Up a Tree

As Gavin slowly wakened from his nap he wondered why the cabin temperature was so low. Beyond low. It was freezing. When his eyes opened groggily he saw pine branches partly obstructing his view of a cloudless starry night sky. His first thought was, “Oh, that is why it’s cold.” His second was that this answer raised a host of new questions. He sometimes woke up disoriented when he traveled; in the morning when waking in a motel room somewhere, he might struggle for a few moments to remember where he was and why. But he never had awakened to sky before. He didn’t remember ever having debarked from the commuter aircraft on which he had booked a flight from Nashville to Roanoke. His face stung as though scratched. He grew conscious of what felt like bruises on his torso. He felt beneath himself with his hands. He was still strapped to his passenger seat… and he was in a tree.
 
Gavin patted his body for his cell phone. He then remembered it was in the inside pocket of his jacket. His jacket was missing. He had removed it earlier because the cabin temperature was too warm. He realized his shoes were missing, too. He had not removed those. They must have flown off in the aftermath of whatever happened to the plane. He recalled a story years ago of a woman whose seat landed in an Amazon forest canopy after her airliner broke up in midair. She survived. He was probably in the hills of North Carolina or Virginia. His odds should be at least as good.
 
Gavin took stock of his surroundings. His seat was lodged in branches with his face to the sky. He leaned to his left and looked down. His eyes took a minute to adjust to the darkness below. When his pupils dilated enough to at least see the ground, he realized he was some 40 feet in the air. The chair shifted suddenly from the change in the center of gravity. Gavin held his breath expecting to be in free fall, but the branches held. He exhaled and gently undid his seat belt. He reached carefully to a branch above his head. The tall pine had climbable branches at this height, but from what he could see the lowest 20 feet of the trunk had mere stubs where it wasn’t bare. He pulled himself out of the seat and cautiously worked his way down the tree. As he reached the bare section of the trunk his hands and shirt already were sticky from sap. He smelled like one of those evergreen car fresheners. The lower part of the tree contained enough branch stubs for useful hand and foot holds but they also stabbed into him as he climbed down past them. He scraped and scratched his body repeatedly through his clothes on the way down, but he was sure the wounds were superficial. By the time he reached the ground he was physically exhausted.
 
Gavin’s shoeless feet were cold. At least there was no snow on this winter day, but there was frost on the ground that turned damp from his own body heat. His socks already were moist to his ankles. He wondered if he should stay put and wait for rescuers. He quickly rejected the idea. The rest of the plane apparently was someplace else – or someplaces else. How would anyone know to look for him here? And when? He might die of exposure by morning if he didn’t move. Downhill was not only easier than uphill, but seemed more likely to lead to civilization. He chose the direction that seemed to be descending and began walking. A survival tip he remembered from childhood – though he couldn’t say when and where he heard it – said to follow water downstream. That will take you to people. If he encountered a stream he would follow that.
 
There was no clear path among the trees. Repeatedly he was forced to push through tangles of vines, brush, and small branches. Thorns did minor violence to his hands and branches smacked him in the face. His wet, cold, shoeless feet seemed to find every possible loose rock on which to step. He was sure his feet were bleeding. At least the cold numbed them. His early determination waned as he plodded on for seemed like hours, though occasional peeks at the sky through the trees revealed that the stars and moon hadn’t changed nearly enough for so much time to have passed. Exhaustion and melancholy overtook him. The desire to sit down, rest, and perhaps sleep, grew nearly overwhelming. His rational mind told him it would be a permanent sleep. He would die of exposure. The non-rational side of him didn’t care. At each stumble it became harder to motivate himself to get back up and resume walking. He pushed onward one foot in front of the other. He no longer could feel his feet. His lungs hurt. He found he had to stop frequently or else grow lightheaded. He took to counting 25 steps, halting to catch his breath, and then pacing another 25.
 
Gavin swore he could hear something in the woods in back of him. Was it just deer or was something tracking him? Coyotes had spread into the area in recent decades but this sounded bigger. A bear? Black bears were fairly common in these woods but he always had been told they are not naturally aggressive with humans. Yet they were predators after all. And he did reek of blood. The idea of sitting down was suddenly less enticing.
 
One foot stepped in water. He had found a stream. He followed the stream to a larger stream. He no longer could feel anything below his knees. He wasn’t sure how he was managing to stand. The stream eventually debouched into a small grassy area, and in front of him was a culvert. He climbed up the embankment next to it on all fours and found himself by a country lane. Headlights appeared. He stood up and waved to the oncoming sedan. The driver honked at him and swerved around him.
 
At least the commotion on the road had scared away the bear if that is what it was. He was too tired to walk any further. He stood until a new set of headlights approached. This time he walked into the middle of the road and waved with both arms. The SUV slowed and came to a stop several feet in front of him. He could not make out the driver but she shouted out the driver’s side window, “Stay there! Don’t come any closer! I’ve called the police!”
 
“Good,” he called back. “That is what I want!” The plane crashed,” he added. His words were oddly slurred. His chattering teeth were interfering with his pronunciation. He sat down in the road.
 
In the back of a police car a half hour later he repeatedly refused to be taken to a hospital. The officers complied with his request to turn up the heat. The warmth felt wonderful.
 
 “We’d really should take you to the hospital.”
 
“If you do I’ll simply call a cab and leave. I just want to go home. I need some dry clothes,” said Gavin.
 
“Your lawyer is at the police station. Ask him.”
 
“My lawyer? Bob Miller is there?”
 
“No, an Anders Something. The lieutenant called in just before we picked you up. She said he was there. He claims to represent all victims in the county of the air crash, though I’m guessing that might be just you. Most of the plane came down over in Rockbridge. I don’t know who tipped him off about you.”
 
At the police station Anders Grunwald, Esq., stopped police from taking Gavin’s statement until he had a chance to consult with his client.
 
“Hi Gavin,” Anders said.
 
“Who are you?”
 
“Someone with experience in the area of airline liability. We have an exceptional case against the airline – much better than if you had died.”
 
“I’m rather pleased about that, too, but ‘We’? And is there any chance I can get some dry clothes?”
 
“I’ll send my assistant. There is an all-night Walmart down the road, but I’ll have to bill you for her time.”
 
“Uh, OK.”
 
“Here, jot down your sizes.” He handed the note off to an overdressed woman in her 20s. “The work on the suit against the airline won’t cost anything, of course. We’ll just take a percentage of the settlement.”
 
A middle age woman in a severe business suit approached the table. “Hi Gavin. Sorry to interrupt you two, but I’m from Schiller and Schiller. This is my card. If we won’t be representing you I have to ask if you made any effort to find other survivors while you were in the woods.”
 
“I’d advise you not to answer that,” Anders said
 
“If not, there may have been hate crimes committed, at least to the extent of civil liability. We’ll have to check who else was on the plane.”
 
“Hate crimes?” Gavin asked.
 
“Don’t worry,” said Anders. “We can represent you in that, too, though we’ll have to bill by the hour.” To the other attorney he said, “I need some privacy with my client.”
 
She nodded and backed off.
 
“Look, I just want to go home. My family has to be worried sick.”
 
“April will be back with your clothes and she’ll drop you off, Gavin. Your home is only an hour away. Now let’s get that statement to the police out of the way. The FAA will send someone to speak to you, too.”
 
The sun was up when April pulled into Gavin’s driveway off a suburban street in Roanoke.
 
“Our office will be in touch with you,” she said. “Once again, we strongly urge you to refrain from commenting on last night’s events without our presence. That includes to news media people.”
 
“Right.”
 
Gavin exited the car and walked to the front door of his simple but pleasant two story home. His feet hurt, mostly from the rough treatment they had received during the night but in part from chafing on account of his new shoes. He patted his pockets for keys but realized they were in his missing jacket. The front door opened in front of him. It was his son David.
 
“Hi dad. Can’t talk. Here comes the school bus.”
 
“OK, we’ll talk later.”
 
He entered the small foyer and smelled the familiar aroma of home. A gray tabby cat slept on the sofa in the living room.
 
He climbed the steps to the second floor and opened the door to the main bedroom. His wife was still in bed. She opened one eyelid and then closed it again.
 
“Hi, honey,” Sarah said. “Today is a work-from-home day, so I’m sleeping in an extra hour. You’re late. Flight get delayed?”
 
“There were problems. Didn’t anyone call you during the night?”
 
“I don’t know. My phone is off. Can we talk about this later?” she asked.
 
“Sure.”
 
Sarah turned away onto her other side.
 
Gavin walked down the steps and sat next to the cat who ignored him. He reached for the TV remote but hesitated to push the power button. He wasn’t quite ready to watch the news. He put the remote down, closed his eyes, and stroked the cat. The cat purred.

 

Leftover Wine

My lifelong relationship with alcohol has not been entirely untroubled. It is conventional wisdom that those with conservative lifestyles are most apt to run wild when they do give into temptation. My experience does nothing to challenge that wisdom. That experience is not limited to alcohol use. I’m not referring to pharmaceuticals, but I’ll leave my dabblings in other vices for another essay – or perhaps not. Early caution with alcohol in my teens was followed by reckless excess in my twenties followed by a teetotal stretch in my thirties, at last mellowing out to “normal” (light to moderate) consumption in my forties.
 
I was not precocious with my vices pre-college. An all-male prep school (1964-70) and observant parents probably would have made that difficult even if I were inclined toward them at the time. I was a literally sober young man my first two years of college as well. I enjoyed those years, the tail end of hippiedom, for their music and free love values but felt no desire to alter my mind even with so old-fashioned a drug as alcohol. That changed when evenings at a local pub with the boys left me on each occasion with a pleasant buzz. The buzzes were legal: the drinking age in DC at the time was 18. So, in my junior year I began stocking my own shelves in my dorm room. At the time I favored wines – nothing stronger than port and sherry. It was from overindulging in merlot in a fellow student’s dorm room that I experienced my first full-blown hangover.
 
Hangovers are at least as old as the technology to brew alcohol. That technology is prehistoric, but the English word “hangover” is fairly recent, the earliest known appearance in print is in a 1904 slang dictionary. Before then the preferred word was “crapulence,” which I rather like better. But no matter how you say it (“cruda” [rawness] in New World Spanish, “resaca” [flotsam] in Old World Spanish, “Kater” [tomcat – you figure that one out] in German, etc.), it’s an unpleasantness with which most of us gain familiarity in life.
 
After that dorm evening of bibulous conviviality with friends and merlot, I returned to my own dorm room three floors below. It was the size of a walk-in closet, but it was a single, so I never had to endure a roommate in college. I fell into bed in the small hours of the morning with my stereo playing a stack of LPs. Sometime after 4 a.m. I awakened to an awful sensation. Whatever was inside me had no intention of staying there. I leapt out of bed and hurried down the hallway to the bathroom: no simple task with the walls seeming to swirl around me. I entered a stall, dropped to my knees, and hugged the toilet. You know what happened next. I could not understand how so much liquid kept emerging. It seemed to exceed by far what I had ingested. At length the heaves became dry and then subsided. I returned to my room still nauseated. Playing on the stereo (no kidding) was Melanie’s Leftover Wine, a song that to this day I cannot hear without queasiness. A couple more hours of sleep did not prevent the subsequent daylight hours from being less than my happiest.
 

Dorm room at GWU 1972

A wiser young man than I might have concluded that this was no experience to duplicate. I did not draw this conclusion. Instead, similar events recurred with alarming frequency over the next several years as I remained willing to pay for nights before with mornings after. The first real nudge toward change came at age 26 on a Sunday morning in New Orleans when I crossed a traffic-free one-way ten-foot wide street in the Quarter. A police officer called out to me, “Sir, you just jaywalked!” I was thoroughly hungover and dehydrated from the night before – also lightheaded. I stood in the glaring sun as he wrote me a ticket. The world turned weirdly gray and in the next moment of awareness I was on my back on the sidewalk as the sky slowly came into focus.
 
“Sir, are you OK?” the officer asked.
 
“Yes.”
 
“Sign here,” he said.
 
I at last concluded hangovers shouldn’t be duplicated. My intake declined thereafter. Still, it wasn’t until age 30 that I became a full teetotaler. I remained so for a decade, which had the mixed blessing of making me the designated driver for every evening out with friends. After age 40, tentative experiments showed I no longer sought the buzz and so no longer needed to shun the bottle. Since then entire years have gone by when I haven’t consumed as much as the CDC’s recommended maximum for a single week (14 drinks), and there has been no year with a week in it that met that maximum. Never again have I felt anything like those long-ago dorm room blues. I might even play a Melanie album tonight including Leftover Wine. As nostalgic flower child music goes, it’s actually pretty good.

Fool's Gold

The StpnPick scanned Lukas’ ID off his phone while still in his pocket and accessed his primary credit account. The small print on the front door informed customers that entering the premises authorized the store to do this. On the touchscreen by the counter he selected a plant-based Reuben, a Caesar salad wrap, and two sparkling waters. One of the three robot chefs visible behind the glass quickly assembled the sandwiches and filled two cups. The containers for the sandwiches and the cups were edible, though Lukas always found them too bland to eat. He always threw them in a bin where birds and squirrels usually would finish them off in an hour. His order popped out through a trap door on an extension board that looked like a mechanical tongue sticking out at him.
 
Lukas had seen videos of mid-20^th century “automats” that were similar to the StpnPick in concept, though back then human workers prepared the foods in the back and inserted them in boxes accessible to customers from the outside when they inserted coins. There were rarely any workers in the StpnPick. Sometimes a technician might adjust a machine or fuss with the software, but generally the store ran by itself without human hands. Usually the only people were customers, and at the moment he was the only one of them. He placed his purchase in the tote he had carried into the store and walked outside to where his leased Changan SUV was recharging at its post. The charging post, having scanned the car license plate and using the car’s wireless connection, was continuously deducting the appropriate amount from Lukas’ primary credit account as payment to the local electric company. He pondered how inconvenient it had been earlier with wallets full of credit cards and even paper money, which had been discontinued two years earlier.
 
The car door opened for him, having noted his proximity via his key fob and determined by some algorithm his intention to get in.
 
“I’ll take those,” said his cousin Aliz from the passenger seat as she reached for her wrap and sparkling water. Aliz was two years younger than he, and fresh out of college. Until this trip, Lukas barely knew her. They had met at rare family get-togethers, but had interacted little. He didn’t know if she had a job. The once common question, “What do you do?” in recent years had come to be regarded as impolite. Lukas was a “technician,” which meant his job consisted mostly of unplugging and replugging glitchy computers and swapping out the occasional part. All of this could be done by robots, and he assumed he would be fired as soon as the cost of buying and operating them dropped substantially below the cost of his salary and benefits.
 
“How’s your Reuben?” she asked.
 
“Not bad,” he answered between bites. “The car should be topped up by the time we’re done,” he added. “I gather Uncle Bertram’s cabin is pretty off-grid, so I don’t want to risk getting stuck there without a charge.”
 
“Right. You know,” said Aliz, “I barely knew I had an Uncle Bertram. I heard my mom mention his name maybe twice when I was growing up.”
 
“Great uncle actually.”
 
“Whatever,” she said. “You?”
 
“Pretty much the same,” Lukas answered. “I knew the name but never met him. But I guess we’re the surviving relatives he disliked the least.”
 
“But he never met us.”
 
“Maybe that’s why he disliked us the least. He even took care of his own funeral so no family was involved in that. His lawyer said drones picked him up and sent him to a crematory according to some predetermined plan.”
 
“If he lived so off-grid, how did he arrange that? How did he pay for it?”
 
“He didn’t work off-grid. Quite the opposite. He had an office/apartment in town that was very well connected. That’s where he died. But all of that space was just leased. The Will said the contents and the space reverts to the landlord. It’s on page five or six of the addenda somewhere. He was a recluse on weekends though.”
 
“I didn’t read all of the documents,” she admitted. “I focused on the part of the Will that mentioned me… and you.”
 
The post lit green.
 
“We’re charged up. Ready to go?”
 
“Let me hit the rest room. I’ll be right back.”
 
While she was gone, Lukas tossed the remains of their lunch in the mulching bin next to the post. Two chipmunks clambered into the bin and would make short work of the containers. The car disconnected itself from the recharge post.
 
As soon as Aliz returned, Lukas spoke up. “Chacha. Continue trip.”
 
Lukas settled back in his seat as his car backed itself out of the parking spot and resumed its GPS-guided drive toward the cabin.
 
“Thanks for driving,” Aliz said.
 
“No problem,” said Lukas with his hands interlocked comfortably behind his head.
 
“You named your car Chacha?”
 
“It came that way from the dealer. I never changed it.”
 
“Maybe you should.”
 
“Maybe. Right now I just want to settle this estate as quickly as possible. I have a serious negative balance because of the estate taxes and will be charged interest until the inheritance dollars come through. Funny how the Treasury deducts the estimated tax right away before anything is fully settled.”
 
“Yeah, funny. They nailed my account, too. Same reason. The text said my account would be credited with any overpayment at the final settlement but would be further tapped for any underpayment.”
 
Forty minutes later the car pulled to the side of the road. “Auto-drive disengaged,” Chacha said.
 
“Chacha, is something wrong with auto-drive?” Lukas asked.
 
“No. The rest of the trip is unmapped,” Chacha’s information center explained. “Tree cover prevents aerial view navigation. I can proceed based on Auto-Vision if you wish to override safety protocols, but I will have to notify the insurance company. Destination is 11 kilometers NNE. Override?”
 
“No Chacha, I’ll take it from here.” Said Lukas to Aliz, “The Will mentioned something about a private right-of-way access instead of a public road.”
 
“How is your manual driving?” Aliz asked.
 
“OK, I guess. They say it’s like riding a bike.”
 
“Do you ride bikes?”
 
“No. I guess that dirt driveway on the right is the way,” Lukas said. He gingerly put the car in drive and carefully made the turn. The canopy from the trees on each side indeed completely hid the lane from above. The GPS display showed the car to be moving toward the end coordinates. The afternoon sun flickered through the leaves above and played on the hood. Collision warning lights on the dashboard lit up at every bend in the lane as the grill briefly pointed at trees.
 
“You weren’t kidding about the recluse thing,” Aliz said.
 
“Apparently not.”
 
They exited the woods and entered a clearing where their great uncle’s weekend home stood. He pulled up to the front porch, which was elevated two steps above the lawn. The lawn didn’t need cutting. Lukas suspected a robot mower tended the grass as some preset interval.
 
“Arrived at destination,” Chacha announced.
 
The house looked modest but homey. The cedar clapboard siding was weathered but not in disrepair. The roof and windows looked tight.  Solar panels covered the roof of a detached garage and a freestanding windmill spun next to it.
 
“At least there is power,” said Lukas. “I was beginning to wonder.”
 
“Me, too. I actually received a mechanical key from a delivery drone,” Aliz said. “You?”
 
“Yeah.”
 
“Weird.”
 
Lukas and Aliz got out of the car and climbed the porch steps. Aliz slid the drone-delivered key in the front door lock.
 
“It doesn’t fit,” she said.
 
“Try mine.”
 
“Nope. Won’t budge.”
 
“Wait, what’s this?” Lukas pointed to a steel box to the left of the door.
 
“It looks like one of those antique milk boxes some people like to display.”
 
Lukas examined it. “It’s bolted to the floor and the lid won’t open – but there is a key slot on the side.” He inserted his key. It turned easily. Inside were three more keys and a note. He unfolded it.
 
“What’s it say?” Aliz asked.
 
“’Lock ALL electronic devices in box.’”
 
“OK, phones in the box,” she said.
 
“That doesn’t make any sense,” he said.
 
“Let’s do it anyway.”
 
“I think there is power connected to the box. There is something like a faraday cage embedded in it.”
 
“Lukas…”
 
“Yeah OK.”
 
He put his phone in the box. Liz did the same. He removed the keys and snapped the lid shut. Lukas tried a key on the front door. Nothing. The second one slid into the slot and turned smoothly. He turned the knob. The door swung inward. They entered a small foyer. They looked about.
 
Plank floors and pine paneled walls created a woodsy feel. The ceilings were painted a light green. A dining room was to right of the foyer, a living room left, the kitchen was in back to the right with an arch to the dining room, while a bath and the primary bedroom and were in the back left. In addition, a stairway from the foyer led to an open balcony loft, the cabin’s version of a guest bedroom. The dining room walls had shelves with paper and ink books, and so doubled as a library. The kitchen had had tile floors and backsplashes on butcher-block counters. The place was dusty but in no way grimy.
 
“This is it?” asked Aliz. “I mean it’s pleasant and all, but I was expecting…I don’t know…more. Plus, there’s no TV and I don’t see any wifi router.”
 
“I guess he went to his car if he needed a connection.”
 
“I guess.”
 
“There must be a basement for the basic utilities: well pump, water heater, battery storage, and all that.”
 
“Basement stairs must be under the stairs to the loft then. Here.” She tried a door she at first had mistaken for a closet. “Locked. Give me those keys.” The first one she tried opened the door.
 
The basement indeed had the utilities. It also had a wet bar and small pool table. Among the stock behind the bar were high proof spirits that had been outlawed by the Health Act of two years earlier. Aliz continued to nose around.
 
“Are you looking for anything in particular?” Lukas asked.
 
“A third key slot”
 
“There’s another lockbox under the bar,” he said.
 
The third key opened it for Aliz. Inside was a note with a rectangular diagram, an X along one side, and the numbers 36945.
 
“What does that mean?” she wondered aloud.
 
“Is it a barebones diagram of this room? The X would be there on that wall or there on the other depending on how you hold the paper.”
 
“Let’s try the paneled wall. The other one is bare concrete.”
 
Unlike the paneling upstairs, the wall down here was plywood.
 
“This panel seems shaky,” she said.
 
She inserted her fingernails into the edge and pulled lightly. The panel pulled away. It had been held in place by magnets. Behind it was a steel door with an old-fashioned mechanical combination lock.
 
“I hope there is not another note in there,” Lukas said. “Are the numbers the combination? One single digit and two double digits. Or three singles and a double?”
 
“Worth a try. I guess we just plow through the possibilities.”
 
Aliz spun the tumbler. 36 9 45 did the trick. The lock audibly clicked and the lever handle turned.
 
“Shit. Uncle Bertram,” said Aliz. “Gold.”
 
“Gold?”
 
“1 ounce coins. There must be thousands of them. Are we rich? I never had a reason to keep up with gold prices.”
 
“Those are worth millions,” said Lukas. “And I don’t mean dollars. I mean real money. I’m guessing 100,000,000 Swiss Francs. We have to be careful about this though. If Uncle Bertram didn’t mention this in the Will – and he didn’t – he might not have mentioned it to the IRS. They could take most of it. Or all of it. And if we don’t mention it, we can only spend the coins person to person: real people – actual shop owners and such – not machines or AIs. We can’t deposit anything. How do you feel about that? Should we report this or not?”
 
“Uncle Bertram wanted us to have this, didn’t he? Not the IRS.”
 
“True.”
 
“I think it would be disrespectful of his wishes for us not to keep it then. The tax AIs can simply not know about it as far as I’m concerned. Can you keep a secret?” asked Aliz.
 
“I can.”
 
Aliz locked the safe and snapped the wall panel back on the magnets.
 
“I’m going to enjoy spending weekends here,” she said.
 
“Me too.”
 
“We’ll work out a schedule. Alternate weekends or something.”
 
They walked back upstairs working out details of dividing the coins and property. They exited the front door and retrieved their phones from the lockbox.
 
The doors to the car opened as they approached. They got into their seats without thinking about it. It was just something the car did. Had it been parked somewhere else, he could have called its name, and it would have unparked itself and driven to the porch to pick them up.
 
“Chacha, start motor.”
 
Instantly the car’s information center lit up. The following scrolled on the screen as the speakers repeated it aloud: “As an adjustment to your estate taxes, 40,000,000 Swiss Francs at current exchange rates have been deducted from each of your credit accounts for your convenience. This includes surcharge for non-digital assets. An additional surcharge of 10,000,000 each for social discredit also has been deducted since our algorithm has determined an intention to avoid paying your fair share of taxes. Your rights are important to us, however, so you may appeal these assessments at your individual my.gov accounts, though there may be additional fees if your appeal is determined to be without merit.”
 
“How?” Aliz asked. “We weren’t connected to the net.”
 
Lukas had a sinking feeling. He reached in his pocket and withdrew the key fob for the car. Chacha was always listening so it could fetch him whenever he called.

Delenda Est

 
The pleasant aroma of fish stew lingered even as the next course of fruits and baked cakes was brought to the table by the servants in the prosperous household. Filling his head with such happy memories was a trick Himilco’s pedagogue had taught him to help him endure pain and fear, but its effectiveness was breaking down. The desperate reality could not be denied. He fought against his lungs while a part of his mind told him to just inhale water and accept the peace of death. He must remain below the surface until he was well past the great chain blocking the inner military harbor or else he surely would be spotted by Roman sentries. Even so, he was gambling that Roman eyes were distracted by events at the city wall. After a protracted siege the Romans finally had taken the wall next to the inner harbor and were pouring over it. Defenders inside Carthage were falling back to the final redoubt at the Temple of Eshmun. Himilco hadn’t gone there despite the entreaties of his mother. He had no wish to starve to death in a siege of the temple, nor did have any illusions he could combat professional soldiers in the streets. Instead, when he saw amid the chaos a clear path to the inner harbor some instinct impelled him to run into it. He stripped down to a loincloth and jumped into the water before the Romans completely cut off access to it.
 
He wished he had stayed in Britain before the war as his seafaring merchant father had offered. He could have stayed in the household of his older sister Asherah who had been married off to a local barbarian who controlled tin and silver mines in the southwest of the island. The marriage had sealed the trading deal for the metals and thereby made their family rich. Asherah had complained bitterly on the sea voyage to Britain but in the end she seemed happy enough to be left behind there with her husband. The fellow was good looking in a hairy barbarian way and he was a nobleman by the rude standards of that place. Himilco had enjoyed the trip, though the swims in the cold northern waters that his father had insisted he take to “toughen up” were unpleasant. Nonetheless, Himilco had refused the offer to stay behind for a year and instead returned with his father to Carthage to pursue his studies and learn more of the family business. Then the war came. His father had been killed in a Roman raid on the outer harbor. Asherah was the only member of his family whom the odds favored to be alive by morning. As for riches Himilco’s only remaining possession was his loincloth.
 
Himilco broke the surface of the water and gasped. He coughed up salt water and then choked on smoke from the burning buildings and burning flesh wafting from the city. He had swum not nearly as far into the outer harbor as he had imagined. He was certain his splashes and coughs would alert Roman sentries but none of the shouts from the shore and walls seemed directed his way. No projectiles splashed around him. He reckoned his only chance was in the water. He had no chance on land, which was thick with soldiers on the mainland side. 13 years old and scrawny, he was no match for even one of them. Yet he was old enough to be considered “military age” and most likely would be killed on sight despite being unarmed – or, if very lucky, he might be sold into slavery. Himilco didn’t pray to Tanit and Melqart for help. He had tried that in the city for months. They weren’t listening. His father, unusually for a seaman, had been a skeptic in such matters and Himilco was leaning toward the view that he was right.
 
Himilco tried to get his bearings. The Romans early in the siege had obstructed the outer harbor’s main exit to the sea. In response, the Carthaginians had cut a canal through the fortified spit of land separating the outer harbor from the Mediterranean. This second lifeline to the sea hadn’t lasted long. The Romans blocked the new canal by sinking one of their own ships in it. Still, Himilco figured the canal was his best bet. If he could swim past the hull of the sunken ship he could slip out to the Mediterranean. His arms ached and his chest hurt as swam toward the canal. Again he contemplated how much easier it would be to give up and be done with the pain. Himilco’s arms and feet continued their motions even as they protested. He could see no guards by the canal as he bobbed his head between strokes.
 
He entered the canal after what felt like an eternity but the setting sun had barely budged since he had surfaced in the harbor. He saw no soldiers. Himilco hoped the ongoing sack of the city had drawn them away from this narrow sea break. He reached the ship blocking the canal. It was sunk up to the gunnels. He could see why the former warship had been chosen for sacrifice. The hull was rotting and infested with barnacles. It would have sunk of its own accord soon anyway. There were just a few feet of clearance between the ship and channel bank. He worked his way toward the sea keeping just his head above the water. Just he passed the stern of the ship the tip of a Roman pilum appeared inches in front of his face.
 
He looked up to see a grizzled veteran with scars on his arms. His armor was well-worn but shipshape. Himilco closed his eyes waited for the killing jab. At least the struggle was over. Moments passed. Himilco opened his eyes. Astonishingly, the pilum withdrew. The veteran nodded his head seaward. The sun had finally slipped below the horizon, and though it was hard to be certain in the growing twilight Himiclo thought he saw tears on the man’s face. Himilco would never know why the soldier let him live. Perhaps he had a son Himilco’s age. Perhaps the kill would have been too easy. He had seen hunters for this reason release animals tangled in vines or trapped in bogs rather than take them as prizes. Romans at this moment were slaughtering his countrymen inside the walls of the city yet this one spared him. You never knew about people. Himilco resumed swimming to the end of the channel and slipped into the open sea. He looked back at the old soldier who was deliberately looking the other way.
 
Himilco swam parallel to the shore hoping to reach the beaches where merchant vessels unloaded their goods to sell to the Roman army. Ideally one would be Phoenician and he could beg for a passage. Despite their blood ties to Carthage, Phoenicians shamelessly sold to the Romans, but the crew still might take him aboard. Then again, they might him into slavery but he had to take his chances. He wasn’t strong enough to swim safely past the entire war zone. On foot, death or capture was certain. His luck with the veteran could not be expected to be repeated.

Himilco hadn’t counted on a backcurrent. No matter what direction he propelled himself the shore continued to recede. His last reserves of strength were fading. He was cold. The waters were not as cold as those by Britain but cold enough. His mind was oddly at peace with the notion of drowning but somehow his body continued to struggle. The sky turned dark and starry. Only the fires in burning Cartage gave him any sense of direction. He eased trying to make headway and instead expended merely enough energy to stay afloat. A sloshing sound approached. He had spent enough time at sea to know what it was. He called out. The sound grew louder. There was definitely a dark shape. It resolved into the silhouette of a type of vessel had seen many times. The ship had a rounded bow, a square mainsail, and a spritsail. It carried oars but not as a primary means of propulsion. They were just to aid in maneuvering into docking positions. She was a merchant vessel and not a very impressive one.
 
He shouted again and this time heard shouts back. As the vessel drew close an oar extended out to him. If it was a Roman oar his long swim would be fruitless. He pulled himself along the oar toward the hull and reached up toward the gunnel. Rough hands pulled him on board.
 
“What do we have here? Not very pretty for a Nereid,” the words in Greek came from a bearded man with a commanding presence despite his small stature.
 
“Prettier than you, Captain, if you don’t mind my saying so,” said a crewman. “Perhaps it’s Arion looking for his dolphin.”
 
Himilco had heard some story of a Greek saved from drowning by a dolphin and guessed this was the reference. A basic familiarity with Greek was another skill beaten into Himilco by his father, a man whom Himilco was increasingly inclined to forgive for his severity.
 
“What are you doing out here, boy? Fall overboard?”
 
Himilco weighed a lie against the truth. Either was a gamble. The Greeks were traditional enemies of Carthage but also had a difficult relationship with the Romans. He decided to be truthful up to a point.
 
“I tried to get away from the city,” he said in halting Greek.
 
“Carthage?” asked the captain. “What was your plan? To swim all the way to Tyre?”
 
Carthage had been founded by Tyrians who maintained a cultural relationship with the city. “No, I meant to keep close to shore but the current was strong and pulled me away.”
 
“I’m not sure what good you did yourself. We’re headed for Carthage.”
 
“There is no Carthage.”
 
“I can see the flames, boy. I’ll rephrase. We’re going to sell our goods to the Romans outside Carthage. Armies always need supplies. Sacking your city means they are better able to pay for them. Maybe I’ll throw you into the bargain as a sweetener.”
 
“The Romans will just kill him,” said one of the sailors.
 
“Well, that’s neither here nor there.”
 
Still shivering from the cold sea, Himilco collected himself. He usually flubbed his rhetoric exercises with his tutor. Getting tongue-tied this time would mean his life. A part of him didn’t care, but once again an urge to live a little longer took control. “You will miss the opportunity of a lifetime if you do that. The Romans use agents to negotiate with merchants like you – Greeks mostly. They will bargain you down to rock bottom prices and take a hefty fee for themselves for the privilege. You would do better trading at almost any random port.”
 
“I don’t think your assessment is disinterested,” said the captain.
 
“It isn’t. But it is true. Tell me, what are you carrying?”
 
An uncomfortable silence lengthened. Himilco knew he was showing unseemly arrogance for someone who had just been rescued, but he gambled the approach would work.
 
At length the captain’s curiosity got the better of his annoyance. “It’s fortunate for you you’re a good-looking lad,” he said. Himilco wasn’t sure what that had to do with it, but didn’t respond. “Not that it’s your business, lad, but we’re carrying wine and olive oil.”
 
“Then you definitely can make a better deal elsewhere.”
 
“A fish in the net is worth a school in the sea.”
 
“There is just a sardine waiting for you here. The farmlands around Carthage are rich with vineyards, fruit trees, and grain. We exported wine before the war. How do you think the Romans have sustained their army? You always can sell what you are carrying of course, but you won’t get a good price for it. Those goods are cheap here. Forget the sardine. I can deliver a whale. Captain, how many times will you rescue a scion of a merchant family who offers you a fortune?”
 
“‘Scion,’ are you? Are you telling me you’re worth a ransom?”
 
“No. The only person would pay for me would be far more profitable just to trade with. Choose to be rich, captain.”
 
“You’re going to make me rich.”
 
“Yes. And you could pay all your men bigger shares than they’ve ever seen besides.”
 
“I’ve heard enough,” said the captain. “Boy, you are an urchin I saved from drowning – an act I’m regretting. Maybe I’ll toss you back in the sea.”
 
“Let’s hear the boy out,” said a crewman, skeptical but curious about Himilco’s talk of shares.
 
“Fine. Tell us. Where is this great fortune of yours? You are doing a good job of hiding it.”
 
“Britain.”
 
The captain laughed. “Beyond the pillars of Hercules? That is crazy.”
 
“No it’s not. I’ve been there myself on a ship no bigger than this.” Himilco chose not to mention that the ship was a sturdier design built and rigged for ocean trade. “My father had a fleet of six. I’m guessing the wine below isn’t the finest.”
 
“Soldiers aren’t picky so long as they can get drunk.”
 
“I’m not so sure about that. But even the vilest plonk is rare in Britain. There are no vineyards there. Wine of any kind is more valuable than gold. It’s more valuable than the tin and silver mined there – mines owned by my brother-in-law, a barbarian noble named Sysul. Go there without me and you’d just be robbed by some local warlord, but Sysul has a longstanding business relationship with my family. And there is more than just metals. Amber is cheap. They import it from the northern reaches of Scythia. You really can be rich.”
 
The crewman who had wanted to hear out Himilco balked at mention of Britain. “Captain, tell me you aren’t really considering going out into the ocean because some fancy boy has caught your eye. There are serpents and giant waves and whirlpools that swallow ships like ours”
 
Himilco thanked the crewman silently, for he saw this rebellion was hardening the captain to insist on the opposite.
 
“Those are just tall tales,” said Himiclo. I’ve been there because my father took his children with him on the trip. Are grown men too afraid?”
 
“Don’t think I don’t know what you are doing boy.”
 
After taking a moment to unravel the double negative, he answered, “Do you care so long as you profit?”
 
Pytheon,” said the captain as he shifted attention to the crewman, “if you don’t want to go we’ll drop you off at a port in Spain. That goes for any one of you. Boy,” he said to Himilco, “if any part of your story is false you’ll wish we gave you to the Romans. We’re tacking north.”
 
“At night sir?”
 
“Yes, at night.”
 
“You won’t regret it,” said Himilco who was half-regretting it himself. As rough as the Mediterranean could get in a storm, there really was even more danger in the open ocean. It would have been so much easier to have surrendered to fate back in the harbor. Still, he had cheated death for at least another day. “Um, may I have some clothes?” he asked.
 
“We’ll talk about that tomorrow.”
 
Himilco wasn’t entirely at peace with the captain’s answer, but he already had learned about himself that he would do what he must. His countrymen who stood on principle were dying back home in the streets. He stared at the orange glow onshore.
 
“You can call me Kimon,” said the captain. “My home is in Corinth. You’ll like it there when we get back.”
 
Though willing to make what business deal he could in Britain if they arrived there alive, Himilco had no intention of ever leaving the island again. Nonetheless, he nodded assent.

Diner

Rex exited the glass four-story office building that housed Trans-Form Corporation along with a several other tenants with similarly uninformative names. It was his final day of work – or rather his final night. He had volunteered for the 6 to 2 shift because it paid a little more than the daylight shifts. “Your division has been outsourced,” he had been told. He wasn’t entirely sure what division that was exactly. He hadn’t noticed any divisions as such. He and three other data-entry workers had been let go seemingly at random as far as he could tell. He suspected it would have been five had not his former coworker Cindy been diagnosed a few weeks earlier with the new sleeping sickness that so far had afflicted a dozen people on the East Coast over the past few months. The last he heard she was still in a coma. The CDC hypothesized a mutation of the mosquito-borne Zika virus was the cause, but had yet to confirm it. He wouldn’t miss the job, but he would miss the paycheck. He sometimes thought that the only reason some simple AI program hadn’t yet replaced everyone doing his mind-numbingly repetitive job was that his manager then would have no one to yell at.

He walked across the expansive asphalt parking lot toward where he had parked his aging Honda. At 2 a.m. the lot was nearly empty. The lights were out on the pole under which he had parked while the sky was still light. His car was now invisible amid a cone of blackness more than 200 feet wide at the base. He felt uneasy as he entered the darkness, but there was no sign of anyone else present. Still, he breathed a sigh of relief when opened the car door and slid behind the wheel.

Rex turned north up 202 toward the building where he lived. The 16-unit building had condo-converted several years earlier and he had bought one of the one-bedroom units on the advice of his accountant, who had said the tenant’s discount made it a sound investment. He just barely had qualified for the loan, and then only because the numbers he submitted on his application charitably could be described as optimistic. He questioned the purchase decision on the first of every month when the bank electronically depleted his bank account by the amount of the mortgage payment, which was higher than his previous rent. He questioned it again when property taxes came due each quarter. The unit was nearby work, which counted for something – or used to be. There was no telling how far he would have to travel to his next job.

He realized he wasn’t ready to go home. He lived alone. Most nights he was alone, and this long since had ceased to bother him. At the best of times he barely could afford to date, which in an odd way was a relief. Still, he wanted to be somewhere other than his couch in front of his TV, so he drove past his condo toward the Nonsense Diner, open 24 hours. The name of the diner came from nearby Fort Nonsense, a spot where some of Washington’s troops had been posted in the Revolutionary War. George, or more likely one his noncoms, apparently had an odd sense of humor.

Not many places were open this time of night, so the diner was moderately full. No one looked at Rex as pushed open the glass door. Beneath various aromas emanating from the kitchen was a hint of marijuana. The diner had been in business since the 1950s, and much of the décor and equipment was original. The customers in the small hours were distinctly different from the daytime mix. They included stoners with the munchies, drunks fresh from the bars that closed at 2 a.m., hospital workers in their blues, and a few inexplicably overdressed men and women. “Freak show,” thought Rex, fully aware that he was one of the exhibits. “One of us,” he muttered to himself. He sat on a stool at the counter. It squeaked as it rotated. The Formica counter was decorated with images of rubber band-like shapes in various colors. A middle-age waitress with long blue nails and bleached blonde hair was reloading the basket of the coffee machine.

 “Menu?” she asked over her shoulder.

“Sure.”

She slid one in front of him. “Here you go, honey.”

As in many diners, the menu was several plastic-sheathed pages of amazingly detailed options.

“I don’t see you in here very often,” she said.

“No. I’m usually too tired after work, but I think you’ll be seeing me more often.”

“Won’t that be great. Coffee?”

“Yeah…Maybe I’ll have a Western omelet.”

“You don’t sound too sure.”

“A Western omelet.”

She poured a cup of coffee and put it in front of him along with four prepackaged tiny plastic cups of half-and-half. He preferred coffee black, so he pushed the packets aside. He sipped the coffee. It was bitter as though having brewed for hours. He chose not to complain. 

He sipped again. He contemplated how his life was so much more bland than he had intended it to be. Back in college he had imagined himself to have traveled the world and to be at least well on the way to riches by now. He remembered how as a freshman he had announced to his parents that he would never accept a dull lifestyle like theirs. “You’re just existing,” he rudely had said. His mom hadn’t answered. Now, with his 30^th birthday approaching, he was nearly broke. The closest he had come to global travel was the World Showcase Epcot at Disney World in Florida, and that only because his parents had moved to Orlando, and he visited them twice. He closed his eyes as a dull headache that had come and gone all day returned. It faded in a moment. He opened his eyes, and took another sip from the mug of coffee in front of him. It was rich, smooth and wonderful. He savored the aroma and flavor so much that the change took a moment to register. Hadn’t the coffee been served in a cup rather than a mug? Perhaps the waitress replaced it. He put the mug down on a butcher block counter top. He could have sworn it was Formica.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

“Not much. Decide what you want?” said the fellow in a white t-shirt and cap behind the counter. The cap had the name “Bob” sewn on it. He was middle aged and slightly overweight but there appeared to be muscles beneath the layer of fat. He needed a shave. His stubble was gray. Rex looked at the menu on the counter in front of him. It was stiff brown paper and a single page.

Since the questions he really wanted to ask pointed toward madness, Rex asked about a menu item: “What are ‘possum fries?”

“What they sound like. Fries cooked in ‘possum lard.”

Rex looked around him. The dimensions and layout of the diner were unchanged, but the materials were rustic and a musty smell underlay the aromas coming from the kitchen. A customer gnawing on ribs caught his eyes and audibly growled.

“Is there a costume party somewhere?” asked Rex.

“Somewhere there is bound to be, I suppose.”

“Yeah, well, that fellow is a pretty convincing werewolf.”

“Freddy? Yeah, well he would be, wouldn’t he? It’s a full moon, buddy.”

Working the floor was a stunning buxom redhead with a very 1940s coiffure and uniform.

“Am I sleeping?” Rex asked.

“Not so far as I can see. If you’re going to sit at the counter you have to order something, buddy.”

“A Western omelet?”

“You don’t sound sure.”

“Did someone already say that?”

“Not that I heard.”

Rex forced himself to stay calm while he figured out what was happening.

“A Western. You take US dollars?” Rex asked.

“Why? You got something else?”

“No.”

 “One Western omelet coming up,” he said. “Possum fries on the side?”

“OK.”

The fellow pushed open a swinging door in back of him a crack, and barked, “Western and P-fries!.”

In his peripheral vision, Rex saw the wolf get out of his booth and growl. Rex instinctively grabbed a fork. Freddy growled again but sat back down.

Bob said, “Freddy just doesn’t like to be stared at. Wolves take that as a challenge.”

“Why did he back down?”

“Silver fork. He’s all about finger food.”

“The tableware is real silver?”

“Why wouldn’t it be? You ask a lot of funny questions.”

“I’ll ask one more. Where am I?”

“Right there.”

“Will you excuse me a second?”

He stepped outside. It was definitely Morristown. He recognized the topography and the road layout, but it was a crazy ramshackle version with fewer than half the right number of structures and not one of them stood straight. The streets were unpaved and wildlife teemed on vacant lots. Baboons stared at him from across the street. Baboons in New Jersey? In the parking lot were luxury cars, monster trucks, and horses tied to posts. Not knowing what else to do, he reentered the diner and sat on the stool. Bob slid a stoneware plate in front of him with an omelet and possum fries. The food smelled delicious.

The redheaded waitress leaned on the counter next to him. “Seems crazy at first,” she said. “You’ll get used to it.”

“None of this can be real. Am I crazy?” he asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“You seem to know what is going on.”

“Maybe you wanted me to explain things to you. Doesn’t mean I will.”

“You mean I wanted… all this?” he asked.

“Maybe. Not everything is about what we want though. They’re what we fear, too. Be careful of that.”

“So you’re saying this is a dream,” he said.

“I’m not saying anything of the sort. You are the one questioning what is real. I was just saying you should be careful.”

The tall man rose from a table near the back. As he walked toward the counter, he did not stand out because of his size, his striped double-breasted jacket, or his fedora. His most eyecatching feature was his lack of any color other than black, white, and gray. He looked as though he had he had stepped out of a ‘40s film noir.

“OK, I’m definitely dreaming,” Rex said, “not in some weird scifi sideslip dimension or something.”

“Red’s my girl,” said the noir goon.

“I’m not anyone’s girl, Moose,” said the waitress

“I’m not talking to you,” said Moose.

Rex pinched himself hard enough to hurt. Apparently even if he was dreaming he still could feel pain. He wasn’t about to fight a movie image if he could feel the punches.

“Whatever you say, pal,” said Rex.

Satisfied, Moose returned to his table – he couldn’t fit in a booth. “Red” lost all interest in Rex, too, and checked the booths for any coffee refill requests. Rex turned his attention to the eggs and fries. They were more flavorful and satisfying than anything he’d ever eaten. He paid his check – $1 including tip – and walked outside. He didn’t see anything resembling his Honda compact. He took out his keys and pressed the “unlock” button on the remote. The lights of a 1939 Packard flashed.

“A Packard with remote door locks,” he said to himself. “OK.”

He got behind the huge steering wheel, slipped a key that previously hadn’t been on his remote into the ignition, and pressed the starter button on the dash. The flat-8 rumbled to life. Rt 202 still existed though it was unpaved. He saw no sign of the interstate that should parallel it. He manhandled the vehicle south along the rutted road flanked by deep woods. He swerved once to avoid a large sabretooth cat, but met no traffic. He didn’t know to expect when he reached the location of his condominium, but the palatial gothic estate on the spot still came as a surprise.

He parked in the circular drive and walked toward the huge oaken double doors to the main house.

His head began to spin. Painfully bright light blinded Rex. He dropped to his knees and then onto his back. The gravel transformed into something softer. Faces in green surgical masks hovered over him. He shut his eyes against the glare, but heard voices. One of them said, “Just like the others. It’s as though they fight being wakened.” “We really can’t up the dose,” another voice answered. The words ceased to be comprehensible but blended into rising and falling buzzes.  He couldn’t tell how long this continued other than too long. There was nothing about it or the life he had led that he wanted to face. He willed himself back to the driveway.

Quiet returned. Rex opened his eyes and recognized Cygnus in the stars overhead. A gentle breeze rustled the trees. He rolled over onto his stomach, got up on knees and palms, and then rose to his feet. He walked to the oaken doors and tapped a knocker. A dark-haired beauty in a blood-read full length dress opened a door and tilted her head to welcome him inside. Fangs were clearly visible behind her parted lips.

Rex hesitated only a moment. Whatever this was, it beat hospital bills and unemployment. He walked inside.