I clicked off.
I concentrated on the blinding emptiness of the interstate.
What you just heard will not answer anything, Bret. This is what the writer said.
Look how black the sky is, the writer said. I made it that way.
21. the actor
The Porsche dived into the garage.
The writer’s laughter had subsided. The writer was a blind guide who was slowly disappearing. I was now alone.
Everything I did had an intent that was solely mine.
The stairs seemed steeper as I climbed them.
I opened Robby’s door.
The computer was off.
(It was on when I had been interrupted.)
After I restarted it I sat in front of its screen for three hours.
The moment I typed in the password to open the MC file the computer screen flashed back to the desktop.
The screen started blinking, its edges shallowing out, and then it burned green and was stubbled with static.
I kept trying to wade through the glitches. I kept telling myself that if I could read those files everything would become untroubled and weightless.
I unplugged the Gateway. I restarted it.
I was on hold with the company’s emergency hotline for an hour before I hung up, realizing there was nothing they would be able to do.
My eyes were aching as I kept tapping keys with one hand while moving the mouse around in useless circles on its pad with the other, my face flushed with concentration.
The computer was now a toy made from stone that just stared back at me. The computer was not going to lose this game.
Each keystroke took me further from where I wanted to be.
I was receding from the information.
Within the random flashing and static I could occasionally make out the hills of Sherman Oaks rising up out of the San Fernando Valley, or I glimpsed the shoreline of a hotel in Mexico, my father standing on a pier and he was lifting his hand, and the sound of the ocean was coming from the computer’s speakers.
Briefly there was a shadow of the Bank of America on Ventura Boulevard.
Another familiar apparition: Clayton’s face.
And then the computer was dying.
Before the sound faded out completely there was the faint and muffled verse from “The Sunny Side of the Street.”
And then the computer whirred itself into silence and died.
The only answers were going to come from Robby, I told myself as I pushed away from the desk.
The writer immediately materialized.
The writer asked in his thin voice: Do you really believe that, Bret? Do you really believe your son will supply the answers?
When I responded affirmatively, the writer said: That is sad.
I told Marta I would be picking Robby up from Buckley. I didn’t let her say anything. I just walked out of her office as I announced this.
I could hear her reluctantly agreeing as I moved down the hall to the garage.
Outside, the wind kept altering its direction.
On the interstate I saw my father standing motionless on the walkway of an overpass.
After I unrolled the window and flashed my driver’s license to a security guard, I pulled into a line of cars waiting in the parking lot in front of the library. The spires of gnarled pines rose up around us, encircling the school.
I glanced at the scar in the palm of my hand.
This was either going to be an ending
(endings were always so easy for you)
or something would get healed, and the healing would forestall a tragedy.
The writer, in his own way, vehemently disagreed.
Privileged children mumbled warnings to one another as they headed toward the fleet of SUVs waiting for them. Security cameras followed the boys. Sons would always be in peril. Fathers would always be condemned.
Robby’s backpack was flung over his shoulder and his shirt was untucked and the gray and red striped tie loosened, hanging slackly from around his neck: the parody of a tired businessman.
Robby was staring at the Porsche and at the man in the driver’s seat. Robby looked at the man questioningly, as if I were someone who had never known his name.
My questions were going to merge with his answers.
I could feel his doubt as he stood rigidly in front of the car.
I was begging him to move forward. You have to surrender, I was begging. You have to give me another chance.
The writer was about to hiss something, and I silenced him.
And then, as if he had heard me, Robby shuffled toward the car, forcing a smile.
He took his backpack off before opening the passenger door.
“What’s up?” He was grinning as he placed the backpack on the floor.
As he sat down he closed the passenger door. “Where’s Marta?”