MARTians Page 6

  I can feel my own phone purring. I reach in my pocket and pull it out. WARREN has sent me a message:

  The Warren is the only contact you need. Any trouble, send a message to the Warren.

  “Just delete the AllMART Help message. Please . . .” Timmer looks at my badge. “ZERO! They did that to you? ZERO!”

  “Could be worse.”

  “How much?”

  “I could be beautiful BELLY.”

  “That happened?”

  “It did, MORT. Did you ask? Is that how you knew it was a bad plan to badger the badger?”

  “Me? No. I was going to wait till the end of the day, you know, be relaxed about it, not call out the mistake in front of an audience. It was a kid tagged DRAIN in my class. He said it was bullshit. It wasn’t a human name. He got really angry.”

  “What happened?”

  “Three days into training, he disappeared.”

  “You mean he quit?”

  “He disappeared, like I said. Come on, it will look weird if we stand here. Follow me.” MORTimmer walks away in what I’m pretty sure is the wrong direction. I run a couple steps to catch up.

  “Look weird? Who’s watching?” I say.

  “The surveillance,” he says.

  “What surveillance?” I look around.

  “Stop it. Don’t look. Never surveil the surveillance. At least don’t look like you are looking.” He points directly ahead, toward a car far across the parking lot. “There are cameras on all the lot lights. Top of the posts. I said don’t look! And there are drones. Mostly they focus on the traffic flow. But just know, they can always see you, so don’t make yourself interesting.”

  I just want to go home. That isn’t an option, so I just want to go to the Warren. If I were a dormitory employee, I’d probably be home by now. That really doesn’t sound like a bad deal. I start across the parking lot. Timmer grabs my arm and pulls me in the wrong direction.

  “Never walk directly toward the Warren. Always walk like you are going to the parking lot, to the bus stop or a car, then circle around.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s a Raoul rule. Purely precautionary.”

  We walk across the pavement. I can feel the heat through the soles of my shoes. Even though I haven’t met him, I’m starting to really dislike Raoul.

  When we open the door to the laundromat, 5er isn’t the only one there.

  “Hey,” says Timmer.

  “Hey,” say the two people sitting on washing machines. They say it at the exact same time.

  “Pineapple,” says Timmer, pointing. “And Luck. They’re twins.” When Timmer says that word twins, their two heads bob up and down, synchronized, like they are bouncing on the same spring.

  If Timmer hadn’t said they were twins, I wouldn’t have guessed it. Pineapple is bigger than Luck. Their hair isn’t even the same color, but then, Pineapple’s hair is an unnatural shade of red and Luck’s hair is green, which is never, in any shade, natural on human beings. They are both wearing AllMART polo shirts.

  “We brought ice cream — melted,” says Luck, and hands a carton to Timmer, who tips it like a big mug and drinks from it. When he lowers it, he has a mess of cream on his lip.

  “Want some?” Timmer holds the carton out to me.

  “No, thank you,” I say.

  “You sure?” says Timmer. “It looks like ice cream is what’s for dinner.” He points at me and says, “This is ZERO. I found her. She lives here now. Currently in training.”

  “I’m Zoë.” I hold out my hand, but neither twin reaches out to me.

  “Training? Look, if you want the coolest job, fail the tests,” says Pineapple. “Prove you’re back-of-the-store, behind-the-scenes material. Best chance to snag stuff, during loading and unloading. And you will develop mighty guns.” Pineapple stops to display. Each bicep gets a kiss from its proud owner. Luck falls sideways laughing.

  “Also, you can look however you want — even bored. Smiles not required,” says Pineapple.

  There is no way I’m ever going to fail a test, accidentally or on purpose.

  “Who are you, really. Pineapple? What’s your real name?”

  “She’s still kind of hung up on the name badge thing,” says Timmer, pointing at me.

  Luck sets down the ice cream carton and looks directly at me and says, “You didn’t complain. . . .”

  “No. She’s safe,” Timmer answers for me. “Belly beat her to it.”

  “Belly! Ouchy! That’s almost as bad as Drain,” says Luck.

  “What’s the story about Drain? You said he disappeared. What’s that even mean?”

  “It means,” says Pineapple, “they took him, he’s gone, and he isn’t coming back.”

  At that moment, the dryers stop tumbling clothes. The air is hot and static.

  Timmer takes a deep breath and says, “You need to know.”

  He looks at Luck and Pineapple where they sit, silent.

  “Zero needs to know, right?” He doesn’t wait for them to answer. “It’s like this: Like I said, Drain was in my trainee class, and he got hotheaded when he saw his badge. He was ballistic about it. He wouldn’t drop it.

  “When I left that day, his sister, Soapy, was waiting by the employee exit door.”

  “Drain’s sister, Soapy?” I need to be sure I heard that right.

  Timmer nods and says, “Yeah, Soapy.”

  And I stop believing the story Timmer is telling me, right at that moment. Soapy! And Drain! I look around the laundromat and wonder if the next person in the story will be called Rinse — or Softener. I don’t say anything, though, because I want to hear how it ends.

  “The next morning, Soapy was there again, asking everyone if they had seen her brother. He hadn’t shown up at all.

  “People said maybe he just left. But Soapy said no to that. He didn’t take the car, and that’s where they were living mostly, to save on gas. All his clothes and shit were still in the backseat. He wouldn’t have left everything. He wouldn’t have left without saying good-bye.

  “It was days and days, and Soapy still couldn’t find Drain.

  “She drove out to where they used to live when they had a whole family, but the place was empty. She asked all the olds who refused to leave the neighborhood. None of them had seen him. After that, she went to Dawna Day and asked to see the security camera data — she figured she could at least see where he went while he was on the premises, like which direction he went. Dawna Day said no to that; it would be an invasion of privacy. So, like I said, Drain disappeared.”

  “And that’s it? That’s the end of the story? What about Soapy? What happened to her?”

  “Soapy is basically nuts,” says Pineapple. “We see her sometimes because she works the back end. She’s been permanently assigned stocking frozen foods during the graveyard shift. Getting froze like that, it’s usually a punishment for stealing food — you know, grazing in the produce department or swiping all the bakery samples. It isn’t easy stealing frozen food. . . .”

  Luck holds an ice cream carton out like a trophy and says, “Unless you are really good.”

  “But,” says Pineapple, “that isn’t the point. The point is they had to move her out of customer service because she was always showing people Drain’s picture and saying he was kidnapped.”

  “Kidnapped? That’s horrible.”

  “You got no idea,” says Pineapple. “Soapy believes AllMART kidnapped Drain.”

  “A week or so later, she said she saw him in a garbage gyre mining operation promo. But how could that be? It takes time to produce a polished ad,” says Timmer.

  “It’s not like every product promo is made fresh. They just add enough new clips to keep it fresh. You know: ‘Surprise is the secret ingredient in memorable advertising.’” I’m quoting from Retail Psychology class. If Timmer recognizes the source, he doesn’t acknowledge it.

  “But why would he end up on a processing ship at sea?” says Luck.

  “Yeah,
that would be weird. Did she see him in a cheerful crowd scene? That’s a lot of faces. Someone might have resembled him,” I say.

  “No, he was in the sewing room. She says she recognized his hands. Pfft! It’s wishful thinking. She just wants to believe he’s there, even though that place sucks — because the alternative is just not knowing at all,” says Timmer.

  “We have a psychological need for closure,” I say. That’s another quote from Retail Psychology. It explains the compulsion to watch a serial advertisement, especially if there is a narrative element. We all want to know the end of the story.

  Timmer digs around in one of the desk drawers and pulls out a mess of keys.

  “You need to see the places that are available, if you decide you really do want to have your own space.”

  I follow him. He’s assuming that I’m going to stay. That’s an assumption I still don’t share. I’m considering other options. I understand the transportation problem, but I could ask Dawna Day for advice. I expect Timmer would have lots of reasons why that is a bad idea, but it isn’t his decision. I’m not sure he needs to know, and I may not tell him. Given the choice, I don’t stir up a Dumpster full of raccoons. I feel the same way about arguing with Timmer.

  Gravel grits under our shoes while we walk to the far end of the alley and stop at the door marked ERUPT SALON. “This is for Juliette,” says Timmer.

  “Pineapple and Luck have dibs on this one,” Timmer says while we walk past another gray door. “They still go to their old neighborhood most times, or sleep in their car. Transitioning. It can take time.”

  I can’t believe he is saying that to me. He isn’t giving me any time for transitioning. I’m just supposed to move into this dead mall and live here happy as a roach in a soda cup.

  “This one is available,” says Timmer. He opens a door and I smell dirty carpet and bitter disappointment. Timmer flicks on the lights.

  It’s Jyll. And she’s ready to sell, sell, sell a story of fun family togetherness. Except it isn’t the living Jyll. It is a life-size cardboard Jyll, with a life-size cardboard smile full of life-size cardboard teeth. She stands behind an acrylic coffee table beside an uncomfortable couch. Jyll is holding a SOLD sign in her cardboard fingers. I am not sold. I step forward and punch Jyll in the cardboard nose and knock her flat.

  “You want this place? You could sleep on the couch, I guess. I forgot there was a couch.”

  “No,” I say.

  We walk to the next gray metal door.

  When I imagine sleeping in the back room of the fashion boutique where mannequin parts are stacked up like bones, my own bones wither.

  “No,” I say.

  “This is your last choice,” says Timmer. “It was an ice cream parlor, and then it was going to be a church, but . . .” He switches on the lights, and we are standing in an aquarium, a glass box full of buzzing, aluminum-flavored light.

  “No,” I say.

  There are no more doors. Timmer answers my silence with silence, which is a good thing, because nothing he has to say interests me.

  The sun has gone down. It is night, but the floodlights from the parking lots stain the sky dead-leaf yellow. Does the higher dark sparkle with disaster? Not that I can see. The promised satellite rain is invisible to me.

  Just before he opens the door to the laundromat, Timmer turns to me and says, “Thing is. Thing is. Thing is: I don’t like to leave 5er alone when he sleeps. He walks sometimes when he dreams. I’m afraid. I’m afraid he will just walk off.” Timmer spreads his hands wide and empty, and I see what he means, all the wide and empty world and 5er invisible, lost in it.

  Timmer is gone. He said he had stuff to do, but he did not elaborate.

  5er is sitting on a washing machine with his arms wrapped around his legs. He is watching clothes tumbling behind a big dryer window. He spends the whole day here, in the Rub-a-Dub-Tub Laundry. The bright-colored clothes in the dryer flutter and leap, unkillable flowers in a merciless wind.

  I lead 5er into the room where the mattress is on the floor. He doesn’t resist.

  “Go to sleep,” I say.

  He crawls into the center and curls himself into a wad.

  “Do you want me to read to you?” AnnaMom used to read to me when I was little. I used to fall asleep to the sound of her voice.

  5er doesn’t say anything, but then, he never does.

  I sit on the side of the mattress and reach into my AllMART bag and pull out the brittle paper book. I open it. It doesn’t matter that I’m starting the story in the middle. All that matters is the sound of words. The words don’t need to mean anything. I just turn the pages and read “And this disease was called The Loneliness, because when you saw your home town dwindle the size of your fist and then lemon-size and then pin-size and vanish in the fire-wake, you felt you had never been born, there was no town, you were nowhere, with space all around . . .”

  I’m spending another night on a mattress in the office of a public laundry, too tired to sleep and too tired to look at the book in my hand. 5er writhes and makes strangled noises in his dreams. When I try to shush him, his eyes open and he looks right through me. He scrambles to his hands and knees, sweating. If he starts walking, do I try to stop him? Do I just follow him? Timmer didn’t say. Suddenly, 5er’s eyes shut and he goes limp and flops over, a hairless twitching kitten. I try not to touch him because touching him doesn’t seem to help. I’m curled on my side into a question mark. I’m just one big question and I don’t even know how to put it into words.

  I pick up my phone. The screen wakes at the touch of my thumb. It knows me. It knows what I want. I imagine it circling out, higher and higher, calling out, calling out to find the shape of the world. Listening, listening for the love I need to hear.

  She isn’t going to call. I hear Timmer’s voice in my mind, like he can suddenly talk to me whenever he wants, like his voice is the voice I need to listen to, even though it isn’t the one I want to hear.

  We play endless rounds of a game on our learning devices. The goal is to direct customers through the maze of aisles to a desired product, but extra life points are earned by interesting the customer in other products during the journey. This is made easier by little thought balloons that appear over the customer’s head: “It’s almost Mom’s birthday; I’m thirsty; She’s hawt!”

  I touch the Special Occasion flowers, the supersize soakers in the drink cooler, and brush the endcap display of condoms as I thread my lucky customer through the aisles.

  I am very good at this game. Of course, it will be harder with real customers, since their wants aren’t written so obviously in the air, but there are always wants.

  Wanting is only human. Humans are only wants. My purpose is to see tiny seeds of wanting that I can magnify and satisfy. Then, because I am human too, I will want stuff. The cycle is so beautiful. I will belong.

  There is a test. A product appears on the vid screen at the front of the classroom. My task is to name it and give the range of aisles where it can be found. The items are difficult. Is this (a) a brown banana or (b) a plantain? I go with plantain, because this is a test and bananas are almost extinct. I use the same strategy to identify fresh squid entrails, tomatillos, and a ball-peen hammer. Once the vid screen wipes to black after the last item, it is only a second before our phones shiver.

  “It’s okay,” says Dawna Day. “Go ahead and look. It’s your test scores. AllMART family, I’m so happy to tell you that one of us has achieved a perfect score: one hundred items correctly identified and located. We all did great, but I know we agree that kind of performance deserves a reward.”

  I have at least two reactions to this announcement, simultaneously: I erupt in a shining moment of Yes! because for that moment it is possible that a reward is forthcoming; I collapse in a sunken moment of No! because the reward is almost certainly going to someone else.

  The shining moment of Yes! happens.

  “Collect your reward, Zero!” says Dawna Day.
/>
  She holds out a medium-size AllMART bag.

  “Thank you,” I say. Then I return to my seat.

  “Zero, aren’t you forgetting something? I’m sure everyone wants to share your happiness. Show us what’s in the bag!”

  Of course. I look in the bag. I’ve gotten very good at appearing happy, so I act like I’m unwrapping the best birthday present ever. I raise each item over my head in triumph and for the viewing pleasure of those less fortunate. “A ball-peen hammer! DentureTite! Three plantains! Kimchi candy! Can the whole class share the candy? I think there’s enough for everyone.”

  There is more than enough.

  Dawna Day says, “I’m proud of Zero. Zero has the kind of talent that is needed by the Retail Rescue Rangers. Haven’t I told you about the Rescue Rangers? They are heroes. When there is an emergency, a commercial disaster, they are the first responders.”

  I’m not exactly sure what sort of situation qualifies as a commercial emergency, but that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that Dawna Day is proud of me. Dawna Day smiles, and I can feel it like sunbeams on my heart. It might also be the spicy-sweet heat of the candied kimchi. Either way is good. Either way my heart is warm.

  “Plantains,” says Timmer when I show him what I’ve earned. “If we had oil and a pan and a little sugar . . . so good.”

  “We can eat them without cooking,” I say.

  Timmer laughs. “No, I don’t think so. But we can maybe use the chiminea. We used it to toast marshmallows. It worked okay for that.”

  It takes time to build a fire. It takes time for it to be hot. It takes time to figure out how to position the plantains so they will cook without falling into the coals. Plantains probably take a lot longer than marshmallows. And all that time, I’m hungry. At last, when the skin is charred, we decide we can eat.

  We split them open.

  “My Grammalita’s plantains were delicious — crispy edges, a little sweet,” says Timmer. “I would steal slices, and she would poke me with a fork, just a little. Then she would laugh and say, ‘You eat them. You are a growing boy.’”