“You know,” he said, “Laurie Anderson wants your brain.”
How does one argue with a statement like that? I wasn’t about to try, but the man who made it was rather large, and I am somewhat less than large, so I was unable to get away. “What…what do you think she wants to do with it?” I asked, desperately sipping at the glass of Coke in my hand.
“But,” the man continued, “that’s only where it begins. It is a conspiracy, my friend, a conspiracy so vast, so widespread that it is difficult to comprehend its entire fabric…”
“Imagine that…” I said. Weak. Very weak. I have, on occasion, promised myself that I would not attend parties where I didn’t know most of the other guests, but, for reasons known only to god and his accountant, I don’t always keep that promise. Now, here I was, talking to a huge man in faded jeans with more jewelry than a Christmas tree has lights, and I knew that I only had myself to blame.
“You may laugh,” he said, although I had given no indication that I would, and, in fact, was far from laughter. “But, the conspiracy will get you, too, one day. It gets you whether you believe in it or not.”
My brain said: “Bite your lip, bite your tongue, bite your -” Inexplicably, my mouth said: “Who would want to get me?”
The man looked around, suspicious. When he was certain that he wouldn’t be overheard, he turned to me and hissed: “Them!”
I looked around, too, hoping that I could latch onto somebody and get away. Unfortunately, nobody I knew presented themselves for my convenience, so I was stuck. Worse: the man took my gesture as a sign that I was buying what he was saying, which encouraged him to add: “Some of Them have come to this party. They are everywhere…”
I nodded sagely (an old television reporter’s trick that I had picked up) and tried not to ask anything, but, despite my desire not to provoke any more than is absolutely necessary (the antithesis of the television reporter’s credo), I did ask: “Who are They?”
I’m curious. It’s a curse.
“Walter Cronkite and Connie Chung,” the man replied. “The entire Bronfman family and the Ford Motor Company. It’s all a game to…Them.”
“Yes…” I said with what I hoped was an appropriate measure of indifference.
“They want to programme Us, make robots of Us, take away everything that makes Us individuals!” The man was clearly getting excited, not a hopeful sign. “They want to make our lives empty, devoid of any real experience or happiness – am I getting through to you, boy?”
“Umm, isn’t that Chaviva?” I asked, pointing to a woman I had never met.
The man didn’t bother to look where I was pointing. “No,” he chided me, “That’s one of…Them.”
I nodded sagely once more.
“It started with the psychedelic drugs in the Wheaties,” the man explained to me. “Then, they got more sophisticated. Subliminal messages in subway advertising – we’ve documented many of their tactics…”
“We?” I asked. One word. So much weirdness.
We,” the man stated, as if it should have been obvious. “Not Them. Us. The people who are not part of the conspiracy.”
“Oh,” I said. One small word, yet again.
“We know all about the real purpose behind the Rubik’s Cube,” the man continued, his eyes darting around the room, not really needing me there to listen. “And, we’ve figured out that the word Rosebud was really a codeword signaling the beginning of their experimentation with radio waves. But, the real dimensions of the conspiracy are a mystery even to us…
“It’s the ultimate psychological terrorism, don’t you see? Isolate the individuals from each other by random acts that are seemingly unrelated, and you can control them. We suspect that there is a centralized office where all of this chaos is managed, but We have yet to find it. Huge sums of money are involved, of course, and unbelievably large amounts of…Brussels sprouts!”
“Maybe people just like Brussels sprouts,” I suggested.
The man looked at me, his gaze narrowing. “Are you one of Us, boy?” he asked, “or, one of Them?”
“I…” I thought about the question for a second. “I would rather not answer that,” I finally said.
The man recoiled, as if I had told him that I had a terminal, highly communicable disease. “You’re one…of Them?” he asked with disgust. “I don’t believe you.”
I didn’t want to do it, but I bared my arm to the man, revealing a tattoo of Walter Cronkite’s signature. “You…you are one of Them!” the man’s face twisted rather evilly.
“Well, let me tell you something,” he told me, hatred in his every word, “We’re on to you. We know all about the base in Alaska, We know what happened to the real Howdy Doody and we will find out about all your other schemes! In the end, it will be You. Not us! You!”
The man stalked off.
No, I’m not part of any great conspiracy; the tattoo was just a happy coincidence. And, contrary to what you might think, I’m not proud of what I did to that man, whose name I never learned. But, let’s face it, it was either him or me, and I was going to be damned if I was going to let it be me!