Memory Motel: A Rock N Roll Fantasy – Chapter 40 – More About Susan
40 – More About Susan
Phil, well you could say he was seriously taken aback and he euyed the juice again and then he yeyed fatou who was a complete stranger to him and for a moment he thought maybe she was Susan under a different disguise, and “said “Susan…?” this time daring it out in a wondrous huh?
“Sorry, not Susan.”
“Has she been fired… where is she. We can’t do it without her, you know. She is really needed.
Fatou giggled a little and sat down. “Susan will be back though I am not sure her actions were in the best interests of her assignment.”
“It was my fault…”
“Nobody’s fault, there never is any fault you know, we don’t work that way. Eternity is too long…”
“Then why has she been replaced…”
“Oh, she hasn’t been anything of the sort. Susan is working with the Stones, she played Mick’s role for a while, and now she is getting ready. Tomorrow, I will be with the stones, Susan will be with the people following the band. If it doesn’t explode before the end of the show, everything will be fine. If it doesn’t, well, goodbye cruel Universe and we don’t want that.”
“So it is purely…”
Fatou poured herself a diet coke and lit a cigarette. “The thing is, Susan died very young, she died very innocent.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“You are the first person Susan has ever had sex with…”
Phillip was at the very least, shocked. “That makes no sense. But she wasn’t what you’d normally think of as a virgin… I mean… I don’t…”
“Susan is a little confused as well…”
“Why me?”
Fatou looked away and then towards him. “Maybe she needed a man easy to respect…”
“You don’t know me…”
“Of course I know you, don’t I?”
“Can you…”
“No, but I can try that’s for sure… For me, when I died, in the 1800s, I was from a country where western thought was infiltrating for the first time. And I died with a book in one hand and my child in the other. But since then, nothing has changed in this sense. I still want to know, I still want to understand. Because the spirit is infinite, you think it has no starting point. But it doesn’t have a starting point and since it does it can evolve in time, in infinite, time, forward, changing.
“Susan is still young, still evolving, still changing. Even more than me or even you, she chose you but she isn’t sure what to do with the choice. This has nothing to do with why I’m here but as long as I am here…”
“It hits me that death is as random as life.”
“True… but the insecurities are different.”
“Have you met God…”
“Sure, so have you but that’s for another time, for now what are we gonna do about Mike?”
Just the sound of Mike’s name made Phil shake. “I can’t stand that kid.”
“He’s a good guy, and he really is a good musician, personally I like him but we can’t have him and Michelle going rogue.”
“Would it matter if we lost them?”
“Oh it would be disastrous…”
“Then what can we do…”
“Does he have any heroes…?”
They sat there in silence, and then Phillip walked to the giant windows looking out towards 5th Avenue and Central Park and stared out at the traffic still moving down towards him., flowing like monsters from the Aftermath, ever onwards like a memory, giant monsters of the modern age, “All across the town, all across the night everybody’s driving with full headlights… black or white turn it on, face the new religion…”
And then he screamed “Everybody’s sitting ’round watching television.”
“Pete Seeger?” Fatou asked.
“One protest singer much like another…”
“Seeger has been a hotshot since he got there…”
“How does he like it?”
“There is nothing to rebel against… though he is trying hard…”
“Not Pete… The Clash, Joe Strummer…
“And…”
“Mike will listen to him.”
“Just because we want someone doesn’t mean we can get them, but let me look into it.”
