Black Balloon

Chapter 24

November 5th marked the 2-year anniversary of my trip down the time-hole and 238 days until Zero Hour. The date approached with frustrating regularity, the days ticking by in an unstoppable drip drip drip of time's passage. Each morning I'd cross out the old number in my notebook and jot down the new: 240, 239, 238...It became a masochistic ritual, waking up each morning in my shitty apartment and watching the number shrink, growing ever closer to nil. It was enough to make one understand in a visceral way how unstoppable the progression of time is. It was like being on an escalator moving towards a spinning blade and having no way to stop or slow down. I was being dragged inevitably forward...day by day, hour by hour, minute by excruciating minute.

On November 5th 1957, however, I was granted a brief respite from this self-destructive compulsion, my mind being otherwise occupied. I had a different mission that day. I woke up early and climbed into Stu before sunrise. I drove without stopping, clear across the state along a lonely stretch of Florida highway, nothing but flat swampland and palm fronds the whole way. My destination was Tampa, Florida. I had an important phone call to make and I needed to be far away when I made it, far enough from Hiawatha that if somehow the line was traced, it would not easily lead back to my hideout.

I arrived at the Old Tampa Free Library around ten and persuaded the librarian to let me make a long-distance phone call. She refused at first but after offering her $20 for her troubles, she reluctantly agreed and escorted me to the back room.

"Be quick," she snipped, "so I don't get fired."

I picked up the receiver and was connected to the local switchboard operator. It took her several minutes but she eventually transferred me to the campus directory at the University of California, Berkeley:

"How may I direct your call?" greeted the receptionist.

"Um, yes...I need to speak to one of your students, please. Carmella Lumnah."

"Hold please," replied the staticky voice followed by an extended pause. In the background could be heard the shuffling of papers and sliding filing cabinet drawers. She finally returned and said, "Would you like me to transfer you to her dorm?"

"That would be great. Thank you."

There was a click and then ringing. It rang twice before another woman picked up:

"Stern house."

The connection was weak and garbled.

"Hi. I am looking for Carmella Lumnah. Is she available?"

"I'd have to check. Can I take a message and have her call you back?"

I couldn't very well give this stranger my phone number, and thus my location, over the phone. If Carmen's dorm was still being surveilled, an army of FBI agents would swarm the library within minutes and drag me away. It wasn't worth the risk, no matter how small. If Carmen was unavailable I'd have to call back later. That's all there was to it.

"Actually, I need to speak to her right away if at all possible," I said.

"Hold on. I'll go ask."

There was a clank as she laid the receiver down. A few moments later, a different female's voice came on the line. She was laughing as she picked up the phone and I recognized her right away.

"This is Carmen."

"Carmen...it's me." I didn't say my name but she knew immediately.

There followed a long pause where neither of us knew what to say next. I hadn't spoken to Carmen in almost a year, even before my cabin was raided by the Feds.