“Yeah,” said Victor. “I mean, no. I mean . . .”
And in that instant he saw himself, this house, his life as it really was for the first time. He was overwhelmed with self-consciousness and shame.
“Did . . . did you have any trouble finding the place?”
“Nope. Followed your directions. Perfect!”
Victor studied the virgules in the carpet, trying to find his next words there.
Rex Christian leaned forward in his chair. The effort nearly doubled him over.
“Look, I know what it’s like for you.”
“You do?”
“Believe me, I do. That’s my business, isn’t it? I’ve seen it all before.”
Rex sat back and took a long pull from the tall bottle. His Adam’s apple rolled like a ball bearing in his throat.
“You must know a lot about people,” said Victor.
“Never enough. That’swhy I take a trip like this, at least once a year.” He chortled. “I rent a car, visit folks like you all over the country. It’s a way of paying them back. Plus it helps me with my research.”
“I see.” There was an awkward pause. “You . . . you said you were in San Francisco. On business. Was that part of this year’s trip?”
“Right. Nothing beats the old one-on-one, does it?”
So he didn’t come all this way just to see me, thought Victor. There were others. “From your writing, well, I thought you’d be a very private person.”
“I am! Somebody wants a book, they have to climb the mountain. But when it comes to my fans it’s a different story. They’re raw material. I go to the source, know what I mean?”
“I used to be a people-person,” said Victor, loosening up a bit. He drained his bottle. He thought of going for two more. But the writer had hardly touched his. “Now, well, I don’t go out much. I guess you could say I’ve turned into more of a project-type person.”
“Glad to hear it!”
“You are?”
“It just so happens I’ve got a project you might be interested in. A new book. It’s called A Long Time Till Morning.”
“I like the title,” said Victor. “Excuse me.”
He rose unsteadily and made a beeline for the stairs. The beer had gone through his system in record time. When he came out of the bathroom, he gazed down in wonderment from the top of the landing. Rex Christian was still sitting there, stiff and proper as a ventriloquist’s dummy. I can’t believe this is happening, he thought. Now everything’s changed. There he is, sitting in my living room!
His heart pounded with exhilaration.
Let me never forget this. Every minute, every second, every detail. I don’t want to miss a thing. This is important; this matters. The most important night of my life.
He bounded down the stairs and snagged two more beers and an opener from the kitchen, then reseated himself on the sofa.
Rex Christian greeted him with a sparkling grin.
“Tell me about your new book,” said Victor breathlessly. “I want to hear everything. I guess I’ll be the first, won’t I?”
“One of the first.” The author folded his tiny hands. “It’s about an epidemic that’s sweeping the country – I don’t have the details yet. I’m still roughing it out. All I gave my editor was a two-page outline.”
“And he bought it?”
Rex Christian grinned.
“What kind of epidemic?”
“That’s where you can help, Vic.”
“If it’s research you want, well, just tell me what you need. I used to do a lot of that in school. I was in premed and . . .”
“I want to make this as easy as possible for you.”
“I know. I mean, I’m sure you do. But it’s no sweat. I’ll collect the data, Xerox articles, send you copies of everything that’s ever been written on the subject, as soon as you tell me . . .”
Rex Christian frowned, his face wrinkling like a deflating balloon. “I’m afraid that would involve too many legalities. Copyrights, fees, that sort of thing. Sources that might be traced.”
“We could get permission, couldn’t we? You wouldn’t have to pay me. It would be an honor to . . .”
“I know.” Rex Christian’s miniature fingers flexed impatiently. “But that’s the long way around, my friend.”
“However you want to do it. Say the word and I’ll get started, first thing in the morning. Monday morning. Tomorrow’s Sunday and . . .”
“Monday’s too late. It starts now. In fact it’s already started. You didn’t know that, did you?” Rex’s face flushed eagerly, his cheeks red as a newborn infant’s. “I want to know pwrfeelings on the subject. All of them.” He pumped his legs and crept forward on the cushion. “Open yourself up. It won’t hurt. I promise.”
Victor’s eyes stung and his throat ached. It starts here, he thought, awe-struck. The last thirty-three years were the introduction to my life. Now it really starts.
“You wouldn’t want to know my feelings,” he said. “They . . . I’ve been pretty mixed up. For a long time.”
“I don’t care about what you felt before. I want to know what you feel tonight. It’s only you, Vic. You’re perfect. I can’t get that in any library. Do you know how valuable you are to me?”
“But why? Your characters, they’re so much more real, more alive . . .”
Rex waved his words aside. “An illusion. Art isn’t life, you know. If it were, the world would go up in flames. It’s artifice. By definition.” He slid closer, his toes finally dropping below the coffee table. “Though naturally I try to make it echo real life as closely as I can. That’s what turns my readers on. That’s part of my mission. Don’t you understand?”
Victor’s eyes filled with tears.
Other people, the people he saw and heard on the screen, on TV, in books and magazines, voices on the telephone, all had lives which were so much more vital than his own wretched existence. The closest he had ever come to peak experiences, the moments he found himself returning to again and again in his memory, added up to nothing more significant than chance meetings on the road, like the time he hitchhiked to San Francisco in the summer of ‘67, a party in college where no one knew his name, the face of a girl in the window of a passing bus that he had never been able to forget.
And now?
He lowered his head to his knees and wept.
And in a blinding flash, as if the scales had been lifted from his eyes, he knew that nothing would ever be the same for him again. The time to hesitate was over. The time had come at last to make it real.
He thought: I am entitled to a place on the planet, after all.
He lifted his eyes to the light.
The dwarf’s face was inches away. The diminutive features, the taut lips, the narrow brow, the close, lidded eyes, wise and all-forgiving. The sweet scent of an unknown after-shave lotion wafted from his skin.
“The past doesn’t matter,” said the dwarf. He placed the short fingers of one hand on Victor’s head. “To hell with it all.”
“Yes,” said Victor. For so long he had thought just the opposite. But now he saw a way out. “Oh, yes.”
“Tell me what you feel from this moment on,” said the dwarf. “I need to know.”
“I don’t know how,” said Victor.
“Try.”
Victor stared into the dark, polished eyes, shiny as a doll’s eyes.
“I want to. I . . . I don’t know if I can.”
“Of course you can. We’re alone now. You didn’t tell anyone I was coming, did you, Vic?”
Victor shook his head.
“How thoughtful,” said the dwarf. “How perfect. Like this house. A great setting. I could tell by your letter you were exactly what I need. Your kind always are. Those who live in out-of-the-way places, the quiet ones with no ties. That’s the way it has to be. Otherwise I couldn’t use you.”