Jason McAuliff

St Petersburg, FL 33701
jaymcauliff@gmail.com

5,200 words

Otherwhere
by Jay S McAuliff
J was never happier than when he was a foreigner. When he
first realized this, he thought it was just the generic
happiness of the tourist experiencing new things, broadening his
horizon, becoming a citizen of the world instead of just a kid
from Missoula. This early blush soon faded as he began to
understand that there is nothing truly new, that anything he
thought he had left behind was already anywhere he might go.
There would always be a McDonalds waiting for him and there
would always be people wanting and needing in the same faulty
way as back home. Fast-food and human inadequacy seemed to be a
planetary misfortune. Oddly, this didn't temper his enthusiasm.
He just needed to look deeper as to why he was so happy to be
otherwhere.

McAuliff / Short Story / 2

The answer came to him clearly and convincingly at four

a.m. one morning while preparing for work. He was conducting his
morning ritual of 'smoking on the balcony first thing' when he
observed an accident on the street below. He was far enough away
not to be noticed, but close enough to clearly see the action of
the drama unfold. A Ferrari suddenly came into view, flying
around a sharp corner the way only a Ferrari can. It slid a
little, regained traction and catapulted into the unfortunate
bread vendor who was crossing the street as he did at this time
every morning. The car carried a bit further after the initial
resistance and deflected off a concrete barrier. The motor then
failed to turn over for the driver, who clearly had no intention
of hanging around. After a few minutes the driver got out. He
was a young man and looked very much like local royalty. This
failed to surprise J at all. Not bothering to even look at the
unconscious bread vendor, he made a quick call on his mobile.
Within ten minutes a limousine, a police van and a tow truck
arrived, no lights, no ambulance. The bread vendor was heaved
into the back of the van, a blonde woman in a red cocktail dress
was marshaled from the passenger seat of the Ferrari into the
limo, and the Ferrari itself was hoisted onto the platform of
the truck. The young driver too entered the limo and then
everyone drove away.

McAuliff / Short Story / 3

J continued to look at the scene after they were gone, not

in disbelief, but in gratitude. He now knew the pleasure of
being a foreigner wasn't from anything new and experienced. It
came from not belonging to a collective past. In this new
country he lived in, their history was not his history and their
sins were not his sins. Having disowned his own past and not
belonging to this new one, his conscience was clear. He went
back inside and put his uniform on. He was happily prepared for
a long, pleasant day of worry-free work.

The job that brought J to this small country was not at all
suited to him, and so it should come as no surprise that he was
not at all qualified for it. This did not seem to bother his
employer at all, and it certainly did not factor into K's
decision in accepting what he regarded as a rather generous
offer. It wasn't difficult work, long hours, yes, but mindless
to such an exaggerated degree that the less sleep one got the
night before, the better the following day went. At first he
tried to focus on his work, but this was counter productive, and
he soon found that a hazy soft focus made the hours go by much
quicker. At this point it should be mentioned that this job of
K's was actually quite important. His title of Force Protection
Specialist clearly indicated this. He felt a little important at

McAuliff / Short Story / 4

first too, but he and his comrades were known simply as FPSs and
the glory soon faded.
It can be supposed that the people who lived within the
perimeter that J and his cohorts were assigned to protect slept
better at night knowing that specialists were out there
safeguarding their well being. They shouldn't have. One of his
primary tasks, day after day, sometimes up to 12 hours a day,
was to search the interior and scan the undercarriages of
vehicles coming on to post. They were on the lookout for
anything illegal, but mostly they were in search of explosive
devices. It occurred to J very early on that the likelihood of
one of these devices going off in his presence would greatly
increase if he actually found it. He was therefore determined to
do everything in his power to find nothing that might cause him
bodily harm. Since he arrived back at home every night safe and
sound, that could only mean that he and his colleagues really
were specialists. After all, their success rate was 100 percent.
The bus ride to and from base was a three hour round trip.
There was about an hour wasted on menial tasks before and after
shift. And then of course there was the 75 hours a week of your
actual shift. If you were lucky you spent nine hours a day at
home, and unless you were truly greedy, you had one day off a
week. In this kind of world everything becomes a routine. If you

McAuliff / Short Story / 5

one day put your keys in a different place than where you
normally do when you get home, you will most likely ruin the
entire next day. You will wake up, not see your keys, and
crumple in despair. You will probably call in sick that day. An
unscheduled day off also means a trip to your favorite local
doctor, because you aren't going back to work unless you pay a
doctor to say you really were sick and couldn't possibly get to
work that day. And so we presently find J sitting in his
doctor's waiting room deciding just how sick he would like to be
and wondering if maybe he is sick tomorrow as well. He still has
no idea where his keys are.
He likes his doctor very much, because for a very
small fee, the doctor will allow J to dictate pretty much
anything he wants written under the doctor's letterhead, and
equally generously the doctor will actually prescribe the
pharmaceutical wonder needed to allay whatever affliction J has
decided he is suffering from. There is currently a purple syrup
that J is very much smitten with and luckily, he always seems to
be the kind of sick that this stuff fixes. After a brief but
productive meeting with the doctor, and an equally brief visit
to the window labeled pharmacy placed conveniently across the
hall, J finds himself holding what for all intent and purpose is
a three day pass and a bottle of liquid that he is 99% sure is

McAuliff / Short Story / 6

illegal in the states and has to have enough morphine in it to

pacify even the most schizophrenic of jaded specialists. As he
heads back to his apartment, vague plans begin to form in his
head. Maybe vague is too specific and perhaps plan is misleading
as well. The idea of seeing Sheila wasn't really a plan just
like putting your keys on the table by the door wasn't a plan.
Everything here was a routine. Even when it wasn't.

His first stop is the coffee shop just around the corner.
He is still trying to come to terms with his unscheduled time
off. He knows it is a good thing, but he wants to start slowly.
He sits down in his customary seat and looks out to the water.
It's another listless day. The water a dull blue, the palm trees
a dull green and everything else grey. Every shade of grey is
represented, from the puzzle-like flagstones that cover the
surface of the outside arcade, to the gulls bobbing on the
surface of the choppy chalky surface of the gulf that is halfheartedly throwing itself on the shore. In a restless mind this
scene would have done nothing but agitate and provoke, but in a
calm mind, such as J presently found his, it was pure serenity.
He sat in the atrium, watching the ocean from behind large
tinted plate-glass windows that accounted for not only the
dulling of colors, but also the muting of sound. He sat enjoying

McAuliff / Short Story / 7

the illusion, waiting for his coffee to arrive. The waiter

placed the cup before him and a slight smirk momentarily flitted
across K's face. This was his first discovery in this new place
he playfully called home. Turkish coffee, though muddy and
sluggish in the cup, acted nothing like this in his body. It
would become fast and edgy and transfer this property to him,
preparing him for the decisively erratic outside world. But not
just yet, for now he wanted to enjoy his fabricated contentment.
He reflected on this new country of his. It seemed ideal.
Outwardly the people were polite, friendly even, but distant. As
a whole, they were well off and not very interested in others.
That their fundamental beliefs were at odds with his, only made
him more at ease. What they did behind closed doors was of no
matter to him. Not my place, not my people, not my past. The
mantra. He floated along carelessly. Being detached, he was able
to wonder about things without being bothered about where such
musings might lead. What does an entire country that doesn't
need to work do? Everyone who worked here was from somewhere
else. Are they bored in their leisure? Do large questions keep
them up at night? Or do they also float along blissfully
ignorant, thinking the well will never run dry. He watched the
silhouettes of far off oil tankers slide across his vision in
the far far distance where the blue grey water met the blue grey

McAuliff / Short Story / 8

sky.
Eventually he did drink his coffee and make his way out
into the oven-like heat of midday. The road that ran along the
water here was the most beautiful he had ever seen. Houses were
mansions, mansions were palaces, and palaces were, well palaces
were behind extraordinarily high walls but they must have been
amazing to see. Each edifice was spectacular, existing
independently from the ones to its left and right. Each one a
framed masterpiece in a disorganized museum. The museum was
always open, but the art inaccessible. Contemplating entry was
like contemplating entry into a Van Gogh. Impossible except
through the imagination, and would you really want to enter if
you could? J thought decidedly not. Never get too close. Admire
from a distance, always from a distance.
He made his way along the water, and eventually found
himself in front of another coffee shop. If he had had a route
map of the kind used by bus systems, almost all of the big red
markers would have been coffee shops. In K's defense, each of
the cafes he visited was very different from the others. Each
had its own individual identity and purpose. One was for
reading, one was for people watching, one for socializing and
one for pondering. All of the coffee was the same. It was very
much like bar hopping back home. Habits don't die, they adapt.

McAuliff / Short Story / 9

He meandered into Costa Coffee. This shop had just one purpose
and her name was Sheila.
Sheila was a barista from the Philippines. She was a list
of adjectives one minute and a series of verbs the next. Loud
and quiet like a Pixies song, confident and erratic like a
Stravinsky concerto. She was neither. She was Turkish coffee and
purple cough syrup all wrapped up in one. J liked to watch the
drama she pretended she didn't create from a corner. This was
against Sheila's rules however. The circle must be entered. You
participated in conversation, you bowed to her, you gave when
the basket came around. She let him sit in the corner for a
while and then made her dramatic entrance.
"Hello J." she said, bringing over cup and saucer. "You're
looking rather dangerous today. It's not even your day off."
"I don't feel dangerous." he replied, lighting a cigarette
in order to look more dangerous.
"Oh, all men are dangerous." she said.
"Ok, all men are dangerous." J agreed. "How's the fishing
today? Catch anything yet?"
She raised an eyebrow. "I'm still reeling him in."
"Good luck with that." he laughed.
She gave a stage sigh. "All men are fools."
"So, we are dangerous fools." Looking down at the frothed

McAuliff / Short Story / 10

pattern on the surface of his macchiato. "I guess that explains

a lot."
She in turn lit a cigarette and they both fell silent.
Sheila's macchiatos always had a cloud-like heart floating on
top. It was meant to be flirtatious, but watching it slowly
dissolve into the coffee underneath, never had that effect on J.
You can have my heart for exactly this long is what it told him.
It was a duration that he felt comfortable with.
Suddenly she spoke. "I don't really consider myself
fishing. I don't think that's a fair analogy at all."
"So how about this then. Maybe you are a pilot fish,
swimming among the sharks. Cleaning their teeth, but also
stealing them one by one."
"I only take the loose ones." she pouted, "but yes, I think
I like that one better. Is it really so different where you are
from?"
He thought about it. "The lines are blurred there, but I
suppose the roles still exist."
"So you mean it's not just the men who are dangerous fools
there."
"We are all dangerous fools where I'm from." he smiled.
"You almost sound proud. This place doesn't seem so bad
now. With the men here at least I know what I'm dealing with."

McAuliff / Short Story / 11

"The men are direct here because they think they own
everything. We don't know how to say anything directly."
"It must be true then." She nodded. "I suppose you should
worry me."
"No, its ok. I'm not from there anymore."
"How convenient. Still though. I wish you had more teeth."
She took his empty cup. "I'd better get back."
"Well I should go anyway. I think the heats starting to get
to me. I'm starting to feel a little dizzy." He left the coffee
shop feeling more hazy than dizzy and knowing full-well it
wasn't the heat but the syrup causing the effect. And maybe the
coffee a little, and perhaps a touch of Sheila.
Dusk was mixing liberally with the already darker blues of
the late afternoon sky, and he decided home would be an
excellent place to be. He called Dhato. Dhato was his trusted
taxi guy. All the expats here had their own trusted taxi guy. It
was a symbiotic relationship wherein the driver would not
overcharge the customer and the customer would send more work
the driver's way. Dhato was additionally helpful in that he
always knew where to go, even when you offered him the vaguest
ideas as to what you wanted. For instance, he had originally
found for J his trusted doctor. Dhato now had J in his backseat
and was presently explaining to J that he did not want to go

McAuliff / Short Story / 12

home quite yet.

"Its not that I don't believe you." J said, beginning to
feel the full cure of his medicine. "But why don't I want to go
home yet." They were driving along dusty back streets with the
windows of the beat-up little four cylinder wide open. He
couldn't tell where the border of his personal haze ended and
that of the world's began. He just knew that they overlapped,
mingled and felt very comfortable together.
"I'm telling you. Its not just a boat party, man. I've
already dropped off three of your buddies. I saw a limo last
time too and I know, I know, I know. There will be girls there,
there will be real scotch there. There will be real money there.
Not going is not a choice. I will have failed in my duties if I
don't get you to this party."
J could find no holes in Dhato's argument. "Drive on Dhato,
drive on."

J was sitting comfortably in the kind of leather

Chesterfield chair that made you instinctively reach for your
pipe and reminisce about hunting wild boar on the Serengeti. He
was sitting directly across from a man who gave the impression
that he was all too familiar with hunting dangerous animals and
thought that there really wasn't all that much to it. He seemed

McAuliff / Short Story / 13

to have taken a liking to J because, unlike several other

people, J hadn't wandered off after 15 minutes of one sided
conversation. J had no intention of wandering off anywhere and
wasn't even at all sure that that was a possibility at this
point. Also, he was actually very interested in what the man was
saying. He seemed to be alternately confirming K's suspicions of
the world and refuting that the world existed at all. The
thought crossed his mind that he was talking to his forty years
senior self. Scotch, no matter the quality, should not be in
ones system at the same time as purple cough syrup.
"When I grow bored with one locale, I simply move on."
his older self told him. "This is why I travel by boat. There is
never a hurry. One must let the last experience fade before
beginning a new one." he said. "You must be wary of flying, it
stretches you too thin too quickly, we are not meant for the
duality of earth and air. Water is what we are." he said.
J floated in and out. His chair bobbed along with the
tide, carpet and ocean becoming one. He was caught in a current
and vaguely remembered that one shouldn't try to fight a
current, that it would eventually let him go. He continued to
nod when it felt appropriate even though the conversation was
drifting farther and farther away from him. He wished he had
brought pen and paper. He had the feeling that all of this was

McAuliff / Short Story / 14

vitally important, but already irretrievably lost. His

concentration was shot and the man droned on. His last conscious
effort was to speak to someone on a phone handed to him from out
of the nether. "Yes, yes . . . okay . . . yes . . . thank you."
He had done his part, whatever that was. He faded out as the
waves gently rocked him.

The rocking stopped about mid-morning as reality started

peeking in on J. It started with a few suggestive hints.
Multiple dings from his computer of more than a few emails
received, his phone vibrating with an uncharacteristic urgency
every few minutes. These hints went unheeded by J as he was
loathe to give up the ethereal feeling he still clung to from
the evening before. At noon reality gave up on subtleties. The
knock on the front door was like a shot of epinephrine. The
waking moment was very sharp and to the point. The noise from
the street below began on cue in an all or nothing desperate
attempt to wake god. In an instant he was once again an
involuntary member of the conscious accountable world. The panic
of his first thought quickly yielded to understanding which
quickly gave the floor back to panic. He opened the front door
to the familiar sight of the building's doorman holding his
pressed uniforms. Everything wanted to get back to normal. Work

McAuliff / Short Story / 15

would like to start again tomorrow. As he closed the door, he

was already beginning to piece last night's events back
together. There had been a lot of lofty misty talk, none of
which he could specifically remember, but that was normal. J
excelled at bubble gum philosophy. That was just another day.
Then there had been a telephone conversation. That conversation
had not been normal. He ran to his computer. A few keystrokes
confirmed what he already knew. His bank account was missing a
zero or two. Next he checked his phone. There were several
messages from the bank. The recorded voice was noncommittal and
vague, but his presence had definitely been requested by the man
from the bank he had spoken to last night. He imagined he would
have to sign something. He imagined the bank clerks would be
laughing at him behind his back. He would play it cool, it
wasn't a drastic amount of money. In fact, it was the right
price for the proper amount of folly. Every now and again you
needed to throw the dice, or you wouldn't be allowed to play
anymore. He dressed quickly.
Quick, however, was not an option as he made his way to the
bank. Pedestrian traffic was worse than vehicular traffic in
this part of the city. The commercial areas were over-run by the
common people, the worker ants. All from somewhere else. They
were just a blur to him. Always an impression with no time to be

McAuliff / Short Story / 16

painted. A dozen different cultures. A million different colors;

cloth, skin, hair swirling together. Always rushing somewhere on
some mission or other that would put a little money in their
pocket or maybe buy them a few hours of sleep. No time, their
pace seemed to suggest. In some of these peoples home countries
25,000 people or more had died the day before. Natural disaster,
their countries' main import. They were either used to it or had
no time to think about it. So many of them that they had no
individual identity to the outside observer. They were only an
obstacle to get around and how they survived wasn't important.
How to get through them was.
The bank was just across the street. He could see the large
letters just above the mass of life, and he plunged in, holding
his breath as if he were diving into a pool. Taking occasional
gulps of air, smell was added to sight. The vitality of fresh
spices mixed with the decay of stale cologne. This was the smell
of the nameless moving quickly in the hot afternoon and it
coated him with the same thoroughness that sand covered the
city. He crossed this river of humanity and reached the doors of
the bank and as they parted to let him in, the flood water
behind him closed in upon itself again.
He was greeted warmly, quickly as if they had been waiting
for him. This individual is clearly supposed to be here. They

McAuliff / Short Story / 17

offered him sugary tea and had him sit in comfort in an air
conditioned office. He was not used to being treated like this,
but he saw no reason to point this out to anyone. "The bank
manager will not be long." he was told. "Please relax." The
office had a rather elaborate restroom adjacent to it, and J
used the gold plated sink to wash the outside world off of
himself. He was well composed when the bank manager did arrive,
smiling of course, always smiling.
"It is good to see you Mr. J. I hope you have been made
comfortable."
"Yes, very much so. I was told there was a change in my
financial situation. I hope I didn't lose everything." he in
turn smiled. "In hindsight it was kind of a silly thing to do.
It wasn't that much though. You needn't bother being too
gentle."
"Oh, that's not it at all, and I apologize for the
suspense, it was a bit selfish on my part, but I wanted to be
the one to tell you." the bank manager said.
"What is it?" J asked, somehow already knowing what he was
about to hear. Somehow already watching simultaneously as both
actor and spectator.
"You, Mr J, are a very rich man today. As they say, your
ship has come in. The investment you made with us was well-timed

McAuliff / Short Story / 18

indeed. In fact, you couldn't have timed it better using a

crystal ball."
"So it really was all true then. There really was something
to it." mumbled J.
"I don't know exactly what you mean, but yes, things fell
very well for you. The time difference worked to perfect
advantage. The company found such a wealth of diamonds at the
bottom of their mine this morning that the stock went up,
practically straight up, its true. Almost minutes after we put
your order in. I've never seen such a thing." the bank manager
smiled widely. "You remember that number you jokingly told us to
sell at?"
"Yes, its coming back to me now. It was the first large
number that came into my head." said J.
"Well that is almost exactly the number we sold at. It was
a little higher because the stock was going up so quickly. But
we did as you asked."
"But that's," J paused, unable to comprehend the math.
"Thats. . ." he repeated.
"Yes. That it is." the bank manager assured him. " You are
rich beyond my wildest dreams. How do you feel Mr J?"
J began to feel less like a spectator and more like a
puppet master. He felt as though he were pulling his own

McAuliff / Short Story / 19

strings. Otherwise, how could he explain the composure, the

complete control he felt? Who was conducting this business so
efficiently as papers were passed and signed, as if this kind of
thing happened to him all the time? Who asked to have a car
arranged to take him to the Hilton and put him in the room on
the very top floor all by himself? Whoever he suspected it might
be, when he awoke the next morning, it was only him.
He stood at the window of his hotel room, looking down at
the city. His room was very high up. The very rich must occupy a
higher plain or be overwhelmed by helplessness, he decided.
They, we, must always stay at the top of very high buildings. We
must feel above it all or we will despair. Out of his window, to
the right, he could see the city compartmentalized, the machine
at work. People have been sorted and placed in the appropriate
box. They never knew. To his left he could see the coastline.
One impressive structure after another followed the contour of
the ocean shelf. The ones in those houses are far worse he
decreed. Not only were they also sorted and boxed, they thought
they were winning something because they had been allowed to
build their own boxes and make them so very big. It must have
all seemed like a fairy tale to them and they were all too happy
to live the fiction. He didn't want to live their fiction, but
he wasn't at all comfortable with non-fiction. He didn't know

McAuliff / Short Story / 20

what to do and when he looked around for the puppet master, he

was nowhere to be found. He needed a cup of coffee.

"You again." she said. She was wiping down tables

outside the shop when J approached her. The wind was beginning
to pick up a little and sand was swirling along the ground.
"Should it not be?" he asked.
"It most definitely should not be." she said, trying
to wipe away the sandy perspiration from her hairline. "Why are
you here today? This is not the routine. I barely recognize
you."
"And tomorrow you won't recognize me at all. I guess I
just wanted to say goodbye."
"Where are you going?"
"I don't know yet. You don't want to come, right?" he
asked.
She didn't answer. She bent down and renewed her
endless battle with the sand accumulating on table tops. J
walked away and the gusts of wind became stronger and more
persistent. Dhato was waiting for him with the motor running.
"Ready to go, J?" Dhato asked. He was wearing
sunglasses now to keep the sand out of his eyes.
"I don't know where to go, Dhato." J said. "I don't

McAuliff / Short Story / 21

remember any of the rules."

"Not a single one?"
"No, not a single one."
"Then there really is only one place to go." Dhato pulled a
red and white patterned handkerchief over his mouth to
facilitate breathing and then took off down a road that led to
the outskirts of the city. He didn't stop until the road ended.
"This is where I come when I'm lost. All the answers are out
here J." J got out of the car. There was nothing out here except
wind and sand, and there was definitely a storm on the distant
horizon. He turned back to the car, but Dhato was already
driving away. He didn't mind. This is all he ever really wanted,
wasn't it? The storm was definitely heading his way.

This is your desert. It is vast. It is empty. It is beyond

the manipulation of man. It is perfect. Flashes of empyrean
lightning; everywhere and nowhere at once. It is sublime in the
way that Jefferson or Thoreau meant the word and J is only on
the very edge of it. Dhato is speeding away at a rate his little
car should not be capable of. J feels like he is inside an
enormous plasma ball that he remembers vaguely from some 50s

McAuliff / Short Story / 22

science fiction movie. Is it any wonder that so many gods were

born in the desert, that this is the arena where they chose to
fight their battles? J falls to his knees, laughing at his own
fragility, laughing at the audacity of his even being here. The
sand rushes across the desert like rain moving across a lake. It
is exactly like that he thinks. And then the wall of sand
envelopes him.

Epilogue
He looked out of his window. How many times had he looked
out this same window? How was he supposed to know if it even was
the same window? How many windows was only one window? He
suspected all of them. He had no bags to pack. He had no
farewells that he wanted to make. He left rooms without the
customary once over. There was no longer anything he could
forget. It had become impossible to leave anything behind; it
would always be waiting for him wherever he arrived. How many
times had he arrived? How many times had he not? The world was
becoming too small for J. Whenever a place started to feel
familiar he would flee. He had become Adam, permitted to
relocate to a new Eden whenever his sins caught up with him. Was
the world so bad? One man's purgatory was another man's Eden
waiting to be despoiled. Which one was he again? It seemed no

McAuliff / Short Story / 23

matter how far he flew, he would arrive at the same place. The
faces the same, the hotels the same, the stores the same. This
window was the same. When he exhaled warm air against the pane
he could see the faint outline of a heart. Your memory will only
last for this long. It was a duration that J felt comfortable
with.