20 

The more things change...

“Well.” Coyul surveyed his restoration job. “How are we getting on? Everything in the right place?”

“Right on.” Scheherazade devoured Purji with her eyes, “Perfecto.”

“I’m not so sure.” Lance sounded that way.

“Give us half a minute to check you out. Purji, inspect Ms. Ginsberg.”

“Please don’t dash,” Scheherazade implored, covering her eyes. “I still got dots.”

“You won’t feel a thing,” Purji promised. “Here we go.”

For a few seconds, Lance and Scheherazade were alone. Lance squirmed with an unscratchable itch. “Sort of tickles.”

“Kinky,” Scheherazade said in a voice full of wonder. “These are weird but wonderful beings.”

The inspectors materialized again, reassured. “Not a corpuscle out of place.”

Purji patted Scheherazade’s butch-cropped head. “Coyul?”

“Clean bill of health, although Lance feels better than he looks. What’s the matter?”

“Ask her.” Lance collapsed into a chair. “I feel awful. It’s not your fault, sir,” he added hastily. “I want to apologize for blowing you up.”

The gracious Prince waved it away. “Professional hazard. As you’ve discovered, traumatic but hardly permanent. What’s the problem?”

Lance hunched over his knees, a tragic figure. “I left Letti for Scheherazade, and now she’s left me for Purji.”

“It’s planetary changes,” Scheherazade defended herself. “Can I help it?”

“That’s why the sinister ensemble.” Coyul took closer note of her costume. “You look like a satanic biker. Purji, have you been irresponsible?”

“Don’t be stodgy, dear. To have a public entails obligation. Had to allow it on Keljia now and then.”

“There, you see?” Scheherazade glowed. “We shall overcome. Were there many sisters, baby?”

“It’s their Bronze Age. They’re all too busy trying to live past thirty-five.”

“You of all people,” Coyul reproved. “Playing musical bedrooms. Promiscuous.”

“Coyul, you’re putting a nasty human complexion on the whole thing. Sherry, please try to understand —”

“I do.” The ardent Scheherazade tried to embrace her. “The first time I opened my eyes and saw you leaning over me, bells rang and I turned on.”

“What can I do?” Purji appealed to Coyul. “Help me, will you?”

“Me?” He folded his arms. “Lie in your own bed, you turn coat.”

“But I didn’t.”

“You did, you made love to me,” Scheherazade insisted. “It was to die.”

“No, child. You made love to me. You were enjoying yourself so, it didn’t seem good manners to interrupt.”

“Sherry, not only have you broken my heart,” Lance in toned darkly, “you are depraved.”

“Nonsense,” Purji sniffed. “She’s barely proficient.”

“I am too,” Scheherazade hurled back, stung to the quick. “I am a primal force!”

An arguable point to Coyul, who had seen more attractive buffalo. “Well, how was it, dear? Primal?”

“Oh... popcorn without butter.”

“Snails without garlic?”

“There you have it: something missing. Sherry, did I get that gall bladder in right?”

“She’s ruined,” Lance groaned. “The love of my life and she just wants to be my brother.”

“What can I tell you?” said Scheherazade, creature of the moment. “Scorpios are unstable.”

To Coyul the definition was inadequate. She was a sexual traffic hazard.

“I know fate like I know good grass,” the hazard appealed to Purji in tones husky with hormone. “Be any kind of light you want. I’ll wear shades.”

Lance got up, resigned. “I don’t need to see this. Goodbye, Coyul. Thank you for everything.”

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know. Out there, like Speed. Out into the dark. That’s all there is for me now.”

“Marchbanks to the core.”

“I do love you, Lance,” Scheherazade vowed despite defection, “but a star is to follow.”

“Stars change,” Purji reminded her, “Consider the age difference alone. There you’ll be, the rekindled flame of Topside and myself the pitiful castoff of your wearied lust.”

“Honey, that’s then,” Scheherazade bleated. “This is now.”

“All you have is now,” Lance said. “That’s all you’ll ever have. And when your goddamn sign changes again, where’ll you be, Sherry? All alone, that’s where.”

“Only a large soul could love a goddess or give her up,” said Coyul.

“Think how much time we could have.” Lance held out his arms, inviting. “Eternity almost. I need you, Sherry. I’ve been burning bridges all morning. You’ve always talked about commitment but you haven’t even lit a match.”

“Oh, hey,” she faltered, confused. “I don’t know if I can deal with this.”

Lance took her hand. “Sure you can, baby. I know you can.”

Being a large soul appealed to the drama in Scheherazade. She looked wistfully to Purji, bargaining with her instincts. If she couldn’t be near the girl she loved, could she always love the boy she was near? Should she bite the bullet, settle for what she could get? Someday, she hoped, she’d get the whole thing straight; one day when the I Ching came out perfect: pass GO and collect the whole bank.

“You’d have to be awful patient, buddy. Until my sign changes, we’d be like two centers in a basketball game.”

“I don’t care.” Lance reached for her, but Scheherazade hung back, desperately appealing to Purji. “He doesn’t understand. I can definitely not make his scene. Hell, I’m even flat-chested. Help me!”

“You ought to manage something in that department,” Coyul suggested to Purji. “You put her together.”

“And rather well, I thought.”

“With the imagination of an artist, darling, but finished work is the hallmark of the pro. Do something.”

“All right, then. Hang on, Sherry. Fringe benefits.” Purji promptly vanished.

Scheherazade squirmed, feeling very odd. “What’s happening? I feel like something in a microwave.”

“Purji’s tinkering,” Coyul told her. “Yes, you look better already.”

An understatement; Scheherazade’s transformation deserved musical accompaniment. The cropped hair lengthened in luxurious waves and fell, thick and lustrous over her bare, smooth shoulders in the electric pink Lance adored. Black leather sloughed away, replaced by a diaphanous and charmingly inadequate garment that revealed most of a truly admirable bosom and other quantum improvements.

“That’s enough,” Coyul advised to no effect as Scheherazade continued to blossom. “Purji, enough.”

Lance marveled, “Look at her!”

“I can’t.” Scheherazade shuddered, eyes tight shut. “I’m scared.”

“Purji, stop showing off’” Coyul admonished. “This is excessive. Why must you always overdo. I said STOP.”

Too late. The process had already trespassed the boundary of miracle. The image was still Lance’s Sherry but as heavy cream to powdered skim milk. With the revised Scheherazade as a centerfold, you could print the rest of Playboy in Urdu; no one would notice.

The changeling gaped at her own form. “Will you look at this bod? I could get horny for me. I could —”

Alas, she could not. The urge strangled at birth as Purji finished rewiring mental circuits and reappeared with a flourish. “Voilà! Should have done it when I reassembled you. Sort of a junk-food mentality, but we’ve got you sorted out now. How do you feel, dear?”

“I...” Scheherazade swallowed hard. She felt marvelous and, for the first time in her astrological life, stable as a Virgo. She glowed. The look she bent on Lance Candor was soft, fetching and unambiguous. Pinochiette had become a real girl. Purji had even managed the satiny Keljian skin with its delicate hints of blue.

“The shade is authentic. Absolute catnip to males,” Purji guaranteed.

Scheherazade found speech a little difficult at first, “Lance, look at me.”

“I certainly will.”

Purji’s hand few to her lips. She brimmed with inspiration. “Coyul, you’ll hate me for this, but I have a simply marvelous idea.”

“Stop improving. She’s already illegal.”

“But darling, it’s brilliant. Talk about fate.”

“What, what?” Scheherazade breathed, beginning to be ready for anything.

In a nanosecond, Purji had shared her concept with Coyul, who beamed his approval. They circled Scheherazade critically; then Coyul clapped his hands in decision. “Yes, Purji: fresh, exciting, original. Though she’s a bit small for the job.”

Lance took a death grip on his lady. “She’s the right size. For God’s sake, don’t change anything.”

“Not for Keljians,” Purji frowned. “But they might think it’s part of the miracle. Come here, Sherry.” She draped an affectionate arm around the girl’s shoulders and kissed her. Scheherazade blushed and wriggled in discomfort.

“Uh, do you mind not kissing me. Can’t we just shake hands?”

“How would you like to be a fertility goddess?”

“Oh,” The notion took a moment to register, then impacted on Scheherazade like the comet that hit Siberia. “Oh, wow!”

Purji winked at Coyul, “She likes it.”

“I love it! TOO FUCKING MUCH!”

Coyul offered the apple of Eden. “You’re a natural.”

“Natural what?” Lance looked from one to the other, confused.

“A goddess, baby,” Scheherazade whispered, already lapsing into character. “I was born for it.”

“We include transportation,” Purji threw in.

“But my moon phases. I mean, what if I change in the middle of something? A bummer.”

“Shouldn’t be a problem,” Purji judged professionally. “Perhaps a relapse now and then, but you can handle fifty percent more of the need than I ever could. No one turned away; and take my word, the traffic on holidays —”

“A love goddess,” The candidate quivered with ecstasy and anticipation. “A fucking star. I’ll draw more fans than Joplin ever could.”

True, but no peach without its pit. Purji felt obligated to point out the downside. She’d have to deal with some very repressive patriarchs along the way. She could expect regular attacks, burnings and crucifixions. There was no job security.

“Sherry, think what you’re doing,” Lance implored. “So far from home among strangers, I’d never see you.”

“It’s my star, baby. Should I let the greatest bod in the universe next to Purji’s go to waste?”

“Wait. Why should he have to?” Coyul posed in the awed dawning of his own inspiration. “Why not go with her?”

“With her?”

“Of course. It’s logical, the last note completing a perfect scale. What did we say, Purji? If only the silly Keljians could develop a messiah early on, how much trouble they’d avoid?”

Her mind synthesized the possibilities in seconds. “Darling, what can I say? It’s groundbreaking. Boggling.”

“Some are born great.” Coyul laid his hand on the new-fated shoulder of Lance Candor. “Some just fall in it. Are you big enough for the job?”

They’d lost Lance at the last turn. “For what, sir?”

“Messiah to the Keljians.”

“Oh. Well. Gee. Really, I...”

“Think, my boy. No homely myth of the stable, sweet as it was. No humble Galilean beginnings. Just – bang! You’re there. Christ come down from the mountain.”

“A very good point,” Purji chimed in from experience. “First appearances are very important, something with color and fireworks. Like a volcano; they have lots. But they’d be in competition, Coyul.”

“Pick, pick, pick. Did I say it was perfect?”

“Hey, gang. I got it,” Scheherazade leaped in. “Dig this. They think were in competition, right? But secretly we work together. Get weekends off, we can even live together.”

Coyul bowed to her improvisation. “Sherry, you improve on the masters.”

“That’s just the beginning. Gifts from the gods; we could introduce pizza.”

Coyul’s approval curdled slightly, but Scheherazade missed it.

Lance felt a bit giddy. He’d always wanted to be a hero and made it in his death. This was the next giant step. A messiah. An eternal good guy. “I’ll do it.”

“Right on. We got it knocked.” Scheherazade gave him a long, deep kiss.

“What —” Lance’s blood pressure took a moment to subside. “What should I be, Protestant or Catholic?”

It was Coyul’s professional opinion that he should start simple and see which way the wind blew. There were built-in advantages. “Think of the theological development you’ll save them. The women will love you. The men will love you. You might just skip the Dark Ages altogether, blending into one redemptive and thoroughly sexy godhead. Purji, I salute your genius.” He blew her a kiss.

“And I, darling. Yours the seed.”

“Lancelancelance come on! Talk about significance. Stars are being born.” Scheherazade took his face in tender hands. “And listen, lover: you can die for them. Over and over.”

“A perennial favorite, never outsold,” Coyul noted. “The Golden Bough never had it so good.” He gestured with a flourish to Purji. “My trained and courteous assistant will handle the details of passage.”

A heady moment while Lance’s imagination went into overdrive, smoldered with each new possibility, roared into game with the notion of death and martyrdom not only hallowed but painless and recyclable. In one cinematic vision, he saw Scheherazade pursued by bigoted males, bruised and bleeding, cornered against a wall, only to be saved by himself. Let him who is without sin... Followed by disciples, speaking in parables, performing miracles. He saw himself on the Cross, forgiving them for not knowing what they did, blessing them even in his agony, and then coming home to Sherry after a hard but satisfying day.

“Sherry, it’s big.”

“The biggest,” she breathed. “What are we waiting for? Can we go now?”

“Come as you are,” Purji beckoned. “You won’t need anything. The ship is waiting. Coyul, dear, I’ll just drop off the children on Keljia. Don’t be too radical before I get back. Low profile.”

He crossed his heart. “Death Valley.”

“Thank you, sir. I’ll make a good messiah.” Lance started after Scheherazade but halted in the doorway with a major consideration. “Shouldn’t there be a devil?”

“Oh no, don’t even think of it,” Coyul quashed the notion firmly. “Trust me, the Keljians will create one of their own.”

“Are you sure?”

“Look what they did to me. Who wants to believe he’s a bastard without help? Au revoir.”

“You let your hair grow,” Scheherazade advised Lance as they went, “and I’ll get

some serious white underwear. From now on we think image. This is a commitment.”

“Back soon, dear.” With a wave, Purji vanished after the godlings.

“Drive carefully,”

Alone, Coyul pondered aloud to the empty room: “What hath God wrought?”

He hoped the rest of the day might be as inspired as the beginning, but that would be rank optimism. A libation was in order. Coyul scanned the Candor-Ginsberg shelves and fridge, finding only a wasteland of diet soft drinks. He materialized a Glen Morangie on the rocks and sipped appreciatively, gradually aware of another voice in the roam, soft but febrile with excitement.

“... sex and redemption in one package. Yeah!” A pleased chortle, “Why didn’t I think of that? Psst – hey, Prince?”

Coyul looked around, “Who’s there?”

“Over here. The answering machine.”

“Oh, it’s you. How are you getting on?”

“Bored, man. How long do I have to stay a machine?”

Coyul’s mind was elsewhere. “Refresh me. What did you do?”

“Nothing,” the machine protested innocently, “Just free enterprise. I started a popular religion.”

Coyul finished his drink, frowning. “So you did. A very lucrative one.”

“So did Rome. Did you hang this kind of rap on Saint Paul? How long?”

“Don’t call me, I’ll call you.”

“Hey – there he is!” The camera crew charged into the room through the open door, Cathy Cataton in the lead, adjusting her microphone. “Sorry to be a drag, Prince, but you’re news again. Quick with the lights, guys. Stand over here, Coyul.”

The Prince was startled out of his composure. “What... what the hell is this?”

“Makeup, check me out.”

A small ferret of a woman writhed between Cataton and Coyul, inspecting the telereporter’s makeup, patting it with a cotton swab. Another technician relieved Coyul of his drink. “Not on camera, sir.”

“I repeat: what the hell is going on?”

“You’re being sued,” Cataton informed him with a spritely grin. “Any reaction on that? Ready? Okay, we’re live.”

No reaction but shock. While Coyul tried to avoid the microphone aimed at him, a large, florid man filled the doorway. Coyul recognized Reverend Arlen Strutley, recently fallen from Grace but spectacularly repented in front of a million TV viewers. Strutley fixed Coyul with a baleful eye, brandishing a folded paper. Behind him, more of the faithful jostled to get into the room.

“Prince of Darkness! Sower of discord. I have here a summons.”

“Strutley, didn’t they bust you?”

Strutley darkened with offense. “My confession was televised. The charges against me were blown out of all proportion.”

And to prove the point, the cry went up from his adoring claque: “THREE CHEERS FOR REVEREND STRUTLEY.”

“Redeemed through media. You wept prettily,” Coyul admired.

“Oh, you creature of the dark.” Strutley’s voice broke with the best-known sob on television. “Come to judgment. Here.” He thrust the paper at Coyul. The word SUMMONS was prominent in Gothic type. “We, the Christian League for an Orthodox Topside —”

“Good old CLOT.” Coyul pocketed the summons; what else was new?

“— are suing you for gross misuse of office.”

“In fully televised hearing.” Cataton leaned into camera shot. “Stay tuned. BSTV will not carry this.”

Reverend Strutley began to perspire profusely. He didn’t really have to, but it made for an impassioned image. If he knew anything, Strutley knew ratings and his flock. “For outright fraud in presenting a false Jesus. Trial convenes in a week.”

Cataton’s mike jabbed at Coyul. “Will it be no contest or will you go to trial?”

“No comment, not without counsel.” Coyul glanced at the summons. The charges were fulsome.

“But can you tell the viewers who’ll defend you?”

“No. I don’t know. This is all too —” Speed, where the hell are you?

“Cringe, Satan,” Strutley trumpeted. “Cringe before JUSTICE!”

“Lay-ance!”

The new voice overrode even Strutley’s stentorian lung power, the hunting cry of a jilted assassin, “Lay-ance, you sunvabetch!” Into the already crowded room speared a dying wedge of robust females, Letti Candor their point. Technicians were shouldered out of the way as Letti hewed her path to the center of the room. “Where is mah husband? He can’t desert me.”

“Rejoice,” Coyul informed her. “He is risen.”

“You!” Letti’s arm snapped out like a switchblade. “The Devil – get him!”

Letti launched herself at Coyul with a banshee yell, a killing machine. Her attack triggered a domino effect. Coyul went down, toppling Reverend Strutley.

Several of Letti’s more nearsighted friends, geared for blood and not at all selective, mistook the reverend for Coyul and fell on him like demented soldier ants.

“Speed,” Coyul wailed as Letti’s nails tore a tiger-swath through his face and a swatch of fine shirting. “Someone get Josh Speed – stop this at once, Mrs. Candor. I’m becoming quite put out. SPEEEED!”

Letti went for the jugular. “SUNVABETCH.”

“Oh, hell,” Coyul muttered. “Always something.” He relapsed to pure light form, ground zero at Hiroshima. Blind as a rabbit in a high-beam headlight, Letti groped for something to rend. “Where’s he at? Where’d that old Devil go?”

“Can’t see a thing,” complained Bernice, doing mayhem on Strutley by Braille, “but I got something here.”

The remains of Reverend Strutley could no longer remonstrate. Blind as the rest of them, but in journalistic clover, Cathy Cataton stumbled to one side, a wounded but gallant chief still at the helm. “Beautiful! And we’re exclusive. Benny, what’s happening?”

“Who knows?” he hooted, blind and joyous as Cataton, “but they’re doing it good.”

“Keep rolling” Cataton leaned against the wall in utter contentment. “It is Heaven, it is the promised land. I love it. I love it,”