Collected short stories, p.206
Collected Short Stories, page 206
Half of the front office is helping to give a tour of the plant. For the camera. They're the ones who look misplaced, what with their suits and ties and polished leather shoes. Miller has to concentrate on his job; he can't watch the group as it moves, lingers, then moves again. He's talking to the Cetian whenever he can. In his head. And the imaginary alien asks him how he came to be here. A person of his interests, of his training, seems wasted in this place. I needed the money, Miller explains. It's just the way things fell together, you know? But the alien doesn't understand, no. So Miller, speaking inside his head, tells half of his life story. It doesn't answer everything, but he tells it with all the vigor he can muster. As if he's practicing for later. For the conversations to come.
The imaginary Cetian smiles in his peculiar fashion the beaklike lips parting and the violet tongue showing against the roof of his mouth. Then he compliments Miller in glowing terms, telling him that he's bright and articulate, and so on. A good thing I found you, the Cetian declares. I thought I might be lonely while I'm here. And bored. But now I've got you for a friend a soul mate
"Hey! You alive, Miller?"
Miller is behind again. He apologizes to Jacob and lifts the next frame, making dead certain that it's properly aligned.
And the next one, too.
And the next.
People from the office begin to file past them, and the news-people. Their jobs are done. Smiles and amiable chatter mean everything has gone well. Miller concentrates on his job. Eventually, the foreman wanders past. He's alone, smoking and looking generally pissed at the world. Miller remembers how last week, hearing that they were getting a Cetian, the foreman had moaned something about not wanting or needing one of those goddamn chameleons. Fuck gifts from the stars and all that shit. He had a business to run. Product to get out. If he couldn't fucking hire who he wanted, then screw all the suits and their goddamn offices, too
Miller stands on his toes for a moment, looking down the line.
The Cetian is standing at the line's end. In the plant's hierarchy, that's one of the worst jobs. The Cetian and a scruffy man are pulling the finished frames from the belt and stacking them on pallets. But what else are they doing? he wonders. Talking? The scruffy man is a drunk, Miller knows. He didn't get past ninth grade, and he's been to prison how many times? For stupid crimes. For drugs. He's probably still stoned, Miller realizes. Red-eyed and wobbly. Yet the Cetian is talking to him, and he's answering. They're having a conversation ?
There comes a sudden wood-splitting crash.
"Goddamn you!" shouts Jacob. He aims the air gun at Miller's chest. "Pull your head out of your ass, Professor. The chameleon will keep, for God's sake! So let's get busy. What do you say? Huh?"
There's a horn for the morning breakfifteen minutes of rest, minus walking time. Most people go back up front, up to where the vending machines are stacked along the concrete walls. They settle down to play cards and nap on the golden stacks of lumber. And there's the talk, the constant talk, about tits and asses and blow and beer.
Normally Miller goes the other way. He has a corner, quiet and out of the way, where he keeps his lunch and books and a comfortable seat he made for himself out of scrap lumber. Sometimes when he's reading he finds a sentence or a little paragraph that he likes, and he uses a marking pen to copy it on the concrete walls. For future reference. Today, hearing the break horn, Miller's first thought is that the Cetian might wander back to his corner and pause, reading some of the carefully written wisdoms. Yes? They're from great novels and classic works of science the crowns of human achievement. It's such a wonderful image, the Cetian and him meeting in that corner. So wonderful that Miller almost expects it to happen. He's got it all planned.
Except the Cetian doesn't know the plan. He comes forward with the general flow of bodies. It's unnerving to watch him. He seems to carry himself like any new employee. There's a tentativeness, a calculated caution in the eyes flat and square, in this case, with tiny triangular pupils the color of new snow and the caution extends to everyone around him. Maybe these people are scared, thinks Miller. I'm not scared, he tells himself. This is an opportunity, rare and remarkable. Miller feels singularly suited to act as a bridge between the two sides. A rush of adrenaline pours through him. He climbs under the belt and joins the flow of bodies, and it's all he can do to keep from jogging after the Cetian and calling to him. Like some long lost friend.
They're amazing, really. These aliens.
In Asia, Cetians dress in peasant clothes and enormous straw hats, bending over and shuffling through the flooded rice paddies. In Australia, in the dusty outback, they drive little 4x4 pickups while they do simple ranch work like abos do. In Europe, odd as it sounds, Cetians are among the protestors marching against imperialism and environmental decay; and they're also the police wearing riot gear and standing in rows, defending order and the state.
These ironies are abundant and somehow comforting.
There is a sense of utter fairness in the process.
Cetians will undergo almost anything to learn about mankind firsthandsome even dyingand Miller has to wonder how many of his coworkers appreciate their earnestness, their good intentions. He doubts any of them do. Probably not one, he thinks.
It must be lonely, dull work for them.
Miller knows.
A Cetian would welcome a friend, sure. Someone who appreciates the age and depth of the Cetian culture. Miller sees the odd white figure sitting alone on a lumber stack, the square eyes watching a cluster of men playing poker on a little table. Miller breathes and sits on the same stack, not too close but near enough that they could talk. If they want. He glances at the odd eyes and the white, white skin. What should I say? he wonders. Why am I so nervous? I shouldn't be nervous, he tells himself. His hands shake in his lap. A couple of poker players glance up at him and smile, then they mutter something rude. No doubt. Again Miller breathes, finding a quick courage. "Hello?" He sees all of the Cetian face, blank and so strange. He offers his name and smiles, extending one of his nervous hands.
The square eyes blink in slow motion. "I'm Rozz," says the Cetian, the voice deep and liquid and amazingly human. One of Rozz's four-fingered hands grabs Miller's hand, squeezing and feeling like plastic. It's smooth and cool and tough. Like plastic. Or maybe Teflon.
"Hey," says Miller, "it's great you're here. I mean it. Everywhere, I mean." He feels clumsy, his mouth spitting words at random. "I just really think it's neat."
Rozz blinks again, no expression to be read.
Miller hears a poker player laughing. Maybe at him. He gulps and tells the Cetian, "This isn't much to look at, I know," and then he glances about, his own face critical but tolerant. "Did they show you everything? I mean, do you have questions? Because I might answer them. I mean, I've been here quite a while." He feels giddy now. He tells himself that he's doing too much, he wants too much, but all he can do is listen to his own prattle. "Years," he says. "I mean, if you want to get a feel for this place and all"
The poker table erupts in laughter. Miller jerks, not having heard what was said but imagining several things. Something tasteless and pointed at him, no doubt. Then he looks at Rozz, ready to deny anything. The Cetian is now focused on the little tableraw pine scraps stapled togetherand the hunched-over bodies with cigarettes in their laughing mouths and the cards tight in their hands. Maybe fifty cents in nickels and dimes are in the middle. Everyone is looking at the alien. The laughter diminishes. Something wary and alert comes into their faces. For a long moment, nothing happens. Then Rozz says with a slow, precise voice:
"Five-card draw."
A couple players blink as if surprised. Someone asks, "You know it? The game?"
Rozz lifts a hand, flattens it, and wiggles it in the air. "A little bit," he seems to imply. "I'm not so good," he says aloud. "But I can play."
The men look at one another, not sure what to make of things. It's the foreman, sitting with his back to Rozz, who announces, "This is an open game, I guess. Anyone who wants to join, joins."
Rozz drops off the stack, leaving Miller without a good-bye glance. One of the players moves aside, giving up most of a long bench, and Rozz sits and watches a new hand being laid out. No one looks comfortable. They're judging him, thinks Miller. This is some test. Rozz picks up the five cards and finds a nickel in his front pocket, putting it into the new pot. Then he draws three cards, adds a second nickel, and loses with a pair of tens. The game couldn't be any quieter. They play again, a couple more hands, and everyone is sneaking looks at the hard plasticlike skin, at the square eyes, at the beaked and toothless mouth. Rozz pays no attention to them, and Miller stays on the stack, still marveling. An ancient race that has traveled around the galaxy, to countless wonderful places, and yet their representative has the charity and poise to sit with a backward race. A hard and graceless race. Us.
At one point, his voice cracking, Miller asks, "How's it going, Rozz? How are we doing?"
Rozz looks at him, maybe smiling. "Not too fucking bad," he declares. "Not bad at all." And he lays down the winning hand, grinning in a very human fashion, sweeping in the nickels while the other players stare, almost laughing, a few of them nodding as if they've seen something and it's something they might like.
Through the rest of the morning, Miller writes little notes on the golden wood of the frames. He uses a black marker. The frames are going to be painted, so there's no damage done. Then the belt carries them and his notes on down the line, straight to Rozz.
"The Cetian Earth," he scribbles, "is tropical and wet and covered with lemon-colored vegetation." He hopes Rozz will be impressed with his interest. "Its largest creature is a fish-analog, one hundred tons, semi-intelligent and peaceful and worshiped by the ancient Cetians." He has to write quickly, trying Jacob's patience. He wants Rozz to respond somehow, but he can't even tell if his new friend is reading the notes. "Cetian starships are powered by matter-antimatter engines, both fuels derived from the interstellar medium." The message is broken up on several frames. Still no response. No wave or smile. Nothing. "I'm interested in you," he writes finally. "And I admire your culture."
This time Rozz looks down the line and nods. Once.
Miller is excited. He looks at his watch, thinking hard. It's close to noon. "Eat with me?" he writes. "Miller." Then he waits, watching the frame travel to the end. To him.
But the Cetian doesn't respond. He seems to read it, yes, but then there's the horn and he's walking down the aisle, down past Miller and gone. Jacob wants to finish the frame on the table. Maybe Rozz didn't understand? thinks Miller. Maybe I should have told him where? Still optimistic, he hurries back to his corner and gets a certain book a recently published guide to Cetian myths and legends plus his lunch pail. But when he's up front, trotting toward the time clock, he discovers the Cetian sitting snugly between the foreman and another one of the poker players.
Disappointment starts to nag at him.
He punches out and returns. The three figures are sharing a stack of lumber. The humans eat from pails sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs and sweating pop cans within easy reach. Rozz has a crumpled grocery sack behind him and a cellophane bag of unshelled, unsalted peanuts in one hand. No one is talking, but the humans watch the peanuts being flipped up into the mouth two at a time. Rozz doesn't chew; he only swallows. His pace is amazing. The foreman shakes his head and smiles. Miller settles at the poker table, barely hungry but pretending to chew on his sandwich. While he watches.
He feels cheated.
Coming here this morning, he had expectations. They'd been building since last week's announcement. It was the prospect of a friend someone he could respect, and converse with, and learn from. Not another sweatshop goon full of harsh talk and ugly humor. But someone of culture, of learning. Someone who had been to odd and wondrous places beyond human reach. Someone he could share breaks with, and lunchtime, the two of them talking and talking and talking
Miller bristles, thinking he might have been wrong.
He sets down his lunch-meat sandwich, his stomach churning and his breath tasting foul. The foreman asks Rozz, "So how do you do it?" and Miller waits. "Like I've seen on TV?"
"A gizzard," Rozz answers, his tone matter-of-fact. Patient. "You know, like a chicken's gizzard? It's lined with rocks that grind up the shells, and I shit out what my body can't use."
"Huh," says the foreman. "Huh!"
"Do you want to see it?"
"What? Your gizzard?" The foreman halfway shudders, surprised.
"You've seen 'em, Pete," says the other man. "They do it on TV."
Rozz unbuttons the blue cotton shirt, exposing the white chest with its narrow, widely spaced ribs. Maybe he's smiling. Miller shifts on the hard wooden seat and watches, his thoughts jumbled. A look of utter calm comes into Rozz's face, and the whiteness weakens like milk being flooded with water. A large yellow heart, six chambers and a tangle of thick arteries and veins, is set within the long pale ribs. The gizzard is the darker bundle of round muscle beneath the heart. Miller recognizes it from all the science articles. He feels an urge to stand and point out organs, lecturing. "This is where the peanuts are now." But Rozz himself points, telling them the same thing. Then, as if to display his talents, the gizzard contracts with a sudden violence. Shells crumble and the two men give a little jump, then they shake their heads and laugh, looking at one another as if to congratulate themselves on their courage.
"All right," says Pete, the foreman. "With rocks, you say?"
Rozz turns white again, and he smiles again. "Here. Watch this." He reaches into the grocery sack and retrieves a single black walnut, rough against the smooth skin of the hand. "Watch," he cautions. The nut vanishes into his mouth, and he swallows in a theoretical way; and with Miller eating again, unnoticed and still glowering at all of them, the walnut shatters somewhere inside the Cetian's belly. It's like a little explosion. The men jump and then giggle, then turn and look around the plant, hunting for someone to show the marvel they've just found.
Rozz is moved off the line after lunch. The foreman wants him up front, up in Assembly, which is pretty much the easiest department. It's where the foreman spends most of his day. What's going on? Miller wonders. He feels betrayed and rather jealous. And maybe foolish, too. All the time he'd been building this image of the Cetians, and all the time he'd been so blind. The Cetians fit into all kinds of places, with anyone. It never occurred to him that they actually enjoyed it! Now the blood roars in his head and his fingers shake. He can scarcely think, barely able to do his job. Jacob glares at him several times, shaking his head but too weary to shout. Miller counts the minutes till afternoon break, the halfway point, because everything afterward will be quick. The day and the craziness will be over soon after break. Then he'll have time to go home and collect himself, to sleep and relax and get it all straight in his head.
When the break horn sounds, Miller decides a Coke would taste good.
By the time he's up front, the poker players are at it. Rozz is among them. Miller pauses and stands nearby, just watching, and then something unexpected occurs to him. Why not? he asks himself. It's an open game, isn't it? There's an empty seat. Miller takes it and looks straight across at the Cetian, waiting, feeling tight inside while he watches the white hands shuffling the deck like a pro.
How does he do it? Miller wonders. Did he practice before coming here? Or does he just pick it up along the way? Card games. The language. All of it. The humans watch Miller while Rozz deals. Miller isn't sure how to bet. He throws a nickel into the pot, takes three cards, and loses with a pair of fours. The foreman wins, grinning at Miller and sweeping up the coins. He says, "So what's the occasion? Thought you'd be social for a change?"
Miller doesn't know what he's thinking. He opens his mouth as if to answer, but nothing comes to mind.
The foreman is amused. Still smiling, he turns to another man and asks, "Have you seen what the new guy can do, Ed? Have you?"
"What do you mean?" Ed works in the paint departmentan ancient simpleton with a partial beard and spooked eyes. He glances at Rozz, unsure of himself. "What can he do?" he manages. "Tell me."
"Would you?" says the foreman. "You mind?"
Rozz shrugs. No, he doesn't mind. His skin immediately turns black, like coal. Someone up on the stacks yells, "Hey, he looks like Jacob! Don't he?"
A lot of them laugh.
The foreman laughs. "But it's the other thing I wanted."
"God, I don't want to see!" Ed shivers. "Why the fuck would anyone do that to himself? I mean Jesus !"
"For camouflage," Miller responds. He says, "They do it so they can hide," and nods, glad to have spoken. To throw in his knowledge.
But no one is listening to him. Except Ed. And Ed doesn't like what he hears. "So how come he's not colored? You know. Green and all? Those fucking lizards are green and brown and shit. Right?"
"Cetians are color-blind." Miller smiles. He's sorting his next hand without looking at his cards, telling everyone, "They see the world in black and white and gray. Like cheap TV."
Only Ed listens, his mouth opened and his expression befuddled. The rest of the table, Rozz included, studies the cards and Ed and the little piles of change out in front of them. They aren't going to let him take part in this. Not if they can help it. Someone up on the stacks says something, probably about Miller, and he hears men chuckling. It was funny to them. He can imagine what they just said.
Nickels are tossed into the pot.
Miller glances at his cards once, then catches Rozz staring at him. The square eyes are cold and a little bit unnerving. He shifts his weight, feeling the hard wood against his butt. There's more betting and he loses again. Rozz wins. Reaching for the pot, he makes the skin of his hands turn transparent. Everyone can see his colorless meat and the fine yellow bones, and almost everyone laughs. Except for Miller and Ed. "Would you fucking stop that?" says Ed. "Goddamn, you're nuts. Can all of you you people do that? Can you?"
