Chapter 5

A while back, Radio (that's what we call him) pointed out, that both came in the morning, both had bad guys and good guys, both were trying to sell you something, both had super heroes (look at the sports section) and "after all" he said "you've been saying nothing in the papers was real ever since I can remember. So what's the difference between your cartoons and mine?".

I shut up and went back to reading Prince Valiant. They watch all the cartoons they want. He's like that. Intermixed with his normal barrage of nonsense is some really irritating logic. Radio's given name is Paul Simon Bowie.

This Saturday however things were going a little different. Jessie was at overload, about to throw a brain breaker, so she went off to take a shower and put on her makeup. That's how she collects her thoughts. It's a process akin to a medieval knight putting on armor.

I knew she needed the time out, so Joey and I...and Jubie just sat in the kitchen and visited. I put on Revolver, Joey likes the old Beatles albums.

"So Jubie can talk..." I asked "what does he say?"

"Whatever he wants, you know like about his food and about us and about the cats...he doesn't use words, he talks in pictures, and know what?" Five-year-olds are always testing your knowledge. "He can tell me if he's sad or scared or mad or happy... He's sad and scared now." Joey looked troubled.

"What's he sad about Joey?" There was an odd new world weariness on his face. I wasn't sure I liked it.

"My friend says Jubie can feel the children hurting too...and the animals hurting." Tears spilled from his eyes as he ran to me. My heart came flying into my throat. "Dad, we gotta save 'em, Dad somebody's hurting them." Jubie followed Joey right up to my lap with an alert protectiveness. He stuck his head between us, almost forcing us apart. I was too preoccupied with comforting Joey to think much about it.

Besides, I could hear the voices again...Calling. My stomach balled into a knot. As Joey wept in my lap, I was overcome by a crushing sadness. Tears came to my eyes. We sat there in the kitchen for several minutes, holding each other, wishing we could push the voices away, grasping for some relief in each others arms.

"Not my child!" I kept thinking "You can't have my child." But it was too late. Whatever it was, the Awakening had my child...and me, and there was nothing I could do about it. I felt lost. I just wanted those voices to go away.

Joey and I rocked in each others arms, letting more and more of it go until we were caterwauling like Italians at a funeral. Jubie started whining and snuffling along with us 'till finally, he pulled his head back and let out an astounding howl. It started deep in his chest like a growl and then rose and rose above the din of our crying until Joey and I stopped and looked at the dog dumbfounded.

Finally the incredible wail came to an end. Jubie look at us self consciously, then walked over to his water bowl. There was a new atmosphere in the room. Joey and I looked at each other.

"Dog Fart!" screamed Joey. We tumbled off the chair puffing and gasping into the next room and plopped laughing on the couch, howling so hard we could barely catch our breaths. I kept trying to quit but every time our eyes met, an avalanche of laughter came rumbling out of my stomach until I lay helpless on the ground. "Dog fart...dog fart." Joey kept mumbling between screams. It was almost like we were exhaling the sadness and terror we had breathed in from the "Gere".

As the last few exhausted giggles sputtered out, we lay peacefully on the carpet. Shortly, Joey sat up and gave me a look of thoughtful consideration, another facial expression I hadn't previously seen on him.

"We have to go Dad. It's going to get bad here...soon. My friend says it won't be safe."

"Go where Joey?" I wasn't sure I wanted to hear the answer.

"He will show us. He just says we should get all our stuff ready in seven days...you know like money and food and clothes and stuff. He says we need enough for lots of kids" Joey was insistent.

Bare feet slapping on the hardwood floors of the hall announced Radio's entrance as he walked in rubbing his eyes.

"Good Mornin' Radio." I reached over and patted him on the back. He started mumbling some nonstop story about weird dreams and video game characters and how weird his brother was and moved off to the kitchen. I heard the juice pour. There was a muffled "Quit it Jubie!". Our dog has a disconcerting habit of sticking his cold nose in your crotch in greeting. Joey and I smothered our giggles. Side one of Revolver was over so I put some Keith Jarrett on to soften things up, Staircase album, side two, "Hourglass".

He walked back into the room. "Mffglggle ark dig duh aee aaaaag..?" he said.

"Take the bagel out of your mouth Radio."

"I had the grossest dream, Dad. It was soooo weird. It was like Out of this World. Do do, do do, do do, do do..." I interrupted the Twilight Zone theme song. Interrupting is the only way you get to talk when Radio is around.

"What was your dream about, Radio?"

"Oh it was tough! Did Mom tell you Joey flipped out, Dad? He truly took the big dive Dad. He's like talkin' to the dog and he's got this whole thing made up about some kid who isn't there and like we couldn't get him off it. I think it was the fish sticks we ate yesterday. They were soft when they came out of the freezer. I told Mom but she wouldn't listen... Noooooooo, not to dumb little Radio and now I've got a brother from outer space. How would you like that? What am I supposed to tell my friends. I knew we weren't supposed to eat soggy fish, probably got brain botulism..."

Now you will notice that this answer seems to have little to do with the question I asked. However, from experience I know that it is less painful to wait than to try to redirect. He eventually gets around to it. Also you must understand that the boy talks at a rate an auctioneer would envy so he can put out a lot of words in a short time. It helps to tune in on about every fifth sentence.

"...so anyway, when I went to bed I figured it was off to the shrink with Joey tomorrow then POW! I have this dream. It was sooooo awesome. I was in this huge crowd of kids and we're all friends and we can like talk to each other in our heads you know, like E.S.P., an we were rockin'', man we are walkin' along and there were like animals with us like dogs and horses and rats and bugs, you know all kinds, even tigers but I wasn't afraid like they were going to eat me or anything. They were friends! And we were fighting this war against bad guys you know like killers and perverts and stuff and we were kickin' butt! We all sang this loud song like 'AAAHHHhhhhhh' but is wasn't a song it was like a laser or a magic hurricane or somethin' but it shredded these guys, I mean we were doggin' 'em and when we passed it was like you know on a Disney film, everything was beautiful an fresh and growin..."

My breath caught in my throat as he stormed through the story. What was Radio doing in my dream? Why had my family been singled out for these messages? Was it because I was a Sentinel? Suddenly I had a scary thought. I muttered "excuse me Radio" and walked into the kitchen and picked up the phone. Radio didn't even break stride.

I called Variety. She already knows I'm crazy. Besides, she's one of those friends that I could say anything to and get away with it.

Her youngest, Tulli, picked up the phone.

"Lo...who is it?" Classy phone technique for a two year old.

"Hi Tulli, It's Uncle Tom, can you let me speak to your mom?"

"It's reeeally Ucca Tom?" She did a security check. Can't let just anybody get through to the queen.

"Yes, sweetheart, go get your Mom." This went on for a while. Parents who let their toddlers answer the phone are out to punish the hurried in the most fiendish ways. Finally Tulli decided dominating me was getting boring and dropped the phone. I could hear her calling Variety.

"Tom" she sounded frazzled "Are you okay?"

"Yes ma'am, I'm fine. Sorry I scared you yesterday. There is some stuff goin' that I need to talk to you about."

"What's that Tom? Why don't you start with what happened yesterday?" she suggested tensely. The woman had something on her mind.

"Variety, you sound beat. Somethin' the matter?"

"Saturday mornin', no big deal." I could tell she was deflecting me. "So what's happenin' that you can't wait to tell me about?"

"Lots," I said "one thing is that I had this strange dream last night." I started to tell her about the dream, got about half way into it and she interrupted me.

"Somethin's goin' on Tom, somethin' not kosher. You know something don't you. That's almost the same dream John Jr. had last night. He jumped out of bed talkin' about it. What do you know?"

"More than I want to Variety. Does Tulli have an imaginary friend?"

There was silence on the other end of the line. Finally she said "What do you know about that Tom, no games, what do you know?" She sounded very cold and dangerous.

"It's okay Variety, at least I guess it is. Joey's got one too. All the preschoolers do. Something big's about to happen. Something that will change everything. Listen girl, I think you need to give some credibility to what the imaginary friend says. Tulli's not nuts. The friend is real." Whatever real is, I thought to myself.

"How do you know that, Tom?"

"Yesterday, when we were on the playground..."

"Yeah?" She sounded suspicious.

"My imaginary friend showed up, I hadn't seen him since I was eight."

She was quiet once again. She's rock steady in crisis, I knew she wouldn't act, or even talk until she was clear of the threat. "Listen Variety, I think they really are our friends, or at least the friends of our children. I don't know where they come from but I don't think Joey and Tulli and I are likely to be having the same hallucinations. I think we're in for some kind of social revolution." I didn't know what else to say. I didn't really have any idea what was going on. I decided I better get off the phone before I dug myself in any deeper. "I gotta go, things are nuts here but I think you ought to listen to Tulli." I hung up.

I walked out into the back yard to visit with Jubie and clear my head. So the "dream" was going around and judging from Variety's reactions, so are the imaginary friends. This was quickly moving out of the category personal delusion and into the arena of supernormal experience.

I walked back in the living room. Keith Jarrett was done so I put a little Van Morrison on. My wife loves Van Morrison. I picked the "Inarticulate Speech of the Heart" album. Jessie was dressed and sitting on the couch talking to Joey. She was intense but calm. She was shushing Radio and asking one question after another preceded by the phrase, "Joey, ask your friend..."

"Well," I thought "the managing partner is back."

I told her about my conversation with Variety. She was quiet for a moment, then said "Honey, I did some thinking in the shower. I don't believe it serves us to avoid the reality of what is happening. If I am clear about what Joey's friend is saying, things could get dicey very quickly. I'm afraid that we could be at risk."

"What do you suggest." I love it when she manages things. She's generous enough to pretend to my authority in the household and the kids are generous enough not to rub the pretense in my face. The truth is she's quicker and more practical. I have learned to trust her instincts and follow her lead.

"I'm afraid we must take a defensive posture. I think we should put out feelers to friends and people who can be trusted, people who have children and who, if Variety is any indication, should be in the middle of the same mess.

"The fact that you, as an adult, are having these same sym... experiences...indicates this is a general phenomenon".

She was going to say symptoms. Clearly she didn't have this settled for herself as well as she pretended. No doubt she still kept the possibility of delusion viable. She's tough minded, weighs all the options no matter how unpleasant.

I watched her as she visited with Joey. Her auburn hair bobbed at her shoulders, simply cut and worn naturally in the fashion of the day. On the sunset side of forty, she was still one fine looking woman. She's a lady of glorious proportions, close to 5'10", with a big, ripe body that is my everlasting pleasure and her everlasting embarrassment. Why is it that women always want to be 5'4", skinny and blonde? I've been following her around drooling like a hound in heat for almost twenty years and she still worries about her looks. I don't try to understand women anymore. I just enjoy them.

I pushed down my rising lust and tried to see what was behind her questioning of Joey and his friend.

Clearly, if a large part of the population was having these "experiences", things were going to get disrupted. The inner city is a festering mess. It wouldn't take too much to destabilize it. Even if this whole thing was about something in the water, crazies would soon be out everywhere. If that happened, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the kids will get the worst of it.

I think children ought to get more respect, but that doesn't mean I woke up after that goofy dream ready to hand over the reigns. It's pretty easy being a gadfly to society when all you have to do is stand back and criticize. It's something else when you are confronted with having things the way you think they should be. For the first time in my life, I was losing control of my children. I didn't like it one bit.

"Shooee...what a soapbox. You really do like to indulge in thinking don't you." The little black boy, still naked, sat on the back of the reclining chair not three feet from where Jessie was quizzing Joey. "Do you really think it makes any difference what your opinions are?"

It was still an eerie sensation that no one else was aware of his presence. Jesse, Radio and Joey were engrossed in their conversation and didn't even look up.

"It's automatic," I said "I think, therefore I am."

"Descartes o' nine tails, that's what it is. It's self flagellation. You need to lighten up. Your role is ordained. All of this worrying and fretting won't put food on the table or bring you sexual liasons. Just 'be' with the situation." He wasn't struggling for idioms any longer.

"You're big on advice for a figment of my imagination." I was beginning to feel hostile. I put an old Iron Butterfly album called Ball on the stereo and skipped the first track on side one and played "Soul Experience". Jesse made me turn it down.

My friend wouldn't shutup. "You use precious time discounting me. Work harder. Time is short. You waste your energy on resistance. I repeat, listening is a more appropriate use of your time than thinking. Be in the present."

Now Jesse still lives with me for one reason. I'm trainable. She knows that if she keeps a steady shoe to my lumbar region, I'll move down the right road. I operate like a prime mule, hard as hell to get started, but real game after I've decided to pull the plow.

I took a deep breath and looked at the little guy. "Okay, what do I need to do?"

"Nothing," he smiled "just listen."

He ffoooped off.

Jesse was sitting back in her chair with Radio's head on her lap. She looked thoughtful...sort of like Eisenhower must have looked thoughtful just before D-day.

"Thomas, I want you to call a few people."