by Terry Persun
She reached for him a few moments after she entered the bed. That was the first awkward movement she had made, as though her shyness caused her to hesitate, like she had not fully decided to be with him. A certain sense of reluctance fell over the situation and he asked her outright, “Are you sure?”
He knew that if she felt coerced at all, if she felt afraid that he might hurt her if she didn't go along with his request, her chip would set off an alarm and the police would be there in a moment. His precognitive feelings returned. He waited for her to answer.
“I'm not used to this,” she said.
“You don't have to.”
“It's okay. I'm fine. Just, could we turn off the lights?”
“You can't turn them off,” he said.
“I forgot. Then can you lower them?”
Keith requested that the lights lower, and the room became darker.
She lay down and nuzzled close to him. She threw one arm over him and pressed her breasts to his chest. She brought a leg up between his, slowly moving her thigh along his until she made the slightest contact.
Keith stopped thinking so much and fell into the senses of the body, the pleasures of their closeness.
When they finished, Nellie held onto him instead of rising to clean up and get dressed as usually happened when he had a companion over. In fact, she placed her head on his chest, pinning him down from rising out of bed. What should he do?
“Are you ever curious why you don't remember your dreams?” she asked.
He stiffened. “How do you know that I don't? I sometimes do.”
“Seldom,” she said.
“What are you saying?”
“Nothing. I was just drowsy and dosing off a bit.” She ran her fingers down his stomach and back up again.
Keith relaxed. He liked her, the fact that she stayed close to him as though their encounter meant more than just being a companion for the night. He let his arm rest over her back and squeezed her closer to him. She pressed into his chest in return.
“I never remember the bad dreams.” He thought back and realized that wasn't all. “Sometimes I wake up so excited about a dream, so happy, but I can't remember those either.”
“Dream space,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“Dream space is where all the best things occur,” she said.
“And the worst. The nightmares.”
“How do you know they aren't the most exciting ones? Like the movies that scare you. Don't you like that? Aren't you excited after seeing them?”
“But they aren't real.”
“So, you believe that your dreams are real?” She lifted her head enough to look at him.
“I didn't say that,” he said. He bent down and kissed her forehead. “Is that what you're saying?”
“Indians, long ago, thought that our dreams were just another part of living. They knew that they were real. They knew it. Are we so smart?”
“But dreams aren't real. This is real.” He tapped her back with his hand. “This place, this room. You. You're real.”
“Oh,” she said.
“Nellie? What are you trying to say? Where did you hear that dreams were real?”
“Dream space. How do we know that it's not just another place? Another life we get to live? I was just wondering.”
“I know when things are going to happen sometimes,” Keith said. “I don't know how I know, I just do. I think it has something to do with my dreams. Do you think that's possible?”
Nellie's breathing deepened as she slipped toward sleep, and she mumbled something.
Keith rubbed her back. “What did you say?”
She stirred. “What do you think?”
Keith stared at the ceiling and thought about the question. He wasn't sure what he thought. The answer could go either way. And what he thought had nothing to do with what was true. Truth lay outside thought, outside believing. He really wanted to know what was true. He shook her. “What do you think?”
“Dream space is real,” she said.
The idea scared him. As she lay across him and slept, he felt nervous about the possibility. He also wondered why, if dream space was real, he couldn't remember it.
Chapter 3
DAY 2
An unusual and exciting night had ended and Nellie dressed quickly before leaving Keith's apartment. She did not talk in the morning, which he was grateful for. He got up with her even though it was long before his scheduled wake-up. He dressed in pajamas and waited for her, watched her.
“Enjoying yourself?” she said while bending at the waist and slipping on her bra.
He turned away. “Would you…” he started reluctantly. He imagined her looking up at him, directly into his eyes.
“Would I what?” she said.
“Agree to see me again?” He closed his eyes and put his hands together, rubbing them.
Nellie shoved him from behind and he almost fell over. “Hey.” He turned around. “Why'd you do that?”
She straightened her shoulders. “What do you mean, why?” she said. “Does it bother you?” She darted toward him and pushed again. “There,” she said.
His back slammed against the wall. His arms went up to protect his face. He had to control his emotions. After such a pleasant night, why would she attack him? What did she want?
She advanced again, only this time her hands were out. When she got close, she began to tickle him. Her fingers wriggling over his sides and stomach, her face laughing up at him, close to his face.
Frightening and funny. “Come on,” she said. “I'm just playing. Haven't you ever played before?”
Confusion ran through him. His raging senses were on overload. What kind of signal would his chip be emitting? “Stop,” he cried out. “Don't. Please. They'll come back. Please.”
Nellie slid her hands up to his cheeks and kissed him. While doing so, she made a humming sound and then a loud smack when she pulled away. “Fun, isn't it?”
Keith breathed heavily. There were tears in his eyes. Got to calm down, got to calm down, he thought. He shook his head. He was afraid to say anything, afraid she might start again.
Nellie squared off with him. She walked over and slipped her arms around his waist.
Keith leaned against the wall and raised his hands, giving in to whatever she chose to do.
“You like me?” she said.
“It's not that so much,” he said.
“Oh,” she said coyly.
Keith laughed.
“Come on,” she said shaking him.
“You know this is highly unusual. Companions are meant for just that.”
“A night's work,” she said.
She was back to normal, but he was on guard. “No. I didn't mean it that way. I meant until one feels the need to become a parent, one doesn't look for a mate, only a companion. That is how the system works. I shouldn't feel as though we could stay together.” He reached around her shoulders and pulled her close so that she couldn't look into his face and see his embarrassment.
“Until one. Who might that one be?” she chided.
“You should go,” he said. He had never requested that a friend, let alone a companion, come back the next day. Even if he enjoyed someone's company, two days in a row was too much for him. He usually waited until much later, after he had time alone.
She walked out of the bedroom with him following. At the door, she swung around. “Did you remember any of your dreams?”
The question caught him off guard. He thought for a moment. “No, why?”
“Pay closer attention.” She opened the door and passed through the opening as though floating. She poked her head back around and looked at Keith seriously. “I'll be back tonight. But only if you request it. It's up to you.” She disappeared behind the door, which closed with a click.
He stared at the closed door. “Only if he requested,” she had said. So, now he had a second chance. He didn't have to make the request. He took a deep
breath and smelled her scent. The room hummed from where she had been, as though she were still there. An energy had been left behind. Keith shook but there was no chill in the air. He checked the clock and found that he had almost two hours before his wake-up.
In the kitchen, he got a drink of water and turned to look at the door again, as though she could come back in, unannounced, crouched into a playful stance, wriggling her fingers at him. He laughed out loud. She had really scared him, yet the police didn't come by. He thought about his fear and what could have been different about it that it didn't alert the authorities.
Did he ever feel as though she'd really harm him? He searched his feelings, his thoughts. She had exhibited both shy and aggressive traits, but never appeared to be dangerous. Maybe that was it. He knew that she wouldn't hurt him. But how could he know? Well, no one had ever hurt him. The system was nearly flawless in that sense. Of course, that was the reason. She couldn't be dangerous in any way or the system would have detected it and dealt with it. So, he decided, the fear was excitement. She was an exciting person…in a dark sort of way.
Keith placed his cup on the counter to use later in the morning. Going back into his bedroom, he kept an eye on the door. She could still sneak in. That's something she might do.
He lay down but it was impossible to sleep. Nellie had stirred his blood to being fully awake. There was a ringing in his ears. He rolled over, then curled into a fetal position. He pushed his face into his pillow. Finally, he just lay on his back and closed his eyes. He thought about the day before and all the things that happened. More went on that day than any day he could remember. It all appeared to have a purpose, but he had no idea why he thought so.
Here's how he put the pieces together: the dream had alerted the police so that they could detain him. When he got to work, he had to make the morning deliveries, which he only did occasionally. Then he saw the boy in the stairwell. Then Nellie, who was nothing like what he had ordered through the Companion site, but was much more interesting, more fun, and more frightening in the end. Now what?
As he thought back through the day, he relaxed, and soon, even though he wasn't asleep, images played out in his mind. Ideas, people, actions whimsically and quickly flashed before him. He couldn't catch most of them fully enough to know what was going on, if anything was going on at all. But he became curious, an unusual feeling in itself. What he wanted was to know more about the boy curled up in the alcove in the stairwell.
He dozed off for a moment and the boy's image came alive, but only long enough to stir in the shadows inside the alcove, then lift his face and look into Keith's, blinking from the harsh light.
When the clock spoke his name, Keith took a deep breath and opened his eyes. He remembered the boy blinking up at him. The shadows blurred the edges of the boy's clothing so that he couldn't tell how large or small the boy was. Keith remembered only the face, the blinking. He closed his eyes and the image didn't return as he had hoped.
The ceiling's pale white color stared back at Keith while he lay on his back. The alarm spoke again, soothing the air in the room, reminding him how peaceful most of his life has been. He rolled to one side and placed his feet on the warm carpet, then reached over and pushed the alarm off. For some reason, he didn't want to hear the voice again. Every time it spoke, it brought him closer to the present and he had more trouble remembering the image. He couldn't really call it a dream, for it wasn't that. It was merely an image, a small movement, and a feeling.
Recalling the feeling, he noticed that it was not as dreadful as it had been yesterday, but something more curious that reminded him of Nellie. But it wasn't her exactly. It was how she made him feel. Wary? Apprehensive? Anxious without the knowledge of what he was anxious about. So, he had traded dread for apprehension.
He shook his head and stood. His saliva was pasty. And he felt more fatigued than usual.
He went through his bathroom routine hardly noticing the room or the items he used. His thoughts shifted back and forth between the boy in the stairwell and Nellie. The emotions attached to each appeared to be opposites, yet similar. He couldn't be sure which intrigued him more, or which was the most pleasant.
Time pushed together in such a way that Keith unconsciously went through his morning without noticing many details until he found that he stood in front of the terminal flipping through the Companion site. His fingers perched over the keyboard when panic hit. What if it was illegal to ask for a companion two days in a row? He did not know the rules, but he did know that everything was monitored. Such an unusual event would surely be noted. It would prove that he was not like others in Newcity. Is that what he wanted to happen? He already felt watched, monitored.
Keith stepped back from the terminal, his eyes wide. He rubbed the back of his neck, then turned away and walked into the living room. It was almost time to leave, but he sat on the sofa for just a moment. Closing his eyes, he drew in a deep breath and blew it out slowly and long, almost to the point where he felt dizzy. Afterwards, he stood to go.
In the hall, as he turned right toward the elevators, he spotted the police. As they rushed toward him, his reaction was to run. But where could he go? He turned down another hallway and collided with someone. The physical contact sent shock waves through his body. The man's head had hit Keith's head hard and they both teetered for a moment, the physical contact sending shock waves through Keith's body. The man stumbled backward. Dressed casually in a gray and white dress shirt and tan slacks, the man looked as though he wasn't going to work at all. Keith glanced around. The police were still advancing, so he turned toward a doorway.
“Wait a minute. Where do you think you're going? You ran into me.”
The man yelled much too loudly for Keith, who held up a hand to stop the angry onslaught, to stop the man from drawing attention to them. But it was too late. Two of the five police coming down the hall peeled off and headed directly for them. The others were rushing past. So he didn't have to be concerned? Keith felt stupid for trying to get away. He'd never done such a thing before. And now he'd actually caused them to advance. His ears were ringing, and he felt a burst of adrenaline as though it were injected into his neck. The police. Two days in a row. What would this mean in the system?
The yelling man, too, was coming at him. Keith just backed farther into the doorway until his back bumped flat against the door.
“Come in,” he heard inside the apartment. Keith reached back for the doorknob.
“I'm talking to you, Mister,” the yelling man said, as he stepped up to Keith and pushed a finger into his chest. Again, unrequested physical contact.
Then, abruptly, the police were on the yelling man, one at each arm, pulling him back and away from Keith. “We are very sorry for the interruption, sir.” They addressed Keith, but he didn't know how to answer. He had expected the officers to take both of them. What was happening?
The policeman to Keith's right said, “You may carry on.”
Keith stared at him.
“Sir,” the policeman asserted, “you may go to work now. There is nothing here that you need to be concerned about. We'll handle it.” He was smiling at Keith the whole time he talked to him.
The yelling man tried to pull loose. “It's him,” the man said. “He attacked me. I did nothing wrong.”
Keith saw one of the policemen reach for his gun.
He drew his hands over his eyes and turned away. The policeman spoke to Keith sternly, “Please sir, we have this under control. Move along.” No one else in the hall had even stopped to see what was going on.
Keith rushed from the three of them, passing other people as he darted away, practically falling into a jog. When the noise behind him seemed to subside, Keith slowed. He was the last to enter an elevator. A breeze of air came from the outside as the doors closed. He realized how heavily he was sweating when the air brushed the sweat across his forehead, momentarily chilling his scalp. What had just happened? Were they coming for him and then the a
ngry man drew them away? Confused their sensors? He hadn't seen where the other police were headed and whether or not they went to his apartment, but he could imagine that happening. He had lived through such an unusual evening and night and then morning, that he would not have been surprised if they were headed for his apartment.
The doors opened and Keith stepped out and began to walk away, until he realized he was on the wrong floor. Many of them looked so similar and he had been wrapped in thought, not thinking about where he was going, not focused on getting to work. He looked around and turned back just as the doors were closing again. A burst of nervousness helped him to thrust his arm into the small gap between the closing doors. They hit his arm and bounced open. “Sorry,” he said as he stepped back inside.
