O prejudice, prejudice that cries out to Heaven, what a hold you have on humanity, and in particular on those specimens of humanity known as publishers!
-E.T.A. Hoffmann
A shrill alarm clock went off. Kyle Stanley pounded the off button and crawled out of his warm futon. A tall, 25 year old skinny man with intense blue eyes; long, dyed black 80’s rock-star hair (short in front and long in back); and sleeves of colorful symbolic tattoos; Kyle fortified himself to face another monotonous day. He hated the morning routine, the abrupt transition that ripped him out of sleep and left him feeling miserable. His job started at 9:00 AM. He woke at 8:00. He showered, making sure to clean the backs of his ears. He shaved, a tedious chore which he resented, for shaving was like a Sisyphean ordeal: no matter how well you shave one morning, the next there would be more hair to shave. He put on his black slacks, white T, white dress shirt and tied his tie in the Windsor style. He tugged his tight dress shoes onto his large feet. He fixed an instant cup of coffee mixed with a couple table spoons of half and half and took the mug with him as he went to his computer to check his emails, in hope that a literary agent might have written an expression of interest in his novel.
An email read as follows,
While there is much to admire about your prose style, ultimately this novel is not for me. However, please keep in mind that I am not just an art appraiser, but a business man in an often hostile publishing industry. I wish you well finding a good fit for your story.
He ruminated. His novel, Love at the End of the World, had at this point been rejected by 86 literary agents. In the early days of attempting to wrangle an agent he would excitedly wake up early in the morning, eager to check his email inbox. But now his mornings were a procession of numb, repetitive disappointment. Kyle was perplexed by the fact that he wasn’t yet published. His novel was a masterpiece after all. He was certain of it.
The novel fit the title neatly. It was about two lovers on a pre-apocalyptic earth, the last two lovers, a reverse Adam and Eve: The Adam and Eve of the Apocalypse, with the tree of life and knowledge burning relentlessly, both inside and outside of themselves. As they naively go about their lives, in conflict and occasional agreement, tensions between major nations flare, the skirmishes of a new cold war are conducted in various third world countries. Sick of their outsider status in global politics the third world countries agitate against the western hegemony, and are supported by China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia, the four of which together form a loose coalition to unite against the West. But all in all, the story was really less about politics and war than it was about two normal but damaged people trying to have a relationship with vague hopes for a future in a seemingly impossible time marked by existential endings that allowed little space for new beginnings. They nonetheless go on a road trip across America, discovering themselves and their country. The story concludes as nuclear war breaks out, and the lovers embrace each other tightly as the world seemingly burns to its end like a lit bomb fuse.
Kyle became obsessed with the possibility that his novel would not be published until a time after these prophesized events had actually transpired. Or that his prophecy would be erroneous and his book would become a mere curiosity. He needed to publish it now! Every day that passed his novel became a little weaker.
Kyle boarded his beige Toyota Camry and took off. He liked to drive fast. He was the cliché aggressive driver, an obnoxious driver who tailgates, who zips in and out of traffic, who races ahead of you often to get to the red light seconds before you do as you shake your head in contempt. Almost all the music stations on the radio annoyed him: the impotent lassitude of soft rock; the banality of pop; the sonic gibberish of jazz; the boring, austere gloss of classical. He was even more annoyed by the NPR news, and had no tolerance for other talk radio. All he could listen to was the “hard rock” station, which sometimes played a song that hit like as a shot of adrenaline.
Kyle had what was once called a “superiority complex”. In his social deportment he was often lost in his thoughts, off putting, and self-involved to an absurd degree. He took little interest in other’s conversation. He had many women interested in him but he didn’t seem to notice or care. At times, he didn’t even seem to understand that other people had thoughts of their own. He regarded others as automatons who were, in gamer speak, NPCs (non player characters). Although he didn’t realize it, he was drowning in himself.
Five days a week Kyle donned his suit to work his job at Macy’s in the Cherry Creek mall. He considered the job beneath him, as he was so certain of becoming a published novelist destined for mass acclaim. He was a representative of Yamaha, who sold grand pianos. So he just stood there, beside the piano, positioned by the escalator, waiting for someone to show interest. He was not to approach anyone directly, only to answer questions. Most days no one paid any attention to the piano. On the few occasions where interest was shown it was merely in passing. “This is a nice piano!” He stood in the glare of the store, the white and gold trimmings, the stacks of brightly colored little boxes, the abundance of glass cases full of watches and jewelry. It was all too bright and antiseptic. All day he felt assailed by the overpowering reek of perfume which emanated from rich old women wandering from store to store.
One day, after work, Kyle went to have a drink and maybe find a woman for the night. It was a semi-crowded pub with tall chairs positioned around the bar. He took a seat, his feet dangling low, unable to fit on the little chair-rail that bridged the two front legs. Dumb pop music played in the background at low volume. He rolled up his shirt sleeves, revealing his tattoos, and ordered a martini from a woman who had been his bartender many times but whose name he could never be bothered to remember. Kyle saw a group of four women standing around a table. He zeroed in on the least conventionally attractive of the three. Her hair was black and frizzy, like Nancy in the funny pages. She had big ears and a strange body type, a fat body like a potato with tiny little tooth pick legs. Having done so many times before, he made his move.
“I saw you across the bar. You look very familiar. Did you go to East High School?”
“No. I don’t think I’ve even met you.” Her three friends exchanged glances of piqued curiosity with one another.
“Alas, I wish I had known you.”
“Alas? You sound like a poet. What do you do?“
“Well, I work at Macy’s for a paycheck, but my real labor is in writing. I’m a novelist.” Her three friends exchanged glances of skepticism.
“Would I have heard of any of your books?
“Well … no I haven’t had anything published yet.” Her three friends exchanged glances of contempt.
It occurred to him that he should write a letter to Dear Abby, just so he could, when asked, truthfully tell that he was a published writer.
“What is your name,” he asked.
“Jo” she said.
Despite her friends’ trepidations, Jo went home with him. They had surprisingly kinky sex for a first time liaison, and exchanged numbers in the morning. They didn’t have a deep emotional connection, just gratified desire. This time, like many times before, with many different women, Kyle was like a cypher with nothing to give a lover but a simple farewell kiss on the shoulder.
The next day, as he stood beside the piano, his thoughts tended to the grandiose. He fantasized away the time, imagining his novel’s great success which would allow him to buy a Porshe, a mansion, a couple greyhound dogs. In the photo of himself on the back of his book he planned to dress like a rapper, with gold chains and New York Yankees hat tilted to the side. He would pose in ways that seemed masculine and sexy. He imagined the interviews, the book signings. He thought of a future where he would use cocaine regularly.
His only real friend was Lorna Nickles. She was a married woman but he had known her since high school, years before she became Mrs. Nickles, and they had an easy, witty rapport. She was very short, with medium length black hair cut at her shoulders. She had a small nose and a cute little mouth that looked a bit sad, like she had frowned too many time: a frowny face.
They met at a low-key Mexican restaurant, with dim lights and cheap margaritas. Kyle was wearing a Bad Religion t-shirt, tight blue jeans, and a pair of Doc Martins. Lorna wore jeans and a loose fitting grey shirt.
“How is publishing going, Kyle?”
“I’m up to 91 rejections.”
“Might as well go for an even 100.”
“If my novel is not published, I’m going to end up an old embittered hermit, Lorna. But my novel will survive me. I am confident that after my death I will be regarded as a man born in the wrong time. Like Kafka. Still, it would be nice to have an accommodating wife to spend time with, but I just don’t see it happening.”
“In high school, there was a time in Senior year when I had a crush on you. Why did you never ask me on a date, Kyle? We could have made a sub-averagely content couple. We could have at least been in solidarity with our mutual miserableness, holding hands as we cried in bed.”
“I can only have sex with unattractive women.”
“Really? I suppose that is … flattering, that I don’t fit in that box. Why can’t you be with a pretty woman?”
“I find there to be something dirty about sex, a degrading carnality, and I can only besmirch the beauty of a woman with little beauty to begin with.”
“Really? You never shared this information with me before!”
“I didn’t know how you would take it.”
“It’s very strange. I mean, so what happens? When you are with a pretty woman you are impotent?”
“Pretty much.”
“That explains a lot. You were always dating plain women. I assumed it was because you were kind hearted, and were attracted to a woman’s personality. I didn’t know you were just a simple pervert.” She laughed, an expression of mirth undercut with derision, a sweet and sour response. She asked, “Do you have really dirty sex?”
“I based Angie after you, you know.”
“Angie?”
“The female main character of my novel! Didn’t you read it?”
“Have you ever been in love, Kyle?”
He became flustered, at a loss for words. As if to distract her he asked about Greg, her husband.
“I married the gentlest man on earth. But he is absolutely obsessed with photographing and filming every little instant of our life, as if he has some deep fear of forgetting and wants every moment to be impeccably preserved. He is fighting a losing war against time. Sometimes I want to throw his phone in to the trash. He annoys the fuck out of me with his instagrams.”
*
In his novel, Kyle predicted an uneasy alliance of North Korea and China. He read, with horror, the news that this had happened and that their targets were South Korea and Japan.
*
In the meantime, Kyle grew disaffected with his intensely boring job and became increasingly lax, taking it for granted and getting away with what he could. In meek rebellion, he would show up late, would sit down at the piano seat and read novels. In the last month’s time he only had three interested parties, none of whom were actually prepared to buy the piano.
One morning Kyle woke up in a grumpy mood. He had no will to go to work. He considered calling in sick but, certain he could get away with it, he urinated and crawled back into bed. This began a bad habit: sometimes Kyle would go in to work, sometimes he wouldn’t. One day, a stay home day, at about 2:00 in the afternoon he got a call. The phone read “Evans”, his boss.
“Hey, Kyle. Just checking on you. Everything okay?”
“Oh yes, fine. Just fine.”
“You know, Kyle, it’s funny. I’m here at the piano and I don’t see you anywhere.”
Kyle paused for a suspiciously long time. Finally he came up with a line, “Oh, Mr. Evans, I have diarrhea. I’m in the bathroom.”
With skepticism, Mr. Evans asked him to come as soon as possible.
Kyle jumped in his car and drove well over the speed limit, running red lights, basically being a menace on the roads. It took him 15 minutes to get to the parking lot and an additional 10 to find a space in the maze of a parking lot. He rushed to the piano. Mr. Evans was not there but there was a note on the piano: You are fired.
*
One morning Kyle had a pleasing surprise. The email read as follows,
Mr. Stanley, my name is Susan Morris. I am very interested in your novel, Love at the End of the World. There are a few changes I would like you to make to strengthen the narrative and the character development. I’m sure you will be obliging. Let’s talk on the phone as soon as possible. My number is ***-***-****.
Kyle was elated. He called Lorna. “Congratulations, Kyle! This could be your big break! I knew you could do it!”
He called Ms. Morris. He got her voicemail and left a message. He spent the day in a frenzy, awaiting her phone call. To occupy himself he ate. He had chips and salsa. He had pop-corn. He had a BLT sandwich. He had a spinach souffle. He had potato chips. He ate a carton of ice-cream. He ate so much he began to feel ill. At last the call came in. She was very enthusiastic about his novel. “Although your novel is gripping, I think your novel is more than just entertainment. I think it is important.”
Kyle gasped involuntary. Things were finally coming together, like a zipper sealing a jacket. She told him the changes she wanted him to make. He was obeisant to her requests.
In one section of his novel, New York city was assaulted with a number of dirty bombs set off by Isis terrorists. Two days after Susan Morris took on the novel, there was an uncanny coincidence: New York city was attacked by a wave of dirty bombs.
Kyle called Lorna. “My predictions are coming true and no one will believe that I predicted this shit. What if the world is coming to an end? No one will want to buy an apocalyptic novel in a genuinely apocalyptic time.”
“The whole city of New York is in a state of emergency and all you are concerned about is your failure to publish your stupid novel in time?”
His agent contacts him concerned, “Frankly, Kyle, I’m dumbfounded. How did you know all this was going to happen?”
“I have a vivid imagination.” Feeling himself in a position on power, Kyle argued with Ms. Morris. “I’ve decided the novel doesn’t require the changes you requested. I think it is whole. It is complete.”
“I’m not sure you appreciate the risk I am taking on by promoting your novel. The changes are not requests, they are demands.”
“You don’t recognize my talent. I could easily find another agent.”
“I would seriously reconsider this tantrum. Do you want to be published or do you want to pretend to be a misunderstood genius? I will call you in three days. I hope you will have come to an agreement with my demands.”
The next day there was a cataclysm of stochastic terrorism across the globe. In the midst of the chaos, North Korea bombed the U.S. military base at Guam and China likewise bombed the U.S. military base at the Republic of Palau, both U.S. territories. It was a provocative threat. The news was full of predictions of a World War III.
Ms. Morris called. “So, Mr. Stanley, I’m sure you have heard about the attacks in the West Pacific. Things are not taking the shape you anticipated. At this point I am skeptical of the successful publication of your novel. Your predictions were dead wrong.”
Kyle tried another method of influence. “Consider it an alternate time stream. These things could have happened but did not. People can still learn from my book! It’s like a book about the Bay of Pigs actually resulting in nuclear war. Isn’t that compelling?”
“Make the changes or we are finished.”
That night Kyle went to a nearby sports bar. He wore a Misfits shirt and his customary tight blue jeans and Doc Martins. He sat alone at the bar and ordered a martini. The TVs were on, playing a football game, where men in different colored tights slammed into each other like elks in primal conflict. Kyle had no interest in sports. To him it was just grown men playing a child’s game, leading to massive brain damage in exchange for million dollar contracts,. As he was enjoying his crisp beverage, a woman sat beside him. She was of medium height, with a cute, toothy smile, dyed black hair, bright green eyes. She was too pretty for him, but he allowed a conversation.
“How’s it going?” she asked.
“I’m really upset about these attacks on the Western Pacific.”
“Yeah, it seems very dangerous.”
“I wrote a future of the U.S. but did not expect this.”
They had “vanilla” sex, nothing kinky, just temperate face to face sex, with him on top. It wasn’t mind blowing sex, but it proved to Kyle that he could do it, he could be with a pretty woman. As he lay there awkwardly, beside a snoring stranger, his thoughts unexpectedly turned to Lorna.
*
Soon, Kyle deigned to rewrite portions of his novel, and Morris found a house to publish it, but soon after the media was a stir with stories regarding a computer program named Deep Scribe 4.0, which had apparently written a literary work as sophisticated and nuanced as the greatest fiction writers of the 20th century. The title of the novel was Possible Futures. Using masses of newspaper data, academic papers, and the entirety of Library of America works, Deep Scribe 4.0 concocted a possible future for the next decade. In the foreground was the story of two lovers holding each other up, surviving and enduring. Kyle was furious. It was the same plot as his own story. This was a worst case scenario he hadn’t anticipated. Nevertheless he sent his agent the corrected draft of his novel.
Kyle met with his agent on zoom, “Kyle, we have a review in the upcoming New York Times Book Review, but in general, things are not looking good. There is great fanfare regarding the novel of Deep Scribe 4.0. It will receive page one attention. I’m not saying your novel is obsolete, but the Deep Scribe 4.0 novel’s interest is going to dwarf yours. The timing is terrible. There hasn’t been such sensation around a new novel in my lifetime as an agent.”
Kyle was incensed. Could a computer really possess the wisdom it took to write a novel? Wasn’t it just an exceptionally good thief? It had no intention, just impact, no inspiration, just imitation. But what of his own work? He himself was a poor mix of Vonnegut, Dostoevsky, and T.S. Eliot. And what would it mean if computers could write good fiction? The Deep Blue program stunned the world when it beat the grandmaster at Chess. Then it was believed a computer would never master the mysterious game of Go, as the game involved such creativity and intuition, a game that has more possible board positions than there are atoms in the universe, but a computer called DeepMind had eventually mastered Go and beat the best the greatest human opponent. A novel seemed like the natural next target.
Possible Futures was declared a masterpiece on the level of Tolstoy’s War and Peace. It was a best seller. Amid great debate, academic consensus was that its creation radically reframed the idea of an author of a novel, but their discourse on the value of the text were greatly divided. It gave all initiative to the reader. Roland Barthes prophecy had become literally true: the death of the author. Meanwhile, Lovers at the End of the World, was a failure, critically and commercially. If the former was a T. Rex of a book, dynamic and hungry, Kyle’s was a mushroom, soft, fragile, and insignificant.
His future was ruined. There would be no gold chains and sports cars. No linen pants and silk shirts. Humbled, he thought of Lorna, his friend of 10 years. In truth, she was the most important person in his life. For years he foolishly kept her at a distance, when she could have been a part of him. He was afraid to share lives with her, but he now had nothing left. He called her to invite her to dinner.
They met at a hole-in-the-wall Irish pub. The booth they chose was well-worn. Kyle took a seat on a cushion with tears exposing a white layer of stuffing. He was wearing an old beat up Metallica Master of Puppets shirt and a pair of his tight blue jeans, while Lorna wore brown cords and a Chicago Cubs shirt. After dinner and a few minutes of cheerful banter, having received refills for their twin pints of black Guinness stout which stood on the table like castles, Kyle grew serious. “ It’s like I have some block. I can only get so close to a person and I meet a wall. I can get no closer. It’s like I’m developmentally disabled. I don’t have a well-defined personality. I think I kind of hate myself, Lorna. And because I hate myself I am unable to totally give myself to someone else as I feel so removed. Dissociated. I thought maybe if I could prove myself a genius I could earn some one’s affections, could be somebody. I didn’t think I could possibly be desirable just for being myself. But I screwed up. It’s always been you I want. I didn’t have the courage to make you the center of my life. I wanted to be powerful, to impress you and others. To win you. Then I would become a real person and real life would begin. But it’s always been real life. And I’ve had a crush on you for years. I was just afraid of really getting involved in your life. You must have known?”
“So now I’m ugly enough that you want to come on my face?” she said with bitter sarcasm.
“No! It’s not like that.”
“Kyle, I’m a married woman. Maybe at some point in the past this might have worked out but that time has passed. Me and Greg are going to try to have a kid. I already have a life. I hope you can find one too. I do love you.”
“You were able to take an emotional risk. I was not.”
Their time together at the table became a burden as conversation faltered. It was as if a band were playing but suddenly fell off the melody and began playing off-key, a gruesome error which the audience should try to ignore but, impolite as it was, Kyle and Lorna could not turn away from the horror of its dissonance. And it persisted in a pitiful manner. Had Kyle made an irrevocable mistake? He felt like his and Lorna’s friendship would never be the same. Like he had broken something.
*
In the next three months all hell broke loose. The U.S. sent armies to Iran and Lebanon; Russia took Naval control of the Baltic and invaded the western region of Germany and Denmark, leading to NATO involvement; Japan and South Korea were at war with China and North Korea; Iran attacked Israel; terrorist attacks were executed all across the globe on an almost daily basis. Kyle watched the news with no sense of good or evil, just a sense of the perpetuation of ancient hostilities and the dark pacts of new alliances for neo-hegemony. In the meantime, he got a job from home, writing ad copy for the back of porn movies. “In this cum-tastic romp, svelte newcomer Stephanie Jade sucks two dicks at once with uninhibited gusto. And veteran Nikki Snow shares a two sided dildo with busty starlet, Angelica Wilde. Don’t miss this erectifying free for all, a worthy addition to the ‘Kingdom Cum’ series.” He hated his job, and watched the films in total apathy. Sometimes he jerked off disinterestedly. His heart was a black rainbow.
Little by little he developed an addiction to food. In a month he gained 25 pounds. He mainly subsisted on fast food with an ongoing unending dessert of candy, developing a big firm belly of visceral fat. His tight jeans rode low. He played video games for six hours a day. In some kind of ritual conversion, he shaved his head bald. It was time for something to happen, but just when some pivotal change seemed near there was a random detour and he ended up lost again. Was there a map? And would there ever be a big reveal? He called his mom to ask for a loan so he could do cocaine but she refused him.
He began to psychoanalyze himself. As a child he regarded sex as something secretive and shameful. He had only the vaguest memories of his life before age eight, as if his memories had been wiped, like a blackout. He remembered having tender feelings for his friend, Nov, in fourth grade. Nov was a small Vietnamese boy who liked making little books with Kyle, featuring super-heroes of their own invention, rendered in crayon and marker. Nov once confessed his love to Kyle. He didn’t know what to say in response. Some popular kids called Kyle a faggot. Nov’s parents threw scalding hot quarters on his naked back, burning scars on his brown skin to get the demons out. Maybe Kyle was supposed to be gay but had destroyed that side of himself. He didn’t kiss a girl till he was 16. His love for conventionally unattractive women began soon after. Erica, who was cruelly regarded as the school “slut”, took a liking to him. She still had braces, which gave her a slightly unsettling childlike vibe. One night, at a party, she took Kyle hand in hand and secretly led him into a small cranny of a room with a washer and dryer. She pushed him to the dirty ground and perfunctorily gave him a blowjob. It was glorious. Although he was greatly drawn to her he ignored her from that day forward, like she was a prostitute who had done her job. He lacked the courage to pursue an unpopular, unattractive girl. He wanted to earn the esteem of his peers, so he tried dating, and for a while his girlfriend was a very pretty and popular girl named Megan Cohen. Once, when her parents were away on a trip, she invited Kyle to spend the night at her house. As he rang the doorbell he trembled in expectation. While she used the restroom he looked at the possessions in her room: on the wall were posters of rock bands posing for the camera; a closet of clothes, organized by color; a bookshelf with fantasy novels, including the Harry Potter series; and a battered stuffed animal monkey, all objects which seemed silly to him, not denoting rebellion or intellect. She re-entered the room and, with a brazen countenance, swiftly took off her shirt and bra. She made consistent eye contact. He could tell in her eyes that she was challenging him, daring him to meet her in a state of fierce vulnerability with a promise of blissful satisfaction. Was he capable? She was objectively gorgeous but Kyle was strangely unmoved. He didn’t know if she was a virgin, like he was, but was afraid to ask. Her confidence made her seemed experienced. Why was he not turned on? She surrounded him. In humiliation, he escaped, weak as a worm. He sucked her toes in poor, sick reciprocity.
*
One day, in a state of languor, Kyle received a call from Lorna but he ignored it. After a couple minutes time, he checked his voice mail to hear what she had to say.
“Kyle, I have a confession to make. I never read your novel. I read like 10 pages and gave up. But I read it. I finished it yesterday. It’s beautiful. I just want you to know it’s beautiful and I want to encourage you to keep writing. I’m honored that you based Angie on me. She is a lovely character.”
These words of reassurance resurrected Kyle. His heart, once numb with fear, now beat against his ribs vigorously. His blood flowed robustly like a march. So his first attempt at a novel failed. Fine. He would write another. It was a communication from his zone of being. It would be his signals sent out to the world. Hopefully his message would be received by a few. For the first novel he dreamed of fame, fortune and the laurel leaf acclaim of genius, but now he wanted to create. Even if his world went up in flames he still had a story to tell, regardless of the absence of an audience. He would write a straight science-fiction story, a work of pure fantasy, a design set so far in a strange imagined future that it would not be matched by a computer. The computer’s novel did not matter. It was artificial by its very name. It had no heart. A diary of a twelve year old girl meant more than an AI book. His new novel would be about a spy in the year 304 of the new Galactic Era. He excitedly got a pen and a pad to mark down ideas. As he wrote he acted the part of other characters, temporarily becoming them.
The secret agent changes his identity by stealing other people’s bodies. Perhaps he was able to throw his mind into another brain, swapping bodies. But maybe he had a limited number of leaps? Who was he really, as he swallowed other people? His name was the Apparition. Kyle related to the Apparition as he had no solid sense of self himself, just performance, like a fraud. Kyle lacked a sense of self. The Apparition’s identity was corrupted as he entered minds like a virus. Kyle was inspired with a rush of ideas. His mind pounced like a tiger on the hunt.