Hour of Arrival

This is a picture of your aunt Chrissy with one of her many asshole boyfriends, the kind
who is always talking about making the world a better place but never getting a job. The
last time I stayed at Chrissy’s place this guy threw beer on me. I didn’t give a shit about
the beer, but I was so pissed off with him lying on the couch all day except for “band
rehearsals” that I passed along a tip about his group to the FBI.

A few months later the boyfriend disappeared. Of course Chrissy hated me. What was
easier for her: believing he left her for the next good lay who wouldn’t nag him about the
rent—or believing that he was a Resistance Hero, spirited off to Guam by my fascist
minions?

I was supposed to be there with your mom to see you into the world. But work, you know….

I’m sure she isn’t surprised. I think she learned a long time ago that work is just another
word for broken promises.

…When I was a boy my dad showed me how to catch a cricket in my cupped hands. He’d let
me hold it for a few seconds, just to feel it flick and flutter against my palms. 3 months
ago, that’s what you were like. There was more room back then and you would be
tumbling and flipping about—you were so active!—and your mother would grab my hand and
put it on her belly and say, “See?” And I could feel you moving in there, bumping and
fluttering against my hand.

I had this joke all planned out for today. After you were born, the nurses would see how
active you are, how alert, and they would say something like, “Look at this kid, checking
out the room!” and I was going to say, “This baby wasn’t born yesterday, you know.”
*
More Presence sightings: Honolulu. Amritsar. Hokkaido. Helsinki.
*

I was supposed to be there with you, but the President called me to Washington to talk
about the Presence.

What is the Presence?

Why, the Presence is the firs
your warm bed and beaten and squashed and finally cast out into the cold, into the Outer
Darkness is what the Bible calls it. And your mother will be crying with the pain of
bearing you, and a huge hand will come down from the sky and cut you from her.

Only unlike us, you were never to blame.
*

The Presence seen in Riyadh
in Alberta. Twice in Jamaica in the space of a few minutes. Sau Paulo. Reykjavik.
Suburbs of Aukland.

And it’s beginning to look very much like the end.

Here’s what Daddy was working on until about 45 minutes ago.

I got this far and looked at it and left my computer. Got a little bottle of scotch from
the mini-bar in my hotel room and looked out the window at Washington, and thought of
you and your mother, so far away.
*

The goddam Presence. What is this fucking thing, Doug? Some kind of, I don’t know,
weather phenomenon?

Weather? No, Mr. President, we don’t believe so.

A weapon?

No, Mr. President, not as far as we know. Certainly not one of ours.

Russian? Syrian? Chinese?

Well Mr. President, we can’t say for sure, but—

Your boys

Yes sir, I know that, but—

Gotta wipe their asses with their left hands, these days, like Arabs, for not being able
to find fucking toilet paper, Doug.

Yes, that’s right, Danny Jane – the President of th
first name! That’s how important your father is.
*

Military intelligence has been reporting the Presence in North Africa every day for the
last 6 days. Sometimes the Syrian militias shoot at it, thinki
weapon of our devising.

They will realize, soon enough, that it isn’t war: it’s the end of all our wars. Maybe
the end of us, one way or another.

I haven’t slept in three days. Every time I close my eyes I see a giant hand reaching
from the sky and things seem terribly precious.

This is the house where I grew up. I guess it’s nothing special but I wanted you to see
it.

When the Presence came, for the first few days we didn’t know what to do. We upped
the Parepin in the water near every sighting, just to keep people from panicking, you
know? We thought maybe it was a weapon or the we
prank, those litt
fucking Zorro, while I spend my days sending agents out to die so they don’t have to
pray to Mecca 5 times and day.
*

Flashback: yesterday. I’m taking the train into work, a girl gets on—twenty-five,
maybe. Square glasses, jean jacket and a black skirt, no stockings, but a scorpion
tattooed on her calf. Full of life. When the train got to her station the doors hissed
open, she turned and looked over her shoulder at me and smiled and I smiled back
and she gave me the finger.

Fuck you, old man.

Fuck you, Washington pig. Fuc
wearing slacks and a belt. Fuck you because there’s a logo on your briefcase, you
are Them you are the Enemy.

And you can’t say, All I ever wanted to do wa
train in fucking Syria in that get up they would cut off her hands.

None of Aunt Chrissy’s friends want to hear that. They are full of liberal righteousness,
which means that it’s better to let foreigners rot in hell than to lift a finger to save them
and be thought a bully.

Chrissy likes to think all our wars are about oil. It makes the worl
because if it’s all just greedy tycoons somewhere there are no hard choices and she never
has to be a bad guy.

I have a master’s degree in political economics from Yale. She has an arts degree from a
city college. I spend 12 and 14 hour days going through State Department briefs, CIA
analysis papers, raw and edited surveillance footage, agent reports, and satellite data.
She reads a couple of liberal blogs and lectures me on the state of the world every time
we meet. Am I *aware* of the *cost* of the Syrian campaign?

I keep waiting for her to realize her own colossal arrogance, but it never happens. In
Chrissy’s world, facts don’t
bands: mine is cool and yours sucks, and if mainstream people like it, it must suck ASS.

This is your grandma. Sometimes she looks at me, and I can see her searching in my face
for the boy she knew, and I feel ashamed.
*

Boise. Instanbul. Cape Town. Macao. Buenos Aires. Munster. Brisbane. Isolated
reports of the Presence coming in from California ranger stations, high up in the Sierras.

So we were in a place called The Situation Room, the President and all the Consortium
hotshots, everybody spinning and spinning… “blame it on the Arabs” “blame it on the
Indians” “blame it on the disside
barking, Danny Jane. Crows screeching.

The time for blame is over. The time for arabs and dissidents and miners
and strikers and soldiers and business and anything but mercy.

We tried to make the world safe for you, Danny Jane, but we tried all the wrong things
and nothing worked. The sky is full of terror and the world is falling down. We tried
and we failed, but w

You can’t pack a good snowball with mittens on. The rule of 3s will make grade school
math easy for you, if Mom remembers to teach it to you. Never answer chain letters but
always make a wish when you blow out the candles on your birthday cake.

Tell Aunt Chrissy I love her in spite of everything. Tell your mom … tell your mom I was
wrong about not getting a cat. And all those times I told he
first grey hairs? I wasn’t lying.

Tell her I should have laughed more at her jokes.

It’s so stupid, Danny Jane. We get scared and our hearts dry up. Don’t be scared. Please
God let me get home safe tomorrow and I swear I will quit my stupid government job and
do nothing but fill you up with courage. I will take spiders out of the house for you, and
buy you roller skates, and teach you how to catch crickets with your bare hands.
*
Bangkok, Antwerp, Pla
Seoul, Portland, Plymouth—faster and faster, the cities pouring in. The great hand playing
like lightning over the face of the world.
*
Happy Birthday, Danny Jane.

When they pull you squalling into life, you yell and you keep yelling. Love as hard as you
can as long as you can. When that big hand comes down for you, nothing else will matter
any more.

At the end—and this is what I’ve learned, and I don’t know why it took so
long—at the end, ever
away and all that’s left is love and ashes.

ITS HERE

o my god, dj, it’s over the capitol. o my god, o my god i’m so sorry.

this is the beginning

the stars are blowing out like candles, danny jane

make a wish make a wish make a wish make a wish make a

I was supposed to be there with your mom to see you into the world. But work, you know….

I’m sure she isn’t surprised. I think she learned a long time ago that work is just another
word for broken promises.

…When I was a boy my dad showed me how to catch a cricket in my cupped hands. He’d let
me hold it for a few seconds, just to feel it flick and flutter against my palms. 3 months
ago, that’s what you were like. There was more room back then and you would be
tumbling and flipping about—you were so active!—and your mother would grab my hand and
put it on her belly and say, “See?” And I could feel you moving in there, bumping and
fluttering against my hand.

I had this joke all planned out for today. After you were born, the nurses would see how
active you are, how alert, and they would say something like, “Look at this kid, checking
out the room!” and I was going to say, “This baby wasn’t born yesterday, you know.”
*
More Presence sightings: Honolulu. Amritsar. Hokkaido. Helsinki.
*

I was supposed to be there with you, but the President called me to Washington to talk
about the Presence.

What is the Presence?

Why, the Presence is the first thing you will see, Danny Jane. You will be pushed out of
your warm bed and beaten and squashed and finally cast out into the cold, into the Outer
Darkness is what the Bible calls it. And your mother will be crying with the pain of
bearing you, and a huge hand will come down from the sky and cut you from her.

Only unlike us, you were never to blame.
*

The Presence seen in Riyadh this hour, and Rouen. Crete, Saigon, Lesser Slave Lake up
in Alberta. Twice in Jamaica in the space of a few minutes. Sau Paulo. Reykjavik.
Suburbs of Aukland.

And it’s beginning to look very much like the end.

Here’s what Daddy was working on until about 45 minutes ago.

I got this far and looked at it and left my computer. Got a little bottle of scotch from
the mini-bar in my hotel room and looked out the window at Washington, and thought of
you and your mother, so far away.
*

The goddam Presence. What is this fucking thing, Doug? Some kind of, I don’t know,
weather phenomenon?

Weather? No, Mr. President, we don’t believe so.

A weapon?

No, Mr. President, not as far as we know. Certainly not one of ours.

Russian? Syrian? Chinese?

Well Mr. President, we can’t say for sure, but—

Your boys have fucked up before, Doug.

Yes sir, I know that, but—

Gotta wipe their asses with their left hands, these days, like Arabs, for not being able
to find fucking toilet paper, Doug.

Yes, that’s right, Danny Jane – the President of the United States calls me by my very
first name! That’s how important your father is.
*

Military intelligence has been reporting the Presence in North Africa every day for the
last 6 days. Sometimes the Syrian militias shoot at it, thinking it must be some
weapon of our devising.

They will realize, soon enough, that it isn’t war: it’s the end of all our wars. Maybe
the end of us, one way or another.

I haven’t slept in three days. Every time I close my eyes I see a giant hand reaching
from the sky and things seem terribly precious.

This is the house where I grew up. I guess it’s nothing special but I wanted you to see
it.

When the Presence came, for the first few days we didn’t know what to do. We upped
the Parepin in the water near every sighting, just to keep people from panicking, you
know? We thought maybe it was a weapon or the weather or some fucking subversive
prank, those little streetcorner shitheads, give them a spray-paint can think they’re
fucking Zorro, while I spend my days sending agents out to die so they don’t have to
pray to Mecca 5 times and day.
*

Flashback: yesterday. I’m taking the train into work, a girl gets on—twenty-five,
maybe. Square glasses, jean jacket and a black skirt, no stockings, but a scorpion
tattooed on her calf. Full of life. When the train got to her station the doors hissed
open, she turned and looked over her shoulder at me and smiled and I smiled back
and she gave me the finger.

Fuck you, old man.

Fuck you, Washington pig. Fuck you because you like the way I look but you’re
wearing slacks and a belt. Fuck you because there’s a logo on your briefcase, you
are Them you are the Enemy.

And you can’t say, All I ever wanted to do was keep you safe. But if she got on a
train in fucking Syria in that get up they would cut off her hands.

None of Aunt Chrissy’s friends want to hear that. They are full of liberal righteousness,
which means that it’s better to let foreigners rot in hell than to lift a finger to save them
and be thought a bully.

Chrissy likes to think all our wars are about oil. It makes the world simple for her
because if it’s all just greedy tycoons somewhere there are no hard choices and she never
has to be a bad guy.

I have a master’s degree in political economics from Yale. She has an arts degree from a
city college. I spend 12 and 14 hour days going through State Department briefs, CIA
analysis papers, raw and edited surveillance footage, agent reports, and satellite data.
She reads a couple of liberal blogs and lectures me on the state of the world every time
we meet. Am I *aware* of the *cost* of the Syrian campaign?

I keep waiting for her to realize her own colossal arrogance, but it never happens. In
Chrissy’s world, facts don’t matter and hard choices don’t exist. Policies are like rock
bands: mine is cool and yours sucks, and if mainstream people like it, it must suck ASS.

This is your grandma. Sometimes she looks at me, and I can see her searching in my face
for the boy she knew, and I feel ashamed.
*

Boise. Instanbul. Cape Town. Macao. Buenos Aires. Munster. Brisbane. Isolated
reports of the Presence coming in from California ranger stations, high up in the Sierras.

So we were in a place called The Situation Room, the President and all the Consortium
hotshots, everybody spinning and spinning… “blame it on the Arabs” “blame it on the
Indians” “blame it on the dissidents” and i just listened to them talk, it was like dogs
barking, Danny Jane. Crows screeching.

The time for blame is over. The time for arabs and dissidents and miners
and strikers and soldiers and business and anything but mercy.

We tried to make the world safe for you, Danny Jane, but we tried all the wrong things
and nothing worked. The sky is full of terror and the world is falling down. We tried
and we failed, but we didn’t mean it to end this way, I swear to you. I swear to you.

You can’t pack a good snowball with mittens on. The rule of 3s will make grade school
math easy for you, if Mom remembers to teach it to you. Never answer chain letters but
always make a wish when you blow out the candles on your birthday cake.

Tell Aunt Chrissy I love her in spite of everything. Tell your mom … tell your mom I was
wrong about not getting a cat. And all those times I told her I didn’t care about her
first grey hairs? I wasn’t lying.

Tell her I should have laughed more at her jokes.

It’s so stupid, Danny Jane. We get scared and our hearts dry up. Don’t be scared. Please
God let me get home safe tomorrow and I swear I will quit my stupid government job and
do nothing but fill you up with courage. I will take spiders out of the house for you, and
buy you roller skates, and teach you how to catch crickets with your bare hands.
*
Bangkok, Antwerp, Plano, Heidelberg, Beirut and Tel Aviv, St. Petersburg, Lhasa, Bangalore,
Seoul, Portland, Plymouth—faster and faster, the cities pouring in. The great hand playing
like lightning over the face of the world.
*
Happy Birthday, Danny Jane.

When they pull you squalling into life, you yell and you keep yelling. Love as hard as you
can as long as you can. When that big hand comes down for you, nothing else will matter
any more.

At the end—and this is what I’ve learned, and I don’t know why it took so
long—at the end, everything dissolves. At the end, everything you thought mattered burns
away and all that’s left is love and ashes.

ITS HERE

o my god, dj, it’s over the capitol. o my god, o my god i’m so sorry.

this is the beginning

the stars are blowing out like candles, danny jane

make a wish make a wish make a wish make a wish make a