WILL BE

  By Robert Reed

  * * * *

  What lies ahead for Robert Reed? The following story should discourage anyone from making such predictions, but we’ll wager that Mr. Reed’s next book will be a collection of short stories entitled The Dragons of Springplace. Perhaps it will even be published this April or May. But who can really say for sure?

  WE WENT TO SCHOOL together. Kindergarten right up through high school. But Marv and me were never what you’d call good buddies. In grade school and junior high, I bet we didn’t say ten words to each other. In high school, Marv was in one of my gym classes, and because of our last names — Donner and Dubrook — we were stuck in the same homeroom. And yeah, sure, our senior year we shared a locker. And that’s it. That’s all. Even considering how things are going now, that’s all there is to tell. To me, Marvin Donner was this scruffy little blond twit who always had to wear his hair longer than anyone else and who said, “Cool,” and, “Neat,” while grinning way too much. The twit loved to smoke that ditch weed. From junior high on, he was our official class doper. The best thing I remember about him is that when we were locker mates, he kept telling me, “Don’t look behind my books, Steve. Okay? And if you’ve got to look, don’t take any more than you really need.”

  “Okay, Marv,” I would tell him.

  “Cool. Neat. Thanks.”

  Despite what you hear, a lot of us kids managed to stay sober and clear-headed in the ‘70s. The occasional beer was it for me. I was this upstanding boy trying to hang out with the college-prep crowd. While Marv Donner was stuck in some blue-collar, pot-haze track. Shop classes and bonehead English, I’m guessing.

  He was already playing the guitar. But back then, every guy tried playing it. We thought gifts liked a man good with his fingers. Marv used to sit outside at lunch, strumming hard and singing little songs that he must have written himself. Must have, because I didn’t recognize any of them. And because they weren’t very good. I can sort of remember their cheery noise and his scratchy little-kid voice and how he would strum and pick until something sounded absolutely awful. Then he would stop the show and twist the knobs, telling stupid jokes while trying to fix what could be fixed.

  Singing and pot. Marv’s life in the shell of a nut.

  During my last semester, I had an early geometry class. One morning, about a week before graduation, I got to school late. One of the counselors was waiting at my locker. Ms. Vitovsky was this chunky little woman who took everything seriously. She said, “Steve,” with a voice that made me hold my breath. She said, “I have awful news.” Then she gathered herself before telling me, “Marvin Donner was in a car wreck.”

  Marvin? It took me a few seconds to put Marv and Marvin together.

  I blinked and straight away, I asked, “Is he dead?”

  Miss Vitovsky gave me a brave little smile, then said, “No. But he’s badly hurt.” Because she thought I needed it, she put a hand on my shoulder. Then she told me, “His car hit a light pole. He’s in intensive care. At General, if you want to visit him.”

  What I was thinking about was that I was late for class. I shook my head and admitted, “You know, I barely know the guy.”

  “Really? I thought you were good friends.”

  I wrestled open my locker. Marv’s books were on the top shelf, their plasticized covers looking new. That’s how much he needed books. On the spur of the moment, I reached up and peeked behind them.

  Nothing there.

  “I’ve seen you talking with him,” the counselor was saying. Explaining why she had mistaken us for friends.

  I grabbed my books, slammed the locker, then told her, “Sorry.”

  “By any chance then...do you know who his friends are....?”

  Again, “Sorry.”

  “Well,” she had to tell me, “Marvin is going to pull through.” She touched me on the elbow. I can remember the squeeze of her fingers and her eyes looking damp, and I remember her voice breaking as she said, “If anyone asks, tell them. Tell them that he should make a full recovery. Would you do that, please.?”

  Our fallen comrade didn’t make it to graduation, naturally.

  But Marv got himself mentioned. Our principal publicly wished him well. Which caused our valedictorian to do the same in her long, boring speech. Using their best Cheech and Chong voices, my classmates repeated a string of bad pothead jokes. And I made some little comment about driving into a light pole and becoming famous. “If that’s all it takes,” I asked, “why don’t we all do it?”

  Summer was busy, and boring. I spent it stocking and clerking at my father’s little grocery store, saving up my money and having zero time for socializing.

  I went to City College in the fall and found myself in a new circle of friends.

  Around Christmas, I bumped into one of my old circle. Both of us were out shopping. We spent most of our breath promising that we’d get together soon. Lying, in other words. Then the guy told me, in passing, “I hear Marv got out of the hospital. Finally. He’s living at home again.”

  I hadn’t thought about my lockermate for months, nearly.

  But I said, “Yeah, that’s great to hear.” As if I already knew it. As if I’d spent my nights worrying.

  Four more years slipped past without Marvin Donner.

  I met this beautiful girl named Patty, and we dated. And screwed. And while that was happening, I started screwing her best friend, Molly. Which wasn’t the smartest trick. Then after both girls dumped me, I met Cathy, who was pretty enough, and fun enough, and we were married just before our senior year.

  I graduated from City College with a degree in business.

  My father hired me. Bribed me. Whichever.

  Maybe it wasn’t smart to return to the grocery. But Cathy was pregnant — with twins, we found out — and she had a talent for spending everything we had. That’s why I took over managing the store, working some bruising hours. Early one morning, driving to work, I heard this odd song that just kept going and going. It was pretty enough, I guess. And the refrain sounded like it belonged on the radio. Light and fun, and all that. “What might be, should be, will be,” it went. Then, “Will be, will be, will be .... “

  The song never finished. The disc jockey put it to bed after five minutes or so.

  “‘Will Be’ is the title,” he announced. “By a local talent. Marvin Donner.”

  I could have rushed over to Musicland and bought the ‘45. I’ve met hundreds who did, or at least claim they did. But frankly I’ve never been much for pop music. Sometimes, I go for years without even playing any of my Beatles albums.

  “Will Be” was in the Top Forty for three quick weeks, peaking at 31st before quietly drowning in the disco sea.

  An old classmate came into the grocery one day. He reported that Marv still looked like the same blond-haired twit. That he was living at home with Mom. Still. And that he was making pretty good money singing at the local clubs.

  I heard “Will Be” a few times, always on the radio.

  Usually I was in the Chevy, which had shitty speakers. But one time I was at my folks’, hearing it on their big cabinet stereo. That was the only time when I really listened to the words, and some of them stuck. “The plague will come in the blood,” stuck. And, “The sandman burns the desert.” Grim bullshit like that, and no wonder it didn’t sell better. That’s what I was thinking. Then I heard that line about “The ragged rings of Neptune,” and I was thinking, “Poor Marv.

  “Saturn is the planet with rings,” I was thinking.

  And I shook my head, feeling awfully superior to that stupid little doper.

  Life melted past me.

  I was this kid just trying to keep his family happy and afloat. And then I wasn’t the kid anymore. I was living out on the edge of town, in a house with four bedrooms and as many toilets. But the twins were out of college, and the other two kids were paid for. And that’s when it occurred to me that more than half my life was done, and if changes were going to be made, I needed to make them now.

  It was a pretty typical divorce. Pissy and bloody, and left unfinished for too long.

  In the end, Cathy got a fat slice of the grocery. But I found myself being philosophical about the loss. The grocery was my father’s, not mine. And Dad was safely dead, immune to what was happening to his legacy and to me.

  No, what mattered in my life was me. Finally.

  I rented this Upscale one-bedroom apartment and leased the best sports utility 4X4 that I could afford. Then like millions of brave grayhairs before me, I went out patrolling for willing young women.

  My third date was a single gal in her twenties.

  Named Lucee. “The same as Lucy,” she told me, “only different.”

  Maybe she wasn’t as pretty as some, and I think she could have misplaced ten or twenty pounds. And early on, I learned that she had some wonky beliefs. Before we were done with dinner, I learned all about Chinese herbal treatments and how the Shriners had a role in Kennedy’s assassination. But on the bright side, we ended up back at my apartment and in my bed, and at one point, while I was lying happily on my back, Lucee started humming a familiar little melody.

  “What’s that song?” I managed to grunt.

  She said something that I couldn’t quite decipher.

  “The song,” I moaned.

  Then her mouth was empty, and she said, “Will be,” as if that was enough. As if I should know instantly what she meant.

  “Will be what?” I said.

  “It’s about the future, Steve. Don’t you kno

w the song?”

  I hadn’t thought about “Will Be” in years. Or Marv Donner. That’s why I just lay there, sputtering, “I don’t know it. Should I?”

  Lucee shook her head and pulled herself up over me, sex forgotten for things more cosmic and vital. “It’s all they talk about on the Internet,” she informed me. “I can’t believe you’ve never heard of it.”

  “Will Be”?

  Again, she hummed the refrain.

  “Wait,” I muttered. “‘What might be, should be, will be...:.’”

  She grinned and said, “You do know it!”

  “Well, sure. I used to hear it on the radio. Back when you were wearing diapers, practically.”

  That put a light in her eyes. “Really?”

  “The singer...he’s a local guy...”

  “He is,” she agreed.

  I rolled out from under her and looked at those bright eyes. Then I told her the clincher. “You know, I went to school with Marv. We were lockermates. Buddies, even.”

  Her eyes changed their color.

  Their tone.

  Then Lucee, with two Es, scooted back a bit and shook her head, pointing out, “A minute ago, you didn’t know what I was talking about.”

  Asking me, “Just how gullible do you think I am?”

  Lucee taught me the basics that night. The song was obscure for a lot of years, she admitted. But then some music buff in Albany or Indiana was playing the old ‘45, and he realized that certain passages made sense. The sandman who started the fire was Saddam, of course. The poison in the blood was AIDs. And Neptune really had a goofy set of rings. Which was something that I didn’t know until that moment.

  According to the Internet, and my date, a bunch of predictions had already come true. And others looked ready to.

  And yet. I didn’t hear anything more about “Will Be” for several months. Lucee was exaggerating the song’s importance, because even the wonkiest rumors on the Net creep out into the real press. Which didn’t happen. And I didn’t hear anything more about it from Lucee, either. She didn’t return any of my calls, and after a week or two, or three, I decided she was too crazy anyway and gave up on her.

  Out of curiosity, I looked for my old lockermate in the phone book.

  No Marvin Donners, or Marvs. But it had been a lot of years, and even potheads move away. And besides, your modem prophets usually have a 900 stuck in front of their phone numbers.

  Those next months were pretty lousy. When I was married, the world seemed filled with young willing women. But after Lucee I plunged into a stale stretch where I wasn’t meeting anyone, young or otherwise. And where every other part of my life was full of problems, too.

  The store roof began springing leaks, and my freezers were coming to the end of their natural lives. My assistant manager left me for one of the big chains. And all the while, my ex was riding me for not keeping up with the monthly extortion payments.

  In the middle of everything, I spotted an article in our local paper. Reprinted straight from The New York Times, it talked about an obscure song and all the ludicrous predictions that had come true. Plus those still waiting for the chance.

  Read his lyrics in the proper way, wrote the reporter, and the songwriter had successfully predicted every President starting with Reagan.

  “The chimp’s sidekick,” Marv called him.

  Bush was, “Texas Yale.”

  Then there was, “The little rock has busy rocks.”

  Plus our current Top Dog: “The hero from the flatlands!”

  And there were other predictions that became history. “The eye-told-us what to do!” was the Iranian hostage mess. Three Mile Island was “The Amish meltdown.” The collapse of the Soviet Union had its own full verse, complete with the birthmark and the wall tumbling down and tanks shooting at their White House.

  Plus there were the wonky science predictions that seemed to pan out. “Jove’s pimply child,” was a moon of Jupiter. Apparently. “A man from New York is born twice,” was the billionaire’s clone baby, announced just weeks ago. And “The sun lives inside a bottle of light.” Which wasn’t a doper’s mutterings. But instead, I learned from the article, was a pretty fair description of the newest fusion reactors.

  Yet what really impressed me, and sold it for most of the world, was what hadn’t quite come true. Yet.

  “After the third day of the third month of the century’s third year,” Marv once sang, “the bear kills a third of everything.”

  The reporter made the easy guess about the bear’s identity. What’s more, that predicted date arrived a week later, and exactly on cue, our stock market took a wild tumble, hundreds of billions of dollars evaporating in a single horrible day.

  Economic nightmares have warnings. But usually not in a bad pop song.

  Over those next days and weeks, what started as crazy electrons on the Internet turned into the only story on the news. Even the stock market took second billing. “Will Be” was the subject of every editorial and a hundred special in-depth reports. The Flatland Hero mentioned the song at his press conference, joking that Mr. Donner was the newest member of his cabinet. And overnight, our little city filled up with cameras and reporters vying for a word with or even a glimpse of our most famous citizen.

  Oh, yeah. Marv still lived nearby. With Mom, as it turned out. And Mom happened to like a certain fat old reporter who worked at one of the local stations. That’s why he beat out a brigade of Pulitzer winners to get the interview of the century. Of the millennium. Whatever.

  Expecting history, I watched that show.

  My first impression was that Marv hadn’t aged at all. My one-time locker buddy was sitting in the tiny living room of his mother’s tiny house, looking as boyish and simple as ever. His hair was thinning but blond still, and it was still just as long, tied in a ponytail. But on second glance, I noticed that his face had that sickly wrinkled look that you find in kids who die of old age at fourteen. Normally I would have thought Marv looked silly. Old hippies always do. But knowing what kinds of gifts he had at his beck and call had me thinking, “On him, it looks right. Just like a prophet should be...!”

  The lucky reporter was flustered enough to tremble, and his voice cracked and broke and sometimes stopped altogether.

  “Where did you...did you...think up this wonderful song...?”

  Marv gave him a doper’s vague stare, then with a smoke-roughened voice said, “On my back. When I was in the hospital. There wasn’t anything to do but look far ahead.”

  The reporter gulped and said, “Yes...I see...”

  He hadn’t done his homework, obviously.

  “Why were you there...in the hospital....?”

  “I wasn’t feeling good.” Then Marv broke into an odd little laugh, something in the eyes either very wise or very empty. “But I got better. I got well.”

 

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