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A bit surprised myself to find that Muse has chosen to mark Trevor and Jason's second anniversary with an actual installment of some substance...
***
Jason is doing his organisational-communication homework in front of a documentary on cheetahs when I get in. "Didn't head straight for the airport?" he says, not quite looking up from his keyboard.
"Need to do a load of washing first."
"Well, before you run off you got an honest-to-god urchin-gram while you were at work. You have some weird friends, man."
I'm almost afraid to open the folded-over envelope that Jason takes out of his pocket. (One assumes the 'urchin' was one of Anton's great-nieces, but it does fit with a certain someone's sense of the style of these things.) "Max seems to have taken to you," I say, turning it over in my hands.
Jason's face is a picture. "He said that if you've put up with me for three years then I check out. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be insulted or what."
(Max's trust is a difficult thing to win. He'd have a go at the traffic-regulations if he didn't see the sense in establishing a consensus about basic physics.)
I'd already guessed from the feel of it what's inside the envelope: more identification documents, each scrap of plastic one more dubious proof of my right to exist (and each with a slightly different photograph, which I suppose will further allay suspicion), all impeccably legal even if the issuing bodies would be hard-pressed to work out whom they had been issued by. There's even an expedited-re-entry card. Jason has one himself, to spare some aggro when he goes to see his father's family; I would not look twice at that, man, he marvels, taking it to lay out side by side with his.
Within the spirit of the law to allege us harmless. I think.
Jason's giving me a look as if he's been sat here mulling over what he's set into motion somewhat after-the-fact. "So, how do you square the crazy-ethical thing with hanging out with the king of fake IDs?" he asks as I begin shuffling the cards into my wallet.
Everything sounds like rationalisations, by now. "I know that I'm who I say I am," I finally say.
A sceptical twitch of one eyebrow, here; "I'm totally going to find out someday that he's your caseworker from the Men in Black or something, aren't I."
I can just see someone trying to require Max to wear a suit. How to explain my vintage radical to someone who doesn't remember a world before the internet? I know that he's chosen this work for the memory of his mother, and Anton's, and for everyone who couldn't produce papers when it was demanded of them; and admits his caprice, and hates himself for that, but carries on regardless, because it's the right thing to do.
Jason's gone back to frowning at his homework. "If you're not taking off right now would you get me a beer next time you go in the kitchen?" he requests, just a shade too offhandedly I think.
The permanence of it strikes me, suddenly, and I find myself needing to sit down. "You got me a bloody green-card," I say.
"Just don't go reading too much into the symbolism here," Jason says. "Although, if you wanted to --"
"I'm good, thanks. Well into it, then?"
Jason squirms. "Getting there," he admits. "Bus home was all boobs and butts. And that cockapoo down the street is, I wish they'd just get her spayed already, it's really... distracting, y'know?"
"Can't exactly say I do, no."
Jason looks as if he's casting about for a way to articulate his distress more precisely, and finally he says, "Bacon."
"Come again?"
"It's like... smelling bacon, even if you don't want bacon right then, smelling it makes you want bacon. Even if you don't like bacon it makes you want bacon."
I almost say who doesn't like bacon? before I realise that it would mean I'm buying into his analogy. "You may be reading too much into your relationship with cured meats," I say instead.
"Whatever, all I know is it's driving me nuts. The cheetahs are starting to look good, you're starting to look good, the, the lamp is starting to look good..." He lets the gesture he'd stabbed towards this last trail off, blinking, and then with as much dignity as he can scrape together Jason picks up his laptop and announces, "I'll be in the bathroom streaming NatGeo. Don't wait up."
***
Jason is doing his organisational-communication homework in front of a documentary on cheetahs when I get in. "Didn't head straight for the airport?" he says, not quite looking up from his keyboard.
"Need to do a load of washing first."
"Well, before you run off you got an honest-to-god urchin-gram while you were at work. You have some weird friends, man."
I'm almost afraid to open the folded-over envelope that Jason takes out of his pocket. (One assumes the 'urchin' was one of Anton's great-nieces, but it does fit with a certain someone's sense of the style of these things.) "Max seems to have taken to you," I say, turning it over in my hands.
Jason's face is a picture. "He said that if you've put up with me for three years then I check out. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be insulted or what."
(Max's trust is a difficult thing to win. He'd have a go at the traffic-regulations if he didn't see the sense in establishing a consensus about basic physics.)
I'd already guessed from the feel of it what's inside the envelope: more identification documents, each scrap of plastic one more dubious proof of my right to exist (and each with a slightly different photograph, which I suppose will further allay suspicion), all impeccably legal even if the issuing bodies would be hard-pressed to work out whom they had been issued by. There's even an expedited-re-entry card. Jason has one himself, to spare some aggro when he goes to see his father's family; I would not look twice at that, man, he marvels, taking it to lay out side by side with his.
Within the spirit of the law to allege us harmless. I think.
Jason's giving me a look as if he's been sat here mulling over what he's set into motion somewhat after-the-fact. "So, how do you square the crazy-ethical thing with hanging out with the king of fake IDs?" he asks as I begin shuffling the cards into my wallet.
Everything sounds like rationalisations, by now. "I know that I'm who I say I am," I finally say.
A sceptical twitch of one eyebrow, here; "I'm totally going to find out someday that he's your caseworker from the Men in Black or something, aren't I."
I can just see someone trying to require Max to wear a suit. How to explain my vintage radical to someone who doesn't remember a world before the internet? I know that he's chosen this work for the memory of his mother, and Anton's, and for everyone who couldn't produce papers when it was demanded of them; and admits his caprice, and hates himself for that, but carries on regardless, because it's the right thing to do.
Jason's gone back to frowning at his homework. "If you're not taking off right now would you get me a beer next time you go in the kitchen?" he requests, just a shade too offhandedly I think.
The permanence of it strikes me, suddenly, and I find myself needing to sit down. "You got me a bloody green-card," I say.
"Just don't go reading too much into the symbolism here," Jason says. "Although, if you wanted to --"
"I'm good, thanks. Well into it, then?"
Jason squirms. "Getting there," he admits. "Bus home was all boobs and butts. And that cockapoo down the street is, I wish they'd just get her spayed already, it's really... distracting, y'know?"
"Can't exactly say I do, no."
Jason looks as if he's casting about for a way to articulate his distress more precisely, and finally he says, "Bacon."
"Come again?"
"It's like... smelling bacon, even if you don't want bacon right then, smelling it makes you want bacon. Even if you don't like bacon it makes you want bacon."
I almost say who doesn't like bacon? before I realise that it would mean I'm buying into his analogy. "You may be reading too much into your relationship with cured meats," I say instead.
"Whatever, all I know is it's driving me nuts. The cheetahs are starting to look good, you're starting to look good, the, the lamp is starting to look good..." He lets the gesture he'd stabbed towards this last trail off, blinking, and then with as much dignity as he can scrape together Jason picks up his laptop and announces, "I'll be in the bathroom streaming NatGeo. Don't wait up."
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