by Sean Platt
Nicole giggled. “I’ve been listening to you for years. I have a few bootlegs.” Then she whispered behind her hand. “I’m only telling you that because you haven’t released anything legit, so it’s all I can get!”
Natasha was flabbergasted. Spooner chimed in before she could respond.
“I’ve known Nicole for a while. We have a business relationship.” The way he said “business” and glanced at their intertwined arms made Natasha suspect that Nicole was an escort, but the suspicion didn’t faze her. Her mother had always articulated strong feelings about prostitution, but the world had changed a lot since her mother was born, and the world had changed a lot more since she’d died. “One of the things we share is an appreciation of talented artists, including you. I’ll confess I’m a little obsessed with following your growing career. I haven’t seen you before in person, but there is plenty online, and I do tend to end up in places with excellent access. Enough to stream holograms in a few cases.”
“They’re making holograms of my performances?”
Spooner gave a good-natured English chuckle. “You’d be surprised. You have a loyal group of fans. Although the holography, shoddy as it is, merely consumes bandwidth that would be better allotted for audio. I do predict improvements on the horizon, though.” He winked as if he knew something. Which, being the highly connected man he was, he almost certainly did.
Natasha’s eyes darted to the clock. It wasn’t meant to be an impatient glance, but Spooner saw it anyway.
“Oh, I’m so sorry. I know you are on soon. The other member of my party urged me not to come back, but this one — ” He ran his palm down Nicole’s arm. “ — wanted very much to wish you luck and to tell you that you have at least three very eager fans in the front row.” He winked. “Especially if you plan to sing ‘Down Deep.’ It’s my favorite.”
“Was this annoying?” Nicole asked, pinching her face into an apologetic expression. “I’m sorry if it was. But I’m a performer, and it always makes me feel good if I know some of the audience is friendly when I step out.”
“There are people in this audience who could snap a broomstick with their tight asses,” Spooner added, raising one side of his mouth in the devil-may-care grin that had endeared the world in the 2020s. “But they don’t have any minds of their own, see. We will cheer, and that will let them know that they should, too.”
“It’s not annoying at all,” said Natasha, flustered. She wasn’t sure if it was good to enter a performance riled up, but Nicole was right: Having someone in the audience whom she could confidently sing to made all the difference in the world. And Spooner was right, too: if the man who’d united the world led a round of applause, others would follow.
“Well,” said Spooner. “We will leave you to your preparations. If you would be so gracious as to join us after you’re finished, I would love the chance to speak further.”
“Of course,” Natasha said. Then, feeling that she’d answered as if conferring a favor, she added, “Thank you.”
He took her hand again and made a tiny bow. “Best of luck.”
“Good luck,” Nicole said, smiling.
Once she was alone again, Natasha realized that her nerves had washed away as if they’d never been there. She looked in the mirror. Her reflection had become beautiful and poised. More: The young girl staring back at her had become a woman. Her eyes were solid and uncompromising. She had the look of someone who’d been, who’d conquered, and who’d come home victorious.
The stage was hers. The crowd, whether they knew it or not, was hers.
On the other side of the curtain, the cellist’s set ended. Natasha didn’t wait to be called; she left the dressing room and made her way to the side of the stage. She stood tall, drawing in the audience’s energy. She knew she could captivate them.
After the stage was made ready for her, the lights dimmed. The spotlight went up. Natasha stood in its center, her heart steady and sure. This was her moment. This was her chance. She’d worked too hard not to grab on with both hands and refuse to let go.
And she sang.
When she was finished, the spotlight died into a single heartbeat. Spooner and Nicole stood at their front row table and began to applaud. The house stood with them, in their finery, all of them living lives that poor, tragic Natasha Thomas could only dream about in flights of fancy. Their eyes were wet, their expressions pleasantly defeated. Even the great Clive Spooner seemed to be sniffing back a tear.
Smiling, Natasha made her way back to the dressing room feeling ten feet tall. The cellist had long since packed up and moved out, but Natasha looked around and allowed herself to feel as if he’d never been there. This was her dressing room. Soon, Natasha would never need to share a dressing room again.
Most of her high had faded by the time she’d changed and made her way out from backstage and into the lobby. By the time she was nearing the entrance to the main dining room, she was already starting to wonder if she’d heard Spooner correctly. She was a poor girl who’d lived in tenements. She’d grown up during the world’s worst years, adding a literal fight for survival to what felt like any artist’s struggle for expression. Clive Spooner had been on top of the world since before she’d been born, and to him, the Fall that had decimated the world had probably been a mere blip. Did he really want her to join them? And for that matter, would the Layback even allow her to?
“That was an amazing performance,” said a voice behind her.
Natasha turned. She’d thought the lobby was deserted, but now she saw a dark man of medium height, his black hair slicked back, a cigarette perched between his fingers, unlit, almost like a prop.
“Thank you,” she said, disarmed.
The man walked closer. “I’ve never seen anyone sing quite like that. It wasn’t just a set of vocal pieces. It was somehow…more.”
She smiled.
The man extended a hand, and she allowed him to take hers. His hand was smooth, unused to hard work. A hand that hadn’t seen the worst of the previous decade.
“I’m Isaac. Isaac Ryan.”
“You were with Clive Spooner.” Natasha released his hand. It was hard for a fat girl to allow herself flattery and admiration, but the affection radiating from the man’s dark eyes was impossible to miss.
“Yes. He dragged me along.”
Natasha laughed. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t mean it like that. We went to dinner. I felt like a third wheel because my brother was supposed to join us but bailed at the last minute. Just me and the two of them. I wanted to leave, but they made me come.”
“Again, I’m sorry.” She was smiling wider, feeling herself playing along.
“I’m so glad I did.”
Natasha’s smile became smaller. More humble. She said nothing.
“I’m not an emotional person,” he said. “Not usually. But you were so beautiful up there.”
“Thank you.”
“Inside and out.”
Normally, that remark would make her cringe with the feel of a sideways complement. Usually, when people complimented Natasha’s soul, she felt like they were insulting its house. Not this time, though. Isaac’s eyes felt different on her somehow. As if, impossibly, he meant it.
Even softer: “Thank you.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone as captivating as you.” Then he stammered. “I…I mean, as you were out there on stage.”
“That’s sweet of you to say.”
“I think you’re going places,” he said. “I really do.”
“Thank you.” Natasha felt like a one-track recording, but it was all she could manage. He was cute. His affection was clear, and she was finding it infectious.
“You’re such a…” He paused, seeming to wonder if he was saying too much. She took another step forward, to encourage him. “Such a…Such a…”
“I sure am,” she said then smiled and touched his arm.
“Such a…a MOTHERFUCKING BITCH!” Isaac scre
amed.
Natasha shook her head, feeling a snake’s smile slither across her lips. Her thin, long-fingered hand was tented on the chaise in their apartment’s front room, tips pushing into the responsive foam through the five-thousand-credit upholstery she’d had it refitted with the month before for no reason at all. She had a few more weeks on Isaac’s Directorate dole before she launched off on her Enterprise own. It made sense to milk it.
“Now, now. Is that how you convince a lady to see things your way?”
“Fucking cunt! You fucking vindictive, spiteful cunt!”
“You sound like you have that disorder that makes you swear over and over for no good reason. The one that causes you to generally make a spectacle of yourself so that everyone points and laughs behind your back. What do they call it? Oh yes. ‘Isaac.’”
“Are you kidding me, Natasha?”
Natasha watched as he began to stalk across the apartment, the effect of her bomb finally sinking beneath his infuriatingly impotent exterior. He was so spineless and worthless, battered about by the whims of others: Micah’s, his mother’s, his bosses’, the entire Directorate constituency’s, Natasha’s. She wasn’t going to agree with Isaac about the parties no matter what, but she’d at least respect him if he had a backbone. He didn’t, though, and throughout nearly sixty years of marriage, she’d always held the upper hand. She loved having control but simultaneously loathed his weakness.
“I’m not kidding,” she said. “What better way to celebrate my triumphant return to Enterprise than with a comeback concert?”
“You don’t need to ‘come back’!”
Natasha shook her head, enjoying the argument’s single side. Isaac was furious. She was cool and perfectly calm. She held all the cards — and was holding his balls for excellent measure.
“Oh yes, I do, love,” she said. “How long have I been Directorate just to satisfy your need to look good to…well, to everyone? A strong man wouldn’t mind his wife belonging to a different party. In fact, if you had testicles, you might see it as a strength. Because what could possibly make you look more confident in and dedicated to your cause than being able to show me off and say, ‘I have chosen what is best for me and am not threatened by my wife’s decision to choose what is best for her’?”
“That’s not the point, and it’s not what happened at all, and…”
“But that’s not how the Directorate works, is it?” she continued, bulldozing through him. “It’s all about fear. ‘If you choose to remain or shift to Enterprise, you’re gambling with your life. Without a guaranteed Directorate stipend propping you up, you’ll starve in the gutter.’”
“Don’t make this about ideologies, Natasha! Your…your vindictive shift against me isn’t about you having some moral epiphany. This is about you being a fucking whore who wants to ruin my career!”
“Oh. Well then, I’d better stop. I wouldn’t want to ruin your career.”
“Because you’re a…”
“After all, it’s not like you were ruining my career by wanting me to stay Directorate.”
“You have a guaranteed dole! You’re more famous than ever!”
She shrugged. “Famous as a sellout, maybe. As a mediocre act, suitable perhaps to open for Samuel Bolton. Or for being pumped into waiting room canvases across the NAU.”
Isaac rolled his eyes.
“It’s also not like you’ve ruined my spirit or anything,” Natasha continued. “Or our marriage.”
“Ruined your spirit!” he gave a sarcastic laugh. “Is that what’s been happening here, while you’ve been living the high life, safe and secure forever, with the very best of…”
“Oh, just shut the hell up, Isaac. You don’t understand. You can’t understand. That’s been the problem all along. I’m trying to decide between left and right, and you’re swearing that the correct choice of the two is ‘blue.’”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
Despite her intentions to remain calm, Natasha felt herself getting angry. This was an old argument, and it had been front and center — sitting in the middle of their every moment like a plate of poisoned fruit — during the two weeks since she’d announced her plans to defect at Shift. At first, she’d made the threat to watch him squirm. Even when she’d stormed out and jetted off to Micah’s (dragging Isaac with her like luggage), she hadn’t really thought she’d go through with it. But the more Isaac blustered his protest — the more he simply didn’t get it — the more resolute she’d become. Now there was no question that she’d shift, and do so in grand, in-Isaac’s-face style. His ongoing obliviousness merely tightened the screws.
“For you, all that matters is the goddamned dole,” she spat. “As long as you get a check, everything’s fine, isn’t it?”
“And you don’t care about money, right?” he said, putting his hands on his hips. It was a feminine gesture. Pouting. Natasha wanted to throw something heavy, but her award statues were all across the room.
“Of course I care!” she said. “Money is a yardstick. It tells me how well I’ve done. But what you — and the entire Directorate system — suggest is that I buy my trophy off of The Beam rather than earning it through merit.”
Isaac looked suddenly confused. “Which trophy?”
She shook her head. “You stupid, stupid man. I don’t know what I ever saw in you.”
“You mean your best artist award? The one you almost killed me with?”
“Maybe I’m thinking too small. Rather than holding my concert the day after Shift as a comeback, maybe I should make it a fundraiser to buy you a proper vagina. At your pay grade, I’m sure we could get a really, really good one.”
“Oh, that’s mature.”
“Micah says the synthetic skins they’re making at Xenia nowadays are outstanding. With your nanobots, and all that neural tuning? Just think, Isaac. You could finally move from metaphorical to literal, and get fucked for real.”
Isaac shook his head, turning away from Natasha to stalk through the room’s sunken center. He walked back to the edge, paced the periphery, then made his way back around to her. They stared at each other and stewed.
“Look,” he said. “Call me all the names you want. Fine. Move out if you want. Stay married and drain me if you must. But can you just, for a moment, please think about this and be reasonable?”
“Oh, but sweetie,” she said, making her voice like syrup, “this is the most reasonable I’ve been in years.”
“It’s vindictive.” He swallowed. Natasha could see him making a mental concession, taking a calculated risk. And then in confirmation, he became even more spineless and added, “You’re better than that.”
“I sure am.”
“Once you’re Enterprise, your money will come from concerts and track sales. Holo-performances. Hell, merchandise, virtual credits, POV streams, whatever. I get it. I know you have to work. And if you feel you need to shift…if you’re feeling ‘creatively stifled’ in Directorate…then I guess I get that, too. If we’re going to stay married and I’m going to have to defend — sorry, if I’m going to ‘take advantage of the PR opportunity’ presented by being half of a high-profile, two-party marriage — I’ll find a way to handle it. Okay? All well and good. But Natasha…please.”
“Please?”
“Just be reasonable. As a human being, I’m asking you to not hold a huge, post-Shift extravaganza. I’m not an idiot. I know you’re not doing it as a celebration for you. It’s really meant as a fuck-you to me. You don’t need the money that quickly, or that badly. Hold the concert a month after Shift. Hell, even a week later would be an improvement. But not the next day. Please, Natasha.”
She sat on the chaise then glanced at the chair behind him. He sat too. She softened her eyes. He scooted the chair closer.
“Isaac.”
“Yes?”
“You are Directorate through and through. It doesn’t matter if you’re Czar of Internal Satisfaction, making millions upon millions, or if y
ou were a mailman or a midlevel manager living two breaths above the line. You’d always be Directorate. The philosophy is in your blood.”
“Okay.”
“You don’t understand what it is to make your own way.”
His eyes hardened a whit, as if waiting for a blow. He looked as if he thought he was being set up. He was, of course, but Isaac was Directorate. He didn’t know to improvise, to steer around an obstacle that was directly in front of him.
“Okay.”
“Before Persephone hit, I worked as hard as anyone I’ve ever known. And after it hit, I worked even harder. In Enterprise, you’re rewarded for being agile. You’re praised for doing things that others won’t. For understanding how the market works and taking risks inside of it.”
Isaac’s eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?”
“That even though I could never expect you to understand, the truth is that humiliating you is the single most powerful thing I can do to re-launch my career.”
Isaac stood.
“My brand was always the angry woman fighting for what she feels,” she continued. “But I’ve been wearing a yoke since I marched behind you into Directorate. I can’t simply announce that I’m returning to being angry and ask everyone to ignore my time in the inferior party. My success depends on shedding the yoke, smashing it to pieces, and burning the splinters while I laugh at what it represented. I have to acknowledge what I did, then disavow it.”
Isaac shook his head as he stood above her. “I don’t believe this.”
Natasha recrossed her legs. “I have to explain all of this away so I can turn my weakness into a strength. Don’t you see?” She laughed. “Oh, who am I kidding. Of course you don’t.”
“Please,” he begged. “This will ruin me. You must realize that.”
Natasha felt herself smile. “Sure, I realize it. The problem is what you don’t realize.”
“And what’s that?”
Natasha stood. She took Isaac’s hands in hers and said sweetly, “You’re protesting that my actions will hurt you, and you keep proposing ways that I can do what I need to do without hurting you.”
