Thesisless

“Find God!”

The door shut, and the light was straining. Luca stood, recognizing he could not sleep there. Clasping his satchel like a life reserve, he wandered out as if it were a simple twilight walk. Further and further he drifted. He imagined each building collapsing as he walked by. How nice it would be to blow away the traffic like the wind does to dust. The noise was all unnecessary. Honks, cranes, and colliding conversations shredded his eardrums. All the while, an obese pigeon waddled by with the torn wing of another.

A peaceful saxophonist played a low tune in the subway. Crouching down in a deceivingly clean corner, Luca rummaged through his sack and ate up two pills. One by one, people hurried off somewhere. Women did look curiously. Young children glared unknowingly. Men in suits grimaced. Generously, he paid them attention. Little worth it was given that in a month or two, withdrawals will crumple him like paper.

A pair of nuns dropped a few bills of cash at his feet, “Already,” he thought.

Then the lullaby melody shot quite as though a cord had been pulled from the TV. The saxophonist charged over and snatched the bills, “Fuck you think this, man? Get your own spot.”

On the way to peaking, Luca returned a thousand-mile stare and guessed the man wanted him to leave. Before doing so, he addressed the man, “Did you write that tune?”

“Hell no!”

“Who wrote it?”

“Everyone.”

“Hm?”

“It’s the rhythm everyone on The Hive is on. Aren’t you plugged in?”

“No. I do drugs instead… Why do you still play?”

“What?”

“You know your moment has passed — even then, there are droids who play better than you could ever. You don’t even write your stuff.”

“Are you trying to start something?”

“It’s just a question.”

“I play to pay my rent. Some people appreciate a human doing the work.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it. Now, get the fuck out of here!”

The world had raced to singularity closer than ever before. Though there were cracks. Lucas saw it in how people did not wait in line anymore — did not even look to make eye contact at the cashier.

“What was the thesis? Did we ever have one?” he thought.

The luxury of a church shelter was afforded after scattered nights of subway corners, dumpster alleys, and cardboard boxes. Luca refused the warm soup and cotton blankets. Nor would the priest’s words enter any further than the wax accumulating in his ear canals.

There was something utterly despicable that Luca saw in the clean-cut pastor. That in a world of pure digitalization, in which codes dictated value, job, and entertainment, men still roamed around as though their faith knew better. They gave as if the people deserved and preached as though they would listen, if they had ever. The fellow smiled with each ladle and read parables to end each night. A small boiling bubble would reach the surface every time Luca heard the words “Go forth.” To where? “Repent.” For what? “Answer the call.” On what cellphone? One way or another, these messages brought everyone to this time.

“How could a book with origins as concrete as time control so much even now?” thought Luca, “What would the world become to take it away?”

“Father,” he asked during one dinner.

“Yes?”

“Where can I get a pen and paper?”

He threw his head back and laughed, “You know how to write?”

“Yeah… You can write on tablets.”

“Yes, excuse me, in my day, the word had a more empirical aspect to it.”

“Okay….”

Father put down his water. “Are you a writer?”

“In my head, I always have been.”

“There is a difference between an idea in the mind and one put on paper.”

“That it becomes tangibly real.”

“Exactly… well, I think I can make that happen. Both are rare now. So, I’ll need something first.”

“How can I be of service to the great Lord?”

Father scoffed, “Don’t patronize me.”

“Sorry.”

“I need something of that.”

Luca saw where it was going, “Seriously.”

“You think you’re the first druggie ever here?”

“My satchel.”

“Yes. Also, I’ve noticed you have been here a few days.”

“I didn’t see a check-out sign.”

“Hmm… well, it is mutually agreed that one in need may stay as long as they actively contribute,” he opened his arms.

“Good faith is not free, I guess.”

“Either work in the kitchen, or you can start with janitor service — ideally, you get back on your feet.”

“I can start in 12 hours.”

“You’ve tried before?”

“Yes.”

“Why do you keep using?”

“I feel the same sober but more pointless.”

Father bent over his plate and peered into Luca’s glossy trance, “Why do you want to write?”

“I can be like that God of yours… may be even better.”

Father shrugged, “Okay, for every week you are sober, I give you one piece of paper.”

“That’s it?”

“What? You think paper grows on trees?”

Luca wrote as if the words were on their last neuron before escaping his mind, “I don’t want to live. I don’t want to die. I will live in between….”

There was a sudden static blankness in his mind. Then he pressed down and continued about himself.

Creator. What type of thing creates this? 28 years old. Parentless and now brotherless — Peter. The final straw for him was that I broke my sobriety. Like I was ever sober. When he came home, it wasn’t much different than before. Yet, even right now, I remember his face decompressing. Like a vacuum was sucking everything out. He shook his head and kept the door open. It’s been almost two weeks. I’d like him to try to be homeless. I’d like the world to be homeless!

A joint splitting ache pierced Luca’s rib cage. The withdrawals had begun. Instinctively, he made his way to the toilet with paper and pen tucked in his pocket. Someone came in and patted him on the back as bile tried to shoot out. However, all he could do was grunt an empty gag.

The delirium ensued next. Time was unadulterated. Every step was a chore. Each breath took thinking. His stomach could barely digest air. The paper and pen were the only bits that got him to the future.

“More people are here, I think. I don’t know. The toilet has been my pillow for,” he hoovered for a second, “I don’t know. My vision is in and out and I nearly implode if I see the sun. No more light. There’s too much light. All the buildings, phones, billboards, and even toys!

Where was any of this going? Did anyone or group sit down and have a concept of what each step went towards? Okay, we had a fire. Then a wheel. After a printing press. Eventually, in some garage, a computer. Now we are in these screens — portals. Light portals.

Luca heaved. Finally, some spit and broth came out.

“How much more? Damn, where am I going? Before, nowhere. I get through this and do what? God knows….”

Father helped carry Luca to the church’s garden. There were roses, white lilies, hydrangeas, and a quaint pond in the center. Father took the bench while Luca sprawled on the grass.

“You need fresh air.”

The thick, lead-stained clouds rolled over. “Why do you do this?”

“I had a calling.”

“You’re that special?”

“Nope. But I knew it was what I wanted to do.”

“How?”

“It was the day that they invented the Hive. An accomplishment it was, connecting everyone and everything like that. Paper became obsolete. Power was now endless. Yet, people grew distant. There were fewer galleries, fewer mass times, and I just felt the only way to change that was by being a priest. The book you hate, the words I repeat, no matter what, always bring people closer.”

“I think there are some religions that think otherwise.”

“True, but it makes people think, react, and that’s living. At least that is how I see it.”

Luca glared at the pond. “What are we doing here?”

“It’s quite packed inside. Some bank collapsed.”

“I meant existence.”

“Oh, well, to live out God’s mission….”

As Father explained through metaphors, parables, and self-examination, Luca dropped his head to face the sky.

He doesn’t know either.

The soup was cold that evening. There was a power outage across the city. People discussed whether it had reached the entire country. No one could declare. Luca twiddled his spoon as if it were a pen in the murky broth, stirring up nothing. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught Peter.

“Peter?”

His eyes sparked up, “Lucas!” he called, rushing over to take a seat, “H-how have you… You look —”

“I know.”

“Sorry,” he rubbed his eyes, “It’s… you look faint, clearer almost.”

“Like a ghost?”

“Sure. Yeah….”

“You look… disheveled.”

Peter forced a laugh, “Yeah, well, things aren’t easy outside.”

“You’re telling me.”

“No, but for even —”

“Even you? Mr. Got-It-All-Together.”

“I was going to say everyone.”

“Well, that happens when you don’t know where you are going. You end here, staring at cold soup with some grandpa treating you like a toddler.”

“You met the Priest?”

“How can’t you? He’s not shy to show his face.”

“Well, we need people like him now.”

“Why?”

“Haven’t you been following…,” Peter’s voice trailed off.

Luca turned his head, tilting his face slightly down, letting his matted hair swing across and sunken eyes deepen, “No. Even if I was, what’s it to me?”

“Marlon Stone went under. Then James Parker. Then Wolf Corporate. Just all of a sudden, they had no money. Then people had no money. So, everyone started taking what they could, landlords especially.”

“You’re landlord too?”

“Yeah… now, there’s something with the power grid. The sun hasn’t been out in weeks, the rain is nonstop, it’s some biblical —.”

“Weeks?”

“At least it feels like it.”

Luca reached into his pocket to count his paper.

“Is that paper?”

There were four sheets, three and a half filled out front to back, “Almost a month.”

“What?”

He held up the pieces, “A month sober.”

“Wow… okay, I must be losing track of time. What have you been writing about?”

“Nonsense. Last night, I thought about Dr. Terran. What a joke of a person… I imagine my life if mom and dad had never brought me to him. I would have never been on pills. I would have never started dealing. Yes, maybe I would’ve been a harder kid, student, whatever. But I know my life would have been better — it would be better if he were dead.”

Peter nearly spilled his soup, “I have to tell you about that. Dr. Terran lost his license some time ago.”

“Go figure.”

“While I was looking for a place to sleep. I saw him.”

“Where?”

“Dead, Lucas. Paramedics were pulling him out of the river. Appears he drowned or —”

“Killed himself.”

“Who knows?”

The withdrawals still clung on another sleepless night. Lucas paddled through a constant state of derealization. Grasping the present only pushed him further into incomprehension. Then, dead relatives, mom, dad, cousins, came in and out, patting him on the back. As he vomited air, the occasional soup broth, the titles melted into a watery clay. Inescapable, Luca nonetheless fought to move. Something in him told him he had to act. Yet, the more he moved, the further he sank in. There was nowhere to go.

“That’s what all this has always felt like. This is the effect. The cause started this. God, did all that work just to produce this? If I could — I feel it in this pen — I will write the world to my liking. Then, we’ll see my bible versus his.”

The night never stopped. Nor did Lucas’s shakes, sweats, and volumes of vomit. The paper turned into a billboard-sized canvas. Spurts at a time, Lucas witnessed what the other side of things could be.

“Are things better?”

“No.”

“Do you feel better?”

“No.”

“Then why did you do it?”

“Because…”

“You still think you can become God?”

“No. I wouldn’t know what to do.”

The room evaporated. Luca found himself buried in a foggy blackness. Still, he felt as though on top of a summit. It was such a height that it had to be shared. Though there was no one. It was despairingly barren… like an empty bag… like a wasted piece of paper.