“Of course not, but—”
Another guest interjected, “I think a Russian agent emptied—”
“A Chinese agent, you mean.”
“Whatever. A foreign agent’s emptied chemicals into our reservoirs and now the knobs on our cabinets are falling off. Some secret weapon that is!”
There was more laughter.
Gloria Delmonico, wearing a textured yellow sunsuit that contrasted with her smooth dark skin, emerged from the house carrying a tray of canapés. “It’s not funny,” she said as she set the tray on the redwood picnic table. “People are frightened by what they don’t understand so they make up stories to explain it. At the hospital we have a patient who’s seen a woman rise from the dead.”
“Like a ghost?”
“The poor man was hallucinating. He’s convinced she’s come back from the grave to ruin his life, but the real problem is he’s still suffering occasional flashbacks from a bad drug experience years ago. When he accepts that, I may be able to help him.”
“The Change can’t be a giant hallucination.”
“It’s a giant hoax and someone’s going to have to pay for the damage.”
Theories were batted around like tennis balls. Everything from a foreign conspiracy to the nation’s propensity for alcohol was blamed.
“The government’s going to have to do something about this.”
“Sure they will. They’ll form a committee the taxpayers will pay for, and the committee will form a subcommittee and put together a panel of experts…”
“That’s all we need, a panel of experts.”
Jack remarked, “The ordinary man in the street might be better than a panel of experts locked into their own viewpoints.”
“Don’t include me in that,” said Gerry.
“You’re a scientist, aren’t you?”
“Industrial chemist, that’s my job description. I got interested in science very early, when my granddad told me about smartphones that spontaneously caught fire years ago. In school I discovered I was like Marie Curie, fascinated by both chemistry and physics. But it’s easier to make a living in chemistry.”
“Did they ever find out why the phones caught fire?”
“Sure they did, science has an answer for everything.”
“You have a lot of faith in science, don’t you?”
Gerry grinned. “Faith and science are a contradiction in terms. Science is about what’s real; faith is wishful thinking.” He shot a glance in Gloria’s direction. “But don’t tell my wife I said that.”
“I know what I saw at the bank,” Nell Bennett insisted on Sunday evening.
“You should stop having those liquid lunches,” her husband told her. A ruggedly handsome man, retaining the neck and shoulders that had made him formidable at college football, Robert Bennett dominated the dinner table. “Alcohol’s going to start showing on your face.”
Nell hated it when her husband made disparaging remarks to her in front of the children. “I didn’t have a ‘liquid lunch’ that day, Rob, I didn’t have lunch at all.”
“Another diet, Mom?”
“I’m not dieting, Jess, I don’t need to.”
“Yeah, sure.”
A few minutes later Colin complained of a headache. Headaches had become a frequent feature of his teens. Rob dismissed them as attention seeking, but Nell worried. The specialist she consulted had sought to reassure her. “It’s a normal occurrence in teenagers, Mrs. Bennett; their bodies are changing so rapidly. If Colin’s headaches occur more frequently or the pain becomes worse, bring him back in and we’ll run some tests, but I don’t think it will be necessary.”
The meal ended as most meals did in the Bennett household; like the breakup of a small constellation. Robert Bennett announced he was going to his office at RobBenn for a couple of hours. His son went to his room to play war games on the internet. In her room Jessamyn avidly followed the celebrity gossip on social media.
Nell was left to retire to the media room and seek electronic company alone, as she did most evenings.
When she activated the wallscreen a local broadcaster walked toward her from a surrealistic set. “A blizzard of potato chips swirled through Alcott Park today. The bags disintegrated as they were being unloaded at the refreshment stand. We also have unconfirmed reports of plastic pill bottles dissolving on drugstore shelves.”
As if I needed this, thought Nell.
She switched the wallscreen to the international news to be greeted by an onslaught of violence and tragedy, interrupted at three-minute intervals by celebrities appearing to walk toward her from the screen, extolling the virtues of a new-model car or the latest energy drink.
She changed to a pay-for-view documentary channel where the past was brought to life again; the safe and distant past that held no surprises. A program on archaeology, one of her favorite subjects, absorbed her interest until bedtime. But she did not sleep well that night. When Rob finally crawled into their bed she was grateful for his bulk and solidity. Robert Bennett, to whom life had given all the prizes, was her bulwark.
He would keep her safe. Rob always kept his trophies safe.
6
On Monday morning Nell alluded to the destruction of the bank card while she spooned scrambled eggs onto her husband’s plate. “I hope my new card comes in the mail today.”
“Do you have to go on about trivia? I’ve got a lot on my mind, an important meeting this afternoon. And don’t give me any yatata about your real estate business either. As if any intelligent person would give you their business,” he added while helping himself to more sage-and-apple sausages.
“Rob, you shouldn’t eat so much sausage. What about your cholesterol?”
“The same cholesterol you’re trying to boost with all these scrambled eggs? Can’t wait to collect on my life insurance, hunh?” Ten minutes later he strode from the house. As he drove away he decided not to come home that night but sleep at RobBenn—his usual response to any disturbance at home, particularly those he had initiated himself.
He had been in his office for only a few minutes when his personal assistant came in. “The grip on my handbag—I thought it was leather—stuck to my hand,” Karen Moeller said, looking stunned. “It took ages to peel it off. See how red my palm is!”
“Don’t you women keep any cream in your desk? Go put some on it and then bring me my calendar.”
A mile away from the Bennett house Sandy and Buster Nyeberger were hard at work on schemes to liven up the summer. Mischief was their constant preoccupation. Any possibility was grist to their mill. As the oldest boy at fourteen, Sandy had a room by himself. Kirby and Buster were thirteen and eleven respectively and shared another room, while Flub and Dub occupied a third.
The wing of the house that contained the boys’ rooms resembled the wreckage left by a passing tornado.
On this morning the two oldest boys had closeted themselves in Sandy’s room and locked the door. They only emerged for a hasty breakfast and then retired again. Sometime later they summoned their brother Buster.
The twins, Flub and Dub, complained at being left out. “They’re playing World War Four again and they won’t let us!”
“You have a PC in your room,” their mother reminded them. “Go on the internet and find—”
“It’s just an old one and you’ve got all the good stuff blocked,” Flub said. “It’s not fair. Why can’t we—”
“You just can’t, that’s all.” Tricia Nyeberger pushed a stringy lock of hair back from her damp forehead and looked at her watch. It was not yet noon. Dear God. A long day still stretched ahead. Children used to play outside in the summer, she recalled with longing. You could shoo them out the back door and not see them again for hours. Now they’re glued to machines and they speak a different language. They don’t even talk to each other half the time, they just send texts, even from room to room.