Elusive Quark

THE ELUSIVE QUARK
by
Andrew Beergnat
copyright (c) Canoga Park

An above the knees, skin tight white dress with embroidered red paisley couldn't look better than on that strawberry blonde, who held on to a Verdegris, the host's own mixed drink invention, and with the other hand, pulled open the glass door of an antique bookcase. The ball in the latch came free with a slight tug on the brass knob, the uneven, ancient glass shuddering in the cherry wood.
"What, are you so bored you gotta read?" I asked, placing a hand on each hip and slowly began massaging.
"No, no, darling," my wife declared. "I'm going to the couch, and I'm going to hold on to a corner until all these people and ourselves get outta here and to the concert, but I need to look at a book."
"Why don't you look at your husband," reminded a distinguished brunette in a black and white checked wool suit. "Steven, you are something to look at, rather than a ... book of game rules."
My mother.
Across the living room, the night air was entering a wide open door, left that way to dissipate the smoke and heat of the overdressed crowd.
Tracey and I passed by her with a thoughtful nod, and sat together on the couch, unwilling to mingle, we grazed the magazine laden coffee table as if in a doctor's office.
My parents were sticklers at these mostly preconcert get togethers. The magazines were fanned out, I believe, in a spectrum of conventional wisdom to black secrets on the far end and buried. They did that as a snide boast, and was against all the protocols, governmental and civilian. When the boss says the notion is black, that doesn't mean you put it on your coffee table.
"Henry's a scientist with a clearance. He should know better," I said.
My wife was leaning forward on her legs, about to pull out an internal memorandum, when I headed her off at the pass with a quilting rag. She looked at me with eyes that showed an image of myself as the missing link, and slapped a Humpty Dumpty on my lap.
"Henry is an overachiever, constantly doing something to get praise by everyone, especially your parents. He's an idiot. You, as a broker, deal with inside information, and your brother deals with stuff that ultimately can get us killed."
She said 'killed' loud and clear.
It was mom's fault, because he's rather deadpan, even though he does the most interesting things that have everyone at parties in his corner talking and laughing.
"I'll bet he's a bore at the office," she snapped.
"Yeah, but outside work, he climbs mountains, skydives, he made that notorious sex film in college, where he and his not yet wife made a moving
hologram of their copulation. You see, it's simple. Get 35mm movie film and use it as the plate where the wavefront is reconstructed. Have a rock steady setup using mirrors, beam splitters, and then you ... do what you always do."
"Maybe something like that would help your problem ...
He's essentially an accountant, doing all those equations and stuff. He's the guy who put the word numb in number."
She softly sighed with a smile that said 'The kid's at the sitter's', and quickly covered up the remaining memoranda.
"They should keep this material in their own living room, and not clutter up this place," I whispered as my mother, Henry and his wife sauntered over.
"Your father is retired," said Mother. "Henry's professional bulletins are the answer to an unhappy void. You can bring over some quarterly reports or
something I know must be lying around the office."
Just then, our father entered from the kitchen, spred out like a tuxedo kite.
"Let's go. Everybody out the door. It's gonna be a good one."
As she stood in her crimson heels, Tracey's bare leg pushed against the table, revealing a new book, the kind my brother would use as a source; one that came off a sophisticated press, slick with small writing on the bottom half, and on the top were large letters.
'... ARKS: IT'S TIME TO PEER INTO THE MURK'
The first part obscurred by a coaster.
"Everyone put down your Verdegris, and get a move on," Father reasserted.
As we were all hustled into our town cars from the town house, I knew what would be the next adventure. By the time our caravan arrived at the august concert hall, I knew I was going to beat my brother by taking an early vacation and doing that very adventure. The postcards and the slides, and the video replete with subtitling, and the taxidermy. Were my eyes popping from a swaying face, niacin flushed? My heart was arhythmic, and if I chose to talk at that moment, my voice would belay a serious problem that I could only term as a joy attack. With a fist, I wiped at the humidity of my excitement, and there they were,
on the granite steps leading up to the auditorium. My father was at the wheel, trying to make a left turn into the parking lot, Mother, next to him, pursing her
lips, leaving me in the back seat, staring at Henry and Laurie, who seemed so
relaxed, almost loitering, not on a rest, but halfway up a set of steps, every
facet in the stone glinting in the light of the street lamps. He was dancing
around her in his black loafers, pointing at the top of the columns, perhaps
translating the latin, both steeped in a seductive scheme.
"Oh, they seem like they're having fun."
I could not face her, so I said it right to the glass.
"We are going on vacation, baby."
"Shipwrecks are the all you can eat cafeterias. The big sharks, the
survivors, visit the wrecks only during the nontourist hours, just after midnight. They actually come in and wake the prey by making several close passes, then, with their wonderful senses, smelling the fear and detecting vibrations, go in for the kill. After that, they get outta there, because they know instinctively about tourists, whose numbers peak during daylight hours."
I thanked the stewardess, and asked about our arrival time to Fort Myers.
She continued down the aisle, pushing the snack cart, leaving me with a beer
and a bag of almonds, which I wrestled open, reflexively hoisting my leg, nearly catching the groin of a gentleman heading for the restroom.
"I'm so tense, I could eat it all ... on her cart," yelped I.
"I know, I know," my wife assured me, clutching my hand and leaning into my side.
Our ten year old daughter was in the window seat, resting her head and glancing now and then past the wing, looking for the magical land of Disney, wherever there was Orlando. I kept reminding her that that was fake adventure, and we were going on a real adventure, to a certain location so dangerous with excitement that the native guides would run away.
"Look," I said, pointing out the window. "Fake over there. Real, with me, over here."
The first day was preparation time. They swam in the motel pool while I
spent hours in the Fort Myers Public Library with Dunn and Bradstreet, Standard and Poors, the Readers' Guide and local papers. I accumulated a spiral notebook full of information. Maps and pages from phone books were copied. I was feeding my 'broker's hunch' that would lead me to not just a shark, but an animal that would dwarf all 'tourist sharks'.
I waved my wife, in her wonderful bikini, back through the sliding glass
door, to the pool and the kid splashing, and the hot afternoon sun. She
caught me as I returned with an arm load that I flung over to the wall desk, one made of cheap plastic jade, that was attached directly to the wall. For a split second both front legs touched the floor. She wanted me to join them, but there was no way I could change into swimming trunks and have motel fun when I had no idea when my brother would follow through on his plan. It could've been any time.
Instead of sitting in the misdesigned chair, one that made my back muscles cramp thinking about it, I upended a suitcase and pulled it close to the desk. There I sat and lifted the phone reciever, quickly going to work. The key was to cut through the gossip and folktale tripe and find a guide who'd actually put substance into any knowledge. There was also needed an efficient way of discerning this.
The opening statement,'I'm looking for Moby Dick', would produce an uneasy response that would turn up the solution. Soon I got such an exchange, only more pathetic. Pay dirt.
Dr. Henry Wanamaker was sitting, I've been told, in a flourescent lit, white tile floor room, sparce, at a grey metal desk, as another man, in his late fifties, overweight and losing hairline, was stooped over, his knuckles on Henry's blotter.
Henry lifted up what looked like a large x-ray, and placed it on the viewing
light on the nearby wall of the secure space they called the observation room for the most powerful super collider in the land.
"I cann't believe it, Henry. Dr. Packer said gluon when he meant to say
meson. It was at the Subatomic Particle Symposium. I saw it on the local news ... People have it in their VCRs. It's on video tape."
"Wow. That makes my day. Let's go to lunch."
The only thing both men were doing up to that moment was talking and
fidgeting. As they were walking from the office, Henry stopped, turned around and grabbed another transparency and placed it also on the viewing light, so that now one sheet was over the other.
"Look at the tracks, Billy."
"They're two different events. It means nothing, Henry."
Henry's face went rubbery with conviction, as it always does.
"I think we better order pizza."
"Guy's Fish Party," I read from the sign as my family and I neared the dock in our rented Olds.
"Guy's Scared Local Stiff Party," I rolled off as a rotund, Samoan built,
middle-aged man in a ponytail came forward. I had stopped the car at some
moorings that held fast a gleaming white cabin cruiser.
"Well, what d'ya think? I quizzed him or whoever was there, namely my
family. Suddenly, he became uncomfortably pallid and cocked his giant head like a pissed-off pro wrestler in the ring. "I wanta go fishn', sir. I think you understand that I want to ..."
The big man raised on his toes.
" ... go fishn' for the big one."
"Marlin?" he questioned softly.
I hugged my wife and grabbed my daughter by the hand.
"No, I want to get the biggest shark you ever will see."
I isolated myself and Guy to one end of the dock.
"I'm a wealthy man, Guy ... Gee"
"Guy."
"I made that capital by being a menacing wizard in their midst, Guy."
I gazed out at the ocean's horizon, or perhaps I was smirking.
"I can spot a potential varience, using resources I have at hand, a mile
away."
Guy was blank, his flowery shirttail flapping in the breeze, he waited, trying to hold still, sockless in his moccasins. I could only think that this was a beautiful chance for my family to see me in action.
The fat man pivotted around and faced the water.
"You finally came. You've got my boat and my nautical abilities. I did not plan on doing this honorable thing today."
"It's like a sunami, isn't it, Guy?"
"Let's do it after lunch. I'll have to charge extra for the beer and blood. A friend of mine works at a mortuary, and sells me the kind of chum bait sharks really like. For the lady, I will bring back a beautiful rose."
"What's it taste like?"
"The quark's flavor?"
"No," said Henry. "The pizza. I can taste a hint of anchovies, like they put them on accidently, then yanked them off."
The two men leaned back in their respective chairs, savoring the pizza
triangles as if on a double date. Looking at each other, chewing, swallowing,
drinking from huge refreshment cups, becoming unselfconscious in their
devouring of the food.
As if on cue, they simultaneously became thoughtfully quiet, and made a
mad dash for the light board.
First one, then another transparency went against the light.
"Hypothesis," said Dr. Wanamaker. "Suppose there are phantom particles. Not true flavors, but rather odors or .. fragrances."
"Eau de Chocolat. Eau de Strawberry," quipped his colleague.
"All I ask is that we think about putting nonexistent numbers in the
formulas and see if that accounts for the missing mass and the improbable
trajectories."
Bill intertwined his fingers.
"Maybe we can get a ten year grant to study the ... 'Cologne Effect'. It will take that long to rule it out experimentally."
Each seemed to transfix on the dew of their cups, before looking at one
another. "Hey! Shut up!" both said in unison. Their workload was already enough.
My wife and I and our daughter were standing in a row on what I believe
was the port side, in the aft section, facing the helm, when after hours of full
throttle speeding, circling and zigzagging, Guy cut the power and turned to us. He was holding what looked like a handful of black lingerie. On every side was ocean, and the sky was half solid blue and half solid clouds, as if we were in a giant eye.
"I knew I wouldn't need these," he said. "Steve. You are lost, aren't you?"
My pulse picked up a bit.
He came at us with his nasal sales voice.
"If your computer had all the facts, it'd put you right here. As you see;
there are no buoys or landmarks. So we could be anywhere. No need for the blindfolds.
"In these waters are special hybridized sharks that have the acrobatic
capabilities of dolphins. Those damn scientists. They don't need bait in the
water, since they've been biologically designed with olefactory senses that can smell chum sitting here like flies passing a barbeque.
"That's exactly what will happen when a school of unnatural Great Whites,
fifty feet long, start leaping ahead of the boat. They'll be on the bow, and this cruiser is sunk."
"We cann't let that happen," said I, nearly gasping.
"Did you bring the aluminum foil so we can cover these?" Guy asked,
pointing to the chum buckets, trying to assign guilt.
"Housekeeping," said Henry, glancing around the room as he jutted a finger into the intercom button on his phone. He then wandered to his chair with the empty pizza box under his arm like a notebook, and assumed Bill's position, sitting with his gut in the air. Both, remaining in their seats, propelled together and high fived, hula waved, finger tickled, then, in the middle of the room, far from their desks, they waited facing the door.
Down the hall, there was Renee, who was about my brother's age, but I
suppose through things like low pay drudgery, being forced to wear white
polyester uniforms, looked a decade older, crow's-feet accenting her otherwise winsome visage. Her gaze went from the phone to a two foot high toothpick roller coaster that wound around the conference table, to the far end, where a geezer security guard sat in a trance. Using a small magnifying glass, she determined the glue to be nearly dry. A wink to a presence she had to tolerate for weeks of breaks, seconds from readiness, the last of the white molecules clearing, lobbing in the air the half inch ball bearing, inspecting its metal for faults, placing it against the uppermost rails, she let go, grabbed a rag and a bottle of blue window cleaner and a small wastebasket.
She reached the doorway and heard the steel hit the glass of the ashtray,
and without acknowledging a thing, she headed for the observation room.
"The barely percievable hum," droned Bill. "It can put me to sleep."
Henry played with the crease in his pants leg, nodding and smiling.
The digital wall clock seemed to slow to a clunky, broken-down round job made a half century ago, with a jumpy second hand noisily, unsteadily going forward.
She entered the room with a bottle of ammonia and the purest white linen
rag over her forearm. Walking over the porcelain tiles to where the two
gentlemen motioned, she brought past a motherly scented lilac breeze filling their nostrils. Without bending her knees, she leaned over and snagged a pepperoni slice in the cloth, and dropped it in the little trash can, then the area of a precise diameter was doused with spray and wiped clean.
Henry shifted on his haunches.
"You know what I want? What I need?"
"What?" sighed his colleague.
"On that wall over there, a poster-sized print of a bubble trail."
"Absolutely." Bill scooted over to him. "A wonderful dust magnet."
Meanwhile, there were no sharks visible to me, unless it was some sort of
native slang for what could've been a cluster of fast moving funnel clouds, as
Guy was pointing to the sea, darkened from a dismal, gusting , overcast sky,
saying 'Look at the circling fiends'. It was on a boat like that, my hero, wearing double scuba tanks and a diving mask propped on his forehead, would say 'See you next week, shipmates.' Why couldn't it be like that? Inviting and adventurous?
I couldn't look for sharks, with the distinct possibility of a full blown tornado forming.
"Not that!" yelled Guy. He grabbed my neck and directed my eyes to the
water. When he let go, I looked up, thinking a jumbo jet was right above the
vessel, then I began to sob as I realized it was not a shadow, but a fish.
Several in fact. Genetically engineered, killer 747 sharks. The now formed
vortex supplying the sound.
All around were highly disturbed drapery and at least one fully extended fold making an ominous racket as it hit at the water.
I turned to my wife and daughter, who were peering over my shoulder,
petrified. As I nearly became catatonic, thinking about that long stemmed rose in Tracey's hand, it came to me as if while shaving or clipping my fingernails, the thought of salvaging the dangerous mess by simply seizing the camera from her, and getting off some shots through the telephoto lens. Given a little faith, one could've ended up as a poster print on my office wall, or maybe at my memorial service, in a gold leaf frame. It did not matter.
I held the instrument high and low, the setting on infinity, daring not to look at such a Medusa that would've caused brown streaks in the underpants of Perseus. My thumb kept flicking until it couldn't.
Not believing what I was watching, Guy thinking he'd waste time, not getting us out of there, but there he was, playing with the bucket of chum, carrying it like a potluck dish, and swinging it out into the terrible scene. Those ten precious seconds, he could've been at the helm.
"EEEEWW EEEE!" cried the captain.
The sharks rose together from the ocean like orcas, maybe seventy-five
feet, the pickle bucket on their snouts, spewing red fluid into their senses. I
turned to confront that and the awesome column of the waterspout that seemed to take the entire weather and make a sunny day, the orange sunset simplifying the elements of white on teal blue.
One last unconscious flick on the film advance confimed a useless camera. I looked over at the man running a hand over his ponytail, and nearly screeched, but controlled myself.
"Hey, Guy, maybe we can get the Gee Wiz outta here, now?"

end