Coming of Age in the late 1970's

November 6, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

My names is Charles Piper, and I’m 15 years old. I live at 215 Oak Street in Pleasnatville NJ (close to Atlantic City). I go to Pleasantville high school, my favorite show is CHiPs, and I have to do this homework assignment in response to the Iranian Hostage Crisis for Mr. Leeds’ Social Studies class. A couple days ago, while watching Welcome Back Kotter, I saw a news report that said a group of Muslim students and militants took over the Embassy of the United States in support of Islam or something. They’ve got like 52 of our people and I think the Russians are helping them. I think we should use Delta Force or something to get them back.
America is the best country and the Russians are evil and don’t have any food and have to wait on line for everything, but here we have freedom of speech and whatever so we’re probably better off. They don’t eve believe in god. In Iran they call God Allah which is from Islam.

I will pray for those kids and people in Iran who are hostages. I hope they come home safe and I hope we punish whoever has them captive.

Sometimes I wonder what It’s like in Russia or Iran with no God and no food and everything, but then I am glad to be in the best town in the best country, Pleasantville, NJ, where I can have freedom of religion and do what I want. I asked my parents and they told me to pray for the poor hostages. I will pray for them every night, although I’m not sure how much that helps. I think they need guns, not prayers.

In conclusion, Islam sounds like a bad and dangerous religion and I think the Russians probably started this.

November 8, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

I got a C- on my last assignment, and I’m honestly not sure why I’m writing this, but it feels good to write down what I’m thinking. I’m Charlie Piper. My sister Maureen is 12. My mom and dad work for a guy named Andre Borgata, somewhere out of town. I am fifteen years old and I go to Pleasantville High School, in Pleasantville NJ. I watch CHiPs, I Listen to AC/DC, Blue Öyster Cult, and Pink Floyd.

I wanna do it with Maryanne Slater in the worst way possible, but I am cool with her boyfriend Dave Grobin so I won’t. I fucking hate the Lacrosse team, especially Mike Zvoncheck, who kicks my ass and once gave me a swirly in the boy’s locker room. I have two Hustlers I found in the woods behind Krausers and half a bottle of scotch that I stole from my dad. I also found a gun in his bedside table once and he doesn’t know I know that it’s there.

The coolest guy I know is probably Paul Castellano. He’s a senior and next year he’s graduating. He’s got a T-top Trans Am he’s working on, I’ve seen a picture of it, it’s sweet. He’s probably gonna join the army when he graduates and kill like a million Russians or something. We read Hustlers and smoked behind Krausers once. He said if I learned drums I could be in his band.

I also have nightmares about WWIII like every night. It starts with the sirens, like I’m watching TV with my sister and my folks are out and then the screen does that Emergency Broadcast thing. It makes that sound and then I hear the sirens. I run to the door and I expect to see jets and Russians and parachutes and shit, but instead it’s all quiet, except for a dog barking. And I stand on the lawn in the dark with Maureen, and I see this tidal wave of light from the north, up by Atlantic City. Maureen holds my hand and she says

“Charlie? Can I go inside and get Missus Beazly?”

Which is her doll, but I shake my head. We stand on the lawn together; I don’t know where my parents are- out like fucking always- and I see Maureen looks really sad, only she’s not sad- I mean I guess she is, but she’s like, melting. Her eyes run out like tears down her cheeks and I know it’s crazy fast; like seconds, but it feels like a million years, and her skin gets wet and her hand feels sharp in mine and I know she’s just bones now, and the bones blow away, and so do mine, and my house, and Maryanne Slater and Dave Grobin and Pleasantville NJ and everything I’ve ever known washes away with bright, white light.

November 14, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Yesterday the Ayatollah let 13 women go. I guess everyone’s got a soft spot for the ladies.

OK so I know it’s been a while but I wanted to tell someone and I’m kind of freaked out. I was at Krausers today getting a slushy and Paul Castellano is there and I know he’s in trouble because a few days later the cops asked my dad if he’d seen this kid and showed him a picture of him, but he said no. They asked me and I said no too, since he’s gonna let me be his drummer.

Anyway, Paul and two other guys I never met were there smoking a real joint of marijuana and everything. They stayed behind the wall and the guy at Krauser’s couldn’t see them, so I went back there and they let me try it. I coughed a lot, I dunno. And one of the guys starts laughing and then they get all serious. Paul goes “Hey kid, you wanna see something?” And they start all looking around all serious to make sure no one’s looking. I said yes, I did. And while the other guys kept watch (I think one guy was named Joey and I didn’t get the other guy’s name) Paul hands me a Hustler I never saw before. He goes “ Check out Miss January” and I do, because I bet she’s got some sweet titties.

I opened it to the centerfold and the guys are all looking around and she’s pretty hot but her eyes are blacked out in every picture so she looks real freaky like in every picture. And in the centerfold she’s lying back with her legs all open so you can see everything... only he covered her poon up with masking tape. And written on the masking tape in Sharpie he wrote:

“WHY HAVEN’T YOU EVER BEEN TO THE BEACH?”

I looked up. I was pissed. I wanted to see bush and he was fucking with me. Before I could say anything, the guy at Krausers yelled at us, and we scattered. Before I ran away, Paul looked at me all serious and he was all “ask your parents.”

I went home and my folks were at one of their PTA meetings so I made TV dinners for me an Maureen. We watched TV. We watched a video of Star Wars. Maureen went to bed, but I waited up for my folks. I watched until after Carson, and they ended the broadcasting day. And I was like another four hours before my folks got home. I never realized how late they stayed out.

November 15, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Tonight we had roast chicken and broccoli for dinner. Mom and dad were bitching about Andrew Borgata. I asked why I had never been to the beach and mom got all freaked out for a second and dropped her wine. Dad jumped in and he was all “ We went to the beach when you were little, and you hated it. You got stung by a jellyfish so we go to the municipal pool instead, remember, Chuck?” I hate when he calls me Chuck.

Mom gave him a look like “thanks” but now I’m really wondering why that was such a big deal. I finished my homework and watched some TV and went to bed. I had my usual dream of the sirens and the fire and Maureen, but instead of waking up, the dream went on. I’m walking along the Atlantic City Expressway, keeping one hand on the brick of the big, high retaining wall that keeps kids and deer and shit from running onto the road. The road was empty, no cars, no people, not even any birds. And there’s this music, and it goes:

“Did you see the frightened ones?

Did you see hear the falling bombs?

Did you ever wonder why we had to run for shelter

when the promise of a brave new world unfurled beneath a clear blue sky?

The flames are all long gone but the pain lingers on. Goodbye, blue sky.”

And I walked along the wall for hours, until I came to a hole in it. I looked in the hole, and saw the road continue off into the distance, and there was Atlantic City, glowing with neon and traffic and life. Beyond it, I could see sunshine, and water, and the beach. I woke up in a cold sweat, and on the news, the hostages were all still stuck in Iran.

November 16, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Today in science class we watched a movie about farms, and it was really boring and I almost fell asleep until I saw this one scene where all the cows are walking up towards the Stockyard. And I realized they were all gonna fucking die in there. Like all of em. And that was like a zillion cows, and cows are fucking big. They can trample people if they want to! There were only like maybe ten guys working there, but the cows didn’t fight them or anything. They just walked up, because they didn’t know where they were going. I got goosebumps watching that.

We then went to some assembly for the graduating class where I got to sit next to Maryanne Slater. Her shirt neck was open so I could see part of her bra and I totally got wood. I tried to look at other stuff, but I’m just sitting there next to Maryanne with this massive rager. So I lean forward, trying to be casual, and she looks at me. And I didn’t know what to say, so like, just out of the blue, I asked her if she’d ever been to the beach. I thought it was lame, and at first she did, too- I could tell by her face. But she thought about it and didn’t say anything. When we got up to leave- my boner went down probably from boredom and I felt bad about freaking out Maryanne like that- she said “walk with me after school’

So that’s how I got to walk home with Maryanne Slater. We talked mostly about bands and stuff, like we didn’t want to talk about what I asked her during assembly, until we got to her house. And she was like,

“ I’ve never been to the beach, Charlie Piper.”

And I said hadn’t been either, although my dad said I went when I was like a little baby. I told her to ask her folks tonight. She said she would. We looked at each other a long time, and then I went home. I wanna ask her out but I’m cool with Dave Grobin so I won’t. When I got home, my mom asked where I was, I said I went to the library. The news was on. Still no change in Iran. We had steak for dinner.

November 22, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Thanksgiving! Mom and dad said a special thanks to Andrew Borgata. They thought that was hilarious. I ate a ton of stuffing, went upstairs and jerked off to Charlies Angels. I want to try drugs, but no one in town ever has any.

November 20, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

I’m pretty sure Paul Castellano has never seen the beach. Neither has Maryanne Slater or Dave Grobin, and when I asked Mike Lancaster he stopped kicking my ass and went back to his locker for a while. Breznev was on TV about something or other the other night and Maureen asked when WWIII would get here. Dad smacked her, and went to the bar.

So today, Maryanne came up to me after Gym class and told me to meet her at lunch. She said she asked her folks why she’d never been to the beach last night. They just told her to finish dinner. Afterwards she snuck out, and she had something to show me. I was supposed to meet her after Maureen went to bed.

After the Gong Show, I put Maureen to bed and met Maryanne by the retaining wall near Angelos, the lunch joint where the seniors hang out. It had that funky smell that the retaining wall walways had. Angelo’s was closed, but we walked and talked for hours, talking about TV and bands and life and our folks and everything. She likes Pink Floyd too, she has two sisters, she’s not really into Dave anymore, but she doesn’t want to break up with him until they graduate so she doesn’t have to sit next to her ex-boyfriend in third period all the time.

We walked for about four hours, until I was like “ what do you wanna show me?” She told me a story about the Atlantic City expressway, which she can see from her house. She was doing her homework and watching out the window, and noticed that in one hour, she watched a conversion van drive past, back and forth, that she’d seen the day before. She started timing it. Same car, same time, every day. Almost all of ‘em. And of course, no traffic after 9 pm. At all. She was like “ you could sleep on it” and we were there. She was right. No cars coming. None going.

I said “ Is this what you wanted to show me?”

She was like “ No.” And then she showed me we were back where we had started. The highway retaining wall loops right around Pleasantville, NJ, all the way, twenty feet high. The moon was high, and she walked down to the road, and we went down and sat on the road and started making out. I guess I’m not a virgin anymore, because we made out and she grabbed me and took off my pants and we did it right there on the Atlantic City Expressway. A few weeks ago I would have done anything to get some of that, but it was... I dunno. It felt kind of sad. She seemed really sad. We got up when the sun came up and went home and mom was super pissed that I was out all night but I was like “I don’t care I’m too sick to go to school.” and she was like “It’s Saturday.” and I was all “good” and I went to sleep.

November 25, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Maryanne Slater wasn’t in class today.

I found out she’d killed herself.

She jumped onto the Atlantic City Expressway from the retaining wall.

November 26, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Dave Grobin didn’t come in today, instead, we had a lot of videos about teen suicide and stuff about suicide hotlines. We watched “Desperate Exit” and talked to our counselors a lot, who said basically the same stuff that was on the show. We had a half day announced after lunch. When I got home, Mom and Dad asked if I wanted to talk about it. I told them she was pregnant. Mom asked her how I knew that and I said because I made her that way. She said “ That’s not funny, Charlie” and I said “Yeah, you’re right.”

Tonight David Brinkley interviewed a guy from the military who said that Russia is probably gonna move into Afghanistan soon, and it will likely start WWIII. He explained that in the event of a nuclear “exchange” - his word for it- major targets include New York, Washington, Chicago, LA, and Boston. I wonder what It will look like. Is Pleasantville far enough from New York and Washington? Will I melt, or will I just be a silhouette on a wall?

What the fuck was beyond that wall? And why did Maryanne have to die? Are the Russians doing this? Or is it us?

November 30, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

I got Pink Floyd’s new album “the Wall” today. Holy shit.

“Did you see the frightened ones?

Did you see hear the falling bombs?

Did you ever wonder why we had to run for shelter

when the promise of a brave new world unfurled beneath a clear blue sky?

The flames are all long gone but the pain lingers on. Goodbye, blue sky.”

I heard that in my dream. How did I hear that if it wasn’t out yet?

November 31, 1979

Pleasantville, NJ

Today it happened.

We had a big assembly to remember Maryanne- she was on the yearbook staff, and they had a big yearbook picture of her, and everyone could take turns saying what they wanted. Even Principal Claridge was there and said some horseshit about how she was a great student and an inspiration and everything. I could feel my stomach knot and turn as I waited to walk up onto the smooth wooden gym floor. Everyone was looking at me. I walked up to the mike and tapped on it and looked at all of my classmates. Even Mike Zvoncheck was waiting for me to talk. So I fucking talked.

I said: “I knew Maryanne better than anyone. I knew she had two sisters and I knew she was gonna break up with you, Dave, when we graduated- sorry, dude- and I knew she liked to make out on the asphalt of the Atlantic City Expressway, because there are no cars there after 9PM, even though the casinos are all open all night.

Now everyone here who has been to the beach, please raise your hands....no? No one? Everyone here who has been to the mountains? To New York? Philly? Washington? Atlantic city is ten miles away... anyone ever been there?”

Principal Claridge gave the cut-throat sign to Mr Curry and Miss Limon, and they started towards me. But I wasn’t done.

“ Anyone seen any of the kids who graduate from here ever come home? Anyone here noticed the retaining wall surrounds the WHOLE TOWN, despite us having a highway running though? Listen to me! Something’s wrong! Something’s very-”

Mr Curry grabbed me, and he had cops with him. I fought, hard, but they wrestled me harder and carried me out, even as Mr Clardige took the mike and said that I was clearly overwhelmed by my grief. Someone stuck me with something. I tried to fight to stay awake.

They pulled me outside and stuck me in the back of a cop car, but not before putting a bag over my head. I didn’t argue, but I struggled. We drove off, and I managed to mess the bag around so I could see out from under it a little bit. I saw the wall and a side street, and then I saw the green grass fade into brown/grey dust and swamp, a swamp I’d never, ever seen before, and then up and along a long, long bridge. I knew I wasn’t in Pleasantville anymore.

We drove and I twisted around so I could see where we were heading. It looked like a giant tombstone, a huge grey-black building- the biggest I had ever seen- and I could still read the sign on the top even though it looked long-since burnt out.

“ Borgata.”

Date Unknown

Atlantic CIty, NJ

I woke up in a dusty hotel room that was probably really nice, once. The TV didn’t work. My clothes were neatly folded at the foot of the bed and there was a note on top with the Borgata logo. It was on everything- the towels, the soap, the robes, everything. It had a map of the layout of the hotel, and a red line leading from my room to an office on the top floor. I started to walk out the door, when something nagged at me. I went back across the room to the big window and opened it.

And then I threw up.

Atlantic City laid out before me, dozens of buildings, all black, sooty, and gutted. Some just skeletal towers. The waves- faintly glowing- lapped over the boardwalk and the boardwalk casinos rose from the ruins like sea monsters. And on the lowest floors, the walls were decorated with what looked like a dancing mural- the white-flash silhouettes of the people who had been vaporized.

An ugly gash ran though town, terminating in the fuselage of a long-desiccated 747 that lodged in the lobby of Ballys Grand. Signs crumbled into the empty streets below. A few people meandered the streets, some pulling long chains of others bounds at the neck. Slaves.

Rising from the streets were dozens- maybe hundreds of makeshift barricades. And beyond the barricades, moving, clambering, and pressing like fans at a concert were... hundreds of thousands of dead people.

In the distance I could see the retaining wall that surrounded Pleasantville, and outside of it, hundreds more of the hungry dead. Maybe thousands. I don’t know.

Something in me just broke. I pissed my pants, fell, and shook and screamed and stared and screamed at nothing for what felt like hour.

Date Unknown

Atlantic City, NJ

“ Do you know who I am, son?”

“ Yes.”

“ Who am I?”

“ You’re Andrew Borgata.”

“ Damn straight I am. And you’re the Oak Street sector Piper boy that’s been causing all of the trouble in Pleasantville.”

“ I am. I am Charlie Piper.”

I sat in a tremendous office that looked cleaner and more well-appointed than anything else in the entire hotel. Gold and expensive furnishings everywhere. Huge picture window revealing all of Atlantic city and the ocean beyond. On the desk was a simple blotter, a razor, and a bottle of brandy. And behind the desk, the powerful, stocky frame of the man called Andrew Borgata, who’s name glowing was thirty feet tall on the roof above us. He had a thick mustache and carefully-groomed beard, and was starting to lose his hair in his late fifties. He wore a white fitted suit and a red tie and smoked a large cigar. I sensed that in this world beyond the wall, these were all unbelievable luxuries, even more so than back home.

“ So... Charlie Piper. You feel good about what you did?”

“ N... No, sir.”

“ Yeah. They always regret it. You have any questions for me, Charlie Piper?”

“ A few, yeah. What year is it really?”

“ No one knows. Maybe some time in the 2060’s? No one’s sure.”

I breathed hard.

“ OK.... OK...” I gathered my thoughts. “ Why?”

“ Why does anyone do anything, Charlie Piper?” He stubbed out his cigar as he answered his own question. “ Profit.”

I cocked my head.

“ Look out that window, way down at the streets. What do you see?”

“ Ruins. People. Chains. I dunno.”

“ Slaves, Charlie, slaves. The world runs on slaves now. They’re the only remaining industry. I’d imagine about 70% of the world’s remaining population is owned by the other thirty. Whole cities run and trade and live on slaves. Iron City, Vegasia, Stalingrad...”

“ Volgograd. They changed it in the sixties.”

“ I wrote your history classes, son, and I assure you it’s Stalingrad again. They all sell slaves. And some are cheaper, and some are stronger, but mine are the best. Atlantica slaves are the Ferraris of slaves. Educated. Cultured. Expensive. Luxurious. Enormously capable. ”

“ What.. why?”

“ There’s a situation out there, son. A gulf of education. The average schmuck out there can barely count, can’t read, and knows nothing about science, language, and radiation. Slaves are even lower- they sometimes don’t even learn to speak. That’s great if you need someone to till the fields, but what if you’re trying to rebuild London? Or assist you in backwards-engineering a generator? Or to purify a water supply?

There is a market for educated slaves, capable slaves. But the problem was one of rebellion, you teach a slave, and they begin thinking they need to not be slaves anymore. Only I had the idea to reverse the process. Only I had the vision to create Pleasantville.” He looked out the window at the wall, squinting as he continued.

“ Take children, place them in a situation of untold promise and endless opportunity. Tell them they can be whatever they want to be. Encourage them to learn. And the whole time, maintain an underlying dread of the cold war. Make sure it’s what they see when they dream at night. Make certain that it’s every last one of their nightmares. So then, when they come out, and they see the real world and what it has become... They break. They just break completely. Afraid, empty... ready to serve.”

“How... How could you?”

“ Let me be clear, Charlie Piper. The Final Nights are upon us. This...”

He stood up and stretched his arms wide, beckoning to the window.

“ ... This is hell. We can only spread suffering among our won until we, too are called.

I looked out at the glowing waves, the grey sky.

“ The Final Nights.”

“ The same.”

“ I ... I don’t understand. Have I... Undone this?”

“ Jesus Christ, Son. You think you’re first? You think you’re special? Teenage rebellion is predicated on the idea your folks are lying to you. That’s what makes the whole thing work. The Pleasantville experiment has been going on for thirty-odd years now. It cost me a fortune to build. Sure, it was a windfall to find one town miraculously intact, but I still had to secure the tapes of all major TV programming from 1976 to 1982, keep food flowing into the compound, training your “parents” and “teachers” to raise you, and of course... build the wall... enormous expense. Years of work. You think I’d let the occasional kid who figures it out destroy all that? I’m gonna let you in on something, Piper. There’s always a suicide. Always.”

He tapped a button on his desk.

“ Send her in.”

The door opened and Maryanne walked into the office, naked, flanked by guards with rifles.

“ You have two options, Charlie Piper. Work for me. I’ll even give you the girl as a starting bonus. Help me run Pleasantville.”

The Guards left her there by the door.

She quietly started to cry, making a half-hearted attempt to cover herself.

“ Your only other option is to die. I can’t let you run off to MayCape and get the do-gooders there all riled up. Pleasantville is a delicate thing. Couple of people get some crazy ideas about freeing the Pleasantville slave kids... Jesus. Ugly situation.”

“ There’s a third option.”

His eyes brightened. He smiled.

“ A third... ?”

“ I think it is the Final Nights. I think you’re right about that.”

I crossed to the window.

“ I think that I will never once be as happy or comfortable or safe as I was inside that wall. I think that everything from here on out is going to be misery and suffering, in a ratio of dishing out to taking that... I’m in no way prepared for, Mr. Borgata.”

I walked to where Maryanne stood, naked and terrified to the point of shivering. I pulsed, looking at her. Her eyes pleaded with me, secretly knowing I had no more answers than she did. I had no idea either. I was working on instinct.

“ Have you seen outside, Maryanne?” I asked.

She shook her head. I looked to Borgata, who nodded his agreement. I walked her over to the window, watched her eyes widen, watched her body heave and double at the sight of the scorched, ruined world. I stood behind her, kissed her neck, and grabbed a handful of her right breast.

“ Yes.” smiled Borgata.

“ It’s all a lie, Maryanne. Nothing was real. We lost our virginity a couple of feet from an army of hungry corpses. There’s nothing real but pain and loss and disease...”

She cried harder now. I watched as a lurid grin crept across Borgata’s face.

“ Keep going.” He encouraged me. I took the straight razor from his desk.

“ Only pain and sin are real. Keep looking.” I whispered in Maryanne’s ear as I bent her over in front of the window. I placed the blade behind her ear so she could feel the cold sharpness of it, scratched down her spine. I held her up so that she wouldn’t double over, watched a red line bloom down her back. I pressed the blade into her cheek so that the blood would mix with her tears. She cried harder.

“ Yes... yes.” Borgata moved around to the front of his desk.

I placed the blade at her jaw.

“ We thought we were warm, and loved, and safe, and out here, It’s the Final Nights. No morality. No comfort. No rules.”

I lunged, felt the hot blood spill from under my fingers. Heard the spitting and choking. I looked over to where my arm had snapped out, covered in blood and flecks of foam, and watched Andrew Borgata sink to the plush carpet.

“ It’s all mine now, Borgata.”

He blinked, clutching his blood-spewing throat, and barely choked out his words.

“ You tricked me. You tricked me. You tricked me.”

I nodded.

“ Good... lad.”

And he fell forward, dead.

I sat behind the desk, smiling, and watched Maryanne cry for a while, determined to re-adjust to madness.