Dr. Marsteller Chapter 25
25
When he
finally returned to the lab after a couple month hiatus, it was football
season. The students were outside
kicking around the hacky sack, flipping the Frisbee or tossing around the
football. The new students seemed
younger and younger every year to Dr. Marsteller. They looked lost and innocent. He strolled through the masses of kids stoned
and playing guitar talking to girls and securing plans for the party that
night. A few discussed classes.
When he entered the lab, his postdoc from
China, Wang Wei, wanted to talk to him.
He kept in touch with his lab over the phone when he was out, but he
knew when he finally showed up he’d be bombarded by their concerns and
insecurities. They’ll all want him to
stroke their egos to validate their existence.
Wang was
dissatisfied with his project. He didn’t
think it was important and wanted some duties with the anti-aging research that
was in the news. He said it would help
his career.
-Wang, your career coming from this lab
will be fine no matter what you’re researching.
If you say I was your advisor, you’d be able to get a professorship
anywhere even if you were researching the consistency of dirt.
Wang smiled obsequiously and laughed and
then left the office saying that he would continue doing what he was
doing. Damn kids can never be patient,
he thought. Always wanting to latch on
to the newest idea instead of plugging away and coming up with something novel
themselves. He sat at his desk for the
first time in a while. He was on top of
the world as he watched the summer winding down outside. Mrs. Viscane has developed no side
effects. His research had worked and if
everything maintained the way it has, he cured aging. Out the window he could glimpse the coming
famous Garret fall days. The leaves
would change. The heat would vanish like
a thought. Kids would soon struggle with
the decision to stay up all night studying or stay up all night partying. The Garret University Moose promised to have
a good football team. And they were all
excited about it. His phone rang.
-Sly, it’s Art. Heard you were back. How’s it going?
-Not
bad. What’s up?
-We’ve been
doing the behavioral studies so far with your mice and see no difference
between control mice.
-That’s
great.
-I mean, they
are exactly the same.
-Great.
-Well, this
will be a good paper to write up. I was
wondering how you wanted to handle it.
-You guys
can just go ahead and write up your parts and email it over here. We’ll take care of the rest.
-Sly, I was
thinking of another set of experiments we could do with the mice.
-That’s all
I want done Art.
-I wanted
to keep them for a while and test them every few months if possible.
-Art,
clearly all we need are these studies.
We can send mice back over to you every few months, but I’m definitely
going to need them housed here.
-Understood.
He could
hear Art swallow on the other end of the line.
His throat sounded dry. Dr.
Marsteller knew he had no other experiments to work on. My benevolence is the only reason he has anything
to do. Screw him, if he couldn’t think
up other experiments, that was his problem.
They can take their time writing up the paper for all I care if they
want something to keep them busy. They
can scrutinize every detail. At least
I’ll give Wang something to do related to this work. He can finish writing it up and be an author
on the paper somewhere. That will make him happy.
-All right,
well, I have to get going. Take it easy
Art.
-Bye.
Dr.
Marsteller walked out of the lab past the kids in late afternoon lounging
around the quad. They were smoking
cigarettes now and drinking out of plastic cups. The sun spread rays through the rippling
leaves of the trees that skirted the ivy on the old brick buildings. He loved the vibrancy of the youth as they
began their studies. When he graduated
he thought about taking a job in a company so he could pull down a huge salary,
but he decided he loved the campus life too much. He jumped in his damaged car and lazily drove
through the back streets of the campus being careful not to hit random kids
sprinting across the road to fetch an errant Frisbee.
He pulled
around the long drive that led up to the front door of Mrs. Viscane’s
mansion. He’d made a point to visit her
every week since the surgery. Even though
he had just visited her the day before, he had the urge to go check on her once
again. She was back up on her feet and
full of energy. When he rang, Ezekiel
came to the door and smiled like Dr. Marsteller was his best friend.
-Dr.
Marsteller, Mrs. Viscane will be ecstatic to see you. She’s upstairs.
-Thanks
Zeke.
He walked
the winding staircase and up to her room.
She was in her robe combing her hair methodically in front of her
mirror.
-Mrs.
Viscane, how goes it today?
She
swiveled quickly around on her chair.
She was sitting like a young girl with one of her legs tucked under her
and her giddiness was perceptible through her artificial face.
-Dr.
Marsteller, two days in a row, to what do I owe this pleasure?
-Just
stopping by to see how my greatest experiment is doing.
-I’m fine,
just fine. Feel very strong. The scar on my chest is obscene, but it is an
unfortunate necessity. Hopefully no more
obscene scars will be part of this process.
I’ll have to get a huge vat of beta-carotene. I’m most concerned about the
Neurosurgery. Do you think this will
cause a big scar?
-There will
be a scar, yes.
-Oh no
matter, I’ll have decades, centuries, millennia, to use advancements in plastic
surgery to….or maybe when we use your cure on my skin it will eliminate the
scar. Do you think? But no - I was
thinking that I wanted to have this performed next for my brain. Do you know what to do?
-Yes,
concentrations need to be worked out, but we’ll add it to your cerebral spinal
fluid.
-How?
-An
injection into the ventricular system of the brain.
-Sounds
gory. Ha ha. Oh, how wonderful this is. The other day I felt like I could run a
marathon or play tennis. It must be my
young heart. Can you imagine? I haven’t played a game of tennis in
years. But I was great. Do you think I could play again? I felt like I could almost fly.
-I’m not
sure it reverses the aging process. It
just maintains your current age.
-But it’s
possible, isn’t it? What if it
could? I’m so excited just thinking
about it. My heart is racing. Feel it!
She lurched
herself towards Dr. Marsteller and pulled his reluctant hand towards her
breast. Her robe spread to reveal the
globular perfect rotundity of her fake breasts and placed his hand over her
heart.
-Feel it?!
-Yes, uh,
yes.
Her heart
was racing. Like the throbbing
vibrations of a house when a plane flies overhead or a train rumbles by. Dr. Marsteller understood it’s rapid pace
under her excitement, but he thought she should calm down.
-Mrs.
Viscane, you should take it easy, you have had surgery less than a couple
months ago.
-Dr.
Marsteller, my heart is invincible.
-That may
be, but you have to take into consideration that the cure, as you call it, may
need some time to work. We are unsure of
how long it should take but you should relax.
-Dr.
Marsteller, can I have the brain surgery soon?
She asked like a child inquiring for a cookie.
-Yes, you
can, but not until after Christmas. Dr.
Reicher advised me to wait at least 6 months before we perform another invasive
surgery.
-Fuck
him! She blurted.
-Mrs.
Viscane, calm down, he led her over to her bed and sat her down. I’m going to England to give a talk about my
research next month, and the month after I’m the featured speaker at the World
Anti-Aging Congress. If these go well, I
don’t want to screw up my greatest experiment for next year’s talks. I’m set to talk at the conferences for
Biochemistry, Cell and Molecular Biology and Neuroscience. I have plans to include you prominently. We need to be careful of the stress on your
heart at this stage.
-That’s
wonderful! It’s just that I feel strong
as a horse. You won’t believe what I’ve
been able to do these last few weeks.
You really won’t believe it.
She put her
hand on his knee and looked up at his gruff masculine face with her damp old
eyes hidden behind her smooth false face.
She furtively pulled her robe back from her shoulders. Dr. Marsteller stood up quickly.
-Well, I
should be going. I have to go home, I’m
sure my wife is wondering why I’m late for dinner.
Mrs. Viscane’s manner remained demure as
she called for Ezekiel. When the
30-year-old Butler arrived in her room, she immediately grabbed him and kissed
him on the mouth openly. She clumsily
tried to wrap her leg around his waist, revealing the varicose veins and
wrinkled saggy cellulose that even thin women can’t conceal in their 70s. They turned towards Dr. Marsteller, Ezekiel
looking helpless, and Mrs. Viscane with a supercilious expression in her eyes,
like a powerful model in a lingerie catalog.
Dr. Marsteller was aghast.
-You can find your way out, can’t
you? She said tersely, spitting out her
words.
This originally appeared in Dr. Marsteller