A World Without Secrets (4 page)

Hours later, I was still scribbling away on scrap paper as I tried to assemble my character cast for the story. As I worked, I would occasionally decide that the personality profile of a proposed member just wouldn't fit in with the rest of the group, so I'd crumple up the page and toss it into the wastepaper basket. So far, the previously empty basket was almost a third full. The good news was that I believed I had a solid foundation with the three principal characters, and populating the story with supporting characters was moving along well. As I pondered the interactions, I further defined the personality and temperament of the protagonist.

I was suddenly inspired with an idea for a truck driver who would provide important information about strange wreckage found at the crash site. I took a piece of paper from my scrap paper pile to start describing him and his history, but the pen refused to write. I shook it and tried again, but the ink still didn't flow. Believing it to be dry, I grabbed another pen to use. When the second pen failed to write, I tried it on another piece of paper. It worked fine. Using the first pen on the second piece of paper was also successful.

My curiosity was aroused. I picked up the first piece of paper and examined it closely. Other than being slightly silver in appearance, it looked like an ordinary piece of copier paper, the type I purchased by the case for use with my computer's inkjet printer. I guessed it must have gotten mixed in with my scrap paper when I'd combined the stacks of useless manuscript pages with some of the trash I'd picked up in the street. Since I couldn't use it, I crumpled it into a tight ball and tossed it at the wastepaper basket as I took the second sheet and began writing again.

It was closing on midnight when I sat back in my chair, stretched, and yawned. A satisfied feeling for the great progress I had made on my first day suffused through my chest— but then the first day always went well when I felt inspired by a new story idea. My stomach had been not so gently reminding me for hours that I hadn't eaten dinner, but I'd managed to ignore it for the most part as I recorded my first thoughts. However, the time had come to quell the uncomfortable rumbling from deep in my bodily interior.

After half-filling a two-quart pot with water, I placed it on the stove and used a stick match to ignite the gas burner. The old stove predated the ones with an automatic, electronic igniter, and I mistrusted pilot lights because if they went out, the apartment could fill with gas.

When I was as hungry as I felt right then, I usually sated my appetite with pasta. While the water heated, I cleared the table so I could eat without splattering pasta sauce on my laptop or paperwork. As I stepped back from the table and turned to see if the water was boiling, I spotted a blank sheet of paper lying on the floor next to the wastepaper basket. I bent to pick it up and immediately noticed the silvery appearance. It was just like the piece I had crumpled and discarded earlier after discovering I couldn't write on it. Grabbing a marker pen, I tried to write a line near the edge rather than just adding a possibly useless piece of paper to my scrap paper pile. When that failed, I tried to write a diagonal line across the center. Again nothing appeared. I naturally assumed it was another sheet like the one I'd tossed away earlier, so I crumbled it into a tight ball. Taking two steps backward, I tossed it as if it were a basketball, using the wastebasket as the hoop.

Since I wasn't otherwise occupied, I let my eyes follow its trajectory. Halfway to the basket, the paper suddenly sprang open and floated gently to the floor. I stood transfixed, my mouth agape, staring at the paper and unable to believe my eyes. I must have stood there with my mouth open, looking at the sheet of paper, for a full thirty seconds before retrieving it and returning to the table. A close examination disclosed not the slightest trace of a crease or mark on the sheet. The pot of water I had put onto the stove was by now bubbling over and hissing when splatters hit the burner, but I ignored it as I sat down at the table to think. I knew I had to determine if I had really seen the paper open up, so I crumpled it into the tightest ball I could manage and set it on the table in front of me. My hand had barely moved away from the wadded up paper before it sprang open. I watched in fascination as the crease lines melted away before my eyes, then just sat and stared transfixed at the paper for about ten minutes as I struggled to dredge up every memory I had about such an outstanding phenomenon.

I had heard about plastics with a memory. And there were several shaped-memory metal alloys such as Nitinol, a paramagnetic alloy of nickel and titanium that reportedly had similar properties but that required the application of heat to metamorphose to its original shape. While I was pretty sure the sheet wasn't plastic, it could be an exceedingly thin sheet of metal. Its slight silvery appearance reinforced this perception.

My only other recollection of anything remotely like this came from a television show I had seen about the reputed alien spacecraft landing in Roswell, New Mexico back in 1947. One of the first people on the scene later reported finding a piece of aluminum-foil-like material that would immediately return to its un-creased flat shape after being crumpled. Government investigators quickly denied the report, saying that the alleged alien craft was in fact just an ordinary weather balloon. Of course, since it was the government, no one
really
believed
them
. Most people expected government officials to always lie and spread disinformation about anything deemed top secret or potentially embarrassing to an administration. "This is certainly no weather balloon," I said aloud. "What if the original report was true and the government was able to duplicate the material at some point?"

To satisfy myself that this was the same paper I had thrown away earlier, I turned the wastebasket over, dumping the contents on the floor. I then examined each piece of scrap paper before returning it to the waste receptacle. When I had checked all the pieces and come up empty, it was proof there was only one piece like this.

"The question now, Mr. Colton James," I said aloud, "is what do you do about it? If you tell anyone about this, they'll confiscate it faster than you can say Area 51."

But what the hell good is having a secret as great as this one if I can't tell anyone
, I thought as I grinned like an idiot.

I never did get my dinner and even forgot to turn off the stove until I noticed the bright red glow emanating from a blackened pot long empty of water. I also didn't get much sleep. I spent the first several hours sitting at the table crumpling or folding the paper every which way and then marveling as it flattened out and the creases completely disappeared. My favorite trick was to shape the paper like a plane and send it sailing across the room only to see it flatten out and float gently to the floor. But while the process was amazing, I failed to see any practical use for it. If it couldn't be written on, it was useless as paper unless there was a special pen that could be used. Thinking I just needed to figure out what kind of writing implement should be used, I tried every pencil, pen, and magic marker I could find in my apartment. I had no success with any of them. I even dug out an old box of graphic art supplies I'd purchased while in college and tried some India ink. It didn't work any better than the others.

It was after four in the morning when I made my next discovery. I had found a grease pencil mixed in with my college art supplies as I prepared to put them away. I happened to be standing when I first spotted the pencil in the box, so I held the paper against the wall to try it. The grease pencil didn't work any better than the other things I'd tried, but when I removed my hand from the paper, expecting it to float to the kitchen table directly below it, it remained stuck fast, as would a rubber balloon with a static charge.

As I stood there staring at the paper, I noticed the time on the wall clock just above it. The hours had passed like minutes. Unable to think of anything else to try at the moment, I decided some sleep might improve my deductive powers. At the very worst, it couldn't hurt. I was suddenly taken with an overwhelming urge to yawn and stretch— a sure sign I was tired.

Ten minutes later I was lying wide awake in bed, trying to decide what to do with this discovery. Light was already pushing its way through the foot-square opening in the plywood that covered the window area by the time I finally drifted off to sleep.

* * *

The paper was still firmly against the wall when I awoke in the early afternoon. I couldn't stop staring at it as I ate my breakfast cereal— two bowls today because I was so hungry.

I left the paper there as I tried to concentrate on the story outline I was preparing, and it was still there four days later when my buddy, Bill Boyles, stopped over.

"Hey, bro, whassup?" Billy said as he came in and plopped into a kitchen chair.

"Not much, Billy. I'm working on a new story."

I'd known Billy for about six years. He drove a cab, and I happened to be his first fare on a day when he felt particularly talkative. I guess I was feeling pretty talkative myself because we spent the whole trip talking about the chances that the New York Giants football team would make the playoffs again. When we arrived at my destination, he shut the engine off and we talked for another fifteen minutes about the Yankees. I finally had to go, but he said that anytime I felt like talking about the Giants or Yankees, I should drop into Murphy's Bar and Restaurant after six p.m. It wasn't far from my flat, and I'd passed it many times, but I'd never stopped in before then.

"I was wondering why you haven't been down to the bar. And you haven't come to the Y either. Our team hasn't won a game since you disappeared. You're the best point guard in the bar league. I thought you were going to take a couple of weeks off after you finished up the last one."

"I'm running out of time, Billy. I haven't had time for boozing or basketball. I still haven't had a publisher express the slightest interest in any of my stuff. I need to get this next book finished before I go back to working a nine-to-five, if I can even find a job. I've been away from computers for a long time now. The field may have passed me by."

"Nah, you're the smartest dude I know. You'll find something if you really want it."

"That's another whole issue. All I want out of life is to be an author. I get such a rush when I think about all the people who read and enjoy my stories. I did the computer thing for four years and was already tired of it when the company downsized after the merger. The money was good though."

"Say the word and I'll get you a job driving a hack. It'll give you tons of time to think about your stories while you're waiting for fares at a stand."

"Thanks, but that's not for me. I have to find something that'll stimulate my mind when I'm working. Driving a cab wouldn't do that."

"You could pretty much pick your own hours."

"Thanks. If I can't find anything else, I'll consider it."

"What's with the paper on the wall?" Billy asked as he stared at my silver conundrum.

"Oh, that's an experiment in static electricity. Don't move it, okay?"

"Sure. How about a beer?"

"Help yourself. There's Bud in the fridge."

"Want one?" Billy asked as he opened the refrigerator door and reached in. He was about the same age as me, but sitting in a cab all day, eating fast food on the run, and then drinking his supper was beginning to have an effect on his physique. It reminded me that I had to start walking more often.

"No," I said. "You go ahead though. I'm keeping my mind clear for the story I'm working on."

"What's it about this time?"

"The usual. Aliens, big brother, love blossoms, love is lost, love is rediscovered, big happy ending, nobody dies."

"Maybe you oughta change the recipe. It might help you sell a story. How about trying something like: aliens, love blossoms, love is lost, the girl dies violently and horribly, the hero is devastated and kills himself."

"Sort of like a Romeo and Juliet story in Outer Space?" I said as I chuckled. "I've considered changing the basic plot. The thing is, of all the free stories I've posted, my online fans love that old formula best. It's only the publishers that don't seem to like it. I just don't get it. And I can't write the dystopian stuff that some authors crank out quarterly because it's just too damn depressing. I want to believe that mankind can and will work through his problems and create a future that's better than what we have today."

"I think people love that dystopian stuff because they want to believe all the misery they've experienced in their sad lives is still superior to what the future holds for mankind. It makes them feel better about their own situation. They see plots like yours as Pollyanna stuff."

"Wow. That's deep, bro."

"Well, you have a lot of time to think when you're sitting at a taxi stand waiting for a fare to come along. I guess you naturally ponder the meaning of life and stuff. Say, how much money have you made from the stories you've posted on the internet?"

I chuckled. "Point taken."

"If the publishers want something different, give them something different. Once you start selling books, you can write whatever you want and see if the paying readers like it better."

"I don't
know
what the publishers want. That's my problem. I send in my stories and they send them back with a photocopied form letter saying they're not commercially viable, the project doesn't fit their current needs, or that a story must be truly outstanding to be accepted. I ask them if the plot was weak, the writing poor, or what? The standard response I get from the secretaries is that the editors don't have time to write a critique of every book they review. Who asked for a critique? All I want to know is the main reason for the rejection. Five words scribbled on the rejection letter would help me adjust what I write to what they wanna see."

"Maybe it's like the old saying. They don't know what they want, but they know it when they see it."

"I guess. I recently read a note posted on a website written by a woman who clerked for an editor at one of the big publishing houses a decade ago. She said that a major part of her job was to accept submissions coming from the mail room, stockpile them in a corner of her office, and then mail them back to the authors after thirty days without anyone ever having read them. It really makes me wonder if anyone is even
looking
at my work. In fact, I read a blog note from an author who placed a tiny white feather between the first and second pages of his manuscript. When the MS was sent back to him he opened it very carefully and found that the feather was precisely where he had positioned it, meaning that the MS had never been opened. I don't know how prevalent that is, but it makes their inability to scribble a comment understandable."