Obsidian Worlds

by Jason Werbeloff

  “You have?”

  We dance. He leads with his left foot, turns me with his right. His stomach is quicksilver against mine. His chest. Mother of God, his chest.

  “Always,” he says, and releases my hand from his. I twist away from him, and snap back to his embrace in rhythm with the violin.

  “What is this place?” I ask.

  He blinks slowly, his eyelids heavy with knowledge.

  “This …” I follow his gaze as he scans the nebula. “… this is all for you, Mascara.”

  I close my eyes. Plunge into the sound of my name on his tongue. I did not know it until he said it. “Mascara.”

  My name is Mascara.

  Pleasure ripples up my spine, as I undulate to the music. And when I step into him again, his lips find mine. Apples. They taste of apples and eternity. I drink in his tongue. Submerge myself into the wave of flesh beneath his fingers. His touch moves down my hip, along my thigh –

  Doo-doomph-doo-doomph-doo-doomph

  My eyes swim into focus. Find the damp bricks of the basement wall.

  Doo-doomph doo-doomph doo-doomph

  Heart thundering in my chest. I try to exhale, but my lungs spasm.

  Doo-doomph doo-doomph

  I push out the stale air. Suck in another breath. But my heart. My head. Jesus, it feels like an evil demon is fingering my brain. Teasing apart its folds. Scrunching my ganglions together in a bloody fist.

  I pry the skullcap from my head. It’s untouchably hot in my hands.

  Doo-doomph … doo-doomph

  That part of me is hard. Achingly hard beneath the sequined dress. It struggles against its harness. I taped it back against the inside of my thigh before I dressed this morning.

  I feel hot and cold everywhere. The dress is wet through. At first I think I must have lost control of my bowels, but then I realize the length of me is bathed in sweat.

  I shudder. Try to catch my breath. If this is what fifteen minutes in the Machine does to my body … I wince at the thought of an hour-long experience. A day-long jaunt in the Machine might be fatal.

  Beep

  I squint at the Machine’s OLED screen. A dialog box sears my retinas in the dim light of the basement. “Use this world in future experiences?”

  “YES,” I click.

  I’ve just finished saving the world as “The Spiral Arm”, when the soft crunch of tires in the driveway seeps into the basement. The tinkle of keys in the front door.

  I glance at my watch. He’s home early.

  “Where you, boy?”

  Crap.

  I bolt from the chair. My head pounds as I scramble to unzip the dress. Fingers, slick with sweat, fumble the zipper … there! I peel the dress off my lanky torso. Jeans on. Shirt.

  “Manfred!”

  I pull on my shoes. “Coming, dad.” I throw the sopping dress into the drawer of the ancient dresser.

  “Where’s breakfast, boy?” His keys clink on the kitchen table.

  “On my way, sir.” I’m about to climb the stairs when I remember the lipstick. Fuck. The lipstick. I dash to the dresser. Tear off a chunk of toilet paper. Scuff at my lips.

  I’m up the stairs in three long strides. Nudge the basement door shut behind me. Do my best not to appear rushed as I enter the kitchen. “Bacon and eggs?” I ask.

  The old man grunts. Settles into the kitchen chair. His side of the table drifts a quarter of an inch off the ground as it settles on his paunch.

  “I tells ya’ …” he starts. I sigh internally. “… the news ain’t good. Ain’t good at all.”

  “Yes, dad.”

  “Paper says …” He downs a shot of whisky. “… those yellow-bellies threatenin’ to go nuclear on us. Can you believe that? Damned Bhutanese.”

  I nod. Muster a concerned frown.

  “Gus says the army might be conscriptin’ the night guards.” He spreads his arms behind his head, and leans back further in his chair. His guard uniform strains across his belly. Hairy, pale skin oozes through the gaps between the buttons. “Ungrateful bastards. Always said they’d be lucky to have us.”

  “Yeah,” I say. My thoughts dissolve into the fatty scrapings of spatula on pan.

  “… says the bomb landed not a mile from the bank this mornin’.”

  “Wow,” I say, trying to appear interested.

  I check my watch. Half an hour till I got to be at work. Another bloody change meeting. But tonight … tonight I’ll be back with Her. The Machine. I remember the dark stranger at The Spiral Arm. His kiss. The way his tongue … I wince as the thing below tugs against the tape that binds it.

  I plate his meal. He slumps forward to eat, and the table legs touch back down to the floor. The way his neck bulges, the way the crown of his balding head reflects the morning light through a handful of wispy hair – make me nauseous.

  I sit in the chair opposite his. The only other chair at the kitchen table. At least, the only other chair since mom died last year.

  “Yeah, Gus says…” he continues.

  The Machine wasn’t that bad, I reason. Some sweating. Raised heartbeat. Headache’s already lifting. Sure, my body can handle another session tonight. I still feel his hand on my hip. The electric rise and fall of my breasts. Real breasts. Yes, I’ll plug back in tonight after work. Just another fifteen minutes. Just fifteen.

  “What’s wrong with your eyes?”

  He’s staring at me. Head cocked to one side.

  My heart climbs into my mouth. The mascara! I forgot to remove the mascara.

  I swallow. Try to unglue my tongue from my palate.

  “Are you …” He cranes his head forward. Squints his bulbous eyes. “Are you wearin’ … makeuppp?” He ejects the word as though it tastes of bile.

  I open my mouth. Shut it.

  The old man stands to his full five-foot height. Almost knocks the table over. “I thoughts we talked about this nonsense.”

  “I … I –”

  “You what? You thoughts you’d go prettyin’ up those lashes a’ yo’s. Lord, boy, what would yo’ mother say?”

  “Don’t,” I whisper.

  “She’d be ashamed a’ you, she would.”

  “She –”

  His voice climbs. “What’s that you say?” Shards of egg and bacon tumble onto his navy-blue guard uniform. Good thing too – the stains don’t show on navy blue, or I’d be scrubbing his uniforms nightly when I do the laundry.

  “She wouldn’t –”

  “Your mother,” he growls, “was a saint, God bless her. A Christian woman. You don’t gets ta talk about her when you’s wearin’ that … that filth on ya’ face.”

  “But dad –”

  “This ain’t how we raised ya’. Don’t you have work ta get to, boy?”

  I lower my eyes. Nod. Catch sight of the sneakers on my feet. My toes burn to wear those lacy shoes again. The pumps with the golden sash.

  My father returns his titanic buttocks to his seat. Scoops another spoonful of eggs into his maw.

  “Then bessht ya’s …” He swallows. “… get goin’.”

  I flee the kitchen. Rinse my eyes in the lavatory basin. The mascara comes away in black rivulets of shame.

  “Be a man,” he grumbles around a piece of bacon, as I shut the front door behind me, and make my way to work.

  *

  I know it’s a mistake before the words escape my mouth.

  “Engineering’s riding us to finish the code for module delta,” I tell the room-full of programmers.

  The sniggers to my left pitch on cue. “I bet Engineering’s riding Manfred hard,” whispers one of them. He’s tall – too tall. All elbows and knees. Elbows nudges the giggling neighbor to his left, the man with the cow’s lick.

  “Yeah, I bet those engineers lurve Manfred,” says Cowlick.

  “When’s the expected delivery date?” asks the big cheese at the head of the table.

  Cowlick can hardly contain his whispers. “They knocked ol’ Manfred up, did Engineer
ing.”

  Elbows cackles behind a muffling hand.

  “Three months,” I say, doing everything I can to stop the blush in my chest from migrating to my cheeks.

  “Manfred’s in his final trimester,” whispers Elbows.

  The blush is well on its way to my face now. I feel it run along my upper arms. Freckles. Every freckle on my skin gleams when I blush. Just one more way I won the genetic lottery.

  “Can you make it ten weeks?” asks The Cheese.

  My heart slumps. Overtime. Which means less time with Her – the Machine. An image flashes across my brain. Women in holographic dresses pirouetting through a starry nebula.

  “Yes, we can do that,” I say.

  “Yes we can,” mimics Cowlick an octave higher than his usual voice.

  “That’s what Manfred says to Engineering when they ask him to bend over.” His elbows bounce on the table as he guffaws quietly.

  I resist the urge to shoot the two a filthy look.

  “Alright then,” says The Cheese, standing to end the meeting. “Good work team.”

  “That’s what Engineering says while they gangbang Manfred,” whispers Cowlick. Elbows slaps the Formica with overflowing mirth.

  I stalk from the room. Cowlick and Elbow’s laughter rises to full volume as my burning neck exits the doorway.

  Eons drag by as shutdown time nears. While I sift through thousands of lines of code, I wonder what my dark stranger and the other patrons of The Spiral Arm are doing right now. Does their world cease when I leave it? I forgot to switch off the Machine when I rushed from the basement this morning. Are they waltzing just this moment? Is a special someone wondering where I am?

  I smile at the memory of Him. My hand reflexively reaches for my chest. My flat chest. Where my breasts should be. My smile drops. The tension that sat in my jaw muscles all morning spreads its tentacles through my hair, and into my brain. I need it. I need the Machine. Now.

  “Three forty-five? Where’d you think you’re going so early?” says Cowlick from the cubicle opposite mine.

  Never one to miss an opportunity, Elbows pops his head up above his cubicle division. With his zinc-starved eyes and sharpened cheekbones, he’s the human equivalent of a meerkat. “Manfred’s getting an early start on his way to Engineering,” he says.

  The building sways, and a moment later I hear the muffled pop of the blast. There’ve been about two a day, the last few weeks. The Bhutanese Empire uses cloaking tech, so we never know where the missiles are going to land.

  Cowlick pales. “That’s a big one.”

  “That’s what Manfred says to the boys in Engineering,” says Elbows.

  Cowlick’s color returns. He slaps his thigh, and howls his delight to the ceiling.

  I ignore them, throw my laptop bag over my shoulder, and march to the elevator. Keep my head down as I pass The Cheese’s desk, but he doesn’t glance up.

  The doors slide closed, and I blow out a chunk of stale air as the elevator takes me one step closer to home. To Her.

  *

  Twenty.

  I can handle twenty minutes. Hell, I think, adjusting the timer. I can handle thirty minutes.

  The skullcap snuggles around my head. I’m wearing the sequined dress again. The material reeks of barely dried sweat, but I’ve had no time to wash it since this morning. I’m sure the Machine will filter out the smell.

  I press “BEGIN”.

  “Would Mademoiselle –”

  I thrust my coat into the bellhop’s hand, and stride across the green plane toward the forcefield.

  He scuttles after me. “You’ll need –”

  “Thanks,” I say, and snatch the diamond watch from him.

  I pause before the black bubble. My heart thumps in my stomach. He’s waiting for me. I know he is.

  I step forward, through the yawning mouth of the forcefield. Its meniscus pours over my face. Over my eyeballs.

  “Oh, you again.” The waitron looks me up and down, unimpressed.

  I scan the infinite space. The Spiral Arm is just as it was this morning. Tuxedos and dresses whirl along the dancing nebula. The delicious tones of violins cling to the hairs on my forearms.

  “You’re back,” says a voice behind me. A voice I know.

  Goosebumps cascade down the nape of my neck. I whip around. The gold of the nebula burns in his eyes. Every word ever spoken, every desire, every dream, balances on the curve of his lower lip.

  His smile fades. “Where did you go?”

  “I come from another place.” I step toward him. “I had to return.”

  He takes my hand in his. Raises it to his lips. Closes his eyes, and inhales me.

  “I do not know you,” he says, “but my hands know yours.” He kisses each finger. “My lips know yours.” He holds the small of my back, and draws me into him. “Let me show you.”

  The nebula dims. The other dancers disappear. My father, Cowlick, Elbows, the world – they fade to nothing more than an illusion of memory. The memory becomes a dream. The dream diffuses into the ether.

  He kisses me.

  My knees buckle. My nipples harden. I am wet. I am wet below.

  He pulls away a fraction of an inch. “I’ve waited so long for you,” he says.

  “How long?” I ask, and throw him half a smile.

  “I have watched the birth of galaxies. I have watched the end of time, and then its beginning. I have waited for you.”

  I giggle at his hyperbole. Stop myself. Giggle again.

  “Come,” he says, “I want to show you something.”

  I nod too quickly.

  He gazes out to the inky void. Squints into the distance, and raises his hand, calling something toward us. Muscles flow like liquid marble beneath his dress shirt as his arm moves.

  “What is that?”

  Barely within visual range, above the plane of the ecliptic, a chunk of ice trails a wake of effervescent silver ions. The comet changes course. Swings languidly toward us.

  I try not to be afraid. It’s almost impossible to gauge its size against the star-patched space. But as the comet approaches, I realize it can’t be smaller than a city block. Icy spires jut from its sides. Glint in the starlight.

  “It’s … it’s coming right at us,” I say, failing to mask my panic. The comet is close now. Maybe a mile away.

  The dark stranger says nothing, but holds his hand to the formidable rock. On his command, the chunk of ice slows its approach. Its silver ions, which don’t decelerate with the comet, crash soundlessly against its rear. A spray of mist surrounds the rock as it comes to a halt above us.

  He takes my hand in his, and turns my wrist carefully until he peers into the diamond watch the bellhop gave me.

  “Turn that dial. Yes, that one.”

  As the notches click-click-click into place, a falling sensation overtakes me. I look down, to find my feet floating above the patch of gas they’d stood upon just a moment ago.

  “No need for alarm, my love.” He turns a similar dial on his own watch, and in a moment he floats beside me. “Hold on.”

  I grasp his midriff. Ribbons of muscle flow beneath my fingers. Hard, tight.

  In a moment we’re soaring above the nebula. Rising, rising. He touches his watch again … We’re upside down! Our feet drop, fall closer to the comet. Until … we’re standing. Upside down, on the bottom of the icy rock.

  I shut my eyes. Control the vertigo that overwhelms my senses.

  I inhale a deep breath of cinnamon and gunpowder. Shift my weight experimentally. Tiny pebbles crunch under my golden shoes. The sensation of falling ceases. I open my eyes, and gasp at the sight.

  The nebula stretches above us, a peachy-indigo ceiling of gas and stars. Almost intangibly, I sense movement. I notice that the tiny, upside-down dancing figures on its surface are retreating from us. From my new vantage, the ceiling rises higher and higher, as the comet on which we stand drifts away from the nebula.

  He squeezes my hand. “This w
ay, Mascara.” The soles of my feet tingle at the sound of my name. He points to a dome about a hundred yards away. “This is my home.”

  Although curious, I resist him a moment. “What is your name?” I ask.

  A question mark daubs his thick brow. “My name …” His eyelids drift closed, and he glances up, searching his internal heavens for a thought. The fiery glow of the ever-fading nebula ripples through his mane. It bathes his cheeks in a beatific radiance. He sniffs the air, as if the answer lives on the comet’s breeze. “My name is Forever,” he says eventually. He smiles. Fire dances in the folds of his brow. “And you …” He strokes my cheek. A tear glimmers in his eye. “… you are Mascara.”

  He kisses me. His tongue finds me, and holds me. Eventually, he pulls away. “Would you like to see my home?”

  “Yes.” I watch his locks of jet-black hair glisten in the starlight. “Yes – please.”

  “This way.” He squeezes my hand, and we stroll toward the light. The dome nestles between pillars of ice, its pale glow illuminating the comet’s pockmarked surface. About fifty feet in diameter, I notice that the dome isn’t entirely opaque. Through its frosted surface, I can just discern flashes of colour.

  “Touch it,” he whispers.

  I reach out my fingertips. Stroke its surface. The forcefield is warm. Electric. My stomach stirs at the sensation.

  “Welcome,” he says. A hole in the dome widens from the point I touch. A wave of heated air tickles my lips.

  I step into the home of Forever.

  “May I take your shoes?” he asks.

  My stockinged feet sink into the soft resilience of the floor. Holographic walls shimmer, and adjust their hue as my perspective changes with each step into the room. Sprays of violet and magenta, clouds of lime and cerise, the walls morph as I walk.

  Suspended in the center of the room, both vertically and horizontally, is a bed of flowers. Chrysanthemums, lilies and heather; rose petals, orchids and pansies – the fragrance of the bed washes over me.

  He places his arm around my waist, and leaps into the air. My feet leave the ground, and we float up, up against the gentle gravity of the comet. The atmosphere up here is thick, heavy with moisture and promise. I laugh, and we swim toward the bed, paddling with our hands, splashing the air with our feet. And then we let go to gravity, and by degrees, settle upon the bed of ambrosia.