Reality Bytes

by Jane Frances

  Colleen had called last Friday morning, the same morning Toni had brought Virgil in for treatment. Emma was actually performing Virgil’s surgery when the call came through, Maggie passing on the message to ring Colleen “immediately she was available.” Emma had purposely waited until late afternoon to return the call, as much to prove she wasn’t going to ask how high when Colleen gave the order to jump as to give herself a bit of time to think. Her protest, however, did little. If Colleen was annoyed at Emma’s delay tactics, she didn’t let on, and the hours between the calls brought no brilliant excuses for what Colleen described as “blatant theft of company resources.” Apparently—even though Emma promised to have a check covering the full amount in the very next mail—she was lucky Colleen didn’t press charges.

  At the conclusion of the call, Emma returned the handset to the cradle, took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Despite the dressing-down she had received, a smile formed. She’d just done what so many dream of but few actually do. She’d just told her boss exactly what she could do with her job. Emma’s smile spread and she laughed out loud. She was free.

  Emma’s post-resignation euphoria was short-lived. “What have I done?” she had worriedly asked herself as she paced her kitchen floor that same night, stopping more than once in front of the drawer where she knew a half-empty cigarette packet lay.

  What was she thinking, throwing in her job with nothing else lined up? True, she had some small savings, and true, even after she repaid Colleen the cost of Blue’s treatment she would have a reasonable leave payout coming to her.

  But that wasn’t going to last forever.

  And she had only more four days as the locum at Tricia’s practice.

  And vet vacancies in Perth were few and far between.

  And Colleen would probably put out a general bulletin to every vet in the vicinity advising not to hire Emma.

  Panic rose. She’d probably never get work in this city again.

  Emma finally opened the drawer and dug out the cigarette packet. Smoking would help her calm down. Another dig in the drawer and her lighter was also retrieved. Then both packet and lighter were tossed disgustedly onto the kitchen bench. Smoking wasn’t the answer. She had to stop turning to it each time she became stressed. She reached for the wall phone instead.

  “Damn.” Lisa’s mobile phone was turned off, even though, by Emma’s calculations, she and Cathy should be in the midst of their Singapore transit stop. Emma had left a message on Lisa’s voicemail. Then she tried Cathy’s number. Again she was switched to voicemail. Another message was left and Emma tried three more friends’ numbers. Again they either rang out or she was directed to their message banks. Glum, she stared out of her kitchen window. Since Friday was Justine’s half-day at the city-based duty free store at which she worked, it was likely she was home by now. Emma could go talk to her. “No way,” Emma told herself firmly. In the mood she was in she was likely to burst into tears, declare her undying love and generally make a complete idiot of herself. Still staring out the window, she groped along the bench until she found the cigarette packet and lighter. Smoke trailed behind her as she headed to the buffet in the dining area. On the bottom shelf she’d located the remains of her bottle of bourbon, placed there purely in case of thirsty visitors, because at the time she had vowed she was never going to touch alcohol again.

  Needless to say, she had woken on Saturday morning with a very bad hangover, a severe case of smoker’s mouth and an unquenchable thirst.

  Now, just the thought of last weekend’s dry horrors reminded Emma she was currently in need of some water. But the water fountain was well behind her and Kayisha. They were already nearly a third of the way around the lake again.

  Another fountain should be somewhere around the next bend. Emma glanced to the golden mass of fur keeping pace with her. “What do you reckon, Kai? Shall we keep going or shall we turn back?”

  Kayisha’s happy woof indicated she could keep this up all afternoon. They committed to their second circuit of the lake, stopping briefly for a water break.

  Despite the distance already covered, Emma continued onward at a respectable speed, driven by continued thoughts of the past week. The weekdays had gone by without incident. Her last four days at Tricia’s practice passed in a flash, the only noteworthy event an “I’m back, how did it all go?” call from Tricia on Thursday night. Emma truthfully related all had gone like clockwork. She didn’t mention her resignation, deciding to keep that piece of information until she saw Tricia in person. Which would be this coming Sunday, Emma having accepted the invitation to Tricia’s home for a “thank you” rib barbeque.

  This morning—Friday—had been the big one for Emma. It was the morning she went to Colleen’s practice to clear out her locker. Emma had approached the morning with dread, tossing and turning for much of the night, anticipating the worst. She even imagined Colleen having the police waiting for her, handcuffs at the ready because she had decided to press charges after all.

  Luckily no such thing happened. Emma’s departure from the practice was low-key and quiet. All the staff knew why Emma was leaving and they watched in embarrassed silence as Emma packed up her personal belongings. Colleen followed a few steps behind Emma throughout her journey through the practice’s rooms. That was the most humiliating part, being watched by the boss as if she would souvenir some item not her own.

  “I’ll miss you, Em,” said Pete, who, under Colleen’s continued scrutinizing eye, had helped Emma pack everything into the back of her station wagon. He stepped forward and drew Emma into a hug. “I’ll call you tonight.”

  “Sure thing.” Emma blinked back tears. The reality of leaving the place she’d put her heart and soul into for so many years was finally hitting home. This was only the second practice Emma had worked at since finishing her training, and prior to Colleen’s taking over the helm, it was the practice she’d envisaged staying at for a good few years to come.

  “Bloody Colleen.” The stress and humiliation of the morning enveloped Emma as she continued to run. Bloody Colleen. Emma mentally repeated her mantra with each step. Bloody Colleen. Bloody Colleen. “Bloody high-heel-wearing, money-hungry bitch of a woman, Colleen.”

  That last curse took Emma all the way back to her front gate. Exhausted, she bent down, hands on her knees, chest heaving, lungs hungrily sucking in oxygen. For her part, Kayisha flopped onto the pavement, tongue dripping as she panted heavily.

  “That’s it.” Emma managed to squeeze out a few words as she fought to regain her breath. “No more ciggies for me. My lungs can’t take it.”

  By the time she stepped under the shower her breathing had returned to normal. She soaped down under a cool stream and rinsed off under bracing cold water. The shock of cold cleared her head and, newly enthused, she sat in front of the computer that resided in a corner of her lounge room.

  Left for extended periods without use, the plastic dust covers were removed from both the keyboard and monitor. Like a car that has been sitting idle for too long, the computer seemed to struggle and groan when Emma booted it up. She half expected to see black smoke coming from the back of the monitor, or whatever part equated to its exhaust.

  No smoke appeared and Emma rubbed her hands together in preparation for her selected tasks. She was going to get her résumé, eight years out of date, into order. Then, so long as the automatic deduction from her credit card was still reaching her Internet service provider, she was going to check the Web site advertised in the veterinary association’s newsletter. The Web site apparently featured a nationwide employment section. This seemed as good a starting point as any for her job search.

  Thankfully, although her résumé was over eight years old, it had been saved on a floppy disk conveniently labeled “Emma: Résumé,” so it was not hard to locate. Kayisha settled on the floor next to Emma’s chair and Emma absently scratched the top of Kai’s head as she reviewed the document.

  “Well, that’s well and truly out of dat
e, Kai.” Emma selected the text that announced she was twenty-nine years old. She deleted the reference to her age altogether, recalling a conversation with someone at some party somewhere who announced it was actually against equal opportunity law to base an employment decision on a person’s age. As the text disappeared, Emma couldn’t decide which was more depressing—being of an age where she was thankful she wasn’t required to reveal it, or attending a party where equal opportunity was the hot topic of discussion.

  She took heart from other changes she made to her résumé. She surprised herself with just how much experience she had acquired in the years since the document was edited. What was now Colleen’s practice was a state forerunner in the field of veterinary dentistry and as a consequence she had gained opportunities of which few vets in Western Australia could boast. A particular highlight was working as an occasional part of the veterinary team at Perth Zoo. Emma would never forget the mixture of awe, exhilaration and pure terror when looking directly into the gaping jaw of an anesthetized tiger suffering from a toothache.

  As if knowing Emma was writing of a distant cousin, Malibu jumped lithely over Kayisha and onto the computer desk. Engrossed in her task, Emma mumbled a distracted “Hi, Mal.”

  Malibu, however, had decided she wanted Emma’s undivided attention. She plopped neatly on top of the keyboard. Emma’s résumé now announced she had successfully removed a tiger’s “hyula67.” That might impress someone ignorant of the finer points of large-cat dentistry, Emma thought, but it wasn’t going to cut the mustard with her peers.

  “Sit here, Mal.” She lifted Malibu off her keyboard and plonked her onto her lap.

  For a while Malibu stayed where placed, stretching as only cats can stretch, head and front paws dangling over the side of Emma’s thigh, haughtily taunting Kayisha by her mere presence. It wasn’t too long before passing contemptuous looks to the floor-bound canine lost its appeal. Malibu stood, two paws on each of Emma’s thighs, arched luxuriously and stepped back onto Emma’s keyboard.

  “Malibu!” Emma shrieked as the contents of her word-processing window suddenly disappeared. Malibu was shooed from the desk and Emma hunched over the computer screen, hoping that by staring at it the lost words would magically rematerialize.

  They didn’t.

  “Shit, shit, shit!” All that work wasted. Emma didn’t even know if she had a hard copy of the original floating around somewhere.

  She sat back in her seat and assumed her thinking position. Wait a minute…She sat forward again. The file name “EmmaRésumé” still blinked at the top of her word-processing window. The file was still there. Empty, but still there. She pointed her mouse at the edit menu and clicked “undo” from the selection.

  “I’m a frigging computer genius.” Emma congratulated herself as her résumé reappeared. “Just as well for you, my girl.” She turned to Malibu, who had taken up position on the back of the couch. Malibu was unconcerned at the potential disaster she had created, concentrating instead on licking the point between her back legs.

  Emma returned her attention to the monitor. The “save” button was quickly pushed, and she made a note to keep pressing it every couple of edits. After another half-hour, numerous edits and numerous saves, she was reasonably happy with the result. She read her résumé in its entirety, decided it was pretty damn good, printed out a copy, which she then read through once again, and closed the file.

  Emma stood and stretched, grabbed a fresh glass of water and settled back down. The computer thought long and hard about connecting to the server, but the modem eventually made the correct sounds and she was in. Now all she had to do was access the veterinary association Web site, find their employment section and get the details of practices in need of a vet. Simple.

  Not so simple. Emma’s prediction of a lack of vet vacancies in Perth was quickly confirmed. “Shit.” Emma cursed at the screen. She hadn’t expected it to be this bad. There was absolutely nothing. She widened her search to the rest of Western Australia and stared at the single entry. An equine specialist was required in the south of the state. But when they said south, they meant almost as far south as you could get. Not exactly commuting distance. Emma sat with elbows on the armrests and fingertips resting against each other. Was there any point in even applying? She’d spent more time astride horses than treating them, her daily experience more geared to cats, dogs, goldfish, budgies and the usual mix of household pets. Not exactly what you’d call an equine specialist. And then there was the distance. If she did get the job, she’d have to uproot herself and relocate. And leave…what? She rented her house, so although she’d carried the lease over ten years and called it home, it wasn’t really hers. She had no lover; she had no job. Her parents chose not to speak to her, but they lived a few hundred kilometers north of Perth so didn’t really enter the equation. She had Malibu and Kayisha, but they would go with her. That left a few close friends and…Justine. Emma considered the pros and cons while she downed what remained of her glass of water. She decided that if she got the job, at least she’d have an excuse not to be a damn bridesmaid. She placed her glass on the table, clicked on the “apply here” button, wrote a brief cover letter and sent her résumé into the virtual ether.

  Her primary objective achieved, Emma browsed some other sections of the site, found a few interesting articles, downloaded them for reading offline and clicked on the cross on the top right of the browser window.

  “Are you sure you want to disconnect?” asked the dialogue box that appeared.

  Emma decided she may as well make the most of her session, clicked the cancel button, navigated to a search engine and typed the first thing that entered her head.

  Lesbian.

  Of course, this wasn’t the first time Emma had entered this search query. On taking delivery of the computer a couple of years ago, she and Chris had sat side by side as they accessed the Internet. They’d typed in the same query and were rewarded with pages and pages of results. Closer inspection revealed most to be pornographic sites. After the first four, Emma decided she’d had enough. Erotica was one thing, but these sites…She doubted any were owned and run by women. They were quite obviously meant for men to engage their distorted women-on-women fantasies.

  The same type of results appeared in this search. She scrolled through the first screen, found nothing, advanced to the second. Again the results were spectacularly awful. Then she spied a title halfway down the page that announced “Lesbian Chat. In real time. Around the globe.”

  Emma had heard of chat rooms. She’d seen stories on television, read articles in the newspapers and magazines. One of her friends—Amanda—was currently into them. Emma had never seen the appeal, but now she wondered if this was the chat room Amanda frequented. Amanda had relocated to Sydney last year, so getting in touch via the Internet was appealing. It would certainly save on long-distance call charges.

  Emma clicked on the link and waited.

  She was confronted with a registration screen. She briefly wondered if she could be bothered, decided she could and began entering her details. Halfway through she got a case of the jitters, went back to the home page and read the privacy policy. Once certain her details wouldn’t be put on public display by registering as a member she reentered her details, answering only the fields deemed compulsory. The profile field, the one that asked her to briefly describe herself, was thankfully not mandatory so she left it blank. The user name field was, however, required. Emma typed “Emma.”

  Then she deleted it. No way was she going to use her real name. She tried Sara. That was already taken. Then she tried Tara, then Belinda, then Cara, and even Lisa and Amanda. All taken. Obviously any name ending in an A was already used. So too it seemed was just about every other female name she could think of. As a last resort she entered Kayisha. The user name was accepted.

  Great, Emma thought wryly. Out to meet the girls under the guise of my dog. At least Amanda would recognize her. She shrugged, clicked the “Enter
Chat” button and waited.

  “Jeez, does this ever end?” Emma asked herself. She’d selected the Women’s Floor from the two options available, expecting this time to be in. Instead she was presented with a long list of “rooms.” She scrolled down the list, balking at some of the room names. Even if Amanda frequented the “Leather” room or the “Dominatrix” room or the “Swingers” room, Emma would never know it, mainly because she had no intention of entering any of them. She was at the point of chickening out of the whole exercise when one caught her eye. The “Secret Garden.” That sounded innocent enough. She followed the instruction at the top of the screen, double-clicking on the room name. She blinked as a new window opened. Maybe she had done something wrong? No, the title bar read “Secret Garden.”

  The window was divided into three panes. To the right was a list of names, hers included. To the left was a bigger pane where text was appearing as if by magic. It seemed the room occupants were acknowledging her presence. A string of names followed by “Hi, Kayisha” appeared.

  Emma assumed the final pane, the one that said, “Type your text here,” was where she should try typing. She moved her cursor to the text field and typed, “Hi, everyone.” As soon as she hit the enter key her words appeared in the main pane. Emma smiled at her success. This was going to be fun.

  After the initial flurry of hellos was over, however, the room occupants went back to typing at whomever they were typing at before. Emma watched the flow, trying to unravel the different threads and figure who was talking to whom. It wasn’t easy. Apart from herself there were fifteen in the room and words scrolled by almost as fast as she could read them. Eventually she figured there were four different conversations happening. The one between Shygirl, Pookie, Vixen and Osmosis seemed the most entertaining, or rather, the least innocuous. In a rather disjointed fashion, and with a lot of acronyms Emma found quite meaningless, they were giving their opinion about the book Angels and Demons. She too had read Dan Brown’s prequel to The Da Vinci Code, and along with all but Vixen had loved it. However, with no idea of the etiquette of a chat room, Emma was unsure if she should barge into the conversation and add her opinion. Just as she’d made up her mind she would, after all, what was the worst that could happen—maybe be ostracized by a bunch of people she couldn’t see and had never met—Vixen began them on a discussion of a book she had actually enjoyed, Life of Pi by Yann Martel. Emma had never even heard of it, although according to Vixen it deservedly won the Mann Booker prize.