Dark Duets Part 52

"My comics in yet?" Carmen asked, flipping a long shank of greasy black hair out of his eyes. Just a few years ago, Carmen had been a ba.s.sist for a number of speed-metal bands, including FightZombies, an infamous group that went on to minor fame (sans Carmen) by touring various dives, barns, and house parties all the way from north Georgia to West Virginia.

"Yes," Riley said, gathering up Carmen's pulls and sliding them across the counter. Carmen's selection of comics was rather eclectic: on top was his run-of-the-mill Marvel stuff, but underneath, carefully hidden inside a paper bag, were his hentai manga, j.a.panese comics that featured busty women having s.e.x with large p.e.n.i.s-shaped robots and tentacle beasts with hundreds of eyes. Riley never understood the fetish and rarely asked about it. "Here you go."

Carmen nodded, thumped his fist flat on the counter, and turned to leave. "Thanks, chief."

"Wait, before you go, I've got to ask you something." Riley pulled the GPS from behind the counter and offered it to Carmen for inspection. "This yours? Or do you know if someone left it here over the weekend?"

Carmen squinted, and his eyes became ferrety slits. "Naw." He shook his head slowly. "Definitely ain't mine. Don't think anybody left it here either."

"Not even one of the guys from the Yu-Gi-Oh tournament?"

"Uh-uh."

"You sure?"

"Positive." Carmen leaned heavily on the gla.s.s counter-a habit that annoyed Riley to no end. All he needed was for Carmen to shatter the gla.s.s and impale himself upon the upraised sword of the Red Sonja statuette below- "What did I tell you about leaning on the counter?"

"Sorry." Carmen stepped back and leaned against a shelf of newly arrived comics instead. "It doesn't look like a normal GPS to me."

"You know anything about them?"

Carmen seemed to think about that, his eyes going wide as he scratched at a crusty brown stain on the Dr. Who T-shirt underneath his biker jacket. "I don't know. I mean, I read about them in Consumer Reports-"

"Really?"

"Yeah, really. I was looking for a dashboard-mounted GPS for the van a while back. You know, for touring and whatnot. Read a bunch of reviews for TomTom and Magellan and s.h.i.t." Carmen pointed at the StreetDreams2000. "Never seen that one before. Must be some flea market brand."

Riley glanced down at the sleek unit and its bright screensaver, which continued to flash the StreetDreams logo over a digitized background of plump clouds. "I don't know. Seems like it's pretty high quality to me."

"Whatever." Carmen shrugged and peeked into his paper bag, the one containing his X-rated import comics. For a fleeting moment one of the covers was visible and Riley saw a bright red nipple being tweaked by suction-cupped fingertips. Carmen interrupted Riley's gaze with a question: "What are you going to do with it?"

"Keep it behind the desk and see if anyone asks for it, I guess."

"Well, somebody obviously left the thing here; you don't just accidentally carry that thing in from your car and drop it behind some comics. n.o.body is coming back for it. Just keep the thing. Or better yet, sell it to a p.a.w.nshop."

"I'm not selling it."

"Give it someone special, then," Carmen said. "Free gift. And with Valentine's Day on the way."

"Yeah, right."

Riley didn't have a girlfriend, but neither did Carmen, so why it bothered him so much, he couldn't say. It just did.

"One of our best shopping weeks," Carmen continued. "Every hopeless sad sack will come in here and blow money on comics because they sure as s.h.i.t can't blow it on roses or lingerie, am I right? h.e.l.l, it's like Christmas in this business, it's like-"

"Shut up," Riley said. "Carmen, just shut the h.e.l.l up."

"Suit yourself," Carmen said, indifferent to his anger, now staring blankly at the GPS again. "I would dump that thing, though. It's almost like someone was trying to get rid of it."

Riley finished up his evening close-out ritual by counting the till, boxing up a modest pile of old role-playing game books, and then pulling down the window shutters. Just before heading out for good, he stopped and looked at the StreetDreams2000, which was still flashing its hypnotic screensaver.

Incredible battery life that thing has, he thought.

He knew that the right thing to do would be to hold the GPS in the shop for a few days at least. See if a customer maybe came back in to reclaim it. Riley knew what it was like to lose something important and then feel that immense rush of calm when you recognized it was in the hands of a Good Samaritan all along. It was the righteous thing. A heroic thing. The kind of n.o.ble action that builds a customer base.

Still, he'd always wanted a GPS, but never truly felt the need to buy one. His life didn't warrant such a device. He barely ever went anywhere that required directions, and everywhere important in his world was within a fifty-mile radius of his house. His stirring social life consisted of driving to and from his shop, visiting his mother in Norcross on the weekends, and maybe catching a LAN party with the guys over at the Strategist.

It wasn't a new, adult monotony. The monotony of his youth had been similar-unless punctured by bullying or rejection. He'd always been the weirdo, and mostly that settled on his looks. In middle school, his peers had nicknamed him "Pug" because of his flat, sloping cranium, bulging eyes, and pert, upturned nose.

Things didn't change much in high school, not until he fell deeper into his love of superheroes, Hammer Horror flicks, and Star Trek. Eventually he found friends-fellow geeks with equally interesting nicknames-and they spent every waking hour together in the camaraderie of shared fanboy obsessions. This allowed them to block out the rest of the social universe. Their geeky interests became a fortress of solitude, a self-governing civilization complete with its own lexicon, social cues, and inside jokes.

Everyone else moved on after high school, going on to Georgia Tech or schools out of state. Riley had never been a stellar student and so he didn't follow his friends to college. The next year was hard. With his universe of fellow geeks moved on he wasn't sure what to do with himself. The nearest comic book shop was twenty miles away, and it mostly catered to little kids playing Pokemon. He'd lost his friends, lost his wonderful coc.o.o.n made up of back issues of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and piles of twenty-sided dice.

Then he figured out a way to stay a fanboy forever: he looked at a map of comic book stores around Georgia and found an underserviced area. Then he sc.r.a.ped together enough family money to move to Winder and open Kingdom Comics. That was ten years ago.

At first it worked. Kingdom Comics made him feel vindicated.

I'm not Pug anymore, he would think. I've built my own world. I can live out the rest of my days surrounded by people just like me.

But now, as he edged toward thirty-two, he recognized the chief limitations of his chosen profession: money. Over the years he watched as his high school friends' lives grew with new families and bigger houses. For Riley, every last dollar went to keeping Kingdom Comics alive. He felt like he didn't even have enough money to take a girl on a date (if she would've gone in the first place), and his lack of funds certainly removed the possibility of any vacations, new cars, or pricey gadgets.

Riley gritted his teeth and s.n.a.t.c.hed the StreetDreams2000 off the counter.

f.u.c.k it, he thought. Maybe this one is for me.

THAT NIGHT, IN his ancient Nissan Sentra, he played with his new toy. The StreetDreams2000 was shedding LED light, illuminating the dangling, tentlike felt ceiling of Riley's disheveled car. Usually the shabby interior would've bothered him. It was a visceral reminder of just one more thing in his life that was mediocre, imperfect, or just plain c.r.a.ppy. But for once, he didn't care, because today he had the StreetDreams2000. He was staring intently down at the GPS, playing with the settings, changing its voice to that of a Finnish man with a deep baritone, then a throaty woman speaking Magyar, and finally he settled upon the voice of a pixielike British woman who sounded part secret agent, part phone s.e.x worker.

The voice controls were remarkable. It seemed to pick up on every word you said, no matter how rushed they came, or what accent you used on them. One setting option said: LET ME GET TO KNOW YOU. Riley grinned at that. Getting to know a GPS? Whatever.

"Get to know me," he said.

A moment later the British voice uttered back to him: "h.e.l.lo, User1. What is your name?"

"Riley."

"Good to meet you, Riley," the StreetDreams2000 said. "What would you like to do today?"

He sat in silence for a moment, unsure of how to answer. It seemed like an odd question, he thought. Almost open-ended, at least from the tone.

"Are you asking for an address?"

"An address or a location of your desire." The GPS seemed to pause for a moment, before adding-he swore with a slight flirtation: "If you can dream it, we can get you there."

Riley grinned a bit and decided to play along. He had had a lot of fun messing around with a customer's iPhone Siri, and the StreetDreams2000 seemed like yet another opportunity to mix it up with a feisty artificial intelligence.

"I'm hungry," Riley said.

"Hungry for what, Riley?"

It was better than Siri. Better than anything of that kind. He decided to screw with it a bit more, see how much it really understood.

"The best f.u.c.king fish tacos in Georgia," he said.

"The best f.u.c.king fish tacos in Georgia," the StreetDreams2000 repeated, not missing a beat. "That would be Restaurante Del Mundo, 16778 Akers Boulevard, Atlanta. Would you like me to ready your directions?"

AFTER ROUGHLY AN hour of following the StreetDreams2000's sweet, dulcet-toned commands, he found himself at Restaurante Del Mundo, a small pueblo-styled building out on I-20. When he went inside, the restaurant looked barely open: unfinished drywall, a few tables and chairs, a counter, and a register. Not even a posted menu. The grand opening was a few weeks away. How in the h.e.l.l had the GPS determined this was the place for fish tacos?

The owners, a stocky husband and wife duo, stomped out from in back and seemed perplexed but genuinely glad to see Riley. He tried to leave, but they insisted that since he'd gone out of his way to find them, they'd cook for him. After a bit, they came back from the kitchen with a big plate of fish tacos. The food was unbelievable. The fish tasted fresh and lightly seasoned, and the tortillas were warm and soft without being overly doughy.

Yup, he thought, licking fresh pico de gallo from his fingers. These are the best fish tacos I've ever tasted.

After he'd finished what easily might have been the best meal of his entire life, the owners asked Riley how he'd found about them.

"Honestly?" Riley said, smiling crookedly and fidgeting with his napkin. The truth felt embarra.s.sing. "My GPS brought me here."

The owners seemed shocked. According to them, Restaurante Del Mundo hadn't even officially opened yet and wasn't in any phone book.

"We want to get a, what do you call it? MyFace page. And on the Google. But we have not yet."

"Well," Riley said, "maybe somebody is giving you a hand with that, and you just don't know it."

When he hopped back in the car, he grinned wryly at the GPS perched on his dashboard.

"So you've got magic powers, right?" he said. "How else would you know about this place?"

The GPS didn't answer him. Instead, the screen flashed back to a current road map and that s.e.xy voice chirped: "Next destination, please."

"Take me to the best comic book shop in Georgia," he said and then immediately regretted asking the question. He didn't want to hear the truth-would rather hear a lie: that it was Kingdom Comics. But he knew that wasn't the truth. He had worked incredibly hard on his store, kept it well stocked and solidly organized, but it wasn't the best. He knew that. But part of him just wanted to feel like he'd really accomplished something.

Pug from high school might've gone out and started a mediocre comic shop, he always thought. But not me. I built something great.

The GPS was about to pa.s.s judgment on that, though, and Riley knew he shouldn't have asked.

"The best comic book shop in Georgia," the StreetDreams2000 said. "That would be Oxford Comics, 2855 Piedmont Road NE, Atlanta. Would you like me to ready your directions?"

"No. And Oxford Comics can kiss my a.s.s."

Silence lingered in the air, but then there was a faint whining sound, coming from somewhere unidentifiable. He wondered if maybe it was the GPS or perhaps just his worsening tinnitus from all that Pantera played in his youth.

Oxford f.u.c.king Comics, he thought. It wasn't just that Kingdom Comics wasn't the best-rather it was the fact that despite Riley's best efforts it still wasn't the best. He was a loser. Couldn't succeed at anything. Couldn't build a successful comic book shop. Couldn't find a woman to love. Was still Pug, after all these years. Still the kid from countless confrontations with jocks in the hallway who pushed him up against lockers or spilled his backpack over, dumping his character sheets, Dungeon Master's Guide and Monstrous Compendiums all over the ground. "Fetch it, Pug!" they'd say, laughing and shoving him to the linoleum floor. "Fetch!"

Pug was a loser. Pug hadn't achieved anything, hadn't built something important with Kingdom Comics. Instead he'd forged a prison from which he could never escape- "I'm not Pug anymore," he said, aloud, feeling stupid as soon as the words. .h.i.t the air.

"Pug is not a known address or location," the StreetDreams2000 said. "Please repeat."

He didn't respond to the request. His temples were starting to hurt-aching from grinding his teeth. It grew uncomfortably quiet in the car again, but the StreetDreams2000 broke the silence with a single question: "Where would you like to go, Riley?"

"I don't know. Okay?" He squeezed the faded steering wheel until his knuckles ached. "Stop f.u.c.king asking."

" 'I don't know' is not a known address or location," the StreetDreams2000 said. "Please repeat."

"Stop f.u.c.king asking me!"

" 'Stop f.u.c.king asking me' is not a known address or location," it said, but this time the tone sounded different. Almost annoyed. "Please offer a valid destination request."

"I don't-whatever-" Riley sighed loudly, frustrated. "Just take me home."

The GPS didn't answer. Not immediately. Instead it seemed to pause, as if thinking, before saying softly: "If you can dream it, we can take you there."

Riley's eyes welled with tears, and he couldn't even explain why. Maybe it was the way the StreetDreams2000 was talking now, as if this cold A.I. really cared about him and wanted to deliver him to the location of his dreams. Maybe it was because no voice so kind had reached him from a human face in years. f.u.c.k years, hadn't reached him from a human voice in his whole G.o.dd.a.m.n life. He was crying now, how pathetic was that, sobbing into his palms, the tears dripping between his fingertips.

"Take me home," Riley said, before whispering: "Take me to someone who loves me."

"Calculating your route, Riley. Calculating your route."

THIRTY MINUTES LATER he was driving through a downpour, listening to bad wipers squeak across the windshield.

Need to get those replaced, he thought, brain still foggy with tears and emotion. They're a driving hazard.

"In 10.6 miles, take Exit 29E-Sandy Plains Road."

Part of him recognized how crazy this all felt. He was following the soft, cooing directions of a GPS that seemed able to magically find any location that he desired. Now it was taking him to someone who would love him? What in the h.e.l.l was he following this thing for?

Because if it's half as good as those tacos . . . he thought, and managed a laugh. What the f.u.c.k did it matter? He had a full tank of gas and, as usual, n.o.body was waiting on him.

The StreetDreams2000 clearly didn't share his mirth. Her voice was hard now. All business: "In one mile, turn right onto Hiram Avenue."

He was thankful that Hiram still looked like civilization to him, albeit a civilization wreathed in a thick Scottish fog. Riley leaned forward and squinted, trying desperately to see anything beyond his windshield. He couldn't help but imagine misshapen creatures hiding in the shadows. One too many comic books. Or ten thousand too many.

"In three-tenths of a mile, turn right onto Sterling Street."

He followed the orders and the fog gradually broke, and Riley was relieved to see a series of housing developments-the expensive kind that he'd never be able to buy into. But the next set of directions gradually took him deeper and deeper into territory devoid of streetlights or finished construction.

"Turn right onto Sampson's Ferry Road."

This next turn brought him over a hill and onto a gravel road that shook his Nissan's ailing suspension. Riley gazed around and realized that he was deep in the middle of nowhere. Time to give up on the StreetDreams.

He was just about to turn around when the GPS barked another order at him: "In five hundred feet, bear left."

From what he could tell, the gravel path seemed to cut out here, stopping at the end of the field.

"Bear left," the StreetDreams2000 said, its polite British voice suddenly sounding a bit petulant.

He paused, considering what to do next, and his headlights illuminated the empty fields and a sign promising dream homes to come.

That was it? The GPS thought this was funny? Riley wanted to find someone who loved him, and in answer the GPS took him to a place where n.o.body lived?

"You're a p.r.i.c.k," he told the device.