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Space. There's a thought.
Andrew hears cicadas. Fruit flies have been to space. And ants. And honeybees. Cicadas haven't. He sees them in the trees, soft breeze and song of summer, chorus warm with katydids. He could take one and send it high, maybe to space.
“My physics professor wondered about the applications of Control to space travel. I have the notes, I should have considered it more seriously.”
James says “You’ve had a busy month.”
“Yeah, and I’m considering it now. How hard is it to get a spacesuit? Actually, what if I don’t even need that? What if I’d only need oxygen?”
“When we only thought you were bulletproof you didn’t feel the need to go get shot. You are resilient but that might end in the cold vacuum.” James puts one hand up to his neck and plays the gasping cosmonaut. With the other he reaches out to Andrew, who smiles distractedly.
“I don’t know. I can stare at the sun without issue, I stopped sweating. I can hold my hands in fire and when we were at Don’s for Christmas you saw me outside in the snow in shorts and bare feet. It was like the pan I grabbed, I could tell how cold it was, it just didn’t register as something I needed to care about. You said the Haze cleansed radiation, what if I’m immune to it? What if I’m immune to the cold vacuum?”
“I guess we must consider that, but with no safe method to evaluate your protections it would be best to avoid the risk.”
“You sound like a lawyer.”
They laugh.
“Canton could get me a spacesuit,” says Andrew.
“He could, but—”
“But we don’t know if he can be trusted. I could go to him in disguise. I bet he’d still give me one. What do you think about space?”
James pauses, in thought. “If you could place ships in orbit, then space would be an incredible use for Control. It could be the best.”
“The best?”
“As-is, a manned expedition to Mars will happen in the next decade or two, but projects at the scale Canton believes is possible with Control would take a manmade solution to the rocket equation without, and there is no guessing the timeframe on that. If you could regularly put ships in orbit before they have to spend fuel? That would make you the solution to the rocket equation, and the good of that is in the best sense undefined. You would facilitate rapid inhabitation, exploration and colonization. Your impact on posterity would be as unique as it is profound.”
“So I should work for Epitaxial.”
“I’m sure Elon would love to have you, but we already know what Canton wants.”
“There’s still that question of trust. Assuming I can trust him, which I don’t, it would be obvious if a Controller is working for him. When I’m done with school I’m going to have to announce I’m not playing professionally, and that’s going to be news, and then everyone would connect the dots when I’m at Epitaxial. If I do that, I think I’d have to still play, and I’m just done with it, dad. I’m done.”
“Canton’s one of the wealthiest men in the world and he did not reach that place without the ruthlessness you see in his fights, but there is a difference. He is a man. You have infinite leverage over him, you could tear Epitaxial to the ground with him inside, and he will know that. I do think he has the right temperament, I’ve read enough about him, I’ve heard him talk enough, I trust my feeling that he’s trustworthy, at least trustworthy enough for you to go to him in a mask. And if you’re working for him, you’ll be helping him achieve his dreams. He’d want to protect you if anything, and as he is a man of considerable influence, having him as your ally could be the greatest way to protect your identity. He will easily be able to compensate you without knowing, if you chose, and if you did divulge your secret, he will no doubt have a way to pay you without anyone knowing it’s from him. But you still have three years left, and that’s a lot of time for things to change. Those giants, yeah, they’ll have to make new leagues for them, and maybe the NFL will fall off as everyone’s watching the NGFL. I don’t know, Andrew, but I think there will be a solution we’ve not yet considered, one Canton himself no doubt has already considered, one that would make this work without you having to still play football.”
“Yeah, you’re right. Thanks, dad. I guess I’m going to work with John Canton.”
James nods, then hums.
“What?” asks Andrew.
“All those things you don’t have to worry about? Are you sure you need to eat? Or drink? Or breathe?”
Andrew exhales.
Cicada song fills the office.
State championships. Michael allows 4 hits in 5 games. Finals against Loganville at Truist, Andrew eyes the pennants. Metal, white text, blue league flags and red world flags – 1995 – 1996 – 1997 – 1998 – 2021 – and he sees the pitch and his brother’s final victim of the day leave the box shaking his head and the team vaulting the dugout rails and throwing their gloves up in the outfield and meeting on the mound to celebrate. Pizza after, packing Piu Bello and overflowing into parking where boxes sit on cars and parents pull out camp chairs, some with faded covers from years spent in the backs of vans and SUVs. A single napkin dances over asphalt; it came from none of the players. These really are the boys of summer, they're covered in dirt and streaks of eyeblack, add a little grease to the glory. Michael’s grin doesn't leave his face, the team uproariously recalling every out-of-their-league batter crossed blind at 94 heat into 80 breaking. In another time he would have looked destined for early Tommy John but arms don't fall off anymore.
In the cooling cab of his father’s truck Andrew watches the team file into the bus. He can see the heat rising from the seats in the field but he could have guessed it from his years spent in those stifling boxes. The players pull down windows, he watches one reach for the release handles and whip his hands off hot metal. They return to Truist, the team taken to the lower tunnels to group behind home plate, cameras showing the state champions on the jumbotron as Brian Snitker and the rest of the Braves congratulate them and stand together for the anthem before a 7-0 routing of the Marlins. Andrew sees birds circling, waiting to descend on the seats for the popcorn peanut and sunflower detritus of the crowd and he sees a young woman with a white Adidas rain jacket tied around her waist and he sees a young man in sunglasses and a red hat with US flag.
He calls Emilia from his bed. He listens to her describe her day, laughs when she shouts Esa perra cerrarse! He wonders if she knows the fear he feels. He wishes he could fall asleep to the sound of her voice.
Another drive with his brother to Gainesville, another stop at Publix to wait for their parents, another cheery conversation with Susan who asks “You’re moving out, Andrew?”
“Yeah, special dispensation, part of me coming.”
She’s wearing the national championship shirt. “I’d say it paid off!”
He carries his belongings in two trips to his car, then makes the short walk to the building with his brother’s dorm. Andrew takes a box from Michael’s car and passes him in the hall on the way to the suite four baseball plays will share. One is already there and recognizes him.
“Hey, you’re Andrew Black! Oh, Michael Black, duh. You got some family. Oh, um, I’m Javier.”
Andrew smiles and sticks his hand out. “Michael’s got all the talent, I just gotta run fast,” something familiar hit in the name and now he remembers, “Javier Hernández? You’re the catcher, right? Are you Jose Hernández’ son?”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s my dad,” he says with a smile.
“Wow, I saw him crush a home run when he was the Cards, like ten years ago right after they won the World Series.”
“Oh yeah! Don Black’s your uncle! I got to meet him back then. He was towering over me. Man you really got a family, my little brothers all play baseball but they’re a lot younger than me.”
“Hey, your dad’s still one of those quiet favorites in St. Louis, and I saw that clip of you on YouTube catching the kid trying to steal second. You got it too, man.”
Javier waves his hand, “He wasn’t fast enough.”
“No kidding,” says Andrew as Michael comes back in. “This is that guy you sent me the Jomboy clip of.”
“Yeah I know!” says Michael. “Cool, right? I can’t wait for next spring.”
Andrew says “Me too. I fucking hate football.”
Javier laughs nervously, “What, really?”
“Nah, I like playing just fine. It’s everything else. But it’s what I’m good at, so.”
Andrew drives behind his parents to the condo they purchased on Bivens, his father’s truck pulling a U-Haul trailer full of Ikea boxes. The condominium development could be called a complex but really it’s a single split column of townhouses slightly offset with the curve of the east shore of the lake. A narrow parking lot is ahead of the row of detached garages that are the same light blue as the three-flour condos, mid-century modern with concrete accents that just evoke Brutalism. He carries two furniture boxes by ratchet straps, walking over neat and faded but clean red tile, around well-cared-for shrubs and flowers and young palm trees in pots, down a short staircase with wrought iron railing. He hears the life surrounding the lake and sees it in the field and he sees something else.
Something half-buried in mud in the marsh banks near the trees, shrouded in water clovers. How did it get there? How has nobody noticed? He passes sliding glass, entering the open living space and kitchen that continues through the semi-basement unit to the lakefront side where his mother stands in the sunroom. His is the northernmost unit, where the condos meet a small forest Andrew has walked in before, its far side to the back of the veterinary college. A group of canoes drift languidly across the water. Still far from it.
“I’m glad we bought this,” says his mother.
“Thank you again, but it feels like saying thanks isn’t enough.”
“Well,” starts his mother, “with you and your brother earning those scholarships we had the money. And your father is right, this is a good investment.”
“People here love bringing up how property values keep rising.”
“Mhm. Is Emilia going to move in?”
“I don’t know. I’d like her to, but if she lived with me, she would notice.”
“If you think you’re getting married you have to tell her, Andrew.”
He thinks of the way Emilia’s voice gets thick when she whispers duérmete.
“I don’t know if we are. I love her, but I keep thinking about what dad said about this being a burden. He’s right, I don’t know if I could push this on her. I already don’t like what it means for you, adding someone feels wrong, you can’t fly away. I think sometimes that I should break up with her. Really, I think I should have never started dating her.”
His mother shakes her head. “All that time to think and you’re being twice foolish.”
It almost stings. “What do you mean?”
“You would ruin what you two have because you might get caught? Who’s to say the world will ever learn who you are? Just because they’re searching doesn’t mean they’ll succeed. You are one person in eight billion, Andrew, and they’re not just looking for you. They’re looking for Redhat, and whoever else they probably know about but who haven’t been so visible. You would end it on that chance? You’d sink in that mistake, every day and long night, imagining what could have been. You haven’t even considered the most important part, it’s her. She wants to know, she deserves to know, and when you tell her, she will want that much more to be with you. She won’t care if you’re caught. She won’t care if people know. She’ll understand why and love you more when you tell her.”
“She’ll be afraid of me.”
“She will, Andrew, but she’ll love you for it.”
“Do you?”
His mother laughs and this makes Andrew laugh and they hug.
Andrew and his father carry in the long couch and the oversized armchairs, then assemble the rest of the furniture. Coffee table and console, dining table and chairs. Shelves and a dresser and a desk. They finish mounting the television to the living room wall and leave for a late lunch, then his parents are back on the road, headed again for their house on Tybee Island.
He opens the sliding glass of the sunroom and feels humid air roll over him. He walks into the trees, flashlight in hand. No hurry, this building also has cameras, let this look like the casual stroll it will be when his work is done. He can see where shallow water meets overgrowth and he takes careful steps to avoid the water. Through bushes and tall grass, the canopy full of the calls of tree frogs. When he can no longer avoid the water he turns off the flashlight takes himself without flight. He’s in running shorts and his feet are bare and he doesn’t mind the mud, but this convenience takes no effort. He moves more quickly, the growth submitting to his strides until he reaches it, the alligator he has held in place from when he found it.
He turns the flashlight on for just a moment, prepared for its size as he brings it to the surface but still amazed by the monster as long as a school bus. There is a protocol to this for others, call the police, who shout Call the fuckin’ governor, who sends the state guard to start the jurisdictional circlejerk of Whose job is it to shoot the fuckin’ gator? He can do better. He didn’t want to kill the bear but he would do it again. The bear didn’t deserve to die and neither does this alligator, but if it hurt or killed someone as it so easily could, it would be his fault. Besides, if he doesn’t kill it now he would have to call the police and bring Dante’s bureaucratic circus. The carcass would be collected for research, but such animals have been studied for fifty years and they’ll collect others this summer. The now is his prerogative: he doesn’t want a circus, and he thinks it best no one ever knows, best no one ever fears.
He sends the alligator as as dust and pushes gentle waves through the water before walking back. In his other sight he sees a car park near his condo and a figure walk from it to the sliding glass doors at the front and knock, then raising a phone and knocking again. He walks more quickly, the figure sits on the steps, phone still raised, then they stand and walk around the building to the back. He knows it’s Emilia before the flashlight catches her. He says “Hey!”
“Andrew! I was just calling you.”
“I thought heard someone. I’ve been out walking, I left my phone inside.”
She says “I wanted to surprise you.”
He feigns surprise, making his mouth into an “O” and then smiles. “You have surprised me. Do you want to walk to the lake?”
“Yeah,” she smiles and puts her arm around his waist and he guides her to the shore where they better see than hear the water, no moonlight cast, summer’s song upon them. Emilia turns and looks up at him, and he down at her. She wants to say something, he says nothing, caught by her eyes.
“That night you made me feel like you stopped loving me all at once. That was the worst night of my life. But you do love me, right?”
He looks at the water, unsure, wanting to pick the right words.
“I love you,” he says, watching her fingers press on her thumb.
“Then why do you sometimes act like such a bastard?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“You won’t tell me.”
“Yes.”
“I feel like–I know I should be mad and say that’s not good enough, so why don’t I feel that way? Why is your answer good enough for me? Is it because something’s wrong with me and I would let you treat me however you want? Or is it because you’re the only person I’ve ever been in love with? Maybe I’m just crazy. I can hear my mother. ‘That güero treats you despicably. He hides things from you and runs from you and you say you never see him sleep. Well do you see it? Something is wrong with him but you think you can fix it and that makes you the foolish one.’”
Andrew says nothing.
“I’ve never meet anyone like you, and I know everybody always says that but I know it’s true for you in a way I can’t explain to anyone, not even my mom. What is it I see in your eyes? Sometimes I want to grab one of those girls and drag her to you and have her stare in your eyes because I think maybe she would get it, but I guess I’m afraid she really would get it and she would fall in love with you right there and she would know the answer and what if . . . what then? What is it I feel with your arms around me? No. It’s always here. It’s always here.”
Andrew says nothing.
She says “It’s always when I think of you, it’s always when I’m with you. It’s here right now. God, what is wrong with me? What is that, Andrew? How do I know you know exactly what this feeling is and exactly why I feel this way and somehow I know that’s exactly why you won’t tell me? Do you not tell me because you don’t trust me?”
“I trust you. It’s everybody else.”
She shakes her head. “What do you mean? Why would that matter? Who cares what people think about you?”
“It matters.”
“You say you love me and you say you trust me, if you think eventually you’ll tell me, why can’t we just skip the wait? What could it be that other people matter to us? Is it football, is—”
“It’s not football. Coming here is the best thing that ever happened to me, because I got to meet you. But once I graduate, that’s it. I’ll be done playing.”
“My mother talks about the money and I tell her I don’t care and she says Why? But really, Andrew, why?”
“Because I want to work at Epitaxial, with John Canton.”
“Psychics? Is that why? Is everything about that?”
“Yes and no. It’s part of why.”
“Do you promise you will tell me eventually?”
“Yes, I promise. I will tell you. But if that’s not good enough,” he shakes his head, “I understand if you want to end things.”
She shakes her head. “It shouldn’t be, but it is. But I don’t know what I’m going to tell my parents.”
She wraps her arms around him and he feels somehow small, but right.
They’re in the living room.
She asks “How was your day, with all the moving?”
“Well, took everything out at the dorm this morning, helped Michael move in, then—”
She kisses him and pushes him back, her hands move to his face and his hands to her hips, pulling her close.
Andrew sits back on the couch, the television on but muted. Emilia sleeps, her head touching his thigh. He changes and takes the white key and hooks it into her keyring, then kneels beside her.
“I need to go the gym, but after that I want to spend the day with you.”
“Okay” she whispers.
“You have a key now, it’s on your ring. It’s got a white band on it.”
Her eyes open and he kisses her and leaves. Out jogging in the rain, 13th to 16th, Archer to Center Drive, past the hospital and its endless figures, across the North Lawn to the stadium and Heavener where he swipes-in at the front and grabs a towel in the lockers and strips, his clothing in one machine and his shoes hanging from another, reading his phone while he waits for them to dry.
He greets the trainers and goes to work. Stretches to start, then shrugs and skullcrushers. He sees a figure in the distance entering the building, heading to the lockers, changing and out on the floor and coming into sight as he’s doing deadlifts. Andrew has seen pictures and watched scout videos but Robert Smith’s similarities with Devaris are more apparent in person. Minus the confidence, same build, complexion, hair and beard. Same eyes. “What’s up, Drew!”
“Hey, Robert.”
He drops the weights and holds out his hand and as Robert takes it Andrew sees a flash in the field and hears a single peal of thunder and where there was the human-shaped void there is now a form most faintly gray in a moment he knew at once only was one-sided.
“You just get here?” asks the gray figure. Black to gray, gray and white, what does that mean? Time might have stopped. He knows he needs to do something or he might be frozen for good.
“Pretty much,” he says, lifting the weights again. Slow movements to impress false exertion.
“You always here this early?”
Slowly down. “Yeah, what else would I be doing?”
“Sleeping for another hour?”
Slowly up. “Not my style.”
Robert says “Yeah, same actually. I need like four hours and sometimes that’s too much. You like that too?”
“Something like that.”
“Cool man, well I’m going to talk to my trainer and get at it.”
Andrew nods. He looks into the field, focusing on the gray, waiting to hear anything else but nothing comes. He thinks about the woman, the moment alone with her in that place. Is he a potential Broken?
Clearly, as if spoken. Not Broken. Lesser.
Lesser? Less than what? Me? What does that mean?
He spends the day with Emilia, wishing he could force from mind the gray figure in the distance.
Routine resumes, jogging every morning to the gym, then breakfast and class. Most afternoons and every evening with Emilia, the time between often spent with Robert who now joins him on his nightly runs. Andrew uses them to watch, constantly waiting for something to happen. On the fourth of July Andrew feels the pulse. Barranquilla, Colombia. Redhat interdicts in less than an hour. The words recur. Not Broken. Lesser. If Broken are almost Controllers, could there be almost Broken? Some lesser form of Control? Some weaker form of Control?
He’s watching fireworks with Emilia when his father texts him.
Major uptick in tumors today for obvious reasons. India and Japan.
He taps a reply then pockets his phone.
Something happened. Can’t easily explain. ‘Weak’ ones might exist.
His phone vibrates but he doesn’t check it until late that night when Emilia is asleep beside him.
Will look into.
Another evening, another run with Robert who struggled at first to keep up but has rapidly improved with two months of conditioning. From the athlete dorms and across campus, to Lake Alice and a stop at the Baughman Center for Robert to take a drink and catch his breath while Andrew admires the chapel, to the empty field they’ve started using to practice throws and catches.
Robert opens his bag to take another drink and asks “How many miles do you think you’ve run over the last year?”
“I don’t know. Couple thousand, at least.”
“You ever run a marathon?”
“Nah, but there were some nights I realized after I was doing half-marathons just on normal runs.”
“Damn. I guess that’s what it takes to be the best.”
Andrew shrugs. “You ready?”
Robert loudly exhales and nods, taking the football. Andrew does a few short hops then sprints, just seeing the ball in the twilight before catching it. This repeats, then they move to faster drills, short throws where Andrew catches and throws back and catches again. In the midst of this he throws it and he can just see Robert's hand sliding across the football and meeting air before the football that he had clearly lost was clearly drawn back into it.
Andrew runs up to him, “What the fuck was that?”
“What was what?” says Robert.
“I just saw the football move back into your hand.”
“I don’t know what you thought you saw, man—”
“Robert, don’t bullshit me. It’s my job to spot the exact movements of a football fifty yards away and I saw you lose it and I saw it get pulled right back into your hand. Are you a psychic?”
“Why’s this fucking matter, man?”
“Because if you did that on primetime the least of your worries would be getting banned from football.”
Robert shakes his head, then raises his arm and spikes the ball. “You can’t snitch.”
“I’m not a snitch.”
“You cannot fucking snitch.”
Andrew raises his hands back to emphasize, “I’m not a fucking snitch. We’re a team, man, we’re in this together, every bit of it. We don’t have to talk about this but you can’t fuck around.”
Robert picks the ball back up. “I’m not a Controller or anything. I don’t know what this but I can’t fly or lift buildings or any of that shit. I can just look at things and if I really want them to, they move around.”
“What do you mean, want, like a reflex?”
“Nah man, I don’t feel anything. It’s like when I was a kid I’d pretend I was a Jedi and that maybe if I just wanted something enough it’d move to my hand. But it actually works.”
Andrew remembers pretending he was a Jedi after he could actually move things. He laughs. “Yeah, I did that too.”
“After that guy in Tampa I tried it again and it worked. But nah, I don’t feel anything. It’s just wanting it.”
“Have you ever tried pushing it?”
“Yeah but nothing happens. I can’t move anything much bigger than a football. Like, one of those reusable bags for groceries is about it, but it’s so slow. It’s not like I could really use this to cheat, I can throw harder.”
“Prove it.”
“How could I prove it?”
“Exactly. They have no way of knowing you can’t do more. Get a handle on it.”
The first Thursday of August, the last night before fall camp. Andrew showers before he takes Emilia to dinner. His phone vibrates with an image message from his father.
Found him. Dinesh Deshpande. They call him “Shajangali.” He’s in the middle.
A group stands behind a carcass. Andrew counts thirteen men shoulder-to-shoulder, together long as the dead tiger tip-to-tail. At their center is a man taller than the rest. He does not cover his fine beard and he does not cover his wild brown-and-black hair. He wears a navy shirt and beige pants and his feet are bare. Andrew looks at his face and something grows, something alongside his apprehension of another. A third. For all the recordings of Redhat there is another thing here, ineffable. Finally a face, finally a name. The screen dims from inactivity and as he taps to brighten it there’s a flicker in the display and for a moment it’s like everything that surrounds the man is static except for his eyes.
Andrew sees the bear and the alligator. In his eyes Andrew sees himself.
Andrew knows. Grim satisfaction.