Chapter 12

I burst into the kitchen where Lara is spooning around some bran flakes. “It works! It works!”

She keeps her head positioned directly over her cereal bowl and looks at me with just her hazel eyes. “What are you talking about?”

“It works! I got it to work. Well, technically I had to hire this Indian named Rameshwar to get it to work, good kid, anyways, it works! I had a lucid dream last night while wearing the machine.”

“But haven’t you had them before?” She’s not impressed.

“Well, yeah.”

“So how do you know it works? I mean, how do you know you had the lucid dream because of the machine?”

No matter what we’re talking about, my wife and I find ourselves being contrarian, if only for the sake of being contrarian. People call it playing devil’s advocate. But really it’s just that after spending so much time with someone, you just want to be right.

I do it all the time. She’ll say something like, “Isn’t it great that people at work are raising money to help kids with cancer?” Instead of just being straightforward I’ll ask, “How do you know that the kids with cancer are really getting the money?”

I try to justify it — that it’s better than not caring at all. It’s better than just blandly saying, “Sure, that’s great.” But really I’m just an asshole. We all are.

It should be just the opposite. If we chose each other to go through life, then we should be sticking together on every issue. It should be us versus the world. We should defend each other’s position no matter how ridiculous they are. But we don’t. We rip each other apart every chance we get, just for the sake of being right. It’s amazing how selfish humans really can be.

“I know because it works.” Nothing like circular logic to really drive my case home.

“Well, good for you. I’m glad that you’re happy with it.”

There’s a fine line between sarcasm and sincerity and she was tap dancing back and forth across it. But I want to believe she means what she says.

She continues, “So what’s the next step?”

I hadn’t given this any thought. I’ve spent so much time trying to get it to work, I hadn’t considered what to do with it once it did work.

“I don’t know. I sort of figured once it works that it would be easy to become rich and famous.”

“Good luck with that. Maybe you need to get seen. Get your face and your machine out there.”

All of a sudden I’m the struggling actor who’s waiting tables who just needs to serve a bowl of French onion soup to the right casting director. I’m the broke screenwriter who’s slipping bound printouts of “The President Rides a Horse” into copies of Variety. I just need my big break.

“Any ideas?”

“That’s not what I do, but I’m sure you’ll figure something out. You always do.” And with that we kiss each other like we hadn’t done in months. The best apologies don’t involve words.

As I dial Charlie’s number, I realize that if this thing ever takes off, I probably owe him at least 10%.

“Yellow?”

“Charlie, you’re not going to believe this!”

“Lara is quitting her job to join the circus.”

“What? No. Why’d you say that?”

“It was the first thing that popped into my head that I wouldn’t believe.”

“No. Uh, my dream machine. It works! I had a lucid dream last night.”

“Sweet. So are you rich yet?”

“No, that’s what I need you for.”

“Well, did you get a patent yet?”

“No.”

“Do you have a lawyer?”

“No.”

“Do you at least have a name for it?”

“Yeah. I think I want to call it the Dreamachine. All one word.”

“It’s not terrible. It needs a tagline.”

I interrupt my friend. “How come you seem to know what you’re talking about?”

“I never told you about my invention, from way back when?”

“No, what was it?”

“I had this idea for a sponge that lasts forever.”

“That’s a good idea.”

“I thought so. I had a big meeting with Proctor & Gamble at this fancy office in Cincinnati. I thought this idea was my winning lottery ticket. Then they told me that if it lasts forever, people would only buy one.”

“Ah, that’s why they work in the fancy office.”

“They laughed my ass all the way out of the building. They’re probably still laughing at me in Cincinnati. Pigfuckers. Where were we?”

“You were telling me I need a patent. It sounds complicated.”

“Right, I know a guy. Tad Kowalski. He’ll help with all the forms and legalese.”

“Is he licensed and legal and everything?”

“Look, you want a patent. You give him three hundred bucks, he’ll get you a patent. End of story.”

I give it a rest but take note that Charlie never answered my question.

I walk into Tad Kowalski’s little one-room shop on Clark in Uptown. On his left is a greasy fast-food place that’s advertising a gyro special. On his right is a shoe repair company with a sign in their window: “We’ll save your sole.”

Tad greets me by name. Charlie must have let him known I was coming by. It makes me wonder what else Charlie does for me that I don’t know about. We shake hands. His hands are soft and greasy. He’s mostly bald but has a few streaks of brown hair lying across the top of his head. The only things on his desk are a phone and scattered manila folders and papers.

“Sit down, sit down. So tell me about your invention.”

“Um, okay. It’s a device that you wear to sleep. You strap on the goggles and…well, what it’s supposed to do is help you lucid dream. It’s a lucid dream machine. I call it the Dreamachine.”

Tad’s hurriedly checking boxes on a form.

“Uh huh, and does it work?”

“Yeah, it works. I wouldn’t be getting a patent if it didn’t work.”

“Hey, hey, I don’t judge. You tell me it works, I believe you. Calm down, Chief. And that’s Delmar with one l?”

“Yeah.”

He goes back to his form. “Well, I think that’s about it. Fill out your address on this form and you should receive your patent in the mail in a couple weeks.”

“Don’t you have to look stuff up on the computer, make sure that there aren’t any existing inventions like mine?”

Tad puts down his pen. “So that’s how you want to play it, huh? Yeah, I got a computer. It’s in the back. Wait here and I’ll go check it out.” On those last three words, Tad mimed air quotes.

After ten minutes of looking at porn or playing solitaire, Kowalski comes back to the desk and we finish the paperwork.

“You’re good to go. That’ll be $400.”

“Charlie said it was only $300.”

“Yeah, well you wanted the deluxe computer patent.”

Back at Charlie’s place, I thank him for his great recommendation.

“So, what’s the next step?”

“Well now that you have a patent, you need an angel investor. Someone to get in on the ground floor and front your start-up costs.”

My expression tells Charlie that I have no idea where to start.

“Look, it’s not so much what you’re selling, but how you sell it. You’ve got to make someone with a lot of money believe that if they don’t invest in your dream doohickey that they’re missing out on the opportunity of a lifetime.”

“How?”

“We’re going to make a movie.”

“A movie?”

“Well, maybe movie isn’t the best word. A short video demonstration, a trailer. Perhaps with some creative licenses to really sell it.”

“I don’t think you know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Maybe I don’t. But we know that you don’t have a clue either, so there. Anyways, first I should try out the machine so I know what it really does.”

“Oh come on, I just want to get this going. Let’s call the newspapers, let’s get me out there.”

“I want to see what it’s like. I mean, you’re the only that’s used it so far, right?

“Yeah, but — “

“Look, I’m not calling bullshit on you — I’m not. But as your friend, I need to know that this thing works before I let you get all excited about it.”

“Ok, fine. Have at it. “

I drop my prototype off at Charlie’s so he can try it out. It will work for him, right? It’s not just me. It’ll work.

While I’m half asleep I hear muffled sounds of bells. Rings and thumps.

It’s 5:24 am. On a Monday. I grab my ratty navy blue robe and lumber down to my front door.

Outside, rapidly ringing my door bell and pounding on my door, stands Charlie.

“Dude, you are a genius!”

“This couldn’t wait? Until, like, noon or something?”

“It was amazing. I had the best dream ever. You’re going to be rich!”

“That’s great. How about we talk tonight after I get off work?” I try shutting the door in his face, but he sticks his foot in the way.

“Don’t you want to hear what happened?”

Dreams are only interesting to the person that had them.

“Send me an email.”

“So the first thing I did was rob a bank, I made the cops show up, and when they started shooting, I made them shoot each other.”

“So I can delete it.” Thank you, Jim Gaffigan.

“And then with the money from the bank, I bought a jet pack! A fucking jet pack! I don’t even think they exist, but I made it happen.”

“So why did you rob a bank?”

“And then, this is the best part, I was fucking whoever I wanted! It was incredible. I was fucking anyone I could think of, for a good 5–10 seconds, then I’d think of someone new! You’re going to be rich!”

“I mean, if you’re controlling it, couldn’t you just make the jet pack appear?”

“You invented a Fuck-Whoever-You-Want Machine! This will make us millions! Billions, even. This is bigger than the internet!”

“Well, it does more than that. Wait, us?”

“No, you don’t get it. Every man on earth, and probably women although they won’t admit it, is going to want a Fuck-Whoever-You-Want Machine.”

“I suppose, although I don’t think that’s how we’ll word it in the brochure.”

“You realize that if it wasn’t for porn, the internet would never have caught on, right? This is huge!”

“So are you ready to help me sell it?”

“Of course, let’s start right now!”

“Right now I’m going back to bed. And then I’m going to work. I’ll see you tonight.” I push the door shut before he can get another word in. I mean, it’s five in the goddamn morning.

With Monday Night Football on in the background, here we are again. No longer trying to get it to work, but trying to get it out there. Charlie is furiously scribbling a storyboard on a giant notepad, I’m fumbling around with a digicam I borrowed from a friend at work.

I try different modes, panorama, letterbox, sepia. Charlie is writing dialogue, cracking himself up in the process.

“So is this going to be like an infomercial?”

“Your problem is that you could build a rocket to the moon, but you’d never be able to sell it to NASA.”

“I don’t follow.”

“We’re not selling the steak. We’re selling the sizzle.”

“Okay, how do we do that?”

“Here’s the script. Your lines are in green. Do you have a gorilla suit? What we need is a boom mic.”

FADE IN:

EXT: AMAZON RAINFOREST — NIGHT

A family of gorillas is bathing in an Amazon sinkhole. They’re using some sort of shampoo, lathering up their greasy, black gorilla hair.

AUDIO: The sound of a manual transmission shifting into fifth gear.

CUT TO: An unidentified convertible sports car jumps off a ramp, over a cliff and into the rainforest swimming hole. The driver jumps out of the car and — in mid-air — aims and fires a bow and arrow at the mother gorilla. The car explodes.

FADE TO BLACK.

FADE IN: The driver is now eating roasted gorilla meat.

AUDIO: A male voiceover starts. “What if you could escape from your world? Be who you want to be? Every night of your life? Now you can. Dreamachine.”

FADE TO BLACK.

I’m in disbelief. “This is the worst thing I’ve ever read in my life. Do they even have gorillas in the Amazon?”

“Who cares? It’s a lucid dream, remember? You can create whatever you want.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. How are we going to film this?”

“I thought we could just CGI it.”

“Do you know anything about doing special effects like this?”

“I was hoping you did.”

“And what did you find so funny about this in the first place?”

“You don’t think it’s funny? I think it’s edgy. Anyways, what we really need is a website.”

“What about the video?”

“I’ll admit there might be a few technical snafus, with post-production and all that. But all we really need is a good URL. The rest is easy.”

I log on to a domain site only to find out I’m too late to get what I wanted. “Hmmm, dreamachine.com is taken.”

“Fuck, by who?”

“Some guy in Washington.”

“The fuckin’ Feds? The CIA? You think they’re developing a weapon to use on terrorists? Sort of like waterboarding? Those fucking illegal detainee, Spanish Inquisition, cock — “

“No, Charlie. Washington state.”

“Those fucking coffee-drinking, flannel-wearing, salmon-eating fuckfaces.”

“Right. I can get dreamachine.info. That might be good for people who want to get information about it, right?”

“How about fuckmachine.com?”

“What?”

“Just covering the bases. I mean, you’re not sold on the name of this thing yet, are you?”

“I’m not calling it a fuck machine!”

“Suit yourself.”

“How about thedreamachine.com — it’s available.”

“Ugh, so predictable. Fine.” Charlie exhales as he says fine to let me know exactly how much of his brilliance is going to waste.

I start picking out colors, and fonts, using their templates. The entire time Charlie can’t believe I’m ignoring his creative vision. We compromise on keeping his voiceover from the script and recording it for the website.

We add testimonials, pictures, and contact information. It looks semi-professional.

Charlie says, “You know what would push it over the top? If we got some pictures of some hot college girls wearing the machine. You know, let your inhibitions go with this dream helmet.”

That’s Charlie. Always the problem solver.

“I don’t think so, man.”

We start emailing my story and website around. Tonight Show. Late Show. Today Show. Good Morning America. Local news. USA Today. Chicago Tribune. Sun-Times. Chicago Picayune. Blogs. Anyone I think will give me the time of day.

A week goes by. Nothing. I start calling, following up with everyone I sent it to. Everyone I talk to gives me the same response, as if there was one person writing rejection letters for the entire world.

It’s all about who you know. And I don’t know Jack Shit.

I consider going in a different direction. Taking it to the people. Putting it on YouTube. But I don’t need public interest. I need private funding. I need a research and development team. I need assembly line mass production.

I wonder how many good inventions just die on the workshop table?

Another week goes by, and I don’t know who to talk to or what to do. I bet George Washington Carver didn’t have this problem. I bet even if I had invented peanut butter I still wouldn’t know what to do with it. Can you imagine the world without peanut butter? Good thing I didn’t screw that up. All I’m doing right now is depriving the world a chance to control their dreams. I’m not taking away Reese’s cups.

I wake up on Thursday the 25th and don’t have to go to work. Even Lara has the day off. It’s Thanksgiving.

Only I don’t have anything to be thankful for. Just a pile of rejection letters.

I wonder: If I had known that this was going to be a disaster, would I have still gone through with it? The months of late nights and late fights and everything else. Was it worth it?

I’m looking for answers in a piece of dry turkey that I overcooked. My mouth chews and chews it. I don’t even like turkey. I’m only eating it out of habit.

I’d really rather be eating pizza. That would be a main dish worth saying thanks for.

Mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and a deep dish pizza with a giant sausage patty.

The more I chew the same stale piece of turkey the more I contemplate what my life has become. Is this all there is? Is my life just a countdown of how many years I have left? Marked by every November when we gather around to eat a stupid bird that can’t fly.

I’m so thankful.

Monday comes and I’m back at work. Spending all day thinking about what I’m going to do. Not just with my machine. But with the rest of my life.

I don’t come up with anything.

That night — three weeks after I got the machine to work — I get a phone call.

My cell’s in my pocket, but I don’t feel it vibrate. Instead, I just hear the beep. The notification of a voicemail.

“Yeah, this is Ricky from the booking department of The Today Show, calling for James Delmar. We just had a lizard expert cancel so we’ve got an open slot in the 9th segment on Thursday. Bring your dream machine. We’ll use you to fill about 6 minutes. We’ll put you up for one night in a hotel but we won’t pay to fly you out here.”