At 1 o'clock, a program was scheduled in the makeshift bandshell, a brief medley of patriotic songs performed by the elementary school's Lesbian Gay Straight Transgender Alliance, followed by two minutes for each of the three candidates for State Assembly, followed by the finale, the presentation of a lifetime achievement award for Karch Kiraly, perhaps the greatest volleyball player this nation has ever known, who was at the moment in the infirmary, having his head bandaged and ribs taped.
All Sergei wanted in the world, and he did not think it too much to ask, was for Murray Olongapo to fall off the platform. He did not want Olongapo to incur any permanent injuries from falling off the platform, he wanted only a stumble, a noticeable stumble that might underline Olongapo's age, perhaps imply a drinking problem, a flaw with the functioning of the inner ear, and therefore put in doubt his ability to function in the workaday world of Sacramento politics. Sergei had been responsible for -- long story; he had his reasons, none of them partisan; he'd loosened the railing -- Dole's fall from the podium in Grand Rapids, and he liked to take credit for underlining in everyone's mind that 77 years old was a sliver from 80, and 80 could be proven to be markedly different from 45, or even 56. All Sergei wanted and needed was for Murray Olongapo to stumble off the platform and into the crowd. If he could get Olongapo to stumble off the platform, or trip over a chair, or have great difficulty with the microphone, he could then ask Olongapo to take a physical, and if that happened, and everyone was told about this physical, Olongapo would be crippled, even if he was healthy.
Sergei had already put one nail into Murray's coffin, or so he believed, with SuitGate, the controversy enflamed by Nicky and Jeannie One and which produced magically delicious results.
There was a small item in the paper, about 14 months before, about Olongapo having left his just-pressed suit on the roof of his car, and having arrived at the ribbon cutting for a new skateboard park without the suit; he'd had to conduct the ceremony in a shiny Diadora sweat outfit, leaving everyone to wonder if he was trying to blend with the young people, or was trying to take Jerry Brown's anti-establishment wardrobe philosophy a few steps, tragically, further. This opened the door for Sergei's favorite maneuver, which was forcing the opponent to release his medical records. He'd done it in every race in America, especially against candidates over 60. After the lost suit, Sergei had called a press conference and got serious, doing his best Jesse Jackson, exploding a local injustice into something universal while presenting an air of enlightened disinterest, of annoyance even that he was the one who had to bring this to the attention of the public. "With all due respect to our senior citizens, in light of this revelation of the incumbent's favorite suit being left on the top of his car, left to fend for itself in traffic, where it fended, my friends, rather poorly [at that point Sergei produced a photo of the suit, shredded and forlorn, found by a local fisherman, who held it like a 4-foot tuna], in light of the fact that the incumbent absentmindedly left this suit to wither and die just before a crucial engagement with our district's best and brightest youth -- what the layman, what the average voter, what the concerned constituent might be compelled to think is that this man, this honorable man, might, perhaps, be very likely almost definitely suffering from early-stage Alzheimer's. And yet! And yet, I will make no definitive claims until a licensed physician provides a second opinion. But for now, I urge all residents of our community to say a nondenominational prayer for Murray Olongapo, and wish him a speedy recovery. Are there any questions?"
It had worked wonders, Sergei believed, and now Murray Olongapo was standing on the platform, a few feet from the superstar Karch Kiraly, and was making a typical Murray Olongapo speech: It was charming in its clumsiness, ingratiating in its shrugging way. He was not a graceful public speaker, and often said so, and people's expectations were lowered and thus they smiled at every damned word he managed to get out. Stuart, sitting on the platform waiting for his turn, watched Olongapo with a low, rumbling admiration. Olongapo had brought state money into the area, had improved the community colleges, had started a number of vocational programs for those unemployed during the downturn, fought gangs with midnight basketball, the list went on and on, and was pretty much beyond reproach. The man was fairly clearly a decent person; he'd been a high school teacher for 22 years before running for office, and he had six grandchildren, whom he never pulled onstage with him. Stuart even sort of liked his socks and his tie and his smile and easy manner, and felt that in hassling him, in casting aspersions and dragging his name through the mud -- they'd done so literally at a monster truck rally, using a Olongapo banner stolen from Murray's mother's home, after they'd knocked over her mailbox -- well, Stuart couldn't help feeling a little finky.
The Lesbian Gay Straight Alliance sang their patriotic medley, all four verses of "Amazing Grace," one student doing beatbox, three more playing the recorder, and stepped off the stage. Karch Kiraly accepted his award and was cheered by all, and introduced the audience to Sharon Fogliani, the third candidate in the Assembly race, whom Stuart had never heard of. She was running as an independent and was polling at about 8 percent, to Stuart's 14 and Murray's 41. Sharon Fogliani was the most qualified candidate and thus could not win. She was the ethical candidate, which meant she didn't have the cojones for the job. When she spoke, people heard reason and compassion, and the media yawned and went home because it was impossible to write about reason and compassion. As she spoke, the assembled reporters, sitting only a few feet from her, loudly complained about her style.
"At least Olongapo wears bright blue socks."
"Seems like the least you can do."
"And sometimes he says funny things."
"It's fun to quote funny things he says."
"It makes people happy."
"And he remembers my name every time he sees me."
"Me too!"
"But Fogliani treats me like some kind of ... journalist."
"Why can't Fogliani just go ahead and wear some bright blue socks?"
"It seems like shooting oneself in the foot, not to wear bright blue socks."
Fogliani had a master's in civil planning, had been on the historical preservation board for a decade, and had just spent four months in Kazakhstan building job retraining centers. She had a husband who owned a construction business and had three kids -- two kids in junior high, both of whom played oboe and ran track, and a daughter in college, at U.C.-San Diego no less. "She's not a factor," Sergei said, loud enough that Fogliani could hear. He was in the front row. "Why not?" Nicky asked.
"First of all," Sergei explained, "if she's so qualified, why is she running as an independent?" Nicky knew this one. "Because she's hiding something?"
"Exactly."
"You know what?" Sergei gasped at his own brilliance: "I bet her daughter's a lesbian!" Sharon Fogliani's daughter was indeed a lesbian. And Sharon Fogliani's lesbian daughter was now at the microphone, congratulating the Lesbian Gay Straight Transgender Alliance and smiling lovingly at her mom. It was a touching moment and a score for Sharon Fogliani, whoever the hell she was. Sharon Fogliani's lesbian daughter was articulate and warm, and the audience was drinking her in.
"Goddamn all these candidates and their lesbian daughters!" Nicky whispered to Sergei. "Why does every other candidate have a lesbian daughter? This is getting ridiculous."
Nicky looked to Sergei for an approving reaction, but Sergei was thinking of the lesbian daughter without her clothes on. She was very attractive, Sharon Fogliani's lesbian daughter, with her strawberry blond hair cut so short, her petite but curvy figure -- man oh man, Sergei loved short hair on a woman! Every time he saw a well-shaped woman with a close-cropped head, he began to think of her without her clothes on, and perhaps with a stalk of sugar cane in her mouth. There was almost nothing Sergei liked so much as a naked lesbian with a stalk of sugar cane in her mouth, especially if that woman had a close-cropped head of hair. Sergei was very much somewhere else, in the Nile Delta with the Fogliani lesbian, when Nicky brought him back to the physical world, hissing.
"I'm fine with the lesbians and stuff, as long as they don't flaunt it, shoving it in our faces all the time. Look at them, holding hands up there," Nicky said, pointing to Sharon Fogliani and her daughter. "Disgusting!"
Sergei and Nicky walked back to the booth, weaving between a group of sailors and small children waving plastic Kalashnikovs. Clouds above parried with the sun.
"So what's she hiding, you think?" Nicky asked.
Sergei thought for a moment.
"Doesn't matter," Sergei said. "Independents, third-party candidates -- they can't win."
"Why not?"
"Because no one votes for third-party candidates."
"Why not?"
"Because they can't win."
"Oh."
Another cluster of balloons, liberated by Dmitri, floated overhead, en route to the highway, where it would eventually land on the cab of an 18-wheeler, covering its windshield, blinding its driver and causing it to plow through an elementary school yoga class. No one will be hurt, but yoga will be quickly banned from all schools in the district.
"Besides, Fogliani's loony," said Sergei.
"Right."
"Why else would she be running for office?"
Nicky paused, doing the math. He hated math.
"Yeah, she's a loon," he said, nodding in a way he'd practiced in a mirror, to look both thoughtful and menacing.
"Like Angry Man."
"Right, like Angry Man."
Angry Man, the fourth candidate in the race, was at the podium, out of earshot for Sergei and Nicky, but it was clear, even from their vantage point, that he was angry. His name was Roger Something, but no one could hear his name over the roar of his wrath. He was angry that he was considered fourth, and not first or second or third. He was angry that he was not polling higher -- he was angry that the voters, whom he wanted so badly to lead and whom he loved so much, were such imbecilic pea-brained sheep and couldn't see that he was the only person qualified for this job. He loved this country so much that he wanted to change everything about it. He loved California so dearly, and was so proud of its many achievements, that he wanted to save it from itself and turn it completely around. He frequently compared the state to a ship, and said that he, as its skipper, would right it. He very much liked his ship metaphor and used it often, but one day, while he spoke to a group of three at a night-school class for recent immigrants learning English, someone mentioned that as a freshman state assemblyman, he probably wouldn't be the skipper -- that he'd be more like the gofer or assistant bartender on the Lido Deck. This had gotten a chuckle from the class, and had made the Angry Man angrier. Angry Man only had a few volunteers working for him, people who hated every boss they'd ever worked for, and now hated Angry Man. As he spoke at the Independence Day Walkabout and Arts Fair, at least a few people in the audience noticed that someone was talking.
"Man, that fellow sure seems upset."
"Is that Karch Kiraly?"
"I think so."
"What would he be so upset about? Didn't he just get some award?"
The Angry Man continued to talk about what he wanted. He wanted the country to be given to people like him, because he had ideals and passion and no one else did because they were getting the donations he'd tried and failed to get. They were getting the TV time he'd tried and failed to get. Why would people ignore him? This made him angry. He was sure there were people behind this, his low poll numbers and low campaign funds, and this, in him, stirred more anger. He'd been given four minutes but at this point he'd been speaking for 22 and hadn't gotten to any of the items on his notes. Every time they asked him to wrap it up he became enraged at the fact that this was what democracy had come to, yanking a guy off the stage because he wanted to discuss the issues.
No one seemed to be able to figure out how to get him gone, and were all puzzling about this, when over the stage came a great growing shadow, enveloping Angry Man in darkness. Angry Man looked up just in time to see Nicky's giant black balloon-ball roaring from the sky -- bearing down and growing over him with the most perfect finality, and with a surprisingly quiet sort of "POONK," it knocked the Angry Man flat, leaving him unconscious or dead.
The EMTs arrived immediately -- they'd just rescued three children who'd tried to swim down the Log Flume -- thus precluding Stuart's chance at the microphone.
The audience, what was left of it, went back to the fair. The fraternity brothers who had launched the ball, using a giant slingshot built to launch the depledged, came to retrieve it; no one faulted them, and no arrests were made. There was a brief press conference in the tent behind the stage, all four candidates present, and Stuart was elected to go first. He was about to open his mouth when he was beaten to it.
"Say something," said one reporter, a small man who looked like an actor playing a reporter.
"How do you mean?"
"Something good."
"Attack Olongapo maybe. Call him a boob."
There was a rush of excitement. A second reporter chimed in: "Yeah, will you call him a boob?" A fourth reporter arrived.
"Did he just call Olongapo a boob?" He was reaching for his cellphone.
"Not yet, but he's about to."
"I'm not calling Olongapo a boob," Stuart said.
"So you're afraid to take a position."
"He's like the rest of them."
"Why are all you politicians so afraid to say something!"
"Just these broad platitudes!"
"Why does political speech have to be so colorless and vapid?"
"Inspire us!"
"Elevate us!"
Stuart sighed. "But how?"
"By calling Olongapo a boob."
Another reporter arrived. "Did he just call Olongapo a boob?" He was reaching for his cellphone.
Stuart, because he was, at his core, someone who liked to please those around him, softened to the idea. Maybe these reporters, who didn't seem so cheerful, would be happier if he called Olongapo a boob. "What would you do if I did call him a boob?" he asked, in a collegial spirit.
"Oh, we'll crucify you for it."
"We'll rip you many new holes."
One of the reporters drew his finger across his throat.
Seeing Stuart blanch, the writer from the Sea Breeze had an idea. "How about saying 'Oriental' instead of 'Asian'? You say, 'Blah blah Murray Olongapo, blah blah an Oriental' ... It'll sound like an innocent slip. Just do that -- that'll work."
They all brightened. "Oh yeah, say that! Say 'Oriental.' That'd be perfect."
"We'll take it from there."
"Everyone who we call to see if they're outraged will be outraged."
Stuart stepped back. "But I would never say 'Oriental' instead of 'Asian.'"
"C'mon! It's just one harmless word: 'Oriental.'"
"Just whisper it."
"Have some courage!"
"It's such a small word ..."
"Until we put it in a headline."
"But don't worry -- no one'll care."
"Until we tell them they should care."
"Just four little syllables."
"No one will see them."
"Except those who are outraged."
"And we'll make sure they're outraged."
"If they're not outraged, we'll ask what happened to our collective sense of outrage."
"But they'll probably be outraged."
"And then we'll ask the appropriate groups if they're demanding an apology."
"Then they'll say, Yes, we are demanding an apology!"
"Then you'll apologize."
"But not right away."
"Let us pressure you into it."
"Then we've got a second story about why it took you so long to apologize."
"And a third story about what this says about your pigheadedness."
"Oh, and we'll need a former co-worker or boss to say you're pigheaded. Who should we call?"
- - - - - - - - - - - -
At 3 p.m., in the bleached light of the late afternoon, the blimp was still there, circling, but most had forgotten it. Sergei Andropov, however, had not forgotten it. That it was still above him, shadowing him after all these hours, brought him to a boil. In it he was now seeing faces, as a child would in clouds or clothes in the dark. He saw the face of every Big Government liberal from FDR to LBJ to WJC. He saw the faces of Richard Rubin and Ted Kennedy and all of the known and future Cuomos. He could tolerate it no longer. He stomped away from the fairgrounds and, as if in a trance, found himself minutes later at a giant toy store, the size of an airplane hangar and filled with more toys than Eastern Europe, where he bought a remote-controlled airplane, expensive and elaborate, and returned to the booth.
"Yikes," said Nicky.
Dmitri helped assemble it. It was about 3 feet long, nose to tail, and powered by gasoline, which Sergei had forgotten and sent Jeannie Two to fetch.
Stuart, much to his own amazement and that of Sergei, was still having a good time. He liked to be able to roam like this, to stand and watch the dunking booth or the squirtgun-horserace game, and call it work. Sergei thought Stuart's ease with people was amazing and wondered whence it came. Had Stuart run for office before, ever, even in high school? Not close. No one who'd ever wanted to be elected in high school ever was elected, and it seemed, at least then, he thought, the natural and correct state of things. If you wanted the office, you could not be trusted with it, and thus only those aloof to power were elected. The less one seemed to care, the more likely one was to win, and Stuart, afraid that he might care, or be perceived to care, had abstained.
But now was different. There was a certain amount of concern allowed now, though truth be told, there wasn't so much he was concerned about in this district. He wished the bars stayed open later, and that he didn't have to drive seven miles to see a movie, but otherwise, he was content. So much so that every time he thought overly hard about why he was running for office, against a man who seemed to have done a very fine and honest job and about whom one would have to effectively invent complaints, he had to pull himself back and remind himself that democracy relies on the challenging of all incumbents, if only to keep them honest and the debate vigorous. Those who said that lengthy campaigns left all candidates so wounded, smeared and, after being accused of lying, scheming, obfuscating and fudging, incapable of regaining the public's trust, were missing the point. The point wasn't so much governance; it was heating the debate to a temperature at which things could change, minds could be bent and shaped. Or so Sergei had said. He had that engraved on a dartboard he kept in the closet.
Across the way, he spotted Murray Olongapo working the crowd. Watching Murray Olongapo chat with families and -- just now -- chase a quickly crawling baby down and return him to his parents -- Stuart knew Murray Olongapo should stay in office. Olongapo was kind, and people liked him, he was deeply invested in the community and his decisions were careful without being cautious. Best yet, he aspired to no other office. Stuart had a fleeting notion that if he wanted to help the district, he would find a way to work for Murray Olongapo, to bring his own followers into Murray's fold, to create a coalition, a compromise, a bipartisan effort to do what would be best for the constituents. Hell, in the name of humility, he should actually just vote for Murray. But somehow this just didn't seem like it would be much fun. It was more fun to have his name on banners and buttons, and have promotional videos made with him walking on the beach, thinking hard about things, skipping stones into the waves. And wasn't that more in the American mold? What kind of American would be forever content to work in the background, toiling away without ever venturing out on one's own? That was more of a Socialist way of thinking, wasn't it? Socialist or collectivist or lazy or something -- so opposed to the pioneering mentality so ingrained in him, from his own plains-crossing ancestors, the Traveling Craspedacustas. To back out at this point would be cowardice, a betrayal even of the ideals manifested by his people, who didn't, after all, stop in Missouri and work for the local grain company -- they kept going, on their own, burying children and shooting at Indians on their relentless and single-minded quest for the Pacific.
So of course he had to stay the course. America was about the dialectic, about two parties, Good and Evil, each villainizing the other to the most hysterical degree possible, always painting for the populace a robust picture of Boschian hell should the other side be elected, accepting no middle, accepting no compromise -- for wasn't compromise just another way of saying "I give up"? Sergei had taught him that; it was engraved under a 20-pound trout mounted above his office door. Stuart's thoughts were slashed by the piercing sound of -- what the hell was that? -- it sounded like the screams of a thousand babies. He jogged toward the noise, weaving through the crowd until he saw Sergei and Jeannie Two, Dmitri and everyone else huddled around a large remote-controlled airplane, sputtering in the long grass, spitting blue smoke.
"Here we take over," said Sergei, who was now wearing an aviator's scarf. "Here we end this thing. Here we win."
"You know how to fly that thing?" Stuart asked.
"Of course," Sergei said. "In Russia I did this for money."
Stuart chose not to pursue the subject. Sergei said that often -- "In Russia I did this for money" -- and the phrase had started to make him queasy.
The plane was colored red, saffron and green, giving it a pleasant Jamaican aura. It was time for takeoff. Dmitri's personal and highly original touch was to attach to the plan a pair of sparklers, one on either side of the fuselage. He'd bought slow-burning sparklers which would last at least 10 minutes, and he lit their tops and held the plan aloft, as Sergei, already feeling triumphant, signaled him to throw the plane aloft.
The plane took to the air, and the reaction was immediate: People were intrigued, excited and repulsed. It was, Stuart had to admit, pretty impressive, and Sergei seemed to really know what he was doing -- not that Stuart would ever have doubted him. The plane was pulling a 10-foot-long banner that read CRASPEDACUSTA -- A NEW BEGINNING STARTS NOW. The plane made one streak across the fairgrounds, at a low altitude, and people ducked and twittered and smiled. A plane with sparklers! It was too much. It was brilliant, charming and fully worthy of and a tribute to this consecrated day. Hail the plane with the sparkling wings! Look, there it goes! Sparks descended harmlessly into the crowd, who grabbed at them as children would at bubbles. Sergei banked the plane and then crossed the grounds from the other side, making an X. Everyone loved it, though only a few knew what the hell it was doing flying overhead.
"Whose plane is it?"
"I think it's the Lesbian Gay Alliance's plane."
"Oh, that's probably it."
"But it says Craspedacusta."
"What does?"
"The plane, the banner it's pulling."
"What's Craspedacusta?"
"I don't know. But it's a new beginning. Something's gonna happen, apparently."
"I sure hope so. I like it when things happen."
Even the teenage boys loved it. They were back, en masse, looking sated but each walking like he'd ridden a horse over the plains. Children clapped and whooped and Sergei was emboldened. He rolled the plane, turned it tight around flagpoles, sent it high into the air and plunged it toward the crowd, only to pull up at the last moment. The plane was a hit, was insisting on attention and even admiration from everyone but those who were gripping their ears in excruciating pain.
The plane was loud. It was about as loud, when it swooped over one's head, as six or seven lawnmowers or leaf blowers screaming in concert. The engine was similar to those attached to motorized skateboards, a rider of which, days before in Santa Monica, had been chased down by a mob and fed to feral dogs.
"Look at that," Sergei said. "Beautiful. The people love it." Sergei was so happy. There were now two aircraft in the sky: one of them bloated and dull, the other quick, nimble, capable of astounding tricks.
"More tricks!" the crowd yelled.
Sergei made the plane swing through the crowd, skimming heads and shoulders. Everyone squealed with delight.
"Make it hurt someone!" the reporters begged.
Sergei was about to accommodate this request when the plane stopped responding to his commands. The controller in Sergei's hands had no effect on the plane, which was still aloft, but was moving with impunity. Its movements became, oddly, more even, more assured and determined. It began circling the blimp, perfectly, sharklike. With each trip around the fairgrounds, it got closer to the blimp, and the throng below it became more deeply excited. Something new and big was about to happen, and they would be right under it. They were at the center of something momentous, here in Southern California, whatever that momentous something would be, and this was yet another reminder of why they lived here, where things were possible.
When the plane finally made contact with the zeppelin, the intersection was slow, insinuating. The zeppelin seemed to give way, voluntarily, allowing the plane to slowly enter it. There were gasps of recognition. Squeals of approval. Parents shielded the eyes of their children. And with enough wiggling and pressure, suddenly the plane was gone, inside the airy expanse of the zeppelin, and the audience laughed and chortled and pointed and laughed more. It was, they all thought, to themselves and aloud, a great Fourth of July. It was something to tell again and again at work and at weddings. Thank god for this. The plane that looks like a -- Wiggling into the -- It all looking like the process of -- It was too rich.
But then, a sucking sound. And a hissing. And with a crisp, whipcrack sound, it all began. A blue sort of light from the end of the zeppelin. Fire. Fire. It started on one end of the zeppelin. That end quickly tipped down, and the flames fingered their way toward the zeppelin's forward tip. Flames of a strange teal tint. A blimp the size of a small home was burning 20 feet above the heads of the thousands assembled, debris falling from it already, leaping from its skeleton, great black burning chunks of its skin whirling to the ground. People screamed. Others, assuming it was part of the planned entertainment, roared with glee. The burning airship's anterior started tilting first, falling. The crowd chortled and ooohed and ahhed and was hysterical and desperate, some now leaping over each other to vacate the spot where the blimp would land. Angry Man screamed, "I told you so! I told you so!" but was quickly crushed under the blimp's armature, and was eventually taken to a single-payer Canadian hospital -- at his request -- where he died awaiting a doctor. As the public flailed and ran, others waited for the ship to land on them, and it did, scorching their skins, melting their eyes and ears and mouths, as they yet marveled at the wonder of it all, how perfectly revolutionary it was, how they'd had a hand in bringing this on. The reporters asked the dying how they felt, and the dying dutifully obliged. Those on the bleachers watched with detached amusement, observing the fiery mass of aircraft descending onto a representative group of whites, blacks, Asians, Latinos, adults and seniors and children, and thought it was totally wrong but fantastically amusing nonetheless. Sergei stood with Ronette and stole from her a long and impassioned kiss, each of them knowing the other was their only friend and that their love was not, in fact, for each other but for the impact of their lips, the twisting of their tongues. Stuart, now standing in relative safety under the shadow of the great statue of his ancestor Miguel Craspedacusta, wondered if this meant he could go home early.
