Flyover Country
For a while, the popular opinion among members of the gathered was that Wa-Zappo, the street magician who roamed this part of town, being generally unimpressive, had pulled off the trick of his life. But Wa-Zappo didn’t hear about it until he saw the television later that night.
“It moved! I just saw it!”
It hadn’t moved.
“Someone call a priest!”
No one did. At least not yet.
At this point, the radius of the crowd had easily overflowed into the street. Cars near the viewing circle had stopped honking in anger, and were just more curious than anything else. Spectators craned their arms upwards, anxious fingers clutching and aiming their camera phones. Someone’s footage was going to be on CNN, Yahoo!, Rev. Randy’s DamnNation Blog, and everyone wanted it to be theirs.
Like a sports huddle full of bewildered pedestrians, passers-by had formed an observation gallery around a seemingly normal city trashcan. But it wasn’t the trashcan occupying the focal point of all those smartphone screens, it was a 22oz, waxed-paper fountain drink cup from SubZone Restaurants Inc., suspended in the air, unaided and motionless, about a foot and a half from the rim of the trashcan.
“It’s one of those marketing stunts” said a man, arms folded, to his wife. “They’re gonna take this one to the bank.” His wife nodded shallowly to communicate agreement, but really, in her heart, she wasn’t so sure.
“Just grab it!” yelled a high-schooler trying to impress his friends with his obvious practicality from under a flat-billed baseball hat with the logo of a coastal team he had no affiliation with. Most people were curious to know what would happen if someone were to attempt such a thing, but one wanted to be the one that did it. No one in the crowd had any knowledge of spontaneous disruptions of the laws of physics. It could suspend a drink cup, but there’s no guarantee what it would do to a human being. No one had any frame of reference for a happening like this at all.
On the inner radius of the circle was Doug Vino, attempting to offer as much of an explanation as he could muster, for the third, or fourth time.
“I had finished my sandwich but not my drink.” He told the wide, wrinkled eyes of the old woman next to him.
She nodded, proud of herself for keeping up so far.
“My car is one more block down the street. As I was walking to it, I finished my drink.”
“What kind of drink was it?” croaked the woman, proud of herself for thinking of a relevant question.
“Um. It was iced tea. I didn’t want to carry the cup anymore so I tossed it at the waste bin. About halfway between where I tossed it from, and where the trashcan was, this happened. It stayed. Just like that.” He jabbed one of his sausage-like thumbs at the trashcan.
The eyes blinked at Doug, expecting more, but there wasn’t more.
“Excuse me, sir?” “Yes?” “Did you throw this?” “Yes. I did.” sighed Doug, his head falling as he did, and began to explain himself for the fourth, or fifth time. Doug had realized that the next days, months, years, of his life, he will be explaining this series of events to people, over and over again. News vans were here, it had already gathered so much attention. He shuttered at the thought of rehashing the same highly detailed tale of trash disposal gone kinematically awry to a toothy, blond, morning news show host. Her makeup melting under the studio lights as he told her about the time he broke physics.
“Who the hell do we call for something like this?” asked a member of the ever expanding crowd. “The Police? The Army? The Feds?”
“The cops are already here.”
Indeed they were. Two patrolmen had just wedged their way through the tightening crowd, and were beginning to corral the gawkers farther back from the cup, when there was a flapping overhead. By the time everyone had completed their helpless flinch, a large, black crow had landed on the suspended cup.
There was a collective gasp and an overtaking air of suspense. The policemen threw their arms backward as if expecting the universe to fold in on that spot. The camera phone paparazzi craned their phones higher, tendons at maximum stretch. The bird stood fixed on the top of the cup, its beady black eyes wide and motionless. No one said a word.
“It froze it too!” a crowd member finally yelled.
It hadn’t. A few seconds later the bird turned its head, paused again, and then flew to the awning of the building in front of the sidewalk.
The cup wasn’t dangerous, just stuck. Generations will live and die. The continents will rearrange. The sun will burn out, and Doug Vino’s SubZone cup will remain. It was a prehistoric mosquito trapped in the amber of space-time.
Within the next few hours, every national network had a story, or a live camera feed of the suspended cup, or both. “Cup defies gravity”. It would say at the bottom of the screen. “Trash Stuck In Thin Air” on another channel. “All Scientists Are Wrong About Everything”. Journalists would go on remote to their local SubZone chain to state obvious facts while, behind them, patrons would buy small drinks and throw them up in the air and watch them fall on the floor, which was now covered in a standing layer of iced tea. Reality shows and minor political debates were postponed. It seemed that unexplainable floating trash had captured the attention of the nation.
As night fell, a priest from the local parish arrived on the scene. He had prepped all day for the most thrilling, and only, exorcism of his life, only to be turned around by several other men, in a variety of uniforms.
*
Vincent McDowell Jr. was tired. He had just gotten back to Connecticut from St. Paul, where he was assigned with the role of a secret shopper. SubZone corporate had been given multiple reports that a location in the area was putting up to twice the amount of avocados on their Baja Jammer™ subs. While the main loss in this situation would be the bottom line for the owner of the franchise, Vincent’s boss would routinely go on about an in-house study that “suggests” that one location in an area putting extra toppings on their sandwiches would make the other locations in the area, and thus SubZone as a whole, look like limp-sandwich slinging cheapskates. This study was bullshit. The reality is that Vincent’s boss is also his father, and after four years of failed college attempts, he needed something for his failure factory of a son to do, but didn’t want to have him hanging around his office all the time. There’s only so many times your son can be asked to leave a private school for reasons ranging from poor grades to intimidating a bus driver, before you have to take his employment status into your own hands. Vincent McDowell Sr. was a pretty big wig in the corporate circus around there, so a minimally believable lie was all that was needed to keep his son off his back, but also off the street.
The small, wooden plaque on the desk of Vincent McDowell Jr.’s desk read “VINCENT MCDOWELL JR., FRESHNESS INVESTIGATOR”. When his father made the pitch to hire him to the other higher-ups, he had to give him a title that would make him sound like an integral part of the company, in the cheeky, unrealistic way that those types really get off on. Plus, he hoped Vincent Jr. would hate his title, and propel him to do something with his life under his own power.
At first, Vincent Jr. never told anyone his title when he talked about his job, and generally kept his name plaque pushed against a comically large pen holder, so only his name, and not his title, was showing.
It gradually became apparent over the last few years that his father’s plan to shame him to greener pastures had not worked. With his job, Vincent Jr. found his life’s calling, and had become dead-serious about his job, though there was no one who his work ever affected, save the PR intern who would occasionally have to write a letter to various franchises explaining a “study” and telling them to cut it out with the avocados.
With his job, Vincent Jr. had finally been granted the self-perceived authority that, all his life, he had been told he had to earn.
At 8:03am, the phone of Vincent McDowell Jr., Freshness Investigator, rang.
“Hello?”
“Vincent. This is Vincent McDowell Sr.”
“Hi Dad.”
“Vincent, we are at work, and this is Connecticut. Not California. You can call me Dad when we’re on the tennis court.”
“Right, Mr. McDowell. Sir.”
“That’s better. Now I suppose you’ve seen this business with the cup on TV.”
Vincent had indeed seen the cup business on the TV. He had a feeling he might soon have to something to do with it, given his critical role of investigator.
“Well, the boys in marketing and PR are having a hell of a time figuring out how to spin this into something that’ll make us look good, but we need someone to go down there, and make sure people know that SubZone has this thing handled.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“It’s your job dammit. Figure out why it’s stuck or something.”
“Right. Ok. Sure. Definitely. When do I leave?”
“Right now, don’t put your coat up, we have a plane waiting in an hour.”
With that, Vincent Jr.’s father hung up the phone.
When Vincent Jr. talked with his friends at home, over whiskey, in nautically themed rooms, he would dependably refer to anywhere in the Midwestern United States as “Flyover Country”. That phrase came to mind as his plane, bound for the very center of “Flyover Country”, left the runway.
*
Agent Sue Powell from the United States FBI was waiting on a report from the physicist they had brought out to investigate the frozen cup, who still had his face pressed up near it and was tapping the printed logo with his knuckles. She was all ready to make a big important phone call to some big important people about how we have a national security issue. Her phone call could start a war, or something of equal magnitude. This could be the defining moment of her career. The physicist wandered over, she snapped her limbs over to meet him halfway.
“Well?” she said as soon as they were in speaking distance.
“All we’re finding is that there is really nothing to find. All we know is that it couldn’t have been frozen in absolute universal coordinates, or, from our standpoint, it would’ve flown off into space at an incredible rate as the earth spun past that point.”
The light vanished from her eyes. Her limbs slacked. She was expecting to hear words like “Al-Queda” and “Terrorist plot” This is bullshit. What are physicists good for anyways?
“It was frozen at a point relative to the Earth.”
Agent Powell didn’t want to hear it. All she could think about is how she got ripped off. What is she going to tell her boss? “Sorry, got nothin”? He’ll like that. The physicist was actually getting kind of excited.
“It means the Laws of Relativity may, in fact, supersede Newton’s Laws of Motion and the Laws of Thermodynamics.”
And, really, that’s about as far as anyone ever got on the cup, the popular opinion being “It has something to do with gravity.”
“Pointless.” thought Agent Powell. At least she still had a small crack left at exposing a terrorist plot to destroy the United States today. Perhaps interviewing this Vino guy would turn something up. She barely harbored any hope though, her thoughts starting to drift to her next assignment, something about a bear trap. Not wanting to waste another minute of her time in this podunk cow town, she headed off to the city hall to interview Doug Vino.
*
Randy Katz groaned as he rose from his mattress on the floor. He liberated his beard from his shoulder, which was stuck to his lumpy sour cream skin with a glue of sweat and mattress-grime. His dirty blonde mane of hair was long, and unkempt, its tips darker than the roots, hanging from his unwashed head in in greasy intertwining waves. His day had started like all his others, but today was different. Today, he had things to say.
He rushed as fast as a fat, dirty, lion of a man could rush down the hallway of his rural California ranch house. As he swept down the hallway, he didn’t even bother to wish a good morning to either of his wives, and was out the door in seconds flat. He made a quick one-hundred-and-eighty degree turn from the small concrete slab that functioned has his doorstep, and descended the steps underground, dusty cellar doors thumping shut as he did.
He was in his Preach-Den, his vinyl office chair his altar, his flickery computer screen his congregation.
He sat, and typed furiously into the address bar of a four-year-old version of Microsoft Internet Explorer “www.revrandysdamnnationblog.com”. The familiar heading of a pixelated cartoon devil repeatedly poking an over-inflated, United States shaped balloon with a trident greeted him, just like it greets his modest following. Which had become even more modest after it took a large hit in numbers following a false rapture prediction.
After the required few minutes of loading time, Reverend Randy was ready to deliver his sermon, a holy assault on non-believers, and proper English.
“Disciples.
It is a Glorious Day!
As I’m sure you have Seen (see video above), a Sign from the Realm Of God has made it self so Inherently Clear, that you must be Blind to miss It. There is no way to misinterpret it. The SubZone cup has Shown us the Great, Defining, UNAVOIDABLE TRUTH. A NEW ERA HAS BEGUN. AN ERA OF THE DAMNATION OF THE SINNERS THAT LIVE AMOUNG US.
Don’t you see? DONT YOU SEE?
My great following!
The Symbol is THERE, in front of your EYES! The WORLD has Seen IT.
Is it not OBVIOUS?
The Cup is frozen in the atmosphere like a Sinner in the Frozen Lake of HELL. It is an ETERNAL WARNING SHOT across the BOWS OF THE SHIP OF REALITY.”
“Sinners, Believers,
WE ALREADY LIVE IN HELL.
IS IT NOT OBVIOUS?
We are ALL subjected witnesses to the Endless Jail Sentence, we will all be Frozen in the Lake of Eternity, it starts NOW.
I have said it from the beginning, now I am finally paid back, the Good Lord has Smiled upon us, Me especially. Given us a TOKEN OF ACKNOWLEDGEMENT.
SOON!
Those who TRUELY BELIEVE will ASCEND to the GREAT KINGDOM, while THOSE WHO HAVE WALLOWED in a LIFE of SIN will be FROZEN in place and forced to watch AS THE WORLD THEY KNOW LITERALLY BECOMES HELL AROUND THEM.
As the ICED TEA spills from a SubZone CUP, so will the FIRES OF HELL UPON THIS EARTH.
Wine may be the Blood of Christ, but now we know BRISK SWEETENED ICED TEA IS THE BLOOD OF THINE DEVIL.
I CALL UPON THEE, MY FOLLOWERS!
DESTROY ALL THE SUBZONE LOCATIONS, BUY YOURSELF TIME TO REPENT WITH MORE VIGOR THAN YOU HAVE EVER REPENTED!
REPENT HARDER THAN THE PREVIOUS DAY OF RAPTURE WHICH TURNED OUT TO BE FALSE DUE TO SOME MISS TRANSLATION WHICH WAS OBVIOUSLY THE WORK OF THE DEVIL, IN EFFORTS TO CATCH US OFF GAURD FOR THE REAL ONE. AS THIS ONE IS UNFALTERINGLY, UNDENIABLY FOR REAL. I HAVE SEEN IT.
YOU SHALL CONGREGATE IN THE KINGDOM! AND YOU WILL CELEBRATE! JOIN AT THE FOOT OF GOD AND I, AND BASK IN THE DEVINE LOVE, AND WATCH WITH GREAT JOYOUSNESS THE TORTURE OF THE SINNERS BELOW!
Yours in great humbleness,
REVEREND RANDY KATZ”
As he rushed off to the hardware store later to build a structure what he called a “Rapture Launching Pad” in his back yard, he pondered if some good old-fashioned sacrifice was in order.
It wasn’t. Nothing happened. Randy’s congregation only experienced another significant hit to its headcount. This was, of course, in addition to the massive lawsuit prosecuted by SubZone for Reverend Randy’s calls to destroy their property.
*
Across the country, a fax machine sputtered, whined, and slowly tongued out a document which was snatched hastily by the hands of Vincent McDowell Sr. This was what he was pacing his lavishly furnished office waiting for. The paper was to be a near-final draft of SubZone Inc.’s response to the happening in the Midwest.
“Proposed Press Release for Suspended Cup – Draft #20
SubZone Restaurants Incorporated has always prided itself on being exceptional. So when we heard the news about one of our fine products being held in non-denominational supernatural suspension, we were honored and thrilled!
We are taking this opportunity to announce several new changes to the SubZone brand to commemorate this wonderful event.
Firstly, we are announcing a new featured sandwich, The Non-Newtonian BMT. Suspend yourself at SubZone, and experience the unnaturally delicious taste of salami and provolone with tasty meatballs hovering between. Of course, we’ve suspended the fat too! It is, after all, a SubZone sandwich.
Secondly, next Monday, we will honor five(5) punches on your SubZone TastyPunch card instead of the usual six(6) required for a free sandwich. Not only do we break the Laws of Physics here at SubZone, we break the Laws of Economics too!
And Finally, we are announcing a new special restaurant location. The SubZone Suspension Memorial And Deluxe Restaurant! Come see the infamous cup in all its frozen glory, and while you’re at it, have one of our famous sandwiches in a 5-star SubZone restaurant, with tablecloths, waiters, and real glassware!”
Vincent McDowell Sr. typed up a response, attached it to the document, and sent it back through the fax line.
Copywriting dept.,
After reviewing the recent press release draft, I am going to go ahead with my approval. Though it’s effects have not been dollarized, is important that we leverage this situation. It’s mission critical that we all step up to bat and move forward here. I know this kind of thing isn’t in any of our swim-lanes, but we have to make an impactful slam dunk here. So let’s synergize this press release with our new hiring drive.
Add to end:
“Also, SubZone is a great place to work. At SubZone, you don’t work for us, we work for you!”
I. McDowell Sr.”
*
Agent Sue Powell, was sitting in her car, having just pulled up to the City Hall for a routine interview with Doug Vino about this cup when her phone rang, it was her boss.
“Sue Powell.”
“Sue, you’re about to interview that Vino guy, right”
“About to walk in to it right now, why?”
“Well, I’m calling to let you know a representative of SubZone will be joining you for the interview, he is already there waiting, they told me he has been there for a while. Vino is there too.”
Sue was surprised by the addition, not particularly happy about it, but more than anything, just didn’t care. All she wanted was to do the interview and catch the soonest plane back to Virginia.
As she got to the waiting room, she was greeted by Vincent McDowell Jr. who upon first seeing her, recognized her as his partner in interrogation and greeted her with “Ready to get this guy?”.
Agent Powell knew this was going to get worse, immediately.
“Look, that cup means nothing. That has been scientifically confirmed. you can go home if you want. I’ll just get a statement, and get it to your office tomorrow morning.” bargained Agent Powell.
The bargain was rejected. Vincent Jr’s nepotistically granted self-importance was at an all time high.
“No, I want a crack at this guy, there’s more to this story, you know?” said Vincent Jr., bouncing on his toes to keep his energy up.
“I highly doubt it” said Agent Powell as she turned the handle of the door to the windowless room.
Sitting a table inside the small conference room was Doug Vino, who was annoyed at how long he had to wait for anyone to do anything, but recognized sitting quietly as most in-line with his goal at all times, to get to Point B from Point A with as little chance of unpleasantry as possible.
Vincent Jr. strutted in the room, glared at Doug, and fixated himself behind Doug’s chair, widened his stance and put both of his hands on either end of the back of the chair. His goal was to make Doug fearful of a presence that he could not see. He had seen this technique on TV.
Agent Powell, who had seen the same episode, couldn’t help but roll her eyes from the corner before sitting down.
“Mr. Vino”
“Yes, that’s me”
“I’m Agent Powell from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, this is...” she looked at Vincent Jr.
“Vincent McDowell Jr. Freshness Investigator.” He grumbled, right above Doug’s ear.
The eyebrows of Agent Sue Powell doubled their distance from her eyes before she could control her amusement.
“Right. Vincent McDowell Jr. We’re just here to get your statement, we won’t take long, right Vincent?”
“Unless you give us a reason to.” He cracked his knuckles as he said this. Even people who made total guesses as to what Sue did at the FBI are usually less cliché than this, she thought.
“Could you tell us what happened when you threw the cup?”
Doug Vino told the cup story for the hundred and seventh, or hundred and eighth time. As he told it, Vincent Jr. became increasingly annoyed he hadn’t already spilled some information that would make the case for SubZone, and perhaps expose him as a ruthless corporate saboteur or at the very least a skilled anarchist.
“Let me ask you something.” he said as soon as Doug finished his story with “It just stopped. Then the cops came and I told them my name and went home.” Which was most certainly the most hassle-free way of handling it.
“How often do you go to SubZone? I mean, it sure doesn’t look like a lot.” said Vincent Jr., as he poked Doug Vino’s wide, fleshy arm, sending ripples of fat down to his elbow.
Sue had expected this from the second she met Vincent Jr.
Doug Vino didn’t quite know what to say, his brained churned for a response to this aggression, but all he got out was “Occasionally, not that often.”
“Well, what do you think the chances are that one of the few time you come to a SubZone restaurant, your drink causes an internationally televised event by getting stuck in mid-air?” asked Vincent Jr. quite loudly.
“I don’t know.” stammered Doug. “It can’t be calculated because it’s never happened before.”
This wittiness was a complete accident. At the time, the answer seemed like the easiest way of getting Vincent Jr. to stop asking. It wasn’t. Nobody was going to get sassy with Vincent Jr., especially not this Midwestern corn-shucker.
“Let me make one thing abundantly clear!” bellowed Vincent McDowell Jr., Freshness Investigator.
“You don’t fuck with us! We fuck with you!”
It was at this point that Agent Sue Powell decided the interview was over, and let Doug go home, which he appreciated more than she knew.
“He will hear from our lawyers.” said Vincent Jr. to the spot where he thought Agent Powell was still standing. She was already on her way out the door.
Doug Vino never heard from any lawyers.
*
The frozen cup fell out of the news cycle pretty quickly after the initial burst of interest. The Deluxe restaurant was never built, the old SubZone on the street was just moved in front of the cup. No one ever bothered to make a protective case for Doug’s drink, as the threat of theft was none. It just sat outside of the restaurant, motionless as ever. A plaque outside the restaurant deemed it significant. Some kids stole the plaque a few years later and put it up in their college apartment, next to a Bob Marley poster. The Non-Newtonian BMT was removed from the menu after a month, it’s sales we’re average. Doug declined to appear on any talk shows, which was probably all the same, and a lot less hassle.
