“Is that so? Well, thank you, Filbert. I consider that—”
“No, it’s not that kind of compliment. It’s because of your age. Chimpanzees respect their elders.”
“Oh. Well, I appreciate that just as much,” I lied.
“Sometimes they part with a kiss.”
“Does that show respect, too?”
“Nope. That indicates friendship.”
* * *
Back in the hospital I went immediately to look for Jerry. He wasn’t in his room, and his matchstick sculpture of the Institute was sitting on its pedestal unfinished and unattended. It seemed sad, in a way, as if the sculptor had died. It reminded me of the final works of Michelangelo, chipped stone blocks with only a hint of the ultimate figures still trapped inside.
I finally found him in the quiet room. He was reading an architecture book. Where he got it is anyone’s guess—it didn’t come from the hospital library. He was so engrossed that he didn’t even know I was there until I spoke to him.
“Hi, Jerry.”
He barely looked up. “Hi, Dr. Brewer. How are you?”
“Can’t complain. Especially after seeing you this way. There’s something I’d like to ask you, though.”
He was still poring over the book. “Mmmm?”
“We both know that autism isn’t a minor affliction, Jerry, and it’s never been cured. You clearly had demonstrable neurological damage. Nothing fled might have told you or showed you could have fixed that. Yet, you appear to be perfectly normal. What happened when you went off with her?”
“You’re right, Dr. B. It wasn’t anything she said that suddenly cured my affliction. It was what she did.”
“Really? What did she do?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea. She took me to a laboratory somewhere. It was the middle of the night, so no one else was around. There was a laser gun. In fact, there were several. She had me lie down on a table. No, it wasn’t a table, it was a lab bench—she had to clear off some equipment first. That’s about all I can tell you. She zapped me in several different places with the lasers, and when she was finished, I suddenly understood things I never had before.”
“You mean like math and so on?”
“That was the easy part. No, it had to do with people. Before this, I could never figure out the interactions people had with each other. Those needs were utterly meaningless to me. In fact, I didn’t care. People were no more important than trees, and somehow repulsive as well. But all of a sudden I was able to figure it out. I am people, if you see what I mean. Interacting with other people is like interacting with myself. For good or bad, I’m one of us. I never understood that before.”
“Which do you think it is—good or bad?”
“I think it’s both. My head is flooded with new ideas, and I want to find out what I’ve missed all these years. I want to talk to people, see how they operate. See how I operate. I don’t have to go somewhere inside myself to have a sense of meaning anymore. But there’s a tradeoff, of course.”
“What’s that?”
“I can’t remember how to do the matchstick sculptures.”
I couldn’t help but smile, which segued into a happy chuckle. “That’s all right, Jer. We’d rather have you than another sculpture, even if it’s a masterpiece. Welcome to the real world!”
“Thank you. I think.”
“It has its good points. Uh—fled didn’t say anything about what, exactly, she did with the laser beams, did she?”
“I didn’t ask her.”
“Tell me one more thing.”
“If I can.”
“What was it like—traveling at the speed of light?”
“I didn’t feel a thing. It’s like nothing happened at all, except there’s a little flash of light and then you’re somewhere else. There’s no sensation of movement whatever.”
“Would you do it again?”
“Depends on where we’re going.”
* * *
Before I could find fled again, I was paged by Will. I phoned him from the lounge. Besides being curious about how the session with Tewks and Filbert had gone, he reported a message he had taken from his brother-in-law Steve, who requested a return call from me. I told Will I’d fill him in later on the recent episode with fled, though I did give him a preview: “She has a heart, after all.”
Then I called my astronomer son-in-law. “Hi, Steve. Returning your call. How are Abby and the boys?”
Steve was in no mood for chitchat. “Damn it all to hell, Gene, when can Ah talk to fled?”
“Oh, God, Steve. So much has been going on here that I forgot to ask her about it.”
“Well, can you do it today?”
“I’ll try. What’s the rush, anyway?”
“We don’t know when she’s leaving, right? Ah don’t want to miss my only chance to talk to her.”
“Well, she won’t be leaving for…” I was amazed when I realized he was right: fled had already been on Earth for more than two weeks, and the first window would come open in a matter of days. “I’ll ask her today. Matter of fact, I was looking for her when you called.”
“Abby and Star want to talk to her, too. And Rain called from Princeton. He’s willing to cut classes for a day if he can be included.”
“Why don’t we just have a picnic and make it a family affair?”
“Great idea! Thanks, Dad-in-law—Ah appreciate it.”
“No, I was jok—”
But he had already hung up.
* * *
Fled was still enjoying the benefits of pre-motherhood. Everyone wanted to bring her a glass of water, a cucumber, a chair. For her part, fled ate it up. Whether it was all an act remained to be seen, but for the time being she seemed to become less belligerent and more fragile. The patients quickly picked up on this. They do live together, after all, and even subtle changes can be quite noticeable. A mental institution is much like a big family and, despite the intense focus on themselves, the inmates sincerely care about one another.
In a sense, I suppose, it wasn’t fled herself whom the patients were so solicitous of, but the unborn child, regardless of its nature. Of course it’s the same after they’re born: who doesn’t google at an infant in a stroller? Studies have shown that a person is captivated not only by the innocence of the little creature, but by the remembrance of one’s own purity, now irretrievably lost. Perhaps this little fella will not be so unfortunate as I was, one hopes. Fled, like all mothers-to-be, basked in the sunshine of this yearning.
I watched her for a while from the other side of the lawn. Darryl was sitting near me gazing at his pocket-size photographs of Meg Ryan. When a sudden burst of laughter came from the back forty, he looked up to see what the uproar was about. I took the opportunity to ask him what he thought of fled.
“I didn’t like her at first. She was so strange. I thought maybe she was going to take us somewhere and stick things into us—you know, do medical experiments like the aliens in the UFOs. Make guinea pigs out of us. Then Howard told us she wasn’t so bad, that we should give her a chance. Didn’t help much, though. She was so loud and obnoxious that nobody wanted to. But the more she hung out, the more she seemed to belong here, you know? I guess you can get used to anyone if you’re around them long enough. Except for the fact that she’s so—well, ape-like—Howard was right. She’s okay. Not that much different from the rest of us. I don’t mean she’s somebody I’d want to live with on a permanent basis. But she’s very smart. She seems to see things the rest of us miss. And she’s really not that bad looking, either, when you think about it. I mean, she’s got hair all over her body, of course, but her eyes are big and brown, and her voice is nice when she speaks softly, don’t you think? And now that she’s pregnant…I kind of like her now.” He sighed and glanced again at the photos. “Of course, she’s not Meg.”