Soft jazz music played in the background when I was ushered into the oval office twenty minutes later.
I wandered around the room, finally stopping to admire a painting of George Washington that hung next to an antique grandfather clock.
"I'm very sorry to hear about your wife," said the Jack.
I turned around, and there he was, standing next to his desk. He looked for all the world like a friend at a funeral, not really knowing what to say at all.
"Thanks," I said quietly.
There was an awkward pause, and then the Jack moved firmly to the cabinet on the opposite side of room, pulling out a chess board.
"Do you play?" he asked.
"Sure," I said. We set up the board without a word. He took white.
"I liked your little slogan," he said.
I didn't answer.
"You ever write before?" he asked.
"Not really," I said, moving my bishop.
"Hmm," he responded, enigmatically.
He leaned over the board, and with the soft clunk of wood on wood, he shifted his attack slightly.
I hung a pawn, hoping he would get back on the right track, but he missed the cue. I liked games that played out neatly, efficiently, but he seemed insistent on forcing himself upon the wrong side of my board.
As I kept playing, he became increasingly aggressive with his attacks.
A good player would have rolled with it, of course, but I was still fixed on steering him in the right direction. In the end, I sacrificed too many pieces trying to correct the game that he was able to mate me easily.
He stood up. "Good game," he said, sticking out his hand, "I'll see you Monday."
And with a firm handshake, my fate was decided.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Four
Please believe that I'm not trying to make this melodramatic. I loved her, and she was burned. She got burned.
The hostel we had been staying in was getting crowded, so we moved to a hotel down the street.
An artist in it had, apparently, said some things about the rioters.
They set fire to the hotel. Lucy was on the 31st floor. She never even had a chance.
Ashes were still falling from the sky long after the firemen put out the fire. I sat on a bench across the street, the street in front of me littered with trash.
My phone rang. I knew it was the Jack.
I picked it up.
The hostel we had been staying in was getting crowded, so we moved to a hotel down the street.
An artist in it had, apparently, said some things about the rioters.
They set fire to the hotel. Lucy was on the 31st floor. She never even had a chance.
Ashes were still falling from the sky long after the firemen put out the fire. I sat on a bench across the street, the street in front of me littered with trash.
My phone rang. I knew it was the Jack.
I picked it up.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Three
It was almost predictable that the Jack would shut down the news, but the swiftness with which he struck was incredible. Within a week newspapers and television stations were shut down, and within two months there was no more mainstream internet. Smaller, more maneuverable sites could evade him for a little while, but servers all over the U.S. were being shut down.
Protests turned to riots quickly. The recently set up government TV stations were burned to the ground.
The police broke the riots up with rubber bullets, mostly. I remember in Los Angeles there was a riot broken up with live rounds.
It was reportedly an accident.
The Jack needed a new PR man.
I went to my cabinet and pulled out and old pack of cards. They were very old, but somehow I knew it had to be these. I took out the cards and wrote in the idea that I had written on the napkin inside my pocket.
"The world doesn't need another king."
I sent it to the Red House.
The day after the Jack used it in his speech, I went to Washington again and waited behind low concrete barriers to see him. I told Lucy to stay at the Hotel.
"You'll be safer here," I said.
As the Jack stepped out of his limousine and walked past me, I reached my hand out to him, holding in it the deck of cards minus the jack I had sent him. On the cover of the cards I had written my name and number. He looked at me and took the cards, pocketing them after a hesitation.
I heard the riots outside my hotel from two blocks away.
I was already too late.
Protests turned to riots quickly. The recently set up government TV stations were burned to the ground.
The police broke the riots up with rubber bullets, mostly. I remember in Los Angeles there was a riot broken up with live rounds.
It was reportedly an accident.
The Jack needed a new PR man.
I went to my cabinet and pulled out and old pack of cards. They were very old, but somehow I knew it had to be these. I took out the cards and wrote in the idea that I had written on the napkin inside my pocket.
"The world doesn't need another king."
I sent it to the Red House.
The day after the Jack used it in his speech, I went to Washington again and waited behind low concrete barriers to see him. I told Lucy to stay at the Hotel.
"You'll be safer here," I said.
As the Jack stepped out of his limousine and walked past me, I reached my hand out to him, holding in it the deck of cards minus the jack I had sent him. On the cover of the cards I had written my name and number. He looked at me and took the cards, pocketing them after a hesitation.
I heard the riots outside my hotel from two blocks away.
I was already too late.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Two
It was the shots that led to the downfall of the internet, of media, of almost all broad-audience communications.
It also destroyed the Jack's persona: the laughing, folksy Midwesterner who could plant a field in the morning, win a debate in the afternoon, and still have time to sit down with his family for a barbeque.
The shots were leaked two months after the painting of the White House, but it was only two weeks after that that the Jack turned the country into a police state.
They were a video of two men practicing free throws in a gymnasium. No one really knew why it was filmed, but there it was. Shot after shot, the two men laughed with each other as they sunk their throws.
And then there was this disturbance. The second man was distracted; the ball bounced off of the rim.
The audio became distorted with the noise of three gunshots. The camera dropped to the ground.
The Jack walked onto the screen, wiping the gun off. He slipped it into his pocket, glanced around, and straightened his tie. He walked off.
Two men came in, cleaning up the mess the Jack had left. They cleaned up the blood from both of the men, and presumably also from the cameraman. They picked up the bodies, and then the agent pocketed the camera. That was wear the footage ended. In the warm, cozy pocket of an associate to a murder.
Things changed.
It also destroyed the Jack's persona: the laughing, folksy Midwesterner who could plant a field in the morning, win a debate in the afternoon, and still have time to sit down with his family for a barbeque.
The shots were leaked two months after the painting of the White House, but it was only two weeks after that that the Jack turned the country into a police state.
They were a video of two men practicing free throws in a gymnasium. No one really knew why it was filmed, but there it was. Shot after shot, the two men laughed with each other as they sunk their throws.
And then there was this disturbance. The second man was distracted; the ball bounced off of the rim.
The audio became distorted with the noise of three gunshots. The camera dropped to the ground.
The Jack walked onto the screen, wiping the gun off. He slipped it into his pocket, glanced around, and straightened his tie. He walked off.
Two men came in, cleaning up the mess the Jack had left. They cleaned up the blood from both of the men, and presumably also from the cameraman. They picked up the bodies, and then the agent pocketed the camera. That was wear the footage ended. In the warm, cozy pocket of an associate to a murder.
Things changed.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
One
To Whom It May Concern,
It has been long since I have written a sincerely honest document, and I suspect it is a futile endeavor anyway. I say this mainly because as soon as the revolution enters they will undoubtedly tear the letter up in their haste to destroy anything that speaks contrary to their own cause.
And yet here I am.
The electricity went out days ago, so you will have to excuse the fact that this is typed by means of typewriter. I was surprised to find it still worked; it had long been abandoned as decoration in my bedroom. My handwriting has fallen into a state of disuse, and I would prefer if my last correspondence was legible.
The revolution has entered many of my coworkers' homes; I heard more than a few frantic phone messages before they cut the power. I suspect that more of my friends have been taken as of this writing. I have no means of obtaining any of this information, however, and even then it is of little importance.
The history is what is important. If someone does not document it now, the revolution will write their own.
It is ironic that I have spent nearly fifteen years of my life manufacturing the truth, and yet the only thing that seems of any consequence now is the truth: this letter will undoubtedly be the last thing I write.
The new government came into power when I was eleven. I remember watching it on TV with my mom. She was very unhappy with the government, but she was even less satisfied with the rising power of the Jack. She never really believed in the idea of a revolution to change the government.
"The new government still has a congress," she said, "It still is a system where change can come from the people. I doubt if we will be able to say the same for the Jack".
It was the summer after I graduated when they executed the Capp brothers. A lot of my friends went out to protest, and my mom encouraged me to go. I remember that it was loud.
My freshman year I met Lucy. A bunch of kids were trashing the Jack in political sciences and she stood up and yelled at them, telling the class that he had brought peace to an area where no one else could have. The professor was impressed.
After we were married I learned that her father and brother had been in the war. Her brother had been killed before it ended, but her father had been luckier. She told me that the Jack saved his life.
"My brother wasn't the only one," she told me, "a lot of people would've died in that war."
Our love was boundless.
Then came the Manhattan Riots. So many were killed, it was difficult to comprehend the magnitude of exactly what had happened.
The Jack was gaining power, and the revolution was still at the forefront of the national news. I couldn't pick a side. I was in limbo, caught between my mother's values and my wife's past.
I needed to think this over.
I spent more than a week's worth of days down at the dock in Maine, just sitting there and thinking. I played guitar a little. Sometimes Lucy would sing.
When the Jack fell in with the government, things got confusing. I can only assume the president thought it would appease the revolution. He was corrupt, though, like every politician at that time. It seems like every member of congress was being questioned by everyone else.
The coup was non-violent, like everything the Jack did. The president and his cabinet were man-handled out of the country, and people danced in the streets. Huge posters bearing the Jack's face were everywhere, but they were missing a slogan. Something that would be easy to remember, something that people would say to each other.
It came to me in a restaurant, and I scribbled it on a napkin. I crumpled it up and stuck it in my pocket.
And then I went to Washington.
Lucy and I stayed at a small hostel on 17th street, 10 minutes walk from the White House.
We were there when they painted it red. It was breathtaking: the Jack walked out onto a balcony, and the crowds cheered. There were four or five shipping containers on the lawn that had been flown in. He stepped up against the railing and lit up a cigarette, taking a deep puff and then tossing it onto the lawn.
And then he took out a paint can and just threw it at the building.
There was this awesome cheer as the splash of red paint hit the building, and then the gates flew open and the crowd rushed in, yanking open the shipping containers and finding hundreds upon hundreds of red paint cans and rollers and brushes of all kinds, and then they went to town. They painted the White House.
And then came the shots, and everything changed.
It has been long since I have written a sincerely honest document, and I suspect it is a futile endeavor anyway. I say this mainly because as soon as the revolution enters they will undoubtedly tear the letter up in their haste to destroy anything that speaks contrary to their own cause.
And yet here I am.
The electricity went out days ago, so you will have to excuse the fact that this is typed by means of typewriter. I was surprised to find it still worked; it had long been abandoned as decoration in my bedroom. My handwriting has fallen into a state of disuse, and I would prefer if my last correspondence was legible.
The revolution has entered many of my coworkers' homes; I heard more than a few frantic phone messages before they cut the power. I suspect that more of my friends have been taken as of this writing. I have no means of obtaining any of this information, however, and even then it is of little importance.
The history is what is important. If someone does not document it now, the revolution will write their own.
It is ironic that I have spent nearly fifteen years of my life manufacturing the truth, and yet the only thing that seems of any consequence now is the truth: this letter will undoubtedly be the last thing I write.
The new government came into power when I was eleven. I remember watching it on TV with my mom. She was very unhappy with the government, but she was even less satisfied with the rising power of the Jack. She never really believed in the idea of a revolution to change the government.
"The new government still has a congress," she said, "It still is a system where change can come from the people. I doubt if we will be able to say the same for the Jack".
It was the summer after I graduated when they executed the Capp brothers. A lot of my friends went out to protest, and my mom encouraged me to go. I remember that it was loud.
My freshman year I met Lucy. A bunch of kids were trashing the Jack in political sciences and she stood up and yelled at them, telling the class that he had brought peace to an area where no one else could have. The professor was impressed.
After we were married I learned that her father and brother had been in the war. Her brother had been killed before it ended, but her father had been luckier. She told me that the Jack saved his life.
"My brother wasn't the only one," she told me, "a lot of people would've died in that war."
Our love was boundless.
Then came the Manhattan Riots. So many were killed, it was difficult to comprehend the magnitude of exactly what had happened.
The Jack was gaining power, and the revolution was still at the forefront of the national news. I couldn't pick a side. I was in limbo, caught between my mother's values and my wife's past.
I needed to think this over.
I spent more than a week's worth of days down at the dock in Maine, just sitting there and thinking. I played guitar a little. Sometimes Lucy would sing.
When the Jack fell in with the government, things got confusing. I can only assume the president thought it would appease the revolution. He was corrupt, though, like every politician at that time. It seems like every member of congress was being questioned by everyone else.
The coup was non-violent, like everything the Jack did. The president and his cabinet were man-handled out of the country, and people danced in the streets. Huge posters bearing the Jack's face were everywhere, but they were missing a slogan. Something that would be easy to remember, something that people would say to each other.
It came to me in a restaurant, and I scribbled it on a napkin. I crumpled it up and stuck it in my pocket.
And then I went to Washington.
Lucy and I stayed at a small hostel on 17th street, 10 minutes walk from the White House.
We were there when they painted it red. It was breathtaking: the Jack walked out onto a balcony, and the crowds cheered. There were four or five shipping containers on the lawn that had been flown in. He stepped up against the railing and lit up a cigarette, taking a deep puff and then tossing it onto the lawn.
And then he took out a paint can and just threw it at the building.
There was this awesome cheer as the splash of red paint hit the building, and then the gates flew open and the crowd rushed in, yanking open the shipping containers and finding hundreds upon hundreds of red paint cans and rollers and brushes of all kinds, and then they went to town. They painted the White House.
And then came the shots, and everything changed.
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