“So where are you going to live?”
“To begin with, I’ll go to my mother’s.”
“In Abilene? Terrific.”
“Then, if things work out with Eve, I’ll get a place in Santa Fe.”
“And what about us? What about work? You gonna commute every day from Abilene?”
“That’s really what I wanted to talk with you about.”
“You want out?”
“If that’s what you want. Or maybe I just take a sabbatical—”
“A sabbatical? Jesus, Ben. You are one fucked-up guy.”
That was the extent of the help and understanding his best friend had to offer. The next day when he came into the office he told Ben it would be better if they made a clean break of things. He coolly asked him to think about a reasonable buyout, bearing in mind the downturn in business and all the money they owed. Maybe he should get himself a lawyer, Martin added. Ben felt the first cool breeze of his new independent life, as if it had already begun.
When the kids came home, he was slumped asleep in front of Casablanca. The movie was ending, the plane gone. Bogart and Claude Rains were strolling off into the fog.
Sarah had heard the car and come downstairs. Ben walked out to the hallway. Josh’s eyes were like an albino rabbit’s and he was smiling, probably at something he and Abbie had been talking about as they came in. Abbie’s smile vanished in a flash. She looked at Sarah, standing at the foot of the stairs, her face as white as her bathrobe, and then at Ben, still disoriented by sleep and trying to order his thoughts. He could see the fear creep into her eyes.
“Mom? What is it?”
“Your father’s got something to tell you.”
“Abbie,” he began. “Josh . . .”
He stalled. His heart was beating so hard he could hardly hear himself think. All he had thought of saying seemed to have erased itself.
“For God’s sake, Dad, what is it?”
“Your mother and I are going to separate—”
“No,” Sarah cut in. “Tell the truth. Your father is leaving us.”
Abbie’s face started to crumple.
“What?” she said. “You’re leaving?”
“Sweetheart—”
“What are you talking about?”
She looked desperately at Sarah, a pitiful, incredulous little smile flicking on and off her lips. As if this might turn out to be some terrible, elaborate joke.
“Mom?”
Sarah shrugged and nodded.
“It’s true.”
Josh was peering at him, his eyes puckered in a frown as he tried to make sense of what was happening.
“Are you guys, like, serious?”
“Yes, Josh.”
“Just like that?” Abbie said.
Her shoulders were shaking and she was gnawing at her fist now. God almighty, Ben thought, what am I doing? Martin’s right. I must have gone mad. He reached out to her but she backed away from him, her face distorting with shock and disgust.
“Dad,” Josh said. “You can’t do this. I mean . . .”
He ran out of words and just stood there frowning, his mouth hanging open.
“It’ll all be okay, Joshie. Honestly—”
“No! It won’t be okay!” Abbie screamed. “You idiot! You’re ruining our lives!”
He tried to reach her again, but this time she lashed out at his hand and turned and ran sobbing toward the stairs. Sarah didn’t try to stop her, just stood aside to let her pass. The three of them stood there in silence as she ran up the stairs. The slam of her bedroom door made the whole house shake. Sarah shook her head and gave him a wry smile.
“Nice work, Benjamin.”
And she turned and followed Abbie up the stairs.
FOURTEEN
Dressing up as genetically engineered fruit was Mel’s idea and had once seemed a pretty funny one. They had spent every evening of the week before Thanksgiving making their costumes out of painted papier-mâché and Mel’s, a scarlet strawberry with the head of a bemused-looking fish sticking out the front, was by a long way the best. Everyone who saw it just cracked up.
Mel had driven all the way up from Missoula on Sunday with the others in Hacker’s camper van, the fruit suits roped precariously to the roof. It was a miracle they had arrived in one piece, which was more than could be said for Abbie’s right now. Hers was supposed to be a cross between a tomato and a sheep but no longer looked like either. In the unremitting drizzle, it was fast reverting to pulp. Both its front legs had fallen off as well as its tail and the red paint had run all down the front of her sodden parka and pants. Eric and Scott, marching to her left, had already ditched their costumes and it wouldn’t be long before Abbie did so too. To her left, Mel’s still looked perfect. She’d probably given it a sneaky final coat of waterproof paint. And beyond Mel was Hacker, who hadn’t made a costume at all, no doubt considering himself above anything so childish.
It was early morning and downtown Seattle was a vibrant sea of humanity. Thousands of demonstrators, tens of thousands, were crammed shoulder to shoulder in every street, all marching toward the convention center. And, despite the cold and the rain, everyone seemed to be having a ball, waving and shouting, laughing and chanting.
There ain’t no power like the power of the people And the power of the people won’t stop!
There were people dressed as trees and elephants, turtles and whales—who all seemed a lot more waterproof than Abbie’s sheep-tomato—and above them fluttered a gaudy canopy of banners denouncing the evils of the World Trade Organization. The guy in front had one with a huge picture of Dracula sinking his bloody fangs into the planet. The woman next to him was waving one that said WTO. Fix it or Nix it. Those who weren’t chanting were blowing whistles or honking horns or ringing bells or banging drums to a dozen different rhythms.
And it wasn’t just students and hippies. There were people of all ages, colors, creeds, and nationalities, taxi drivers and construction workers, cleaners and clerks. What was more, it actually seemed to be having an impact. Word was going around that they had already succeeded in stopping the opening ceremony and that all the fat-cat politicians were either cowering in their hotel suites or besieged in their limos. In fact, the whole city was under siege and the police were just standing around unable to do a thing.
It was totally awesome, like some epic carnival, the most fantastic display of solidarity Abbie had ever seen. History was being made. It was one of those world-changing events, like Woodstock or the Berlin Wall coming down or Martin Luther King, Jr., telling the world about his dream. And Abbie was actually taking part and bearing witness. In years to come she would be able to tell her children and grandchildren about it. She only wished she could feel more a part of it, more wholly involved. For, however hard she tried to block them, the images of what had happened over the weekend came flashing into her head and spoiling things.
She nearly hadn’t come here at all. The previous morning, her mom had virtually had to frog-march her into the airport. Abbie had said no way, she wasn’t going. They should all be together. She would stay home for the week; in fact she wouldn’t go back to college at all. But her mom would have none of it.
The woman had been incredible. On Sunday morning, while the bastard went around the house quietly gathering his things and packing his bags, she held her head up and didn’t shed a single tear. She was even nice to him, for heaven’s sake, helping him look for his goddamn glasses. It was obviously all a big front that sooner or later had to crack. But it hadn’t. All through the day, even after he went, she had looked after Abbie and Josh, kept on hugging and consoling them, as if the hurt belonged entirely to them.
Poor Joshie. He didn’t seem to know what to do. After their dad had broken the news and Abbie had fled screaming to her room, Josh had eventually followed his mom upstairs and found the two of them wailing and sobbing and clinging to each other. And he just sat himself down on the end of the bed and gazed forlornly at the wall. He was still ston
ed, of course, and trying to get his head around what had happened. But even the next day, even after that horrible, icy good-bye when they’d stood at the door with their mom’s arms around their shoulders and watched their dad go off down the driveway, his things all stacked into the back of the station wagon, the poor kid didn’t seem to know whether he was allowed to cry or had to be the big, brave man of the house.
“Abbie, listen to me,” her mom had said that night, when all three of them were sitting there at the kitchen table over a supper none of them wanted and Abbie had just announced she wasn’t going to fly to Seattle the next morning. “Listen to me. We are not going to let this destroy us. Life has to go on. Maybe your father’ll come back, maybe he won’t. My guess is that he will. But these things happen, and there’s nothing any of us can do about it. He’ll either come to his senses or not. Meanwhile, we get on with our lives, okay? You’ll darn well go to Seattle, young lady, and give these—TWO creeps—”
“WTO.”
“Whatever. You go there and give ’em hell. From me too. I don’t know who they are or what they’ve done, but I already don’t like them.”
They laughed. A little hysterically, but they actually laughed.
Then George and Ella arrived and there was more crying, but not by her mom. Grandma was intending to stay for a few days and even she told Abbie to stick to her plans and catch her flight, though Grandpa said the whole idea of the protest was woefully misguided and clearly inspired by anarchists and communists and that the WTO was, as a matter of fact, one of the few true forces for good left in the world. Abbie was too tired and too emotionally drained to fight.
So here she was, soaked to the skin and trying to enjoy being dressed as a sheep-tomato, which had now gotten so soft and gooey that the time had come to ditch it. Without breaking step, she managed to lower it to the ground and stepped almost gracefully out of it. Mel gave her a grin. She was the only person Abbie had told about her dad leaving and was under strict orders not to let the others know. The last thing Abbie wanted was for them all to start feeling sorry for her, treating her like she was some kind of invalid.
Hey-hey! Ho-ho! WTO has got to go!
Hey-hey! Ho-ho! WTO has got to go!
The rain seemed to be stopping now and as they marched forward the sky began to clear. Between the buildings she could see the ocean and port, two massive container ships anchored offshore. She had never been to this city before. Stacked steeply at the water’s edge, it was even more stunning than she had heard.
Up ahead there was a billowing black pillar of smoke and as the march surged on she saw a Dumpster had been set on fire and fueled with car tires. The crowd divided to pass it. Now, below the hubbub, she heard glass being smashed but she couldn’t see where or what it was. To her right now, a chanting throng of demonstrators was laying siege to a McDonald’s. They had a banner saying Resist McDomination and some were hammering on the windows and the doors. On the walls, in black paint, they had scrawled McShit and McMeat Is Murder.
The police they had so far seen had been laid-back and friendly. A couple of them, riding along with the march on mountain bikes, had even smiled and joked with them. But the ones they were now beginning to see looked altogether different. They seemed to be some kind of special riot police. They were all in black, wearing helmets with visors and gas masks, long capes and leather leggings and jackboots. They stood still as statues, blocking off the side streets, nightsticks at the ready.
“Wow,” Mel said. “Who are those guys?”
“It’s the Darth Vader look-alike convention,” Eric said. As ever, he had his accordion with him and immediately started playing the theme to Star Wars. Everybody around them started singing along and yelling May the Force be with you! If any of the cops were amused, it was impossible to tell. Their visors and gas masks completely obscured their faces.
A helicopter suddenly thundered over their heads and they all ducked as the air vibrated to the thud of its blades. Gradually, the march slowed and then stopped and for a long time they all stood there, chanting and singing, canyoned around by the stores and office blocks, herded ever more closely by the cordons of cops and the pressure of more marchers arriving behind.
Quite how or why it all began to go wrong, Abbie never really knew. Some later blamed it on a few nervous or trigger-happy cops. Another Dumpster had been set on fire and the black and acrid smoke kept drifting across the crowd so that sometimes it was impossible to see what was happening. Through the crowds Abbie could see a lockdown going on, a circle of chanting protesters, their linked arms encased in metal pipes.
Listen to the voices of the people in the street!
We don’t have a vote, we don’t have a seat!
And beneath this now, another voice, that with every repetition became steadily more stern and ominous. Somebody with a megaphone was telling everyone to leave the area, that they were in violation of state and city law and that all who refused to disperse would be arrested for unruly behavior.
To begin with, Abbie didn’t know what the smell was. She thought it must be something burning in the Dumpster. Then her eyes started to sting and in the next moment the crowd in front of her scattered and she saw a cannister rolling across the ground, spewing smoke. Somebody yelled that it was tear gas. A young guy who had brought his own gas mask rushed forward and grabbed the canister and hurled it back behind the lines of police who were now starting to move down the street toward them. The cops had plastic shields and nightsticks at the ready and all but a few defiant or foolhardy protesters began to retreat nervously before them.
In just a few minutes, the whole atmosphere had changed. For the moment, the breeze was blowing the tear gas away from them, but there was the start of panic now and it rapidly began to spread.
Through a gap in the crowd, Abbie saw one of the protesters who had stood his ground being beaten to his knees by the cops with their nightsticks and the limp body of another being dragged away. Some who saw it started jeering and yelling and one or two started hurling anything they could find at the cops. But the cordon steadily advanced. Then a girl standing just a few yards ahead of Abbie jerked violently and fell and started screaming and rolling on the ground, clasping her leg.
“Holy shit!” Eric yelled. “They’re shooting at us!”
Even as he said it, there was a sudden salvo of sharp pops and two more protesters cried out and fell. One was clutching his face. Abbie saw blood streaming through his fingers.
“They’re firing plastic,” Hacker said. He probably meant to reassure them but it didn’t do the trick for Abbie. She had never felt more scared in her life. Hacker and Scott were helping Mel scramble out of her strawberry-fish, whose expression suddenly seemed a lot less amusing.
“Come on,” Hacker said. “Let’s get out of here.”
But it was easier said than done. Except for the few who were standing up to the police, everybody was trying to leave. There were too many people and too much panic and nobody seemed to know the best way to go. With the flow of the crowd, they were being swept toward a side street but then those in front started ducking and diving. Water was gushing all over them and for a moment Abbie couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. Then she saw the police truck with its water cannon and in the next moment the jet caught Mel full in the chest and sent her cartwheeling backward.
Abbie rushed to her and knelt beside her and asked if she was okay, and Mel nodded but seemed too shocked to know. There was a trickle of blood coming from her nose. Hacker and Scott took hold of her, one on each side, and hoisted her to her feet. As they hauled her off, Hacker yelled to Abbie over his shoulder to stay close.
Once they had gotten clear of the water cannon, Abbie stopped and looked back for Eric. There was no sign of him. Then she spotted his accordion lying smashed on the ground. She hollered to Hacker and the others to stop but they couldn’t have heard her. They were somewhere near the burning Dumpster and the air was suddenly swirling again with bl
ack smoke and when it cleared and she looked in the direction she had last seen them, they had vanished.
She started to run but must have lost her bearings, because there weren’t so many people now and she realized she must be heading back toward the advancing police line. Another helicopter roared over and as she looked up at it she collided with a man who was running the other way. The impact shocked her and knocked the wind from her and she gave a little whimper and just stood there, fighting for breath and trying to figure out where to run, but her head was paralyzed with panic.
That was when the tear-gas canister came skidding across the debris and knocked her clean off her feet. The back of her skull hit the ground when she fell and she saw a flash of white light. For how long she was knocked out, she had no idea, maybe only a few seconds, but when she opened her eyes again she was staring at the sky and wondering what that strange black blur was and why the air was throbbing so. Then as the world reconfigured she realized there was a helicopter directly above her and she had a sudden fearful certainty that it was going to land right on top of her. She scrambled to her knees and then to her feet and tried to run but found she couldn’t because of the pain in her shin where the gas canister had struck her. The air all around her was filling fast with the tear gas and her eyes and lungs were on fire and she hadn’t the slightest idea which way to run. Alone in the chaos, Abbie stood there and clamped her hands to her eyes and started to scream.
The next thing she knew, someone had grabbed hold of her arm and was hauling her away. Her first thought was that it was a cop and she yelled and lashed out at him.
“For Christ’s sake, I’m trying to help you!”
Through her streaming, smarting eyes all she could see was the black snout of a gas mask, which made her think, despite what he’d said, that he had to be a cop. Then the snout lifted and she saw a thin, stubbled face and a pair of intense blue eyes and long black hair tucked pirate-fashion under a red bandana. He was dressed all in black but he sure didn’t look like a cop.