Sphere 8

Sphere 8

January 20, 1999

I’d been avoiding Catherine for the past two days. It was easier then it sounded, even as it tugged on my heart to lie to her and tell her I was working late again. That lie had made me feel particularly sick, in fact. It hasn’t been as hard as it should have to avoid Catherine, and that made me feel guilty. My sleep had suffered for it, but I had simply come home after she had gone to sleep and left before she had woken up. I didn’t want to confront the issue. I knew what I was doing, I had enough self awareness that it would have been impossible for me not to realize what I was doing. I knew that my actions weren’t that of a good spouse. The fact that I had been fired proved that.

I just didn’t want to think about that right now. Or ever again.

It was just easier to pretend it had never happened. It was a polite fiction, a fragile fantasy I was aware could be shattered at any moment. But it was the fantasy that I needed, it was the escape I needed. I would have to face the music one day, but that music didn’t necessarily need to be faced today. I could procrastinate, I could put it off as long as possible.

The scenery at the park helped me do that.

Today was a particularly frosty one, which had led me to bundling up. It was primarily because of the biting breeze that almost seemed to howl, whipping leaves and trash around in the air. It was a cloudless day, which was rare for a winter in Washington. Something that drew my eye was the sheer amount of ants running around on the slightly overgrown grass. I hadn’t ever noticed the amount of ants the park had, nor had I noticed how the poorly managed grass would likely effect the overall health of the ants.

That was something else I had begun noticing recently. I wasn’t sure if I had just simply become more observant after I had... gotten more time on my hands, but it was becoming readily apparent to me that the park was in a slow decline. Perhaps it was just pessimism lingering from my meeting, but if nothing was done then it was a given that the park would die out one way or another. Either it would overgrow and choke itself out, or the weather and poor management would gradually kill all the life in it. Considering it was a city park, the latter was what I was suspecting would happen.

I had made it a little game over the past two days to idly see if I could think up solutions for the park’s problems. It had made the day fly by once I had gotten truly into it. It was a helpful distraction, and one that I would use and abuse if necessary. Outside pollution was effecting the park. If I cut off the outside influences, then I would only have to worry about the internal influences, which would be things like overgrowth and ensuring that there would be enough nutrients to spare. In my mind, I theorized solutions to the problem I was imagining. I would need a suitably large barrier to prevent outside influences from getting in. I would need a wall to keep things out. No, scratch that, I would need to add a wall too. Air pollution was definitely a factor this would have to mitigate. I would need a giant cube perfectly encompassing the park, and it would have to be glass. Otherwise the circadian rhythm of the whole ecosystem would be disrupted by the lack of sun. Animals wouldn’t know when to wake up, which meant nocturnal and diurnal shifts would conflict, and the plants wouldn’t get  the sunlight they required to grow. Life would stagnate and shrivel, which would be the opposite of what I wanted. That meant I had to use glass if I wanted to keep things going.

Or I could use artificial sunlight, but that was stretching the realm of reality and my suspension of disbelief for my wandering mind.

I would definitely have to use some type of glass, but a lot of types would be too fragile, which meant I would have to use the heavy duty glass found in skyscrapers. That was the most durable glass I could think of, other then maybe the glass on the international space station. I wasn’t sure about that last one, so I ruled it out.

Hiding the whole park under a glass box brought its own issues, however. Primarily the issue of water. Life couldn’t survive without water, that was a fact. The park had a decent sized pond, but that wasn’t nearly enough water for a whole park to thrive off. I would need ways to have the water replenish itself. For starters, the water would be at the lowest point in the park so that water coming from things like rain would find their way to the pond to replenish it. Speaking of rain, I would need to ensure it regularly rained properly. Senseless ideas popped into my head, and I shoved some of them aside. They were half baked thoughts, incomprehensible ones that made my fingers twitch in anticipation for some reason I couldn’t comprehend. Perhaps I could use condensation to pull water out from the atmosphere, but there would only be a set amount of water in the atmosphere due to it being a self contained cube. Which meant I had to-

My phone rang. I blinked once, then twice, then twice again. My eyelids felt heavy, as if I’d been on the brink of sleep, but hadn’t quite made it. The sun had dipped significantly lower in the sky. How long had I been theorizing? I barely comprehended that I had sketched something into the dirt underfoot, before phone rang again, and I sighed. I recognized the number by heart.

Dread filled me as I flipped open the phone. I couldn’t do this, I didn’t want my fantasy to end. It had barely begun, it couldn’t end yet. “Hello, sweetie, how was your day today?”

Hearing Catherine’s voice brought a minor relief to me. It was a minor comfort, but one that had been almost immediately drowned out by guilt. I had been avoiding my wife to the point that I hadn’t even heard her voice over the past two days. “It’s been a rather... it’s been okay, in all honesty. Nothing spectacular, but I can live with that.”

I nodded, before realizing that I was on the phone and she couldn’t see me. “Oh, well that’s alright, I guess.” I needed to wrap this conversation up immediately, otherwise I would lose the battle against my guilt and I would confess everything. I needed to interject levity. I couldn’t think of anything, and the conversation stalled.

“Oh, thanks. You must be busy with work right now.” I felt like there was something hinting in that tone, as if she knew I was keeping secrets from her.

I moved the phone away from my ear, taking a deep breath in to steady myself, before going back to the phone, “Yeah, work is really hectic right now, I’m going to go soon.”

There was definitely something in Catherine’s tone. It sounded like... sadness, maybe? I wasn’t nearly impossible to tell, “You’ve been working really long hours lately, haven’t you? It’s okay, Alan, it will all come to pass.”

Those words meant more to me then I think my wife knew. It would all come to pass. I wish that was true, but we were all suffering. This wasn’t something I could wait out, there was no sticking my head in the sand. “I know it will... I just have to ride it all out.” I needed the levity, it would help relax this conversation. I pulled on the thickest accent I knew that mixed stereotypical country and southern accents, “This ain’t my first rodeo, partner.”

The humor didn’t bring a smile to my face, but it helped in its own tiny way.

Catherine sighed, “Alan...”

I cut her off before she could continue further, “Cathy. I’ll be sure to take breaks in the future. Right now, I need to get through this.” I needed to get a job, first and foremost. I needed a steady income before I even considered telling Catherine anything.

She sounded somewhat satisfied, even if there was something of concern in her voice, “Good.” She paused, and the concern seemed grow to become palpable, “Lori needs a father, Alan. It would be nice to have you around. If work allows it, of course. I, um, I wouldn’t want to get in the way of your career path or anything. I understand the company is probably going through some changes right now. I ran into Will the other day and he told me that you had handled the company takeover like a champ.”

Catherine’s words hit me like a gut punch. I might have wheezed, I wasn’t sure. My head was spinning somewhat, I felt dizzy and nauseous. I really was a terrible father. Catherine was acknowledging it. She was obviously hinting that I could do a better job as a parent. I needed to be around more. William had covered for me by lying to Catherine. A feeling of gratitude and intense sickness rose up into me. He had lied to my wife, but he had done it for both our sakes. He was helping me out and saving Catherine from the tragedy of learning that things were changing.

I smiled sadly, turning to stare back at the park, “I got things under control Catherine. Have a nice night.”