The Gum Thief - Douglas Coupland [23]
Steve realized the silence was going on a bit too long (oh yes, that wretched young man’s wretched novel) and looked out of the corner of his eye at his wife, her jewelled talons clasped to her bosom, her eyes tearing up. “So deep. So truly, truly deep,” she said, casting a taunting eye at Steve. “So simple and yet I felt blood pulsing through every fibre of its being. Intelligent, yet broad. And it’s sold millions of copies, correct?”
“Ten,” said Kyle. He then looked at Steve’s bookcases. “Steve, are those leather-bound copies of your five novels I see there?”
Bethany
I should be mad at my mother for writing to you, Roger, but I’m not because that’s exactly the sort of depressing thing she does—not only writing a paper letter during the golden age of email, but also mailing it to you with a stamp. At work. What kind of person gets mail at work?
To hear my mother speak, you’d think her life was something shattered and gone, like Superman’s home planet. But she’s got friends, her job, and when I leave home she’ll still have me in her life.
I dream of going to Europe one day. What exactly is it about Europe? People go there and suddenly all of their problems are solved, and as a bonus they’re suddenly sophisticated and glam when they come back. Hello, I’m Count Chocula. Welcome to my chateau. We’ll dine on peacock livers atop little pieces of toast cut into triangles with the crusts removed. After that, I’ll ravage you with an heirloom jewel- encrusted dildo from the Crusades, and then we’ll discuss the socially beneficial effects of government-sanctioned drug injection sites.
Listen to me; I can barely wait to find out.
On my pay? Ha.
So . . . Kyle. Ever since he talked about death with me, something clicked and I have to say I really kind of like the guy. I know he’s dumb as five planks (he can’t remember the PLU number for gum), but this afternoon he brought me a CD of songs containing the word “moon.” He’s cute, and he doesn’t find me repulsive, and he’s not gay, so why not go for it? My mother makes it sound like we’re engaged in a Mormon courting ritual. Gee, Kyle, before we go to A&W, let me fetch my Holly Hobby prairie sunbon- net so that other men don’t lust for me against their wills. He’s just a nice guy.
As for you . . .
I don’t know how to begin addressing all the issues in your life, Roger, but I do find it interesting that the hero of Kyle Falconcrest’s first novel doesn’t believe in the Apocalypse. That’s wrong. How could you possibly be alive and on earth and have a set of eyes and ears and a brain and not figure out that some kind of end is near? It’s in the tap water. It’s in the freshness-sealed pound of bacon you bought last week. It pulsates in the air every time Blair’s cellphone rings with her lame 1980s retro Madonna “Holiday” ring tone.
The end is near.
I think about it all the time—how the end is going to look and feel. When it finally happens, it won’t be the way I thought it would be. Here’s how the end of the world happens: It’s a Sunday afternoon, and I’m at a barbecue in someone’s back yard. I’m sick of too many people and of standing in the sun for too long, so I go around to the side of the house and sit in an old folding chair, wishing it were nighttime and that I hadn’t come to the party. I’m looking at a fly buzzing in front of me. It isn’t bugging me or anything—I’m tracing its flight pattern in the air behind it, like an invisible waggling strand of yarn, when out of the blue, the fly stops and falls to the ground.
And the world becomes quiet: the voices around the corner near the barbecue stop, as does a touch football game—but I can hear the hamburger patties chattering on the grill. But a neighbour’s weed whacker two yards over stops, as does someone’s lawnmower.
I know right away what has happened—every living thing on earth except me has died. People, seagulls, earthworms, bacteria and plants. I look at the trees and shrubs and think, Well, of course they