A perfect day for promotion

(In memoriam of the great literary legend J.D. Salinger who died at 91 on 29 January 2010)

-‘Milk?’ the vendor with one arm asked.
-‘I take it black’, Edina replied with confidence. ‘Like the deep blue sea’.
-‘No sugar?’ the man enquired, hiding a hopeful smile. He was obviously hitting on her.
-‘Maybe’, she said and turned away to inspect the bananas. Someone had written “NASTY COMPANY” in capital letters on the Chiquita box.

The bananas were not yellow enough to be eaten on the spot, but not green enough to be saved for later. Besides, it was past 11 o’clock, anyway, so she had to rule them out. She had an appointment with the hairdresser (the one with sexy dreadlocks, next to Metro Madou) after work and did not want to suffer from stomach cramps while getting her head shaved.

Today is the day, Edina thought. There was a distant smell of fish in the cafeteria.
-‘Well, how many?’ The one-armed man’s smile stretched from ear to ear, as he proudly held onto her cup. You are like the laughing cow cheese, she thought.
-‘Four’, she said, looking straight into his peanut eyes. ‘Today I need it’.
-‘Yes?’ he replied, inviting her to continue the pleasant conversation. Edina took her coffee with a nod, walked towards the cashier and poured several small coins into the swollen palm of a lemon-faced lady. From the corner of her eye, she saw the man waving his one arm while smiling like a knife. Poor man, she thought, and wondered if he had learnt to masturbate with his left hand. Then she walked off, to locate a seat in the buzzing cafeteria.

There was only one seat available, next to the emergency exit.
Good, she thought. In case he really is as grumpy as they say.

Edina sat down and started producing gurgling sounds, deep down her throat in order to chase away the two other people occupying her table.
-‘Grr’, she said, sounding a bit like you would imagine a pigeon on heat.
The couple looked up from their UN resolution and exchanged a look of surprise. The smell of fish was stronger at this side of the cafeteria. Edina looked at her watch that said 15:33. He was four minutes late. Arrogant bastard, she thought and then she made another ‘grr’ sound – this time in a more opposing manner. The young woman in a pinstriped pant suit looked up at Edina, and then over at her bald colleague.
-‘I have to get back’, the pant suit told her resolution-friend.

They left just in time. Edina closed her eyes and started doing breathing exercises, practising her lines silently.

You are the guiding star of the group. A lighthouse; a rock; a hero! We admire you, man – you; your Glass family; your dialogues, and most of all, your bananafish.

-‘Your must be Edina’, someone said, sharp as an alarm clock.
-‘It’s me’ Edina said and opened her eyes slowly.

There he was, alive and kicking, in a yellow poncho and rain hat. More than three fifths of his face was covered with hair; one long eyebrow connecting with sideburns connecting with moustache and beard. She wondered whether the non-trimmed beard connected with his chest-hair while naked.
-‘I’ve heard about you and your guys’, J.D. Salinger whispered, looking around nervously while pronouncing the last word.
-‘Yes’ she replied, inviting him to sit down. ‘We are the guys’.
-‘Who wrote The Conspiracy’ J.D. Salinger filled in. Water was dripping down his triangular shaped hat. It made Edina think of a simple song from childhood: My hat, it has three corners. Three corners, that’s my hat. And if it lacks three corners, then it is not my hat. She never thought hats could have three corners outside the world of nursery rhymes.
-‘Yes’ Edina said, ‘that’s us!’ She tried hard to hold back a laughter boiling from deep down her stomach. One of those laughs that can make rooms tremble; that warm up frozen hearts of cynical grandfathers. Today is the day, she thought.
-‘Let’s talk about it’, J.D. Salinger said with a nothing-like-a-cow smile. ‘I have an idea’.

Resistance is futile

“Walk, keep walking, don’t look back.” I kept repeating that sentence to myself as I made my way down rue Franklin, headed for the Schuman metro station where I was sure I could loose them in the crowd.

There, right in front of me, disguised as a STIB controller was one of them. I wouldn't fall for that old trick; I about to show him that I hadn't wasted my time playing Rugby when I was younger. Fast walking, no, running toward him, ready for battle, I allowed myself to see how it all had started.

Little bastards, thinking they were smarter than me, thinking I wouldn’t notice the signs. Everything began when I came home, right after I had taken it. I knew it was a huge risk to take, so I was very cautious, I looked in the rear view mirror every now and then, checking if the cars behind were behaving the way cars ought to do. I even burned two or three traffic lights, James Bond style.

I was beginning to doubt my sanity when I got home, but there it was, the first signs that they were onto me. The parking spot right in front of my apartment was free. Ha! Ha! That parking spot’s never free. So, I did what any sane person would do and went to park three blocks away and came back on foot, taking big detours. They probably thought I would park there like an unsuspecting idiot so they could plant a bomb under the car and as soon as I started the engine in the morning: BOUM!

Anyways, it’s when I got home that I realised that those after me were no amateurs. Nothing and I mean absolutely nothing was out of place. Everything was where I had left it.

“Oh”, I thought to myself, “they’re good!” Incredible, it was simply amazing how meticulous they had been. Everything they had moved while searching, they had put it exactly as it was, even the frame holding Uncle Nick’s picture, which I had tilted on purpose was still at an angle.

I rushed to the sleeping room without turning any lights on, because A, they probably were bobby trapped and B, even if they weren’t, I was certain that there was a vehicle opposite the street, probably a van full of men armed to the teeth waiting for a sign of my presence to “take care of me”, if you catch my drift.

Ho! Ho, they really had sent the elite after me. The bed was as well made as in the morning when I had left. Well, that is if you omit the C4 under the bed and the motion detectors to trigger it as soon as I sat a foot in the room.

Well, I was about to prove to them that I was no amateur myself. I slept in on the hard bathroom floor that night.

Uncomfortable? Yes! But I woke up alive.

Kill your darlings

‘Since I turned sixty, I’m not afraid anymore. For what should I be afraid of? What is still there that is worth the dread of loosing it? I learned to live in peace with all that needs to leave or perish or die out. And now I’m afraid again. But I’m not afraid for myself. I’m afraid for someone I am responsible for. Not for the waiter, not for the fat family, and not for the lady with the head like a bullet... there, in the corner with the saddest child..’
He points at the woman whose head resembles a bullet, and sips from his coffee.
‘But I’m afraid for you.’
The girl doesn’t know what to say. She sets her t-shirt right, regretting that she put on such a deeply cloven top this morning. Is he blackmailing her? She agreed on having coffee with him because it would not have been strategic to say no to her creative writing professor after she sent him to hell and far beyond, drunk at the party of the literature department, when he invited her to his flat to discuss her grade.
‘What are you afraid of?’ she asks, staring at the fat family at the neighboring table: the father just refused to offer ice cream and sympathy for his only child who is now making up his mind to have another nervous breakdown – the third today and it’s only three in the afternoon. For he is young, he doesn’t mind: he still has plenty of nerves to break down. The mother is good, non-judgmental; too busy with her heavy breathing.
The professor raises his eyebrows, he is not here to share the attention of the girl with some side characters and the fat father takes a fifty euros note out of his wallet, leaves it on the table and walks away abruptly. His folks follow him with marble eyes and no discussion. Thirty euros tip is enormous but so is the family, the waiter thinks and smiles goodbye.
‘As you might know, having read all my books and attended my seminars, that I’m not one of those idiots who talks about conspiracy theories, like the Tel Aviv, London, New York plot or the nine eleven folklore. What I’m talking about is true, relevant and terrifying. And above all, it can be proven. When could you really relax for the last time?’
‘I don’t remember,’ the girl says and sets her T-shirt even righter.
She sits right and talks the truth: she doesn’t remember. There is always something to worry about. She dries her sweaty palms on her jeans and looks around, hoping for the waiter. But there is no movement in the whole venue whatsoever, and the place looks smaller than before. Where is the bullet lady with the sad infant? And the old Moroccan guy and the deaf toy speculator? She didn’t see them leaving.
‘You might think that this nervousness is in your nature’, the professor continues. ‘But what if someone is keeping you insecure? You are about to graduate, you look at the job sites and there are hardly any ads apart from non-paid internships. You think that there are no jobs on the market. But what if there are no ads because someone is hiding them from you?’
The girl is sitting hunched up, staring at her thumb that is drawing circles on the napkin. A bystander couldn’t tell if she is listening or not, but the professor knows that she is listening. He must be right, for who could know it better?
‘What if someone wants you to feel anxious and uses all the tools he has to keep you feel insecure? And what if he has all the possible tools? You believe that the financial crisis is actually happening. But what if someone invented it to make you feel more worried? What if the economy is going very well? What if the environment never felt better? You take the climate change for granted, and the elections in Iran...
‘What about the elections in Iran?’
‘It’s not true.’ The professor whispers. ‘It didn’t happen.’
‘What didn’t happen?’
‘Iran didn’t happen.’
The girl shakes her head and makes a numb attempt to laugh. The professor looks around and sees exactly that he wants to see: no one. He is still whispering, for the effect rather than for any reasonable reason.
‘And do you remember that last month your boyfriend broke up with you after a fight over biscuits and blowjobs?’
‘Of course I remember.’ The girl rubs her forehead. ‘But how the hell do you know about it? Did someone from the class...?'
‘It didn’t happen.’
‘What didn’t happen?’
‘You didn’t break up, because you had no one to break up with. You haven’t had a relationship for years. There was no boyfriend.’
‘God. You are crazy.’
‘Are we becoming personal here, is that what’s happening? Do you think I am crazy? What if you are crazy? Do you want to go crazy?’
‘Leave me alone. Please. Just leave me alone.’
The girl tries to stand up but the professor grabs her wrist.
‘Last Saturday. You were rather impolite if I may say.'
‘You know what, you miserable, horny old fuck?’ the girl’s eyes widen and her voice is now high pitched. It sounds like a sheep in labor, the professor notes down as the girl goes on ‘You go and fuck yourself and leave me alone...’
The voice dies out.
'You look pale.' The professor says gently. 'Do you feel rather unstable lately?'
The girl shakes her head almost invisibly.
'Let me go.'
'Do you feel sometimes that it would be nice to fall asleep and not wake up?'
'Cut the crap, please..' Her voice is begging.
'I will cut the crap, dear.' The professor nods. 'It's time to cut the crap. I tell you the truth why I'm here.'
The girl looks up, and there is a hint of hope in the red eyes: was this scene just some crazy writing experiment? And the professor says:
'I'm the messiah, sent to you by the God of writing.' He chuckles and winks and then he stays silent for a second. The girl is speechless for what could be said to such nonsense?
'And I was sent here to tell you that you will never be a writer. You will never be a writer because you don't even have a story yourself. Once I thought you were worth a story, once I had big plans with you – but you made me change my mind. You didn't live up to my expectations. You disappointed me. I was fooled by my instinct: you are not worth mentioning. You are expelled, dear.'
The professor lets go of her wrist and the girl doesn’t try to stand up.
‘What a sorrowful end after such a promising beginning.’ The professor finishes the last sentence, pays for his coffee and leaves the girl with eyes wide open in the cafe, frozen for eternity in such a nasty surprise.

A conspiracy theory?

Everyone is talking about my new boss. They say she is not quite what she makes herself out to be. She is not corrupt or anything; no unpaid TV licenses or undeclared ownership of multinational companies. She is not licking God’s arse to be liked; she is not smiling to convince her team to work for her. She is not stupid. It’s just I think she is a man.

The first day I met her, she was wearing a dark green combat suit. I said hello and then I did not find anything else to say but “oh, that is a combat suit”. She said “yes”, quite militantly and without a smile. I wanted to ask her how her weekend was, but the combat suit killed it for me. Her thin Scandinavian hair looked even shorter than on the images I had seen of her on Google. Why do middle-aged women cut their hair short? Is it because it stops growing; or because they want to distinguish themselves from youth; from young pretty girls?

I am not the only one to believe that Mrs C is actually Mr H. My colleague in the legal service told me she’d heard it was a way for Mrs C to slip in, unnoticed, into the unfilled female quota of the College. I know it’s true that God from the 13^th floor addressed the leaders of our continent with the following words: “Dear men and leaders of our continent, this year it is women or nothing. Give me women, and in return I will offer you the reign over our farms, fish and tractors; our crisis, crowns and wastelands.

Blackmailing? I guess you could call it such. But the thing is, it really seemed to have worked. Suddenly everyone and their dog in the governments of our continent wanted to be a woman. Women with fake breasts or nasty surprises in the crotch region after sharing the lift with a long-legged blonde stagiaire. Or real female flesh and blood; flabby middle-aged lady flesh. God didn’t care about which – as long as you could label yourself woman.

Against this, it may seem like showing up in a combat suit is sort of taking unnecessary risks. You know, suspicions confirmed; masculinity declared.

But “Mrs C” is smarter than that. I have only known her for five days but I already know she only does things for a reason. My secretary thinks she is using inverse psychology, you know like telling everyone I’m so much like a man that you would never guess I’m really a man. Some might wonder whether a combat suit is appropriate when you will work on immigration issues. I don’t know, maybe I’m exaggerating. Maybe there is nothing fishy in Mrs C’s pants. Maybe this is all a big conspiracy theory created by those rumour-spreading media bastards. They have nothing to write about, and so – POOF – they create a transvestite amongst the future rulers of our continent.

Conspiracy Theory 21/01/2010 [Quique]

My writing-on-the-spot exercise came out like this:

-------------------

'You know how the European Commission is just an institution created by different governments to centralize control on the population?' - said the foul-smelling guy that was sitting next to me at Café Central.
'Hm-hmm' - I said, not paying him much attention. I had other things in my mind, like how I fucked up that mind-control experiment last week.
I took a sip from my now cold coffee and went over the events in my mind one more time.
There were seven subjects in that experiment, two women and five men. No, it wasn't discrimination, it's just that the female mind is harder to control.
We lost a man the second day, because his mind was overcrowded and finally his sinaptic connections couldn't hold and his brain shut off. Just like that.
None of the others died, but both women and three of the men became idiots. No mind to control means no interest to us, so the agency made them disappear.
There was one man left and our hope laid in his shoulders. We were beginning to make things he didn't want to, the final objective of every mind-control program.
But now he has escaped.
And we don't know how.

*****

The man with the hat looked across the Grand Place. It was summer in Brussels and the square was vibrating with visitors and inhabitants from the most varied countries.
He spotted the man quite easily. He was wearing a black suit and sunglasses, the uniform from all the secret agencies all over the globe. How do they expect to remain secret if they all dress the same way? It's stupid!
He turned around to his companion and pointed to the man in black.
'It's that guy, Viktor.' - he said.
'How can you be so sure?' - Viktor replied - 'Has he been following you?'
'I can't be sure if it was him, but I've seen other suits on my way here' - the man answered.
'I saw no-one after I rescued you from the underground levels of the Berlaymont building.'
'That doesn't mean they weren't there.'
'I think you're just being paranoid.' - Viktor said, rolling his eyes upwards.
The man with no name swore under his breath. Then grabbed Viktor by the shoulders and started shouting almost soundlessly.
'How can I make you understand?! They are conducting experiments! They kept us in cells! A man died and five people became effectively brainless!'
'And how can you prove that?' - Viktor asked calmly.
'I saw it with my own eyes!' - The man was visibly excited and his voice was becoming louder.
'That's no proof' - Viktor said - 'You may be crazy.'
'AAAARH!' - shouted the man in desperation.

When the man in black was handcuffing Subject 4, Viktor had already vanished.

*****

We finally have found and recovered Subject 4. He's in a cell, but we haven't resumed the tests yet. We are trying to find out if he has talked to anyone about all this. But he refuses to talk.
I go out to the Schuman rond-point and, once in the little garden in the middle of it, I take out the recently bought disposable mobile phone.
I book the services of a professional interrogator. He should be here in about half an hour.
The sun is reflecting on the Berlaymont building, but this time it doesn't give me hope.
I'm worried.
Has he talked?
Who with?

The Devil Inside.

Thirteen years have passed

And his hair is now grey.

Thirteen years in a cell

Was what he had to pay.

Murder was not easy on his mind

But the burden was not his alone:

Half was taken by the devil

That lived inside his own.

He was granted a small house

After his release back to the street.

Rehabilitation had been assumed

But the devil was back on his feet.

He fought it with all his might

As its hold on him was strong;

He gathered all his will although

He knew he couldn't resist long.

They found him in the bath

Water, blood and porcelain white

Open veins and pale his face:

The devil inside had lost the fight.