Water of Life
by Jeffrey Greene
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Table of Contents parts: 1, 2, 3 4 |
part 1
Coleman Stillworth was acutely aware that his name sounded like everything he wasn’t: tall, thin, rich, WASP-ish. In fact, he was a dark, balding accountant of modest height and means, thirty-six years old and unmarried, born and raised in Duluth of mixed Jewish/Gentile parentage. He had a decent job with a national insurance company in Minneapolis until he interviewed for and, to his surprise, got a job in the accounting department of a lobbying firm on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., and moved there in September. The shockingly high housing prices in the D.C. area necessitated his subletting a condo on the Northwest side.
On the day he moved in, his landlord, a tall, gray-bearded Sikh named Mr. Singh, began venting about the previous tenant, a Ms. Helen Merrivale, who had moved out “in unseemly haste” three weeks before without giving notice and leaving piles of books and personal belongings for Mr. Singh to dispose of, a hauling job that far exceeded her security deposit and put him in a mood to freely disparage her in front of Stillworth.
“She disappointed me dreadfully,” Mr. Singh told Coleman, shaking his white-turbaned head. “In a word, I was conned.”
It didn’t occur to Coleman at the time to wonder why or even if she had done such a thing. He knew he had the tendency, inherited from his mother, to expect the worst from people. So he let Mr. Singh go on about what a lying, irresponsible fraud Ms. Merrivale was, clearly implying that he himself had better not be another deadbeat in disguise.
Two weeks later, Coleman received further evidence of his predecessor’s carelessness in the form of two five-gallon bottles of spring water left outside his door, stamped with the inscription: Water of Life. Apparently, Ms. Merrivale hadn’t bothered to close her account before moving out.
The condo association had strict rules about everything, of course, including delivered goods being left in the hallway, so he carried the bottles inside. They sat in a corner for a few days while he procrastinated over what to do about them. But he soon decided that a regular supply of spring water was preferable to the poor-tasting stuff coming out of his faucets, intending to call the water company as soon as he got around to it and get the account in his name.
One thing the landlord had not hauled away was a chilled water dispenser, so Coleman opened one of the bottles and upended it into the dispenser, then drew a glass and tried it. To his pleasant surprise, it tasted wonderful, or as close to wonderful as water ever tastes: clean, pure, with a subtle suggestion of effervescence, though he couldn’t see any bubbles in it, and unusually refreshing.
Draining his glass, he poured another and, as he drank it, he began to feel, well, better about everything, his life, his health, his prospects for success in his new job. He may have felt more whole and complete in that moment than at any time he could recall.
It occurred to him that Water of Life might be one of those so-called “smart” waters, laced with caffeine, vitamins, even sugar, although there was certainly no sweetness detectable in this water. But he’d never heard of doctored water being sold in five-gallon bottles, and the label carried an ingredient list that was exceedingly brief: “pure mineral-spring water.”
His job kept him very busy, and it was a few days before he had a spare minute to call Water of Life. Or rather, tried to, since he soon discovered that the company wasn’t listed either in the city directory, Information, or in Maryland or Virginia. He searched every variation of “Water of Life” and found no water company by that name, which was disturbing, conditioned as one is these days to finding everything on the Internet.
He had no choice but to wait for the bill and then straighten things out with a phone call. By now he was drinking Helen Merrivale’s spring water every day and finding all other water — in restaurants, water fountains, office coolers — not only inferior-tasting, but devoid of those salutary properties that he had quickly come to depend on for the ebullient personality for which he was now known among his co-workers. The effect, he observed, had none of the crudely stimulating or addictive effects of drugs like caffeine or nicotine.
He continued his moderate consumption of coffee, beer, wine, and the occasional cocktail but noticed that Water of Life seemed to provide a brighter backdrop to everything he did, thought and felt. If he hadn’t yet drunk any on a given day, and then went out for Happy Hour with co-workers, he felt the usual brief intoxication followed by the jaded aftermath common to depressants like alcohol. With Water of Life in his system, liquor spurred and stimulated, setting his brain alight with emotions and ideas.
Having tried going a day without drinking a glass and observing himself, he could no longer doubt that Water of Life helped him enjoy life to the fullest, sharpened his senses without distorting them, pushing him just slightly past his natural reticence and dry temperament. He slept deeply and soundly every night, his dreams filled with color and light. His mind seemed to work faster and more efficiently, as did his body. The face he saw in the mirror had the glow of perfect health. He had become, for the first time in his life, popular.
On a Saturday morning, the same day, coincidentally, that he’d just drained the last of the second bottle of Water of Life, there was a forceful knock on his door. By the time he’d crossed the room and opened it, the blue-shirted delivery person was already disappearing around the corner at the end of the hallway. Two more bottles of water were outside his door, but this time one of them had a blue envelope taped to it, and it wasn’t addressed to Ms. Helen Merrivale, but to Mr. Coleman Stillworth. How they’d gotten his name he had no idea, though at the moment, so pleased was he to see another month’s supply delivered to his door that he didn’t really care. He hauled them inside and opened what he assumed was an invoice.
Accompanying it was a hand-written letter that welcomed him “into the family of Water of Life, both stewards and purveyors of the most precious gift of Mother Earth, absolutely pure drinking water.”
We hope you’ve enjoyed your complimentary first month’s supply of Water of Life, and so confident are we in the quality of our product, that we have taken the liberty of delivering, unasked, your next month’s supply.
If the price below seems high, remember that our product is unconditionally guaranteed to be the best and purest water you will ever drink, which covers our considerable production costs and quality control. The location of the spring is a closely guarded company secret, but I can tell you that the journey to and from the spring itself is arduous and expensive, requiring two weeks by mule train into one of the most remote and inaccessible mountain ranges on the North American continent. We make the journey just six times a year, so our supply is always limited, and our clientele is of necessity small but intensely loyal.
In the interests of conservation, our policy is to limit each customer’s supply to ten gallons a month. Periodic rate adjustments will appear on your bill, which are strictly necessary in order to maintain the service we are proud to provide.
The letter was signed, “William Chowilawu, Hopi Nation, President and C.E.O., Water of Life, Inc.”, and the amount of the invoice was a shocking two hundred dollars. The company address was a post office box in Window Rock, Arizona, and there was neither a phone number nor a website listed on the letterhead.
Coleman didn’t need a calculator to figure that his wonderful mountain spring water was costing him twenty dollars a gallon, or $2.50 a pint. Still, there was no denying that Water of Life actually lived up to its advertising, and that he would pay more for a glass of beer and not feel nearly as good. He mailed them a check on Monday.
The thought of life without his water’s subtle but essential qualities of enhancement had even then become, if not quite alarming, certainly a condition to be avoided. He wasn’t really worried that he might be developing a dependence since, he reasoned, it is medically impossible to become addicted to water. True, he desired a continuous supply of it, as anyone would, but water being a physical necessity, he chose to fill that need with Water of Life.
And he knew, at least intellectually, that if the company providing it were to go bankrupt or their spring run dry, he would simply have to fall back into the ordinary condition of life as he had known it before: the world according to tap water, where he would be just another cubicle drone instead of the office wit.
The letter from Water of Life, Inc. had emphasized its limited inventory and, although he selfishly guarded his monthly allotment, finding that it was just enough, he occasionally shared a glass with people who interested him without, of course, telling them anything about it. There was Julie Bartel, for instance, who lived two floors above him. They might never have met, and certainly not socialized, had he not chosen to break the tacit silence of elevator etiquette and spoken to her.
Coleman had seen her before, on the first day after moving into the building, and in his pre-Water of Life shyness, had found her quite attractive in a chilly way, and probably unattainable. Surveying her slim, impeccable blondness, imposing height, at least the equal of his five-feet-nine, her tasteful jewelry, her notable absence of a wedding ring and her blue pinstripe business suit, she had struck him as the type who would grudgingly offer a limp hand as he introduced himself, her dry half-smile provoked less by his audacity than by the comic dissonance that his physical appearance often caused when juxtaposed with his name.
Copyright © 2019 by Jeffrey Greene
