The Everborn - Nicholas Grabowsky [24]
Instead, he spoke with the voice of a man. A contemporary human male, no less, with a kick-back slang spoken almost lazily, almost in depressed sorrow, hinting of a certain sarcastic resentment I could have taken personally if I hadn’t noticed immediately that it was directed not towards me but towards circumstance. There was an air of confidence, not in how he spoke but in the words themselves, which he used, carefully chosen, and in these words I found the underlying pronouncements of a being agelessly knowledgeable yet somehow human enough to remain at odds with that knowledge.
“Do you love your wife?” he asked me.
I did not expect this to be his first words, and I placed myself in check to expect the unexpected. Feeling subjected to a surge of humility in his presence, I instead gave in to my own professional instinct to question and not to simply kiss ass. And I had many questions. “Why do you ask?”
He answered with a shrug, and was silent, but his shrug displayed an indifference which assured me there was no cause for alarm, although the apparent lack of concern pissed me off.
Maybe this was his way of breaking the ice, because my sudden indignation reduced my awe considerably and I felt free enough to speak on human terms. But before I could answer, and quite demandingly I might add, yes I love my wife, what of it, he spoke again.
“She loves you, and very much, I should say.”
I didn’t expect this, either.
Okay, so I still expected things.
When I chose to keep silent, not knowing what to say to this, still absorbing my delight in his words and anticipating more, waiting for him to go on, he continued.
He changed the subject.
“How was your journey? Manic? Surreal? Frustrating?”
I didn’t know how to answer.
“You hungry at all?”
I had forgotten about that. I remembered my M&Ms feast on my way there, and I couldn’t believe I was as hungry as I was. I couldn’t believe I wasn’t the least bit hungry now. This reminded me for crazy reasons not of food but of my equipment I had brought with me, the microcassette recorder, and I cringed as this in turn reminded me of my clumsy pratfall at the diner entrance.
“You don’t talk very much, do you, Mister UFO Investigator? Or is it detective UFO Investigator?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The Church On The Rock. Lawndale. Remember? You went there looking for my kind. You couldn’t very well tell the pastor of that holy place that you were there on official UFO business now, could you? You were the sly one, weren’t you? You could tell, Uncle....”
Again, the detestable sarcastic cool. Wasn’t there a more reasonable method to pacify my butterflies than to pique my temperament?
“Private Investigator,” I found myself answering, “I did not impersonate an officer.” I also found myself remembering. Remembering more. I thought to tell him, purely out of offense, I am not your Uncle, but the thought why did he call me Uncle distracted me, and instead I found myself dumbfounded, and I asked him, “Who are you?”
“I am a Watcher.”
I waited. In waiting, I noticed he had not changed his position, but remained in a half-turn, leaning toward his ashtray and I got the self-conscious feeling he was scrutinizing me from the corner of an eye that appeared to be bulbous and black.
He continued, “Don’t ask me why I’m called that. That is what they call me. Why they call me that is a long story. What matters now is that I’m watching you.”
I said nothing. I couldn’t say anything.
“And you are watching me,” he said. “I must be very new to you, yet I’m very old. Older than you may suppose. Older than what I supposed when I thought I was human. Does that surprise you? That I thought I was once human?”
This time he waited for an answer and, mesmerized, I gave him one. “I don’t know what surprises me anymore. When I was still