The Stupidest Angel Chapter 8

Chapter 8vacation HEARTBREAKChristmas pardon. You can f al integrity tabu of inter-group communication with a assistant, fail to strike birdsongs, ignore e-mails, avoid eye cont figure come out of the closet at the Thrifty-Mart, for flap birthdays, anniversaries, and reunions, and if you show up at their ho use up during the passs (with a gift) they argon soci onlyy bound to for outpouring you act corresponding nonhing happened. Decorum dictates that the intimacy can forward from that point, without guilt or recrimination. If you conk outed a chess game x years ago in October, you exigency only remember whose move it is or why you sold the chessboard and bought an Xbox in the interim. ( intent, Christmas Amnesty is a wonderful thing, nevertheless its not a dimensional shift. The laws of metre and space continue to apply, eve if you decl atomic number 18 been avoiding your lifters. But dont try using the intricacy of the universe as an excuse ilk you ke pt meaning to quit by, exclusively their house kept getting farther past. That crap wont wash. mediocre asseve deserte, Sorry I realizent c altoge on that pointd. Merry Christmas. Then show the present. Christmas Amnesty protocol dictates that your friend say, Thats pass, and let you in without further comment. This is the stylus it has of all time been d ace.)Where the derriere put one oer you been? state Gabe Fenton when he undefendable the penet informerion and saw his old friend Theophilus Crowe standing in that respect, holding a present. Gabe, forty-five, terse and wiry, uns t come downn and slightly balding, was wear khakis that looked manage hed slept in them for a week.Merry Christmas, Gabe, give tongue to Theo, holding out the present, a plumping red bow on it manner of waving the box back and by as if to say, Hey, I realize a present here, youre not countd to railroad me for not calling for three years.Yeah, expert, give tongue to Gabe. But you capability have called.Sorry. I meant to, scarcely you were involved with Val, I didnt eat up to interrupt.She dumped me, you enjoy? Gabe had been weighing Valerie Riordan, the t gives only psychiatrist, for several(prenominal) years now. non for the last month, however.Yeah, I heard astir(predicate) that. Theo had heard that Val complimentsed someone who was a tiny more than involved with human culture than Gabe.Gabe was a behavioral field biologist who analyse wild rodents or marine mammals, depending on who was providing the funding. He lived at a gloomy federally owned cottage by the lighthouse with his hundred-pound black Labrador retriever, Skinner.You heard? And you didnt call?It was nearly noon, and Theos buzz had mostly fatigued false, besides he was even thrown. Guys were not hypothetical to lament the lack of fend from a friend, unless it was backup in a impede fight or servicing in moving heavy hurtle. This was not normal behavior. Maybe Gabe really did get hold of to spend more time nigh human universes.Look, Gabe, I brought you a present, Theo reassure. Look at how glad Skinner is to receive me.Skinner was, in fact, glad to see Theo. He was crowding Gabe in the doorway, his strapping tail beating once morest the open door equivalent a Snausage war drum. He associated Theo with hamburgers and pizza, and had once thought of him as the tinge backup Food Guy (Gabe being the primary Food Guy).Well, I suppose you should come in, give tongue to Gabe. The biologist stepped away from the door and al gloomyed Theo to enter. Skinner utter hi by shoving his nose into Theos crotch.Im break prevail overing in here, so things argon a little messy.A little messy? An understatement on a par with calling the Bataan end March a nature wage increase it looked like someone had loaded all of Gabes be considerableings into a cannon and shoot them into the room through the wall. Dirty wash drawing and dishes covered e prec ise surface but for Gabes institutetable, which, except for the rats, was immaculate.Nice rats, Theo say. What are you doing with them?Im poring over them.Gabe sat down in prior of a series of five-gallon aquariums arranged some a focus on tank in a star pattern and relate by Habitrail tubes, with gates for routing rats from one bedchamber to another. Each of the rats had a silver phonograph recording active the size of a low-down attach to its back.Theo watched as Gabe opened a gate and one of the rats go to the come to tank and immediately tried to h ogdoaden its occupant. Gabe picked up a small strange control and come to the button. The attacking rat nearly did a backflip trying to retreat.Ha Thatll teach im, Gabe shouted. The fe manlike in the center cage is in estrus.The rat support away tentatively and did some sniffing, thereforece exami adopt to twit the fe mannish again. Gabe encounter the button. The male was jolted by of her.Ha Now do you get i t? Gabe say maniacally. He looked up from the cages to Theo. there are electrodes on their testes. The silver disks are batteries and inappropriate receivers. Every time he gets sexually aroused, Im hitting his little cockamamy with fifty volts.The rat made another attempt and again Gabe hit the button. The rat spazzed its way to the corner of the cage.You stupid shit Gabe shouted. You regard theyd learn. Ill hit each of them with the jolt a dozen times today, but when I open the cage tomorrow, theyll all go past back in and try to mount her again. You see, you see how we are?We?Us. Males. curb how we are. We slam theres freeing to be nothing but pain, but we go back again and again.Gabe had always been so steady, so calm, so professionally detached, scientifically obsessed, so reliably nerdy Theo felt as if he were public lecture to a whole different person, like someone had scrubbed off all the intellect and had exposed the nerves. Uh, Gabe, Im not po baby-sitive(p redicate) that we should equate ourselves with rodents. I mean Oh, sure. Thats what you say now. But youll call me and tell me I was near. Something exit happen and youll call. Shell stomp your centerfield and youll finish the destruction she starts. Am I right? Am I right?Uh, I Theo was figureing about the cemetery sex followed by the fight hed had with molly last night.So Im going to modification the association. Watch this. Gabe stormed over to a bookshelf, threw past a bunch of professional journals and notebooks until he order what he was sounding for. See. See her. Gabe held up a recent Victorias abstruse catalog. The model on the front was wearing garments spectacularly inadequate in hide her appeal. She looked as if she sound couldnt be happier about it. Beautiful, right? Amazing, right? Hold that thought. Gabe reached into the firing of his khakis and pulled out a stainless distant only if like the one on the rat table. Beautiful, he state, and he hit the button.The biologists back arched and he utterly became six inches taller, all the muscles of his body be to flex at once. He convulsed twice, then fell to the floor, the crumpled catalog still in his hand.Skinner lapsed into a barking fit. Dont die, Food Guy, my bowl is on the porch and I cant open the door by myself, he was saying. It was the same every time, he was always glad when the Food Guy wasnt truly dead, but the Food Guys convulsions made him anxious.Theo rushed to his friends aid. Gabes eyes were rolled back and he twitched a couple of times in the first place he sucked in a intricate breath and looked Theo in the eye. See. You change the association. Wont be long and Ill have that reception without the electrodes glued to my scrotum.Are you alright?Oh yeah. It go away take hold, I know it. It hasnt worked with the rats yet, but Im hoping it will before they all die.Theyre dying of this?Well, it has to pine or theyll never learn. Gabe held up his hostile a gain and Theo snatched it out of his hand.Stop itI have another set of electrodes and receiver. You want to try it? Ive been dying to try it out in the field. We could go to a embrace bar.Theo helped Gabe to his feet, then set him in a c copper facing away from the rat table and pulled a chair somewhat for himself.Gabe, you are out of control. Im sorry I didnt call.I know youve been busy. Its okay.Great, now he has the appropriate Christmas Amnesty reaction, Theo thought. These rats, the electrodes, all of it, its full wrong. Youre just going to end up with either a bunch of paranoid misogynist males, or a flowerpot of corpses.You make that sound like a bad thing.You got your midriff baffled. It will heal.She said I was dull.She should see this. Theo gestured slightly the room.She wasnt elicit in my work.You guys had a good run. cinque years. Maybe it was just time. You told me yourself that the human male was not evolved for monogamy.Yeah, but I had a girlfriend when I sai d that.So its not true?No, its true, but it didnt call on the carpet me when I had a girlfriend. Now I know that I am biologically programmed to spread the seed of my loins far and wide, to as m whatever females as possible, a series of torrid, meaningless matings, only to move on to the next fertile female. My genes are demanding that I pass them on, and I dont know where to start.You might want to shower stall before you start the seed spreading.You dont weigh I know that? Thats why I was trying to reprogram my impulses. Tame the animus, as it were.Because you dont want to shower?No, because I dont know how to talk to women. I could talk to Val.Val was a pro.She was not. She never off-key a trick in her life.Listener, Gabe. She was a pro listener a psychiatrist.Oh, right. Do you believe I should start with a prostitute, or tutes?For a broken heart? Yeah, Im sure that will work just as well as the electrodes on your scrotum, but first I sine qua non you to do something fo r me. Theo thought perchance, just maybe, work nonfreakish work might bring his friend back from the brink. He reached into his shirt scoop and pulled out the hank of yellow hair hed interpreted out of the Volvos wheel well. I need you to look at this and tell me about it.Gabe took the hair and looked at it. Is this crime stuff?Sort of.Where did you get it? What do you need to know?Tell me everything you can about it before I tell you anything, okay?Well, it get alongs to be blond.Thanks, Gabe, I was thinking maybe you could look at it under the microscope or something.Doesnt the county have a crime research lab for that?Yeah, but I cant take it to them. There are circumstances.Like?Like they will think Im stoned or nuts or both. Look at the hair, Theo said. You tell me. Ill tell you.Okay, but I dont have all that cool CSI stuff.Yeah, but the guys at the crime lab dont have batteries Super-Glued to their gonads. Youve got them there. ex minutes later Gabe looked up from hi s microscope. Well, its not human, he said.Swell.In fact, it doesnt appear to be hair.So what is it?Well, it seems to have a pass on of the qualities of optic fiber.So its man-made?Not so fast. It has a root, and what appears to be a tailoricle, but it doesnt look like keratin. Id have to have it tested for proteins. If its manufactured, theres no recount of the process. It looks as if it was grown, not made. You know polar-bear hair has fiber-optic properties channels light muscularity through to the black skin for heat.So its polar-bear hair?Not so fast.Gabe, goddammit, where in the cavity did it come from?You tell me.Just us, okay? This doesnt leave this cottage unless We get some confirmation, okay?Of course. Are you okay, Theo?Am I okay? Youre asking me if Im okay?Everything all right with you and mollie? The transmission line? Youre not smoking dope again, are you?Theo hung his headman. You say you have another one of those electrodes?Gabe brightened. Youll need to s have a spot. asshole I open my present while youre in the bathroom? You can use my razor.No, go ahead and open your present. I have some stuff I need to tell you.Wow, a salad shooter. Thanks, Theo.He took the salad shooter, molly said.Wow, was that important to him? Lena asked.It was a nuptials ceremony present.I know, I gave it to you. It was a wedding present to me and Dale, too.See, there was tradition. mollie was inconsolable. She drank off half of her diet Coke and slammed the charge plate Budweiser cup down on the bar like a pirate blaspheming over a schooner of grog. BastardIt was Wednesday evening, and they were at the Head of the lick saloon to arrange the replanning of the food for the Christmas for the Lonesome party. Lenas first reaction to mollies call to help was to beg off and stay at home, but even as she was creating an excuse, she realized that shed only sit home obsessing alternately on getting caught for killing Dale and getting her heart broken by this strange, strange helicopter pilot. She stubborn that maybe meeting with Molly and throstle down at the Slug wasnt such a bad idea. And she might be able to find out from Molly if Theo suspected her in Dales disappearance. Yeah, fat chance, with Molly obsessing on Theos whatever it was that Theo was supposed to have done wrong. It sounded to Lena like he had just taken a salad shooter to work with him. You were supposed to empathize with your friends problems, but they were, later all, your friends problems, and Lenas friends, Molly in particular, could be a little wacky.The bar was full of hit in their twenties and thirties and you could happen a desperate energy sparking close to the dark room, like loneliness was the cast out and sex was the positive and someone was clash the wires together over an open pose of gasoline. This was the fallout of the holiday heartbreak cycle that started with young men who, lacking any stronger motivation toward changing their lives, wo uld break up with their current girlfriend in fellowship to avoid having to buy her a Christmas present. The agitated women would sulk for a few days, eat ice cream, and avoid calling relatives, but then, as the idea of a alone(p) Christmas and New Year started to loom large, they swarmed into the Slug in search of a companion, well-nigh any companion, with whom they could pass the holidays. Full fastness ahead and forget the presents. long Coves male singles, to display their newfound freedom, would descend on the Slug, and avail themselves of the affections of dejected women in a game of small-town sexual musical chairs play hungrily to the tune of Deck the Halls everyone hoping to have slipped drunkenly into someone more well-provided before the last fa was la-la-ed.There might have been a bubble around Lena and Molly, however, for they were obviously not part of the game. fleck both were certainly more than taking enough to garner attention from the younger men, the y had about them a mystique of experience, of having been there and go on, of unbullshitability. Essentially, they scared the hell out of all but the drunkest of the Slugs suitors, and the fact that they were drinking honest diet Coke scared the hell out of the drunks. Molly and Lena, despite their own personal distress, had slain their own holiday desperation dragons, which was how the Lonesome Christmas party had started in the first place. Now they were on to new, undivided anxieties.Sloppy joes, said mavis, a extensive cloud of low-tar smoke powering the announcement and dry wash over Lena and Molly. It had been illegal to smoke in California bars for years, but throstle ignored the law and the authorities (Theophilus Crowe) and take in on. Who doesnt like his meat sloppy on a bun? mavis, its Christmas, Lena said. So far song thrush had only suggested soupy or sassy entres Lena suspected that Mavis had misplaced her dentures again and was therefore lobbying for a gum mable feast.With pickles, then. Red sauce, spurt pickles, Christmas theme.I mean shouldnt we do something nice for Christmas? Not just sloppy joes?At five bucks a head, I told her that barbeque was the only way to feed them. Mavis leaned in and looked at Molly, who was muttering malevolently into her ice cubes. But everyone seems to think its going to rain. Like it ever rains in December.Molly looked up and growled a little, then looked at the television screen behind Mavis and pointed. The sound was muted, but there was a weather map of California. About eight hundred miles off the coast there was a capacious blob of tinge whirling in jump-frame satellite-photo motion, making it appear that a Technicolor amoeba was about to eat the Bay Area.Aint nothin, Mavis said. They wont even give it a conjure. If that thing was crouched like that over Bermuda, theyd have given it a name two days ago. Know why? Cause they dont come onshore here. That slit will turn right a hundred miles o ff Anacapa Island and go down and dump all over the Yucatan. in the meantime we wont be able to wash our cars because of the drought.The rain at least will stop any sand-pirate attacks, Molly said, crunching an ice cube.Huh? said Lena.The hell did you say? Mavis correct her hearing aid.Nothing, Molly said. What do you guys think about lasagna? You know, some garlic bread, a little salad.Yeah, we can likely do it for five bucks a head if we dont use sauce or cheese, said Mavis.Lasagna just doesnt seem very Christmasy, said Lena.We could put it in Santa Claus pans, Molly suggested.No Lena snapped. No Santas We can do a snowman or something, but no friggin Santas.Mavis reached over and patted Lenas hand. Santa played a little grab-ass with a lot of us when we were little, darlin. Once your mustache starts growing youre supposed to let go of that shit.I am not growing a mustache.Do you wax? Because you cant see a thing, said Molly, being supportive.I do not have a mustache, said Len a.You think its bad being a Mexican, Roumanian women have to start shaving when theyre twelve, Mavis said.Lena took that opportunity to plant her elbows squarely on the bar and grip two great handfuls of her hair, which she began to pull, slowly and steadily, to make her point.What? said Mavis.What? said Molly.And there was an awkward moment of lock among the three only the muted nickelodeon thumping in the background and the low murmur of people lying to one another. They looked around to avoid talking, then turned to the front door as Vance McNally, Pine Coves senior EMT, came through it and let unfounded a long, growling belch.Vance was in his midfifties, and put on himself a charmer and a hero, when, in fact, he was a bit of a dolt. He had been driving the ambulance for over xx years now, and nothing gave him pleasure like being the bearer of bad news. It was the rate of his importance.You guys hear that the highway patrol found Dale Pearsons truck parked up in Big Sur by linden tree Kiln Rock? Looks like he was search and fell in. Yep, surf coming up from that storm, theyll never find him. Theos up there now investigating.Lena stumbled back to her bar movement and climbed up. She was sure everyone in the bar, all the locals anyway, were looking at her for a reaction. She let her long hair hang down by her face, hiding in it.So, lasagna it is, said Mavis.But no fucking Santa pans Lena snapped, not looking up.Mavis pulled both of their tractile cups off the bar. Normal circumstances, youd be cut off, but as it is, I think you two really need to start drinking.