Kid A
*though it's probably pretty obvious to some, let me just say that this is based loosely on a radiohead album. at least, that's the framework. i read somewhere that kid a was about a similar idea as something i was thinking about. the idea was interesting. though i had my own idea, the more i worked on it, the more it reminded me of this album. so i wrote this, a rough draft for something which will probably never be completed. Originally wanted to write this as a screenplay. But got lazy.
I: Everything in its Right Place
The men crouched smiling over him. All teeth as toneless white as the room and the smocks they wore; the fleshy tones of their faces and the few flimsy decorations the only accents in a room lit bright from all angles, rendered shadowless. They wore colourful cone hats banded to their heads by thin strings of rubber that cut deep imprints into their chins and cheeks. One of the men leaned in close and, after sipping his champagne, spoke to the boy. “Happy Birthday, son!” he cackled and moved out of the way, clearing a path for the nurse who was rolling a cart with cake on it towards him. Five candles sprouted from the five points of a star that was coloured onto the cake and the men joined the nurse in singing “Happy Birthday,” as somewhere, someone turned off all of the lights. The fiery orange glow of the candles cast a hellish glare onto the boy’s face as he smiled dimly into the blindness of the crowd. There was a moment of silence after the song. “Well, go on! Make a wish!” the cackling man said before downing the rest of his champagne in a single, thirsty gulp. The boy thought for a moment, hesitated, then, wishless, blew out the 5 candles in one healthy breath. Around him the men applauded and clapped him on the back, shook hands with one another, and then dispersed from his table; someone had turned the lights back on and the nurse started slicing up the cake and handing out small pieces of it on red plastic plates. She gave him a piece and removed a bottle of lemonade from beneath the cart, poured him a glass, and handed it to him, smiling.
“Don’t forget to drink your juice!” she said.
After finishing the cake and the sour juice, the boy jumped down from the table and began to walk the length of the room, tracing his fingers along the wall and humming “Happy Birthday” to himself. He knew a few songs, taught to him by the nanny, but he’d never heard that one. He wondered what it meant and why his room was decorated and why the men all wore hats. Why he had been given cake. Why even they seemed happy, anything less than serious. Nobody seemed to notice him as he weaved through the crowd, trying to stay against the wall but finding it increasingly difficult as the crowd bloated outwards, expanding wet-sponge-like towards the walls. He stumbled into the man who had encouraged him to make a wish.
“Well, hello, m’boy!” the man said loudly as he leaned in close to the boy’s face and peered at him with jaundice-yellow eyes. His breath stunk of cigar and whisky, an empty glass of which dangled in his hand. The boy was frightened, and wanted to leave, but the man leered over him threateningly, studying the boy’s features. “We’ve done very well this time,” he said to himself. After a moment, the man seemed to return to his senses, “Well we haven’t even given you your presents, have we? What sort of gentlemen are we?” he laughed loudly. He grabbed the boy’s tiny hand and ushered him through the crowd, back towards the table. The man’s hand was rough and leathery and the boy looked at the gold wristwatch which dangled loosely on the man’s wrist. He picked the boy up and set him on the table before turning to the crowd.
“Silence!” he yelled, “I’m going to give him his present!”
The present was set in his lap: a large box covered in wrapping paper and topped with a bow red bow, pulled from beneath the same cart the cake was on. The man told him how to open it and the boy eyed it suspiciously for a moment before tearing off the paper and opening the cardboard box. It was filled with Styrofoam nuggets and the boy looked up, confused. “Go on,” the man said encouragingly, “You have to dig a little now.” The boy dug through the popcorn and found, at the bottom, a box of crayons and a colouring book. Again, he looked up at the man, confused. The man smiled back, expectantly.
“Here, I’ll show him.” A woman moved out of the crowd towards him. He looked up and smiled brightly at her: it was his nanny. She sat down on the table next to him and opened the box of crayons. “With these you colour, see?” she said as she scratched the crayon over the surface the colouring book. The sensation was delicious to him; he who had been deprived of colour, trapped in a bright, white room, the colour of freshly laundered sheets, looked down upon the sensational red mark on the page with excitement. The streak was exhilarating and he quickly took the crayon out of her hand and, after examining it in the light, slashed his hand across the page, opening up the flesh of colour; he made another streak, and another, then crossed them. Then made another and hooked all of it together with a squirmy line. “There are more colours too, you know,” his nanny said. He remembered and looked at the crayon box again. It was filled with colours!
“Ah! He likes them!” the man said, raising his empty glass and shaking the whiskey dirtied ice cubes in it like a bell. The crowd of men returned to their chatter and the boy stretched out on the table and experimented with all of his wonderful colours before falling into a restful slumber.
II: Kid A
The rain dribbled a wet rhythm onto the roof and slid down the window like silvery minnows. The boy looked out past the barbed-wire topped chain-link fence and out upon the green field beyond and the gray clouds floating heavy and pregnant above. His nanny sat in her chair, reading a story to him which he had ceased listening to. They were in the nursery, a room splotched with colour, dizzyingly full. Normally he was jubilant during his 2 hours here. But the rain polluted the aura of the afternoon; something extraterrestrial about it sopped up the colour of the room and surrounding hills, turning it gloomy. He looked back at the large mirror: they were watching him from there. They were always watching him, making notes to each other in hushed whispers. Time had passed since he was given the crayons, and he looked around the room at the pictures he’d made; they’d gone from explosions of pure colour to simple stickmen to pictures of birds and fish. He drew children, lot’s of them, walking around a town, smiling happily. Many of his pictures the men had taken for themselves. The nanny had to buy him more crayons after the first few weeks, and since then he’d gone through many more boxes. Some colours, those neglected, he had too many of. These he stowed away in a drawer in his room. Others went quickly and he learned to be more sparing with them, using red, for instance, only for a dramatic effect. The buzzer rang and interrupted his thoughts; his nanny stopped mid-sentence and closed the book as two white-cloaked men stepped into the room. He hopped away from the window and followed the men.
They ushered him down the glossy-floored hallway towards the next room: it was time for his daily check-up. He dutifully followed and sat atop the cold table as they prodded him with metal tools. He wanted to go outside, let the rain fall onto his face, but knew there would be no outside for him that day. They shined a light into his eye and then into his ears while scribbling on their clipboards. After the routine half-hour, they dismissed him with an approving nod and he was sent to the kitchen to drink his juice.
His school books were laid out on the table, next to his juice, and the cackling man, Dr. Lessing, sat across from him, ready to return the boy to his studies. Together they moved through the multiplication tables, onwards to science (Dr. Lessing’s favourite subject), and back into reading and writing, where they had started that morning. Normally the boy studied diligently, but grew tired quickly that day and asked to go to bed for an early nap.
“Of course, of course,” said Dr. Lessing. They walked together back to his room; he’d been moved from room of the blinding white lights and into one that more resembled a child’s bedroom. Tacked to the walls, again, were all of his pictures. Tucked into one corner were all of his toys, and lining the wall next to his bed was a bookcase filled with all of his books. The boy thought he saw something move in the shadow beneath his bed, but dismissed it and hopped happily up onto his bed before nodding off into a peaceful nap.
III: The National Anthem
A hand came across his face and covered his mouth before he had a chance to scream.
“Shh!” The man said as he put a finger to his lips. The boy looked up at the man: he was haggard, a stubble of hair dirtied his face, his hair was dishevelled, and there was a look of insane excitement in the man’s eyes. He grinned widely to reveal teeth the shade of stale butter. Outside darkness had settled and the rain subsided. The boy started to thrash and kick, futilely trying to get out of the man’s grasp.
“Stop! Stop!” he whispered frantically, “I’m a… friend,” the man’s eyes watered as he looked down at the boy. The word “friend” seemed to calm the boy down. “I’m going to take you out of here, ok? We’re going to go outside.” He turned from the boy and looked around the room. “Is there anything you want from in here? I see you’re quite an artist. Do you want to keep any of your pictures?” The boy shook his head. The man removed his hand from the boy’s mouth for a second and the boy spoke up for the first time.
“Can I please have my crayons?”
“Of course!” said the man, “When we get out of here I’ll buy you a lot more crayons too. Even some paint or… coloured pencils or something. Anything you want… anything.” The boy smiled up at him for the first time.
“Really?” he asked, excitedly.
The man looked at the beaming child beneath him for a few second before starting to sob, “Of course, of course, anything for you… Daniel.” The last word came out hoarse, and as he said it he broke down into tears and mumbled between sobs, “you… look… so much… like him… I mean… you are him…” The boy moved over and started to pat the man sympathetically on the back; the man reached out and drew the boy into a firm embrace.
“Mister…”
“No, call me Dad… or Daddy.” The boy hesitated, confused for a moment. He knew what a Daddy was from the stories he’d heard from the nanny, and had asked Dr. Lessing where his own Daddy was. Dr. Lessing had smiled down at him and told him, “For all intents and purposes, I’m your Daddy.” At this the Dr. had laughed maniacally and dropped the subject. The boy took a step back and looked at the sobbing man, wondering where he had come from.
“Uh… Dad, where are we going to go?” The man looked up.
“Somewhere safe. Somewhere where you’ll be able to play outside everyday. Somewhere where you’ll be able to play with other kids. Would you like that? You would wouldn’t you?” the boy nodded. “And no one will do experiments on you. They won’t touch you with their tools or… drug you. You’ll… you’ll be happy there, living with me, where you belong.”
The boy thought for a moment about the stories he’d read. “Can we go now?”
“Yes, right away,” said the man as he straightened himself up. They grabbed his box of crayons and stuffed them into a Spider-Man backpack before sneaking out of the room. The man had an access card and so they left the room together and moved swiftly through the corridors, glancing first around the corners to make sure nobody was around. The red lights of the cameras did not blink. But as they moved through the building and then out onto the tarmac that ran like a run-way between each building, the boy heard a cacophony of alarms sounding in the distance. He looked as they rounded a corner towards a slash of red and orange light searing the night time sky; some people ran from the building, others towards. Somewhere a woman was crying while a child screamed; their voices grew louder and as the boy and the man peered around the corner, the boy saw a frightening sight: a woman was carrying a small child whose face was smeared with crimson red blood. Even beneath the mask of the wound, the boy was unmistakably identical to him, only younger, by several years. It was the boy of his memory: who he once was, except bloodied and screaming. Something else was strange about the other boy: his limbs were disproportionate, one leg was terribly short, infant short, and the hand that groped towards invisible objects in the air had no fingers. His “Dad” was busy looking elsewhere, though, and grabbed the boy’s hand and whispered, “Come on.”
Together they made a mad dash across the centre road and into the shadow of another building, where a large truck was parked. The man picked up the boy and pushed him beneath the canvas top of the truck bed before getting into the car and starting the engine. It roared to life, the only thing audible for a moment, suffocating the screams and shouts that came in from the distance. There were a few lead pipes in the truck bed that rattled metallically as the car began to move. Daniel, as he was beginning to think of himself, grabbed hold of an old gas can and clung to it, frightened. The truck swerved and turned several times before coming to a stop, its engine idle. Muffled voices came and argued for a few moments before the truck sprang back into life and they began to move once more.
After a half an hour, the truck slowed and pulled off onto a much bumpier road. After halting, the man cut the engine and swung out of the cab to pull back the canvas top.
“Are you Ok?” he asked the boy, who nodded, releasing the gas can he’d hugged like a teddy bear.
“Good,” said the man. He lifted the boy from the truck bed and carried him to another car, parked behind several bushed, obscured from the road.
In this car, the boy rested his head against the window. He felt sick: cars always did that to him, on the rare occasions when they took him into town. He closed his eyes and tried not to think about the bloodied, screaming replica of himself he’d seen, tried to think about this promised new life. Dreaming about other children, he fell asleep.
finish later...
IV: How to Disappear Completely
The truck swung into a gravel driveway and passed through a thick grove of pines before halting at the base of a large, two-story house. Together they got out and went quickly into the unlit mansion. The house was dark and felt unlived in. The man turned on the lights and peered through the shades for a moment to make sure no one had followed them. The boy turned and began to walk through the cluttered and musty living room. The couch was draped with an old blanket and smelled like dog—a smell new to the boy. The tabletop had a few old magazines, some empty beer cans, and an ash tray; all were covered by a thick layer of dust, part of the table, it seemed, a beer had spilt on, never to be cleaned, and hair and dead bugs stuck horribly in the gum. He heard the man moving behind him, but kept walking the living room. Perched on the mantle above the fireplace was a picture that made the boy gasp: it was him. Him happy, in a baseball uniform and hugging a dog. Except it wasn’t him. Not at all. The boy in the picture was a few years older. But the eyes were unmistakably his.
“That there,” he said, pointing towards the picture and beckoning to the man, “That’s not me.”
"That... that was your brother," said the man. "He won't be coming back." The man moved towards another picture, on the wall, of him, a blonde haired woman, and the boy's "brother."
"And she... she was your mother. She won't be coming back either. Now, let me give you a tour of--" just then the dog from the picture came bounding down the stairs, barking madly. Immediately the dog ran to the boy and growled threateningly. The boy backed up into the wall, terrified.
"Chandresekhar! Down boy! Chandresekhar! It's Daniel! Down! Down!" the dog continued to bark and growl at the boy, who trembled against the wall, unable to escape. He was feeling dizzy and knew that soon he would have to drink his juice.
finish later...
V: Treefingers
"What was your childhood like?"
"I don't really remember much of it, it was kind of a blur. After my dad lost his job, we moved around a lot."
They sat atop a wall overlooking the valley of the mountains. A cold, Autumn wind chilled them slightly. The forest beneath them was filled with brilliant reds, yellows, greens; the spectrum of late September.
"What did your dad do?"
:He worked for NASA. Started in the military, but ended up working on satellites for NASA."
"And your mom?"
"She died in an accident when I was little."
"That's terrible."
Her hand touched his knee.
"Yeah, apparantly I was in the car with her, that's why I don't remember much about my childhood, my dad says. Must've blocked it all out."
"Does it hurt to talk about it?"
"Not really."
The colors swayed like waves in an ocean as the wind rustled through the great valley beneath.
"Where is your dad now?"
"Lives in the woods. Doesn't trust the government. Kind of lost his mind when I was 13. It got worse. Later he really lost it, started telling me I wasn't his son... no, started telling me I was nothing like his son. We haven't spoken since I was 18, the day I moved out, my birthday."
"That's terrible."
"Sometimes I miss him. I guess I just miss having some sort of family. I don't feel like I have a history anymore. It's like I came from nowhere."
Her long, golden hair blew into her face in clumps, obscuring her beautiful blue eyes, her rose red lips. He reached out and brushed the locks aside before leaning in close and kissing her.
"Thank you," he said," for listening. For your curiosity."
VI: Optimistic
The man looked familiar: he smiled broadly, his teeth were the color of summer clouds. He stuck out his hand and the man shook it. Dangling on his wrist was a shiny, gold watch.
"Daniel Farmer," he said, "Welcome to my exhibit. Thanks for coming."
"I know who you are, but you probably don't remember me, do you?"
Daniel shook his head.
"Dr. Anthony Lessing. I knew you when you were... much younger."
Daniel surveyed the man for a moment before asking, "Did you help me when my mother died? Because I don't remember that."
The man laughed, "No, of course you don't. But yes, I helped you."
The two eyed each other for a moment. Daniel didn’t like the man very much, didn’t like how he’d laughed at the mention of his mother’s death. But he wanted to be cordial. “Well, I guess the least I could do would be to show you around. After you saved my life.” The man laughed again.
“Certainly. I’d like that very much.” They moved to one of the walls towards a large painting that shifted through a hazy spectrum of different reds, each graded into the next.
“This one’s ‘Optimistic.’ I painted it about a year ago, after getting married.”
“I see. Very interesting. Do you want to explain? Why reds? Why the lack of form?
“Well, I was trying to express the etherealness of human emotion, and how, sometimes we can be boxed in to a single emotion for so long that we learn to differentiate between the subtle shades of that emotion, something that, when viewed from afar, or without much analysis, can appear to be single. Once approached, once studied, it becomes very different. And red, well red has always been my favorite color. It’s passionate, warm, violent, tender… no wonder we always associate it with love.”
“Yes, of course, of course,” said the doctor, “but why ‘Optimism’? Why not something more relevant to love, if this has something to do with love… I mean you say it was painted just after your marriage. Optimism can be about many things.”
“Yes, well meeting my wife made me feel optimistic about life for the first time in a long time. For a while it felt like I couldn’t feel anything else, but that the future was bright.”
The man nodded and moved to the next one. This one was strikingly different. The scene was surreal, a desert at dusk with bare mountains in the distance, something from Dali, but less dream-like and more haunted. Visually it lacked the clarity of Dali, but materially it was more accessible, less buried in the folds of an individual. The doctor smiled bemusedly. Two vultures circled above the giant head of a man whose body seemed sticklike. The vultures, compared to the head, were small, like flies.
“And this one?” the man asked.
“Well, I painted this one shortly after I met my wife, but while we were split up for a little while. During that period I found out my father was dead. I put it next to ‘Optimistic’ because of the contrast created by the juxtaposition. The title is ‘Eaten Alive,’ though I thought about changing it to ‘Pessimistic.’ That was a little cliché, though, so I left it as it is. This piece is part surreal, part impressionistic. I wanted the feeling of the landscape to affect the viewer’s mood, and the corpse-like man to nauseate.” They moved around the gallery. Bright lights shone on the pictures, but the rest of the white room was dim. Men moved around in black suits, and the women in elegant black dresses. Some of them were drinking champagne and coming up to Daniel and congratulating him. As much as he tried to pull himself away from the Doctor—who was beginning to creep him out—the closer the Doctor seemed to draw himself to him.
Gabrielle spotted him and moved through the crowd. She too wore an elegant, black dress that clung tightly to her hips; her hair was done up in a bun but a streak of blond, a casual tussle of hair, fell over one cheek. In her ears were the pair of diamond earrings he’d given her for their anniversary, and around her neck a necklace she inherited from her grandmother. She smiled radiantly and her cheeks were flushed with happiness. She carried two glasses of champagne and handed one to Daniel as she approached.
“Daniel, I’ve been looking all over for you! I was just talking to Joshua Smith, the art critic for the Times and he was absolutely raving about your exhibit. I wanted you to meet him, but he had to leave early.”
“Ah, well that’s great! I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to talk to him in person. I’ve been talking with a new friend. Gabrielle, allow me to introduce Dr. Lessing. He’s one of the doctors who helped me after the car accident when I was a child.” She smiled and shook his hand.
“Pleased to meet you. I don’t know where I’d be without Daniel, so I guess I owe you a good deal of gratitude,” she said.
“The pleasure is all mine,” he replied.
VII: In Limbo
