Here & There

Read Here & There for Free Online

Book: Read Here & There for Free Online
Authors: Joshua V. Scher
two sit on the bed for a moment and then burst out laughing. He wraps an arm around her back. Eve curls into Reidier, snorting laughter into his armpit, their bodies shaking with amusement. Reidier kisses the top of her head.
    It’s a rare moment of relief for them. Somehow, in this mundane suggestion, Reidier and Eve found a way to cut through the months of tension and alienation they had endured.
    Eve slept that night.
    Reidier did not.
    Instead, a few hours later he’s sitting on the floor of his sons’ room. He rests with his back against the nightstand between their two beds. Reidier barely moves. He just rubs his thumb against his forefingerabsentmindedly. The only sound is the synchronized breathing of the twins.
    Less than a half hour later, Reidier is downstairs in his home office/lab in the basement. The footage is discontinuous, jarring. It is not from the Department feeds, but recorded with his computer’s webcam. Reidier obviously made this recording himself, but without any decipherable purpose or method. Instead, it’s a disconnected montage of half thoughts and disjointed moments. The overall effect suggests that he randomly, and sometimes accidentally, hit the record and pause buttons. There’s no indication of any review or editing. More of a stream of consciousness, or unconsciousness as the case may be.
    The first shot is of Reidier at his desk, still in his pajama bottoms and sport coat. He faces the camera in a whispered testimonial. Reidier’s manner and tone are conspiratorial, bordering on paranoid. “It’s all about tomorrow. If I’m right, then . . .”
    A quick smile curls at the corners of his lips and flattens back out. He nods to himself, then finally stops. “It solves everything. You’ll see, Kai. Then we’ll—”
    He abruptly turns around and stares up the stairs. He appears to be searching for the source of a noise that either didn’t occur or didn’t get picked up by the computer’s microphone. 9
    After almost half a minute, Reidier turns back to the camera. He leans in close to the camera and confides, “The ceiling fan is still trying to eavesdrop.” He shakes his head. “Don’t think it can hear down here. But it doesn’t matter. It still can’t read Leo’s Notebooks.”
    Jump-cut to his empty chair. In the background, Reidier, wearing an eye-patch on his right eye, paces back and forth, holding, ofall things, a wok. He makes small circular motions with it as he walks. From inside the wok swishes out the tinny sound of metal on metal.
    Jump-cut to a God shot (presumably Reidier holds the webcam above, pointed down) of the wok. At the center of it sits a metal marble. Reidier’s hand comes into view and spins a second metal marble around the wok’s lateral surface like a roulette ball. As it spirals down, the other marble jumps away from the first, as if pushed by an invisible force. It’s disorienting at first until you realize the two marbles are similarly charged magnets. They move in tandem together, circling the center. Every now and then Reidier reaches his hand in and nudges one. Instantly, the other moves in response.
    Jump-cut to Reidier sitting with his back to the camera at a three-quarter angle. He seems completely motionless, possibly asleep. At the bottom left corner of the screen, a fluttering movement catches the eye. He holds an unframed photograph. He tilts the photo ever so slightly back and forth. Due to the angle, the dim lighting, and the general low quality of webcams, we cannot see what’s in the photograph.
    After this, there’s one more jump cut to a final testimonial, although its intent is debatable, as it might have simply been an accidental recording. Reidier faces the camera, but his eyes are focused below it, on the computer screen. He shifts from right to left. His eyes similarly shift in the opposite direction. It is unclear as to what he is looking at, but his behavior suggests that he’s staring at his own live video image

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