Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

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I was so mad that I slammed the sauce onto the counter and the lid popped off. "Will you just tell me why it is that the only way we ever seem to take steps forward in life is through pain? Huh? Why is exposure to pain always supposed to make us better people?" "Heather, it's grotesque to think for even a moment that suffering in and of itself makes you a better person." "I'm listening." "Heather, I'm having one of my good days today. I'm not feeling as full of doubt as last time. Doubt comes and goes. And my thinking today is that it's equally grotesque to think that a lack of bad events in your life means you're a good person. Life is only so long. The whistle gets blown, and "when it does, where you are is where you are. If people lived to be five hundred, that's probably be about long enough for everybody to have experienced most of what there is, and to have done all of the bad stuff, too. But we check out roughly at seventy-two." "So?" "So if we assume that God is just - and I think He is, even after everything that's happened - then justice can still be done. Maybe not here on earth, or in our own lifetimes, but for justice to happen then there has to be something beyond this world. Life on this plane is simply too short for justice." "Huh." "Some people even give the impression that they've escaped all the bad stuff, but I don't think anybody does. Not really." "You don't?" "No." "I used to be a really nice person, Reg." "I can't say that about myself." "But now something's changed and I'm not a nice person anymore. It happened to me today in the mall's bathroom when I was crying. I stopped being nice." Reg said, "No, no, that's not true." In any event, I was heating the spaghetti sauce, and I dropped the subject of psychics, evil, Froggles, and Jason, and spoke about those things that float on the surface, things without roots: current events, TV and movies. The moment Reg left I pounced on the phone and called Allison, but she didn't pick up and there was no machine. I tried again an hour later. Nothing. I would have called her every three minutes, but then I realized how uncool it would look if Allison came in, looked at her call screening display, and saw that I'd phoned her seventy-eight times. So instead I phoned her three more times, and just now took a sedative my doctor had given me back when Jason Page 104
first disappeared, but which I've so far refused to take. I'm going to bed. Monday night 7:00 Work today was hard, and I screwed up several times. I passed on lunch with Jayne from the court next door, and I bought a tuna salad sandwich and some chocolate milk. It sat beside me untouched on the courtyard steps while I began phoning Allison's number once again. How many times had it been, at that point - ten? But I couldn't help it: her number was the combination to a safe, and I desperately wanted in. <strong>By</strong> the end of lunch hour, I felt sick - well, more freaked out than sick. I clocked out and drove home, as if home would afford me any comfort. I phoned Allison twice again and then decided at the last minute to visit Jason's mother at the extended-care facility off Lonsdale. She was awake and for an instant seemed to recognize me, but quickly forgot me again. She kept asking for Joyce, Jason's old dog, but I told her about ten times that because I was allergic to her, Joyce was living with Chris down in Silicon Valley. Then she asked how Jason was. I said he was fine, and then from the innocent expression on her face I time-traveled just a few months in the past to a world where Jason was still here. I felt relief that we'd decided to not tell her the news. Tuesday morning 5:30 Allison won't answer her phone, and I'm ready for murder. For the love of God, how many times do I have to dial her? I threw all caution to the wind and put her number on autoredial for the entire evening. Then I went and bought a copy of every local newspaper and checked out all the psychics, looking for her. I went through the Yellow Pages and the Internet, and still nothing. She must have some sort of business alias. I called all the psychics I could, asking who Allison might be, but nobody knew. Some of them tried reeling me in by fishing for what Allison might have been onto. Scum. But all leads went dead. The nerve of this woman - the nerve - she knows darn well what it's like to endure what I've endured, and she doesn't return my call. I can't sleep. Instead, I just think about her more and more, and then I think about Jason, somewhere out there in the afterworld trying to reach me, and instead all he connects with is Allison in her teal-colored fleece - pilled fleece, at that - who tells me right out of the gate that she's in the business of being a liar. I walk around the condo, talking aloud, telling Jason that he could come directly to me, instead of wasting his time trying to go through this uncommunicative Allison bitch. I then felt uncharitable and petty. I thought that maybe if I drank a couple of gallons of water, it'd de-gunk anything in my veins or muscles that might be blocking Jason from reaching me directly. Then I figured I was maybe too clear, so I drank a shot of tequila. Page 105
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Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Couplan
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house was quiet - not even a clock
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I said, "Let's talk about it at hom
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Dear God, Remove the blood from the
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My family didn't know what to make
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Dear God, What's hardest here is th
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The important thing is that we were
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only indicate Your absence - that f
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outfits must have made us look all
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And I did have questions and uneasy
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late into the game, I think." "What
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didn't hurt, the shooting, and I di
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someone who spends her days deliver
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ecame ghosts. The only thing that c
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It's a bit later again, still here
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on a locker's ventilation slits. "L
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turned around to me and said, "You
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their badge. Another cop looked at
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myself reflected in the one remaini
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* * * Like anyone, I've seen those
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I sat down, while Mom gave Joyce a
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Mom said, "Didn't you hear me?" Dad
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"Stick a potato in it. Your job, by
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"Barb?" "Go now. Because I'll break
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the water, and here I am now in my
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My main memories of those two weeks
Page 53 and 54: Just don't screw your life up the w
Page 55 and 56: was in. What came over me? It was n
Page 57 and 58: I changed the subject. "How long ar
Page 59 and 60: In the third week after the massacr
Page 61 and 62: don't, and they all work so hard -
Page 63 and 64: Alive! friends look forward to the
Page 65 and 66: But I was going to say that when it
Page 67 and 68: "Tell me." "He said, 'Who are we to
Page 69 and 70: "I've heard of that. More for me, t
Page 71 and 72: I dropped the rock onto a nearby bo
Page 73 and 74: But I hadn't killed Yorgo. I stoppe
Page 75 and 76: * * * I'm in a Denny's in North Van
Page 77 and 78: "No. Just you." I was confused. I h
Page 79 and 80: have a carry-on bag? So that some c
Page 81 and 82: I was going to motion to the elevat
Page 83 and 84: Saturday afternoon 4:00 I met Jason
Page 85 and 86: Barb's commuting down the coast, an
Page 87 and 88: "Heather, how many people are in th
Page 89 and 90: Okay, Barb's housekeeper will be in
Page 91 and 92: Oh, Heather, you knew it wouldn't b
Page 93 and 94: "I'm driving." "So?" I didn't argue
Page 95 and 96: kitchen table where I picked at the
Page 97 and 98: "Wait. Hold on a minute. When you g
Page 99 and 100: It was becoming windy, and our voic
Page 101 and 102: Oh. So, um - what are you up to lat
Page 103: "Why did he say, 'Oh, I say'?" "Bec
Page 107 and 108: What has happened to me? I've gone
Page 109 and 110: In my peripheral vision I'm also no
Page 111 and 112: sweater and readying my purse. "Oh,
Page 113 and 114: morning jobs, and he clocked out ea
Page 115 and 116: Tuesday afternoon 3:00 I was eating
Page 117 and 118: "No, I'm not." And he wasn't. Reg h
Page 119 and 120: "Five thousand dollars." "I figured
Page 121 and 122: existence. This is when I felt the
Page 123 and 124: "How could Allison have known such
Page 125 and 126: Okay then, what did happen? I follo
Page 127 and 128: Five years ago, before I met Jason,
Page 129 and 130: Allison didn't like this. "Oh, real
Page 131 and 132: I was appalled. "How could you use
Page 133 and 134: eating an egg salad sandwich, when
Page 135 and 136: We were in the Keg at the foot of L
Page 137: But I haven't lost you, my son. No
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Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

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