This piece is re-worked off the last pitch I made to my editors at Sac'to Weekly, before I "took the law into my own hands." I was sure we were never going to find any way to agree on anything subtle about what might be newsworthy.
-John Morganstern
Davie was cheerful, hopeful, grateful, but still welcome by these few people. I thought he was a good kid. They didn't need him to be any kind of real and neither did I. Fine, if he pixilated everything like it was local TV news.
He was saying, "If we didn't want the world to be exactly the way it is, it wouldn't be."
He had suggested that the mall was about more than mall rats. One of his friends had balked at that with a smile, and walked away.
Nina put a hand on Davie's arm and said, "We?"
Nobody mentioned that he wouldn't be finding any friends in there. His disconnectedness spooked everybody, even other happy Young Republicans.
Jack said, "Let's all not be mall rats" -- keeping things obscure and generic.
"I like being a mall rat," Bobby put in, "...by myself."
According to Nina, "That doesn't count."
"It counts," said Jack, "if the mall rats think so."
"If they notice." Nina didn't always want to be noticed.
"They notice." Jack was certain. "What else have they got?"
Nina said none of it meant anything to her.
Davie sat back awkwardly on the edge of a tree planter and folded his arms. "Yeah. Try to live in a world without malls."
I expected Nina to take him by the shoulders and shake him (I had seen her do this a few times before); smile in his face until he laughed, red.
"Cake," said Jack, as in, "Let them eat..." His usual final word on anything common.
The consensus was that Davie was smart enough to eventually work these things out, if he ever had to. If we ever let evolution get going again. He would never get them to bicker.
It was a dry, hot day last June. The suburbs were trying to offer another empty one, so they were inventing something else. They were at the mall to see a carnival in the parking lot. They walked around drinking paper cups of coffee from a shop inside, randomly commenting on things. Michael wasn't there, but some of his aunt and uncle's old rides were. Nina was recording random sound for him to sample.
Davie had started to get in line at a ticket booth. He turned and saw the others looking at him, so he came back and they all walked on. There was a cheap, but large action-figure toy hanging by a string from a post. Nina reached up and turned it so that it faced Davie.
"Got this one?" she asked.
However disinterested, any one of them could tell that it was "incorrect." Davie dubbed it, "Indiana Skywalker." He only had a few of the merchandising figurines left, but he still had all of the movies. Jack's attention and comments wound up being about the girls around. Bobby snapped the lid off and on his coffee, saying "...movies, malls, parking lots, carnivals..." to nobody.
Mrs. Bert was there on a small, but unavoidable errand. She didn't get out much anymore -- just on her street, with some neighbors; lawn furniture out front, on the corner. But there was also the internet, and she was trying things. She had the tarps off of Mr. Bert's motorhome for the day and had had to park it way out. On her trip across the parking lot she stopped to watch two kids whirling around in a giant cup and saucer. Nearby, there were some retro arcade games happening at a whole new scale.
('I better be on the lookout for first-person shooters.')
They had all heard about Proclamation 8 on the news. They knew that unemployment had become a problem again -- the new kind of unemployment: people refusing to participate in the "income opportunity" system.
"Tupperware parties," according to Jack.
Bobby, Nina, Jack and their friends wouldn't be, "...spending any time in any of the lounges at any big-box store." Nor would they be, "...trying to get enough 'documented recognition' to earn comps," nor, "...trying to play the whole fashion-model role at a favorite boutique, to get free clothes."
They wouldn't be making themselves, "...the 'value-added' on merchandise, even if that might pay the rent." That is, they wouldn't be anything like the people who were, "...taking a percentage of what's on the price tag for a torque wrench as compensation for a few minutes of showing people how to really enjoy using one ...or how to enjoy something about me -- if I'm doing the demo -- that might be remotely related to hand tools ...or books ...or an amazing new moisturizer..." None of them would be campaigning to "...get elected Floor Leader."
"All publicity is good publicity," was Bobby's flat sarcasm on all that.
They wouldn't be "...taking a chit that's equal to a comp and trading that for a supply of pizzas." And they wouldn't be "...like the non-charisma people, trying to move up the ranks a little just by the grace of their 'shopper participation.'"
They could see that almost all of the newer kind of disaffected people were as disruptive as the chronic jobless had been a few years earlier. But unlike most of the disaffected, they never talked about being disillusioned with their own roles.
Before the "opportunities" started up, Nina called the general job-outlook, "Musical chairs." The way she saw it, there had been, "...five overqualified people for every position that opened..." while "...in every other way, the economy seemed to somehow be doing fine..."
They wouldn't be taking sides, as this new proclamation attempted to define who the disruptive people were, why those people were disruptive and what to do about it. They wouldn't be part of, "...the bickering that's in the background noise again." The small, but sharp, "...tang of uncertainty," all around wouldn't be their biggest problem. Everybody else could worry about, "...the stress that's meant to keep things taught enough to sing; that's snapping some strings instead," now that it was clear that a small percentage of the population wouldn't be going along with the "opportunities." They hadn't been "...keeping tabs on any 'socio-economic indicators' that might be wafting downward."
King George may not like the situation, "...but, so what?"
In the news about the proclamation, Mrs. Bert had heard a discussion of the origin of the term "window-shoppers" and how it had become a derogatory term for certain people, even when those people weren't in the vicinity of a shop window, even at home with their otherwise happy families. She had heard it said that some families were acutely sensitive to the disruption and that some of these homes were, "...popping with dispute again." It wouldn't be "...anything I would call the police about, but some of my neighbors might, if the recriminations got loud enough."
She had heard a couple of sound-bites.
From a suit: "We hadn't anticipated being null with some people."
From a teen: "They don't do anything. They don't want anything. Why can't they just go away?"
When Mrs. Bert got inside the mall, she tried to pick out the troublemakers, but couldn't. ('What am I? What should I not do?')
She had heard that state officials had "no choice" but to start rounding up this new order of vagrants -- using tax withholding records; segregating them by age, education, determination of consequential appeals. She had heard about the plans being made for turning surplus government property into detention centers. Before much longer, they would be starting-up the first one, right there in the capital of The Golden State and filling it with "losers."
* * *
When "the camp" first opened, decks of playing cards and a small TV, with basic cable were about all that was provided for the detainees to keep themselves busy during what was expected to be a short stay. Davie's friends just played solitaire, but not him. He joined the poker game. Poker doesn't work without substantial money involved, so coins represented a hundred times their face value and it was assumed that everyone would pay-up on the outside. Davie was into what he thought to be some serious debt to some of the others around the table. He would just be able to cover his losses at the nearest ATM and, "It hurt."
The game's promoter was a guy who had recently realized that poker was something he had overlooked -- an ideal way to bluff on logic for the kind of payoff he always counted on. This guy carefully slid three tall stacks of coins over to Davie. In poker, loaning somebody a new stake is presumed to be welcome -- part of the unspoken quality of the game. Nobody would want to have to ask.
Davie didn't seem to see it that way. He scooped up the coins and dropped them in the guy's lap.
Somebody said, "That's it."
Frank, an older guy, said, "Wait a minute..."
Davie had immediately gotten up and walked over to sit with his friends, followed by most of the other poker players, who left by a door just beyond. Last was Frank, who was also in the hole. His pleas to continue the game had been ignored as everyone walked away. Frank tried glaring at Davie and then locked eyes with Nina, smiling up at him.
The smile was always unconditional, but Frank just said, "People like you..."
Nina touched her heart with the fingertips of one hand, still smiling.
Frank went on: "This place is for you. All you."
Mild taunts were exchanged with others in the group; Frank the only one not happy about it; Davie not knowing what side to take. They had been over all this several times in the past few weeks. "Get a job," kinds of accusation and insults from a guy who -- like everyone else there, of course -- didn't have one ...in a world that wasn't always about jobs anymore.
"...like the world owes you a living," Frank was saying.
This time, it came down to who could hustle; who had a better chance of making it on the street.
Nina asked, "When can we see this street? Do you have one with you?"
And Jack was saying, "That's all about trying to be some kind of scam-lord. Why would I want that? And don't try to call it survival," but the sparring had halted.
Bobby said, mostly to himself, looking away, "Put together a nice set of income opps, instead and don't come back."
Frank was still paused on Nina when Jack said, "The only hard part about what you try to do would be watching people get sucked in. Or maybe just staying interested."
Frank turned to Jack. "Wanta put your money where your mouth is?" he asked, with a glance at the poker table.
Jack said, "So predictable..." and then looked around at the others.
Nina said, "Yes, let's do some poker."
Davie hung back on the way over to the table. Frank was saying something about the good old days. Only Davie seemed to be listening. Others were kidding each other about wild-west cliches. Somebody started singing, "Don't try to understand 'em. Just rope 'em, tie and brand 'em," and some others joined in on the next line.
"Used to be, when I lost a job I'd just go out and get another one," Frank tried to say over the noise.
Bobby looked back and suggested, "After how many weeks in front of the TV?"
"You don't know anything about the real world. Not knowing where your next meal is coming from..."
Everybody was digging in their pockets for change. Nina stopped. "You've never missed a meal in your life, Frank. And why should you? Why should anybody? ...anywhere?"
This seemed enough for Frank to be smug. He looked around the table. Maybe picking out their resolve. "Who wants to deal?" he said, trying to break into all the happy chatter. Nobody responded. "Who wants to deal?" he asked again, several times, monotonously, but more emphatically each time and finally let his anger into it. "Who wants to DEAL?"
Nina picked up the deck and handed it to him. He relented slowly, shuffled a couple of times without paying much attention, put the deck down in front of Jack and said, "Cut," but got no response. He said it again, several times. It still didn't break their festive mood. "CUT the cards."
Nina said, "We trust you, Frank. Just deal."
"What?" Frank asked, flatly, trying to get her -- or anybody -- to name the game.
"Draw. Five-card," said Jack.
Everybody put a penny in the center of the table except Davie, who was sitting at the end of a long table nearby. Frank made sure they were all in and dealt the five cards to each. He turned to Jack again, on his left, and said, "Bet."
Jack said, "Check."
They all passed on the opening bet, until it came back around to Frank, who said, "Five," and threw in a nickel. When they were all in for the five, Frank asked Jack, "How many?" -- the game's usual chance to trade in for a few better cards.
Jack said, "I like these."
Nina looked behind his hand and said, "Ooo, those are pretty. Look at these."
Davie said, "Hey," as they all started comparing and then trading cards.
Frank sat back, with his lower lip moving up over his mustache, as everybody but Nina and Bobby flipped and flung their cards at the center of the table, like the game with a hat. Nina watched Frank gather up all the cards and start to shuffle them, ignoring everything else. Bobby was watching Nina.
One by one, the table started emptying. Bobby hesitated, sober, quiet. Nina had left it to him to watch Frank shuffle. Jack stood waiting to hear what Bobby might say.
"Ever play in a band or anything, Frank? ...draw pictures?" Frank just did one strong exhale. "Do you have a camera? ...guitar?" It sounded almost as much like accusation as sympathy.
Jack interjected, smiling, "...a box with rubber bands around it?"
Then Bobby asked, more directly, "There anything you want to do sometime before you die?"
Jack gave Frank a small frown, which he then turned to Bobby, before going off with the others. Bobby got up and followed.
When they caught up with Nina, Jack put his chin down and smirked, "I didn't know it was loaded."
Nina said, "Cute," and then she asked Bobby, "Think he'll work it out?" But Jack answered.
"I don't want to be there when that wears off."
Bobby dropped into a big chair. "Where was I when all the really good self-deception was handed out?"
Nina said, "When are you going to start leaving bad faith to the experts?"
Jack added, "No DIY."
Nina wondered further, "Who needs you to feel like you're getting it all wrong?"
Bobby said, "Maybe not you..."
Jack might have redirected the point a little. "The other day, somebody tried to say, 'I can read you like a book.'"
Nina smiled. "Did you ask them what page they're on?" she said before looking back toward Bobby.
He started taking the hint, playing a role, but without much of the enthusiasm, "Stay tuned to meet all of our contestants. Next, on this week's Justify Your Existence."
Nothing quite resolved.
* * *
From where Nina sat, in an old office chair on the roof of the two-story women's dorm, she could see lights on in the art extension -- a school-away-from-school that was meant to make up for deleted curriculum in the local grade schools and high schools. The extension used a smaller portion of the same former army supply depot where the detention center had been set up.
Even though by this time, Jack, Davie, Nina, Bobby and all were out of high school -- all but two having graduated -- this didn't keep them from spending most of their time at "the X" every day. It was "theirs" by right of having lobbied successfully for its existence and by the dubious right of -- again -- spending most of their time there.
The tricky part was that they were all postponing college indefinitely, which kept them from being able to legitimize their presence at the art extension by lobbying the local colleges to sanction it. Their status hadn’t been keeping them from getting a lot of work done over there.
It didn't keep them out of "the camp" either.
Nina could see people working over at the extension, but that night, she didn't climb over the fence. She had talked about considering some inevitabilities in her immediate situation. She hadn't been allowed to bring even her smallest keyboard. ('So... What? Read 'em and weep?')
* * *
In part two:
Eight months later, along a fairly desperate trek across acres of tract homes, on her way home from cleaning newly empty apartments, Nina would come up in front of Mrs. Bert’s house, crossing the highest point for miles around; just a couple of blocks of roadway rising above most of the rooftops and the rest of the suburban street network, like the day she had met the older woman.
There would be Mrs. Bert and some of her friends and neighbors, tables and chairs set up out front on the lawn, up by the sidewalk where it turns the corner, having watched Nina come in out of the west horizon — a moving dot all the way down in one of the roads; grooves between the billowing roofs — Nina looking tired and determined to go out into the opposite horizon, but then she was persuaded to stop and rest, have something to drink, visit.
Nina and Mrs. Bert joked about a plan to remake the culture and administration of the camp with a “...nicely disruptive lack of officious tactics.” They weren’t necessarily figuring on Nina being back inside.
[My editors never ran part one, so they never saw part two. -Morganstern]