Points of Divergence

I really knew he’d lost it because of his eyes.1

I mean, looking back, I guess there were all kinds of signs. There was the way he’d stopped closing drawers all the way after he took stuff out, or how you’d never hear doors clunking shut after he’d walked through them. The way that creepy haze of cigarette smoke followed him around all day like it was his only friend. Or how you could walk up to him, pass him in the hall, say “hey dad” or “hey pop” or whatever, and it was like you weren’t even there. Like he was sleepwalking. Like you were a cloud and he was a plane flying right through you. No more standing like a skyscraper. Just him, hanging by his spine, resting on his feet because he couldn’t think of anywhere better to be. Doing things like breathing and eating and wandering around because they passed the time.2

When report cards would come home in the mail, all the digits so pathetic and droopy, it was like he couldn’t even muster up the energy to be mad. To be disappointed. To be anything. No signs of life in those big brown eyes. Eyes that had always been so clear, but had all of a sudden become musty and cluttered, streaks of red punctuating them and cutting across. Two dead voyeurs that couldn’t focus enough to watch anything on a screen, or to read the books that I had spent years wrapping myself in to avoid coming to terms with that muddled house. When I think about the time he must have spent in the basement, working on that damn thing… Well, I don’t really want to.3

I remember the day he came back to the house with his own report card. “I got fired,” was all he needed to say. He left the pink piece of paper on the coffee table, not that I needed to read it. The Somethingorother Center for Quantum Research and Development regrets to inform you that, in light of recent… And so on. The usual bullshit about how his performance “wasn’t up to par”, as though anyone’s performance would be “up to par” if his wife and kid had been incinerated in the worst terrorist attack in American history. Although, getting down to it, I’m not sure how much I can blame them. The idea of him sleepwalking around their offices and fancy machines is even more pathetic than the way I have to see him now.4

But this story isn’t really about my dad, or his job, or all those dead people. This is really about some different dead people, except the kind that walk around and wear sweater vests.5

I got to the Bartlett campus at about 11 o’clock in the morning on a Thursday. I never liked Thursdays. My dad always called them the most unnecessary day of the week, caught in limbo between Wednesday and the weekend. The kids at Bartlett were a little like Thursdays at first glance: Trapped somewhere between being dumb kids and hollow adults, cocooned in their scarves and sweater vests like they were trying to stay safe from each other instead of the New England cold. The campus looked very flat and very green beneath the bleached-blue sky.6

“It would be good for you to see what the place is like,” he had said.7

“It’s not like I’ll get in,” I’d responded.8

“Still.” He had wiped his watery eyes, the beard stubble already beginning to consume his face. “You never know.” His motto.9

My dad had gotten this notion in his head that me seeing the place would make me want to go there really badly, which would make me pull up my grades and so on. He’d even gotten me an interview with one of the admissions people, which he’d said would let my “winning personality shine through” and show them that I’m “not just a number”. But see, the problem with that is, I am just a number. Not that that bothers me. Being a zero in an ocean of zeroes is the sort of thing you just have to get used to, like gravity or half your family getting blown up. In all honesty, it wouldn’t even surprise me that much if, say twenty years down the line, he were to take me aside and tell me I was just one of his experiments, another one of the many science projects he’d brought home from the lab; maybe some test tube monster gone awry that The Somethingorother Center for Quantum Quantumness had dumped on him. I wouldn’t mind. At least I’d have an excuse for the way I am.10

See, I’m a writer, which is a very polite way for people to say that I’m a bullshit artist. I make things up. It’s really the only thing I’ve ever been any good at. When you’re a little kid whose name is “Ramiel”, the first thing you learn how to do is lie. Your name becomes John. Your name becomes Alex. Your name becomes Mike. Anything but what it is. Deception turns into a survival instinct.11

Get good at cheating and you never really have to get good at anything else.12

I spent my first few minutes on the college green awkwardly shifting my weight, until I managed to spy out a group of people who looked vaguely like they knew what they were doing. It turned out they were on a tour. I joined the herd and managed to harmlessly take part in the sight-seeing expedition, which I don’t have much to say about. All of the buildings looked like buildings. The only interesting thing was that the tour guide had Tourette’s, which meant we spent a good ten minutes surveying the Wilson Fucking Cafeteria and Student Lounge, followed by a brief look at the Valentine Shit-Bastard Dormitory. I suppose I shouldn’t have laughed.13

When most kids were learning the names of all the animals on the farm, my dad told me about these things called “points of divergence”.14

“The universe is an ever-shifting soup of quantum particles. Everything moves through time, but not everything moves in a straight line. Some things zigzag.” I was five. I had no idea what the hell he was talking about.15

“Just try to understand, Rami. The idea is that every time change occurs in the universe – from the smallest atomic shift to the birth of a new star – the timeline branches off.” I remember looking at him with a vacant slab where my face should have been.16

“Look. Let’s say you buy an ice cream cone, and you have to choose whether you want vanilla or chocolate. Well, that moment of choosing is where the timeline splits. Suddenly, there’s a whole different universe, one where you had chocolate and one where you bought vanilla. But that’s only the beginning. There are more universes than that: Maybe in another the ice cream truck doesn’t come to our street that day, or maybe they’re out of both flavors. There are universes where you don’t even like ice cream.” It sounds crazy because it is.17

“Points of divergence are those moments when the timeline splits. Moments where people make big choices, or when things happen that affect the universe in a very serious way. When your mother and I got married, that was a point of divergence. Whenever someone dies, that’s a point of divergence.” This was him at his most lucid. 18

I was in school on the big day. It was the beginning of fourth grade. A Tuesday. I remember stumbling into the teacher’s lounge, confused by all the commotion, wondering why all my teachers were bleary-eyed and quiet, cupping their mouths with their hands like they were afraid something scary would climb out if they didn’t. One of them – a tall woman who kept clutching a big silver cross that dangled from her neck – took me aside and said some words. I don’t remember them. I just remember watching the TV behind her, seeing clip after clip of those two planes that looked like missiles flying into those two buildings that looked like tombstones. I knew my mom and sister were in there. If I were a normal kid, I would have said something like “Oh no,” or maybe started crying. Instead, I said this:19

“Mrs. Hopkins?” 20

“Yes, Ramiel?”21

“This is a point of divergence.”22

After the tour, I managed to shuffle myself towards what I figured was the admissions building, as I hadn’t paid much attention to the instructions of my Tourette’s-stricken guide. A few of the students eyeballed me suspiciously as I passed through the campus; I suppose a day of greyhound bussing my way up there hadn’t done much for my already scraggly and vaguely squirrelish appearance. I considered taking on a limp to at least justify myself, maybe get some sympathy from the people who were looking at me like I was an insect, but I ultimately decided against it. Messing with these kids would feel like tipping cattle.23

On September 17th, I came home to find that my house had found its way into some kind of limbo between the monkey cage at The Bronx Zoo and a mad scientist’s laboratory. The basement had become the staging ground for an experiment that might have haunted Dr. Frankenstein’s wildest dreams. It was littered with stray metal parts, hundreds of odd trinkets eclectically strewn about as though to keep him company. On the floor, he had deconstructed the treadmill. On one desk was every light switch in the house. He had masked each window with imposing black garbage bags which served to thwart each and every beam of light from entering the room. His only source of illumination was a flimsy overhead bulb.24

“What are you building?” He was at a table with a screwdriver and a hammer.25

“Something to fix this.” He ran a hand through his greasy hair.26

“A time machine?” He shook his head.27

“Your alarm clock is a time machine,” he intoned, picking up a hammer, “this is a temporal relocator.” And he looked up at me, two dead orbs peering out from where his eyes should have been. And I wondered where my dad had gone.28

“Ra… Ruh-meel?” I didn’t bother correcting the quaint receptionist. Her day seemed to be going well enough without me trying to surgically remove her plastic smile.29

“Mrs. Langdon will see you for your interview now.”30

Her room was sparse. A clunky wooden desk and a cushy leather chair on her side, a lonely plastic seat on mine. She said:31

“Hi, Ramiel,” and pronounced it correctly.32

“John, please. Ramiel’s just my middle name.” Remember when I said I was a writer? I am. It’s just that my best stories are the ones I tell other people.33

“I guess this is normally the part where we would talk about your body of work, but I’m afraid I only have one thing from you. A short story of yours…” I nodded.34

“Points of Divergence, yeah. I thought it was good.” She produced a manila folder from her desk drawer, taking care to close it all the way after she finished. I liked that.35

“I see a lot of these. Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is the one about the brilliant physicist who invented a time machine, right? And then went back and stopped 9/11?”36

“Yeah. A temporal relocator.”37

“It was very… Creative,” she continued, apparently trying to be tactful. “Lots of vivid imagery. You really created a sense of loss in your protagonist. Good stream of consciousness, too.” I thanked her. “What I’m wondering about, though, is the ending.” 38

I was genuinely confused. “What do you mean?”39

“Well,” Mrs. Langdon began, “it’s sweet, but predictable. I mean, your hero sets out to build a time machine to stop the World Trade Center attacks. He does that. And then he sees his family again, and it ends. Very upbeat. But to be honest, I felt a little cheated. As though there was no way he could possibly come to terms with it like everybody else, or just deal with the loss like a regular person.”40

“Well, it’s a science fiction story.”41

“Yes. But where’s the human element? What connects it to the real world? There’s nothing compelling about a man who can solve all his problems with some technological Deus ex Machina. There are no ties to reality.”42

“Well, ma’am, reality sucks.” This should have been funny. It wasn’t.43

“Why don’t we move onto your more academic accolades. It says here that your grade point average is currently at about a 1.7.” She looked at me for a response I did not have. “And there’s a bit of a theme in your teachers’ comments.” She extracted another piece of paper from the beige manila folder.44

“American History: ‘John is polite and conscientious, but he is missing a lot of work. He has made no effort to make up for his low scores or integrate with his peers. Recommend extra help’. Or English: ‘Mike shows much promise as a writer, but he is yet to meet a single deadline in my class. He has had six unexcused absences this quarter alone’. And every teacher calls you by a different name. I was wondering if you could help me understand that.” 45

This had been a bad idea. 46

“There’s not that much to understand. I like a fresh start from period to period.” She gave an uncomfortable half-smile, not buying a single word.47

“Well John, or whoever you are today, I’m not sure Bartlett is necessarily the best place for a fresh start for you. You’re a talented writer, but there’s nothing here to demonstrate that you’re motivated. I’m sure you can see why you aren’t a strong applicant at this point.” The interview was over. There was no good will left to salvage, none of my “winning personality” left to shine through.48

“Well, I’m starting to think this wouldn’t be such a good place for me either. It’s not like I need to be boxed in by someone’s petty idea of what my education ought to be. Thanks for your time.” I got up, making to leave.49

“’Petty’, John? If I were you, I wouldn’t take on such a cynical attitude. You’re the one who claims that ‘reality sucks’. Maybe if you could actually come to terms with the world around you, instead of just dismissing it, you could make something of yourself, and deal with the things that make you unhappy. These comments make it clear that you’re used to talking your way around things. Well, fine. But your words will only get you so far.” 50

That did it.51

“Really? With all due respect, Mrs. Langdon, I think that might be the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. My words have gotten me far enough. You can snub me from your little school, but I’ll still have them, even if they’re only in my head. No matter how shitty things get, I can always make myself up again. I’m only who I say I am, no more, no less. That story? Maybe it’s not great. But it’s mine. I made it. I put those words into the world, and now no one can take them back out. No matter who rejects me, no matter what happens, I’ll always have my words. No admissions officer can take them away. No fucking plane will ever crash into them. Those words… Those words are all I’ve got.” 52

Her hands ran nervously across the wood of her desk, tracing angry patterns with her pink manicured nails. 53

“John, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.” And I said:54

“My name is Ramiel.” And walked out.55

Time passed slowly on the bus ride back home. As I watched the world turn by underneath the wheels of the depressing gray vehicle, I thought about a lot of things. My dad. The basement. My mom, and the way her face would crinkle when she laughed. My little sister, who had ballet on Wednesdays and whose favorite flavor of ice cream was mint chocolate chip. My mother screaming at me, and then her buying me Hungry Hungry Hippos for Christmas. My little sister vomiting after her fourth birthday party, and her tiny blue eyes staring up frozen at the Fourth of July fireworks. As I saw tree after tree run past the window on their immobile root legs, I considered them. If I were to cut one down, would it be a point of divergence? What if I cut them all down? It passed the hours.56

The door was unlocked. The house was the same. Garbage bags strewn across the floors, some empty, others filled with refuse. My books that I had taken refuge in while he had hidden himself in his basement, all scattered across the tables and beginning to blend in with my father’s hundreds of mechanical curiosities. The paint peeling. The grass fervently overgrown. If there were a fire, we would have perished, a plethora of smoke detectors finally emitting their sirens when the fire reached his work table.57

He was in the basement.58

“Hi, dad.” He didn’t look up. He was just the way I’d left him: Hunched over, sweating, tinkering with his mass of tentacle-like wires and electrical oddities. His beard rushing to meet his neck, the dandruff in his hair accumulating and periodically falling to the floor. He looked like a man waiting for a train that would never come.59

“Rami.” The red lines cutting through his pained eyes had almost made them a deep scarlet. His hands trembled as they worked. As I picked up the claw hammer, mine did not.60

“What are you doing?” I felt the steel ripping through the wires, tearing at the guts of the machine, shredding through all of the sweat he had poured into it and all of the birthdays he had missed. Eviscerating his failures as a father and as a man and annihilating the delicate and intricately prepared circuitry. He tried to pull me off, but I couldn’t feel him. He screamed, but I couldn’t hear him. The only sensation was the dull resistance of the metal as I pulled at it, using the sharp end of my tool to end his flirtation with fantasy. I was done with fantasy. So was he.61

When I was finally done, there was no yelling. Just the tears, streaming down to his soaked face from his sad, sad eyes. Mine were not tears of sadness, but tears of anger and regret. And, in some small part of me, of satisfaction. Of knowing it was finally over.62

“I just. I just wanted to do something. Anything,” he choked. “I just wanted them back. God. I just want them back.” He hid his face in his palms. I put a hand on him.63

“Yeah. Me too. Me too.” I wrapped my arms around him, and we tried to squeeze the misery out of each other. And in just the most miniscule way, it worked.64

“This…” he choked again, this time somewhere between a sob and a laugh, “Is a point of divergence.” 65

And he looked at me with clear eyes.66