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political forces kept him from making the grade. He also said
that he was a vigilante, bringing criminals to justice who had
escaped their just desserts.
Well, yes, I said.
I am sorry to tell you this, sir, but Clarence Pound is a retired
postal worker with some severe personality problems. Every few
months he stops his medication for a while and gets to thinking
he s some super-cop. If he s been bothering you, let me know and
we ll pick him up and take him to his doctor.
No. He hasn t been bothering me at all. Thank you.
I hung up as he was asking Who are
Mr. Pound is some kind of nut. I ll have to be ready for him.
Day 21. I slept in the studio and he broke in. I woke up and saw
him looking at my paintings. He had a gun in one hand and a
Xashlight in the other.
They re blank, he said. All of these canvasses just painted
white.
No, I said, They re very subtle. You must study them
carefully.
They re blank. You re some kind of nut.
No, you re the nut. You re an ex-postal employee. You re not
a cop. You ve never been a cop.
DIARY FROM AN EMPTY STUDIO 213
That s not true. He pointed the gun at me.
It is true. You re not a cop.
Suddenly he sat down. Just sort of collapsed. He didn t say
anything for a long time. I thought about going over and taking
his gun away.
Then he began to talk in a low monotone. He explained who he
really was and everything became clear to me.
He is Mr. Carlos Pound, owner of a very important gallery in
New York. Today we are putting my paintings into a U-Haul van.
We will drive up to New York, where he ll host a one-man show
for me.
I bet we make quite a splash.
Is That Hard Science, or Are You Just
Happy to See Me?
Leslie What
Independence Day Fourth Of July Fireworks Begin
I was waiting in the hallway so I could be Wrst to hear the door-
bell, but Mother still beat me to the door. She held the spy clam
gingerly, like Wnger cymbals, and its green light blinked to signal
readiness. The spy clamshell was gray textured aluminum that
looked both comical and scary; in fact, it was always that way at
my house you never knew whether to laugh or cry.
I said, Oh, Mother!
But she said, Ginny, we have to know, and opened the door.
Jason took a step forward. He shrieked when the spy clam
opened and its foot reached out, grabbing hold of his skin, to
measure his temperature, blood pressure, and psychological
proWle. His freckles began to sweat I never knew freckles could
sweat and though he stood as tall as the doorframe, he slouched
enough that Mother looked bigger by comparison. He checked
me out, as if trying to decide if I was worth dealing with her. I
had already promised to make it worth his time, but I could tell
he was having second thoughts.
214
IS THAT HARD SCIENCE, OR ARE YOU JUST HAPPY TO SEE ME? 215
Mother glanced at the readout, her eyes narrowing as the foot
slowly retracted. The clam snapped shut, and a faint buzzing
sounded. She already knew what Jason was thinking she didn t
need a spy clam for that. He was seventeen, same as me. He was
thinking about things a seventeen-year-old thinks about and what
would happen next. Mother was forty and was thinking about
then. Her then, and all the trouble she d gotten into.
She punched the ready button on my cattle-prod pants and said,
Okay. I guess you can go out with John.
Jason, I said.
Whatever, said Mother.
The prod pants Wt like oven mitts, wired and preset to a maxi-
mum of stun. Wearing them made me feel huge, like I was a girl
Michelin Tire Man. The pants had made Mother, their inventor,
rich. Millions of units were in use across the globe, and so far
there had only been Wve fatalities, from heart failure. Mother had
used the proWts to develop the Smart Twat and a lot of other weird
surveillance technologies, most of which she tested on me.
It was the hot part of the afternoon, and I was boiling inside my
pants. I could smell my own body odor above the sweet scent of
deodorant and baby powder. Mother didn t care that it embar-
rassed me to sweat. God, she was crazy. No wonder the CIA had
rejected her application.
I couldn t wait to get out of the house.
Later, I said, clutching my purse and hoping she didn t search it.
Nice to meet you, Mrs. Vuoto, said Jason.
Ms., Mother said.
Whatever, said Jason, and I rushed him out the door and into
his van.
The seats smelled a little sour, like summer sweat and brake
Xuid. I unrolled my window. The whoosh of air released the
scented evergreen from Jason s paper tree air-freshener across the
seat. We drove oT.
Did you get the tickets? I asked.
Jason reached in his shirt pocket and fanned out two stubs.
Our alibi was going to the movies a Star Wars marathon. That
gave us time to fool around, eat, and even actually see a few
216 WITPUNK
episodes after, if we felt like it. Jason drove past the lumberyards,
out of town, and onto the Mackenzie Highway. The thick trees
shrouded the road, their shadow lowering the temperature enough
that I stopped sweating. He passed the Leeburg Dam and drove
over a narrow bridge. He turned left and eased the car onto a
gravel road leading to the river. He parked. Once the engine was
oT, I heard the drone of Xies and mosquitoes and I rolled up the
window to keep them out. I began to sweat again.
Jason was all over me while I was still trying to Wgure out what
to do in response. It wasn t easy knowing how far to take things.
My pants emitted a warning beep, followed by a test buzz.
He pressed against me and thrust his tongue into my mouth. He
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