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Previously: Mapmaker and co suspect that recent contagion events are all caused by a single instigator. Mapmaker needs a break to play his guitar.
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○ Months after the Great Opening, Manhattan
Deshawn strummed a chord. It needed more distortion.
As he pressed down the guitar pedal, he caught a warped reflection of himself in the tinfoil that covered the walls of his bedroom: thick glasses, lanky, T-shirt and jeans that didn't fit. He was aware of his own stereotype. If he saw himself in the street, he would classify himself in an instant: Gen Alpha, nerd. He didn't feel like either of those things. For one, he didn't watch anime. For another, he played guitar like the second cousin of the devil himself – one of dead gran's famous southern similes – or in his ma's flowery professor words, he played like a mathematician solving the equation of sound. Which really did make him sound like a nerd.
Deshawn strummed the second chord. The distortion was high enough now. He began the hypnotic riff from "Get Got" and chanted over it:
"Made a hole through to my head / Pierced the skull and / Took in the breeze...nuh-nuh nuh-nuh nuh-nuh-nuh..."
He forgot how this part went. In fact, he wasn't sure if any of these lyrics were right. His memory was only good for gestalts – wholes rather than parts.
"Struck by each mind's floating streams / In the nexus weaving dreams," he attempted.
Death Grips was a band from the early 2010s that combined punk rock, hip hop, and glitchy industrial. It was difficult to place on his maps. He liked his music that way: unclassifiable.
He wove a wall of sound until he entered trance. Trance was like a home. It helped him forget all the post-Opening craziness outside. More importantly, it brought him to the place he went mentally to make his maps. Or more like...returned him there.
He practiced the riff over and over, nodding his head left and right, four power chords looping back on themselves in syncopated rhythm, like an ouroboric lanyard.
He stopped. He could feel someone outside his door. Deshawn put the guitar on its stand.
There was a light knocking. "Deshawn?"
Deshawn opened the door. His dad was there in his wheelchair.
"Deshawn, it's 12:39am."
"Oh."
"Look, it's no big deal for me. Your mom and I sleep like rocks. But the folks I just leased the apartment to next door, they're complaining about the noise."
"I thought you were retired."
"Yeah, well, with the economy where it is right now, we can't exactly rely on your mom's poetry professorship to rake in the dough, if you know what I'm saying. Unless somehow her next poem gets a movie deal." His dad grinned. "That was a joke."
"OK," said Deshawn. He felt antsy. He'd been on the verge of a potential memespace connection.
His dad's grin fell away. He glanced around Deshawn's room. Normally Deshawn kept it meticulously tidy, but he'd been too in the zone the past few days to pay much attention to where he put things. Now that he'd discovered The Instigator, it was the only thing he cared about. He was like a stone rolling down a hill.
"You all good in there?"
"Yeah, I'm good. I'll plug in headphones. I forgot this time. Sorry about that."
His dad smiled again, nodding across the room. "You know the story behind that guitar?"
"It's mom's."
"It was mom's. She gave it to you. But did she ever tell you that it was the reason we met?"
"No." For some reason it had never occurred to Deshawn to ask how his parents met. "Do you want to tell me?" he immediately regretted saying.
"Now where'd you get that idea? Yeah, son! You gonna let me in?"
Deshawn sighed, then stepped aside so his dad could wheel into his room. His dad squinted against the bright red and blue grow lights over Deshawn's bonsai tree. Then he glanced at the tin foil covering the walls, which reflected a purple gleam across his dad's waxed scalp.
"You been sleeping all right?"
"Better than before," said Deshawn.
"I'm gonna talk to your mom about that fancy paint you want. I know she called it crazy, but I told her whatever helps the boy sleep, helps the boy sleep."
"Thanks, dad."
His dad wheeled around and then looked him in the eye. "So about that guitar." Deshawn didn't do eye contact, but he noticed that his dad's eyes (which were typically a bit crossed) looked strangely normal. His dad wheeled over to the guitar and put one hand on the curve of its red-hued body.
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"The Rickenbacker 330," he said. "Know how I remember that? It's the first words your mom spoke to me."
"The first words mom said to you were, 'Rickenbacker 330'?"
"That's right. I asked her, 'What kind of guitar is that?' And so she told me, all distracted while preparing for her show. She said: It's The Rickenbacker 330."
Deshawn frowned. "What do you mean her show?"
"Really? She just gave you this thing without telling you? Before you mom went into academia, she was the frontwoman of the baddest hardcore punk band in the city! But she didn't call herself 'frontwoman,' of course. They were all, you know, DIY egalitarian anarchists or whatever."
Deshawn sat down. His interest was now competing with his desire to get his dad out of his room as quickly as possible. He tried to recall the name of the venue that he'd read was the birthplace of punk. "Did she every play at, uh, CPGP's?"
"You mean CBGB's? Hell yeah she did! In fact that's where I became her groupie."
He meant to respond oh cool, ok I'm going to go to sleep now. Instead he responded: "You were her groupie?"
"Hey don't say it like that. You woulda been her groupie too if you'd seen her!" His dad stared dreamily into space. "Jean jacket with the studs and the patches, laced-up knee-high boots with chains hanging from 'em, red streaks and medallions all in her dreds...her hair was like a punk Christmas tree! And her piercings..."
Again, he tried to say, nice, ok, goodnight. But also...this was an opportunity to deepen his understanding of the punk memeplex, so instead he said, "She had piercings?
"Indeed she did. Not to mention those same piercing eyes that she still has today. Heh heh!" his dad said, laughing at his own wordplay. "Yup, I was a goner from the second I saw her. And I didn't even like punk. I'd come to CBGB's on the wrong night!
"I got real close to the stage, no earplugs, because I'd come thinking there'd be bluegrass. Nope. Hardcore punk all night. Anyway, I got close and I saw she had this earring that was an upside-down cross. And I remember thinking, 'Just what I need, to fall in love with a damn satanist.'
You can bet your mom's mom didn't like that earring one bit. No siree! Your gran, when she met me, she put one hand on my knee and she asked me, 'Ethan, can I count on you to turn my daughter toward Christ our Lord?' I said 'Of course, ma'am,' cuz I would have said anything for your mom. But in my head I was like, 'What kind of question is that?' You should have seen your gran's when she found out my last name was Baruch. Whoaaah boy. That almost gave her a heart attack. She didn't realize that my folks were Ethiopian Jews. But you know I loved your gran. We all did. She just wanted your mom to be happy."
"So, uh, CBGB's. You went up to her?" Deshawn asked, hoping to speed the story along, so his dad would finish and get out.
"Hell no! I was scared as hell! Did you know I was a socially inept computer nerd back then? But we didn't have any of this internet stuff you guys have now. I was into hardware. Used to build my own computers."
"You never told me that."
"Yup. Really just a hobbyist though. But then I started selling them and that when I realized I was good at sales. Buy yeah, before that, I was shy like you. You'll get over it when you've got something to fight for, trust me."
"OK..."
"Anyway, so I followed that freaky band of hers all over the city. The Freedom Fighters, they called themselves. Shouting 'Down with capitalism!' and all that. My ears still haven't recovered," his dad laughed and shook his head.
"I kept trying to summon up the courage to talk to her, but I tell you, after her gigs the whole damn room would flock to her like moths to a flame. And you bet she'd burn them – ho ho! – your mom had a big bad attitude then. Even bigger than now if you'd believe it. I couldn't get in there past all those fans. If she's were playing these days? With Psi and all? The whole city would be flocking.
Back then all the record people were trying to offer her deals. She said no to all of 'em, you know. Wouldn't release a single record. Something about keeping music to its roots. Keeping it all communal. Keeping the music alive. She thought that the music died as soon as you froze it on a record."
Deshawn scrunched his brow. "But now she writes down words for a living."
"Not really, son. She teaches at Colombia. That's how she makes her bread. No money in poetry these days. Or ever really." His dad pointed at him. "But hey, don't let that discourage you. You wanna write poems, you write poems. You wanna make maps, you make maps, all right?"
"OK, sounds good. I think I'll go to bed now," Deshawn said.
"Wait! Story's almost over! OK, so eventually, I get an idea. I roll up before one of her shows with a big shipping box. I go to the stage manager. He stops me and he's like, 'Where are you going?' And I told him, 'Package for Deborah.' He let me go backstage with a suspicious eye. Anyway, that's when I see your mom tuning that guitar right there. The Rickenbacker 330. And that's when I showed her what was inside my box. I'd brought her a little token of affection."
"What was in the box?"
"That's the first thing she asked."
"And what did you say?"
" 'A piece of my heart'."
"But what was it?"
"It was a, uh...spiked choker."
There was a pause. Then they both broke into laughter.
"Hey, I actually made my boy laugh! Yeah, she laughed too. She laughed her ass off at me. And I just stood there kinda helpless in my striped little bowtie."
It didn't surprise Deshawn that his dad had always worn his bowties. It wouldn't surprise him if his dad had been born wearing a bowtie.
"But then you know what she did when she finished laughing?" his dad continued. "She took me by the hand and said, 'Let's go.' And I was like, 'Uh. Where?' And she said, 'I'm buying you a drink.' Well, her bandmates, they were none too happy about that. They had a show to put on! But your mom reminded them that they were the Freedom Fighters and they were each free to do whatever they want. Different Deborah than the one you know, right?" His dad chuckled.
"The band broke up soon after that. Yup, she still blames that one on me. But she said I was worth it – heh heh. We ate pizza that night at her squat in the East Village. You believe it, fancy lady like your mother? Living in a squat? Two weeks afterward, I leased your mom her first apartment. And two months after that? I moved into it. Heh heh! You shoulda seen her reaction when I carried in all my crates of cathode ray tubes and circuit boards! She was like 'Who did I just move in with?' Heh heh!"
His dad's laugh was like the honking of a goose.
"Heyyy now," he said, looking at Deshawn, "I can't remember the last time I saw you smile, D." He took Deshawn's hand in his own. Deshawn stopped himself from pulling it back. "We been worried about you. Don't you think some sunshine would do you good?"
"Oh..." He felt the tic start in his cheeks.
"How about we go for a walk in St. Nicholas Park. Or...you walk. I'll roll." His dad smiled.
"I think not right now," said Deshawn. "I've got a lot of work to do. With the maps and stuff."
"Hm. All right. You sure?"
"Yeah, dad. Maybe some other time."
"All right, you'll let me know?"
"Yeah."
Deshawn heard steps in the hallway. The sleepy voice of his mother: "Ethan, come back to bed and let our boy play his damn guitar." She yawned. "Fuck the neighbors."
"OK, all right. I'm coming. Well...goodnight then, Deshawn. Get some rest."
"Goodnight, dad. Thanks for the story."
Deshawn closed the door behind him. He looked at the guitar, at the light gleaming off its body. He tried to imagine his mom playing it in a studded jean jacket. The image didn't come easily. But then Deshawn's own friends – if some day he made some – probably wouldn't guess that Deshawn played either.
He put on headphones. Then he strummed another chord—as his gran would say—like the second cousin of the devil himself.