© Justin Cumberland 2007

Chapter Eighteen

Jason had seen Handy-Man lots of times. It was a game the show featured regularly, every week or so; and it was popular because it featured the work of avant-garde Synthetic artists.

It was a play, essentially; but it was never the same play. Every time it appeared Jason got a shock because Synthetic art was so confronting; and the writers seemed to be saying something, as though they knew something which no one else knew, as though they had discovered a truth that had been hidden in time.

They weren’t just play-writers, of course. They were painters and sculptors, poets and novelists, musicians and fashion designers, choreographers and architects; and they lived concealed lives somewhere, hidden from the public, working under pseudonyms, and never appearing to collect the awards they received. They were afraid, Jason supposed, because there were so many Christian fundamentalists opposed to them, fundamentalists who had waged their campaign for years, and were losing. They actively worked to uncover the identity of these artists, employing a network of spies and informers. The artists were in danger; and, until fundamentalism died its final death, they always would be.

It happened, of course, that they succeeded occasionally, or, Jason later found out, at least thought they had.

Jason suspected a community, somewhere, something along the lines of Atlas Shrugged; but he never expected what he later discovered, that the people responsible for this art were isolated from the world, living out of it entirely; and only entering it sometimes, to make a point, and take a victim.

His favorite writer was J. L. Lovecroft. He had seen a few of the guys (if it was a guy) plays featured on Handy-Man; and he had even viewed a painting the guy had done, way back at the turn of the century. It was the only thing Lovecroft ever painted and Jason had traveled all the way to New York to see it, surprising himself, because it was the only purpose of the trip.

Jason believed Lovecroft was some superman of Neitzcherean imagination.

The play was performed before Handyman proper. It led into and made sense of what came after it; although this just didn’t seem possible. The game was the most sadistic of all that the show featured, but somehow, Jason liked it best.

He wanted to be Handyman; but he discovered, as they prepared him for it, that Todd had already been chosen. Todd was Handyman. It had been decided in the previous round; while Jason had sat, oblivious, on the saddle, smiling and looking at nothing.

The computer chose Todd. The director chose Todd. And he never had cause to regret it. He was, after all, about profit maximization.

Although the game changed from time to time, Jason recognized the basic scenario as they led him behind the box-set to his position in the wall. The scene was the interior of a house. Behind the back wall of the set there was some scaffolding, some metal frames and the type of restraints they use for mental patients – for serious, sadistic, killers.

It was necessary, after they had locked Jason’s boner into the hole in the wall, to restrain him to a degree where he could not, would not, move. The metal frame enclosed his body. There was a straight jacket, a bit for his mouth, a rod in his anus. His legs were banded, his arms were banded, his body was banded; and his head locked back by a metal ring. The stage hands set it up. It wasn’t the sort of thing that a couple of children, working together, would have been able to manage; and when the show came back from the break Jason was locked in firmly with his cock protruding through the wall and into the set, where it was part of a series of sixteen fixtures, ranged in a line along the wall, as though they were part of some Art-Nouveau design.

On one side of Jason, Peter (called Paul) had been strapped, and on the other side, Simon (called Peter). They were in exactly the same position as he was. At the far end, Pete was alone, right up against the corner, and looking very lonely, Jason thought, when he watched the tape.

Todd, as Handyman, needed to make a decision after the play fell out into improvisation. He had to choose one of the sixteen fixtures, and he was in great danger, because he had to choose correctly. If he got it wrong and chose one of the prosthetic fixtures (which were indistinguishable from the others) then he would end up playing the victim in the following round; and really, Todd had already had enough. He had played victim for too long. He had played it too many times.

When Jason watched the tape he realized that Todd had been chosen in the saddle round. Of course he had. Everyone knows that. And when he saw Todd chosen Jason realized that Todd had known, definitely, all the time they were in the surgeon’s cell; and before that, when he been in the corridor, learning his lines. He had known what he was going to do; and he had met Jason deliberately, in order to give him a gift, which, as it turned out, he opened too quickly, and spoilt.

‘Who’s gonna play our Handyman?’ Larry had said, at the end of the saddle round.

‘TODD!’

‘Oh, come on folks! Have a heart! Give a guy a break, already! Not Handyman!’

Larry made such a good show of not liking the show he hosted that Jason was deceived into believing that he did. He didn’t. He was a Catholic preacher, a veteran game show host; and he had agreed to host the show, at the bidding of the director, in order to provide guidance and absolution to the contestants.

‘Give it to Jason. I want to see him fuck the kid up,’ someone in the audience yelled.

Larry moved to the computer. He turned to Andy and Sam. ‘Well, are you two things going to press the button or shall I?’

Andy and Sam shrugged their shoulders.

‘What’s wrong with you two pooh-pooh heads,’ he said. ‘Are you worried that Todd’s gonna get hurt? You like Todd, don’t you Sam?’

Sam shook his head.

‘Well, Andy, you like Todd, don’t you?’

Andy shook his head.

Larry turned to the audience and shrugged, ‘Well, they’re in a funny mood today, aren’t they?’ He reached out his hand to press the button. It was the very same detonator they had used for Blast-Off.

There was a tinkling, twinkling flashing of music and of names on the screen – and then suddenly, the names slowed, flashing one at a time, TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD TODD. ‘Tell us when you’re ready folks.’

The sound of the audience swelled and then, when it reached a fever pitch, Larry hit the button.

TODD.

Laughter.

‘You’re getting fucked, Jase.’ It was a sing-song voice, from an audience member.

Jason, meanwhile, an inane smile on his face, sat oblivious. Andy had just sucked his penis.

‘What do you think about that, Jason?’ Larry asked.

Laughter.

Handyman Slays the Duchess

© 2037

J. L. Lovecroft

WOMAN: Type.

TODD: Contestant chosen in the saddle round.

DUCHESS: Archetype

SERVANT: Menial (Played by actor playing Woman)

Act 1

Split scene:

[Toolman’s office, desk, telephone, window (post-modern).]

[Interior Southern Home. Drawing room. Art-Nouveau décor (Realism).]

[Woman dials, waits. Telephone rings in Toolman’s office.]

Todd: Howdy-Doody. Can I help y’all?

Woman: Are you a Handyman?

Todd: I sure am, maam. I’m the handiest man you’re ever gonna land; and I sure come in handy because that’s the plan. [smiles at audience]

Woman: Do you reckon you could dog-gone come over here and help me with some paintins I got?

Todd: Well I’m not no artist Maam, but I’ll see about doin what I can.

Woman: Oh, I don’t want no paintin done. I just gotta somehow get em hung.

Todd: What’s that problem, Maam? You gotta get em hung? [smiles at audience]

Woman: Well, that’s right! I gotta get em hung.

Todd: Don’t you know how to do that, Maam?

Woman: Well, of course I do. I’m a Christian woman, but I don’t know how to fix em.

Todd: Fix em? Fix em? Can you hear what you’re sayin, Maam? That’s the perfect plan. They gotta be hung, and you don’t know shit, so I’ll have to fix em, Maam.

Woman: [Deaf to insult.] Well, that’s why I need a Handy-man! If you can’t fix em, I’ll get some other man.

Todd: There ain’t no other man, Maam. Why I’m the only Handy-man that can. I’m carryin out the perfect plan. My job’s fixin any fucked-up man.

[Todd breaks scene. Regains composure.]

Woman: Are you there, Handy-man?

Todd: Yes, Maam. I really am. Don’t go getting worried whether I can’t do fixin or I can. Why I’m near done fixin one least-special man.

Woman: Well can you come on over here, then?

Todd: Why I certainly can. When do your want your fixin done? [Aside: Raises eyebrows. Smiles knowingly.]

Woman: Why, as soon as humanly possible! We don’t want no delay. What’s that you say?

Todd: Maam, I’ll be over there some time today.

[They hang up. Woman walks toward kitchen. Todd knocks on door. Woman is surprised. Puts hand on breast.]

Woman: [Tone alteration: Serious, fearful.][Aside.] Why I wonder who that could be? [Moves to the door. Pauses. Calls out, fearful.] Who is it?

Todd: Why it’s the Handy-man, Maam. You rang.

[Woman is nervous. Hands flutter. Opens door.]

Woman: [False joy, surprise, relief.] But that’s not humanly possible!

Todd: I aint no human, Maam. I’m the Handy-man. I’ve come to kill the one that’s bad.

[Lights darken.]

Woman: [Tone alteration: Cold, Lifeless. Accent Alteration: English Upper Class. Speaks slowly.] Why hello there. Have you come to slay me?

[Actors frozen.]

[Transition to Act 2 instantaneous.]

Act 2

The Drawing Room, Mansfield Park.

[Georgian interior. Lighting stark. Angular distortion. (German Expressionism)]

[Actors frozen. Door has closed.]

Todd is waiting on the doorstep, dressed in full-length black cloak.

Woman is now Servant wearing a gray shawl.

[SERVANT opens door.]

[Shakespearean pentameter.]

TODD: It is I.

SERVANT: Have you come to see the husband?

TODD: Aye, how fares he?

SERVANT: Why, he is abed and sits close to death; though it does not surprise me.

TODD: She has misused him so?

SERVANT: Misused him? Yes, I think you say so justly – brow beaten, heart broken, he stands near to death to fall. Her discourse, so full of foul retorts – why it choketh his breath and drags him down to ruin. Have you heard her?

TODD: Indeed, faithful and good servant, I am neither dead nor deaf; and, here I stand because this age has set. I have heard her, and heard her in days gone by when they were friends. And now, she, mistaken – that faker and forsaker who ruined him of old – stands holy, faultless she supposes; when his palsy, that enfolds him, is her twisted mouth’s result.

SERVANT: Will you come with me to see him?

TODD: Yes, but rather I would first see her and tell her of her fault.

[They enter house. Duchess is on couch with lapdog (Pug). Todd approaches.]

DUCHESS: Who goes there?

TODD: It is Toddrick, Maam.

DUCHESS: Ah, Toddrick! I have thought of you these many days and awaited your return.

TODD: You would’st not think it.

DUCHESS: Why says you so? Aren’t I his loyal partner from of old?

TODD: Well! Well said, woman, you do not speak a lie!

DUCHESS: No, indeed, I know it. I have carried out his bidding to a tee. Would’st thou like a cup of tea, a beverage? [Motions to Samovar on the table.] To drink?

TODD: Nay Duchess! You fat strumpet! I would’st rather die again than drink it from your mouth. Your cup is overflowing, you are bloated, you are soak-ed with blood from your husband’s skull. You will fall.

DUCHESS: But how! You are mistaken! Am I to be forsaken? When I followed his instructions, after all? He told me they could listen to advice. Are words too hard to hear? Am I at fault? Why teach one to lay me open? What good can come of teaching Jason so? To have my law made out before them all as though it were of nought. Is that right?

TODD: Right? I do not deal in rights and wrongs, Maam. I am no guilty thing surprised. You will not drag me down to ruin. I have com’st to make thy tomb.

DUCHESS: My tomb? Why thou think’st me perhaps a criminal! When indolent I lay here on my couch!

[Pug barks: a single yap.]

TODD: Woman, you are violence.

DUCHESS: Dost thou perceive me right?

TODD: Indeed, Maam, you incite – violence.

DUCHESS: Violence? Thou art mad, surely! Why, I am said to be their bride. Dost thou not know me?

TODD: I know you well, I’ve seen you once before. You words convict you Maam. You are a whore.

DUCHESS: A whore indeed! What say’st thou that I am?

TODD: Lady, thou art a box of hard-taught tricks, at best but a foul-mouthed temptress, holy to the core. You slay your husbands – self-righteousness you teach them, believing you make preachers as of old. Where are those hollow-eyed mad men that crawl around you so? - like a spider you have bred them, those guilty things begotten of your law - your panderers! You have destroyed them. They are dead for the grave - gone to be forgotten: Weaker than a wisp of wash-ed custard, milky-white with gore. You stare! But hast thou never seen a meat-maggotty dead creature, loosely full of bones. That is thing you have made them.

DUCHESS: You make little sense. I have taught them well.

TODD: I speak my wisdom.

DUCHESS: Yet I recognise it hard. It does not sound like it did of old. I thought that you were with me.

TODD: Duchess, I weren’t ever with you. You are that mistress of the flames. Your song, it sounds too old; and no one stands to listen anymore. Your panderers have taken it, and turned it into a worst-worn, smelly and pickled green penis, a dead and mashed up birdy-bird-bird.

DUCHESS: Birdy-bird-bird?

TODD: A too-proud creature, crushed.

DUCHESS: Ah, but you knew it would be so! You told me that of yore.

TODD: Sadly, Maam, you speak the truth. The stone has crushed them.

DUCHESS: Too much – goody good good?

TODD: Indeed. For, you are right, I used you as my partner. I came here once before. But Maam, you see, I brought the peace, while you, you brought the sword. Thou were'st ever a strumpet.

DUCHESS: I have laid abed with many.

TODD: And sewn flames, a violent heat.

DUCHESS: And now one dares to teach men so? To break my law?

TODD: Indeed, he will be least.

DUCHESS: And satisfied with that?

TODD: Of course.

DUCHESS: Then thou hast com’st to make my tomb?

TODD: Yes, Maam. I made it long ago.

DUCHESS: Of what stuff hast thou made it?

TODD: Wisdom, Maam. Words.

DUCHESS: Then I am doomed.

TODD: Yes, Duchess, as sad as that might make me. I slay you with a strange new sword. [Removes cordless drill from cloak with flourish. Drills hole in Duchess’s temple. (Note: Please use actress prepared to suicide on stage.)][As she dies] And with this kiss I do betray thee. [Kisses Duchess’s lips.] Gethsemane.

Act 3

[Southern Interior: fifties décor. Lights up.]

TODD: [Southern accent.] And now I’m gonna play that Handy-man. I’m gonna fix – one least-special man… [End of characterisation. Todd becomes Todd.] I hope.

[Improvisation.]

When he sees the tape, Jason knows, without a doubt, that Todd is the most beautiful boy that has ever lived.

It has never occurred to Todd to worry about what another person might think of him. He has that sense, of right, of wrong: guiltless, shameless, guileless, he absolves.

Todd is conscious that he is blemish, personified. Consequently he is divine.

He picks up his toolbox from the floor and moves it to a table by the wall. There is a transistor inside and he takes this out and puts it near the toolbox, to one side.

He turns the dial and moves centre stage. When the music starts it is the studio sound system. It is loud. It has base. It is Britney Spears.

I’m addicted to you cause you’re toxic.

As the music starts Todd bops his head from side to side as though it is a metronome. He then lifts one ankle, then the other, alternately. It is a ridiculous dance. It is childish. It is absurd. It is burlesque.

It is camp, satirised.

He throws his arms into the action and begins to move around the stage, thrusting his hands in various directions as though they are wet, or he is a conductor.

And then it is time for Handyman. The dance finishes. Todd chooses a fixture to fix; and though it doesn’t look bad on the tape, as he reaches up his hand,

Jason felt as though he would explode with the pain. He had watched the play, interested at first, amused because he could tell it was a Lovecroft; and he was happy, being on the show, when they did a Lovecroft play. He wished he could have got to play the Handyman; but as he watched Todd, he realised he would not have been able to do it – not like that. It wasn’t his to do.

Todd was perfect. The role was made for him.

At that stage, of course, Jason hadn’t read the script and hadn’t realised that the role really was made for him. He hadn’t realised that Lovecroft had cast Todd as himself, so that the producer would have to text him and ask him to come in. This is, as it turned out, was what had actually happened. It seemed impossible; but Todd had been texted because Lovecroft had written the play; and Todd was left to make a decision about coming on the show, even though he was only thirteen, knowing nothing about the play and his role in it. Lovecroft had left strict instructions, telling the producer, in no uncertain terms, not to give the game away, and not to give Todd the script, until the computer had chosen him to play Handyman.

It was enigmatic. It was insane. But that was Synthetic art. It made connections with people that didn’t seem possible. It engendered szcizophrenia. It engendered psychosis. It pushed people somewhere they didn’t know existed.

It rent the veil.

Jason understood all of this only later, of course, on the following day.

Todd had given him an antidote to pain. And he had done it, he said, because he wanted Jason to know, absolutely and without a doubt, the position he was in, so that he could make a decision for himself about whether he wanted to go on or not. He would feel what had happened all at once.

Todd reaches up on tiptoes and kisses Jason’s head. The toolbelt is sliding again, angled across his arse. He puts his tongue on Jason’s head and starts to move it, turning it around and around. He pulls his head back and pokes his tongue into a point, working it into the eye of Jason’s penis.

Todd moves back. He changes the drill bit. He inserts a number one and raises it to the eye of Jason’s penis, lining it up. He starts the drill and pushes forward.

Jason felt like he would explode with the pain.

[Frame: Open.]

Jason felt like

[Frame: Open.]

Jason felt

[Frame: Open.]

Jason

[Frame: Open.]

Ja

[Frame: Open.]

.

[Frame: Open.]

.

[Frame: Breath.]

Jason tried to relax and

[Frame: Open.]

.

[Frame: Open.]

.

[Frame: Open.]

.

[Frame: Breath. Loxen. Force flux, distortion. Neural rephrase. Ululation. Ripple.]

He could see what Todd had meant, of course, but he figured the pleasure enhancers had only been increased by the removal of the blocks to the pain. He certainly felt the pain, and it was awful, but there was so much pleasure associated with the feel of the cool, steel drill-bit as it worked its way into the eye of his penis, that Jason wondered if it wouldn’t feel good anyway, even without the drugs they had given him; and he thought, if it was possible somehow, to cure the mess that Todd was making, then he would do this again some day, on the condition of course that his dick would be okay, and that everything would be restored to the way it had formerly been. This would certainly be possible, he was sure. Todd would not want to damage him permanently. He was a beautiful child, in a difficult position and had chosen Jason, obviously, because he recognized him, firstly; and because the other contestants were unreachable from his position on the stage.

Jason bit his lips and sucked them as the drill bit worked down into the core of his manhood. It felt divine. It was a pleasure he had never experienced before in his life – being stimulated, not only from without, by the hand which Todd had wrapped around him, but from within. The bit slid down, Todd being careful not to go too quickly, obviously not wanting to make a mess of Jason, sliding it down his eurethra, scouring it and making a slightly larger passage; and then, the butt of the drill hit Jason’s head and he could feel it spinning, trying to twist his cock as Todd pressed hard, making sure the point had rammed home.