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There was not a town, and then quite suddenly, there was.
-
Carlos is very busy. He can be forgetful of the little human things, that he needs to sleep and eat and live.
Cecil is very understanding about this. He knows that Carlos subsists off of pure science, off of thought and reason. He knows that this is Carlos’ funny little quirk that he needs to work around, in the same way that if he had dated the Scout master he would have dealt with a man in constant communion with terrible things and small children, which are sometimes the same thing.
Cecil deals with it by leaving Carlos food and post-it notes reminding him of things that needed to be done. Carlos listens to the radio every night now, like every citizen of Night Vale does, so Cecil reminds one listener in particular that although the lights overhead may be frightening and mysterious, they will be there tomorrow. Probably.
Carlos, beautiful, perfect Carlos, is a very busy person. So busy that he never bothered telling anyone when his birthday was. Cecil only found out when a card arrived in the mail, a week late and clearly opened, probably by a vague yet menacing government agency such as the newly opened post office.
“I understand why you might not have told me,” Cecil says. “After all, not everyone likes celebrating their birthday and another step towards the inevitable void. But, well…”
Carlos laughs sheepishly. “I forgot myself,” he says. He gently pulls the card from Cecil’s hand and sets it aside. “I don’t think it’s that important. I passed the milestones a while back, and I won’t be fifty for a while yet. My birthday is pretty irrelevant for now.”
“Your birthday is not irrelevant,” Cecil says, outraged. “It’s the day you came into the world. What a day that must have been! A rare day, to befit a being as rare as yourself entering this world. I’m sure your hair was already long and perfect.”
Carlos smiles. He still feels awkward when Cecil speaks about him like that, to be so openly praised and obviously adored. “I don’t know what the day was like,” he says instead. “I never asked my mother.”
“I would love to know if you did ask her,” Cecil says earnestly.
Carlos nods. “I’ll let you know,” he says, looking at the card. His age is written on the front, which is considerate, as he may have forgotten it at some point in all of his thoughts about science. He looks back at Cecil, who is neither tall nor short, not old nor young. He suddenly feels doubt, a feeling that reverberates through his bones in a very unscientific manner to jar his brain and lever his mouth open.
“How old are you?” he asks.
Cecil looks at him blankly. “Hm?”
“I guess it isn’t important,” Carlos says, taking Cecil’s hand.
Cecil smiles. “Of course.”
-
Of course, even a town as strange as Night Vale does not just appear. Towns, on the whole, are built slowly and over time. Buildings can spontaneously arise, and people may unexpectedly appear in the square with all their worldly possessions stacked around them, but towns take some time to build.
But while a town is being built, is it really a town?
-
Carlos asks others. He’s just curious, which is probably the only reason why he really remembers it past the first day. He makes a few offhand comments to people as he takes notes, or gathers readings on particularly interesting phenomena, or cowers from the terrifying thing on Crinoline Street.
He is surprised by the answers he receives. Mostly because he gets no answers. His questions are answered by blank stares, by noncommittal shrugs, by people screaming loudly and running away while making a warding gesture.
Eventually, he goes to old woman Josie, in part because she asked him over for more cornbread muffins and also because she is the only one who can remember what happened last Tuesday, which Carlos remembers as being vaguely important. But she is also one of the oldest people in town who is not completely addled, so she probably has the best idea about Cecil’s age.
Old woman Josie, who lives with angels, mostly tells him about omens and portents. And that all angels are named Erika, with a ‘k’. She repeats this meaningfully until Carlos sets up the calligraphy brush and inkpot to messily scrawl this in his notebook.
She tells him that as long as she can remember, there has always been a radio with a talk show in Night Vale. But she is old, and can’t quite remember if it has always been the same person. She does say that the radio keeps getting quieter, and she wonders if angels cause interference with radio waves.
Carlos politely does not point out that she seems to be going slightly deaf, and that her radio is buried under layers of quilts so that a pure E sharp tone can barely be heard.
He asks the angels, or tries to. Old woman Josie tells him sharply that the angels don’t truck with just flat out telling people things, as god (or God; the newspaper editor apparently was tearing her hair out over the distinction and the number of people writing in to complain about its usage in the imaginary edition no matter how she spelled it) preferred people to work things out on their own.
The angels float quietly and say nothing. Or at least, nothing that Carlos can hear.
Carlos walks out and reassures the agents outside that he most certainly did not speak to any purely hypothetical and entirely impossible angels.
He feels as though he is getting the hang of living in Night Vale.
Cecil seems to agree, as he excitedly recounts Carlos’ adventures to his audience. Carlos wonders how he always knows what is going on.
-
A town is an urban area that has a name, defined boundaries, and a local government. But in a purely singular sense, a town is a community of a town, the urban area with defined boundaries.
Night Vale’s boundaries, while at times vaguely defined, are most certainly there, and have been for a very long time. Perhaps for as long as people had been building the town.
The town, in a singular sense, is most certainly there as well, for a not quite so long time. But it is the singular sense that is important.
-
“It’s the weirdest thing,” Carlos says, leaning back against the counter and watching the seismograph, which is busily churning out reams of paper covered in shaky black lines. “No one feels anything, but it still picks up vibrations. I tried moving it a couple of times just to be sure it wasn’t just on a wobbly surface.”
“Goodness, haven’t you been fiddling with this since you first came to town?” Cecil asks, fidgeting in his chair.
Carlos laughs. “Yeah. I’ve given up hope of ever understanding, but every now and then I turn it back on. Just to see if it’s still going.”
“It certainly is going,” Cecil says. “It’s very neat! Very science-y. Like you!”
Carlos covers his mouth with one hand, pretending to study the seismograph, but he is really hiding a smile. Cecil is so very eager, so excited about everything Carlos does, even if he does not always understand it. Cecil will willingly sit and listen as Carlos rambles on about the strange things he has uncovered that day, making interested noises whenever Carlos pauses for breath.
Carlos finds this surprisingly endearing.
“Do you want me to show you how to read this?” he asks.
“Oh, would you really?” Cecil says, standing up. He inches closer, grinning nervously.
“Come over here,” Carlos says, tugging on Cecil’s hand. “You want to see-“
The seismograph goes into fresh paroxysms, pen waving wildly across the paper.
“Wow, there goes a doozy,” Carlos says. “See how big the line is?”
“Yes, I do,” Cecil says, pressed against Carlos’ side.
“I normally don’t see earthquakes that big,” Carlos says, squinting at the paper. “They’re usually smaller and don’t last so long.”
“Really?” Cecil asks.
“Yeah,” Carlos says. “I wish I had data from a few years back. I think some comparisons over time might be helpful. Probably wishful thinking on my part.”
“Never regret thinking,” Cecil tells him. “That’s what brought you here. Or maybe it was your parents not thinking, in the end, but more immediately, it was you thinking.”
“Of course,” Carlos says, but something is tugging at his memory. “Cecil, when’s your birthday?”
“W-what?” Cecil asks.
Carlos ignores the suddenly spasmodic twitching from the seismograph to focus on Cecil. “Sorry, I know it’s a bit random of me, but
I guess I wanted to know when you were born. Just so I know if I need to be picking up a present,” he says with a gentle smile.
“I wasn’t born,” Cecil tells him. “I just appeared here.”
Carlos considers this. “Oh, all right then,” he says. He will never understand Night Vale. “Do you remember the date?”
“February 30th,” Cecil says. He checks his watch. “Oh! I have to go. The show, you know,” he says apologetically.
Carlos smiles and shakes his head. “I understand,” he says, and means it.
Cecil jogs out the door, waving goodbye. He blows a kiss just before he leaves.
Carlos laughs and rubs his neck. He watches as the seismograph slowly settles, until there is only the faint, occasional tremor that he is used to seeing. He shuts the seismograph off and turns on the radio. Cecil should be on soon.
-
Humans, in the singular sense, believe in many things. A community, like a town, also singular, can believe in many more things.
Generally, not enough people believe hard enough for anything to really happen. This is widely known to anyone who has attempted to pass a new ordinance to prohibit people from opening inter-dimensional portals in the middle of the night.
But in Night Vale, the citizens have learned to believe very strongly in Night Vale itself and in the information that is given to them.
But when you can trust no one, or everyone, who is the best person to trust to give you the important information?
-
“Listeners, adding it up, I do believe that I am the same age as Carlos! Imagine that, being the same age as such a wonderful, beautiful person. I feel very, very, honored.”
Carlos smiles faintly, moving about his lab. He is fully engrossed in his work once again, only partially listening to the radio. He will remember the words, of course, and he may even think about them later, but it is doubtful that he will wonder how Cecil counts his age. Carlos will probably never realize that Cecil’s birthday is a very rare thing, coming only on the years that a toad sits on a chicken’s egg, which is maybe once every decade, if you are lucky.
Carlos will never quite realize that Cecil’s age is not how old he is, although he will know it in a strange, unscientific way that he never gives credit to. Carlos will not know that Cecil is only a little bit younger than the town, which has boundaries that are not precisely set, but just as old as the town, which has a very definite although often disappearing community.
In the end, it doesn’t really matter, because while Cecil may be right to fear for the things we do not know that we do not know, Carlos and Cecil are in love, which is very important in combating the things we do not know.
Cecil, you see, is very busy, but he never forgets the little human things. He does not forget to eat and sleep and live. Cecil is human, or as close as one will ever be to human, and he appreciates it too much to ever forget the little human things.
Like being in love with a perfect scientist, who occasionally forgets how to be a human.