The Visible Man by Chuck Klosterman Read Free Book Online Page B

the man in the suit was standing in front of a brick wall, the third party would see the bricks. These bricks would only be a reflection, but they’d match the rest of the wall. It would be an imperfect match, but close enough to fool anyone who didn’t know what they were looking for.
    Does that satisfy you?
    [I say, “Not really.”]
    Of course it doesn’t. How could it? I’m already dumbing this down to a level where it barely makes sense to me. Seriously, Vicky—don’t concern yourself with science. I don’t know why it matters to you, anyway. Here’s all you need to know: At Chaminade, we constructed something akin to a ninja suit. They almost looked like a child’s pajamas. In my apartment, two years later, I finished the translucent cream. It took another ten months to concentrate that cream into a mist so that I could apply it as an aerosol. That was harder than I thought it would be. In many respects, that was the hardest part. The only way I could do it wasby trial and error. I don’t even want to think about that period of my life. It was incredibly tedious. But like I said—these details are not your concern.
    Now, if I put on this ninja suit, and I shave my facial hair and I put on a pair of goggles, and I spray down the suit and my hands and my feet and my face with this concentrated cream, an optical illusion occurs. You won’t be able to see me. Instead, you will see what’s directly behind me, and you’ll interface with that false image at the speed of light. And like I said before, because this process unnaturally bends the light source, my fabricated image will be a little off. It will be less sharp and less vivid. The difference is roughly similar to the disparity between high-definition and standard-definition television, if that helps your imagination. The match won’t be perfect. But it will be close enough.
    Now: Does that satisfy you?
    [I say nothing.]
    The decision you’re going to have to make, Vicky, is how much this mental hurdle is going to impede your ability to work with me. I understand how strange it must sound. But here’s the thing: It’s not that strange, or at least not as strange as it feels at this specific moment. What the military wanted—and what I eventually finished—was simply a way to be unseen. They probably wanted to be unseen in order to murder Afghani dissidents, but my motives were different. I’m not a terrorist. I’m just a person. So can we get back to the problems that matter?
    [“Yes,” I say. But then I casually said something that enraged Y ____. I said, “It’s just hard for me to accept that you’re the Invisible Man.”]
    Jesus Christ. Did you really say that? Am I drunk right now? Are we six years old? Are you really a therapist? Where did you go to school? Did they make you read books there, or did you get one of those online degrees? I am not an invisible man, Vicky. It’s not the fifties. I’m not black. People can’t be invisible . Sorry to disappoint you. You can’t see directly through something that’s not, you know, made of fucking Plexiglas. I didn’t drink a potion and disappear. I’m not fucking Gyges. There’s no magic ring. I don’t wear a cape. That’s not how it works. I was never invisible . I was always there. Jesus fucking Christ. Don’t you know how the human eye works? An invisible person would be totally blind. You realize that, right? A transparent retina wouldn’t register color. This is a little offensive, to be honest. More than a little. I spend all that energy explaining the cloaking process to you—despite my apprehensions, knowing you’re not a scientist—and still, this is what happens. You think I’m H. G. Wells. Actually, that’s not true. I’m sure you have no idea who H. G. Wells even is. They probably don’t cover that at the University of Phoenix. He’s probably not pictured on their home page. Do you know who Chevy Chase is? He was the invisible man, once. Maybe you think I’m