Chapter 25:

Friday, September 9, 1966 After Audrey left, Conrad got a couple of bottles of wine and walked down to the Mary Lyons dorms.

It was Friday, five in the afternoon. Ace would be drinking in his room—the room he’d planned to share with Conrad. God willing, there’d be grass as well—Conrad hadn’t had a chance to get high since back in Louisville with Dee.

It was a nice walk, not too far, the mellow September sun sliding down, and a tang of cool winter in the air. Conrad had the wine in a paper bag; he was wearing jeans and a Swarthmore T-shirt in a mock-Bulberesque attempt to look like “one of the guys.” He figured to run a real number on Ace’s head.

As long as Audrey had been here—a week, a week of bliss—Conrad had lain low. Audrey didn’t want people to see her shacking up with someone over thirty—there were still plenty of people around Swarthmore who would have recognized her. So mainly they’d gone into Philly, or hung around Bulber’s pad talking and making love. It had felt like being married, having their own little house; every morning they made scrambled eggs together; every night they drank German white wine and fucked. Daytimes they might go to the Philly zoo, or the art museum—it had been paradise.

But Audrey didn’t want to miss the start of classes at Columbia; and Conrad could see her point. He was, after all, on the FBI’s Top-Ten Wanted List—yes, he and Audrey had actually seen the actual photo in the actual post office.Felony burglary and immigration violation . Audrey loved Conrad as much as ever—more—but they could both see the possibility of real bad shit coming down, and there was no reason for her to throw her life away. The hope was that things would somehow work out and they’d get married in June as planned.

So now Conrad was on the loose, and all his pals were back, and it was time to push the whole trip another notch further. Before leaving Crum Ledge, Conrad had carefully combed his hair into the same cocky little Vitalis pompadour that had always infuriated him so much on Bulber. Humming slightly, he walked up the ML dormitory staircase and knocked on Ace Weston’s door.

“It’s Mr. Bulber.” A hard grin covered Conrad’s face.

“Who?”

“Professor Bulber. I want to talk to you about your application for Kutztown State.”

“What?”Ace’s voice was high in bewilderment. The lock rattled, and then Ace cracked open the door to peer out. Dope fumes swirled.

“Hello, Ace, I know this may not be the best moment for an old fuddy-duddy like myself to be butting in this way, but, hey, man, could you get a brother high?”

Ace’s bloodshot eye stared out through the crack for what seemed a very long time.

“You look like a hermit crab,” offered Conrad. “Come on, Weston, let me in, I won’t bite. I brought wine.” He clinked his two bottles invitingly.

“Uh ... sure.” Ace opened the door and Conrad stepped on in. Platter was there, and Chuckie Golem, too. They had a hookah in the corner; Chuckie was trying to stand in front of the hookah so Mr. Bulber wouldn’t see it.

“Don’t worry about the illegal narcotics, boys,” said Conrad. “And feel free to tell it as it is. We have a lot to learn from your generation. You should just think of me as one of your friends; you see, I’m on sabbatical this year.”

“Yeah,” said Chuckie tensely. “That’s what I heard. You were supposed to go to France, and you’re just hanging around here instead?”

“That’s right,” said Conrad, brushing past Chuckie to kneel by the hookah. “Who’s your connection?”

At some point here, Platter had gotten hysterical with laughter. He lay slouched back across Ace’s bed, shaking in stoned ecstasy.

“What’s the matter with this fellow?” demanded Conrad, giving Platter’s upper thigh a slow, intimate pinch. “Ron Platek, isn’t it? Anybody got a match? And you ought to recharge the bowl while you’re at it, men. I’m ready to really do my own thing. Do you have any good records, Weston, besides those shitty old blues tracks you always made me listen to? Who wants a blow job?”

The three boys looked at Conrad with pale anxious faces. They’d been stoned when he got there, and now it had all gotten too unreal too fast.

“No blow jobs?” rapped out Conrad. “Then let’s start on the drugs.”

“Look,” said Ace, stepping forward with his face set tight. “You can just get out of here, faggot. We don’t need—”

“Relax,” said Conrad, smiling. “I’m really your old roomie, Conrad Bunger.”

Ace didn’t smile. “We don’t need this, Mr. Bulber. We don’t need you coming down here to try to act like one of us. We don’t want to see you around, understand?” Ace grabbed his arm—hard—and began propelling him toward the door. “Conrad hated your guts, you know that, man? You think it’s time you got hip ... well, we don’t give a shit. You come back here and we’llkill you, Bulber, you—”

They stared at him openmouthed.

“That’s right,” continued Conrad. “I changed my face to Mr. Bulber’s to get away from the cops. I did it so I could come up here and impersonate Bulber, who is indeed on sabbatical in France; I did it so I could see you guys again.”

Ace finally smiled and gave his dry chuckle.Eh-eh-eh . “Well, let’s charge up the hookah. Are you really from a flying saucer, Conrad?”

“Sure he is,” said Platter. “I read it inTime . Conrad.” He stood up and gave his old friend a hug. “Mr.

Bulber.”Haw-nnh-haw-nnh. “It’s perfect. The thing about the blow-job was perfect. ‘Tell it as it is.’ ”

Haw-nnh-haw-nnh. “Oh, Conrad.”

“You blew our minds,” said Chuckie, giving one of his rare smiles. He got out a film can of grass and recharged the hookah. “The ... uh ...feds are in town. What’s scary is that they aren’t asking questions. They’re just ... fucking ...hanging around. ”

“I’m not going to be here too long,” said Conrad. “I want to do one big prank on the college before I fade.”

“Aprank ,” said Ace thoughtfully.

“Give them a teaching,”amplified Conrad. Just breathing in the room’s air, he already felt high. “I got that phrase from an article inTime , it was in the same issue as the articles about me. You know the Bhagween ? The fat kid with the big cult-following in Chicago? It seems there was an IRS guy who infiltrated the organization, and the Bhagween finds out. Bhagween takes his head disciple aside and says,

‘Hey, you know that IRS guy—give him a teaching.’ So the head disciple goes to the IRS guy and smiles and says, ‘You are now prepared to receive truth.’ So, OK, they go in a hotel kitchen, and the head disciple stands behind the IRS guy and hits him on the head with a hammer. And in the same issue ofTime , right, Potts gives a quote like I’m a follower of the Bhagween!”

“ ‘Although Conrad Bunger may indeed have been an extraterrestrial,’ ” recited Chuckie, “ ‘I think it is also appropriate to view him as a confused young victim of the madness of our times.’ ” He fired up the hookah and handed Conrad the mouthpiece. “Careful ... the water cools it off, and it’s easy to inhale too much.”

“Motherfaaarf’ck’nout.” Conrad drew in a big, show-off breath and succumbed to a coughing fit. No matter how hard he coughed, the tickle in his throat wouldn’t go away. The rhythm of the cough filled all his body; he was on the floor now, still coughing, coughing for dear life. Finally the spasm passed, and Conrad opened his watering eyes to see his three friends standing over him, conversing in hushed tones.

“A flying saucer, hey, Pig?” asked Ace.

“The real thing,” wheezed Conrad. “What happened there?”

“I think you’re tricking us.” Ace made his mouth a thin line and shook his head. His blond hair was shoulder-length this year; he kept it out of his eyes with a leather shoelace worn like a headband. He looked vaguely like an Indian. “You tricking us, man.”

“I’m not Mr. Bulber, if that’s what you think.”