‘Now what would you like to do?’ And the answer came to me and do you know what it was? It was to find your old pogo stick, pogo around the house, and have Mr. Donovan throw eggs at me. This is the most fun I’ve had in ages. Would you like to join us?”

  “No, thank you. So, do you know what time it is?”

  “I most certainly do not. All of the hands fell off all the clocks in the house so I don’t have any idea.”

  “Oh, okay. Hi, Mr. Donovan.”

  He raised his hand in a wave and then faked tossing an egg at me. I pretended to be surprised, recoiling at the splatter of the egg I knew would not come.

  “Well, carry on, Mother. I’m going to go out and sit in Zerostrata for an inordinately long period of time.”

  “Have fun!”

  She began bouncing up and down once again.

  “I’m sure I will. You do the same.”

  On my way outside the phone rang. I went into the kitchen to answer it because there was too much wild laughter coming from the living room. It rang something like five times and I wondered if I was the only one who heard it or if I was the only one in the house bothering to answer it.

  I picked it up and said hello.

  “You are a dirty man.” It was the same old woman who had called yesterday.

  “I think you have the wrong number.”

  “I know I have the right number. You are a dirty stinking man and I hope you rot in hell.”

  “Whatever,” I said, hanging up the phone even though there was some grain of perversity inside me that wondered exactly how nasty this woman was willing to get.

  I took a deep breath and headed outside.

  Chapter Ten

  Chasing the Girl Who Seems Forever Out of Reach

  I don’t know how long I waited, standing at the window in Zerostrata longing to see this girl again. It filled me with all kinds of perplexities. I knew where she lived. I thought about just wandering over to her house and lurking around but then I would feel like a peeping Tom. I thought about getting my telescope from my room but that didn’t seem exactly right either. Instead, I stood and waited.

  The past couple of days had been strange. Had my life always been like this? I didn’t know. I couldn’t remember. I didn’t think it had been because, if it was, I don’t see how I could have possibly forgotten any of it. Time ceased to have any real meaning for me. The past ten years could have been the past ten minutes. And now I found myself eagerly looking forward to every approaching minute. I didn’t know if I would be able to make any contact with this girl or not but just the thought of someone like her existing made me a more content individual.

  That was insane, I knew. It was insane that simply seeing a naked girl running along in the rain could fill me with such a feeling but it was the truth. And it was a truth I welcomed. It wasn’t harsh or ugly like many truths could be. I tried not to let myself dwell on the various fantasies my mind normally constructed about such things. I tried not to imagine us doing things together, having conversations together, laughing together. I tried not to think about any of that because it would be painful if those things never happened.

  I just stood there and thought about her. I thought about how much I wanted to see her this one more time. But what if I didn’t see her again? What if she didn’t come running out of her house? Would I be crushed? I didn’t know. I had become incapable of knowing anything. If I had been told that morning that I would come home to find my mother on a pogo stick in the living room, I wouldn’t have believed it. I never thought humans could fly either. Or that buildings could simply disappear.

  And all of this, all of these things happening over the course of a short day, I took to be reality. I didn’t for once think I was going insane.

  And there she was again.

  She ran out of her house just like she did yesterday, into the twilight. I saw her much more clearly now. She was definitely naked. My heart sped up. This was what I had waited for all day. Was I just going to let her run past me again, not noticing me? Was I going to treat her like some movie or piece of entertainment, there for my viewing pleasure?

  I didn’t think I could.

  I had to join her. I didn’t have to think twice about it. I hopped on the elevator and descended from Zerostrata, taking off my clothes as it bumped down the tree, leaping off before reaching the ground.

  Completely naked, I took off running toward the trail, looking for the girl. She had rounded the second turn and was rapidly closing the distance between that and the third as I raced across the backyard to join her.

  I don’t even know if she noticed me or not. By the time I reached the trail she was already ahead of me. She ran much faster than I did. There would not be any catching up to her. I ran behind her, ran as fast as I could, watching her naked buttock
s and her orange hair swishing along the tops of her shoulders.

  It felt good to be behind her, that much closer, sharing in some kind of experience. She didn’t look back once and the run didn’t seem to take any time at all. She rounded the fourth turn and I knew she was almost home. I wondered if she would stop and talk to me but, when I saw her racing toward her porch, I knew she wasn’t going to. She probably hadn’t even seen me back there.

  And then, just like that, she was gone again. I didn’t really know what to do so I just kept running. I looked at her house for as long as I could. The older woman opened the door, letting the running girl back in. The older woman noticed me, a haunting click of recognition as we made eye contact. Then the door shut and I felt very alone. I ran past all the other houses on the trail, suddenly very self-conscious about my nudity. Maybe I could just cut back to the house through the woods. But I wasn’t wearing any shoes either and didn’t think my feet could take the abusing the woods would give them.

  Resigned, I tried to enjoy it as much as I could. There was something incredibly liberating about it. Running without any clothes to restrain me. Feeling the wind rush across my skin, cooling the sweat as soon as it emerged from the pore.

  Trudging through the early night I comforted myself with the thought that she would probably be out there tomorrow doing the same thing. It had happened two days in a row, after all. It was now a pattern.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Lettuce Boys

  I would have made it home okay if it wasn’t for the gang that decided to stop me on my way. I rounded the first turn from the girl’s house, enjoying myself. Now that I wasn’t chasing her, the pace wasn’t so strenuous and I didn’t wheeze as much. I looked off into the distance, focusing only on the next turn, the one that would take me home and not paying attention to much else. Then I tripped over something and went sprawling onto the soft dirt of the trail. I immediately thought it must have been a rock or a rogue branch. I was mistaken.

  I turned over onto my naked butt and looked up. Facing me were five teenage boys dressed like pirates. One of them had tripped me. Why hadn’t I noticed them?

  The meanest looking one was in front. They were arranged in a tightly militant ‘V’.

  “What are you doing out here?” he asked.

  “I was just running.”

  “Naked?”

  “Yeah, well, I guess I forgot my clothes.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  I wanted to point out the fact that he was dressed like a pirate but realized I was now old enough to have a preternatural fear of teenagers.

  “What were you really doing?” he asked. “Were you chasing the girl?”

  “You’ve seen her?”

  “Everybody’s seen her. You’re not the first, you know.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re not the first person to chase her. You might as well give up though. She’s not going to pay any attention to you.”

  “I don’t know if I want her to pay any attention to me.”

  “Sure you do. Everyone wants her to pay attention to them. She’s like everyone’s secret. No one really talks about her. It’s almost like she doesn’t exist but everyone thinks about her and that is all I will say about it.”

  “Does she do this every night?”

  “What did I just say? You don’t listen very well. I said I wasn’t going to talk about her anymore. Bad things happen to those who talk about her. I should kick your ass.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re just a dirty old pervert running around naked in a public park but I’m not going to kick your ass because I’m made of lettuce.”

  “What?” Now I was totally confused.

  “I said that I am made of lettuce so instead of kicking your ass I am going to make you a salad. Get up.”

  I stood up.

  “Julio?” the boy called to one of the boys in the back. “Do you have the bowl?”

  Julio brought the bowl forward and the boy opened his shirt. Sure enough, he was made of lettuce.

  “This is going to be the absolute best salad you have ever eaten and you have to promise me you will eat this salad tonight. If you wait until tomorrow, it’ll go bad. This way it’s fresh. Besides, it’ll help you sleep better tonight. If you’re thinking about her, you’ll never sleep.”

  He went about pulling away chunks of his lettuce skin and putting them in the bowl. The salad did look better and better as he put it together. When it was finished, he handed it to me and told me to get lost.

  I took off toward the house at a slow trot, eager to go inside and eat the salad.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sidekick

  I made it to the backyard and put on my clothes. I couldn’t wait until I got inside to eat the salad. It smelled too delectable. It tempted me with its fresh garden scent, begging me to eat it, although I knew it would not be incredibly filling. It was of a modest size and it was, after all, just a salad. So I found myself sitting on the steps of the back porch, holding the salad bowl in my lap and eating the green leaves with my fingers. After the first leaf, I knew I would not be able to stop. Even though there wasn’t any dressing or other frivolity that often goes with a salad, it was absolutely scrumptious. It took me less than a minute to devour the entire thing.

  I left the bowl sitting on the porch step. Perhaps the lettuce gang would find it there while parading through the neighborhood looking for booty. They were pirates, I told myself. One can never really trust a pirate if all the stories were true.

  Before going into the house, I paused to contemplate what the situation would be like. I wondered if the chaos had died down at all and I wondered if I preferred the chaos to the sadness or the other way around.

  I think I liked the chaos better. When I had entered the house after my appointment, it contained a certain buzz I had never felt before. Even as a child, the only one in the household who provided any kind of energy was Dad. And I think the energy he exuded was due to this sheer enigmatic quality he had. I was never exactly sure what he did. He always said he was an inventor but I never saw all the gadgets and gizmodgery one would expect to find in an inventor’s house and he seemed to be home all the time. The items he claimed to invent, things like clouds and wood, were ludicrous. Unless he was God.

  Maybe he had just invented one thing and retired off that. Something so embarrassingly simple he didn’t even feel the need to tell his children what it was.

  I opened the door. The house was darkened. That was relatively normal. Francis had probably already gone home. She usually went around the house and turned off all the lights before leaving since Mother typically turned in right after dinner and Zasper never left the basement.

  Of course Mother had to be in bed. She must have been exhausted. What I had seen her doing earlier would have been a workout for a young person who hadn’t been addicted to prescription drugs and cigarettes for the past twenty years or so.

  I stood there, confused. I wasn’t sure why I was even in the house. Wasn’t I going to sleep in Zerostrata again? It seemed to serve me perfectly fine last night. Maybe I was just checking in to make sure everything was okay. It probably was. I imagined Mother curled up in the hairy arms of Mr. Donovan and Zasper lying in his customary position in the basement.

  I turned to leave when I heard a loud thump. It startled me and I went to its source. It seemed to come from around the staircase.

  Reaching the bottom of the staircase, I found Zasper lying in a heap on the floor, dressed in a skintight black jumpsuit, newer and shinier than his previous jumpsuit.

  I flipped the light switch, filling the area with a mellow glow.

  Zasper moaned and clutched his head.

  “Are you okay?” I asked him.

  I lowered his arms from his head and he looked up at me. He looked like he had been badly beaten. One of his eyes was blackened and he had a small gash above the other.

  “Jesus, you look terrib
le.”

  “No,” he moaned. “I’m okay, really.”

  “What were you doing? And why are you wearing a cape?” I noticed this particular accessory as he struggled to stand up. It was a short cape, coming down only to about the middle of his back.

  “Haven’t you heard? Dad called today.”

  “Really?” I didn’t know what that had to do with Zasper’s present situation. I waited for him to elaborate but he just kind of stared dazedly forward as though he were in the early stages of a concussion. “And what did Dad say?”

  “Oh, yeah, right… You know he left to become a superhero? That was quite a while ago. He called today to tell me he completed his first successful mission. He managed to save some obscure African tribe from total assimilation. It was a small task, he admitted, but one he was particularly proud of.”

  “Good for him.”

  “Yeah. He calls himself The Whirlwind and he asked me if I wanted to be his sidekick and I said yeah so I went out and bought this new jumpsuit and this cape and I’ve been throwing myself from the top of the stairs all day, trying to fly, and now my head really hurts and I still don’t know what to call myself.”

  “I’m sure it’ll come to you. Maybe you just need to rest for a bit.”

  “Yeah, maybe. Are you planning on sleeping in Zerostrata tonight?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you care if I sleep with you?”

  “That’s fine. You might want to bring a pillow or something.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  I Never Could Understand What You Saw in Something That Was Only Everything

  Zasper and I lay on the plank wood floor of Zerostrata. The wind rustled through the surrounding trees. It was a sleepy sound, like the ocean from a distance. All around us were the comforting smells of the neighbors’ laundry and the dirt and the grass and the old wood of Zerostrata.

  “I never could see what you saw in this place,” Zasper said.

  “Ever since Dad had it built, I never wanted to be anywhere else.”