“I don’t see why you wouldn’t have the same problem here,” Willing said.
“Lotta shrivs—sorry, the long-lived—left at secession. Couldn’t face life without Medicare. And I’ll be honest with you, Noll. The oldsters who’ve stuck it out—usually native-born Nevadans; the blow-in retirees fled in droves—well, they’re getting sick. Nevada doesn’t have any pharmaceutical plants, and the drugs ran out years ago—for hypertension, cholesterol, angina. So they’re dying sooner. I’ve seen it plenty on an anecdotal level, but if anyone bothered to assemble statistics here I bet you’d find a sharp drop in life expectancy. I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing. An opinion broadly shared in this part of the world, but scandalous in the Outer Forty-Nine. If you’re frail or ailing in Nevada, you have to rely on someone else, and I don’t mean collectively, on an institution. A relative, or a neighbor.”
“Isn’t it interesting that seems so weird,” Nollie said.
“The Free State is an experiment in going backwards,” Jarred said. “Even technologically—there don’t happen to be any rob plants within its borders, yet. So as the existing robs break down they’re replaced by human employees. It’s not an answer in the long run—someone’s bound to manufacture the bastards in due course—but in the short term, loss of automation has really helped the labor market. You’ll see, there’s plenty of work here. Though it’s either biggin’ low skilled and often physical, or it requires a level of education you and I, Willing, don’t have anywhere near.”
“We’ve gone to some trouble to get here,” Nollie said, glancing around a room far more depressing than the cozy home in East Flatbush they’d left behind. “I want to be optimistic. But what makes the USN so much of an improvement?”
“It’s what I said to Goog on the Fourth of July,” Willing said. “Freedom is a feeling. Not only a list of things you’re allowed to do. I feel better.” He might have just taken his own temperature. “I feel better already.”
“Tax forms in this state, believe it or not,” Jarred said, “are one page long. That’s pretty much the way it is with everything. You don’t get a business license or a marriage license, an entertainment license or a liquor license. You do business, get married, entertain yourself, and drink.”
“However,” Willing said. “Nevada is not a utopia.”
“No, no, no!” Jarred agreed vehemently. “It sure isn’t. This town is filthy with losers and T-bills, scammers and swindlers. And people really do starve. Nobody helps you here unless they want to, and what’s worse they have to like you. Just being needy doesn’t cut it. Native Nevadans are apt to give each other a hand, but we interloping Outer Forty-Niners are on our own. Nobody asked us to come here, so we’re expected to make ourselves useful or go away. Right at secession, folks were worried only the hardcore would stick it out, and the state would rapidly depopulate until it wasn’t viable. Now the prevailing fear is just the opposite: that refugees from Scab persecution will pour into the Free State in quantities Nevada can’t absorb. That’s a big reason people don’t try harder to get word out that it’s not so bad here.”
“So maybe some of the more outlandish rumors in the USA,” Nollie said, “about cannibalism and genocide, are actually propagated by the USN.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Jarred said. “I’m getting reluctant to spread the gospel myself.”
“But if everyone here is a maverick,” Willing said. “Doesn’t that make you a conformist?”
“Very funny,” Jarred said. “Problem is, mavericks rarely get on with other mavericks. And you’ll find out soon enough how much stuff you simply can’t get: replacement parts for your maXfleX. Lemons. Realize how few dishes you can make without lemons? The Chinese takeout is splug, because there aren’t any more water chestnuts, or bamboo shoots, or shiitakes—not even in cans. You’re entirely dependent on some entrepreneur who’s had the bright idea to manufacture wooden salad bowls, or you can’t get wooden salad bowls unless you carve them yourself. Nevada has started to generate its own media—TV shows, movies—which sounds cute, but they all suck. People write their own books, but they’re awful.”
“Glad to hear it,” Nollie said. “No competition.”
“I can’t overemphasize, though,” Jarred said, “how leery locals are of new arrivals. They’re not touched by your eagerness to convert. They’re not impressed by your bravery in coming here. Obviously, a lot of Lats drained south of the border when Mexico’s economy went ape shit. After secession, Nevada lost a fair number more. With all the holdout Republicans around Reno and Carson City, Lats were edgy that an independent state would turn into a racist repeat of the Confederacy. Well, everyone needs a cat to kick, and that’s us. We’re the new undocumented workers. Forty-Niners show up with unrealistic expectations, no education, and worst of all, no assets. They get chip-stripped at the border. You’re unusual; most of us don’t realize we could have brought in a car.”
“Most of us wouldn’t have cars,” Willing reminded him.
“I kick myself for not crossing in the pickup. I’ve been getting around on a ramshackle bicycle that isn’t even electrified. In the heat of summer, it’s insufferable. As for this place, I know it’s not much to look at. But it’s a miracle I have somewhere to live. Plenty Forty-Niners are homeless. I only stopped dozing in doorways at the beginning of May.”
“What kind of work are you doing here?” Nollie asked.
“I work at a cheese factory,” Jarred announced shamelessly. “Separating curds and whey—the whole Little Miss Muffet nine yards. Nevada’s had a dairy industry for ages, but they didn’t make much cheese. Couldn’t top a taco anymore, and everyone freaked. The market for Monterey Jack is biggin’. Casa de Queso is thinking of expanding into a knockoff Parmesan. I know guys who are quasi-suicidal because they can’t get Parmesan.”
“It’s crazy,” Willing said, “but I pictured you owning another farm.”
“How would I do that? No capital, mi amigo. You’ll see. I mean, you and Nollie are welcome to crash here. But even in the land of self-reliance with a negligible flat tax, it could take you a while to swing your own place.”
“I’d hate to part with it,” Willing said. “But selling this goblet might raise enough for a security deposit on a small apartment. The top part is solid gold.”
“But what you complained to me about, when you moved back to Brooklyn?” Jarred said. “The no trajectory problem? Here, in that respect, nothing’s changed. Man, this is the first time in my life I wish I’d earned a degree. Nevadans don’t really need another fifty-something yunk to press, cut, and schlep cheese. They need chemists, and engineers.”
“What would you do,” Nollie said, “if you did have capital?”
“Waste of time to fantasize.”
“Wrong answer,” Nollie said.
Jarred indulged her. “I’d build a gigantic greenhouse. I’d grow lemons.”
“That’s better,” she said, turning to Willing. “What would you do with capital?”
This house was ugly. With its partially constructed rectangles of waist-high walls, the whole development was ugly. But the sunset had been stunning. On the drive into Las Vegas, looming red mountains to the west were impervious to whatever government came and went. The cityscape was goofy; the land on which it sat was austere. The balance was good. A lightness leavened Willing’s body that hadn’t percolated through his limbs since before the Stonage. He personified a favorite chocolate bar when he was small, its muddy cocoa solids pipped with hundreds of air bubbles, so what had been heavy and indigestible became fluffy and almost weightless. He didn’t know what he was doing tomorrow, and he liked that.