Part 21 (1/2)
”It's the same as them 'mathematics' that you and that Marvin Stewart kid are always scribbling on pieces of paper,” Arnie grumbled. ”What do you think they'll ever do for you?”
”Paper?” Stan repeated, blinking his eyes. ”You mean with pens? They write things on pieces of paper with pens?”
Ella stared in disbelief. ”You mean without any b.u.t.tonpad, even? No screen?”
”They've even got a game they play without a screen,” Beth told them. ”Chess, or something, they call it.
They push pieces of wood around on a board.”
Stan gave Kenny a worried look. ”You mean that's it? They just move pieces of wood around on a board? Nothing else happens?”
”It doesn't even have batteries,” Beth moaned miserably.
”That's what you get for your trouble, Stan,” Arnie said in a hopeless voice. ”You do your best, and all you get is rejection. No grat.i.tude, no appreciation. And on top of that they have to be reasonable with you all the time, and discuss everything . . . and talk in that low-key kind of way that drives you crazy-as if you're not worth arguing with.” He shook his head. ”They don't try to solve their problems, Stan. They think about them.”
”That's bad,” Stan said. ”You mean just sitting there, staring at nothing-not doing anything about anything?”
”Right.” Beth waved vaguely at the screen, which was showing baton-swinging police clas.h.i.+ng with demonstrators in a street riot somewhere in South America. ”It ain't as if they don't ever get to see the proper way to handle life . . . I mean, everyone has problems, right? But people need to do something positive about them-like they throw something, scream, smash things, go out and have a breakdown and beat up on somebody, or whatever. . . . But kids these days don't do things like that any more. All they do is sit and talk, and then say the problem's gone away, or maybe it ain't so bad or something.
They won't face up to anything.”
”Hyperpa.s.sivity,” Ella p.r.o.nounced. ”That's what Dr. Friedmann said was wrong with Alice's daughter in Bayview Apartments. Too much thinking is the first sign of losing touch with reality. It's a big problem everywhere with kids. There are some pills that will get him back up to a normal level of hype.”
”Thanks, but I'm sure I can manage fine without,” Kenny said hastily.
”Don't keep thanking people,” Arnie complained. ”It ain't good manners. It sounds like people are doing you favors or something . . . as if they're n.o.bodies trying to get liked.”
”Well that G.o.d-awful music you play in there won't get you anyplace,” Beth said to Kenny. She turned toward Ella and Stan. ”You know the kind of stuff I mean-no beat or feel to it all, just noise.”
”The kids across the street from us are always playing it out the window,” Stan said, nodding. ”It's primitive, not even electronic. I went over there one night and set fire to their rose bushes.”
”What's that place you were talking about the other week?” Arnie asked Kenny. ”Beat Heaven or something? I mean, what's it all about, huh? Where in h.e.l.l is Beat Heaven supposed to be?”
”Beethoven,” Kenny said with a sigh.
”Same difference. So where in h.e.l.l is that?”
”Is that where they wear all the freaky clothes, Kenny?” Ella asked, giggling and waving her hand at his general appearance.
”They don't say anything, kid,” Stan told him. ”Are you ashamed to be yourself? Is that what it is, huh?”
He gestured down at his own crotch-hugging white pants with scarlet side-stripes, tucked into calf-length astronavigator boots, officer's belt with Alpha Centauri Squadron buckle, and navy, white-trimmed blouse, complete with Strikefleet shoulder patch. ”See. You should try to find yourself, and then tell the world who you are-like a stars.h.i.+p admiral, for instance. It's easy once you find yourself and make the effort to fit in.”
”But I never lost myself,” Kenny said. ”And I'm not a stars.h.i.+p admiral.”
”You have to be something sooner or later,” Ella insisted. ”You can't spend your whole life staring at books and listening to crazy music. You have to get involved eventually. It ain't all gonna change to suit you.”
There was short pause. Then Beth lowered her eyes and said dismally, in the voice of someone finally revealing a long-concealed secret of congenital madness in the family, ”He says he wants to be some kind of scientist.” She looked at Arnie. ”What was it, a fizzy-something?”
”Physicist,” Kenny supplied. Arnie looked away to hide his shame.
”But that kind of thing is for n.o.bodies, like schoolteachers, technical waddyacallits, or people who make things,” Ella protested. ”Why would anyone wanna do something like that?”
Arnie showed his empty palms. ”That's the way they are, Ella. They want to work, and learn things.
They say it shouldn't be the government's job to keep them. Something to do with 'ethics' and that kind of c.r.a.p. . . . I don't know.”
Kenny looked around and shook his head. For the first time his expression betrayed rising exasperation.
He pointed at the screen. ”Look . . . that idiot behind the desk is telling you how the U.S. is more respected in the world today because of the way we've strengthened our strategic forces, right? But they only voted the appropriation a year ago. They haven't actually spent any money yet. They're still only talking about what to spend it on. And even if they had spent it, it couldn't have made any difference on that kind of time scale. It would be ten years at least before any new weapons ordered through last year's budgets could be produced and deployed. But they're talking as if it had all already happened, and taking the credit for it.
”Can't you see what's happening? Things in the real world don't happen fast enough to be entertaining any more. So the media have created a make-believe world that runs at several times the speed of real time, with a crisis every half hour and always an instant solution.
”It's the same with all the other 'crises' that they invent and then say they've solved. How could a crime wave of 'epidemic proportions' that n.o.body had heard of before suddenly materialize in two months, just before Ed Callones ran for governor-and with a program already worked out to fight it? . . . And then have been 'successfully eliminated' in just as short a time after he was elected? It couldn't have. Things don't change that quickly. The 'economic recoveries' that somebody or other is always supposed to be masterminding every six months are from slumps that never happened. The 'environmental catastrophes'
that are always supposed to be imminent never materialize. And yet people everywhere believe it all and carry on paying . . .”
Kenny looked from one to another of the four faces staring blankly back at him. He exhaled a long sigh.
”It doesn't matter. . . . I guess I got carried away a little. I was going out anyhow. I'll just be on my way.
You folks have a good evening.” With that he turned away quickly and left, closing the door behind him.
An uncomfortable silence persisted for a while. Finally Stan said, ”Gee, I didn't realize you guys had it so bad. . . . I guess he'll probably grow out of it, huh?”
”What was he talking about?” Ella asked, still dazed after Kenny's outburst.
Arnie was still looking down at the floor. Beth came over and leaned her head against his shoulder. ”Oh Arnie,” she sobbed. ”We tried, didn't we? Where did we go wrong?”
Outside, Kenny pulled his parka on over his jacket and walked around to the back of the house to pick up the backpack, suitcase full of selected books, and crammed briefcase that he had dumped from his bedroom window. He carried his things to the end of the street and waited in the shadows of the shrubbery by the corner streetlight. After about ten minutes, Marv Stewart's battered '95 Chevy van appeared. Marv was at the wheel, with Bev Johnson and Harry wedged in next to him up front. Kenny slid open the side door and hoisted his bags inside. Then he climbed in to join the crush of young people jammed in the back amidst coats, rucksacks, suitcases, sleeping bags, and bundles of books. ”Okay, Kenny?” Marv called from the front as the van pulled away. ”Any problems?”
”No,” Kenny answered. He felt drained, now that the worst was over and he was committed. ”It went okay. Did everyone else make it?”
”All here,” Tom Pearce's voice said from somewhere in the shadows nearby. ”You're the last.”
Kenny gradually made out the forms as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. Tom, who could read IBM microcode and wanted to get into AI research, was propped just behind him, next to Nancy, who had painted the murals in Giuseppe's restaurant in Oakland. Sheila Riordan, who understood tensor calculus and wrote plays, was behind them, with Kev, the chess expert, and Charlie Cameron, who was into number theory and could recite pi to fifty places. . . . And yes, the others were all there, too, farther back. Kenny leaned back and made himself comfortable between his backpack and a pile of blankets.
”So what's the schedule?” he called out to Marv.
”Down the Interstate and on through L.A., bound for Phoenix. We'll probably stop for breakfast somewhere near the Arizona border.”
”When do you think we'll make Boston?” Kenny asked.
”Aw . . . should be sometime around Tuesday, I figure.”
”Uh-huh.”