Though it doesn't have to be, this is a love story.
I don't like love stories. I don't dislike them either. They're not for me. Truth be said, the concept of romantic love is one I find alarming and elusive, and against the human race I would lay the indictment of being unduly obsessed with it. Having studied it from every perspective I am still none the wiser, and yet people, little, afraid, and isolated, quest ever onwards in search of tokenistic metrics of value bestowed by someone else. They depend, to excess, upon another person, forsaking all else, forsaking all the effort they could instead have expended on life, on creating, on exploring the myriad wonders of this universe, until the day they fall out of love in a spewing volcano of recriminations and hurt. What, by heaven, is the point?
This love story is a little different. This one is Sam's.
Convention might have me say that the story begins on the day which changed Sam's life, but this is a typically absurd example of the human tendency to speak mysticism over sense. Every day of his life has changed his life. Every day of his life is his life. People choose to look for big, significant acts of fate which aren't there as if convinced it was something minor but vital that day which sent their arrow of time spinning off on a new trajectory – 'oh, if I hadn't missed the bus that day then I wouldn't have met my future business partner in the café while I waited for the next one' et cetera et cetera. A tedious and misplaced fixation.
It was the work of my hand. Nothing could have been simpler than providing the wrong number for Maria.
It was a working day for Sam and Max on the day which I choose to begin. They work in a basement. Above is a glass and steel tower of grim aspect which reaches arrogant heights in the sky. Tedious people of varying degrees of skill work with varying degrees of success at every level. It's not the best company: I'm still trying to iron out the kinks. Max knows that I own it but often forgets. Sam has no idea.
"Pass me some crisps, will you?" Max asks. Sam throws him a packet and I silently disapprove. Max is overweight and listens to absolutely none of my advice about this. Unlike Sam, glowing and golden, Max fits perfectly into this basement like a sun-fearing troll, sprawled lazily in his chair. I compose another argument to put to him about why he must exercise and then give up. Worlds would fall before me, should I want them to, but I cannot control Max.
His hand dips sharply into the packet again and again. A heron in a fishpond. There is grease on his keyboard.
Outside, men, like gods, soar high, seize fire and shape the world unto their liking. Meanwhile, Sam and Max fester underground. The basement (nicknamed 'the anus' by those above it) is as dark and depressing as you would expect from a vital and underacknowledged department of two people. It's not a place I would choose to put up with myself, and Max sometimes nags me to do something about it, forgetting my role as beneficent overseer who doesn't interfere directly. If he wants it renovated he can ask someone lower down the chain than me, but he won't get off his lazy arse and do so. Renovation would probably involve removal of all the cameras dotted around the room, installed by my neurotic predecessor. Not my choice, but I use them. I could watch everything again from several different angles if I wanted.
The phone rings and Max wipes his grease and salt covered fingers on his shirt (disgusting) before answering it.
"Yello?" he grunts. I swing around in my chair as I have an idea, which I won't explain to you because you'll most likely find it boring. I note it here for my own recollection. It was one of the most useful ideas I've had this year, even more useful than Fish's Principle of Divisive Interchange which anyone familiar with the field of translational gravinometry will know I won an award for, an award which my assistant collected since I could not attend myself. This idea was a really good one.
I continue to think about the idea while I watch Sam, who is busily working under the high frequency flicker of cheap lighting, oblivious to my interest. He works as if it is the sole and vital axis of his life, which is true but won't be for long. Sam's condition is unfortunate and something he is entirely blameless for: he can neither see nor hear another human being without experiencing acute pain and extreme nausea. It is what we would call an unfortunate trait, much less useful than an ordinary special trait (an absurd oxymoron which never fails to irritate me) such as levitation of the self. Katie can translate any language and Yan can translate himself halfway across the world just by thinking it. Aleksander has a healing touch. Ordinary people with one special skill. Poor Sam could have been born thus, but instead he's allergic to everyone.
After some time arguing down the phone about distribution packages, Max hangs up. "That was Whelks." He heaves himself out of his chair, annoyed. As Sam's only friend, he is due sympathy, and sure enough Sam is concerned when he looks over towards Max.
"Is he still being difficult about it?"
"Yes."
"Do you want me to send him an updated procedure?" Sam asks. This will take him a lot of work but will soothe Whelks. For someone who lives a hermit life by necessity, Sam is good with people. Better than Max, who makes his way towards the door.
"That would be great, thanks mate," he says, and leaves to spend probably twenty (excessive) minutes in the bathroom. Sam, as his life often dictates, is alone in the room.
Nothing happens for a while, and then the phone rings. Sam freezes like he's caught in a crosshair, and he looks at the receiver. Answering it is Max's job, and it's a year since Sam last had to. That phone call did not go well. My prediction is that he will answer it, and I am fascinated to test this theory. For a moment it's unclear what he will do, but then he picks it up.
"Hello?" he says, simultaneously reaching for a bucket. I congratulate myself on my correct prediction while Sam's muscles go rigid in expectation.
"Hi, is Anita there?" says the female voice on the other end of the phone. There is a clunk as the bucket falls to the ground.
"Exc...excuse me?"
"Anita Green?" she says again. Sam, dumbstruck, cannot answer. His mouth gapes from its hinges.
"Er...er sorry, wrong number. Who-" He tries, but she cuts him off, apologising, and hangs up. And that's that.
When Max eventually returns it is to find his friend looking like he found the secret to unending happiness for all of humankind and immediately lost it.
"What's up?" he asks. Ha, like he doesn't know. I told him what would happen in more detail than he could wrap his head around.
"The phone rang," Sam explains, his eyes taking longer than usual to focus.
"Oh. You didn't answer it?"
"Yes."
"Uh, why?" Max drops into his ancient chair which makes a sound like a squashed cat as it takes his weight. Sam fiddles with the receiver and then returns it, having run out of reasons to hold onto it any longer.
"It might have been important."
"Unlikely. Was it?"
"No. Wrong number."
"Well," sighs Max, fishing through his in-tray for something. "That's why you shouldn't bother. Just let me do it." He scratches himself. "Are you going to vomit again? You look traumatised." This, Max, is why it is always a privilege to watch you. Observations of unparalleled astuteness.
"I'm fine."
"You don't look fine," Max says. He takes a proper look at Sam and frowns.
"It was a woman. On the phone," Sam explains. Trailing his fingers twice through his blond hair, he pulls himself together and finds what he was working on before the phone rang. "She didn't make me feel ill," he adds. Max's face, unseen by Sam, dials through several shades of comprehension as he remembers what I told him.
"Like me?" he asks. Though I know Max inside-out, even I struggle to read the expression on his face. I would suggest, perhaps, it sits somewhere between irritated and admiring.
"Kind of. Not really. With you there's nothing. With her, it was like..." he casts about for an answer. It was like chemical bliss, is the wording he hunts for. Like a simultaneous hit of endorphins, serotonin, oxytocin and dopamine. From a voice he tasted goodness and a seed-scattering of words were enough to love someone he had never met.
But he's still reeling, and just shakes his head, speechless.
"Huh," says Max. "That's weird."
Sam is left to this staggering personal revelation alone.