Reading the Papers of Borges: Some Interesting Discoveries by Abraham Burickson | Main | On participation, printing, the "future of print"
May 15, 2007
HL Hunley by Jeff Crouch
Tim wanted to be the first in line for the new submarine ride at Our Texas Galveston, but he couldn’t let on to his friends that he still had a seasons pass.
Captain Nemo , even Nautilus—that name was probably still under copyright—, would have been a better name for a submarine ride, Tim thought.
Tim sighed out loud.
The Confederate theme had been downplayed at the Our Texas Cleburne, but Our Texas had obviously revisited it for the H.L. Hunley. Tim wondered why. He wondered about the politics involved, the need to raise questions about the course of events, however abstract those questions might be.
But for all his mathematical savvy, the best Tim could do was a senior essay on Profiles in Courage, a book supposedly ghost written for John F. Kennedy, a book concerning, of all people and places, Sam Houston and the State of Texas.
Tim wondered if a movie theme was in the making: he obviously couldn’t dress as a Storm Trooper to go to this event. How would ride enthusiasts dress? His sister was into Gone With the Wind; he wasn’t.
“This question might be a good one for Bruce Sterling,” thought Tim. “Perhaps I should email him.”
Had he not had work, Tim would have gladly camped out to be the first in line, but his notion of firstness was deflated by Susie Cluck, one of the sales ladies at his office, who had already been to one of the private openings for the H.L. Hunley
Tim decided to hang out in the computer room the rest of the day.
Dejected, Tim didn’t have his mom drop him off that night so he could camp out in line. And the next day she dropped him off in the parking lot of Super Boxes, across the street, and Tim could see that the line would be long.
Tim finally got his Later pass for the H.L. Hunley. His ride time wouldn’t be until 9:30 that night. Tim rode a few rides, but spent most of his day in the Raphael Semmes Pizzeria on the internet.
Unlike the picture of the H.L. Hunley on the internet, there wasn’t a place to sit.
Tim heard a whistle. He then felt the boat bubble up, and as he peered through the portals, he realized he wasn’t in a glass bottom boat. He was under water.
Bright lights lit the underwater scenery for a while. Tim had wondered why a submarine ride in the dark would be interesting.
And Tim began to doubt himself.
“Was that a fake lamprey?” he asked aloud.
A submarine ride with nothing to do or see would be stupid, and Tim began to wonder where the submarine was going. He listened intently and occasionally clamored for a spot at the portals, but the aquarium that constituted the scenery for the in-park ride was long gone.
Though he had not forgotten who he was, Tim now answered to the name Alfredo and spoke fluent Spanish.
Tim was part of a clone crew set to replace the Ecuadorian government at a social gala. He had no idea how long he had been under water waiting to go ashore. His handlers told him he was not the only clone Alfredo; other submarines had similar parties.
Someone began to sing, “These Are Your Confederates”—in Spanish.
Tim thought to check his cell phone to see if he had coverage, but it emitted a strange tune. When he flipped it open to catch a glimpse of the familiar, the screen read: “No Regrese.”
For a second, Tim began to sob. He almost felt as though he were in middle school again, and someone had stolen his lunch money. But perhaps now his life was entirely gone.
Tim rubbed his nose. Some scent was acting as an irritant and his eyes welled for an instant.
Tim thought for a second that the perfume the clone President’s wife was wearing was going to make him sneeze, but then he noticed that she had a warm musk about her. That stinky powder had come from elsewhere.
Tim felt his face: the smooth but slightly oily texture of hair. Tim had yet to experience stubble; he now had a well-groomed beard.
Tim gave an eye to the President’s wife’s backside, and he lost himself tracing the angle of her rib cage into her hip. When she almost backed into him, he didn’t flinch. His gaze fell to her calf, into the heel of her shoe.
Her legs were shapely.
Tim looked around for his partner, knowing he should have one, but he didn’t spot her, not that he knew what she looked like.
Tim remembered that he had left his sinus medicine in his Storm Trooper mask, and as usual, he had no tissue.
The curve of the woman’s back had made Tim think of astronomy and of the philosophical problem known as abduction.
Near the exit hatch of the submarine, Tim saw a spittoon. Perhaps it was there only as a kind of joke, as something meant to give the submarine an 1860s look and feel.
Tim stretched his arms above his head, hawked a loogie, and spit it heartily into the spittoon.
Tim thought he heard a female voice, slightly in disgust, slightly in surprise, say, “Alfredo,” and he looked around, an internal sunburn radiating from the bottom of his neck and out his ears, but found no one.
More than ever, he suddenly felt dignified, invigorated—his mother, could she have known it—would have believed him cured.
Outside, one of the handlers shouted, “Vamalos!”
Tim wondered why he had taken Spanish, yet Alfredo felt good about that decision, his boots hitting the gangplank with a clop.
Posted by Overlord at May 15, 2007 10:41 AM
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