Interview with Reader Views Editor Sheri Hoyte

Interview with S. Lee Barckmann – Author of “The SwiftPad Trilogy”

Posted on May 23, 2021by Reader Views

Hi Lee, Welcome to Reader Views! Tell us a bit about The SwiftPad Trilogy

The Trilogy is an alt-history of the last decade. It starts with “The SwiftPad Takeover” which is a serial killer thriller combined with a peek at the business of starting up a worldwide social media system, as well as a fanciful sci-fi-techno tale about the features of an advanced social media app.

“The next book is “The SwiftPad Insurgency” which moved time ahead about 5 or 6 years. Now SwiftPad is a worldwide mega success. It has changed not only the characters in the story, but the city of Portland itself, bringing in money and influence to the city. Politically however, the nation has descended into fear and terror as a boorish monster has taken over the government and caused major disasters.

Portland, rich, turns into a human catastrophe with a million refugees. The city mobilizes to aid the homeless people who have descended on the city, and this infuriates the @RealPrez. One of the principal creators of the “SwiftPad” app is kidnapped. Much of the novel is about urban warfare, and its aftermath.

“The SwiftPad Extinction,” the final novel, follows the action from the previous installment as nationwide the conflict spreads.  Simultaneously the world is hit by a pandemic of a bizarre disease with unpredictable symptoms, that baffles science. The story is about the coalescing of the nationwide resistance to the dictatorship. It is also about the main character’s search for his kidnapped colleague and for a cure for the pandemic.

What inspired you to write this particular story line?

The first book was written with no thought it would become a trilogy. My career as a corporate  IT troubleshooter came to an end before I was ready, so the first book was meant to be, in part, a satiric account of the IT business from different perspectives, from the C-level negotiations, to the business of “consultants”, down to the people who actual do the technical implementations. It was sort of a ‘revenge of the nerd’ story if you will.

It was completed in 2014, so I had no idea how the 2016 US Presidential election would turnout.   But as  the deepening realization hit of what tRump actually wanted to do, all that seemed to cause me to be consumed by politics. I could not believe it was my country, the United States, that I was watching. So, I turned that to writing as an outlet, and decided to write a sequel to “The SwiftPad Takeover”.

“The SwiftPad Insurgency” was published in 2019. “The real “Insurgency” in Portland, when DHS Security troops were kidnapping people into unmarked vans happened in July 2020. I wasn’t looking to make prediction, but only to find a story angle where I would be familiar with the setting and locale.  I live in a Portland suburb. By listening to the rhetoric coming out of the White House and right-wing News, where the word “Portland” was used as an epithet, it seemed like a logical outcome.

What are some of the relevant topics readers will encounter in your series?

• The theory and design of an ideal social media app.
• The business requirements of starting a software company that has a worldwide footprint ( on the cheap).
• The sick mind of a psychotic sadistic rapist/serial killer
• How to hack a communication system.
• The kinds of disasters that an American fascist can create, when combined with climate meltdown and a widespread epidemic.
• Extrapolations as to the nature of 21st Century Urban warfare.
• How a country can slowly be draw into a civil conflict that almost no one wants
• How to hack and disrupt a major infrastructure.

Tell us about your lead characters – what motivates them?

• Kip – a laid back son of a rich, cutthroat limber baron.  Kip is a nice guy, a stoner, with traces of the Big Lebowski’s “The Dude”, a man in his early 40s who seems completely guileless and without ambition and who lives on a dwindling trust fund and who stumbles into a role of worldwide business leadership.

• Jim – Jim Kip’s childhood best friend who was raised in the woods by a poor single mother and is competitive with Kip. He goes into the Army, catches his CO in an East German Honey trap, and gets total freedom to wander disguised as a civilian on both sides of the Berlin Wall. He returns to civilian life as an IT troubleshooter for Global Industrial Processing, (GIP), a declining mega IT company.

• Paula – a 60s Political radical, and hippie goddess who discovers the fountain of youth (Fungus) and travels through the second half of the 20th Century as physically a young woman. She taught Nate the tricks of love when he was young and they get together again.

• GG – the real brains behind SwiftPad. Sleeps with Kip and the next morning she gets funding to start her Social Media development project.

• Senator Cadez – a former Nixon operative who also discovered the Fungus and is running for President in 2020

• Spence – a weak but brilliant software engineer who is building the computerized link between recorded mind reads and the internet. Married to Maggie but has a crush on Alison.

• Nate Schuette – an old man who has forgone perpetual youth and is Paula former sometime lover

• Maggie – Spence’s wife who becomes a feared urban guerrilla. Formerly Nate’s girlfriend when Nate was still on the fungus.

• Alison – Work colleague of Spence, who comes to play the pivotal role in the climax of the conflict.

• Leone (Humpkin) the shadow leader of the opposition to RealPrez and Nate’s old college roommate

Did you let your characters dictate the story or did you map things out first?

The characters, and the thread of the story itself took on a life of their own. I had only the vaguest idea where I was going as I was writing.

What kind of research was involved in writing The SwiftPad Trilogy?

I took most of the technical ideas from my own experience. But I did a fair amount of technical research. I studied specs for high end process control systems. I took most of the technical ideas on Internet hacking from my own experience (as an Internet security administrator for Oregon State Government and a system monitoring specialist in the private sector). I did recycle some of the back story of Nate and the origins of telepathic recording and transfer of mental images from a previous unpublished work from many years ago, (when I did research on 1970s technologies).  I read a book about Ed Snowden. And I certainly did do a lot of research on existing technologies as disparate as light plane flight specs, current EEG sensing and recording of brainwaves for legitimate  usage.

What was one of the most surprising things you learned in creating your series?

I was surprised by how violent things could become.  I hate violence, and am uncomfortable writing about it, but I think it is important not to be too comfortable when writing. The study of the past has been a serious lifelong hobby for me, so as I wrote, I thought a lot about how much pointless violence happens during revolutions and how horrible civil wars often turn out. 

So, the violence is meant to be a warning. We are in some ways sleepwalking, like Europe was in August 1914.  The threat of civil conflict is real and our responsibility to avoid it is paramount. This Trilogy is a fictional warning. It is not a prescription. As the author I claim no ability for prognosticate.

I also discovered, to my surprise, that I could create and write under deadlines and pressure. I need to say, that on one level writing the Trilogy was a collaboration with my editor Linda Franklin. She didn’t get involved until I was “done” or thought I was. But during her engagement almost every day she would send me notes on things that were weak or missing.   I would make corrections and because I wanted us both to stay engaged I wrote a number of major (and maybe the best) storyline additions overnight.  If I had to describe the perfect editor, it would be Linda.  I was lucky to be introduced to her by Inkwater Publishing, a great organization that got me on the right track in a number of ways. (Masha Shubin, also from Inkwater did the interior design and implemented my ideas for the covers.) 

How does The SwiftPad Trilogy stand apart from other books in the genre?

Honestly, it is hard to think of a specific genre. I guess it is alt history, like Phillip Dick’s “The Man in the High Castle”, about life on the American West Coast if Japan had won World War II. Or John Brunner’s novels, such as “The Society of Time”. about time travelling in an alt-world where the Spanish Armada successfully conquered England.  As I think about “The SwiftPad Trilogy”, it really is about a second Trump Administration.  But it is also speculative fiction in that it extrapolates where technology might be taking us. It is also social commentary, about where our social behaviors are leading us. There is a bit of the old “ripped from the headlines” about it too. But really, I hope it is more story about the characters who work through the problems that are unexpectedly (to me and them) thrown at them.

One thing I don’t want it to be, is a counter story to something like “The Turner Diaries” which is a right wing fantasy about a revolt against a “liberal” government. My books are not made to inspire anyone, but to frighten them. “The Turner Diaries” was a handbook for Timothy McVeigh. On the surface The SwiftPad Trilogy” might seem like something similar, but that is not what the books are about. Yes it recounts a civil conflict in the US from a particular side, fighting a corrupt wannabe dictator, but the “power” is far away, most of the time. The issues in the story personal and “locally sourced”. And it is clearly fanciful. There is no attempt to attach anything real to any real people, except in satire. If it is a “Protocols of a Libtard Qanon”, then it is obvious satire. The difference is QAnon believers really believe tRump is Q or is close to Q.  The SwiftPad Trilogy is fiction. It is not “liberal Anon.”

What kind of feedback have you received from readers?

Some negative. I can’t deny the Trilogy is political and people who see it through that lens only, and dislike my politics, will likely dislike the books. I certainly don’t disguise that it is (in part) a revolt against a tRump-like figure. Wackos like those that attacked the Capitol on Jan 6 tell themselves “we have the guns”.  And clearly that is true. The story is a bit of a meditation on how it might play out, especially in a city like Portland where almost no one is armed. While the extreme right is armed in an infantry sense, those advantages are not necessarily so overwhelming. I wanted to explore how that might play out in a “war game” like scenario.

What do you like to read?

Fun books. Carl Hiasaan is a particular favorite. Donald Westlake.. I like le Carre, and the noire writers of the 30s and forties, James Cain, Dashille Hammit, Raymond Chandler, Eric Ambler. I like Walter Mosley, Of course Tomas Pynchon. I don’t know Don deLillo, Jonathon Lethem. I thought Joan Didion’s “Play it as it Lays” was great, and I have read much of her nonfiction. John D. McDonald, Martin Cruz Smith,  Phillip Roth, Kingsley Amis, James Ellroy – and of course the greats, Shakespeare,  Melville, Faulkner, Ken Kelsey (“Sometimes a Great Notion” is the greatest American novel, needs to be read again and again…) but I read a lot of history too. Recently half of my bookshelf is history.

Which book has most influenced your writing?

Gravity’s Rainbow. I got it right away, and most people shake their heads and say it is incomprehensible. I studied a lot of 19th and 20th century German history in college, and some physics too. And his sense of humor really appealed to me. So, of his more recent work I have been indifferent to though.

What do you like to do when you’re not writing?

I’m wife and I were both decent runners in school. We try and help each other stay in shape. We hike and do camping in the late summer. Nothing too radical, maybe 5 days in the woods at a time.

What’s next? Are you writing another book? What can you share with us?

I have a couple of ideas. I want to write a mystery set in the 50s. Maybe through the eyes of a young boy. Also thinking about a comedic-satiric political scandal in a modern small city. A la Anthony Trollope. Comedy is hard, as they say, but I like to read it, so, maybe I can pull it off.

What is the best piece of advice you’ve ever received, about writing, or about life in general?

Do what you like to do. The hard part though is knowing what that is.

Do you have any advice for aspiring authors?

Don’t quit your day job.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

My wife Mary and I  live outside of Portland Oregon now. We like to go backpacking, biking, and enjoy playing with our grand daughter, who lives with our son and daughter-in-law not far away. 

I grew up in Barnegat NJ, and had a Huck Finn childhood, surrounded by woods, streams, and meadows. In the 1950s, 1200 people lived there. I have two younger sisters, Laura and Liza.

 My Dad was an amazing story teller, and a town character.  Mom was from the mountain region of North Carolina.  She graduated from college and taught us kids to read early.   My parents bought a set of Encyclopedia Britannica, along with the Britannica Junior set and also a set of books of mythology and heroes, such as William Tell, William Wallace, and Robert the Bruce, (through my mother’s Appalachian family, legend says Bruce is a direct ancestor).  

We moved from Barnegat to a north Jersey suburb when I was 12.  I ran track and cross country at Northern Highlands Regional High School in Allendale.

I studied Economics and History at the University of Kansas,  moved to Eugene Oregon, and then met Mary.  I did various jobs, and then went to China to teach English.  Mary joined me.  After two and a half years, we returned to the US, broke, with Zach on the way, and I got a job in a Florida strip mall computer store.  It was a hard few years, but I learned computers and the associated technologies. I went on to a career in IT, from which 30 years later I retired from IBM.  During that time I wrote intermittently, mostly on “Farewell the Dragon”.   

I have a few ideas as to what kind of fiction I will write next. I love history, but the responsibility of “sticking to the facts” is more than I want to take on. So in the meantime, I am exercising, reading a lot and occasionally writing book reviews for my blog.

Notes on the Ballooning Crisis with China

 

The recent political eruption over the Chinese balloon has revealed an ugly and dangerous  underside of ‘Twitter politics’. This kind of sensational ‘journalism’ is not new. Remember the Maine? If you were alive and paying attention in 1898, you would remember this slogan that drove us to an imperialist war with Spain.  A bomb went off under an American warship, (The Maine) sinking it in Havana harbor. We didn’t know  who set the bomb, and to this day have never determined it, but it led to a rush to judgment and jingo! We stole Spain’s colonial empire. 

Or how about the Incident in the Gulf of Tonkin, where McNamara exaggerated a minor naval incident into a Casus belli that led to 50K American and up to a million Vietnamese dead for essentially nothing?

 

  This sort of spark is not uniquely American by any means. Bismarck wanted war with France,  so he edited a telegram, (see Ems Telegram) about a minor disagreement with the French to seem as though the French had been insulted, egging them into starting the war that they would lose badly.

 One gets the feeling that we are experiencing this type of public opinion manipulation now. Everybody is jumping on the attack of the balloon, from Fox News to MSNBC. As of today, (Feb 10, 2023) we have heard from  the US State department, claiming that the balloon was capable of sophisticated data collection, hinting at possible telephone conversations being overheard, and used this as the rationale for shooting down the balloon over the Atlantic.  But at the same time they are saying that measures were taken to ensure no important intelligence was leaked. What is this really about?

We have the “China Hawks”, who are shouting about shooting it down sooner, and taking retaliatory measures, that appear to have no bounds. These China Hawks have an irrational hatred of China, and are part of a multi-generational American faction that have hated China ever since Truman stopped MacArthur from nuking Beijing (or Peking, as it was known in the West in those days.) Their motto then was “Unleash Chiang Kai Chek!” under the delusion that the losers of a 20 year Civil War could return from Taiwan and take back the Mainland from the Party that had just defeated them.     

The China Hawks grumbled when Nixon went to China, yelled when Carter let the Mainland into the UN, (and demoted Taiwan), and have silently simmered as their bank accounts fattened as more and more trade developed between the US and China.

But this trade (in part) led to the demise of many industries here, and it has hit working people the hardest. There are other factors involved in this decline that have nothing to do with China, as well, but they are glossed over. This decline in American manufacturing has led to a reorientation of US politics, flipping the economic classes and the parties that represent them. The result being the rise of Trump, who leaned heavily on racism and warlike bluster to gin up hatred of China among the Walmart shoppers who purchase Chinese made consumer goods. The Rs cravenly jumped on the Trump bandwagon and turned China into a sinister ‘Fu Manchu’ power that has a ‘Plan’ to destroy America.  

 

Oddly, many of those same ‘China Hawks’ have shown sympathy for Putin, and seem ready to forgive his blatant attack on Ukraine.  

We have been through this before. In the 1950s, many of the Americans who really understood the facts on the ground in China were purged from government and academia.  They had seen the futility in supporting the Guomindang, (国民党）ie. The Nationalists, who ended up fleeing to Taiwan in 1949.  This led to a loss of knowledge about China, creating a blind spot that led to disastrous mistakes.

As we subsequently learned, Mao had no love for Russia or Stalin, and we could have avoided the Korean War with a bit of diplomacy.  Mao had no love for American liberal democracy either, for sure, and he did  become  unhinged with his many mad schemes from 100 Flowers, Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, etc. But how much of that was the result of the American imposed international isolation? It is impossible to answer that, but the policies we did have at that time were a failure.  They led to to two wasting wars on the Asian mainland, and 30 years of non-contact.  Would the aging Eisenhower have allowed those policies to flourish  if he wasn’t protecting his ‘crazy right flank’(ie. Joe McCarthy)?   

Biden appears again to be  allowing us to fall into another period of China bashing, also at the behest of his Crazy right Flank, (ie. Kevin McCarthy - front man for Cotton, Marco, Cruz, et al).  He is trying to control it, with nuanced outrage, canceling the Blinken trip, and protesting the balloon. Hopefully this will die down as the Rs seem more interested in Hunter's laptop.

China is not going to be internationally adventurous. Its recent outbursts have been extremely costly and will weaken Xi’s grip on power. He has awakened Japan, the Philippines are re-signing treaties with the US, and the Indian border is warming up. They don’t need any of this after losing two years of economic growth because of COVID. It has too much to lose. It is surrounded by potential enemies that loom much larger than the US.  Xi’s (and his right wing) recent threats to Taiwan are hollow.  Stability is its prime directive. They will go to any length to maintain it, including locking up its own political dissidents, which is horrible, but this is nothing new, and we can’t totally remake a country with 5000 years of continuous history, and ways of governing itself. 

Biden’s instincts are correct, that we engage with China, adjust to the changing economic situation regarding trade, but keeping in mind what any student of economics knows - that trade is good, it lifts everyone, it adds wealth to all. But we should not fall into the ignorant cacophony of China bashing.  Having lived there and developed friendships, yes, I am biased, but I also have the benefit of understanding a little bit about how things work and how China really thinks and feels about the world and the US in particular.  They know we are a better bet long term as friends. We should not close them off again.  

 

For more on American blunders in Asia see review of "The China Mirage". 

 

The China Mirage

 

 

 

Land Mark

 

 

Land Mark (1976)

I was lying on my back, on top of the six cubit high stone block, drinking wine, and was watching the stars slowly begin to appear as the sun set. Venus glowed and twinkled over the western desert,
and a slight breeze cooled the air. Pronti, the Easterner, and boss of the raft, was telling us about his brief time working around the top-stone crew.

The Top Stoners were highly paid cutters, and almost everyone hates them. “I saw them let one slide down and crush two workers, killing one, eventually,” said Pronti. “An accident, one of them said. Another one laughed. I punched him, and the other jumped me, and I broke his arm. I was reassigned after that. Stuck here with all of you.”

Pronti is a good boss. I suppose if I insisted, I could have been boss,but, frankly I didn’t want it. This is my last run anyway.

“But they are highly skilled right,” said Andue, who had the rudder.
“Years of training.”

“No, not really. You can learn in weeks, if you pay attention.
Longer to get good of course. But it’s also about talent. Only a few get really good. It is about handling the light saws. I was in the caravan that brought them over from the Eastern edge. It takes about two, three weeks to learn the basics. But sometimes they do have to do it by hand - rather - if the grain is right, you can get a better cut with a hammer and chisel. That is skill, that is what slow things down because there are only a few guys who can do that. Grulon is a better cutter than any of them, but they don’t like Southerners, so that would be a problem. It is all fucked up. I would rather work with you guys.”

Grulon and Andue were from way down river, beyond the headwaters, from the Green Hills.

“Why’d they let you go Pronti?” Andue couldn’t get enough of Pronti’s stories. He was both different and authentic, salt of the earth, like him and Grulon. Me, I was just different, at least in their eyes. But I knew things, and I shared what I knew, so I mostly got along with everyone, as long as I played the fool.

“In Zhumud”, said Pronti, “we already have mountains - you wouldn’t be able to breathe at the top of even the smaller ones, even if you could stand the cold.”

“You ever climb those cold mountains Pronti?” Andue worshiped Pronti, a fact his countryman Grulon thought comical.

“When I was young, sure. It was expected. We all did, even the women. I lived above the clouds. We don’t need to build mountains.”

“We have mountains in the south. Plenty high. Only goats live there.”

“Goats!” Pronti laughed. “Even in the foothills of Zhumud, the birds
can’t reach the top.”

Andue looked at Grulon, who shook his head, not believing any of
it. He reached for the wineskin. I knew Pronti was right, because I had flown over the Zhumud mountains. Pronti caught my eye and smiled.

“Why did you leave Zhumud Pronti?”

“You have woman trouble,” Grulon asked.

Pronti was silent. He looked at Grulon, began to say something,
then stopped.

“Why do you bring that up?” Andue threw a small rock at Grulon.

“Is it because your wife…” Grulon leaped like a cheetah on Andue, and punched him.

“Get off him! Yes, I had ‘women trouble’. Yes! I wasn’t the only workman she sought out. But…” There was more to the story of course, but Pronti wasn’t about to tell it.

“Like Grulon’s wife!” said Andue, as he pushed away from his countryman.

“Anyway, after I was dismissed from the Emperor’s honor guard, I helped Fontu come here,” Pronti continued. “I never realized who he was or why he was coming here. I thought he was just a rich traveler.”

I had worked with Fontu when I was with the Planners.

“You knew him, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” I said. “He understood the project better than the lead builders. They were too preoccupied with their numbers and the way the stars aligned.”

The rough squaring of the stone is done on the boat. The finer the work we do, the more money we make. But if we take off too much, the block won’t fit and will be useless. This block, the one we carried was nearly perfect, except for an overhang on one side.

Grulon’s chisel work was the best I have ever seen. Sometimes, with a few well placed shots, he can finish a piece as smooth as a top stone. He sees the flow of the grain better than anyone. Andue, however, wants to cut all the time, in little bits. Chip, chip, all the way up the river. It is the safest way, he says. He wants all of us to work like that, rather than risk a bad cut. Pronti had told me he had never seen Grulon make a bad cut.

Prontus and myself aren’t great cutters, and would rather let Grulon do his magic. Grulon climbed up on the block with his hammer and chisel.

“Wait,” yelled Andue. “Why aren’t we all just chipping at it? We can gradually get it almost perfect.”

“Almost perfect.” Grulon laughed as he prepared to find his groove.

“Wait a minute!” said Pronti. He studied the stone impatiently, aware as anyone that he was probably the least expert of us in the matter of stone cutting.

“Its a question of value, Pronti,” I said. “Is our free time on the boat
worth the slight chance that we ruin the stone?”

“No,” he answered.

“Fuck you then,” said Grulon. He jumped down off the stone and took the rudder. “I ain’t helping you with that.” He took a big pull from the wine bag. “You guys can chip all you want.” He handed me the wine and I took a good pull myself. I agreed with him. Really perfect work brought a significant bonus. It was worth the risk to let Grulon do it. We both sat in the bow, and I dug the last wineskin out from the supplies. Pronti and Andue were chipping and whispering to each other.

“I thought you could do it,” I said.

Grulon smiled and lay back. It was a big wine-skin.

Grulon was soon asleep, and I was restless, so I grabbed a hammer and chisel and jumped back up on the stone. Pronti took the rudder.

“How much further?,” asked Pronti.

Andue looked at the river bank. “Tomorrow morning, maybe early
afternoon.”

When the sun went down we stopped at a village lit up by several
large campfires and bought more wine and a side of antelope. Andue and Pronti climbed up on the stone and made a fire. I woke Grulon and he had trouble climbing the stone. We all laughed at him, and he laughed too, and the argument of earlier seemed forgotten. I went for a twilight swim before joining them.

I floated along behind the raft to avoid snags, and wondered why I
was enjoying life so much now that I had left the Council. They were moving away from the original purpose, drifting into megalomania. The so-called Pharaoh was merely their puppet now. He really thought they were building his mausoleum. I looked up and saw an Atlantian ship, heading east.

At that moment, I knew they were taking Fontu’s body back to his
home. How the river must look from up there tonight! Hundreds of
dinner fires on the floating stone blocks, all in a line as far down
river as you could see.

With Fontu gone, there were no wise ones left.

“Fontu is dead,” said Pronti. Andue was eating with carnivorous
gusto and Grulon was nibbling and drinking.

“How did you know,” I asked. Pronti shrugged. What a waste of
talent! But it was too late to harness it. I was glad for him actually,
because I knew what it meant to have your powers harnessed.

“I guess I will marry and settle in this desert,” he said. I nodded.

Andue immediately began telling Pronti about the quarter he lived
in. “It is a good place. Close to the docks. We have nice places to eat and shop. It isn’t too wild, good for children.” Pronti nodded. I saw he was thinking of his son being raised in the palace of a princess. His princess.

I had the first shift on the rudder. I woke at the first light and could
see the unloading terminal ahead. We made good time. The river
was up from yesterday. They were already pulling one up off the
raft. In this light that was dangerous. We would be second in line.
The council was growing impatient at the pace of work, it seemed.

“Perhaps in our lifetime,” I could almost hear their idle chatter. I am
leaving this land. I will go north to the forest, beyond the sea. No
more of this foolishness.

“Look at that!” Grulon was pointing. Four Atlantian ships taking
off together. Any flock of birds would launch themselves with more
style and synchronicity. I wasn’t impressed, and did not hide my
annoyance.

Andue and Pronti hadn’t expected to arrive so soon. “Must of rained like a motherfucker back home,” said Andue. Grulon nodded. We only had a couple of hours at most to finish cutting the stone. It was too late to let Grulon find a proper groove now. So we all chipped away furiously, including Grulon. Every pebble cut was more money.

I got off the raft, collected my pay, which was better than I had expected, and said goodbye. Although they would have no trouble replacing me, they were all silently mad that I was leaving, and soon I was a stranger to them. After a couple days, they would be on camels headed south to get the next raft. I bought a donkey and started for the coast.

Nightmare for a Gilded Stalion (1973)

 

Slowly, Tom walked toward Shorty’s Cafe. It was around dusk, and

 cold. Muffled thunder rumbled in the distance and Tom was 

enveloped by a strange feeling of melancholic discombobulation.

He wandered into the dingy diner and decided not to sit at a booth. 

He only wanted coffee. He sat on the backless, round counter seat,

 two stools over from an old man, who was nodding in starts and fits.

 Tom caught a whiff of urinal cake ammonia.  A fly wobbling with a 

sputtering buzz, circled around a doughnut case. Behind him, in a 

booth, a loud teenage girl in a faded maroon blouse was ribaldly 

entertaining a couple of old hobos.

Tom felt at home here. He took out a small notebook he always kept 

in his back pocket and wrote, “The bizarre nature of this dive 

seduces my imagination to induce cerebral semen into the fertile 

and virgin regions of my intellect.” He clicked his pen and put it back 

in his front short pocket and sipped his coffee with some self-

satisfaction.

A raven-haired woman entered Shorty’s, dragging a beat up suitcase. 

She was wearing a flowery, silken red dress, the hem of which drug 

across the dirty linoleum cafe floor.  She was looking around as if 

distracted by something.  Tom couldn’t guess her age - she looked 

18, maybe 20,  but something about her face, or the haunted look in 

her eyes told him she was older.  She sat down next to him. He 

looked at her, smiled and lifted his coffee to her.

“Is the coffee any good?”

Tom shrugged noncommittally.

She scowled, looked away and shook her head.

Tom stared at her until she turned back toward him.

“You can’t even commit to how you feel about a cup of coffee, can 

you?” 

Tom’s puzzled look turned to a chuckle. “It’s - I don’t know.”  He took 

a sip and made a face. “It’s coffee.”  He kept an anodyne face, but 

inside began to feel both dread and excitement.

She looked directly at him. They held each other’s gaze for an 

eternity.

“The coffee sucks,” he said.  “But that is an opinion. Not a 

commitment.”  From behind the counter Shorty looked at Tom, then 

at the woman, blinked slowly and held up the pot.

The raven haired woman smiled sadly. “Sure.” She pointed at her cup.

 “I have to stay awake so I don’t miss the next bus out of here.”

“Where you heading?”

“Wherever.”

 

Tom looked at her and again she looked back.  They sat in silence 

listening to the teenage girl’s laughter change to sobbing. A garbled 

argument between her companions was slowly escalating. Tom shook

his head and made a strained face and the woman in the long red 

dress and black hair seemed amused at his discomfort.  

“You need a place to crash tonight?”

“Probably.  Why?”

“You could stay at my place tonight. There will always be another 

bus."

She looked at Tom, and laughed, but continued staring at him. Tom 

didn’t look away. She shrugged and nodded.  He got up, paid for 

both of their coffees and picked up her suitcase.  They walked out 

together.  As they strolled past the shops on Main street, the lights in

the shop made Tom feel he was on stage with an unseen audience 

watching from the street.

Spring came quickly. This has all been a dream, thought Tom. Things

 are never surprising in dreams.  He was looking out his window at 

the rain, which was more than a drizzle and less than a downpour.  It 

was foggy and even though he had stared out his bedroom window 

countless times, the view seemed to flicker between the familiar and 

some other place. Tom leaned over the bed and shook Mary.

“Let’s go down to Shorty’s for breakfast. Come on, we’ll walk.” Mary 

acted annoyed, but beneath that Tom sensed her reluctance - almost

 - but not quite - fear. But he ignored it, subconsciously telling himself 

that she was just sleepy.  “Come on, it will be fun. We have not been 

back there since we met.”

She sat up, then after a bit, got up, and pulled on faded jeans over 

her well shaped legs. She slipped on a black sweater and combed 

her long dark hair straight back and then let it fall lightly on her 

shoulders. Meanwhile, Tom pulled on a tee shirt and climbed into a 

pair of mechanics overalls. They walked out into the cool spring rain, 

holding hands.

The rain matted Mary’s hair down. Tom looked at her with awe and a 

smidge of fear.  He suddenly realized he was - happy, complete, more

than content - but in love?  It might be love, he wasn’t sure - this was 

the first time he ever felt this way. He must have been, even though 

the winter had passed almost without notice. At least it must have 

passed, he thought.  As they exited Tom’s apartment, they skipped 

together for about ten yards, Yellow Brick Road style, a little ritual 

they had acquired somehow. But soon stopped and walked steadily, 

watchfully. Tom couldn’t remember the last time they had been out 

together.

A Lincoln Continental with dark mirrored windows pulled up next to 

them and stopped, and a small man in a gray, tight fitting jacket and 

a skinny dark tie, got out of the back seat and stepped toward them.

“He wants you to come home,” he said to Mary.  She squeezed Tom’s

 hand, and looked up.  She lowered her head and stared blankly at 

Tom.  The water on her cheeks could have been rain or tears.

“Come with me?” she said.

Tom nodded once with a determined and worried look.

They got in the back of the Lincoln together.  The front seat was 

empty, and the man in the tight-fitting sport coat got in the driver’s 

seat and drove down Main a couple of blocks and parked in front of 

the bank, the biggest building in town.  He waited while Mary and 

then Tom got out. An old man in a bellhop uniform came out of the 

bank and  ushered the three of them into the main entrance.

Inside, several men respectfully said hello, but the man in the sport 

coat ignored them and led Tom and Mary behind the counter, and 

down a hallway to an elevator with a security number pad. They got 

in, but it went down. It came to a stop  and the three of them got out 

in front of spacious, clean well-lit offices. They saw a number of 

beautiful people working.  It was like there was an modern metropolis

underneath Tom’s sleepy college town. 

“Mary?...”

She gave Tom a stony look, as though to say “not here!” There was 

no fear, no remorse, no hint of what was amiss on her face. But no 

awe or surprise either.  Tom tried to wipe his mind of any thoughts. 

They turned right and walked through a glass door and stepped down

 into a vast lobby.  Across the room on an elevated platform was a 

naked man nailed to a wooden cross. The naked man lifted his head 

and opened his eyes and cried, 

“Mother!”

“I gave him his chance in the desert.”  Tom turned around and 

looked at the man in the tight fitting sport coat who had driven them 

to the bank.  “The bastard could have used Mystery, or Caesar's 

sword, he could have fed them, awed them, and ruled them. It would 

have all been so much simpler. Instead he gave them all false hope.”

“Mother forgive me! I didn’t know what I was doing!”

With a stoic face, she turned away and said to Tom, “Let’s get the 

hell out of here.” She sneered at the thin man in the gray jacket, “We 

are closing our account,” she exclaimed. She and Tom walked back 

to the elevator.

“OK,” said Tom. “What now?”

“Get your savings out in cash. We are going to need more room.  I 

am pregnant.”

      

*****

Tom looked out the window of Shorty’s all night cafe. The dark haired

 woman was lugging her heavy suitcase across the street to the bus 

station. The thunder that had seemed distant before was now closer, 

but somehow it was less ominous. 

It was starting to become light outside. Tom waited for the bus to 

leave, then walked back to his basement apartment in the drizzling 

rain.