by Anthony Puyo
I shrug. Myra obviously has more confidence in man than I do.
She stares at me like I’m a lost child. She then comes in for a kiss.
“You don’t think us intertwining in the mainframe would be magical? Life changing?” Her whisper comes inches from my lips.
“Possibly. But I think this is better. There’s mystery to us right here, right now. We have to converse. Get things out little by little through new experiences we share. Things that we’ve filed away in our brains. Memories we forgot or didn’t know we have come out when they are stimulated to. And when they pop in our mind, we share them. The memory is supposed to work that way. That’s how it keeps us intrigued. Finding the right moments to let us know our time on this planet is precious. The triggering effect is perfect; it doesn't need to be changed by a species that feels what it is never good enough. We just need to step back and enjoy the beauty of our minds and it’s quintessential timing. Like going ice-skating and falling on your butt, and just then a memory of your father showing you how to skate when you were four-years-old tethers to the mind. Or someday, in the distant future, closing in on your own mortality you see a young couple in the park; one proposing to the other, and this brings you to remember how your love who has since passed proposed to you on your day. That’s special—spontaneous, that’s how it is supposed to be. We can connect our own way. We don’t need the help.”
“You should have been a lawyer, Jason. There is romanticism in what you say.” She pulls back, holding my hand in both of hers, “Speaking of skating, let’s do it. We can make another memory.”
Even with my impending devirginization of the mind, Myra takes the bad away. I kiss her softly on the cheek. “Let’s go.”
She gazes at me with stunned features. “On the cheek? I haven’t had one of those since the last time I saw my grandfather.”
“I know. It was weird. I guess I was just adoring you in the moment.”
We find our way to the Ice-Dome. An indoor winter wonderland complete with snow, pine trees, and two large ice surfaces for skating.
I neglected to tell Myra, I have never skated. I broke the news to her as we were putting on our skates. Of course, she laughed pleasantly, taking some sort of pride in knowing she would be the first one I ever glazed the ice with.
“Look,” she says, a hint of excitement jolting in her words. She points to a young child whose hair was a sandy blond and thick. “It’s just like you said.”
The kid wearing a blue winter coat, hands who could only be her father, two palms full of snow from the edge of the ice. Her father rolls it into snowballs, handing them back.
“How adorable,” she cants. She notices my reaction is not as grand as hers. “Well isn’t it?”
I finish tying my skates. “Um, I guess.”
“You don’t think so?”
“It’s not that. My opinion on it isn’t exactly as strong as yours, I’m sorry for that.”
She looked like she was going to say something, but something stopped her. I believe she remembered I didn’t have her kind of experience growing up. The way her brows drooped a little makes me believe she may have felt some sort of remorse. The truth is—though I spoke of the moments people have great feeling towards, I experienced very few myself, especially as a child. Being raised by my “activist” grandmother, I feel I was conditioned to be a crusader. So, knowing how moments mean something to so many as Myra does, is much different from only understanding the importance of them like I do. But to understand, does that at least count for something? I guess there’s a part of me that envies those who’ve had many of those heartfelt moments. I’ve developed a few recently with Myra, and it makes me want to fight for more. Not only for me, but for the human race. If my youth was sacrificed for what I feel I must do, and I have an impact, then I would live a sheltered life a thousand more times.
“Come on. Let’s go,” I relay.
She grabs my hands and pulls me up. I feel like a fawn trying to stand for the first time. My legs can’t stop shaking.
“Just relax, and you’ll be fine.” She snickers.
I try, but it’s of no use, my knees buckle inward. “I thought this was supposed to be fun.” I blurt.
She tries to get some encouraging words between her laughs. Her nose and cheeks are a blush from the cold. She never appears unattractive to me.
“Come on,” she skates back a few feet. It might as well have been a mile. “Come to me. One foot in front of the other.”
Her smile is so big. I power through, balancing myself. I do as she asked, one foot in front of the other. By golly it works. I move at a snail's pace, but I move. I stretched mightily, fingers reaching for hers. They unite. She kisses me, pulling my bottom lip wedged between her soft two.
“Good job,” she whispers.
She breaks the moment and turns. “Hold my waist. I’ll pull you.”
I could feel my body wanting to collapse again.
“Wait, Myra. I’m not sure this—this—whoaaa!” I hold on for dear life as if we are going ninety on a motorcycle, but of course we’re not. She guides me gently. Her hair waving just a little, some strands cross over my thin cheek. I have a cat’s grip on her hips. I can’t help but think how not sexy this is. She probably expected me to have a man’s grip there.
Myra grabs my hands and turns herself around as we glide over the ice.
“Tell me something about you that nobody knows?”
“Huh?” Her question really caught me off guard.
“You heard me, silly.”
I think for a few—“Um . . . I never had a girlfriend.” I thought she would freak out, but she didn’t.
“You don’t really like to open up, do you?”
“It’s not that.”
“Then what is it?”
“I don’t believe I have much to offer, I guess.”
“Well, I know I wasn’t your first. If you’ve never had a girlfriend, did you like stalk the streets for hookers or something?”
I gasp a laugh at that one. “No.” Not replying any more than that.
“Well?”
I roll my neck. This is uncomfortable for me. She keeps on me with persistent eyes.
“Okay, fine. There was a girl—someone I knew years ago back in high school.”
“Was it more than once?” Her pitch was a little higher than usual.
“Could we not talk about it? I really don’t want to.”
She stops in front of me, very close. “We’re adults. I’m not bothered by it. I’m a curious that’s all.”
“. . . Yes. Strangely we did it quite often for the one semester I knew her.”
“That sounds like a girlfriend.”
“No. No we were not.”
We ski to a bench at the edge of the ice and sit.
“Explain?” She badgers, steam leaving her mouth, forcing me to remember the past pit stop of time.
“I don’t know. It was strange. I met her in detention. She was an outcast, I believe. She was only at our school for that winter-spring time of the year. All I can say; is we would meet at random places but we didn’t talk a whole lot. We didn’t call each other. She would only text me to accompany her, and I would. And we made love during those meets. It went on till the end of that sophomore year, then she moved or something.”
“You say it as if you don’t really know what happened to her.”
“That’s because I don’t. She just stopped texting me this one day and that was it. I never saw her at school anymore, so I assume she moved.”
“That is so weird. What about she died.”
“No. I don’t think so.”
“How would you know; it’s not like you—”
“I overheard a couple of teachers talking about her once. They said she was gifted, and that some government agency was courting her. She wasn’t from here I don’t think. I heard the words ‘American guardian’s’ from them. So I don’t think she died. She probably moved onto bigger and better
things. I guess we were just a release to each other—I don’t know.”
“Did you care about her?”
I sigh. “Why are you so interested in this?”
She bit her pinky while she listened then talked, “I find it fascinating. I find you fascinating.” She twirled my hair by my neck with her index finger. “Did you care about her?”
“No. Not really. It was just physical. I think she liked me because I didn’t ask any questions, and I liked her because she offered something for nothing. I could just be me.”
“Do you think any less of me because I had sex with you after our first meet?”
“The answer is still no to that.”
She stares at me as if waiting for something more.
“It’s strange how you can say so much about one thing, but become a clam on something else that probably requires more to say.”
I touch her hand. “Myra, I’ve wanted you ever since I laid eyes on you three years ago in the print room. I don’t care why you chose to have sex with me on our first night. I was just happy it happened. If you expect me to have a judgement on you for making love to me on the first date, or have some sort of notion of ‘what kind of girl is she?’ I don’t. That’s not me. I rarely want something. But when I do, I’m willing to take all that comes with whatever it is I want. And believe me, I rarely get anything I want.”
She puts her hands on my cheeks, cradling them. “You’re cute. Odd—but cute.”
Three hours later we lie hidden in the grey of night on my bed. The sheets barely cover us. Myra lies on her side facing my window. I stare up to the ceiling; hands under the back of my head.
It tears me up inside, but as usual I keep my emotion from flooding out of me like a broken dam. I know this thing made by hands just like mine will soon become a part of me, and I have absolutely no control over it. I would love to just scream right now. Pound the wall with my fist. Pound till it's bloody. But I won’t. I know it won’t do any good.
“What’s bothering you?” Myra asks.
I thought she was asleep.
“Oh, nothing.”
“Do you feel you can’t tell me the truth?”
I turn, seeing her naked back. Her shoulder blade rises above the smooth valley of skin between there and her hip.
“I don’t know.”
“You’re right. Two weeks does not constitute trust.”
I don’t say anything to combat the hurt sarcasm in her voice. What should I say? In four hours, I won’t have to say anything.
6
I smell the baking of sweet . . . of sweet—what is that. Pancakes? The sun sparkles through the window, a rarity, causing me to wince and cover my eyes. My arm is so small. My hand, what’s wrong with my hand.
“You’re up! Well, come on into the kitchen. Breakfast is ready, kiddo.”
“Kiddo?” I say to myself in thought.
The wood floor, the yellow walls, the sun. For God sakes, the sun? This is not 2052, this is 2020, maybe 2024. Then that’s—
“Grandma made your favorite. Are you going to join me?”
I stare at the doorway to the kitchen. I feel the flesh around my eyes stretch open. “Grandma! It’s you!” I get up and run to her, hugging her above her waist.
“Gosh, kiddo, I miss you too. It’s only been a day, but I can see how that feels like a long time.” Her older and a bit rusty voice winds.
“You don’t know the half of it, Grandma.”
We sit at one corner of the small square table. She drinks her coffee. I eat my pancakes with some orange juice to drink. My feet swing happily between the legs of the chair. My cheeks bulging with her buttery cooking. She appears as I remember her. Plump cheeks, crow's feet, sandy blond hair and eyebrows over light green eyes. It’s my grandma. Every bit of her.
“I heard there’s a line outside Sci-buy with kids waiting to get that phone chip thingy. I don’t know what’s wrong with just having the thing in the palm of your hand? Why stick it in the body? If God wanted that, he would have made us with one. I don’t trust it, kiddo. If man made it, it can’t be good. They say it will make humanity smarter, better. Well, they’ve been saying that for years and where has it gotten us. The air is getting worse. The tides are rising. You have men thinking their women, and women thinking their men. There’s more poor than I’ve ever seen in this country. The homeless. The poor homeless. And the wars are never ending. Always in places that are “coincidently” mineral rich.”
She sighs heavily, brushing my hair back with the fingers and palm of her hand while I chew my food. “Jason, don’t let them get you. The flesh will love it, but it’s your mind and soul that will ultimately pay the price.”
Everything fades into deep darkness. I feel my body move from side to side in a relaxing rhythm of a sway. Am I on a boat? I feel the smooth waves of the ocean. They love me like a beautiful soft melody . . . Am I dreaming still?
I feel her on top of me. Flesh on flesh. Loving me. She kisses my neck. I feel her warm breath hover over my skin.
“Why didn’t you tell me.” She whispers.
Her voice is velvety—sexy as the source it comes from.
She tugs my earlobe with her gentle bite. Her hair skims off my chest, shoulders, and face. It’s as soft as rose petals. Pleasant in smell.
Another whisper.
“You’re mine.”
I feel her hand slide through my hair as she cradles me underneath her thighs. I feel the sweat. Her breast dangle, rubbing on me as she moves forward and back.
Just above me the words ricochet of my forehead like a cloud of steam.
“And I’m yours.”
I barely start to snap into my own and grasp the reality of it. My grandmother. The dream. A memory triggered by the mainframe through the Thin Chip.
“What are you talking about?” I ask, sluggish, but more alert.
“You’ve been Adamed.”
She sits up. The blanket falls off her back. Her breasts show surrounded by her red hair. She grabs my hand, forcing it up the side of her face, kissing and sucking on my finger as they pass her mouth. Caressed against her skin, she extends my fingertip onto her tempo. And she does the same to me while still circling her hips on me.
“You hear me?” she asks.
“I do.”
In my brain, in my thoughts, I hear and feel her voice just above my eyes in the inside of my skull.
“We’re connected.” She says softly. This time out her mouth.
Things immediately get more intense. My heart accelerates. My chest soaks with sweat.
“Don’t be scared,” she says in my mind. “Close your eyes.”
I lie back down, trying to control my state.
“Just breathe in and out. Relax.”
I do as I’m told and my mind lights up as vibrant as reality. More so. The colors. The world around me: a beach near the tide of the bluest of oceans, is gorgeous—amazing.
Myra walks up to me dressed in a one piece black bikini. It goes around her neck and crisscrosses over her bust. I lie on a blanket with light sand particles dashed on my legs and arms. She undresses. A tanned, curvy body, misted to perfection. It’s all so clear. Infinitely clear.
She straddles on top of me. Kissing me. She seduces me in my mind while all the while seducing my body in the real world outside of my thoughts. It’s exhilarating, extraordinary, scary, everything from A to Z, every emotion wrapped into one, exploding out of the thread of my mind into and out of the flesh over my bones.
“I think—I think I love you,” I say as I finish. Then she stops.
We breathe hard, coated with sweat, staring up at the ceiling side by side. It didn’t bother me she didn’t say the words back to me.
I sit at the edge of the bed rubbing my forehead. In the kitchen, passed the island, Myra stands with coffee in her hands near her chest.
“Was this some sort of surprise for me? The way you were talking by the bar yesterday, I could’ve swore you were aga
inst being chipped.”
I sigh, moving my head in a circle. I could lie. But I have many things hidden from her already. I don’t want to add anymore.
“I am, Myra.”
I didn’t see her, but heard her. I can tell from her breath, she’s confused.
“Why then? Why did you do it?”
“Do you want to see, or should I just tell you like normal people do—through conversation?”
“I don’t like your tone. Are you saying I made you get it?”
I think better of my words. “No. Just forget it.”
“Why can’t you just say what you feel?”
“This has nothing to do with feeling. I can’t tell you why,” because I’m not ready. And I don’t think you are either, “because I don’t even know why myself.”
She puts her coffee down, and walks speedily to my dresser at the corner of my studio. She grabs her clothes and begins to dress.
“Are you angry?” I feebly ask.
She sits, pulling her boots up her ankles. No words for me.
“Myra?”
She makes her way to the door, hair lifting she moves so quick.
“Myra, wait.”
She stops at the door. “I thought you enjoyed this morning. But it feels like you hate yourself now. I don’t understand you.”
“Myra—”
“I shouldn’t have looked, but I know why Vivian left her Junior year.”
She knows her name.
“It was because you didn’t make the effort to make her stay.”
And like that, she slammed the door and left.
After sulking the morning hours away over Myra, and going over the file Jake gave me, I decided I had to find out more about Matson’s involvement over the mandatory chip placement. More than what is on those papers. I wanted to meet the leaker himself. See if there’s anything else he could tell me.
I land west of the Hudson to meet the crew over in the back of Beck’s Tower. It’s almost sunny for once, but still cold on the ground. I know there is a rally being held in Philadelphia, the new capital, over the Thin Chip and the newly formed mainframe, but as far as I know Jake and Leonard were not going to be a part of that one. Things were getting very hot for PAC and Leonard, especially since it was our group who organized many of these rallies. So, it made more sense for the leaders of activist groups like ours to hide this particular moment in time. They would no doubt be targets of the authority.
