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InterText Vol. 9, No. 4 / July-August 1999 
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  Contents

    Baby Girl.....................................William Routhier

    The Worlds of My Desire............................Stephen Doe

    The Camel Story..................................Melanie Dixon

    The Posticheur....................................David Appell

....................................................................
    Editor                                     Assistant Editor
    Jason Snell                                    Geoff Duncan
    jsnell@intertext.com                    geoff@intertext.com
....................................................................
    Submissions Panelists:
    John Coon, Pat D'Amico, Darby M. Dixon, Joe Dudley,
    Diane Filkorn, Morten Lauritsen, Bruce Ligget, Rachel Mathis,
    Heather Timer, Lee Anne Smith, Jason Snell, Jake Swearingen
....................................................................
    Send correspondence to editors@intertext.com or 
    intertext@intertext.com 
.................................................................... 
  InterText Vol. 9, No. 4. InterText (ISSN 1071-7676) is published 
  electronically on a bi-monthly basis. Reproduction of this 
  magazine is permitted as long as the magazine is not sold 
  (either by itself or as part of a collection) and the entire 
  text of the issue remains unchanged. Copyright 1999 Jason Snell. 
  All stories Copyright 1999 by their respective authors. For more 
  information about InterText, send a message to 
  info@intertext.com. For submission guidelines, send a message to 
  guidelines@intertext.com.
....................................................................



  Baby Girl   by William Routhier
=================================
....................................................................
  How can you even begin to describe the ways a parent affects a 
  child's life?
....................................................................

  So there I am driving down the highway, she's beside me in the 
  front seat making little baby noises, strapped into the 
  kid-driving-seat thing I bought special for the occasion, and I 
  see the sign and I think, all right, _this_ is still New 
  Hampshire... here comes Massachusetts... state line, automatic 
  federal case. You're in it all the way now. I mean, it's not 
  like I didn't know what I was doing, but I'm thinking, well, 
  here I am, deep shit again.

  All I wanted was to be with my baby girl, that's all. There was 
  no sense in mulling over consequences at that point. When a 
  thing's done, it's done, and you deal with it strictly on those 
  terms. Any other way of looking at life just makes you crazy.

  For custody the court was gonna side with Donna, naturally. All 
  it would take was one look at my sheet. Done time twice, 
  numerous arrests. Assault with a deadly weapon. Repeat offender, 
  career type. Yep.

  He said I have a low boredom threshold, one of the prison 
  shrinks. Hyperactive, starting when I was a kid. Too smart to be 
  content with a normal life, basically insecure, and needing to 
  prove myself on a large scale, like, with society in general. 
  Problem with authority, stemming from a bad relationship with my 
  old man. Yeah, you might say that.

  So his advice was, when I got out after my eight months or 
  whatever, if I wanted to change, I'd have to find a proper 
  outlet for my excessive brainwave activity. Higher aspirations, 
  loftier goals, maybe think about returning to college, take up 
  philosophy, dentistry, archeology. Become a lawyer. Then, after 
  I finish, pay off all the loans, by the time I'm fifty, I can 
  start earning a decent living. This is advice he gives to a guy 
  they know has a low boredom threshold. This is an expert.

  Hey, everybody carves their own niche in life, you know? You 
  make it however you can, put together what works. I don't say 
  I'm a prize, but I'd never do anything to hurt my little girl. I 
  want the best for her. But you think any judge is going to see 
  things that way?

  Yeah, sure, I'm dangerous. Christ, I know it, I've been around 
  myself longer than anyone else, right? Yeah, get in the way, 
  wrong day, wrong place, and I'm dangerous. But does that mean 
  I'd hurt my daughter? Fuck no.

  So I'm driving, feeling good enough, Jennie sitting there 
  looking out the window at things going by. I turn on the radio, 
  a slow country heartbreaker comes on, weepy steel guitar, and 
  she just beams at the sound of it. My heart leaps and I think, 
  well, she's got her old man's good taste in music, anyhow.

  See, people paint you all one color. Oh, he's a criminal, pushes 
  drugs, shot a guy in a 7-11. It sure was lucky for Bobby the guy 
  didn't die, or he'd still be up the river and not out on the 
  street.

  Well, yeah, okay, I did it. I got reasons. Maybe I came into 
  this world a little bit bent out of shape from the start. Try 
  living through what my old man did to me, when you're a kid and 
  don't know shit, get smacked on the back with a two-by-four, ten 
  years old, 'cause you didn't clean up the garage good enough. 
  Get locked in the cellar for a weekend for talking back. 
  Watching him do worse shit to your Mom. Then tell me how you 
  feel about the world in general.

  So when you're someone like me who never had, what you'd call a 
  fair shot, you find out something else. People can smell it on 
  you like dog shit on shoes. They can see it in your eyes, the 
  fear you have just saying hello to an adult. They just say 
  you're an unbalanced individual, but you're more like a scared 
  animal. And people make judgements, say things behind your back 
  about you, and this is when you might still have some 
  vulnerability left, full of pain, hurt and hatred, maybe, but 
  still got them tender young feelings, right?

  So what do you get? Understanding? Nah. Judgement.

  Do you know what judgement is? Judgement's a stone wall. You can 
  hit it with a rock, you can bash it with a baseball bat, you can 
  run up against it with your head until your brains are on the 
  floor and that wall will stay there just like it was, not busted 
  up even a tiny bit. That's when you start getting the idea the 
  only thing that will knock Judgement down is something big 
  enough to get everybody's attention. Something like dynamite.

  You meet a new neighbor kid's mother who shuts her door in your 
  face after saying go home and don't ever come back because 
  you're one of them Gilkins and she heard about you and she don't 
  want you playin' with Jimmy and you run away crying but secretly 
  in your heart agree with her that you're no good. Or there's 
  some chick, when you're a little older, and she flirts you along 
  until you're half crazy and when you finally get to her front 
  door for a date and her old man who tells you screw, he's heard 
  things about you from the cops and there's no way in hell he'll 
  ever let you alone with his daughter. _Slam._

  See, it makes you feel testy, makes you sort of surly. Anything 
  good that ever happened to me happened because I pried the lid 
  off the sucker with a crowbar and stole the goods. So. Now that 
  I got a bit more leverage in this world, I'm supposed to let my 
  baby girl be taken away, just like that?

  Who would've known how much Donna would change after having 
  Jennie? I mean, it used to be I'd come home with five grand and 
  a quarter key of coke, she'd be as happy as me. Well, first few 
  times, she'd be acting nervous, talking scared and sensible, 
  whine about the risk, stomping around, but in the corner of her 
  mouth there was a little curl-up, you know? She was itchy and 
  into the danger, I could tell, the thrill, the money, Jesus, of 
  course the money, and the "dangerous-but-smart man doing 
  dangerous-but-serious money-making things" turn on, and before 
  you could say boo we'd be knocking the chairs aside and doing it 
  right there on the kitchen floor, she'd be so wet and open I'd 
  be sliding in and out like a schoolboy and I'd grab her cheeks 
  and go slapping her on the linoleum until we both screamed like 
  someone was cutting our throats. That's when it was good, me and 
  Donna, that was our honeymoon time.

  Then, for some reason -- "Because of Jennie," she said -- it all 
  had to stop. Okay, Bobby, you have to get a real job and cut 
  this shit. Huh? Am I hearing you right? I have to get another 
  job? Since when are you in charge of me? Oh, for the sake of the 
  baby. Okay, well, let's look at this. I have a prison record, so 
  that leaves out politics. And just about everything else. Okay, 
  how's about me working as a bouncer someplace, breaking my 
  knuckles for chump money, never have enough to be able to really 
  save anything, like for college for our girl, probably not even 
  enough to afford health insurance, for Christ's sake.

  This is Donna being sensible.

  I know! I can ask down at the McDonald's if they have any local 
  outreach programs and maybe give me a whirl at burger flipping. 
  A couple of years, and it's straight on up to manager, then 
  maybe ten more and I buy the place and they make us into a 
  rehabilitation story on 60 Minutes. Jesus.

  It's like, we have a kid and reality suddenly goes flying out 
  the window. Can't have this stuff going on around the baby. 
  Okay, Donna, relax, I agree, hey, no problem. Honest. I keep 
  everything away from home, won't even talk about it, when she 
  gets old enough I'll tell her I have a number of different 
  businesses. We'll make something up. I'm in construction. How's 
  about that? I can see no trouble there. And maybe sometime in 
  the future I will be able to go straight, but not just yet. I 
  got to keep working out these various angles I'm into. The 
  timing's wrong.

  She won't settle for that. She says something's changed. She 
  says she sees things differently now. She says I got to get 
  straight. Real soon. For the sake of the baby.

  Then one day she's gone. And Jennie's gone. I go out, come home, 
  they're gone. My wife. My kid.

  My kid. See, the important word here is my kid. Donna, she's 
  like everybody, she's got me all one color. She thinks I'm gonna 
  corrupt Jennie, like I'm gonna make her into a monster, as if 
  anything could sour that sweet baby, least of all me who loves 
  her. Hell, I want to spoil her awful. But Donna thinks I got to 
  drain all the color out of me that she don't like, all the old 
  James, that's what I need to do to fix things. Like after I do 
  that I'm still gonna be me. Fuck that. I'm what I am. One piece. 
  Good or bad, like it or don't. I won't be cut open, gutted like 
  a fish, stuffed and sewed up and told I'm better now. That's a 
  dead man. That's nothing. That's what all the good people would 
  like me to be.

  So I stole my baby back. One good turn. I'm driving and thinking 
  and Jennie's looking around, flexing her little hands the way 
  kids do, smiling, happy. Thirteen months old and I haven't even 
  seen her for ten. Man, it's still like she just jetted in from 
  some place where they go on Star Trek, you know? Her eyes, those 
  eyes, right from some deep sleep, fresh out of the universe, 
  man, it's like they were washed in a magic pool that gives them 
  a shine nothing on this earth could ever take away. Yeah, sure. 
  But, like, this here is my kid, man, that's the difference this 
  time. She's gonna keep that shine in her eyes if I have any 
  fucking thing to do with it. Damned if I'm not going to make 
  sure she's treated right and gets everything a little girl 
  should have and doesn't ever want for a thing, never ends up 
  holding the short end like yours truly.

  Donna's not always too bright. I wouldn't trust what kind of guy 
  she might end up with. I didn't care about her leaving me, I 
  mean, I was already getting sick of her. So that I didn't really 
  mind, though it pissed me off she was the one breaking it off. 
  After she took off with Jennie, she calls, finally, a couple of 
  days later. Okay, you want to split up, fine, I say. Oh, you say 
  you've got a restraining order and you're going to court for 
  custody and are going to keep me from having any contact with my 
  baby? Ahhh. Not so fine.

  So we wait and wait and then we go to court and they say I can't 
  see her, can't see my baby girl. I'm deemed an unfit parent. Not 
  that I had any arrests or violations lately. The past was 
  enough. She talked about cocaine in the house and some other 
  deals I was involved with recently. Allegedly.

  So the judge judged me guilty. What else is new?

  And at first I let it go, said fuck it, even though I'm burning 
  inside, I let it go, for months and then one day I say no, I 
  can't let it go no more.

  Jennie's not crying, even after an hour on the road. I figured 
  she would be, but she's not, seems happy as hell, cooing and 
  looking around out the window interested at things, guess she 
  still remembers and likes her Daddy, fuck you, Donna.

  All I'd figured out at this point was I'd sneak her with me into 
  a motel someplace and then think about what to do next. What I 
  didn't think of was her shitting her drawers so quick. Then she 
  started crying. Okay, I find a CVS. Get the Pampers, pull into a 
  Burger King on the highway, check the lot out for State cops, 
  bring her with me into the men's room with the box of the 
  things, everybody smiling at me, nice daddy. Change her in the 
  stall, she's bawling and it's not real easy and it stinks, but 
  we do it, dump it, clean her up, put a new one on and she's 
  happy now, I get her a soft ice-cream cup, and we drive out 
  safe.

  I'm in a rental. I'm not worried about being spotted because I 
  took it out on the primo credit card I'd been saving for just 
  such an occasion. It's a card copy, valid magnetic tape, 
  cross-checked social security number on the matching I.D., 
  forged signatures, the whole bit. This inside guy at the credit 
  card company does them. I got turned on to the racket by a mafia 
  friend of mine. They do things right. Clean. With them it's 
  strictly business. My kind of people, except for the paisan 
  thing. They're a little bit... what I'd call exclusive.

  Anyway, the card holder never has his card stolen, so he doesn't 
  think there's anything wrong, has no way of knowing I've got a 
  little vacuum hose attached to his account until the charges 
  show up at the end of the month. It's perfect. Plenty of lead 
  time. Just don't make any strange withdrawals. So I wasn't 
  worried about being tracked.

  I'm pretty sure no one saw me going into the apartment Donna was 
  holed up at. That was a beauty too. This cop I'm friends with 
  found out about her case, got into the file and checked where 
  they relocated her. He owed me. I bailed his ass out of a touchy 
  matter once, eliminated a certain problem. He was sympathetic 
  besides, has kids and knows what cruel bitches women can be. I 
  cased her house from a hill half a mile away with binoculars. I 
  felt bad about tying up the old lady who was taking care of 
  Jennie while Donna was out, but it was just duct tape and 
  clothesline, and she wasn't all that old. I'm sure she was all 
  right. I wore a gas company hat and that fooled her. Jesus. Some 
  people are so dumb it's criminal.

  Jennie sleeps, wakes up, cries a little, I give her this 
  pacifier I bought and she's happy again. I drive, and when it's 
  night I find a Red Roof Inn and rent a room. I got on glasses 
  and I'm wearing a Red Sox hat to cover my hair, I got my fake 
  I.D. and credit card, I'm not doing anything high profile, so 
  far so good, we're still okay, I'm feeling all right. I carry 
  her around to the room without anybody seeing us.

  I put her on the bed -- she'd peed her diaper. I change it, and 
  she's real sleepy and not sure what's going on, so I put her 
  under the blanket and she seems happy about that and she's out 
  cold instantly, sleeping like a goddamned baby, you know, and so 
  I go out quick, just down the street to the liquor store for a 
  fifth of Jack Daniels. I'm gone only, like, less than five 
  minutes, and coming back I'm jumping out of my car running up to 
  the room, my hand shaking putting the key in, thinking she woke 
  up and is touching the electric outlet, smashing the little 
  glass in the bathroom cutting herself even though she couldn't 
  reach it. She's strangling herself choking under the covers.

  I flip on the light and she's just like she was, little sleeping 
  face. I put out the light, turn on the bathroom light, take the 
  paper off the glass and pour a good long shot.

  I sit there on the chair beside the bed looking at my baby girl. 
  She doesn't know what any of this means. She's innocent, 
  beautiful, a blank slate. I'm considering that I was probably 
  something like that before my old man got to me. I'm staring at 
  her and I know it's just me thinking but it's suddenly like 
  she's worrying in her sleep, and then I'm thinking tomorrow 
  sometime she'll look at me wondering what the hell's going on 
  here, and she's gonna wonder where her momma is and start 
  crying. And we'll be moving all the time, driving, I'll be 
  changing her diapers and trying to keep her quiet with 
  McDonald's and eventually she'll be crying all the time 'cause 
  her momma isn't there and I won't know what the fuck to do.

  A streak of anger shoots up, from the liquor I guess, but I'm 
  suddenly feeling real mean about this whole thing. Something 
  flips over like a card you weren't expecting in a poker game, a 
  loser card. It seems no matter what, I can't ever get it to work 
  how I want, that's how it hits me. This anger rages red hot, and 
  I want to hurt her bad, hurt the baby, just for what I know it 
  would do to Donna. I hold myself in check then the room goes 
  dark, I don't know for how long. When it comes back into focus, 
  I'm afraid to look down, actually, for what I might see. But 
  she's there sleeping, peaceful, just like before.

  That split second, I know something about my old man, about him 
  drawing the loser card, always, about the things he couldn't 
  ever beat or understand, and suddenly I get this weird rush of 
  sympathy, warmth for the bastard. At the same time I can feel 
  him inside my gut twisting it, telling me how good I'll feel, 
  trying to force me to do something I absolutely don't want to. 
  I'm shaking hands with the devil and I know it. He smiles. 
  Winks. My body's shaking. I suck in some air, sneer at him, say 
  "Fuck off, old man, I ain't you. Fuck off and die," and I drink 
  another one. Then I'm all right, I get back my control.

  I stroke her head and pretty soon I fall asleep.

  In the morning before dawn I call the cops from the phone booth 
  outside the motel, tell them where my baby girl is, tell them 
  she's fine, sleeping, then I beat it quick right out onto the 
  highway, drive west, try not to think. A thing's done, it's 
  done. Go. Just go. I love my baby girl. That's worth something. 
  I know it is.


  William Routhier (wrouthier@aol.com)
--------------------------------------
  William Routhier lives in Boston and has written for Stuff 
  Magazine, The Improper Bostonian, The Boston Book Review, and 
  Living Buddhism; his fiction has appeared in Happy and atelier. 
  He is currently working on a novel and a book of essays.



  The Worlds of My Desire   by Stephen Doe
==========================================
....................................................................
  An active fantasy life isn't always such a healthy thing.
....................................................................

  All Gaul was divided into three parts -- and I was about to lose 
  them all. Which was _not_ the way it was supposed to happen.

  I was reliving the conquest of Gaul (the interesting parts, 
  anyway), and for a while things had gone my way. I had just 
  taken command, you might say, of the armies of Caesar, when the 
  Aedui -- treacherous brutes -- renounced their alliance, took my 
  base at Soissons, and prepared to drive me back to my -- I mean, 
  Caesar's -- province. All of which had my men mightily 
  disturbed, stoic Romans that they were.

  The situation looked grim, but of course I knew what was to come 
  next -- the conquest of Gaul, and later, Rome. But I wasn't 
  interested in that part at the moment. As Caesar had once done, 
  I gave orders to march on Alesia, where word had it that an army 
  of Gauls was gathering.

  And as I had wanted, I found myself caught up in the moment: the 
  desperate march of an embattled army, racing through country 
  filled with foes -- quite exhilarating, even though I always 
  knew, deep down, that I was never going to be in any physical 
  danger at all. When was the last time you were truly hurt by 
  your fantasy?

  Things began to go wrong after we reached Alesia.

  My army and that of the Gauls were of about the same size; that 
  made the Gauls reluctant to fight. Instead, they holed up in 
  their city, hoping that help would arrive. So far, I had 
  followed known history to the letter (even though that was not 
  really necessary). As my army laid siege to the town, I called 
  my lieutenants together, to prepare for the great battle to 
  come.

  I had just had my headquarters set up -- a big, leather tent, 
  half my living quarters, the other half a workspace, mostly 
  taken up by a large table covered with maps of Gaul and recent 
  dispatches. A half-dozen of my aides and I were seated around 
  this table, discussing tactics, when a messenger rushed in, 
  still breathing heavily.

  "There's an army of Gauls coming," he gasped. "And it's _big_."

  I raised an eyebrow. I knew this army would come, but this was 
  sooner than I expected. "How many?" I asked.

  "Almost two hundred thousand," he said, wincing.

  One of the officers -- I didn't see which one -- gave a low 
  whistle at this figure. Mostly they remained calm, but I could 
  see by the flicker of their eyes that the messenger had 
  certainly gained their attention.

  "General?" said the one seated to my immediate left.

  "Yes, Marcus Antonius?" I don't remember if Mark Antony had 
  actually been there or not, in history, but it pleased my fancy 
  to think that he might have been.

  "I hate to say this, but perhaps we ought to retreat. The men 
  will fight to their last breath, of course, but against so 
  many..." He left it there, clearly uncomfortable.

  I frowned; it seemed out of character for Mark Antony to make 
  such a suggestion. (Though of course, he was a good general in 
  his own right, and was perfectly capable of counting.) At any 
  rate, it jarred my suspension of disbelief, and I didn't like 
  making mistakes like that.

  So I sighed, and said, "That would indeed be prudent. However, 
  we have already been forced to retreat once. All of Gaul is now 
  in open revolt. If we retreat now, we have lost Gaul. And we 
  must not lose Gaul -- at the very least, Gaul must serve as a 
  buffer against the Germans. Not to mention that the Gauls have 
  shown themselves capable of attacking Rome on their own account. 
  Gaul must be pacified, and it must be pacified now." Then I 
  smiled at them. "Do not fear too much, men -- remember that 
  Caesar's fortune is with you."

  The men filed out, unexpectedly cheerful at that pronouncement. 
  They really believed that stuff.

  Now, what happened in real history was that Caesar's army 
  sandwiched themselves between two walls of earth, the inner wall 
  surrounding the city, which was still besieged, and the outer 
  defending against the Gauls coming to lay siege to the present 
  besiegers. After about a week of futile attacks, the Gauls 
  outside gave up and left, being relatively feckless and low on 
  supplies. The starving Gauls inside the siege then gave up their 
  chieftain, and Gaul was from then on territory of Rome.

  Well, this time it didn't turn out like that at all.

  My hackles went up immediately when I saw how quiet and 
  disciplined they were. In previous battles, I had seen them wild 
  and barbaric, reckless, quick to attack but also quick to run 
  away when outnumbered or outfought. These Gauls took their time 
  arraying themselves against our ramparts, waiting for the word 
  to attack.

  Then all at once they charged us, silently. They usually 
  screamed bloody murder. Two hundred thousand screaming Gauls 
  would have been bad enough, but this was worse, somehow. The way 
  they charged, all in step together, and silent, like zombies -- 
  truly creepy.

  Then they opened up on us. With rifles.

  Can you picture a barbaric Gaul, trousered, wearing torcs and 
  ornaments of gold, hair and beard streaming behind him as he 
  charges you -- with a fucking _rifle_ in his hands?

  I despise anachronisms. Some people enjoy them, but God, I hate 
  them.

  And now I have to admit that I am really no general. By the time 
  I caught my breath, half my army had been mowed down, with 
  hardly a Gaul injured. Even when a Gaul did go down, felled by 
  the occasional javelin or arrow, the others paid no mind, but 
  just kept firing. And just then those bastards _inside_ the city 
  charged out to join the battle. And yes, they had rifles too.

  Up until now, I had done nothing really extraordinary, aside 
  from re-creating the battle in the first place. Now, I did what 
  I could to resist the Gauls, though the attack was so swift the 
  battle was already nearly lost.

  I found that if I concentrated, hard, on a group of my soldiers, 
  the bullets would do them no harm, and they could attack the 
  Gauls. But there were still just too many barbarians attacking, 
  and I couldn't focus on all my soldiers at once. Here and there, 
  desperate bands of soldiers held out for a time; but there was 
  no victory to be had here, only a brave death.

  Inside an hour, the battle was over, lost. I was the only Roman 
  left standing. All the others were dead.

  The Gauls didn't celebrate, though. In fact, they made little 
  noise at all; they just slung their rifles over their shoulders 
  and began drifting away.

  Except for two, who approached me, rifles trained on my 
  midsection. Not that weapons would do them any good against me 
  -- I had already been through the thick of the battle, 
  unscathed.

  "Come with us," said one.

  "Where?" I said.

  "Our leader would meet with you."

  "Your leader, eh?" I said, sardonically. I had a pretty good 
  idea who this might be.

  After a moment, I said, "All right. I have a few things to say 
  to him myself." Outwardly calm, I had the desire to commit 
  serious mayhem on their busybody leader.

  "Follow us," they said, and we left the field of carnage. It all 
  seemed to dissolve into mist behind us as we walked.

  Gradually, we approached a cluster of tents -- one of the Gallic 
  camps, no doubt. It had been bright and sunny out, but as we 
  approached the camp the sky seemed to become more overcast and 
  gloomy. A perfect match to my mood.

  We passed through the camp. I saw more silent Gauls about, 
  eating, drinking, some incongruously cleaning their weapons. As 
  sour as my mood was, I had to grin wryly at that.

  The largest tent seemed to be the headquarters of their leader. 
  Two men, big even for Gauls, guarded the entrance. One of them 
  nodded to my escort as we passed within.

  Two tent flaps had been pulled back to light the interior. There 
  were two more big Gauls, flanking a crude wooden chair. And 
  seated on this chair was a rather small man, clean-shaven 
  (unlike the Gauls), leaning back in rumpled tweed, eyes 
  twinkling at the sight of me, clearly pleased with himself.

  I felt like decking him. Instead, I let my breath out in one 
  long, exasperated sigh, and said, "Dr. Friedman."

  "Hello, Dan." Then he said, a bit melodramatically, "So, we meet 
  again!"

  I couldn't help it; I had to wince at that awful old line. The 
  man just has no imagination at all.



  The first time I met Dr. Friedman, I was building a city in 
  ancient Egypt.

  I was being Pharaoh for a little while. I had begun at Cairo -- 
  not actually an Egyptian city, but I wasn't being picky about 
  historical accuracy -- and passed through it to the road leading 
  to the Pyramids; I stood on the summit of the Great Pyramid of 
  Cheops for a long time, gazing out over the sand. I also saw the 
  Sphinx -- I didn't like that it didn't have its nose, so I put 
  the nose back on. Then I sailed down the Nile at my leisure, 
  down to Memphis, the most ancient capital of Egypt, then to 
  Luxor, and finally down to Karnak, sixty acres of the mightiest 
  temples ever dedicated to any gods. And everywhere I went, I 
  made Egypt look not as it does now, but as it must have in its 
  days of glory. I strained my imagination to the limit. And when 
  I returned to Upper Egypt, I decided to try building my own 
  city. Why not? It was my Egypt; it was my dream.

  I assembled a typical complement of slaves and granite blocks 
  and architects, but I could see right away that building my city 
  would take about twenty years. Well, that wouldn't do; so I made 
  some of the slaves "super size," and made the others work much, 
  much more quickly than humanly possible. The city began to grow 
  before my very eyes.

  By noon, I could see the outlines of my city. The giants were 
  stacking up great blocks of granite, and the other slaves were 
  blurs of motion, raising obelisks and covering every available 
  surface with hieroglyphics. There was going to be a great wall 
  around the city when it was done, with sphinxes guarding every 
  gate, temples and palaces faced with marble and filled with 
  gold, lush and intricate gardens crammed with statuary, and 
  beyond the city walls, to the west, solemn tombs suitable for 
  the greatest of long-dead kings. A fitting city in every way for 
  a Pharaoh, and one I would explore by evening, perhaps.

  That's about when Dr. Friedman arrived.

  He came dressed as an explorer -- khaki shirt and shorts, pith 
  helmet. Very similar to what I was wearing, really. I suppose we 
  both looked out of place, what with all the slaves running about 
  in their loincloths, and the overseers and architects in their 
  Egyptian gear, but I couldn't bear to put on the Pharaoh outfit 
  in this heat (I honestly didn't think of lowering the heat at 
  the time). This guy who just didn't belong was coming right 
  toward me. I supposed I would hear his story before long.

  I frowned. When I bought the dream chip, I had been warned that 
  things like this might happen. "The Ultimate in Virtual 
  Reality," they had called it, and the implant almost lived up to 
  its hype. But, I had been warned, occasionally my subconscious 
  would spontaneously throw up images out of sync with my dreams. 
  Obviously, this man was such a character.

  I watched all this from a seat upon a high dais I had made. 
  There were seats for maybe two or three people, and a low table 
  upon which rested a tray of suitably royal delicacies, and of 
  course my queen sat beside me, watching the city rise. _She_ 
  didn't seem to mind the heat, royal outfit or no.

  My new arrival walked right up and sat down next to me, without 
  even asking, which annoyed me to no end. "Hello, Dan," he said.

  I drew myself up haughtily. "Who are you, to address Pharaoh as 
  a familiar?" I felt I had to stay in character, even with this 
  oddball.

  He smiled at me, and spent a few minutes checking out my city. 
  Up close, I could see that he was actually a short, wiry guy, 
  with moist, brown eyes that seemed to bug out slightly. 
  Actually, he looked a little bit like me, even if you don't 
  consider the explorer outfit. "That's quite a city," he said, 
  finally.

  "It will be."

  "I'll bet the real Egyptians could have used a few of those 
  fellows," he said, pointing to one of my giants.

  "They seemed to do all right on their own."

  "I suppose they did at that."

  "You know," I said, "you really don't belong here. So you may go 
  now." Brusque, I know, but it _was_ my dream. Besides, simply 
  dismissing out of place characters often worked.

  But not this time. "Dan," he said, "do you know where you have 
  been for the past three weeks?" He said this in a very unctuous 
  tone -- like when a talk-show host tries to draw out a reticent 
  guest.

  I was going to get tired of this guy real fast, I could see. 
  "I've done a lot of traveling. China. Paris. Mars. And now 
  Egypt, as you can see."

  "No, Dan," he said, smiling sadly, "for the past three weeks 
  you've been in a coma at Massachusetts General Hospital. You're 
  suffering from dream-chip addiction. And it's way past time for 
  you to snap out of it."

  "Says who?" I sneered. I hate being patronized by my own dream.

  "I'm Dr. Friedman. I'm a psychiatrist. And I'm not part of your 
  dream, Dan. I'm interfacing with your implant, through my own. 
  Here, let me show you." Suddenly, the desert was gone, and we 
  found ourselves standing in a hospital room. Very dim, after the 
  desert, and hushed, save for the beeping of some medical gadget 
  or other. I turned and saw myself lying in bed, IV needle 
  dripping into my arm; a second Friedman sat in a nearby chair, 
  this one not in explorer khaki, eyes closed, head back in 
  slumber. Our dozing doppelgangers both had electrodes stuck on 
  their foreheads and temples. A very concerned looking nurse 
  stood nearby, monitoring a computer console.

  I didn't like this scene, so I shut my eyes and began spinning.

  After several seconds of this, I heard Friedman say, "What are 
  you doing?"

  I stopped and opened my eyes, saw I was still in the hospital 
  room. "I was spinning. You know."

  But I could see he didn't.

  "Sometimes spinning is enough to trigger a change in the dream 
  scenery," I explained, suddenly feeling foolish.

  "Oh. I didn't know that."

  "You must not be much of a doctor, if you don't even know _that_ 
  about using your dream chip."

  "Well, to tell you the truth," he said, grinning sheepishly, 
  "you're my first case of dream-chip addiction."

  "Wonderful. And I'm not any `case' of yours. You're probably 
  part of my dream too."

  Friedman raised a finger, as though conceding the point. "But 
  even if I am just part of your dream, what harm is there in 
  listening?"

  I thought it over. "All right," I said, finally, taking a seat. 
  "I'll listen -- for a while. I want to be back in Danopolis by 
  nightfall, though."

  "Oh, of course." Friedman rested his chin in his hand for a few 
  moments, then: "Consider this, Dan. Ever since the invention of 
  the dream chip, people have been able to control their dreams, 
  almost absolutely. You can be anything you want -- a rock star, 
  a king, a private eye, anything -- and go wherever or whenever 
  you wish. And, you can do this for as long as you wish."

  "What of it?"

  "What do the ads say to you, Dan? You can have dreams more 
  vivid, more real than real life. `Dreams so real, you never want 
  to wake up.' " He paused for a beat, and then said, "And that is 
  just what we are finding, with people like you, Dan. You just 
  don't want to wake up."

  "Well, it's great fun, of course," I said. "And I can see how it 
  can be addictive -- like TV, in my grandmother's time -- but 
  three weeks..."

  "But just think of all the places you have been to already! When 
  is the last time you remember waking up, hmm? Tell me that, does 
  it feel like only one night, or longer? Maybe a lot longer?"

  "Time can feel different here," I said. "And the implants aren't 
  supposed to allow more than eight hours of dreaming per day, 
  real time. Besides, I've never heard of such a thing happening."

  "Some people can learn to override that restriction, sometimes 
  without even consciously wishing it. You have already shown you 
  are skilled in the use of your implant." He paused a moment, 
  then said, "Of course, they are trying to fix that in the latest 
  versions. That doesn't help you, I'm afraid."

  "Then just shut it off, _Doctor_," I said, laying on the 
  sarcasm.

  "That's too risky; the shock of it would be too great. They've 
  tried it before, you know. It could kill you. Certainly, you'd 
  be a real vegetable then -- worse off than you are now. No, all 
  I can do is talk to you, try to convince you to wake up on your 
  own."

  "You have an answer for everything, don't you? But I'm not 
  convinced."

  "Why do you resist the idea so, Dan? Maybe because deep down, 
  you sense it might be true after all?"

  I smiled. "No, Dr. Friedman. It's because I am, as you said 
  yourself, skilled in the use of my dream implant." I stood up 
  suddenly, and clapped my hands together, and we were back in the 
  desert, outside my city.

  Dr. Friedman looked dazed by the sudden transition; I had caught 
  him on the hop, as I intended. The queen gave a start at our 
  sudden appearance, but immediately covered it over with royal 
  hauteur. (As for the overseers clustered near the dais, they 
  said nothing, because obviously, Pharaoh can do as he likes.)

  I continued, "I have seen my unconscious throw up some pretty 
  weird stuff while I've been here, you know. Frankly, you're 
  small potatoes, compared to some things I've seen." I called out 
  to a couple of nearby guards. "Take this man from my presence, 
  and don't let him come back." They leapt forward at once to 
  obey.

  As they dragged him away, I heard Friedman shout, "Dan, stop 
  this -- you need help, listen to me -- "

  I turned. "Doctor, listen to me. Even if, by some miracle, what 
  you say is true, I'm not ready to go back."

  I ceased to listen as they took him away. I sat back down, next 
  to my queen, and watched my city rise in splendor as the sun 
  set.



  Of course, I saw Dr. Friedman again.

  On three other occasions, he appeared at totally inappropriate 
  times. (On one occasion, I happened to be in bed with an actress 
  whom I have often fantasized about. You can bet I was 
  particularly irate on _that_ occasion.)

  And each time, he was more difficult to eliminate. I could never 
  again have a dream underling get rid of him -- he learned that 
  same invulnerability trick I learned long ago. So I had to get 
  rid of him myself, which frankly, meant killing him -- or at 
  least, his dream image.

  To be honest, I've killed many times in my dreams, but this was 
  a lot more disturbing -- it's usually some monster I've dreamed 
  up, not a person. And he did plant the idea in my head, that he 
  was a real person, outside of the dreaming... just supposing it 
  _was_ true, did it hurt? But he never talked about it -- he just 
  became more difficult to vanquish.

  He was learning, you see. That's something that also should have 
  disturbed me. I don't know why it didn't.

  And now for the fifth time we met, in a Gallic camp after 
  battle, and this well-meaning putz had just cut down thirty 
  thousand of Rome's finest.

  "Dr. Friedman," I said, "you are a real shit! I put a lot of 
  work into setting up that battle you just ruined."

  "I'm sorry, Dan," he replied. "Though I have to say, it 
  interests me that you often re-create these detailed historical 
  scenes. Not everyone does that. To be blunt, a lot of people 
  just go for constant fantasy sex. You seem to have more 
  imagination."

  "Hey, I go for the sex plenty -- you know that quite well," I 
  said heatedly.

  "I know, I know. I just find your other fantasies interesting. I 
  suppose if I were here as long as you've been, I would construct 
  ever more elaborate fantasies as well."

  I refused to respond to this.

  He sighed. "Look, Dan. It's been almost six weeks now. Aren't 
  you getting tired of this?"

  "No."

  "Don't you miss your friends? Your family?"

  I let out a sharp breath. "Even if I believed you... Those 
  aren't really good enough reasons."

  "Oh, come on. I know you have a sister; she's been here to 
  visit."

  "Yeah, maybe... but I'm not close with the rest of my family, 
  and my friends... well, I think they can manage without me -- 
  Wait a minute! What am I doing, talking to some dream shrink in 
  the middle of ancient Gaul? Jesus!"

  "Stranger things have happened. Now, what about your health? 
  Aren't you concerned about your body? After all, whatever is 
  going on here, you're a vegetable Outside. Would you like me to 
  explain, in full medical detail, what will happen to your body 
  if you spend months or even years in a coma?"

  "Oh, please, not on my account. I was never a health nut 
  anyway."

  "You're whistling in the dark, Dan."

  "No, I've been thinking about what you have been saying. If you 
  really are just a part of my dreams, I will eventually wake, 
  after a normal eight hours of sleep. But if you're for real... 
  in a weird way, I'm free. I don't ever have to go back to that 
  life -- I can have adventure, excitement here, for a long time." 
  I shrugged, and asked, "Why give that up?"

  "Dan..."

  "See, I'm hopeless, Dr. Friedman. Might as well give up and move 
  on to some other, more promising patient."

  Dr. Friedman was shaking his head slowly. "Oh no, Dan. We aren't 
  finished yet. Not nearly finished. You need even more help than 
  I thought." He sighed, and slowly rose. "You people just don't 
  listen to reason. You always have to go to an extreme."

  It was time to end this. The Gauls hadn't bothered to disarm me; 
  I drew my short sword and prepared for combat.

  But he didn't bother to arm himself. Instead, he looked to the 
  Gauls. "Seize him," he ordered.

  Each Gaul beside me grabbed one of my arms. I twisted about, but 
  astonishingly, their grip held. I struggled some more. "Unhand 
  me!" I cried, as they forced me to drop the sword.

  The Gauls ignored my orders. I struggled uselessly in their 
  grip. Slowly, it was beginning to dawn on me -- that I was 
  unable to either order or overcome these dream characters.

  I gave up struggling; I could feel the blood draining from my 
  face, as I stared at the doctor in wonder.

  He shrugged. "I've been learning too, Dan. And, of course, the 
  chip manufacturers have managed to augment my dream chip. The 
  world -- the _real_ world -- does not stop, simply because you 
  shut yourself off, Dan. I think I am as adept as you are, now. I 
  think I can make you leave this place."

  "You said it was up to me -- you couldn't pull the plug, or 
  force me to leave -- "

  "You'll leave of your own free will. It's just that now, I have 
  the power to help you more effectively. Now, if I can't bring 
  you to the hospital, I can bring the hospital to you." Now he 
  looked at the Gauls, who had changed into hospital orderlies 
  while my attention was on the doctor.

  "Bring him," said Dr. Friedman.

  He drew back the tent flap and stepped outside, and the former 
  Gauls dragged me out as I cursed them. Instead of being outside, 
  I found myself being dragged down a hospital corridor. I looked 
  back where the tent had been, and saw instead a pair of swinging 
  doors.

  I looked ahead, and saw Dr. Friedman standing next to a gurney. 
  I shouted and cursed now, trying futilely to grab at passing 
  doctors and nurses, to at least get their attention, as the two 
  orderlies lifted me up and strapped me down. The straps were 
  drawn tight by my useless struggles; I could already feel the 
  blood to my arms and legs being cut off. They even pulled a 
  strap over my forehead, so I was as immobile as possible.

  Then they pushed the gurney down the hall, fast. I still tugged 
  at the straps as I watched the hall lights passing overhead.

  Finally, they turned right, and I heard a door being opened. I 
  was in a small, white, bare room, as far as I could see. There 
  was a bright, white light directly overhead. And that was really 
  all.

  I heard Dr. Friedman say, "Leave him here for a while. Sometimes 
  this is enough to send them back." He and the orderlies filed 
  out of the room.

  It was when I heard the lock turn that I began screaming in 
  earnest.



  So, that is how I come to be here, in this dream "hospital." 
  (Yes, I know it _seems_ real -- that's the whole point, isn't 
  it?)

  Now, I'm no fool, and as soon as I was strapped to that gurney, 
  I tried to end the dream program. Dr. Friedman said it is up to 
  me, when I leave, right?

  Except it's not working. I keep trying to wake up. I _know_ how 
  to do it; it's hard to describe just how it's done, but I know 
  how. It feels like surfacing when you've been underwater. Except 
  I can't do it, now.

  Something has really gone wrong.

  Dr. Friedman says some part of me is still resisting the idea of 
  going back and is still stronger than my conscious wish to 
  return. I keep urging him to check my implant for a defect, but 
  he says that has already been done, and that they can find 
  nothing wrong with the implant itself.

  Maybe he is right. Or maybe they messed up the implant and are 
  being quiet about it. Who knows, maybe he is just a sadist.

  Or a dream character who has gained control.

  He figured out, at any rate, that solitary confinement wasn't 
  going to do the job. So I get to wander this "hospital" at 
  least, and I talk to Dr. Friedman a lot, and I tell other people 
  my story. I keep looking for patterns, something that will get 
  me out of here. And to keep my spirits up I tell the story in 
  different ways, or I talk about other dreams I have had. I try, 
  at least, to be entertaining when I tell these tales.

  But now that I have reached the end of the tale, I have to tell 
  you: I dread the next "treatment" Friedman comes up with. 
  Because he thinks I have to be broken before I'll let myself out 
  of here.

  He's wrong. I want out _now._

  I really do.



  Stephen Doe (pspc@sunspot.tiac.net)
-------------------------------------
  Stephen Doe is a resident of the Boston area, where he works as 
  a software developer. Before that he lived in New Mexico, where 
  he pursued a degree in astronomy. He is now at work on his first 
  novel.



  The Camel Story   by Melanie Dixon
====================================
....................................................................
  Didn't your mother ever tell you not to talk to strangers?
....................................................................

  Mike waited patiently for the door to slide shut behind him, 
  then looked around the cell. To his pleasure, it was everything 
  he'd imagined from TV and the movies. Gray brick walls; a dirty, 
  seatless toilet in the corner; flat benches on either side of 
  the cell; even a liquored-up bum asleep on the floor.

  "The handcuffs, Mr. Welke," the cop behind him said.

  Mike obliged by sticking his hands back out through the opening 
  in the bars. He tried not to wince as the cop pulled them back 
  further than they wanted to go. Instead, he looked over and saw 
  that one of the cell benches was occupied by a man who, like 
  Mike, wore a rumpled suit and tie. He was sitting with his 
  elbows resting on his knees and his face planted in the palms of 
  his hands. Hell of a night out for him, too, Mike thought with a 
  smile. As the cop removed the cuffs, Mike watched his cellmate, 
  waiting to make eye contact if the opportunity arose.

  Once the cuffs were off, Mike rubbed his wrists like he always 
  saw on TV and started toward the unoccupied bench. The cuffs 
  hadn't really hurt him, but he'd never been arrested before and 
  wanted to make the most of the experience. Ever since the cops 
  had come to get him, he'd been taking mental notes; it was going 
  to make a hell of a story for his buddies back home. Guess what 
  happened on my Vegas trip, guys? First they cuffed me, then they 
  read me my rights, put me in the back of their squad car, booked 
  and fingerprinted me, and then I had to wait in a holding cell 
  until my brother posted bail.

  Mike sat down and sighed, hoping his cellmate would look up. 
  When he didn't, Mike decided to take a different approach.

  "So will they bring me a drink of water if I ask them?" he said. 
  He watched as his cellmate slowly raised his head from his 
  hands. The man paused for a second as he studied Mike and then 
  he dropped his arms to his knees. Mike noticed how bloodshot his 
  eyes were and how he really needed a shave. He hoped he didn't 
  look quite that bad, but he knew it was wishful thinking.

  "Doubt it," the man shrugged. He ran his hands through his short 
  hair, which made it stand up on end. "In fact, I doubt you'll 
  hear from them again until someone posts your bail. That's my 
  guess at any rate. I don't make it a habit of frequenting jail 
  cells."

  "It's the first time I've been arrested, too," Mike confessed. 
  "First time in Vegas, first time arrested."

  "First time for everything, I guess," the man said. "My name's 
  Louis, by the way." Louis offered his right hand to Mike.

  "Mike Welke," he said. He had to get up off the bench and lean 
  forward to shake it.

  Louis smiled and then pointed to the sleeping drunk. "I'd 
  introduce you to him, but he's been sleeping one off ever since 
  I've been here."

  Mike grinned and felt himself loosen up a little. He reached up 
  to undo his tie and was slightly surprised that it was gone -- 
  he'd forgotten that the police had taken it away from him before 
  putting him in the cell. The truth was, he'd had a lot to drink 
  earlier and some of the details weren't exactly clear. When he 
  looked up again, he saw Louis watching him. For the first time, 
  Mike noticed that Louis was wearing a particularly nice suit, 
  wrinkled though it was.

  "I feel like an idiot asking this," Mike said, "but that isn't 
  Armani, is it?"

  "Hugo Boss," Louis replied. He leaned back and examined his 
  lapel and sleeves. "Looks like it's salvageable, too. Nothing a 
  good dry cleaning can't fix."

  "Me, too," Mike added, taking a quick look over himself. "So are 
  you like me and just had a little too much fun tonight?" Mike 
  saw a playful glint appear in Louis's eye and watched him shrug.

  "What can I say? I've been bad."

  Mike laughed out loud but had to stop as soon as he realized it 
  hurt his now-throbbing head. Still wincing, he looked back up at 
  Louis. "I'm out here for a bachelor party, my brother's bachelor 
  party, actually. A bunch of us drove in from L.A. for the 
  weekend. It's been pretty crazy."

  "Older or younger brother?"

  "Older, but we're pretty close. You have any brothers or 
  sisters?"

  "I did," Louis said. He inched himself back on the bench and 
  with his hands locked behind his head, leaned against the brick 
  wall. "I had an older brother but he died a few years ago."

  "Sorry to hear that," Mike said. "Were you close?"

  "Well, we were always pretty competitive growing up," Louis 
  explained. "Actually, there were times when I hated his guts. 
  It's too bad, really. There's not much I can do about it now."

  "I guess I'm lucky," Mike said. "My brother and I get along 
  really well now. We had some fights growing up but not anymore. 
  In fact, I'm going to be the best man at his wedding next 
  month."

  "That's great," Louis remarked, not changing his facial 
  expression. "I guess my brother and I never grew out of our 
  fights. He was quite a guy, though. A real clown."

  "Good sense of humor?"

  Louis glanced back at Mike and frowned for a half a second. Then 
  he shook his head. "Well, actually, he _was_ a clown. It was his 
  hobby since high school. He did kids' birthday parties, events 
  at the zoo, local store openings, that kind of thing. I always 
  used to hear, `How come you can't be more like your brother the 
  clown?' "

  Mike chuckled until he noticed that Louis was staring at him. He 
  wondered if Louis hadn't meant it as a joke.

  "You get tired of hearing that kind of thing after a while, you 
  know?" Louis added. "Ah, well, nothing I can do about it now, I 
  guess."

  "Do you mind if I ask what happened?" Mike said carefully. He 
  saw Louis's face grow darker and decided he probably shouldn't 
  have pressed him.

  "The police ruled it was a suicide," Louis answered. "No note, 
  but his wrists were slit. I don't know, it's sort of too 
  perfectly ironic, isn't it? A clown who commits suicide."

  Mike remained stoned-faced, not sure how to react.

  "Anyway, his death was sort of a turning point in my life," 
  Louis continued. "I knocked around for a while in various places 
  and I've been in Vegas for the past couple of years," he said. 
  For some reason, this made him stop. He turned back to Mike, 
  studying him hard. "You know, Vegas is a pretty easy place to 
  get along in without getting into too much trouble. Mind if I 
  ask what you did to make them arrest you?"

  This time, Mike felt he would probably be okay when he responded 
  with a laugh. "Well, I asked you about your brother so I guess 
  it's only fair," he explained. "I told you things got a little 
  out of hand. It was because we'd been drinking and gambling 
  since early this afternoon. Doing shots, cruising the casinos. 
  Anyway, we started at the north end of the Strip, and were 
  making our way down. We were pretty hammered by the time we got 
  to New York, New York, but it was a bachelor party so we weren't 
  about to stop. You know how all the casinos are connected to 
  each other by moving walkways down there? You can walk through 
  five blocks and five hotels without touching the street. We 
  crossed over to the Excalibur on those walkways to keep drinking 
  and gambling. Then my brother decides he wants to check out the 
  Luxor, so we grab a few more drinks and hop on the next moving 
  walkway. Now, right at the point where you are entering the 
  Luxor, there are these two animatronic camels that welcome you 
  to the casino and wish you luck or whatever. You ever seen 
  them?"

  Louis nodded. "Big things, right?"

  "Well, they're camel-sized, like something you'd see at an 
  Arabian Disneyland. Anyway, they move their heads around in kind 
  of a jerky, animatronic way and say stuff like, `Welcome to 
  ancient Egypt, where the slots are as loose as Cleopatra's dress 
  and the crap tables as hot as a summer on the Nile,' " Mike 
  said, making his voice deeper for the camels' part. "So there we 
  are, coming down the moving walkway, and we spy those things. We 
  start shouting at them and making fun of them and suddenly my 
  brother says that he wishes someone would just put those camels 
  out of their misery. I'm drunk enough, it's his bachelor party, 
  and the bottom line is, I take it as an invitation. I leap over 
  the handrail and start pummeling those two camels. And I mean 
  pummeling them! Left! Right! Left! People all around us stop and 
  stare. At this point my brother and his friends are on the 
  ground laughing hysterically, which only makes me wail on them 
  some more. It doesn't take long for a couple of security guards 
  to come over and wrestle me to the ground, and before I know it, 
  I'm being handcuffed and put into the back of a cop car. So now 
  I'm here, waiting for my brother to post bail, I guess."

  Louis let a smile develop on his lips and nodded at Mike slowly. 
  "Well, like I said, I've been here a few years and I don't think 
  I've ever heard of anyone pummeling the camels at the Luxor 
  before," he offered.

  "First time for everything, right?" Mike said. He pushed himself 
  all the way back on the bench and leaned against the brick wall, 
  not unlike Louis was doing. "Hey, Louis, you make it out to L.A. 
  much?"

  "Actually, I have been thinking about moving there, a few years 
  down the road maybe."

  "Well, let me give you my card..." Mike said, leaning forward 
  again. As he reached for his back pocket he realized that he 
  didn't have his wallet. He frowned. "Uh... the cops have all my 
  stuff. Do you have a pen or anything? I could write it down."

  Louis shook his head. "They have all my things, too. Look, don't 
  worry about it -- "

  "No, I'd feel bad if you came out and couldn't look me up. I'm 
  in the book, I guess, if you can remember my name until then," 
  he said.

  "Well, no offense, but it's a long time to remember a name," 
  Louis said.

  Reluctantly, Mike nodded. As he thought about what else he might 
  do, he brushed his hand against his breast pocket and realized 
  he'd stuck a couple of cards in there before going out that 
  evening. "Look at that, I've got one after all," he said as he 
  fished a card out and leaned over to hand it to Louis. "I put 
  them in there just in case I met any contacts in the casinos 
  tonight. I'm in commercial real estate and always looking for 
  good leads. I never thought I'd be handing out my cards in 
  jail."

  Louis continued to lean against the wall for a few seconds 
  longer, staring at Mike with an oddly self-pleasing expression. 
  Something about it made Mike want to retract the offer, but by 
  the time he fully considered it, Louis had snapped the card out 
  of his hand.

  "Good," Mike said, forcing a smile and trying to usher those few 
  unsettling thoughts out of mind. "So I've been going on and on. 
  Why don't I shut up and you can talk for a change? Let's start 
  with what you're in for."

  "Punching a clown at Circus Circus in the face."

  "Really?" Mike said brightly. "Now that's irony, huh? Here I am 
  for punching the animatronic camels at the Luxor, and you 
  punched a clown at Circus Circus."

  Louis stopped and considered this carefully. "Well, there was 
  that and the fact that I stabbed him repeatedly with a steak 
  knife."

  Mike smiled as he waited to be let in on the joke. His smile 
  started to fade, however, when Louis's expression remained 
  unchanged.

  "The unfortunate thing is that this one lived and also, I 
  suppose, that I got caught," Louis continued. Slowly, he turned 
  toward the ceiling with a faraway look in his eyes. "See, it's 
  not that I have a phobia of clowns. I just hate them. I hate all 
  of them. Must have started with my brother, I guess, although, 
  they weren't able to pin that one on me. I was smart about that 
  one, more in control. Then there was that clown in Kansas City, 
  but he deserved it. I whacked off his head with an axe. A few 
  more clowns here and there through the years, not that I make a 
  hobby of this, and trust me, they always deserve it. I just do 
  it when it needs to be done and so far no one has bothered me 
  about it. Oh, and Mike, I'd certainly like to keep it that way."

  Mike slowly felt himself start to slump backward. All the color 
  had drained from his face and he had no doubt now about the 
  veracity of what Louis was telling him.

  "I'm just not big on clowns, sort of like you're just not big on 
  camels," Louis said. "It's really is... how did you put it? 
  Ironic? I'm thinking you understand, though. I'm thinking 
  someday you'll find yourself at a zoo or somewhere and there'll 
  be a camel and all of a sudden you'll just start pummeling him, 
  Mike, just like you pummeled the camels in the Luxor. I see that 
  in you, Mike, and that's why I'm telling you all this."

  Louis stopped and smiled, still holding Mike's complete 
  attention. Then he raised his right hand and Mike glanced at it, 
  suddenly realizing that Louis still held his business card 
  between his thumb and index finger. The business card, with his 
  home, work, and cell phone numbers on it, not to mention his 
  address. Without it, there was always the hope that Louis 
  wouldn't be able to remember his full name. He even admitted it 
  would be difficult. But the card, Mike thought, well, that 
  changed things. As the true realization of what he'd done came 
  over him, Mike sat up and struggled to remain calm. He began to 
  try to figure out how he might get the card back while Louis 
  gently waved it back and forth in front of him.

  Then Louis paused as if reading his mind, and then let go of the 
  card. As it began to float harmlessly downward, they each 
  focused their eyes on its slow motion descent. When it came to a 
  rest on the ground, it lay almost halfway between them.

  "Who knows, Mike?" Louis said, looking back up at him. He held 
  Mike's gaze as he leaned forward on his knees, making himself 
  just a few inches closer to the card than Mike. "Maybe you and I 
  have a fine future scheduled together. You pummeling camels and 
  me stabbing clowns."

  Mike hesitated for a moment, then broke from Louis's gaze just 
  long enough to gauge exactly how far out of reach the card was 
  for him. Seeing this, Louis flashed a thin smile and sat back 
  upright. He placed his hands on his knees as if deliberately 
  indicating to Mike that he'd given him the edge, and daring him 
  to go for it.

  "Mike Welke!"

  At first Mike thought the call had come from Louis. But he'd 
  been staring at his face the whole time and he clearly hadn't 
  said anything. The voice had come from outside the cell. Out of 
  the corner of his eye, Mike saw there was a cop just outside the 
  bars.

  "Mr. Welke, your brother just bailed you out," the cop said. 
  "He's waiting by the station desk. You are free to go." The cop 
  sifted through the ring of keys on his belt until he found the 
  one he was looking for. He unlocked the door open and slid it 
  open. "Lucky for you, Mr. Welke, the Luxor said there was no 
  damage to those camels and so they aren't pressing charges. Just 
  don't go back in there any time soon, understand?"

  Mike dared to steal only a quick glance at the cop before 
  returning his full attention to Louis and the business card. 
  Louis remained completely motionless, his hands still on his 
  knees. The business card waited on the ground between them.

  "Mr. Welke, did you hear me?" the cop said. "Mr. Welke, you're 
  free to go as long as you don't go back to the Luxor."

  Mike's eyes were still fixed on Louis. Slowly, he watched as 
  Louis raised his right hand up by his side and flexed his 
  fingers like a gunslinger, smirking at Mike the whole time.

  "Mr. Welke!" the cop said, his voice much louder now. "If you 
  don't look at me and tell me you understand, I'm going to come 
  in there and crack you over the goddamned skull until you do. Do 
  you get it? Do you get it, Mr. Welke?"

  Mike whirled around toward the cop. "I get it!" he yelled. In a 
  split second, he turned back again, but it was too late. In the 
  moment it had taken to acknowledge the cop, Louis's hand had 
  shot out and snapped up the business card.

  Once he had the card again, Louis took a few moments to read it 
  and then smiled and leaned back against the brick wall. "Thanks 
  for the card, Mike," he said, placing it into his inner breast 
  pocket. "It was good to meet you. Do me a favor and remember not 
  to say anything about what we discussed. When I get out, 
  probably two or three years I'm guessing, I'm planning on giving 
  you a call."

  Slowly, Mike dropped his gaze to the ground and turned away from 
  Louis. Without lifting his eyes, he rose from the cell bench and 
  brushed past the cop into the hallway, then stared straight 
  ahead as the cop closed the cell door, not flinching even as 
  Louis's deep laugh began. Mike followed the cop out of the 
  lockup area, the laugh chasing him the whole way. Then again, 
  Mike feared that laugh would be chasing him for a long, long 
  time.

  As soon as Mike was out of earshot, Louis became quiet. He took 
  out the business card and looked at it for a moment. Then he 
  tore it up into little pieces that he let fall out of his hand 
  onto the ground. That one was the best story so far, ten times 
  better than any of the ones he'd told to the guys in here before 
  Mike.

  They were all idiots, believing every ridiculous lie he could 
  come up with. At least it was making the time pass, Louis 
  thought. And he had no shortage of time. With his wife out of 
  town until Monday, there was no telling how long it would be 
  until his bail was posted.

  Louis heard the door to the lockup area open and his ears perked 
  up. As he listened, he could detect two sets of footsteps 
  starting down the hallway toward the holding cell. Right away, 
  he knew one belonged to a uniformed cop and the other was 
  undoubtedly a new victim. Smiling to himself, Louis immediately 
  started coming up with his next story.



  Melanie Dixon (mel@meldixon.com)
----------------------------------
  Melanie Dixon grew up in Hawaii, graduated from Yale, and just 
  recently completed her first novel, Jules' Housmates. Her Web 
  site (www.meldixon.com) contains excerpts and a synopsis of
  the novel, other short fiction, and links to other 
  e-zines that publish her work.



  The Posticheur   by David Appell
==================================
....................................................................
  The wisps that allow us to retain our humanity are sometimes no 
  wider than a single strand of hair.
....................................................................

  1.
----
  
  Racino oversleeps; he did not finish the Marguerite plait until 
  late, and now already it is time to go to work. Of all days to 
  be tired. He will be on his feet for ten hours, and probably 
  both ways on the Transit as well. By tonight he will be 
  exhausted when she arrives. It will not be the way he wants it, 
  he can tell already. Not that it ever is.

  He skips hiding the tube -- too tired, and too much else on his 
  mind anyway. He doesn't realize it's raining until he steps out 
  the door of his apartment, and goes back inside to get his hat. 
  Standing in the drizzle at the Transit stop, Racino feels his 
  body wanting to sag back into sleep, back into bed, back into 
  the darkness. The brim on his hat begins to droop, and it does 
  not do much to keep his head dry, either. He should buy a new 
  one, he knows; someone might ask why he hasn't, and what can he 
  tell them. Sorry, but what little extra money I have is going 
  toward plastic and thread? Hardly. It's one of the smaller 
  chances he takes, and if he's caught a warped brim will be the 
  least of his problems.

  Inside the Transit he moves as far down the aisle as he can, 
  reaches for the plastic bar above him and removes his hat. Small 
  drops of water cling to the short fuzz on the top of his head; 
  he'd like to run a hand over it, to dry it off and, while he's 
  at it, check its length, something else he forgot to do this 
  morning. It's been ten days since his last cut, and only four 
  remaining until he must go again, though length is more 
  important than the interval, they all know. Nothing longer than 
  a half centimeter; a cut every fourteen days, regardless. It 
  hardly seems frightening anymore.

  Soon the Transit is stuffed full, and Racino is pushed further 
  back. It's hot and stuffy, and the mood is hushed, like the 
  weather. Looking down at his chest, he counts the stops. At four 
  he begins to get excited; at five, he begins to get aroused. 
  Suddenly at six he has a thought: what if she doesn't show up, 
  what if she's changed her mind, or, worse than anything, what if 
  she's been caught since yesterday? Racino's heart beats faster; 
  his face grows warm. At her stop, seven, he hears nothing, like 
  a vacuum -- but then, he sees the side of her face as she comes 
  aboard. By the time the Transit is moving again he's calming 
  down, and she is standing sideways in the aisle near the front 
  of the vehicle, wet people crowded around her, but in Racino's 
  line of sight. A minute later -- Racino wonders if she too 
  counts to herself -- she turns her head slightly and his brown 
  eyes meet her blue. Neither of them smile, and their faces 
  remain blank. How are you this morning, Peter, he imagines her 
  asking; fine, thank you, and you, he imagines asking her in 
  return. Then, to confirm yesterday's signal and tonight's 
  meeting, he brings his hand to his mouth and coughs into his 
  fist, watching her carefully. She reaches up to remove something 
  from the corner of her right eye, and he coughs again.



  After clearing security he walks for five minutes, down long 
  concrete halls that the rain will never reach. It's only 8:15; 
  he's already weary, and has to force himself to walk fast. At 
  his closet he puts on his work smock; while tying it in back 
  Jones comes along and, as if Racino wouldn't notice him anyway, 
  taps him heavily on the shoulder.

  "Big haul out in the desert last night," Jones says, grinning 
  widely. "Six of 'em, holed up in some commune or something. Came 
  in early this morning."

  "Good morning to you too, Jonesie," Racino says, straightening 
  his outfit.

  "Yeah, yeah," Jones says, his head jerking to look down the 
  hall.

  "So where are they at now?" Racino asks, as if he doesn't care.

  "Huh? Yeah. The women, four of 'em, they're done already, shaved 
  slick as a baboon's ass." Jones' head jerks to the right, to 
  look down the hall in the other direction. "The guys, two of 
  'em, big as bulls. They just strapped the last one down a few 
  minutes ago."

  "That so?" Racino says, reaching inside for his broom.

  "Yeah, huge mothers." Jones continues to look over his shoulder 
  while scratching at his ear. "Derelicts, probably."

  "Probably," Racino says, bending over for his dustpan. "Or 
  worse."

  "Were, anyway. Gettin' theirs now." Jones laughs quickly, and 
  his head wavers back to look at Racino.

  "So where they cuttin' em?" he asks.

  "Two-twelve," Jones says, and starts to walk away.

  Racino is disappointed -- his area stops at Two-ten, and 
  Two-twelve might have already been swept by the time he can get 
  there. He calls out after Jones, moving away down the hall.

  "Jonesie...."

  Jones' head jerks back around, nervously.

  "Jonesie, have a good day, huh?" Racino tells him.

  "Worthless derelicts," Jones mumbles, turning back around.



  Racino carries his broom and pan down the hall and looks into 
  each of his five rooms. None has been used yet this morning, and 
  probably won't be for another half-hour, before the regular 
  Cutters arrive at nine o'clock. He wants to linger in each room, 
  if only a minute, to grab a sort of mobile nap. What he wants 
  most is to crawl up onto one of the tables and let himself sink 
  away. It would be so easy. But the conversation with Jones is 
  pressing on his mind.

  From 210 he can hear cursing in the next room, and the sound of 
  electric razors -- Jonesie was right. Racino leaves the room and 
  turns right instead of left, and goes slowly past the doorway of 
  212, carrying his broom on his side, trying to make it 
  conspicuous.

  "You!" someone yells from inside the brightly lit room, just as 
  he had hoped. Racino stops quickly and steps in.

  "You. Where the hell have you been?"

  He vaguely recognizes the Cutter who is shouting at him -- 
  Bursley, or Bursty, something like that. He has on a blue smock, 
  a surgical mask and cap, and thin white rubber gloves on his 
  hands. He's holding a pair of electric shears, the heavy ones, 
  Racino can tell, and standing in front of the strapping table -- 
  all Racino can see are the man's boots, heavy and dirty, with a 
  buckle on the side. The rest of him -- "Patients," they're 
  called officially -- is obscured by Bursley's assistant, but 
  he's there in the room, on the table, like a stone.

  Racino acts taken aback by the sharpness of the question, and 
  looks down. He begins to mumble an answer. He won't explain that 
  this isn't his room unless he's asked. "Sorry," he says.

  "I'd hope so," Bursley spits out. "Get in here and clean this 
  filth up."

  Racino quickly begins to sweep. It is as good as he suspected. 
  Long hair covers the floor beneath the table, curly blond locks 
  and some straight, long brown. He could use it, certainly -- for 
  another plait, or the pin curl he has been thinking about. If 
  only he had his tube. These days he can fill it in five seconds, 
  and be in and out of the toilet before anyone could possibly 
  suspect anything. The yellow curls, especially, would lay 
  beautifully in a small postiche. He has to find a way to keep 
  them from going to waste. If only he'd put the tube up inside 
  him this morning.

  His fatigue has been pushed away, and Racino's eyes roam across 
  the floor. He is careful not to look too far up, careful to act 
  dumb. Then, twisting his neck slightly in order to look 
  underneath the second table, he sees long, black strands, lying 
  scattered on top of itself like coiled string, one cutting after 
  another. His heart jumps. Pure black is rare, jet black, and now 
  there it is, waiting for him. Exactly what he wants.

  He works quickly, sweeping around the first table, underneath 
  where they are cutting. By being thorough and fastidious he 
  tries to ensure that they will finish before he does. The Head 
  Cutter curses continuously, and Racino is able to sneak a few 
  glances at the Patient, grounded like a captured whale.

  "What a mangy bastard," the Cutter says, throwing down a clump 
  of brown hair. Racino sees that the Patient's beard has already 
  been shaved away, and is relieved. His face is cut and bloody, 
  and it must have been a long, difficult job. Usually they 
  anesthetized them first, but sometimes they lash them down, 
  thick straps across the head and neck that they tighten 
  pneumatically, and rough them up for fun. Then they knock them 
  out in order to shave the head. Racino has found teeth beneath 
  the tables, chipped and bloody, and once even a piece of an ear. 
  This one they should be finished with soon.

  A few minutes later the Head Cutter turns off his shears. He 
  peels off his rubber gloves, snapping them from his fingers one 
  at a time, and says to his assistant, "Why don't you finish this 
  dog and then come down to 220 -- Roach said there's a whore 
  they're bringin' down from Booking."

  "We'll make her up nice and pretty," the other one says.

  As the Head Cutter walks away he adds, "Ought to be a good time 
  for everyone."



  Ten minutes later, just as Racino is scooping a large pile of 
  the blond and brown hair into a numbered bag, the second Cutter 
  shuts off his shears and steps away from the table.

  "Have someone take him down to Cleanup," he says without looking 
  at Racino.

  "Yes sir," Racino says, standing up.

  He leaves the room and Racino is alone with the drugged Patient. 
  His heart suddenly begins to pound so he can feel it in his 
  chest, harder than on the Transit this morning, and even before 
  he has done anything he feels guilty. He rushes to finish the 
  first table, reaching all the way under where the Cutters had 
  been standing, and quickly bags up what he has. He would like to 
  keep it too, smuggle it out one day at a time, but there is more 
  at stake. There is not enough to fill the bag -- he'll probably 
  get a reprimand for turning it in low, but separating the black 
  hair would be impossible if he put it in too. Taking out a new 
  bag, one number higher in sequence, he moves to the second table 
  and begins to scoop up the black hair. It is smooth and fine, 
  and longer than he's seen in months, undoubtedly from someone 
  young. He places it in the new bag, then sweeps up the scraps 
  and dust, scooping it into the other bag and tying it shut. He 
  tries not to think of what he is about to do.

  With the room clean -- he glances back from the doorway to be 
  certain, and takes one last look at the table -- he carries his 
  broom, pan and the two bags back down the hall. This biker, the 
  hippy -- was he stupid, or just unlucky? Racino drops the filled 
  bag at the Disposal Station; Kurnicki, fat and oily, his own 
  shaved head shaped like a squashed cone, hands Racino a receipt 
  and asks about the other bag.

  "I'll have it here before the end of the day," Racino says, 
  forcing himself to sound calm.

  "Better," Kurnicki says. "No fuckin' around in this sector."

  "I know," Racino says. He didn't notice the bag wasn't 
  completely full. "There's one in 212 ready to ship." Who turned 
  them in, Racino wonders, and what did they get for it?

  Kurnicki pulls phlegm up his throat and spits. "How fuckin' 
  wonderful."

  Kurnicki inspects the closets every other afternoon, so he can't 
  stash it there. The floors are all concrete, the ceilings like a 
  warehouse. Kurnicki's room? He doesn't know if they inspect 
  there or not -- probably they do. Everyone is inspected, 
  sometime, aren't they? No one hides anything anymore. Racino 
  wants this, has been looking for it for months, since he started 
  sweeping here, it seems, and now he has to find a place to hide 
  it, somewhere he can get at it once a day and steal it away, one 
  tube up his ass after the other. He has to find a place for this 
  bag in his hand. Has to. He can't carry around a 
  partially-filled bag forever.

  Suddenly he thinks: or can he? Maybe it would work. He has to 
  hand the bags over to Kurnicki in sequence -- the bastard 
  checks, every time -- but what if every time he got a new one, 
  he transferred the black hair to the new bag, and filled up the 
  one he already had? He'd have to carry one bag around with him 
  at all times, keep it in his closet at night, but it might work. 
  It might, and he can't think of anything else that will. Maybe 
  he's too tired. Maybe when he's fresh he'll think of something.

  But for now he tightens his grip on bag 1018 and walks back to 
  see if the regular Cutters have started yet, feeling, for a 
  moment, full of light and air.



  2.
----

  Back at his apartment it's nearly dark, never soon enough on 
  nights like this. It was raining still on the way home, and 
  Racino is past weariness and dripping into fatigue. He'd skip 
  dinner and go straight to bed if she weren't coming. A cough, 
  something in the eye, another cough. He doesn't know who chose 
  it, or who she works for. What if he's caught? All he knows is 
  what he wants.

  Drops run down the plastic windows, as if to wash away the murky 
  view they offer of the world. When the light is gone he's aware 
  of the sound of rain, and nervousness begins to bore into his 
  mood. Probably another hour, at least. Will she come in the 
  rain? How will she keep the plait dry? He's hungry but can't 
  eat. What a day this has been. The black hair, and now she's 
  coming over. There's a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling, a 
  table, a bed and a picture. The bed, nothing but a cot, really, 
  is about twice the size of the table, and, when he's home, the 
  picture hangs above it. That's all, except for a sink and a 
  toilet and what he keeps inside it. The picture is of his 
  parents, fading more every year, hanging on the gray wall -- his 
  mother's long hair is slowly turning the color of dirty water, 
  and his father's teeth are a chalky, yellow gap in the middle of 
  his face. He remembers the way her hair fell down around her 
  neck, how his father's was long and neat, swept across his 
  forehead from left to right. That, he's found, is the best way 
  to try and remember them.

  Ten o'clock. She's right on time, but still the bumps on the 
  door make him jump. Two, then a pause, then three. Bumps, that's 
  all they are, like it's her shoulder. Still it makes him jump, 
  just like the other two times.

  When he opens it she hurries in without waiting to be asked. 
  Racino steps back, out of her way. She's his height, in a long, 
  dark coat, dripping wet, and a hat that comes over her face. She 
  removes her gloves before she looks at him with the blue eyes.

  "Some weather," he says.

  "I suppose."

  "Can I take your coat and hat?" he says, trying a small smile.

  She looks right into him. "No." Nothing on her face.

  "It's good to see you again."

  "What do you have for me?" she asks, glancing quickly around his 
  apartment.

  He watches her for just a few seconds, then turns into the 
  bathroom. "In here."

  She stands at the door while he lifts the lid off the top of his 
  toilet and pulls a dark green plastic bag from inside.

  "How the hell do you ever flush that thing?"

  "I don't," he answers. "I try to only go at work."

  She huffs, but he ignores her. He unwraps the plastic and pulls 
  out what's inside.

  "That's it?"

  "Yes, that's it," he says defensively. He hands the Margeurite 
  plait to her, one simple braid of brownish-blond hair, about 
  thirty centimeters long. There's a clip on top, and it tapers 
  off on the bottom, just like in his book, except it's only one 
  braid, not two. Racino is especially proud of the clip, which he 
  was able to form from a plastic fork. She holds it in front of 
  her like a dead animal and inspects it.

  "Well," she says finally, "it's not what the Major had in mind, 
  but I suppose it will do." He waits for her to go on -- what 
  else can he do? "Actually," she says slowly, "actually it's not 
  that bad. It's not full, like I thought, but sexy, in a way." 
  When she says it, she looks at him, and his face lightens for a 
  moment.

  "So how is a person supposed to wear it?" she asks.

  "Here," he says, digging into his bag. "I made this band." He 
  pulls out a thin strip of cloth, brown. "It clips on here," he 
  takes the plait out of her hand, "and then you wear it around 
  your head, like this." He brings it around his own head so the 
  braid hangs down the back of his neck.

  "Oh," she says, in a way he's dreamed about. Then she comes 
  back. "OK, give it to me." She takes it, and opens her top to 
  put it in her bra.

  "Wait," he says, gently. She looks up at him.

  "Could you wear it? Please?"

  She huffs again, but then opens the cloth strap and quickly puts 
  it around her forehead. She ignores him reaching up to help her.

  "Come on," she says, agitated. "Let's get this over with."

  Slowly, sheepishly, he unfastens the belt around his waist, and 
  unzips his pants. They fall down around him, and he waits, 
  embarrassed and still aware of it. Finally she says, nodding to 
  his underwear, "And those?"

  He places his thumbs inside the loose band and peels them off 
  his waist. He won't look at her now. When they fall to the floor 
  she gets down on her knees, and Racino leans back against the 
  wall, the bare bulb prying through his eyelids. When she gets 
  close the brim of her hat bumps up against him and falls to the 
  floor.

  She puts her hands on his hips so he can't thrust as much as 
  he'd like. His hands come down onto her head, and he feels the 
  tiny hairs which cover it, like felt. As he tries to push her 
  nose bumps up against his bald, shaved groin.

  When she stands up she says, "Next time, how about something 
  bigger. Fuller. OK?" He nods. At least she does not spit into 
  the sink, like last time. After she leaves he remains standing 
  against the wall, pants still down, exhausted, listening to the 
  rain on the roof.



  He has to find a way to get more.

  Racino is laying in bed early the next morning, thinking. The 
  tube is only eight centimeters long, and about three in diameter 
  -- bigger than the first one, but still it took two months to 
  get enough just for the plait, small scraps he was able to glean 
  each day. A full wig needs more, much more. And he wants 
  something to give her again, too, as soon as he can.

  He has saved a few plastic pouches, rectangular, with a seal 
  across the top. He's been thinking about where he can hide it -- 
  working up the nerve, really -- and now seems the time to try. 
  It seems impossible, but then the tube once did, too.

  She doesn't look at him on the Transit, which is just as well, 
  because he has other things to think about this morning. He 
  knows how he's going to do it, where no one will walk in on him 
  or watch from under the stall. Like the bag he carries around 
  all day, he's learning that the best hiding places are right out 
  in the open. So just before the end of the day, when he's 
  returned from the toilet, he kneels down in front of his closet 
  and casually lets part of the partial bag, a new bag two numbers 
  higher into which he's shifted the black hair twice during the 
  day, fall out onto the hallway floor.

  When he opens the door his hands are shaking; he leans his broom 
  against the wall and kneels forward and down on his left knee. 
  By kneeling and appearing to reach toward the back of the 
  closet, he can keep one foot and two hands inside long enough to 
  remove his shoe. Quickly, frantically, he unstraps his shoe and 
  digs out the wrinkled plastic bag. Reaching back and underneath 
  for some hair, he wants to look down the hall but can't -- it 
  would look suspicious to anyone who glanced his way. The tube 
  juts and pinches inside him. His hands are shaking as he fills 
  the pouch and stuffs it back into his shoe, thinking he'd better 
  stand up soon. He lines the bottom of his shoe with it, leveling 
  it as best he can, and steps in. Restrapping it, Racino is up 
  and out of the closet, breathing hard, sweat on his forehead.

  It is strange walking, like it might be on water, and he tries 
  to compensate so nothing appears strange. He's done it -- at 
  least, it's hidden. Now to get out. Will it be a simple pat 
  down, or something more extensive?

  It's been three months since they removed their clothing and 
  searched through every pocket and seam. They're getting 
  complacent. They're supposed to look in the mouth, too, but 
  rarely do. And never down below. The pouch in his shoe is the 
  equivalent of two weeks worth, or more. Three months since the 
  last search -- does that mean it's time for another one, or that 
  the odds are on his side?

  Walking toward the exit, he forces himself to regain control. 
  Jones walks in front of him, twitching and mumbling, unaware of 
  anyone. The tube has found a niche in which to settle, and the 
  plastic pouch seems smaller, too, but he knows it's there. He 
  feels like he did the day he smuggled the first tube out -- his 
  tongue is dry and his ears ring. It would be too suspicious to 
  put his shaking hands in his pockets, so he squeezes his fingers 
  together, and rubs them against one another. He doesn't know if 
  it will do any good, but he doesn't know what else will. He 
  keeps as much weight as he can on his right foot.

  But the Security search is a simple pat-down, and 
  unenthusiastic. Kurnicki seems not to even recognize him. Before 
  he knows it Racino is out the door, like air coming out of a 
  balloon, a smooth, bald balloon, like his head, like all of 
  their heads.



  He's excited again, and this time it's fresh. At home he takes 
  the pouch out of his shoe and removes the hair; it's mashed and 
  dirty, but still long, black and magical. Before anything else 
  he sits in his chair, puts his head back and dangles the hair 
  over his face, letting it lightly touch his nose, his cheeks, 
  and finally his lips. For a moment it feels like electricity 
  running across his mouth, like sucking on metal. He's aroused; 
  confused; wants to cry; doesn't want to care.

  Racino leans forward and begins to comb out the dust and dirt 
  with his fingers, then with a fork. He fills his bowl with hot 
  water and adds detergent, and works small sections of the hair 
  in the water, then rinses. He lays the hair out on a towel and 
  looks at it. It still shines. It will be dry tomorrow and he can 
  begin.

  He wants more.

  The next day he puts a pouch in both shoes. If he's going to get 
  caught two won't matter any more than one, and already he cares 
  less, and wants what he wants more. Today she looks at him, 
  briefly, but he looks away. He wonders how she looked when she 
  had hair -- blond, probably, but she's the type to have had 
  brown at the roots.

  Every day he avoids her and clenches the bag of black hair with 
  a fist. His face is flush when he rushes to fill each pouch, but 
  soon for other reasons. Risk is beginning to elevate anger over 
  his fear. At the pat downs he plays dumb, and feels hatred. He 
  seethes at his twice-monthly cut; they shave it away, but now he 
  believes that he's letting them, that it's his idea. In the 
  Transit what he wants to do most of all is punch out a window, 
  or smack the driver across the side of his fat head, or punch a 
  hole in the sky and jump away into cold, black freedom of space. 
  It's only been a week.



  Each day he stuffs away as much as he can, and each night he's 
  up late, blankets and towels over the windows, washing and 
  combing and drying, the picture brought out and placed on the 
  wall. Halfheartedly he also works on another plait; he wants 
  what it can get, but it's not enough. Racino has a mane of black 
  hair now, like the tail of a horse. Often he dangles it over his 
  face, lets it drag lightly over his skin, sometimes playing with 
  himself at the same time. Sometimes he opens his eyes for a 
  second and glances at the picture, a simple mat in a plastic 
  frame, and his hatred for them climbs another step.

  He's reading, too, the book she gave him. History of Ladies' 
  Hairdressing, by Mallemont, translated 1904. He has no idea how 
  it's survived, or where she obtained it. She brought it over the 
  first night she knocked on his door, the first time he'd ever 
  met her, the first time she showed him what he could get for 
  what they wanted. It's old, its pages yellow -- they tear away 
  if he's not careful as he handles them. He's read it many times, 
  always at night, and now he reads it again, more intently than 
  ever. He's trying to weave scraps of string into a wig net, 
  experimenting. It will not cling to a head the way elastic 
  might, but it is the best he can do for now. He'll put a thin 
  tie on it, to go under the chin.

  She signals him on the Transit with coughs and dramatic wipes at 
  her eye, and he ignores her. He ignores her! He wonders about 
  her breasts, and about her name. He wonders where she takes the 
  plaits, if she gets more for them than he does. Once the side 
  door of their Transit jammed, and he had to exit through the 
  front. She bumped into him when he tried to pass. "Not yet," he 
  whispered through clenched teeth, and dared to bump back.

  Racino spends two nights trying to fashion a knotting hook from 
  a plastic fork, holding it over a candle, warming, bending 
  carefully, warming again. He has four tines to get it right, but 
  each breaks under the stress. Frustrated, he kicks at the table, 
  stubs his big toe, and has an idea. He cuts his biggest toenail 
  down to the quick, carves it into a hook with the clippers, and 
  melts the fork handle around it. It works, if he's careful, if 
  he's gentle.

  Single knots are quicker. Double knots and point knots are more 
  secure, he learns, but difficult without a solid hook. He works 
  half the night, knotting the black hair to the net, until his 
  eyes feel like rocks. He glances up at the picture above him, at 
  his mother's dark hair, and tries to recapture the way it lays, 
  the way it fell from above. The coughs each morning are 
  beginning to sound menacing, but he looks right back at her 
  without blinking, not yet ready, enjoying the small defiance. 
  One day Kurnicki searches everyones' pockets on the way out, but 
  doesn't think to look in the shoes. One night there is a knock 
  on the door. Racino sits at his table, everything laid out 
  before him, his heart jumping up his collapsed throat. He waits, 
  thinking suddenly about the straps, the razors, about what they 
  can do if you're caught. But it goes away. When he's sure he 
  sets the black wig aside and resumes work to finish the plait. 
  The weave is loose and the end is ragged, but the next morning 
  when she glares at him he brings his fist to his mouth and 
  coughs.



  3.
----

  Racino is pretending to work on the black wig when she knocks. 
  Two, then three. He's managed to fill in most of the net; there 
  are gaps, but only in the back, nothing he can't imagine his way 
  around. When he lets her in she is livid, shouting at him in 
  whispers.

  "What the hell has been going on?" Spit flies when she speaks.

  "Nothing," he says. He is calm -- he's getting good at it, at 
  masking what's underneath. But it's there, even more now. "I 
  just wasn't ready, that's all."

  "Well, I was," she says, glaring at him.

  Racino refuses to respond. Finally, she asks, "So what do you 
  have for me?"

  "Can I take your coat and hat?"

  "No. What do you have?"

  He stands as straight as he can and looks at her. After his jaw 
  tightens he says, "Not until I take your coat and hat."

  Something narrows around her eyes, until she says, "Oh, all 
  right. Here."

  "Thank you," he says, reaching for them.

  She is slimmer than he thought. Her shoulders slope gracefully 
  away from her neck, and the brown button-down fits her 
  perfectly. Heavy pants and leather shoes with a strap. The same 
  thing everyone wears, but he sees them on her in a different 
  way, as a costume, as something she wore just for him.

  "Now," she says, impatiently, "can I see it?"

  He glances at the small, brown ridge across her chest. "Sure. In 
  here."

  Racino steps back into the bathroom, watching her over his 
  shoulder. He waits before removing the ceramic lid and pulling 
  out what's inside, but as he steps back to the hallway she's 
  already moving away from the door, toward the table, toward the 
  wig. Just as he hoped.

  "What's this?" she asks, like a window has suddenly opened, like 
  unused air is flushing through the room.

  "Oh, that." He follows her, slowly. "Something new I've been 
  working on."

  "It's beautiful," she says, drawing out the word.

  He steps behind her, and looks over her shoulder. "It's not 
  quite finished yet, of course."

  She picks it up. "But it's beautiful already," she says, holding 
  it like it's electricity. "It looks finished to me."

  "Thank you," Racino says. "Tonight, though, I have this for 
  you." He holds out the plait for her to see, which she looks at 
  only for a second. She returns to the black wig, which she's 
  kneading softly, massaging in her hands. She rubs it against her 
  face.

  "But I want this." She looks at him. "Please, Peter."

  His face flushes. They've never used names before, let alone the 
  first. He didn't even know she knew it. He didn't know anyone 
  did.

  "I'm sorry," he says after a pause. "I'm flattered, but I want 
  to keep that one for myself."

  "Oh, Peter, please," she coos, and begins to kneel down before 
  him. No, he tries to say, but already she's digging into his 
  pants.

  "No," he says again. "For this," and again tries to show her the 
  small, brown plait.

  "I've had those," she says, glancing up at him with big eyes. "I 
  want the wig." By now his pants are open and he's already hard, 
  unable to control it.

  "No!" he says, throwing her hands off his legs.

  She looks back up at him, hurt. "No," he says, quietly.

  "What then?" she whispers. "What?"

  He's looking down at her but doesn't know how to say it. His 
  pants have fallen down around his ankles, and he suddenly feels 
  guilty.

  Before he says anything she reaches down and unfastens her own 
  pants, and quickly peels them down around her knees. She moves 
  away just a bit and turns around, still on her knees. Then she 
  puts her head down to the floor and says softly, back and to the 
  side, "Go ahead."

  Racino looks down at her, a vacuum again filling his ears, like 
  a dream. His jaw is unclenched now. His knees are weak. 
  Everything seems reduced to what's right in front of him. One 
  quick step and he could be behind her. And then in. Go ahead, 
  she said to him.

  Straining. Throbbing. Resisting. "No."

  "Please," she moans, deeply.

  "No," he says again, and begins to pull up his pants.

  She waits, but finally gets up on her knees, slowly, and then 
  stands. Without a word she pulls up her pants and then looks at 
  him, her lips pressed tightly together.

  Racino looks at her, right in her face, and says, "That's not 
  what I want."

  "Well then, what?"

  "Here," he says, quietly. "Sit over here." He points to his 
  other chair.

  Her face is tight again, her eyes again small. Just for an 
  instant she shakes her head, but then sits behind his table.

  Racino picks up the black wig and opens it from the bottom. 
  Spreading the flimsy string net, he lowers it over her 
  bony-white scalp. His hands are shaking, and his erection rubs 
  up against her through his pants.

  It fits about as well as he expected, but that doesn't matter. 
  When it's in place he untucks the tie strings and, from behind 
  her, reaches down around her neck and under her chin, and ties 
  them in a bow. Finally he picks at the dry hair, rearranging it 
  and covering the gaps. He moves from behind her and sits on the 
  other side of the table.

  She reaches up and pulls the side of the wig so it falls down 
  her neck and in front of her shoulders. Then she looks at him 
  and smiles.

  After he stares at her for several minutes he says, very 
  quietly, "What's your name?"

  "What do you want it to be?"

  "No," he says. "What's your name?"

  She smiles again, and then says, softly, "Brenda."

  "Brenda," Racino says softly. He looks at her, studies her, for 
  a long time. She lets him, smiling back occasionally, fingering 
  the hair on her head, holding it to her nose and lips, letting 
  it rub against her cheeks.

  Finally she says, slowly, "I need to get going, Peter."

  "Yes," he says, breaking his gaze. "I guess you do."

  She stands up with the wig on. "Thank you," she says, beginning 
  to untie the bow under her chin.

  "Yes," he replies softly. She slides the wig off her head as he 
  reaches out to take it; suddenly her face changes and she tries 
  to lurch away. Racino gets a hand on the wig, but she's already 
  pulling.

  "What are you doing?" he says. "You're going to damage it!"

  "No!" she says, her voice suddenly loud. "It's mine."

  "No it's not," he says, shocked.

  "I did what you wanted."

  "No, that's yours." He nods toward the plait. "This stays here."

  "No!" she says, pulling more, shaking her head. She pulls 
  harder, and the string net rips out of Racino's hands. He's left 
  clutching a handful of hair, and she's left holding the broken 
  net, gasping.

  She throws her piece back at him. "Fix it!" she spits. "Fix it 
  by tomorrow!" She glares at him. "Or else."

  "Or else what?" He glares back at her, for the first time ever.

  She pauses and says, suddenly calm and quiet, "Or else we'll 
  find someone else, Racino. Like we found you. It's that simple."

  He's clenching his fists; his arms drop slowly. A piece of the 
  wig tumbles to the floor. The room is drifting away, and his 
  vision begins to cloud over, without a fight, like a loosening, 
  like the way plastic windows look instead of glass, like the way 
  they took away their pictures, their reflections, their very 
  selves. It's too much, all his anger with no place to go, 
  nothing to strike at, nothing to hold on to but a plastic bag, 
  ten hours a day. Brenda. That's not what he had guessed. 
  Jennifer, maybe, or Melanie. He should have gotten a new hat. He 
  remembers the sound of rain on his roof, the way it feels to 
  walk on water.

  "Good night, Racino," she says flatly, picking up her coat and 
  hat. "I will see you tomorrow night."

  He stands there after she leaves, until he picks up the two 
  pieces of the black postiche. He sets them on his table and sits 
  in his chair, staring at them until he falls asleep.



  On the Transit the next morning she gets on and stands backward, 
  looking right at him. Racino is in back, staring through her 
  when she brings her finger to her eye, when she coughs, even 
  when she wets her lips. She tries them each again, one more 
  time, but he keeps her out of focus, looking beyond her, to 
  what's after her. She turns around, shakes her head, and stays 
  that way. At his stop she departs ahead of him. It's never 
  happened before, always she stays on and rides away. He sees it, 
  but he's back in a vacuum, separated from the world, the sound 
  of nothing ringing in his ears.

  At the entrance she breaks away to the left. The metal detector 
  quietly clicks; in the corner he sees her speak to Kurnicki, and 
  then he's swallowed into the long hallway. Of all people, he 
  knows what they can do to you. He arrives at his closet; by now 
  a Security team will already be knocking down his apartment 
  door. He ties his smock, nodding nervously to Jones; they'll be 
  into the plumbing, probing spigots and drains. Racino closes his 
  closet door and starts to walk again down the hall; he imagines 
  a sledge making the first hole in his gray plaster wall, shaking 
  the building. When he rounds the corner Kurnicki is coming 
  toward him; Racino clutches the partially-filled bag and stops, 
  thinking of the illicit picture of his parents that would now be 
  bouncing up off its hook. His veins puff up as he makes a fist 
  and clenches his jaw. "Racino," Kurnicki barks in a gruff, ugly 
  voice, dark hair twisting around and around in its frame, 
  falling down, tumbling toward Racino's mind. He knows exactly 
  what they can do, sees it all the time, wakes up at night 
  thinking about it. "There's a holy mess in two twenty-six." 
  Kurnicki allows a thin, quick grin. "Make sure you get it all, 
  huh?"



  David Appell (appell@usa.net)
-------------------------------
  David Appell is a freelance writer determined to exist outside 
  the corporate paradigm. His work has appeared in Audubon, The 
  Seattle Review, Sycamore Review, Hawaii Review, and other 
  magazines. He currently lives in central New Hampshire.
 
  <http://www.together.net/%7Eappell/>



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