Lost Boys: A Novel Read online

  This was the chance Step had been hoping for—it would never get better than this. Might as well ask for the moon. “I don’t want to work for anybody, Arkasian. Not even Agamemnon. If I leave Eight Bits Inc., it’ll be because I have a development deal with somebody, and I can work on my own, at home, with an advance large enough to live on while I write code. And I have a one-year noncompetition clause with Eight Bits Inc. Hacker Snack is excluded, though, and also programs for machines that Eight Bits isn’t developing for.”

  “And how much would you need?”

  “Depends on how long the program would take to develop,” said Step. “That atlas would take a long time.”

  “What about Hacker Snack for the 64?”

  “Two months,” said Step.

  “And what about Hacker Snack for the PC?”

  “I don’t know 8088 machine code.”

  “So include the learning curve.”

  “Six months at the outside,” said Step. “But it won’t look as good in IBM’s lousy three-color graphic screen.”

  “I want it monochrome first, anyway.”

  “Why not do both versions and put them in the same package? That way if they upgrade their machine, they already have the game.”

  “Why not sell it to them twice?”

  “Because they’ll feel robbed,” said Step, “and if they’re thinking about upgrading you don’t want them to put off buying Hacker Snack until after they’ve decided about the upgrade. Heck, they might upgrade just because they already own the color version of the game.”

  “Let me think about this,” said Arkasian. “I can tell you right now, I want Hacker Snack for the 64. But different. Upgraded. So we can say, Better than the Atari version. New improved, all that bullshit.”

  “I’ll think of stuff,” said Step.

  “We haven’t decided about the PC, either. Nor would I have any idea how much to advance you on PC projects, because we still don’t know what the entertainment software market is going to be like on what is essentially a business machine.”

  “A crippled business machine.”

  “With an inflated, monopolistic price,” said Arkasian. “I don’t like IBM either. But I think Neddy’s right. I think IBM will make the PC go. I think it’ll be ten times the CP/M market, and I think people will want color on it. And do you know why I think they’ll want color on it?”

  “So they can play games,” said Step.

  “Dead right.”

  Step laughed. “That’s the only reason computers exist, isn’t it? To play games.”

  “No joke,” said Arkasian. “And the more gamelike the serious software is, the better it’ll sell. Step Fletcher, I’ll give you a development deal on Hacker Snack for the 64, just to start with. But it won’t be enough money for you to quit your job.”

  “I understand.”

  “But if Ray Keene is as cheap and stupid a son-of-a-bitch as I think he is, he’s going to decide not to develop for the PC. If that happens, you tell me, and we’ll do a deal for the PC. A serious deal, maybe even including that atlas idea. You do want to do that, don’t you? I mean, I know you were just making it up as you went along, and maybe—”

  “I’d give my teeth to do it.”

  “So tell me when Ray Keene decides.”

  Step took a deep breath. “I can’t do that,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Mr. Arkasian, I work for Eight Bits Inc. I can’t tell a competitor things that I find out about Ray Keene’s plans.”

  Arkasian looked at him, perplexed. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

  “The second I quit,” said Step, “then I will be able to tell you whether my noncompetition agreement will allow me to develop for the PC or not, and then you can conclude what you like. But until I quit, I can’t tell you what Ray decides about anything. I shouldn’t even have told you that he hasn’t decided yet, and I feel bad enough about that, I’m not going to make it worse.”

  “Well, then, if he decides not to go for the PC, quit your job and call me.”

  “I can’t quit my job unless I already know I’ve got something lined up.” What Step couldn’t say was, There’s a chance that you’re only offering me work in order to get a spy inside Eight Bits Inc., and I won’t do that. “I’ve got three kids and a fourth due in July.”

  Step almost held his breath, waiting to see what Arkasian would say.

  “OK,” said Arkasian. “I’ll send you a contract for Hacker Snack for the 64. There’ll be an option clause in it. Hacker Snack for the PC, and a development deal for the PC. If I decide, as I probably will, to take Agamemnon into PC development, then I’ll exercise the option on Hacker Snack for the PC. At that point, if you come to the conclusion that your noncompetition agreement with Eight Bits Inc. would allow you to develop for the PC, then you can exercise the option on the PC development deal. And I’ll make sure the bucks are big enough. What do you make now?”

  “Thirty thousand a year, only that isn’t enough to live on.”

  “I know how it is,” said Arkasian. “A two-year deal, a hundred thousand dollars. You can’t exercise your option unless I’ve already exercised mine, for the PC version of Hacker Snack, but after that, it’s up to you.”

  “Up to Ray Keene, you mean.”

  “I’m betting on Ray Keene making the wrong move. Maybe only for six months before he changes his mind back, but if everything works out, your work is going to be coming out with the Agamemnon logo on it.”

  Step cocked his head. “You aren’t just using me to stick it to Ray Keene, are you?”

  “I don’t invest money to stick it to anybody,” said Arkasian. “I invest money where I think I’m going to make a shitload more.” Then he grinned. “But if it also makes Ray Keene piss green, so much the better.”

  “You need my address,” said Step.

  “Give me your card.”

  “I don’t have a card. I just moved and, well, I don’t have a card.”

  “Write it on the back of mine. And keep one of these for yourself.” Step pocketed one card, put the Chinqua Penn address and phone number on the back of the other, and returned it to Arkasian. Arkasian took it, put it in his pocket, and held out his hand. Step took it. Arkasian’s grip was large and firm and it made Step feel . . . safe. Like he was in good hands now.

  Arkasian didn’t let go of his hand. “What I’ve said to you about my plans . . . ,” he said.

  “I don’t spy for anybody,” said Step. “And Ray Keene knows better than to ask me to.” Though of course Ray could ask him to sneak around and run the programming behind Dicky’s back, and Step would do that. I pretend to be so clean, but I’m really not.

  That was what Step thought as he left the Agamemnon booth. I’m only somewhat clean. I only have some standards that won’t bend. And if Arkasian had offered me enough money maybe I would have folded on all of them. He probably thinks I’m a good man who can be trusted, but I know that I can only be trusted until I think that being trustworthy won’t get me what I want. Even as it is, I’m a sneak and a cheat, coming here to talk to one of Eight Bits Inc.’s most powerful competitors when it was Eight Bits that paid for me to come to this convention in the first place. I tricked them into paying for me to fly to a job interview with a rival. I’m even getting paid for the time that I spent here.

  By rights I should share the idea for the atlas with Eight Bits Inc. My employment agreement says so, that any ideas I come up with while I work for them belong to them.

  Then he thought: That’s easy. All I have to do is propose the atlas to Dicky, and make him think that I really want to do it. He’ll shoot it down. He’ll kill it, just to spite me. If I get him to do it in writing, I’m home free. I’ll have proof that I offered it to them and that clears me.

  Sneaky. I’m so sneaky.

  That night, Glass tried to get him to join him and the marketing guys and some young programmers at Apple who were working on software for the Lisa. They were going to drink the
ir way through San Francisco, and Step begged off. “But we need a designated driver,” said Glass.

  “Take a cab,” said Step.

  “Oh, yeah,” said Glass. “I forgot. This is a real city. Cabs.”

  So Step had the hotel room to himself when he called DeAnne and told her everything that had happened with Neddy Cranes and Dan Arkasian. He loved hearing the relief, the excitement in her voice. “It’s not a sure thing,” he said. “But the money for the 64 adaptation is.”.

  Then she thought of something that could go wrong. DeAnne was good at thinking of things that could go wrong. “Only if you can get Eight Bits Inc. to stop working on their own 64 adaptation.”

  “I’ll just tell them to stop.”

  “Right, you’ll walk in and say, I sold it to Agamemnon.”

  “No, I’ll just tell them that I won’t sell it to them.”

  “And they’ll ask why, since you work for them, and especially because they’ve got so much invested in it now.”

  “Not my fault.”

  “Not your fault, but then they fire you anyway because you’re not a team player.”

  Step sighed. “This is all very complicated.”

  “It’s all a matter of timing, isn’t it,” said DeAnne. “Because what if things come to a head about the 64 adaptation before we actually get a contract from Agamemnon, and then you tell Eight Bits Inc. they can’t do it and they fire you and then you don’t get the contract from Agamemnon after all.”

  “But what if the contract comes first and the 64 adaptation doesn’t come to a head until after Ray decides not to develop for the PC and after Arkasian decides that he will develop for the PC.”

  “Everything depends on other people,” said DeAnne.

  “Everything always depends on other people,” said Step. “And maybe the Lord is looking out for us a little. Maybe God has a plan.”

  “Well, if he planned for you to work for Agamemnon, why didn’t he get us to move to California instead of this side trip to Steuben? Or even leave us where we were? We were happy in Indiana. Stevie wasn’t playing with imaginary friends there.”

  That was something new. “Imaginary friends?”

  “I realized it today. I mean, it’s been going on for weeks. Almost since we moved here. He comes home from school so morose, I don’t think he has any friends there, I mean I’ve asked him who he plays with at school and he says, Nobody, but I didn’t worry because then every now and then he says, Jack and I did this, or Scotty and I did that. So I thought, he does have friends, he just wants me to feel sorry for him.”

  “Heck, I didn’t even know he talked at all.”

  “He’s not a catatonic or anything, you know. Just depressed.”

  “Oh, well, that’s OK.”

  “On Saturdays I’ve been spending time with you, doing the shopping we had to do, all the work, all the unpacking, you know? But this Saturday you were gone, and I was lonely, and so I just sat on the patio for a while reading that Anne Tyler book you got me while the kids played. Robbie and Elizabeth were playing two-man tag or something, anyway they were chasing each other everywhere, but Stevie just sort of sat there on the lawn, and then he wandered around, touching the fence, touching the wall of the house, stuff like that. It worried me. He used to play with the younger kids, and here he is still sulking or something and he doesn’t play with them, even though Robbie kept coming up to him and saying, Play with us. Anyway, then I went inside and did the laundry and stuff, but I kept checking on the kids because that’s what I do—”

  “Madame Conscientious.”

  “That’s me, Junk Man. But what I’m saying is, I know Stevie never left the back yard and I know that no other kids were there. But then at supper I asked him, What were you playing there in the back yard today? And he says, Jack and me were searching for buried treasure. And I say, You mean at school? Because that’s where I thought Jack was. And he says, Jack doesn’t go to school.”

  “Are you sure he understood what you were asking?”

  “Yes. I mean, I asked him right then, Well when did you search for buried treasure with him? and he says, Today, and I say, Where? and he says, In the back yard mostly.”

  “Isn’t he a little old for an imaginary friend?”

  “Yes, Step, of course he is. Way too old. It worries me.”

  “Maybe he’s just pretending that his friends from school are part of his imaginary game at home. You know, including them even though they aren’t there.”

  “I’m not making this up, Step. He actually said that Jack doesn’t go to school. Doesn’t that sound like an imaginary friend?”

  “I forgot that you said that he said that. I haven’t had a chance to think about this the way you have.”

  “Step, he doesn’t have any friends at school, apparently, and at home he’s not playing with his brother and sister, he’s playing with imaginary friends—even when the kids are right there, when I’m right there. Tonight I tried to get the kids to play Life with me, you know Stevie’s always liked that game, but he wouldn’t play. I made him play, but he wouldn’t move his car or handle his money, I ended up spinning for him even, like he was just a dummy player, and he just sat there staring off into space.”

  “Is he still punishing us for making him move and go to a new school?”

  “What else can I think?” asked DeAnne.

  “Things have to work out,” said Step. “They have to work out so I can come home, work at home. So we can get life back the way it’s supposed to be. I feel so helpless, so cut off, my boy is having these problems, he’s so angry at us, and I can’t do a thing, I’m trapped. How do other men do it? Going to work all the time? And then these housewives want to go to work just like the men, so they can be cut off from their families, too, when what should happen is all the men coming home, to put the family back together.”

  “I know, Step. At least that’s how we need it to be.”

  “So pray for us tonight,” said Step. “Pray for this contract to come through. For all the timing to be right.”

  “I don’t know if I should be praying for things like that,” said DeAnne. “It’s so selfish.”

  “Listen,” said Step, “even Christ expressed a personal preference before he said, Thy will be done.”

  “Yeah, but then look what happened to him!”

  He hooted with laughter. “I can’t believe you said that.”

  “I didn’t mean it to be so—sacrilegious.”

  “It wasn’t, Fish Lady, it wasn’t.”

  “Things will work out,” she said.

  “I love you,” he answered.

  “I’ll pick you up at the airport tomorrow,” she said.

  “We’re all coming in on the same flight,” he said. “So I can just hitch a ride home with one of the ones who parked there.”

  “I want to meet you at the airport, Junk Man. The kids want to meet you.”

  How could he tell her—he didn’t want his children there when Glass got off the plane. He didn’t want anybody from Eight Bits Inc. to see his family. The kids were still pure, still untouched by this slimy company, and he just didn’t want them to be defiled by having Ray Keene tousle Robbie’s hair or Dicky Northanger chuck Stevie under the chin or Glass look at Betsy.

  “Please,” he said. “Keep the kids home. Let me come home to them. To you. Please.”

  “Whatever you say, Junk Man.” But he could tell she was hurt.

  “Please understand,” he said.

  “Fine, it’s fine,” she said, though it was clearly not fine. “I love you.”

  “I love you more,” he said. Another ritual.

  “Not a chance,” she said. The ritual answer.

  “Hang up first,” he said.

  She did.

  6

  INSPIRATION

  This is the career DeAnne found for herself: In high school she realized that the only way a decent woman with no skills could make money was as a burger flipper or a waitress. So she
set about getting a skill. When she entered college, she could type a hundred words a minute. She earned enough money as a part-time secretary in the Child Development and Family Relations Department to pay for the materials to make her own clothes and the gas she used driving the old red Volkswagen to the Y and back. She mastered the magcard electronic typewriter, got a raise, and saved enough to pay for a semester in Paris.

  Her choice of major was less practical. She loved art and music and literature, and so she majored in humanities, even though she knew that there was no career on earth for which a humanities degree was regarded as a serious qualification. But that didn’t matter. In the back of her mind she knew that motherhood was going to be her career, as it had been for her own mother. She studied humanities so she could create a home filled with art and wisdom for her children. If she ever needed a job, she could walk into any office, type a flawless 300-word page in three minutes or less, and be hired on the spot.

  It turned out, though, that motherhood wasn’t quite the career she had hoped it would be. For one thing, motherhood was always preceded by months of misery. If it hadn’t been for Bendectin, which barely controlled her perpetual nausea during the first four months of each pregnancy, she would have vomited her way into the hospital with every child, and the nausea never really went away until the baby was born.

  More important, though, was the fact that each newborn was a complete barbarian. She and Step put prints of great art on the walls and played records of great music of every kind, but that was background—her main activity was chasing, feeding, wiping, washing, changing, scolding, comforting, and containing her impatience with the little vandals. There were wonderful moments, of course, but they were few and far between, and while DeAnne loved her children and took pride in caring for them, she could never find any measurable accomplishment in her life. When Step finished working he wanted peace and solitude; she was dying to have an adult to talk to. And when Step helped her with housework or tending the kids, the fact that he was perfectly competent at everything told her that nothing she did could only be done by her—except nursing the newest baby, and baboons could do that.