Doris Piserchia

IDIO

WE ARE IDIO:

Genadee: Her hair is short and black and sleek, and grows down to a fraction of an inch from her eyebrows. To look at her eyes alone, you wouldn’t know she was once brainless. They’re dark and shiny. She has a nice smile. Her build is like a pumpkin. No, a gourd. She has damp hands.

Creel: One of her ancestors must have been a spider. She has four arms. She can’t wear shoes because her feet leak. Anytime you want to find her just look for a yellow trail; at the end of it is Creel. Since she has become part of this three-in-one trinity, Creel has taken to stealing. When anyone misses something they look in her locker.

Risa: Me. How do I know what I look like? I’m back here gawking the other way. Except that I have big legs. Big arms, too. The hair on me is about half an inch long. Not bad.

We would rather be one trinity than three human vegetables. Now we don’t scream without making noise. Now if we want to scream, we do it.

Idio is a scientific experiment. It is living proof that anyone can perform meaningful work. It is a kick in the prunes of women who buck for abortion and mercy killing.

Right after Creel and Genadee and I were born, our mother gave us to the government. If anyone asked me what our I.Q. was, I wouldn’t know what to tell them. We vary from 60 to 75, except when the Cycler breaks down, then our I.Q. is about 25. For a dog, that’s okay. For a woman, it means she might as well be growing out in the garden.

The integrator in my head stimulates the waking parts of my brain, then it gathers up the energy and passes it on to the machine in the second brain of the trinity, which passes it on to the third brain. The Cycler takes all this current and sends it back through me. Each of the brains in Idio gets to share the energy produced by all three.

What this means is that our I.Q. is high enough so that we can get out of bed and act human. Without the machines, we would just lie still with our mouths open.

Idio is in the desert. We are working on a scientific project. This place is a weather station. Near one edge of the project is a radar unit. Idio goes into the unit four times a day-and pushes five buttons.

Don’t knock it. Nobody can push those five buttons but us, on account of a disease called boredom.

We had two caretakers. One of them we called Brown. He had brown hair, brown eyes, brown skin. Green wore a green hat all the time. They said they were geniuses compared to us. Their regular job had been kicking Boots in the Navy, and they were always saying how they wanted to get back to it and leave the desert and the dumdums to hell where they belonged. We couldn’t have cared less, even when they called us names. They were supposed to look after us and cook for us and make sure we stayed in good shape, and if they didn’t, they would catch hell from their bosses “out there.” They didn’t bother us about how we kept house. If we didn’t want to clean the shack, it was our business. Our stink was their business. Brown and Green told us we had to take baths every night or they would switch off the Cycler.

“All right, idiots, drag your slimy butts out of bed or I’ll switch you back into a cabbage, turnip and radish.”

I opened my eyes and looked up and saw God-only-knew-what. The integrators in our brains lost power when we went to sleep. Idio became three dumdums. These woke up in darkness, inside and out. After a few minutes the integrators perked up and and the darkness faded.

Idio sat up.

“Hi there, Brown, you look good enough to lap,” I said.

He didn’t know what I was saying. We could understand him and Green when they talked, but they said we were mushmouths who would never learn to speak. I was always trying to figure that out. Creel and Genadee and I had no trouble understanding one another.

“One of these days I aim to strip the pants off him,” said Genadee. She giggled and her widow’s peak touched her eyebrows. “Got a feeling he’s interesting.”

“Hey, you know what? Somebody wet my bed.” Creel leaned forward and reached for Brown, who hotfooted it away. One of his hands hovered near a machine on a table. That was the Cycler.

“Goddammit, Creel, leave him alone,” I said. “He might turn it off.”

We sat on our beds and started discussing what it would be like if the Cycler were turned off permanently.

Brown listened to us for a minute, then he said, “Jesus,” and went out

“Why do you call Brown a him?” said Genadee.

“Get your mind off stupid subjects,” I said.

She stood up and scratched herself all over, then she got dressed with everything going on wrong side out. She forgot underwear.

I sat on the edge of my bed and looked at the hair on my legs. Sometimes I thought about shaving it off, only I did that once and it grew back in stiff and since it’s all the way up my belly I was damn uncomfortable.

“I recollect I had six cans of beer,” I said.

“Don’t look at me.” Genadee made a big to-do about putting on lipstick. Her shoes were on the wrong feet. She had on a pair of jeans and a red sweater. Since the pants were on backwards she couldn’t get the zipper all the way up without grinding some meat. Sometimes she did that.

“You’re a dirty liar, and don’t remind me that you took a bath last night.”

“Kiss off,” she said, and hauled her rosary from a drawer and began praying. I think that was the first thing they taught her after she graduated from being a vegetable.

I felt crabby as hell. Stomped into the bathroom and tore open the first door and there sat Creel with a can of beer in one hand and one of Brown’s pictures in the other. Should have known better, but I reached out and grabbed the beer. She let out a howl and came up off the pot and rammed me in the belly with her head. Then she took back the beer and sat down again.

I went out and spent a few minutes kicking a hole in the wall. Pretty soon she came in, and when I told her the beer was mine, she handed it over. She was an amiable critter except when she was on the can.

My clock wasn’t on my bureau. It was in Creel’s locker, along with just about everything else I owned. I took it all back to my own locker and gave that thief a kick in the rear.

Idio walked out onto the desert. We wore sunglasses because our pupils didn’t respond to light fast enough. We didn’t mind the heat, in fact we liked it. I walked in front. Genadee kicked sand on my legs. It itched and reminded me that I forgot my jeans.

“First time I ever knew King Kong had that much hair on her behind,” said Creel.

“He’s a him,” I said over my shoulder.

“What’s the difference?” said Genadee. She ran ahead of us, slowed down and began to strut. Something was wrong with the way God put her hips together. When her feet hit the ground they were about a yard apart. Kind of funny-looking.

The radar unit was a big sonofabitch made of white rock. There was only one door in it, and when you went in you felt like you were walking into a grave. Smelled dry. It was quiet.

Idio was afraid of the machines in the radar building. Luckily, we were attracted to the color red. The five buttons on the five machines were a bright red.

“Tit,” I said and punched the first one.

“Tit,” said Creel and punched the second.

“Tit,” said Genadee and punched the third.

Quick as could be I punched the last two buttons. Usually we punched those last ones together. I got clobbered for taking their turns, but it was worth it. They slugged me and busted me in the mouth and then I finally got sore, picked them both up by their sweater fronts and tossed them out the door and let them eat dirt.

“You look sick,” I said to Green at lunchtime.

“He looks sick?” said Creel.

“Why is he a he?” said Genadee.

“I’ll ask Sister,” I told her. Again I said to Green, “You look sick.”

It didn’t do any good. Green never talked to us. He never looked at us, either, unless he had to.

We ate canned spaghetti and salad.

“Did you wash that lettuce?” said Brown, and Green nodded.

Genadee dropped her spoon and looked as if she might scream.

“He isn’t calling you a cabbage,” I said to her. “Lettuce and cabbage ain’t the same.”

We liked the cafeteria. It had wooden walls and tables and chairs and red curtains and a potbelly stove. Brown called the stove a rotten bastard and why can’t we have decent equipment in this place God forgot.

Creel put some spaghetti in her pocket.

“All right, get up and stand in the corner,” said Brown. “All three of you. Stay there until you fall over. You’re nothing but slobs.”

I stood with my nose in the crack and wondered at the ignorance of pretty Brown boy. It wasn’t much of a punishment to stand us in the corner. Creel couldn’t stay straight and still for more than five minutes before her head started spinning. She had something wrong with a tube of water in her ear. Everytime she stood still for a while she always fell unconscious, and when one part of Idio conked out that was the end of the trinity and the rebirth of the dumdums.

I heard Green go outside. From the corner of my eye I hunted for Brown. Couldn’t see him. Turned and looked. He wasn’t there.

“They’re gone,” I said.

“So what?” said Genadee. “They say we stand here, we stand.”

“Why?”

“Well, why not?”

“Sister says independence is not listening to orders.”

“Does that include an Idio?”

“You know what an Idio is?” I said. “It’s people born with something wrong with them. Three people.”

“A trinity?” said Creel.

“Right. A trinity is an Idio. That doesn’t mean we’re idiots. Sometimes we are and sometimes we aren’t. Depends on the chemistry of the moment.”

“Then let’s get the hell out of here,” said Genadee.

We went back to our shack and listened to records. It was a nice change to do that instead of standing in the corner until Creel fainted and we all fell on our heads.

A few days before, I was punching the buttons in the radar station and dropped my top down in one of the machines. I tried to get it out, but it was stuck in a crack and I couldn’t work it loose. Got irritated and punched wild and pushed a yellow button. Sister was born that day. She may not have been a genius, but I never asked her a question she couldn’t answer.

“You ever hear of Idio?” I said.

“Project Idio is on my tapes,” said Sister.

“Don’t recollect you being around before.”

“Who’s in that machine?” said Creel.

“Get the hell out,” said Genadee. “What do you think you’re doing hiding in there?”

“I respond to questions,” said Sister.

“How do you figure we can talk all of a sudden?” I said.

“You activated my mechanism.”

“What does that mean?”

“We are in communication.”

“Hell, this thing is another idiot,” said Genadee.

Brown and Green used to read books, but later they spent most of their time looking at pictures. I described some of the pictures to Sister and she said they were pornography. She said some of the people in the pictures were women.

“Bull,” said Creel.

‘Tit,” said Genadee.

“This Idio is women,” I said to Sister. “Why don’t we look like the pictures Brown and Green study all the time?”

“Idio is physically defective.”

“What does that mean?” said Genadee.

“It means we aren’t beautiful,” I said.

“Go to hell, I’m as good-looking as you any day,” said Creel.

“Why does Creel have four arms and all that piddling equipment?” I said to Sister.

“Define the word ‘piddling.’ “

“Going to the bathroom.”

“The Idio portion known as Creel is androgynous.”

“What kind of language is that?” I said.

“It only means she got four arms,” said Genadee.

“Never mind that stuff, I want to hear some more about pornography,” said Creel. “Why do Brown and Green read it all the time?”

Sister gave us a long lecture and we were all ears.

I sat in the hot sun and cried. Didn’t know why, just felt like crying.

“Darkness making faces?” said Creel. She stood behind me and patted my head.

“Something sure is.”

Pat, pat went her two hands on my head. I didn’t know which arms she was moving. It had to be only one pair, because she couldn’t use all of them at once. While she used one pair the other hung limp.

“You think maybe we’re getting smarter since we found Sister?”

“We have more information, that’s all,” I said. “We ask Sister a question and she answers it, but we don’t know what it means or how to use it any better than we did before.”

Creel patted my head. “I feel intelligent today. Think I’ll ask her how Idio works.”

“Done asked her. It works like a relay. The action goes from my head to yours, then to Genadee, then to the Cycler and back to me again.”

Just then Genadee came out of the shack and saw us. She stomped over and kicked sand on my feet.

“Let’s do something.”

“Like what?” I said.

“Hell, I don’t know, let’s just get clicking.”

We went to spy on Brown and Green. Their shack was no better on the outside than ours, but they kept the inside in order and it was a pleasure to look at it. Keeping things neat was something Idio found impossible. We peeked in one of the windows and saw them lying on their bunks looking at pictures.

“Remember what Sister said about appetite?” said Creel. “Those two nice boys are suffering from lack of tactile stimulation, and it’s a shame. We ought to do them a favor.”

“What does that mean?” said Genadee.

Creel looked at me. “You know what I’m thinking?”

“Yeah, except none of us looks like those pictures.”

“Sure as hell you or me don’t, but I been imagining Genadee here and the more I imagine it the better she looks.”

“What you talking about?” yelled Genadee.

Brown and Green heard her and threw away their magazines and got up cussing. Creel and I dragged our partner back to the shack and made her take a bath.

“How come you guys aren’t getting in here with me?” she wanted to know.

“You’re the one we’re trying to make good-looking,” I said.

The septic tank backed up into the shack, so Genadee and I took off for the sand and sun. We sat talking, and after a while Brown came out of his shack, yelling at the top of his lungs.

“What’s that smell?”

I told him.

He cussed for a while. “If I wanted to know anything I wouldn’t ask a mushmouth. It’s that damned tank again. I told you to quit flushing beer cans. Well, you’ll all have to get out of here till we get it cleaned up. Where’s the other one?”

I jabbed a hand toward the shack.

“It’ll have to get out, too,” he said. “Can’t have your valuable selves getting contaminated.”

“If I was you I wouldn’t go in there. Creel’s on the can and she isn’t amiable—”

“Mushmouth,” he said. He looked at Genadee.

We had made her wear a piece of curtain to hide her gourd figure. She looked pretty damn good. Her hair was her best feature. Thick and glossy, it was just like fur and fit her head neat, and brushed back the way it was, she didn’t look too much like a throwback to the cave. Her widow’s peak was so pronounced that she sort of resembled Dracula, but sitting there in the sun with her cheeks rosy and her eyes glittering … well, anyhow, Brown looked at her.

He took off toward the shack, and again I said, “If I was you I wouldn’t go in there.”

In he went, then a few minutes later came a ruckus, then he ran outside holding his stomach.

“Goddamn,” he said and went away to find Green so they could clean our house.

For supper we had ham and spinach. Creel and I sat on either side of Genadee and made her eat slow. We kept her chin clean and whenever she started growling we pinched her gourds.

“Just for that you have to stand in the corner,” said Brown. He was eyeing Creel.

“What’d I do?”

“You threw your plate on the floor, mushmouth. Get up and stand in the corner, both of you.”

I got up grinning, looked from him to Genadee.

“She didn’t do anything,” he said. “She’s acting like a lady. You two are hogs.”

Creel and I shoved our faces into the same corner. Knocking her out of the way, I said, “Go find your own.”

It took her five minutes of standing still to faint. I followed a second later and as I dropped I hoped Genadee wouldn’t slam into her plate and mess her makeup.

I needn’t have worried. Woke up and found Brown had pulled the plate away and stuck a pillow there. Genadee wasn’t messed and she didn’t have a sore head.

I was in love with Brown.

“Tit, tit, tit, tit, tit.” Five buttons punched. Nothing to do.

We went and beautified Genadee some more, cut her fingernails, scrubbed them with Creel’s toothbrush, then we put red polish on them. Had to do something about that black fuzz on her upper lip. Sandpapered it off while she bellowed.

Spent the afternoon drinking beer. So hot I finally took a bath. The septic tank backed up again so my feet stunk worse than ever, but they smelled better than Creel’s.

“Tit, tit, tit, tit, tit.” Five buttons pushed. Nothing to do.

We laid around on the sand most of the evening.

“Let’s do something,” said Creel.

“Like what?” said Genadee.

“Like shut up,” I said. “What’s those lights up there?”

“You know damn well they’re stars,” said Creel.

“Oh, yeah, I forgot. What are we gonna do when Brown and Green fall in love with Genadee?”

“We’re gonna watch.”

“Tit, tit, tit, tit, tit.” Five buttons pushed. Nothing to do.

Creel and I built another shack. Brown and Green yelled at us and told us to quit it. They had the sweats. Everytime I saw one of them he was dripping sweat. Creel and I paid no attention to them.

“Genadee don’t want to live with us,” I told them, but they didn’t understand.

“She is a lady, or don’t you have eyes?” I said.

“The thing of it is, she’s been taking a bath twice a day and she can’t stand Creel and me,” I said.

They went away cussing and we went on with the work. Sun was nice and warm.

“I feel dizzy,” said Creel all of a sudden.

I started to raise my head toward her, then the lights went out.

We woke up on the sand. We went to the shack to find Genadee. She was taking a bath and drinking my beer.

“You took a nap, didn’t you?” said Creel.

She squirted beer through her teeth and spattered the wall. “So what?”

“So get out of that tub and get hell beat out of yourself. You know the rules. You can’t take naps or fall unconscious without our permission. We are out there breaking our asses building you a house and you’re in here falling asleep. Suppose one of us had been on the roof when you conked out?”

This time the beer was squirted on us. “Kiss off. Brown and Green think more of me than they do you pigs, and if you don’t—”

That was as far as she got. We hauled her out of the tub and laid her bellydown on the bed and beat her gourds till they were blue.

We got bawled out because we forgot to punch the buttons. Somebody from “out there” called on the phone and bawled Brown out. After he hung up he bawled Green out, then they both came and bawled us out.

“Quit working on this shack and do your job,” said Brown. He had the sweats. From the corner of his eye he watched Genadee. She was building castles in the sand, and damn if she didn’t look like a sweet little angel. Vampirish but still angelic. Matter of fact, the vampire part helped the other.

Creel and I watched her too, and we were thinking the same thing. If she didn’t look up and smile, she wasn’t going to be able to sit while she ate supper.

Up she looked. Big smile. Pretty as anything.

We laid in bed and listened to Genadee cry. Couldn’t go to sleep listening to her. She hated sleeping in her new shack by herself.

“You lied to Brown,” she had sobbed. “You told him I didn’t want to live with you all anymore.”

“You have to live alone,” Creel said.

“Why?”

“A scientific experiment.”

“No idiot can experiment,” said Genadee scornfully.

“No, but an Idio can and that’s what we are. Now shut up.”

“You guys have to move in here with me.”

She stayed awake three nights.

“Can’t stand it anymore,” I said to Creel. “I’m tired.”

“Only one thing to do. We got to move in with her.”

“Brown and Green won’t come if we’re in there,” I said.

“Well, what if they don’t know we’re in there?”

It was a warm night and the shack felt stuffy. Genadee was snoring, but she wasn’t asleep. I went over and pinched a gourd. She quit snoring and began singing her rosary. She did it softly so it wouldn’t get on our nerves.

Creel opened a window and mosquitoes came in. We had forgotten to put up screens.

Genadee’s bed was on one side of the shack. Creel and I were in the corner nearest the door. Bugs were making a racket. The shack was stuffy, but I was feeling good. Sprawled out on the straw mat, I relaxed and wandered about God.

“Move over, you’re hogging the bed,” I said to Creel.

Over she went.

“Which one of us is gonna put the others to sleep?” she whispered.

“Sure not Genadee.”

We listened to the prayers being sung.

“If you want to know what I think, I think she is the dumbest of us,” Creel whispered. “What do you think?”

“Agree.”

“What was that noise?”

I rolled over and sniffed the straw under me. “Didn’t hear anything.”

She listened for a minute before she went on whispering. “The thing of it is, Genadee doesn’t seem curious about much of anything.”

“She don’t, for a fact.”

Laying a hand on my arm, Creel said, “Shhh.”

“Huh?”

“Keep quiet, I hear something.”

The moon came in and flew around as the shack door opened. With it came Brown and Green. They were pretty boys when they were dressed and they were pretty when they had nothing on. I couldn’t see them perfectly, but I knew they had the sweats. Their voices dripped.

“Shut the door, she might start yelling.” That was Brown whispering.

“Oh, let’s get out of here, we don’t have to be this hard up.” That was Green whispering.

The door closed and the moonlight vanished. As Creel had said, Genadee was the dumbest portion of Idio. She didn’t even know somebody had opened the door, didn’t notice the moonlight coming in or going away, didn’t give two cents that Brown and Green were in there stumbling around trying to find her. She lay in her bed, not singing anymore, but just growling now and then.

For a minute everything was quiet, then Brown and Green went the wrong way. Instead of moving toward Genadee they came to the corner. A hand went over me and I reached out and touched a leg. Lord, never knew Brown felt like silk.

The boys had come in after Genadee and she was what they would get.

In just a second.

Green missed me when he was fumbling, went across me and grabbed hold of Creel. The shock of Brown’s leg in my hand had been powerful. Couldn’t help what I did then. I raised up and gathered him close.

The shack was as full of noise as a Fourth of July picnic.

Brown was bucking like a mule as he tried to get away from me. His mouth was wide open and he shrieked in my ear. I kissed him silent. I had no trouble holding him down, he being kind of small and me outweighing him by about a hundred pounds, none of which was fat.

Creel was suddenly taken by Green. By that I mean she lost her head and forgot he was meant for Genadee.

To hell with Genadee.

Old Creel, she being androgynous and kind of freaky, she was strong as a bull and little Green couldn’t do a thing but squawk. She kissed him silent.

Genadee started singing again and the prayers sounded gentle and innocent.

Bad was hurting. I knew Creel wouldn’t forget that we were always good. Sister knew all the answers and she had passed them on to us. There was no such thing as doing what came naturally if you didn’t know how. I knew how and so did Creel. Sister had told us. If you wanted to love somebody you had to do it right.

Did everything perfect. Genadee could go to hell. Pretty Brown was mine to do with as I pleased. As a matter of fact so was Green. Neither Creel nor I was stingy. We swapped the boys back and forth like dessert being passed across the supper table.

The bosses sent us two more caretakers after Brown and Green hanged themselves. We called the new fellows Curly and Peaches. They were pretty boys, except Peaches looked just like those pictures in the magazines. Creel spied while Peaches took a bath.

Today Sister told us Peaches is a girl. Creel is in love with her. “Tit, tit, tit, tit, tit.” Five buttons punched. Nothing to do.

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