Entanglement Read Free Page B

sure?”
    Jack kissed her lightly. “Yes, I’m sure. I’ll see you later.”
    He headed toward his room and parted the batik curtain that served as his door. Inside was a mattress, a video-editing dock, a computer, and a pile of clothes. He pulled off his shirt, kicked off his combat boots, and threw himself down on the mattress, putting his hand on his head.
    Jack had lived in this room for almost two years, ever since he and Charlie, his twin brother, had gone their separate ways. A part-time art student, Jack had received a short-term scholarship that had recently ended. Now, in order to make ends meet, he had to work three different odd jobs and share a floor of the warehouse with a group of friends.
    Decorating the walls were photocopies of his digital creations—vines, tentacles, and futuristic landscapes, somewhere between cyber and organic. Beside the bed was a stack of books by a variety of authors, philosophers, and theorists: Albert Camus, Buckminster Fuller, Khalil Gibran, Aldous Huxley.
    He grabbed one from the top of the stack and tried to read, but he couldn’t concentrate. He finally tossed the book down and turned off the light.
    The ceiling above his bed was decorated with glow-in-the-dark stickers of the solar system—hundreds of stars, moons, and planets.
    Jack stared at the sky above him, his breathing heavy. Something was very wrong. His chest felt constricted, as if something were sitting on it. As he shut his eyes, he was overcome by a dreamlike vision, a series of disjointed images, all set in the desert. There were hands on a Humvee steering wheel, a flash of a khaki uniform, the sound of an engine grinding its gears.
    Sunglasses reflected the white-hot sun and miles of desert. The sweating face of his twin brother, Charlie, suddenly looked up at a hilltop ridge to the left of the Humvee, where there stood a strange creature. A coyote or a wolf? Then, a male scream, a sudden flash of light, and a loud ringing in his ears.
    Jack jumped up, covered in sweat. “Charlie!” he cried, just as the coyote’s face also appeared at the foot of his bed with a great snarl. Jack was breathing fast, his eyes wild as he looked around.
    â€œOh, God—oh, God!”
    He stood up and rooted around frantically in the clothes on the floor until he found his cell phone. He flipped it open and pushed buttons until he came to his senses. Charlie was in Afghanistan. He couldn’t be reached on a cell phone.
    He moved over to his desk. The screen on his laptop lit up, reflecting his own panicked face. When he tried to get online, a message popped up as he opened the browser: “No connection available.” He tried to log on to Skype, but still the same message appeared. He looked out the window to see a crack of lightning flash across the sky, followed by a low roar of thunder.
    â€œCome on, come on.”
    He reached down and checked whether the ethernet cable was plugged in and saw that it was. He checked the screen again; still no service. He pounded on his keyboard.
    He followed the ethernet cable out of his room, down the hallway, to a high ledge where it ended. Climbing onto the ledge, Jack found that the modem was blinking red.
    â€œDamn it!”
    Shirtless, he moved into the large open space where Alma was sitting with a few of her friends on the floor.
    â€œHow long’s the Internet been down?” he asked her.
    â€œHi, sweetie! How’re you feeling?”
    â€œWhy’s the Internet down?” he asked.
    â€œI don’t know. What’s going on?”
    He stormed past her into an alcove where Sam sat reading.
    Sam gazed at his friend’s face. “Dude, what’s the matter?”
    Jack said, “I need to talk to my brother, and the Internet’s down.”
    â€œSo can’t you call him?”
    Jack gave him a withering look. “He’s in the service—in Afghanistan. How many times have I mentioned