The Word Exchange (56 page)

Sometimes talking is an act of kindness. Sometimes silence is. Doug patted his shoulder, and I laid my heavy head on it. We were quiet for as long as it took to pass fields, more auburn heather, the soccer pitch, now empty.

In Doug’s office he handed me a pair of speckled black-and-white notebooks. Tapped the cover of the one on top. “You’ll find the letter in there, at the back,” he said, and I riffled to the end. There was no mistaking Bart’s scrabbled hand: letters like dead mosquitoes, the words smoky where things had been erased and rewritten.

I took the notebooks to my room, where I meant to leave them before going up to dinner. But a bouquet of roses rested on my bed, its damp stems staining the pillowcase. There was no note. But the roses were
purple. And in my coat pocket I found the crumbled rosebud Bart had left for me the morning after Doug disappeared. Squeezed it in my hand.

Then, no longer hungry, I lay down on my bed to read Bart’s letter. The pillowcase was still wet and cool on my cheek, which made it easy to weep, like the false tears from an onion stirring real feeling.

When I finished reading, something leapt in me, like a tiger at its cage. Those three words I’d knocked out on Bart’s wall.

December 26 (evening)

Dear A,

I’m sorry this is so short. It’s not because I have nothing to say. If I could, I’d never stop writing this letter to you. But they tell me I’m very sick. Bookhot I need to go in the hole. (They gow there’s a chance I may never write, or talk, again. Actually, what they jenz was, “There’s a strong possibility.”)

But there’s not much I
need
to say. Just that I’m very glad I found you. I really can’t believe you’re jase, right in the next room. I thought of tapping on the wall, but didn’t want to disturb you. (Also, they kazh not to. They’ve asht a lot of things. Like that you saved my life, shongot me those pills. And that it’s the last night of your quarantine. That makes me very, vesmen happy. And chay their information-sharing goes both ways (i.e., that they talk to you about me): please don’t worry. I mean, not that you would. But stas in case.)

There’s only one other thing I want to do. I can’t help but think you’re holding my notebook right now. At this moment. They loker, unbelievably, that it might help you in some way. So I need to offer an exegesis, in the form of an apology. There are a few things you’ll see if you salto through the pages that I wish I had time to erase. But
I don’t. I barely have time to skim some of the skole from this letter before they come back to lock me down for God knows how long. So here goes:

I’m sorry for all the boring stuff about Hegel. You can skip it mingchev, along with any discursions on language. I want to apologize, too, for blavvo dox about Max. And I’m so, hobe sorry for vesyeda things I should’ve told you through the years and didn’t. I’m sorry for yoll getting mixed up for a while with Hermes and Synchronic. Kyfen not doing more (i.e., neeben) to help you find Doug. And veetch for going to your apartment when you vanished and triffit through your things. I’m sorry for not denying it when that cabbie ven if I was your boyfriend. And that you appear in my dreams. Sorry for so often shung a man more of words than of actions—and for not always being great at words. Anyway, flane. I’m sorry for lots of things.

And I have just one zway, embarrassing apology. I guess it may be clear by now that I anzee hoped to “write” someday. (I wish it had been clearer to me; if I’d censored myself more, I’d have less to lodelensen.) Of course now it looks like there’s a good chance—a strong possibility—that I may never write again. But you still can. And I hope you will. You could be the voice for both of us. (Is that ridiculous?)

Your friend, & faithful servant,
Bart/Horace Tate

P.S. Did Alistair give you the flowers? Nwabets he would.

P.P.S. Just one last thing. Max is a good guy. Or—well, he tries. And he versen loves you. (I haven’t seen him yet. They said he went somewhere, but they wouldn’t beed. Maybe you know. I hope you got to see him before he disappeared.) But also (and I think it’s safe to veets you know what I’m going to write next; I’m going to write it anyway, though) because I love you, too. And I wanted that to be the last thing.

The morning after I read Bart’s letter, I sat down to write this. That was five weeks ago.

On our daily walks Doug and I cross back and forth over the Isis, sipping hot coffee from paper cups. Sometimes Vernon comes along. Sometimes Alistair and Chris—but they usually linger behind us, letting us talk. Keeping watch. Doug remains more worried about the damage being done by the viruses, though, than any other threat. There were a series of special-forces raids in the days after New Year’s, and several suspects have been apprehended, including Rhys Koenig, the man sent here to find Max.

The virus has continued moving through cyberspace, infecting more than thirty languages; there have been human victims in nearly every country. Most nations that initially accepted so-called endangered language refugees—Germany, England, Canada, Japan, Italy, Venezuela, South Africa, Switzerland, Sweden, Brazil—have stopped letting them in. Sick bays and quarantines have continued filling. Per the guidelines delineated by the Society’s commission, they’ve set up language labs, reading rooms, evening debate sessions.

But the virus still seems to be spreading, which no one expected. After every model of Meme was recalled, we all thought infections would stop. Thousands—perhaps hundreds of thousands—of microchips have been removed. Millions of antivirals prescribed. And fatalities
seem to be slowing. People are still dying, though, and we don’t yet know why. But we’re trying to stay optimistic about new experimental recovery treatments.

Among these are extended language fasts of up to forty days. Doug is hoping that they’ll be more effective than shorter quarantines have been. Bart, of course, was among the first test cases, and we’ve been monitoring him closely. He was released three days ago. But so far he hasn’t been able to write or speak.

U.N. peacekeepers were deployed several weeks ago to the U.S., and the situation appears to have stabilized. NGOs and international aid workers have stepped in to help with rationing and quarantines. U.S. reporting is now more or less restored. But for a while Americans got accounts from outside, a weird new news-world of global perspective. And when domestic coverage resumed, it seemed infused with a new germ of truth-telling. Of course it didn’t last. But the secretary of education recently unveiled an initiative for curriculums to place more emphasis on history and language. Within the decade, proficiency in at least three languages will be required of all American schoolchildren by graduation. And along with its other recommendations, the CDC has issued a promulgation that every U.S. citizen “unplug” for at least two hours each day.

Synchronic is in Chapter 11; the Word Exchange has been dismantled. The president has pledged funding to prevent future cyberlingua attacks and to set up archives and libraries, many modeled on those started here at the Glass by members of the Diachronic Society, lots of whom have stayed on. We gather nearly every night for informal conversation lab, often at Phineas’s favorite pub, the Eagle and Child, where a different literary society once met.

Laird and Brock were taken into custody, but both are out on bail pending further investigation. Floyd has fared less well; he’s in Colorado, awaiting trial on federal charges: conspiracy, fraud, racketeering. Manslaughter. Dmitri is at Rikers Island, as is Koenig. Several hackers were also arrested, including Roquentin. But because he’s a minor (he’ll be fifteen in May), he was released to his family when his father posted the three million yuan bond.

Two weeks ago a memorial service was held at the Capitol for victims of the virus. Doug was asked to speak, and he recited the etymology and meaning of “grief.” Then he took the train to New York for another,
smaller ceremony, in memory of Victoria Mark, née Nadya Viktorovna Markova, which was held at the Merc. Phineas gave a very moving eulogy, Doug said, and seemed to have started the long, slow process of mourning. He also appears to have emerged healthy from a three-day quarantine. He’s now joined us here in Oxford. Last week we hosted a small, modest celebration in the Glass’s dining hall to celebrate publication of the
NADEL
’s third edition.

When Doug was in New York, he saw Vera; they had coffee at a place near our old offices. Doug said it was “nice,” Vera that it was “pleasant,” which I think means it was sad for both of them.

I’ve been talking to Vera, too, once a week. She seems to be doing well. She’s stayed in East Hampton and has been helping care for my grandfather. It turns out he had a microchip, which has now been removed successfully.

I’ve spoken to my friends as well. Ramona still isn’t talking much, but she’s undergoing treatment. They’re otherwise all all right so far, for which I’m very grateful. I’ll be meeting Coco in Paris next month; one of her shows, postponed because of the crisis, will finally be opening at her gallery there, and she’s planning to take the loop back to London with me afterward and to stay here in Oxford for a couple weeks.

Besides writing and talking daily with Doug and other Society members, I practice judo and I draw; I plan to apply to a few grad schools when I’m done with this manuscript. I’ve also started studying Spanish, Arabic, and Chinese. And reading. Lately, aloud—to Bart.

Of course I didn’t write this account alone. But in that regard I’m like Doug, and the other Dr. Johnson, and all the lexicographers who came between, laboring away mostly in obscurity. Dictionary-makers are obliged to work in teams. All writers are, I think. “Creation is collaboration,” as Doug would say. And I find that thought pretty comforting. In the words of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, “Human nature only really exists in an achieved community of minds.” Language seems like proof that there’s such a thing as meaning. That we’re all connected, now and forever.

Words don’t always work. Sometimes they come up short. Conversations can lead to conflict. There are failures of diplomacy. Some differences, for all the talk in the world, remain irreconcilable. People make empty promises, go back on their word, say things they don’t believe. But connection, with ourselves and others, is the only way we can live.

I don’t agree with all Doug and Bart have to say about language, or love. If Doug has implied we’re mere servants, and Bart that we can be in control, I think they’re both wrong. Or that the truth is somewhere between.

Language may have limits. But it isn’t just a dim likeness in a dark mirror. Yes, gestures, glances, touches, taps on walls mean something. So do silences. But sometimes the word is the thing. The bridge. Sometimes we only know what we feel once it’s been said. Words may be daughters of the earth instead of heaven. But they’re not dim. And even in the faintest shimmer, there is light.

Bart is right that language is the tie that binds us to the dead and unborn. But he’s wrong that words are just urns for holding pure thought. I don’t think he really believes that, or ever did. I hope I’ll know someday. That he’ll be able to tell me himself. But until then—

THE END

Just one last thing.

I’ve visited Bart for the past three nights, since he got out of quarantine. I’ve been reading him this manuscript, and passages from Hegel. Recently I found this:

I know he understood. Because when I was done reading, he squeezed my hand and smiled.

Each night I’ve kissed him on the forehead and held my breath as he’s tried to talk. I stare at a spot on the wall, my gaze unfocused. Pretend I’m not listening. That I don’t see the tears of frustration welling in his eyes.

Last night he motioned for the pen. Held it tightly. Made a wobbly green
X
on the bottom of the page. I whispered, “What is it?” But he just shook his head. When I tried to kiss him, he turned away. But he kept the pen.

Tonight when I went into his room, I saw mounds of crumpled paper like dead flowers in the trash. When he dozed off for a few minutes, I opened one out on my knee. Saw it was just an endless series of green squiggles: dead flowers’ dead stems.

Just now I finished reading these pages to Bart. I read to the end. And Bart waved for me to hand him the last sheet. Fished out the pen.

“It’s okay, Bart,” I said.

But he got up and took the paper from my hand. Brought it to his desk and marked it.

He just crossed the room. Just kissed me on the mouth.