Lawson's Last Stand
Inside the town’s small poorly lit library Manfred Lawson was safe, for the moment, from the angry mob, an ad hoc coalition of pedestrian bounty hunters, waiting outside his house a block from the library; the mob was still arguing the merits of hanging him versus, burning him. Teary and itchy from the musty library residue that Lawson rubbed into his eyes, his head buried in a thick unauthored book, repeating the same fragment for an extended period of time, focusing on the last word INEVITABLITY. Bemoaning inevitability, word and concept – his chest pressed dead weight forward against the large table before him and thoroughly accepted his impending ending, after all he had only the day before learned his own name, when the high hatted pot bellied religious emperor blurted his name out of a megaphone. Yesterday had been the first day in decades that a proper name was uttered aloud. The reason for this deviation occurred during a long arduous discussion about dog racing and other gambling shoptalk between the preeminent world leaders. The Chief World Kommissar randomly told the high hatted pot bellied religious emperor that the name of the son of the Anti-recognition chip maker, Lawson, needed to be made public, though due to his tendency to lisp he chose not to elaborate why. Matter-of-factly the Chief World Kommissar added that he wouldn’t be on hand at Lawth-th-thon’s lyn-th-th-ining, having instead to pay off his debt that he owed to his bookie, that was higher than the high hatted pot bellied religious emperor’s hat. The pot bellied religious emperor seized the opportunity for the first proper elocution of Manfred Lawson aloud then he spat a gob of cream cheese and cucumber at the floor; his diet was unnerving him. Supposedly publicly divulging his name made the whole situation more noteworthy. The newscasters struggled spelling his name correctly Manfried, Manfrid, Manfriend, but not Manfred – Lawson they were no better with. The only bright spot for Lawson was that his imminent death would prevent him from knowing the names and accomplishments of the elite that resided on the mudball, rumored to have been called earth. Lawson turned the page, haphazardly scanning words: jumble; syntax was meaningless. When he came to the word steak his mouth filled with phlegm, he would be burned at a stake. He pushed his roast beef sandwich away from him with his book and then took a swig of his pina colada slurppe, washing down, impeding the upward chuck movement. The virgin colada had a placebo effect and image of his father the Anti-Recognition chipmaker stirred in him while he played with his slurppe straw. What a terrible childhood and early adulthood his father must have lived through, what a wonderful world he made for me, even for its short time Lawson thought aloud, alone. Swallowing some pina colada he then sucked in a puff of stale library air, the same musty dusty air from his childhood, the harangue of his teachers still hovering in it. School was held in the library basement. In his own head, was the voice of his fourth grade teacher, who was extremely progressive for her age, believing way back then, thirty some odd years ago, that in the future the world would again give awards to people and everyone would address each other by their given names. “Someday you’ll rise head and shoulders above the rest of the world,” she told him. Five feet two inches tall then, now he stood just shy of five-five, in lifts. Outside the library the streets were filled with the ad hoc group of bounty hunters, eyes peeled to snatch Lawson and force him to cough up his Anti-recognition chip. When they did catch him he hadn’t the faintest idea what to do with it. As a kid when his dad first told him about the chip young Lawson asked if he could have a bite of it. His pedantic horned rim-glassed father thought that his son was a prodigy, thinking he was punning bytes of computer memory. When his father eventually saw the young boy trying to take a bite of a replica chip on another occasion he quickly lost interest in the boy and spent fewer hours with him. Lawson always felt lousy about his computer ignorance, but knew that it was a beautiful world that he lived in appreciating the work of others not because of their names but because of their work alone, it was almost utopian except that he couldn’t make his dad proud. The Coalition of Computer Hackers for the Non Apple Pie Country impressed his father greatly; Lawson loathed them. At first they volunteered their services, breaking into publishing houses and expunging the identities of both emerging writers and past writers, but when the snot nosed prepubescent hackers entered college their Intro to Economics classes turned them onto cold hard cash. Now the sons and daughters of the hackers too wanted a piece of the Country’s Pie. Outside Lawson’s house, a block and a half from the library, the town’s most intellectual, most irate, most idiotic and even the most previously upstanding citizens were ready to lynch him. Resident writers, politicians, actors, newscasters, and clergymen also gathered outside of Lawson’s house. The clergyman contacted the high hatted, pot bellied religious emperor who himself was ready to wring Lawson’s neck. Everyone was tired of universal defamation that had gone on for too long, defaming as in disallowing people to have fame. The World Congress of Incidental, Sometimes Experimental and Very Rarely If Ever Monumental Laws, under the auspices of The Chief World Kommissar, was in the process of making a full no-nonsense amendment, but they hadn’t heard from the Kommissar because he was currently, although no one was aware of it, getting his bottom paddiwhacked by his bookie’s henchman. The high hatted pot bellied religious emperor had everything under control outside of Lawson’s house even though the mob of would be bounty hunters currently looked more like a bunch of baggy eyed deadbeats. One of the newscasters sprayed Manfried in kingly golden letters on the front of Lawson’s house. A little girl in a blue dress, held back a pout, she could easily be taken as a daddy’s-little-girl-par-excellence; twirling the white bow by the neckline of her dress she wondered what was going through Lawson’s mind. The religious emperor shouted through his megaphone, reminding the baggy eyed mob why they’d spent three sleepless nights outside Lawson’s home, although as he spotted a man gobbling up a shishkabob, he nearly forgot why he was still up. Inwardly cursing his New Year’s resolution, fitting into his old bishop’s robe. The little girl in the blue dress, known by many as the town’s self-proclaimed do-gooder, hesitantly approached the religious emperor; she had become disheartened after discovering his appeal to brutal justice. When she was arms-length apart she whispered in his ear, he retracted slightly. “Now’s not the time,” he exclaimed! The little girl went back to the line. She would wait before asking the religious emperor again to have mercy on Lawson. Her knees buckled as she stood near a newscaster catching his reflection in a white jade carved hand mirror. Ten minutes or so later her impulses drew her toward the religious emperor but her feet brought her toward the library. The library was her paradise, nobody would be there now. Her local branch stayed open all hours of the day just like the local Fast Food and Slurpee Superstores. Slurpees a town favorite were hers as well. She stopped into the nearest Superstore before the library and bought a slurpee. Because she was friendly with the manager she was able to drink a little of her slurpee before making her purchase and refilled it at no extra cost, although everyone did this anyway, without paying for them. The manager complimented her good manners. He had two articles waiting for her at the counter. One was on the Romanian Oil spill in Armenia and the other was about another arrest of a Fulan Gong supporter in China entitled Mass Egalitarian Movement. He always clipped out articles and commentaries that were of interest to her. If he had a daughter he would do the same. She smiled at the man wishing she knew his real name, but realized the sinfulness of it. She wished it possible to continue living in the Anti-recognition world; she couldn’t fathom any other one. After she filled her blueberry slurpee to the brim she left for the library, reading and walking. What was egalitarian anyway she thought? In the library she asked the librarian for some help in her word search for egalitarians, because when she punched her search into the computer it didn’t register it. The Thesaurus was missing. In place of the book was a sign offering a five-thousand-dollar reward for its safe return. There was also the warning that things would soon change when proper name calling was made legal. Thefts had got out of hand since the birth of the Anti-recognition period thirty some odd years ago. Descriptions, fingerprinting, identification by any sort were no longer on record. The librarian helped the little girl, but she too didn’t know how to spell egalitarian. The two brainstormed. “Eagle,” the librarian began.” “That’s our country’s bird,” the little girl said. “I thought it was the turkey,” the librarian said. The little girl was tempted to make a face, but thought of her unblemished image. Her mother always told her, “Show a good face.” She didn’t want to get a pimple “smart-alacky kids,” always broke out more when puberty set in than non smart-alacky kids. She was determined to keep her hormones in line. When the little girl typed in gong by itself, Fulan wouldn’t register, serendipitously a chart popped up with thirteen references. Eleven of were missing from the shelves when she checked, but two good sources were found stuck together with a sticky orangish substance that smelled of a blend of between pina colada, mandarin orange and roast beef. The first book she found was about a group of people that lived in hot central most part of the world, not far from what was referred to as the Great Rift Valley. They sounded a lot like another group of people from the hot central most part of the world who she had seen a movie about in which a bottle black carbonated soda ruined the people’s sharing lifestyle. The second book was about a group of people who lived in the same country that she lived in. These people, according to the abstract on the screen, were a plain and humble life, but they were not the horse and buggy, that she had once read about. These people lived a noncompetitive subsistence and were not drawn to material goods. Finally the little girl thought she found a people with whom she was curious of meeting. Perhaps these were the people who had orchestrated the ideas of the contemporary noncompetitive society. She read on and couldn’t find anything about name deletion as a means for making a community objective and noncompetitive. She felt disappointed wanting to get to the bottom of this desire for equality. Flipping to the end of the article she saw a passage that described all of the people from that culture as celibate. She smiled briefly, her father the town preacher, had inculcated the word into her brain at a very young age. She had to know the motivation for Anti-recognition. She sat gloomy eyed, her melted slurpee overflowed and was dripping on the table and onto the article of the Egalitarians. The librarian not the least bit annoyed since the blue droplets would only stain the paper, articles and books didn’t have authors names so no harm was being done to anyone’s name, only to their words. The librarian dabbed her index and middle fingers on the blueberry drops, then tasted them. “You know my favorite flavor is lemon, but lately I’ve been mixing my flavors – in the same cup,” the librarian said in a characteristically soft voice, uncharacteristically admitting to this subversive tendency. There was no one else in the room but Missy and the librarian, but the librarian still spoke in a lull. “You like what you like.” “I mean I thought it was silly myself until that Lawson started coming by. He was a nice man. To tell you the truth I kinda agree with him. Name and fame corrupting softly,” the librarian added as if to cover up her sorrowful feelings for Lawson. The little girl’s mind wandered about the library, letting the librarian’s voice drone out. Her voice appeared to sound lower and lower, like fading muzak. She peered through the book vacancies of the shelf two aisles away from her. The little girl saw a man with a faded baseball cap, clean-shaven, looked like a boy of fifteen from his right profile. He held a slurpee, the back of his hands were covered in orange syrup. She picked up the book of the Egalitarians and smelled the cover. She walked over toward the young man. He was engrossed in his book. She couldn’t help but confront him, nervously poking his shoulder. He jumped from his seat dumping his slurpee all over the little girl. “Always wanted to be a red head, but orange isn’t so bad,” she said. Verbally mute the man tapped his toe. Never studying a day of tap dancing in his life, remembering that his father hated boys who danced since as a boy he was forced to tap dance. The young man remembering his father guiltily tapped his foot. His periodic tapping fits might’ve left his system by now, had he taken lessons in secret. Watching the man pitter pattering on the uncarpeted floor, the little girl felt relaxed. She immediately took to him. Always nervous around her own father, she sensed he might be thinking about his own. “That book looks interesting what’s it about?” she asked, not getting too close, using the technique she often incorporated when she came across a strange animal. Uncertain at first the young man replied quickly so that his words were a connected string, separated not even by pausing for air “It’s about the young man who wishes he was young forever. And this artist paints a portrait of this young man and the devil I suppose overhears the young man’s wishes and then he never ages. Neat huh? The quality and the texture of the words reminds me of this play I once read. But the two couldn’t possibly be by the same author. People are too busy to work in different genres.” “I think a really good writer could do both anyway. Plays and stories that is.” “Say that’s what I’ve always-” Instantly he saw the female child version before him. The librarian as she bumped into a bookcase brought him back to reality. “Won’t be long till we find out. They’re going to force name recognition real soon.” “Maybe not.” “Look I appreciate you’re trying to be nice. I also know that you know who I am, but the reality is that the rock bands, the newscasters, the hack artists, the poets and even that high hatted religious guy are ready to fry me or hang me, they haven’t decided which.” “You can’t give in – it was a wonderful thing trying to save the planet and make us more like the good people from the hot central most part of the world.” “So you’ve read about them.” “It’s a beautiful idea.” “And now they’re going to fry me. Years and years and believe me it seems like eons of political correctness and now they plan to go back to stake burning.” “You’re a hero.” “I’m no hero. And look at all the stealing now. I’ve tried to maintain a society of equality and what do we have? Lynch Mongers and thieves. Those people from the hot center never had problems of stealing and they never had ego. You know what they did to men with egos?” “What?” “The big hunters, the ones who thought they should be the leaders, the chiefs of their people – and you know they’re people weren’t supposed to have an organized hierarchy?” “I do. I mean I read about that.” “Good keep reading just as you are now, even when they tell you who has written what. Anyway those people would down play the catch of the hunter if that hunter thought he was better than anyone else. His people made him feel God awful about his swollen head and then the hunter would eventually come to his senses. They stopped heckling him then.” “That’s incredible.” “That’s what the world that you should be a part of. That’s the world my dad made for me. Honest to goodness he saw those hunters and gatherers in the Desert of the central most, hottest part of the world.” Lawson had completely forgotten what was waiting for him in the streets. He continued without care in the world excpet for preserving the only world he knew, the world of Anti-recognition. He gazed at the little girl in the blue dress. She wanted to tell him her name and just because he seemed so nice, but that would go against everything he believed in. He had no idea what was going on inside her head, but he promised himself that he would not lay back and watch the good world come to an end. He patted the Anti-recognition chip in his pocket, if it stayed there all would be well. “I must admit I still want to read literature as is,” the little girl in the blue dress said. Don’t you worry you’ll never know any rock musicians, poets or names, pedagogues by name, not if I have anything to do with it.” Just then the doors to the library flew open and the religious emperor shouting through his megaphone led his mob. The librarian pointed to where Lawson was seated, then the religious emperor barked, “Little girl get away from him he’ll corrupt you.” Lawson, the midget of a man, fled dauntlessly hooking his foot on his chair’s leg and tumbling to the ground, the anti-recognition chip flew out of his shirt pocket landing by the high hatted pot bellied religious emperor’s feet. He flubbed it, finally grabbing it firmly and looking at it longingly. The mob cursed at him; an old lady plowed right through the crowd and kicked Lawson in between the legs. Lawson groaned. “You’re a slacker,” she said and he looked up, it was his elementary school teacher thin as a rail, a walking skeleton. “I’d rather die,” Lawson squealed belly first on the floor. “Please don’t hurt him,” the little girl begged the crowd. “Burn him,” a man bellowed. “Hang him,” the newscasters replied. For an instant it looked as if the crowd was so caught up arguing their views, hang or burn that Lawson might have a chance to get away. The scrawny old elementary school teacher knocked the baseball cap off of Lawson’s head and yanked on his floppy hair. “He’s really a good man. He never wanted to be known and he always liked the good people from hot central most part of the world. He’s a true egalitarian.” One newly face-lifted newscaster whispered into the librarian’s ear, presumably to learn the definition of egalitarian. She shook her head. “All he ever wanted was to appreciate good books for the words that were written in them.” “What a precocious little girl,” the scrawny old elementary school teacher said pinching the little girls cheek. The little girl stood still waiting for the religious emperor to respond, not able to look directly into his hollow eyes. He gazed at the blue drops dripping off the edge of the desk from the slurpee. Then he noticed the roast beef sandwich sitting untended, unbitten on the table next to the slurpee. He licked his lips, forgetting what he was doing in the library with the megaphone in his hand. Diet what for? He pulled the megaphone to his mouth imagining that it was the roast beef and the slush. “So little girl you say that this Lawson is a good man,” the religious emperor rhetorically stated after awhile had passed. The crowd growled. The little girl nodded her head. “And you say that he would rather be unknown and live his life never knowing the names of all these people and all the performers, poets, is that so.” She nodded again. “It seems than that the only thing we can do-” Lawson lifted his head, but not the rest of his body he was still in pain on the ground. Stooped he was almost the little girl’s height. When the religious emperor finished his pronouncement he blinked, the mustiness of the old leaves made him scratch his eyes. The librarian didn’t know where to place the Anti-recognition chip. The religious emperor made a blanket declaration, offering a handsome monetary prize for the hacker who assembled the chip back into the library’s main system and could break the code so that all names of authors would return. The owner from the Fast Food and Slurpee Superstore came forward. The little girl mouth agape whispery shouted stop. The man pulled out a customized screwdriver that was in travel pouch fastened to his waist. He undid a few screws and then proceeded in placing the chip into the appropriate location inside the motherboard, which he covered with his whole upper body, preventing anyone from seeing where exactly it went. After rebooting the system he made a few lightning quick adjustments and then he pointed to the screen. The scrawny old elementary school teacher held onto Lawson’s floppy hair and the religious emperor himself and the newscasters pulled Lawson toward the screen. “Look,” the religious emperor said jubilantly. Lawson shut his eyes tightly. The scrawny old elementary school teacher and the religious emperor tweaked Lawson’s eyes open. Presto Campanella, Camus, Caravaggio, Cervantes, Cicero appeared on the screen. For some odd reason there was a glitch that didn’t allow for the list to start from A. The Fast Food and Slurpee Superstore owner quickly attempted scrolling back up but it made no difference. Soon he scrolled down the rest of the names Dewey, Edison, Greene, Mahler, Mozart – the names, the constant fluttering of them with their opus titles flick-flick-flickering. Lawson screamed but no words came out. Then the religious emperor, glassy eyed glaring at the melting slurpee and uneaten roast beef sandwich said, “We’re going to erect a giant statue in your honor.” The crowd bellowed hang’im, burn’im. “Shilence,” the high hatted pot bellied religious emperor roared, sounding much like his comrade the Chief World Kommissar, except that it was the slab of roast beef hanging from the side of his mouth that caused his recent impediment. “You’re scrawny old elementary school teacher will present you with a replica of the statue tomorrow for your cooperation. It will have you’re name inscribed on it. Tomorrow will be a new national holiday in your honor.”
Copyright © 2000 John G Gorman |