Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7
It lasted little more than a year. The Resource chick moved out when she was six months pregnant with Jimmy’s kid. Left Jimmy a five-line note taped to the fridge. Said she was looking for a karmic reboot. Whatever the hell that meant. Fact of the matter is, Jimmy creeped the chick out with his hallucinations and amateur science experiments. Jimmy’d been a research doctor back in the day, an MD/PhD, but he hardly had the brain cells left to boil an egg. It wasn’t his fault. After the Pestilent Maize hit, everybody got real stupid fast. The corn genome infiltrated our cerebral cortex. You know the type of day you have where everything accumulates? Well, that part of your brain that does the adding up — that puts time together — is gone. When you become infected, you let go of your uniqueness. That’s a wonderful release. You stop wasting your life trying to obtain impossible dreams. You no longer feel crappy about yourself because you don’t stack up. You assimilate. You are welcomed by the colony. You anxiety fades. Your soul dissolves into the void.
Jimmy tried to get back into the game. Spent his days titrating and distilling. Wanted to reverse the malaise with chemistry. But fumes from the Bunsen burner made him see ghosts in the floor tiles. When Jimmy failed to find a cure for the collapse, he got frustrated. Violent. Couldn’t remember basic calculus. Didn’t recognize his own lab notes. The self-loathing and doubt triggered an irrational rage. Resource chick feared for her life. More than once called the cops when Jimmy started smashing things.
After the chick left, Jimmy lost his will to live. He stopped eating. He took excessive risks. Rode his Harley in the rain. At night, he drank himself into a foul stupor. Stretched out in the bathtub. Fully clothed. Ran a utility knife up and down his wrist — before he passed out. Tiny giant had all he could do to jump-start Jimmy out of his funk. Used his psychic powers to get Jimmy’s endorphins flowing. Held Jimmy’s head up so it wouldn’t sink beneath the surface of the water. Sat there on the tub singing to him like a baby.
Jimmy heard through a mutual friend that the Resource chick was out in California, working at one of the food distribution centers. After she gave birth, the chick tried to stay in touch. Once she sent Jimmy some fingernail clippings in an unmarked envelope. Some of his kid’s hair. A drawing the boy did of a sailboat on a lake. It was like he’d been kidnapped. But with no ransom note. A few months later, Jimmy found a FedEx pouch propped against his door. Inside was a single strip of prints from a photo booth. The kid was wearing a cowboy hat. He was sitting between Jimmy’s ex and some guy in Army fatigues. Jimmy wasn’t jealous. He was actually glad she’d hooked up with somebody who could protect them.
About David Hancock
