Ayrie: An Auxem Novel

by Lisa Lace

  As the population expanded, they needed more space to live. They pushed out The Barrier to expand their territory. No person or committee planned the expansions. The result was a hodgepodge of barriers all over the planet.

  Since they lived their lives in safety on the right side of The Barrier, and they had constructed it so long ago, modern Vandwans were afraid of what lived beyond it. I was too. I was certain there were undiscovered horrible exotic animals in the ocean, waiting to consume me.

  Even though it was difficult to see land in the ocean waters, it existed. For now. The tides were rising, and the available natural land was decreasing rapidly. Ashlyn and Nathaniel were environmental scientists working to solve the Vandwan housing crisis. They were practically national heroes for their innovation - their idea was to build artificial land masses anchored to the ocean floor.

  Their companies had made a few test cities in places without natural land. Some environmental refugees now had places to live, but nearly half of Vandwa's population had refugee status. Many people waited for accommodations, but the government could only work so fast.

  After we had landed, I needed to take a boat to Jori's address. The boat drove itself. Even though I hated being on the ocean, it was nicer than having to deal with motion sickness in a spacecraft. The fresh breeze helped me overcome my problems.

  Jori was supposed to pick me up, but I couldn't find him at the spaceport. I tried not to let it bother me. We weren't a couple, and Jori wasn't a thoughtful person. I had to squash the feeling of disappointment in my stomach.

  When I got to his apartment and knocked on the door, there was no answer. I found myself stuck outside and didn't know what to do. I wondered where the hell he was. He knew when my spacecraft was scheduled to arrive, and I wasn't late. I sent him a message and waited, tapping my foot.

  There was no response. What was I going to do now? My stomach started growling.

  I turned around. I had a passing familiarity with the area, but I couldn't read Vandwan. The signs for most buildings were incomprehensible to me. I remembered a restaurant across the street that served exotic food I was able to digest.

  Most of the dishes on this planet were seafood.

  That was an understatement. Everything they ate here was seafood, which wasn't my number one choice for a meal. If there were tentacles or shells on the food, maybe humans were not meant to eat it. But I was hungry, and I was going to be here for a while. I needed to work on adjusting my palate. I made up my mind to get myself a bite to eat.

  My luggage was heavy, but I wasn't going to leave my belongings at Jori's front door. I dragged everything behind me, wondering if I had brought too much stuff to Vandwa. It was difficult choosing what to take with me and what to leave on Earth. I couldn't stand to leave some things back on Earth that were part of my personality. At the time, I couldn't do without them. Right now, I speculated that perhaps they were not as important as I thought at the time.

  I went into the restaurant and remembered a few seafood-lite dishes I thought I could swallow. Getting some food into my mouth helped me calm down, even if it was a taste I didn't enjoy.

  I wished Jori would contact me. I wondered if I would have to stay in a hotel tonight, or if he had changed his mind about the marriage. He could still back out. We weren't married, and he would have to pay a penalty, but he was rich.

  My mind wandered to different possibilities. I suppose he might have had an accident, or be hurt in a hospital. Perhaps I was fuming at him needlessly.

  I pursed my lips into a thin line. I hoped he wasn't hurt, but if he was all right, I felt like punching him for treating me like this.

  After my meal, I ordered Tlisihsh, a delicious Vandwan drink that was one of my favorite things on the planet. I couldn't dislike everything on Vandwa. Finally, because I couldn't stomach another bite, I trudged back across the street and up to Jori's apartment, lugging the heavy suitcase behind me up the stairs.

  I had sent him several messages while I sat alone in the restaurant. When I dropped my suitcase outside his door and sat on it, I sent him one more, just in case.

  Waiting for you outside your door. Where are you?

  There was no answer, and I felt like a crazy person sitting there.

  The flight from Earth to Vandwa took forty hours, and I spent two more in customs. Add in two hours at the restaurant and another waiting around at Jori's apartment, and the total of time spent on my space adventure was forty-five hours. I was too exhausted to stay angry. I lay down on the floor, put my head on top of my suitcase, and dozed off.

  When I opened my eyes, I saw a handsome man gazing down at me with a concerned look on his face. I could hardly believe it was Jori. As he saw me regain consciousness, his expression changed into a frown.

  "What are you doing here?" he demanded.

  I felt myself becoming defensive immediately.

  Jori put me in a position where I had to get myself home from the spaceport, made me wait hours for him to arrive, and had the nerve to ask me what I was doing here?

  "What do you mean, what am I doing here? I'm here to marry you. Isn't a better question why weren't you here? I hope this isn't setting the tone for the rest of our relationship."

  "Samantha." He cut me off with one reserved word. "Your flight was supposed to come in tomorrow."

  "I was supposed to come in today, and I did," I said, getting revved up again. "I don't mind getting myself from the airport to your place, but you could have been here to meet me. I've been waiting for three hours. How come you didn't answer my messages?"

  "Samantha," he said, holding up his hand in an ineffective attempt to stop the flow of my words and anger. "I'm sorry. Your message said you were arriving tomorrow. I was going to pick you up, and I didn't make you wait on purpose. I must have been in a communications dead zone, and I didn't get any messages."

  "Oh," I said. My anger should have died immediately, but I was still hot. It had been a misunderstanding, but I still felt disappointed and wronged.

  He stared at me, and I realized I must look like a mess. There was no showering allowed on the space ship as water was scarce. I hadn't had a shower for two days. I had moved from one grungy spaceport to another, and I had spent the last hour sleeping on top of a suitcase. I smoothed down my hair. I knew I looked nasty.

  "You look tired," he remarked, scanning his retina to open the door.

  "That's why I was sleeping on the floor," I said, getting up and going into the apartment.

  Jori took my suitcase into a room opposite the bathroom.

  "I set up the spare room for you," he said. I ignored a flash of disappointment. It would be crazy to sleep in the same bed with him. We weren't in a relationship; we were getting married.

  The room had a view of the ocean. I went back out into the hallway and checked out the rest of the apartment. Every room here had a view of the ocean. Jori lived in a city that was constructed on artificial land. There were houses, apartment buildings, businesses, and boardwalks that looked like streets. All the buildings floated together in the middle of the ocean with no land in sight.

  The apartment was minimalist and had an air of simplicity paired with technology. I had noticed this combination everywhere I went on Vandwa. There were stairs in the apartment, but a retina scanner was on his door. The oceans had a combination of old sailing vessels and modern, computer-driven boats. It was charming to me.

  "I know it's late, and you might want to sleep in tomorrow, but I've rescheduled the wedding for nine o'clock."

  "Nine in the morning?" I said, horrified. My brain was hardly active at that hour; I was an evening person. I wasn't sure what time it was currently because of the space flight, but on Earth, I didn't like getting up until ten at the earliest. On my days off, I slept in as long as possible. "I can try, but I'll be a zombie."

  He frowned at me. "It's a TerraMates stipulation that we must get married within twenty-four hours of your arrival. We will only have a few hours of emerg
ency time if there are any complications and we have to postpone our appointments. We're pushing the boundaries of TerraMates already. We should follow their rules or your Vandwan citizenship could have problems."

  I'd forgotten all about the TerraMates paperwork.

  There was a reason we were using TerraMates instead of getting married on our own. The mail order bride agency could expedite my citizenship papers. If we had to navigate the complicated bureaucratic process by ourselves, I might never get what I needed. The fact that I was trying to marry a convicted criminal also complicated things.

  It didn't hurt that TerraMates was going to pay me 500,000 credits. I was going to invest it all in my retirement fund. My job at the coffee shop back on Earth wasn't going to pay for my golden years.

  "I forgot," I said. "Don't worry, I'll be there."

  After a moment's hesitation, he said, "Ashlyn mentioned you brought a dress."

  My cheeks flushed. I wished Ashlyn hadn't said anything to him.

  "It was my mother's."

  I didn't meet his eyes. I was afraid I might cry in front of him. "Mom gave it to me so I could have something that was hers at the wedding. She wanted to be here, but it was too expensive."

  "Why didn't you tell me? I could have paid for her flight to Vandwa, but I didn't know."

  My jaw dropped open. I had hinted several times about my parents and their poor financial situation and how disappointed they were to be stuck on Earth. If he had understood me earlier, I could have my mother with me right now.

  I didn't want to say what was on my mind. "It doesn't make sense. We'll be getting a divorce in a year. It's not a real wedding, so my parents don't have to be here. It's too late now."

  I closed my mouth. The half-truth left a bad taste in my mouth.

  "Right," he said, gazing at me with his intense green eyes. "I guess you're right." He seemed about to say one thing, then stopped and started saying something else. "The bathroom's across the hall if you want a shower. Help yourself to anything in the refrigerator. If you wake up, and I'm not here, I'm probably just out for a run or taking care of last minute wedding details in the morning."

  I nodded. "Okay."

  A hug would feel nice right now. Or even him reassuring me that our marriage through TerraMates was a good idea. Anything that would make me feel like I wasn't alone on an alien planet.

  Jori wasn't a touchy-feely person. "See you in the morning," he said.

  "Sure. Good-night."

  He was gone, leaving me by myself. But what had I expected? Jori wasn't my boyfriend. He wasn't even my friend. We were virtually strangers. Strangers who were going to get married in the morning.

  The exhaustion, his cold treatment, and the thought of being married to him for a year made me burst into tears.

  Chapter Two

  JORI

  I stood frozen outside Sam's door. Was she crying?

  I had the urge to go in and wrap my arms around her, but it was against my nature. I wasn't comforting. I focused on other things. I didn't have time to be compassionate, kind, or considerate, and she would have to adjust.

  A memory of the feelings I experienced when I saw Samantha the first time flashed through my head. I was short of breath. My heart pounded and my pulse raced. It had almost felt as though I were in love.

  Almost, but not quite.

  I pushed the thought away. I didn't have time for love either.

  I walked into the kitchen and pulled out some fish and sea vegetables from the refrigerator. I liked to cook, though I didn't do it often. I could only work in the kitchen when I had time off at home, like the two days I had taken off for my wedding.

  I found the kitchen calmed me when I was upset. My mother taught me the basics before she died. I learned the rest by trial and error.

  When we were children, I loved making pancakes. Nathaniel had eaten a lot of uncooked pancakes until I learned to let all the bubbles burst before flipping them. He never complained or teased me about it. He just told me to try again and that I would get it.

  I let fish oil melt in the pan before I slid in some fillets and gently fried them. As the fillets cooked, I prepared a salad. I laid the plate, fork, and knife out on the island with precision. I folded a napkin in half, carefully matching the edges and sliding it under the knife.

  By this time, the fish was done; I scooped it out and placed it on the plate. I put some salad on the other half and sat down to eat. I thought of offering Sam some food, but I remembered she didn't enjoy Vandwan cuisine and had eaten already. At least four of her messages mentioned she was waiting for me at the restaurant across the street.

  As I ate, my thoughts turned to Sam again. I hoped she had fallen asleep. When I heard the shower turn on, the noise pushed my thoughts in a different direction.

  Sam was in my shower right now. She was naked.

  When I had first seen her, I was captivated by her beauty. I forced myself to remember that the exterior and interior of a person were different. Still, she cleaned up nicely. She was gorgeous for an Earth woman, and one of the sexiest females I had ever seen. For a second my mind imagined her nude in my shower, and I felt a rush of lust overcome my body.

  I walked over to my pull-up bar and forced myself through multiple sets of exercise until my body was tired and I wasn't thinking about sex anymore.

  Sam chose that moment to walk out of the bathroom wrapped in only a towel. She glanced at me and scurried across the hall into her bedroom. Just like that, the erection was back.

  Maybe it was going to be harder than I imagined to keep myself under control.

  I remembered what Nathaniel said to me earlier.

  "I think when you have a wife, she is expected to sleep with you. If she's willing, or even throwing herself at you, it's won't be as easy to resist her as you think. If you have a good reason, maybe you can hold out. You're probably going to have to cut it off if you want to abstain."

  I had scoffed at the time, thinking I could resist any woman. I had techniques to control myself other than a cold shower. But now that I was in the heat of the moment, remembering how she had looked seconds ago clad only in a towel, I thought that I might need additional help.

  I had fancied myself a master at withstanding female advances, but I now realized the advances came from uninteresting women who had not been living in my home.

  I thought about my impending marriage to Sam and having her next to me every day. I had kissed her once before, and it was incredible. Based on her response, I knew she was attracted to me as well.

  The notion of us remaining celibate for an entire year seemed naive at best, but I had made myself a promise that I wouldn't sleep with her. As soon as sex was involved, the women always got lovey-dovey and expected commitment. They wanted to hear "I love you" and things got complicated. I could do without further complication in my life. I didn't want to hurt her, either.

  The year would pass more smoothly if we didn't get emotionally involved. Maybe Sam and I could have a talk where we went over the ground rules between us.

  I'd tell her that we were not going to sleep together. Once she understood that I was not interested in her for sex, everything would get easier, and the fantasies that had been playing in my head since we kissed would stop.

  That would get my sex drive under control, right?

  A moment later, she came out of her room. It was a hot night, and she wore a white tank top and sky blue pajama pants with white furry animals on them. I wasn't entirely familiar with Earth animals, but they may have been sheep. I could clearly see her nipples through the fabric of the tank top. It was a little short; it rode up and gave me a tantalizing peek of Samantha's flat stomach.

  "Jori?" she asked. She sounded tentative. I wondered if she were afraid of my reaction.

  I cleared my throat and looked at her face, ignoring the twin buds that were staring at me from her chest.

  "Yeah?" I said, trying to look friendly and failing miserably. My brother said I alway
s looked intense or brooding, no matter what sort of mood I was in.

  "I can't get the window open, and it's hot in my bedroom. Would you please come and try to open it?"

  "That stupid thing," I said, shaking my head. "When the tide rises, it sticks. It's very annoying. Nathaniel complains about it every time he stays here."

  "Good to know it's not just me," she said, following me into her bedroom. She had her suitcase open but hadn't put anything away. Apparently she had been digging to the bottom of her luggage to find her pajamas because everything in her suitcase was in disarray. She had pulled out some clothes and dropped them on the bed.

  Hadn't she only been here for a few minutes? I had lived by myself for a long time, and I had forgotten what it was like to have a roommate. She was messy.

  Maybe it didn't matter. She wasn't going to be sharing a bedroom with me. I needed to set up some ground rules for the apartment and make sure she kept shared living spaces tidy.

  I strode across the room and yanked on the window. It wouldn't open for me either.

  "Shit," I muttered. I looked at Sam quickly. I had forgotten I wasn't alone. She didn't seem shocked, but she was blinking her eyes a lot and yawning. She was working hard to stay awake. "Does profanity bother you?"

  She lifted an eyebrow. "Fuck, no," she said. I felt a smile start to form in the corner of my mouth. "But I find it unusual for a Vandwan to cuss like an Earther."

  "I learned that one from Ashlyn, and it's been hard for me to put down."

  "I see," she said, smiling in response.

  "I think we should make a bed in the living room. This room will be unbearably hot with the window shut."

  "That's fine with me. I think I can rest on the couch tonight. I'm so tired that I think I'll be out as soon as I lie my head down."

  I nodded.

  She grabbed the comforter and pillow off the bed and trailed after me to the living room. The windows here were already wide open, and a cool breeze was flowing through the air.

  "This is great," she said. "Thanks, Jori."

  I hadn't done anything except suggest she sleep in the living room but if she wanted to thank me, she could. My mother's training kicked in, and I replied automatically.