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Page 60.

Alex and Maryan had other stories to tell as the years went by, but the ice cream story was their first and favorite.

They remained friends all through grammar school and high school. Her parents retired and opened a flower shop next to Ito’s news stand. Maryan worked part time there, and Alex loved to stop by on his delivery route for Johnson’s Appliance Repair. Alex and Maryan both got scholarships to Beacham University, he in prelaw and she in sciences. It was at Beacham, on a summer day not unlike the one of their ice cream truck adventure, that they were strolling arm in arm by Swan Lake on campus, when a young graduate student came down to the water with a small black dog.

“Oh what a cute puppy!” Maryan said, tugging on Alex’s arm and dragging him along so she could pet the puppy. “What kind is he?”

“She’s a six week old black lab,” the grad student said. He set down a wooden box that looked like a briefcase. “Say, how would you two like to help the cause of science?”

“I will soon be able to give you a good introductory deal at my law firm,” Alex quipped.

“I’m a science major,” Maryan said. “Any chance of getting some credit in Rector’s class?”

“Rector the biology prof?” The grad student ran his knuckles through his dark, curly hair. “That would be my boss. We’re taking blood samples for a biological experiment. I might be able to put in a good word.”

“Oh, wonderful!” Maryan said. “When do we start?”

The student let her play with the puppy while he opened his case. Alex made a wry face, recognizing that the puppy was a shill, a come-on, and what a cute one. He couldn’t resist petting it himself. In a few moments, both he and Maryan were on their hands and knees, playing in the grass while the puppy romped in cute little quick zigzags, panting, throwing itself about so its pink belly showed.

“Excellent,” the grad student said. “The puppy is actually a test, believe it or not.”

“You’re joking,” Alex said.

“I am dead serious,” the grad student said. “You guys will need to sign waivers and fill out questionnaires, but I already know you have kind and sociable personalities. That’s important.”

“Why?” Maryan said, holding the puppy up and nuzzling with it nose to nose.

“We’re doing some Government research for Homeland Defense,” the graduate student said, and from his dead-serious face Alex quickly got the drift he wasn’t joking.

“So it’s a big secret?” Maryan said as the puppy licked her nose.

The grad student laid out a rubber tourniquet, two glass test tubes, and a towel. “This won’t sting but for a moment,” he said holding a steely looking needle up.

On a lovely day like this, with the swans honking on the water as they chased bread crumbs through the greenish ripples, under a blue sky and warm sun, in an air like rich liquor, who could say no, Alex thought as he lay on his back and rolled his sleeve up. “We’re actually after stem cells,” the graduate student said. “If Rector likes your blood, he’ll invite you to the hospital for a brief outpatient procedure and you’ll be handsomely paid. I promise you.” He winked at Maryan. “It’s an easy A.”

“I like that,” Maryan said.

“Are you two married?”

Maryan looked at Alex and laughed. “Not yet. We’ve been joined at the hip since we were little kids, so who knows. Maybe one day?”

Alex made a face at her, suppressing a grin. He loved her, and she loved him. They had already planned to become engaged in their senior year of college. They had discussed getting married after he finished law school. Alex had returned from the military, and Maryan had come to New York City to spend a few days on vacation before driving home upstate.

These were the last memories, the final goodbye, the dark and sensuous moments that would survive for a million years into the future, and perhaps another million years if humankind found a new lease on its existence.

The television set in the hotel room sent waves of light flickering, like the ocean tide washing in and out under the moon, flickering at a slow and measured pace loaded with its own hidden purposes, over naked bodies moving against each other, sharing envelopes of sweat and desire, groaning with passion, two whole lives filled with hope, while the detritus of a takeout dinner sat on the hotel china nearby, and champagne smoked languidly from an open bottle.

Alex lay on his back and felt a tingling through his limbs as he became aware that it was his time to be born.

His eyes were closed but he understood he was floating in a greenish liquid swirling with ambient light. He remembered going through this once before, but understood that this was not a cave and that he was safe now.

And yet, here he was, floating in his dream, over a beach. A tropical breeze stirred in the palm trees on one side, and the ocean made loud pounding noises as breakers crashed among the rocks. Standing on a sandbar was a figure in a flowing cloak, and he knew he had seen her before. As he looked at her, she removed the winding from around her head and exposed long dark hair and pale skin. Her almond-shaped eyes, filled with anxiety, were green and crackled as if with lightning. Her mouth was contorted in a melancholy twist, and when her lips parted a low keening noise came out like a constant cry of pain and loss. Or was it a cry of alarm at terrible things yet to come? Dot. He lay very still and tried to remember what had happened to make her so sad. He couldn’t. Almost immediately, as though someone else were vying for his attention, he was torn back into another place: the lab at Beacham, where he and Maryan had so innocently signed away their blood work.

There was only a brief memory, almost nightmarish, of being in a dark office with a cold, not entirely pleasant professor with a white lab coat, latex gloves, and a light over his forehead. The professor was chewing clove gum and frowning as he finished working on the sheet-draped lower half of Maryan’s body. She cried softly with pain and held Alex’s hand while a nurse stood by and a physician manipulated cool steel scissors and other instruments under Rector’s direction. “It will all be over in a few moments,” the physician said.

To which Rector added: “You’ll enjoy a nice steak dinner on me, and I’ll give you an A on your biology survey course.”

Maryan gave Alex’s hand a squeeze and made a yelping sound.

“All done,” the physician said, standing up.

“You did great,” the nurse said.

That was all Alex could remember as he lay in the tank, immersed in water, while bubbles rose quietly and steadily around him. His eyes were closed. He couldn’t open them quite yet; but what of Maryan? Had he married her? Had they lived happily ever after? He would never know for sure.

“I am Rector,” said a man’s voice. “You have been here nearly a year now, and you will be born soon.”

Alex felt sad. He felt a sense of loss, a coldness, an absence of Maryan. He felt a vague sad memory which he slowly realized was the memory of her having died.

“I will increase your drip,” Rector’s rich, calm voice said someplace nearby. “It’s a nice drug that will calm your bloodstream and make your respiration smooth.”

Alex felt himself lying straight in some liquid, with his arms by his sides. His hands were relaxed, and he wondered if he had fingers. He was almost sure he had legs, but if he did, did he also have feet? Toes? Did he twitch an eyelid whenever Rector spoke? He wished he could see himself. He almost could, so disembodying was this experience.

“You had a terrible experience,” Rector said.

Alex felt his right eyelid twitch.

“You are completely safe now,” Rector said.

Alex felt the light growing. Lemon. Vanilla. Warm. Like ice cream.

“You are being born,” Rector said. “Be happy.”

A rubbery thing snaked into his mouth and started making pulsing sounds, like a pump, and he felt water being sucked from his lungs.

He panicked, thinking the rubber thing (which smelled and tasted like pencil erasers) was choking him to death as it filled his mouth. He gagged and tried to sit up, but restraints held him down.

As he struggled to raise up and spit it out, he lost consciousness and sank into a deep place full of faint earth-tone lights.