C-Shapes

by Matthew Fish

  “White…?”

  “The wine,” Michelle says with a wry laugh.

  “Oh, of course,” I say as I take the glass in hand and take a sip. I’ve never really been much of a drinker—always seemed to give me to worst headaches the next day. “It’s good, it is an excellent choice.”

  “So I hear you are new…” Michelle says as she leans forward as though she is studying me. “How new exactly are you?”

  “One week…” I say in a rather embarrassed tone.

  “One week?” She says as she laughs.

  She has a nice smile and pretty blue eyes. Her light brown hair is curled and she is wearing a very form fitting red dress that compliments the current setting rather well. She smells faintly of lavender and vanilla.

  “One week…” I repeat, almost feeling kind of Mirrorish.

  “You know how long I’ve been a Sitter?”

  “Six years?”

  “You actually read the profile,” Michelle says as she leans back in her seat. “I’m impressed, most guys they just look at the pictures.”

  “I thought it would be the polite thing to do.”

  “I like that,” Michelle says as she smiles. “So what kind of basket cases did they start you out on?”

  “Oh…” I reply, taken a little bit aback by the terminology. I suppose it was just like Katharine said—people who have been at this kind of thing for years tend to have become a bit desensitized to being politically correct… or polite about it. “I have a Mirror and a highly functioning Amnesiac.”

  “No shit?” She says as she leans in. “Who did you have to sleep with to get that kind of first gig?”

  “I assure you, I’m not shitting you,” I say, not really knowing how to respond. “That’s just what I was handed.”

  “My first cases were a god damned vegetable and a Manic,” Michelle says as she takes another drink from her crystal glass of wine.

  A waiter brings food, a plate of lobster, some chicken and an assortment of red potatoes. A long piece of asparagus rests over the top, sprinkled with some kind of black salt.

  “Did we order?” I ask, slightly confused, but finding that this is a pretty usual state for me.

  “You don’t order here…” Michelle whispers. “They have the finest chefs prepare basically whatever they feel like giving you.”

  “Oh,” I say as I nod. “Makes sense… Anyway, do you have any tips for me? I mean… half the time I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing or not.”

  “Just make sure they take their Calm,” Michelle says as she shrugs. “You can pretty much do whatever you want—especially with your types. Read a book, take a nap.”

  “Shouldn’t you try and engage them though…”

  Michelle laughs. “What is the point? They’re screwed no matter what. I mean sure there is a chance now that they won’t go Aggro, either way even with a cure it’s not like we can fix their issues. No matter what happens, you can’t really help them. Most of them are a menace.”

  “That’s unfortunate…” I say, I don’t really like what I am hearing. It is rather unexpected.

  “I mean let me tell you about my first two… the vegetable, she just sat there and stared out the window for the entire time I was there. I just had to shove a pill down her throat and make sure that she drank her nutritional shakes and that was it…”

  “Sounds like a pretty easy job,” I say. I dislike the way she is talking about her case, but I bite my tongue.

  “Now the other girl, a fucking Manic, she was a handful. Let’s say that I dreaded those days. She would not leave me alone for a single moment. She was always either upset, or trying to get me to sleep with her. I guess they figured if they paired her up with another girl that she’d back off a bit, but I had to literally beat her away at times. I mean, seriously, it is a good thing that the Calm makes them infertile while they are on it—could you imagine what kinds of kids those nut jobs would have?”

  “Calm makes them unable to reproduce?”

  “Yeah,” Michelle says as she scoffs. “You didn’t know that? It was a big deal when it first came out. A lot of human rights groups, or what was left of them at the time, were talking about how immoral it was. But, yeah, in males it decreases their sex drive and makes them unable to reproduce. In the females it makes them completely infertile. Just as long as Calm is in their system, you never have to worry about having messed up kids running around. It’s important, after all, that we normals regain control of the population.”

  “So you never became friendly with any of your cases?” I ask, very disappointed.

  “I wouldn’t have lasted six years if I did. You can’t be in this business and make friends with the Unstables. You ever hear about that guy back in the 90’s… he tried to integrate himself in with grizzly bears. Believed that he was their friends and could become one of them—you know how that ended?”

  “They killed him.”

  “They tore him apart. It is an important thing to learn. Sure they’ll accept you, and you’ll think that they are almost human—but in the end you have to remember what you’re dealing with are basically grizzly bears and if you get to complacent around them… then you will get torn apart. If there is one thing you take from this conversation as a newbie, it’s that you can never trust them.”

  “I’ll remember that…” I say. I do not like any of this conversation. I begin to severely doubt my capacity to really be a Sitter. I have already made friends with my cases in my first week. I can’t just turn that part of myself off and turn into… Michelle. To me she seems more monstrous to me than they do, and that thought begins to concern me even more about myself and my future. “Have you ever had one go Aggro on you?”

  “Go eggroll,” Michelle says as she laughs. “That’s a bit of Sitter humor. Yeah. My fifth case was an Amnesiac. She worked on crossword puzzles all the time, so I didn’t really need to do much. She cooked, mostly cleaned up after herself. Anyway, yeah she was your typical Amnesiac—and one day she’s doing a puzzle and she just breaks her pen… just snaps it into pieces. I see her face growing red. That’s when I knew to get the hell out of there. I fumbled with my phone and got that stupid safety off and hit the button for the hunters… they were there in about five minutes. I was hiding up on a nearby hill and I watched them put her down. Took about 4 shots… she just charged at them.”

  “That sounds terrible,” I say as I shake my head.

  “It happens, honestly,” Michelle says as she nods. “You have your cell on you?”

  “Yeah, I say as I hand it over.

  She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a pocket knife and breaks a piece of plastic off of the side of the device. She then fidgets with it for a moment before handing it back to me. “There, now you can flip it open, and don’t worry… it won’t go off accidentally. But it saves you a few seconds, but it counts.”

  “Thanks…” I say as I return the phone to my pocket. To be honest, I hadn’t even given it a proper look over since receiving it. I know it has a bright red light on the top that lets you know help is on the way, and how to use to as a cell, but I never game much thought to the emergency button on the side. “I hope I never have to use it… So say in a year they come up with a cure, what happens then. What do you do?”

  “While I’m sure that a Sitter’s job will be a lot easier… and they’ll still need a good number of them. I’ll probably become a therapist through C-Shapes. It’s kind of funny, we have this huge issue with the virus, that we’ve forgotten there’s still about three million people out there suffering from everything from post traumatic stress disorder, to general anxiety disorder—I suppose we’ll go back to caring about those people rather than just having them suck it up because right now the country is messed up. I suppose, the Hunters will be offered jobs repairing the infrastructure, I mean we have broken roads, and crumbling bridges… although I’m sure they’ll be upset that they don’t get paid to merely drink beer and shoot people for a liv
ing. What about you? What are your plans if the cure works?”

  “I haven’t thought about it. I suppose if I am not needed anymore as a Sitter I could help rebuild somehow.”

  “I’m sure C-Shapes will take care of you either way. I mean someone has to still take care of all the Unstables, it’s not like the cure isn’t going to magically make them better—they just won’t go Aggro anymore. World’s largest corporation, after all… they pretty much run the country if you think about it.”

  “I have a friend who has theories on that,” I say, realizing that if she knew I was talking about one of my cases she’d probably lose her shit.

  “Anyway, that’s a year from now and who knows if it’ll even work… Just worry about now and worry about getting by. That’s how I feel about it.”

  “Have you ever felt bad about having to hurt an Unstables feelings?” I ask, although I’m pretty sure I already know the answer. At that moment my mind begins to wander back to Cherie, and how disappointed she would be if she really knew how her life worked.

  “You can’t think like that, remember… you’re dealing with grizzly bears—they just look human. If you have to hurt them in order to keep them in order… that’s what you have to do,” Michelle answers as she folds her arms and cocks her head to one side. “Otherwise you won’t make it. Think of it as a soldier, or a police officer—when they have to fire their guns to kill someone, they can’t feel bad about it. Otherwise they would have no career.”

  “I understand,” I say, although I dislike the analogy. As I mentioned before I dislike violence of any kind.

  “You’ve seen the video, where the guy goes all eggroll on the lab techs…”

  “I’ve seen it.”

  “You don’t forget that video,” Michelle says as she nods and then points to her head. “You always keep that video up here—every time you are around one of them.”

  “It’s pretty hard to forget,” I say as it flashes in my mind at the mere mention of it. I can still hear the noises, the screams—fresh in my mind as though I had watched it only yesterday.

  “The food is probably cold now,” Michelle says as she looks down to the plate that she has barely touched. “I think the chef tonight sucks… usually the food is a lot better than this.”

  “I’ve never been a fan of lobster,” I say as I look down to my own plate. “Or really chicken that is still attached to the bone.”

  “Is that like a vegetarian thing?”

  “No, I just don’t really like my food to look like it did when it was still alive,” I say as I shrug.

  Michelle laughs. “That’s one of the strangest things I’ve ever heard. Well, I get it though. When I was younger we took my sister out to a dairy farm… she was probably ten—but whatever, after she saw the cows and realized that was where her hamburgers came from, she refused to eat them.”

  “Did she make it through V-Day?”

  “She became one of them,” Michelle says as she takes larger drink from her glass. “A fourteen year old Psychotic… after losing my mother when she went Aggro my father insisted on trying to care for her—it didn’t take long for him to realize that she needed to be placed in a facility.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say. It seems like a terrible first date thing to bring up.

  “Don’t be,” Michelle says as she wraps her arms around her chest and looks out a window. She then pulls up the sleeve of her dress and shows me a long dark scar that runs from her elbow nearly all the way down to her wrist. “A little reminder she left me. Had she made it a bit further, I wouldn’t be here. How about you… any family left?”

  “All dead,” I say as I nod.

  “Sometimes I think that’d be a comfort,” Michelle says as she pours herself more wine and continues to drink. “Sorry to be such a downer.”

  “I kind of brought it up…”

  “You’re new,” Michelle says as she gets up. “You need to know these kinds of things.”

  I get up as well; I suppose the date is over. Then again, I suppose I was not the best company. I should really figure out how to be more social and less work obsessed in the future.

  “Would you like to come back to my apartment?” Michelle asks as she locks eyes with me.

  I pause for a moment, caught off guard. Of course a part of me would love to, at the end of the day I am a guy and I know that this is a promise of sex… with someone who is rather attractive. However, there is something in the back of my mind that just does not find her as appealing as I feel I should. Perhaps there is something wrong with me. As I think about it, Cherie’s face keeps coming to mind, her constant smile—her kindness. There seems to be a rather cold and callous personality to Michelle that I cannot look past. Also, I know deep down that this is not about attraction as it is about keeping the population of normals up. “I think I would love to, but I’m… I, I’m a little overwhelmed with this being my first week.”

  “I understand. I had a hard time my first week… all the Sitters do,” Michelle says with a single nod. She reaches out her hand.

  I accept the hand as she squeezes my hand tightly and pauses for a few seconds. My cell in my pocket chimes and announces that a new contact has been added.

  “Whenever you’re feeling more up to it, give me a call if you like.”

  “I will,” I say, although I know that once again, I’m lying.

  “It was good to meet you, Ethan,” Michelle says as she turns and walks off.

  I feel a bit of regret at not taking her up on her offer. After all, it has been a while—longer than I would like to admit. I suppose this makes me not shallow… that or incredibly stupid. I’m not sure which. I suppose, in the end, we are just too different.

  I’m not as afraid as I make my way down the elevator. My mind is elsewhere.

  When I get home, I begin to set out clothes for the next day. I go with just a white button up shirt and pants. I take out the crumpled note from Noah and reread it. I wonder if it is a good idea—then again, I suppose I did the same thing with Cherie and nothing bad happened. I could leave my badge in the car… I do not see the harm in that. I would just have to go and pick up Cherie beforehand.

  As I get ready for bed I turn on the TV. A male reporter is talking about the outrage going on in Japan. The Prime Minister approaches a podium, he looks deeply saddened. He faces the camera and a translator explains what he is saying. He is outraged over the sinking of the Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha just a few miles off shore. An unnamed terrorist group has claimed responsibility. Over ninety thousand Mirror, Amnesiacs, and Manic type Unstables were killed when a bomb went off on the massive cargo ship completely destroying it. Approximately eight thousand C-Shape Sitters and staff, and a hundred and thirty crew members were also killed in the explosion. There are reported to be no survivors. Despite the heavy setback, a new cargo ship will be retrofitted to make the journey back and forth and the plan will go as continued under severely heightened security.

  I bury my face in my hands. I do not understand it. Why can’t we stop killing each other?

  I turn off the TV just as the reporter begins to talk about the continuing chaos in Los Angeles.

  With a heavy heart I fall asleep—I know there is nothing I can do to change the world, so I should at least get plenty of rest so I can continue to do my job.

  9. The Truth and the Changes

  I arrive at Cherie’s apartment early that day. Although I do not want to admit it to myself, I am excited to see her. However, at the same time I feel saddened that she will probably believe that we are in Paris—that she will have to come to grips with it in some way when we leave to see Noah.

  I knock on her door. She does not answer.

  After knocking a second time I begin to pace outside of her door. I pull out my keys and I slide it into the lock. I hesitate. I am not even supposed to be here today—it feels wrong to just barge in when I am not expected.

  I knock once more, louder. I hear the faint sound of crying. Without a
ny further hesitation I open the door and run into the room. I find Cherie balled up on the couch in tears. Her luggage is sitting beside her.

  “What’s wrong, Cherie?” I say as I kneel down beside her.

  “I waited…” She says in a barely audible whisper. Her lips are cracked and dry.

  I go to the kitchen and pour her a glass of water. She sits up and takes it from me and drinks its entire contents all at once.

  “Have you eaten anything?” I say, she looks weak. Her cheeks are red and her eyes are bloodshot and dark circles rest beneath her hazel eyes.

  “I waited,” Cherie whispers once more.

  I sit down next to her, deeply confused as to what she is referring to. “Please tell me what is wrong.”

  Her face turns red with anger. I nervously reach for my phone out of instinct. ‘Please no… not you.’ I think to myself.

  With one open hand she slaps me hard across my cheek. She then collapses against my chest and begins to hit me over and over, tears stain my white shirt as she is sobbing uncontrollably.

  “Where where you…?” Cherie asks as she stops striking me and instead grabs my shirt and balls it up in her fist. “I waited for you all day… we missed our flight. You promised you would be here. I waited all day—all night… you never came, why?”

  “I am so sorry,” I say, confused. My mind suddenly flashes back to Saturday. In all the excitement I had forgotten to have her take her pill—she must not have slept because of my mistake. I only have one major responsibility and I could not even do that properly. “I had a work thing, I…”

  “Did you not want to go?” Cherie sobs. “You… you could have just told me. I thought you cared.”

  “I do care, I promise.”

  “You promised that you would be there…” Cherie says as she gets to her feet. “I thought you were different.”

  I nod. I do not know what to say. I realize that what I have done is not something that I can easily fix… if I can ever fix it or be forgiven for it. “I promise from now on… I’ll never do that. I will always be here when I am supposed to be.”