For a long time afterwards I blamed myself. If only I had told mom and dad that she was doing crack. If only I'd gotten up there sooner. Everyone else made me feel worse by being so nice. I felt that I didn't deserve to be treated so nicely. After a while it started to get on my nerves. People were constantly asking me if I was okay or if I needed anything. I've always been a private person; I can't stand it when I'm the centre of attention.
I missed Caitlin a lot, but it felt that she had been dead for years. When she died, she was a junkie, not the Caitlin I had known and loved. It felt like an empty pit in my stomach, that I had not had a chance to say goodbye. From the day I'd seen her and Steve doing drugs she had ceased to be my sister. She'd become a stranger to me.
It ripped our little family apart. We hadn't exactly been the closest family in the world but it was worse now. I hardly ever saw my parents: we all lived our own lives, separate from each other.
I closed off even more from the world. When people asked how I was doing I always said fine, no matter how I was actually feeling, and moved on to avoid any more questions. I learnt how to blend into the background, how to create an aura around myself that said fuck off to anyone who got to close.
You can't trust people. They screw up. Better not to get too close, so if they die, you mourn, go to the funeral, shed a few tears and move on. Get over it.
My grades at school got worse, but that was to be expected I guess. High school was a blur for me. I didn't have too many friends and I pissed off my teachers by questioning their teaching methods. Only two moments stand out clearly in my head.
The first was when I had started a debate in English class about the existence of god and fate and all of that crap. The teacher was a devout Christian and got so pissed off at me that he dragged me out to the corridor and started bawling me out. I only remember part of what he said to me clearly:
"…You're looking for something, Thomas. You're searching for a truth. I know that that's hard; God know I went through the same thing…"
Then he went to yell at me for disturbing the class and trying to convert me but I wasn't listening anymore. His words were buzzing in my ears.
I was searching for a truth... I hadn't realised but as soon as he said it I realised that I was. What truth? I was so struck by it that I felt faint. I was looking for something but what?
The second thing I remember was my physics teacher's new computer. He bought it in to school, figuring that someone there would be able get it to work. It was the biggest hunk of junk I've ever seen. We spent the entire class trying to figure out how to switch the damn thing on. It was me who figured it out. You couldn't do much on it but I was fascinated by it. This was what I had been looking for. A machine that could only do what I told it to do: it didn't screw up unless I told it to. I could rely on it.
I helped Mr Crandell with the computer every day after school, trying to get the damn thing to work. I was a natural. I find out about the new technology the government had been using for a while and hooked the computer up to the school phone line. I started searching the Internet, looking for something I couldn't explain. Of course, this was during the 80s so there wasn't much to look at without hacking. So I started. Nothing very big, just looking around at government files. I read about some guy named Trinity hacking into the IRS d-base and nearly did something like that myself but then thought what's the point? I'd get arrested and do about a zillion years in jail.
My dad died when I was 18. Died seems like too gentle a word: he lost control of his truck and plowed it into a gas station. My mom was devastated, a wreck. She kept asking me when Caitlin and her husband were going to visit. I had plans to go to college, but I put them on hold to look after her. She died a year later. Pneumonia.
It sounds like I didn't care that they died, but I did. I still do. They were good people. In a way though I expected it. People die. Never get too close…If you remain at a distance you can't get hurt. At least that's what I thought.
I used the money they'd left me to put myself through college, studying to be a computer scientist. I bought the crappy computer from Mr Crandell and retreated further into my own world. The college had all the latest equipment and I copied it to use on my own computer. Needless to say I never did much studying. I spent most of my days trying to get that damn computer to work and spent my nights out drinking. Well, why not?
Like school, college was a blur. The only thing that really stands out was how I got my real name.
John was the closest I had to a friend in those four years. We had the same courses and he sometimes tried to help me with my computer. I was too independent to want any help and to be honest he sometimes pissed me off. He was always so damn cheerful. He was the only person who ignored my aura telling people to get out of my space.
He was much better then me at programming though. He knew how to manipulate the computer so that it actually obeyed commands. The only thing keeping him from being freed was his cheerfulness. He was happy in the little world he had created and no amount of persuasion could have made him leave it.
Anyway. He was sitting in my room, throwing a baseball at the wall. I was searching and hacking the net as usual and he asked me what my alias was.
" My what?" I asked not taking my eyes of the screen.
"Your alias. You know, a fake name."
"Why the hell would I want a fake name?"
He rolled his eyes. "So if you hack into anything-"
"Who said I was hacking into anything?" I glared over at him. He gave me a look.
"So all this time spent on your computer, your working on assignments? Please."
I half smiled and turned back to the screen.
"Anyway, if you do anything you're not supposed to, the government can't trace you because the name's ambiguous. They can't even tell whether you're a man or a woman. That's why you need an alias, hacker boy!" He threw the baseball at my head. My hands jerk forward from the impact and I hit the keyboard. The screen went blank.
"Oh shit," I muttered and pressed a few buttons. Nothing happened.
"Oh man, if you made me break my computer I'm gonna kill you!" John just laughed and carried on throwing the baseball at the wall.
"Come on baby. Work!" I hit the side of the monitor and blinked. For a moment I thought I saw something move across the screen. I leaned in, trying to see what it was. I saw nothing. I shook my head.
"Must be going crazy…" I looked again. This time I saw it. For the briefest moment I thought I saw a green code flash down the screen. It flowed out of the screen and I suddenly saw it everywhere. On my bed, my clothes strewn across the floor and then across John. I closed my eyes and saw it there to, dripping like water across my eyelids. I felt that I could almost understand it-
"Tom? You okay?" I opened my eyes and saw John staring at me, baseball in hand. He repeated his question.
"Fine," I said, looking back at the screen. It was blank.
"You've spent too much time on that hunk of junk. Come on man, we need to get you out of this room and into the real world." He hauled me up and pushed me out the door.
"Yeah," I muttered. "Sure."
By the next day, I had convinced myself that I had seen nothing. Probably been looking at the screen for too long and the green code was just one of those blobby things you see when you stare at a bright light for too long. Maybe a part of me knew there was more to it then that but I buried it deep inside of me.
I had forgotten about John's idea of an alias. It was only that he kept pestering me that I finally gave in and started looking for one. Again, he tried to help me with it.
"Let's face it, 'Tom' does not suit you."
"It doesn't?" I asked furrowing my brows. It had never occurred to me that a name could suit you. I had always assumed you suited the name.
"No, we need something new… something original… something only you can have…"
Those words repeated themselves in my head over and over. In the end it was one of my professors who thought of it. He was trying to explain to me some new programme that had just been invented. Of course, I'd known about it for months but I figured that it would not be too wise to reveal that fact. Besides the guy loved explaining complicated things: it gave him a sense of superiority to the rest of us.
"… I call this type of programme a neo programme"
"What did you say?" I asked, for the first time paying attention to what the jackass was saying.
"I call it a neo programme," he said patiently. " In other words, a new programme."
I smiled slowly, rolling the word around my head. He smiled back; thinking that he'd finally made some kind of contact with me. Fat chance.
Neo… It's perfect….
That night I used that name for the first time. I hacked into the college database and changed the grades of most of the students. The faculty went crazy, since there was no obvious target. The grades had just been randomly changed. I didn't want them to track me so I put some of my grades up and others down. In fact, the only reason they ever found out was that the top students now had F's. Everyone started freaking out, thinking that some mad man was going to hack into the software and blow the computers up and it would cause the end of the college as we knew it. I laughed at their ungrounded and hysterical fear. The cops started investigating, mainly to calm the student body down but all they found was that someone called Neo had done it but they never traced it back to me.
After a while, the name Neo became more natural to me then Thomas Anderson.
* * * * * * *
Somehow I graduated and flitted from job to job, apartment to apartment for a couple of years. I only just got by. I still had an authority problem apparently. I was just beginning to despair when I ran into John at a coffee shop,
I had just been fired from a research company. They had hired me to dig up dirt on the Internet for their clients. I had refused one: to look up the names of every criminal listed in New York who's name began with M. The client wanted to find the guy who he said had killed his brother. I didn't believe him. I met the guy and he didn't have a brother. You could see it in his eyes. He just wanted to find someone. He was insane. I told him that and had been fired instantly.
So there I was, feeling and looking like shit because I hadn't slept for two weeks, when John walks up to me, looking like he should have been in a toothpaste commercial.
"Tom! I haven't seen you in years! How're you doing?"
I knew then that he was just being polite. It was obvious that I was not all right. I couldn't sleep: every time I started to drift off, Caitlin's dead face floated up in front of me, then my mother's. Even though I hadn't seen it, I saw my dad's crash, saw his face twist in pain, then melt in the blazing inferno. I had what I guessed were probably panic attacks. When they hit, I could only sit in a corner, head in hands trying to slow my racing heart. I was a wreck.
"I'm good," I forced the words out my mouth with a fake smile. "How are you?"
"Great, great…" I knew with a sinking feeling in my chest that he was better then great. He looked tanned and healthy, perfect teeth, the works. While I stood there, pale and unshaven, trying desperately to keep the wave of nausea I could feel at arms distance.
"So what are you doing these days? Still working at that hunk of junk?" he laughed and I forced myself to laugh along with him.
Sure I am John. In fact that's all I do… Aside from wondering into coffee shops before realising I can't even afford a regular cup of coffee and apart from being lousy at every job I get… In fact, working on that hunk of junk is the only peace I get from the questions in my head… I suspect I might be having some kind of breakdown John, can you recommend a good shrink?
Of course I didn't say any of that. I think I said sure and then asked him what he was doing.
"I just got a job at a new software company. It's called Metacortex."
"Never heard of it."
"That's 'cause it's new, dumb ass!" I can't help but smile. No matter how business-like he now looked, a far cry from his perpetual messy look at college (which on him was cute and endearing to women. On me it was just messy) he hadn't changed a bit.
"So, you still haven't told me what you're doing. What are you, head of your software company?"
I smiled the first genuine smile since I saw him. "No. Actually I just got fired." I turned and started to walk away.
"Oh shit man… I'm sorry."
"It happens." I shrugged. Take a hint and just fuck off.
"Tom, wait!" Damn. He was running to catch up with me. Fuck off fuck off fuck off…
He grabbed my shoulder, forcing me to stop. "Listen if you want, I can spring you an interview. They're still looking for workers… And I know you got the skill." This last part was said with a smile. I looked across the street. Two men wearing brown suits and sunglasses got out of a car. For some reason, my eyes couldn't look away. They both paused and turned to look at me, as if with one mind. I shivered.
I heard my voice say, "Sure. Why not?"
That's how I got to work at Metacortex. I had an interview and somehow managed to look halfway presentable. I don't think they really cared what I looked like. They seemed impressed by my programming skills. I couldn't really work out why at first; I had always assumed that John was better at it then I was. It took a while for me to realise that all my time working on "that hunk of junk" had actually paid off. I outstripped him by a long shot.
And for a while, things started to look up. My job at Metacortex was simple enough. I just kept my head down and do what my superior told me to do. I started sleeping again and with my new regular income I bought a better computer. I always kept the old one though. I don't know why: in some twisted way I felt that owed it something.
The only real thing wrong with my life was John. It wasn't really John though. It was the way he and his new perfect wife kept inviting me round their new perfect house. They saw me as some kind of charity case and it drove me insane. I can't stand being the centre of attention. It made me feel sick, how happy they were. It left me feeling hollow inside. In the end, I started acting a happy as they were around them and after a while they seemed satisfied that I was 'cured' and left me alone.
I had been hunting around on the net, still looking for my 'truth' when I noticed a, small, insignificant banner in a corner. It was some new psychiatrist trying to drum up business. There was a picture of a happy family, laughing because Dr Wonderful had fixed their problems.
Then it hit me. I worked out why I was having panic attacks: I missed my family. I hadn't grieved for them properly and being around John and his perfect-now-pregnant wife reminded me on what I was missing. I felt guilty for the way they died, especially Caitlin. I felt that maybe I could have done something.
A family. I was so relieved when I realised how simple it was I almost wept with joy.
I went back to my old town one weekend to visit their graves and try to lose the feeling of emptiness inside me. When I got there I sat outside our old house, now abandoned and rundown. I sat in the dirt, ignoring the looks passing drivers gave me and watched them go past. It gave me a sense of peace just sitting there. It was just me, the sky and the road. I sat there as long as I could, ignoring the cramp I could feel in my leg. I wanted to preserve that feeling in my mind as well as I could, so I could recall it whenever life got too hard. I still do sometimes.
Finally, when the cramp became too much for me to handle I got up and headed for the cemetery. I didn't have a car - I had travelled by train - so it took me a few hours to find the cemetery. The town had changed so much since I had last been there. Buildings had been torn down, streets renamed. Nothing remains the same. Not in this world.
I found their graves, side by side, Caitlin in the middle. At least they're together now, I thought miserably. There was a space next to my mothers and a dark corner of my mind whispered that grave's for you Thomas. You'd better get in it before it's too late.
"What's too late?" I asked aloud in a trembling voice, but the voice was silent. I shuddered and knelt beside the graves to put the cheap flowers I had bought a gas station down. Suddenly, something burst inside of me. I rested my head against Caitlin's headstone and wept. I wept for my family and the terrible ways they had died, for the way I had tried to forget them but most of all for the person I had become.
Eventually my sobs subsided and I sat up and I sat up, staring at the headstones.
Never get too close… I can't go through what I've just been through again… Better for it not to start…Keep to yourself and you'll be just fine…
When I left the next day I felt that I'd left a part of me behind. That I'd buried the part of me that was still Thomas Anderson in the dirt by my old house, in the space next to my family. I got back to my apartment and sat at my computer. I realised that before the trip I had been living two lives: one as Thomas Anderson and another as a computer hacker named Neo.
Now I was just Neo.