The Good Rat

Illustration by William R. Warren, Jr.

Get home from spending two weeks in Thailand and Nepal. Nice tan from lying on the beach at Koh Samui, duffel bag full of stuff picked up cheap on the street in Kathmandu. Good vacation, but broke now. Money from mortgaging kidneys almost gone, mailbox full of bills and disconnect notices. Time to find work again.

Call agent, leave a message on her machine. She calls back that afternoon. We talk about the trip a little bit; tell her that I’m sending her a wooden mask. Likes that, but says she’s busy trying to broker another couple of rats for experiments at Procter & Gamble. Asks why I’m calling.

Tell her I’m busted. Need work soon. Got bills to pay. She says, I’ll work on it, get back to you soon, ciao, then hangs up on me. Figure I’ll send her the ugliest mask in my bag.

Jet-lagged from spending last twenty-four hours on airplanes. Sleep next two days, watch a lot of TV in between. Mom calls on Tuesday, asks me where I’ve been for last month. Says she’s been trying to find me. Don’t tell her about Koh Samui and Kathmandu. Tell her I’m in night school at local college. Remedial English and basic computer programming. Learning how to do stuff with computers and how to read. She likes that. Asks if I got a job yet. About to lie some more when phone clicks. Got another call coming in, I say. Gotta go, bye. Just as well. Hate lying to Mom.

Agent on the phone. Asks if my legs are in good shape. Hell yeah, I say. Just spent ten days hiking through the Annapurna region, you bet my legs are in good shape. What’s the scoop?

She say, private test facility in Boston needs a rat for Phase One experiments. Some company developing over-the-counter ointment for foot blisters. Need someone in good physical condition to do treadmill stuff. Two week gig. Think you can handle it?

Dunno, I say. Got a few bruises on thighs from falling down on rocks a lot. How much they pay? A hundred bucks a day, she says, minus her 15 percent commission. Not bad. Not great, but not bad either. Ask if they’re buying the airplane ticket. She say, yeah, tourist class on Continental. I say, gee, I dunno, those bruises really hurt. First class on TWA would make them feel better. Says she’ll get back to me, ciao, and hangs up.

Turn on TV, channel surf until I find some toons. Dumb coyote just fell off cliff again when agent calls back. She say, business class on TWA, OK? Think about trying to score box-seat ticket for a Red Sox game, but decide not to push my luck. Bruises feel much better, I say. When do they want me?

She say two days, I say OK. Tickets coming by Federal Express tomorrow, she says, but don’t tell them about bruises, all right? Got no bruises, I say. Just wanted to get decent seat on the plane.

Calls me a name and hangs up again. Doesn’t even say ciao this time. Decide not to send her a mask at all. Let her go to Kathmandu and buy one herself.

Two days later. Get off plane at airport in Beantown. Been here two years ago, when some other lab hired me to drink pink stuff for three days so scientists could look at what I pissed and puked. Like Boston. Nice city. Never figured out why they call it Beantown, though.

Skinny college kid at gate, holding cardboard sign with some word on it and my name below it. Walk up to him, ask if he’s looking for me. Gives me funny look. He say, is this your name on the sign? I say, no, I’m Elmer Fudd, is he from the test facility?

Gets pissed. Asks for I.D. Show him my Sam’s Club card. Got my picture on it, but he’s still being a turd about it. Asks if I got a driver’s license. Drop my duffel bag on his shoes, tell him I’m a busy man, so let’s get going.

Takes me to garage where his Volvo is parked. No limo service this time. Must be cheap lab. Got limo service last time I did a job in Boston. Kid looks mad, though, so don’t make Supreme Court case out of it.

Get stuck in tunnel traffic after leaving airport. Want to grab a nap in back seat, but the kid decides to make small talk. Asks me how it feels to be a rat.

Know what he’s getting at. Heard it before. Say hey, dude, they pay me to get stuck with needles fifteen times a day, walk on treadmills, eat this, drink that, crap in a kidney tray and whizz in a bottle. It’s a living, y’know?

Smiles. Thinks he’s superior. Got a college degree that says so. He say, y’know, they used to do the same thing to dogs, monkeys, and rabbits before it got outlawed. How does it feel to be treated like an animal?

No problem, I say. You gotta dog at home you really like? Maybe a cat? Then bring him over to your lab, make him do the stuff I do, and half as well. Then you tell me.

Then he goes and starts telling me about Nazi concentration camp experiments. Heard that before too, usually from guys who march and wave signs in front of labs. Same guys who got upset about dogs, monkeys and rabbits being used in experiments are now angry that people are being used instead. Sort of makes me wonder why he’s working for a company that does human experiments if he thinks they’re wrong. Maybe a college education isn’t such a great thing after all, if you have to do something you don’t believe in.

Hey, the Nazis didn’t ask for volunteers, I say, and they didn’t pay them either. There’s a difference. Just got back from spending two weeks in Nepal, hiking the lower Himalayas. Where’d you spend your last vacation?

Gets bent out of shape over that. Tells me how much he makes each year, before taxes. Tell him how much I make each year, after taxes. Free medical care and all the vacation time I want, too.

That shuts him up. Make the rest of the trip in peace.

Kid drives me to big old brick building overlooking the Charles River. Looks like it might have once been a factory. Usual bunch of demonstrators hanging out in the parking lot. Raining now, so they look cold and wet. Courts say they have to stay fifty feet away from the entrance. Can’t read their signs. Wouldn’t mean diddly to me even if I could. That’s my job they’re protesting, so if they catch the flu, they better not come crying to me, because I’m probably the guy who tested the medicine they’ll have to take.

Stop at front desk to present I.D., get name badge. Leave my bags with security guard. Ride up elevator to sixth floor. Place looks better on the inside. Plaster walls, tile floors, glass doors, everything painted white and gray. Offices have carpets, new furniture, hanging plants, computers on every desk.

First stop is the clinic. Woman doctor tests my reflexes, looks in my ears, checks my eyes, takes a blood sample, gives me a little bottle and points to the bathroom. Give her a full bottle a few minutes later, smile, ask what she’s doing two weeks from now. Doesn’t smile back. Thanks me for my urine.

Kid takes me down the hall to another office. Chief scientist waiting for me. Skinny guy with glasses, bald head and long bushy beard. Stands up and sticks out his hand, tells me his name. Can’t remember it five minutes later. Think of him as Dr. Bighead. Just another guy in a white coat. Doesn’t matter what his name is, so long as he writes it at the bottom of my paycheck.

Dr. Bighead offers me coffee. Ask for water instead. Kid goes to get me a glass of water, and Dr. Bighead starts telling me about the experiment.

Don’t understand half the shit he says. It’s scientific. Goes right over my head. Listen politely and nod my head at the right times, like a good rat.

Comes down to this. Some drug company hired his lab to do Phase One tests for its new product. It’s a lotion to relieve foot blisters. No brand-name for it yet. Experiment calls for me to walk a treadmill for eight hours the first day with a one-hour break for lunch, or at least until I collect a nice bunch of blisters on the soles of my feet. Then they’ll apply an ointment to my aching doggies, let me rest for twelve hours, but put me on the treadmill again the next day. This will be repeated every other day for the next two weeks.

Do I get paid for the days I’m not on the treadmill?

Of course, he says, but you have to stay here at the test facility. Got a private room in the dorm for you upstairs. Private cafeteria and rec room, too.

Does it have a pool table?

Got really nice pool table, he says. Also a VCR and a library. Computer, too, but no fax or modem. Company has strict policy against test participants being permitted open contact with outside world. Phone calls allowed, but they’re monitored by security operators. Can receive forwarded mail, but all outgoing mail has to be read by a staff member first.

Nod. Been through this before. Most test facilities work this way. Sounds reasonable, I say.

When you’re not on the treadmill, he says, you have to be in bed or in a wheelchair. No standing or walking, except when you’re in the shower or going to the bathroom.

Shrug. Not a big deal. Once lay in bed for three days, doing nothing but watch old Flintstones cartoons on closed-circuit TV. Some kind of psychiatric experiment for UCLA. Ready to shout yabba-dabba-do and hump Betty Rubble by the time it was over. After that, there’s nothing I can’t do.

Dr. Bighead stops smiling now. Folds hands together on desk. Time for the serious stuff now.

The ointment we put on your feet may not be the final product, he says. May have to try different variations on the same formula. Side-effects may include persistent itching, reddening or flaking of the skin, minor swelling. Computer simulations of the product have produced none of these results, but this is the first time the product has undergone Phase One testing.

Nod. Been there, done that.

Goes on. Tells me that there’s three other volunteers doing the same experiment. Three of us will be the test subjects, the other one the control subject who receives a placebo. We won’t know in advance who gets the product and who gets the placebo. Do I understand?

Test subjects, control subjects, placebos, and my feet may rot and fall off before this is all over. Got it, doc. Sounds cool.

Dr. Bighead goes on. If any of this bothers me, I can leave now, and his company will pay me a hundred dollars for one day of my time and supply me with airfare back home. However, if I chicken out during the test period, or if I’m caught trying to wash off the ointment, they’ll throw me out of the experiment and I won’t be paid anything.

Yeah, uh-huh. He has to tell me this because of the way the laws are written. Never chickened out before, I say. Sounds great to me. When do we get started?

Dr. Bighead grins. Likes a nice, cooperative rat. Tomorrow morning, he says. Eight o’clock sharp.

Ask if I can go catch a little nightlife tonight. Frowns. Tells me I may have to submit another urine sample if I do so. Nod my head. No problem. He shrugs. Sure, so long as you’re back by midnight. After that, you’re in here until we’re through with the experiment.

No problem.

Spend another hour with contracts and release forms. Dr. Bighead not surprised that I don’t read very well. Must have seen the file my agent faxed his company. Make him read everything aloud, while I get it all on the little CD recorder I brought with me. Agent taught me to do that. Means we can sue his company if it pulls any funny stuff. Maybe this rat can’t read, but he’s still got rights.

Everything sounds cool. Sign all the legal stuff. Dr. Bighead gives me plastic wristband and watches me put it around my left wrist, then lets me go. Notice that he doesn’t shake hands again. Maybe afraid he’ll catch functional illiteracy.

Same kid waiting outside. Takes me up to dorm on the seventh floor.

Looks like a hospital ward. No windows. Six private rooms surrounding a rec area. Small cafeteria off to one side. Couple of tables, some chairs and sofas. Bookshelf full of old paperbacks and magazines. Fifty-two inch flatscreen TV, loads of videos on the rack above it. Pay phone in the corner. Pool table, though it looks like a cheap one. Look up, spot fish-eye camera lens hidden in the ceiling.

Same as usual. Could be better, could be worse.

Room is small. Single bed, desk, closet. No windows here either, but at least it’s got a private bathroom. Count my blessings. No roommate this time. Last one snored, and the one before that went nuts six days into the experiment and was punted.

My bag is on the bed. Notice zipper is partly open. Been searched to make sure I didn’t bring in any booze, dope, butts, or cellular phones.

Kid tells me he’s got to go. Reminds me not to leave without my badge. See you tomorrow, I say.

Unpack bag, leave room. Want to get a bite to eat and check out the night life.

Two people sitting in the rec room now, watching TV news. A guy and a woman. Guy looks like he’s about thirty. Thin, long-haired, sparse beard. Paperback book spread open on his lap. Barely glances my way.

The woman is different. Another rat, but the most beautiful rat I’ve seen in a while. Long brown hair. Slender but got some muscles. Good-looking. My type.

Catch her eye as I walk past. Give her a nod. She nods back, smiles a little. Doesn’t say anything. Just a nod and smile.

Think about that nod and smile all the way to the elevator.

Found a good hangout last time I was in Boston, over in Dorchester.

Catch a rickshaw over there now.

Sign above the door says No * Allowed. First time I was here, someone had to read the name to me, then explain that the symbol in the middle is an asterisk. What part of your body looks like an asterisk? Still don’t get it, I say. Laughs and says, bend over, stick your head between your legs and look harder. Get it now, I say.

Can smoke a butt inside wherever you want, if you can find a butt to smoke these days. Fifty-six brands of beer. Not served only in the basement, but at your table if you want. Hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken-fried steak and onion rings on the menu. No tofu pizza or lentil soup. Framed nude photos of Madonna, Keith Moon, Cindy Crawford, and Sylvester Stallone on the walls. Antique Wurl-itzer jukebox loaded with stuff that can’t be sold without a parental warning sticker on the cover.

No screaming kids, either.

Cops would shut down this place if most people knew it existed. Or maybe not. Several guys hanging out at the bar look like off-duty cops. Cops need a place to have a smoke and drink, too, y’know.

Good bar. Should be a place like this in every city. Once there was, before everyone took offense to everything and no one could stay out of other people’s business. Laws got passed to make sure that you had to live in smoke-free, low-cholesterol, non-alcoholic, child-safe environments. Now you have to go slumming to find a place where no *s are allowed.

Cover charge, tonight, though. Can’t have everything.

Find seat near the stage, order ginger ale, watch some nuevo-punk band ruin old Romantics and Clash numbers. It’s Boston, so they’re obligated to do something by the Cars. Probably toddlers when Ric Ocasek was blowing speakers.

Usually have a blowout the night before an experiment. Never binge, but have good fun anyway. Lots of babes here tonight, most of them with guys who look like they should be home wanking off on Internet. A couple of their girlfriends throw gimme looks in my direction.

Should do something about it. Still early. Can always get a hotel room for a few hours. Use the line about being a biomedical research expert in town for an important conference. Babes love sleeping with doctors.

Heart not into it. Keep thinking about the girl in the rec room. Don’t know why. Just another rat.

Find myself looking around every time the door opens, hoping she’ll walk in.

Leave before eleven o’clock, alone for once. Tell myself it’s because the band was dick. Know better.

On the way back to the test center, wonder if Mom’s not right. Maybe time to get a job. Learn how to read, too.

Bet she knows how to read.

Eight o’clock next morning. Come downstairs wearing my rat gear. Gym shorts, football jersey, sneaks. Time to go to work for the advancement of science and all mankind.

Dr. Bighead is waiting for me. Not as friendly as he was yesterday. Takes me to clinic and waits while I fill another bottle for the doctor. Escorts me to the lab.

Four power treadmills set next to each other on one side of the room, with a TV hanging from the ceiling above them. Stupid purple dinosaur show on the tube. Sound turned down low. College kids wearing white coats sitting in front of computers on other end of the room. One of them is the guy who picked me up at the airport. Glances up for a second when I come in. Doesn’t wave back. Just looks at his screen again, taps fingers on his keyboard. Too cool to talk to rats now.

Two other rats sitting in plastic chairs. Already wired up, watching Barney, waiting to go. Walk over to meet them. One is the skinny longhair I saw last night. Wearing old Lollapolooza shirt. Name’s Doug. Other guy looks like he works out a lot. Big dude. Shaved head, nose ring, truck stop tattoo on right forearm. Says his name is Phil.

Doug looks bored, Phil nervous. Everyone swats hands. We’re the rat patrol, cruising for a bruising.

Time to get wired. Sit on table, take off shirt, let one of the kids tape electrodes all over me. Head, neck, chest, back, thighs, ankles. So much as twitch and lines jump all over the computer screens. Somebody asks what I had for breakfast, when was the last time I went to the bathroom. Writes it all down on a clipboard.

Phil asks if the TV has cable. Please change the channel, he says, it’s giving me a headache. No one pays attention to him. Finally gets up and switches over to The Today Show. Dr. Bighead gives him the eye. Wonder if this is the first time Phil has ever been on the rat patrol. If the scientists want you to watch Barney, then you do it, no questions asked. Could be part of the experiment for all you know.

Don’t mess with the scientists. Everyone knows that.

Last rat finally arrives. No surprise, it’s the girl I saw last night. Wearing one-piece workout suit. Thank you, Lord, for giving us the guy who invented Spandex. Phil and Doug look ready to swallow their tongues when they see her. Guy who tapes electrodes to her gets a woody under his lab coat when he goes to work on her chest and thighs.

She ignores his hands, just like she ignores everyone else, including me and the boys. She’s a true-blue, all-American, professional rat.

Time to mount the treadmills. Dr. Bighead makes a performance about us getting on the proper machines, as if it makes a difference. The girl is put on the machine to my left, with Doug on my right and Phil next to him.

Grasp the metal bar in front of me. Dr. Bighead checks to make sure that the computers are up and running, then he switches on the treadmills. Smooth rubber mat beneath my feet begins to roll at a slow pace, only about a foot or so every few seconds. My grandmother could walk faster than this.

Look over at the girl. She’s watching Willard Scott talking to some guy dressed like a turkey. Asks Dr. Bighead if he’d turn up the volume. He say no, it would just distract his team. Think he’s pissed because Phil switched off the purple dinosaur.

Just as well. Gives us a chance to get acquainted.

She starts first. Asks me my name. Tell her. She nods, tells me hers. Sylvie Simms. Hi Sylvie, I say, nice to meet you.

Scientists murmur to each other behind our backs. Sylvie asks me where I’m from. She tells me she’s from Columbus, Ohio.

C’mon, man, Phil says. Turn up the volume. Can’t hear what he’s saying about the weather.

Dr. Bighead ignores him.

Look over at Doug. Got a Walkman strapped to his waist. Eyes closed, head bobbing up and down. Grooving to something in his headphones as he keeps on trucking.

Been to Columbus, I say. Nice city. Got a great barbecue place downtown, right across the street from the civic center.

Sylvie laughs. Got a nice laugh. Asks if it’s a restaurant with an Irish name. Yeah, I say, that’s the one. Serves ribs with a sweet sauce. She knows the place, been there many times.

And so we re off and running. Or walking. Whatever.

Doug listens to rock bands on his Walkman, getting someone to change CDs for him every now and then. Phil stares at the TV supplying his own dialogue for the stuff he can’t hear, bitching about not being able to change the channel. A kid walks by every now and then with a bottle of water, letting us grab a quick sip through a plastic straw.

Sylvie and I talk to each other.

Learn a lot about Sylvie while waiting for the blisters to form. Single. Twenty-seven years old. Got a B.A. in elementary education from the same university where I got my start as a rat, but couldn’t get a decent job. Public schools aren’t hiring anyone who don’t have a military service record, the privates only take people with master’s degrees. Became a rat instead, been running for two years now. Still wishes she could teach school, but at least this way she’s paying the rent.

Tell her about myself. Born here. Live there. Leave out part about not being able to read very well, but truthful about everything else. Four years as a rat after doing a stint in the Army. Tell her about other Phase One tests I’ve done, go on to talking about places I’ve gone hiking.

Gets interested in the last part. Asks me where I’ve been. Tell her about recent trek through Nepal, about the beach at Koh Samui where you can go swimming without running into floating garbage. About hiking to the glacier in New Zealand and the moors in Scotland and rain forest trails in Brazil.

You like to travel, she says.

Love to travel, I say. Not first-class, not like a tourist, but better this way. Get to see places I’ve never been before.

Asks what I do there. Just walk, I say. Walk and take pictures. Look at birds and animals. Just to be there, that’s all.

Asks how I’ve been able to afford to do all this. Tell her about mortgaging my organs to organ banks.

Looks away. You sell your organs?

No, I say, I don’t sell them. Mortgage them. Liver to a cloner in Tennessee, heart to an organ bank in Oregon, both lungs to a hospital to Texas. One kidney to Idaho, the other to Minnesota….

Almost stops walking when she hears that. You’d sell them your whole body?

Shrug. Haven’t sold everything yet, I say. Still haven’t mortgaged corneas, skin, or veins. Saving them for last, when I’m too old to do rat duty and can’t sell plasma, bone marrow or sperm anymore.

She blushes when I mention sperm. Pretend not to notice. She asks if I know what they’re going to do with my organs when I’m dead.

Sure, I say. Someone at the morgue runs a scanner over the bar-code tattoo on my left arm. That tells them to put my body in a fridge and contact the nearest organ donor info center. All the mortgage-holders will be notified, and they’ll fly in to claim whatever my agent negotiated to give them. Anything left over afterwards, the morgue puts it in the incinerator. Ashes to ashes and all the happy stuff.

Sylvie takes a deep breath. And that doesn’t bother you?

Shrug. Naw, I say. Rather have somebody else get a second chance at life from my organs than having them rot in a coffin in the ground. While they’re still mine, I can use the dough to go places I’ve never been before.

Treadmill is beginning to run just a little faster now. No longer walking at a granny pace. Dr. Bighead must be getting impatient. Wants to get some nice blisters on our feet by the end of the day.

Phil sweats heavily now. Complains about having to watch Sally Jesse instead of Oprah. Don’t wanna watch that white whore, he says. C’mon, gimme that black bitch instead. Doug sweating hard, too, but just keeps walking. Asks for a Smashing Pumpkins CD, please. One of the kids changes his CD for him, but doesn’t switch channels on the TV.

Couldn’t do that, Sylvie says. Body too precious to me.

Body precious to me, too, I say, but it ain’t me. Gone somewhere else when I’m dead. Just meat after that. Why not sell this and that while you’re still around?

She’s quiet for a long while. Stares at the TV instead. Sally Jesse is talking to someone who looks like a man dressed as a woman but looks like a woman trying to resemble a man, or something like that.

Maybe I shouldn’t have told her what I think about organ mortgages. Being a rat is one thing, but putting your innards on the layaway plan is another. Some people don’t get it, and some of the ones who get it don’t like it.

Sylvie must know this stuff. All rats do. Most of us sign mortgages. So what’s her problem?

Bell dings somewhere behind us. Time for lunch. Didn’t even notice that it was noon yet. Dr. Bighead comes back in, turns off treadmills. Gets us to sit on examination tables and take off shoes. No blisters on our feet yet, but he still puts us in wheelchairs. OK, he says, be back here by one o’clock.

Can t wait, Phil says.

Lunch ready for us in rec room. Chicken soup, grilled cheese sandwiches, tuna salad. Push our way down the service line, carrying trays on our laps, reaching up to get everything. Been in a wheelchair before, so has Doug and Sylvie, but Pliil not used to it. Spills hot soup all over his lap, screams bloody murder.

Share a table with Sylvie. Newspapers on table for us to read. Intern brings us mail forwarded from home. Bills and junk for me, but Sylvie gets a postcard. Picture of tropical beach on the front.

Ask who it came from. Her brother, she says. Ask where her brother lives, and she passes me the postcard.

Pretend to read it. Only big word I know is Mexico. Always wanted to visit Mexico, I say. What does he do down there?

Hesitates. Business, she say s.

Should shut up now, but don’t. What kind of business?

Looks at me funny. Didn’t you read the card?

Sure, sure, I say. Just asking.

Thinks about it a moment, then she tells me. Younger brother used to live in Minneapolis, but was busted by the feds early last} ear. Sold cartons of cigarettes smuggled from Mexico out of the back of his car. Smoking illegal in Minneapolis. Felony charge, his third for selling butts on the street. Three-strikes law means he goes to jail for life. For selling cigarettes.

Judge set bail at seven grand. Sylvie came up with the cash. Brother jumped bail, as she knew he would. Fled south, sought amnesty, went to work for Mexican tobacco company. Sends her postcard now and then, but hasn’t seen him in almost two years.

That’s tough, I say She nods. Think about it a little. Question comes to mind. How did you come up with seven grand so fast?

Doesn’t say anything for a minute, then she tells me.

Got it from mortgaging her corneas.

Five is the usual price, but she got seven on the overseas black market. When she dies, her eyes go to India. At least it kept my brother from going to prison, she says, but I can tell that isn’t the point.

Sylvie doesn’t want to be buried without her eyes.

She takes back the postcard, turns it over to look at the beach on the front. Kind of makes you want to visit Tijuana, doesn’t it?

Tijuana looks like a great place, I say. Always wanted to go there. At least he’s found a nice place to live.

Gives me long, hard look. Card wasn’t sent from Tijuana, she says. It’s from Mexico City, where he’s living now. That’s in the letter. Didn’t you read it?

Oh, I say Yeah, sure. Just forgot.

Doesn’t say anything for a moment. Pulls over the newspaper, looks at the front page. Points at a headline. Says, isn’t that a shame?

Look at picture next to it. Shows African woman with a dead baby in her arms, screaming at camera. Yeah, I say, that’s tough. Hate it when I read news like that.

Sylvie taps a finger on the headline. Says here that the unemployment rate in Massachusetts is lowest in fifteen years, she says.

Oh yeah, I say. That’s not what I meant. That’s good news, yeah.

Pushes newspaper aside. Looks around to see if anyone is listening. Drops her voice to a whisper. You can’t read, can you?

Face turns warm. No point in lying to her. She knows now.

Only a little, I say. Just enough to get by, like a menu or a plane ticket. Not enough to read her brother’s postcard or a newspaper.

Feel stupid now. Want to get up and leave. Forget that I’m supposed to stay in the wheelchair, start to rise to my feet. Sylvie puts her hand on top of mine, makes me stay put.

It’s OK, she says. Doesn’t matter. Kind of suspected, but didn’t know for sure until you asked me about what my brother said in his letter.

Still want to leave. Grab rubber wheels, start to push back from table.

C’mon, don’t go away, she says. Didn’t mean to embarrass you. Stay here.

Feel like an idiot, I say.

Sylvie shakes her head. Gives me that smile again. No, she say, you’re not an idiot. You’re just as smart as anyone else.

Look at her. She doesn’t look away. Her eyes are owned by some company in India, but for a moment they belong only to me.

You can learn how to read, she says. You’ve just never had a teacher like me.

Get blisters on my feet by end of first day. Same for the other guys. Dr. Bighead very pleased. Never seen someone get so excited about blisters. Wonder if he’s got a thing for feet.

Scientists take pictures of our feet, make notes on clipboard, then spread lotion on our soles. Pale green stuff. Feels like snot from a bad head cold, smells like a Christmas tree soaked in kerosene. Use eyedroppers to carefully measure the exact amount. Should have used paintbrushes instead.

Everyone gets theirs from different bottles. No idea if I got the test product or the placebo, but blisters feel a little better after they put it on.

Doesn’t last long. Skin begins to itch after dinner. Not bad itch, but can’t resist scratching at the bottom of my feet. Sort of like having chigger bites from walking in tall grass. Sylvie and Phil have the same thing, but Doug doesn’t. Sits in corner of rec room, reading paperback book, never once touching his feet. Rest of us watch the tube and paw at our tootsies.

Guess we know who got the placebo.

No treadmill work the next day, but we go back down to the lab after breakfast and let the scientists examine us some more. Tell them about the itching while they draw blood samples. They nod, listen, take more pictures, make more notes, then put more green stuff on our feet.

Different formula this time. Now it’s Extra Strength Green Stuff. Must be made out of fire ants. Nearly jump off the table. Sylvie hisses and screws up her eyes when they put it on her. Phil yells obscenities. Two guys have to grab him before he decks the kid who put it on his feet.

Feet still burning when we go back upstairs. Sylvie goes to her room. Doug picks up his book and reads. Phil mad as hell, pissing and moaning about Dr. Bighead. Says he only did this to get a little extra dough, didn’t know they were going to put him in jail and torture him to death. Says he wants to go put his feet in a sink.

Don’t do it, I say, it’ll screw up the test. Tell him that trying to punch out a scientist is way uncool. Calm down, dude. Let’s play some eight-ball. Get your mind off it.

Mumbles something under his breath, but says, yeah, OK, whatever.

Hard to shoot pool sitting in wheelchairs, but we manage for awhile. Phil can’t get into it. Blows easy shots, scratches the cue ball twice. Sinks eight-ball when I’ve still got four stripes on the table. Loses temper. Slams his stick down on table, turns chair around and rolls off to his room. Slams the door.

Look up at lens in the ceiling. Know someone must be catching all this.

Go over to TV, turn it on, start watching Oprah. Sylvie comes over a little while later. Asks if I want to begin reading lessons.

Not much into it, I say. Wanna watch Oprah instead.

Gives me a look that could give a woody to a monk. C’mon, she says. Please. I’d really like it if you would.

Think maybe I can score some points with her this way, so I go along with it. What the hell. Maybe I might learn something.

OK, I say.

Turns off TV, wheels over to bookshelf, starts poking through it. Think she’s going to grab a book or a magazine. Can’t even read the titles of most of them. If she brings back Shakespeare or something like that, I’m outta here.

Picks up a bunch of newspapers from the bottom shelf. Puts them in her lap, hauls them over to a table, tells me to come over next to her.

Finds the funny pages. Asks me if I like comic strips. Naw, I say. Never really looked at them. Smiles and says she reads the funnies every morning. Best part of her day. She points to the one at the top of the first page. Here’s one I like, she says. Tell me what this little kid is saying to the tiger.

That’s how I start to learn how to read. Seeing what Calvin and Hobbes did today.

After lunch, we go down to the lab again for another checkup. Feet no longer burning, but the itch is back. Feet a little red. More blood samples, more photos, more notes. More ointment on our feet. Doesn’t burn so much this time. Looks a little different, too. Must be New Improved Extra Strength Green Stuff.

Scientists notice something different when they look at Phil’s feet. Spend a lot of time with him. Compare them to photos they took earlier. One of them takes a scalpel, scrapes a little bit of dead skin off the bottom of each foot, puts it in a dish, takes it out of the room.

Phil keeps saying, what’s going on? What’s the big deal? Gotta right to know.

Scientists say nothing to him. Examine Sylvie and Doug, spread more ointment on their feet, then let the three of us go back to the dorm. Tell Phil he has to stay behind. Say they want to conduct a more thorough examination.

Dr. Bighead walks past us while we’re waiting for the elevator. Just says hi, nothing else. Goes straight to the lab, closes door behind him.

Phil screwed up, I say to Doug and Sylvie when we’re alone in the elevator. Don’t know how, but I think he screwed up.

Just nod. Know the score. Seen it before, too. People go crazy sometimes during a long test. Happens to new guys all time. Every now and then, some dumb rat gets washed down the gutter.

Return to rec room. Doug picks up his paperback, Sylvie and I go back to reading the funnies. Trying to figure out why Sarge just kicked Beetle in the butt when door opens and Phil comes in. Not riding a wheelchair now. Dr. Bighead and a security guard are right behind him.

Doesn’t say much to us, just goes straight to his room and collects his bag. Leaves without saying goodbye or anything.

Dr. Bighead stays behind. Says that Phil was dismissed from the experiment because he scrubbed off the product. Also displayed lack of proper attitude. Won’t be replaced because it’s too late to do so without beginning the tests again.

We nod, say nothing. No point in telling him that we were expecting this. Warns us not to do the same thing. Phil isn’t being paid for his time, he says, because he violated the terms of his contract.

Nod. No sir. We’re good rats.

Apologizes for the inconvenience. Asks us if we need anything.

Sylvie raises her hand. Asks for some comic books. Dr. Bighead gives her a weird look, but nods his head. Promises to have some comic books sent up here by tomorrow. Then he leaves.

Doug looks up from his book as the door shuts behind him. Good, he says. Leaves more green stuff for us.

Two weeks go by fast.

Phase One tests sometimes take forever. Drives everyone crazy. This one should, because we’re not on the treadmills every single day and have lots of time on our hands, but it doesn’t.

For once, I’m doing something else besides staring at the tube. Usually spend hours lying on a couch in the rec room, watching one video after another, killing time until I go to the lab again.

But not now.

After work and on the off-days, I sit at a table with Sylvie, fighting my way through the funny pages.

Sometimes Doug helps, when Sylvie needs to sleep or when her feet are aching too much. Both are patient. Don’t treat me like a kid or a retard or laugh when I can’t figure out a long word, and help me pronounce it over and over again until I get it right. If it’s something difficult, Sylvie describes what it means in plain English, or even draws a little picture. Take notes on stationery paper and study them at night until I fall asleep.

Able to get through the funny pages without much help after the first few days, then we start on the comic books Dr. Bighead got for us. Archie and Jughead at first, because they’re simple. When Sylvie isn’t around, Doug and I get into discussing who we’d rather shag, Betty or Veronica, but pretty soon I’m tackling Batman and the X-Men. Find out that the comics are much better than the movies.

Doug is a good teacher, but I prefer to be with Sylvie.

Funny thing happens. Start to make sense of the newspaper headlines. They’re no longer alien to me. Discover that they actually mean something. Stuff in them that isn’t on TV.

Then start to figure out titles on the covers of Doug’s books. Know now that he likes science fiction and spy novels. Better than movies, he says, and I believe him when he tells me what they’re about. Still can’t read what’s on the pages, because I still need pictures to help me understand the words, but for the first time I actually want to know what’s in a book.

Hard to describe. Sort of like hiking through dense rain forest, where you can’t see anything except shadows and you think it’s night, and you try to stay on the trail because you don’t know what’s out there. Then you get above the treeline and there’s a clearing. Sun is right over your head and it’s warm and we can see for miles, mountains and ranges and plains all spread out before you, and it’s so beautiful you want to spend the rest of your life here.

That’s what it’s like. All of a sudden, I’m not as stupid as I once thought I was.

One night, after everyone else has gone to bed and the lights are turned off, I find myself crying. Don’t cry easily, because that’s not the way I was brought up. Dad beat the crap out of me if he caught me doing so, call me a faggot and a little girlie-boy. No short or easy way to explain it, but that’s sort of why he took me out of school, made me go to work in his garage. Said he wanted me to be a man, that he didn’t want no godless liberals messing up my brain with books and ideas.

When he dropped dead with a socket wrench in his hand, I was eighteen. Only thing in my wallet was a draft card I couldn’t read. Time in the army showed me the rest of the world and made me want to see more, but by then was too late to go back to school. After that, only choice I had to stay alive and see the world was to become a rat. A rat whose body didn’t belong to himself.

Something wrong when the law lets a human be a rat, because a rat has more respect than a human. Rats can’t learn to read, but a human can. No one wants to spend money on schools, though. Rather spend it on building prisons, then putting people in there who sell cigarettes. Meanwhile, teachers have to go do things that they won’t let rats do anymore.

Didn’t cry that night for Sylvie or her brother, even though that was part of it. Cried for all the lost years of my life.

Spend last few days trying to learn as much as I can, but can’t get past one thing.

Sylvie.

Started to learn how to read because I wanted to shag her. Going along with her seemed like the easiest way of getting her into bed.

Can’t do that during an experiment, because sex with other rats is a strict no-no in the standard contract. Seen other rats get punted for just being caught in someone else’s room, even when both persons had their pants on. When tests are over and everyone’s paid, though, there’s nothing wrong with a little party time at the nearest no-tell motel.

Still want to sleep with her. Get a Jackson sometimes just sitting next to her in the rec room, while she’s helping me get through some word I haven’t seen before. Can’t take my eyes off her when she’s running the treadmill next to me.

Different situation now, though. Isn’t just about getting Sylvie in some cheap motel for some hoy-hoy. Not even about learning how to read. Got some scary feelings about her.

Two days before the end of the tests. Alone together in the rec room, reading Spider-Man to each other. Ask her straight. Say, hey, why are you helping me like this?

Keeps looking at comic book, but flips back her hair and smiles a little. Because I’m a teacher, she says, and this is what I do. You’re the first pupil I’ve had since college.

Plenty of winos in the park who don’t know how to read, I say. Could always teach them. Why bother with me?

Gives me long look. Not angry, not cold. Can’t quite make it out.

Because, she says, I’ve always wanted to visit Kathmandu, and maybe I’ve found someone who can take me there.

Can take you there, I say. Can take you to Nepal, Brazil, Ireland. Mexico to visit your brother, if you want.

Blushes. Looks away for a second, then back at me. Maybe you just want to take me to nearest hotel when we’re done here, she says. I’ve done that. Wouldn’t mind doing it again, either.

Shake my head. Like Kathmandu better, I say. Sunrise over Annapurna is incredible. Would love you to see it with me.

Love? Thought I was just teaching you how to read.

Look around to see if anyone is watching. No one there, but there must be someone behind the lens in the ceiling.

Hell with them. Put my hand under the table and find hers. One more word you’ve taught me, I say.

She smiles. Doesn’t take her hand away. Finds a pen in her pocket, hands it to me, pushes some paper in front of me.

If you can write it, she says, I’ll believe you.

Phase One test of the product pronounced a success on the final day. Last batch of Brand New Improved Green Stuff doesn’t smell, doesn’t itch, doesn’t burn, and heals the blisters on our feet. Doesn’t do a thing for our leg cramps, but that’s beside the point.

Dr. Bighead thanks us, writes his name on the bottom of our checks. Tells us we’ve been wonderful test subjects. Hopes to work with us again soon. In fact, are you available next March? Scheduled test of new anti-depressant drug. Looking for subjects now. How about it?

Look at Sylvie. She’s sitting next to me. Doesn’t say anything. Look at the check. It’s written on an account at the First Bank of Boston, and it’s signed by Dr. Leonard Whyte, M.D.

Thank you, Dr. Whyte, I say. My agent will be in touch with you. Ciao.

A cab is waiting for us at the front door. We tell the driver to take us to the nearest hotel.

Three years have passed since Sylvie and I met in Boston. A few things are different now.

She finally managed to get me to use proper grammar instead of street talk. I’m still learning, but personal pronouns are no longer foreign to me, and it ’s no longer necessary to refer to all events in the present tense. To those of you who have patiently suffered through my broken English during this chronicle, I sincerely apologize. This was an attempt to portray the person I once was, before Sylvie came into my life.

We used the money earned during the Boston tests for a trip to Mexico City, where Sylvie got see her brother for the first time in two years. Six months later, we flew to Nepal and made a trek through the Annapurna region, where I showed her a sunrise over the Himalayas. Since then we have gone on a safari in Kenya and rafted down the Amazon. Now we’re planning a spring trip to northern Canada, above the Arctic circle. A little too cold for my taste, but she wants to see the Northern Lights.

Anything for my baby.

The first night in Kathmandu, I promised to give her the world that I knew in exchange for hers. She has made good by her promise, and I’m making good by mine.

Nonetheless, we re still rats.

We can’t marry, because the labs that supply our income won’t accept married couples as test subjects. Although we’ve been living together for almost three years how, we keep addresses in different cities, file separate tax returns and maintain our own bank accounts. Her mail is forwarded to my place, and only our agents know the difference. We’ll probably never have children, or at least until we decide to surrender this strange freedom that we’ve found.

Our freedom is not without price. I’ve mortgaged the last usable tissue in my body. Sylvie hasn’t repossessed the rights to her corneas, despite her attempts to find a legal loophole that will allow her to do so, and although the time may come when she has to give up an organ or two, she insists that her body is her own.

More painful is the fact that, every so often, we have to spend several weeks each year participating in the Phase One tests. Sometimes they’re the very samt experiments, conducted simultaneously at the same test facility, so we have to pretend to be strangers.

I haven’t quite become used to that, but it can’t be helped.

But the money is good, the airfare is free, and we sometimes get to see old friends. We spent a week with Doug a couple of months ago, while doing hypothermia experiments in Colorado. He and I discussed favorite Jules Verne novels while sitting in tubs of ice water.

For all of that, though, I lead a satisfactory life. Sylvie and I have enough money to pay the bills, and we visit the most interesting places around the world. I have a woman who I love, my mother has stopped bothering me about getting a job, and I’ve learned how to read.

Not only that, but we can always say that we’ve done our part for the advancement of science and all mankind.

For what more can a good rat ask?