Well,
youłve heard the question before: In a society that increasingly alienates and
depersonalizes people, what chance is there going to be for meaningful
communication between us? Gardner Dozois suggests that no matter how hopeless
things get therełll always be men who will find a way to break through the
barriers. And he shows one of those heroic, determined efforts.
THE
MAN WHO WAVED HELLO
by Gardner R.
Dozois
The
world solidified.
He was Harry Bradley, Caucasian,
thirty-seven years of age, of certifiably good character. A junior
executive-grade GS 8, $10,000 a year, Readjusted Scalewho had been a junior
executive since he was thirty and would be a junior executive until he died in
harness or was forcibly retired to a Senior Citizens Haven (you can get in but
you canłt get out). His apartment measured thirty feet by thirty feet by twelve
feet, and was decorated in the pseudocolonial that was popular that year,
everything made out of plastic and scaled down. He had plush red artificial
fabric drapes across a picture window that looked out at nothing except acres
of other picture windows looking back. The window measured exactly sixteen
inches by twenty-four inches, no more or no less than any other picture window
owned by any other executive of his grade and seniority. That was only fair;
that was democracy. He had a solar-powered kitchenette that could cook him
almost anything in five minutes, but he was very seldom hungry. He had paneled
walls made out of artificial wood. He had a fireplace with a simulated fire
that was actually a (safe; economical) electric coil; you could turn it on and
off with a switch and plug it into the wall socket. He had a colonial"
chandelier (scaled-down) that was made of a plastic that you almostcouldnłttellfromrealglass,
and that would sway and tinkle convincingly if you turned the air-conditioner
up high. He had (although he didnłt know it this precisely) the 152,673rd copy
of a Cezanne print to be run off the presses that year, and the 98,435th copy
of a Van Goghboth pictures were hung magnetically so that the uniform creme
luster of the walls would not have to be marred by a nail. He wasnłt allowed to
mar the walls anyway, and if he did he would have to explain it in writing, in
triplicate, in exasperating detail. There was also a large Rembrandt (copy
number into the high millions) that he didnłt like but which was government
issue and had come with the apartment, and which his contract didnłt allow him
to get rid of. He had a silent electric clock with a built-in optional tick. He
had a combination viewphone/color hologram (but he didnłt want to think about
that now: later) that enabled him to either talk to peopleother executivesor
watch commercialgovernmentprogramming. He had a table shaped like an old
sailing-ship wheel that you could put cocktails on and spin around. He had a
simulated antique colonial lantern for a conversation piece. He had an automatic
stereo with a selection of twenty-three classical symphonies and six
uninterrupted hours of interpreted popular music that he never listened to. If
he wanted, he could use his viewphone to talk to people on the moon via the
communications satellite linkups. There was nobody on the moon he wanted to
talk to. Nobody on the moon wanted to talk to him either.
He was Harry Bradley. There was
no way to avoid it.
He lay perfectly still in the
middle of the floor, with an erection.
He was naked.
Sweat dried on his body, and his
breath came in rasps.
His stomach knotted.
Bradley struggled weakly, flopped
over onto his stomach. The tile was unbelievably cold against his wet skin, and
hard as rock; his flesh crawled in revulsion at the contact. He managed to
raise himself up on one elbow before his head began to swim. He paused, head
bowed, panting, involuntarily studying the dirt in the cracks between the
tiles. For a moment there he had been two people, living two different
existences in two separate environments, and thatłd been rough. He was still
having trouble separating realitiesconflicting memories chittered at him,
emotions surged in opposition, lingering afterimages merged nauseously with
vision: one universe still superimposed over another like a double-exposed
negative. But one universe was fading. The universe he preferred, the universe
where he wasnłt doomed to be Harry Bradley, junior executive, grade GS 8,
$10,000 a year. Even as he struggled to hold onto it, to something, it
slipped away irrevocably. His dream universe melted and flowed back into the
well behind his eyes, to be replaced by the gray, familiar scenes of reality
that boiled up like landscapes in bubbles.
The rococo opulence of the other
place was gone: supplanted by a plastic sterility that was worse than poverty.
He shook his head ponderously,
wincing at the rasp of pain. Even memory had gone now. All he could recall of
the other place was a vague impression of abstract beauty and richness, and
that there he had been important, an integral part of totality. That it was a
better place than here.
The electric clock in the kitchen
ticked noisily, each tick a nail pinning him more tightly to the world.
A furnace started with a roar on
a lower level
His throat was clogged with sandpaper.
He had taken the egomorphic drug
two hours ago: ten thousand years of subjective existence.
He began to shake, trembling
uncontrollably. The cold of the apartment was getting through now, piercing
like knives. His teeth chattered painfully together. His lips were turning
blue.
With an effort, he sat up. The
floor tilted queasily, first one way and then the other, like a seesaw. He put
his head between his knees for awhile. The room steadied. He heard the elevator
swarm by outside his walls: a snide ratcheting sound.
Donłt think. Just donłt think at
all.
Slowly, he got to his knees, and
then crawled to his feet. It was easier than hełd thought it would be, if he
stopped at every stage to rest It only took him about five minutes.
He was finally able to stand. The
shift in perspective was amazing, and frightening. Suddenly, he felt like he
was balancing on a tightrope above an abyss, like he was a taffy-man thatłd
been stretched out to miles in length and was now in danger of toppling over
because he was too thin for his height. His knees kept giving way, and he kept
trying to lock them. The taffy-man swayed precariously, as if in a high wind.
Incongruously, he still had an
erection. It slapped awkwardly and painfully against his thighs as he moved. He
touched it cautiously: the pallid head. Nausea surged through him.
Bradley stumbled toward the
bathroom, teeth clenched to keep back the vomit that had suddenly geysered up
from the pit of his stomach. He couldnłt feel his feet, although he could see his
toes stubbing clumsily against pieces of furniture, and knew that it must hurt.
He floatedor sliddown the slowly tilting floor toward the bathroom, using his
head as a gyroscope. One foot in front of the other, only momentum to keep you
from toppling into the abyss.
The bathroom door irised aside to
let him through. He crashed to his knees before the voider, not feeling the
jolt. He leaned into the voider and vomited violently, bringing up only an
oily, greenish bile. Triggered by his presence, the bathroom began to play
soothing Muzakwoodwinds and stringsand to fill the cubicle with subtly
perfumed incense: sandalwood. It was all very modern.
Bradley worked his way through
the dry heaves and shuddered into stillness. He retched one final, wrenching
time and then knelt quietly, his head resting on the lip of the voider. It
chuckled cheerfully and energetically to itself, busy digesting his vomit. His
stomach spasmed retroactively; muscles fluttered in sympathy along his bowed
back. Sweat had drawn itself primly into precise beads on his upper lip.
Throwing up had cleared his head,
and made him aware of his body again, but otherwise had not helped much. He
still felt horrible.
Don t think why, donłt get on
that at all. Just keep moving, get the blood going a little. Or die, damn you.
Die and rot in hell forever.
Christ
He went back out into the hall,
cursing feebly at the bathroom door as it dilated open and closed behind him.
Retching him out. The apartment was warmerthe thermostat reacting in obedience
to his own body temperature, shutting down as his temperature dropped in the
stasis induced by the egodrex, revving up again as he returned reluctantly to
life. Very clever, these clockwork things. They always functioned, no matter
what. Automatically he picked up the clothes he had scattered around when the
drug had started to depress the higher-reasoning centers of his brain,
translating his undermind directly into experience. He threw the clothes into
the hamper that led to the buildingłs reconstituting systems. Theyłd be pulped
and treated and made usable again. So would his vomit. Now that it was almost
too late, the government was very big on ecology. Good to the last drop.
There was a full-length mirror
(convertible to one way so he could peek into the corridor outside) near the
hamper. He studied his nakedness with distaste: fish-belly white, flabby,
bristly-haired as a dog. His erection had finally gone down, but now it looked
like some obscene, wrinkled slug crawling from a nest of dirty, matted hair. He
felt a touch of returning nausea. New clothes. Get dressed. The fresh cloth
feeling even more stifling against his dirty skin, but never mind. Cover it all
up. Before it begins to decompose..
Dressed, he walked aimlessly into
the kitchen, past the sailing-ship wheel. The big electric combination chrome
blinked relentlessly at him from the wall: hour, day, month, year. Calibrated
to a tenth of a second. Never let you forget. Why did anybody need to know the
time that closely? Why did anybody need time? Despite himself, he read the
chrome dials, scanning left to right in reflex. Christ, only five p.m.?
Work tomorrow. Back to the office, the tapes, the papers, the meaningless files
of numbers, punch cards to be sorted. Routing. And Martino promoted over him,
in spite of seniority. The second time. Time. All the hours left in this day,
all the days left ahead. Unrequited time hung over him like a rock, threatening
to fall.
This was going to be bad. This
was going to be very bad.
Suddenly, Bradley was having
trouble with his breathing. He tried not to think of the seconds turning into
minutes into hours into days into weeks into months into years, all ahead of
him, all of which hełd have to somehow get through. He thought of them anyway,
ticking them off one by one inside his skull. This was going to be too bad to
stand. Hełd have to. He couldnłt possibly get any more egodrex until Friday.
Thatłd been his regular fix for three years. And he couldnłt afford it
anywayit already took every cent of the small credit margin he was allowed for
accessories, illegally transferred, to buy his weekly dose of the egomorphic.
But this was bad. He felt another, familiar pressure building up, forcing him
toward the other thing. No, not this time. Donłt think about the other thing.
Donłt think.
He took stock of his body, to
distract himself. He found, to his disgust, that he was hungry. His body was
hungry. He wasnłt actually in need of nutrient, and his mind gagged at the
thought of eating, but the food he lived onlike most of the governmentłs
products-was mildly addictive (habit-forming was the official term, not
addictive) and his body wanted to eat. Chew and swallow: a pacifier.
Resignedly, he punched out a combination on the kitchenette at random, not
caring what he got. The kitchenette mumbled, the solar oven buzzed briefly, and
a tray slid out of a slot, sealed in tinfoil. He peeled away the tinfoil and
ate. The food was divided into tiny geometrical sections on the tray, a glob of
that here, a spatter of this there. It all tasted basically the same: like
plastic. Bradley ate it without noticing it, trying to involve himself to
distract his mind from the other thing, failing.
It wasnłt enough. Nothing was
enough.
He put down his fork. Hands
cupping the eyes, squeezing. Keep it in.
Maybe youłre finished this time.
Youłre going to do it again, arenłt you? No. Yes, you will, you know it. (He
shook his head, arguing with himself.) Maybe theyłll catch you this time. Maybe
theyłll just put you away. Rot in the darkness, no light. Maybe theyłll just
put you the hell away. Huh? Degradation. Disgrace. Youłve been lucky all these
years, in a way. Nobodyłs ever found out about the egomorphic drugonly
psychologically addictive, no needle-marks, no lasting metabolic effects: the
thinking manłs junk. But someday theyłll catch you. Maybe this time. Today.
Bradley got up and walked
stiff-legged around the apartment, circling around and around his furniture,
looking but carefully not touching anything. His furniture. His things.
He said. They werenłt really. The apartment and everything in it belonged to
the government. The exchange was automatic. He never saw any money, there wasnłt
really any such thing as money anyway. The bank computers balanced the credit
tally he earned against the credit debit he owed to rent the good things in
life a GS 8 was entitled to. Nothing more or less. Food, clothing, antique
lanternsthe government allowed him to rent these things from them as reward
and compensation for his services. There was no place else you could get any of
them. There was only one game in town. If he rose to a higher grade, he would
be allowed to rent more good things from the government, of correspondingly
finer quality. And when he died, the government would continue to rent the same
facilities to someone just up from GS 7, including the same reprocessed food
and clothingalthough in practice there was an inevitable attrition rate, a
little always lost from the system, something else added.
My things. God save me from my
things.
He looked out the window:
Baltimore faded into Washington into New York into Boston.
There was no place to go. Outside
the door, along the corridor, down the elevators and escalators, past the
concrete arcades and recycled fountains, past the glass-and-steel hives of the
other GS residences, past the drabber cinderblock sections for the
rank-and-file, past the cadet nurseries and crŁches, the tank and algae farms,
the oxygen reinforcement systems, the industrial quarter, the rec areas, the
outer maintenance rim, then the edge of the megalopolis. And beyond that: only
anarchy and death. And the armed patrols, walls, minefields and barbed wire
that guarded the City from chaos. No way out that way, not at all.
And no one else there. In all the
four hundred miles of the City, in all the raped lands beyond, no one else
there. No one here but him.
He sobbed, gasping air. Isolation
filled his lungs like syrup.
He would do it now, it was too
late to stop. Suicide? He thought briefly of suicide, of hurtling himself down
from his window and falling forever until the ground caught him. No, he was too
scared. Too afraid to be alone. He would do the other thing instead, as he
always did.
Bradley walked to the viewphone.
It was handsome, done in polished artificial wood and steel, with a wide
screen. Trembling, he sat down.
The company representative had
not even bothered to pretend that his spiel was not a spiel, that he wasnłt
speaking it from rote. He explained the merits of the new viewphone network in
a rehearsed tone. Bradley listened numbly. They were both bored. It was all a
formality anyway. Bradley had received a bonus for seniorityhe had to rent
something new whose cost would correspond to the bonus. He had to: there could
be no such thing as a credit unbalance. The only initiative he could execute
was in the selection of the item. He could choose from about five equally
priced items. The company rep seemed to be pushing the viewphone network, maybe
because they were overstocked
Bradley activated the network,
waited for the set to warm up. He opened a drawer, took out an address book,
looked up a scribbled number. It had taken him three days this time to find the
right girl, to follow her home, to find which apartment in the hive was hers so
that he could look up the code number. He had been terrified every waking
second of those three days, and he had almost been stopped and questioned by a
security guard. Every time it got harder, every time he came a little closer to
being caught. The view-phone hummed. The dialing pattern appeared on the
screen.
The greatest advantage of the
viewphone network, the company representative had told Bradley mechanically, is
its intimacy. It can save you a great deal of unnecessary travelitłs every bit
as good as being in the same room with the person you want to talk to. It
enables you to perform all your social and business functions-
Bradley punched out the code number. Six
short, savage jabs of his finger. He counted each click distinctly to himself.
The dialing pattern disappeared; static swirled on the screen. With one hand,
he reached down and opened his pants, unsealing the magnetic flap along the
front. He had become excited, thinking of what he was about to dohe took his
erection in his hand, squeezing, feeling the blood throb under his fingers. His
mouth was painfully dry, and he was quivering with tension. Static condensed,
became a young womanłs face. Pretty, long dark hair, big golden eyes. Yes?"
she said, not recognizing him. Bradley stood up, letting his pants drop down
around his ankles. Her eyes widened. She stared at him in shockbut there was
also a quick flicker of fascination behind her eyes, and something else.
Recognition? Longing? Love? It is love, he wanted to tell her, it is you and
me, it is us. We touch here. But he only thrust his pelvis, a little more
forward. She watched in fascination, lips parted, tongue against teeth. After a
second, she dutifullyalmost reluctantlyopened her mouth to scream. He flicked
the set off. Silence echoed. As her scream must be echoing now, in her own
apartment, in her own hive. Gradually, he lowered himself back into the chair.
He sat there with his pants bunched around his ankles and listened to the clock
tick in the kitchen.
in the convenience of your own
home
Then he began to cry.
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