Error

by Ásgrímur Hartmannsson

Chapter 8

'Error' synopsis

One day, Jonas, who has recently migrated to the city, discovers that all his records — including his assets — have been erased somehow. No longer able to get work, buy anything on credit or sell his now legally non-existent car, his life becomes a unique adventure.

There was nothing on TV except sitcoms. All sitcoms are the same, with only the smallest of differences to tell them apart, mainly the title and the theme tune. The basic setup is always the same: the living room, with the stairs in the back, just visible. It seems all sitcom people have access to an upper storey. One exception is Friends. But even that sitcom had a staircase, although it was not visible from the apartment.

The sofa is always situated in the middle of the living room. One exception is Cheers, but it doesn’t have a living room. Why this is so is a mystery.

In most sitcoms, there is a fat, ugly and annoying man married to a voluptuously built and surprisingly tolerant woman. This is in all cases painful to watch. The exception is Roseanne, in which a fat, ugly, annoying woman lived with a similar man.

It was either soap operas or music videos. They split into Arenby and rap, pop and weird stuff Jonas did not remember hearing on any of the radio stations while he was switching between classic rock and the news.

Having watched videos for a very long time, Jonas had them figured out too. There are two basic types of Arenby video; the female singer type, and the male singer type. The difference between Arenby and rap is that actual singing is perpetrated upon the listeners in Arenby — at least sometimes. A lot of the time it is just moaning.

Female vocalist Arenby videos have the woman walking about in slow mo while singing. All the scenes are in soft focus. There is usually a man involved, and he often slaps the woman, or at the very least a woman. Why he does this rarely if ever comes to light. But it is a music video. Things are not supposed to make sense.

Male vocalist Arenby videos are similar to rapper videos, except it is done more in slow mo, and less money is being flung into the air. And rappers don’t do soft focus.

The pop video is always the same too: formation dancing.

The music videos explain why musicals — that is, song and dance movies — are no longer made.

Jonas got irritated and flipped to the religious TV network. A fat, egg-shaped guy was speaking of fire and brimstone. Christian fundamentalists speak of Hell as though they have been there in person, perhaps while on vacation. Jonas wondered if that was the reality of the matter. Maybe he could get a week’s trip to Hell if he contacted them. It would be interesting. He might prepare for the afterlife.

According to all fundamentalists, everyone is going to Hell. To go to Hell, all you need to do is to commit sin. Everybody is sinful, thanks to original sin. Ergo, everybody is going to Hell.

Either that, or the other way around: to go to heaven and skip hell, you must accept the lord Jesus Christ into your heart. If you do not accept Jesus, you go to Hell, no matter what. Jonas doubted if the real Jesus had ever been accepted into anyone’s heart. Rather, a surrogate Jesus, a placebo instead of the real one was accepted.

But even if the right Jesus were involved, all the people that seemed to have accepted him into their circulatory system seemed to be very mad indeed. And Heaven filled with psychos can be no Heaven at all. Thusly, everyone went to Hell, even those who went to Heaven, perhaps especially those.

Christian TV was awful, but it sure beat watching an Arenby video.

* * *

The clock ticked on, and come midnight, Jonas got ready to deliver some packages. He got the packages from under his bed and had them close at hand while he was putting on his shoes, as though he expected them to sprout feet and run away.

After putting on his jacket, he opened the door to his apartment, shut off the lights, got the bag, went out the door and made sure it was locked before he shut it.

When Jonas got to his car, he opened the door and threw the bag with the parcels into the passenger seat. He then found the list in his pocket and looked it over for a while, memorizing it.

After thinking it over for some time, Jonas decided on the most economical way to deliver the parcels. Having done that, he started the engine and got going.

The first guy was waiting for him just where he was expected to be according to the list. He knocked on Jonas’ window and identified himself. Jonas handed him the packet out the window, and the man ran off into the night. One delivered, nine to go. Jonas checked him off the list to avoid a repeat visit.

The next one was supposed to be waiting for him on a parking lot downtown. He did not show, so after ten minutes of waiting, Jonas left.

The next delivery required that Jonas exit the car. Jonas hid the other parcels under the seat before getting out. There were two parcels to be delivered to the same general area, to two different persons.

Jonas found one at a pub; the other was just walking about with his friends. He looked amiable enough, and offered Jonas a beer for his efforts. Jonas excused himself, said he was busy for the night. The man then offered him a smoke.

“As I said, I’d love to, but I’m busy,” said Jonas apologetically. Then he smiled and waved as he left. A few people get beat up by junkies every year for refusing drugs in an impolite manner. Jonas did not want to become one of those victims.

Delivering the rest of the parcels involved knocking on doors: two in suburban areas, the rest in large apartment buildings, one of which was close to where Jonas lived.

Jonas then went to the suburbs. The first house he came to was a large, clean and well kept building, a new SUV in the driveway beside a late-model high-end sedan. The trees were well kept, and the whole place had an air of law-abiding citizenry about it. But according to the list, this is where one of the parcels was supposed to be delivered.

A parcel he had been handed by some pale and sickly-looking gangsters.

Jonas knocked on the door. He looked around. There was the doorbell. He sighed, and pressed it. A chime emanated from inside the house. A little later the door was opened. It was a young man, healthy-looking and clean.

“Hugo?” asked Jonas.

“Yes, that’s me,” said the man. “Do you have my stuff?”

“Lou sent me,” said Jonas.

“What? Who are you?” asked the man, clearly disturbed.

Jonas smiled, and produced the parcel: “Frank told me to say that. Here.”

The man laughed, and received the parcel.

Had the man not said anything when Jonas mentioned Lou, he had been instructed to run. Run fast. Jonas did not know why this had been stressed so much, but he figured that they were more experienced than he was, having been in the business for longer, so he’d better obey.

Jonas went to his car and checked the next address. It, too, was in a good neighbourhood. Jonas raised both his eyelids. He’d had no idea how wealthy some of his recipients were. No wonder Frank had agreed to pay him so much. He must be raking in the cash.

The next house differed only in shape from the last. Jonas did not see cars in the driveway, but there was a double garage, so they might have been in there. The lights were on in the living room, turned low, and Jonas could hear faint music when he approached to ring the bell. Several voices were chatting between themselves inside, and a faint odour of smoke was coming from an open window near by. It had a strong smell, similar to that of tobacco.

Jonas rang the bell. He could hear a woman’s voice from the inside call: “I’ll get it,” before the scurrying and pattering of feet approached, and the door opened to reveal a timid-looking girl.

“Maria?” asked Jonas

“Yes?” answered the girl.

“Do you know Frank?” asked Jonas.

“Oh, do you have my packet?” Maria asked.

“What’s the secret word?”

“Mmm... secret word? I can’t remember any secret word.” Maria looked clearly bewildered.

“Good,” said Jonas, handing over the parcel. Maria looked overjoyed to have it and nearly slammed the door in Jonas’ face as she rushed into her living room again.

“Bloody stoner,” said Jonas to himself, God, and whoever else might be listening.

He returned to his car again and went to deliver the last four parcels. He would have to deliver the last one tomorrow night. He did not much desire to wait for random junkies he had never met before. Or maybe the guy had an excuse. Maybe he had gotten himself arrested. Maybe he had OD’d, or maybe he’d just overslept. You can never be sure with such people. Then again, normal people can not be relied on either.

Next on the list was a guy living in one of the social apartments. They were the worst. This guy was probably on disability because he was a junkie. Some people were on disability because they were fat — their fatness then caused actual problems like weak knees, back aches, heightened blood pressure and various cardiovascular problems.

Some people were just too lazy to work. They would complain of back aches too, because back aches cannot be disproved medically, and doctors will just have to trust the patients. Better physicians just write “junkie” in their file and prescribe whatever the patient wants. The logic is that if he won’t work anyway, why not capitalize on his drug addiction?

Jonas had listened to Frank speak in annoyed tones of such people on the way to get the packet. He felt that doctors were butting in on his business by prescribing hard anaesthetics to these invalids. The invalids should come to him and get the same stuff at roughly the same price, just freebased a little.

Jonas entered the building, and rang the bell. Nobody answered, but he was buzzed in just the same. After finding the right door, he knocked. There were some people in there, that was clear, but the right man opened the door, identified himself in the prescribed manner, and got a small taped-up bag of whatever for his troubles. Jonas wondered how Frank was running his business, if the clients trusted him enough to pay in advance.

Frank just must be a really nice guy.

The same smell was emitted from all apartments that Jonas visited. It was the same smell as he had whiffed when he delivered to Maria, and it was similar to the smell in the pub where he had first met Frank: the pungent, heavy smell of something very similar to burnt tobacco and hay. Jonas was beginning to have strong doubts as to the nature of the stuff. He was not so sure it was tobacco. But if anyone asked, he smelled of cigarettes.

If you are going to claim you smell of something, claim that you smell of something legal.

When Jonas had delivered the next to last parcel, he thought again about the one parcel he had not delivered. Why had that man not showed up to get his stuff? Jonas imagined, from what he had been paid so far, that it must have cost him in excess of 1000 KR.

Jonas had no idea of the price of these things, but he was pretty sure the stuff he had left would buy him a ticket to China and a hotel for the week. What was the dose going on anyway — 3000 for a few grams? Jonas had no idea.

The price of drugs was advertised in the news at random intervals, but he never paid attention. Someone once told him that a leaf of marijuana lasted for a month. The parcel he had in his passenger seat was the size of a small milk carton, and the content probably weighed 200 grams. How much would that chunk be worth?

Whatever it was, it was wholesale. Not even Tommy Chong smoked this much, which made Jonas even more worried about the one who had not shown up.

But he was getting tired, and his identity, he was afraid, would have to come first. He would just deliver the stuff to Frank if the man did not show up tomorrow. He would get 10 % less than agreed upon, but that, on a weekly basis — would still keep him his apartment.

Jonas drove his car home and made sure to take the little parcel with him when he exited. He just put it in his pocket and strolled into his house as though nothing were the matter — which was the case, apart from the fact he did not officially exist but did so only in the flesh, which was apparently not enough for the Bureau of Personal Information Protection.

Jonas put the parcel under his bed and went to sleep.

To be continued...

To Challenge 420...